Page 4 of Masquerade

George’s explanation made him ashamed of his initial doubt. George wouldn’t betray his trust. This wasn’t a reminder of Liam’s past cock-up as an environmental defender.

Because her face is plastered all over a billboard. Because I can’t think straight when I’m in the same room as her.

But if Liam was right, the advertising exec—Kate’s sister—was on the billboard, and she’d mesmerised him as well. Kate Turner didn’t look like the woman on the billboard.Except for the eyes.Liam shook his head.

“Not yet.” Liam was pissed off but unprepared to throw her under a bus until he’d checked Genosearch’s bona fides and spoken to his brother. If Kate Turner’s twin was on the billboard, working together—despite her outfit today—would be pure farce. He refused to be part of any double-trouble pantomime. Only one of them could stay on the job.

“Then can you call her back in please.”

––––––––

Twenty minutes later, Liam closed his office door. Four times the size of his last office. Hell, only a fraction smaller than the one-room apartment he’d rented until he’d accepted George’s job offer. Liam was unmoved by its steel and glass luxury. The big money it screamed meant he’d earned enough to save his mother’s home and make inroads on his dead father’s debt. Shucking his jacket, he threw his wallet on his desk and stared out the window. He’d given up his dreams, but the prospect of being involved in environmental law again hurtled him back to his past. He was unsure of his reaction. A tickle of excitement maybe? A second chance?

A knock, and before he’d swung to answer, George was in the room with the door closed behind him.

“This is for the girls. Their future.” Astute, discreet and surprisingly flexible, Liam admired George’s openness to the idea of adjusting his company’s direction to support his daughters’ passion for prioritising the planet over profit.

“I understand.” Liam pushed his hand through his hair. Not only did he understand, he’d have been on picket lines with them if he wasn’t dedicating fourteen hours a day to making money.

“Then what’s the problem?” George settled in the wide-armed chair facing Liam’s desk. “If yours is the successful project, I’ll have your back.”

“Thank you.” His private and professional worlds were colliding today with stunning force. “I know that, sir. You don’t hang your people out to dry.”

“Less of the sir.”

Liam dropped into his chair and opened his wallet. He pushed a photo across the desk.

“I’d forgotten you were an identical twin.” George glanced from the photo back to Liam. “Nice looking bloke.”

“Ha ha.”

“You rarely talk about him.” George returned to his study of the photo.

Liam winced.

“What’s he do?”

Liam had memorised every detail of the photo his boss held. Two brothers. Identical yes, but more importantly close. They were laughing, their arms looped around each other’s shoulders. Their dad was behind the camera. He’d shared their joke. Enough so that the photo was shot at a bad angle. The last photo their dad had taken of them before Niall headed for Ireland. Their dad had been dead a month later.

“He’s a master cabinetmaker. Niall’s”—he searched for the word to describe his brother’s genius with wood—“brilliant. He also designs and crafts bespoke furniture.”

“And you didn’t explain your sudden switch to intellectual property law.” George wasn’t asking a question.

“No.” Liam slumped back in his chair. “Niall’s been out of the country a few years.”

Some days it felt like a few hundred years.

“He won a prestigious scholarship in Ireland. Only returned to Australia about nine months ago. Been in Sydney about six.” Liam paused. He had no hard evidence to implicate Niall, just his gut. “I think he’s the male model for the Genosearch billboard.”

When he’d seen the eyes of the male model in the billboard, he’d pulled up his brother’s social profile on his phone. Nothing. Nada to link his not-always-in-the-real-world, cabinetmaker twin to the slick advertising campaign.

“My wife pointed that billboard out the other day. Clever concept, breaking faces into jigsaw pieces and then reassembling them.” George held the photo between two fingers.

“Niall’s face.My face”—Liam emphasised the word— “is about to appear across the country, according to the quick search I did before I got here. Rather nixes the idea of me having any anonymity at all.”

George didn’t miss a beat. “I asked for confidentiality. Not anonymity.”

“I was the public face of the campaign against Futureproof Mining. My picture was on permanent rotation on certain newsfeeds when the deal blew up. Some people with long memories were pretty bitter about what happened. If you’re wanting to run a discreet test case, you need someone else. I’m offering to step aside.” He waited a heartbeat. “I think I should step aside.”

---