Plotting Up My Next Chapter (Twin Waves #3)

Chapter 1

ONE

JESSICA

Every morning, I unlock The Fiction Nook and pretend my life is as romantic as the shop smells—vanilla candles, well-loved paperbacks, and the mustiness that comes from books whose spines crack open like they’re genuinely happy to see you.

Before the shop opens, it’s just me, the books, and the comforting illusion that I have any control over my existence whatsoever.

No customers asking for recommendations I could provide in my sleep.

No well-meaning friends checking to see if I’m “doing okay” after eight years of divorce, as if grief has a clearly posted expiration date like milk.

No reminders that my tiny independent bookstore is bleeding money like a Victorian heroine with consumption and a dramatic backstory.

Just me, the books, and Austen.

“Morning, traitor,” I say to the gray tabby sprawled across the checkout counter like a furry paperweight with strong opinions about my life choices.

Austen cracks one judgmental yellow eye and dismisses me with contempt.

“My caffeine delivery is late. Some of us can’t function without a little assistance.”

His tail twitches. It’s sympathy, right? Not the feline equivalent of “that sounds like a you problem.” Of course not.

I move through my morning routine. Lights on—the vintage Edison bulbs my best friend, Michelle, helped install last year, because apparently even struggling bookstores need ambiance to properly convey their financial desperation.

I count the register and adjust the front window display because the summer reading tower keeps tilting left like it’s trying to escape.

The V. Langley section occupies prime real estate in the front corner, exactly where browsers will see it immediately upon entering.

But only books one through nine. The most recent three releases?

Conspicuously absent, banished to the back corner with the remaindered diet books and that biography of a C-list celebrity nobody remembers.

I pull out a blank recommendation card and my favorite fountain pen—the one that makes me feel literary and important instead of divorced and struggling financially.

V. Langley’s early work is required reading for contemporary romance lovers, I write in my neatest script.

The Lighthouse Keeper’s Daughter and Second Chance Summer showcase emotional honesty that will ruin you in the best way.

His recent releases, however, have lost what made him special.

Read the first nine. Skip the rest unless you enjoy watching a gifted author forget what hearts actually do.

I prop the card against book three and step back to admire my handiwork.

“Too harsh?” I ask Austen.

The cat stretches, yawns wide enough to display all his teeth, and begins grooming his tail with aggressive disinterest.

“You’re right. He’ll never see it anyway. Also, I should probably examine why I’m seeking emotional validation from a cat.”

Austen does not dignify this with a response.

V. Langley is my favorite contemporary romance author and has been for eight years, ever since his debut novel made me cry in public—full ugly crying with mascara rivers while tourists pretended not to stare.

His heroes are grumpy men who learn to be soft, and the heroines are women who claim their own power. His prose made love feel like poetry and coming home to yourself.

Made. Past tense. Because somewhere around book ten, something broke.

He started writing like someone who’d forgotten what makes hearts actually beat. Like someone hiding behind walls so thick he couldn’t even see his own story anymore.

Six months ago, I posted my first critical review of his work as “J.A. Reads Romance”—my anonymous reviewer identity across multiple platforms. I agonized over those words for a week, knowing his team would read it, knowing it might sting.

Two stars. This book reads like the author stopped believing in his own story. The hero’s walls feel performative rather than authentic. Where is the emotional honesty that made his earlier work transcendent? I’m heartbroken to watch a gifted author lose his way.

Three days later, I was removed from his ARC team without explanation. No email. No apology. Just gone, like I’d never mattered at all.

I cried about it in Michelle’s coffee shop. Embarrassingly. Drank wine while rereading The Lighthouse Keeper’s Daughter and mourning an author I’d never met but whose words understood me better than my own ex-husband ever had.

And now I sell his books with a warning label like I’m the protagonist in some kind of sad literary revenge fantasy.

“Very mature of me,” I mutter, adjusting the card one final time.

The summer reading tower chooses this moment to finally commit to its leftward lean, toppling spectacularly and sending eighteen paperbacks cascading across the floor in a domino effect that also takes out my carefully curated “Beach Reads!” display.

I lunge to catch them and manage to save exactly zero books while somehow knocking my coffee mug off the counter—the mug that was empty, thank goodness, but which shatters on the hardwood.

Austen observes this chaos from his counter throne like he’s watching a nature documentary about prey animals making poor decisions.

“Not a word,” I tell him.

I’m on my knees gathering scattered paperbacks when the brass bell above the door chimes.

“Please tell me that’s coffee,” I call without looking up, because dignity left the building approximately thirty seconds ago.

“Better.” Michelle sweeps in wearing yoga pants and an oversized cardigan, smiling like she’s already consumed caffeine and is therefore operating on an entirely different plane of existence. “It’s coffee and gossip.”

My best friend since high school, Twin Waves Brewing Company owner, professional busybody, and, most importantly, the person who brings coffee.

“You’re a goddess.” I accept the travel mug, taking the first sip while still kneeling on the floor surrounded by books. The espresso hits my bloodstream like heaven on earth. “Bless you and your perfect espresso machine.”

“I know.” Michelle surveys the destruction around me. “Rough morning?”

“The summer tower collapsed, and then the beach reads followed. I lost a mug in the process.”

“That tracks.” She steps carefully over a copy of The Summer of Us and props herself against the counter. Austen immediately abandons his perch to wind around her ankles, purring like she’s made of tuna fish and compliments. “So. We need to talk about the bouquet toss.”

My hands freeze on a copy of Love and Other Disasters. “No, we don’t.”

“Jess.”

“Michelle.”

“He looked at you like you were his last meal and his first prayer.”

I choke on my coffee, which requires impressive coordination given that I’m still kneeling in a pile of romance novels. “That’s... very dramatic. Even for you. And I say this as someone who’s read your wedding Pinterest boards.”

“I’m engaged to a man who proposed with a coffee blend he created specifically for me.

I know dramatic romance when I see it.” Michelle crouches down to help gather books, but her expression says she’s not dropping this topic anytime in this lifetime.

“Scott Avery was staring at you with an intensity that probably violated several fire codes.”

“Scott Avery was probably calculating the property value of my entire existence.”

Michelle laughs, bright and delighted in the early morning quiet of my shop. “Come on. You caught the bouquet. He was standing right there. The entire reception saw the way he—”

“The entire reception was drunk on reading way too many romance novels.” I stand, dusting off my knees. “Including you. Especially you.”

“I’ve been reading romance novels my whole life.”

“It’s given you an overactive imagination.”

“Scott Avery looked at you like he wanted to put you in his pocket and keep you forever. That’s not imagination. That’s eyewitness testimony.”

I move behind the counter, needing the familiar barrier between myself and this conversation.

Between myself and the memory of Scott Avery’s storm-gray eyes meeting mine across a crowded dance floor while I clutched Amber’s bouquet like it might protect me from whatever was happening to my heartbeat.

“Scott Avery sees me as a financial inconvenience with unrealistic business expectations,” I say firmly. “That’s all.”

“Is that what we’re calling sexual tension these days?”

“That’s what we’re calling my landlord who keeps suggesting I turn this bookstore into a wine bar or boutique or literally anything more profitable than my dreams.”

“A wine bar would be very profitable,” Michelle says thoughtfully.

I throw a bookmark at her. It’s the closest weapon available. “Traitor. You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“I am on your side. The side that wants you to kiss a tall grumpy man who secretly reads poetry.”

“He—” I set my coffee down with too much force. “What? Scott Avery reads poetry? The man who called my shop ‘charming but not profitable enough’?”

“Caroline mentioned it. Apparently he’s at the library every Tuesday morning in the poetry section. Sits in the corner with coffee and old books and looks like a man with feelings.”

The information does not compute. Scott Avery is all sharp suits and sharper words. Quarterly profit margins and ruthless negotiations. He owns half of Twin Waves through Reed Development Corp and treats sentiment like a communicable disease.

He does not read poetry. He probably doesn’t even believe in it.

“Caroline probably mixed him up with someone else.”

“She works here four days a week. I think she knows your landlord on sight.”

I focus on re-stacking the rescued books, which is definitely not about avoiding Michelle’s knowing expression. “Well, even if he does read poetry—which I doubt—it doesn’t change the fact that he’s trying to price me out of my own shop.”

“Has he actually raised your rent?”