The Counterfeit Lover

By Lynn Kaylor

Zane Wilder's wealthy family has an un-human nature that his parents have kept hidden from him. He's Ademeni An Indweller. An Inhabiter. He can put on anyone's body-male or female-and commit good or evil deeds using their identity, voice, fingerprints, and sperm or egg. 

Widowed Zane's unknown monstrous capabilities are re

• Language: English
• Publisher: Writers Publishing House
• Release date: Jul 22, 2022
• ISBN: 9781648732775

Lynn Kaylor

Lynn Kaylor wrote her first romance story when she was in middle school. After a long career in software development for major global companies, she has retired and is back to writing romance. So far, her first three novels (which includes this one) have been triggered by real events in her sphere. Her next project is something entirely from imagination. We'll see how that turns out.....

Book preview

The Counterfeit Lover

Lynn Kaylor

Published By Writers Publishing House

Copyright © 2022 The Counterfeit Lover

Lynn Kaylor

All rights reserved.

Hardcover - ISBN: 978-1-64873-279-9

Paperback -ISBN: 978-1-64873-278-2

Ebook - ISBN: 978-1-64873-277-5

DEDICATION

To my ever-indulgent husband. xoxoxo

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A million thanks to BookCoverZone’s artist Elo Software Co, LTD for the perfect cover for this story.

Chapter One

Zane Wilder didn’t know what woke him. With no personal worries and a clear conscience, he was usually a deep sleeper, but a startling frisson had slithered through him, rousing him to consciousness. Lying on his right side, Zane opened his eyes to check the time. Instead of his alarm clock on the nightstand next to his bed—and beyond that, his bedroom’s arched windows overlooking the grounds of his estate—he faced a tall chest of drawers he’d never seen in his life. No! It’s not possible. Zane squeezed his eyes shut, felt a tiny tremor of nausea, and looked again.

Five minutes after midnight.

​Rolling flat on his back, Zane’s eyes drifted closed. Good grief. Must have been dreaming. But he couldn’t dredge up any memories of one. A moment later, it took all his willpower not to jerk when he sensed a subtle movement on the bed next to him. Had someone knelt beside him? His security couldn’t possibly have been breached. The around-the-clock guard of his mansion the size of a sprawling mountain resort wasn’t simply the best money could buy—it was much, much more than that.

Keeping his eyes closed, he remained relaxed, trying not to show he was awake and startled, hearing slow, quiet inhales and exhales. Was someone watching him as he lay vulnerable—flat on his back? The person next to him shifted a fraction. The breathing remained faint, low, rhythmic. The room felt warm, which was odd because he kept his bedroom cool. Zane kept his eyes closed—as if he were sleeping—and slowly turned his head, then took a peek. Even in the darkness, he recognized Rachel’s long, brunette hair spilling over her shoulder. His best friend’s beautiful wife lay in the bed beside him, sound asleep, her back to him, in a room foreign to him. She wore a silky nightgown—the dip of her waist visible above the blanket that covered the curve of her hips and legs. He smelled her scent. It was one of her favorite perfumes—Black Orchid. He’d given it to her this past Christmas.

Zane moved his left hand toward her, thinking to touch her hair, or her, to see if she was real or a dream. But it wasn’t his hand reaching out. This hand wore a wedding ring. Zane had stopped wearing his long ago—a few years after Allison’s death when he’d decided the ring was a sad, daily reminder of his loss that he couldn’t take any more. He recognized the hand and the ring reaching out to Rachel, and it explained the putrid taste of vomit and booze in his mouth. It belonged to her husband, Jessie Hughes. He knew Jessie’s hand as well as he knew his own. They’d been inseparable friends since their first day at college as eighteen-year-olds—over two decades ago. He touched Rachel’s braid with Jessie’s fingertips. What kind of abomination was this? Zane was horrified. What had he done? As much as he wanted it, he had no right to be in bed with her. Closing his eyes, he turned his head away and felt a swoosh as if something passed through him. He looked again.

Seven minutes after midnight.

Zane rubbed a hand down his face. He must have been having a helluva bizarre dream because it sure didn’t feel like one. He got out of bed and padded naked to check the surveillance monitor in the foyer of his bedroom suite. Watchmen patrolled the outer perimeter of his large estate above downtown Prescott, Arizona, and electronic sensors bordered the groomed portion of the grounds. A manned high-tower with a panoramic view sat next to the gatehouse that controlled the main entry point to the compound. The gatehouse staff monitored all the cameras twenty-four hours a day—including those inside the manor when they were activated.

Both Kaven, the head of his security team, and Woodlock, the second-in-command, were on duty that night. He’d put his life in either man’s hands any day. Neither one was dozing or inattentive. Both were alert and scanning the camera feeds. Zane turned the thermostat down further. Maybe an ice-cold room would help him sleep. As he got back into bed, a distant flash of lightning lit up the sky moments before a boom of thunder broke the silence. Soon rivulets of rain streaked down the panes, and the white noise was calming.

Lying on his side, Zane closed his eyes and listened as splatters hit the windows. It was the abrupt silence a few moments later that made his eyes fly open. He inhaled sharply. Instead of seeing the clock on his nightstand, he was looking at Jessie—on his back, mouth slack in sleep, and reeking of puke. Zane reached out his hand to see if Jessie was real. The hand Zane moved was feminine and delicate. He looked down his side and saw a dipped waist and curved hip draped in a moonlit-purple nightgown. Rachel’s hand touched Jessie, and Zane experienced the connection. He was in Rachel’s body, making Rachel’s movements, feeling what she touched at his steering. Gah. He squeezed his eyelids closed at the atrocity, then looked again.

Ten minutes after midnight.

What on earth was happening? The storm outside had abated—if there had ever been one. He couldn’t be sure because the only rational answer he could conjure up was that he’d just had one freaky nightmare.

Zane tried his best to go back to sleep, but gave up after tossing and turning for an hour. His mind was on an uncontrollable track. He threw back the light covers and pulled on a robe to stand in front of the story-and-a-half tall windows of his room. His view was not from the front of his home or of downtown Prescott—but on a back corner overlooking natural grasses that stretched to a small stand of white-barked birch on the edge of a dense evergreen forest. At dawn and dusk, it was there where mule deer stepped out into the open to graze.

As he stood staring into the moonless night, his gut said there was something he needed to remember—something connected to what had just happened that he didn’t want to forget. But it had been too long ago to recall readily.

He thought back through time of each year’s highlights—where he’d lived, where he’d been, who he’d been with—to see if anything triggered the memory he was sure lurked somewhere. It wasn’t until he reached the year when he was only seven years old that scenes with potential came to mind. Zane was here with his mother and father, visiting his Ravenov grandparents before they had bequeathed this property to him.

He’d come into the living room where his parents and grandparents were having a heated discussion. It alarmed him to hear them argue, and he’d tried to intervene. His mother had smiled at him and said it was nothing. They were debating about which Christmas present to get him. Get Kaven and go shoot baskets. Scoot, his mom had said. One of Zane’s favorite pastimes was shooting hoops with the then-fifteen-year-old Kaven.

The memory of that day almost forty years ago gave him a chill. There was something important he needed to remember, something he wanted to remember, something someone had whispered to him. He had to think. Zane headed to his closet to dress.

His reflection flashed in the U-shaped string of precisely sized glass-doored enclosures in the walk-in closet that his exacting grandmother had designed. When his wife was alive, they’d held varying numbers of hangers in dust-free conditions—four for coats, six for slacks, five for dresses. Most were empty. Above each was a small glass cupboard that used to hold purses and hats. Now, a few contained his sweaters. On either side of a narrow window were two tall racks, each with six shelves for shoes. Once, Allison’s side overflowed with high heels, pretty sandals, loafers, flats and petite-sized hiking boots. It sat barren.

Zane selected a pair of khakis and a rust-colored Henley shirt, then pulled underwear and socks from the long chest-of-drawers in the center of the closet. There was a padded bench beside the dresser where he sat to put on socks and shoes.

Before he left his suite, he straightened his sheets and smoothed the utilitarian pine-green comforter. Two down pillows rested across the top of the bed, and a lightweight coverlet that he used once in a blue moon lay at the foot. He’d made his own bed since he turned nine years old—never leaving it for housekeeping. It was a thing with him.

When Allison was alive, the bed had been decked with fancy bedding and at least four layers of decorative pillows. He’d put them on the bed only once—the morning after she and their unborn baby had died during childbirth. Then he’d called housekeeping and asked them to get rid of all the nonsense pillows and get him practical bedding.

And by the way, he’d told housekeeping, Allison’s parents would be arriving later that day. Zane had sent a plane for them. Prepare one of the ground level suites. Make it The Versailles. Also, his parents were flying their helicopter up from Scottsdale. Put them in their usual—The Royal on the upper floor.

Next, he had arranged for Allison’s cremation. He wanted her parents to take the ashes home with them. It seemed the proper thing to do, and they’d been grateful.

Then he’d returned to the hospital to meet Rachel and Jessie’s baby Emma, who had been born just as his wife and baby died in the next room.

It was a day that gets permanently etched in your mind. You never forget the accompanying images, sounds and feelings—and you recall them from time to time, whether you want to or not.

Like now. Zane sighed.

After flipping off the closet light, he headed for the kitchen, but as he passed through the living room, he detoured to step into the entrance hall. The foyer was a mosaic of ceiling-to-floor natural stones around tall, leaded-glass windows and the mansion’s massive wooden front door. He pressed the control panel next to the door, turning on the communication screen where he could see Woodlock and Kaven watching the many monitors showing different parts of the property. Neither man was loafing. Both were concentrating.

Zane’s sentries were men and women descended from those who had protected his family’s lands and resources for longer than anyone could remember. When his ancestors left the old country and migrated to America several generations back, the liegemen came too. They were like family, but not family—more than that. History, purpose, and whispers of dark secrets linked their families and his.

Hey, Kaven. How’s it going? Zane asked as he flipped the switch so they could see him.Only the bedroom suites were private, even when the security system was on.

​Fine. Kaven glanced up at Zane for a second before turning back to his work.

Has anything unusual happened tonight?

Kaven started to shake his head, then chuckled. "Earlier, we had an alert when something crossed all three beams, but it turned out to be a big bull elk with a huge rack."

Cool! I’ll have to check out that tape. Anything else?

No, sir. It’s been a quiet night, as usual.

For the thousandth time, you don’t have to ‘sir’ me.

I know I don’t. Kaven checked his watch. What are you doing up at this hour?

Couldn’t sleep. I’m going to make coffee.

Kaven looked at Zane in the interior monitor. Don’t think that will help you get back to sleep, he said, one corner of his lip curling up.

That’s the idea.

Zane switched off the monitor that allowed the guardhouse to see the living areas and then went to the kitchen to make himself a pot of strong coffee and comb through old memories. He wasn’t ready for bright light in these wee hours of the morning. Thankfully, there were individually controlled dimmers on all the kitchen lighting—overhead, under-counter, and hanging.

Placing his mug on the counter in the muted light, Zane settled on one of the chairs at the kitchen bar, leaned back, and thought more about the year when he had turned seven. What was he supposed to remember? Who had said he needed to remember something?

Nothing came to mind at first. He ran through mental images of family and friends and finally halted at his grandmother’s face. She was leaning down, her hands on her thighs as she whispered to him. "Don’t forget, Zane. You must remember. You won’t be able to ignore it, anyway. It won’t let you. Your silly mother thinks you can escape it forever. She’s foolish, and your dad lets her get away with imagining you won’t be what you are. What we all are. You can’t. Use it for good—never for evil. You’re a good boy, Zane. You’ll always do what’s right."

He could hear her voice. ‘You’re a good boy, Zane. You’ll always do what’s right’. His father had come into the room just then, and his grandmother could say no more. There was something his parents didn’t want him to know, something he wasn’t supposed to learn or explore. He’d heard murmurs about some…sorcery was the only word he could think of. He remembered feeling a mixture of fear and confidence. What exactly had she tried to tell him? It must certainly be connected to his dreams this night. He’d give anything to be able to talk to her again.

Zane put his empty coffee cup in the sink and began to walk through the stately mansion that had been his grandparents’ residence in his earliest recollections, searching to see if anything jogged his memory. Grandmother’s secrets were here—somewhere. There must be a hidden chamber that would reveal the mysteries he needed to know. He had to find the entrance to the cache of records and explore them.

On the uppermost level, the solarium opened to a rooftop deck. After looking around, Zane decided a portal opening there was impossible.

Nothing spoke to him in the living room on the main floor, where a grand piano sat in front of an arched two-story window facing the front of the house. Then came the inviting den with longhorns mounted on one wall, a flat-screen TV above the fireplace mantle, and bronze statues of horses and cowboys in glass display shelves. With multiple entries, the den was too open to other rooms to keep confidences and hide dark histories.

Zane couldn’t believe it would be in any of the four guest suites with private balconies on this level. If company was visiting, they might interfere with accessing the vault. So he skipped The Grand, The Penthouse, The Royal and The Maharaja—each identified by a plaque beside the door.

On the lower walk-out level, the family room—with its Old West theme and a central light fixture made from a wagon wheel suspended by heavy chains—offered game tables, shuffleboard, and every entertainment one could want for the younger set. As a kid, Zane had spent many happy hours here. At one time, his grandparents had even hung an open-weave hammock high up, accessed by a pirate’s rope ladder. A small glass case resting on a shelf held the bird’s nest a young Emma had found after it had been blown down from a treetop. The room didn’t provide any options for a hidden doorway, not to mention its juvenile mood.

A transparent glass-walled computer/Wi-Fi business space with six tables for guests, was impossible to be a portal for Grandmother’s secrets.

The workout gym’s solid mirror walls couldn’t hold a concealed passage, and the indoor pool room was equally unsuitable with an Olympic-size lap pool, a spa for eight, and large potted tropical plants spread around the tiled deck.

There were four guest bedroom suites on that level—The Versailles, The Ivory, The Imperial and The Teddy Bear. Zane ruled them out, too.

Then came his magnificent library, where—for the first time—something hummed in him as he walked into the windowless room. An image of his grandmother’s face flashed before him. "Remember, Zane. You must remember. Off, then five, four, three, two, one. Say it, Zane."

Off, then five, four, three, two, one, he had repeated.

Zane remembered Off. Off was the internal security monitor. Sometimes it was on, sometimes off. He always turned it on when no one was at home so the guards could keep an eye inside, too, in case something happened, or someone managed to enter. That could never happen, of course.

Next was five. What was five? He walked through the manor's rooms again and felt fairly certain the process started in his bedroom suite. But he was clueless about what room came next. So he explored further to see what might tickle his brain.

When he got to the pool room, his eyes skimmed the area and stopped when they landed on the jacuzzi. Oh wait, the numbers were minutes, he remembered. Yes. He could hear his grandmother’s voice. Go to the pool room and turn on the jacuzzi. Set it to turn off automatically in… he wasn’t sure, but he suspected four. He had four minutes to perform the next step.

The procedure started to come back to him. He had to turn on a light switch in his bedroom suite within five minutes of turning off the inside surveillance, but he couldn’t remember which light. So it took two tries—starting over—to get it correct. Turn off the surveillance and then turn on the light in the master closet—not the bedroom—and go to the pool room. Turn on the jacuzzi. Set it to turn off automatically in four minutes.

The rest tumbled into place when he entered the library. There were a pair of sconces mounted on small wood panels on either side of one of the bookcases. Tug on the left sconce and it will swing open. Opening it must be completed within three minutes. A keypad will be exposed. You have two minutes to enter the time of day in military-time as displayed by the clock on the top shelf—even if it is wrong. Close the sconce. It will lock. The bookcase will now swing open with a light tug, exposing stairs going down