Page 2

I turn from the wall and pace back, and Lyla, with her apathetic, I-hate-these-meetings gaze, sweeps her eyes over my manuscript. As she does so, her face clears. She raises one perfectly arched brow. “Is that . . . ?”

“I promised I’d turn it in today,” I reply.

“Yeah, but . . . here?”

So this is what it feels like, being the one on the receiving end of a raised eyebrow.

All our lives it has been the other way around. Me, the rule keeper, the one staying tightly within the lines. Lyla, the free spirit. Smuggling in her diary—vibrantly pink and covered in hearts on the outside, secrets within—into middle school in seventh grade and holding it brazenly open during lunch period while I silently have a panic attack on her behalf. Lyla, gaily pitching in with the other seniors to fill up Principal Peterson’s office with orange cones during spirit week, all while I stand guard, listening to my knees quake.

“I have to send it in today,” I repeat swiftly. “I just need a few minutes to squeeze a last edit in.”

Out of the corner of my eye, a man steps up to the podium beside Ms. Pennington, and she shakes his hand.

Like they’ve never met before.

Like this isn’t the only human being standing before her with half her chromosomes.

I stifle a grin and keep on.

The thing is, everyone knows Ms. Pennington’s son got sacked from Sterling House three months ago. Everyone was on high alert the day we got the mass Pub News email. It informed not only the employees at Pennington but every reputable publisher, literary agent, film agent, and everyone else related to the industry down to the aspiring author tapping away in some basement that Sterling House’s newest editorial director was Jim Arrowood. Ms. Pennington’s beloved son had not simply been on furlough during the pandemic of 2020. He had been replaced.

The son of the Queen of Hearts had been tossed out of New York City and landed here, back in Nashville.

And now Ms. Pennington is patching up her son’s situation.

“Thank you for the introduction.” William Pennington clasps both sides of the podium, just as his mother did. His posture is as perfect as his mother’s, as though they both have rods attached to their spine. They look like a couple of penguins standing side by side in impeccable gray suits—the kind that are sleek and mind-numbingly dull and that few in this room could afford. His striking icicle-blue eyes—also the same as his mother’s—pierce the room. And like her, he frowns.

Gazes at us as if we’re juvenile delinquents trying to break out of the bus.

“I’m William Pennington. Some of you may remember me as a child.”

“Little Willy!” In the front, old Bernie Peterson (Pennington Trophy, thirty-four years) waves, and William, without smiling, nods curtly.

“I won’t keep you unnecessarily. Authors are now making their way to us for the conference, and we all know how imperative it is to prepare as much as possible. From what I’ve gathered, nobody wants a repeat of two years ago.”

I halt.

Great. Just grrrreeeat.

My stomach lurches, just as it always does at the mention of my first Librarians of America Conference and Exhibition—or, for short, LOA. I raise my manuscript higher to avoid anyone’s eyes.

So, I had done this tiny, innocuous thing of losing four hundred books and the entire set of promotional materials for my author, who had flown across the country for his signing. He’d ended up signing bits of scrap paper and bookmarks that were actually promotions for other authors and—in one incredibly uncomfortable moment—one man’s bulging bicep.

There’s a lot to remember for these big events. Not easy when you’ve only worked for the company a total of two weeks, okay?

4200 steps.

Maybe Ms. Pennington hadn’t specifically said who’d done it, I tell myself, moving my eyes from my watch and flipping a page. Maybe William had just been told the story in an off-handed way, like, “Yes, one of our employees—who turned out be quite bright, really, an invaluable employee during these harsh and trying times—had the unfortunate experience of being undertrained as a new hire, and, poor thing, she ended up having to . . .”

I half listen as I march on, my eyes scanning for any misspellings or glaring errors. There aren’t many, only one or two notes every dozen pages, which only fuels the inner fire hungry to run up to my office and email the manuscript right now.

Ms. Pennington wouldn’t fire me for a bathroom break, would she? I mean, yes, technically Donna got The Email two days after dashing to the bathroom with the stomach bug. But that was coincidental. Right? That had to have been coincidental.

And how many times have I edited this manuscript at this point? Two dozen times? Fifty times? A hundred? Whatever it is, it certainly feels like a thousand.

And that feeling, as I’ve told my own authors so many times, means it’s done. It’s finally ready. That’s the telling moment.

Or when the deadline hits. Whichever comes first.