This is why the rules exist. To protect against this exact (okay, approximate) scenario.

There’s only one way to handle this. Be the shark, Nora.

I stand, roll my shoulders back, and approach the register.

“Is she going to buy any of those,” Charlie drawls, tipping his chin toward Libby’s tower of books, “or just get coffee all over them?”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re a natural at customer service?” I ask.

“No,” he says.

“Good. I know how you feel about liars.”

His lips part, but before he can retort, I say, “I’ll get Dusty on board—but I have a stipulation.”

Charlie’s mouth jams shut, his eyes going flinty. “Let’s hear it.”

“Your notes go through me,” I say. “Dusty’s first publisher did a real number on her psyche, and she’s just regaining her confidence. The last thing she needs is you bulldozing her self-esteem.” He opens his mouth to object, and I add, “Trust me. This is the only way it can work. If it can work at all.”

After a long moment of consideration, he stretches his hand across the desk. “Okay, Stephens, you’ve got yourself a deal.”

I shake my head. I won’t be making the mistake of touching Charlie Lastra again. “Nothing’s settled until I talk to her.”

He nods. “I’ll have my cocktail napkin and pen waiting for your signature.”

“Oh, Charlie,” I say. “How adorable that you think I’d sign a contract with anyone else’s pen.”

The corner of his mouth hitches. “You’re right,” he says. “I should’ve guessed.”

OceanofPDF.com

11

BUT SHE WASN’T due until next month,” Dusty says.

“Trust me: I tried telling her that.” I pick at a bit of peeling paint on the gazebo as I watch a plump bumblebee drunkenly spiral through the flower beds. The woods are thick with the creaking-door chirp of cicadas, and the sky’s turning a bruised shade of purple, the heat thick as ever. “But Charlie’s really excited about this book, and from what I hear, he’s great at what he does.”

Dusty says, “Didn’t we submit Once to him? And he passed?”

I tuck my phone between my shoulder and ear, moving my frizzy bangs aside. “That’s right, but even then, he was adamant that he would love to see your future projects.”

A long pause. “But you’ve never worked with him. I mean, you don’t know what his editorial tastes are like.”

“Dusty, he’s in love with these pages. I mean that. And looking at his other titles . . . I think Frigid makes sense for him.”

She sighs. “I can’t really say no, can I? I mean, not without seeming difficult.”

“Look,” I say. “We’ve pushed this deadline back before, and if we have to do it again, we will. But I think, timing wise, with the Once movie coming out, your release couldn’t be positioned much better. And I’ll be there every step of the way. I’ll run interference—do whatever I have to do to make sure you’re happy with how this book turns out. That’s what matters most.”

“That’s the other thing,” she says. “With Once, there was all this time. I had your notes before we sold the book, and—this is all happening so fast, and I knew with Sharon, we could make it work, but—I feel sort of panicked.”

“If you want my notes, I’ll get you notes,” I promise. “We can fold them into Charlie’s, so you’ll have two sets of eyes on it. Whatever you need, Dusty, I’ve got you, okay?”

She lets out a breath. “Can I think about it? Just for a day or two?”

“Of course,” I say. “Take your time.”

If Charlie Lastra has to sweat, I won’t complain.

Four of my clients have decided to have simultaneous meltdowns, about everything from overzealous line edits to lackluster marketing plans. Two more clients have sent me surprise manuscripts, mere weeks after I read their last books.

I do my best to honor my promise to Libby—to be fully present with her after five every day—but that just means I hardly come up for air during the workday.

As different as we are, my sister and I are both creatures of habit, and we fall into a rhythm almost immediately.

She wakes first, showers, then reads on the deck with a steaming cup of decaf. I get up and run until I can barely breathe, take a scorching shower, and meet her at the breakfast table as she’s dishing up hash browns or ricotta pancakes or veggie-stuffed quiche.

The next fifteen minutes are devoted to a detailed description of Libby’s dreams (famously grisly, disturbing, erotic, or all three). Afterward, we FaceTime with Bea and Tala at Brendan’s mom’s house, during which Bea recounts her dreams while Tala runs around, almost knocking things over and shrieking, Look, Nono! I’m a dinosaur!

From there, I head to Goode Books, leaving Libby to call Brendan and do whatever else she wants during her treasured alone time.

Charlie and I exchange sharp-edged pleasantries and I pay him for a cup of coffee and then settle into my spot in the café, where I refuse to give him the satisfaction of glancing his way no matter how often I feel his eyes on me.

By the third morning, he has my coffee waiting by the register. “What a surprise,” he says. “Here at eight fifty-two, same as yesterday and the day before.”

I grab the coffee and ignore the dig. “Dusty’s giving me her answer tonight, by the way,” I say. “A free coffee isn’t going to change anything.”

He drops his voice, leans across the counter. “Because you’re holding out hope for a giant check?”

“No,” I say. “It can be a normal-sized check, just needs a lot of zeroes.”

“When I want something, Nora,” he says, “I don’t give up easily.”

Externally, I’m unaffected. Internally, my heart lurches against my collarbone from his closeness or his voice or maybe what he just said. My phone buzzes with an email, and I take it out, grateful for the distraction. Until I see the message from Dusty: I’m in.

I resist an urge to clear my throat and instead meet his eyes coolly. “Looks like you can forget the check. You’ll have pages by the end of the week.”

Charlie’s eyes flash with a borderline vicious excitement.

“Don’t look so victorious,” I say. “She’s asked me to be involved every step of the way. Your edits go through me.”

“Is that supposed to scare me?”

“It should. I’m scary.”

He pitches forward over the desk, biceps tightening, mouth in a sultry pout. “Not with those bangs. You’re extremely approachable.”

Most days I don’t see Libby until after work. Sometimes I even get back to the cottage before her, and she guards her alone time so jealously that every time I ask her how she spent those nine hours, she gives me an increasingly ridiculous answer (hard drugs; torrid affair with a door-to-door vacuum salesman; started the paperwork to join a cult). On Friday, though, she joins me around lunchtime with veggie sandwiches from Mug + Shot that are about eighty percent kale. With a full mouth, she says, “This sandwich tastes exceptionally unplugged.”