Chapter 1

I awoke with a start, my heart pounding in my chest. I had felt like I was falling through a great black hole, falling out of it onto my bed. My brain was screaming that something was wrong. I had no idea what might be wrong, no evidence, but an overwhelming dread that my life had changed drastically, that things would never be the same again. I looked at the clock — 2:30 AM. My first thought was for my wife, Elizabeth, but there was nothing I could do to check on her. She was not home and it was not possible to reach her where she was. I immediately thought then, with fear in my heart, about our daughters, Amy and Cindi. I hurried down the hall to each of their bedrooms, and looked in. They were tossing and turning in their sleep, very restless. I went in first to Amy and sat down on the bed. She was lying on her back, her Garfield tee shirt scrunched up above her waist, pretty pink panties showing between her slightly spread legs. I didn't even want to think about why her tee shirt was pulled up so high. I kissed her gently on the forehead, stroking her hair, trying to calm her down. I had always been affectionate with my daughters, as were they with me. She smiled in her sleep, mumbled "I love you, Daddy", and reached over, rubbing her hand on my cock gently. I froze in shock. Whoa, where did that come from? She had never done that before. I reached down and took her hand. She grasped my hand and laid it in between her legs, holding it there. This was too much for me, especially with the wetness I felt there. I gently pulled it away, wondering what had brought this about. I didn't think I was ready to even start thinking of sweet, pretty, innocent little Amy as knowing anything about sex. I whispered in her ear that I loved her, kissed her on the forehead, and got out of there as fast as I could. I was going to be having nightmares about that for awhile. Nightmares or dreams? I didn't even want to go there.

Next, I went in to check on Cindi. She was wearing a pretty little pink baby doll nightie. I smiled. Sweet, classy, pretty, prissy little Cindi, would never be so crass as to wear a tee shirt to bed. I sat down and tried to calm her restless night also. When I bent down to kiss her forehead, she wrapped an arm around my neck and kissed me in her sleep, tongue in mouth and all, as she used her other hand to move my hand to her breast. What the hell was going on here? Neither of these girls had ever shown any interest in sex before, and certainly not with their father! It was not that I was a prude about such things; my sister Victoria and I had done our share of playing around together before, but I had never run into this before. These were my daughters, and only 13 years old to boot. I got out of there as soon as I knew Cindi was ok, and headed downstairs. I knew I would get no more sleep that night.

I searched the whole house. I didn't know what I was looking for, but I kept looking until I was sure it wasn't there. I finally went downstairs and called my sister, Victoria. I knew I would probably be in big trouble for waking her up at 3:00 in the morning, but I had to check to make sure everything was ok with her and her kids. I occasionally had these feelings, and was wrong as often as I was right, but I had to check. To my surprise, she sounded awake when she answered the phone.

"Hi, big brother," she answered. The wonders of caller ID. Big brother. I was a whole 15 minutes older than she was, being the older of the twins. I chuckled to myself, remembering the time that Robert, Victoria's husband, had convinced his sister, Elizabeth, my wife, that Victoria and I were identical twins. He assured her gravely that a brother and sister that were twins could indeed be identical twins. Unfortunately, he didn't include me in the game beforehand and I guess I blew it when I put my hand between her legs, her hand on my cock, and asked her what part of identical she didn't understand. When she finally realized she had been had, the bloodletting was of epic proportions. Elizabeth did have a temper. She hated to be made to look like a fool.

"How are you doing, little sister?" I asked, trying to keep the anxiety out of my voice. I could never fool her, though. "How come you aren't asleep?"

"You're calling me at 3:00 AM to ask me how I am?" There was a long pause. "You felt it too, didn't you?" she whispered. The icicles played up and down my spine.

It was not unusual for Victoria or me to know exactly what the other was thinking. We finished each other's sentences, often not needing to talk at all to know what we were thinking. I know this is going to sound weird, but as long as we could remember we had had an interesting type of... mental connection, I guess you would call it. I always knew where she was, and she could tell the same about me. We knew each other's emotional state without even having to be around each other. If I was sad, she was there almost immediately. If she needed comfort, I was there even before she fully realized it. Sometimes we even almost seemed to read each others minds. Recently, I had begun to suspect that Amy and Cindi together, as well as the girls and I, had such a connection also.

"Yeah. What happened? I was sound asleep, and all of a sudden, it was like my whole life was turned upside down. Something is wrong, Victoria. I can feel it. Or, at least, something is very different. I can feel it with us. Our connection is suddenly stronger. At the same time, I feel sad somehow, as if I have lost something with you. I feel like I just want to cry. Are you sure you are ok? Have you checked the kids?" I was really getting worked up.

"I feel it too," she whispered. "The kids are asleep, but very restless. It was weird. They kept whispering 'I love you, Daddy' in their sleep. They never call Robert daddy." She paused; I could hear the wheels turning, smell the burned diesel fuel as she thought, then she went back to what we were talking about. "I can feel you stronger than ever before, but it feels like... I don't know... kind of like the sadness I felt when I broke up with my first boyfriend. Except I don't feel a loss about you, I just feel... a little sad. It's weird." She was whispering softly, lovingly.

"That's exactly how I feel. Like we broke up, and are a little sad about that, but that we remain really good friends, even closer than before." I paused, feeling very emotional. "I love you, Victoria. I wish..." I knew I needed to shut up now, or I was going to cry. And get us in trouble again.

"I know, dear brother of mine. There are many times I wish you weren't my brother." She sniffled. I tried to cheer her up.

"I can remember quite a few times when being your brother didn't bother you at all... or stop you any, either!" I could almost feel her blush over the phone.

"Yeah, I remember you several times begging me to 'stop it some more' too!" I heard her suddenly turn serious again. "But that is not what I meant, and you know it, favorite brother of mine."

"Thanks. I'm your only brother. I know, Victoria; I feel the same. But we need to talk about something else. You have Robert and I have Elizabeth, and neither one of us wants to take another chance on messing that up. We were really lucky with the timing last time. You will always be number one in my heart, but that is where it has to stay." I didn't really believe that, but I had to say it. I couldn't hurt her again.

"You didn't hurt me, silly." Did I mention we could sometimes seem to read each other's minds? "I wanted it too. We just had an unfortunate accident that turned out to be not so unfortunate. It all worked out ok. I'm not ready to say never again yet, if ever. We just need to be more careful." I sighed deeply. I wasn't sure if she was trying to convince herself, or me. I knew I could never refuse this woman anything. Back to safer subjects.

"Anyway, what do you suppose happened? Something did. I have never felt anything like it. I'm not going to feel comfortable until I know what it was." Once something started bugging me, it would drive me crazy until I knew what it was.

"I don't know. Maybe I will call Megan tomorrow, have lunch with her. She always seems to have the answers to things we can't figure out. Too bad a genius like that is wasting her life digging holes in the ground." She giggled at that; she just loved to harass Megan. All in good fun, of course; Megan was her closest and best friend. Megan would just smile gently and let it go. Nothing ever upset her. Well, except when she thought Elizabeth was not treating me right. It only took once and after that Elizabeth was always nice to me around Megan. She learned the hard way; don't mess with the ones Megan loved. It was not pretty.

After hanging up with Victoria, I went into the den in the basement, so I didn't wake up the girls, and turned the TV on. I picked the most boring movie I could find. I didn't want to watch it; I just wanted something in the background. The feeling that something bad had happened was certainly not going away. If anything, it was stronger. To take my mind off it, I started thinking about my life up to now. I didn't realize yet that it had changed forever, and I was beginning one of the worst days of my life.

I am a 37-year-old man, married to a beautiful 36-year-old woman, in a marriage I would describe as... happy, I guess. Most of the time, anyway. Convinced you, didn't I? Don't get me wrong. I love Elizabeth with all my heart. She is a beautiful woman, 5' 7" tall, 120 lbs, slim, athletic, pretty grey eyes, and curly blonde hair down to the middle of her back. We met when I was in high school, through Victoria, my twin sister. She and Victoria were cheerleaders together. I was usually included in their activities due to my amateur photography, and the fact that Victoria and I always went everywhere together. If I wasn't invited, she didn't go either. Since she was one of the most talented cheerleaders and well liked, everyone wanted her there, so I was usually invited. Victoria was beautiful in her own right. She was 5'4", 110 lbs, long black hair, and the most striking green eyes you have ever seen. Just like mine. She was shy and really pretty much of a geek, just like me,

I think I would best describe my marriage with Elizabeth as... comfortable. I love her dearly. I am sure she loves me, also, in a distracted sort of way. I didn't take it personally, as she loved our 13-year-old twin daughters the same way, and everyone just loved them to pieces. It wasn't as though this was something new. Elizabeth had been honest with me from the start. Her career came first. She had told me that on our first date, when I was sixteen years old. She didn't have a career then, obviously, but she already knew what she wanted to do. She was going to be a world class, world famous journalist, a TV personality. She succeeded. Her name had become a household word. Her daily reports as an imbedded journalist from the Iraq war were heard all over the world. That was her life, to go all over the world to trouble spots, to report the news. She was famous to her husband and children, too. We watched every broadcast, so we wouldn't forget what she looked like and could say hi to her through the TV.

Do I sound bitter? I don't mean to. As I said, I knew what her goals were from the beginning. We just had different priorities. Hers were her career. I had a career too, as the founder and co-owner, with my sister Victoria, of a very prestigious private investigation firm. We were world famous, too, in some ways that few people knew about. However, even though that was important to me, my first responsibility was to my children. I made it work. Elizabeth couldn't seem to.

Life is a series of adaptations. We adapted, Amy, Cindi, and I. Since I owned my own business, I could arrange to be home almost anytime I needed to be to take care of them. They were good girls, needing little care anyway. Amy was 5' 4", 108 lbs, long black hair, and beautiful green eyes. In fact, she looked amazingly like my sister Victoria. Most people mistook them for mother and daughter. Cindi was 5' 7", 120 lbs, long blond hair down to her butt, and beautiful deep blue eyes. She looked a lot like her mom. It was hard to tell the girls were twins. They were as different personality wise, also. Cindi was quiet, emotional, polite, and shy. Amy was outgoing, talkative, sometimes outspoken and impolite, sometimes even boisterous. You never had to guess what was on Amy's mind. Sometimes you would rather not know! I never could understand how Elizabeth could love them in such a distracted manner. They wouldn't have allowed that with me. I would have found myself tied up and gagged one morning, being unspeakably tortured if I ever tried to ignore them. Of course, when you're never home, it is easier, I suppose.

Both of the girls were so smart that the schools didn't know what to do with them. I had a longstanding agreement with Victoria and Megan to teach the girls in addition to their official schooling, kind of like a supplementary home schooling, to keep them from getting bored. The girls loved it. Victoria and Megan were two of the smartest people I've ever known. Well, along with Cindi and Amy. Both were part time teachers. Megan was an archeologist also, as well as helping out with the private investigation firm with me. Victoria had been an FBI agent for several years, as had I been, before she got tired of never seeing her children. Since it was obvious at the same time that Elizabeth was not going to be much help in raising our girls, Victoria and I quit about the same time to start our own business. She hassled Elizabeth periodically about her missing the best years of her children's life. It sometimes caused some conflict between the two. So the subjects they studied were never boring. They loved the subjects, especially studying archeology and hearing about some of the digs Megan had been on. Of course, they also loved to hear about law enforcement and the cases Victoria knew about. Megan, especially, understood my girls pretty well, and during break times would regale them with science fiction stories about teenage girls with super powers who kicked butt. They were great stories and Megan was a great storyteller; sometimes she even had me riveted, half believing they were true and wondering what would happen next. It was great bribery to get them to study, although you usually didn't have to force them.

The other reasons they loved the supplementary home schooling was because of Victoria's and Megan's children. Victoria was married to Elizabeth's brother, Robert. He was a career marine. I liked him a lot. He had ended up being my roommate in college. He was gone a lot too. In fact, he was in the unit that Elizabeth was imbedded with in Iraq, and they often rode in the same Humvee or Bradley. Having him there with her made me feel a lot better, as I knew how good he was at what he did. Megan had two girls, Julie and Samantha, and Victoria had two daughters also, Katie and Becky. Katie and Becky were identical twins, and Julie and Samantha were fraternal twins, like my two. Twins seemed to run in our family, as well as in our group, as Megan was not related to Victoria and me. They were all sweethearts. Julie was about 5' 4", about 108 lbs, black curly hair, brown eyes. She was very quiet, shy, and smart. Samantha was 5' 6", 112 lbs., long, almost white blonde hair, and grey eyes. She was cute, outgoing, smart, and very confident around boys already. If any of the girls would be a problem, it would be Samantha. For some reason that no one remembered, she sometimes went by the nickname of 'Sandi'. I refused to call her that — I liked the name Samantha and for some reason could not stand the name 'Sandi'. Megan wasn't crazy about the name either. Samantha was a good girl, but she was stubborn and prone to do things her way, regardless of what anyone thought. She was also prone to go outside the rules when she thought she could get away with it. She could be downright rude at times. She was the only one of the group that was not a cheerleader. She thought cheerleaders were brainless bimbos. She expressed that point of view. Once. She didn't stop to think first that her sister, cousins, and some of her best friends were cheerleaders. Megan heard it, grabbed her and took her into the back room. I don't know what went on, but when they came out again Samantha tearfully apologized to all the other girls. I had never seen her cry before. The subject never came up again. Katie and Becky were 5' 1", 95 lbs, long blond hair, and deep blue eyes. They were both brilliant, quiet, soft spoken, but not shy. All the girls got along well, were all, except Samantha, on the same cheerleading squad, and were lots of fun to be around. Even Samantha hung around the squad a lot, once she decided her viewpoint on cheerleaders was not compatible with good health and a long, happy life, and meant a lonely existence without her best friends. Anyway, all of them there together made for good study habits. I guess it helped with studying when you had others there to do it too and someone to hang out with afterwards.

The current assignment in Iraq that Elizabeth was on had been going on for about 2 months. It looked like it would be another two to four months before we saw her at home again, if then. She was pretty good about calling and talking to the girls and me, but it just wasn't the same as having her there. Of course, we seldom had that anyway, so we should have been used to that by now. The girls were used to it, I think, never having known anything else, but I still had problems with it sometimes. Ok, lots of times. She had the opportunity to come home periodically when the unit was on stand down, but she just thought it was a lot of travel for a short time and besides, she might miss something. Yeah, like your kids growing up!

I remember the first time I really noticed Elizabeth as anything other than a pretty girl way out of my league was when I was invited to a get together for all the cheerleaders and some of us geeks that hung around with them. I was sixteen at the time. I knew a few of them. My sister Victoria, Elizabeth, and another pretty girl named Megan. Megan was probably Victoria's best friend. She was 5'4", 110 lbs, slim, athletic, with the wildest red hair you've ever seen. Her hair was always everywhere. It didn't help that it was long, too, down to the middle of her back. She hated it, but I thought it looked really cool. She had the prettiest dark, almost deep purple eyes. I swear, even to this day, they are purple. I have never seen purple eyes before. Megan was quiet, shy, smart, sweet. Elizabeth was more outgoing, the life of the party. I had been thinking of asking Megan out, as I thought we would go well together, both of us being quiet and reserved. Elizabeth ended those thoughts at the get together that night.

This particular get together was largely unchaperoned. I think many of the parents would have had a fit about that, but no one knew. There was a fair amount of alcohol present. Although there was underage drinking going on, we were responsible about it. The previous year, one of the senior cheerleaders and a senior football player had been killed in a DWI accident. It had scared the hell out of all of us. Each group of kids had a designated driver, to prevent that from happening again. What happened at the party was largely unregulated.

At this particular party, after everyone who was drinking was drunk enough, someone had suggested strip poker. The boys, of course, thought that was a great idea. Some of the girls were not so sure. Elizabeth was one of those. I would have thought, at 15 years old, and as outgoing and pretty as she was, that she would be somewhat experienced. Wrong. I learned that night that Elizabeth hardly knew the meaning of the word sex. I was somewhat more experienced. There was almost an electrical jolt between Elizabeth and me as soon as we saw each other naked, and any thought of others was gone forever. She was clearly the second most beautiful girl I had ever seen.

I say the second most beautiful girl I had ever seen. The distinction of most beautiful girl clearly went to my sister, Victoria. That would be regardless of fully clothed or... um... naked. Okay, I guess I need to explain that.

Victoria and I were much closer than a normal brother and sister would have been. First, we were twins. That usually results in a special brand of closeness. We had our mental connection, also promoting a special kind of closeness. We also were closer simply because we had to be. Our parents were wonderful people, but they were a lot like Elizabeth. Whoever said that children marry spouses like their parents was right on with Victoria and me. Both of our parents were career driven, with family second. Oh, I'm sure our parents loved us. They just didn't have any time for us. We were so intelligent, self-sufficient, and responsible that from the age of about 10 years old on, we basically took care of ourselves. Being only children of parents that were only children, we really had no relatives around. I was pretty much of a computer geek that didn't have much social life. Victoria, being stunningly pretty, could have had a lot more social life than I did, but she chose to stay at home or go places with her geeky brother. We loved each other dearly.