Chapter 17
Mitch woke up not because he was ready but because of the noise Joyce was making in the kitchen. It wasn’t that much noise, but it wasn’t peace and quiet, either. At least it wasn’t barking.
He groaned, his body stiff from sleeping on the couch in his office. He gingerly sat up, rolling his shoulders and working his head back and forth to loosen things up.
He really needed to get a decent night’s sleep. In his bed. Tonight, he would. If that woman next door could keep her enormous mutt corralled.
An image of her appeared in his head. Shapely legs illuminated by moonlight and those big eyes that had looked up at him, already filled with an apology for disturbing him.
She shouldn’t have let the dog run onto his property in the first place.
More noise from the kitchen, but it was the scent of coffee that pushed him to his feet. There were baked goods, too. What kind, he wasn’t sure, but the smell was making his stomach rumble. He scrubbed his hands over his face and decided to brave the inevitable encounter with Joyce.
He walked out to the kitchen.
Joyce was taking a tray of muffins out of the oven. Another tray sat on a cooling rack already. She glanced in his direction. “Good morning. Or should I say good afternoon. Didn’t sleep well, eh?”
He looked at the time. It was just turning eleven. Not exactly afternoon. “No. Your new friend’s dog is a menace.”
Joyce straightened and put the muffins on the rack next to the other tray before narrowing her eyes at him, her skepticism on full display. “You wouldn’t be talking about that sweet pup Archie now, would you?”
“I don’t know the beast’s name.”
She pursed her lips. “Archie’s no beast. He’s a dear creature. Sweet as pie.”
It was just like Joyce to take the dog’s side. “So you didn’t hear him barking like a maniac last night?”
She shook her head. “Nothing gets through my white noise machine. You should try one yourself.” She tipped her head toward the counter. “There’s coffee and cinnamon apple muffins. The new batch is hot, but the first should be cool. Help yourself. I’ve got cleaning to get done.”
She picked up her caddy of cleaning supplies and left.
He got out a big mug and filled it with coffee. He stood at the counter drinking it until it was half gone, then he refilled it, grabbed two of the cooled muffins and went outside. Another stupidly beautiful day. Wretched sun. How was he supposed to work in these kinds of conditions?
He sat and ate the muffins and drank more coffee until he felt relatively human. The muffins were very good. They weren’t just cinnamon apple, they had raisins and chopped walnuts in them, too. If Joyce asked him what he thought of the muffins, he’d complain about the nuts later, but he didn’t really mind them that much.
In fact, he sometimes wondered if she put nuts in the baked goods just to see if he was paying attention.
When the muffins were gone and his coffee was empty, he set his cup aside and leaned back. Still tired, but not so much that he couldn’t get on with his day. He had about a third of the book left to read through.
So far, it was good. Better than he’d remembered, which was a nice surprise. But he still had no big idea about where the next book should go. No great new twists or turns for the characters that would have his readers talking.
His mind just didn’t seem to work that way anymore. The deal with Netflix hadn’t helped. At all.
The blasted show producers had changed some things in the storyline and while it shouldn’t affect what he was writing, those changes were hard to ignore.
He knew what would happen once the new book came out. He’d get letters and emails from readers wanting to know why he’d changed things. They’d confuse what happened in the show with what was going on in the books. Or they’d think he was the one writing the show, which he wasn’t. It happened all the time.
Knowing that reader reaction was inevitable didn’t help the creative process. It was borrowing trouble from tomorrow, as Jeanie would have said, but those thoughts were in his brain, and he couldn’t find a way to shake them.
He went inside to refill his coffee cup and start his day. But instead of going back to his office, he went into the bedroom so he could take a shower and put on a fresh change of clothes.
Joyce was in there, dusting and wiping down the wood furniture with lemon polish. “Be out in a second.”
“I can shower in the other bathroom.”
“Nonsense.” She tidied the top of his dresser, although there wasn’t much on there that needed tidying. “How were the muffins?”
He frowned. “You put nuts in them.”
“How many did you eat?”
“Two,” he said begrudgingly.
“Hmph. Walnuts are a grand source of antioxidants, and they help decrease inflammation in the body. At least one of us cares about keeping you healthy.” She went back to her polishing.
“I’m plenty healthy. And I don’t have any inflammation.”
Her brows rose and she cut her eyes at him as if to say he had all sorts of things and inflammation was the least of them. She dropped the duster in her cleaning caddy and headed out. “So you won’t be wanting the rest of those muffins then?”
He grunted. “No. I’ll eat them.”
“Hmm.” She hesitated outside the room. “Pork tenderloin with orange glaze for dinner.”
He shrugged. “I could just eat the leftover pot roast.”
“You will. For lunch.” She went on her way.
He took his coffee into the bathroom and stared at himself in the mirror. He should change and go for a run, but he didn’t have it in him right now. Maybe after he worked a bit. He could go out this evening when the day started to cool.
He cranked on the shower, letting the water get good and hot, then he got in and tried to wash away the poor sleep and the restless dreams. Dreams his neighbor had no right to show up in. She was attractive. He’d give her that. But in his mind, he was still a married man.
He felt guilty for thinking about her, whatever her name was. He felt like he’d cheated on Jeanie.
He hadn’t. He understood that. But the weight of those thoughts were there, pressing on him like a reminder that he had already found his soulmate. He’d been in love with the most amazing woman in the world.
Jeanie had been the one. She’d been all he needed. Unlike most people he knew, he’d been fortunate enough to marry the love of his life. He’d spent twenty-nine incredible years with her before cancer had changed everything.
Twenty-nine years was a good amount of time. Almost three decades. It was more than some people got. It should have been enough. He tipped his face into the spray. It was enough.
Except when it wasn’t.
He flattened his hands on the tiled shower walls and pressed his forehead between them, letting the cold tile soothe his tortured mind.
It sucked that Arlington was gone, too. Arlington always had the right words to say for whatever Mitch was feeling. The man just knew. Mitch had treasured his counsel. Their friendship had gotten him through the worst of things after Jeanie passed.
But losing Arlington had sent Mitch into freefall again. He had no one to talk to. No one to turn to. No wiser, older mentor figure with the insight Mitch so desperately needed.
He clenched one hand into a fist and smacked the wall in frustration. Life was infinitely unfair.
He rinsed himself one more time, then turned the water off and got out. He had work to do. Wallowing wasn’t progress.
Maybe life being unfair should be the theme of the new book. Maybe he should kill all the characters off and let the bad guys win. That was real, wasn’t it?
He hooked a towel around his hips, and leaned on the counter, the fog on the mirror thankfully preventing him from looking himself in the eyes. Readers didn’t want real. They wanted an escape.
So did he. He just didn’t know how anymore.