Her Surprise Sister

by Marta Perry

  She hustled back into the hall, presumably toward the kitchen. Violet glanced up at him and smiled.

  “You have to stay, you know, or we’ll never hear the end of it.”

  “I guess we can’t let that happen.” He looked into her face, caught by the warmth that emanated from her, as welcome as a wood fire on a cold winter day.

  Whoa, back up, he reminded himself. You just broke up with her sister. Oddly enough, that didn’t seem to make a bit of difference.

  Chapter Five

  Violet pushed the pillow up against the headboard of her bed, trying to get more comfortable. Her vision blurred as she tried to concentrate on the laptop screen, and she’d begun to think she couldn’t answer one more message of sympathy. So many people were worried about her mom, so many were praying for her recovery. Surely God was listening to all those petitions.

  Sighing, she set the laptop aside and rubbed her eyes. Landon had left soon after supper, saying he’d be in touch after he’d spoken to the private investigator again. She’d tried to give him an opportunity to speak to Maddie without her hanging around, but her twin had been quite determined not to let that happen. Apparently, Maddie really was serious about not picking up their romance again.

  The more Violet saw of Landon, the more she thought he was right for Maddie, but Maddie just didn’t see it that way. Violet touched her wrist, reliving the warmth that had swept through her when Landon touched her. She hadn’t had that instant response to a man in…well, ever. The guys she’d dated in college had been boys in comparison, and since she’d come home to run the produce business, romance hadn’t been in the picture.

  She smiled, thinking of Jack’s reactions when she’d turned down one of his buddies who’d asked her out.

  “You’re too fussy,” he’d said. “You want to end up alone? It’s time you were getting serious about someone.”

  She’d just grinned. “You’re two years older than I am, remember? I’ll get serious when you do.”

  That had ended it, as far as Jack’s marital advice was concerned. But Landon—

  She cut that thought off before it could go anywhere. Landon was totally unsuitable for her in too many ways to count. She wasn’t going to think about him anymore.

  Rolling off the bed, Violet shoved her feet into slippers. She’d go downstairs and get a snack. Then maybe she’d have enough energy to answer a few more emails.

  The upstairs was quiet. Maddie’s door was closed, and no light shone beneath the crack. Her sister must have gone to sleep already.

  Moving quietly, Violet went down the stairs. The light in the first-floor hall was always left on, and she found it reassuring as she tiptoed down. The house was empty without her mom, no matter how many people were here.

  When she reached the hallway and headed back toward the kitchen, Violet realized she’d been wrong. The television was on in the den at the back of the house. Maddie was curled up in a corner of the saggy, comfortable old sofa, watching the news.

  “Hi.”

  Maddie jerked, turning. “Violet, you scared me! I didn’t hear you coming.”

  “Sorry.” She held up one foot. “Slippers don’t make enough noise, I guess. I thought you were asleep already.”

  Maddie shook her head, curling her feet under her. “I never go to bed this early, no matter how tired I am. What about you?”

  “I’m usually asleep by ten. I get up early so I can do the outside work before it’s too hot.” She gestured toward the kitchen. “I was going to get a snack. Do you want something?”

  “What are you offering?” Maddie wrinkled her nose. “I know I shouldn’t, after that meal Lupita fixed, but something sweet would taste good.”

  “It probably sounds silly in the middle of July, but I love a cup of hot chocolate in the evening,” Violet confessed.

  “Me, too.” Maddie smiled. “Maybe it’s a twin thing.”

  “Maybe so.” She waved her hand when Maddie started to get up. “Stay put. It won’t take a minute to fix, and we might as well have it in here where it’s comfortable.”

  It was more than a minute, but not much. Violet put the mugs of cocoa on a tray along with a plate of homemade oatmeal cookies and swiped a paper towel over an errant splash of cocoa on the quartz counter that Lupita kept gleaming.

  Maddie still sat in the same position when Violet went back into the den. She put the tray down on the coffee table and sat down on the couch.

  Maddie sipped cautiously at the steaming cocoa. “Mmmm, perfect.”

  Violet leaned back, smiling. It was nice to find they had something in common, despite their different upbringings.

  “You and your mother seem to be very close,” Maddie said, frowning down at the mug she held. “Was it always like that between you?”

  “Pretty much,” Violet said cautiously, not wanting anything she said to hurt Maddie. “You can talk about her as our mother, you know.”

  Maddie nodded. “I know. Sometimes it comes out so easily, and other times it just seems to get stuck. Crazy, isn’t it?”

  “That’s how I feel about our father, so if you’re crazy, I am, too. The normal rules don’t seem to apply when you find out something that changes everything you think about who you are.”

  Maddie’s expression was sober, but she reached out to touch Violet’s hand. “At least we’re not alone in this. Back to our mother…what kinds of things did you do together growing up? Baking cookies, that sort of thing?”

  “Actually, I remember doing those kinds of things with Lupita. Mom was so busy helping Uncle James run the ranch that she was outside most of the time. I did lots of things with her, of course, learning to work the ranch. Jack, too. Mom’s job was here where we lived, and we worked right along with her.”

  Violet’s voice warmed as she thought about those times. Maybe it sounded strange in comparison to how Maddie lived, but when you grew up on a ranch or a farm, that was how things were. The whole family worked together and everyone’s work had value to the family.

  “What about you?” she asked. “Did you have a good relationship with your stepmother?”

  Maddie’s smile was a bit sad. “I didn’t know Sharla wasn’t my birth mother. She loved all of us a lot, and she did all the mom things.” She hesitated. “I think she felt she had to do more because Dad was gone so much. Whenever we questioned it, or got mad because he wasn’t there for a school play or a football game, she’d remind us that he was a doctor and sick people needed him.”

  “She sounds like a lovely person,” Violet said gently.

  “I missed her more than I can say after the accident. I was quite young when she died. Now…well, everything’s so confused in my mind, but it doesn’t change the fact that Sharla loved me. I can hang on to that fact.”

  “Do you think she knew the truth? I mean, obviously she knew that she wasn’t your birth mother, but do you think she knew that you and Grayson each had a twin?”

  Maddie looked startled. “I don’t know. I hadn’t even thought of that, but there was never any indication that she knew. If she did, she kept Dad’s secret very well.”

  Violet picked up an oatmeal cookie and then put it back again. “Besides our parents, there’s someone else out there who knows the truth, whether Sharla did or not. The person who sent you that note and the Bible.”

  “We really are on the same wavelength.” Maddie pulled out the object that had been out of sight between her body and the arm of the couch…the Bible. It was a small Revised Standard version, with a white, soft leather cover—the sort you could buy at any bookstore. She opened it, taking out the letter.

  “There was no information on the packaging as to where it came from?”

  “Nothing. No return address at all, just my name and address in block printing. But you’re right—the person who sent this knows all about us.” Maddie shook her head. “I suppose there could be someone…some relative or close friend of our parents who knew the truth.”

  “True,
but that doesn’t account for the writer asking for forgiveness, does it? Why the implication that the person did something bad to our family? That almost sounds as if he or she was responsible for our parents splitting us up.”

  Violet found her head aching at the thought of what had been done to them. On second thought, maybe it was her heart that ached.

  “You can’t have any more questions than I do,” Maddie said. “In fact, I never did dismiss that note from my mind, even though I kept telling myself it was meant for someone else. It was just too odd. Now I know why I couldn’t forget.”

  Violet touched the leather cover of the Bible. “Is anything written inside?”

  Maddie shook her head. “I’ve gone through it three or four times. Nothing. And why didn’t you get the Bible and note as well? I mean, if this person was responsible for splitting us up, he or she hurt you and Jack as well. Why just send it to me?”

  That hadn’t occurred to Violet. “I don’t know. Maybe you were easier to find, for some reason.”

  “I guess so.” Maddie was looking down, seeming to stare at the Bible. “I’m in the phone book, so anyone who knew my name and that I lived in Fort Worth could find me.” She hesitated. “You could have, Violet.”

  Violet stared at her twin for a long moment as the meaning of her words sank in. “You think I sent the Bible? That I planned this whole thing?”

  Maddie pressed her lips together. “I don’t want to think that. But I can’t ignore the fact that you could have.”

  “I could have if I’d known you even existed, but I didn’t. Can’t you see that I’m at as much of a loss as you are?” Violet discovered that there was something worse than all the unanswered questions. It was realizing that Maddie didn’t trust her.

  She started to get up, knowing that if she sat there any longer she’d start to cry. Maddie grabbed her arm.

  “Violet, don’t go. I do believe you. But once in a while the doubts creep in, and I wonder if I can trust anyone. My whole life has been turned upside down.”

  “Mine has, too. Remember?” She wanted to be angry, but she understood what Maddie was saying. “Sometimes the doubts ambush me, too. But you’re my twin. I keep coming back to that. Not trusting you would be like not trusting myself.”

  “I know.” Maddie’s voice was small. “I just felt like I had to say it, instead of letting it eat away at me. I’m sorry if I hurt you.”

  “It’s all right.” Violet managed to smile, wanting to show there were no hard feelings. But that wouldn’t be true. The hurt still lingered. She had to remind herself that twin or not, it was going to take time to build a relationship between them.

  * * *

  Landon drove toward the ranch house the next morning, his thoughts shifting from the business that had kept him on the phone for several hours to the problem that lay ahead of him: convincing Maddie to go back to Fort Worth.

  The ability to concentrate fully on the issue of the moment was one of his strengths, but it seemed to be deserting him just when he needed it most. Violet’s image kept coming between him and his need to do what was best for Maddie.

  How could he have mistaken Violet for Maddie, even for a moment? Now that he knew them both, he could probably identify them if he were blindfolded. Despite the external similarities, Maddie and Violet each had a distinctive personality that was all her own. Violet had a glow about her—a welcome warmth that seemed to draw him closer each time he saw her. He’d known instinctively that whoever was at fault in this tangled situation, it wasn’t Violet.

  And the tangle had gotten worse, judging from the call from Dave.

  His fingers tightened on the wheel as he made the turn into the lane. Dave, with his customary thoroughness, had gone the extra mile in trying to find out what he’d been asked, checking birth records in Belle Colby’s name as well as in Brian Wallace’s. That had led him farther than even he had expected.

  “Belle Colby doesn’t exist,” he’d said flatly.

  “What are you talking about? The woman is in a hospital in Amarillo. She’s real, all right.” He’d been impatient, eager to get on with the business at hand.

  “She may be real, but she’s not Belle Colby.” Dave’s sureness rang in his voice. “I’ve checked and cross-checked. Whoever she is, she has a manufactured identity. It’s a good job, but not quite good enough.”

  “Can you find out who she really is?” Landon had focused in on this new issue.

  “I don’t know.” Dave would never promise what he couldn’t deliver. “It’s easier to find out who someone isn’t than who they are, if you get my drift.”

  “Do your best. Put more people on it if you have to. I need to know what’s going on here.”

  “Will do.” Dave had clicked off, needing nothing more to put a full-scale search into operation.

  And Landon had headed straight for the ranch. Whatever was going on, he wanted Maddie out of it. He glanced at his watch. If they’d already left to go to the hospital—but no, Violet’s SUV and Maddie’s compact were parked on the gravel sweep in front of the house. He pulled in behind the vehicles and got out, urgency riding him.

  Violet might know nothing at all about her mother’s past. But if she did, her instincts were wrong, and she’d been deceiving them. Either way, that didn’t alter the fact that by staying here, Maddie was getting involved in something that was probably way over her head.

  * * *

  Violet pressed soil firmly around a pepper seedling that had been disturbed by something during the night. She’d have to double-check the fence to see how the unwelcome visitor had gotten in. If she—

  A shadow fell across the plant. Startled, she looked up. Landon was a tall, dark outline with the sun behind him.

  She stood quickly, pulling off her gloves. “Landon. I didn’t expect to see you this early.” Sometime in the wee hours of the night she’d formulated the words to something she wanted to tell him, but she hadn’t expected to have the opportunity this early.

  “I thought I’d stop by before you and Maddie headed out for Amarillo. At least, I assume you’re going to see your mother today?”

  There was an undertone to his words that Violet couldn’t quite identify. Disapproval? But that was ridiculous. He couldn’t disapprove of Maddie going to see her injured mother.

  “I needed to get some work done here before it’s too hot, so we’ll go after lunch. Maddie is in the house if you want to see her.”

  He didn’t move, glancing down the rows of plants. “So this is your domain, is it?”

  “Part of it.” She waved a hand to the other planted fields. “At the moment we have several kinds of peppers, tomatoes, okra, black-eyed peas and green beans. And the pecan groves, of course.”

  Following the direction she was pointing, Landon looked toward the pecan groves in the distance. “You have an impressive operation here.” That sounded somewhat reluctantly admiring. “You never wanted to do anything else with your education? Teach, for instance?”

  Violet shook dirt from her gloves. “Something where I wouldn’t get my hands dirty, you mean?”

  “Am I sounding condescending again?” Landon gave her a trace of a smile.

  “Maybe just a little.” She glanced at the rows of plants. “This is satisfying. Plants are predictable, unlike people. Given the right circumstances, they’ll flourish.”

  “Speaking of which, isn’t it too hot to be planting now?” he asked.

  It was a more intelligent question than she’d have expected from someone who looked as if he couldn’t tell the difference between an asparagus plant and a weed. “We plant peppers a couple of times a year. The plants we set out in July give us a fall harvest.”

  His eyebrows lifted. “You sound like an expert. Did you study horticulture?”

  She couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped. “Actually, I majored in English literature. I can’t say that knowledge of Shakespearean sonnets improved my gardening abilities, but it has enriched my life.” />
  Violet had surprised herself with her answer. She usually turned off that question with a joke, but somehow she’d found herself telling Landon what she really felt.

  He was studying her face, his expression grave. “I see the Colby family is full of surprises.”

  If her cheeks had reddened, maybe he’d think it was from the sun. “Yes, well…” This was her chance to say what she’d been rehearsing, so she’d better do it. “Before you go in to see Maddie, there’s something I wanted to say.”

  Wariness settled on his face. “Yes?”

  “I know I’ve given you a hard time once or twice.” That was probably an understatement. “But it’s good of you to go to so much trouble to help us. And if you’re here because you’re trying to get Maddie back, I don’t want to stand in your way.”

  Landon just stood looking at her for a long moment. Then he shook his head. “We’re not engaged any longer,” he said flatly. “To be honest, I think it only happened because Maddie was feeling vulnerable. She’d lost her job, and with her family away, she needed someone to turn to. And I proposed because…”

  He stopped, and she didn’t seem to be breathing while she waited for whatever else he was going to say.

  Landon shook his head. “It’s complicated. Maddie always felt like a younger sister to me. Grayson’s in a dangerous line of work, and he asked me to promise to take care of her.” A faint smile crossed his face. “I’m sure he didn’t mean I should propose to her. I don’t love Maddie that way, and she’s made it abundantly clear she doesn’t feel that way about me, either. I think we’re both relieved to be un-engaged.”

  “But you’re still here,” she pointed out.

  “With all that’s happened, I expect she’s still vulnerable. So I’m still keeping my promise.” His gaze seemed to be probing her thoughts. “At a guess, you’re probably pretty vulnerable right about now, too.”

  She had to shake off the sudden longing to lean on him. “Me? I’m fine. I mean, worried about Mom, of course, but otherwise, I’m okay.”