“Hi, Auntie,” Corinne says—sighs, really—letting herself be hugged tightly by a mauve blur of a woman I assume to be Theresa Bien-Aimée, the decidedly mismatched twin to the elegant and stoic Chantale Bien-Aimée Troy.

“Thanks for hosting us last minute. Mom says she really appreciates it.”

“Oh, stop that!” the woman says, pulling away only to cup Corinne’s cheeks, seemingly immune to Corinne’s invisible force field of personal space. “Look at you! All woman-sized.”

Up close, it’s a bit uncanny: Terry’s features look exactly like Chantale’s. The same sharp eyes and chin, inherited by Corinne too, but this version is from an altogether different time line: one of shaved heads, dangling earrings, and blue lipstick. Nothing she’s wearing matches, which somehow totally works.

I imagine all the tea and rye toast that Chantale spent a lifetime eating while working on dissertations were replaced by muffins topped with butter, cupcakes, and donuts for this larger-than-life version of Chantale, emanating joy with every fiber of her being.

“Hi, Ms. Bien-Aimée.” I Smile, removing my glove and extending a frostbitten hand toward her to introduce myself formally. “My name is Henri Haltiwanger. Thank you so much for hosting me.”

She vigorously shakes my hand and pulls me in, tilting my chin down with a gloved hand and grinning into my eyes.

If only all women in this family were so easily charmed.

“Now, Henri, first things first: were you always this handsome?”

“No, ma’am,” I say, following her lead, wiggling my eyebrows at Corinne for good measure before getting into the front seat. “But that Monkey’s Paw had one last finger on it, and I made the most of it.”

She lets out a sharp cackle from the driver’s seat, craning her neck to pull us out of the parking spot and into the mild traffic of Montreal, Quebec.

Corinne’s smack to the back of my head is so lightning quick that I would need slow motion to prove it in a court of law.

Of course, Aunt Terry lives over her bakery. The building in question is a two-story structure by a small park. The forest-green roof looks black at this time of the night, especially covered in a layer of snow.

“‘The Good Twin,’” I read aloud. The name is in cursive, and at the side is a sketch of Terry, complete with a shaved head and round gold ear hoops, holding a pie with cartoon flavor lines drawn over it like it was baked for the express purpose of luring in Wile E. Coyote.

“Mom was not amused to learn the name when we drove up for the grand opening,” Corinne comments.

Judging by Terry’s hint of a smile, I’m going to guess that that was partly the point. Having a sibling that close must be a hell of a thing.