Page 132 of The Woman By the Lake

The Bohannans occupied a bona fide compound on a lake.

Their lake was probably ten of Riggs’s. It was huge, and they didn’t own it.

But they did inhabit some impressive properties at one end of it.

As we drove up, Riggs told me Delphine and Cade occupied the main house. Cade’s daughter, Celeste (who was at the first marathon screening of season one of OMitB, something that had started at six that morning), lived in a smaller pad close to it. And Jace and Jess occupied cabins across from each other a ways up each side of the lake.

Upon entering, I discovered the interior of Cade and Delphine’s house was impressive, and attractive, if not as interesting and eccentric as Riggs’s house.

Though their view of that lake was smack-you-back spectacular.

Delphine moved off to make us coffees as Cade led us to his office.

It, too, was impressive. And unlike the rest of the house, which was gorgeous, but gender neutral, this space was entirely masculine.

I’d had the opportunity to do a full-house tour of Riggs’s place, and he had an office too.

However, unlike the rest it (I’d learned he’d somehow miraculously and painstakingly renovated it in only three years between jobs, commissions, having Ledger and having a good time), his office was a small, dark, cramped, untidy room at the very back of the level where the kitchen and dining room were.

The level above it angled to the north west and into the slope. It held Ledger’s room, which had a three-quarter bath attached to it.

Or, if I’d figured out how Lincoln had crafted it, his daughter’s room.

This I guessed because opposite that were two smaller bedrooms that shared a Jack and Jill suite (for Lincoln’s boys).

And pushing deeper into the earth of the natural slope, the guest room with en suite that I officially still occupied, but unofficially had only briefly occupied.

The kitchen/dining room level didn’t dive as deeply into the slope, but it also included a very large room that held a pool table and a very fancy, full wet bar.

Riggs’s bedroom was mostly a level all its own. Though some of it was built over the living room, most of it jutted off over the lakeside of the house.

So, yes.

Eccentric.

We settled in Cade’s office, and I figured Cade had shared what he had to say already with Delphine, because he launched right in before she returned with coffee.

He started by putting his hand on an enormous pile of papers and folders resting on his desk that had to be at least ten inches tall before he shared, “Harry gave me copies of everything he could pull on the entire Whitaker mess, including the local and Seattle case files, court documents and depositions. And I’ve spent the last four days reading through them.”

My goodness.

That was a lot of work.

Cade took his hand from the pile. “Now, you can guess I have experience with twins, and because I had my own and do what I do, I researched the various phenomena about them. But that isn’t fresh research, and I didn’t have time to dive back into it.”

“Right,” Riggs said when Cade paused.

“Saying that,” Cade continued, “got firsthand knowledge of the link they share. They communicate intuitively in ways we don’t. They have an uncanny sync. They also feel each other’s emotions, and sometimes even physical pain. Last, they have a closeness where, in major life events, for them it doesn’t feel like they’ve fully experienced it unless they either experience it with the other, or until they share with the other that it happened.”

Riggs and I nodded.

This was common knowledge with twins, except that last, which I found intriguing.

“That said, they are each their own man with their own thoughts, opinions and personalities,” Cade shared. “They are not one person split in two. They’re two distinct people who look the same.”

More nodding from me, not Riggs.

Cade kept at it.

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