Chapter 6: Petrified

Kira stood there not really sure what to do. 'Guess I'll have to get used to a lot of hugging from now on, huh?'

Kira had to break the mood somehow. She didn't want to offend Jesse by pulling away, so she did the only thing she could. She mentally reached out to Bo to distract herself. Bo, taking the hint, readily jumped in to help her.

'At least for a couple of days.'

"Uh, Uncle Jesse? Um..." How could he let his uncle know Kira really needed him to let go. Sensing her anxiety level rising, Bo placed his hand on Jesse's arm causing him to look up at his blond nephew. Emotion still running high, he pulled the young man towards him, allowing Kira to slip out of the old man's grasp.

'Thanks.'

True, she had been more patient with Bo's emotional outburst a few days earlier, but she's always known Bo. Jesse was a stranger to her, blood or not. Plus, she'd not been faced with the knowledge of knowing that she could expect many more displays like this in the coming days.

"Come on, Boss. Ain't no reason for us to stay." Rosco would love to stay for the reunion, but he understood that this was a private family moment. He led Boss towards his car as he gave Luke a heartfelt smile (something he rarely did to the Dukes) as he passed by him.

Jesse started to pull away from Bo as he lightly smacked him upside the head. "I ought to tan your hide for making me worry so much about you!"

"I'm sorry, Uncle Jesse. I didn't mean to worry you none. I just-"

Kira put her glasses back on to hide her amusement as it appeared that Bo wouldn't be granted a reprieve from Jesse's annoyance over running off to Atlanta.

"Well let's get inside. You're just in time for supper. Go get cleaned up."

"Yes sir." Bo answered automatically while walking toward the house. Kira, not quite ready to face the others and wanting to head off any more emotional outburst, quickly followed right behind him.

'Oh no you don't. You're not leaving me alone with them just yet.'

'Scared?' Bo teased her, trying to lift her mood but missing the mark.

'Petrified.'

Jesse watched the twins walk in together slightly confused. When she faced Boss, she seemed so confident. Now it was like that bold woman who had stood there smirking at Boss had been replaced by a scared child. He wondered just what kind of life would make Kira scared of her own family; because she was. He had seen it in her eyes just before she'd put those danged glasses back on. That must have been the reason behind them.

"Well, let's go on in too."

"Uncle Jesse?" Luke walked up, not sure if he really believed that Bo could mysteriously find his twin so quickly after just learning about her. Luke was suspicious and didn't want to see Bo hurt if she turned out to be a fraud. "Do you really think that she's Kira, our Kira?" The others had gathered around, letting Luke ask the same questions that they wanted to know the answers to. "How can we know for sure she is who she says she is?"

"Luke. She is Kira. She looks just like her momma. Plus, remember the bond that they have, it's the same as the one that yours and Bo's daddies had. Bo says she's Kira, then there ain't no doubt."

Back in the hall, Bo waited for Kira to finish cleaning up before heading into the main room.

"Kira, you going to be alright?" Bo asked as she stepped out of the bathroom.

Kira looked up to answer. She almost bluffed her way out but remembered the one rule that Bo said that Jesse had always enforced. Dukes don't lie to other Dukes. "Ask me later." There, a safe answer.

Bo gave her a smile as he led the way to the kitchen. The leaf had been added to the table and chairs were added to accommodate the seven Dukes. Coy was about to sit in the chair next to him, Vance was already sitting opposite of the chair that Coy was heading for. That only left the seat between Daisy and Vance for Kira. Bo caught Coy's eye and barely shook his head while mouthing the word please.

Coy seemed to understand and took the other seat instead. The blessing was said and the Dukes all began to start their supper of pintos and sweet cornbread. No one seemed to want to be the first to break the silence. Not sure where to begin.

Finally, Bo took the lead. "Okay, I have to know, when did you get that paper signed? I know it wasn't today because I was with you at the office."

Kira looked up with a slight grin on her face. "Yesterday. Aren't 'cha glad I didn't trust you when ya said you'd be in the clear as long as you weren't caught crossing the line?"

"A word of warning, never trust Bo unless he's behind the wheel of something on four tires." Luke piped in.

Kira laughed as Bo tried his best to look offended, then gave up and laughed along, too. "I'll keep that in mind."

"Just how is it that you were able to get that there paper for Bo?" Daisy asked while reaching for another piece of cornbread.

"I just asked Judge Barclay a favor. He owed me. It's a good thing that I haven't been in the habit of calling in those favors a lot. It made it a bit easier to get him to agree."

"Just what do you do in Atlanta that would make a Judge owe you a favor?" Coy had to hear this one.

"I've been helping his daughter through a rough patch, is all. You could say she learned the hard way what can happen to a runaway in the city. We clicked, so I've been like a big sister to her to help her out."

"Now that still didn't exactly answer Coy's question. What do you do in Atlanta?" Jesse wanted to steer the conversation to how Bo and Kira met up after so long, but he'll let the kids run it for right now.

"I, uh… I'm a public defender." Kira heard a spoon clatter in a bowl. Not sure who dropped it since no one was eating anymore. No one but Bo that is.

"As in a lawyer?" Luke tried to remember if he had ever heard of a Duke lawyer. Nope. Guess there's always a first. Then a thought hit him causing him to burst out laughing. "A lawyer whose brother is on probation for running moonshine. I bet that'll go over well with your co-workers."

That broke the ice as the others joined in with the laughter and then began to ask Kira various questions about how she had become a lawyer. Kira explained, vaguely (she's a lawyer after all), of going to law school as a condition of the will left by Ben Kyle. She also explained that she had become a P.D. instead of accepting the junior partnership at Ben's old firm when Tom and Michelle had offered it. She had wanted to prove that she could do her job without anyone's help. Her tuition may have been a gift, but she had busted her hide to earn her diploma.

Pride. The only thing that she had held onto all her life had kept her from taking the easier path. Duke Pride, Jesse acknowledged silently. It appeared that she had her share. As he saw Kira talk about her time in Atlanta, he once again saw the confident young woman who had stared down J.D. earlier.

"For twins, you and Bo sure ain't much alike." Daisy looked at her cousins trying to find any similarities. "I'm tryin' to picture it if Bo had gone off to Law School. And I can't." Daisy grinned at his pout. "Bo wasn't much for book learnin'."

"Nothing alike, huh?" Kira raised an eyebrow to that. "I can out argue anyone south of the Mason-Dixon, I can out-drive, out-fight, out-race nearly anyone I've come across. I'm spiteful to a fault. Telling me I can't do something is a sure-fire way of getting me to do it just to prove ya wrong..." Kira took a breath when Bo laughed as he got seconds of his beans. "How am I doing? Sound like anyone else you know?"

"We'll have to race tomorrow to see who's better between the two of us."

"You're on, Bo."

"You race?" Luke had a tough time combining the image of the Lady Lawyer who just happened to be his cousin with a racing fiend. They just wouldn't merge. The way she'd just described herself did sound just like Bo. Of course, when Bo argues, it usually involves fists, not words.

"That's my racer on the back of the truck. I race Motocross. I've done some stunt riding back in college, too."

"Okay, I take it back. The two of you are so much alike it's scary." Daisy laughed. "Those highfalutin folks at your college must have loved that."

"Why do you think I did it?" Kira grinned at Daisy. "I told you that I'm spiteful."

The rest of the dinner, to Kira's relief, revolved around the various races that the Dukes had entered. It was agreed that they would have a race the next day. The two race cars with the four fellas against Kira and her motorcycle. After supper, Bo and Luke got up and headed out for evening chores. Jesse went out with them, intent on asking the questions that had gone unasked at dinner.

While the three were out under the pretense of chores the other three Dukes, plus the new addition, went into the living room to sit. Kira felt her discomfort return as she was left alone with the three cousins that she had never met before.

Vance was the first to break the silence by asking the obvious question. How did she and Bo meet up after having so long being separated? She wasn't sure where to begin until Daisy assured her that Jesse had told them about hers and Bo's dad being Luke's dad's twin; that they had the same kind of bond as she and Bo.

That helped; knowing that while their link was unusual, it appeared to run in the family.

Daisy also said that they all knew her as Bo's imaginary friend when they were younger. So, Kira proceeded to go over the events of Saturday as she remembered them, while Bo was out in the barn doing the same for Uncle Jesse and Luke. After the stories were told, silence once again fell over the Duke Clan. The men returned from the barn and Bo was glad that he seemed to get off fairly light when it came to the lectures he'd been expecting.

Inside, he remained in the kitchen a moment. He caught Daisy's eye and signaled her to join him from the doorway.

"You need something, Sugar?" Daisy reached up to get the hug that she as of yet had gotten from her baby cousin.

"I just wanted to give you this for the festival is all. I didn't get around to giving you one Saturday; what with everything. I want you to use this one." Daisy looked down at the photograph that Bo had handed her, fighting back tears as she saw it. "Please."

"Alright, Sugar. I'll go put this some place safe."

After another hug, Daisy slipped off into her room to put the picture away as Bo went into the living room. Kira was sitting on the hearth looking out at the rest of the clan. They all seemed to be telling stories, apparently about him. Walking in, both Luke and Kira seemed to have just finished one story as they looked up at him as he walked in.

"I swear, Bo ain't never grew up, just got taller is all." Luke walked up to throw his arm around Bo. "Not sure he ever will, now, either."

Bo pouted a bit. Unsure just how this conversation started.

"Well, maybe somebody shouldn't have read Peter Pan to him. Gave him the idea and all."

"How did you-?" Luke thought back to when Bo was little. He had indeed read Peter Pan to him. But how did Kira know?

Kira shrugged her shoulders at his unfinished question. "You said if I wanted to listen then I had better listen when you read it to Bo because you weren't going to read it twice. It's one of my earliest memories... Maybe I shouldn't have brought it up."

Kira felt like kicking herself. She'd been in the house for only a few hours and already making people uncomfortable around her when she was uncomfortable enough for them all.

Bo, seeing the shift in the room, tried to ease the tension by suggesting that Luke and he grab their guitars and play a while. They played some of their favorite songs, including Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow up to be Cowboys. Of course, they changed cowboys to Duke Boys which Kira found just a bit too funny.

'I know you're scheming, Bo. I'm not getting my keyboard out. So go ahead and get the idea out of your head.'

Bo tried to give her his best, I'm innocent look, even though he was about to suggest just that. Well, maybe tomorrow, he thought.

Meanwhile, Jesse watched the two interact. He'd had years of practice watching his brothers communicate without saying a word to know the signs. At least despite the years of separation, and whatever havoc that had surrounded Kira's life, it hadn't been able to keep that bond from becoming as strong as if they really had lived together all their lives. Jesse had forgotten just how annoying it can be to be left out of the conversation going on barely five feet away from you.

None of the others seemed to catch Kira's frustrated look towards Bo as he faked his innocence at some unsaid accusation. Jesse smiled as he saw the look that he knew meant that Bo wasn't giving up, only waiting for later. He just wished he knew what he wasn't giving up on.