Cavanaugh’s Woman by Marie Ferrarella

been three years. Three years without a word. And now here Carrie was, in her room, pretending to be her. It was a little difficult to grasp all at once. “Funny, I always thought I looked like you.”
    Younger by eleven months, her sister was an inch or so taller than she was, and perhaps a little thinner of face, but to the undiscerning eye, they looked enough like one another to be twins. Or, at the very least, pass for each other.
    It was a fact that hadn’t been wasted on their father. He used their uncanny resemblance whenever he could incorporate it into one of his scams.
    The years melted away, as did the hurt at being left to carry on without her. The past was instantly forgiven. What was left was joy, sheer joy at seeing Carrie.
    Moira crossed quickly over to the bed, part of her wondering if she was dreaming with her eyes open. Kissing Shaw had addled her brain, so was this a hallucination?
    She reached out and took her sister’s hand. “What are you doing here?” she asked again. “Why didn’t you call, write, send smoke signals, something?”
    Carrie shrugged. “I figured it would get lost in the shuffle.” Mail addressed to Moira arrived at Firestone Studios in large gray canvas bags by the ton. “Now that you’re a big star—”
    She didn’t want to get into that, didn’t want it separating them. She’d been lucky. Carrie had run off with some guy she’d met during their travels. Things hadn’t turned out all that well for her.
    “Never mind that now. How long can you stay?”
    “A while.” Carrie pressed her lips together. The look on her face was uncertain, as if she didn’t know how to phrase the next part. “That all depends on Simon.”
    “Simon,” Moira repeated. That wasn’t the name of the man Carrie had run off with. That had been a Lewis Sotherland. “Who’s Simon?”
    Carrie took a deep breath. To Moira’s way of thinking the smile on her face seemed a little forced. “The man I’m going to marry.”
    “Marry?” Moira stared hard, searching for the customary joy that traditionally accompanied that kind of declaration. She didn’t see it. What was going on here? “My God, you just drop out of the sky after three years and tell me I’m going to have a brother-in-law? Wow.”
    Trying to be thrilled for her, Moira hugged her sister. She felt Carrie wince against her, heard the whimper that escaped before she could press her lips together.
    Moira drew back, wary. Worried. And suspicious. “What’s the matter? I haven’t gotten that strong, or you that weak,” she added.
    Carrie looked away, unable to meet her eyes. “Nothing.”
    Puzzled, concerned, Moira deliberately pressed her fingers against the left side of her sister’s rib cage. Carrie winced even as she pulled away. Moira matched her movement for movement, peering at her face, trying to read between the lines.
    “Carrie?”
    Carrie deliberately avoided looking at her. “It’s nothing.”
    The hell it was. “Let me see ‘nothing.’”
    Her sister began to back away, but Moira grabbed hold of her blouse and managed to pull it up before Carrie could step back. There, pressed against her flesh, was an ugly rainbow of colors—yellow, blue, green with a dash of purple—swirling around in an uneven swatch. Moira’s heart froze. Her voice was stony as she raised her eyes to her sister’s face. “How did you get that?”
    Before Carrie could answer, Moira heard the sound of the toilet being flushed. The realization that there was someone else in the hotel room with them penetrated just as the bathroom door opened and a tall, dark-haired handsome man walked out. A broad smile graced his tanned face. Moira caught herself thinking that whoever this was, he looked like a matinee idol and had the swagger to match.
    Carrie took the opportunity to snatch back the edge of her blouse and tuck it back into her jeans.
    The man extended his hand toward her as he approached. “Hi. You must be Moira. And