“Do you and Andrew have any other siblings?” She knew very little about their family, actually. She hadn’t realized quite how little Andrew had shared until she’d discovered there was an identical twin he’d never even mentioned.
“No. Dad said the two of us were all they could handle.”
She giggled, remembering the “terrible trio” nickname they and their cousin had been given. “You said your dad is a twin, too?”
He nodded. “Also identical. The only way you can tell them apart is that my father has a scar across his left eyebrow.”
“How do people tell you and Andrew apart?”
He flashed a smile. “I’m the better-looking one.”
She wrinkled her nose at him, even though she foolishly agreed with the joking comment.
Shaking his head, he said, “No, really, people who know us well rarely get us mixed up. I mean, there’s the hair—Andrew has always liked his shorter—and just something about our personalities, I guess, that tips them off.”
She could understand that. She was quite different from her own siblings, of course, but she’d never really thought about identical twins having such diverse personalities. She’d bet that was frustrating for twins trying hard to establish their own unique identities.
The shadows around them had lengthened as the sun dropped lower, glittering golden on the water, deepening the sky to azure. She hardly noticed the sounds of boat motors and drifting conversation and laughter and children’s chatter, a few barking dogs and the rumble of a passing motorbike. Any out-of-the-ordinary sound would catch her attention, but this was simply the everyday background of her life.
What made up the soundtrack of Aaron’s life in Dallas? Traffic, car horns, sirens? Did he live in the city or the suburbs? There was so much she found herself eager to know about him. “What was it like growing up in a family of private investigators?” she asked, propping her elbows on the picnic table to study him.
He seemed to find her wording funny. “My dad’s not much different than any other businessman. He goes to the office every day carrying a briefcase, comes home most evenings in time for dinner. He and my uncles gave up stakeouts and most out-of-town trips years ago, focusing on the management of the business instead. Dad said he got tired of being shot at and living undercover identities. After he was a married man with kids, he said he found all the adventure and excitement he needed at home with us.”
“That’s nice. But—he was shot at?” she asked with a puzzled tilt of her head. “Andrew told me the investigation business is a lot less dangerous than fiction would have us believe.”
“That’s true,” Aaron acknowledged. “But most of my dad’s escapades took place before the D’Alessandro-Walker Agency was even formed. He and my uncle Joe worked in risky undercover government operations for a while when they were younger. They also served as bodyguards in a few dangerous situations. They don’t tell us a lot of the details, but we’ve figured out that their lives were on the line more than once.”
“Wow.”
“Uncle Joe actually met his wife, my aunt Lauren, when he was working as her bodyguard. Her dad was a judge in an organized-crime case and Lauren was seen as a threat to hold over his head. My uncle was shot protecting her, almost died, himself.”
“Oh, my gosh! Was your dad hurt, too?”
“He wasn’t involved in that operation. Dad was nearly killed a couple years earlier than that when he was deliberately run down by a speeding car on an undercover operation in the Caribbean. To this day, he has no memory of that incident—which means he doesn’t remember meeting my mother.”
She must have looked thoroughly bewildered. Aaron laughed and explained. “Dad met my mother during that operation. She was a photographer on a photo shoot, totally unconnected to his investigation, but they crossed paths at the worst possible time for him. Because of the sensitive and dangerous nature of his investigation, and because he and my mom had just met and she was deemed a possible security risk, she was told he died of his injuries. She says it broke her heart. Two years later, they ran into each other again in Dallas when Dad and his twin tracked down their long-lost biological sister, who was my mom’s best friend. Dad didn’t have a clue who Mom was, but she recognized him as the lover who had supposedly died in front of her, which—needless to say—was awkward all around. They fell in love all over again, married and had us, so it all worked out.”
Shelby followed along with an effort. “Your dad fell in love with his long-lost sister’s best friend while he was underc
over in the Caribbean?”
Aaron’s chuckle was wry, as if he fully understood her confusion. “Yes. Then found her again two years later. Trust me, we know how improbable it seems. One of my cousins is really into fate and the stars and stuff like that, and she’s convinced paths are meant to cross. She insists that when Mom and Dad were separated through no fault of their own, fate stepped in to bring them back together.”
Sighing, Shelby murmured, “That’s so romantic.”
“I can’t dispute that they were meant to be together. Even all these years later, my folks are crazy about each other.”
“Is your mom still best friends with your dad’s sister?”
“Oh, sure. Mom and Aunt Michelle are as close as sisters themselves. Michelle’s husband, Tony, is the D’Alessandro part of D’Alessandro-Walker. He was already a P.I. when my dad and Uncle Joe were reunited with Michelle. When he heard about their undercover work, he talked them into joining and expanding his own fledgling agency.”
“You have a very interesting family history.”
He wiped his hands on a paper napkin and grinned. “You’ve only heard part of it. Dad and his twin were separated from five other siblings when they were still in kindergarten, after their parents died. Two of them were adopted, the others went into foster care. One died in his late teens, leaving a pregnant girlfriend behind. Almost thirty-five years ago, my aunt Michelle hired Tony to find her siblings. That’s how Michelle and Tony met. Anyway, the siblings were all reunited—they even found the daughter their late brother left behind—and they’ve remained very close since. We get together often so that I’ve grown up close to my cousins. Pretty much like you and Maggie and Hannah. We don’t all live in the same compound the way you do, but it seems like we’re always gathering for some family event or another.”
In only one dinnertime conversation, she had learned more about the Walker family than in the almost two weeks she’d known Andrew last year. And she found it fascinating. “No wonder Andrew considers private investigation to be an average, everyday-type career. With your family history, adventure and the unexpected are just ordinary occurrences!”
“Yeah,” he conceded. “Our background is a little offbeat. But you have to admit yours isn’t all that average, either. Not everyone grows up in a resort.”