Page 52 of Rescued Dreams

He could hear soft music playing. Not the kind he’d ever listen to, but it wasn’t terrible. The soft sound of conversation halted.

“Come in.”

He couldn’t tell which one of them said that, but it wasn’t unusual. From the day they’d been born, he had made sure he was the big brother they came to and their friend. Ridge didn’t know his dad because he hadn’t stuck around, and the twins’ father hadn’t lasted all that long either.

At fourteen, he’d known he would never be the kind of man who left his kids. The twins were his sisters, and he’d have to be dead before he abandoned them.

No way would he be the kind of guy either of their fathers had been.

Or the kind of parent who would sign their rights away, like Mom had so they could stay with Ridge.

He eased the door open. The girls had twin beds pushed to either side, end tables between them. They sat sideways on their beds, backs to the wall. Books on their laps. They had a rug on the floor and an armchair in the corner that they’d picked up from a yard sale and made him load into his truck so they could bring it home. The room looked like a college dorm.

“Did you guys get your homework done?” He didn’t want to launch into a conversation about Amelia right away, but that was what he wanted to talk about before he left them to it.

Maddie shot him a look. “It’s never done.”

Ridge smiled. “And your chores?”

Ella said, “I did mine.”

Maddie made a face. “Fine. I need a break anyway, and the dryer is probably done.”

“Pretty sure that load has been in there since yesterday,” Ridge said. “Not that I’m better about that.”

“Better at hiding things though.”

Ridge glanced at Ella. “Maybe you should just share with us what you’re thinking rather than making comments under your breath.” He felt like a father rather than a brother, and less like a friend the longer they lived with him. The friend part could come later, when they were adults. “Whatever you have to say, I want to listen.”

“That washer,right?”

Ridge nodded. “Yes, Amelia is the one I dated a few times.”

“Before she broke it off.”

Maddie said, “You were pretty torn up about it.”

There wasn’t much point in arguing with that. “We only went out a couple of times.”

“Then you shouldn’t be kissing her now!” Ella pushed her books aside and got up off her bed, looking upset in a way he didn’t see much. She was so quiet it was often hard to tell how she felt, let alone whether she was sad or having a hard time. “She didn’t see how you felt about her before. Now she’s back?”

Ridge wasn’t sure he entirely grasped what the issue was.

Maddie slid her books off her lap and bent her legs, wrapping her arms around her knees. “You don’t see it because you like her, but Ella thinks she’s just using you.”

Her sister shot her a look, a twin thing. The silent communication they understood but which no one else was privy to.

“She isn’t using me.” Ridge wasn’t going to share all that Amelia had been through. “She had good reason to break it off, given the awful relationship she was in before.”

Ella didn’t say anything.

“She was in a bad relationship?” Maddie asked, concern in her tone.

“The kind I’m going to pray neither of you ever get in.” They’d know that meant he wasn’t about to explain more than that. “She has reason to be wary, but relationships are about trust. We’ve worked together for a long time, but neither of us shares much that’s personal.”

“Because you don’t want people to know we live here?” Ella’s voice sounded so small.

Ridge shook his head. “I keep my personal and my professional lives separate. Not because I’m ashamed of you or don’t want anyone to know I’m your guardian. It’s the kind of person I am that I want to live a quiet life. Uncle Kane wants to save the world, and Maria was in the CIA. But I’m just a small-town guy living a simple life.”