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“Thanks. I’m glad you came. I want to talk to you about something.” There’s probably a better way to play this, butI’ve never been one for subterfuge. And there are enough lies between us already.
She frowns and shuts the door. By the time she’s facing me again, she’s smiling, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “I’m sorry I lied about having to go to work early. I had a few things to take care of for Fernwood.” She sets the bag on my desk and warm, delicious scents rise out of it. “A few loose ends to tie up, but I didn’t want you to get upset about me still doing work for him, so…”
“Why would I get upset about that?”
“Because you think he takes advantage of me, asks too much of me. I didn’t want to get into an argument.”
I’ve mentioned in the past that I think Fernwood takes advantage of Daisy, but we’ve never fought about it.
“I talked to Sadie. She’s worried about you.”
She pulls a paper-wrapped sandwich out of the bag and hands it to me, before taking out her own sandwich and carefully opening the wrapping and flattening it on the desk. “Areyouworried about me? Do you think I’m an irredeemable workaholic like Sadie does?”
Damn it. I really don’t want to go there. “Before three weeks ago, I hadn’t seen you in more than eighteen months and, before that, we only saw each other now and then. I don’t know enough about your life to know whether you have a problem.”
“That sounds like an evasion.” She lifts her chin, glaring at me, but there’s a vulnerability there, a fear echoed in my chest. I can’t push too hard or I might lose her.
“I’ve been busy too. It’s not an evasion, but Sadie told me—”
“What? That I’ve go no life outside of work? That I nearly killed myself working too hard?” She’s angry now, her hands flat on my desk on either side of her sandwich, her eyes narrowed, but she’s keeping her voice level. “Did you two compare notesand find me lacking? Because I have to warn you, Noah, she exaggerates.”
“I’ve never known her to exaggerate.” I speak as gently as I can, but she’s radiating tension like a porcupine who’s popped her spikes into firing position.
Her smile is tight. “The book I was working on is ah-mazing. Do you know how easily a good book can get lost in the sea of manuscripts, new and old? It wasn’t about my career, Noah, it was about supporting a talented author.”
I don’t want to be the bad guy here, but I can’t continue to see her so miserable without at least trying to help. “But if it did well, it would help your career. It would be the third book you’ve acquired that hit the top of the lists. It would be promotion-making stuff.”
“It was promotion making.” She speaks through gritted teeth, her justified anger clear. “I deserved that promotion.”
“You absolutely did, and it was criminal that you didn’t get it. Fernwood sounds like a misogynist and an asshole.”
She relaxes. “Right.” She waves a hand. “What I do is important. I’m not going to say it’s as important as what you do, but books save lives too. I just want to bring amazing books to people so they can be saved the way books saved me when I was a kid. It’s not working too hard.”
“I’m not saying it is. All I’m saying is you’re unhappy and, based on what Sadie told me, you were unhappy in New York even before you quit.” Sadie didn’t say that exactly, but she wouldn’t be worried if Daisy had been cheerily working herself to death. “You deserve to be happy.”
“I’m happy when the world makes sense, Noah. I’m happy working in a field I love and getting ahead in a logical way. Getting overlooked for that promotion is what made me unhappy.”
She’s evading again. “Sadie said you’re working at Lovemore Publishing to poach an author. That doesn’t sound like you.”
She freezes, her eyes going wide, panic flashing. “Tenth Avenue Books has resources Lovemore doesn’t. It’s a better fit for this rock star author. I’m helping her to thrive.”
“And hurting a lot of people along the way? Hurting yourself by sacrificing your principles and your health to get ahead?”
“Would you say that to a man?” Her glare is deadly. “Would you tell a man he needs to find a hobby or give up on his dream?”
I jab a finger in my chest. “I’ve said it to myself. I could have gone on tour after tour with Doctors without Borders. I could have gone to work at a top hospital and never taken a day off, but I need downtime. My hobbies need more than an hour a weekend. So I dropped everything and explored the National Parks.”
“Easy to do when you have a trust fund.”
I roll my eyes. “Give me a fucking break. You didn’t get into publishing to get rich.”
She sniffs and wraps up her sandwich. “I need to get back to work. I told Joy I’d only be gone an hour.”
“Joy? Is she your new boss?”
Daisy stuffs her sandwich back in the bag. “Don’t worry, there’s not enough work there for me to overdo it.”
I stare at her, biting back a million stupid things I want to say. “Did they hire you on for the short term? Just until you go back to New York? Have you told them you’re planning to steal one of their authors?”
