Chapter 1 #2
“Bad enough that Richard’s been locked in meetings all week.” Priya set one of the coffees on Livvie’s desk. “Just…keep your head up, okay? And don’t be afraid to take a little credit.”
“For what?”
Priya’s eyebrows rose. “That book hitting the list today. You found it.”
“Richard—”
“Richard read three chapters and called it ‘competent.’” Priya leaned against the cubicle wall. “You’re the one who saw what it could be. So make sure that’s on the record.”
Livvie wrapped her hands around the warm cup. “I don’t think—”
“Listen. You’re a very nice sunfish in a sea of sharks. You gotta grow some teeth.”
“I’m a sunfish?”
“It’s just an expression. But yeah, you’re too…well, sweet to be in this business, really.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You brought Derek a cupcake.” Priya gestured to the gift on his desk. “For a guy who stole your promotion.”
“It’s fine.” The smile came automatically. “And it’s his birthday.”
Priya looked at her for a long moment. “He’s been here three months. To your six years. Honey, grow some teeth.”
“I have teeth—”
Priya shook her head and headed for her own desk, the click of her heels fading into the growing noise of the office.
By 8:47, the floor had come alive. Bodies streaming from the elevator, voices rising, the smell of fresh coffee replacing the stale.
She refreshed the bestseller page. Not live yet.
“Fox.”
Richard Ames—silver hair, charcoal suit—walked past her cubicle. He didn’t look at her—his thumbs were moving on his phone—but his voice carried. “I need talking points for the three manuscripts I sent to you for the acquisition meeting. Thirty minutes.”
“Of course.”
He was already walking away. “On my desk by nine fifteen.”
She opened a new document and started typing. She was halfway through when Ryan Webster appeared at her cubicle—twenty-two, fresh out of college, khakis that didn’t fit and a button-down that had definitely belonged to his father. His face had gone the color of old paper.
“I think I deleted something. Something important.”
Livvie looked at her half-finished talking points. Looked at the clock. Looked at Ryan.
“Show me.”
“I don’t even know what I—”
“Ryan.” She was already standing. “Show me. It’s probably in the trash folder.”
She followed him to his cubicle. It was in the trash folder.
“You’re a lifesaver,” he said, color returning to his cheeks. “Seriously. I owe you, like, seventeen coffees.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
She made it back to her cubicle at 9:11. Finished the talking points in four minutes flat—not her best work, but Richard wouldn’t notice. She printed them, walked them to his office, set them on his desk while he talked on the phone.
“Mmm,” he said.
Back at her desk, she watched the clock crawl toward ten. She was refreshing the page every thirty seconds when Derek wandered past, cupcake crumbs on his tie.
“Oh, hey.” He paused. “Thanks for the”—a vague gesture at his face—“the thing.”
“Happy birthday.”
“Yeah.” Already looking at his phone. “Did you hear about the meeting? Sounds intense.” And then he was gone.
9:59 a.m.
She refreshed.
10:00 a.m.
Refreshed again.
Number three. The New York Times bestseller list. The book she’d found. The book she’d believed in.
Bam. And that’s how it was done. She wanted to print the page, but Richard’s voice cut across the office. “Conference room. Now.”
The “fishbowl” filled quickly. Four senior agents, their assistants, a handful of junior agents hoping to fill their own ledgers with bestsellers. Livvie found a spot near the back. Richard stood at the head of the table, expansive, magnetic.
The conference room was made to impress. Bookshelves lined the walls—first editions, awards, framed covers of authors he claimed to have discovered. The window looked out over Midtown, the September light catching the glass of a hundred buildings.
Richard grinned, something rare as he folded his arms. “As I’m sure you’ve all seen, we have a new entry on this week’s list. Number three.” A pause. “Number three. This is what happens when we trust our editorial instincts.”
We.
“I want to thank Derek for giving the publisher that marketing push—outstanding work.” Richard nodded at Derek. “And the whole team. This is what Pemberton does.”
Applause. Livvie clapped along, palms meeting in a rhythm that felt hollow.
Derek?
“But now we have a problem.” Richard pulled out the leather chair at the head of the table and settled into it, fingers steepled. “Namely, Ian Rivers.”
Rivers.
No, oh no—
“Ian Rivers?” Ryan asked.
“The Thornwood Chronicles.” Richard’s eyes were already back on his computer screen.
“YA Fantasy author duo—Emma and Nate Rivers, writing as Ian. They had four bestsellers, and then…well, Nate has had some trouble, and now he’s two years past his deadline, and Starlight Publishing is talking about canceling the contract and getting their advance back.
And on a one-million-dollar deal, our fifteen percent is a hundred and fifty thousand we can’t afford to lose.
We lose this, and we’re going to have to cut back around here. ”
Cut back. And it didn’t help that Richard glanced at the row of juniors standing in the back of the room. “That’s not the worst of it. We don’t get a manuscript soon, we’re facing a potential lawsuit and…well, we need to figure out a way to salvage this situation, fast.”
He sighed. “He used to be Bette’s client, but he never got reassigned.”
Bette Northrup, who’d left the firm two years ago and quietly slipped away to Alzheimer’s.
“So no one has talked to him in two years?” asked one of the senior agents—Linda Gallop, striking blonde, even in her mid-fifties.
“You want him?”
She held up her hands. “No, thank you. He’s…well, let’s just say Bette knew how to talk to him. He likes living his hermit life in Minnesota.”
Livvie glanced at Linda. That wasn’t fair. Nate wasn’t a hermit.
Well, okay, she didn’t know what he was, really. She hadn’t seen him in years. Although maybe, given her last memory of him…
And just like that, the fluorescent hum of the office faded. The smell of leather and cologne shifted to something else—pine needles and woodsmoke. Lake water. The particular sweetness of a Minnesota summer, thick and green and alive.
She was twenty years old again, sitting by a firepit at the edge of Maple Lake.
The summer she’d never forget, of course.
Emma had just finished an experimental treatment—had another month of waiting to see if it took—and Livvie had come to Maple Lake because, well, reasons, and…
And Nate had been there. Hurting, but trying. Sometimes she could still see the firelight catching the angles of his face, the smell of smoke in his hair, and something in his expression that made her breath catch—
“We need someone to get in touch with him. See if he’s anywhere close to fulfilling that contract. Otherwise it could get ugly.”
Livvie looked at Richard. And she didn’t know why the words formed—or even how they formed—but suddenly, there they were, issuing from her mouth.
“I know him.”
Richard stilled, looked at her. (Along, of course, with everyone else.) Was she turning red? Or maybe it was just hot in here—
“Excuse me?”
Her heart thundered so hard she could feel it in her teeth. She swallowed. “Nate—Ian Rivers. I know him. I can reach out.”
Richard leaned back in his chair. The leather creaked.
Silence.
“You know Ian Rivers.”
“Yes.”
“Personally.”
“Yes.” Her voice held steady. Barely. “I can text him. Today. See if he’ll talk to me.”
Richard studied her for a long moment. Then, just like that, he nodded. “Good. Do it. If he doesn’t respond, we get our lawyers involved.”
“And if he does?”
Richard’s mouth curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Then you’ve just made yourself useful, Fox. Don’t waste it.”
She nodded, her body hollow.
Somehow, she made it through the rest of the meeting, but the words kept echoing through her brain.
I know him. I can text him.
What? Hello—once upon a time she’d known him.
Wanted to know a lot more of him, frankly.
But that was then. Before.
And this was the over-her-head now. What had she been thinking? She leaned against the wall, the cool surface pressing through her blouse.
What had she done?
Seven years since that summer. Three years since the funeral. Three years since he’d looked right through her like she was made of glass.
She pulled out her phone. His number was still there—she’d never been able to delete it. Her thumb hovered over the screen.
Hey, it’s Livvie. Livvie Fox. I don’t know if you remember me—
Delete.
Nate, I know this is out of the blue, but—
Delete.
I heard about your situation and I want to help—
Delete. Delete. Delete.
She stared at the blank message. The cursor blinked. Waiting.
The taste of smoke and pine ghosted at the back of her throat.
She thought about the fiddle-leaf fig. The cupcake. The list she wasn’t credited for.
And she thought about firelight on his face. The crackle of burning pine. The question she’d never gotten to ask.
Heaven help her, she could do this.
Her thumbs moved.
Livvie
Nate. It’s Livvie. I know it’s been a long time. I’m at Pemberton now, the agency. They’ve asked me to reach out. I don’t know if you want to hear from me, but I wanted you to know: I still believe in those books. I still believe in you. Please give me a call.
She hit Send before she could change her mind.
The message showed delivered.
She waited.
One minute. Two. Five.
The hallway hummed with the distant sounds of the office—phones ringing, keyboards clicking, the copier churning.
Nothing.
She slid the phone into her pocket and walked back to her desk.
And tried not to think about the fact that her entire career now hinged on a text from the man who broke her heart.
The lake lay still at five a.m., and Nate was the only thing moving on its surface.
His paddle dipped in and out of the water silently, just a few drips plinking into the clear water as the kayak moved across the surface.