Excerpt
You Are Fatally Invited
Chapter OneRodrigoI was prepared to sell my soul for a one-way ticket back to Spain, and I’d only been off the plane for three hours.
“Ro?” Olivia’s cold fingers wound through mine, and I tore my gaze from the vein of dark cloud over the harbor. “What is it?”
I extracted my face from my scarf and grazed my mouth against hers. “Nada, mi vida.”
I glanced down the dock, the graying planks warped with age. The stalks of a dozen derelict sailboats poked at the Maine sky like toothpicks, the small ferry bobbing next to us pristine by contrast. The sun was a shameless lie, having burned off most of the fog, but I still couldn’t see Wolf Harbor Island over the horizon.
Olivia attempted to unsequester my hand from my jacket pocket, her cheeks wind whipped. “You’re still on edge.”
“My face is freezing.”
“That’s the only part of you I can see.”
“Which is why my face is freezing.”
A divot appeared between her eyebrows that I wanted to smooth away with my thumb. “Look, I know you’re—”
“A suspicious bastard?”
“Beautifully put, love, but I was going to say ‘nervous.’ Trust me, Alastor does not have some devious scheme to land us in a courtroom and ruin our lives.” She flared her eyes comically, and I felt the corner of my mouth lift against my will. “The NDA has to be just a formality. How else is an anonymous author supposed to make sure we won’t let his identity slip?”
My leather necklace constricted around my neck. If only the NDA was what I was worried about.
“I’m sure you’re right,” I lied, sliding my arm around her shoulders. But a decade in courtrooms had instructed me that anyone was capable of anything—including celebrities, including authors. Including myself. What on earth had possessed me to think coming was a good idea?
“Fashionably early, are we?” The pitiless wind carried Fletcher’s words to us, his British accent threading through them from down the dock, and the tension in my neck eased a little. His herringbone suit hugged his broad shoulders, and his hair was combed and gelled within an inch of its life. Just the way he’d looked the last time we’d gone out for drinks. Had it really been a year ago? “Hello, lovebirds.”
Dread soured my relief at finally seeing my friend, who my wife was convinced was not my friend. But finalmente, we might get some answers about the secretive nature of this retreat.
I raised my arms affably. “Fletch.”
“Been a long time, hasn’t it?” We embraced, Fletcher’s hand clapping my shoulder. He dipped his head to my wife. “Olivia, darling, lovely as always.”
“Fletcher.” Olivia knotted her pale mane around one hand to keep it tamed, her smile not reaching her eyes.
Fletcher’s teeth flashed in a grin. “What a week this’ll be, eh?”
“Did Alastor tell you anything?” I asked. “Particularly concerning the NDA? It’s a little odd for a writers’ retreat, no?”
His expression turned sly. “Unfortunately, my lips are sealed.”
A growl curled in my throat. “Yes, we know you know more than we do. Can we skip to the part where you’re helpful?”
“I don’t think it’s odd,” Olivia said to me, amicably rehashing the last five months of speculation. “I mean, this is a huge deal—Alastor’s first in-person event in his entire career of nearly thirty years. It totally makes sense for keeping his identity a secret. Which honestly makes me think the rumors are true, and it’s not J. R. Alastor the original, but his son who’s taken over writing in his name.”
“Olivia.” I dragged her name out with my thickest Spanish accent, shaking my head with a smile. “That was one interview ages ago where Alastor mentioned having a child—”
“Or the NDA could also be because we’re going to get a sneak peek of his next book,” Olivia said, eyes glittering like the harbor. “Perhaps Alastor wants to work on it with us.”
Fletcher snorted. “How the devil would you plebeians workshop a J. R. Alastor book? Only Ashton Carter’d be dumb enough to try, and we’d all be given the boot for letting him.”
“I heard that,” a voice called up the dock, and I flinched, turning toward it. A man in his late twenties or early thirties strode toward us, hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, a laptop bag slung over his shoulder—Ashton Carter, a Chinese American author whose paranormal thriller appeared in every one of Olivia’s book box subscriptions; we must have had three or four copies of his book.
“Speak of the devil,” Fletcher said, raising his voice with a wry smile. “Carter, you fool, this is a retreat for writers. How on earth did you procure an invitation?”
“Charming as always, Fletch.” Carter stuck out a hand to me with a grin. “Ashton Carter, writer, surprisingly.”
“A pleasure. Rodrigo Sandoval.”
“Carter here bribed himself onto an author panel with me last spring,” Fletcher announced cheerfully.
“Hey now,” Carter objected. “I was not the one the moderator asked to chill out.”
“Now that’s a story I’d love to hear,” Olivia said, mouth curving as she held her hand out. “Olivia. I’m afraid I haven’t read your book yet, but it’ll be my reward when Ro and I finish this draft.”
Between the two of us we’d tried to get through everyone’s books before the retreat, but I’d rather endure the seventh edition of The Literary Lawyer’s Handbook on Copyrights, Trademarks, and Contracts in Publishing and Entertainment again than another thirty pages of Ashton’s. Something about the paranormal and haunted lost me every time.
“I’d be honored,” Carter said, dipping his head.
“All right, let’s see it.” Fletcher flapped a hand at Carter. “Your invitation? I’ll believe you were invited only when I see your name at the top, not a moment before.”
Carter rolled his eyes but popped open his bag and rummaged inside. “I was actually thinking we could all compare, see if we got the same invite, or if Alastor hid, like, a clue or something in one of them.”
“Oh, a clue,” Fletcher said with false revelation. “What are you, a child?” He plucked a severely folded envelope from Carter’s fingers, the paper a familiar matte black with a gold wax seal shaped like a skull. His nose curdled as he read the gold cursive words aloud. “ ‘Dear Mr. Carter.’ Rodrigo, Olivia, I do believe we are witnessing an anomaly. Either that, or a lapse in J.R.’s cognitive function.”
Olivia had already taken out our invitation—preserved like a piece of evidence within a small manila folder, the envelope neatly slit with the letter opener she’d given me for my birthday last year—and she held it up next to Carter’s, her eyes flicking to mine with a glint of excitement that, yes, I mirrored.
Dear Mr. Carter,
It would do me a great honor to have you join me at Wolf Harbor Estate in Maine for a themed writers’ retreat during the last week of October.
I make it my business to be “in the know” about what thriller/horror is doing these days, and IT SWALLOWS US WHOLE rightfully snagged my eye. I think you have something unique here, something visceral, and I’m on the proverbial edge of my seat for your next book. Dare I say, it’s one of my most anticipated reads.
My hope is that this little retreat will provide an opportunity for you to write, engage with other rising and established stars in your field, and provoke the Muse into speaking with you through nightly mystery dinners. You’ll have a killer time, I assure you.
Please RSVP to the number below. My personal assistant, Mila, will see to the details, including sending over an NDA for your review—for my anonymity’s sake, you understand.
Would you join me? I hope you will.
Yours fatally,
J. R. Alastor
“It’s basically the same,” Olivia murmured. “Except our names, and what he said about our books.”
“Still doesn’t really explain much, though.” I watched a wave break over the dock onto our feet, salty water beading on my leather shoes. “Why would Alastor engage with the world now, after thirty years of obscurity?”
