Chapter 5
chapter
five
Addison
By the time Monday rolls around, I’m convinced there is a legitimate wormhole in Saddle Creek, Texas.
There is really no other explanation for what happened to my notebook.
It had been with all of the rest of my things at the bakery.
Kelsie hadn’t found it after I’d left. I’d looked all over my car and house, and still nothing.
It kind of felt like an omen about my potential as a romance novelist. And not a good one.
It felt like meteors screaming across the sky and hell-mouths cracking open in the center of town.
As though trying my hand at writing a romance novel has pushed me to the edge of the map into There-Be-Dragons territory.
By the way, there is a slight chance I’m being overly dramatic.
I had a Master’s Degree in Creative Writing, and I know for a fact that all of my professors would be horrified if they knew I was trying my hand at a romance novel. They’d call it a waste of my talent and work ethic.
I should just go back to working on the literary novel I started in school. Did I want to? No, not even a little bit. The entire premise was depressing and boring—sensitive ingenue goes through struggles as her parents divorce and her mother is diagnosed with breast cancer.
I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to read it, and I sure as hell didn’t want to write it. Yes, there was a place for those types of stories in the world. But I just didn’t feel like I was the person to tell them.
Yes, I was young, and sure I’d faced challenges. But much like my inexperience with physical activities of the romantic variety impeded my romance writing, similarly, I didn’t have much in the way of personal angst.
I came from a good family, without much in the drama category.
My parents are still married and very much in love.
My mom’s tattas are (thankfully) cancer-free.
And yes, before I wrote that bit into the outline of the class project novel, I made her send me the results from her latest mammogram.
Why yes, I am overly dramatic and prone to anxiety, thank you very much.
My family has oodles of money thanks to the West (my mother’s maiden name) family’s vast properties and mineral rights. I have a good relationship with all of my siblings.
Maybe I’m just not cut out to write anything other than catchy copy for social media.
Or maybe I need to get out in the world and experience some life.
Hadn’t I tried that already when I’d gone to get my master’s? Hell, I’d lived in another state during that experience. None of my siblings could say the same.
I’d lived in a shitty apartment close to campus and worked as a barista at the local coffee shop.
I’d lived off ramen and three-day-old takeout.
Not because I couldn’t afford better, but because all my classmates were doing the starving artist thing, and it seemed like I should do it with them.
Plus, there was no way I was going to admit to getting monthly checks from an oil drilling company.
Not when my roommate refused to wear clothes that weren’t thrifted and carried her own cutlery around to decrease her carbon footprint.
All through grad school, I hoped that my years roughing it on the mean streets of Iowa City would forge me into an angsty literary writer. Spoiler alert, they did not.
I came home to Saddle Creek and my beloved collection of paperback romance novels wiser but still just as interested in writing smut.
But if I can’t get some real-life experience under my belt, I may be forced to admit that I’m not qualified even for that.
And by real-life experience, I mean laid. And by under my belt, I mean literally in my pants and hopefully with some fantastic oral sex.
Needless to say, I bury those hopes deep as I drive to my new day job.
As soon as I walked into the lobby of Limestone Brewery, the receptionist smiled broadly and waved.
“Addison, I have a piece of mail here for you,” she says.
“Mail?” I ask, confused. Still, I took the envelope she held out to me.
My name was scrawled across the front, and the envelope itself was sealed. Aside from it being expensive-feeling paper, the envelope was nondescript. I stepped away from the receptionist and headed to my office. Once I was enclosed inside, I slid my finger under the seal and tore open the envelope.
Inside, I found a monogrammed card. HTC. Beneath, a simple message was scrawled.
Ms. Blankenship
I have your notebook in my office.
You can come and retrieve it at your earliest convenience.
T-
Oh, God.
This was Thorne. It had to be. Hawthorne something-that-starts-with-a-T Cumberland. Thomas? Surely there were other names that began with that letter, but my mind was drawing a blank. Tad?
Focus, Addison, who cares what his middle name is!
I must have left my notebook at the bakery, and he found it before Kelsie had a chance.
Oh God!
Oh God!
That meant he had seen it. He'd seen all of my notes about my Regency story and all of my sticky notes with my admissions all over them.
Oh God!
Oh God!
This was terrible.
This was the worst.
I pulled out my phone and immediately sent an SOS to my sister.
Me: SOS!
Oliver: What's going on?
I glanced at the top of the screen. Awesome. In my haste, I’d sent my message to my sibling group chat.
Me: No, no, I just need Kelsie.
Me: This is just a Kelsie emergency, a girl emergency.
Henry: If it's about your period, we do deal with livestock. It’s not like we aren’t familiar with female bodily functions.
Me: Did you just compare me to livestock?
Me: You know what? Forget it.
Me: It’s not a period thing. It's something else entirely.
I flip over to a different screen and text my sister directly.
Me: Thorne has my notebook.
Me: All my notes.
Me: ALL of them, Kels.
Me: All my secrets were on those sticky notes.
Kelsie: Later, we will explore why you wrote your secrets on sticky notes to begin with.
Kelsie: In the meantime, calm down.
Kelsie: I'm sure there is nothing to worry about.
Me: You don’t understand.
Me: I all but admit that I am completely untouched.
Me: And also that I think he smells nice.
Kelsie: What the hell kind of notebook is this? Is it like your diary?
Me: NO! It's a story thing.
Kelsie: Okay, settle down. You don't need to yell.
Kelsie: Just breathe.
Kelsie: Go to his office, get your notebook, and laugh it off.
Kelsie: Like you did with the porn thing.
Me: Oh, God, I am a disaster.
Me: I should never have taken this job.
Me: I don't need the money.
Kelsie: No, you don’t need the money, but you do need structure.
Kelsie: And you need something to do, or you're going to drive yourself crazy.
Me: Why couldn't I just be a baker like you?
Kelsie: Because you are a disaster in the kitchen.
Me: Okay, that is fair.
Kelsie: Rip off the bandage and go get it.
Kelsie: You can always blame your “secrets” on the characters or whatever.
I’m pretty sure the death march from Star Wars is playing across the building’s speaker system. Everyone knows. They’re probably all laughing at me.
I blow out a breath when I reach Thorne’s office. His door is open, but I still knock.
“Come in,” he says.
I step inside and find him behind his desk, looking like a damn thirst trap. His gaze is locked on his computer screen. So I have a moment to oogle him.
Why does he have to have his shirt sleeves rolled up all the time? Why do I need to look at his forearms with the corded muscles, strawberry blonde hair, and the freckles? It should not be sexy for a man to have freckles, and yet it is so sexy.
Just stupidly sexy.
He’s also wearing glasses. Why is he wearing glasses? Why are his glasses so hot?
Awesome, there's a kink I didn't know I had.
I clear my throat. “Uh, I got your note,” I say.
He looks up and smiles. “Addison.” He motions me forward. “Come and sit. Let’s have a chat.”
I’m already shaking my head. “Oh, no, we don't need to have a chat. I know you're busy. I'll just take my notebook and run away. Run very far away.”
He laughs. “Come on, love, don’t be skittish. Close the door on your way over here.”
Love. He called me love. It’s a British thing. It doesn’t mean anything. I make my way over and sit in one of the chairs across from his desk.
As soon as I'm sitting, he stands and walks around to my side of the desk. Then he leans against the dark-grain wood. It's like one of those sexy man poses, you know, where they lean.
He's all like long legs and muscular, freckled arms and… what is wrong with me?
This man makes me stupid.
So stupid.
“I know you're likely embarrassed,” he says. “But you needn’t be.”
“I’m assuming that means you read it. You violated my privacy.”
He smirks. “I apologize.” Then he shakes his head. “No, I don't apologize, because the truth is, that I think you need my help.”
“I need your help? I don't think so. I don't think a lawyer can help me unless you're planning to sue me because you're offended. Or I could sue you because you violated my privacy.”
Another smirk. “That's not a thing.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “Well, it should be. Privacy violator.”
My heart is pounding so hard, so rapidly, that I’m surprised he hasn’t asked if I hear thunder.
“Addison,” he says my name with a mystifying tone; part amusement, part patience.
Is he making fun of me? The thought is horrifying, but it also doesn’t ring true.
“I don't need your help with the writing. I have a master's degree in creative writing. Thank you very much. I know how to write. I just don't have anything to actually write about because I have no life experience.”
He moves to the chair next to mine, lowering his long body with far more grace than I’ve ever had. He leans forward, bracing his elbows on his knees.
“I can help you with that in particular,” he says.
I raise my eyebrows. “What in particular?”
“Your lack of experience,” he says smoothly.
Do not look at his sexy, freckled forearms.
Do not look at his sexy glasses.
Gah, I need to get out of this room. He’s just too much sexy for me to deal with.
“You're going to have to break that down for me, because I don't know exactly what you're offering.”
He retrieves the notebook from his desk and holds it up. “Well, I can answer these questions for you. Some of the questions, at least.”
He opens the book to reveal the sticky notes. The incriminating pile of my secrets jotted down like would-be plot points.
Why? Why did I do that?
I should have been a normal weirdo and instead made some sort of a murder board at home. Where I could pin up all my stupid sticky notes and strings tied from one thing to the next.
Date with Robert. Tried to touch my boob, and I freaked out.
Freaked out and ran away because, yeah, that's who I am. I'm that girl.
I glance at the notebook and see that the note on top is not my handwriting.
It's cedar and bergamot.
Smug and sexy. That should be annoying.
“I might not have been talking about you,” I say.
He raises one brow.
I drop my head into my hands. “I feel like this is a fever dream of humiliation and that I'm going to wake up any minute now, and none of this will have actually happened.”
He shifts my chair—with me in it!—to face his. “Love, you cannot erase what has already happened. Let me help you.”
I peer at him between my fingers.
“For example, I can give you that toe-curling kiss.”
I sit up. “Kind of brazen of you to assume that you can provide that type of experience.”
“Brazen is precisely what you need.”