Page 67 of Mirror Image

I blink at the whiplash. “Did you?”

“I read about your sister.”

Of course she did.

“When you said she died in an accident, I thought you meant a car accident,” she continues. “Not an amusement park ride.” Her voice drops. “That was . . . my God. That was horrific. And it was all over the news.”

I nod once.

“Yeah,” I say quietly.

She tilts her head.

“So you can understand why Dr. Braithwaite thought you and I might be a good fit. Not just because I lost a twin too, but because the worst experience of my life played out for the whole world to see. Not a lot of people share that, do they?”

“Not many,” I admit.

“Do you ever feel responsible?”

“Every day,” I tell her honestly.

Mary leans back, assessing me. “Why?”

“Because I let go.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Mary

Four and a half years ago

It took the both of us to help a writhing Leo to his feet and guide him, stumbling, to my campsite and the river. After using some dish soap to mix up a pot full of cold, sudsy water, we rinsed and dabbed at his angry skin in an attempt to break down the oils causing him so much agony. Finally we led him to the bank and helped flush his face with the icy river water until our hands went numb from the cold. For over an hour, the only words spoken were our soft reassurances, periodically punctuated by his profanity. When, at last, he felt a slight improvement, we sat him down by the fire, and I wrapped gauze around his swollen eyes.

My sister was the first one to broach the subject—loudly enough that I’m sure her voice carried for a good mile in the still night.

“What the actual fuck, Mary?!”

It wasn’t a question so much as a demand for an explanation—and that really pissed me off.

“No! No, no, no!” I shook my head violently. “You do not get to do that. You do not get to go screwing around in the woods five minutes from my campsite—with our guide, no less!—and then ask me what the actual fuck!”

“Wow, look at you throwing around the big nasty f-bomb! What would Mommy and Daddy say if they heard that word come out of the mouth of their precious little ‘Marebear’?” she taunted. “Oh, no! They might cut off your trust!”

I’ve never been so angry as I was at that moment. So angry that I went completely still with a rage powerful enough to render me unblinking, unbreathing, and unseeing for several heartbeats.

She must have sensed it because she immediately shifted from the offensive to the defensive. “I’m sorry, Mary,” she said in a much softer, much more contrite tone. “I was just . . . I’ve been really lonely, and Leo and I hit it off—”

He scoffed from next to us.

I’d almost forgotten he was there.

“What? Have you got something to add? ’Cause, last time I checked, relationships between team members are ‘frowned upon,’ but relationships between team members and guides are explicitly forbidden.”

Leo, who, with his gauze-wrapped head looked more like a World War II hospital patient than an outdoor adventurer, swung his blind gaze in my direction. “Yeah, your sister over there already lobbed that little Molotov cocktail my way when she threatened to report me if I had you two kicked from the course after that shit show on the river.”

My turn to demand. “Wait, what? What is he talking about, Sam?”

She rolled her eyes and shook her head as if she couldn’t believe we were having such a ridiculous conversation. “I just . . . I mean, we’d already, you know, hooked up. Just because we wanted to . . . And maybe after the thing with the raft, I might have mentioned that it wouldn’t be great for him if anyone happened to find out . . .”