Page 139 of No Headlines Please

They were both tall, attractive, and impossibly polished, like the sort of couple who belonged on a red carpet or at one of those exclusive parties where everyone was somehow famous.

Already, four days had passed since Walt had called me over to see the news. Since then, I'd spent nearly every waking moment gobbling up information like the answer to life itself might be buried in the details.

For what felt like the millionth time, I shifted my attention to the woman at Maddox's side.

Sloane Hayworth.

Wow.

The identity of Maddox was shocking enough. But seeing him paired with Sloane – the daughter of Cynthia Hayworth, who my mom had been griping about for years – was the one-two punch that still had me reeling.

By now, I'd watched Sloane cry at least a dozen times on various TV and podcast appearances, where she told the sad tale of how she'd been left at the altar by the black-hearted villain I'd known simply as Maddox.

She was a gorgeous cryer, too, somehow managing to look luminous even with tears sliding down her cheeks while she dabbed at her eyes.

How on Earth did she do that? Whenever I cried, I ended up with puffy eyes and a red nose. But not Sloane. She looked heartbreakingly beautiful while I looked like someone who'd been hit with a pollen bomb.

Some of Sloane's crying had occurred while promoting her new book, which had just made the New York Times bestseller list. In it, she'd described Maddox as a cold, controlling man who viewed people as possessions and was impossible to please.

She'd called him abusive – not physically, but emotionally – saying that he made people earn his affection and took it back whenever they disappointed him.

Honestly, it didn't sound like abuse to me.

Like, let's say someone did something awful and refused to apologize. Were you supposed to smile and move on?

She'd also described him as a ruthless narcissist who thought of nobody but himself, which was hard to reconcile with the man who'd been so generous and thoughtful with me – well, until I'd flipped out, that is.

But that wasn't all my fault, was it?

Maddox had definitely misled me. But why?

And why on Earth was he showing people my photo?

None of this made sense.

Regardless, I felt terrible – not only about the way I'd lost my temper, but about the fact that Sloane was still missing. And of course, that made me feel even worse, because a stupid argument was nothing compared to a real tragedy.

I was seriously losing it.

It didn't help that in only a few days, our time at the cabins would be done. Already, we'd stayed a lot longer than planned. But the place was seasonal and would be closing at the end of October, which meant my little escape hatch was about to disappear.

In other words, whatever I was doing next, I would need to figure it out soon.

But here I was, still stuck on Maddox.

By now, I knew his biography by heart.

Maddox McGuiness was thirty-three years old, which somehow seemed impossibly young for a man the internet kept describing as a billion-dollar cautionary tale.

His mother was Evelyn Whitmore-McGuiness, but it was the middle name that carried so much clout. The Whitmore side of the family owned enough companies, hotels, resorts, and luxury brands that even I recognized the name.

Maddox was the younger of two brothers. The older brother, Alexander, was the undisputed golden boy. He'd married the right woman, worked for the family business, and apparently spent his entire life saying exactly what everyone wanted to hear.

Unlike Maddox, Alexander had never once thrown a man out of a fundraiser for harassing a waitress. Or told reporters to shove it. Or been photographed flipping off a blogger at a gala.

Regardless, every article, every blog post, every newscast repeated the same two words when it came to Maddox.

Black sheep.