Page 86 of The Shadows We Keep

Harkin still hasn’t uttered a word; his silence is killing me. I want him to rip her slimy fingers from his arm and march in my direction. I want him to show her she doesn’t get a piece of him anymore. That he’s moved on and is mine. That I finally get to be the chosen twin and one-up her. She never knew about me, but knowing about her my entire life set us up for a one-sided sibling rivalry. I wait and wait, but he doesn’t do any of that. He just stares at her.

The smile plastered on her perfectly done-up face makes me want to punch it and watch the blood trickle from her surgery-altered nose. How do I know? Because we used to have the same one. Now hers is thin and petite, like the rest of her. I never thought we’d be in the same place at the same time so I could compare our similarities and differences.

She might be my twin, but you can tell our personalities are on two different ends of the spectrum, our looks following suit. Where she’s little miss elite clubs, high-end everything, she’s the light to my darkness. The Louboutins to my Docs. We’re not comparable, at least that’s how I’m hoping Harkin feels.

“What a reunion,” Domenico—my father says, clapping his hands before sitting behind his desk. The thrill of the reveal bolstering his confidence stifling the room.

His interruption finally breaks the trance Harkin’s been standing in since Alina waltzed in here, resurrected. I watch as he stumbles away from her, finally breaking the contact I haven’t stopped staring at since she had the nerve to initiate.

“What the fuck?” His voice is quiet but strong, it doesn’t waiver or break. “How?” he adds.

“It’s a long story, baby, and I want to tell you all about it when we can get away and have some privacy.” Her gaze moves my way me, and I swear she sneers. My fists clench on my chest behind my crossed arms.

Yep, I definitely want to break that perfect nose of hers and send her back to whatever plastic surgeon gave it to her.

“Alina, I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Domenico tells her from across the room.

“But, daddy!” she protests, in the whiniest tone I’ve ever heard come out of a grown woman. She can’t be fucking serious.

“Mr. Greyson, please, come take a seat. We have a lot to discuss regarding your relationships with my daughters.” For the first time since our bodies separated, he finds my eyes, ready and waiting for his attention. He’s always had it—for years now—and that’ll never change.

Stuffing the emotions I’m feeling deep down, not wanting to stoop to Alina’s level of spoiled demands to get my way. I need him to see past the façade I’m throwing up, like he has every other time in the past couple of months. I need him to command them from me, like we both crave.

I don’t know how their relationship was, but I know he’s not the same man she used to toy around or used as a back-up plan when she was bored. The Harkin she knew died in that car accident, just like we thought she did. Except, she obviously didn’t and nothing about her has changed. If I’m being honest, she seems to be the same girl I watched online, but worse, and that has to be Domenico’s doing. But Harkin? No, he’s changed. His blackened soul matches mine. The other side of some fucked-up coin the universe handed us. It’s weighed down with tragedy and trauma that only happens when you lose someone in the blink of an eye, right in front of you.

“Keira, you too. Come sit.” I shift in his direction, but I don’t make to move. I don’t trust myself not to send Alina back to where we though she was, six feet under.

“I’m good,” I tell him and lean against the table next to my hip.

Harkin’s lips pull to the side, but he schools it before walking toward the sitting area in the center of the office. Alina traipses behind him like a little puppy, all too excited for another person to give her attention. I always thought if we could have spent time together, we would have been close. That she would have been the sister I never had because our parents separated us at birth.

But I can see the way she’s soaking up every inch of him. She’s intrigued by the changes he’s made, the new man he’s become. The little green goddess in my head is telling me to shut that shit down, claim what’s now mine before she can get her claws back into him. But the thing is, I won’t fight for his attention. I’m not her. If she can steal him away, then he was never truly mine, and I was just a replacement.

Harkin’s shock must be wearing off because his frame drops into the leather chair with a lethal air of disregard for the man across from him. I’m impressed. Domenico is an intimidating man in his own right. But I guess when you’re the Don of the New York, Italian mafia with a mini-army at your disposal there’s no reason to act otherwise.

Harkin’s bulky frame shifts in the chair as he moves to prop his foot on the opposite knee. His hands come to interlock, resting behind the back of his head. I’m momentarily distracted by the bulging of his ink-covered biceps.

“So, you kidnaped my girl for this fucked up family reunion?” he asks bluntly. A small gasp comes from the unnecessary occupant in the room.

Point for Keira.

If I was the insecure type, I’d walk over to him and let my actions speak for me, but I still don’t know what Domenico has up his sleeve, and I’d rather not tip my hand just yet. He told me about his history with my mother.

How no one knew she was having twins until the moment she had me. How his uncle had secured an adoption through Harkin’s father for Alina, which could have been me, had I not been born after the men had taken Alina from my mom the moment she drew her first breath. The young woman, who’d stayed back to look after my mom didn’t expect her to start laboring again. When I came fifteen minutes later, she quickly got her situated and ready to leave like nothing extra had happened.

They hid my birth from his uncle in fear that I’d be taken away, too. So, my mom took me and ran, not even an hour after giving birth, with the clothes on her back and a wad of cash in her pocket.

I don’t think she ever looked back or spoke to her family again. And according to him, Domenico never stopped thinking about us, worrying about us.

What I didn’t expect him to tell me was that his uncle eventually found out about what my mom had done. I couldn’t tell from his story, if he ever fessed up to his aid in our disappearance.

The emotion of him dropping the news of our relation was overwhelming. For a few minutes, I could picture my future where I had a father. One I could slowly get to know and build a relationship with. I was naïve. The kidnapping should have been the first clue that there was more to this than a father finally reunited with his long-lost daughter. The second sister dearest waltzed through the door in all her resurrected glory. But the breaking point was finding out his uncle was the one to put a hit out on us.

It doesn’t matter that his uncle’s choice is what ultimately lead to his demise, with a bullet to the brain at the hands of a distraught father. Because that means nothing to me. He had years to step in and help, but now that I’m grown, he pops back up.

I think not.

“Listen Mr. Greyson, my uncle and your father had a business agreement—”

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