Wrong Twin, Right Man
Wrong Twin, Right Man
Laurie Campbell
HE WANTED A SECOND CHANCERafe Montoya had known his wife, Beth, was unhappy. She wanted him home earlier, wanted a baby, wanted more of himself than he could give. He thought that being her knight in shining armor would be enough. But then a tragic accident claimed Beth's life, and left her twin sister, Anne, injured–and he had run out of time. All he could do was help Anne recover her strength and her memory–it was what Beth would have wanted.Yet when Rafe looked in Anne's eyes, for a fleeting minute, he had the feeling it was Beth's eyes looking back at him. His Beth, ready and waiting to give him a second chance. But that was impossible…wasn't it?
Rafe smoothed out the paper and gazed at Beth’s handwriting that formed an uneven headline on the page.
Pros & Cons Of Staying Married/Getting Divorced.
What?
Rafe stared at it again, trying to come up with some reason—maybe she was helping a friend with a troubled marriage. But already his eyes were betraying him, racing down the list of pros and cons, and he felt a hollow ache creeping through his bones.
Beth’s life lay before him, and it looked like she hadn’t wanted him there. Because…
Lonely.
The word was a condemnation. He’d failed her worse than he realized, failed her right here in black and white.
No baby. No sharing. No time.
But he had tried, damn it! How could she say there was no sharing? No intimacy? He’d given Beth more of his heart and soul than he’d ever given anyone, and it still—
It still wasn’t enough.
And now it would never be enough.
Dear Reader,
It’s October, the time of year when crisper temperatures and waning daylight turns our attention to more indoor pursuits—such as reading! And we at Silhouette Special Edition are happy to supply you with the material. We begin with Marrying Molly, the next in bestselling author Christine Rimmer’s BRAVO FAMILY TIES series. A small-town mayor who swore she’d break the family tradition of becoming a mother before she becomes a wife finds herself nonetheless in the very same predicament. And the father-to-be? The very man who’s out to get her job….
THE PARKS EMPIRE series continues with Lois Faye Dyer’s The Prince’s Bride, in which a wedding planner called on to plan the wedding of an exotic prince learns that she’s the bride-to-be! Next, in The Devil You Know, Laurie Paige continues her popular SEVEN DEVILS miniseries with the story of a woman determined to turn her marriage of convenience into the real thing. Patricia Kay begins her miniseries THE HATHAWAYS OF MORGAN CREEK, the story of a Texas baking dynasty (that’s right, baking!), with Nanny in Hiding, in which a young mother on the run from her abusive ex seeks shelter in the home of Bryce Hathaway—and finds so much more. In Wrong Twin, Right Man by Laurie Campbell, a man who feels he failed his late wife terribly gets another chance to make it up—to her twin sister. At least he thinks she’s her twin…. And in Wendy Warren’s Making Babies, a newly divorced woman whose ex-husband denied her the baby she always wanted, finds a willing candidate—in the guilt-ridden lawyer who represented the creep in his divorce!
Enjoy all six of these reads, and come back again next month to see what’s up in Silhouette Special Edition.
Take care,
Gail Chasan
Senior Editor
Wrong Twin, Right Man
Laurie Campbell
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Thanks to my gifted friends on the Desert Rose
brainstorming loop, who always come through
with new possibilities, and to Lori De Jong and
Mary Rahrig, who help me keep God in the picture.
LAURIE CAMPBELL
spends her weekdays writing brochures, videos and commercial scripts for an advertising agency. At five o’clock she turns off her computer, waits thirty seconds, turns it on again and starts writing romance. Her other favorite activities include playing with her husband and son, teaching catechism class, counseling at a Phoenix mental health clinic and working with other writers. “People ask me how I find the time to do all that,” Laurie says, “and I tell them it’s easy. I never clean my house!” She rarely cleans her mailbox, either, which makes it a special treat to hear from readers on her Web site at www.bookLaurie.com.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Epilogue
Chapter One
If only she could say he loved her, the toothpaste wouldn’t matter.
Neither would the late hours. Neither would the baby—
No, the baby mattered.
“I want a baby,” Beth told her sister. “It all comes back to that.”
“Write it down,” Anne ordered, turning over the dining-car flyer on their breakfast table and sliding the blank page across the white tablecloth. “If you want to straighten things out with Rafe, you need to know exactly what the problem is.”
He doesn’t love me!
But she couldn’t bring herself to say that aloud.
“He doesn’t want a baby,” Beth said instead. Which amounted to the same thing. “I know we agreed to wait until the legal clinic was up and running, but that’s taking a lot longer than I expected.”
“Write it down,” her twin repeated, handing over a pencil, and Beth dutifully jotted “doesn’t want baby” on the paper. “When was the last time you talked about it?”
“Friday. The night before I left to meet you.” The night before her and Anne’s annual “Sisters’ Vacation,” she had accused her husband of caring more about Tucson’s street kids than having kids of his own.
And he hadn’t denied it.
“What happened?” Anne asked, and Beth gritted her teeth against the tip of the pencil.
“Nothing. I was kind of hoping he’d get mad, get upset, say I was wrong.” If he had lost his temper, sworn at her in the same gutter-style Spanish he used with the former gangbangers who occasionally phoned the house, she could have taken comfort in knowing his emotions were fully engaged. “But he just said the clinic’s not all the way there yet, and we have plenty of time.”
“Twenty-six isn’t exactly over the hill,” her sister observed. “And Rafe’s, what, twenty-eight? But okay, there’s problem number one. What else?”
“Isn’t that enough?” Beth protested, just as the waiter arrived with their breakfast order. She wished they could send him away, finish this conversation without the distraction of mushroom omelets and rye toast, but of course the fun of eating in a dining car was why they’d taken the train from Los Angeles back to Tucson.
Back to the husband who didn’t want her.
Or at least not nearly as much as she wanted him.
“I still can’t believe you decided to leave your wedding ring home,” Anne told her, eyeing the claddagh ring she’d loaned Beth when she found her crying over the vacancy a few nights ago. “And didn’t even mention it! Bethie, you need to talk about things more.”
Maybe so, but she couldn’t expect her sister to fix her problems. Taking care of people was Beth’s strong point, while Anne took care of everything else.
Besides, she’d hoped that a week away from Rafe would settle the turmoil inside her.
“I just thought,” she muttered, “I could try pretending we’d never gotten married, and see how it felt.”
“But it feels sad, doesn’t it?”
Which pretty well summed up her problem. Leaving the wedding ring in her jewelry box had been a foolish gesture, and the loan of her sister’s ring hadn’t made her finger feel any less forlorn.
“You have to talk things out,” Anne continued. “Forget this new-look stuff, that’s not what you need. Not that you don’t look wonderful—”
“You’re only saying that because I look like you.”
Her sister grinned, acknowledging the point. With Beth’s brand-new haircut, they looked more alike than they had in years. “Strawberry blondes are better with short curls, that’s all there is to it. But anyway, talking to Rafe would be the fastest way to fix things. I mean, if you want to stay married.”
“That’s what’s so embarrassing!” She still wanted him as her husband, and a whole week of vacation hadn’t made any difference in that fierce, heartfelt yearning for Rafe Montoya. “What kind of woman wants a husband who doesn’t need her?”
Anne hesitated, gazing at her coffee cup before meeting her gaze with an uncomfortable expression. “Bethie, I know you’ve got this thing about taking care of people, but being needed isn’t the same thing as being loved.”
Maybe such statements made sense for a career woman who didn’t understand the essentials of love, but Anne was completely wrong. “That’s what marriage is about!”
Her sister thought that over long enough for Beth to realize there was no comfortable solution to be found, then tapped the page on the table with her usual executive determination.
“You need a list of pros and cons,” she announced. “Reasons to stay married, and reasons to get divorced. Come on, write it down.”
“But…” What if the reasons for divorce outweighed the reasons for marriage? And how on earth had she and Anne traded roles so quickly, when normally she was the one taking care of her sister? “I don’t want to give up on him yet.”
“That goes in the pro column,” Anne ordered, taking another sip of her coffee. “What else do you like about him?”
It wasn’t a question of liking him, though. It was more a matter of loving him.
And suspecting he would never love her.
“Come on,” her sister prompted. “Is he smart, handsome, rich, charming, good in bed—”
“Anne!” They were in the middle of a dining car, with people all around them, and here she was asking about Rafe in bed?
“Good-looking, punctual, courteous, good athlete—”
“All of that,” Beth interrupted hastily, trying to dismiss the memory of his athletic body pressed against hers. At least while making love to her, Rafe Montoya could be wonderfully free with his emotions. “Well, except rich. He’s still paying back his student loans, and the legal clinic won’t ever make big money.”
“So that goes in the con column, along with waiting for a baby and leaving the lid off the toothpaste,” Anne directed. “Good thing he’s punctual, though, if he’s picking us up at the train station.”
They had arranged last week that Rafe would meet them at nine-thirty this morning, so he and Beth could show Anne their new house before taking her to the airport. And, knowing him, he had phoned the station at dawn to check on their arrival time.
Because while Rafe Montoya would never give his heart, neither would he give up a responsibility.
“Probably coming right from work,” Beth said, drawing a wavy line between the two columns on her page.
“He’s at work this early?”
No hour was too early for a man whose workday could easily begin at three in the morning. Or last for seventy-two hours at a stretch…especially if a juvenile gang member needed someone to post bail, a ride home from the police station, or a temporary place to stay.
“He probably spent the night at Legalismo,” she explained. “I mean, with me on vacation, there’s not much reason to come home.”
But as soon as she heard the words “not much reason to come home,” she wished she hadn’t spoken. Because they sounded like a death knell for her marriage.
And she wasn’t quite ready to accept that yet.
“Some people,” Anne said dryly, “might think sleeping in a real bed was worth driving home for.”
People who’d grown up sleeping in a real bed, yes.
“People like you and me,” Beth agreed. “But you know how Rafe is.”
Anne raised her eyebrows in agreement, as if confirming her initial opinion of Beth’s husband. On the night of Beth and Rafe’s engagement party, the first time she’d ever met him, she had drawn Beth aside and observed that the man was “incredibly gorgeous if you like that reformed-rogue, dark-and-dangerous look. But, Bethie, do you really want to spend the rest of your life with this Saint Rafael of the street kids?”
A question which had haunted her for the past six months.
“I know how Rafe is,” Anne agreed, glancing at her wristwatch. “If you say he’s gonna be on time, he’s gonna be on time.”
“You’ll make your flight home just fine,” Beth promised, noting with a touch of amusement that her sister was already slipping from vacation mode back into work mode.
Because she was still staring at her watch.
Or rather, at Beth’s engraved confirmation gift, which Anne had borrowed on the first day of their trip. Leaving her own watch at home, Beth’s twin had announced, was a stupid idea, and she was never listening to that stress-reduction tape again.
“Okay,” Anne said now, looking up with an apologetic smile as if realizing how quickly she’d shifted gears. “So I’ll be in Chicago by dark. But, listen, if you want time alone with Rafe, you don’t have to give me the house tour yet. I can see it next time I come out.”
“No, you have to see it! You’ll love how I did the guest room like an office, and next time you visit it’ll be like having your own desk right there.”
Anne grinned at her. “Humor the workaholic, right? I did pretty good this week, though.”
If you counted phoning the business manager twice a day as pretty good, then she had.
“You did,” Beth agreed. “And we even found time for shopping.” Her sister had insisted on new clothes to complement Beth’s midvacation makeover at San Diego’s trendiest salon, which had left them looking more like twins than they’d looked since seventh grade.
“Wasn’t that fun? The waiter just now, I could tell, was dying to ask.”
Anne always enjoyed fielding questions about what it was like to have an identical twin, and Beth had always been glad to let her sister do the talking. “You can tell him when he comes back with the coffee,” she offered, returning her gaze to the list of pros and cons. “I wish we had another few days of vacation.”
Sometimes a sympathetic look spoke more loudly than words, and Beth felt a flicker of dismay as she caught Anne’s expression. Her sister evidently suspected that a few extra days of vacation wouldn’t make any difference to the Montoyas’ marriage, but she was too tactful for such an observation.
“Listen,” Anne offered instead, “you know you can always come visit me. Actually, it’d be wonderful to have you looking out for things.”
“What, at the office?” That wasn’t Beth’s domain, even though they shared ownership and responsibility for their nonprofit company. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“But you could learn. I mean, if you decide you want a change in your life.”
Regardless of what happened with Rafe, though, she couldn’t imagine trading roles with her five-minutes-older sister. Anne was born to run a Dolls-Like-Me business that had blossomed ever since she took it over, while Beth was happy to work at home, designing look-alike dolls for Down syndrome children.
“Not that big a change,” she said. “But thanks, anyway.”
“All right, then, think about your list. You’ve only got three hours to finish it.”
Three hours to decide whether she wanted her marriage to last? “I can’t decide anything that fast,” Beth protested.
“You’re not making any decisions yet,” Anne explained, lifting her coffee cup and nodding at the waiter. “You’re just listing the pros and cons.”
“All right,” she conceded, and as soon as the waiter returned for the kind of conversation that men everywhere seemed to enjoy with her sister, Beth set to work on her list.
There wasn’t nearly enough space on the page, though, to describe what had happened over the past two years. Ever since she’d turned over the management of her home-based business to Anne, who’d returned from Harvard with an MBA, Beth had been ready to start a family ahead of schedule.
And Rafe wasn’t.
Not last year.
Not six months ago.
Not now.
No, all his passion was reserved for the legal clinic. All his fierce energy, all his intensity, all his time was devoted to helping kids escape the kind of life he’d survived with his crusading spirit aglow. The knight-in-shining-armor spirit which had captivated her the first time they’d met.
Back before she realized that it was far easier to love a knight in shining armor than to live with one.
“Tell you what,” Anne said, jolting Beth out of her reverie as the waiter departed. “You look like you need a break. Let’s go check out the observation car.”
They hadn’t toured the train last night, settling into their bunk-bedded sleeper compartment as soon as they’d pulled out of Los Angeles, but a view from the upper level would be a nice change of pace.
“Okay,” Beth agreed, and folded her list in half. She stuffed it into the side pocket of her suitcase as they passed the luggage area, hoping that’d help her forget the entire problem.
At least for the last few hours of the trip.
After all, the whole point of a “Sisters’ Vacation” was to enjoy spending time with her sister.
“Where shall we go next year?” she asked as they settled down in the observation car’s last pair of up-holstered seats, with a floor-to-ceiling view of the wide open desert. “It’s your turn to pick.”
“New York,” Anne said immediately. “You’ve never been, and you’re way overdue. Besides, if I’m still in touch with Marc, he’ll get us tickets to any Broadway show we want.”
Marc was the Italian architect her sister had met a few months ago, the latest in a string of eligible men whom Anne attracted and discarded with astonishing ease. But the idea of him being around next year implied more than the usual duration.
“You think he might be…” Beth hesitated, searching for the right word. “Is he special?”
“Not for a lifetime or anything,” Anne said, handing the newspaper on the table between them to a passenger who had evidently been hoping for a seat. “But for a few months, I think he’s a lot of fun.”
If only she could borrow her sister’s confidence as easily as she’d borrowed her claddagh ring. If only she could view the man in her life as “fun” and nothing more….
But that was no way to start a family!
And without a family, she might as well give up on mattering to anyone.
“You know what we need?” Anne asked, evidently noticing the distress on her face. “Coffee with brandy in it. Make the last part of the trip a little more bearable, what do you say?”
Coffee with brandy wouldn’t make her homecoming any easier, Beth suspected, but if Anne was dreading the end of the trip, as well, it would be no problem to run down to the bar car.
“I’ll get it,” she offered, scanning the aisle and realizing there were already passengers waiting for someone to leave. “If you want to save our seats, I’ll be right back.”
“Well, at least let me pay for it,” Anne said, handing over her wallet-size purse and moving Beth’s handbag into the empty chair beside her as a placeholder. “I’ll be right here unless some better seats open up.”
Such confidence was typical of her sister, Beth decided as she made her way down the narrow staircase with Anne’s flame-red purse in hand. Some people were born with the kind of certainty it took to make things go exactly the way they wanted…which made them even more attractive to everyone they met.
And that observation was confirmed as soon as she reached the bar car, where a man with a briefcase looked up from one of the tables and greeted her with an exuberant smile.
“Anne Farrell! Jake Roth, from Boston. How’ve you been?”
She hadn’t been mistaken for her sister since high school, and it was as disconcerting as ever. Flattering, yes, but also embarrassing when someone refused to believe they’d gotten the wrong twin.
Jake Roth was already standing up to shake hands, looking so pleased that she hated to disappoint him. “Actually,” Beth began, “Anne is my—”
“Great to see you!” he interrupted, offering a hearty handshake before she could continue her explanation. “Mindy still asks about you, I’ve gotta tell her we were on the same train. Where you heading?”
“Uh, Tucson.” It was hard to keep her balance, for some reason, the train felt shakier than usual. “But, Mr. Roth—”
“Jake,” he protested, when suddenly the floor jerked underfoot and Beth felt herself lurching sideways. He caught her, then stumbled himself, and the floor seemed to sway in the other direction.
She grabbed the table, which felt solid for a fleeting moment, until something slammed into the man beside her and sent them both staggering back. Then, as another passenger cried out in alarm, she heard a harsh, grinding shriek of metal and his warning shout, “Anne, hold on, we’re gonna crash!”
No, surely they’d just hit a rock or something—but even as she fought for such reassurance there came a heart-wrenching scream. Beth froze in panic, felt the floor give way beneath her, and looked up to see the wall of the train collapsing on top of Jake.
And herself.
Would Beth be smiling?
Maybe, Rafe decided as he unlocked the scarred wooden door with its Legalismo sign, he should hold the flowers in plain sight when she got off the train. He’d stopped on his way to work for the kind of bouquet people gave visiting celebrities, a comparison she’d probably blush at…but he needed to show her how much she mattered.
After their grim parting last week, without even a phone call since her plane landed in California, he needed to prove to Beth she was still the most important person in his life.
So he’d made reservations for a homecoming dinner tonight, and—
“Hey.”
The kid’s voice was elaborately casual, but he recognized the desperation that would lead someone to camp outside a law office at this hour of the morning. And he’d be glad at any hour to talk with Oscar Ortiz, who reminded him so acutely of himself at fifteen.
“Bueno,” Rafe greeted him, then saw the gun in his waistband. Rather than risk losing the kid again, he made a show of fighting a yawn. “I was just thinking about getting some coffee. Walk with me?”
He wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee in spite of the August heat, because as long as they stayed on the street he could avoid enforcing the No Drugs/No Weapons policy that ruled the clinic. So when Oscar shrugged, he locked the door and started down the cracked sidewalk toward the nearest bodega.
If he could ease Oscar out of Los Lobos the same way he’d gotten himself out of the Bloods…
“You still lookin’ to meet Cholo?” the boy asked, and Rafe shot a quick glance at his watch. This could be tight, because he had to leave for the train station in plenty of time to meet Beth. Yet he couldn’t ignore the chance to strengthen a potential bond with the leader of the second biggest gang in the area.
Oscar evidently saw the glance, though, because he immediately withdrew the offer. “Lawyer’s got places to be.”
“Yeah,” Rafe said. No sense trying to save the conversation now, and as long as he kept things straightforward there might be another chance later. “I’m picking up my wife. She’s taking the train in from L.A.”
The kid gave him a suspicious glance, even as he swiped his hand across a bench with a rival gang’s chalk-marked emblem. “That’s not the one that crashed, is it?”
A train crash? No, he would’ve heard.
“It was on the radio,” Oscar reported, evidently seeing his disbelief. “Some big wreck out in the desert.”
No. Not Beth’s train. There had to be, what, half a dozen trains between here and Los Angeles? More than that. There had to be.
But even so, he felt a cramp of fear in his chest before reminding himself that Beth was surely fine, that he wasn’t losing anyone he loved.
Not again.
Never again.
“She can’t be on that train,” Rafe told Oscar, who shrugged and looked past him toward the police car at the corner. “Not Beth.” Not his wife. “She’s fine.”
The kid shrugged again, as if unwilling to comment, and Rafe felt his body tightening with the same reflex he used to feel before an attack.
“It’s a mistake, that’s all,” he said. The radio probably reported things wrong all the time, and some station must’ve been trying to stir up excitement by announcing a train wreck that had never taken place. “I just need to straighten it out.” A simple phone call would do the trick, and for the first time he found himself wishing he’d given in to Beth’s request that he carry a phone for those nights he worked late.
“The radio—” Oscar began, and Rafe cut him off.
“I’ve gotta find out what happened.” There, a pay phone across the street. No one there, either, which—if the phone still worked—would save him the two minutes it’d take to run back to the office. He sprinted for the phone and felt a surge of relief at the sound of a dial tone, then fumbled in his pocket for change.
Beth was fine.
He just had to—
Damn! Two nickels and a couple of bills, which meant he’d have to hit the bodega for change and then—
“Here.” Oscar dropped a handful of coins on the ledge beside him, then sauntered away as Rafe fumbled with the quarters. Where to call, somebody, who, the train station? Right, they would know, and from memory he dialed the number he’d called at dawn to confirm the nine-thirty arrival from Los Angeles.
Somebody had to know, he told himself as he listened to the phone ring. Somebody there would tell him everything was fine, that Beth was fine—she had to be fine, he wasn’t losing her. She had to be safe.
“The nine-thirty from Los Angeles,” Rafe barked at the clerk who answered the phone. “My wife is on there, and—”
“Sir,” came the reply, “there’s been a…a delay…and we’ll have all the information here. If you’ll please come—”
“No, I just need to know, is she all right?”
A hesitation.
“Sir, please come to the station and—”
He slammed down the phone. This wasn’t working, but everything would be fine. Beth would be fine. Okay, maybe they were having some problems, but he could fix that. Get everything straightened out, make her understand they still had plenty of time for a baby. He could fix anything, he just needed to find out what was—who could—
Morton, he remembered. The cop who’d helped him, under the radar, a few months ago when those kids needed a word.
Morton could find out. Except, damn it, he’d left the number back at the office.
Rafe took off running, fueled by the same panic that had once filled his nights as a matter of routine, back when you never knew who was coming after you. Nobody after him now, the streets were almost empty—although that didn’t necessarily mean anything—but all he had to do was reach the clinic, fumble with the door key, shaking, damn it! and there was nobody waiting for him, good, because he couldn’t protect anyone else right now, not until he found Beth.
There, the phone. Morton’s number, direct line, if the cop would just pick up, okay, no time for conversation, just identify himself and ask—
“Can you find out about a train wreck?”
“What, the derailment?” The cop’s voice was more curious than bewildered, which meant Oscar’s radio report might’ve been accurate after all. But that still didn’t mean there was anything wrong. Beth was fine.
“The one from Los Angeles,” Rafe said over a short, tight breath. “My wife’s on there.”
“Oh, man.” Morton sounded alarmed, but that was probably just the phone connection. Because everything was fine. “Hold on, let me see what—hold on.”
Beth was fine, he repeated to himself as he gripped the phone with a fist too numb to release, and paced the six-foot gap between his desk and the door.
Beth was safe.
She was on her way home right now.
Right. Right, although people didn’t always come home—look at Mom, look at Carlos, look at Nita and Gramp and Rose—but this wasn’t the same thing. It wasn’t like he depended on Beth.
Never had, never would.
So she had to be fine. It was just taking Morton a while to confirm that, but any minute he’d be back on the line with word that Beth’s train delay was nothing, a minor glitch…. And there he was now.
“Rafe?” The cop sounded uneasy, and he felt himself bracing for a blow before he could remember that everything was fine. “Look, I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but—” Then Morton broke off. “Wait a minute, was your wife traveling with—”
“Her sister, yeah,” he managed to answer. Maybe there was a mix-up, maybe something had happened to her sister. Which would be hard on Beth, yeah, but as long as she was still alive— “Anne. They’re twins.”
“Ah, hell,” the cop muttered. There was a pause, during which Rafe scrambled for any prayer he could think of, any hope, any magic, and came up completely blank. “The sister’s being transported to emergency right now. But Beth…I’m sorry. She didn’t make it.”
No.
No, he repeated as he slowly replaced the phone in its cradle. That wasn’t possible.
It couldn’t happen.
It happens all the time.
No.
Not this time.
“She didn’t make it.”
Not Beth.
Not again.
But already he recognized the feeling—that same heaviness, that same hot pressure of tears—
No.
No tears. He had to move, Rafe knew, he had to move someplace, do something—
Not cry.
No. No point. He stumbled into the lobby, where if anyone was waiting he could find something to do, something besides crying, because he wasn’t crying, this was crazy, even with nobody here he still wasn’t breaking down—
It hurts.
No, it couldn’t. Beth couldn’t be gone, because he still needed to fix things. After the way she’d left, thinking that delaying a baby meant he didn’t love her, when he did love her—
But not enough.
Never enough.
Rafe felt a shudder rising in his chest and gulped it down, bracing his hands against the back of the cracked plastic sofa where clients waited for the lawyer on duty. He couldn’t lock the door, not when someone might show up any minute, but he couldn’t—
God, he couldn’t do this.
He couldn’t fix this.
He had to fix this! That was his job, fixing things, and he couldn’t stand here crying in the clinic lobby—
But the tears wouldn’t stop. No matter how he clenched his muscles, how rigidly he held his breath, for some reason there was no swallowing the—
Not here!
Rafe fled to the bathroom and slammed the door lock home, already feeling the torrent of heat swelling into his eyes, his throat. God, he was practically choking, and suddenly he was sobbing, and somehow he couldn’t seem to stop, couldn’t keep from gasping out the desperate plea….
No. Not Beth.
Not this time.
Please!
There was no answer, which he already knew was the only possible response, but even so he begged with all his heart, with all his hope, knowing all the while that it wasn’t enough. Crying wouldn’t help, nothing helped, and he had to get himself together, get himself out of here, get back to the kind of strength he’d spent a lifetime building so this pain would never come back.
It was back now, though, worse than he remembered from the last time, although by now he knew how to fight it. Knew how to move, knew to flex his arms behind his back, to stop those bone-jarring gasps for breath and count five, ten, fifteen…
Seventy-five, eighty, eighty-five.
Two twenty, two twenty-five, two hundred thirty.
Counting as high as it took. That was the beginning, he knew, but real strength lay elsewhere. For real strength, he had to get out of here, he had to take care of someone. Anyone. Maybe some clients in the lobby, although he hadn’t heard anyone come in—and when he finally managed to square his shoulders and resolutely opened the bathroom door, the clinic was empty.
Okay. He could still get through this.
He knew what to do.
If there was nobody here, he’d try somewhere else. He could do it, Rafe knew. He’d done this before. Just find someone to look out for, somebody hurting or scared or—
Hurting. Right.
Anne.
Emergency, the cop had said, and she’d have to be at the hospital by now. So…
Okay. He locked the clinic door for the second time that morning and started for the dirt lot behind the building. Just move, just go. Protecting someone was the key to staying strong, and Beth’s sister was probably in bad shape right now.
So get going, Rafe ordered himself, stumbling blindly toward his car. Go, and you can get through this.
You can do this.
Go take care of Anne.
Chapter Two
“Anne? There’s someone here to see you.”
The soothing voice was familiar, although she couldn’t quite say why. Maybe she’d heard it this morning, or during the night, or—
Wait, was it morning?
Well, there seemed to be light somewhere, yes. And the light seemed familiar, as well, which must mean she was at home in—
In—
In bed, right, but why didn’t this feel like her bed? Her bed shouldn’t hurt, yet this one felt strangely painful. Like she’d been sleeping wrong, with her arm twisted backward and something burning her side. “Anne, would you like to visit with your brother-in-law today?”
The question sounded like it was meant for her, but did that mean she was Anne? The name seemed familiar, somehow, even more than the cajoling voice and the light creeping into her eyes….
“He’s been coming every day to see how you’re doing, and he keeps saying you’re not to worry about a thing—”
“Okay,” she murmured. Or at least she meant to say that, but her voice didn’t sound quite right. Still, it must have gotten through to the woman who was speaking, because she gave a delighted cry.
“You’re awake! Let me run tell Dr. Sibley. Now, you don’t have to see anyone until you’re ready, but I know your brother-in-law would be thrilled if you’re feeling up to it.”
“Okay,” she said again, and this time it sounded clearer—even though she still couldn’t quite sit up. “What… Uh, what…” She couldn’t quite think of what she wanted to ask, but something didn’t feel right.
“You’re in the hospital, sweetie. You’ve been here for eight days, and we were starting to get a little worried about you, but now you’re going to be just fine.”
The hospital? Had they taken her tonsils out? She remembered the hospital, with her sister in the next bed—oh, and they were laughing about something!—but that seemed like a long time ago. Eight days?
No, more than that.
“I’m going to send him in,” the woman announced, helping her to a sitting position that somehow rattled a tube in her arm. “You take all the time you want to get comfortable, and he’s certainly not going to expect any conversation, but if Dr. Sibley is on rounds you might as well have some company with you.”
“Okay.” She was getting pretty good at that one word, and it seemed to thrill the nurse—a nurse, right? Wearing a white uniform in a hospital, she had to be a nurse. And the way she backed out of the room, with a watchful eye all the way to the door, rang with the comfort of familiarity.
Even if everything else was mixed up right now, at least she could still recognize a nurse.
She didn’t recognize the man who came in next, though. Not a doctor, because he wore what she thought of as “lawyer” clothes—a conservative white shirt and gray suit, but with his tie and shirt collar loosened.
And he also wore a look of intense relief.
“Anne,” he greeted her, reaching for both her hands and giving them a surprisingly gentle squeeze. Maybe because of that metal thing bracing her arm, which she didn’t remember from the tonsil hospital. “You’re gonna be okay. Dr. Sibley said another few days here, maybe six weeks of physical therapy, and you’ll be good as new.”
He seemed so pleased about that, it must be good news. “Good,” she managed to answer. But it didn’t explain who this man was. “Um…are you the doctor?”
He reacted with a jolt of shock as he moved a plastic chair closer to her bedside, then she saw his startled expression replaced by something more careful. More calm.
“I’m Rafe Montoya,” he said, and hesitated. As if he was waiting for her to recognize the name. “Your sister’s husband.”
Her sister had a husband? She hadn’t remembered that from the tonsil hospital, either, but if her sister was married they must have left childhood behind them a long time ago. “Where is she?”
Even though the man retained that same relaxed demeanor, she saw a flash of pain in his eyes before he sat down and met her gaze again. “She isn’t here. You…you were pretty badly hurt.”
“I thought so,” she admitted, shifting away from whatever was pressing against her side. “I don’t feel right.”
He nodded, then reached across her to move something at the edge of her bed—which left her feeling a little more comfortable. “You and Beth,” he said slowly, “were in a train wreck.”
“Beth?” That name felt familiar, and from the way he spoke it, she could tell it belonged to someone he loved. “My sister?”
“Yeah. Anne, I’m sorry.” The nurse had called her that, too, which meant she must be Anne. And the combination of those names seemed to resonate within her, as if Anne and Beth belonged together. “I didn’t realize you— Everything’s kind of a blank, huh?”
Pretty much, but she hated to see this man so worried. Especially when he had his wife to worry about…although Beth must be all right by now, because otherwise her husband wouldn’t be here.
“No,” she assured him, “I remember having our tonsils out.” For some reason that memory was the clearest—maybe because this hospital smelled the same as that other one—but there were other images floating in her mind, as well. Playing with a dog, braiding each other’s hair, cutting out snowflakes… “Only it was a long time ago.”
“Yeah, I guess it was.” He gazed at her for a moment, as if the sight of her face offered some curious mixture of nostalgia and regret, then gave her an apologetic smile. “Look, maybe you just need to concentrate on getting some rest. There’s a lot of people praying for you.”
“Really?” For some reason, she couldn’t think of anyone who’d do that except her sister, who ought to be arriving any minute…because somehow she had the feeling there was no other family in her life. No parents, no grandparents, no one but her sister.
And this man. Rafe.
Her sister’s husband.
“Yeah, well, Jake Roth—the guy who pulled you off the train?” Rafe seemed to think that phrase might trigger a memory, but again nothing came to mind. “He and his wife have been calling. And everybody in Chicago.”
Chicago. That sounded vaguely familiar, and she had an impression of a city skyline. Maybe on a calendar, or a postcard. “Is that here?”
“No, right now you’re in Tucson.” He closed his eyes for a moment, then continued, “That’s where Beth and I lived…uh, live.” But the falter in his voice spoke more vividly than his show of calm, and she knew there was something terribly wrong. “You and Beth were on vacation, and—”
“Is she okay?”
He hesitated, and she felt a sinking sensation inside her even before he met her gaze and said quietly, “Beth is…she’s gone.”
Gone? As in—
She must have flinched, made some kind of whimper, because he swiftly reached for her hands. “Anne, I’m sorry,” he blurted, then continued in a rush as if the right words delivered quickly enough could somehow ease the shock. “Everybody said it must’ve happened really fast, before the fire. She never knew what hit her.”
But that meant—
“Beth…my sister? She’s dead?”
Still holding her hands, he nodded. Just once, without looking up.
“Oh, no.” That couldn’t be. “No, she’s not.” Only a moment ago they’d been playing in the tonsil hospital, arranging paper dolls on their beds, and— “Not my sister!”
But his expression didn’t change, and she felt a new jolt of pain that eclipsed any other sensation. Her other self, her longest companion, the sister she’d shared her life with was gone?
No, she couldn’t lose her sister.
“I can’t—” she began, then stopped. Crying now would only make the pain worse, and she couldn’t bear that right now. “Oh, Rafe…”
“I’m sorry,” he repeated, with a crack in his voice, and suddenly she realized that he must be hurting as much as herself. This ache, this sharp and hollow desolation, wasn’t solely her own…but how was anyone supposed to get through a loss like this?
She couldn’t think about it, that’s all. Surely the next time she woke up, her sister would be in the bed next to hers. All she had to do was sleep again, and everything would be fine.
Except somehow she knew it wouldn’t be. Maybe just because of his anguished expression, but—
Oh, dear God. Not only had she lost her sister, but this man had lost his wife.
“Are you okay?” she blurted.
The question seemed to startle him, because he let go of her hands and sat up straighter in his chair.
“I’ve had a while to get used to it,” he answered with such deliberate steadiness that she knew he wasn’t okay, but that he wasn’t about to say so. “Anyway, I know Beth would want me to make sure you’re all right.”
Which explained why he’d been coming every day for the past eight days. Beth must have wanted the certainty that her loved ones were taken care of.
“Anything you need,” Rafe continued. “The insurance and everything, I took care of that already. But anything else…I want to help.” And then, as if he knew at the same moment she did that nothing sounded better than sleep, he stood up and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I mean it, Anne. Whatever you need, I’m here for you.”
He did mean it, she knew, even before he rested a gentle hand on her shoulder and turned to move his chair away. And she knew why it mattered to him…which meant she must be remembering the essence of her sister.
“Someone has to be there for the people she loved,” Anne whispered. Because somehow she already knew that, even while Rafe was looking out for her, she needed to be there for him, as well. “That’s how Beth would want it.”
That’s how Beth would want it.
The phrase stayed with him over the next few days, promising a faint hope of making amends to his wife. If he could just continue taking care of Anne until she was back on her feet, he could take comfort in knowing Beth’s wish was coming true.
At least one wish.
“Feeling better?” he asked Anne each afternoon for the next week, and her responses grew gradually more coherent. To the point where he could finally tell her, “The nurse says you’ll be ready to leave, day after tomorrow.”
“I can’t wait to get out of here,” she said, shifting in bed with considerably more ease than she’d shown only a few days ago. “Back to…well, real life.”
But she looked uncertain about the prospect, which he suspected meant there were still some gaps in her memory.
“Look, don’t push yourself,” Rafe warned. He’d already phoned Dolls-Like-Me to warn everyone that Anne needed time to recover, and had accepted their condolences with the careful guard he’d perfected over the past two weeks. “If it takes a while for you to remember things, the doctor said that’s normal.”
“I know, but I hate not knowing things! Yesterday someone named Marc sent this strange letter saying he wants to give his marriage another try. Except I can’t believe I’d be dating a married man.”
He had no idea who this woman might date, but she seemed so disturbed that he hurried to offer the first reassurance he could think of. “Maybe the guy didn’t tell you he was married.”
Anne contradicted him with a rueful smile. “Or maybe I’m a really bad judge of character.”
No, that didn’t fit with what he knew of her. “Beth always said,” he offered over the knot that still rose in his throat whenever he spoke her name without preparing for it, “there was nobody in the world as smart as you.”
Without warning, he saw her eyes fill with tears. But unlike himself, she seemed to take such weakness for granted.
“More than anything,” Anne whispered, “I miss her. I don’t remember what we used to talk about, or even her phone number, but I remember having the other half of me. I can’t believe she’s gone!”
Losing someone you’d known since before birth, he realized, must be even more traumatic than losing your memory. And while time supposedly made every loss better, you sure couldn’t prove that by him.
But he was fine, Rafe reminded himself hastily.
He knew how to get through this.
“If only I’d stayed with her,” she continued, twisting the edge of the hospital sheet between her fingers. “If we’d been together when the train crashed—”
“You’re not blaming yourself, are you?” he interrupted. He’d done the same thing when Gramp died, and again when Carlos was shot, but she couldn’t possibly be responsible for a train wreck. “It was an accident, Anne. One in a million.”
“I just…I wish I’d done something different. I don’t know what,” she said, and her voice broke on the edge of a sob. “But to let my sister die, and not me…that’s not right. It’s just not right!”
Her loss was even worse than his own, Rafe realized with a tug of compassion. Maybe he was hurting, but at least he knew how to take care of himself. “I’m sorry,” he said, leaning forward to take her hands in his. “I’m really, really sorry.”
Her tears spilled over so easily that he found himself almost envying her—which was crazy, because this woman didn’t have anything to fall back on. Nobody to protect. But after a few minutes, she straightened up and wiped her eyes, looking so much like Beth that he felt his heart twist all over again.
“I shouldn’t keep—” she began apologetically, then broke off. “You’re going through the same thing.”
Not exactly, because Anne had never failed the sister she loved. Never woken up reaching for Beth before remembering, once again, how cold and how distant their parting had been.
But there was no point getting into any of that, no point in encouraging her sympathy.
He didn’t need it.
“Yeah,” Rafe muttered, “but at least I can remember where I live.”
She gave him a startled glance, and then the same wry smile he’d seen on Beth a thousand times—making his heart lurch for a moment before he realized that identical twins would naturally share similar expressions. Seeing Anne’s smile, though, he was struck once again by the astonishing resemblance between the sisters, and for a wild instant he wondered whether there could have been some mistake.
But an old friend had identified Anne to the trauma team, and they’d reported finding Beth’s watch and handbag with her body. Besides, this woman’s hair was different and the ring she wore wasn’t Beth’s…which meant, Rafe knew, he was spinning impossible fantasies.
“I sort of remember where I live,” Anne told him. “And I know, once I see it, everything will come back. I just need to get home, and the hospital social worker’s coming to talk about that tomorrow.”
But his phone calls to Chicago had revealed that Beth’s original assessment of Anne was correct. As a woman completely dedicated to business, she’d never bothered with close friendships.
At least not with the kind of friends who would take her in while she completed six weeks of physical therapy. Everyone who’d inquired about her had sounded cordial yet harried, and not one had offered her a place to stay.
The way Beth would have, in an instant.
“Look,” he said, “before you talk to the social worker, there’s something I want to run by you. Because while you’re doing your physical therapy, you’ll need a place to stay.”
“I have an apartment in Chicago,” she told him, then gestured toward a small red purse on her bedside table. “I keep looking through my wallet for clues, and I live at—”
“Yeah, but you need a place where there’s someone to look after you.” Maybe not around the clock, but at least someone who could be on call throughout her recovery period. “I think you should stay in our guest room,” he told her. “I can drive you wherever you need to be, or you can use Beth’s car as soon as you’re driving again. And anything you need help with, I’ll be right there.”
She looked a little hesitant. “I…”
“Or if I’m working,” Rafe continued hastily, “I’ll have the phone with me.” The phone Beth had urged him to use, and though he hadn’t honored her request at the time he could damn sure make up for it now. “You can call anytime. Anytime. I mean it.”
Anne regarded him with a sober gaze. “You’ve put a lot of thought into this,” she observed.
Because it was his only way of making amends to Beth. The only possible way to keep himself strong. To protect someone who needed it—and she did need it.
“Well, it just makes sense,” he said. “For the next six weeks, I think this would be the best thing for you.”
“Maybe it’d be the best thing for both of us,” she said, which startled him. Anne didn’t need to worry about what was best for him.
But as long as she was willing to let him take care of her, Rafe reminded himself, there was no point arguing about it. And already she was nodding in agreement.
“All right, then. Thanks,” she murmured, and he felt a rush of relief shoot through his veins. “For the next six weeks, Rafe, I’ll come stay with you.”
Rafe was as thoughtful a host as anyone could possibly want, Anne decided after he’d left her alone to “settle in” to the guest room Beth had reportedly decorated with her in mind. The room wasn’t quite as cozy or relaxing as she might have liked, but surely her sister had known her tastes.
Which meant, she realized while rearranging the bewildering jumble of faxes on the desk, this room was just one more example of how the accident had changed her character.
It was nothing to worry about, Dr. Sibley had assured her. People always changed after some kind of trauma, and the changes seldom lasted.
So this feeling of being slightly off balance, of not recognizing clients and names she had apparently known for years, was sure to disappear soon.
As if he’d sensed her disquiet, Rafe called from the hallway outside her door, “Anne, you all right? Can I get you anything?”
“I’m okay,” she called back, then realized he must be deliberately keeping out of her room. “Come in…I was just looking at all these faxes.”
He frowned when he saw her hunched over the desk, but refrained from comment. Instead he said, “I’m going to make some coffee, if you want any.”
Coffee sounded surprisingly good, although she hated to have him waiting on her after he’d already disrupted his entire day to bring her home from the hospital, past the physical therapy clinic for a first meeting with Cindy, and finally here.
“I’ll do it,” Anne offered, and he stopped her with a quick gesture.
“You’ll be on your own tomorrow morning, remember? Don’t push it.”
She had insisted that he maintain his usual schedule at the legal clinic, even though it meant taking a cab to her therapy session, and Rafe had reluctantly agreed to keep his early-morning appointment with a pregnant teenager. This man lived for the street kids he served, Anne suspected, and her rueful awareness of such devotion meant that Beth must have complained about it.
As a third party, though, she couldn’t help admiring his heartfelt dedication to the job.
After all, from the tone of the messages on her desk, she apparently shared it herself. Which made it all the more disturbing that none of these faxes made sense.
“I’d better save the coffee break for when I get caught up,” she admitted, and Rafe hesitated in the doorway.
“Take it easy, okay?” he cautioned her, evidently viewing the warning as even more vital than the coffee. “Give yourself time to get back on your feet.”
Good advice, she knew, but that didn’t make it any easier to ignore the pile of papers on her desk. She picked up the stack again, wincing at the thought of all those decisions to be made. “I just feel bad thinking about everyone in Chicago, waiting for me to get back—”
“Anne,” he interrupted, crossing the room to pull the papers away from her and jamming them into a drawer. “Stop it. They’re lucky to have you alive, period, and they can wait another couple months to have you back.”
She should probably take offense at such high-handed behavior, but for some reason all she could feel right now was gratitude. Because this man, however dictatorial, was right. What mattered was being alive.
And everything else could wait.
“Thanks,” she murmured, then saw the wreath of straw flowers in the drawer he’d left open. That Southwestern cluster of turquoise and coral blossoms mingled with twigs was part of the guest room decor, and its absence had puzzled her. “Oh, the desert wreath! I was wondering what happened to—”
But that didn’t make sense, she realized with a sudden jolt of shock, and saw the same incredulity on Rafe’s face before his expression grew softer.
“Beth must have told you a lot about the house,” he observed.
That did make sense. Far more sense than feeling as if she and Beth had somehow traded places.
“That has to be why I know where everything goes,” Anne agreed. And why she felt so very much at home here, as if she belonged in this house. It was the same sense of belonging she had felt when Rafe brought her Beth’s clothes to wear home from the hospital—their luggage from the train was still lost somewhere—and she’d been overwhelmed with a sense of familiar comfort. “We must’ve spent so much time talking, it’s like…well, kind of like she’s still with me.”
He regarded her curiously for a moment, but she saw no hint of doubt in his dark, watchful eyes. “Yeah?”
“I know that sounds weird, but—”
“No,” he said gently, “not for twin sisters. And you two were pretty close. You talked every week.”
They must have, because otherwise she couldn’t possibly have known that Beth kept pencils in the file cabinet.
But how could she be so clear on pencils, on how to jiggle the bedside lamp switch, on the names of her sister’s closest friends, and so vague on the details of her own life in Chicago?
“I wish I could remember more,” Anne told him. “I know it’ll all come back, but so far almost everything I remember is from when we were little.”
“Give yourself time,” he repeated, then sat down on the foot of the copper-varnished bed, facing her with a mingled look of resolve and entreaty. “Meanwhile, is there anything I can do?”
He’d done so much already that she hated to ask for more, but seeing her sister’s wreath had reminded her of the need for a traditional farewell. She would never say goodbye to the memories of her twin, which seemed even stronger here in Beth’s home, but after missing the funeral she needed to make some kind of gesture.
“Well, if you wouldn’t mind…I’d really like to take Beth some flowers.”
Rafe hesitated, and she saw his neck muscles tighten.
“It’s okay,” she said hastily. The man didn’t need any more reminders of what he’d lost. “I can do that later.”
“No.” He stood up, squaring his shoulders. “No, you need to say goodbye.” Then he glanced at his watch. “Let me just—”
“Rafe, not now!” Surely he didn’t think she meant him to drop everything and escort her to the cemetery this very minute. “I just meant, when you get time.”
But apparently he was already recovered from that moment of hesitation, because he asked, “How about tomorrow?”
After more than two weeks since her sister’s death, there couldn’t be any rush about saying goodbye. And yet visiting Beth’s grave might let her start working through the grief, accepting the loss and moving on.
“Well,” she said softly, “if that’s all right with you.”
“Yeah, it’s okay. It’s fine.” He walked back to the door, then turned to face her again, as if he needed to explain himself. “I haven’t been there since the funeral.”
“You don’t have to—” she began, and he cut off her protest.
“No, I do. How about, I pick you up from your session with Cindy and we’ll stop for flowers on the way.”
Suddenly the man was sounding more like an attorney than she’d ever imagined him—more decisive and also more determined—yet somehow she had the impression that his take-charge demeanor was only a facade.
“Is that all right?” she faltered. “I don’t want to put you through—”
“Anne, come on.” Even his posture had changed; he was standing with an attitude of confidence that bordered on defiance. “I can handle it.”
“Well, it’s just…”
“I can handle it!”
“Because you’re Mr. Tough Guy,” she offered, and he responded with a startled expression.
“Did Beth tell you that?”
She must have. But anybody could see from his stance, from the way he held himself ready for battle, that Rafe Montoya would stand alone against whatever challenge came his way—and that an offer of support would only make his determination more fierce.
“You don’t need anyone looking out for you,” Anne observed.
It surprised her when a flicker of remorse crossed his face. “No,” he muttered, dropping his gaze to the carpet. “That drove her crazy.”
And that sounded like the kind of marital problem a sister-in-law had better stay out of. “Look, I’m sorry,” she said hastily, closing the drawer with the wreath, which had started her thinking of Beth. “This is none of my business.”
He didn’t even bother to voice an agreement. Instead, he straightened his shoulders as if dismissing the entire topic. “Anyway, let me know if you want some coffee later.”
“Thanks.” It actually sounded tempting, but she’d already intruded enough. “I ought to get some work done.”
His smile flashed so quickly that she was caught by surprise at how attractive this man could be. “I hear you. The job comes first.”
He was right, Anne thought a little breathlessly. What was the matter with her, anyway? Here she was, wearing her sister’s clothes and living in her sister’s home…but feeling her sister’s appreciation for Rafe Montoya was going way too far.
“Tell me,” she blurted, “how you and Beth met. I mean, the whole thing. How you fell in love with each other.”
Rafe looked taken aback, but he shoved his hands into his pockets and leaned against the doorway, as if searching for the right words.
“Because you did love her,” Anne prompted. “I mean, Beth probably told me the whole story at the time. It’s just, I don’t quite remember.”
His guarded expression softened slightly. “Well,” he said, “it was here in Tucson. You’d gone off to Harvard, and Beth was at the U of A.”
“That was after our dad died, right?” She’d pieced together enough scraps of memory to know that their mother had died when they were young, and their late grandmother had raised them without much help from their dad. “So it was just Beth and me left.”
“Right, and she came to this homeless shelter with a bunch of her sorority sisters. Volunteer weekend. I was coming off shift—this was an internship, my last year of school—and when I saw her reading to these kids, it just kind of hit me.”
“Love at first sight,” Anne said. This was what she needed, hearing about Beth from someone else who had loved her. And already the story was setting off chords of memory. “She’d never met anyone like you.”
Rafe gave her a rueful smile. “She didn’t know the half of it…I didn’t want to scare her away. But I kept working extra hours, hoping I’d see her again, and she kept on showing up with dolls for the kids. You remember the dolls, right?”
“Nobody makes dolls who look like they have Down syndrome,” Anne quoted her sister, who had spent years volunteering at the group home in their neighborhood. “And everybody should have a doll who looks like them.”
“Of course you remember that,” he apologized. “She wouldn’t have turned it into a business without your marketing. Anyway, that was how we met.”
“And fell in love.”
“And fell in love, yeah.” Rafe hesitated, then squared his shoulders, and for a moment she saw a grimace of pain cross his face before he resumed his look of calm control. Even so, his voice was a little unsteady when he muttered, “Thanks for asking. I needed to remember that.”
Chapter Three
He had loved Beth.
He needed to remember that, Rafe knew.
He needed to hold on to whatever he could, if he was going to get through this cemetery visit.
“You don’t have to drive me,” Anne had told him early this morning, as if she might have seen some sign of the uneasiness that had haunted him all night. “I can always get a cab from the physical therapy clinic.”
But that wasn’t how Beth would want her sister cared for, he knew. And he needed to care for somebody.
Especially after how badly he’d failed his wife. Letting her think the street kids mattered more than she did, letting her leave on vacation without making the time to fix things…
“No, I’ll take you,” he’d told Anne, and now they were almost to the Fairlawn Memorial Park.
With a bouquet of yellow roses and a wildflower wreath on the seat between them.
“I really appreciate this,” she said. “I know you’ve got a lot of work backed up.”
He did, but this visit mattered more. Because Anne needed this trip.
“No problem,” Rafe assured her, pulling into a parking space. “It’s been twelve days since the funeral, and I should’ve come before now.”
But she surprised him with a quick gesture, laying her hand on his arm as if to cut off the very thought. “Not if it tears you up inside. Beth wouldn’t want that.”
No, she wouldn’t. Not Beth.
If this visit tore him up inside, though, it was no more than he deserved for letting her leave with things still uneasy between them.
And besides, he could handle it. As long as he had Anne to look after, there was no risk of breaking down.
Even so, accompanying her across the endless lawn to Beth’s grave cost him more self-control than he’d anticipated. And Anne seemed to realize that he wasn’t quite as strong as he’d hoped, because she made no attempt to engage him in conversation.
Without speaking, he placed his sheaf of yellow roses by the headstone and retreated to give her some time alone with Beth’s memory. Yet after a few minutes of what looked like silent prayer, she turned to him without even wiping away the tears on her cheeks.
“Rafe,” she said softly, “you have a right to feel bad, too.”
“I know.” But crying wasn’t an option. He swallowed and shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s okay.”
“I mean,” she faltered, addressing the flowers in her hands as if meeting his gaze might be too intimate, “I know you feel like you have to look out for me, but if you need a shoulder to cry on…I can look out for you, too.”
“That’s okay,” he said hastily. This trip was for Anne, not himself, but it was kind of her to make such an offer. “Thanks.”
She seemed to realize that he didn’t need comforting, because without another word she turned back to the grave and gently laid her own flowers next to his. Then she stayed still, probably saying goodbye to her sister in her own way, which Rafe hoped would take a while.
Because he needed to get himself back in control. Back to the kind of strength he’d relied on for years, the kind that kept him looking out for whoever needed protection.
Which didn’t include Rafe Montoya.
No matter what Anne thought. But since she wouldn’t be around for long, anyway, there was no point in explaining that he didn’t need a shoulder to cry on.
Never had, never would.
So get yourself together.
It helped to remember the day of the funeral, Rafe discovered, mentally reviewing all the mourners he’d seen around the closed casket. Beth’s friends from the quilt shop. The whole crew from Legalismo, because he hadn’t thought to insist on keeping the clinic open. A couple of former clients. Their old neighbors from across the street, the Harts, Roger and Linda and Marci and Jim….
“Thanks for bringing me,” Anne said, startling him with the realization that he’d completely lost track of the present. But apparently she had finished crying, leaving her wreath behind, because she was standing beside him and looking a lot more composed. As if she’d unloaded whatever grief was haunting her. “I needed to say goodbye.”
“I’m glad it helped,” he managed to answer as they started back toward the car. Back to real life, with its ongoing list of demands. Which reminded him of the guy who’d come in this morning, worried about his girlfriend taking their baby to Mexico. “Listen, if I go back to work tonight, will you be okay?”
She shot him a surprised glance. “Of course.”
Maybe he was judging all women by Beth, who’d hated it when he stayed late at the clinic. “You sure? I don’t want to leave you alone if you need—”
“A shoulder to cry on?”
He hadn’t even thought of that, but of course he’d be there for her if she needed to cry. “Well, yeah,” he said, reaching for his car keys. “Whatever I can do.”
Anne waited until he’d opened her door before fixing him with a wry gaze. “Kind of a one-way street we’ve got here, isn’t it?”
What, just because he wouldn’t cry on her shoulder? “Look,” he explained, holding his hands out in case she needed assistance, “I take care of people. I don’t need people taking care of me.”
She settled into her seat without taking his hand, moving so much more easily than yesterday that he felt a jolt of admiration for the physical therapist. “Ever?”
“Well, not since I was a kid.” Not since his mother had fled the burden of caretaking. Not since he’d learned it was all his fault.
Anne reached for her seat belt, flinching a little as she stretched her arm back, and returned her gaze to his. “Tell me about when you were a kid.”
Maybe she thought it would help him let go of some old grief or something, but he couldn’t expect her to enjoy hearing about his childhood in the barrios of L.A.
“That’s a story for some other time,” Rafe said lightly, closing her door and moving to his own side of the car.
But as soon as he took his seat, Anne shifted her posture as if to get a better look at him. “All right,” she said, and in her voice he heard the same determination he used to hear from Beth, whenever she tried to nurture him. “I’ll make sure and ask some other time.”
Some other time took a few days to arrive, but she wasn’t going to let him out of talking about his life. Not when, Anne suspected, this man was carrying more grief than anyone should have to carry alone.
So when Rafe picked her up after her last therapy session of the week and apologized for having to return to the clinic as soon as he dropped her off, she told him to skip the trip home. “I’ll just go with you,” she said, and felt a shimmer of satisfaction when he turned the car around.
Maybe a visit to Legalismo would give her the chance to help Rafe Montoya.
Because there was something bothering him, she knew. And if she could encourage him to talk about it—not directly, not when he’d made it clear that he didn’t need any nurturing—she might feel more capable of honoring Beth’s wishes.
Her sister wanted the people she loved to be taken care of, and Rafe needed someone to talk to.
There wasn’t much time for talk, though, she discovered when they arrived at the clinic and he introduced her to Oscar, a threatening-looking teenager who was evidently helping him replace a window.
“Only one bullet,” Oscar told him, fingering a dent in the wall behind Rafe’s desk. “Good aim, that’s all.”
Anne swallowed a gasp. “Somebody shot at you?”
“No, we were closed,” Rafe said, rolling up his sleeves while Oscar removed a sheet of cardboard from the window frame. “This happened last night, I just never got time today.”
He sounded as matter-of-fact as if the window had been shattered by a baseball, but apparently her start of alarm raised a red flag, because he turned to her with his usual swift offer of aid.
“Why don’t I take you home and come back later? You don’t need to wait around here.”
“No, that’s okay.” If she waited, it would give her a chance to read the Legalismo flyers she’d seen on the battered coffee table. And that, in turn, might give her some clue to drawing out this man. “Really, I’m fine. You guys go ahead and fix things.”
“This won’t take long,” Rafe promised as he and Oscar turned their attention to the pane of glass in the corner, so she returned to the lobby with its green plastic sofa and dented folding chairs. And by the time she made her way through the company-history brochure, halfway listening to the dialogue in Rafe’s office, she found herself more intrigued than ever.
How did he do that? she wondered. How did a Law Review attorney, regardless of his past experience, keep up such a natural, easy conversation with a gang-tattooed boy who responded only in monosyllables?
How could Rafe do such a breathtaking job of caring for everyone around him, and refuse to accept any support for himself?
And why should she care?
But she did, Anne knew, even though she had never been much of a nurturer. That was Beth’s role, while hers was to succeed in the world. Yet maybe the loss of her sister had made a difference in her priorities…because right now this man’s welfare mattered far more than any business.
More than anything, she wanted to give him a chance to let down his guard.
“Thanks,” she heard him tell Oscar, who came back through the lobby and headed outside without even a glance at her. All right, they must be finished—which meant she could start another attempt at looking out for the man her sister had loved.
“I didn’t think lawyers could install windows,” she told Rafe when he came down the hall, buttoning the cuffs of his sleeves.
“Depends on where they practice,” he replied, then shot her a quick grin as he wiped a streak of plaster dust off his face. A simple gesture, but one which—without any warning—suddenly made her heart skip a beat. “We’re in a pretty good location for this part of town, but bulletproof glass would be nice.”
Anne caught her breath. She had no business reacting to the sight of this man—not even in the context of physical labor, which made her more aware of his powerful body—with such raw, primitive yearning.
“Is it safe,” she asked, hoping her voice sounded normal, “working here?”
“Pretty much.” He evidently hadn’t noticed any flush of warmth on her skin, for which she could only be grateful, because he was moving with his usual unconscious grace. Opening the door, reversing a sign, twisting home the lock. “I won’t let the interns work alone, but I’ve never had any problems.”
She was supposed to be offering support, here, but for the moment all her carefully rehearsed openings had vanished, leaving her with a faster pulse and the desire to blurt out any question, any distraction she could think of. “Uh, do your clients carry guns?”
Rafe held up the No Drugs/No Weapons sign he’d just removed from the door and set it on the coffee table. “Not inside,” he announced, then glanced back at his office. “I just need to grab a few things, and we’re out of here.”
“Take your time,” she told him, and used the free minute to steady her breathing, pressing her hands against her thighs until she felt herself edging back into common sense. Enough so that by the time he returned with a handful of file folders, she was able to ask a casual question.
“Was this a pretty typical day?”
“Well, it’s not every day we have to replace a window.” He gave her an apologetic smile as he turned toward the ancient answering machine on the front desk. “Sorry that took so long.”
“No, I enjoyed seeing you in action.” Which wasn’t what she’d meant to say! Although she had enjoyed hearing his conversation, even before he came down the hall adjusting his shirt—and she’d better change the subject fast. “Is Oscar some kind of an assistant or something?”
Rafe picked up the machine and shook it until a red light came on. “I’m just keeping an eye on him.”
“How come?”
“He reminds me of myself, I guess.” He met her gaze with the same half confident, half defiant expression she’d noticed the other day, then set the machine back in place. “I’d like to see him get out of here.”
So her impression of Oscar as the dangerous type had been valid, Anne realized. Because according to the company brochure, Rafe himself had grown up as a gang member in Los Angeles…until his last juvenile conviction had started him down the road toward rehab, law school and the crusade to help kids like those he’d done time with.
“I saw that fund-raising story about your background,” she told him, and saw his posture stiffen as he headed down the hall.
“That was Peter’s idea,” he said, snapping off the light switch at the end of the hallway. “Guy who put up the money. He said we’d get a lot more donations if people saw a poster child make good.”
Although his face was obscured by the shadows as he came back toward the lobby, she heard the thread of uneasiness in his voice. “How do you feel,” Anne asked, “about being a poster child?”
He hesitated for a moment, then she saw his expression grow more determined, more resolute as he came into the light.
“It gets the job done.”
And getting the job done, she suspected, was worth any amount of sacrifice. If he was ashamed of his past, the way she suspected from the sound of his voice, he wouldn’t let that interfere with helping Legalismo.
“This really matters to you,” she said softly, “doesn’t it.”
“Yeah.” Rafe moved past her toward the desk, where he retrieved what looked like an appointment book from the center drawer and reached for a pencil. “I want to get some of these kids on track.”
“Who did that for you?”
“Lot of people,” he answered without looking up from the page. “I’m still paying it back.”
Which would explain his passion for the job, and why Beth had complained that he put his crusade ahead of his marriage. But paying back implied a time limit, which she couldn’t remember her sister mentioning. “For how long?”
He glanced at her then, checking off one last name on the page. “Beth always asked that, too.”
Maybe because she’d recognized that Rafe was already doing more for the world than it had done for him. “And what did you tell her?”
Shutting the appointment book, he slid it back into the drawer and straightened up. “Long as I can do somebody some good,” he said, reaching for his keys. “These kids—somebody’s gotta be there for ’em.”
It looked like he was getting ready to lock up, but she hated to leave right now. Not when a glimpse of his personality was almost within reach.
“Was anybody there for you?” she asked as he locked the desk drawer. And when he didn’t answer, she offered a prompt. “Your parents?”
“My mom took off when I was three.” He glanced around the room, as if making sure all the closing chores were complete. “My dad left me with a neighbor who left me with Aunt Nita, who left me with my grandfather, who—” Then he broke off, as if only now realizing what a narration he’d begun. “Long story. Anyway, you ready to go?”
No, although clearly his chores were finished. But they couldn’t leave with his story hanging in limbo like that, because finally she might be near his motivation to avoid needing anyone. “How many people left you?” Anne blurted.
“What, you want a head count?” He sounded amused rather than annoyed, but he made no attempt to offer a count. “It was a long time ago.”
All right, then. She wasn’t going to push for whatever lay behind that nonchalant defense…at least not now. Instead, she reached for her purse, then caught her breath. Cindy had warned her not to sit still for more than five or ten minutes without shifting her posture, but she hadn’t realized how much that warning mattered.
Because right now she couldn’t stand up without Rafe’s help.
Although helping her up probably wouldn’t affect him one bit, since he’d been touching her with such casual courtesy all along. She just needed to forget that bizarre moment of longing, which had swept through her a few minutes ago, and focus instead on—
On—
Oh, the business. Legalismo.
“Rafe,” she said hastily as he came toward her, “I should have told you this sooner, but I really admire what you’re doing here.”
“Ah. Thanks.” He leaned down, offering her his hands for as solid a grip as she needed, and as she rose from her seat she saw more warmth in his gaze than she’d ever noticed before.
“I mean,” she faltered, “you’re really making a difference in the world.”
Why that statement should affect him so strongly she wasn’t quite certain, but she saw an unmistakable glow of pleasure in his eyes as she recovered her balance.
“That means a lot,” he said, keeping hold of her hands until she felt the pulse of warmth between them swirling even higher, then quickly letting her go. “Thanks.”
It shouldn’t mean so much that somebody admired his work, Rafe told himself, handing his card to the judge’s clerk. Anne was just being polite, same as all the well-meaning donors who raved about the importance of saving kids from gangs.
But somehow her acknowledgment, coming from a woman so much like the one who’d resented his passion for Legalismo, made him smile every time he remembered it.
Like now, while he was waiting for Diego’s file, and mentally replaying this morning’s conversation with the physical therapist.
“Anne is terrific,” Cindy had told them both. “Lucky in the first place, yes, but also a really dedicated worker. And doing so well, she can start driving anytime now.”
Which was great, since he’d had to work around her schedule no matter how often she insisted she could take a cab.
But in a way, he would miss the conversations they’d shared on the way to her morning sessions and on the way home at night—
“Here you go,” the clerk told him, and he jerked his attention back to the judge’s office.
“Thanks,” Rafe muttered, and headed outside. His next mission was to check for messages, see if Anne was doing okay. See if she needed a ride home yet. She’d promised to call when she was ready to leave, but his cell phone had to stay silent in the judge’s chambers.
It rang the moment he switched it back on, and he felt a flash of pleasure before realizing that such intense happiness didn’t make sense. This might not even be Anne.
And even if it was, so what? The woman was his sister-in-law!
The caller, though, was the newest intern at Legalismo, Heidi, who had drawn front-desk duty for the day.
“I just thought you should know,” she told him, “someone called about the train crash. They’re returning Beth’s luggage, so I told them to bring it here.”
Real life couldn’t have intervened at a better time, Rafe decided. He needed a reminder of Beth right now, before he found himself edging toward fantasies that were completely out of line.
“If you want,” Heidi continued, “I can just put everything in the storage room until you’re ready. Because I remember when my dad died, it took my mom a long time to go through his things.”
That hadn’t struck him as a problem, although he’d been living with Beth’s things all along. He’d actually been seeing Beth’s face and her body and her clothes on Anne every day, so seeing the clothes she’d taken to California shouldn’t be any different.
“It’s okay,” he said, “I’ll swing by on the way home. Did they mention finding Anne’s things?”
“No, just Beth’s. I don’t think they’re very well organized.”
Anne might regret not having her own clothes back, although that would likely happen within the next few days. Meanwhile, there was no point in mentioning the find. He could go through Beth’s luggage on his own.
But it surprised him that night, handling the clothes from his wife’s severely battered suitcase, how much her scent resembled Anne’s. Maybe that was always the case with twins, but somehow he’d never noticed the similarity between his wife’s personal fragrance and her sister’s.
Which was something he needed to forget.
Because thinking that way about Anne was completely unacceptable.
Rafe picked up another shirt, caught Anne’s scent again and closed his eyes. He’d loved Beth, not her sister, so these feelings were way out of line. It would be one thing if he’d accidentally mistaken Anne for her twin—which people probably did all the time—but he knew perfectly well who was in the guest room down the hall.
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Laurie Campbell
HE WANTED A SECOND CHANCERafe Montoya had known his wife, Beth, was unhappy. She wanted him home earlier, wanted a baby, wanted more of himself than he could give. He thought that being her knight in shining armor would be enough. But then a tragic accident claimed Beth's life, and left her twin sister, Anne, injured–and he had run out of time. All he could do was help Anne recover her strength and her memory–it was what Beth would have wanted.Yet when Rafe looked in Anne's eyes, for a fleeting minute, he had the feeling it was Beth's eyes looking back at him. His Beth, ready and waiting to give him a second chance. But that was impossible…wasn't it?
Rafe smoothed out the paper and gazed at Beth’s handwriting that formed an uneven headline on the page.
Pros & Cons Of Staying Married/Getting Divorced.
What?
Rafe stared at it again, trying to come up with some reason—maybe she was helping a friend with a troubled marriage. But already his eyes were betraying him, racing down the list of pros and cons, and he felt a hollow ache creeping through his bones.
Beth’s life lay before him, and it looked like she hadn’t wanted him there. Because…
Lonely.
The word was a condemnation. He’d failed her worse than he realized, failed her right here in black and white.
No baby. No sharing. No time.
But he had tried, damn it! How could she say there was no sharing? No intimacy? He’d given Beth more of his heart and soul than he’d ever given anyone, and it still—
It still wasn’t enough.
And now it would never be enough.
Dear Reader,
It’s October, the time of year when crisper temperatures and waning daylight turns our attention to more indoor pursuits—such as reading! And we at Silhouette Special Edition are happy to supply you with the material. We begin with Marrying Molly, the next in bestselling author Christine Rimmer’s BRAVO FAMILY TIES series. A small-town mayor who swore she’d break the family tradition of becoming a mother before she becomes a wife finds herself nonetheless in the very same predicament. And the father-to-be? The very man who’s out to get her job….
THE PARKS EMPIRE series continues with Lois Faye Dyer’s The Prince’s Bride, in which a wedding planner called on to plan the wedding of an exotic prince learns that she’s the bride-to-be! Next, in The Devil You Know, Laurie Paige continues her popular SEVEN DEVILS miniseries with the story of a woman determined to turn her marriage of convenience into the real thing. Patricia Kay begins her miniseries THE HATHAWAYS OF MORGAN CREEK, the story of a Texas baking dynasty (that’s right, baking!), with Nanny in Hiding, in which a young mother on the run from her abusive ex seeks shelter in the home of Bryce Hathaway—and finds so much more. In Wrong Twin, Right Man by Laurie Campbell, a man who feels he failed his late wife terribly gets another chance to make it up—to her twin sister. At least he thinks she’s her twin…. And in Wendy Warren’s Making Babies, a newly divorced woman whose ex-husband denied her the baby she always wanted, finds a willing candidate—in the guilt-ridden lawyer who represented the creep in his divorce!
Enjoy all six of these reads, and come back again next month to see what’s up in Silhouette Special Edition.
Take care,
Gail Chasan
Senior Editor
Wrong Twin, Right Man
Laurie Campbell
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Thanks to my gifted friends on the Desert Rose
brainstorming loop, who always come through
with new possibilities, and to Lori De Jong and
Mary Rahrig, who help me keep God in the picture.
LAURIE CAMPBELL
spends her weekdays writing brochures, videos and commercial scripts for an advertising agency. At five o’clock she turns off her computer, waits thirty seconds, turns it on again and starts writing romance. Her other favorite activities include playing with her husband and son, teaching catechism class, counseling at a Phoenix mental health clinic and working with other writers. “People ask me how I find the time to do all that,” Laurie says, “and I tell them it’s easy. I never clean my house!” She rarely cleans her mailbox, either, which makes it a special treat to hear from readers on her Web site at www.bookLaurie.com.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Epilogue
Chapter One
If only she could say he loved her, the toothpaste wouldn’t matter.
Neither would the late hours. Neither would the baby—
No, the baby mattered.
“I want a baby,” Beth told her sister. “It all comes back to that.”
“Write it down,” Anne ordered, turning over the dining-car flyer on their breakfast table and sliding the blank page across the white tablecloth. “If you want to straighten things out with Rafe, you need to know exactly what the problem is.”
He doesn’t love me!
But she couldn’t bring herself to say that aloud.
“He doesn’t want a baby,” Beth said instead. Which amounted to the same thing. “I know we agreed to wait until the legal clinic was up and running, but that’s taking a lot longer than I expected.”
“Write it down,” her twin repeated, handing over a pencil, and Beth dutifully jotted “doesn’t want baby” on the paper. “When was the last time you talked about it?”
“Friday. The night before I left to meet you.” The night before her and Anne’s annual “Sisters’ Vacation,” she had accused her husband of caring more about Tucson’s street kids than having kids of his own.
And he hadn’t denied it.
“What happened?” Anne asked, and Beth gritted her teeth against the tip of the pencil.
“Nothing. I was kind of hoping he’d get mad, get upset, say I was wrong.” If he had lost his temper, sworn at her in the same gutter-style Spanish he used with the former gangbangers who occasionally phoned the house, she could have taken comfort in knowing his emotions were fully engaged. “But he just said the clinic’s not all the way there yet, and we have plenty of time.”
“Twenty-six isn’t exactly over the hill,” her sister observed. “And Rafe’s, what, twenty-eight? But okay, there’s problem number one. What else?”
“Isn’t that enough?” Beth protested, just as the waiter arrived with their breakfast order. She wished they could send him away, finish this conversation without the distraction of mushroom omelets and rye toast, but of course the fun of eating in a dining car was why they’d taken the train from Los Angeles back to Tucson.
Back to the husband who didn’t want her.
Or at least not nearly as much as she wanted him.
“I still can’t believe you decided to leave your wedding ring home,” Anne told her, eyeing the claddagh ring she’d loaned Beth when she found her crying over the vacancy a few nights ago. “And didn’t even mention it! Bethie, you need to talk about things more.”
Maybe so, but she couldn’t expect her sister to fix her problems. Taking care of people was Beth’s strong point, while Anne took care of everything else.
Besides, she’d hoped that a week away from Rafe would settle the turmoil inside her.
“I just thought,” she muttered, “I could try pretending we’d never gotten married, and see how it felt.”
“But it feels sad, doesn’t it?”
Which pretty well summed up her problem. Leaving the wedding ring in her jewelry box had been a foolish gesture, and the loan of her sister’s ring hadn’t made her finger feel any less forlorn.
“You have to talk things out,” Anne continued. “Forget this new-look stuff, that’s not what you need. Not that you don’t look wonderful—”
“You’re only saying that because I look like you.”
Her sister grinned, acknowledging the point. With Beth’s brand-new haircut, they looked more alike than they had in years. “Strawberry blondes are better with short curls, that’s all there is to it. But anyway, talking to Rafe would be the fastest way to fix things. I mean, if you want to stay married.”
“That’s what’s so embarrassing!” She still wanted him as her husband, and a whole week of vacation hadn’t made any difference in that fierce, heartfelt yearning for Rafe Montoya. “What kind of woman wants a husband who doesn’t need her?”
Anne hesitated, gazing at her coffee cup before meeting her gaze with an uncomfortable expression. “Bethie, I know you’ve got this thing about taking care of people, but being needed isn’t the same thing as being loved.”
Maybe such statements made sense for a career woman who didn’t understand the essentials of love, but Anne was completely wrong. “That’s what marriage is about!”
Her sister thought that over long enough for Beth to realize there was no comfortable solution to be found, then tapped the page on the table with her usual executive determination.
“You need a list of pros and cons,” she announced. “Reasons to stay married, and reasons to get divorced. Come on, write it down.”
“But…” What if the reasons for divorce outweighed the reasons for marriage? And how on earth had she and Anne traded roles so quickly, when normally she was the one taking care of her sister? “I don’t want to give up on him yet.”
“That goes in the pro column,” Anne ordered, taking another sip of her coffee. “What else do you like about him?”
It wasn’t a question of liking him, though. It was more a matter of loving him.
And suspecting he would never love her.
“Come on,” her sister prompted. “Is he smart, handsome, rich, charming, good in bed—”
“Anne!” They were in the middle of a dining car, with people all around them, and here she was asking about Rafe in bed?
“Good-looking, punctual, courteous, good athlete—”
“All of that,” Beth interrupted hastily, trying to dismiss the memory of his athletic body pressed against hers. At least while making love to her, Rafe Montoya could be wonderfully free with his emotions. “Well, except rich. He’s still paying back his student loans, and the legal clinic won’t ever make big money.”
“So that goes in the con column, along with waiting for a baby and leaving the lid off the toothpaste,” Anne directed. “Good thing he’s punctual, though, if he’s picking us up at the train station.”
They had arranged last week that Rafe would meet them at nine-thirty this morning, so he and Beth could show Anne their new house before taking her to the airport. And, knowing him, he had phoned the station at dawn to check on their arrival time.
Because while Rafe Montoya would never give his heart, neither would he give up a responsibility.
“Probably coming right from work,” Beth said, drawing a wavy line between the two columns on her page.
“He’s at work this early?”
No hour was too early for a man whose workday could easily begin at three in the morning. Or last for seventy-two hours at a stretch…especially if a juvenile gang member needed someone to post bail, a ride home from the police station, or a temporary place to stay.
“He probably spent the night at Legalismo,” she explained. “I mean, with me on vacation, there’s not much reason to come home.”
But as soon as she heard the words “not much reason to come home,” she wished she hadn’t spoken. Because they sounded like a death knell for her marriage.
And she wasn’t quite ready to accept that yet.
“Some people,” Anne said dryly, “might think sleeping in a real bed was worth driving home for.”
People who’d grown up sleeping in a real bed, yes.
“People like you and me,” Beth agreed. “But you know how Rafe is.”
Anne raised her eyebrows in agreement, as if confirming her initial opinion of Beth’s husband. On the night of Beth and Rafe’s engagement party, the first time she’d ever met him, she had drawn Beth aside and observed that the man was “incredibly gorgeous if you like that reformed-rogue, dark-and-dangerous look. But, Bethie, do you really want to spend the rest of your life with this Saint Rafael of the street kids?”
A question which had haunted her for the past six months.
“I know how Rafe is,” Anne agreed, glancing at her wristwatch. “If you say he’s gonna be on time, he’s gonna be on time.”
“You’ll make your flight home just fine,” Beth promised, noting with a touch of amusement that her sister was already slipping from vacation mode back into work mode.
Because she was still staring at her watch.
Or rather, at Beth’s engraved confirmation gift, which Anne had borrowed on the first day of their trip. Leaving her own watch at home, Beth’s twin had announced, was a stupid idea, and she was never listening to that stress-reduction tape again.
“Okay,” Anne said now, looking up with an apologetic smile as if realizing how quickly she’d shifted gears. “So I’ll be in Chicago by dark. But, listen, if you want time alone with Rafe, you don’t have to give me the house tour yet. I can see it next time I come out.”
“No, you have to see it! You’ll love how I did the guest room like an office, and next time you visit it’ll be like having your own desk right there.”
Anne grinned at her. “Humor the workaholic, right? I did pretty good this week, though.”
If you counted phoning the business manager twice a day as pretty good, then she had.
“You did,” Beth agreed. “And we even found time for shopping.” Her sister had insisted on new clothes to complement Beth’s midvacation makeover at San Diego’s trendiest salon, which had left them looking more like twins than they’d looked since seventh grade.
“Wasn’t that fun? The waiter just now, I could tell, was dying to ask.”
Anne always enjoyed fielding questions about what it was like to have an identical twin, and Beth had always been glad to let her sister do the talking. “You can tell him when he comes back with the coffee,” she offered, returning her gaze to the list of pros and cons. “I wish we had another few days of vacation.”
Sometimes a sympathetic look spoke more loudly than words, and Beth felt a flicker of dismay as she caught Anne’s expression. Her sister evidently suspected that a few extra days of vacation wouldn’t make any difference to the Montoyas’ marriage, but she was too tactful for such an observation.
“Listen,” Anne offered instead, “you know you can always come visit me. Actually, it’d be wonderful to have you looking out for things.”
“What, at the office?” That wasn’t Beth’s domain, even though they shared ownership and responsibility for their nonprofit company. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“But you could learn. I mean, if you decide you want a change in your life.”
Regardless of what happened with Rafe, though, she couldn’t imagine trading roles with her five-minutes-older sister. Anne was born to run a Dolls-Like-Me business that had blossomed ever since she took it over, while Beth was happy to work at home, designing look-alike dolls for Down syndrome children.
“Not that big a change,” she said. “But thanks, anyway.”
“All right, then, think about your list. You’ve only got three hours to finish it.”
Three hours to decide whether she wanted her marriage to last? “I can’t decide anything that fast,” Beth protested.
“You’re not making any decisions yet,” Anne explained, lifting her coffee cup and nodding at the waiter. “You’re just listing the pros and cons.”
“All right,” she conceded, and as soon as the waiter returned for the kind of conversation that men everywhere seemed to enjoy with her sister, Beth set to work on her list.
There wasn’t nearly enough space on the page, though, to describe what had happened over the past two years. Ever since she’d turned over the management of her home-based business to Anne, who’d returned from Harvard with an MBA, Beth had been ready to start a family ahead of schedule.
And Rafe wasn’t.
Not last year.
Not six months ago.
Not now.
No, all his passion was reserved for the legal clinic. All his fierce energy, all his intensity, all his time was devoted to helping kids escape the kind of life he’d survived with his crusading spirit aglow. The knight-in-shining-armor spirit which had captivated her the first time they’d met.
Back before she realized that it was far easier to love a knight in shining armor than to live with one.
“Tell you what,” Anne said, jolting Beth out of her reverie as the waiter departed. “You look like you need a break. Let’s go check out the observation car.”
They hadn’t toured the train last night, settling into their bunk-bedded sleeper compartment as soon as they’d pulled out of Los Angeles, but a view from the upper level would be a nice change of pace.
“Okay,” Beth agreed, and folded her list in half. She stuffed it into the side pocket of her suitcase as they passed the luggage area, hoping that’d help her forget the entire problem.
At least for the last few hours of the trip.
After all, the whole point of a “Sisters’ Vacation” was to enjoy spending time with her sister.
“Where shall we go next year?” she asked as they settled down in the observation car’s last pair of up-holstered seats, with a floor-to-ceiling view of the wide open desert. “It’s your turn to pick.”
“New York,” Anne said immediately. “You’ve never been, and you’re way overdue. Besides, if I’m still in touch with Marc, he’ll get us tickets to any Broadway show we want.”
Marc was the Italian architect her sister had met a few months ago, the latest in a string of eligible men whom Anne attracted and discarded with astonishing ease. But the idea of him being around next year implied more than the usual duration.
“You think he might be…” Beth hesitated, searching for the right word. “Is he special?”
“Not for a lifetime or anything,” Anne said, handing the newspaper on the table between them to a passenger who had evidently been hoping for a seat. “But for a few months, I think he’s a lot of fun.”
If only she could borrow her sister’s confidence as easily as she’d borrowed her claddagh ring. If only she could view the man in her life as “fun” and nothing more….
But that was no way to start a family!
And without a family, she might as well give up on mattering to anyone.
“You know what we need?” Anne asked, evidently noticing the distress on her face. “Coffee with brandy in it. Make the last part of the trip a little more bearable, what do you say?”
Coffee with brandy wouldn’t make her homecoming any easier, Beth suspected, but if Anne was dreading the end of the trip, as well, it would be no problem to run down to the bar car.
“I’ll get it,” she offered, scanning the aisle and realizing there were already passengers waiting for someone to leave. “If you want to save our seats, I’ll be right back.”
“Well, at least let me pay for it,” Anne said, handing over her wallet-size purse and moving Beth’s handbag into the empty chair beside her as a placeholder. “I’ll be right here unless some better seats open up.”
Such confidence was typical of her sister, Beth decided as she made her way down the narrow staircase with Anne’s flame-red purse in hand. Some people were born with the kind of certainty it took to make things go exactly the way they wanted…which made them even more attractive to everyone they met.
And that observation was confirmed as soon as she reached the bar car, where a man with a briefcase looked up from one of the tables and greeted her with an exuberant smile.
“Anne Farrell! Jake Roth, from Boston. How’ve you been?”
She hadn’t been mistaken for her sister since high school, and it was as disconcerting as ever. Flattering, yes, but also embarrassing when someone refused to believe they’d gotten the wrong twin.
Jake Roth was already standing up to shake hands, looking so pleased that she hated to disappoint him. “Actually,” Beth began, “Anne is my—”
“Great to see you!” he interrupted, offering a hearty handshake before she could continue her explanation. “Mindy still asks about you, I’ve gotta tell her we were on the same train. Where you heading?”
“Uh, Tucson.” It was hard to keep her balance, for some reason, the train felt shakier than usual. “But, Mr. Roth—”
“Jake,” he protested, when suddenly the floor jerked underfoot and Beth felt herself lurching sideways. He caught her, then stumbled himself, and the floor seemed to sway in the other direction.
She grabbed the table, which felt solid for a fleeting moment, until something slammed into the man beside her and sent them both staggering back. Then, as another passenger cried out in alarm, she heard a harsh, grinding shriek of metal and his warning shout, “Anne, hold on, we’re gonna crash!”
No, surely they’d just hit a rock or something—but even as she fought for such reassurance there came a heart-wrenching scream. Beth froze in panic, felt the floor give way beneath her, and looked up to see the wall of the train collapsing on top of Jake.
And herself.
Would Beth be smiling?
Maybe, Rafe decided as he unlocked the scarred wooden door with its Legalismo sign, he should hold the flowers in plain sight when she got off the train. He’d stopped on his way to work for the kind of bouquet people gave visiting celebrities, a comparison she’d probably blush at…but he needed to show her how much she mattered.
After their grim parting last week, without even a phone call since her plane landed in California, he needed to prove to Beth she was still the most important person in his life.
So he’d made reservations for a homecoming dinner tonight, and—
“Hey.”
The kid’s voice was elaborately casual, but he recognized the desperation that would lead someone to camp outside a law office at this hour of the morning. And he’d be glad at any hour to talk with Oscar Ortiz, who reminded him so acutely of himself at fifteen.
“Bueno,” Rafe greeted him, then saw the gun in his waistband. Rather than risk losing the kid again, he made a show of fighting a yawn. “I was just thinking about getting some coffee. Walk with me?”
He wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee in spite of the August heat, because as long as they stayed on the street he could avoid enforcing the No Drugs/No Weapons policy that ruled the clinic. So when Oscar shrugged, he locked the door and started down the cracked sidewalk toward the nearest bodega.
If he could ease Oscar out of Los Lobos the same way he’d gotten himself out of the Bloods…
“You still lookin’ to meet Cholo?” the boy asked, and Rafe shot a quick glance at his watch. This could be tight, because he had to leave for the train station in plenty of time to meet Beth. Yet he couldn’t ignore the chance to strengthen a potential bond with the leader of the second biggest gang in the area.
Oscar evidently saw the glance, though, because he immediately withdrew the offer. “Lawyer’s got places to be.”
“Yeah,” Rafe said. No sense trying to save the conversation now, and as long as he kept things straightforward there might be another chance later. “I’m picking up my wife. She’s taking the train in from L.A.”
The kid gave him a suspicious glance, even as he swiped his hand across a bench with a rival gang’s chalk-marked emblem. “That’s not the one that crashed, is it?”
A train crash? No, he would’ve heard.
“It was on the radio,” Oscar reported, evidently seeing his disbelief. “Some big wreck out in the desert.”
No. Not Beth’s train. There had to be, what, half a dozen trains between here and Los Angeles? More than that. There had to be.
But even so, he felt a cramp of fear in his chest before reminding himself that Beth was surely fine, that he wasn’t losing anyone he loved.
Not again.
Never again.
“She can’t be on that train,” Rafe told Oscar, who shrugged and looked past him toward the police car at the corner. “Not Beth.” Not his wife. “She’s fine.”
The kid shrugged again, as if unwilling to comment, and Rafe felt his body tightening with the same reflex he used to feel before an attack.
“It’s a mistake, that’s all,” he said. The radio probably reported things wrong all the time, and some station must’ve been trying to stir up excitement by announcing a train wreck that had never taken place. “I just need to straighten it out.” A simple phone call would do the trick, and for the first time he found himself wishing he’d given in to Beth’s request that he carry a phone for those nights he worked late.
“The radio—” Oscar began, and Rafe cut him off.
“I’ve gotta find out what happened.” There, a pay phone across the street. No one there, either, which—if the phone still worked—would save him the two minutes it’d take to run back to the office. He sprinted for the phone and felt a surge of relief at the sound of a dial tone, then fumbled in his pocket for change.
Beth was fine.
He just had to—
Damn! Two nickels and a couple of bills, which meant he’d have to hit the bodega for change and then—
“Here.” Oscar dropped a handful of coins on the ledge beside him, then sauntered away as Rafe fumbled with the quarters. Where to call, somebody, who, the train station? Right, they would know, and from memory he dialed the number he’d called at dawn to confirm the nine-thirty arrival from Los Angeles.
Somebody had to know, he told himself as he listened to the phone ring. Somebody there would tell him everything was fine, that Beth was fine—she had to be fine, he wasn’t losing her. She had to be safe.
“The nine-thirty from Los Angeles,” Rafe barked at the clerk who answered the phone. “My wife is on there, and—”
“Sir,” came the reply, “there’s been a…a delay…and we’ll have all the information here. If you’ll please come—”
“No, I just need to know, is she all right?”
A hesitation.
“Sir, please come to the station and—”
He slammed down the phone. This wasn’t working, but everything would be fine. Beth would be fine. Okay, maybe they were having some problems, but he could fix that. Get everything straightened out, make her understand they still had plenty of time for a baby. He could fix anything, he just needed to find out what was—who could—
Morton, he remembered. The cop who’d helped him, under the radar, a few months ago when those kids needed a word.
Morton could find out. Except, damn it, he’d left the number back at the office.
Rafe took off running, fueled by the same panic that had once filled his nights as a matter of routine, back when you never knew who was coming after you. Nobody after him now, the streets were almost empty—although that didn’t necessarily mean anything—but all he had to do was reach the clinic, fumble with the door key, shaking, damn it! and there was nobody waiting for him, good, because he couldn’t protect anyone else right now, not until he found Beth.
There, the phone. Morton’s number, direct line, if the cop would just pick up, okay, no time for conversation, just identify himself and ask—
“Can you find out about a train wreck?”
“What, the derailment?” The cop’s voice was more curious than bewildered, which meant Oscar’s radio report might’ve been accurate after all. But that still didn’t mean there was anything wrong. Beth was fine.
“The one from Los Angeles,” Rafe said over a short, tight breath. “My wife’s on there.”
“Oh, man.” Morton sounded alarmed, but that was probably just the phone connection. Because everything was fine. “Hold on, let me see what—hold on.”
Beth was fine, he repeated to himself as he gripped the phone with a fist too numb to release, and paced the six-foot gap between his desk and the door.
Beth was safe.
She was on her way home right now.
Right. Right, although people didn’t always come home—look at Mom, look at Carlos, look at Nita and Gramp and Rose—but this wasn’t the same thing. It wasn’t like he depended on Beth.
Never had, never would.
So she had to be fine. It was just taking Morton a while to confirm that, but any minute he’d be back on the line with word that Beth’s train delay was nothing, a minor glitch…. And there he was now.
“Rafe?” The cop sounded uneasy, and he felt himself bracing for a blow before he could remember that everything was fine. “Look, I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but—” Then Morton broke off. “Wait a minute, was your wife traveling with—”
“Her sister, yeah,” he managed to answer. Maybe there was a mix-up, maybe something had happened to her sister. Which would be hard on Beth, yeah, but as long as she was still alive— “Anne. They’re twins.”
“Ah, hell,” the cop muttered. There was a pause, during which Rafe scrambled for any prayer he could think of, any hope, any magic, and came up completely blank. “The sister’s being transported to emergency right now. But Beth…I’m sorry. She didn’t make it.”
No.
No, he repeated as he slowly replaced the phone in its cradle. That wasn’t possible.
It couldn’t happen.
It happens all the time.
No.
Not this time.
“She didn’t make it.”
Not Beth.
Not again.
But already he recognized the feeling—that same heaviness, that same hot pressure of tears—
No.
No tears. He had to move, Rafe knew, he had to move someplace, do something—
Not cry.
No. No point. He stumbled into the lobby, where if anyone was waiting he could find something to do, something besides crying, because he wasn’t crying, this was crazy, even with nobody here he still wasn’t breaking down—
It hurts.
No, it couldn’t. Beth couldn’t be gone, because he still needed to fix things. After the way she’d left, thinking that delaying a baby meant he didn’t love her, when he did love her—
But not enough.
Never enough.
Rafe felt a shudder rising in his chest and gulped it down, bracing his hands against the back of the cracked plastic sofa where clients waited for the lawyer on duty. He couldn’t lock the door, not when someone might show up any minute, but he couldn’t—
God, he couldn’t do this.
He couldn’t fix this.
He had to fix this! That was his job, fixing things, and he couldn’t stand here crying in the clinic lobby—
But the tears wouldn’t stop. No matter how he clenched his muscles, how rigidly he held his breath, for some reason there was no swallowing the—
Not here!
Rafe fled to the bathroom and slammed the door lock home, already feeling the torrent of heat swelling into his eyes, his throat. God, he was practically choking, and suddenly he was sobbing, and somehow he couldn’t seem to stop, couldn’t keep from gasping out the desperate plea….
No. Not Beth.
Not this time.
Please!
There was no answer, which he already knew was the only possible response, but even so he begged with all his heart, with all his hope, knowing all the while that it wasn’t enough. Crying wouldn’t help, nothing helped, and he had to get himself together, get himself out of here, get back to the kind of strength he’d spent a lifetime building so this pain would never come back.
It was back now, though, worse than he remembered from the last time, although by now he knew how to fight it. Knew how to move, knew to flex his arms behind his back, to stop those bone-jarring gasps for breath and count five, ten, fifteen…
Seventy-five, eighty, eighty-five.
Two twenty, two twenty-five, two hundred thirty.
Counting as high as it took. That was the beginning, he knew, but real strength lay elsewhere. For real strength, he had to get out of here, he had to take care of someone. Anyone. Maybe some clients in the lobby, although he hadn’t heard anyone come in—and when he finally managed to square his shoulders and resolutely opened the bathroom door, the clinic was empty.
Okay. He could still get through this.
He knew what to do.
If there was nobody here, he’d try somewhere else. He could do it, Rafe knew. He’d done this before. Just find someone to look out for, somebody hurting or scared or—
Hurting. Right.
Anne.
Emergency, the cop had said, and she’d have to be at the hospital by now. So…
Okay. He locked the clinic door for the second time that morning and started for the dirt lot behind the building. Just move, just go. Protecting someone was the key to staying strong, and Beth’s sister was probably in bad shape right now.
So get going, Rafe ordered himself, stumbling blindly toward his car. Go, and you can get through this.
You can do this.
Go take care of Anne.
Chapter Two
“Anne? There’s someone here to see you.”
The soothing voice was familiar, although she couldn’t quite say why. Maybe she’d heard it this morning, or during the night, or—
Wait, was it morning?
Well, there seemed to be light somewhere, yes. And the light seemed familiar, as well, which must mean she was at home in—
In—
In bed, right, but why didn’t this feel like her bed? Her bed shouldn’t hurt, yet this one felt strangely painful. Like she’d been sleeping wrong, with her arm twisted backward and something burning her side. “Anne, would you like to visit with your brother-in-law today?”
The question sounded like it was meant for her, but did that mean she was Anne? The name seemed familiar, somehow, even more than the cajoling voice and the light creeping into her eyes….
“He’s been coming every day to see how you’re doing, and he keeps saying you’re not to worry about a thing—”
“Okay,” she murmured. Or at least she meant to say that, but her voice didn’t sound quite right. Still, it must have gotten through to the woman who was speaking, because she gave a delighted cry.
“You’re awake! Let me run tell Dr. Sibley. Now, you don’t have to see anyone until you’re ready, but I know your brother-in-law would be thrilled if you’re feeling up to it.”
“Okay,” she said again, and this time it sounded clearer—even though she still couldn’t quite sit up. “What… Uh, what…” She couldn’t quite think of what she wanted to ask, but something didn’t feel right.
“You’re in the hospital, sweetie. You’ve been here for eight days, and we were starting to get a little worried about you, but now you’re going to be just fine.”
The hospital? Had they taken her tonsils out? She remembered the hospital, with her sister in the next bed—oh, and they were laughing about something!—but that seemed like a long time ago. Eight days?
No, more than that.
“I’m going to send him in,” the woman announced, helping her to a sitting position that somehow rattled a tube in her arm. “You take all the time you want to get comfortable, and he’s certainly not going to expect any conversation, but if Dr. Sibley is on rounds you might as well have some company with you.”
“Okay.” She was getting pretty good at that one word, and it seemed to thrill the nurse—a nurse, right? Wearing a white uniform in a hospital, she had to be a nurse. And the way she backed out of the room, with a watchful eye all the way to the door, rang with the comfort of familiarity.
Even if everything else was mixed up right now, at least she could still recognize a nurse.
She didn’t recognize the man who came in next, though. Not a doctor, because he wore what she thought of as “lawyer” clothes—a conservative white shirt and gray suit, but with his tie and shirt collar loosened.
And he also wore a look of intense relief.
“Anne,” he greeted her, reaching for both her hands and giving them a surprisingly gentle squeeze. Maybe because of that metal thing bracing her arm, which she didn’t remember from the tonsil hospital. “You’re gonna be okay. Dr. Sibley said another few days here, maybe six weeks of physical therapy, and you’ll be good as new.”
He seemed so pleased about that, it must be good news. “Good,” she managed to answer. But it didn’t explain who this man was. “Um…are you the doctor?”
He reacted with a jolt of shock as he moved a plastic chair closer to her bedside, then she saw his startled expression replaced by something more careful. More calm.
“I’m Rafe Montoya,” he said, and hesitated. As if he was waiting for her to recognize the name. “Your sister’s husband.”
Her sister had a husband? She hadn’t remembered that from the tonsil hospital, either, but if her sister was married they must have left childhood behind them a long time ago. “Where is she?”
Even though the man retained that same relaxed demeanor, she saw a flash of pain in his eyes before he sat down and met her gaze again. “She isn’t here. You…you were pretty badly hurt.”
“I thought so,” she admitted, shifting away from whatever was pressing against her side. “I don’t feel right.”
He nodded, then reached across her to move something at the edge of her bed—which left her feeling a little more comfortable. “You and Beth,” he said slowly, “were in a train wreck.”
“Beth?” That name felt familiar, and from the way he spoke it, she could tell it belonged to someone he loved. “My sister?”
“Yeah. Anne, I’m sorry.” The nurse had called her that, too, which meant she must be Anne. And the combination of those names seemed to resonate within her, as if Anne and Beth belonged together. “I didn’t realize you— Everything’s kind of a blank, huh?”
Pretty much, but she hated to see this man so worried. Especially when he had his wife to worry about…although Beth must be all right by now, because otherwise her husband wouldn’t be here.
“No,” she assured him, “I remember having our tonsils out.” For some reason that memory was the clearest—maybe because this hospital smelled the same as that other one—but there were other images floating in her mind, as well. Playing with a dog, braiding each other’s hair, cutting out snowflakes… “Only it was a long time ago.”
“Yeah, I guess it was.” He gazed at her for a moment, as if the sight of her face offered some curious mixture of nostalgia and regret, then gave her an apologetic smile. “Look, maybe you just need to concentrate on getting some rest. There’s a lot of people praying for you.”
“Really?” For some reason, she couldn’t think of anyone who’d do that except her sister, who ought to be arriving any minute…because somehow she had the feeling there was no other family in her life. No parents, no grandparents, no one but her sister.
And this man. Rafe.
Her sister’s husband.
“Yeah, well, Jake Roth—the guy who pulled you off the train?” Rafe seemed to think that phrase might trigger a memory, but again nothing came to mind. “He and his wife have been calling. And everybody in Chicago.”
Chicago. That sounded vaguely familiar, and she had an impression of a city skyline. Maybe on a calendar, or a postcard. “Is that here?”
“No, right now you’re in Tucson.” He closed his eyes for a moment, then continued, “That’s where Beth and I lived…uh, live.” But the falter in his voice spoke more vividly than his show of calm, and she knew there was something terribly wrong. “You and Beth were on vacation, and—”
“Is she okay?”
He hesitated, and she felt a sinking sensation inside her even before he met her gaze and said quietly, “Beth is…she’s gone.”
Gone? As in—
She must have flinched, made some kind of whimper, because he swiftly reached for her hands. “Anne, I’m sorry,” he blurted, then continued in a rush as if the right words delivered quickly enough could somehow ease the shock. “Everybody said it must’ve happened really fast, before the fire. She never knew what hit her.”
But that meant—
“Beth…my sister? She’s dead?”
Still holding her hands, he nodded. Just once, without looking up.
“Oh, no.” That couldn’t be. “No, she’s not.” Only a moment ago they’d been playing in the tonsil hospital, arranging paper dolls on their beds, and— “Not my sister!”
But his expression didn’t change, and she felt a new jolt of pain that eclipsed any other sensation. Her other self, her longest companion, the sister she’d shared her life with was gone?
No, she couldn’t lose her sister.
“I can’t—” she began, then stopped. Crying now would only make the pain worse, and she couldn’t bear that right now. “Oh, Rafe…”
“I’m sorry,” he repeated, with a crack in his voice, and suddenly she realized that he must be hurting as much as herself. This ache, this sharp and hollow desolation, wasn’t solely her own…but how was anyone supposed to get through a loss like this?
She couldn’t think about it, that’s all. Surely the next time she woke up, her sister would be in the bed next to hers. All she had to do was sleep again, and everything would be fine.
Except somehow she knew it wouldn’t be. Maybe just because of his anguished expression, but—
Oh, dear God. Not only had she lost her sister, but this man had lost his wife.
“Are you okay?” she blurted.
The question seemed to startle him, because he let go of her hands and sat up straighter in his chair.
“I’ve had a while to get used to it,” he answered with such deliberate steadiness that she knew he wasn’t okay, but that he wasn’t about to say so. “Anyway, I know Beth would want me to make sure you’re all right.”
Which explained why he’d been coming every day for the past eight days. Beth must have wanted the certainty that her loved ones were taken care of.
“Anything you need,” Rafe continued. “The insurance and everything, I took care of that already. But anything else…I want to help.” And then, as if he knew at the same moment she did that nothing sounded better than sleep, he stood up and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I mean it, Anne. Whatever you need, I’m here for you.”
He did mean it, she knew, even before he rested a gentle hand on her shoulder and turned to move his chair away. And she knew why it mattered to him…which meant she must be remembering the essence of her sister.
“Someone has to be there for the people she loved,” Anne whispered. Because somehow she already knew that, even while Rafe was looking out for her, she needed to be there for him, as well. “That’s how Beth would want it.”
That’s how Beth would want it.
The phrase stayed with him over the next few days, promising a faint hope of making amends to his wife. If he could just continue taking care of Anne until she was back on her feet, he could take comfort in knowing Beth’s wish was coming true.
At least one wish.
“Feeling better?” he asked Anne each afternoon for the next week, and her responses grew gradually more coherent. To the point where he could finally tell her, “The nurse says you’ll be ready to leave, day after tomorrow.”
“I can’t wait to get out of here,” she said, shifting in bed with considerably more ease than she’d shown only a few days ago. “Back to…well, real life.”
But she looked uncertain about the prospect, which he suspected meant there were still some gaps in her memory.
“Look, don’t push yourself,” Rafe warned. He’d already phoned Dolls-Like-Me to warn everyone that Anne needed time to recover, and had accepted their condolences with the careful guard he’d perfected over the past two weeks. “If it takes a while for you to remember things, the doctor said that’s normal.”
“I know, but I hate not knowing things! Yesterday someone named Marc sent this strange letter saying he wants to give his marriage another try. Except I can’t believe I’d be dating a married man.”
He had no idea who this woman might date, but she seemed so disturbed that he hurried to offer the first reassurance he could think of. “Maybe the guy didn’t tell you he was married.”
Anne contradicted him with a rueful smile. “Or maybe I’m a really bad judge of character.”
No, that didn’t fit with what he knew of her. “Beth always said,” he offered over the knot that still rose in his throat whenever he spoke her name without preparing for it, “there was nobody in the world as smart as you.”
Without warning, he saw her eyes fill with tears. But unlike himself, she seemed to take such weakness for granted.
“More than anything,” Anne whispered, “I miss her. I don’t remember what we used to talk about, or even her phone number, but I remember having the other half of me. I can’t believe she’s gone!”
Losing someone you’d known since before birth, he realized, must be even more traumatic than losing your memory. And while time supposedly made every loss better, you sure couldn’t prove that by him.
But he was fine, Rafe reminded himself hastily.
He knew how to get through this.
“If only I’d stayed with her,” she continued, twisting the edge of the hospital sheet between her fingers. “If we’d been together when the train crashed—”
“You’re not blaming yourself, are you?” he interrupted. He’d done the same thing when Gramp died, and again when Carlos was shot, but she couldn’t possibly be responsible for a train wreck. “It was an accident, Anne. One in a million.”
“I just…I wish I’d done something different. I don’t know what,” she said, and her voice broke on the edge of a sob. “But to let my sister die, and not me…that’s not right. It’s just not right!”
Her loss was even worse than his own, Rafe realized with a tug of compassion. Maybe he was hurting, but at least he knew how to take care of himself. “I’m sorry,” he said, leaning forward to take her hands in his. “I’m really, really sorry.”
Her tears spilled over so easily that he found himself almost envying her—which was crazy, because this woman didn’t have anything to fall back on. Nobody to protect. But after a few minutes, she straightened up and wiped her eyes, looking so much like Beth that he felt his heart twist all over again.
“I shouldn’t keep—” she began apologetically, then broke off. “You’re going through the same thing.”
Not exactly, because Anne had never failed the sister she loved. Never woken up reaching for Beth before remembering, once again, how cold and how distant their parting had been.
But there was no point getting into any of that, no point in encouraging her sympathy.
He didn’t need it.
“Yeah,” Rafe muttered, “but at least I can remember where I live.”
She gave him a startled glance, and then the same wry smile he’d seen on Beth a thousand times—making his heart lurch for a moment before he realized that identical twins would naturally share similar expressions. Seeing Anne’s smile, though, he was struck once again by the astonishing resemblance between the sisters, and for a wild instant he wondered whether there could have been some mistake.
But an old friend had identified Anne to the trauma team, and they’d reported finding Beth’s watch and handbag with her body. Besides, this woman’s hair was different and the ring she wore wasn’t Beth’s…which meant, Rafe knew, he was spinning impossible fantasies.
“I sort of remember where I live,” Anne told him. “And I know, once I see it, everything will come back. I just need to get home, and the hospital social worker’s coming to talk about that tomorrow.”
But his phone calls to Chicago had revealed that Beth’s original assessment of Anne was correct. As a woman completely dedicated to business, she’d never bothered with close friendships.
At least not with the kind of friends who would take her in while she completed six weeks of physical therapy. Everyone who’d inquired about her had sounded cordial yet harried, and not one had offered her a place to stay.
The way Beth would have, in an instant.
“Look,” he said, “before you talk to the social worker, there’s something I want to run by you. Because while you’re doing your physical therapy, you’ll need a place to stay.”
“I have an apartment in Chicago,” she told him, then gestured toward a small red purse on her bedside table. “I keep looking through my wallet for clues, and I live at—”
“Yeah, but you need a place where there’s someone to look after you.” Maybe not around the clock, but at least someone who could be on call throughout her recovery period. “I think you should stay in our guest room,” he told her. “I can drive you wherever you need to be, or you can use Beth’s car as soon as you’re driving again. And anything you need help with, I’ll be right there.”
She looked a little hesitant. “I…”
“Or if I’m working,” Rafe continued hastily, “I’ll have the phone with me.” The phone Beth had urged him to use, and though he hadn’t honored her request at the time he could damn sure make up for it now. “You can call anytime. Anytime. I mean it.”
Anne regarded him with a sober gaze. “You’ve put a lot of thought into this,” she observed.
Because it was his only way of making amends to Beth. The only possible way to keep himself strong. To protect someone who needed it—and she did need it.
“Well, it just makes sense,” he said. “For the next six weeks, I think this would be the best thing for you.”
“Maybe it’d be the best thing for both of us,” she said, which startled him. Anne didn’t need to worry about what was best for him.
But as long as she was willing to let him take care of her, Rafe reminded himself, there was no point arguing about it. And already she was nodding in agreement.
“All right, then. Thanks,” she murmured, and he felt a rush of relief shoot through his veins. “For the next six weeks, Rafe, I’ll come stay with you.”
Rafe was as thoughtful a host as anyone could possibly want, Anne decided after he’d left her alone to “settle in” to the guest room Beth had reportedly decorated with her in mind. The room wasn’t quite as cozy or relaxing as she might have liked, but surely her sister had known her tastes.
Which meant, she realized while rearranging the bewildering jumble of faxes on the desk, this room was just one more example of how the accident had changed her character.
It was nothing to worry about, Dr. Sibley had assured her. People always changed after some kind of trauma, and the changes seldom lasted.
So this feeling of being slightly off balance, of not recognizing clients and names she had apparently known for years, was sure to disappear soon.
As if he’d sensed her disquiet, Rafe called from the hallway outside her door, “Anne, you all right? Can I get you anything?”
“I’m okay,” she called back, then realized he must be deliberately keeping out of her room. “Come in…I was just looking at all these faxes.”
He frowned when he saw her hunched over the desk, but refrained from comment. Instead he said, “I’m going to make some coffee, if you want any.”
Coffee sounded surprisingly good, although she hated to have him waiting on her after he’d already disrupted his entire day to bring her home from the hospital, past the physical therapy clinic for a first meeting with Cindy, and finally here.
“I’ll do it,” Anne offered, and he stopped her with a quick gesture.
“You’ll be on your own tomorrow morning, remember? Don’t push it.”
She had insisted that he maintain his usual schedule at the legal clinic, even though it meant taking a cab to her therapy session, and Rafe had reluctantly agreed to keep his early-morning appointment with a pregnant teenager. This man lived for the street kids he served, Anne suspected, and her rueful awareness of such devotion meant that Beth must have complained about it.
As a third party, though, she couldn’t help admiring his heartfelt dedication to the job.
After all, from the tone of the messages on her desk, she apparently shared it herself. Which made it all the more disturbing that none of these faxes made sense.
“I’d better save the coffee break for when I get caught up,” she admitted, and Rafe hesitated in the doorway.
“Take it easy, okay?” he cautioned her, evidently viewing the warning as even more vital than the coffee. “Give yourself time to get back on your feet.”
Good advice, she knew, but that didn’t make it any easier to ignore the pile of papers on her desk. She picked up the stack again, wincing at the thought of all those decisions to be made. “I just feel bad thinking about everyone in Chicago, waiting for me to get back—”
“Anne,” he interrupted, crossing the room to pull the papers away from her and jamming them into a drawer. “Stop it. They’re lucky to have you alive, period, and they can wait another couple months to have you back.”
She should probably take offense at such high-handed behavior, but for some reason all she could feel right now was gratitude. Because this man, however dictatorial, was right. What mattered was being alive.
And everything else could wait.
“Thanks,” she murmured, then saw the wreath of straw flowers in the drawer he’d left open. That Southwestern cluster of turquoise and coral blossoms mingled with twigs was part of the guest room decor, and its absence had puzzled her. “Oh, the desert wreath! I was wondering what happened to—”
But that didn’t make sense, she realized with a sudden jolt of shock, and saw the same incredulity on Rafe’s face before his expression grew softer.
“Beth must have told you a lot about the house,” he observed.
That did make sense. Far more sense than feeling as if she and Beth had somehow traded places.
“That has to be why I know where everything goes,” Anne agreed. And why she felt so very much at home here, as if she belonged in this house. It was the same sense of belonging she had felt when Rafe brought her Beth’s clothes to wear home from the hospital—their luggage from the train was still lost somewhere—and she’d been overwhelmed with a sense of familiar comfort. “We must’ve spent so much time talking, it’s like…well, kind of like she’s still with me.”
He regarded her curiously for a moment, but she saw no hint of doubt in his dark, watchful eyes. “Yeah?”
“I know that sounds weird, but—”
“No,” he said gently, “not for twin sisters. And you two were pretty close. You talked every week.”
They must have, because otherwise she couldn’t possibly have known that Beth kept pencils in the file cabinet.
But how could she be so clear on pencils, on how to jiggle the bedside lamp switch, on the names of her sister’s closest friends, and so vague on the details of her own life in Chicago?
“I wish I could remember more,” Anne told him. “I know it’ll all come back, but so far almost everything I remember is from when we were little.”
“Give yourself time,” he repeated, then sat down on the foot of the copper-varnished bed, facing her with a mingled look of resolve and entreaty. “Meanwhile, is there anything I can do?”
He’d done so much already that she hated to ask for more, but seeing her sister’s wreath had reminded her of the need for a traditional farewell. She would never say goodbye to the memories of her twin, which seemed even stronger here in Beth’s home, but after missing the funeral she needed to make some kind of gesture.
“Well, if you wouldn’t mind…I’d really like to take Beth some flowers.”
Rafe hesitated, and she saw his neck muscles tighten.
“It’s okay,” she said hastily. The man didn’t need any more reminders of what he’d lost. “I can do that later.”
“No.” He stood up, squaring his shoulders. “No, you need to say goodbye.” Then he glanced at his watch. “Let me just—”
“Rafe, not now!” Surely he didn’t think she meant him to drop everything and escort her to the cemetery this very minute. “I just meant, when you get time.”
But apparently he was already recovered from that moment of hesitation, because he asked, “How about tomorrow?”
After more than two weeks since her sister’s death, there couldn’t be any rush about saying goodbye. And yet visiting Beth’s grave might let her start working through the grief, accepting the loss and moving on.
“Well,” she said softly, “if that’s all right with you.”
“Yeah, it’s okay. It’s fine.” He walked back to the door, then turned to face her again, as if he needed to explain himself. “I haven’t been there since the funeral.”
“You don’t have to—” she began, and he cut off her protest.
“No, I do. How about, I pick you up from your session with Cindy and we’ll stop for flowers on the way.”
Suddenly the man was sounding more like an attorney than she’d ever imagined him—more decisive and also more determined—yet somehow she had the impression that his take-charge demeanor was only a facade.
“Is that all right?” she faltered. “I don’t want to put you through—”
“Anne, come on.” Even his posture had changed; he was standing with an attitude of confidence that bordered on defiance. “I can handle it.”
“Well, it’s just…”
“I can handle it!”
“Because you’re Mr. Tough Guy,” she offered, and he responded with a startled expression.
“Did Beth tell you that?”
She must have. But anybody could see from his stance, from the way he held himself ready for battle, that Rafe Montoya would stand alone against whatever challenge came his way—and that an offer of support would only make his determination more fierce.
“You don’t need anyone looking out for you,” Anne observed.
It surprised her when a flicker of remorse crossed his face. “No,” he muttered, dropping his gaze to the carpet. “That drove her crazy.”
And that sounded like the kind of marital problem a sister-in-law had better stay out of. “Look, I’m sorry,” she said hastily, closing the drawer with the wreath, which had started her thinking of Beth. “This is none of my business.”
He didn’t even bother to voice an agreement. Instead, he straightened his shoulders as if dismissing the entire topic. “Anyway, let me know if you want some coffee later.”
“Thanks.” It actually sounded tempting, but she’d already intruded enough. “I ought to get some work done.”
His smile flashed so quickly that she was caught by surprise at how attractive this man could be. “I hear you. The job comes first.”
He was right, Anne thought a little breathlessly. What was the matter with her, anyway? Here she was, wearing her sister’s clothes and living in her sister’s home…but feeling her sister’s appreciation for Rafe Montoya was going way too far.
“Tell me,” she blurted, “how you and Beth met. I mean, the whole thing. How you fell in love with each other.”
Rafe looked taken aback, but he shoved his hands into his pockets and leaned against the doorway, as if searching for the right words.
“Because you did love her,” Anne prompted. “I mean, Beth probably told me the whole story at the time. It’s just, I don’t quite remember.”
His guarded expression softened slightly. “Well,” he said, “it was here in Tucson. You’d gone off to Harvard, and Beth was at the U of A.”
“That was after our dad died, right?” She’d pieced together enough scraps of memory to know that their mother had died when they were young, and their late grandmother had raised them without much help from their dad. “So it was just Beth and me left.”
“Right, and she came to this homeless shelter with a bunch of her sorority sisters. Volunteer weekend. I was coming off shift—this was an internship, my last year of school—and when I saw her reading to these kids, it just kind of hit me.”
“Love at first sight,” Anne said. This was what she needed, hearing about Beth from someone else who had loved her. And already the story was setting off chords of memory. “She’d never met anyone like you.”
Rafe gave her a rueful smile. “She didn’t know the half of it…I didn’t want to scare her away. But I kept working extra hours, hoping I’d see her again, and she kept on showing up with dolls for the kids. You remember the dolls, right?”
“Nobody makes dolls who look like they have Down syndrome,” Anne quoted her sister, who had spent years volunteering at the group home in their neighborhood. “And everybody should have a doll who looks like them.”
“Of course you remember that,” he apologized. “She wouldn’t have turned it into a business without your marketing. Anyway, that was how we met.”
“And fell in love.”
“And fell in love, yeah.” Rafe hesitated, then squared his shoulders, and for a moment she saw a grimace of pain cross his face before he resumed his look of calm control. Even so, his voice was a little unsteady when he muttered, “Thanks for asking. I needed to remember that.”
Chapter Three
He had loved Beth.
He needed to remember that, Rafe knew.
He needed to hold on to whatever he could, if he was going to get through this cemetery visit.
“You don’t have to drive me,” Anne had told him early this morning, as if she might have seen some sign of the uneasiness that had haunted him all night. “I can always get a cab from the physical therapy clinic.”
But that wasn’t how Beth would want her sister cared for, he knew. And he needed to care for somebody.
Especially after how badly he’d failed his wife. Letting her think the street kids mattered more than she did, letting her leave on vacation without making the time to fix things…
“No, I’ll take you,” he’d told Anne, and now they were almost to the Fairlawn Memorial Park.
With a bouquet of yellow roses and a wildflower wreath on the seat between them.
“I really appreciate this,” she said. “I know you’ve got a lot of work backed up.”
He did, but this visit mattered more. Because Anne needed this trip.
“No problem,” Rafe assured her, pulling into a parking space. “It’s been twelve days since the funeral, and I should’ve come before now.”
But she surprised him with a quick gesture, laying her hand on his arm as if to cut off the very thought. “Not if it tears you up inside. Beth wouldn’t want that.”
No, she wouldn’t. Not Beth.
If this visit tore him up inside, though, it was no more than he deserved for letting her leave with things still uneasy between them.
And besides, he could handle it. As long as he had Anne to look after, there was no risk of breaking down.
Even so, accompanying her across the endless lawn to Beth’s grave cost him more self-control than he’d anticipated. And Anne seemed to realize that he wasn’t quite as strong as he’d hoped, because she made no attempt to engage him in conversation.
Without speaking, he placed his sheaf of yellow roses by the headstone and retreated to give her some time alone with Beth’s memory. Yet after a few minutes of what looked like silent prayer, she turned to him without even wiping away the tears on her cheeks.
“Rafe,” she said softly, “you have a right to feel bad, too.”
“I know.” But crying wasn’t an option. He swallowed and shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s okay.”
“I mean,” she faltered, addressing the flowers in her hands as if meeting his gaze might be too intimate, “I know you feel like you have to look out for me, but if you need a shoulder to cry on…I can look out for you, too.”
“That’s okay,” he said hastily. This trip was for Anne, not himself, but it was kind of her to make such an offer. “Thanks.”
She seemed to realize that he didn’t need comforting, because without another word she turned back to the grave and gently laid her own flowers next to his. Then she stayed still, probably saying goodbye to her sister in her own way, which Rafe hoped would take a while.
Because he needed to get himself back in control. Back to the kind of strength he’d relied on for years, the kind that kept him looking out for whoever needed protection.
Which didn’t include Rafe Montoya.
No matter what Anne thought. But since she wouldn’t be around for long, anyway, there was no point in explaining that he didn’t need a shoulder to cry on.
Never had, never would.
So get yourself together.
It helped to remember the day of the funeral, Rafe discovered, mentally reviewing all the mourners he’d seen around the closed casket. Beth’s friends from the quilt shop. The whole crew from Legalismo, because he hadn’t thought to insist on keeping the clinic open. A couple of former clients. Their old neighbors from across the street, the Harts, Roger and Linda and Marci and Jim….
“Thanks for bringing me,” Anne said, startling him with the realization that he’d completely lost track of the present. But apparently she had finished crying, leaving her wreath behind, because she was standing beside him and looking a lot more composed. As if she’d unloaded whatever grief was haunting her. “I needed to say goodbye.”
“I’m glad it helped,” he managed to answer as they started back toward the car. Back to real life, with its ongoing list of demands. Which reminded him of the guy who’d come in this morning, worried about his girlfriend taking their baby to Mexico. “Listen, if I go back to work tonight, will you be okay?”
She shot him a surprised glance. “Of course.”
Maybe he was judging all women by Beth, who’d hated it when he stayed late at the clinic. “You sure? I don’t want to leave you alone if you need—”
“A shoulder to cry on?”
He hadn’t even thought of that, but of course he’d be there for her if she needed to cry. “Well, yeah,” he said, reaching for his car keys. “Whatever I can do.”
Anne waited until he’d opened her door before fixing him with a wry gaze. “Kind of a one-way street we’ve got here, isn’t it?”
What, just because he wouldn’t cry on her shoulder? “Look,” he explained, holding his hands out in case she needed assistance, “I take care of people. I don’t need people taking care of me.”
She settled into her seat without taking his hand, moving so much more easily than yesterday that he felt a jolt of admiration for the physical therapist. “Ever?”
“Well, not since I was a kid.” Not since his mother had fled the burden of caretaking. Not since he’d learned it was all his fault.
Anne reached for her seat belt, flinching a little as she stretched her arm back, and returned her gaze to his. “Tell me about when you were a kid.”
Maybe she thought it would help him let go of some old grief or something, but he couldn’t expect her to enjoy hearing about his childhood in the barrios of L.A.
“That’s a story for some other time,” Rafe said lightly, closing her door and moving to his own side of the car.
But as soon as he took his seat, Anne shifted her posture as if to get a better look at him. “All right,” she said, and in her voice he heard the same determination he used to hear from Beth, whenever she tried to nurture him. “I’ll make sure and ask some other time.”
Some other time took a few days to arrive, but she wasn’t going to let him out of talking about his life. Not when, Anne suspected, this man was carrying more grief than anyone should have to carry alone.
So when Rafe picked her up after her last therapy session of the week and apologized for having to return to the clinic as soon as he dropped her off, she told him to skip the trip home. “I’ll just go with you,” she said, and felt a shimmer of satisfaction when he turned the car around.
Maybe a visit to Legalismo would give her the chance to help Rafe Montoya.
Because there was something bothering him, she knew. And if she could encourage him to talk about it—not directly, not when he’d made it clear that he didn’t need any nurturing—she might feel more capable of honoring Beth’s wishes.
Her sister wanted the people she loved to be taken care of, and Rafe needed someone to talk to.
There wasn’t much time for talk, though, she discovered when they arrived at the clinic and he introduced her to Oscar, a threatening-looking teenager who was evidently helping him replace a window.
“Only one bullet,” Oscar told him, fingering a dent in the wall behind Rafe’s desk. “Good aim, that’s all.”
Anne swallowed a gasp. “Somebody shot at you?”
“No, we were closed,” Rafe said, rolling up his sleeves while Oscar removed a sheet of cardboard from the window frame. “This happened last night, I just never got time today.”
He sounded as matter-of-fact as if the window had been shattered by a baseball, but apparently her start of alarm raised a red flag, because he turned to her with his usual swift offer of aid.
“Why don’t I take you home and come back later? You don’t need to wait around here.”
“No, that’s okay.” If she waited, it would give her a chance to read the Legalismo flyers she’d seen on the battered coffee table. And that, in turn, might give her some clue to drawing out this man. “Really, I’m fine. You guys go ahead and fix things.”
“This won’t take long,” Rafe promised as he and Oscar turned their attention to the pane of glass in the corner, so she returned to the lobby with its green plastic sofa and dented folding chairs. And by the time she made her way through the company-history brochure, halfway listening to the dialogue in Rafe’s office, she found herself more intrigued than ever.
How did he do that? she wondered. How did a Law Review attorney, regardless of his past experience, keep up such a natural, easy conversation with a gang-tattooed boy who responded only in monosyllables?
How could Rafe do such a breathtaking job of caring for everyone around him, and refuse to accept any support for himself?
And why should she care?
But she did, Anne knew, even though she had never been much of a nurturer. That was Beth’s role, while hers was to succeed in the world. Yet maybe the loss of her sister had made a difference in her priorities…because right now this man’s welfare mattered far more than any business.
More than anything, she wanted to give him a chance to let down his guard.
“Thanks,” she heard him tell Oscar, who came back through the lobby and headed outside without even a glance at her. All right, they must be finished—which meant she could start another attempt at looking out for the man her sister had loved.
“I didn’t think lawyers could install windows,” she told Rafe when he came down the hall, buttoning the cuffs of his sleeves.
“Depends on where they practice,” he replied, then shot her a quick grin as he wiped a streak of plaster dust off his face. A simple gesture, but one which—without any warning—suddenly made her heart skip a beat. “We’re in a pretty good location for this part of town, but bulletproof glass would be nice.”
Anne caught her breath. She had no business reacting to the sight of this man—not even in the context of physical labor, which made her more aware of his powerful body—with such raw, primitive yearning.
“Is it safe,” she asked, hoping her voice sounded normal, “working here?”
“Pretty much.” He evidently hadn’t noticed any flush of warmth on her skin, for which she could only be grateful, because he was moving with his usual unconscious grace. Opening the door, reversing a sign, twisting home the lock. “I won’t let the interns work alone, but I’ve never had any problems.”
She was supposed to be offering support, here, but for the moment all her carefully rehearsed openings had vanished, leaving her with a faster pulse and the desire to blurt out any question, any distraction she could think of. “Uh, do your clients carry guns?”
Rafe held up the No Drugs/No Weapons sign he’d just removed from the door and set it on the coffee table. “Not inside,” he announced, then glanced back at his office. “I just need to grab a few things, and we’re out of here.”
“Take your time,” she told him, and used the free minute to steady her breathing, pressing her hands against her thighs until she felt herself edging back into common sense. Enough so that by the time he returned with a handful of file folders, she was able to ask a casual question.
“Was this a pretty typical day?”
“Well, it’s not every day we have to replace a window.” He gave her an apologetic smile as he turned toward the ancient answering machine on the front desk. “Sorry that took so long.”
“No, I enjoyed seeing you in action.” Which wasn’t what she’d meant to say! Although she had enjoyed hearing his conversation, even before he came down the hall adjusting his shirt—and she’d better change the subject fast. “Is Oscar some kind of an assistant or something?”
Rafe picked up the machine and shook it until a red light came on. “I’m just keeping an eye on him.”
“How come?”
“He reminds me of myself, I guess.” He met her gaze with the same half confident, half defiant expression she’d noticed the other day, then set the machine back in place. “I’d like to see him get out of here.”
So her impression of Oscar as the dangerous type had been valid, Anne realized. Because according to the company brochure, Rafe himself had grown up as a gang member in Los Angeles…until his last juvenile conviction had started him down the road toward rehab, law school and the crusade to help kids like those he’d done time with.
“I saw that fund-raising story about your background,” she told him, and saw his posture stiffen as he headed down the hall.
“That was Peter’s idea,” he said, snapping off the light switch at the end of the hallway. “Guy who put up the money. He said we’d get a lot more donations if people saw a poster child make good.”
Although his face was obscured by the shadows as he came back toward the lobby, she heard the thread of uneasiness in his voice. “How do you feel,” Anne asked, “about being a poster child?”
He hesitated for a moment, then she saw his expression grow more determined, more resolute as he came into the light.
“It gets the job done.”
And getting the job done, she suspected, was worth any amount of sacrifice. If he was ashamed of his past, the way she suspected from the sound of his voice, he wouldn’t let that interfere with helping Legalismo.
“This really matters to you,” she said softly, “doesn’t it.”
“Yeah.” Rafe moved past her toward the desk, where he retrieved what looked like an appointment book from the center drawer and reached for a pencil. “I want to get some of these kids on track.”
“Who did that for you?”
“Lot of people,” he answered without looking up from the page. “I’m still paying it back.”
Which would explain his passion for the job, and why Beth had complained that he put his crusade ahead of his marriage. But paying back implied a time limit, which she couldn’t remember her sister mentioning. “For how long?”
He glanced at her then, checking off one last name on the page. “Beth always asked that, too.”
Maybe because she’d recognized that Rafe was already doing more for the world than it had done for him. “And what did you tell her?”
Shutting the appointment book, he slid it back into the drawer and straightened up. “Long as I can do somebody some good,” he said, reaching for his keys. “These kids—somebody’s gotta be there for ’em.”
It looked like he was getting ready to lock up, but she hated to leave right now. Not when a glimpse of his personality was almost within reach.
“Was anybody there for you?” she asked as he locked the desk drawer. And when he didn’t answer, she offered a prompt. “Your parents?”
“My mom took off when I was three.” He glanced around the room, as if making sure all the closing chores were complete. “My dad left me with a neighbor who left me with Aunt Nita, who left me with my grandfather, who—” Then he broke off, as if only now realizing what a narration he’d begun. “Long story. Anyway, you ready to go?”
No, although clearly his chores were finished. But they couldn’t leave with his story hanging in limbo like that, because finally she might be near his motivation to avoid needing anyone. “How many people left you?” Anne blurted.
“What, you want a head count?” He sounded amused rather than annoyed, but he made no attempt to offer a count. “It was a long time ago.”
All right, then. She wasn’t going to push for whatever lay behind that nonchalant defense…at least not now. Instead, she reached for her purse, then caught her breath. Cindy had warned her not to sit still for more than five or ten minutes without shifting her posture, but she hadn’t realized how much that warning mattered.
Because right now she couldn’t stand up without Rafe’s help.
Although helping her up probably wouldn’t affect him one bit, since he’d been touching her with such casual courtesy all along. She just needed to forget that bizarre moment of longing, which had swept through her a few minutes ago, and focus instead on—
On—
Oh, the business. Legalismo.
“Rafe,” she said hastily as he came toward her, “I should have told you this sooner, but I really admire what you’re doing here.”
“Ah. Thanks.” He leaned down, offering her his hands for as solid a grip as she needed, and as she rose from her seat she saw more warmth in his gaze than she’d ever noticed before.
“I mean,” she faltered, “you’re really making a difference in the world.”
Why that statement should affect him so strongly she wasn’t quite certain, but she saw an unmistakable glow of pleasure in his eyes as she recovered her balance.
“That means a lot,” he said, keeping hold of her hands until she felt the pulse of warmth between them swirling even higher, then quickly letting her go. “Thanks.”
It shouldn’t mean so much that somebody admired his work, Rafe told himself, handing his card to the judge’s clerk. Anne was just being polite, same as all the well-meaning donors who raved about the importance of saving kids from gangs.
But somehow her acknowledgment, coming from a woman so much like the one who’d resented his passion for Legalismo, made him smile every time he remembered it.
Like now, while he was waiting for Diego’s file, and mentally replaying this morning’s conversation with the physical therapist.
“Anne is terrific,” Cindy had told them both. “Lucky in the first place, yes, but also a really dedicated worker. And doing so well, she can start driving anytime now.”
Which was great, since he’d had to work around her schedule no matter how often she insisted she could take a cab.
But in a way, he would miss the conversations they’d shared on the way to her morning sessions and on the way home at night—
“Here you go,” the clerk told him, and he jerked his attention back to the judge’s office.
“Thanks,” Rafe muttered, and headed outside. His next mission was to check for messages, see if Anne was doing okay. See if she needed a ride home yet. She’d promised to call when she was ready to leave, but his cell phone had to stay silent in the judge’s chambers.
It rang the moment he switched it back on, and he felt a flash of pleasure before realizing that such intense happiness didn’t make sense. This might not even be Anne.
And even if it was, so what? The woman was his sister-in-law!
The caller, though, was the newest intern at Legalismo, Heidi, who had drawn front-desk duty for the day.
“I just thought you should know,” she told him, “someone called about the train crash. They’re returning Beth’s luggage, so I told them to bring it here.”
Real life couldn’t have intervened at a better time, Rafe decided. He needed a reminder of Beth right now, before he found himself edging toward fantasies that were completely out of line.
“If you want,” Heidi continued, “I can just put everything in the storage room until you’re ready. Because I remember when my dad died, it took my mom a long time to go through his things.”
That hadn’t struck him as a problem, although he’d been living with Beth’s things all along. He’d actually been seeing Beth’s face and her body and her clothes on Anne every day, so seeing the clothes she’d taken to California shouldn’t be any different.
“It’s okay,” he said, “I’ll swing by on the way home. Did they mention finding Anne’s things?”
“No, just Beth’s. I don’t think they’re very well organized.”
Anne might regret not having her own clothes back, although that would likely happen within the next few days. Meanwhile, there was no point in mentioning the find. He could go through Beth’s luggage on his own.
But it surprised him that night, handling the clothes from his wife’s severely battered suitcase, how much her scent resembled Anne’s. Maybe that was always the case with twins, but somehow he’d never noticed the similarity between his wife’s personal fragrance and her sister’s.
Which was something he needed to forget.
Because thinking that way about Anne was completely unacceptable.
Rafe picked up another shirt, caught Anne’s scent again and closed his eyes. He’d loved Beth, not her sister, so these feelings were way out of line. It would be one thing if he’d accidentally mistaken Anne for her twin—which people probably did all the time—but he knew perfectly well who was in the guest room down the hall.
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Laurie Campbell
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: HE WANTED A SECOND CHANCERafe Montoya had known his wife, Beth, was unhappy. She wanted him home earlier, wanted a baby, wanted more of himself than he could give. He thought that being her knight in shining armor would be enough. But then a tragic accident claimed Beth′s life, and left her twin sister, Anne, injured–and he had run out of time. All he could do was help Anne recover her strength and her memory–it was what Beth would have wanted.Yet when Rafe looked in Anne′s eyes, for a fleeting minute, he had the feeling it was Beth′s eyes looking back at him. His Beth, ready and waiting to give him a second chance. But that was impossible…wasn′t it?