The wine was a bad idea.
I managed to keep it together through the salad course and the “mains”—a choice of grilled vegetables, yellowtail, or beef tenderloin. (Saul and I had the yellowtail, Frannie the tenderloin.)
I kept silent while Will stood up and welcomed all of us and thanked us for being there. I maintained an appropriate level of dignity during dessert (key lime pie), not asking everyone at the table who didn’t eat theirs if I could have their slices.
I even made it onto the author bus (this time it wasn’t the sheriff or Molly who drove, but a male librarian named Henry) without falling over or otherwise disgracing myself.
But when we got to the hotel and Saul insisted we all have a nightcap (his favorite: Baileys on ice), I lost it.
“Okay, everyone take out your phones,” I said as we sat down with our cool, deliciously creamy drinks and dipped our bare feet into the pool. “You’re all great writers and incredible researchers. So I need you to help me research what horrible tragedy happened to Will Price and his sister approximately a year and a half to two years ago.”
Saul had already passed out on one of the chaise lounges, his drink untouched in his hand, and Garrett had retired to his room with the excuse that he needed to get more work done—not on his book, it turned out, but on the big magic trick he was planning to perform on Saturday night, the one I had absolutely no intention of watching.
But Kellyjean was sitting with us, even though she didn’t drink. She said she’d wanted to stay up to watch a meteor shower one of her sons had told her was supposed to be visible in the Florida Keys this weekend.
The moment she heard what I wanted her to look up on her phone, however, she turned her head away from the night sky. “What makes you think something tragic happened to Will Price and his sister?”
“Because he said so. Both he and his sister said something about it. My books apparently helped her through one of the worst times in her life, and around the same time, Will said he was going through such a difficult period that he lost his head and bad-mouthed me to the New York Times.”
“I don’t understand,” Kellyjean said. “Why not just ask Will?”
“I did,” I said. “He doesn’t want to talk about it. Apparently he’s very protective of his privacy.”
“Well, there you go, then.” Kellyjean turned her gaze back toward the stars. “You shouldn’t pry. Everyone deserves their privacy.”
“Um, excuse me.” I really should have stopped at one glass of wine after all the screwdrivers I’d had on the plane, and then the margarita in the pool, and of course I should have said no to the Baileys now. But I had not. I had had two or three—or four—glasses of California’s finest Pinot Noir, and it had all gone straight to my head. “But are you saying I don’t deserve an explanation for why Will Price dragged my good name through the mud?”
“He told you,” Kellyjean said. “Something so deeply tragic happened to him that he doesn’t want to talk about it, and it made him behave badly.”
“If it were only his sister we were talking about, I would fully respect her right to privacy. But it isn’t. I have the right to know why Will said what he did.”
“Did he say he was sorry?”
“Well, yes. But I still need to know.”
“For heaven’s sakes, why?”
“Because, Kellyjean, I’m a writer! I’m curious about people and what motivates them.”
“Well, I’m a writer, too, and I say butt out.”
“Maybe because it wasn’t your good name that he trashed.”
“I think there’s more to it than that,” Kellyjean said primly.
“Oh, really? Like what?”
“Like you’re in love with him.”
“I’m in love with him?” I started laughing. “Kellyjean, what on earth would make you think I’m in love with Will Price?”
“I’ve got eyes in my head, don’t I? I’ve seen the way you look at him. When you two were talking when I came up to you on the beach before dinner, you could have cut the sexual tension with a knife.”
“That was hatred, Kellyjean. That was pure, unadulterated hatred.”
Kellyjean shook her head. “I don’t think so. I’m a romance writer, Jo, don’t forget. I’m an expert in these things.”
Astonished, I looked over at Bernadette for help. “Are you hearing this?”
“Uh, Kellyjean,” Bernadette said. “I have to agree with Jo here. This isn’t one of your paranormal romances. No one is going to shape-shift into a wolf. I can assure you, Jo hates Will’s guts.”
I did hate his guts. I absolutely did.
Although I had to admit that some of the parts outside his guts were pretty appealing. Sitting next to him all night, I’d been all too conscious of his hands—big, strong-looking hands for a man who apparently did nothing all day but type.
And those wide shoulders I’d first admired back in that green room hadn’t gotten any less irresistible, either. Neither had his night-dark eyes.
Ew, yuck, what was I doing, describing Will Price’s eyes as night-dark? That was like something straight out of a Will Price book . . . both a cliché and not true. Will’s eyes were brown. Just plain brown.
Not that I didn’t think of those eyes, and often. Occasionally, when I came across photographs of Will in airline magazines (he was forever getting interviewed in them, and I was forever coming across those interviews as I flew to and from book events), I blacked out those brown eyes and even his teeth with whatever pen I had handy, then left the periodical for the next passenger to discover. Who hated bestselling author Will Price so much that they’d do something like this? I often imagined the passenger wondering to themselves when they came across the defaced photo of him. What did he ever do to them?
Ha! Plenty!
Ugh, I needed to drink some water. But Baileys tasted so much better.
“I think it’s good for Jo to find out what Will’s hiding,” Frannie was saying when I tuned back into the conversation. “Supposing it turns out he secretly ran over her husband?”
“Happens.” Jerome shook his head. “Happens all the time. White people are crazy.”
Kellyjean looked confused. “Jo, are you married?”
I grinned. “No, Kellyjean. They’re talking about Will’s new book, The Moment.”
“Oh. Well, I don’t think this is a joking matter,” Kellyjean said. “If Will doesn’t want you to know what happened to him and his sister, you shouldn’t be trying to look it up. It’s an invasion of his privacy, and it’s wrong.”
Frannie sighed. “Loathe as I am to admit it, Kellyjean is right, but not for the reasons she thinks. It’s wrong because it’s futile. I see Will Price’s name in the news every week, practically, for donating to charity or coming out with a new movie or being nominated as one of People magazine’s sexiest men alive. If something bad had happened to him, we’d know already.”
“Hey,” Jerome said. “People magazine nominated me as one of the sexiest men alive, and all of you missed it.”
“Funny, Jerome,” I said. “Very funny.”
Bernadette had her cell phone out. “The only negative thing I can find online that happened to Will is the plagiarism thing.”
“If he’s so protective of his privacy,” I said, “it wouldn’t necessarily be something the press would know.”
“I’m protective of my privacy, too,” Jerome said. “So protective that when People magazine tried to name me one of their sexiest men alive, I turned them down.”
Frannie laughed. “That’s because your wife wouldn’t share you, Jer.”
“Well, yes, that is true.”
Kellyjean looked confused. “Wait, I can’t tell if y’all are serious or playing with me.”
Bernadette was still scrolling through her phone. “They’re playing with you, Kellyjean. Jerome wasn’t named one of People magazine’s sexiest men alive. And I can’t find a single piece of dirt on Will Price aside from the Nicole Woods thing, Jo. He’s never dated anyone, never had a job outside of publishing. It’s like he graduated from college and went straight into bestseller-dom. His very first book, published when he was twenty-three, was a smash hit. A lot like yours, Jo.”
“Uh, not at all like mine. Kitty Katz got rejected a hundred times before she became a smash hit.” I leaned back and gazed up through the palm fronds swaying in the breeze. I didn’t see any meteors, but frogs croaked all around us, the only sound, besides that of the waterfall over by the Jacuzzi and our own voices, in the hotel courtyard. “Never mind, it’s okay. I have a message in to my agent. You know agents get all the best dirt. I’m sure she’ll have something for me by morning.”
“I still don’t understand why you have to go poking into that poor man’s business,” Kellyjean said. “What all happened over at the Hemingway table tonight, anyway?”
“Nothing,” I said.
I meant it, too. My evening had been completely uneventful once Will had asked me to drop what had happened at Novel Con. The conversation at the table had been light—Saul sharing hilarious stories from the horror-writing business, Molly and Sheriff Hartwell sharing how they’d met, and Dorothy Tifton sharing a bizarre but entertaining story about how she’d helped catch a local thief.
Aside from his welcome speech, Will had hardly uttered a sound, except to laugh in all the right places at the others’ stories, and ask if I liked my food, or if I needed anything. It had been almost like sitting next to a very attentive butler. A very good-looking butler from England, who’d spent a good deal of his time worriedly watching his younger sister every time she flitted past with a tray or dish.
But when Chloe hadn’t dropped a single thing or otherwise embarrassed herself in any way, I’d noticed him relax a little. He’d even taken off his shoes beneath the table, and rubbed his feet in the sand. I don’t think he thought anyone would notice, but then, he probably didn’t think anyone was paying that much attention to him.
But I was. I couldn’t help it, much as I might have wished differently. Any more than I could help noticing that he had very sexy feet. God, what was wrong with me?
“I don’t understand any of this,” Kellyjean declared. “I think y’all are being very mean to poor Will, especially considering the fact that he’s invited us to his house and this festival and offered us those very generous stipends.”
I snorted. “Oh, please. If Will thinks he can make me forget what he did to me by paying me off with a ten-thousand-dollar stipend, you’re crazy.”
There was silence around the pool. The frogs suddenly sounded extremely loud, as did the splashing of the waterfall over by the Jacuzzi.
I realized then that I’d said something very, very wrong.
“Wait a minute.” Bernadette’s voice sounded unlike her usual flippantly casual tone. “You’re getting a ten-thousand-dollar stipend to be here?”
“Um.” I looked around at the stunned faces of my friends and fellow authors and felt my stomach lurch. Uh-oh. “Yes. Aren’t you?”
“Heck, no!” Saul suddenly sat straight up. If he’d ever been asleep at all, he was certainly awake now. “I’m only getting fifteen hundred!”
Frannie patted her husband on the knee. “Now, now, dear. Fifteen hundred dollars is nothing to sneeze at. And we’re getting a lovely, all-expense paid, first-class vacation out of it. And think how many books you’ll sell at your signing tomorrow and Sunday.”
“I’m only getting fifteen hundred, too.” Bernadette looked at Jerome. “You?”
He nodded. “Same. How about you, Kellyjean?”
Kellyjean was staring up at the stars again. “I don’t know. My agent arranges all of that. But I don’t think it’s anywhere close to ten thousand.” She looked back at us. “Why would Will Price pay Jo so much more than the rest of us? No offense, Jo, you know I love you. But I have a Netflix series, and you don’t.”
I shook my head, my throat suddenly dry. I had no idea why . . . and didn’t want to venture a theory, since every one I could think of sounded absurd.
“I know why.” A new, masculine voice rang out from the darkness. I gasped in alarm, thinking for a moment that Will Price had driven over from his mansion to join us for a nightcap and overheard everything we’d said.
But it was only Garrett who stepped from the shadows, wearing the complimentary robe the hotel had supplied over a pair of ridiculously bright yellow board shorts. Apparently he’d decided to take a break from rehearsing his magic trick to go for an evening dip in the pool.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Garrett sounded indignant. “He wanted to make sure she’d show up, of course.”
Kellyjean gasped as she whipped her head around, long blond hair flying, to look at me. “Of course! Jo isn’t in love with Will. Will is in love with her!”
“Oh, come on,” I said.
“Really, Kellyjean,” Frannie scolded. “Now you’re just being silly.”
“How is that silly?” Garrett dropped the towel he’d brought with him onto a nearby chaise lounge and then sank down onto it. “I’m not the romance writer here, but it’s a pretty good explanation, isn’t it?”
“Honestly, Garrett,” I said. “You’re wrong. Will’s made it pretty clear that he hates my guts as much as I hate his. And we’ve only met one time before this, and that was almost two years ago for approximately an hour, after which he dogged me to a reporter. Does that sound like the act of a man in love?”
“That doesn’t mean anything.” Saul shook his head. “I carried a torch for Frannie for years after meeting her only once, but she wouldn’t even consider going out with me because I told her I thought the Knicks stank. I had to swear allegiance to a basketball team I don’t like to get her to even consider a date.”
Frannie patted him on the hand. “And you’ve never regretted it, have you, dear?”
“Will probably only paid me such a huge stipend to make sure I showed up here so he could clear his conscious,” I insisted. “He told me he thought about apologizing before, but wanted to do it to my face.” I didn’t mention how Will had said he hadn’t been able to find the words. No one would have believed me.
“Well,” Jerome said. “That is one expensive apology.”
“If anyone deserves it, it’s Jo,” Bernadette said warmly. “I mean, Jo’s had terrible writer’s block ever since Will said all those nasty things about her books.”
I sent Bernadette a warning look. I appreciated the sympathy, but enough of my private business had been shared with the group.
It was too late, though.
“Oh, no!” Garrett exclaimed. “Is that why there hasn’t been a new Kitty Katz book this year, Jo?”
“Yeah, I was wondering the same thing.” Jerome looked concerned. “They’re Aesha’s favorite. She asks me when there’s going to be a new one all the time.”
I didn’t think things could get worse from there, but they did. Kellyjean scrambled to her feet and ran over to throw her arms around me.
“Oh, you poor thing.” Kellyjean hugged me. “I had no idea you were blocked. Do you want to use some of my essential oils? I have some sourced from the Rosa damascena plant that should open you up to inspiration and joy. Did you bring a diffuser?”
I was already enveloped in whatever essential oil or perfume Kellyjean habitually wore, and the scent was so strong, it was making my eyes water, not opening me up to joy. “Uh . . .”
“Never mind,” Kellyjean said. “You can borrow mine. Remind me when we get upstairs to bring it around to your room.”
“No, really, it’s okay—”
“I insist.” Mercifully, Kellyjean released me, but still held on to one of my hands, which she squeezed. “We’re artists, Jo. We have to help one another in our hours of need, not tear each other down.”
Great. Now I felt terrible for having asked them all for help snooping into Will’s personal life.
I felt even worse for letting slip how much more I was being paid to be at the book festival than they were. But how was I supposed to have known they weren’t receiving an equal (or greater) stipend? Male authors in the book industry often received higher advances and speaking fees than their female counterparts. It was odd that it was the opposite way around this time.
“So are we all reading that book of Price’s, the one that came in our swag bag?” Jerome asked out of the blue.
I kept my mouth shut. The real trick to being a writer, I’d learned long ago, was to keep quiet and observe.
“Saul is.” Frannie twinkled at her husband. “Saul loves it.”
Saul shrugged. “So sue me. The guy spins an entertaining yarn.”
“That female love interest, Melanie, remind you of anyone?” Jerome asked.
“Melanie?” Saul thought about it. “Not really. Is she supposed to?”
“I think she is.” Jerome looked at me. “You reading it, Jo?”
I shrugged uneasily. “I skimmed it a little.” I was such a liar. I was up to Chapter Ten and devouring every word.
“Melanie doesn’t remind you of anyone?” he asked. “Physically, I mean.”
“Not really. She’s such an idiot. The fact that she can’t figure out that Johnny killed her husband? That’s so unrealistic!”
“Oh, I don’t think Johnny did it,” Jerome said.
“Of course Johnny did it,” I said. “He says right in the book that he did it!”
“Johnny thinks he did it.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“I think Johnny’s going to turn out to be innocent. You wait and see.”
“Wait—did you skip to the end? Jerome! Spoiler alert!”
“And on that note,” Frannie said, rising to her feet, “Saul, I think you and I should go to bed.”
“You’re right.” He slipped an arm around his wife’s waist. “I have a big day tomorrow, a panel and a signing, plus that tour of historical Little Bridge, since you won’t let me go out on Will’s boat.”
“I’m always looking out for you, honey.” Frannie kissed him on the cheek. Those two were such relationship goals. It was so cute.
“Don’t forget the author bus leaves early tomorrow morning,” Bernadette reminded all of us. She’d gathered up her bag and climbed to her feet as well. “No stragglers.” Of course she looked directly at me as she said the last part.
“I’m looking forward to hearing all of you speak tomorrow,” Garrett said. He was getting up to leave for his room as well. I guess he’d decided against the midnight swim. “I think your panels will be highly informative.”
God, could he be a bigger suck-up?
Then I realized everyone was leaving.
“Wait.” I blinked at all of them as they filed past me. “That’s it? The night is over?”
“You and I have the first panel, Jo,” Bernadette warned me from the outdoor steps to her room. “Right after the welcome speech. You should go to bed. You know what you’re like if you don’t get enough sleep.”
I loved Bernadette, but sometimes she seemed to forget I wasn’t one of her kids. I waved at her. “Thanks! But I’ll be fine. I’ll meet you in the lobby by eight.”
“Sure you will.” Bernadette rolled her eyes as she pulled the key to her room from her bag.
“I will!”
Kellyjean squeezed my hand again while smiling at me kindly. “I’ll make sure you’re up by then if you want, Jo. I’m always up at dawn so I can watch the sunrise. And if you want I can bring my diffuser to your room now and show you how it works. I promise my oils will get you writing again.”
I smiled back at her, though the thought of having a diffuser in my room pumping out her strong-smelling oils was completely unappealing. “Thanks anyway, Kellyjean. But I’m afraid it’s a lost cause. I don’t think tincture of rose oil or whatever is going to make any—”
“Look!” Kellyjean gasped, and then her arm shot past my face as she pointed toward the night sky. “A meteor! Do you see it?”
I followed the direction of her index finger and was shocked to see not one, but two bright stars dive across the dark, velvety heavens and disappear amid the palm fronds above our heads.
“I saw two of them.” I gripped Kellyjean’s hand with excitement. “Two!”
“I saw three!” she cried. “Oh, Barnabas is going to be so thrilled when I tell him. Now, don’t forget to make a wish.”
“On a falling meteor?”
“Of course!”
I should have realized she meant it. Kellyjean believed mermaids—and fairies and werewolves—were real. Why wouldn’t she believe that a wish made on a falling star (also known as a meteor) would come true, as well?
“You do what you want,” she said. “But I’m wishing.” She closed her eyes, looking as if she was concentrating very hard, so I did the same. Why not? It wasn’t like my luck had been so great lately that I could afford not to. And it certainly couldn’t hurt.
Only, what to wish for? I didn’t believe in wishes any more than I believed in mermaids or magic, but for over a year, whenever I’d found an eyelash or saw the first evening star, I’d superstitiously wished for the same thing:
Something bad to happen to Will Price.
Not for him to die or anything. Wishes weren’t real, of course, but even if they were, I would never wish for anything like that to happen to someone.
But I wouldn’t mind seeing something just a little bit bad happen to Will Price. Like for him to get the kind of debilitating writer’s block that I had.
Or maybe for him to get into a Twitter war with a beloved social icon like Tom Hanks, so that everyone turned on him.
Or possibly for him to get stung by a jellyfish. Just something.
But now that he’d apologized—even if his apology had been very stiff and British and come out of nowhere and therefore not been very satisfying—I was surprised to find that I didn’t wish him that kind of ill anymore.
Obviously I didn’t like him, even if he did have a very cool sister who was on a dance team and loved my books.
But I didn’t wish him ill.
So I decided to wish for something else. Something positive instead of negative.
Was it possible that the essential oils Kellyjean wore had already rubbed off on me and were making me a better person?
When I opened my eyes, I found her staring at me expectantly.
“Well?” she asked. “What’d you wish for?”
“Kellyjean, you know I can’t tell you that. I don’t know much about wishing, but I do know that if you tell someone what you wished for, your wish won’t come true.”
“Oh, that’s nonsense. In my family, we always tell each other our wishes, and they still always come true. Here, I’ll tell you what I wished for: that while you’re here on Little Bridge Island, you’ll find whatever it is that you’re searching for.”
I was touched. Kellyjean could be a ditz sometimes, but she was a genuinely sweet person.
“Oh, Kellyjean,” I said, leaning over to give her a hug and this time finding the scent of her oils agreeable. “Thank you. That is so nice. But you didn’t have to waste your wish on me. And what makes you think I’m looking for something, anyway?”
“It’s never a waste to use a wish on another person,” she said, hugging me back. “And of course you’re looking for something. That’s what’s keeping you from writing your next little kitty cat book. And let’s be honest, Jo: you’re such a mess right now, you need wishes way more than I do.”
That sounded more like the Kellyjean I knew. “Thanks a lot,” I said with a wry laugh as I released her.
“You’re welcome, hon. So go ahead, tell me. Whadja wish for?”
But I shook my head. The wish I’d made was one I intended to keep all to myself . . . at least for now.
The Moment by Will Price
When Melanie raised her head to look at me, her eyes were shining as bright as the moon. I caught my breath, tightening my grip on her shoulders and drawing her close to me.
I don’t know how I found the nerve, but somehow, my mouth grazed hers, just once. Then, when she didn’t object, again.
A second later her arms slipped around my neck, and I found my hands cradling her head, my fingers tangled in the thickness of her hair. Our open mouths met.
Kissing her was easy. I kissed her lips, her cheeks, her throat, the soft hollows behind her earlobes. My hands explored the territory beneath the fitted green jacket and found that she wore something silky beneath it. Her fingers clung to the back of my neck, and the touch of her lips sent chills up and down the backs of my arms.
She kissed me like she meant it. I wasn’t used to that.
