Open for a glow-up.
(she's a beauty!)
Happy Friday, you handsome devils. ❤️ First off - I dropped a link in my last newsletter for a Donor’s Choose classroom that was close-ish to meeting it’s goal and you all fully funded it. Mrs. McGirth-Singleton’s reading students are going to walk the Ravenel bridge. Thank you!! 🥹 During the harder days right now, remembering we have the ability to help each other out is what gets me through.
Second — your boy got a logo/branding glow-up!! I last had my author logo/branding/colors done in 2018 which, quite frankly, feels like 110 years ago at this point, at least emotionally. I reached out to Ada at Be the Archetype because I adored her style and asked for a big refresh (specifically I said: I’m cooler and gayer now, please help 😛). For inspiration, I sent her a bunch of retro, 70s-inspired designs and color schemes and she delivered.
Voila!
Plus she sent me an entire color scheme, graphics and cute monograms:
Boy HOWDY did she nail it!! I’m slowly dropping this logo and these colors across my various digital footprints (I even updated my website) so if you see that cute disco ball 9,000 times you’ll know why. 😉
In writing news, I should be ready to announce the official release date for my filthy MMF baseball novella next week! (it’s completely re-written from the 2018 version). Cash (L), Darcy (middle) and Sawyer (R) have kept me good company this week and I’m just over halfway done (and sending it to my editor on the 23rd).
I had a burst of inspiration just before writing this newsletter where I scrawled down “does Sawyer come HANDS-FREE???????” so I’d say things are going super well. 😌
I sent chapter two of Two Rakes Make a Right out to my paying subscribers yesterday (aptly titled: “Give Us a Command, My Lady). Here’s a sneak preview:
Lockhart paused, using the tip of his thumb to tip Fitz’s face back down to his. “Looks like we have a sweet little spy.”
I froze in place, embarrassed to have been caught like this. Watching without their knowledge, practically leering.
“Not to worry, Lady Evelina,” Lockhart continued. “Fitz loves an audience, something you’ll soon learn to love about him like I do.” Then he crooked his finger with an authoritative air. “Come. And lock the door behind you.”
I obeyed, following some instinct I didn’t even have a name for. Lockhart released Fitz, who rubbed his wrists and raked a hand through his tousled hair.
“And you’ll come to learn that Lockhart Rosethorn, the Earl of Pembroke, is quite bossy,” Fitz said with a grin. “Whether I love that about him or not depends on my mood.”
And finally — I woke up thinking about Cope and Serena from OUT OF THE BLUE (this isn’t unusual for me) and thought I’d share one of my favorite under-rated scenes. Keep reading if you like second-chance angst, surfing romances and bodyguards!!!
My ex-husband leaned against a tree with his arms crossed, jaunty and fresh even at this early hour. “At Banks Security we believe in keeping our clients on their toes. It’s even in the bodyguard handbook. Oh, and good morning to you too, Ms. Swift.”
Scowling, I perched on the step and tugged on my running shoes, tightening the laces. “So did you send Falco home, or did you sleep out by this tree like a weirdo?”
His eyebrow arched. “Sent him home, of course. You woke up at this time every single day when we were together to either train or surf. And since you’re a royal pain in my ass, I had to get here early to foil your plans to give me the slip.”
Laces tied, I jogged down the steps and bounced lightly on my feet. Warming up, stretching my muscles. I needed to be strong for tomorrow, loose and flexible, focused and prepared.
I did not need Cope in his running clothes, showing off his giant biceps or his rough, gravelly, just-woke-up voice either.
“Do you talk to all of your clients like that, Mr. McDaniels?” I asked, tapping my chin. “I can’t imagine they enjoy being called a pain in the ass.”
“Nope,” he said cheerfully. “I only talk like that to the ones I’m married to.”
I spun on my heels and broke into a run. “We’re not married,” I yelled over my shoulder.
“Tell that to the state of California,” he yelled back, but he caught up to me quickly. I didn’t have to tell him where we were going. Because the little blue beach house that I lived in had been our house. And the route I was running was the same one we ran together on the mornings I didn’t surf.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “This kind of charming interaction is really convincing me to respect that client-bodyguard relationship.”
He tsked behind me, slowly moving up until we were shoulder to shoulder on the sidewalk. “Try as hard as you’d like, but you’ll recall just how determined and dedicated I am. At everything.”
My feet faltered for a second, but I pushed past it. “I don’t recall, actually.”
I heard the soft growl of frustration in his chest and the steady sound of his breath.
“You stayed in the house, I guess?”
I trained my eyes straight ahead. “I was traveling a lot, still am. It’s been easier to stay, to not have to pack up everything and move. You know I always really—”
I stopped, surprised at the admission. But Cope said, “You always loved that house.”
It was bright and sunny and close to the beach. And it had been filled to the brim with our love once. Given that love was absent from my house growing up, it felt impossible to leave.
“I do love it,” was all I could say. Our feet pounded against the pavement in perfect sync.
“I heard about your win at Jaws. Congratulations.”
I shook my head, panting slightly. “You don’t mean that.”
“You don’t know what I mean, actually.”
I picked up the pace out of sheer irritation. “So… how have the past four years been?”
“Spectacular.”
“Yeah?”
“Oh, yeah,” he said. “Four best years of my life probably.”
“Well, good for you,” I said. “Since you asked me like a hundred times yesterday if I had a boyfriend—”
“Oh, bullshit. I was doing my job—”
“—do you have someone? A girlfriend or anything?”
“Of course not,” he said. He turned, saw the amusement on my face. “Obviously, I receive a lot of attention and requests from, like, literally hundreds of women wanting to take me out on a date every day.”
Our shoulders brushed together, and we both bounced away instantly.
“Hundreds, huh?” I said. “Your inbox must be agony.”
He waved his hand over his face and chest. “This body is basically a liability.”
I felt the very beginnings of a traitorous smile, so I picked up the pace again until I noticed a distracting burn in my calves. “I’m so sorry for you,” I managed.
“Heavy is the head that wears the… super hot face and stuff,” he replied.
I smiled—goddammit—but covered it by wiping my arm across my mouth. “Are you going to tell me why you’re on thin ice at your job?”
I heard his grunt of annoyance. I snuck a sideways glance and caught the clench of his jaw. “My boss, Marilyn, who I genuinely respect and appreciate, is pretty pissed at me right now. Clients complaining about my…” He paused, breathing heavily. “Attitude. Lack of focus. Apparently, I’m not taking things seriously, and I often come off as chatty and overly familiar.”
“Wait, you?” I said with as much sarcasm as I could muster.
“Not everyone appreciates my unique work style or sense of humor,” he replied.
“You referred to me as a royal pain in your ass not one minute into being my bodyguard,” I said.
The corners of his mouth twitched. “I’d like to think the other agents are jealous that I’m so funny.”
I shook my head, not buying it. Cope’s lightness and silly jokes had been one of the things I used to love about him. But he also used it as a shield when things got too intense. And in the months after the incident, when I begged him to open up to me, to acknowledge how scared I’d been, he used that lightness to shut down. To shut me out.
Sometimes I worried he used it to avoid his grief.
“What?” he pressed. “You don’t believe me?”
“What exactly were you not taking seriously?” I asked. I could feel the threads of our past arguments drifting into this conversation and didn’t like it. But there was no escaping my morbid curiosity.
Cope went quiet. We reached the outside of Dora’s gym and slowed to a stop together. I propped my hands on top of my head as I breathed heavily. He leaned against the wall, one hand up, and stretched his right quad.
“There was a kidnapping attempt on my last client,” he finally said. “I messed up, wasn’t paying attention. Got myself in a sticky situation, as it were.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Define sticky.”
He shrugged, ran a hand through his hair. “I miscalculated the number of attackers. Ended up on my knees, restraining a guy, when a third guy stepped out.” He shrugged again. “He held a gun to my head.”
I gripped my hips, focusing on my breathing to keep from being pulled under by bad memories. “Someone got the jump on you?” I asked.
“I had him on his ass, gun in my hand, thirty seconds later,” he said. “It was fine. I was fine. Most importantly, the client was fine. Arnold Sheffield will live to swindle people out of their money for another day. It’s not that big of a deal. And no one got the jump on me, thanks.”
I marched right up to him, angry. “You, Cope McDaniels, were reckless on purpose.”
His answering grin was all charm. “I was never in any real danger.”
“If I’d done what you did when we were together, you’d be giving me a lecture right now.”
The grin vanished. “If? Serena, you put yourself in danger every goddamn day.”
I blew an irritated breath out of my nose. “You had a gun to your head. I happen to think that men with guns are scarier than Mother Nature.”
He pointed at the ocean to our left. “You’re surfing thirty-foot waves tomorrow, and you tried to escape from a bodyguard being paid to protect you right now.”
I glared down at the ground, tapping my foot. “Four years later, and we’re still going ’round and ’round.”
He crossed his arms. “For the record, you picked the fight right now. I’m just the bodyguard, remember?”
“Really? Because earlier you were so sure you were my husband.”
His gaze filled with anger and lust. “And you’ve made it perfectly clear that I’m not.”
“Good.”
“Great.”
“And I don’t need your protection, by the way,” I said.
A shaggy-haired guy with a strip of sunscreen down his nose suddenly walked right between the two of us, carrying his board over his head. Cope and I maintained pissed-off eye contact the whole time, both refusing to back down. But when the surfer turned, the heavy end of the board swung hard right at my face.
Before I could even blink, Cope reacted. He reached out and caught it a mere inch from hitting me square in the forehead.
“Oh, bro, sorry about that,” the guy said in his SoCal drawl.
Cope still held the end of his board, which had the veins in his forearms standing out. “Hate to break it to you, bro, but the board goes in the water not onto people’s faces.” His voice was mild, but his grip was still strong.
“Right on, right on,” the guy said. He struggled to break Cope’s firm hold, and when he did, he laughed nervously while Cope watched. “Thanks for the pro tip.” As if finally realizing I was standing there, the guy gave my body a comically long perusal. When his eyes reached my face, he bobbed his head. “What’s up, beautiful? You doin’ anything later?”
“Competing as one of the most elite surfers in the entire world,” I said.
“Damn, that’s hot.” He laughed, took a step closer, but I wasn’t in the least bit concerned.
Cope had his palm on the guy’s chest a nanosecond later. “Watch it,” he snapped. “I only had a few fucks to give this morning, and unfortunately for you I’m now bordering on zero.”
The guy gulped, audibly, before walking away backwards. “Okay, geez. See ya later or whatever.”
The moment he was gone, Cope and I exchanged a much too intimate look. I stepped back, shaking my head. “I need to get to my workout. Are you coming with me or not?”
His grin reappeared. “Of course. Three feet behind as the handbook says. Oh, and you’re welcome for protecting you from getting your face smashed in.”
Rolling my eyes, I flounced toward the door before I could get sucked into his frustrating orbit. “I could have handled that myself,” I yelled, sounding pissy.
“I’m so glad we’re going on this journey together!” Cope yelled back.
