Wrong Twin, Right Man. Laurie Campbell
although clearly his chores were finished. But they couldn’t leave with his story hanging in limbo like that, because finally she might be near his motivation to avoid needing anyone. “How many people left you?” Anne blurted.
“What, you want a head count?” He sounded amused rather than annoyed, but he made no attempt to offer a count. “It was a long time ago.”
All right, then. She wasn’t going to push for whatever lay behind that nonchalant defense…at least not now. Instead, she reached for her purse, then caught her breath. Cindy had warned her not to sit still for more than five or ten minutes without shifting her posture, but she hadn’t realized how much that warning mattered.
Because right now she couldn’t stand up without Rafe’s help.
Although helping her up probably wouldn’t affect him one bit, since he’d been touching her with such casual courtesy all along. She just needed to forget that bizarre moment of longing, which had swept through her a few minutes ago, and focus instead on—
On—
Oh, the business. Legalismo.
“Rafe,” she said hastily as he came toward her, “I should have told you this sooner, but I really admire what you’re doing here.”
“Ah. Thanks.” He leaned down, offering her his hands for as solid a grip as she needed, and as she rose from her seat she saw more warmth in his gaze than she’d ever noticed before.
“I mean,” she faltered, “you’re really making a difference in the world.”
Why that statement should affect him so strongly she wasn’t quite certain, but she saw an unmistakable glow of pleasure in his eyes as she recovered her balance.
“That means a lot,” he said, keeping hold of her hands until she felt the pulse of warmth between them swirling even higher, then quickly letting her go. “Thanks.”
It shouldn’t mean so much that somebody admired his work, Rafe told himself, handing his card to the judge’s clerk. Anne was just being polite, same as all the well-meaning donors who raved about the importance of saving kids from gangs.
But somehow her acknowledgment, coming from a woman so much like the one who’d resented his passion for Legalismo, made him smile every time he remembered it.
Like now, while he was waiting for Diego’s file, and mentally replaying this morning’s conversation with the physical therapist.
“Anne is terrific,” Cindy had told them both. “Lucky in the first place, yes, but also a really dedicated worker. And doing so well, she can start driving anytime now.”
Which was great, since he’d had to work around her schedule no matter how often she insisted she could take a cab.
But in a way, he would miss the conversations they’d shared on the way to her morning sessions and on the way home at night—
“Here you go,” the clerk told him, and he jerked his attention back to the judge’s office.
“Thanks,” Rafe muttered, and headed outside. His next mission was to check for messages, see if Anne was doing okay. See if she needed a ride home yet. She’d promised to call when she was ready to leave, but his cell phone had to stay silent in the judge’s chambers.
It rang the moment he switched it back on, and he felt a flash of pleasure before realizing that such intense happiness didn’t make sense. This might not even be Anne.
And even if it was, so what? The woman was his sister-in-law!
The caller, though, was the newest intern at Legalismo, Heidi, who had drawn front-desk duty for the day.
“I just thought you should know,” she told him, “someone called about the train crash. They’re returning Beth’s luggage, so I told them to bring it here.”
Real life couldn’t have intervened at a better time, Rafe decided. He needed a reminder of Beth right now, before he found himself edging toward fantasies that were completely out of line.
“If you want,” Heidi continued, “I can just put everything in the storage room until you’re ready. Because I remember when my dad died, it took my mom a long time to go through his things.”
That hadn’t struck him as a problem, although he’d been living with Beth’s things all along. He’d actually been seeing Beth’s face and her body and her clothes on Anne every day, so seeing the clothes she’d taken to California shouldn’t be any different.
“It’s okay,” he said, “I’ll swing by on the way home. Did they mention finding Anne’s things?”
“No, just Beth’s. I don’t think they’re very well organized.”
Anne might regret not having her own clothes back, although that would likely happen within the next few days. Meanwhile, there was no point in mentioning the find. He could go through Beth’s luggage on his own.
But it surprised him that night, handling the clothes from his wife’s severely battered suitcase, how much her scent resembled Anne’s. Maybe that was always the case with twins, but somehow he’d never noticed the similarity between his wife’s personal fragrance and her sister’s.
Which was something he needed to forget.
Because thinking that way about Anne was completely unacceptable.
Rafe picked up another shirt, caught Anne’s scent again and closed his eyes. He’d loved Beth, not her sister, so these feelings were way out of line. It would be one thing if he’d accidentally mistaken Anne for her twin—which people probably did all the time—but he knew perfectly well who was in the guest room down the hall.
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