Chapter 2
ANNABEL PUSHED THROUGH THE GLASS DOOR AND INTO RECEPTION with no time to spare.
Stella wasn’t known to be on a schedule—ten o’clock was the earliest she’d been sighted in weeks—but Annabel couldn’t risk missing her chance.
Balancing a cardboard carrier with three coffee drinks, she gave one to the receptionist in exchange for a stack of mail, put the second on her own desk beside a mangy old cat fast asleep on her slush pile, then pushed into Stella’s minimalist office, all cool colors and sharp edges.
Her high-gloss lacquer desk was a just-so, everything-in-its-place affair.
Annabel set Stella’s triple-ristretto flat white to the east of her desktop monitor, the west of her marble inbox, south of the framed photos (Stella with various authors du jour), and north of her limited-edition gold fountain pen, a gift from a former lover Stella kept not for nostalgia of any kind, but for its sharp nib and smooth hand.
Annabel pulled the manuscript from her tote and placed it neatly at the top of Stella’s inbox, rehearsing what she’d say while she sorted through mail, magazines, catalogues.
“I know nothing annoys you more than everyone thinking they can write,” Annabel said to herself. “And I would never ask if it weren’t . . . for a good friend.”
She stopped short when a British Interiors rose to the top of the pile.
Gracing its cover was a painted watercolor portrait of Annabel’s hero, idol, and guide in all things, wearing a pale Regency gown with her topaz cross about her neck, sitting at a simple writing desk under a sashed window, pen in hand, beneath the title: “In Jane Austen’s World. ”
Annabel sighed, bit her lip, and lost her nerve. She plucked her manuscript from the inbox and walked to gaze out on the cityscape, trying to recover her courage.
“Actually, it’s not a friend, Stella. It’s me.”
“I’d stick with the friend if I were you,” said a voice from behind.
She turned to find Stephen Chao leaning against the door.
He was fiendishly handsome, Stella’s chosen writer of the moment, though he had started exactly where she was now, as a lowly assistant.
He had a pub date fast approaching for his new novel and a spot on several “most anticipated summer books” lists.
Annabel generally thought him out of her league, but that didn’t prevent her being besotted with him, and even, on some days, believing him semi-besotted back.
“Stella’s Rule Number One, remember?” he said. “No writers need apply.”
“I know. I wasn’t exactly lying when I got the job. It’s just—I never thought I’d have the nerve to tell her.” Annabel looked down at her novel. “Which obviously I don’t.”
Stephen stretched out his hand. “Then let it be a friend of mine.”
She held her breath and handed over the book, the thing upon which all her hopes hinged.
“What You Wish For,” he read from the title page.
“Too frivolous?”
“By Elliot Price-Bennet?”
“Too obvious?”
“That you did a mash-up of Austen heroines to come up with your pen name? Maybe a little.”
“You’re right. It’s stupid.” She reached to take it back, but Stephen pulled it away.
“But maybe lose the ribbon?”
“Right.”
Stephen dispensed with the ribbon and opened to page one, reading aloud.
“ ‘Whether a single waltz might be sufficient to alter the course of one young woman’s life was the last whisper on many lips on the eve of Clara Winter’s first ball.’ ”
He looked at Annabel. “Waltzing, hmm?”
Annabel pinched the sides of her dress and curtsied gracefully. “‘Fine dancing, I believe, like virtue, must be its own reward.’”
Stephen cocked an eyebrow, even more irresistible. “Gotta love a girl who can quote Emma.”
“All her books,” Annabel said, “pretty much by heart.”
Stephen set the manuscript down. “You’re not quite of this world, are you, Annabel Blake?”
She shrugged. “It’s the only world on offer.”
He stepped closer, touching the lace at her collar.
“Part of me wants to kiss you right now, but something tells me it would be wrong,” he said. “Though that never stopped me before.”
She wondered if he could hear her heart beating too. “Well, don’t let it start stopping you now?”
She was about to close her eyes and pucker her lips, when Stephen, instead of kissing her, took her playfully into a waltzing stance.
“My dirty little secret?” he said. “I was a cotillion kid too.”
Stephen waltzed her about the room, counting out loud. “One-two-three, one-two three . . .” He didn’t know the footwork like she did, but Annabel was happy to let him lead. Happy for his attention at all.
“Sorry to interrupt your little cotillion, dears, but I’m in no mood!”
Just like that, Stella Barron burst in like a summer storm.
Annabel stepped back awkwardly as Stephen turned his attention to Stella, who liked being the center of it.
She was a woman of a certain age, high expectations, and low tolerance—an Americanized ex-pat, except for the posh English accent that only made her more feared by everyone except her own “stable of authors,” whom she fêted aggressively.
Maisy, the old cat, followed her in with a whining meow as Stella sat on her sleek leather sofa to slip out of her Hokas and into her heels.
“I have to cancel the Hamptons! It’s my mother.”
“I thought she was dead,” said Stephen.
“Oh, but that wasn’t enough.” Stella walked to her desk. “Besides leaving me her decrepit puking cat, she tosses in that crumbling old pile of a country house!”
“Everyone in England wants a crumbling old country house,” said Stephen.
“That’s why I left England!” said Stella, wielding a letter opener to attack the pile of mail, when she picked up the British Interiors and scowled. “Why do they keep sending me this shit? I give fuck-all about ‘Jane Austen’s World.’”
“How can you say that?” Annabel blurted it out before she could stop herself.
“Jane Austen is dead to me. There. I said that too.”
“She doesn’t mean it,” Stephen said to Annabel. “She’s just mad she didn’t think of zombies or sea monsters!”
Stella sat in her chair. “The whole Regency world can bugger off for all I care.”
Annabel spotted her manuscript on the desk. She wanted to snatch it up but feared drawing attention to it.
“In fact, as far as I’m concerned,” Stella said, “Sotheby’s can take the whole bloody lot away. But oh, no! Aunt Bunty insists I come have a ‘look-see’ at Kidlington House for anything of sentimental value.”
“But you don’t value sentiment,” said Stephen.
“Exactly! But that’s my summer holiday! Instead of the Hamptons, I get two hellish weeks. And a house full of Hepplewhites!”
“Real Hepplewhites?” said Annabel, forgetting herself again.
Just then, Maisy jumped onto the desk, causing Stella to shoo her off. “This fucking cat.”
Annabel stepped forward to rescue Maisy, but she was already puking all over Stella’s abstract modernist rug.
“On cue!” said Stella.
Annabel looked between her manuscript, the cat vomit, and Stephen, who saw her dilemma. Thinking fast, he grabbed the manuscript and held it high.
“I may have just the thing to cheer you up, Stella. It’s possible I’ve discovered a brilliant new writer!”
Annabel was stunned by the gesture.
Stella eyed the manuscript greedily. “Real-ly?”
“Well, I’m only on page one. But I love her sensibility.”
Between flattered and mortified, Annabel swept the cat into her arms, eager to escape. “C’mon, Maisy. Let’s get something to clean up this mess.” She slipped out and around the corner to the supply cabinet, when she heard the double ding of a text on Stella’s phone.
“Shit. That bitch Caroline’s backing out of dinner tonight.”
“Caroline’s not a bitch,” said Stephen.
“She is if she backs out of dinner, morning of. Now we’re uneven!”
“Good. Let’s cancel the whole thing.”
“Darling. Don’t be silly. You’re the guest of honor. I’ll think of someone,” Stella said. “Wait! Why not invite your brilliant new writer?”
Annabel froze at the door, squeezing a roll of paper towels. She could see Stephen, and he could see her, but Stella didn’t know she was there.
“Better yet, why not Annabel?” he said.
Stella scoffed. “My Annabel?”
“She’s not your Annabel, Stella. She’s an interesting young woman with aspirations, dreams—a life.”
Annabel was grateful Stella couldn’t see her blushing.
“Are you kidding? I mean, I admit she’s the most capable assistant I’ve had, present company included.” Stella lowered her voice. “But as far as I can tell, she’s got no life, no boyfriends, or friends, for that matter!”
“Maybe no one’s good enough for her.”
“‘Good’ is definitely the problem. I mean, have you met her? She’s like Laura Ashley’s wet dream!”
“Laura who?” he asked.
“Good Lord. Am I that old, or just that English?” Stella shouted toward the door. “Annabel! This cat puke isn’t cleaning itself!”
Now doom-hugging the paper towels, Annabel steeled herself and walked in, careful not to make eye contact. She kneeled down to wipe up the cat vomit, hoping to escape with one shred of her dignity intact.
“Annabel, you’re free for a dinner party this evening, aren’t you?” said Stephen.
Annabel looked up. “Oh, I couldn’t.”
“See? She couldn’t,” said Stella.
“I am the guest of honor, Stella. You said so yourself.”
“Oh, fine, then. Annabel, I’d love to have you, of course.”
Annabel stood with a wad of dirty paper towels, dignity hanging by a thread. She looked between Stella, tapping her French silver-tipped nails on the desk, and Stephen, with her manuscript under his arm. Her future, it seemed, was in both their hands.