Page 59 of Written with Love

Max grinned. “I wanted to surprise you, but since we were already coming into town, I figured we’d pick one out together.”

Juliette’s heart squeezed. “You want to get me a camera?”

He shrugged like it was no big deal. “You mentioned that you’d been thinking about getting something of your own for a while. Consider it a housewarming gift.”

She stared at him, speechless for a moment. No one had ever done something like this for her before.

“Max…”

“Pick one,” he said, nodding to the case. “I want you to have something special.”

Juliette swallowed past the lump in her throat and focused on the cameras, her fingers brushing over the cool glass.

He was making it impossible not to fall deeper in love with him.

And somehow, that scared her more than the man who had attacked him.

After the camera shop, where she’d picked out a used Olympus Pen-F complete with several lenses and a case, they headed to the hardware store and grabbed a few items he needed along with a couple of cases of backsplash tile they’d picked out for the kitchen.

Before heading back to Pride, they found a burger place and ate lunch.

It was there, when they were almost done eating lunch, when the report on the television caught Juliette’s eye. She tapped Max’s arm and pointed to the screen just as the words “Gabriella DeLuca found dead in hotel room” scrolled across.

“What the…” Max pulled out his phone and quickly searched for the report.

“What happened?” Juliette asked, glancing at his phone.

“They aren’t saying.” He glanced at her. “She was found early this morning by her agent. The first reports say that she was attacked.”

Juliette swallowed. “What are the chances that someone would attack you and her in the same twenty-four hours?”

“We need to get back home.” He glanced around. “Quickly.”

She nodded and followed him out to the car.

When they pulled up to his driveway, the number of cars parked outside his place had easily doubled.

Cameras flashed as she drove quickly by while people yelled at them. There were a couple of police cruisers parked there along with all the construction workers’ trucks.

“This is going to be a very long day,” he said before they got out.

“We’ll deal with it, together.” She took his hand in hers.

He lifted it to his lips and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “This is not how I expected things to go.”

They had talked on the trip home about Gabriella. He’d skimmed through all the articles he could find about what had happened. So far, all that the press knew was that she’d been attacked and most likely murdered sometime the day or night before and then discovered by her agent, Mariam Collins, early that morning.

When they walked in, Nick was standing in the living room talking to Parker.

“You heard?” Nick asked them.

“Yeah, what do you know?” Max asked.

Nick shook his head. “Not much more than what they’re saying on the reports.” He motioned to the TV, which was muted but playing the news channel.

“We’ve been asked by the local police handling the case to question you. Aiden has already confirmed that you both were here all yesterday and last night.”

“Thanks,” Juliette said, sitting down on the sofa, suddenly exhausted by everything. Max sat next to her and took her hand in his.