Beguiled (35 page)

Her parents hadn’t left her at all. They’d been taken from her. By Grant and Karl, who awaited trial in jail without eligibility for bail.

Grant’s assets had been seized by the courts, including Rylee’s ancestral home. But she had no desire to live in a house that had been occupied by her parents’ killers.

Shaking herself, she sat up. Off in the distance, Logan was trying to teach the mutt a new trick.

“Just let him play fetch,” she called. “That’s what he likes.”

Reaching for a half-empty water bottle, she drank deeply. Logan had surprised her late one night by appearing at her doorstep with what looked like a miniature German shepherd with who-knew-what mixed in.

He’d seen it racing after a car that was speeding away. Pulling over, he rescued the shivering mutt, which at the time was little more than skin and bones.

The two of them had sat on her kitchen floor while she held its shivering body, cooing and soothing it. His hair was so matted and full of sticker burs that she’d resorted to scissors to remove them all. They bathed him and met at the spca the next morning for his shots.

She’d insisted Logan name him. After a great deal of indecision, he finally christened the dog Steve Rogers after his favorite comic book hero, Captain America. And now that he’d signed a three-book contract, he worked out of his home and kept Steve company during the day.

Logan spun the Frisbee to her, but then neither he nor Steve seemed interested in it.

She lifted her sunglasses for a better look. The dog held something while Logan tried in vain to twist it from his grasp.

The mutt growled merrily as they wrestled for the prize.

She lay back down and closed her eyes.

Logan’s footsteps approached, and he stretched out beside her.

“You finally give up?” she asked.

“If I ignore him, he won’t be able to stand it. He’ll be over in a minute.”

“You hear from Dora today?”

“Yeah. She e-mailed me a jpeg of my cover.”

She lurched to a sitting position. “Get out! Why didn’t you say anything?”

He smiled. “It’s fantastic.”

“I can’t wait to see it!”

A week after the Robin Hood case had busted open, she’d received a call from Seth Altmeyer. Logan had walked away from a six-figure book deal because he’d refused to include her in the story.

She’d been stunned. Logan had never said a word. Never even asked her if he could include her in the book. When she’d questioned him about it, he’d said no amount of money was worth exploiting her.

After a great deal of coaxing, she finally convinced him to let her read the manuscript. It was fantastic. And had completely stalled out two-thirds of the way through when it became apparent he’d need to include personal details from her life.

But instead of shying away from the idea, she embraced it. What better way to exonerate her parents than by a book that might sell hundreds of thousands of copies?

“Is he back yet?” Logan asked.

“Not even close.”

Sitting up, he gave her a quick kiss, then clapped his hands for Steve.

The Confederate Memorial was silhouetted against the sparkling bay. She counted the months that had passed since that first night. Who would have imagined it would all end up like this?

“He’s got something in his mouth,” Logan said, “but I can’t get him over here. See if you can call him.”

“Here, boy! Come here, Stevie!”

The dog stopped mid-lope, cocking his head. But he trotted laterally, not moving any nearer to them.

“Looks like he’s got a mind of his own today.”

“Try again,” Logan said. “I don’t want him running off too far or I’ll have to go after him.”

She smiled. “So what? I already know you can run fast.”

“Ha, ha. Now would you call him?”

She inserted her fingers in her mouth and gave a whistle.

Across the park, Steve’s ears perked up. She called his name, and he bounded toward them.

“What’s he got in his mouth? I can’t tell from this far away.”

Leaning forward, she squinted and was able to make out a miniature shopping bag, the kind made of heavy stock with a braided rope handle.

“Logan, I think he took that from someone.”

There were some people picnicking near the trees where Steve had been. She shaded her eyes, trying to tell whether they were stirring, perhaps missing something.

Steve loped up. Instead of heading for Rylee as usual, he paused at Logan’s feet.
Oh, dear.
The top of the bag was wet with saliva and rather chewed up.

“Don’t bring that to me,” Logan was saying. He waved the dog toward Rylee. “It belongs to her.”

“What’s he got?” she asked slowly.

Steve edged alongside her leg, dropping his wet package beside her. Logan ruffled his head. “Good boy.”

“What is it?”

“Open it up and see.”

She pulled the top of the bag apart, reaching inside with her fingertips. She touched a hard, felted surface, round at the edges. Her hand pulled back.

“Open it,” he said.

Before she’d drawn the small black jewelry box out of the bag, Logan was already shifting on the blanket, rising, settling himself on one knee.

The box trembled in her fingers. It took two tries to get the lid open.

When she did, a ray of light caught the faceted stone.

“Will you marry me, Rylee?”

She looked up. His warm brown eyes were earnest and filled with hope.

“Yes!” she cried. “Of course. Yes!”

He slipped the ring on her finger, then pulled her to him. Before he could seal his proposal with a kiss, a long, sandpapery tongue swiped between them, catching them both on the lips.

Logan reared back, dragging a hand across his mouth over and over.

Laughing, she wiped her own lips, then threw the Frisbee. Steve charged after it.

She grabbed Logan’s shirtfront and pulled him toward her. “You wanna try that again, Woods?”

“I do, but for the record, I’m gonna have a real problem with a wife who gives her kisses out so freely. From now on, all your kisses belong to me. You got that?”

She slipped her arms around his neck. “Yeah. I got it.”

Authors’ Note

Deeanne sprung the idea of collaborating on Mark, fully expecting him to resist. Instead of putting up a fight, though, he saw the beauty of the plan at once. Even though neither of us had ever collaborated with another author, even though our writing styles and work flow couldn’t be more different, we decided to give it a try.

“Let’s do it,” we agreed.

That was the easy part. Figuring out the story we wanted to tell—and more importantly,
how
to tell it—took more time. Mark wanted to write about Charleston. Deeanne wanted the heroine to be a dogwalker. (In which case, Mark said, the hero will be terrified of dogs!) Little by little, the novel took shape. Then we wrote it. And rewrote it. And rewrote it again.

At first, we figured having two authors work on one story would cut the work in half. Wrong. If anything, it doubled the amount of writing! We both went over every line, every detail, getting everything just right. The result is
Beguiled
, a book neither of us could have written without the other.

Don’t try sneaking into Washington Park after midnight, but apart from that, you can walk the streets of Charleston with
Beguiled
in hand, retracing Rylee’s routes, experiencing the rendezvous sites for yourself. Even before we put the first words on paper, we knew that Charleston would loom large in the story. If you’re inclined, you can sip coffee at City Lights, attend a service at First Scots Presbyterian, or have a meal at Slightly North of Broad. Afterward, stroll down East Battery and try to figure out which house was Grant Sebastian’s. To look right for the occasion, you can drop in on Ben Silver, where Logan buys his suit and picks out a dress for Rylee.

And if you’re athletic and a little bit crazy, you can attempt to replicate Logan’s feat of jumping onto the Confederate Memorial at White Point Gardens. But we don’t recommend it.

Confession time: When the story insisted, we tampered with the landscape a bit. Logan finds parking spaces in the historic district a lot easier than you will, and Rylee navigates a few paths on rollerblades that might require exceptional skill in real life. But for the most part the Charleston of
Beguiled
will be recognizable to residents and visitors alike.