Page 14 of The System

“Well, you know that I’m adopted.”

“Yes,” he confirmed.

“I just found out that I have a sister out there.”

“Oh, that’s great. She contacted you?”

“No,” Kieran said, shaking her head now because she was explaining this wrong, but she also didn’t know the right way to do it. “I put my DNA into the sample kit thing from work. It’s free for employees, and I wanted to know if I had any blood relatives out there.”

“Ah,” he said. “And you have a sister? That’s great.”

Kieran still wasn’t doing this right.

“I do. But I didn’t find out through the site, actually. I found out because I got a call from the police saying my DNA matches an old murder.”

“What?” Diego asked.

Now, she was getting somewhere.

“It turns out, they’ve been doing that thing where they try to track familial DNA through the–”

“Consumer sites? Yeah, I know. I’ve had a case where they did that. Shady business, in my opinion, but it works.”

“My DNA matched the sample that they put into my work’s database, which they weren’t expecting. The detective called me and asked to talk. She thought I was my sister and that I’d changed my name and went on the run or something.”

“That doesn’t make sense. Your DNA wouldn’t match your sister’s completely.”

“That’s the thing, Diego… She’s not just my sister; she’s my identical twin.”

“What?” he asked a little louder. “How is that possible?”

Kieran reminded him of the story her mother had told her, that she’d shared with him after initially finding out that she’d been adopted, and then added the part that Dylan had discovered about another baby and the homeless woman. She finished by telling him the little that she knew so far that Dylan had revealed about Marin’s life and the crime itself.

“She definitely doesn’t think you did it, right? You’ve been cooperating, Kieran. You should have called me first. I could’ve advised you on what to do.”

“I know. But she’s only asked for fingerprints and my financial history.”

“And you gave them to her?!” he asked.

“I didn’t do this, Diego. And my fingerprints wouldn’t be at that house. My financial history isn’t anything to worry about. She thought I might have met Marin and would have helped her, but there’s nothing there. And Dylan confirmed that I’m not a suspect. They’re bringing Marin from Florida, where they found her, and she’ll be arraigned. They know it’s not me.”

“Still. How many times have you seen me have to deal with something after a client didn’t wait for me or call me first?”

Kieran sighed and said, “I know. It was a dumb move. But it’s over now. Marin is going to be tried for this, though, and I was hoping you could represent her.”

“You want me to represent a sister you don’t even know?”

“She’s still my sister. She’s my twin, Diego. I don’t know… I’m going to meet her, but I’d like her to have someone good at this, not just a randomly assigned public defender who’s probably a year out of law school.”

“Not all PDs are young or bad. Most of them are really good, actually. They choose that job. They just don’t have the same resources I do.”

“Well, I want her to have the resources. I’ll pay your fee myself.”

“What? No, you won’t pay me. She’s family.”

Now wasn’t the best time for Kieran to argue that they were no longer connected by marriage, so Marin wasn’t his family, technically. She supposed, given their history, she and Diego would always be family, even without the piece of paper tying them together legally.

“I don’t want charity, Diego.”

---