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“Whatever it is, it can’t be terrible enough to tank your career. I’ve seen some pretty crazy things happen this past decade.” Parvati kept talking, even though she claimed to give Rhea plenty of opportunities to answer. “That’s the new digital age we live in. Since e-books finally took off, people are openly hungry for some of the craziest drivel you’veeverread. I love it. Makes my job as a professional reader so much more interesting! So what is it?” Parvati leaned across the table, removing her sunglasses. “A campy slasher book? Schlocky sci-fi? A Tom Clancy ripoff that will certainly get us sued into oblivion?” Parvati was still laughing. “Can you imagine! You really do look the type to read some Clancy, Rhea.”
“My dad reads a lot of Tom Clancy. Does that count?”
“Ha! I love it.”
Rhea shifted her gaze to the other diners on the shaded Beverly Hills patio. Although a large plant and a fountain separated her from the other people having business lunches in that part of town, she was still too shy to loudly proclaim, “It’s more like aFifty Shadesknockoff.”
“Oh?” Parvati’s elbow slid off the table. “Oh.”
“Yeah.” Rhea already regretted this. “Just for fun. I wanted to try writing things totally not like what I usually submit. Purge some ideas that were knocking around my noggin.”
“Interesting.” Whatever went through Parvati’s mind was as elusive as a chilly Santa Ana breeze. All Rhea could say was that she wasn’t confident in that scheming look on a New York editor’s face.
“As I said, I wasn’t planning on submitting it to you guys, or anywhere else for that matter. It’s for fun while I figure out what ‘serious’ thing I want to write next. Maybe it’ll give me ideas.” She was already toying with a plot idea involving a woman rediscovering herself through ridiculous fantasies that would never come true.
Parvati still tapped her lips with a perfectly painted pink nail. “We do have our other imprint, you know,” she said, voice low. “TheForever Escapesline. It’s basically allFifty Shadesknockoffs.”
“Oh?” Rhea genuinely didn’t know.
“Of course, we don’t bill them that way, and erotic romance is older than Harlequin. But… are you sure you don’t want to publish the current thing you’re working on? Honestly, you write quickly enough we could get two names going at once under different imprints.”
Rhea’s heart tumbled toward her stomach, hitting every rib along the way. “I would fucking die,” she flatly said.
Something about her discomfort made Parvati laugh again as if Rhea wereso real and relatablethat this jaded New York cynic couldn’t keep herself from falling in love with such wholesome wit.
“Honey,” she exclaimed, “it would be under a different name,obviously.”
No, Rhea knew that. In fact, she would demand it should it come to fruition.My dad can’t know. My friends can’t know. I don’t even want Paige to know.What Rhea wrote was private. It was forher.She was as interested in sharing her sexual fantasies with the world as she was sucking her wife’s toes.We’ve all got our boundaries.Foot worship was one of Rhea’s.
“Why don’t you send me some of what you’re working on?” Parvati took out one of her business cards, which Rhea already had. Instead of handing it straight over, though, she wrote something on the white side. “This is my personal email. As long as it doesn’t hit my work email, we can consider it off the record. I can tell you if there’s something we can work with over atForever Escapes.Of course, you’d be passed to their head editor, but I can attest the woman knows a hit when she sees one. She’s the one responsible for Codie Savage and Grace St. Michaels.” Parvati realized she had to explain to Rhea who those women were. “Codie Savage won a Rita Award from the Romance Writers of America, and Grace St. Michael’s latest release broke the record for longest run in the New York Times top ten for a romance novel. Trust me. If Sheila over atForever Escapeslikes you, it can open new avenues.”
“I’m not sure…”
“Hey, don’t send me something if you don’t want.” Parvati shrugged. “I’m simply telling you that we might be interested in changing your life yet again. You can’t tell me that we haven’t been very good to you, Rhiannon.”
Rhea pretended she hadn’t been called that name. “I’ll think about it. Can’t say I’m jonesing to be a part-time romance writer. Besides, you’ve got to know that I’m gay, right? I’m not writing anything sexy between a man and a woman. It’s women all the way down.”
“Publisherslovegay stuff these days. We haven’t met our quota for next year yet, so you’d have a real shot if Sheila likes it.”
Our quota. Gotcha.This was exactly what Rhea wanted to avoid. Her literature was rarely about her and more about the random characters and stories that appeared in her head. She could write about a jilted housewife with three kids going to her high school reunion where everyone expected her to still be cheerleader chic, but only if she didn’t have to writeintimatescenes with the main character’s husband.I wouldn’t know the first thing about it.Everything Rhea knew about straight relationships, let alone sex, came from the media and what her friends openly talked about. Last she checked, the masses weren’t exactly champing at the bit to read the lesbianFifty Shades,no matter how much lip service they offered on their social media profiles.
“I might.” That was all Rhea would commit to as she willed this meeting to end. “Although I am working on a new lit-fic novel. I promise.”
Parvati scoffed. “Don’t get me wrong, we love the awards and buzz that come from our more literary fiction, but it’s the dirty romance that pays the bills in the company.”
Rhea wasn’t surprised to hear that, but she was still reticent to commit. Like a lot of things in her life lately, that sounded like something with the power to change things for the better… or the worse.
She had to consider her options carefully. The last thing Rhea wanted was to rock the boat too much. Both in her career… and in her marriage.
Yet some things were already past the point of no return, weren’t they?
Part 3
Rekindling the Love
Chapter 21
Thesummerworeontoward September, a time when Rhea often felt her most human. She hated to admit it, but shewasthe woman who loved pumpkin spice, cozy sweaters, and kitschy Halloween décor that went on clearance two days before the big day. Living in LA her whole life, though, she rarely had a good excuse to indulge all three at once. It was like searching for snow on Christmas.
