I’m still seething and it’s been almost two days since Chris snapped at me and sent me away from the hilltop. I tried as hard as I could to swallow my pride and help him. Some soft, stupid part of me wanted to believe there is something inside him worth saving, and that helping him write his manuscript would do it. I even thought I could handle the inevitable outbursts and harsh words that would surely come with trying to help him, but I wasn’t ready for it.

I cried like a baby when I got home that morning. Brooke and Amelia were already up, so I had to hold it together just long enough to get in the shower where I could fall apart in private. I hate him for making me act like someone I’m not. I hate how he makes me feel so weak. More than anything, I hate that there’s something about him that refuses to let me forget he even exists. A part of him crawled into my mind, curled up, and made itself at home, stubbornly refusing to budge no matter how hard I try. Just when I think I’ve moved on, I feel that nagging presence, and the endless obsession with the compellingly broken man and the book he’ll probably never finish.

Amelia sets a coffee mug down in front of me with a sweet smile. For all her innocence, she has a natural instinct for taking care of people who are hurting, and she never asks prying questions. Going back as far as I can remember, through breakups and failed tests in school and money troubles, I can always remember Amelia being there with sweet gestures and quiet kindness. Unlike Brooke, she doesn’t ever push me to talk about it. If it’s something I want to share, she’ll listen, but if it’s something I’m embarrassed about or just can’t manage to get out, it doesn’t seem to phase her.

I feel guilty for holding back what I’m going through from Amelia, especially after her rare outburst at the grocery store. She was right, after all. Just because we like to think of her as the baby in the family, it doesn’t give us a right to exclude her. She’s old enough to be included. And I will include her more, but not in this.

I pull her to me and lean my head against her stomach briefly, giving her a grateful squeeze before she goes back to the kitchen to finish the eggs and bacon that are sizzling in the pan.

I sip the coffee, which burns my lips and tongue as it goes down but I keep drinking it anyway. I need caffeine if I’m going to survive today. The blogging world is an unforgiving one, and the surest way to end your career is inactivity. I haven’t reviewed a book in over a week, and I missed my Thursday Throwdown post where I try to find the worst books I can so I can do an over-the-top roasting of them for my reader’s amusement. I’ve been so preoccupied with Chris and the ever-tightening financial stress that I haven’t had the energy to do it.

Someone knocks at the door, making Amelia and I both jump. Brooke pokes her head out of the bathroom, hair still wet and makeup half-applied. Part of me fills with a mixture of excitement, and then anger when I think it could be Chris, because no one ever comes to the door and knocks way out here in the woods.

I get up and look through the peephole while Amelia and Brooke silently watch after me, just as curious as I am about who it could be.

I see a thin guy in his early twenties with thick-rimmed glasses, well-groomed hair, and a square-shaped tie waiting impatiently outside. "He looks harmless," I say quietly to Amelia and Brooke before opening the door.

“Yes?” I ask.

“Are you Lindsey?” he asks.

“Yes…”

He extends a hand and flashes a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’m Alec. Chris Savage’s agent. I was hoping to have a few words with you.”

“Everything okay?” asks Brooke, who comes up from behind me, apparently not worried about her half-done makeup or the robe she’s wearing.

“It’s fine,” I say. “He’s Chris’ agent.”

Brooke looks him over suspiciously. “What does he want?”

“I don’t know,” I say a little tightly. “You haven’t given him time to tell me that much yet.”

“We’re going to be just inside. So don’t try anything funny,” says Brooke.

Alec raises his palms defensively. “Just here to talk.”

I decide to step out on the porch, because I don’t think Brooke will stop threatening him if I don’t put a door between us. “What do you want?” I ask once we have some privacy.

“I want to offer you an opportunity that I think could be beneficial to everyone involved.”

I cross my arms. “It sounds like you’re trying too hard to make this sound like a good thing. What’s the catch?”

“No catch,” he says. “I need Chris to write a book. He has a contract for another one with his publisher and he’s running out of time to meet the deadline. If he doesn’t meet the deadline, he forfeits the advance he was paid—the advance I was also paid a cut of—and he is also going to be fined out the ass for breaking the terms of the contract. But the real problem is I lose credibility if my biggest client can’t stick to contracts. Publishers are going to look back on this and I won’t have as much bargaining power for my other clients, if any. Chris will lose momentum and the shot to keep his grip on the global market if he waits too long. Everybody loses.”

Alec leans in, pushing his glasses up his nose. “He needs to write a book.”

“How does any of this involve me?” I ask.

“Because I know you’ve been going up there to see him.”

A chill runs through me, turning my impression of Alec from neutral to apprehensive in a split second. “How do you know that?”

“He told me, obviously,” Alec says. He fiddles with his glasses a little uncomfortably, eyes shifting away from mine. A bad liar.

“Even if I have gone up to see him. What makes you think I have any influence on whether he finishes the book or not?”

“I’ve known Chris for a long time. I know how his mind works. He just needs something real for a while. Something soft. Fame hardened him, but there’s still a good guy in there. Bring that guy back out and he’ll write the book. I know he will.”

Listening to the way Alec talks about Chris makes me think there might actually be a real friendship, beyond an agent’s worry about money and his career, but I still don’t want to trust him.

“Well,” I say, “I guess you’re going to have to keep looking, because I’ve embarrassed myself enough times now trying to extend the olive branch to Chris. He doesn’t want anything to do with me.”

Alec makes a dismissive sound. “Has he fucked you?” he asks.

My hand twitches at my side, itching to slap the stupid glasses right off his face. I control my anger though, just barely. “Excuse me?”

Alec pulls a face that is probably supposed to look apologetic. "Maybe the easiest way to think of Chris is a predator. A lion, maybe. Fame was like a cage for him. Women, money, success… It was like people were just lobbing it into his cage. There was nothing left to challenge him anymore. Nothing to excite him. So he shut down. Day by day, week by week. He closed himself off. This," says Alec, gesturing to the woods around us. "This was inevitable. But make no mistake, Chris is still the same man I knew before all this happened. He's that same lion, and you're like the first piece of meat—pardon the expression—to come along in years that he might have to work for. Give him a few more chances and he'll wake up to the challenge."

I shake my head. “Wow. Just wow. I’m going to give you about five seconds to explain why I would even be remotely interested in throwing myself at Chris like a piece of meat until he decides he wants to fuck me like some kind of animal.” I don’t mention how a shameless part of me—a part located just between my legs—heats at the idea and all its dirty implications.

“A hundred thousand dollars,” Alec says. His eyes don’t shift this time and he doesn’t flinch. “Cash, and I’ll take care of the taxes and everything on my end. You get him to write the book, you get the money. It’s that simple.”

I lean my back against the door and brace myself because my legs feel suddenly weak. I already saw how bad a liar Alec is, but he’s showing no signs of dishonesty now. He’s just watching me with those lifeless eyes, waiting. My brain instantly jumps from all the bills and debts I could pay with that kind of money, to how I could invest in my blog and Amelia’s beauty school.

“You’re serious?” I ask.

“I’m serious. He writes the book, you get the money. It’s that simple.”

“And he fucks me too,” I say dryly.

Alec shrugs. “Probably. Yes.”

“Assuming I actually believe you, and assuming I’d actually do this… how would I trust you to follow through?”

He pulls a folded stack of papers from his pocket and opens them up so I can see. “A contract. You can have a lawyer look it over if you want to be sure it’s legit. I’ll even pay their fees.”

I run a hand through my hair, shaking my head slowly. “I can’t do it. I don’t care if Chris is Satan himself. I’m not going to sneak behind his back so I can make a few quick dollars. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.” Even though the right words come out, they only thinly cover the greedy desire to do whatever it takes to get that check, and I’m worried if he pushes the issue at all, I’m going to cave.

“No? So you’d protect your delicate little conscience while he stays up there self-destructing his career and his life? You get to sleep easy at night knowing you didn’t try to help him because it would’ve been wrong. Think about it. You get to do the right thing and you get paid for it. Don’t kid yourself,” he says, looking at our small house. “You need the money.” He sticks the contract in my hand. “Think it over. My number’s in there if you change your mind.”

I slip back inside a few minutes later when I’ve composed myself enough to keep my sisters from figuring out something is wrong.

“What did he want?” asks Brooke, who apparently decided bacon and eggs were more important than finishing her makeup or getting dressed.

Amelia looks up curiously too, with that same concern she’s been wearing since Chris turned me away two days ago.

“Nothing, really. Just wants to know if Chris told me anything about working on a new book. I guess he was supposed to have some new big novel out and his publishers are getting worried.”

“Has he?” Brooke asks through a mouthful of bacon. “Told you anything, I mean.”

“We’re not exactly best friends,” I say.

“Then what do you two do when you’re up there?” she asks.

I shake my head, sitting down to the plate Amelia made for me and shrugging. “Argue? I guess? Or it’s more like I keep stupidly trying to be nice and he keeps reminding me he’s a jerk.”

“Ah,” says Brooke. “Don’t feel bad. Falling for an asshole is a womanly right of passage. It’ll make you appreciate the next guy who comes along more.”

“I’ve never fallen for an asshole,” Amelia says thoughtfully. “I don’t see the appeal. I mean, I want a guy who will baby me when I’m sick and ask how my day went. Who wants some grumbly jerk?”

“It’s more complicated than that,” I say with a sigh.

“Yep,” Brooke agrees. “The way they get you is making you think you can fix them. No matter what they say, people don’t want the perfect and put together guy to fall into their lap. It’s like those model airplanes dad used to build. He cherished those things like they were priceless, but it was because he put them together himself piece by piece. He cut his fingers on the sharp edges and made his own tweaks to the paint jobs. If you gave him a model somebody else built, he wouldn’t have cared about it.”

Amelia makes a skeptical face. “That’s kinda messed up, though. I mean… You can’t just shape and mold a guy to be exactly how you want. What about what he wants?”

Brooke grins. “Give it time, Meels. You’ll understand one day. The prototypical bad boy sucks women in like a mirage. They see the potential, the looks, the danger, the excitement. Being with a guy like that is a thrill because you know it’s wrong. So you convince yourself you can change him, that you can fix him, because then you don’t have to feel guilty about riding that sexy ass wave.”

I laugh at Brooke’s attempt at wisdom and the look of confusion on Amelia’s face, but deep down, I can’t help feeling the truth in what she’s saying. I’m probably telling myself a convenient lie about the supposed good I see in Chris. He writes beautifully, but it doesn’t necessarily translate to who he is as a person.

“Some guys that seem like bad boys really are good on the inside though,” I say in a frail attempt to convince myself.

Brooke gives Amelia a knowing look. "See, Lindsey is currently in the denial stage. First comes lust, then denial, then acceptance. It's a three-stage process. The guy is hot, so you start talking. You realize said hot guy is actually a royal dick, but you deny what's in front of your face and spin some pretty lie about how that one time he smiled at an old lady it proved he's actually nice deep down. You have your fun, then eventually you accept he really isn't going to change. He never was. But now you have a fun memory and you'll learn to appreciate the nice guy when he does finally come along. Right of passage," she says smugly, popping another strip of bacon into her mouth.

Amelia looks to me with an expression of vague horror, like she wants me to convince her it’s not true.

“She’s being dramatic,” I say. “Just because Brooke got burned by an asshole, it doesn’t mean her one experience is some kind of universal standard. There are nice bad boys out there.”

Brooke rolls her eyes. “I’m having trouble hearing you over those raging hormones, Linds. Besides, Ryan was your first asshole. You’re just too stubborn to learn your lesson the first time.”

“My hormones aren’t raging. And I’m done with Chris anyway, so that already proves your little theory wrong. I mean, Chris writes like a poet, but—”

Brooke claps her hands in victory, laughing. Amelia even grins at me a little guiltily.

“See?” asks Brooke. “She’s trying to say she won’t be knocking on the door of his cabin tonight, but she’s still making excuses for him.”

“I’m not making excuses,” I say, frustrated that my own stubbornness is making me argue for Chris, even though I’ve been spending so much time trying to make myself forget him. “I’m just saying you make it sound like it’s impossible for there to be some good inside a guy, even if it doesn’t seem like it at first. Besides, maybe it’d be like doing the world a favor to try to fix a guy like that.” I have to try not to wince at how desperate I sound. Whether I like it or not, the idea of Alec’s money is rattling around in my brain just as much as my desire to see the finished manuscript. I’m even more ashamed to admit that somewhere just beneath all that noise is my stupid body’s tendency to feel like fireworks are going off when I’m near Chris.

"Well," Brooke says. "Then maybe you should prove me wrong. If there was ever a bad boy worth risking a little heartbreak over, a mega-millionaire superstar is probably not the worst place to start."

“Just be careful,” Amelia says . She gives me a sweet but concerned smile. “If you do still want to give him a try, I mean.”

I look at my plate, feeling like I don’t have an appetite anymore. “When did we decide that I was even doing anything close to dating or trying to give Chris Savage a chance again? Because from my perspective, he thinks of me more like an annoying gnat than a living human being. So even if I did want something else, I don’t even know where I’d start or how my sense of self-respect could survive another moment with him.”

“Oh Lindsey,” says Brooke, who squeezes my hand and puts on her best matronly expression. “Amelia told me all about what happened in the grocery store. Even his agent knows you’ve been talking to Chris. Trust me, he’s at least interested. But a guy like him is used to having women throw themselves at him. I bet if you just give him the cold shoulder for a few days, he’ll have a chance to see what he’s missing and come around.”

“Plus,” Amelia adds. “He’d be crazy if he didn’t think you were super hot. Just look at you!”

If anyone else tried to say the things Amelia does sometimes, I’d roll my eyes, but she doesn’t have a mean or sarcastic bone in her body, so I actually let her words sink in and improve my mood a little bit. “Well,” I say with a sigh and a quick smile for Amelia. “I was planning to ignore him anyway, so I guess that shouldn’t be too hard to test. No more going up to his cabin. If he wants me, he can come down here.”

The words leave my lips with surprising finality, almost like I just cast some sort of curse over myself. Either way, I mean them.

I’ve suffered one too many embarrassing rejections from a man I’m not even technically trying to date. I just want him to write his stupid book, but somehow along the way he made me feel like a desperate groupie slathering over his boots.

No more though. Chris Savage can come to me, or our strange, confusing little tango is over.