Free Rifter (The Survival Project Duology Book 1) by Juliet Boyd Page A

wider now. She raised an accusing finger at him.
    “You knew?”
    “No, I didn’t know.” That wasn’t a lie. At the time he hadn’t been certain.
    Mayra poured hot water onto a chamomile teabag and slammed the kettle back onto its base.
    “Where did she come from?” she asked.
    “What?”
    “The other woman? My doppelganger?”
    “How would I know? I don’t work for the police.”
    “You work for the MoD. That’s the same.”
    “No, it isn’t.”
    She slammed her teaspoon down into the sink and let it clatter before responding.
    “Do I have a twin? That’s it, isn’t it? Your stupid Government secret won’t-tell-me-what-you-do agency did a check on me when I started going out with you, didn’t they? That’s the kind of thing those places do, isn’t it? All secrets and spies. Like your life isn’t your own. When they did their checks, did they find out I had a twin?” Leo resisted shaking his head for fear of extending her deliberations. She turned on her heel for a moment and then turned back. “Am I adopted? Was I farmed out because my parents couldn’t afford to keep two babies? They didn’t want me. My parents didn’t want me. Or my mother. Was my mother single? Or is the other woman the one who was abandoned? But why did she hurt me? Does she want revenge?”
    Eventually, he had to intervene. She was revving herself up so much, it wasn’t healthy.
    “No. Mayra, you’re reading too much into this.”
    “Then, tell me, Leo. How the hell do I have a double?”
    He tried to backtrack. To return sanity to the situation.
    “I don’t know. Even if it were true that you’re a twin, they wouldn’t have told me.”
    “You could ask.”
    “No, I couldn’t. Those files are secret. Look, Mayra, lots of people have near doubles. There are too many people living on this planet for that not to be a thing. Think about it. It’s like,” he clicked his fingers, “I know, music. There are only a certain amount of notes and combinations, which is why some tunes sound so similar to others. People are the same. Was she the same height? The same build? That’s the kind of thing that makes an exact double. Other similarities, the ones that we notice on the face, are simply coincidence, or maybe some long lost family connection going back hundreds of years.”
    He wasn’t sure he’d made himself clear, but at least his explanation, plucked out of the air at a moment’s notice, seemed plausible.
    Mayra screwed up her face as she considered what he’d said.
    “Right, well, that doesn’t alter the fact that she attacked me.”
    For someone who’d been zapped, she was surprisingly alert.
    “And you’re sure that she did?”
    “Leo, I was unconscious when I was found. That kind of thing doesn’t happen by accident, or this.” She pulled up her sleeve to show the angry red welt the stun clip had left on her skin.
    Leo grabbed her shoulders to curtail her endless gesticulating.
    “Okay, maybe she simply freaked out because she was scared, like you.”
    Mayra shook her head.
    “I wasn’t scared. No, I was. I was freaked, but I didn’t react by giving her a shock. She gave me an electrical shock, Leo, not a quick slap round the face. Who does that kind of thing? Isn’t it illegal for people to carry tasers?”
    “Yes, it is.”
    “Then, for that reason alone, you have to bring her in.”
    “I’ve already told you, we’re not the police.”
    “Then, the police need to bring her in.”
    “And for that, you need to tell them.”
    Mayra slammed her fist down on the counter. “I’m calling my parents. I need to make sure.” She reached for the phone in her pocket, but he grabbed her hand to stop her.
    Tears began to form at the corners of her eyes.
    “You can’t do that now. It’s the middle of the night. And you’re so worked up. You don’t want to have an argument with them.”
    She put the phone back.
    “I suppose. But what if she attacks me again?”
    “I don’t think that’s