by Alexa Ross
THE MOUNTAIN MAN’S SECRET TWINS
By Alexa Ross
And
Holly Rayner
Copyright 2017 by Alexa Ross, Holly Rayner
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part by any means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the explicit written permission of the author.
All characters depicted in this fictional work are consenting adults, of at least eighteen years of age. Any resemblance to persons living or deceased, particular businesses, events, or exact locations are entirely coincidental.
Table Of Contents:
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
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Kenzie felt chilled to the bone. Sitting there in her real estate office chair, glaring across the room at the empty seat near the window, she thought back to all the times she should have recognized the truth: that her boyfriend, Austin, was sleeping with their mutual coworker, Tori.
God, the clues had been right there in front of her, probably making many of her coworkers think she was completely stupid, or clueless, for not seeing them. But Kenzie had been happy, or at least mildly so, and she hadn’t pushed any questions. Not when Austin and Tori had worked late together, nearly every night of the week. Not when Austin and Tori had decided to take that real estate vacation out to California, to “bone up” on some of the West Coast real estate tactics. As if.
Austin had moved in with Kenzie the previous year, uniting their funds and their lives in a small apartment in Concord, New Hampshire, just 20 minutes from where Kenzie had grown up with her mother in a lower-class home in the suburbs. Her father had left her and her mother when she was 16, driving quickly away from them and toward another job, another life, in Nevada. This had devastated her mother, at least for a while. But Kenzie had watched as her mother had regrouped, plotting eternally to remarry someone rich, someone who could take care of them.
Often, throughout her later teenage years, her mother would sit her at the table, tossing chicken and beans onto her plate, and declare that Kenzie’s one position in life was to nail down a husband, someone who could pay for her and keep her safe. Someone who could ensure she had a seat at a table, with a heaping plate, every single night of her life.
When Kenzie was 19, her mother had opted to marry a man down the street, an ex-real estate agent with a broad smile and three young children from a previous marriage—a man who talked a great deal about how much money he had and who could flash a credit card. Of course, the funds ran dry rather quickly. Kenzie hadn’t had the money to move out or head to college with the rest of her classmates at that point, and thus she had found herself as head babysitter, chasing the kids around the backyard and daydreaming about personal freedom, about her own piece of the world—one that wasn’t tainted by her mother, or by the fact that her father had left. Naturally, since then, she hadn’t thought much about motherhood for herself.
Her mother’s husband had suggested it first: that Kenzie become a real estate agent at the local firm. “She’s pretty, bright, and personable,” her stepdad had said, speaking as if Kenzie weren’t mere feet away from him, nibbling on a cracker. “She could really bring in the cash. And we could use it, Barb.”
Once the spark had entered her mother’s mind, Kenzie hadn’t questioned her, knowing that requesting permission to live her life would stunt her growth even more. She’d immediately headed to the real estate office, asking flirtatiously to fill out an application and quickly finding herself in an interview. The interviewer, a balding man with a drawl who had obviously moved up from the South, simply leaned back, assessing her with fish eyes. “Sell yourself,” he’d said.
And Kenzie had. She’d sold herself with dramatic and piercing words in the interview. “I have the skills and the ambition to sell these houses,” she’d said. “I’ve worked my way up from the bottom, selling candy bars to kids on the playground when I needed the extra cash. I’m nothing if not resilient. I’m the girl for this job.”
Then she’d sold houses. So many houses, in fact, that she’d found herself brought up to the Concord office in less than a year, leading her to getting her own place, to building her own life from the ground up. She didn’t often return to her mother’s, knowing the moment she arrived back, she’d be sucked into the chaos, probably babysitting within the hour. And her mother would nag, often declaring that Kenzie needed to move home, to contribute to the family funds.
“I gave you my entire life, Kenzie,” her mother often said, taking a long drag from a secret cigarette. “The least you could do is help me out a little bit once in a while. My husband and his kids drive me absolutely nuts. I need you around.”
But Kenzie didn’t allow herself to fall into her trap. She’d met Austin at the office when she’d been 23 years old, and they’d begun an intimate affair, with Kenzie hardly able to believe she’d found the kind of love people dreamed about, the kind her mother had never sought because she hadn’t believed it could exist. She’d allowed her mother to meet Austin exactly once, and her mother had been impressed, whispering to her daughter across the table: “He’s a keeper.”
But he hadn’t been. Or, at least, Austin hadn’t believed Kenzie was a keeper. Kenzie was a beautiful brunette with a broad smile and a medium frame who exercised three times a week at the gym to keep everything tight, or at least tight-ish. But Tori was a stunning blonde with bouncing breasts and a cinched waist. Many of the men at the office had pined after her, speaking about her lovingly at their various company parties. More than once, Kenzie had watched Austin’s eyes glide down Tori’s body, assessing her every angle.
But the saying “boys will be boys” had followed her, keeping her sane, reminding her that what she and Austin had, alone in their apartment, was special. It couldn’t be destroyed.
How had she found out? How had it all come tumbling down, you ask? Well, at lunchtime that very day, Kenzie had checked in on Austin, who had told her he was doing some last-minute touchups for an apartment down the block from their office. With a spare hour at her disposal, Kenzie had decided to grab lunch from his favorite burger place and surprise him there, allowing them a few moments of privacy before returning to their frantic office life.
Of course, they wouldn’t sleep together in another person’s apartment; that was strictly forbidden, and Kenzie liked to play by the rules. She couldn’t afford to get fired. She couldn’t afford to take that chance. Not ever. She’d been at the bottom before, and she wouldn’t go back.
But when Kenzie arrived at the apartment, she found the door cracked open. Clinging to the greasy bag of food, she tipped the door open more and listened, her mouth ajar, as the sounds of lovemaking, moaning, met her ears. Immediately, she panicked. Had the owners of the apartment returned, thus ruining Austin’s plans to complete the apartment in time? Who was going to wash the sheets? She shifted her weight, hating that she’d been listening for so long.
Immediately, it struck her that she should call Austin and tell him what was going on. She lifted her phone and dialed quickly, still listening to the moaning inside the apartment. If she closed the door too loudly and was caught, she’d be mortified.
But as the phone rang, she heard a familiar ring on the other side of
the door, coming from the direction of the bedroom. She stopped, tilted her head, and realized that the lovemaking and moaning had stopped. She heard muffled words from down the hallway, someone saying, “Who is it?”
And a familiar, gruff voice saying, “It’s her. It’s Kenzie.”
“Let it ring,” the other voice said, giggling. “It’s our time right now.”
Kenzie’s eyes had grown wide, realizing that the other voice was Tori’s and that Tori and Austin were inside, naked, sweating, touching. She shivered and took a step back, feeling as if she were at the bottom of a well, looking up at another reality, another world—one she was no longer a part of.
She walked back to the office, taking a small bite of a burger before tossing it in the trash. She hated the taste of the meat against her tongue, the feel of the grease between her teeth. When she returned to the office, she immediately threw up, feeling the weight of Austin’s infidelity upon her shoulders. This was something that happened to other girls, not her. And yet, here she was.
Sitting there, in her chair, still in shock and waiting for Tori and Austin to return, she realized she had to leave. She couldn’t remain in the office another second, not when she knew Austin and Tori would march in, laughing, salty from sex, in just an hour’s time. She lifted a sheet of paper from her desk and scribbled on it, writing the words in jagged handwriting: “I know. Be out of the apartment before the weekend. I’m going away for a few days. No questions.” She turned toward Austin’s desk, folded the sheet of paper, and smacked it in the center. The noise was a bit too loud, causing the secretary to begin whispering to another coworker, her dark green eyes still upon Kenzie. But Kenzie was far from caring.
She sent an email to her boss, explaining that she’d canceled her client meetings over the next few days and she’d be in Vermont to “clear her head.”
“Go ahead,” her boss emailed back. “We’ll see you when you’re ready to return.”
From the email, Kenzie realized that her boss had known this day was coming all along. He’d probably recognized Tori and Austin’s affection for one another long before and had decided to stay out of it, for better or for worse.
As she sat, stewing, she clicked around online, checking out a few Vermont cabins near the ski resorts. She imagined having the entire creaky cabin to herself: making tea, reading poetry, trying to remind herself what made her unique, what made her who she was, beyond Austin. The photos seemed fine, displaying a rugged interior and a large, crooked bed.
“Perfect,” she whispered, clicking on the payment options. Before she knew it, she’d booked a stay for the next week.
Her boss gave her a knowing look as she left the office. She wrapped her coat around herself and trudged to her car. That morning she’d been loved, a woman with a boyfriend—one she’d assumed would propose in the next year. But this afternoon she was single, alone, with nothing but the open road stretched before her.
She stopped only once, at her apartment, to grab a few clothes and her skis. Then she swept off toward that tiny cabin in Vermont with fire in her eyes, listening to music as loudly as she possibly could and driving five miles over the speed limit, a reckless action incredibly unlike her.
Vermont became hilly, mountainous, covered in snow around her as she drove into the evening. As she drove farther toward her destination, she found she could no longer hear the gossiping of her coworkers echoing in her ears. She could no longer hear her mother’s words declaring that her only purpose was to find a suitable mate. All she could hear was the music blaring in her ears. She felt free.
CHAPTER TWO
The Vermont cabin was tucked away on Mount Mansfield, behind several twiggy trees and up a winding driveway. As she crept up, Kenzie passed one or two other rickety cabins. She wondered who her neighbors were. Perhaps married couples, looking to get away? Or other soulless, single women trying to get over the prospect of love? She imagined she’d never know, as she’d be locking herself away, leaving only for food runs and long, solitary days at the ski resort. She hadn’t come to commune with anyone, or to make friends. She’d come to rid her brain of its current turmoil. She’d come to feel like a person again.
She parked outside the cabin she’d reserved, checking her email quickly to ensure it was the proper address. She shrugged to herself, noting that the cabin looked a bit more dilapidated than it had in the photograph. As a real estate agent herself, she knew the little tricks of the trade, the ways to make a place look better than it really was. Remarkably, the online tactics had worked on her as well. She supposed she’d been a bit distracted, however.
She got out of her car and marched through the snow, feeling the chilly precipitation melt upon her nylons and drench her skin. She walked up the creaky steps, lifting the ‘welcome’ mat to find a key beneath. She smiled to herself, feeling like it was 1950, when people trusted one another enough to leave hideaway keys, and even to keep their doors wide open for children to run in and out.
She unlocked the door, feeling a vague fear pass over her. The door stuck, but she forced it open, revealing the run-down interior. Immediately, she realized the cabin hadn’t been warmed in several weeks, as it was even chillier on the inside than it was on the porch. She walked along the floorboards toward the heating system, flinging the switch up. She waited, tipping her weight forward on her toes, and realized that the heater cranked nothing but dust into the air. She breathed hot air into her hands, scrubbing her palms together, realizing she couldn’t survive in that cabin without heat.
“Shoot,” she whispered. She turned toward the kitchen, with its ’60s-era refrigerator and its crooked sink, and turned the handle of the faucet, thinking she could heat up some water. Nothing but a small, brown trickle came from the mouth. She sighed.
“Guess it’s time to use those Girl Scout skills,” she murmured, turning toward the fireplace. Unfortunately, the previous tenant hadn’t stocked any firewood. As she gazed outside, into the woods, she realized that all the firewood she could find that evening, before twilight struck, would be coated in snow, unable to dry out before the following day.
As she pondered what to do, her mind fluttered back toward thoughts of Austin. He was a strong, able-bodied man, but he’d always complained when they’d gone camping together, nearly throwing out his back while chopping firewood. He would have hated this cabin. He would have requested a beach vacation, somewhere where they brought cocktails to you as you dipped your feet beneath the waves. Tori probably preferred something similar. If anything, this was what Kenzie was meant to be doing, despite her current predicament. She had to persevere.
Strapping a smile on her face, Kenzie stomped back to her car, changed into her dark snow boots, and hopped into the driver’s seat, not bothering to lock the cabin. She cranked backward, reversing the car, and chugged down the driveway, stopping at the first cabin. She parked and hopped out, still maintaining her real estate smile.
But neither this cabin nor the one down the hill was occupied. Growing chillier with each passing moment, Kenzie forced herself to drive farther into the mountains, deeper into the woods, hunting for a neighbor. If she couldn’t find one, she’d turn back, head to the closest town, rent a motel room, and weep herself to sleep in a grungy, bedbug-swarmed bed.
After driving for nearly 15 minutes, lost in the heat of her car’s blasting air and the cyclical nature of her own thoughts, Kenzie found herself staring at a small, remote cabin with a slight porch in front and a large truck parked in the center of the driveway. The cabin was far from the main road, leaving Kenzie to believe that whoever had built out here wasn’t hunting for visitors. But as she gazed at the cabin, watching as the light from the interior fireplace licked at the porch poles, she realized this was her only hope.
And now that she’d been shamed so supremely by a man she’d loved and a woman she’d worked alongside for years, she couldn’t imagine any kind of embarrassment at the hand of the stranger in the cabin. If he murdered her, perhaps
that was all the better. At least Austin would feel guilty.
Giggling to herself, realizing her thoughts were crazed and her stomach was gurgling with hunger, she ducked from the driver’s seat and began her ascent toward the cabin, shivering full force. The stairs creaked beneath her. With mere inches between her nose and the door, she could almost feel the warmth of the fire inside.
Unable to wait in the chill a moment longer, Kenzie rapped on the door. She waited, listening to the shifting weight of someone inside coming to his feet and marching toward the door. His footfalls were heavy, sending fear coursing up and down Kenzie’s spine. Perhaps she wasn’t prepared to be murdered after all.
After what seemed like a small eternity, the door burst open, revealing a tall, blond, blue-eyed man with a muscular frame beneath his blue and black flannel. The blue in his shirt made his eyes gleam. The moment Kenzie caught sight of him, her breath stopped. She took a slight step back, overwhelmed by his masculinity and frank expression. She stuttered, wanting to find the right words.
“Hello,” he said, his voice gruff. “Can I help you with something?”
