So, a while ago (last week, or so) I ran a preorder contest, and one of the winners requested that I give her a little follow up to Love Letters. I finally complied, and she said I could share it, so! Story snippet for you!
***
A heavy, hardback
copy of Codes, Ciphers and Secrets: The
Spycraft of the American Revolution lay on the bedside table, almost but
not quite knocked off of it during its author’s rather energetic celebration of
the news that the book had hit number one on the New York Times bestseller’s
list. The bed wasn’t shaking any more, and the lights were out, but the silence
was still punctuated with soft conversation and the murmur of bodies shifting
under blankets, moving against each other with gentle acceptance that they
belonged close enough to touch.
“Seriously, congratulations,” Ryan said again, pressing his
lips to the side of Ben’s neck. Ben tilted his chin up a bit, and his lover
slotted his head into the proffered space with ease.
Ben wanted to shrug, but he couldn’t with Ryan lying on top
of him. “I think it was more a matter of timing than anything else.” The
History Channel had just run a miniseries on the same topic, and they’d invited
Ben to be interviewed for it. He was, Ryan and Heather had assured him,
ridiculously hot during his five minutes of fame. Mostly Ben had felt awkward,
but—hey, whatever worked.
“That helped, sure, but the book is great. You make the
subject fun.”
“Spies are always fun.”
“Not unless they look like Tom Cruise.” Ryan laughed suddenly.
“You know Linda is trying to pitch your book as a potential movie, right? What
if he got the lead role?”
“Linda is crazy.” Ben loved her, but she was crazy. “There’s
no single main character in the book, if you don’t count George Washington. It’s
a history, not a thriller—there’s no way to cast anyone because there’s no leading
role for any one person to play.”
“I know, I know, but…”
Ryan’s voice was weirdly tentative, which Ben hated to hear.
“But what?”
“But maybe…you should consider turning it into a novel. Or a
part of it, at least. What about the Culper Ring? Or Lydia Darragh?”
“Lydia Darragh’s story isn’t well substantiated,” Ben said
automatically, but his mind was already turning the idea over. The truth was,
it was a thought Ben had had before, to take some of his extensive research and
turn it into something more approachable, more focused on human relationships.
He’d actually written a few chapters of a story about Avery Toth and Charles
Lancaster, but the idea of writing a romance that was destined to end in
tragedy had made him put it aside. It was just too sad. He might be able to handle
things like that when they were from real life, but more and more Ben found
that if he was reading for pleasure, he wanted a happy ending.
“Not her, then, but someone like her. Or you could make up a
new character altogether, a spy and patriot working for Washington against the
British and having all sorts of daring adventures and narrow escapes.” Ryan
picked up speed as he got into the idea. “There are so many ways you could go
with this, and think of the supporting cast! And the tricks and methods you’d
get to put in there, and it could all be so historically accurate that even the
loudest critics couldn’t deny it. It would be so much fun.”
“It probably would be.”
“You should think about it. Just…something to consider.”
“Or,” Ben offered, “maybe we should think about it together
and then collaborate on the writing.” Ryan was on the sixteenth volume of Janie
and the Phantom now, and while he still enjoyed the story, Ben knew that the
sameness of Ryan’s work was starting to get to him. “You have more experience
as a storyteller, after all.”
Ryan sat up and looked at Ben, his dark blue eyes wide. “Are
you serious? You’d actually want to work together with me on something?”
“Of course.” In fact, the more he thought about it… “We can
talk it out when we’re in Hawaii.”
“We’re going to Hawaii?”
“Linda promised you, remember? If this book made the list,
she’d send us on vacation there. Now you get to collect, and we get to go
somewhere warm in the middle of winter.” And maybe Ben could finally ask the
question he’d been meaning to ask for the past year, too. He thought of the
little box in the back of his desk drawer and was grateful it was dark, because
he knew he was blushing.
“Wow.” Ryan’s grin was brilliant. “Great news, a new project,
and the promise of a vacation, all in one day? This is gonna be hard to top
for, like, the rest of my life.” He leaned down and kissed Ben, and his mind
went from rings in boxes to the man in his arms with barely a skip.
The book fell to the floor a few minutes later. Neither man
noticed.
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