For the first few pages, she struggled. She found herself rereading what she had just read. It wasn’t because the writing was bad—it wasn’t—or that it didn’t read like Elijah’s—it did; it was because she couldn’t stop thinking this was Elijah’s last book, making it hard to concentrate.
She blamed Jason for giving her this push.
Eventually, however, the characters dragged her in. She turned the pages, her wine forgotten. It was a good book, a really good one. And it was so Elijah; she kept turning the pages to find that one moment making it his. Before she knew it, she’d turned the last page.
And then she turned the whole manuscript over, as though his words would be on the back, leaping out, marking this as his work; the ones by which she would know him. But they weren’t there. Flipping it back to the front, she stared at the cover, feeling betrayed.
He was there,right there—close enough to touch her with his words, but there was a piece missing, preventing him bridging the gap. Bending over the manuscript, she asked forlornly, “Where are you, baby? I needed you, and you didn’t show up.”
From within, she heard her cell phone. Setting aside the pages, she walked inside to answer it. Darlene was calling about the schedules. She was distracted and seemed to miss the struggle in Cassidy’s voice. Cassidy closed her eyes, agreeing to whatever would get her off the phone.
By the time Darlene had the schedule straightened out, darkness had fallen. Fred still hadn’t come inside, the manuscript and throw were on the lawn sofa, and her wine was on the side table. Running a hand down her face, overcome with weariness, she decided to let the items go. The only thing she needed inside was Fred.
Walking to the sliding door, she leaned against it as she whistled. “Fred, now!” She cocked her head to listen for the patter of his feet; she didn’t hear them. Frowning, she called again, “Fred!”
Just as she reached over to flip on the outside lights that would illuminate the backyard down to the dock, Fred came loping up toward the porch. “Take your time about it, mister. I’m glad to see you’re in no hurry. I’m so happy I wasn’t in here being murdered.” Her tone of voice belied her words.
He gave her a lazy smile as he meandered past her into the house.
“You used to be such a well-behaved boy,” she said in humorous wistfulness. She slid the glass doors shut and flipped the lock. She scanned the darkness beyond before turning away from the glass.
The next morning when Cassidy went out to retrieve her wine glass and the manuscript, the wine glass was knocked over and on the ground. The manuscript was gone. She did a complete circle turn looking for it, perplexed. She scavenged underneath the throw, the settee, and walked a few feet away; it couldn’t have disappeared!
There were raccoon tracks in the wine and stained across the small side table. She had no idea what the creatures wanted with paper, but apparently, the little beasts had stolen her manuscript. She ran a finger over her lips, still looking around as though she would find a trace of it, wondering how she would explain this to the publisher. They weren’t expecting it back, but this had to be a first.
She cast her gaze farther, but no luck.
Fred came loping up to her, sniffed the spilled wine, and then looked up at her, disinterested.
Looking back at him, she raised an eyebrow. “You better hope this happened after you came inside.”
He wasn’t impressed with her implied threat, wagging his tail.
Glancing around again, she started to head inside when she heard a familiar motorboat on the water. She lifted her hand to her brow and watched as Marge approached the dock in her gray aluminum fishing boat. A pang of remorse washed over her. After she’d made her mad escape from the Trading Post the other day, she hadn’t called to explain. Marge wanted to check in.
Cassidy started to make her way down to the dock when she noticed Marge’s attention was focused on Mac’s cabin. The woman straightened for a minute in her boat, sent a decidedly unhappy look, and then continued tying up to the dock. Cassidy paused. She couldn’t see beyond the trees to Mac’s cabin from where she was standing, but she could tell he was there. She waited on her lawn.
Marge hauled a sizeable reusable bag out of the boat with her and headed up the dock, sending ornery looks toward the cabin until the tree line cut off her vision. Then, she turned her attention to Cassidy. As she neared, she called up, “Hey, sweet girl.”
Cassidy met her halfway, reaching for the bag. “Hi, Marge, let me help you. What is this?”
“You were after milk.”
Cassidy ducked her head. “I’m sorry. I just—”
“I also have croissants and eggs and some biscuits for the dog.”
“Oh. Thank you, you didn’t need to.” They headed toward the house. “I appreciate it. I do need to explain what happened.”
Marge harrumphed. “All that boy said was you’d had a misunderstanding. I knew there was more to it. A woman doesn’t go running away like you did over a misunderstanding.”
Cassidy set the bag on her kitchen counter along with last night’s wine glass.
Marge’s weathered face puckered in a fierce scowl. “Did that boy touch you?”
Cassidy stared, wide-eyed. Marge looked ready to run next door and castrate him. She held up a hand. “No need to defend my virtue, Marge; that ship has sailed.”
Her face turned a furious red. “You mean he—?”