Chapter One
Two Truths and a Lie?:
One shouldn’t date their neighbor just to gain internet access.
John Kater’s books are the epitome of white male privilege.
Pumpkin spice is a crime against humanity.
“What in Bowie's name have you done to my store?”
I gasped, avoiding a near collision with a customer and clutching my chest, cursing at just how out of shape I was.Three faces turned my way. One of them smiled.?
“Surprise?”
My best friend’s bleach-blonde head stuck out like a lightbulb. Otis’s smile was so bright it nearly blinded me. His customer service smile. “I didn’t think you’d come in early today.”
I held a finger up high, trying to regain the breath that I’d lost cursing at my neighbor Dan (through the wall), cycling like a maniac past every red light and nearly getting hit by a car, twice, on my way here.?
The other faces belonged to two young women who looked surprised at being interrupted mid-book-purchase by a yelling stranger. Otis, meanwhile, gave them a placid look, like he was saying,Oh this person? That’s just Nora. Our village crazy.?
I’d do anything for Otis—steal a horse, give a speech—but when I looked around Skye’s Books, my heart and soul, I wanted to strangle him until his fake lashes popped off.
Normally, just unlocking the stiff door to my shop melted tension from my shoulders. I’d breathe in deep, smile at the crooked wooden shelves, the cozy worn sofa, the display of glorious 1970–1985 pulp covers in the corner.
Not today. Today, I felt like someone had kicked me in my nonexistent balls. Because everywhere I looked, there he was: smug grin, raven hair, and thatI could shave, but I need the edgestubble. Otis had decorated my church with none other than New York Times bestselling author John Kater.
Posters plastered the walls—conveniently covering the peeling paint—and flyers littered the tables. Smack in the middle stood a life-sized cardboard cutout of the man himself, grinning condescendingly down at me.? Taunting me to look at him, to melt into a puddle, and liquidate my monthly savings into mediocre airport reads.?
Beneath the posters, every surface of Skye’s was stacked with his latest bestselling adventure romp,Earth's Core.An acid-green cover featuring a fireball in space. A toddler could have made it.? Not that I knew many toddlers.
It was a terrible waste of perfectly good bookstore space. At least my pride and joy, the Lew Elliot shelf, had been untouched.
“I am going to kill you,” I muttered, tossing my bag behind the counter and booting up the ancient computer.
“Nah. You’re gonna kiss me.” Otis pointed toward the door. A line. An actuallineof customers had formed. My jaw dropped. We never had a line. We should make this a national holiday.
“People are going bananas for him,” Otis said. “You can’t deny he’s the hottest thing on the market right now. The phone wouldn’t stop ringing for preorders. I barely had time to flirt.”
I scowled some more, tapping my fingers impatiently on the counter. “You know what I think of his books,” I said under my breath. He rolled his eyes dramatically.
“You gotta get over yourself.” He handed a bag to a smiling teen. “So, why were you sprinting through Middleton like Mia Wallace on speed?”
I took a sharp breath in as the screen finally lit up, then opened my manuscript and checked the time. I had wasted precious moments being distracted by John Fucking Kater.?
“You remember Dan, my neighbor?”
Otis grinned.“The hot guy with the neck tattoo?”
“Yes. He changed his Wi-Fi password, my data’s empty, and I am” —I checked the clock— “eight minutes from the deadline.”
The connection popped up. Haller & Mark’s website loaded on the submission site. At the bottom of the page was a green button. I selected my file then let out an exhausted rush of air while I skimmed the website I knew by heart.
The publisher was searching nationwide for the one writer who’d pick up where Lew Elliot had left off. The internet said he was ready to retire, but rumor was, even though Captain Caruso and the Sky Pirates were a national treasure, the publisher was pushing for a fresh perspective. Which was my cue.
Even though millions had read his books, following the band of misfits on their ship, the HMS Samurai, these books were my home. No one knew them better than I did. I spent my nights sitting by the light of the laptop, typing away adventures. And after cracking half a million likes on my last Captain Caruso fan fiction, I couldtastethe $100,000 prize money.
It tasted like fucking freedom.Like rent paid. Like champagne popped in celebration of finally being debt free.
