Chapter 25
“Five minutes everyone, five minutes, sharpies at the ready!”
The PA announcement had Kate straightening her already neatly lined-up signing pens and glancing over the table that had been set up for her.
Copies of the book arranged in artful piles, a banner behind her with her name on it—Rachel had arranged all the trappings and staging to make sure she blended in seamlessly among the other authors.
She glanced to her right and found the next table empty, the author yet to arrive.
Two minutes before opening time, an impossibly glamorous blonde with her husband in tow strolled over with water, sweets, and all of the things Kate hadn’t thought to bring.
“Spot the signing rookie,” Kate said, watching wide-eyed as her table neighbors arranged their display and stashed their belongings in thirty seconds flat. “I wish I’d recorded that to study later and copy you move for move.”
The author, dazzling and fresh as a daisy, winked a perfectly made-up eye, then skipped over and dropped a bag of gums and a bottle of water on Kate’s table.
“Trust me, you’re gonna need sugar. Shout if you need anything else, it can be a lot if you’re new to it.
Or even if you’re not. Make sure someone closes your line for lunch. ”
“Got it. Close the line,” Kate nodded. She’d be lucky to have a line, and no idea how to close it if she did, but she was relieved all the same to have such a welcoming neighbor.
“Curtain up,” the announcer said, sending a ripple of anticipation around the huge tent as people streamed in.
“Oh God,” Kate whispered. “Please come to me, please don’t come to me.”
A couple of large table plans stood near the entrance, explaining the layout in IKEA-level detail.
The biggest-name authors were on a roped-off stage area to one side with a ticketing system and queue managers, while everyone else had been spaced around the edge of the tent.
Kate had read the list and found herself starstruck, hoping to grab time to get around the tent herself later for a few social media selfies.
Liv would be so proud. Liv. What she wouldn’t give for her sister’s company and confidence right now.
Pretty much every other author had someone with them; she put a brave face on it, but she felt very alone.
She reached for her water and sent her pens flying with her elbow, bending to gather them up from the grass.
“Kate?”
She banged her head on the underside of the table as she pulled up sharp, pink-cheeked, and found a couple of women looking at her expectantly with copies of the book clutched in their hands.
Everybody farts, everybody farts…
“Hi,” she said, painting on a wide smile.
The younger of the two women held her book out. “Can you sign it to me, please? My name’s Ruby. I read it on the train before work last week, had to go in the loo and wipe my ruined mascara before I went to my desk.”
“Ah, I’m sorry,” Kate said, unsure how to react.
“Oh no, don’t be,” Ruby said. “I love it when a book rips my heart out and stamps all over it.”
Her friend nodded. “Me too. If I haven’t had a complete breakdown, I want my money back.”
Someone else appeared behind them, and then someone else. Kate spotted her author neighbor posing for a photo with one of her readers, her arm around their shoulders. Did she need to do that? Ruby passed her phone to her friend and stood beside Kate’s banner, expectant. That would be a yes, then.
“Don’t tell anyone, but this is my first signing event,” Kate laughed as she posed in front of her banner, noticing someone else join the back of her line. Her line! “Thanks for showing me the ropes.”
And so it began, her line growing, everyone chatting and unhurried when it was finally their turn at the table.
She stored the bookish compliments away to share with H later, grabbing gulps of water between readers.
A glance around neighboring authors showed their helpers smoothing things along in their queues, opening books to the signing pages, handing out sweets and anecdotes.
Oh Liv, how I wish you were here, she thought, unable to see how many people deep her queue was, jumping up every couple of minutes to pose for pictures.
By the time it had turned one in the afternoon, she’d run out of water and had no idea how to close her queue to even go to the loo, let alone for lunch.
“Sign my book, Miss Darrowby?”
A reassuring hand landed on her shoulder, and she looked up to find Charlie beside her.
“Charlie, what are you doing here?” she breathed, her cheeks flushing at his unexpected presence.
“Thought you might need a hand.”
“More than you know,” she said, feeling the tension drain from her bones.
He took one look at the situation and slid straight into ultimate host mode, effortlessly charming her queue, working his way to the back and roping it off so she could take a much-needed break.
“Seriously, how are you even here?” she said, once they’d made their way out the back to the hospitality area.
“I was passing,” he said.
She wasn’t buying it. “We’re two hundred miles from London.”
He shrugged. “I promised not to leave you alone in this. Liv couldn’t make it.”
“You didn’t have to,” she said. “But I’m really glad you did. I’m so desperate for a wee it’s not even funny.”
She made a dash for the Porta Potty and caught sight of herself in the mirror as she washed her hands.
Pink cheeks, sun-activated freckles, lip gloss long gone but an undeniable shine in her eyes.
She’d been so daunted by the idea of the festival, then so swept along by the tidal wave of bookish joy that she’d all but forgotten her nerves.
Charlie’s arrival had lifted her onto surer ground; she had someone in her corner now, a sense of being a double act rather than flying solo.
They helped themselves to the buffet in the hospitality tent and found a quiet bench under the shade of a patio umbrella.
“Storm’s coming,” Charlie said, glancing out over the rolling hills.
Kate frowned at the clear blue skies. “How can you possibly tell?”
He opened a bottle of sparkling water, then grinned. “Heard it on the radio in the cab.”
“They must have it wrong,” she said. “It’s clear as a bell.”
“Hi, Kate,” someone said, a thin voice behind her.
She twisted and found herself face-to-face with Sally Rose, the starriest superstar author at the entire event, and one of Kate’s all-time favorite writers. She shot up out of her seat and practically curtsied, making Sally laugh and place her suntanned, liver-spotted hand on Kate’s arm.
“I read an advance copy of your book on holiday in Portugal a few weeks ago,” Sally rasped, in a voice Kate would have recognized in her sleep. “You’ve got a dazzling future ahead of you, my darling.”
And then she was gone, clutching the arm of her assistant. Sally’s books were myth and legend among the romance community, her inimitable heroes and ballsy heroines the bedrock of the genre for the last thirty years.
“Oh my God, I love Sally Rose with my whole heart,” she said, watching her retreating figure. “I should have said something, anything. Did I even say thank you? Oh shit, I didn’t, did I? I was dumbstruck by the sight of her. She’s going to think I’m a monster.”
“You curtsied, I think she got the message. Prue will be straight on the phone to get a cover quote for the next print run,” Charlie said. “Speaking of which, I bring news.”
“Go on?”
He put his plate down and gave her his undivided attention, sending heat prickling up her neck.
“It’s made tomorrow’s Sunday Times list, Kate. Straight in at number three.”
She gasped, wide-eyed, and he put a cautionary finger against his lips. “You can’t breathe a word until it’s out in print.”
She stared at him, her fingertips pressed against her mouth to stop any noise escaping. He nodded, triumph in his whiskey-cola eyes, enjoying being the one to deliver the news every author dreams of, even pseudo ones.
“I can’t believe it, Charlie,” she whispered, euphoric. “They won’t change their minds?”
He turned his mobile around to show her Prue’s confirmation email, the flurry of out-of-character exclamation marks and whoops.
“Wow,” she murmured. “This is really special, isn’t it?”
He whistled low under his breath. “It sure is. Everyone’s excited.”
She sat for a few quiet seconds thinking about Sally Rose, and the readers she’d met in the tent, and the impending Sunday Times listing. It was all such terrific news, validation that the book was knocking it out of the park.
“Okay?” Charlie said, watching her carefully.
She nodded, then shrugged. “It’s…I don’t know. I’m being selfish, really. I just wonder how it would feel if it was genuinely mine, you know? If I’d actually written the Sunday Times bestseller that Sally Rose loves.” She stopped, then started again. “I feel like a fraud among all these people.”
“Right.” He drummed his fingers on the table.
“Kate, how many people have told you just today how much they love the book? The woman who said it took her mind off her husband’s illness, or the girl who’d read it to her neighbor who can’t see to read anymore?
None of those things would have happened without you. ”
She took a cooling drink of water, trying to let Charlie’s conviction shore up her own. Her face must have told him she wasn’t quite there yet, and she really needed to get over this attack of nerves before she went back inside the tent.
“You’ve seen Russian Matryoshka dolls?” he said.
She frowned. “Liv had a set when we were kids.”
“Right,” he said, his knees skimming hers as he turned to look her straight in the eyes.
“See the book as the smallest doll in the center.” He bunched her hand into a fist on the bench between them.
“Then there’s the author,” he said, blanketing her fist with his own hand.
He nodded for her to add her other hand to the top of the pile.
“That one is you,” he said, and then he placed his bigger, warm hand over hers like a protective cap. “This is me, then the publisher. We’re one team, all working together to protect the book and get it out there into the hands of the people who matter the most. The people queuing in that tent.”
She looked at his fingers, strong and capable over hers, and then she looked up into his dark, deadly serious eyes and believed him.
“It’s a good thing,” she said, letting out a long, slow breath.
“A really good thing,” he said. “Now come on. Kate Darrowby’s public awaits.”