Taking On Twins

Outside, a car horn sounded. His cab. As quietly as possible, Wyatt retrieved his luggage and made good his escape. Fresh air filled his burning lungs as he opened the double doors that led out of the house. With a gentle pull, he closed the door behind him, then moved to the portico and handed the cabby his luggage.

“Airport,” he instructed.

As he left the parlor and headed for the dining room, Jackson Colton fought the bile that rose in his throat. His father’s confession disgusted him more than he could ever put into words. Although he couldn’t say he was surprised. His father was no choirboy.

And Meredith. Meredith had changed.

As a child, he’d adored his Aunt Meredith. In fact, he’d looked upon her as a second mother. But in the past years—before the time of Teddy’s birth, in fact—Jackson had noticed changes in Meredith that more than disturbed him. For so long, everyone had tried to pass these changes off as postpartum depression or the accident, but Teddy. was eight years old now and the accident happened a decade ago.

His sister, Liza, had once hinted that she believed something very amazing and unbelievable accounted for the changes in Aunt Meredith. At the time, Jackson had brushed off the wild notion. But now, as he reflected back on Liza’s crazy theory, a chill raced down his spine and he feared there might just be more than a grain or two of truth there.

When he arrived in the dining room, he was dismayed to discover that he was not entirely alone.

Meredith was seated at the head of the table with a cup of coffee, a croissant and the society page. Languidly, she lifted her gaze from the print and trained it on Jackson. A small smile played at her lips, and she sat up a little straighter.

“Good morning, Jackson.”

“Is it, Meredith?”

He could feel her watching him pick up a serrated knife and begin to saw his bagel in half.

“Something wrong, dear? You don’t seem quite yourself.”

Still holding the knife, Jackson turned to face her. “Funny, I could say the exact same thing about you.”

Meredith’s face hardened. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Just this—If you don’t stop extorting money from my father, I will go to the police.”

Meredith laughed, playing it light, as if she thought he were joking. “Jackson, honey, what in heaven’s name are you talking about?”

Jackson had to hand it to her. She was as cool as the other side of a pillow on a hot summer day. “I’m talking about the fact that my father is paying you hush money because he’s afraid Joe will write him out of his will, if—” his voice grew steely “—Joe finds out that his rotten little brother is really the father of your son.” He ran the blade of the knife across his fingertip, testing its sharpness. “So, since my father is too much of a spineless jellyfish to call your bluff, I guess the dubious pleasure is mine.” Jackson stabbed his knife into the cutting board and turned to look her in the eye. “Back off. Do I make myself clear?”

Meredith blanched and clutched her cup till it rattled against the saucer. “Don’t you dare threaten me, Jackson Colton.”

“Or what?”

“Or you, my precious nephew, will be sorry.”

“I’m already sorry.”

Shaking with rage, Meredith watched Jackson stalk out of the room and frantically wondered exactly what he knew. He couldn’t know that she was an impostor. No one knew that—with the exception of Emily—and soon, that would no longer be a problem.

Meredith reached into the pocket of her robe for her ever-present bottle of tranquilizers. After several botched attempts, she was finally able to shake two into her palm. She tossed them into her mouth and chased them down her throat with a gulp of coffee.

She took a deep, cleansing breath, and waited for the rage to subside and the little voices that shrieked in her head to quiet down.

Breathe in, breathe out.

In…out… In…visualize the peaceful place…out. She focused on the hands of the wall clock and watched a minute dissolve into ten.

Yes. There now. She was fine. She would be just fine.

Better than fine, actually.

A rough plan began to form in the back of her mind. She needed Jackson gone now too, but it would get a little messy if there were too many murder attempts all at once. No, there had to be an easier way to get rid of Jackson.

Too bad she couldn’t send him to jail. That was a good place to go, if you were an annoyance. She ought to know. She’d certainly spent her share of time in jail. The tranquilizers began to kick in, giving her a relaxed and vaguely euphoric feeling. Jail. Hey, now. Maybe she should give this jail thing some thought. Maybe that wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility.

But for what?

Unless…

Unless she could get him to go for the attempt on his uncle’s life.

A light bulb flashed on in Patsy’s mind.

That was it.

Her heart began to hammer. In fact, while she was going to all the trouble, she’d set him up for both attempts on Joe’s life. A slow smile crept across her lips. Oh, yes, Patsy, honey, she gave herself a mental pat on the back, you are good.

Satisfied as a cat with a bowl of cream, Meredith went back to the society section and her half-empty cup of coffee. After a little nap, she’d get started on her plan to get Jackson out of the picture, and thereby solve a lot of nasty problems.

Annie Summers, her mouth full of bobby pins, looked into an antique, gilt-framed wall mirror with disgust. Her hair. Her lousy, rotten, crinkly, goofy hair was having one of its notorious bad days. The April sun streamed in from a nearby window, creating a rusty halo that gave her a bit of a fallen angel look. She curled an upper lip to enhance the effect. It was hopeless. No amount of spray or gel or relaxer or blow-drying or clippy doo-dads would whip it into submission, either. They hadn’t invented the product that could handle her particular mop, and the day they did, she was buying stock. She’d be a millionaire overnight.

“Moah? Amicks?” she muttered around the hairpins.

“Yeah?” Noah and Alex’s muffled voices came from the back of her shop.

“Mat are oo doing?”

“Playin’.”

“Id oo tut ’er shoes on, yike I asked?” Annie removed the pins from her mouth and crammed them into her makeshift bun and hoped for the best.

“Uh…” Whispered laughter and some scrambling reached her ears. “Yeah, we’re putting our shoes on.”

“Are you putting them on your feet?” She grinned at their giggles. One didn’t live with two five-year-olds and not know when they were up to no good.

“Er, uh, okay,” Alex, self-appointed spokesman for the two, answered.

“Are you putting them on now?”

“Uhh…yeah.”

“Are you wearing socks?”

“Oh…well—”

With a sigh, Annie dropped her brush on a Louis XIV love seat and strode from the showroom of the antique store, Summer’s Autumn Antiques, that she’d inherited from her father. Moving into the play area she kept next to her office for her boys, she stopped short and stared.

“What the—” Exasperated, Annie shook her head. “What are you guys doing in your—” she took in the bare chests and, in one case, bare bottom “—underwear? Alex, where is your underwear?”

“It was his idea,” Alex said, pointing at Noah.

“Was not.”

“Was too!”

“What idea?” Annie asked.

“We were going to put our clothes on the dog and surprise you.”

As Alex explained, Chopper, the aging black Lab, came hobbling out from behind the toy box, his foot caught up in the arm of a sweater. He sported socks and shoes on three of his four feet. His tail, which he wagged pitifully, protruded from the fly of some small body’s—obviously Alex’s—underpants. Chopper looked absolutely miserable.

Try as she might, Annie could not hold back the giggles. Screaming with delight, the boys joined in, doing a little jig that had their skinny little bodies flailing and leaping.

“Why on earth did you think to put clothes on poor Chopper?”

“No shirts, no shoes, no service,” Noah offered.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Annie looked back and forth between the two faces, mirror images of hers, both earnest in their explanation.

“We wanted Chopper to come out to lunch with us—”

“—and he couldn’t go if he was naked—”

“—cause Emma says the sign in the window says—”

Annie held up her hand. “Okay. I get it. But you guys need to know that they don’t serve dogs at the Mi-T-Fine Café. Even well-dressed dogs, like Chopper, here.”

Alex’s face fell. “Never?”

“Never?” Noah echoed.

“Nope.” She gestured to the dog. “And since they don’t serve naked kids either, put this poor animal out of his misery and you two get dressed.” She glanced at her watch. “I’ll give you five minutes. If you’re not ready, I’m going without you. And I’m ordering hot dogs.”

“Hot dogs!” the boys shouted with glee and in record time were ready for lunch on the town—or at least at the restaurant next door—with Mom.

Over the glass entrance doors of the Mi-T-Fine Caféin Keyhole, Wyoming, an electronic chime announced Wyatt’s arrival. The restaurant was doing a healthy business and no one in particular looked up to see who’d come in. From inside the kitchen a wonderfully familiar female voice called, “Take a seat. I’ll be with you in a minute.”

It was Emily. She sounded safe and healthy, anyway. That was a good sign. Wyatt breathed a sigh of relief.

“Take your time. I’m in no hurry,” he called and wandered to an empty booth in the front of the restaurant near a bank of windows that overlooked the quaint main street.

Keyhole was a Mecca for tourists on their way to or from Yellowstone National Park. Nestled in a lush valley, surrounded by spectacular, majestic mountains, the little town ingeniously mixed the new and the old to create a trendy, upbeat feel. Keyhole was known to antique hunters all over the country for its delightful painted lady Victorians, western facade buildings and the historic treasures they held within.

Skiers—both water and snow—hikers, climbers, wind-surfers, hunters and fishermen enjoyed the sports offered by the great outdoors. All around the perimeter of town, hotels were popping up as Keyhole became a mini-Aspen. It wasn’t unusual to see celebrities shopping or skiing in Keyhole anymore. Luckily, growth was relatively slow and Keyhole had managed to maintain its small-town flavor.

Wyatt could see why Annie loved this town. Like Prosperino, it was a bit of heaven on earth.

He plucked a menu from between the sugar container and the salt-and-pepper shakers and studied the special that was clipped to the cover.

At the other side of the café, Annie shushed her rowdy boys and, cocking her head, listened for the mellow baritone again, to no avail.

“No,” she whispered. “Couldn’t be.” Craning her head, she searched the aisle and tried to peer over the high-backed booths and the partitions that blocked her view of the front of the room.

That voice.

Just the sound of it unleashed a plethora of emotion within her, both good and bad. Annie shrugged off the crazy notion as her boys distracted her, wrestling over crayons. Must be someone who sounded incredibly like him, she thought and rubbed the gooseflesh that had risen on her arms.

“Alex, eat the bun too.”

“But I’m saving it for Chopper.”

Annie threw her hands up. Where Chopper was concerned it was impossible to reason with her boys. “Fine. But don’t put it in your shirt pocket. You’re getting mustard everywhere.”

“Okay.” Alex removed the mustard-slathered bread and slapped it into her hand. “Here. Could you put this in your purse?”

Annie exhaled mightily and searched the ceiling for patience. Her crisp white blouse now sported yellow polka-dots in various shapes and sizes. Dabbing at them with a napkin only made them worse.

From inside the kitchen, Emily recognized the familiar voice and openmouthed, flew to the pickup window and craned her neck to catch a glimpse. Wyatt! After seven solid months on the lam, to finally see a member of her family was overwhelming. She blinked back the tears of joy. Help had arrived at last and now, perhaps, someone might just take her seriously.

Reaching behind her, she untied her apron and waved at Roy who was busy over the sizzling grill. Helen was making coffee and Geraldine was out on the floor. They’d be fine without her for a few minutes. “I’m taking a break,” she called and they nodded.

Emily rushed through the restaurant as old fashioned as its name implied. The walls were a rough plank and overhead, shelves were loaded with historic knickknacks and plants. In the background, some easy listening was piped in through speakers in the ceiling. The murmur of voices ebbed and flowed, and underscoring it all, silverware clanked and the grill sizzled.

Wyatt glanced up at the sound of her approach. “Emily!” He held out his hand and pulled her into the booth beside him and gave her temple a sound kissing. Eyes thirsty, he drank in the sight of her, checking her over until he was satisfied that she was all right. He reached up, touching her shock of chestnut-red hair and was once again reminded of his Annie.

Emily plucked a napkin from the chrome dispenser on the table and crushed it to her mouth. “How did you find me?”

“Rand and Austin tracked you down.”

“I would have called, but it’s not safe.”

“I know.”

“You do?” She pushed her napkin to her eyes and cast him a watery smile. “You believe me?”

“We all do.”

“Oh,” she blubbered. “Finally.”

“Better late than never?”

“Oh, yeah.” Smile tremulous, she turned her back to the aisle. Facing him, she leaned on her elbow to create some privacy. “I don’t have much time. This is the middle of the Saturday lunch rush and it can get a little hairy here.”

“That’s fine,” Wyatt said with a nod. “We can talk later. I plan on staying for several days—”

“Really?” Emily heaved a ragged sigh. “I’ve been starved for news of home.”

“Well, I’m loaded with that, and more.” He tapped the envelope that lay in front of him on the table, then slid it over to rest in front of her.

Emily stared. “What’s this?”

“The news you’ve been waiting for. It’ll make some interesting nighttime reading, that I can guarantee.”

“It’s about Mom?”

“And her identical twin sister. A woman named Patsy Portman.”

“A twin. I knew it,” she murmured.

“We’re guessing that you were right all along about Patsy taking Meredith’s place.”

“It happened the day of the accident. I just know it. Remember when Mom went off the road and wrecked the car?”

“Emily, do you have any idea what may have happened to Meredith?”

“I can’t remember,” she whispered. “It happened so fast, and it’s years ago now. I was crying and confused. My head hurt and Mom’s head was bleeding so much. I think I passed out. What I do remember is seeing another woman there who looked exactly like Mom. Then, I don’t remember anything until she brought me into the emergency room. I couldn’t figure out why she wasn’t bleeding anymore…”

Wyatt slowly nodded. “Meredith must have disappeared between the accident and the emergency room, while you were unconscious.”

Snatching another napkin from the dispenser, Emily scrubbed at her nose. “Mmm. That’s what I’ve always suspected. But no one believed me until now.”

“We believe you, honey. We’re on your side and we’re here to help you.”

“What about Mom?”

Wyatt slipped an arm around her shoulders and brought the top of her head to his neck. “We’re working on that. Austin’s on her trail, as we speak.” He tried to inject a note of confidence into his voice. “What exactly happened the night you left?”

In a halting voice, Emily spoke. “Someone tried to kill me. And, he nearly succeeded.”

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