Carbon Copy Cowboy (Texas Twins Book 3)

by Arlene James

  Jack was here. She didn’t know why having him near settled her, but she slept soundly for the remainder of the night and went downstairs the next morning in the eager anticipation of seeing him.

  He sat at the breakfast table sipping coffee when she came into the kitchen wearing Maddie’s altered skirt and a sleeveless sweater suitable for church. She’d even put her hair up, using a pair of elastic bands to capture twists into a kind of bun. The best that she could do for footwear, however, was to ditch the socks that she usually wore with her white leather athletic shoes. Lupita, she noticed, was nowhere to be seen, so Kendra smiled at Jack and offered to get him some breakfast.

  “Doughnuts,” he said, nodding toward a white, rectangular pasteboard box on the counter. “Lupita keeps them frozen. I usually nuke three or four.”

  “Or five,” Violet quipped, practically dancing into the room. She wore a denim jumper over a pale blue satin blouse and a pair of “barely there” flats.

  Chuckling, Kendra carried a plate to the counter and filled it with doughnuts. “Anyone want fruit?”

  “I do,” Violet said.

  Jack just got up and walked out of the room. Kendra sent Violet a questioning glance, but she merely shrugged and went to the refrigerator while Kendra went to the microwave. Seconds later, Kendra set the plate of doughnuts on the table next to the bowl of mixed fruit. Maddie came into the room, looking stylish in a pair of smart slacks and a short matching jacket over a Western-styled shirt. After she poured herself a mug of coffee, the three of them sat around the table eating breakfast and chatting about the previous evening. Maddie and Ty had driven to a neighboring town to see a movie, while Landon and Violet had spent the evening hanging drapes at his newly renovated place, somewhere on the ranch. Kendra hadn’t even realized that he had a place in Grasslands, though it stood to reason. She didn’t see Violet running off to Fort Worth to live.

  “Landon has exquisite taste,” Maddie observed, waggling her eyebrows at Violet, who blushed.

  “He absolutely does,” she agreed. “Look who he’s engaged to marry.”

  Maddie laughed. Kendra was still smiling at their banter when Jack returned to the room, carrying a pair of obviously expensive alligator cowboy boots with sharp, metal-tipped toes.

  Going straight to Kendra, he crouched and lifted one of her feet to remove her shoe. Standing, he matched the sole of her shoe to the sole of the boot. “Little big,” he judged, dumping a pair of heavy socks from the boot into her lap. “ I figured as much. Better wear those.”

  “Uncle James’s boots,” Violet said with an approving nod. “I should’ve thought of that.” Leaning forward, she said to Kendra, “He was a small man, but he prided himself on his wardrobe.”

  “I think the boots and a couple of dress hats are all we have left of his things, though,” Jack said, walking around the table. “Pity. You might’ve been able to wear some of his jeans.” Sitting down, he began to eat doughnuts.

  Touched, Kendra looked down at the shiny, dark brown boots. They would certainly look better with this skirt than her athletic shoes. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ll take good care of them and return them after church.”

  “Might as well hang on to them while you’re here,” Violet said.

  “Are you sure? They belonged to your uncle, after all.”

  “James Crawford wasn’t our uncle,” Jack stated matter-of-factly. “We just called him that.”

  “We were the closest thing to family that he had,” Violet explained. “Mom came here to work for him as housekeeper. James was pretty old even then. Over time, Mom took over more and more of the ranch for him. When he died, he left it to her. Well, the oldest part of it, anyway. She started adding acreage and included Jack and me in the legal setup.”

  “I see. That makes the boots extra-special mementos, though.”

  “They don’t do anybody any good sitting in a closet,” Jack decreed.

  “I’ll take extra-good care of them, then,” Kendra said, accepting the offer with gratitude.

  Violet smiled, and Jack ate his doughnuts while Kendra blinked back silly tears and tried not to read more into Jack’s gesture than could possibly be there. They were just borrowed boots, after all.

  Borrowed boots, a safe place to stay, elastic hair bands, a shoulder to cry on, a few assigned chores... Every time she turned around, Jack was doing something kind for her. How could she not feel more than simple gratitude for him?

  * * *

  After breakfast, they all trooped out to Jack’s truck. As promised, Kendra was wearing Uncle James’s shiny boots. Violet and Maddie climbed into the backseat, leaving the front passenger space for Kendra.

  The twins chatted all the way into town, leaving Jack and Kendra to ride in silence. At the church, Violet and Maddie immediately paired up with Landon and Ty, leaving Kendra with Jack. He seemed to hang back, sliding into place beside her on the middle pew only at the last moment, as if reluctant to do so. She tried not to be hurt by that. It wasn’t as if they were a couple, after all, and he had been more than kind. She had no reason for complaint.

  Fixing her full attention on the service, she soon discovered that behind the horn-rimmed glasses of the red-haired, freckle-faced minister, Jeb Miller, stood a capable man of God. The good reverend couldn’t have been more than thirty and tended to teach more than preach, but he quoted lengthy passages of Scripture with the ease usually provided by a teleprompter and spoke with simple but unassailable wisdom. She noticed, too, that retiring little Sadie Johnson, with whom Kendra had chatted at the First Wednesday meeting, sat virtually enraptured at the front of the church during the sermon.

  Afterward, Jack practically sprinted for the back of the church, leaving Kendra to shuffle along with everyone else who crowded the central aisle. A tiny, elderly woman at Kendra’s side squinted up at her through the thick lenses of oversize eyeglasses, asking, “Do I know you?”

  Kendra’s heart lurched. “I’m not sure. Do you?”

  The woman tapped her chin with a gnarled finger, tilting back her head to stare at Kendra through her bifocals. “You look familiar.”

  “Were you at the First Wednesday gathering?”

  The old woman shook her head. “Don’t get out much in the evenings at my age.”

  “Have you seen me somewhere else?” Kendra asked hopefully.

  Surely, if she’d been to Grasslands before, someone would have recognized her by now. Still, it could be that she hadn’t been around in some time—or that she was related to someone who lived around here, someone who looked a lot like her. An unreasonable hope rose in her, painful in its intensity. She felt total recall hovering somewhere in the back of her mind, as if one little jolt would open the floodgate of memories for her.

  “No,” the old dear said, narrowing her eyes. “I think it was here at the church. I just can’t remember when.”

  “Can you try to recall?” Kendra heard herself ask, wincing at how pathetic she sounded. She clamped her jaws shut and mentally prayed instead.

  Please, Lord. I have to know who I am and where I belong.

  She held her breath, waiting to see what God would do in that moment.

  Chapter Eight

  The old woman stared at her, unaware that Kendra’s whole life hung in the balance.

  “I can’t be certain,” the elderly lady said, smoothing her thin, silver hair, her delicate, knobby hands sweeping from her wrinkled brow to the lopsided bun at the nape of her slender neck. “Seems like it was a long time ago, though.”

  Kendra felt her bottom lip tremble and clamped down on it with her teeth. “I—I’d appreciate it if you could remember,” she encouraged gently.

  After staring at her for several seconds longer, the feeble woman offered a sweet smile. “I’m Bessie Lindley,” she said. “My late husband Albert an
d I used to ranch a small acreage that’s part of the Colby spread now.”

  Kendra managed a wan smile. Not wanting to give her adopted name or explain her situation, she said, “I’m a guest there.”

  “Ah,” the woman commented, “maybe I have seen you around town, then.” Mrs. Lindley shook her head. “That’s old age for you. Something that happened years ago you remember clear as a bell. What happened yesterday, pfft!” She tilted her head in an oddly birdlike gesture, chirping, “You do look familiar, though.”

  Kendra’s heart pounded with fresh hope. Somehow, Jack overheard the conversation and made his way to Kendra’s side, moving against the tide of the crowd.

  “Miss Bessie,” he said, inclining his head. “Hope you’re keeping well.”

  “As well as old age permits, Jack,” she replied, lifting a hand to pat his cheek. “I was just telling this young lady here that she reminds me of someone.”

  Jack shifted so that his shoulder touched Kendra’s and sent her a meaningful glance. “Any idea who that might be, ma’am?”

  Bessie Lindley shook her head. “Most likely, it would be someone from long ago.” She chuckled, adding, “Can’t remember what I had for breakfast, but something that happened fifty years ago... Well, it couldn’t be important.”

  Kendra swallowed a lump in her throat. If only Bessie Lindley knew! Jack lifted a comforting hand to the small of Kendra’s back.

  Mrs. Lindley squinted up at Jack and asked, “How are you coming with the house?”

  While Jack gave a rundown on the improvements that he’d made with the Lindley’s former home, Kendra tried not to let her disappointment reduce her to tears. Presently, she felt Jack apply pressure to her back. He ushered her up the aisle, past the pastor—who briefly shook their hands—and out of the building.

  “Let it go,” he whispered as he walked her across the graveled drive to the greensward beyond. “Just let it go.”

  “Do you think it means anything?” Kendra asked, effectively ignoring his advice. “Maybe I was headed here, after all. Maybe I have f-family or...” She broke off, trying desperately to convince herself.

  He steered her to a bench placed beneath a mature pin oak and all but pushed her down onto it. “Could be,” he answered, parking his hands at his waist. “Or perhaps simply you remind Bessie of someone else—someone completely unrelated to you. She’s an old woman. She said it herself. She can’t remember what she had for breakfast.”

  A tear fell from Kendra’s eye and rolled down her cheek. She quickly wiped it away. “It’s just...” She saw the pity in those light brown eyes and gulped. “N-not belonging anywhere or to anyone, it’s like not e-existing, like I’m not even real.” She wiped furiously at the tears that now streaked her face.

  Twisting about, Jack sank down onto the bench next to her and looped an arm about her shoulders. “I never met anyone more real than you,” he told her, “and you do have a place in this world. For as long as you need or want it.”

  She tried to smile but mostly managed a sniff. “Thank you. The thing is, though, I sense that I’ve felt this way my whole life, as if I don’t quite belong or fit in.”

  “Aw, come on,” Jack said, giving her a quick squeeze. “A woman like you could fit in almost anywhere. You fit in with the Colbys well enough. Better than some I could mention,” he muttered.

  “If you mean Maddie, that’s not fair,” Kendra told him softly.

  Jack looked at her with some surprise. “I didn’t mean her, but what makes you think I did?”

  “You seem to have a hard time equating her with Violet,” Kendra ventured quietly, glad to have something else upon which to focus.

  “Haven’t known her as long as I’ve known Violet,” Jack grumbled.

  “It’s not just Maddie, though, is it? It’s your brothers, too.”

  Dark brows drawing together, Jack stared at her. “What do you know about my brothers?”

  “Mainly what I’ve overheard,” she admitted.

  Jack shook his head. “Leaving Carter out of it,” he began quietly, “I just keep asking myself what reason a mother could have for splitting up her family of two sets of twins and hiding them from one another. Especially if Brian is not my and Grayson’s father. Talk about a messed-up situation.”

  “All I know,” Kendra told him earnestly, “is that I’d give almost anything to discover that I have siblings, whatever the circumstances. And to find a twin... How wonderful that would be!”

  “I’m not so sure of that,” Jack mumbled, squinting off into the distance. “Sometimes the price for such a thing is just too high.”

  Kendra couldn’t resist the impulse to lay a hand upon his knee. “I don’t understand. What do you mean?”

  Jack looked down at her hand. Just as she was about to take it away, he covered it with his own larger, stronger one. He didn’t move again as he told her in a low voice how he’d badgered his mother for information about their past and family, how they’d argued and she’d jumped onto her horse that day and ridden away at breakneck speed.

  “I’ll never forget how she looked,” he said woodenly, “crumpled there with her head bent beneath her.”

  “Her neck is actually broken?” Kendra asked, horrified.

  “No,” Jack said, shaking his head. “If—when—she wakes up, she ought to have full movement. Mouse didn’t even step on her that I could tell.”

  “Mouse,” Kendra echoed. “That would be the grulla mare in the barn?”

  “Yes.”

  She understood now. “That’s why you warned me to stay away from the horse. You’re worried that the same thing could happen again.” Kendra found that deeply touching.

  “I can’t have another tragedy like that on my conscience,” he said, frowning.

  Surely he didn’t think that the accident was his fault or the horse’s. “No one is to blame,” she said.

  Shaking his head, he looked up and sucked in a deep breath. “I wish that were true,” he muttered just before getting to his feet and walking away.

  Kendra watched him with an aching heart. She couldn’t help hoping that a deeper feeling than misplaced guilt rooted his concern for her, but what right did she have to any emotion from Jack? She couldn’t forget that she might be engaged to some other man. It seemed unimaginable, but how could she know?

  * * *

  “Here you go, Lupita,” Jack said, handing her the pale blue envelope on his way to the lunch table on Monday.

  “Thank you,” Lupita replied sliding the envelope into the pocket of her apron.

  Just as soon as Belle woke up, Jack had decided to speak to her about setting up an automatic debit system with their bank. That alone would save hours of work every two weeks. Meanwhile, he’d do things as his mom had done them, printing and signing checks and distributing them throughout the day. Only one envelope contained cash. Surprised to see Maddie at the lunch table, he placed the blue envelope as nonchalantly as he could beside Kendra’s lunch plate. He’d meant what he’d told her the day before: so far as he was concerned, she had a permanent place at the Colby Ranch. To his mind, that meant she was now on the payroll.

  Kendra looked at the blue envelope. “What’s this?”

  Rather than answer, Jack let her open the envelope and take out the money. It wasn’t much, just a few hours’ pay for the help she’d given him and Lupita.

  “But you only gave me the job of feeding the animals a couple days ago,” she said, eyes shining.

  He shrugged, sat down and picked up the sandwich that Lupita had put in front of him. Maddie, who also sat at the table, cleared her throat. Jack ignored her and bit off a huge chunk of sandwich.

  Smiling, Kendra asked, “Is anyone going into town this afternoon? I really need to pick up a few things.”

  Jack looked pointedly
at Maddie, expecting her to volunteer. Obviously, she wasn’t working at the newspaper today. His sister shook her head.

  “Sorry. I got a text from Grayson earlier. He’s finished his undercover assignment and has been catching up on everything that’s happened with the family. We’re due for a long phone conversation. That’s why I took the afternoon off from work.”

  Jack pulled in a deep breath to try to keep from asking, “Does he know about me, then?”

  “You and Violet,” Maddie replied gently. “That’s one of the reasons we have to talk.”

  Jack didn’t know how he felt about that. More to the point, how did Grayson feel about having a twin? Pushing aside the thought, he glanced at Kendra, who stood there watching him with a mixture of hopefulness and expectation. He just didn’t have the heart to disappoint her.

  Swallowing, Jack wiped his mouth with a paper napkin and said, “I have to pick up some materials myself. You can ride in with me after lunch.”

  Maddie and Lupita shared a conspiratorial glance, but Kendra, thankfully, seemed too excited to notice. She hopped up off her chair, saying that she would run and get ready. Jack couldn’t imagine what she had to do. She couldn’t look any better than she did now. He shook his head and realized that both Maddie and Lupita were grinning at him.

  “Don’t you two have anything productive to do?” he grumbled, frowning at his sandwich.

  “You’re the one with time to run into town in the middle of a workday,” Maddie observed innocently.

  Jack scowled. Biting her lip, Maddie hastily rose and hurried from the room, while Lupita chuckled and clucked her tongue.

  Of course, both Lupita and Maddie were aware of his attraction to Kendra. Probably everyone who saw him and Kendra together was aware of it. Sadly, that didn’t make the attraction wise. He mentally ticked off the reasons.