Her Reason To Stay

He’d turned down those women because his son needed him and he couldn’t afford to complicate his life any further. But something about Daphne had almost made him forget.

With ridiculous weakness, he’d basked in her scent, eased closer so that the dark tendrils of her hair had curled against his shoulder, while he’d kept her talking, not only to persuade her to give Raina a second chance, but to prolong the pleasure of drowning in the whiskey-honey tones of her voice.

He’d been too long on his own with his son, Will.

“She’s staying, but you have to call her, Raina. I’m done.”

“I will.” Raina pushed herself out of her chair. Happiness softened the pinched lines of her face as she hurried to the window.

Patrick had worried about her since the moment her mother had pulled him closer to her hospital bed and begged him to look after her daughter. It was good to see those lines ease.

Nevertheless, he had to make sure she understood he wasn’t part of her relationship with Daphne, whatever it turned out to be.

“You’re too late,” he said as Raina’s forehead bumped the window. “She was speed walking last time I saw her.” He’d probably lit the fire—hanging on to her as if she were a rope at the edge of quicksand.

“I didn’t know what to say.” Raina pressed fingertips to her head. “She looks like me, but she…she seems so different.”

Raina was right. Daphne was different. She was strong, independent and, most telling, she wasn’t afraid to let her feelings be known.

At twenty-eight, Raina remained, improbably, the princess under glass in one of Will’s Disney movies.

“You know where she’s staying?”

“She sent me the address.” Raina dug in her purse. “Even after your secretary told her to get in touch with you if she wanted to meet today.”

“She doesn’t take orders well.”

“You admire her, Patrick?”

Admire her? He shrugged. “She’s got courage. She’s had a harder life than you.”

He needn’t have been so blunt. Daphne had rattled him, resurrected feelings he’d thought had gone forever. He’d deliberately kept his emotions on ice after what had happened to his son last year. Staying detached from everyone except Raina and Will had become his special skill.

“How do you go to someone you’ve never met and tell her you’re her twin? And how do you anticipate being welcomed?” Raina found what she was looking for, a crumpled envelope. “I admire her courage, but I don’t have it in me to love a sister who’s a stranger.”

“I’ll repeat what I said to her. Give her a chance.”

“You asked her to give me a chance?” Raina looked affronted at the idea that she had done something that required being given a second chance.

Which was Patrick’s last straw. He should have walked when Raina had first called him about her twin-out-of-nowhere. Untouched by life except in her own extraordinary home, she might be out of her depth with a woman like Daphne.

Patrick began to gather the papers around his folder, still open on the table. “Raina, I’ve paved the way for you. The rest is up to you.”

Raina waved off his impatience. “I know. I get upset about the wrong things, and I always look to you to help me make a decision, but my mother’s not here, and I can’t ask her why she didn’t tell me I was adopted. She should have warned me. She had to know Daphne or my birth parents might show up.”

“No one came in all these years. Hannah probably thought her secret was safe.”

“Okay, okay.” Raina gripped the envelope so hard it crinkled in the silent room. “Why do you suppose they didn’t adopt Daphne, too?”

“I don’t know. You were infants. Maybe your parents didn’t know about Daphne.”

“Does that seem likely?”

“I’d think the agency would have wanted sisters to go together.”

“Just when I need my memories most, I feel as if I didn’t know my parents, either.” Raina straightened the envelope and pulled out the letter. “I’ll call Daphne’s hotel.” She scanned the writing. “Good Lord, it’s one of those cheap ones out on Helier Drive.”

Patrick had noticed the frayed cuffs of Daphne’s long-sleeved T-shirt and the worn spots on her jeans. Those shiny white patches, forming the seat of her pants, would stay on his mind a while, but he couldn’t attribute them to her sense of style.

“That hotel is probably all she can afford.” He wasn’t any happier than Raina at the thought of Daphne in an area where most of Honesty’s criminal activities occurred.

“I wonder if she’d meet me for coffee?”

“Ask her.” He glanced at his watch. “I have some meetings.”

“Why are you so eager to rush off? We didn’t intend to hurt her feelings.”

“It got out of hand fast. We should have been more tactful.” Accusing Daphne right at the start of wanting money had been unfair. “She wants to get to know you. You’re interested in finding out about her. If you talk, things will work out.”

Raina took out her cell phone. “Mind if I use this room a second longer?”

“Fine. Will’s waiting for me.” His mother looked after Will, and Patrick was already late to pick up his son. He shoved the last of the loose pages inside the folder he’d made on Daphne. Sports clippings from the Internet, bank statements, her initial letter to Raina, hope written between every line. “Take your time and try to keep the games to a minimum, Raina.”

“Games?”

“You know what I mean. This morning was a game. You tried to make Daphne angry enough to admit she’d come to take advantage of you. But maybe she didn’t.”

She stopped in the middle of punching in Daphne’s number on her phone. “What happened downstairs?”

“Nothing happened,” he said. Nothing would. Will was his priority.

But from the second he’d read hurt in Daphne’s eyes, from the moment he’d held her hand too long, he’d wanted her, pure and—not in any way—simple.

How, out of the blue, could he desire a stranger when he’d sworn off any attachment except to Will until they had their life under control again?

“Patrick?” Raina dropped the phone to her side. “You look funny. Are you okay?” She put her hand on the table, leaning toward him. “Is Will all right?”

He turned the legal pad and folder as if aligning their edges were a priority. Raina knew he still felt guilty that his son had almost died because he’d been blind to his ex-wife’s addiction. If he’d known how much Lisa had craved the drugs that had become her crutch, he’d never have left Will alone with her. And his son would have been safely at home that snowy day, rather than nearly dying of hypothermia in the backseat of the car while his mother lay unconscious in a dressing room less than a block from Patrick’s office.

“Will’s fine.” Raina had witnessed the rapid divorce that left him with custody of his son. She might be focused on her own grief, but she could step outside it long enough to care about his family. That was why he went out of his way for her.

“Daphne didn’t come for money.” He hoped he wasn’t mistaking his own lust for good judgment. “I believe her.”

“Why?”

“She wouldn’t have walked out of here if she’d planned to work you for a paycheck.”

“Something changed. You were on my side, but suddenly Daphne’s strong and kind, and I’m not supposed to play games.”

“We’re talking trust. You both want to know each other, and that’s going to take trust.” He reached for the door then turned to look at her. She was right in a way. Those few minutes with Daphne had changed his feelings. It didn’t make sense and it wasn’t convenient. “I didn’t mean to hurt you, Raina.”

She’d always been the younger sister he’d never had, but the image of her twin, using her body to push through the revolving door, made him hitch his shoulders beneath a shirt that suddenly tormented his skin.

He’d looked at Raina almost every day of her life. He’d talked to her and laughed with her and protected her, but Daphne was different. Her sad eyes had made him wonder about the secrets hiding behind them. He had felt the taut weight of her breasts, a breath away from his chest, as if he’d held her already.

After living alone with his son for long, empty, safe months, he’d longed to wrap his arms around Daphne’s slender waist and simply take pleasure in her warmth and curves.

Wouldn’t he be safe with a woman who wanted family as badly as she did? Did he dare even entertain the possibility? After such deep acquaintance with fear and anger, hope seemed to sting.

“I’ve got to get to Will,” he said.

LATER THAT DAY, Daphne inhaled the coffee aroma, trying not to be noticed by the woman and little girl in line in front of her, not wanting them to mistake her for Raina. She checked her watch. She’d arrived at Cosmic Grounds about fifteen minutes early for her appointment with her sister, but it gave her time to appreciate the dark wood wainscoting beneath rich red walls without gawking like the stranger she was.

She eyed buttery-smelling scones on plates beside jars of biscotti and chocolate-chip cookies wrapped in crinkly sleeves. The little girl plucked a praline out of a pyramid of the fat caramel-colored candies.

“Can I have one, Mommy?”

Her mother glanced down, barely comprehending. “I guess.” Then she looked startled when the girl behind the counter asked for more money.

Daphne risked a scan of the other customers, a man buried behind a newspaper, a young girl running her index finger over a tome the size of the Domesday Book. The girl sipped her coffee. Her short cap of brown hair fell away from her face, and she smiled with tired gray eyes.

Daphne had worked her way through a criminology degree. She recognized the signs of unremitting study. The girl went back to her work, and Daphne sighed, hoping despite a healthy dose of wariness that this might become her favorite coffee shop.

Cosmic Grounds didn’t compare in size or even selection to the chain coffee shop down the block. Interesting that Raina had chosen it for their meeting. She seemed conventional all the way. Maybe she was hoping that the two of them wouldn’t be seen by too many of her neighbors.

The mother and daughter hurried from the shop, balancing a coffee cup, a small container of hot cocoa and the girl’s candy.

Daphne didn’t realize she’d been watching them until she turned back to find the spiky-haired blonde behind the counter staring at her. Daphne glanced over her shoulder again before she realized the college-aged young woman must have thought she was Raina.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” the girl said, but then slapped her hand over her mouth as if she’d dared too much. Was Raina a snob?

Daphne slid her hands inside her jean pockets. “I’m not my sister” almost slipped out of her mouth. But even as the idea of Raina intimidating coffeeshop employees troubled her, she didn’t want to criticize her sister.

Forget it. The good citizens of Honesty would soon find there were two of them, and this girl could expect the shock any moment.

The girl lifted her khaki Cosmic Grounds baseball cap and settled it again on her spiky hairdo. “Can I help you?”

“May I have a café au lait and a cherry scone?”

“Sure.” Smacking a big wad of gum, she tapped out the charges and gave Daphne the bill, still studying her. “I’ll bring it to your table.”

Daphne paid then found a spot for two in a dark corner. Until she knew how Raina felt, it might be best to keep their meeting private.

Trying to be invisible reminded Daphne of how she’d spent her adolescence, hunched over, pretending she wasn’t a developing young woman, that she didn’t exist, hoping no one else would try to touch her.

She was spending her twenties learning to live confidently in her own skin.

A small hand with a Celtic ring tattooed in henna on its index finger slid a mug and scone onto the table.

“I like that.” Daphne pointed to the girl’s finger.

“You like it?”

Daphne almost laughed. Raina must not seem like a tattoo kind of girl. The door opened, making the bell above it peal. The girl turned to greet her new customer. Only to wheel back and eye Daphne.

“I thought you were her.”

“You’re probably wondering why now.” Seeing them both, no one would have trouble telling the sophisticated, well-groomed Raina from Daphne.

“Hunh.” The girl whistled around her gum and went back to the counter.

Even Daphne felt confused when she looked at her twin. Daphne’s hair tended to clench like a fist in the rain, so she’d wound it into a knot before she’d climbed out of her car. Raina’s hair dared not curl. If they ever became intimate enough, Daphne would ask how her sister achieved such flawless control.

Raina placed her order then came to the table. She tucked her change into a wallet that matched her multibuckled, oversize white purse. “Sorry I kept you waiting. I couldn’t find my umbrella. I never used to be so scattered.” Not one wrinkle, not a speck of dirt touched her white suit.

Daphne marveled. Nature versus nurture. They were bound to learn which was more powerful if they got to know each other.

“You’re staring,” Raina said.

Daphne shut her mouth. “Not to be rude. Why’d you ask me to meet you here?”

“You get to the point.”

“I thought the same thing about you in Patrick’s office.” She must have said his name with some special emphasis because Raina lifted both eyebrows, leaning forward. Daphne touched her own brows.

“Patrick talked you into giving me a second chance,” Raina said. “How did he do that?”

Daphne picked a packet of sweetener out of a small ceramic holder. “He said you’d want to know me.”

Raina stared at the sweetener package for a second. “I’m sorry about accusing you, but I have money, and you…”

“Don’t. But I do have a temper.” And pride. “I have manners and feelings, despite my low-class background.”

“Right. Sorry.” She took the sweetener out of Daphne’s fingers, and Daphne met her sister’s gaze.

Again, Raina said nothing for several moments. Finally, she held her hand out. “I behaved like an idiot, but please take some time before you decide about me.”

Daphne took her hand. They shook as the girl from the counter approached with a tray.

Raina took it, her expression relaxing into a smile. “Thanks, Kyla.” She set her mug—tea—and a dish of sugar cubes on the table.

“Sure.” Kyla took the tray back, still staring from one to the other of them. “Call me if you need anything else.”

Raina grinned at Kyla’s retreating back. “She’s shocked. So am I, every time I look at you.”

“But you seem to be taking it in stride now.” Daphne sipped her coffee. “I thought you were frightened this afternoon. Now, you seem confident, like a woman with a plan.”

“My parents never told me I was adopted. Imagine opening a door and seeing someone with your face who tells you the last thing you want to hear.”

“What did you think? That I’d had plastic surgery or something to make myself look like you so you’d give me money?”

“I’m not suggesting we aren’t twins, but I’ve learned to be suspicious of everyone. I’ve already had guys ask me to marry them. Not because I’m so lovable.” She shrugged, and Daphne admired her ability to laugh at herself. “Which you may have noticed. But they each desired a piece of my net worth. My life is ludicrous, and you show up when I’m feeling most cynical.”

“When is a bad time to find family? All I wanted was to know my sister.”

That word felt strange to Daphne, not warm anymore. Raina ignored it.

“I do a lot of things well.” She dropped a couple of sugar cubes into her cup, and then she dipped her tea bag. “My mother taught me to pretend people aren’t staring at me and my companion in a coffee shop. She trained me to wear the right clothes for spring, although she probably would have checked the weather forecast before she put on white. She taught me how to appear cool under fire.” She tilted her head at a wry angle. “Only, I seem to have a problem with that one, too.”

“You’re not under fire. I want to know if we can be sisters.” A knot in her throat stopped her. She didn’t want Raina to realize how much it mattered.

But Raina noticed. “That’s what I mean. I don’t know how I’m supposed to respond. My parents lied to me. You’re looking for someone who could be your family. I’ve just lost the last of mine, and here you are, suggesting we could belong together.”

Belong together. Even Daphne hadn’t gone that far. Her heartbeat picked up a little pace. Speaking became difficult. This was why she’d come to Honesty.

Raina stirred her tea without touching the sides of the mug and set the spoon delicately on a paper napkin.

Suddenly, there was something Daphne had to know. “Did Patrick make you call me? He came after me because he was worried. This meeting was his idea.”

Raina looked straight at her for the first time. “You call him Patrick as if you know each other.”

Had he noticed she was attracted to him? “Should I have said Mr. Gannon?” What had Patrick said after he’d gone back upstairs? Had they laughed at her?

“That’s not what I meant, but you two spent a few minutes alone in an elevator, and suddenly you’re both different.”

Worse than laughing. “I took the stairs.”

Raina looked confused, but then she laughed, picking up her spoon again. She gave her tea another stir. “I overreacted. To you and to everything about our situation.”

“Being sisters? That situation?” Or was Raina staking her claim to Patrick? Suddenly, Daphne couldn’t breathe. She felt around for her own purse.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting out of here, once and for all. You don’t care that we’re sisters. You called only because you do what Patrick says.”

“No, no, no.” Raina said it as she would chide a young child, and she reached for Daphne’s wrist. She looked down. “My God, you’re thin. Don’t you ever get a square meal?”

Daphne wanted to run, but if she did, she’d never see Raina again. It was too much to risk.

“Will you let me say I’m sorry?” Raina let Daphne go, but her steady gaze suggested she might grab at Daphne again if she made a move toward the door.

Maybe they were both overreacting.

“Sorry,” Daphne said. “Maybe I seem confident, but trust isn’t my strong suit.” She wrapped her hand around her throat. Moments like this made her thirsty for more than just coffee.

“That’s something we share.”

Daphne flattened her hands on the table. “We share?” She hardly knew she’d said it out loud until Raina’s mouth began to move.

“Four guys, Daphne. Four requests to help themselves to the Abernathy portfolio, all during the past three months. And I’ve known these men since I was a child.” She sipped her tea. Her mouth was so tight, Daphne half expected the liquid to trickle down her chin. “One was a friend of my father’s. His age.”

Daphne slid her hands up her arms, over goose bumps. “I feel the ick factor, but you didn’t understand me.” Being blunt felt awkward. “I want to share—things—our past, the lives we want, the truth—with you. I want a real relationship, not a nodding acquaintance.”

She stuttered to a halt, but Raina’s smile switched on. “You have weaknesses, too.”

“That makes you happy?” That she was vulnerable? That one person left in the world could hurt her?

“No, not happy. But I can identify with you. I may look capable, but something happened to me after my mother’s—death.” Raina’s sadness made Daphne long to comfort her, but Raina had a formidable touch-me-not air. “As you saw in Patrick’s office, sometimes I’m barely able to function. I’m wondering where you get your guts, why you have them but I don’t.”

Daphne smiled. “That’s a funny word from you.”

“Courage, if you prefer.”

“I wonder whether we’re both brave enough to try being sisters.” Daphne eyed Raina over the rim of her coffee cup.

Raina drank her tea, honest-to-God splaying her little finger, then she set the cup in its saucer.

“Let’s get your things.” She pulled her suitcasepurse close to her chest.

“My things?” Raina had gone from shrinking in Patrick’s office to bossing the sister she hadn’t fully accepted yet. Daphne grabbed her coffee, telling herself it was too soon to move in together. “I can’t stay with you.”

Raina arched her perfect eyebrows. “You don’t have a job. Where can you afford to—”

“I have a room in a hotel. I sent you the address.”

“That place isn’t safe for a rat.”

Daphne ran a finger over her eyebrows, which could have benefited from the waxing Raina had obviously recently endured. “Don’t let anyone say you’re not a plain speaker.”

“I’m just suggesting you’d feel more comfortable, and we’d have more time together if you came home with me.”

“Just a few hours ago you accused me of trying to rob you. It’s pretty hard to forget what you said.”

“About?”

“Not having money for me, Raina. Now you want to adopt me. But you and your buddy Patrick might talk it over in a few days and decide I’d tricked you into giving me a room in your ritzy house.”

“Come on. I didn’t react well. Would you have done any better?”

Daphne stared at her. “I honestly don’t know. I’m very aware that I’m the bad bargain in this deal.”

“Bad bargain? What are you talking about?”

“Are you serious? Look at me. My clothes are rags compared to yours. My tastes are plebeian. I have nothing to give you.”

“I haven’t asked for anything.”

“Except to be left alone.”

“That’s over. Let’s think of how you can find a way to live here. You need a job, a home.”

She stopped, her gaze pointed.

“Raina, forget it. You own a palace and I’m peasant material.”

“And proud of it.” Raina clearly refused to comprehend. “Can you type? I’ll bet Patrick could find work for you.”

Daphne might have been annoyed if the seductive memory of Patrick’s hand sliding over her palm hadn’t made her push her fingers under her thighs. Getting close to Patrick would be courting danger. She’d learned a long time ago to ignore instant attraction. Her defenses must be down. “His charity won’t do, either. I’ll find something.”

Raina opened her mouth, but words didn’t come.

“You’ve also changed a lot since this afternoon,” Daphne said.

“I’m not stunned anymore.” Raina stirred another cube of sugar into her tea. “Now that we agree, come with me and we’ll get serious about what to do next.”

“We agree?” Raina’s enthusiasm put her off. Why had her sister changed her mind so quickly?

Raina ignored her reticence. She flicked the label on her tea bag. “This stuff’s horrible. I’ll take you to a place that’ll serve us something with some taste.”

“I can’t afford to waste food.” Daphne hated the slightly smug, pompous note in her own voice. “Sorry. I mean I can’t afford a meal in the kind of restaurant you’re talking about.”

“Oh.” Raina became deeply interested in Daphne’s scone. The door opened again, and watery sunlight revealed a pinkish blush on her cheek. “Maybe I’ll get one of those.” She leaned back, nodding her head to the beat of the jazz tune being played. Her eyes followed the swirls of burgundy and passion-purple paint, cut by dark beams. The lines around her mouth relaxed—almost. “I’ve never been here, but it’s not so bad.”

“So how do you know Kyla?”

“We go to the same church.” She waved at the young woman behind the counter. Kyla stared as if Raina’s chic dark brown coiffure had tilted of its own volition upon her head.

“You have to go up there to get one,” Daphne said.

“Really?” Raina sat up, feeling for her purse, but seemingly surprised to find it still in her lap. “Usually they come to me.”

Daphne smiled into her cooling coffee as her sister sashayed to the counter.

So far, nurture was winning hands down.

Chapter Three

THAT NIGHT, as the temperature in Daphne’s rented room dipped below bone-chilling, she negotiated with the thermostat for more heat. The unit rumbled like a jet on takeoff, and Daphne gagged from the stench of burning dust. She was running for the door to let in fresh air when someone knocked.