AS MARIAH CLEMMENS GLANCED DOWN AT HER ONLY FAMILY PICTURE, SHE HAD OF HERSELF WITH HER SISTERS, TEARS THREATEN TO FALL. EVERY TIME SHE LOOKED AT THE PICTURE, IT MADE HER WISH HER CHILDHOOD HAD BEEN DIFFERENT. SHE HAD LEARNED TO LOVE HER ADOPTED PARENTS AND THE PAIN OF THE MEMORY OF THAT DAY HER LIFE HAD CHANGED SO DRASTICALLY HAD FADED SOMEWHAT OVER THE PAST TWENTY YEARS, BUT THE HURT FROM THE LOSS OF HER FAMILY WAS STILL THERE IN HER HEART.
If it hadn’t been for Evan Clemmens, the man who was her husband, her heart would still be empty. Mariah Faber had been twenty-three when she was hired at Clemmens’ Manufacturing, a company ran by three brothers, to be Chandler Clemmens’ assistant. Evan the oldest brother was the company’s President, Chandler was the Vice President, Casey, the youngest brother, who had founded the company, kept the place running smoothly.
When she met Evan, sexual sparks had flown between the two of them, and six months later, they were married. A year after they were married, her adoptive parents were killed in a freak airplane accident, and now Evan and his family were the only family she had left. Recently just minutes before he was to fly to Chicago on a business trip, she and Evan had a terrible argument. Her feelings had been hurt by his comment regarding them adopting his nephew. She had to forgive him, as she knew deep down, he hadn’t meant the words to sound the way they had.
Between thinking of her sisters and her fight with her husband, she gave up trying to prevent the tears and let them fall. She grabbed the picture, brought it up against her chest, and she began to sob.
The television was on for noise, and when the news program finally penetrated her brain, she looked over at it. The story was regarding two brothers, who after a ten years separation had found each other. A smile came across her face, similar to the sun coming out on a rainy day, as she was going to do the same thing. Why hadn’t she tried to find her sisters before now, she couldn’t say? She wasn’t going to put it off a second longer, so after wiping her tears away, she sat down at the computer to begin her search.
* * *
Evan Clemmens was missing his wife and hoped the drinking would help him forget her. He knew he’d had too much to drink, but he didn’t care, he wasn’t going anywhere tonight. They’d had a horrific fight about Austin, his infant nephew, regarding getting custody of him.
Mariah wanted to take on the responsibility of raising the baby after the death of Evan’s half-sister and her husband, but he told her he didn’t want to raise someone else’s child. It wasn’t until the words were out of his mouth that he realized what he’d said, knowing his words had hurt his wife regarding her life as a child.
After his comment to her, they both had said terrible things to each other, but his words to her had been the worst. He loved his wife and wouldn’t ever purposely do anything to distress her, but he had. Mariah still had scars from her childhood and his words had hit a raw nerve, and he felt dreadful for hurting her feelings. Not only had he hurt the woman he loved, he wasn’t even sure if he had a marriage to go home to or not, for she had shouted she wanted a divorce before he had a chance to apologize.
He glanced up from his drink when he noticed a woman out of the corner of his eye had sat down next to him. He turned to look at her, and in his drunken state, he thought she was Mariah, as she looked like his wife. When he took in a deep breath, the aroma of her perfume was the same one she always wore, the one her birth mother had worn, as it one of the few things Mariah did remember from her childhood.
What he couldn’t understand was why she looked younger than the last time he’d seen her, then he figured his drinking must have fuddled his mind. He moved closer to her when he heard a familiar voice ordered a drink. “Sweetheart, please forgive me,” he said with a slur.
Whitney turned to the man next to her. “Sir, I don’t know you. I believe you have me confused with someone else.” She picked up her drink the bartender sat down in front of her and started to leave, then she gazed over at the man, noticing his forlorn expression, she sighed. Whitney saw the man was drunk and probably could use a friend, so she sat back down on the barstool as what could it hurt to listen to this man’s story? “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Mariah, I was wrong.”
“Sir, I’m not Mariah,” she said, thinking that the woman’s name sounded familiar to her.
“Since when? I don’t understand. Why did you change it?” he asked, his voice rising in his anger.
“My name is Whitney O’Rourke,” she told him, taking in a deep breath, smelling his aftershave, which was too strong for her taste. “Maybe I should leave since I seem to be upsetting you.” She was staying at this hotel, as she’d come to Chicago to interview for a new job, which had gone so well, she decided to celebrate with a drink before returning to her room.
His hand reached out and tightly gasped her wrist. “No, you aren’t upsetting me.”
“Is Mariah your wife?”
“She was,” he replied sadly, then looked away from her, but didn’t continue speaking.
“You want to tell me about her.”
“I don’t know where to start,” he mumbled, thinking of how much he loved Mariah.
“Start at the beginning,” Whitney said, prepared to listen to the man talk about his wife, whom she assumed had recently passed away.
“I’m Evan Clemmens,” he said, then started his story of his and his wife’s meeting.
The love he had for his wife brought tears to Whitney’s eyes, as he had the kind of marriage, she had always wanted for herself, the kind of marriage that lasted for a lifetime. It broke Whitney’s heart to listen to the man talk about the woman he’d loved. She wasn’t sure how long his wife had been dead, but by the way, he was talking, it hadn’t been too long.
The drinking continued as the man poured out his love for his wife to her. When the night came to an end, neither of them had memory of how it had concluded.
* * *
Mariah sat looking out the window in the quiet, empty house. Why had she fought with Evan? They weren’t one of those couples who were always arguing over one silly thing or another. They had been married for five years and this had been their first fight. The argument had ended with her informing him she wanted him out of her life and was going to file for divorce while he was gone on his trip.
Now she was sorry for all her angry words. She wanted to have a child to love, but what good would it be if Evan weren’t in her and the baby's life? She had to talk to him so they could straighten out this problem, but when she called his cell phone, no one answered. When his voice mail came on, she hung up instead of leaving him a message, deciding she would keep trying to get him until he answered the phone himself. Sometime after midnight, she fell asleep on the couch with her hand still on the phone.
* * *
Whitney opened her eyes and winced as the daylight filtering into the room, caused a pain to shoot through her head. How she wished she hadn’t consumed as much as she had last night. She wasn’t much of a drinker and hadn’t realized how strong the drinks were until it was too late. She felt a movement next to her, which scared her, causing her to gasp.
As her heart pounded furiously in her chest, she quickly turned her head to see who was in bed with her. When she spied the man from last night next to her, she let out a loud swear word. He stirred and she promptly covered her mouth with her hands, praying she hadn’t woken him.
She glanced around the room, quickly realizing she wasn’t in her room, but in his. She had to get out of here before he woke, so she quietly crept out of the man’s bed. When she happened to gaze her naked body in the mirror above the dresser, she realized she must have had sex with the man. She shook her head at the thought of having sex with a total stranger, speculating what she had done with him in that bed.
She wasn’t the type of woman to go to a man’s room and had sex with him. In fact, she had only been with one other man in her young life. She could blame the drinking, but it was more than that, she’d been lonely and had wanted someone to want her.
Her eyes immediately jerked to the bed, hoping she hadn’t wakened him by getting out of the bed. The last thing she wanted was for him to open his eyes and discover her in his room, especially when she didn’t have a snitch of clothing on. She snatched up her clothes, then swiftly moved to the bathroom so she could get dressed in private. Once she had her clothes on, she slowly opened the door, and stepped back into the room.
She looked over at the dresser and saw the man’s billfold, then quickly glanced over at the sleeping man and by his snoring, she knew he was still sleeping. Soundlessly she moved to the dresser, picked up the wallet, and quickly opened it. When she saw his business card, she pulled it out. At least knew he hadn’t lied about his name.
What did surprise her was the fact not only did he lived in Kansas City, Missouri, the same as she. What an unlikely occurrence! How odd it was for two strangers to meet in a city, miles from their home, when they lived just a few miles from each other.
When she went to put the business card back in his billfold, Evan moved, causing her to drop the card to the floor. When she bent down to pick it up, she spied a penciled heart on the back of the card. Surprised at the sight of the man and his wife’s name in the middle of the heart, tears abruptly came to her eyes as she thought of this man’s love for his wife. How she wished she could find a man who would love her as much as this man loved his wife.
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She had just stood, when the man moved in the bed. Thinking he was about to wake up, she hurriedly put the card in her pocket and the billfold back on the dresser. Knowing she had to get out of here and fast, she gazed around the room for any sign she’d been there, but there wasn’t anything to indicate she had.
She couldn’t put her finger on it, but something didn’t seem quite right to her, something that screamed for her attention. Before she could figure out what it could be, the man turned over in his sleep, causing her to jump and tightly grasped her purse in her fists. Her eyes never leaving the man on the bed, she slowly opened the door and silently let herself out, then softly pulled closed the door behind her.
When his door latched closed, she hurried to her room, and once there, she swiftly undressed, letting the clothes drop to the floor. When she was naked, she stepped into the bathroom and started the shower, turning the knobs to the hottest temperature setting she could possibly stand. She stepped in, letting the scalding water flow over her as she viciously scrubbed her body, especially between her legs. As she cleaned her body of any signs of last night activity, she began to cry. Her tears continued as she scoured her head with shampoo, wanting the scent of that man off her, as it was all she could smell since she woken.
When the tears finally stopped, she turned off the water and grabbed a towel to rub her body dry. As she stepped out of the tub, a frightening thought entered her head as she suddenly realized what had been bothering her concerning the room she’d just left. Birth control! She didn’t remember seeing any condom wrappers lying around the room.
Her mother had drilled into her to be prepared for sex, and she made sure to carried condoms with her just in case the opportunity ever arose. She ran out of the bathroom, grabbed her purse, and threw it open. She dumped out the contents of her purse onto the bed and quickly counted the little packages.
Damn! Every one of them was there. If they had used any sort of protection, the man would have provided it, but if they had, where had the condom wrapper been left? She hadn’t seen any in his bathroom’s trashcan, but maybe he’d thrown it into the trash container beside the bed. She looked up and glanced into the mirror, shocked to see the frightened naked woman staring back at her. She could only hope the man had thought clearly enough at the time to use a condom.
* * *
Evan opened his eyes when he heard a noise and his dazed sleepy mind wondered what it could have been. He sat up quickly, then just as fast, dropped his head back to the pillow. The pain pounding in his brain told him he had drunk too much last night, so he closed his eyes and fell back to sleep for another hour. When he woke, he laid there trying to focus his mind, and realized the room smelled of Mariah’s perfume. How could that be possible? Mariah was hundreds of miles away from him and probably still mad at him. As the fog seemed to clear in his head, the aroma made him think of the young woman he’d talked to at the bar last night.
Part of his mind remembered naked limbs and hot lovemaking. Did they have sex? No! He wouldn’t have done that, as he was a happily married man. Well, he had been happily married until their fight. He shook his head as if to empty his mind of his sexual thoughts, but instantly regretted it.
His cell phone on the dresser rang, causing him to jump; he stood, wobbled to the phone, and grabbed it before it could ring a second time. “Hello?” he mumbled.
“Evan, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean all the horrible things I said to you.”
“Mariah,” he croaked. “God, how I’ve missed you. I yearn for you so bad; I swear I can smell you in this room. I even dreamed we had sex.”
“Oh, honey, that’s so sweet. When are you coming home?” she asked anxiously.
Evan looked at his watch. “My plane leaves in two hours.”
“I’ll be waiting for you,” she purred.
He looked up and glanced at his face in the mirror. He grimaced, as he looked awful this morning. “You sure you want me to come home?”
“Yes. We’ll work through this.”
“Mariah, I’ve been thinking,” he started slowly.
“Don’t say it. Don’t tell me you’re leaving me,” she cried. “I promise I won’t talk about us adopting Austin again.”
“No, I wasn’t going to say that, I was going to say you were right. It is time for us to start our family, so if you want to adopt Austin, we will. I’ll talk to Casey as soon as I get home.”
“Evan, what if Casey doesn’t want to give him up.” She dreaded asking her brother-in-law for the child, but Casey was a single man, and the child needed to have a mother and a father. If she and Evan took Austin, at least he would still be with family.
“If he won’t, we’ll just have to start on a baby of our own.” He smiled at the thought of getting Mariah pregnant with his child.
“It might take several tries,” she teased.
Evan laughed. “We’ll keep at it until we get the job done right.”
“Evan, thank you.”
“It will be my pleasure,” he said, then chuckled.
“I love you, Evan.”
“I love you, Mariah. I’ll call you when we’ve landed so you know when to expect me.”
“I’ll be waiting for your call. Bye.”
“Bye.” Evan disconnected the phone and put it back on the dresser. He knew he had to get busy if he wanted to be at the airport in time for his flight. He shaved, took a quick shower, and then rushed around his room packing his bag. He hailed a cab and arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare.
He had been one of the first passengers to board, and when he arrived at his seat, he moved towards the window and sat down. He glanced outside, but the glare of the sun hurt his head so badly that he quickly lowered the blind and turned his head away. As he waited for takeoff, he watched the people walk down the aisle to find their seats, hoping no one would sit in either of the two seats in his row. All he wanted was quiet trip home so he could recover from his hangover; maybe even take a small nap before seeing his wife. He closed his eyes against the pain of a headache that had started just behind his eyes, but they flew open when he felt something hit his arm. He turned to see what had hit him and saw a young woman had sat down in the aisle seat, and saw her coat had hit his arm as she laid it in the seat between them.
“I’m sorry,” she said, smiling at him.
“That’s okay.” He glanced away, and then promptly jerked his head around to look at the woman again. How could this be possible? The young woman looked like Mariah too, but she even looked younger than the woman he met last night. He tried to think of the woman’s name from the bar, but he couldn’t remember.
Had she even told it to him? He wondered what had happened to her. How late was it when he had returned to his room? He really must be loaded last night, that or he was losing his mind because he couldn’t even recall walking back to his hotel room. Maybe the fight with Mariah had upset him more than he originally thought.
“Excuse me sir, but is there a reason why you keep staring at me like you’ve seen a ghost?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to stare. It’s just that you look like my wife, only younger,” he said, as he continued to stare at her, knowing that Mariah would want to meet this woman.
Lindsay thought this was the strangest pick up line she’d ever heard. “I don’t know whether to take that as a complement or an insult,” she replied curtly.
“It wasn’t meant to be either; I was just stating a fact. I’m Evan Clemmens,” he said, putting his hand out to her.
“It’s nice to meet you,” Lindsay replied coolly, as she didn’t feel like being picked up by a married man. She turned away from him and opened the book in her lap.
He knew better get her name and at least find out where she lived so he could tell Mariah about her. “And you are?”
“I’m Miss Haggard,” she said hesitantly, not really wanting to engage him in a conversation.
“Where are you from?” Evan asked her.
Lindsay didn’t turn to look at him. “I live in Kansas City, Missouri.”
“Great, we do too. I really would love my wife to meet you. Soon in fact,” he told her excitedly.
She turned towards him, confusion in her eyes. “You would? Why?” What was with this guy? Was he trying to pick her up or not? She certainly wasn’t into a sexual threesome.
“I wasn’t kidding when I said you looked like my wife, so much so that you two could be sisters. You see, her family was torn apart when she was a young girl, and she hasn’t seen her sisters since then.” Evan wondered if he had told the woman from last night that, but he’d been too drunk to remember much of their conversation.
“Let me give you my card.” Evan got his wallet out and opened it to get the business card he always had on him, but it was gone. That was strange. Where could it have gone? He didn’t remember giving it to anyone, then he thought back to the woman at the bar. Maybe he had talked to her about how much she looked like Mariah and given her his card after all. “Sorry, I seem to have given it away. Do you have something I could write on?”
“Sir, I really don’t think I need to meet your wife. I’m sorry, but I can’t be her sister.”
“Please,” he begged.
“I’m not her sister.” Lindsay smiled at the man. “I’m an only child.”
“Maybe that isn’t true. Maybe you were adopted and just forgotten about it. Do you look like anyone in your family?” he asked, hoping she would say she didn’t.
Lindsay was shock by his statement. Maybe this man was right, for as long as she could remember, she’d always wondered why she didn’t look like either of her parents. Why didn’t her parents have any pictures of her as a baby or as a toddler? The first pictures they had of her were when she was about five. She asked her mother about it once and she told Lindsay there had been a fire and all of her baby pictures had been lost, but she hadn’t believed her. “Okay, we’ll exchange names and phone numbers.”
He smiled at her. “I can’t wait to tell Mariah I’ve met someone who could be her sister.”
Lindsay’s face quickly turned pale, as somewhere in the back of her mind, his wife’s name rang a bell. Why would the woman’s name seem so familiar to her? Could his wife be her sister? Why had she always felt as if a vital part of her was missing? Could it be she wasn’t who she thought she was? Maybe Mariah was the part that had been missing in her heart.
“Are you okay?” He reached out and touched her arm.
Lindsay turned to stare at the man. “For some reason I know that name, but I don’t know why. It isn’t one of those names you hear every day.”
Evan beamed at her. “Maybe it’s because she is your sister.”
“If that’s true, then that means my parents have lied to me all my life,” she cried.
He squeezed her arm. “Don’t think of it that way. If you are her sister, your parents probably didn’t talk about the adoption because at the time you were old enough to remember it. They didn’t want to remind you of it, so they never talked about it. Then as time passed you forgot about your old family and before you knew it, you didn’t have any memories of not being their child,” he said, trying to give her some sort of comfort.
She nodded. “I guess that could’ve happened. How old is your wife?”
“She’s twenty-nine now. She was nine when her parents died and she was put into a foster home. How old are you?”
“I’m twenty-five.” Her face cringed at the sound of a crying baby somewhere behind them, as the sound had caused her breasts to start leaking milk as soon as she heard the baby’s first cry. She tried to ignore it, trying to pay attention to what the man was saying to her. Surely, the mother of the child would do something soon to quiet the baby.
“If you are her sister, then you’re one of the twins,” he said, beaming at her.
Lindsay’s attention quickly returned to him and her eyes began to water. “Twins? If I am your wife’s sister, then I have a twin?” She wiped the tear away. That would definitely explain why she had the sensation that a part of herself was absent in her life. “What kind of twin?” she asked, squeezing hard on his arm.
“An identical twin sister.”
“Do you really think I’m Mariah’s sister?” she asked emotionally, then she held her breath, waiting for his response.
He grinned and nodded. “What is your first name?”
“It’s Lindsay.”
Evan smiled at her. “Your name is the same as Mariah’s sister. If you are her sister, your twin sister’s name is Lesley, and you have a sister two years older named Whitney. You are the first one to be found, as Mariah hasn’t had any luck finding the others yet. All she has from her childhood is a picture of the four of you before their parents’ death.”
“Her sisters’ names seem familiar too. Do you have a picture of your wife?”
“No, but she is going to pick me up at the airport, so you can met her then.” He watched as she started to squirm in her seat. “Is something wrong? Are you feeling sick?” he asked with concern.
The baby’s cry became louder. “I can’t bear to hear a baby cry like that. Excuse me, but I have to take care of this matter.”