Page 22 of Perfect Order
“How? You’re her twin.” Carys treads carefully.
“Identical.” David joins the conversation as he places mugs of coffee in front of us. His eyes are compassionate. I understand why when he says, “Cream and two sugars?”
“Yes, how did you kn—?” My head drops to the side. Kylie took her coffee the exact same way. For just a moment, I’m reminded of the days we’d have cravings for the same food from hundreds of miles away. And then we’d call each other eating kung pao shrimp, strawberry ice cream, or our favorite snack: carrots.
Needing a moment, I take a sip of the coffee to steady myself. The trickle of heat is the closest to feeling warmth since the call I made to my parents. “Thank you,” I say to David gratefully.
He nods and sits back with his own mug. “Honey?”
My head swivels to find Carys perched on the edge of her plush couch, like a coiled snake ready to strike. “And now I know why my sister both feared and respected you.”
David tries to muffle his laugh with a cough. Carys’s aqua eyes narrow on him before they turn on me. “And how do I know you’re not Kylie? Police rarely make this kind of mistake.”
“They found my missing driver’s license in Kylie’s pocket. Her purse wasn’t with her. Her face was beaten but not badly enough that they couldn’t identify her. Or so they thought.” I reach down into my bag and pull out two items: the card and a small computer. The first I hand to Carys. “We’re identical, but even with twins, some things are different. Fingerprints, for one.” I don’t mention mine are long gone, a necessary requirement to be eliminated long ago. Back when I was just an analyst, I thought he was just crazy. But since I began dipping my foot into fieldwork… I shove those thoughts away and instead nudge the envelope forward. “I received that from her yesterday morning before I went into a major meeting with a number of government officials. We had been planning on this girls’ weekend for a few weeks, so I was touched when I first got it. Still, I couldn’t leave it behind when I left my office in Saratoga around two. I had just walked into the lobby at the Plaza when I doubled over in agony.”
Carys frowns. “Why?”
“Because that’s when the doctor indicated her heart first…” I can’t say the wordstopped, but judging from the chalkiness of Carys’s face, I don’t have to.
It’s an image that’s already living in both of our minds. “A few moments later, I received a call from NYU’s ER.” Almost as an aside, I speculate aloud, “How am I going to get into my room at the hotel?”
“Leanne.” Carys’s voice snaps me back to the here and now. She nods at the card. “May I?” I nod. Carys grabs a tissue before touching the envelope—smart woman. She studies the outside of the envelope, frowning when she examines the postmark before setting it aside. “You said there were a few things. Does that hold something else?” She gestures to my small but very high-powered laptop
I open the lid and let my fingers dance across the keys, doing what comes second nature to me, much like songwriting came second nature to Kylie. Carys’s brows arch so high, they practically disappear. A few seconds later, I flip the screen around and show her security footage from a tattoo parlor early yesterday. “If you read the card, you’ll see she’s apologized for getting this done without me. She went to a tattoo artist named Kitty and had this finished. The time stamp is yesterday at the same time I was in a final conference with my team preparing for that meeting. Do you see the look on her face? She’s smiling.” My eyes well up at the expression on Kylie’s face.
“Yes, I see it.” Carys’s eyes are focused on my twin, who’s doing everything I just described.
“The tattoo—it’s something we always talked about doing…together.” My voice breaks.
“Gemini. Twins,” Carys murmurs as she studies Kylie jerking when the needle moves back and forth over a particular spot, embedding the rich blue shade of our eyes onto her skin. Mine scrunch briefly as riotous emotions surge through me when I recall reading the postscript. If she’d lived, I’d be livid she went without me. Now?I just wish you’d have been able to enjoy it longer.
Setting the computer aside, I stand and lift my shirt to my ribs to demonstrate there’s a thin scar along my midsection but no tattoo. It’s the reason we were going to get the ink in the first place—to permanently hide a knife wound I’d sustained. Kylie gave me a knowing smirk at the bullshit reason I provided her for having it. I should have known better than to have believed she wouldn’t have put it all together.
I should have protected her better. That’s just the beginning and end of it.
I give Carys a moment to gape at my stomach before letting the shirt fall and sitting back down.
“You really are Leanne,” Carys wonders.
“Yes.”
Carys scoots closer and wraps her arm around my shoulders. I feel the pressure but no warmth. I’m not certain I’ll ever feel warm again. “Leanne, I know what it’s like to lose family members—close ones—but I don’t know what to say to help…”
“Say you’ll help me find out who killed my sister, Ms. Burke. Because this is too open-and-shut to suit me. Something else was going on with her, something she alluded to on the phone in the last few weeks and in this card.” I pick up the card and slap it back on Carys’s lap. That’s not everything we’ll be looking into, but I was advised to play up the shadowy parts of my sister’s life I was one of the few people privy to while the investigation on whether one of my own cases became compromised continues. It feels wrong, so cold, but if I want answers, this is how I have to seek them out.God, Lee. The agony of not knowing what truly happened is ripping me apart.I swallow my nausea and continue. “The woman who sent me the extremely funny, yet completely inappropriate, card to my office to wish me luck on my meeting wasmyLee. The question is, why is she gone? Was it a mistake? Should I be scared if they figure out they missed?”
David cautions, “Carys…”
And she holds up a hand to him while her eyes don’t leave mine. “This is way outside my wheelhouse, Leanne. As your sister’s lawyer, the best course of action I can recommend is for you to contact the police.”
Frustration surges up inside of me. I’m about to grab my stuff and politely thank them for their time when Carys’s hand briefly touches the top of mine. Her eyes are churning with the depth of emotions she’s feeling. I easily recognize equal parts sadness and fury. “But I have a company on retainer who specializes in this type of investigation. If you’re really interested.”
“Yes,” I whisper, even as David curses off to the side.
She nods before reaching for her phone. “You’ll get your answers, Leanne. You just might not like them. Are you prepared for that?”
“I have to be, don’t I? I have to know what happened to her.” Without answers, I’ll never come back from the dark places I live in. I just know it.
Carys presses her hand down. I feel warmth, that fire I need to absorb. “I’ll make the call and see what they think but not until after your sister’s funeral.” Tears well in my eyes at the thought of burying my her. “That’s the only thing you need to get through right now, Leanne.”
