Lexie (6 page)

Her mind blanked. She didn’t know what to say or what to do.

So they went back to staring at each other.

Finally, she shook her head, too nervous to accept anything on face value—even her face. There were things she needed to know. Facts had to be checked. “When’s your birthday?”

“April twelfth.” Roxie barely waited for her to nod in agreement before she fired back. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-eight.”

They both let out shuddering breaths, yet it wasn’t enough. “Where were you born?” Lexie asked, drilling deeper.

“Here in the Cobalt Valley, I think. Have you been in Cobalt City the whole time?”

So close. They’d been so close their whole lives and hadn’t known it. “East Side.”

Roxie’s lips pressed tight. “No surprise there.” Her gaze slid over the designer suit and high heels before she gestured at her surroundings with a nod. “Mostly west for me.”

The ache in Lexie’s chest rose to her throat, making it hard to talk.

Her doppelganger took the lead. “How tall are you out of those heels?”

“Five foot five. That birthmark on your shoulder on the billboard?”

Roxie pushed her right shoulder forward. “You mean this?” She looked at Lexie anxiously.

Daring to let go of the bar, Lexie fumbled to undo her suit jacket. Rolling her shoulder, she tugged the jacket down to the crook of her arm. The light blue chemise she was wearing had spaghetti straps. Following Roxie’s gesture, she pointed at the mark on her own shoulder. A perfect, tiny replica.

Roxie carefully reached out to touch the discoloration. She traced it twice before her eyes started blinking fast. “Is this really happening?” she whispered.

“I think so,” Lexie whispered back.

“Are you my sister?”

“I think I’m your twin.”

A sound left the back of Roxie’s throat, but then Lexie found herself pulled into a hug. She wrapped her arms around this stranger and clung. Oh God. It was happening. It was truly happening. She had blood, somebody who was hers that no paperwork or genetic test could ever deny. A sister. She had an identical twin!

She squeezed harder, but Roxie already had her in a death grip. “Where were you?” she asked.

Lexie stroked her hair. “I’m here now.”

“I missed you.”

“You knew I was out there?”

Roxie shook her head and clenched her fist to her chest. “Here. I missed you here.”

Lexie closed her eyes. She pressed her face into her sister’s hair and inhaled her spicy perfume. So had she. She just hadn’t known what it was she was missing.

“Holy Je-sus.” The man with the scruffy face was looking at them like something out of
Ripley’s Believe It or Not!
“Charlie, get out here. We need alcohol. Pronto.”

The handyman realized the light bulb was still popped up in his fist. He set it down and wiped his hands on his jeans. He grabbed a chair from atop a nearby table and flipped it over. The legs scraped loudly as he set it on the floor. Not caring, he did the same with another chair and patted the seat. “Sit. Sit before I fall over,” he ordered. “Char-leee.”

An ebony face appeared over the top of the half doors. “Keep your britches on, Skeeter. I’ll be there in a—” The man’s eyes widened to the size of saucers as he saw Roxie in duplicate.

“Look, boss.” Skeeter’s index finger waggled as he pointed again. “Look at this.”

“Sweet mother,” Charlie hissed. “Hold on. I’ll get the bourbon.”

Lexie and Roxie edged together towards the seats. They were both shaking so badly, they clung to each other to stay on their collective feet. At some point, they’d taken each other’s hand. Their fingers were interlocked, and neither was letting go.

Lexie had so many questions, but emotions were colliding inside her chest. She didn’t know where to start. “We have to figure this out.”

“Make sure,” her reflection agreed.

“What’s to figure out?” Skeeter bent closer, and his gaze ran over the two of them, this time with less confusion and a lot more interest. “You’re the same right down to the boobies.”

Roxie’s reflexes were quick. She reached out and bopped the man upside the head.

“Hey,” he said, rubbing the spot. “It’s true.”

“But you don’t have to say it out loud.” Roxie grabbed the back of the closest chair and dropped into it. She glanced at Skeeter as he moved outside of arm’s length. “Sorry. He’s a nice guy, but if he’s around long enough, you’ll eventually want to swat him.”

Lexie sat in the other seat, her knees finally giving way. “Do you work here with him?”

“Barmaid, manager and all-around utility player.”

“Don’t forget model.” Lexie pushed her hair back with a shaky hand. She couldn’t believe this day. From bad to worse… She didn’t think so! For once, the hatchet man had been wrong.

She stiffened. Why was he, of all people, popping into her head now? She shifted uncomfortably and concentrated on the here and now. She didn’t want to miss out on a moment of this. This day and place were going to be imprinted on her brain forever. “I hated that billboard an hour ago, but now I’m so glad you did it.”

“The billboard. Right. That’s what brought you here.” Roxie nibbled at her lower lip. “Has it been giving you problems?”

Problems? Her family had practically disowned her because of that sensational shot, but all that seemed insignificant now. Problems could be fixed, but people didn’t find sisters every day. Lexie waved off the question. “I should have read the article in the newspaper.”

Her gesture hitched midair. Had anyone taken time to actually read the article?

“It wouldn’t have helped.” Roxie looked at their entwined hands and ran her thumb over Lexie’s pale pink nail polish. Her own fingernails were hot-rod red, yet she seemed as fascinated by their differences as she was by their similarities. “Charlie’s doing his best to keep my name out of the press.”

“Yeah, but if any of those snooty reporters would come down here and interview the regulars, they’d have your name like that.” Skeeter snapped his fingers. He scratched his head as he studied them. “It’s like I’ve gone on a binge and I’m seeing double.”

“You’ll be seeing four of them after we drink this.” Charlie came out from behind the bar. He handed out drinks to everybody and chewed on his bottom lip as he stared at the pair of them. “I’ll be damned.”

Reaching out, he caught Lexie’s chin. She lifted it obediently as the man studied her. Finally, he just shook his head. “I take it neither of you knew about the other?”

“No,” Roxie said, following it with a curse.

Lexie swallowed hard. They’d been so close, yet so far away from each other. They’d grown up on opposite sides of the same city. Same city, but obviously very different lives. How much longer would they have remained in the dark about each other if not for that billboard?

Would they have ever crossed paths?

Roxie reached for her bourbon, and Lexie did the same. She took a stiff drink, throwing it back. It burned going down, but she needed it. Badly. If she’d felt like Alice down the rabbit hole before, it was nothing compared to what she felt now. She couldn’t stop sneaking peeks across the table. It was so bizarre to see herself sitting there, wearing those clothes and making gestures that were so familiar. It was like having an out-of-body experience. Anyone looking at Roxie would think it was her, plopped down into the wrong scene.

“Oh!” The drink in Lexie’s hand nearly sloshed out of the glass. “Oh no.”

“What’s wrong?”

“My family… I mean, my adopted family. I thought one of them had…” God, she couldn’t admit what she’d thought. This woman wouldn’t understand her family’s dysfunction. She’d blamed them, while they’d blamed her. In the end, none of them had been right. Rowe had been closest to the truth. He’d been the only one who’d known it wasn’t even her.

Lexie frowned. There he was again, inside her head.

“One of them had what?” Roxie prompted.

“Hmm? Oh, I thought the billboard was a prank. I blamed them.”

Roxie leaned closer, her gaze sharp. She took in the expensive suit, the fancy shoes and the designer handbag. “What are they like? Your family?”

Lexie stilled, guilt stinging her. All the hurt, anger and finger-pointing earlier this morning now seemed petty. She’d been adopted. She’d been taken in and loved. She had others she could turn to for support and advice. Others to play with, laugh with and fight with. Roxie hadn’t been so lucky. “Like any other family, I guess.”

“I wouldn’t know what that’s like.”

Lexie felt even smaller.

Roxie took another gulp of her bourbon. “Tell me about them. Do you have brothers? Sisters?” She ran her finger carefully around the rim of her glass. “Parents?”

Charlie and Skeeter backed away until they were behind the bar.

“Two brothers and two sisters.” Lexie fought not to squirm. She’d been given so much. Things hadn’t always been perfect, but did she really have anything to complain about? She gripped the tumbler and took another fiery drink. “Two parents.”

Roxie frowned. “That’s a lot of kids. What are they, social do-gooders?”

Her parents were big into philanthropy, especially her mother. Of course, if the charity could be tied back into the family business, all the better.

“It wasn’t my parents’ way of giving back,” she confessed. “I came first. They…uh, they didn’t think they could have kids.”

“And then they had four of their own?”

She shrugged.

“But if they wanted a bunch of rugrats, then why?” Roxie didn’t continue, but she didn’t have to. She wanted to know why one of them had been adopted and the other hadn’t.

Only Lexie didn’t know. She’d never known there were two of them. “We must have already been separated.”

“But how could that happen? How old were you when they took you in? Do you remember?”

“Around two, or so I’ve been told.”

Roxie’s face darkened and, in her eyes, Lexie finally saw the edge that Cameron had described. It was there, and it was jagged.

“How the hell did we get split up so early? Why didn’t the adoption agency keep us together?”

“I don’t know,” Lexie said. “I thought they tried to keep families intact. And we’re not just siblings, we’re…”

“Identical twins,” they said simultaneously.

Roxie ruffled her hair. She didn’t seem like someone who cried easily, yet this was upsetting her. Clearing her throat, she steadied her gaze. “Were they good to you?”

Lexie toyed with her glass. She’d been fed and clothed. A roof had been put over her head. She took another quick sip and was surprised to find her bourbon nearly gone. She downed the dregs. “Yes. Was foster care…?” She couldn’t find the right word. Terrible? Lonely? Scary?

Roxie shrugged. “I was passed around the system until I got out at sixteen.”

“So young?”

Her twin stared down into the swirling liquid of her drink. “A friend got me out.”

Lexie didn’t want to push, so she just squeezed her sister’s hand. “Have you ever thought about our parents? What they must have been like?”

“And why they gave us up? Kind of hard not to, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Lexie agreed. She’d always wondered. “I never thought about a sister, though.” Her gaze landed again on Roxie Cannon’s face. It was still so shocking. Every time she caught her reflection doing something she wasn’t, it was a jolt. Yet the hand clutching hers told her it was real. Real…irrefutable… Her brain began clicking. “We need to have a DNA test run.”

Roxie’s chin snapped up. “What, you think I’m trying to scam you?”

Lexie started shaking her head as soon as she saw the woman’s reaction. “To prove it once and for all. I want documentation that shows you’re mine. I’m not going to lose you again.”

They’d gotten split up once and nobody had been the wiser. She wanted it on paper this time and in computer databases. She wanted a solid line connecting her and Roxie on a family tree somewhere.

“Oh. Yeah, that’s a good idea.” A slow smile slid onto Roxie’s face. “It would be kind of cool running around showing everyone our matching double helixes.”

Lexie grinned back. Really cool for somebody who’d always been considered different. A square peg in a round hole…

She watched as her twin flipped back her hair, the gesture unconsciously sexy. The dark strands trailed down Roxie’s back in wild tumbles. As similar as they were, there were differences. Nurture over nature. Her twin was tough and impulsive. Bold, confident and nonconforming. A poser couldn’t have pulled off that billboard.

Yet at the moment, Roxie looked vulnerable. “Can you stay for a while?” she asked.

Lexie felt her shoulders relax. She had nowhere else to go, and she certainly wasn’t heading back to the offices. She’d found the answer to all the questions that had been screamed at her this morning, but this wasn’t something she was going to fix. She lifted her empty drink in Charlie’s direction and got more comfortable in her chair. “Are you kidding me? I’m not going anywhere.”

Charlie grinned and reached for the bottle of bourbon.