Starcrossed
Page 30
Well, that letter was as real as a wooden nickel. Did Kenzie already suspect he had a forgery? Was that why he’d come to Brodigan’s in the first place?
A distant jingle startled Rory, the sound of the front door’s bell ringing behind Mrs. Brodigan as she left for the night. He glanced at the clock and groaned. It was hard to keep track of present time when he scried, and he’d let himself get distracted and spent longer than he’d meant watching the vision of that letter’s past.
He set the forgery on his side table and reached back into the box, withdrawing the second letter off the stack. He unfolded it to find it was also signed by Frederick Douglass, this time dated October 1855.
Huh.
He emptied the box of all its letters and found them all signed by Frederick Douglass, all dated between 1855 and 1857, some duplicates of each other. He spread the letters across his lap, the chair, and the footstool, and pursed his lips.
There was no way all twenty-two of the letters were going to be real. Had this sap bought an entire lot of dodgy historic letters, hoping to get lucky? But why would a congressman’s son need to pay double for some Hell’s Kitchen shop to rush-appraise the lot?
Rory ground his teeth. This was weird and he didn’t like weird—he liked safe and predictable.
But he also liked having a roof over his head, and he still had twenty-one letters to scry. He rubbed his eyes behind the glasses. He’d leave the mysteries to people who could afford to care about them and just be grateful he’d make February’s rent.
But as he picked up another letter, he couldn’t shake the heavy suspicion that something about this job smelled wrong. Mr. Kenzie had said he wanted any forgeries found by breakfast.
What wasn’t he saying?
Spellbound by Allie Therin, available now wherever Carina Press ebooks are sold.
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Copyright © 2019 by Allie Therin
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ISBN: 9781488055195
Starcrossed
Copyright © 2020 by Allie Therin
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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