Page 41 of Triplet Babies for my Ex's Best Friend

“Miss Clarke,” I reply, stepping forward.

Her mouth twitches.

I take the larger suitcase from her before she can object, because standing in a hallway negotiating luggage isn't how I intend to begin this. “Come in.”

She follows me across the threshold, and I’m immediately aware of the contrast she creates against the apartment’s restraint. The space is designed to be clean and functional. Glass, steel, muted color. Deliberate architecture. Nothing placed without reason.

And then there’s Addy, all warmth, restless movement, and human unpredictability, standing in the middle of it as though the room itself has been forced to acknowledge a variable it hadn’t prepared for.

She stops just inside the entryway and looks around, trying, I suspect, to be subtle about it.

She isn’t.

I set the suitcase down. “You can take your time, if you need to, that is.”

Her gaze shifts back to me. “Is it that obvious?”

“Yes.”

She exhales a short laugh, glancing out toward the windows. “I mean… this is a lot.”

That’s one way to put it.

Floor-to-ceiling glass curves along the main living area, cutting across the skyline and lake beyond in a sweep of blue and silver. The afternoon light catches on the marble in the kitchen, the darker wood built into the walls, the details most people tend to notice only after they’ve recovered from the view.

Addy notices all of it at once.

The view, the space, the scale.

I’m used to that reaction. It rarely interests me. This one does.

“It’s functional,” I say.

She turns slowly, fixing me with a look that suggests she finds that assessment either absurd or deeply offensive. “Functional?”

“Yes.”

She gestures toward the entire apartment. “This isn't functional. This is… what Batman would live in if he got into Scandinavian design and had a better therapist.”

Despite myself, I feel the slightest shift at the corner of my mouth.

“Oh, wow,” she says, eyes narrowing. “That was almost a smile. Do I get some kind of bonus for that?”

“No.”

“Shame.”

I pick up her second bag. “I’ll show you your room.”

She falls into step beside me, and I'm immediately, unhelpfully, aware of her proximity. The scent of vanilla and citrus reaches me before I can make a point of ignoring it.

The guest wing is set slightly apart from the main suite, not isolated, but private. The room I prepared for her is larger than strictly necessary, with its own bathroom, a window overlooking the lake, and a seating area I doubt she’ll use for at least a week. Most people don’t when they first arrive. They tend to spend a day or two trying to decide whether the whole thing is real.

I open the door and step aside.

She walks in.

Then stops.