LITMIR.BIZ

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for her long lost twin, Mallory Carstairs meets and hires an ex-sniper to help her out.

      “You can always change your mind.”

      I jerked my thoughts back to the present.

      “You don’t have to stay at the ranch,” Cole continued. “We can just say that you’ve hired me to make some inquiries and that you don’t feel comfortable staying there until you find out why you ran away.”

      “No. I’ll be fine.” The whole idea of my coming to the ranch was to investigate Cameron’s disappearance from the inside. “I’m just having a little attack of stage fright.”

      Truth told, I was having a major attack. Now that I was about to step out on stage, I was suddenly realizing that acting out story lines was a lot different than sitting on the sidelines and writing them. One of the things that I’d discovered in the past few days as I’d been poring over everything I could find about my sister was that we were different in one aspect. She would never have suffered from an attack of cold feet. Cameron had always been in a sort of limelight. Plus, she was confident, outgoing and probably very assertive. I, on the other hand, was a writer. While I experienced life vicariously through the characters I created, she went out there and boldly lived. I envied her that.

      “We could also go to plan B and I could stay on as your bodyguard,” Cole said.

      That, too, was something we’d discussed during the three days I’d spent in the offices of Rossi Investigations while Pepper and Cole established my cover story and drilled into me every fact they’d dug up on the cast of characters at the ranch.

      At the end of three days, I knew each one of the players as well as I knew the characters on Secrets, maybe even better. But I’d rejected plan B. How was I supposed to find out anything with Rossi Investigation’s biggest intimidation factor dogging my every step?

      I turned to Cole and put on my most confident smile. “I’m going to be able to do this.”

      He pulled to a stop in front of an opened wrought iron gate that bore the name McKenzie Ranch. Then he turned to me. “I don’t doubt that. Pepper has told me a lot about you. But if you want help, Pepper and I are a phone call away.”

      I felt tears prick behind my eyes. “Thanks. But I think I have a better chance of learning something if I do this alone. My sister would be able to do this. If I’m anything at all like her, I can, too.”

      Cole gave me a brief nod, then guided his car through the gate and up the winding driveway. When we rounded the last curve and the hacienda came into view, I gave a little gasp.

      The Hacienda Montega was listed in every book that chronicled historic homes in California. In addition to being an excellent example of Spanish architecture, the house had a mysterious and colorful history. I’d done some research on it that went beyond Pepper’s report. What I’d discovered was that the mistresses of the hacienda had a tendency to die young. Not even Cameron’s father’s wives had escaped. James McKenzie’s first wife, Sarah, hadn’t died, but she’d still been young when she’d run away with Sloan Campbell’s father. Of course, I’d tucked that little piece of information away for a possible story line. Then James’s second wife, Elizabeth, had passed away shortly after they’d adopted Cameron.

      But there was a lighter and even more colorful side to the history, too. Originally built by Don Roberto Montega on the occasion of his marriage to the Spanish Countess Maria Francesca in the eighteenth century, the hacienda had eventually fallen into the hands of a silent film producer who’d only owned it a year before he’d lost both the hacienda and the land to a professional gambler named Silas McKenzie.

      And the rest was history, as they say. Silas had married, mended his gambling ways and turned to his first love, raising Thoroughbred horses. From the looks of the hacienda, the stables and the other outbuildings, he must have had a knack for it. James, the current owner of the estate, was his grandson.

      All of the pictures I’d seen paled in comparison to what I was looking at now. The main part of the house rose three stories with a bell tower at its center that thrust up another two. The colors were so intense—those golden stones, the reddish-orange tiles on the roof against a bright blue sky. My gaze swept along the arches and stone pillars that framed the courtyard, then rose to the lacy ironwork that fanned each one of the windows on the second and third floors. Flowers bloomed everywhere, crowding the paths bordering the walks, and spilling out of terra-cotta urns.

      Beatrice McKenzie Caulfield, the sister of James McKenzie, the aging patriarch, was responsible for the flowers. I ran through the information I knew about her. She was renowned for her gardening skills and was a frequent participant and speaker at garden shows. In addition to that, she’d run the Hacienda Montega for the past twenty-five years since the untimely death of Elizabeth McKenzie. Beatrice was also the mother of Austin Caulfield, Cameron’s cousin, who’d taken over her job in her absence.

      Cole pulled to a stop in front of the courtyard. Inside, I could see a fountain shooting sparks of light back at the sun.

      “It’s beautiful,” I said.

      “That it is,” Cole agreed. “Does it trigger any memory?”

      I glanced at him in surprise.

      “Get used to the question, Brooke. The moment you step out of the car, you’re Cameron McKenzie, suffering from amnesia. Are you ready?”

      I drew in a deep breath and pushed open the door on my side of the car. “Ready.”

      My step didn’t falter once as we walked up the path past the fountain to the huge wood door of the house. Cole knocked. I counted to ten, and Cole had raised his hand to knock again when the door swung open to reveal a small, brown-skinned woman who was as wide as she was tall. She stared at me for a moment, but even as she tucked the towel she was holding into an apron pocket, her face brightened into a smile that was almost as wide as her girth. “Ms. Cameron, Ms. Cameron, you’re safe!” She grabbed my hands, drew me over the threshold and enveloped me in a warm hug.

      For a moment, she held me tight and I caught the scent of vanilla. Then she drew back, studied me at arm’s length, then pulled me in for another hug. “They said you’d be back. Mr. James and Mr. Sloan—they weren’t worried. But I…”

      When she released me, I saw tears in her eyes. This had to be Elena Santoro, the woman who’d been the housekeeper and cook for the McKenzies for more than forty years. According to Pepper’s information, much of the job of raising Cameron had fallen on her shoulders after Elizabeth McKenzie had died.

      Elena rubbed the heel of her hand against her cheeks. “I was worried. I shouldn’t have.” For the first time, she seemed to notice Cole at my side.

      “Ma’am.” He nodded at her and withdrew his license from his pocket. “I’m Cole Buchanan of Rossi Investigations. Ms. McKenzie here was mugged in San Francisco a little over a month ago, all her ID was stolen, and she’s been suffering from amnesia ever since. If the rest of the family is home, perhaps you could let them know we’re here, and I could explain everything all at once?”

      “You were mugged?” She reached out a hand, hesitated and then dropped it. “You’ve lost your memory?”

      “Yes. Hopefully, it’s only temporary. But when I woke up in the hospital, I couldn’t remember anything—who I was, where I should go….” Seeing the concern in her eyes, I felt a little twinge of guilt, but it didn’t seem to be interfering with my ability to lie. “I hired Mr. Buchanan’s security firm to help me find out who I was, and they finally did.”

      “How awful.” She did take my hands then and squeezed them briefly.

      “The family?” Cole prompted.

      “Yes. But only Ms. Beatrice is here. Mr. Sloan went to Kentucky to pick up a horse and Mr. James is in Los Angeles, having his yearly checkup. Mr. James will be back later today, but Mr. Sloan isn’t expected back until tomorrow. Mr. Austin is in Saratoga Springs with Ms. Linton at the races. But Ms. Beatrice is in her

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