Win an entire set of the Witchlands series!

Thank you to everyone who answered my survey in the last newsletter! I definitely wasn’t weekly in my schedule since that email went out…

But in my defense, I had two deadlines for two different books! And I hit them both. 🎉 The first Murder Quartet book, Two for Joy, is now copyedited. Meaning the next (and final) step for me will be the first pass pages.1 All of the hard stuff is past.

And you can expect to read Two for Joy in only FIVE MONTHS. Yes, you read that right.

Five months until my next book hits stores.2

Of course, you can also scroll down and get a teaser now, too…

The other deadline I hit was for the second Murder Quartet book, Four and Twenty Blackbirds! It’s due out a year from now (so December 2026), and it was a lot harder to finish than Two for Joy.

Which…it was still very easy compared to, say, the Witchlands. But all the touring and promo for The Executioners Three and Witchlight made my autumn a difficult time for sinking into flow.

But I got it done! Two books, one year. My stretch goal was three books—and maybe I’ll still get close. I did dive back into the third Murder Quartet book today, Three Mollys in the Well…😌

To celebrate the completion of the Witchlands series—and the completion of all my travel, I’ve got an international giveaway for all of you.

Win all of the Witchlands books SIGNED and PERSONALIZED!

All of the books will be hardcover and have the new covers, with the exception of Sightwitch—you can choose between the old cover on a hardcover OR a paperback with a new cover. 🥰

Now click on the button to enter! And thank you for being a subscriber and reader!

Enter the giveaway!

If you haven’t read the first chapter in Two for Joy, do that here! I updated the chapter to match any changes I made during copyedits—but they were truly minimal. (No need to reread, in other words.)

Also, please pre-order! I would love it if you pre-order!

Especially since Two for Joy is being released straight to paperback in the US with only a LIMITED FIRST EDITION HARDCOVER RUN. In other words, on release day, both the paperback and hardcover will hit stores in the US….

But one will get reprinted when supplies run out. The other (the hardcover) will not. 👀

Pre-order in the US

Pre-order in the UK

Now on to Chapter Two!

CHAPTER TWO

“Where’s Shannon?”

It is 5:25 in the evening, and Magpie stands before Buck at the photo stand-in, her pack snug against her back. The heat of the day coils off the pavement, unrelenting despite the river’s breeze.

The intense heat waves that scorched the region in recent weeks might have tapered off, but that doesn’t mean that summer is ready to release its grip. I still have a few weeks left, the humidity seems to taunt. Don’t put your fans away just yet.

A fan like the portable one Buck holds while he sits in a plastic chair and Liam sits on a bucket. The boys are playing cards—some kind of poker, judging by the dollar bills that seem to be accumulating in Buck’s camo cap.

Also, judging by the slump of Liam’s shoulders, he’s losing.

“Liam’s a fisherman,” Buck declares, as if he didn’t hear what Magpie just asked. He studies his cards while blowing the fan across his face. “Mostly fly fishing, but I’m going to take him out on the pond tomorrow.” The pond is actually a large bend in the river where the current slows and bass gather. “Here, Liam. Want a go at the fan?”

“Oh yes, please.” Liam snatches it to him. Then sighs as the tiny engineered breeze hits his face.

“That’s great.” Magpie frowns. “Have fun on the pond, you two. But why isn’t Shannon here? Aren’t you two going out tonight, Buck?”

“Nope.” Buck drawls this word. “It didn’t work out between us, so we parted ways.”

Magpie blinks. Then rocks back on her heels. “I’m sorry,” she tries to say, only to break off as soon as Buck’s stormy eyes find her.

He clearly doesn’t want her sympathy, and clearly doesn’t want to talk about it. It’s one more girl in the long, snaking line of girls he has hooked up with over the last year and a half.

They don’t call him the Buckin’ Cowboy for nothing.

“Look, Liam. I’ll cut you some slack.” Buck tosses his cards down by the cap. “Keep your tips, and we’ll play again tomorrow.”

“Oh, thank god.” Liam practically melts into his bucket. He switches off the fan. “I’ve lost so much money, I was worried we’d have to sell the condo we just moved into.” While he reclaims his lost dollars from the cap (so many—Magpie guessed right about him losing), Buck pushes to standing.

Which brings him right next to Magpie, where she can’t help but notice a new algae stain on his Chain Ferry T-shirt. “Liam says you’re going to the museum now. Want me to pilot you?”

Magpie’s eyebrows rise. “Would you?” This wouldn’t be the first time Buck has given her an exclusive trip across the river to meet his sister, but it’s certainly been a while since he offered.

“Of course, Mags. Anything for you. But—” He dips closer so only she can hear him. He smells like sweat and river. “You have to stop doing that bird-face thing you do around new people.”

Magpie stiffens. Then swallows. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She really thought she was getting better about that.

“You don’t need to be afraid of Liam, all right?” Buck pins her with one of his more serious stares. This near, it makes his blue eyes inescapable. “He doesn’t care about Hunter O’Neal—doesn’t even know who the guy is. And frankly, I don’t think he would fall for Hunter’s bullshit anyway, even if he did know.”

Magpie wishes she could believe Buck. Like, she desperately wishes. But everyone else in Two Pines fell for Hunter’s bullshit, so why would a new guy be any different?

A goose squawks nearby. The wind off the river coasts against her. And a flash of color in the nearby park catches her eye. Here, at the center of the maple and red pine trees, is a blue-painted pavilion. As Adelaide says daily on her tour, Here is where Alfonso first confessed his feelings to Jill in the iconic dance scene you see painted on the side of the bus.

Beside the pavilion are two picnic tables that only got installed five months ago because Mayor Taylor decided it was time they reclaimed the space from the geese. (The geese have yet to agree.)

Magpie twists that way, expecting to find a family of waterfowl waddling by. Instead, she finds a person.

They’re tucked by a maple tree near the pavilion, which in and of itself isn’t odd. What does make it odd is that the person is very clearly hiding and also very clearly looking this way.

But when Magpie tries to squint at them—to bring their green shorts and white T-shirt into sharper focus—a gust of wind kicks across her. It carries sand and boat fumes. She coughs. Her eyes tear up.

And by the time she can see clearly again, the figure in the park is gone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ferry is a generous term for the actual boat that carries tourists across the local river. At a mere fifteen feet by twelve, it has only two benches—which are as cushionless as Magpie herself.

You should start lifting weights, says a voice like Hunter O’Neal’s. It’ll help you fill out those jeans better, Maggie.

Magpie sighs. It’s been a year; she really wishes she could scrub his backhanded criticisms out of her brain.

After claiming her usual seat, she digs Held by a Duke from the backpack she is almost never without. Then she flips to the last dog-eared page.

She doesn’t mind that Liam is studying the cover and probably judging her genre choice. Or that Buck is whistling his clear whistle (sounds like Nirvana). Or that she has only nine minutes before they reach the river’s other side and the brick museum beyond. Magpie falls right back in to where she left off shortly before closing up shop inside the trailer. The Duke of Rother and Elena are now past their first kiss and moving toward a more intimate embrace.

The Duke is pulling Elena to him, a flicker of tongue just visible behind his perfect teeth. The earlier kiss was Elena’s first ever, and she is now simultaneously terrified and elated to receive more. Her lips touch Rother’s . . . then he plunges in.

It’s not a gentle kiss, but an immediately passionate one. And despite Elena’s inexperience, Rother finds her enthusiasm appealing.

Because of course he does. Elena is everything he desires in a woman, and he doesn’t need a summer tourist to make him happy. Elena fills out her jeans (or Regency ball gown, rather) and she doesn’t look like a beaver when she smiles. She doesn’t annoy Rother with her fumbling inexperience in the boudoir, and Rother doesn’t have to point out that Elena’s bangs look uneven or that her legs look a bit stork-like in those shorts.

Er, in that gown.

And Magpie knows none of this is real life. She knows the Duke of Rother and his endless, unconditional adoration are a fantasy—just as each of the one hundred and sixteen other romance heroes she read about this year are fantasies. Along with the hundred and seventy-four she read last year.

But that’s the point. That’s why Magpie reads these novels: real life can never measure up, so why shouldn’t she—and every other reader out there—be allowed to enjoy some mass-market paperback dreaming?

For a glorious stretch of nine minutes, it’s just the waves lapping and the ferry crank-cranking. The cicadas have started quieting. No motorized boats putter nearby. The sun is sinking behind the forested dune ahead, turning the edges of the sky to pink.

Ahead, the plain, split-level museum stretches down to a retaining wall at the riverbank’s edge. Only a simple red emergency exit disrupts the brick exterior—no windows, no vines, no signs to declare this is the famed spot to get all your Two for Joy fan experiences.

To the right of the museum is a set of wide stairs surrounded by fiddlehead ferns already turning brown with summer’s denouement, and at the base of those stairs is the Chain Ferry’s western landing—less ornate than its eastern sister, with only a wooden bench to disrupt the faded planks.

The ferry thunks! against that dock. It’s not the usual smooth landing Magpie is used to, and she topples forward. Drops her book.

Liam blurts, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I’m still not used to this.”

Buck hops away from the seat he’d taken when Magpie wasn’t looking. “You’ll get better,” he assures as he strides toward the chain crank to lock it up. On his way, he scoops up the fallen book and hands it back to Magpie.

Liam, meanwhile, is hurrying toward Magpie with a look of pure devastation on his face. “I’m really sorry, Magpie. Is your book wet?”

“It’s fine, Liam.” She shakes it at him. Droplets slide off the Duke of Rother’s exposed abs. “I buy these in bulk. Twenty paperbacks for five bucks at the All Booked Up used bookstore. So even if this had gotten damaged—which it didn’t—I have plenty more to read at home.” She smiles, lips closed, and pats Liam.

Then she rises so she can do what she always does when it’s just her and Buck: moor the ferry to its western dock. Buck takes one rope, Liam a third, and together, they knot fat, fibrous ropes in silence.

Magpie has just finished tying off her rope—and is about to inspect Liam’s work—when a scream rips out.

Adelaide. Magpie shoots to her full height, so fast she nearly loses her balance. She almost topples into the river. Only Buck’s sudden grip against her keeps her on the dock.

Another scream splits the evening. And Buck—now certain Magpie won’t plummet into the murky depths—leaps away like the baseball player he is after hitting a double. He reaches the steps up to the museum and claims three at a time. Ferns grasp and claw for him.

In moments, he has reached the parking lot and vanished.

Magpie looks at Liam, whose mouth hangs open. “Come on,” she commands before launching into a sprint of her own.

A third scream sounds.