Authors: Alexandrea Weis
“Something’s happened,” he
whispered, knowing that an exorbitant amount of messages usually signaled trouble.
His first call was to Lynn at the offices of Propel. When she picked up his private line after two rings, he skipped all pleasantries.
“What’s going on?” he pressed, before she had barely gotten her “hello” out.
“
Mitch Douglass has been calling for you every ten minutes. Things are about to blow in Oklahoma. It seems the state legislature wants to call a committee meeting on how the proposed pipeline was approved and to review the company’s submission process for leases and building permits. They are saying we paid someone off.”
“We did pay someone off,” Tyler
roared. “Where is Mitch?”
“On the company jet to Oklahoma. He has a meeting with a state rep named Hal Askew. It seems Mr. Leesburg contacted M
r. Douglass directly when he couldn’t get you last night.”
“Son of a bitch.” Tyler wanted to throw his cell phone against the wall. “I can’t believe Gary had the audacity to go around me.”
“Mr. Douglass made it sound like something needed to be handled right away,” Lynn informed him, sounding worried.
“When did Mitch leave?”
“About an hour ago. Mr. Leesburg has scheduled a lunch today with Mr. Askew.”
Tyler
checked his watch. “I’ll call Mitch and go over a game plan. Is there anything else?”
“I’ve got an inspector with the
Feds looking to review the safety procedures again for our Gulf rigs.”
“They’ve been breathing down everyone’s necks since that BP mess.
” He massaged his right temple. “Where’s Lloyd McDonald? That’s his department.”
“His wife went into labor last night. His assistant, Marc Packard, said he can handle it, but he’s never dealt with a federal safety review before.
Any suggestions?”
Tyler
ran through a list of names in his head, and then one stood out from the rest. “Contact Trent Newbury and explain the situation. He does a lot of consulting work for us and knows the safety regs better than anybody. He can work with Marc. The last thing I need is the Feds wanting to come in and hold up production because of some screw up in paperwork.”
“I’ll call him. Legal needs to speak with you, as well. They
want to go over some contract changes.”
He
closed his eyes, suddenly feeling inundated. “All right. Let me get with Mitch, and then give Gary a call. I’ll get back to you after I get a handle on Oklahoma. Have legal send me an e-mail—”
“They already did,” she cut in over the phone.
“I’ll look it over.”
“Sorry to ruin your vacation,” Lynn apologized with a tinge of trepidation in her voice. “But I knew you would want to be
updated on everything.”
“Thanks, and you’re right, I needed to know. I’ll—”
A muffled yelling from downstairs interrupted him. “Let me call you back, Lynn.” He hung up the phone as he heard a man’s voice and then Bart’s continued yapping.
“What the hell
?” Throwing the phone on the bed, Tyler flew to the open bedroom door. He was at the second floor landing and about to head down the stairs when he recognized the man’s voice coming from below.
“Monique
, you have got to listen to me,” Chris Donovan shouted.
Tyler
jogged down the old walnut staircase, and was making his way along the narrow hallway when he heard hushed voices coming through the partially opened door to the living room. Dashing to the door, he was about to step into the room when Bart came running out.
“Some guard dog you are,” Tyler
commented.
Pushing the door all the way open, he
ventured inside.
“You have no right to tell me—” Monique stopped when Tyler enter
ed the room.
Chris was standing in front of a red-bricked hearth topped by a high white mantle that was covered with mirrors and rose all the way up to the
white plaster ceiling. Dressed in a long-sleeved white shirt and dark blue slacks, his blue eyes closed in on Tyler.
“He’s here?” Chris
angrily pointed at Tyler. “You didn’t tell me he was here, Monique.”
“Is there a problem?” Tyler asked,
turning to Monique.
She
was standing next to a contemporary white sofa covered with a number of red throw pillows. Her hands were tightly wrapped together and her pink mouth was drawn back in an angry scowl. Tyler could tell by the way her eyes were scrunched together that she was about to rip into Chris.
“Yeah, there’s a problem,” Chris
croaked, coming toward him. “You’re the problem.” He motioned back to Monique. “Did you tell her to write that crap?”
“It’s not crap!” Monique snapped. “You kept telling me to put more sex in my books
. Well, I gave you what you wanted.”
“I didn’t tell you to put in bondage, Monique
,” Chris hollered. “That’s not what Donovan Books sells. You know Hunter doesn’t want any erotica, but that is exactly what you gave him.” He waved a hand in the air, as if signaling there would be no further discussion on the subject.
Tyler moved across the room to her side. “Chris, you need to calm down.”
“She’s not screwing up your business, Tyler, so don’t you dare tell me to calm down!”
“I’m not screwing up anyone’s business, Chris,” she
roared. “Did Hunter send you here? Did he read it?”
“Of course he didn’t read it. I can’t send it to him,” Chris
insisted. “You need to change it, or at least let me find another publisher to put it out under a pseudonym. We can’t tarnish your reputation with your readers.”
“I won’t do that.” Monique crossed her arms defiantly over her chest. “It is either published as is with my name, or I’ll find another publisher, Chris…and another manager.” She stormed out of the room, leaving Chris and Tyler gaping with surprise at the open living room door.
Tyler listened as she trotted quickly up the stairs.
“This is your fault,” Chris
huffed behind him.
Ball
ing his hands into fists, Tyler slowly faced him. “I do not see how what she writes is my fault.”
“I told you before…writers are like sponges, they absorb the world around them. You came back and
exposed her to your deviant sexual behavior.”
Tyler raised his eyebrows. “My
‘deviant sexual behavior’?”
Chris pointed to the living room door. “I know you’re sleeping with her. I knew the moment I
started reading her book. You came back into her life and opened the door to this forbidden world, and she wrote about it. She wrote about the male character tying up his lover, and introducing her to a world of wild sexual pleasure.”
“So what if she wrote about that? What difference does it make?”
“She’s not that kind of writer! Don’t you get it? She has a fan base…a loyal fan base that buys books they expect to go a certain way. There’s a chase, some emotional yielding, kissing, and when the characters do have sex in her books, it’s pretty damn tame. Not handcuffs, whips, or blindfolds.”
“So she’s changing.” Tyler
scowled at Chris. “She has the right to change as a writer.”
“She would never have changed until you came along. You made her different. Suddenly, the dream man she wrote about is in her life and she has written a book that reflects that life. But her readers don’t want to see that.” Chris ran his hand over his
curly gray hair. “If Donovan Books publishes that piece of shit, it could end her career.”
“You’re being a bit dramatic, Chris.” Tyler turned for the door. “She’ll get new readers.”
“And if she doesn’t? Do you want to be the one responsible for ending her writing career?”
Tyler
hesitated, before answering him. “It’s her career. I’m not going to tell her what to do.”
“My God
, you are a cold son of a bitch! How can you just waltz in here, rearrange her life, and leave? Because that’s what you’re going to do, isn’t it?”
Tyler stifled his hankering to punch Chris’s face in
“You’re just her manager. What happens between Moe and me is not your concern.”
“To hell it isn’t! What do you think she is she going to do when you leave like you did before? We both know you’re not the kind to hang around. Tell me,
Tyler, are you out to break her heart or just wreck her career? Because if you destroy one, you’re inevitably going to destroy the other.”
Unable to hold back any longer,
Tyler rushed up to Chris and grabbed the collar on his shirt. “Where in the hell do you get off accusing me of hurting her?”
Chris glared into his eyes. “Do you love her?”
Tyler let him go. “I’m not using her like you.”
“I never used her.” Chris straightened out his shirt collar. “I love her. There’s a difference, but someone like you would never understand.”
“Get out,” Tyler snarled.
Appearing thrilled
that he had pushed Tyler to the breaking point, Chris curled his lips into a smug smirk. “After you’re gone, I’ll be the one left to pick up the pieces. You won’t get a third chance with her; I’ll make sure of it.”
Chris
collected his dark blue suit jacket from the back of the sofa and hurried to the living room entrance. After he had slammed the front door closed, Tyler fled from the room.
He needed a drink,
now more than ever. He could deal with the bullshit from his stepfather, and the confrontation with Chris, but the sudden realization that he may have ruined Monique’s writing career was more than Tyler could stomach. He was not ready to shoulder that burden of guilt.
After reaching the kitchen, Tyler threw
open the pantry door and snapped up the dark bottle. Standing in the pantry doorway, he drank one long sip after another. The burn of the alcohol calmed the furor of his emotions. It made him feel empowered, and slowly, as the warmth of the liquid worked its magic, he felt his sense of control returning. Chris’s dire insinuations about destroying Monique’s career quickly waned, and his thoughts reverted to his life and his problems.
He took one more reassuring swig from the bottle
, replaced the cap, and returned it to the pantry floor. As he gazed down at the bottle, he made up his mind. He had to go. Staying would only end up hurting both of them. At least after last night, he could walk away knowing he had experienced that moment of bliss with another that so many hope for.
“What are you doing?
” Monique called from the kitchen doorway.
Tyler backed out of the pantry. “
I was looking for a can of soda.”
“What did Chris say to you?”
He made his way across the kitchen. “That you could ruin your career if you publish that book. Is he right?”
She went to the kitchen table and pulled out a chair. “The market is changing. Readers want racy books with more sex in them. I guess to reflect the way relationships
truly are. I mean, there is still an audience for the tame stuff, like I used to write, but I really don’t want to write that way anymore. I want to get edgier with my characters, but Chris has been fighting me on that.” She flopped down in the chair. “I know I will lose readers who liked what I used to write, but I may pick up readers who are into the meatier stories.”
Tyler sat down next to her. “Is this what you want to write?”
She slowly nodded her head. “I would never have had the courage to do it before you came back into my life.” She took his hand. “You showed me how it should be between two people, and that is what I want to put into my books. Chris was just not ready for me to change.”
Tyler
squeezed her hand. “So what are you going to do?”
“Publish it, either with Don
ovan Books or with someone else. I can’t write the way Chris and his brother want me to anymore. I want to write what I feel.”
Tyler let her hand go and sat back in his chair, feeling like absolute shit. “Chris was right. Maybe I shouldn’t have come back in your life.”
“Are you kidding?” she said, half-laughing. “Your coming back has been the best thing that has happened to me.”
“You’re exaggerating, Moe. I could never be the best thing that ever happened to anyone.”
She stood from her chair and moved closer to him. “How can you say that?” Her fingers played in the touch of gray along his right temple. “You sound like the man I knew twenty-one years ago, the one who never thought he was good enough to work with his stepfather.”
He stood up. “Moe, perhaps you should reconsider the book. I don’t want to be responsible for ruining your dream of being a writer. I’ve ruined enough lives already. I could not live with adding yours to the pile.”
“You’re not ruining my dream of being a writer, don’t you see that? If anything, you reminded me of the kind of writer I want to be. You asked me before why I wrote about you in all my novels, and do you want to know the real reason? Because you were the one man I was too afraid to go after. You represented what I dreamed of in a guy, and I figured as long as I wrote about you, I was fulfilling that dream.” She waved her hand down his body. “But now you’re here, and those fantasies I wrote about were nothing compared to the reality of being with you. From that first night we were together back in Dallas, I realized that, and that is why I changed my book. I wanted it to be the reality and not the fantasy anymore.”