Under the Boardwalk (Costas Sisters 1)

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Ari stepped back to study her sister. Zoe’s hair fell to her back and she was as beautiful as ever. “You don’t look like you’ve been suffering too much,” Ari said, not sure where she was or what her sister was enduring here.

Wherever “here” was.

Zoe rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. “Looks are deceiving. You try spending twenty-four/seven with Marco. Insanity’s about to set in. Speaking of Marco, I’m going to strangle him for letting you in the door.”

Ari bit down on her lower lip. “That would be Quinn you’d have to strangle for bringing me here in the first place.”

Zoe raised an eyebrow. “Mr. By-the-Book Donovan? He’s responsible? I saw him here but didn’t put two and two together.”

Ari nodded.

Zoe strode up to her and looked her in the eyes. “Why? Why would Quinn bring you to me here? Now? When he knew how dangerous it was for you?” she asked, sounding more like an interrogator than a sister.

Her tone and her air of authority set Ari off. “Oh no. You’re not the one who’s going to ask questions, I am.” Long-suppressed anger took hold at last and her voice shook as she turned on her sister. “Do you realize we thought you were dead? Mom and Dad are holding on to hope and going on with business as usual, but they’re in pain. Do you have any idea how selfish that is? Just who the hell are you? What are you doing here? And where is here, for that matter, since I drove blindfolded just to see you?” She drew a deep breath. “You’re my twin, but I feel like I don’t know you at all.”

A flash of guilt and more than a hint of hurt crossed Zoe’s face. “I may have a lot to answer for, but you’re not exactly blameless when it comes to not knowing who I am.” Zoe marched over to a couch and settled cross-legged on a cushion. “It’s not like you ever wanted to know. Or ever cared. You formulated all these high and mighty assumptions and they stuck.” She lifted her chin in the air. “You were the professor, the academic, the smart one, and so much better than Mom, Dad, or me because of the choices you made.”

Ari winced, knowing her sister was right. She’d held herself above her family and they’d all paid the price. But that didn’t change the agony Zoe had been putting the family through.

But dealing with their relationship could come after both sisters understood the situation as it stood now. “I know Mom set you up to work at Damon’s to get closer to him, thinking he was a good catch. But Mom also said she paid Damon back, so why were you still working there?” She ran a hand through her hair, frustrated at all she didn’t know. “Because I’ve met Damon and I know you couldn’t have fallen for him the way Mom had hoped.”

To Ari’s surprise, Zoe chuckled. “Mom’s got these rose-colored glasses on, doesn’t she? To think I could fall for that low-life sleaze.” She shook her head, obviously as amazed as Ari had been.

“He definitely is slime,” Ari agreed. “So . . .” She prodded Zoe back to her story.

“You should sit down, Ari.” Zoe patted the seat beside her.

Ari sat, then she waited.

Zoe sighed. “I worked at the casino one night and figured out Mom had set me up. That Damon was no threat to her and the money she owed didn’t amount to anything much. It doesn’t take a genius or a federal agent—which by the way I am—to sniff out a setup.”

Ari blinked, feeling as if she’d been hit by a two-by-four. “Say that again. Slowly.”

“I. . . was. . . set. . . up. By our mother.”

Ari shook her head. “No, the other part.”

A wry smile took hold as Zoe reached for her twin’s hand. The connection felt good after so long.

“I’m a federal agent, Ari.” Zoe met her gaze, nodding slowly. “I work for a local division of the Secret Service, guarding diplomats and other high-level officials.”

“Since when?” Ari asked, the truth much stranger and harder to believe than anything even her parents could have conjured up.

“I applied and started training right out of college.”

“But I thought . . .” Ari sputtered, not sure what to say. “I mean you always acted like life was one big game. There was that jaunt cross-country where nobody heard from you for almost four months.”

Zoe shrugged. “Training at Quantico.”

“You worked as a showgirl when you needed money.”

Zoe shook her head, her long hair swishing over one shoulder. “I enjoy dancing and it’s good exercise, but I never worked as a showgirl. I left the house saying I was going to work. It’s not like you ever saw me dance. And for the last five years, it’s not like you were even home.”

Ari was still unable to process what she was hearing. Or what her sister’s words meant to her entire outlook on life. “Our family operates on the P. T. Barnum assumption that there’s a sucker born every minute. How the hell can you be a special agent?”

Zoe laughed. “The same way you can be a psych professor. You have to admit with the family’s eccentricities, nobody would suspect me of being with law enforcement. So?” She spread her hands wide. “Anymore questions or do you finally believe I’m not wasting my life, just taking up space on this earth by operating one con after another?” she asked, repeating words Ari remembered using during one of their arguments.

Pain sliced through her at the memory. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Zoe’s green eyes bored into hers. “Why bother changing a perception you found so comforting?”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it? Come on.” Zoe rolled her eyes. “You needed to believe the worst about us all or else you couldn’t justify your fear and need to run.”

Ari reared back, shocked by her twin’s brutal yet dead-on assessment.

“You’re not the only one who took psychology in school,” Zoe info rmed her. “And if just once you’d looked at me like you cared about who I was inside, not who I appeared to be, I might have shared my life with you. I love you, Ari. And I never wanted to change any part of you. Except the part that wasn’t accepting.”

Ari wrapped her arms around herself and rocked back and forth on the couch. She took a deep breath and tried to push aside the hurt and anger overwhelming her.

Anger at herself, not Zoe. “I love you, too. And you’re right, okay? I was judgmental. But only because I couldn’t understand your life. A simple explanation and this rift between us would never have happened.”