Page 12 of Twins to Tame Him

She loved his sons like no one else would—not even himself maybe—and she’d tangled with him to protect a man who had been kind to her. Now, she’d taken a chance on Sebastian, despite what she called calculating the odds.

It was his turn to show her that trust, to win her over, to give her everything she’d ever wanted in life for the gift she’d given him. To prove to her that she and the boys belonged with him.

Any momentary hesitation he’d felt about having two little boys to care for, to nurture and protect, dissipated, leaving behind a crystal-clear clarity he had never known in his life.

He had already fallen in love with his sons. It was a deluge, this sudden gripping, intense need to protect them, and hold them close and to have them near for every sweet and hard moment, a primal urge to walk into the now quiet bedroom where they were resting and watch over them for the rest of the dark nights and sunny days, a profound, gut-wrenching kind of relief to know he could feel so much for them, that Konstantin hadn’t beaten that particular ability out of him.

Sebastian rubbed a hand over his face, shaking and shivering under the onslaught of emotions.

This was what he’d needed in his life, even if he hadn’t known it until now. For the first time in his adult life, he wasn’t simply meandering through it, trying his best to detach from the Skalas name and empire, burying himself in his art, wasting himself away on shallow experiences that drained his mind and body.

Now, he wanted his life to take a certain shape and he would actively pursue it.

Whatever instinct had propelled him to demand Laila marry him... It carried the weight of his deepest, most secret desire within it.

For his sons to be happy and well-adjusted and thriving, they needed their mother and he needed them in his life. Ergo, his primary goal now was to do anything to keep Laila in his life.

And while he’d have never admitted openly to his brute of a father, Sebastian had always known he could be just as ruthless as Alexandros, for all that he wore different masks for the world. He simply hadn’t cared about anything enough, except finding his mother.

While his twin had devoted his ruthless will to ousting their father and rebuilding what it meant to be a Skalas man running the prestigious bank, Sebastian’s own willpower had never been interested in anything. Until now.

He was keeping his sons and he was keeping their mother in his life, even if it meant he had to seduce every inch of logic and rationale out of Dr. Jaafri. And he would make sure she not only enjoyed the seduction but that she had everything she’d ever wanted in her life. He would make all her wishes and dreams come true. It was only a matter of getting her to admit them.

For himself, there was nothing he enjoyed more than a challenge with high stakes. Despite her lies and her one attempt at blackmailing him—all to protect Guido—he hadn’t stopped thinking of her for a single day since she’d disappeared. So, it wasn’t as if it was a hardship to seduce her.

As it was usually with him, she’d become an obsession, not just because she’d left him wanting more, but also because she’d gotten the closest to the one thing he held sacred in his life—his art. Now to know that she’d done it all to save a man he’d been bent on ruining...just for a piece of information that would unlock his own past. To reach a woman who’d abandoned him and Xander years ago.

Cristos, even for him, it was twisted.

But now that she was back in his life, with a gift unlike he’d ever received and not even known he needed, he would fix it all.

CHAPTER FOUR

IT SHOULD HAVE felt strange to have Sebastian shadow her and the boys for the evening. Laila had found it nerve-racking when Mama and Nadia had visited a month after the boys had been born. And then when the boys had turned one.

Mama had criticized her about everything—that Laila was sharing the bed on alternate nights with Nikos and Zayn, that she didn’t impose enough structure on them or that they had too much playtime or that she let them eat from her plate.

It had taken all her goodwill to not point out Mama’s own flaws and faults in how she’d raised Nadia. For Laila, it was Baba who’d taken care of everything.

First, she hadn’t even expected him to show up. She had compulsively followed enough of his wild, playboy exploits to know that he was a man who was bored easily, who thrived on unconventional risks, who chased every high like his life depended on it. And really, on their best day, her boys were exhausting and demanding. So, she’d been shocked when he’d arrived to get them ready for sleep.

When she got over that initial shock that he actually wanted to be part of their actual routines and rhythms, she’d braced herself to be watched under a microscope, to be weighed and judged and criticized. To be questioned.

He turned her assumptions upside down, yet again. The man had possessed a knack for making Laila feel good in her own skin in just a few hours. He’d made her laugh, step out of herself for a night. Now, she had none of that polish and fake sophistication, and yet, that same sense of ease lingered with the warm, easy energy he put out.

Through playtime and dinner and bath time and story time, he had been a quiet, easy presence in the background, keeping up a soft, slow dialogue with all three of them, without quite crossing the invisible boundary that Zayn had drawn.

It helped that Nikos, as ever, kept up their little unit’s momentum, demanding to play, to eat, to be read to, on schedule and that he gave Sebastian one-word answers even as Zayn quietly observed them. By the time they’d settled into bed, Nikos had extracted another promise about the horsey from his papa.

Laila went to shower, leaving Sebastian standing outside the vast bedroom that had magically been arranged with two cribs, a changing table, a number of stuffed animals and toys in shiny new packages, and any number of paraphernalia that the boys could need, in just a matter of a few hours. Without Laila even broaching the topic, he had arranged for Ani and Alexandros to move to the second floor since the numerous open terraces and stairs were dangerous for the boys.

Being a caregiver apparently came easy to Sebastian Skalas, as easily as stunning art and that wicked, sinful smile. As hot water pounded through her tired muscles, Laila couldn’t help but wonder if being a good husband would come easily to him, too.

Having dressed in an old T-shirt and a pair of shorts that suddenly felt too tight across her butt, Laila arrived in the attached bedroom to find Sebastian standing on steps that led directly to a private strip of beach from their suite.

With the moon full and high in the sky, silvery light danced on his hair, delineating the breadth of his shoulders and the taper to his waist. He was simply dressed in a linen gray shirt and black trousers and yet, somehow, he managed to highlight the powerful masculinity that seemed to thrum around him.

Laila felt tired to her bones. It had been an especially trying day, and she should have crawled into bed and let exhaustion take over. While Paloma would be the first one to wake usually if one of the boys was up during the night, Laila had given her tonight off. It was a new, strange place and she wanted to be the one they saw if they woke up feeling disoriented. Or maybe it was she who needed the comfort of snuggling one of them in her bed, since she felt more out of element than either of them. Even Zayn, while his usual reserved self, had been constantly taking everything in with those wide eyes.