Carbon Copy Cowboy (Texas Twins Book 3)

by Arlene James

  “Your dad taught school.”

  She nodded. “History, and he coached baseball at the high school.”

  “I remember you, too,” Jack went on excitedly. “You were just a little girl, and your mom used to put up your hair in two ponytails with these big bows, I mean huge bows.”

  Keira laughed through her tears. “I still have those bows in a box back at Grandpa’s house in Amarillo.”

  “You know what this means, don’t you?” Jack asked softly.

  She shook her head, her heart racing.

  “It means that this is where you truly belong,” he whispered. “Grasslands is your home.”

  Grasslands. Not the ranch. Disappointment abruptly swamped her, but she somehow managed to keep her smile in place, murmuring, “It’s something to think about.”

  “Think about this while you’re at it,” he told her, cupping her face in his big, capable hands.

  He tilted her face up, and her heart did a double backflip as he slowly lowered his head. When his lips met hers, she moaned softly and closed her eyes, lifting her hands to his shoulders. Tilting his head, Jack pulled her to him, going up on his knees so that they knelt face-to-face. She slid her arms around his neck and put her whole heart into that kiss.

  At first, just as last time, she was afraid to hope, to read anything meaningful into his kiss, but then she remembered how ardently she had prayed not to be separated from Jack. She had so feared that her past would keep them apart, but that was not the case. All that could separate them now was Jack himself.

  Jack broke the kiss. He hugged her, tucking her head into the curve of his shoulder.

  “I thought I’d lost you,” he choked out. “I thought you’d left me.”

  “I meant to,” she admitted. “It was bad enough when you were avoiding me, but when I realized how angry you were with me... I just couldn’t stay here without being able to see you.”

  “I wasn’t angry with you,” Jack refuted urgently, leaning back so they were eye to eye. “I was just angry, period. Mostly, I was angry with myself for failing to find any answers for my family.”

  “That’s not your fault. I pushed you into—”

  He kissed her again, quite effectively shutting off the flow of words. Afterward, she could only sigh and lay her head on his broad shoulder.

  “It was never about finding answers,” he told her softly.

  Surprised, she lifted her head, looking him in the eyes. “No?”

  He slowly shook his head side to side. “No. It was about us. Don’t you see? God used those trips and all of our problems to bring us together.” He smiled, smoothing her hair with one hand. “It was no accident, my being out on the range that day just when you came along, your amnesia...none of it. Even as beautiful as you are, if God hadn’t crashed your car right in front of me, I’d have walked away, and He knew that, so He literally threw you into my path and fixed it so I had to bring you home with me.”

  Hearing that, she threw caution to the wind and risked everything. “I love you, Jack.”

  Abruptly, he sank back onto his heels, his light brown eyes plumbing hers. “I think you mean that.”

  “I was in love with you even before my memories returned,” she confessed. “How could I not be? You took me in when I had nowhere to go.”

  “Wasn’t no one else to do it,” he drawled.

  “You gave me a job.”

  He chuckled. “A job I didn’t want to be doing myself.”

  “You trusted me with your deepest secrets,” she tenderly pointed out.

  “Turns out that a girl with no memories of her own is a pretty good listener,” he quipped.

  “And you made me feel safe when I was terrified.”

  “I always want to keep you safe,” he said, sobering. Then he suddenly grinned. “And I won’t even insist on a big wedding.”

  She blinked as the implications of that hit her. “Are you asking me to marry you?”

  “I have to,” he said. “You’re the only one who won’t let me get away with hiding from my problems. Besides, I can’t move you into my house until you marry me.”

  “Jack!” She threw herself at him.

  Laughing, he caught her and wrapped her in his arms. “I love you, too. I loved you before I even knew your name, before you knew your name. I loved you when I feared that you might belong to someone else. I loved the idea of you before you even showed up to give that idea a face, but I thought romance was out of the question for me, that everything else had to take precedence.” He exhaled deeply. “I was a fool. There’s nothing more important than what we have together.”

  “Oh, Jack.”

  “Everything else is still a mess,” he warned. “All your questions are answered, but I still don’t even know for sure who I am.”

  “Yes, you do,” she insisted. “You don’t know your true name because you don’t know for sure who your father is. There’s a difference in not knowing yourself and not knowing your name, believe me. I’m one of the few people in this world who can speak authoritatively on the subject.”

  “Okay,” he conceded with a grin, “but wouldn’t you like to know if you’re going to be Mrs. Colby or Mrs. Wallace?” Lifting an eyebrow, he added drily, “Whatever happens, you won’t be Mrs. Earl, I promise.”

  She laughed at that. And then she cried. She was going to marry Jack!

  “I don’t care. As long as you give me your name, I don’t care what name it is.”

  “My name,” Jack vowed, “and my heart.”

  Epilogue

  They agreed, as Landon and Violet and Ty and Maddie had before them, that no wedding, however small, could take place until Belle awakened or Brian Wallace returned to furnish the family with some answers. Meanwhile, Keira would continue to live at the ranch and help Jack “feather the nest,” as she put it, at their place.

  Jack loved the notion of their place. Suddenly, the old rock house was no longer the Lindley place. Now it was home, even without Keira in residence, a place of peace and comfort, rather than simply a means to avoid the turmoil of his life.

  “So I should change your address to the old, er, new house?” Pastor Jeb Miller asked, signaling to Sadie, the church secretary.

  Jeb, Keira and Jack stood together on the grounds of the church in the waning daylight. Picnic tables arranged on the green looked all but ready to collapse beneath the weight of the many dishes arranged buffet style atop them, while blankets inhabited with diners created a crazy quilt pattern across the grass.

  Jack chuckled. “To tell you the truth, Pastor, I don’t even know what the address is out there. We can leave things as they are for a while.”

  “Ah.”

  Instead of signaling Sadie to stay where she was, the pastor folded his hands and rocked back on his heels. Jack traded a small, surprised smile with Keira. The kindly preacher seemed to be forming an attachment to the reticent secretary. Jack couldn’t imagine why. Compared to Keira, Sadie Johnson was a colorless, almost invisible little soul, but he supposed that she probably suited the mild-mannered minister. Perhaps she triggered the man’s protective instincts. Jack knew all about that, and he silently wished them well, provided, of course, that Sadie returned the good reverend’s affections. She certainly appeared to, given the way her shy gaze flashed over Jeb’s face and how tightly she clasped her hands together, unconsciously mimicking the pastor’s stance.

  “Yes?” Sadie said in a voice just above a whisper.

  Jeb bent his head, giving her his full attention. “My mistake,” he told her, “but since you’re here, you can add your congratulations to mine.”

  Sadie looked around in confusion. “Oh?”

  Keira lifted her hand, showing off the tasteful engagement ring that she’d picked out after she and Jack had delivere
d the still-damaged car to Drew Knoel in Amarillo. After learning of Keira’s amnesia, the brash auto dealer had insisted that he would take care of the matter. He had not, Jack had noted, tried to convince Keira to continue their engagement. Jack surmised that, as an aspiring politician, Knoel wanted to avoid any whisper of scandal, which seemed to be why he hadn’t reported Keira or the car missing. Jack also figured that, being less idiot than fool, Knoel knew exactly who Keira would be marrying when that happy day arrived.

  Keira’s former boss, Merry, had been much more effusive in her relief and welcome when they’d stopped by the pet clinic. She regretted losing Keira’s help and apologized for not questioning Knoel when he’d assured her that Keira had probably gone off to A & M to look for a position that better suited her. Given Keira’s expertise in agricultural medicine, Merry could be excused for believing Knoel’s story. Pleased when Keira had joked that she’d found the “perfect position,” Jack had happily concurred that Merry should be kept informed about the wedding, as well as Keira’s career plans.

  They were still undecided if she would open her practice at the ranch or in Grasslands. Jack hoped to eventually build her a treatment center at their place and add an office onto the house for her. That way, everything would be at hand once the babies started coming. Their babies. The very idea made Jack’s chest swell.

  Sadie murmured appreciative remarks about Keira’s ring and congratulated Jack on the engagement, color blooming in her face. Keira was trying to put the poor thing at ease when Johnson Parks bumped into her.

  “Wow, Keira,” the stumbling cowboy said, iced tea sloshing from the disposable cup in his hand. “Credit where it’s due. You’ve really cleaned up our Jack. I hardly recognize him.”

  Smiling proudly, Keira turned to sweep a hand over Jack’s shoulder. He’d donned his best jeans and brown felt hat with a clean, white shirt and a bolo tie with a silver concho for the occasion.

  “I think he always looks great,” she purred.

  Jack smiled, hearing Parks jokingly ask, “Did you have to twist his arm to get him in that sport coat?”

  “Sport coat?” Jack echoed, frowning at Parks’s obvious shock as recognition widened his eyes. “What’s wrong with you?” Jack queried, as the other man gaped at him.

  Turning to point in the direction from which he’d come, Parks intoned, “If you’re here, then who is that?”

  Jack knew before he even turned. Grabbing Keira’s hand, he jerked around, his gaze searching the scattered crowd until it came to the edge of the parking lot. There stood Grayson. It could be no other.

  His twin wore his hair short and neat. The aforementioned sport coat, worn with a dark T-shirt and perfectly tailored slacks, lay snugly across his shoulders, one of which bore a sling that cradled his arm. In the other hand, he held a Bible. Jack knew, with dead certainty, that it contained a piece of paper bearing a handwritten note with the same wording as those received by him and his sisters. Correction. Their sisters.

  “Oh, wow...” Keira breathed, starting forward with a laugh.

  Jack quickly passed her, dragging her along in his wake as he felt himself drawn inexorably to his brother. He stopped short, staring at the man who stared at him.

  “You must be Jack.”

  “You brought your Bible and note,” Jack said, switching his gaze to his brother’s hand.

  “Yes. I brought them to show everyone, along with copies of Maddie’s emails. I think we all need to sit down and talk about Dad.”

  “Brian,” Jack corrected automatically.

  Grayson said nothing to that. Jack stood there a moment longer, wishing he could shake his brother’s hand. Then Keira slipped forward and gingerly hugged Grayson.

  “I’m Keira, Jack’s fiancée.”

  Gray’s eyebrows rose at that, but he said simply, “Good to meet you. Both.”

  Jack smiled, partly because Keira was always leading the way in these things and partly because his twin brother stood right in front of him. Stepping up, Jack carefully embraced this man he hadn’t even been sure he wanted to meet. To his relief and delight, Grayson folded his free arm across Jack’s back, Bible and all.

  Violet and Maddie ran up, breathless and excited. Jack stepped back just as Maddie threw herself at Grayson.

  “Gray, you’re here! I’m so happy to see you.”

  “There’s two of you,” Grayson teased, grinning at Violet. “Hello, other little sister.”

  Smiling, Violet wedged her way in to curl an arm about Gray’s neck, just in the same way that she often did Jack’s. Strangely, Jack was glad. He’d expected to be a little resentful, but instead he felt...right. That was his twin brother standing there. His twin.

  “Now listen, everyone,” Gray said, growing serious. “I have a plan to find out the truth. That’s what we all want, right? The truth about the family.”

  A spurt of doubt shot through Jack. Their mother had been so determined to keep her secrets. Who knew what the truth might be? Wild possibilities flitted through his troubled mind, but then Keira slid her hand into his, and that one small touch grounded him.

  Of course they had to find out the truth. They owed it to the family. And whatever came, they would face it together, as a family.

  “Let’s all go see Mom,” he proposed, squeezing Keira’s hand tightly. “Then let’s take this brother of ours home. Show him what he’s been missing.”

  Grayson shifted his weight. Jack understood what his twin must be feeling, but God would set it all right for him, for all of them. The look of love in the pretty hazel eyes of the woman at his side told him as nothing else could that the Lord God had a plan for each and every one of them.

  * * * * *

  Dear Reader,

  Has your life ever been in such a mess that you didn’t know how to pray? I think at some point we’ve all been uncertain what to ask for and what was best. Sometimes, we look at all the possible solutions to our problems and we don’t see one that doesn’t have unpalatable consequences. Fortunately, God’s vision is better than ours, and He cares for us so much that when we don’t know how to pray for ourselves, the Holy Spirit intercedes for us.

  My dad used to say that the only true prayer for a Christian is “Thy will be done.” He was right to teach that we should all submit ourselves to the perfect will of our Heavenly Father. We can take great comfort, however, in knowing that the Holy Spirit will intervene on our behalf, no matter how tricky the situation seems.

  God bless,

  Arlene James

  Questions for Discussion

  How important is it that we know about our pasts? Jack Colby thought it was very important until his curiosity resulted in his mother’s riding accident. After Belle fell from her horse and wound up in a coma, Jack decided the past should be left alone. Was he right?

  Have you ever found yourself prompted by an unconscious need to go somewhere or do something? After an ugly scene with her fiancé, Drew Knoel, Kendra found herself recklessly drawn to the site of a previous trauma. Does this seem reasonable to you?

  Because Jack discovered Kendra after her auto accident, he felt responsible for her. Have you ever felt responsible for someone in a similar situation? If so, when, where and why?

  Do you think it is possible that God chooses mates for us and brings them into our lives? (See Genesis 24.) Why or why not?

  Twins are purported to have a special connection that other siblings do not share. Do you think this is true? If so, does the connection exist if they are separated at birth or before memories form? Explain.

  Most people think that amnesia wipes away all memories, but that is not usually the case. Even when victims of amnesia forget their identities and entire pasts, they still recall how to walk and talk and perform functional tasks. Amnesia may not wipe out education or skil
ls. Would you find amnesia frightening even if you could manage to do what you were trained to do? How would you react?

  Kendra comes to a place where she doesn’t even know if she wants to remember her past for fear that something from before will cost her the present. If you could choose to forget your past in order to maintain your present circumstances, would you? Why or why not?

  Jack’s guilt concerning his part in his mother’s accident leads him to resist accepting his newly discovered siblings into his life. Because he pressed Belle for information she did not want to give, he felt discovering that information after she was unable to protest was unfair. Have you ever closed your heart to someone because of a tragedy? What happened?

  Kendra’s lack of memories left her without connections to anyone. This colored her perception of Jack’s emotional rejection of his previously unknown sister, Maddie, twin brother, Grayson, and half or stepbrother, Carter. Was Kendra right to urge Jack to open his heart and fully embrace his whole family? Why or why not?

  Jack’s life is in turmoil. His mother is in a coma. Siblings he hadn’t known existed suddenly pop up. His supposed father, Brian, is missing and possibly ill. He has a twin, a carbon copy of himself, for whom he has no affinity. Add to that a previous romantic disappointment and the sudden engagements of first one sister and then the other.... Wouldn’t it be wise for a man in his position to avoid emotional entanglements? So why didn’t he?

  Kendra’s life is also in turmoil. She has no memory of her past, no money, no place to live, not even a change of clothing. She doesn’t even remember her real name! Wouldn’t it be wise for a woman in her position to avoid emotional entanglements? So why didn’t she?

  Despite her lack of memories, Kendra seems to possess a type of emotional wisdom that Jack needs. From where might that wisdom have come?