1
Erin
My mother always told me I was too young to be so stressed.
She told me when I was just six, learning to tie my shoes, furious the older kids could do it.
She told me when I fussed over going to the prom or not-- not, by the way, because all the boys were too immature.
And she told me when I sent my first query letter to an agent for my books.
Maybe she was right those other times, but now, as I pace outside the far too grandiose doors of that very same agent who agreed to take me on, I know this is when it's okay to be stressed. Who cares if I'm only eighteen? I’ve always felt older, anyway. An old soul.
Which, my agent Michael told me, is a great quality. Now I'm here, pacing outside his office with its elaborate doors. All he cares about are those fucking doors. He constantly tells the story about buying them off some church in South America. Or something like that. If I’m honest, I don’t really listen when he goes on tangents about places I've never been in my short time on this earth. I let him talk and I go back to working out a plot problem or tweaking a piece of dialogue. All in my own head, of course.
Right now, I’m waiting for him to finish reading the final chapters of the book that I’ve been working on for months, before I finished high school, in fact. It's been slowly coming together, put aside for other ideas that seemed better but weren't. That's why they were always rejected. But this? This is the one. Finally, I think that he’ll agree to send me on submission. I can practically taste it with this book. The characters leap off the page, the emotions are there; the dialogue is snappy, and the sex is hot.
I’m not one of those writers that thinks everything they write is god’s gift to man and that it’s going to be a worldwide bestseller, but I can see this one doing well. Hopefully. Optimistically. God, I hope that he likes it. I can’t stop biting my nails and wearing a path in the plush carpet.
My heart jumps into my throat when I hear footsteps. The door opens and he puts his head out. “Come on in, Erin.”
There are approximately a million baby kangaroos jumping up and down in my stomach. Joeys. That’s what they’re called. I sit in one of the big chairs on this side of Michael’s desk and do my best not to fidget. He was happy to take me on as my first agent, but nothing I've given him has stuck. Either I’ve been just behind a trend, didn’t hit the tropes hard enough, or I just wasn’t writing well enough. He'd always assure me the big idea was coming, that I was just too fresh, too young. I’ve been driving myself crazy trying to get a book exactly right.
It’s not like he’s stifling me. Michael Collins is one of the best literary agents in New York. Maybe even the best. The fact that he took a chance on me at all is a miracle.
He drops the stack of pages on his desk. “So,” he says. “How do you feel?”
“Nervous,” I say.
“Why?”
I shake my head. “Because I finally feel like this book is good enough to be the one and I’m dying to know what you think about it.”
He smiles, but with that smile my stomach drops, because I’ve seen that smile before and it’s the smile that comes with an apology. “I think that it’s almost there.”
The urge to tear up is immediate, but I force it back. I need to be a professional. “Revisions?”
“Actually,” he says, “I have a bit of a different idea. I think you need to get out of your own head and expand your writing in a different direction.”
“How am I going to do that?”
“Help Malik Ellis on his latest book.”
I stare at Michael, feeling my eyebrows rise into my hairline. Malik Ellis is the king of erotic romance. Against all odds, he’s carved out a name for himself in a female dominated genre and has managed to do so without being a complete prick and misogynist. Or at least that’s how it appears from the outside.
Not to mention that Mr. Ellis happens to be smoking fucking hot, and everyone who’s ever read one of his books has ended up with one hand in their pants, thinking about one of his characters. Or possibly him.
And I do mean everyone. Men and women.
Including me.
My mother never found the books of his that I'd sneak home. Lying in my bed at night, Malik's words guided me to discover more about my inexperienced body than I ever would have guessed. He was my first crush, in a way.
“What would Malik Ellis want with someone like me?”
“He has a deadline and is stuck. I’m not going back to the publisher and asking for more time. Again. So, he’s going to need a ghostwriter, and I’m not taking no for an answer.”
At first thought, my excitement blooms. Writing for someone like that? That would be amazing even if no one knew it was me. But then the second thought comes. “If I’m not good enough to have a book published on my own merit, then why am I good enough to ghost the book of one of the most popular romance writers in America?”
Michael fixes me with a stare that tells me he thinks I’m completely missing the point. “He’s stuck, not stupid. Once you give him the draft to get past whatever block he has, he’ll take it and polish it up. Give it that Malik Ellis shine.”
I swallow. “That makes sense. I guess.”
“So do you want to do it?”
“How much is the payment?”
Michael slides a piece of paper across the desk, and I almost roll my eyes because people don’t seriously do that in real life, do they?
But holy shit. The number on that paper? There are enough zeroes to keep me afloat for a long time even without getting published myself. “Wow.”
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
“Doesn’t he want to meet me first? Or read some of my writing?”
Michael stands. “We’re about to take care of that first bit right now. The second part, I already told you. He’ll polish it, and I already know you’re good enough for the basic draft. He doesn’t really have an option here. I’m backed into a corner, and I’m not letting any of us get any deeper into this.”
I try not to take offense that I’m only good enough for the basic draft, but he has a point. The world of publishing waits for no one. Not even Malik Ellis. Michael’s hands are pretty much tied. I’m sure that Malik would understand that, too.
“Wait,” I say. “What do you mean we’re about to take care of the first part?”
Behind me, one of the giant doors swings open and the man starring in my thoughts strides in. “Michael, I swear to God if you made me come all the way downtown in Manhattan traffic for something that could have been a phone call, we’re going to have words.”
He stops when he sees me, and I quickly stand. Michael has his back turned, pouring two drinks from the bar in the corner of his office.
“Sorry,” Malik says. “Didn’t expect anyone else.”
Wow, the photos of him do not do him justice. Not just hot, the man is lava. You can feel his presence from across the room, and he’s every inch the person I imagined him to be. Worn jeans that look sleek on him, and a slouchy t-shirt. Glasses and mussed hair that give him the sexy silver-fox vibe.