by Laudat, Reon
“Legend has it I was reading my first book at the age of three.”
“Asimov? Yeah, right. BS detector twitching like crazy right about now.”
“Okay, okay, so I actually zipped right through Pat the Bunny at three. Asimov came a little later.”
“Just a little later, huh? I doubt I was reading at three, but I’ve had a love for books for as long as I can remember. The library was my playground. And nothing was more intriguing than a massive card catalog. It was a map to endless treasures. Computers are more efficient, but I miss card catalogs.”
“Me, too,” Dominic said.
“A science fiction geek. Why am I not surprised?”
“I was big bully bait —a sci-fi geek in glasses, who sometimes wore blue or white streaks in my hair.”
“Tell me more about teen Dominic.”
“Well, I also wrote morose poetry on the side.”
“Poetry? Get out!”
“I’ll treat you to a sample.” He cleared his throat as if to give a Shakespearean reading.
“Like a tin soldier in a losing skirmish,
Feigning laryngitis,
Hiding fetid filth, dirt, scum,
Enemies of man,
Readily, greedily, and shamelessly accepting man’s refuse.
Playground for maggots, cockroaches, flies,
Away with you!
Bastard!”
“That was titled ‘Ode to a Garbage Can,’” he said in closing.
“That was boss!” Kendra added enthusiastic finger snaps as if at a fifties Beat Poetry reading. “I, mean, a real blast, Daddy-O.”
“Pretty awful, huh?”
“Not nearly as bad as my junior high attempts at creative expression. My best girlfriend, Jewel, and I used to do sleepovers and make up tributes to our favorite groups at the time. She choreographed our dances and did beatbox. I wrote the rap.”
“You wrote hip-hop songs? I’m impressed.”
“Well, one hip-hop song. One pitiful hip-hop song.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“Oh, no.”
“I shared ‘Ode to a Garbage Can.’ How about a little quid pro quo here.” He reached over and tickled her middle.
“It’s hard without Jewel as my beatbox.” Kendra laughed, swatting his hands away.
“I’ll be your beatbox. Jump in when you’re ready. Go on, bust a rhyme or two for a bro or Daddy-O.”
When Dominic bobbed his head and performed verbal percussion complete with one-hand chest and thigh taps, she went for it, speak-singing her heart out.
A few verses later, Kendra still had a big grin on her face. “I’m pretty sure I out-awfuled your awful.”
“I’m calling a tie. Jay Z has nothing to fear from either of us.”
“I’ve never shared that with anyone but Jewel, Aunt Jackie, and Uncle Alex,” Kendra said, mystified by the gleeful abandon Dominic brought out in her.
“Meanwhile, I made the dumb mistake of scribbling my poems in a composition book when I was bored in class. Kyle Davis swiped one of those notebooks and read my, um, lyricism to the class. Thought I’d never live that down.”
“Awww. What happened?”
“One tough guy dared to put his hands on me after that. He pushed me down not once, not twice, but three times after I’d warned him to back off. I had to dole out one good ol’ fashioned ass whupping. Word got around I took taekwondo. They said, ‘Dorky Dom is a bookworm and a crappy poet, but if you mess with him he will clean your clock, without breaking a sweat or his glasses.’”
“And what did the girls think of you after that?”
“Unfortunately, the lead ax-kick and the double knife-hand strike developed a lot faster than my way with the ladies. Most still thought I was a major dork. They didn’t appreciate my sense of humor.”
“Imagine that.”
“And regularly dousing myself with knockoff Drakkar Noir probably didn’t help, either.”
Dominic had matured into such a gorgeous specimen, how had those junior high and high school girls overlooked him even during his gawky teen years? Kendra studied his profile. Those soulful thick-lashed eyes and kiss-me-crazy lips didn’t arrive in the mail with his voters’ registration card.
“But I eventually scored with quality females, who had a taste for my type,” he confessed, winking at Kendra.
“Late bloomer.”
“Yup. Freshman year. College.”
“Me, too,” Kendra said, unsure why she was surprised they’d shared the same social trajectory when they had so many other things in common.
He glanced at the GPS and then added, “Which brings me to Leighton Rothchild, who I crushed on for a whole year. I asked her to senior prom. She turned me down flat, with a pat on my head and a ‘buck up little camper.’ She said ‘I admire anyone who shoots for the moon.’ ”
“Oof!” Kendra grimaced. “Nice girl.”
“Leighton was so out of my league actually accepting my invitation would’ve been a deus ex machina twist.”
“In other words, over-the-top contrived and highly improbable. Wow. Look what you did right there. Worked in that plot device without sounding the least bit like Pretentious English Lit Guy,” she teased. “That takes skill.”
“Well, you know, what can I say?” he replied with a grin.
“I was the chunky chick who went to prom with Jewel and Fredrick McCoy, another close friend who worked in the school library with us. Strictly platonic.”
“Too bad for Fred.” Dominic scanned her body with a heated look that made her feel warm and zingy between the thighs.
Kendra had wanted Dominic at the luau; it had taken great restraint to not fling one leg over his lap and straddle him, right there on the straw mat. As his hand stroked the Jeep’s gearshift, she imagined stroking his, obviously locked in drive and rarin’ to go. This could only lead to complications. Maybe a walk on a potentially secluded beach wasn’t such a good idea after all.
“Did you always know you wanted to work in the publishing business?” she asked to right her wayward thoughts.
“Not as an agent.” He glanced over at her and then back at the road. “Not right away. What about you?”
“I studied library science in college. I was going to be a librarian. It was all about my love of books, but I landed a job as an editorial assistant and then associate editor at Hearts & Flowers Romances, first working on their sweet category books before moving on to single title and women’s fiction. From there, I landed an associate editor position at Winn-Aster, and then I quickly moved up to senior editor before leaving to open my own agency. And I still love libraries. They’re among my favorite places to visit.”
“Ditto. And I love a brick-and-mortar bookstore. Nothing against ebooks, but nothing beats standing among lots of books.” Dominic paused and added, “If I couldn’t read I’d go insane—”
“Me, too! Brings to mind one episode of that old sci-fi mystery series The Alternate Dimension Theater—”
“The one with the iconic Norman Butterfield?”
“Yes!”
“The episode titled ‘Deja You!’ ” they said in unison.
“I’ve watched that one dozens of times over the years.”
“Me, too!” he said. “Aunt Aubrelia gave me this cool Norman Butterfield action figure. It’s on my desk at home.”
“And I have the T-shirt! There’s an action figure?”
“I always rewrite that cruel ending in my head.”
“Poor, poor Norman Butterfield,” Kendra said. “In a type of Sisyphus-ian purgatory, bookaholic Butterfield is granted eternal life, but is compelled to read the same lousy book—”
“Over and over and over and over and over and over again,” Kendra and Dominic said at the same time.
“Sounds like some of my early days in the business, working through slush,” Dominic said.
“When I log on to certain sites anonymously I feminize it for a user name,” she divulged. “I’m Norma
Butterfield.”
“I like that, but you’re not anonymous anymore.”
Kendra looked out the window, enjoying what she could see of the night landscape. “I’ve lost count of the number of times one of us has said, ‘me, too!’ tonight. It’s kind of, well, freaky. Like, maybe we’re twins, fraternal of course, separated at birth or something.”
“I’m glad we’re not related.” Dominic stared at her lips as if he wanted to seal those words with a kiss before turning his gaze back to the road. “You get me,” he said, as if he couldn’t believe it.
“And you get me,” Kendra said.
Dominic went on to confide how his parents had expected him to attend an Ivy League school, earn a master’s in business administration, and then work for the family’s finance and commercial real estate companies like his three older brothers. He checked off the school and the major, but he detoured from the family business when he joined Ekstein, Jarrod & Montgomery literary agency as an intern after completing undergrad.
“My parents were not happy that I didn’t want to work with my brothers. They’ve expressed pride in everything else I’ve accomplished, but when it comes to Impact there’s a polite inquiry every now and then, but that’s about it.”
“I’m sure they’re proud of what you’ve done. Sometimes people have trouble putting what they feel into words, especially if they have to admit they’ve been wrong.”
“I wasn’t going to miss out on the opportunity to work with the founder of that agency.”
“Samuel Ekstein, wow. One of the greats,” she replied, more than a bit envious.
“He taught me everything he knew, and then gave me his blessing when I struck out on my own.”
“How did that job come about?” she asked, though she could probably guess the answer.
“Family connections had nothing to do with it if that’s what you’re getting at,” Dominic replied with a note suggesting she’d touched a nerve, but he kept his eyes on the road ahead.
“I didn’t mean…”
Dominic hesitated, and then glanced over at her. “Do you know anything about my family?”
Kendra nodded because she’d read about his father in business journals and his mother’s charity fundraising parties in a couple of society columns.
“For the record, I landed that gig with no country club connections.” His voice had an edge.
A chill that had nothing to do with the evening air swooshing inside the vehicle settled between them. She secured the wrap and hugged herself.
Chapter 16
“I did make some assumptions,” Kendra said a few minutes later. “I applied for an internship at E, J &M when I was in college. I didn’t get it. I was told I had to know someone. I’d heard all the stories about nepotism and the entry level jobs going to wealthy friends’ children. It made sense to me. You had to come from money to survive in New York, because those jobs usually paid peanuts, if anything.”
“You’ve done well for yourself. Porter has a great reputation.”
“Thanks, but c’mon. I’m not in your league when it comes to big money deals,” she said, openly giving him his due for the first time.
“But it’s not just about money if you get pleasure from what you do. The business of helping authors make their dreams come true. Connect with the right editor and publishing house to—”
“Put entertaining stories that touch readers out into the world,” she completed the sentence. “Work that transports them to another time and place—”
“And keeps them on the edge of their seats and up until the wee hours of the morning on a work night because they have to finish a few more chapters—”
“A sigh-inducing protagonist, part-hero, part-bad boy, who knocks the heroine off her feet.”
“Or vice versa,” he said, giving Kendra a meaningful look.
She smiled.
“We’re in the business of selling these memorable, emotional, enjoyable experiences,” Dominic added.
“And we’re getting darn hokey right about now.”
“Of course we are! But who cares? It’s just you and me!” he said with king-of-the-world exuberance. “We’re not curing diseases or brokering peace in war-torn countries, but what we do is pretty cool, isn’t it?”
“Yes, for now.”
“No lie, the industry is changing so much, the writer-agency-publisher model, I mean. Who knew ebooks and self-publishing would take off the way they have? Paper and big publishing still rule for now, but I do see that tipping eventually, well, the paper ruling part.”
Kendra sighed. “It’s kind of sad, though, don’t you think? A friend of mine had to close his agency.”
“Can be sad for the bottom line. Are your submissions down?”
“No, not yet,” she replied, not telling him about her agency’s most recent financial strains.
“There’s no one size fits all. Some writers will always prefer to work with good agents and major publishers if the terms are fair and the math adds up. We have to stay nimble and find creative ways to keep bringing true value to the table.”
“By publishing or helping clients self-publish?”
“Impact is not a publisher. And I’m uncomfortable with that arrangement. But, hey, I have friends who do it, and it works for them and their clients. If everybody’s happy…” He shrugged. “But I have encouraged some clients to give indie a shot when there’s a project they feel strongly about that doesn’t fit what the houses want. Or if the advances or contracts offered are either drying up or getting too crappy to even bother trying to change. And I’ve seen some real doozies lately. I’m sure you have, too.” He whistled. “I refer them to people who do crack editing, cover design, and such, but I don’t take any cuts for those referrals. Pointing people in the right direction doesn’t take much of my time. It’s the least I can do when their careers aren’t going well on the traditional track.”
“So you make your money off those projects by handling subsidiary rights?”
“I do if they request that service. Impact has excellent contacts, and we can always get better terms than they can get on their own.”
“That’s the way I prefer to do it, too.”
“Enough shop talk. I think we’ve established we’re very much alike.”
“Doesn’t that scare the bejeezus out of you?” More passages from Lizzy’s book and Kendra’s plan to deviate from its advice came to mind. But when Dominic gave her a crooked grin she felt like the heroine in the latest Aurora Chastain sizzler. Her heart knocked against her chest. The night air hummed with possibilities. So much had shifted between them in mere hours.
The GPS led them off the highway to several dark, two-lane dirt roads that curved, dipped, and climbed. “We’re here,” Dominic said, upon reaching a Shoreline Access sign. He parked in a limited, off-road area flanked by walls of trees, fern, and bougainvillea. Dominic helped her out of the Jeep and reached for a canvas bag he told her contained a lamp, a blanket, a first-aid kit, and bug spray. Always prepared. She liked that about him.
“I wanted to build a campfire, but unfortunately, that’s not allowed on state beaches,” he explained. “I bought a very nice merlot and two glasses, but because I’m driving I can’t imbibe—”
“I don’t want to drink alone,” she said. “But better leave that wine behind so I’m not tempted.”
A narrow public path led to the ocean.
They strolled along the swatch of beach, passing only a few other couples who obviously had the same idea. Kendra and Dominic removed their shoes so the soft sand could sift through their toes. The moon’s reflection scattered like crushed crystal across the dark water. A foamy tide rolled in, serenading them as it lapped against land. Before it receded, she pulled Dominic toward the surf line to get their feet wet. Shivering upon discovering the water was cooler than expected, she let Dominic draw her close.
Kendra snuggled against his broad chest. As the shadows of their connected bodies played on the
sand an unexpected tenderness overtook her. They found a private, inviting spot beneath a group of palms and wordlessly walked over to rest. The moon provided enough illumination so the lamp wasn’t needed. Dominic spread out the blanket and relaxed against a tree. She settled between his outstretched legs as he cradled her in his arms. She lost track of the time, gazing at a night nature scene so beautiful it seemed surreal.
“Isn’t this great?” Dominic whispered in her ear. “And you didn’t think you’d find the time for me.”
Kendra marveled at the ocean, the stars, and the clusters of greenery forming their little alcove. “Oh, look!” she said, pointing at the small white fan-like blooms with purple streaks sprouting from the shrubs. She linked her fingers with his again. “I think that’s naupaka. I read about it in one of my travel guides. It blooms this time of year?”
“Obviously.”
“Legend has it the half blooms symbolize ancient lovers who couldn’t be together, one banished to the mountains, the other to the ocean, like where this flower blooms,” she said. “It’s a sad but romantic story.”
“The version I read includes the goddess Pele, bolts of hot lava, and wrath of scorned female,” he said. “Drama and good sex always sell.”
“There’s certainly no shortage of sex in most of the submissions I see.”
“Cross genres. Teen sex. Space alien sex. Artificial intelligence sex. Thug sex. Vampire sex. Billionaire BDSM sex. Sasquatch sex. Gargoyle sex. Were-weasel sex—”
“You mean werewolf.”
“No were-weasel.” He played with the colored lock of her hair in the ponytail.
“Please tell me were-weasel sex was a bizarre comedy in the slipstream, experimental fiction mode.”
“I wish I could say the writer was going for laughs, camp, or satire using the fantastic or absurd, but somehow I don’t think that was the intent.”
“Oh, hell to the no.” Kendra chortled.
“Right. I read everything, I mean everything, with an open mind, because you never know when you’ll find a gem. After I have chapters in hand, I give everything a shot. The right writer with skills can make just about anything work, especially something that defies categorization. But at the risk of coming off like, what did you call it? Pretentious English Lit Guy? I couldn’t bring myself to read enough of that one to figure out what the hell the author was trying to accomplish.”