by Giselle Fox
Keira’s burning brown eyes gazed up into hers. Her hand moved down between them, pressing in between Daisy’s legs. Keira soon found her pace and rhythm. Daisy pushed down onto her hand, pulling her deep into her body, letting her hips roll.
Another gust of wind shook the trees, splattering rain onto the cedar deck around them. The balcony door banged shut and open again. Keira’s eyes lit up as she looked into the trees above them. Daisy felt her climax descend from above, like lightning crackling through her body. When it landed in her core in a rush of heat, she arched back and cried out. Then, she fell forward, pressing her lips to Keira’s mouth.
As her body calmed, she felt ecstasy leave its indelible impression. She felt calm as she hadn’t in years, as though an old skin had been discarded. She felt vibrant and buzzing with energy and light. When she saw the warmth shining back in Keira’s eyes, she felt it sparkle all around her as the spring rain continued to fall.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Keira was asleep beside her, her hair messed and skin flushed from the warmth of the blankets. The wood stove was still throwing a little heat, but the balcony doors were open. Daylight had faded into early evening.
Their legs were interlocked, but Daisy managed to pull out without waking her. Naked, she crossed the room, stood in the open door to feel the cool air before quietly pushing them closed. She turned. Keira’s eyes were closed still. Her breath deep enough to indicate sleep. Daisy gathered her cardigan from the floor and slid it around her shoulders.
In the bathroom, she cupped her hand under the faucet and took a long cool drink. Then she combed her bedhead locks with her fingers. She regarded herself with a smile—naked but for the open blue sweater, with fresh love bites on her neck and belly. There were more on the insides of her thighs. Her knees were grazed from the carpet. She could feel patches on her elbows, too.
Sex. Just how she remembered it. She smiled at herself in the mirror. “And it was good, too.”
She cleaned herself with a fresh cloth and brushed her teeth with some toothpaste on her index finger. When she returned to the library, Keira was still asleep. Her arms were wrapped tight around a cushion; a corduroy pattern imprinted on an exposed stretch of her arm. Daisy thought of waking her but decided to let her sleep.
She walked to the desk and pulled the empty coffee cup from it. Curious, she replaced it softly and slid the mouse a little to wake it up. On the screen in front of her was the piano scene, almost as it had played out before they both had moved outside to the deck for their first round of fun. The writing was provocative and sexy. She read to the end and smiled in Keira’s direction again. When she looked back at the screen, she saw something in the left margin that made her stop.
Kay Ember untitled outline.
Daisy looked up from the monitor, hunched as she was in front of it. Keira stirred and then settled again. Heart racing, Daisy clicked the tab—the Kay Ember tab. The outline of a story about a flight attendant named Callie appeared on the screen. It was laid out in chapters, organized into three acts with several parts missing.
When the realization struck her, it seemed so obvious. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t figured it out before. K.D. Maitland, Kay Ember, the play on the initials K and M. The reason why Keira owned every Kay Ember book. The wealth, the traveling. It explained everything so much better than Keira’s vague story of being a financial analyst.
She clicked back to the piano scene and stepped away from the desk. The shock of her discovery had left her trembling. She walked to the long line of Kay Ember books and kneeled down in front of them. She read the titles on the spines, pulling them out just enough to read the backs. Midnight Son, set in Sweden. Venetian Doll, in Venice. Harbor nights, in Turkey. She went to the end and pulled out one of the last in line. Solitude Bay. “Hummingbird Cove is Solitude Bay.” There were no more stories after that. Keira’s life, and Kay Ember’s career, had somehow frozen in time.
She looked back along the titles, pulling some out and reading paragraphs. She imagined Keira in all those exotic places; learning to fly, to sail, wreck diving, being part of an archaeological dig, racing motorbikes, climbing, traveling endlessly. Everything she’d ever heard about Kay Ember suddenly seemed so… Keira.
There were sounds behind her. When she turned to look back, Keira was sitting with the blanket half-wrapped around her shoulders. Daisy tried to speak but stumbled. “I was curious and I…” she aimed her eyes in the direction of Keira’s desk. “I wanted to read what you wrote today. I shouldn’t have.” She looked back at her. “You’re Kay Ember.”
Keira’s gaze didn’t waver even when Daisy said the name. “I was.”
“Solitude Bay is here. It’s the cove.”
Keira nodded. “I was only supposed to be here for eight weeks, enough to get the first draft done. But…”
“You stayed.”
Keira nodded again. “No one except for my family, Jane, and a few of the people at my publishing house know who I am.”
It was a bigger secret than Daisy had ever been told. “Does Sydney know?”
A few seconds passed before Keira shook her head. “No. I didn’t trust her or the Brocks. It’s awful to say, but… I turned out to be right.” Her eyes were sad. “Maybe it doesn’t matter anymore. I haven’t published a book since Noah was born.”
That didn’t seem that long to Daisy. “Maybe you could again.”
Keira tried to smile. “Who knows?” She rose, gathering the blanket around her naked body before stepping out of the pit. “You’re shivering.”
It was true. Daisy’s cardigan wasn’t enough to keep chills from wracking her body. Keira kneeled down beside her and surrounded her in the plush blanket. Daisy turned and looked into her eyes. “It never made sense that you were a financial consultant.”
Keira chuckled. “No, but I used to be. Did it for few years before I realized I’d made a terrible mistake. Started writing as therapy, really. Jane read some of it, and told me to keep going.”
“Is that when you wrote your first book?”
“Yes. Jane pitched it to a small publisher, they took it on. Writing became an obsession. The more I wrote, the more I wanted to write. Eventually, I realized I wouldn’t be able to keep living that other life. So I quit my job.”
Daisy nodded. “Was it hard?”
Keira smiled. “No. It was the easiest thing I’ve ever done.”
“How did you become Kay Ember?”
Keira smiled. “In the beginning, I sold most of what I owned. Took my savings and downsized. I rented a cheap apartment and locked myself away over the winter. I wrote another book and then another one after that. They were both published, but…” Keira shrugged. “When the publisher folded, the people I knew from my old life were all, ‘well, you gave it a shot. Now come back to the real world.’ Their faces were a mix of sympathy and satisfaction, and it really, really bothered me. So, I said no. No way. I was going to make it work, no matter what. I moved into an even worse apartment. My parents visited once and never came back. They tried to talk me out of it. So did my sister. So did everyone. Everyone except Jane.”
Daisy smiled. “That’s a true friend.”
“She was working with other publishers by then. She’d knew of an author that was looking for a ghostwriter and suggested I give it a try to get some income coming in. So I read one of this person’s bestsellers and sat down to write a few chapters to give her as a trial. We thought up the name Kay Ember as a play on Keira Maitland. I wrote half the story; two hundred pages, with the rest all mapped out. It just flowed out of me. Jane went off with it. I didn’t ask her about it, I just assumed that after I heard nothing for a few weeks, it wasn’t happening. By that time, I was working on something else—another romance. Then Jane came back and told me she’d sold the book and that the publisher wanted more as soon as possible. That’s when Kay Ember became a real thing.”
“Why did you keep so secret?”
“They weren’t su
re I was the one they wanted to front the project. I was an untested author; an out lesbian with a three book history of flops, trying to step into the straight romance world. If I didn’t end up working out, they planned to hire another writer. So we kept my identity a secret. Jane was the one with the idea to double down and build the mystery into the Kay Ember brand, and that’s how it went. After the third book hit the bestseller list and they made it into a movie-” Keira shook her head. “It all just took off from there.”
“What does your family think now?”
“It’s hard for my mother, especially since her friends still sometimes mention those first books I wrote that never went anywhere and how much of a shame that was, but thank goodness I had a real career to fall back on.” She laughed.
“Meanwhile, you’re Kay Ember. They probably read your books.”
Keira smiled. “It’s so strange, you know. People love stories about people that follow their dreams, about grit and perseverance, but when you actually try to do something different, everyone around you tells you you’re crazy and that you should stick to what you know. There’s this big panic that the sky is going to fall down. Especially when you tell people you want to write.”
“Good thing you didn’t listen to all their good advice.”
“No. The only person I listened to was Jane.”
“You two seem so different.”
“We are, and we aren’t. We’re family, you know? We’ve known each other forever.”
“So, you love women but you write straight romance. How is that?”
Keira laughed. “I just focus on my leading lady, try to pair her with a man that will lift her up. It’s always about her.”
“I think I would like that.”
“Have you ever read a Kay Ember book?”
“Actually, I haven’t,” Daisy said curling her fingers through Keira’s hair. “I have a question about a scene I just read.” She looked into Keira’s eyes. “Did your leading lady in Blaze after Fire seduce you or was it the other way around?”
“I…” Keira smiled, “may have started it.”
Daisy smiled too. “Are all your heroines real women?”
Keira smiled. “Some of them.”
Daisy reached back and slid her finger along the spines of the books again. She stopped at Midnight Son and turned back, letting her raised eyebrow ask the question. She smiled when Keira nodded. “How about this?” She let her finger trail across to Venetian Doll. Keira nodded again.
“Kiss and Telluride?” Daisy said and then laughed at the title.
“I wanted to call it Landslide, but the focus group said no.”
“Was she real?”
“She worked in the museum. We were just friends.”
“Have you ever sailed around the world?”
“No, but I sailed the Caribbean.”
“Was the captain a woman?”
“She was and so was the first mate. They were a couple.”
“Lesbian sailors?”
Keira nodded and pulled Daisy up onto her lap.
Daisy leaned forward and kissed her, letting her tongue play over the cleft of Keira’s chin before slurping her pouty bottom lip between her teeth. She rolled her hips against Keira’s naked body. Keira moved with her.
“Did you sleep with them?”
Keira laughed. “Now there’s a good way to get kicked off a crew.”
“So that’s a no?”
“A big no.”
“Are you going to write a story about me?” Daisy whispered.
“I don’t know. Should I?”
Daisy shrugged. “You have one pretty hot scene already.”
“I’m a bit rusty. I know I can do better,” Keira breathed as she zeroed in on Daisy’s mouth. Her hands slid under her bottom, lifting her higher. She slid her fingers between Daisy’s legs. “Show me who you are, Daisy Morgan.”
Daisy’s body recoiled at hearing her married name spoken while Keira’s fingers were moving inside her. No, she wanted to cry, I’m a Hunter. She took a deep breath. “I’m a developer that came to buy up Solitude Bay, but I ended up falling for the incredible woman that lived there.”
Had she laughed, or even smiled after saying it, Keira might have thought her confession was just a part of the story. But Daisy didn’t laugh. Instead, she curled her arms around Keira’s neck and held on because she knew that in a moment it would all end. And she was right.
Keira stopped making love to her. Stopped moving. Stopped breathing, stopped infatuating, stopped radiating trust, pleasure, and desire. She began to pull back. Daisy lifted her head from her shoulder and looked into her eyes. “I’m so sorry. I’ve wanted to tell you…”
“I can’t believe it.” Keira’s face tightened, her brow furrowed, her smile became a thin line of mistrust. “You lied to me?” Then it registered, perhaps jogged by the memory of the town meeting where Daisy had asked all the right questions and known exactly what to say.
Keira pushed her off her lap and shot up. She plucked her clothes off the floor, shoving her legs into her jeans and her arms through her sweater. She gave Daisy one last hurt look before disappearing through the library doors.
Daisy sat there. Stunned, shocked, embarrassed, and ashamed. When she heard the engine of Keira’s boat start up outside and then speed away, she knew, once again, that she was terribly and utterly alone.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
She sat on the edge of the dock, looking out into inky nothingness. A west wind was blowing in through the mouth of the cove, chilling her body through her jacket. She pulled her hood tight around her face and shivered. Keira had been gone for more than an hour; where? Daisy had no idea. Freezing to death on the dock seemed a fitting punishment for a person as low as she felt. But she knew once Keira came home, she was the last person she would want to see. So she rose from her icy perch and walked back up to the house.
Her things were still scattered on the floor as though she’d dropped them and ran. She picked up her phone and noticed she’d missed her brother’s call. She dialed him back, hoping his voice would provide a lifeline back to the real world.
“Hallooo,” he answered in his usual cheery tone.
“Hi,” she said.
“Are you on your way back?”
“No. Still here.”
“Oh. I thought you’d be gone by now. I talked to Kirby a while ago. He said he was going to check up on you.”
“Haven’t seen him,” Daisy replied.
“You sound off. What’s up?”
“Everything,” she said, before taking a seat on the piano bench. But that just made her feel terrible again, so she stood. “I have a problem.”
“Go on.”
“I slept with Keira Maitland.”
“Wow. That’s aggressive, even for you.”
“I like her. I actually really like her.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“I told her who I was and now… I think she hates me.”
“Oooo. Yeah, I can see the problem now.”
“I don’t know what to do. She left. I’m here at her place, alone. It’s dark. I don’t know where she is or if she’s safe. I’m worried. I feel like a total shit. I have to make this right.”
“Well, Kirby did say he was on his way over there when I talked to him. Maybe you should just pack up and leave. Let her cool off a bit.”
“But I don’t want to leave.”
“Daze, what else can you do? Give her time. Try back in a few days. Or not.”
“It’ll be the same in a few days unless I do something.” She heard the sound of a boat engine in the distance. “Someone’s here. I have to go.”
“Call me.”
“I will.” She hung up and went to the window. She could tell from the lights on the bow that it wasn’t Keira. Kirby was pulling into the cove. She grabbed her coat and ran out to meet him.
“Thought you were gone. The lights were off,” he called.
“No
, I’ve been at Keira’s. Have you seen her?”
Kirby made a face. “No. Why?”
“She left before dark. I thought she maybe went into town.”
Kirby regarded her with suspicion. “If she did, I didn’t see her.”
That didn’t leave many more possibilities. “Where could she be?”
“Don’t know but... she knows these waters. Got a good boat—better than mine, that’s for sure. I wouldn’t worry about her.”
Daisy sighed. “Okay.”
“I talked to your brother. Looks like bad news.”
“I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”
He pulled off his ball cap and scratched his head. He looked up at the dark cabin. “Don’t know what I’m going to do with the place now. Got no money to fix it up and nothin’ to tear it down. Maybe I’m crazy but… I look at it and I see potential. I know it needs work, but it’s there.”
“Maybe your brother could help.”
“Nah, he’s working to keep his family. He’s got nothing extra. He isn’t here, anyway. Can’t do it all on my own.” He eyed Daisy. “I fucked up. I should’ve taken Keira up on the easement. Could’ve built a road out. Instead, I’m landlocked.”
Daisy hadn’t heard anything about the offer of an easement. “Why didn’t you do it?”
“I don’t know, maybe ‘cause she took off with Sydney?” He shook his head. “I tried my best.”
Daisy knew better than that. “By asking Sydney to shack up with you after your brother walked out on her? That was your best?”
Kirby’s eyes flashed back at her, but behind them wasn’t anger, it was pain. “You don’t understand. I loved her.”
Daisy could see he was telling the truth.
“She loves Colton...” he said, his voice cracking. “I have to accept that.”