0215543001348293036 vaughn piper oshea m.j. (9 page)

“Awwww,” gushed a voice from beside me. “That’s so sweet!

How old is she? She looks just like you!”

I almost jumped out of my skin. Instinctively, I cupped the back of Alice’s head and pressed her closer to my chest as I turned to face the person who was speaking.

It was a tiny blonde woman, probably only an inch or two over five feet, who, from the look of her clothes, had probably been out for a jog or something. An overweight chocolate lab sat on the ground next to her feet, its tail wagging lazily. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said with a smile. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Uh… it’s n-no problem.”

She nodded toward Alice. “How old is she?”

“F-four weeks.”

“Aww, I thought she had that squishy newborn look.” The woman took a step closer, and I barely stopped myself from backing away. “It’s so nice of you to be out here with her. You don’t see men out here by themselves very often. Is your wife at home?” The question was so unexpected I could only blink down at her for a moment. “W-wife? I’m not m-married.”

“Your girlfriend then?”

“N-no girlfriend.”

The woman stepped even closer. “So you’re raising her all on your own? You poor thing. That must be hard.” She reached toward me, and I wasn’t sure if she planned on touching me or Alice, but I didn’t stick around to find out. I stumbled backward, nearly falling over my own feet in my rush to get away from her. “G-gotta go.”

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one small thing

I turned and almost ran from the park. I caught a few odd looks as I dodged around the people who were walking the trails, but I didn’t care if they thought I was crazy. I
really
didn’t like to be touched, especially not by strangers, and I didn’t want anyone trying to touch Alice either. It seemed so unreal to me that someone would just take that kind of liberty without asking permission first. She was a baby, not some toy in the store with a “try me” button. Why did people assume they could just put their hands on her? It made my skin crawl.

Dusty was approaching my apartment building from the opposite direction when I finally got back to my street. He smiled cheerfully when we met up on the front steps. “Hey, Erik. Out for a walk?”

“Y-yeah. I took Alice to the park to see the flowers.”

“That’s
so
cute,” Dusty said with a soft little sigh. Then he seemed to shake himself a bit. “Did something happen, though? You look kinda upset, hon.”

I shook my head quickly. “I’m f-fine. It’s just… sometimes it’s hard, you know?”

“Yeah.” Dusty nodded. Something in his expression told me he really did understand. “Well, I know I’m early, but I don’t work tonight. I figured I’d come take the munchkin off your hands.”

“O-oh, okay. Come on, I’ll get you her stuff.” Dusty and I made the walk up to my apartment in silence. He followed me in and started gathering up Alice’s belongings as I took her out of the carrier and undid all of the straps so I could remove it.

Since I’d started watching Alice, Dusty and I had gotten used to each other too. He wasn’t anything like what I’d expected when I saw him that first day. Underneath his odd exterior—the piercings (two on either side of his lower lip, several in his ears, and a small horseshoe ring in his septum), the bleached blond hair and skintight clothes, and the shiny black nail polish—he was one of the kindest people I’d ever met. I’d never had even a flicker of discomfort around him, which was entirely new for me. Even Rue made me uneasy sometimes. More than sometimes. But Dusty was so nonthreatening with his big, dark eyes

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and candy-sweet smile, I couldn’t even begin to feel nervous in his presence.

“Is she gonna need a bottle soon, hon?” Dusty asked as he leaned down to scoop Alice into his arms.

“Yeah. She should be hungry by now.” I watched as he hefted Alice’s black-and-pink diaper bag onto his shoulder. “Need me to carry anything?”

Dusty flashed me a grin. “No, I’ve got it. Thanks, though.”

“Okay.” I trailed behind him as he moved toward the door. Some days I almost hated to see Alice go. Maybe I was getting used to having company, even if it was the mini, nonverbal variety.

Once he was at the door, Dusty stopped and looked at me over his shoulder. “I’m going to be making a veggie stir-fry for dinner. If you want, you can come over.”

“Oh….” I hesitated, feeling awkward. It was nice of him to invite me, and I really didn’t feel uncomfortable around him the way I did around most people, but we hadn’t spent more than a few minutes at a time in each other’s company in the last month. I didn’t have any idea what we would talk about over dinner.

“It’s okay, hon,” he said when I couldn’t go on. “The offer’s open. See you later.”

After he left I felt a little bad. I probably should’ve taken him up on the invitation, if only because of how often he and I would be seeing each other while I was babysitting Alice. I told myself next time he asked I would go. If I said no again, it might hurt his feelings, and I really didn’t want that. But right then there was writing to be done.

Since Dusty had picked Alice up a couple of hours earlier than usual, I had a bit more time than I normally would. It didn’t make sense to waste it.

TWO hours later I’d put three thousand words on my manuscript, and was in the middle of heating up a bowl of ramen in the microwave

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one small thing

when my telephone rang. A quick glance at the screen confirmed it was my agent calling.
Oh, no….
My stomach instantly seized up.
Please let
it be about a contract. I can’t take any more rejections.

I pressed the “talk” button and lifted the phone to my ear. “Hi, B-Bill. How are you?”

“Hey, Erik! Good, good, and you?” Bill sounded as brutally cheerful as ever. The problem with him was it always rang false. I’d never doubted Dusty’s sincerity or his sunny personality. With Bill I knew it was just an act. But he’d been my agent since I was twenty-two, and five years was more than long enough for me to get used to his hollow geniality. He did his job, and that was what mattered.

Besides, the idea of breaking our contract and trying to query a new agent was too daunting to consider.

“Fine.” I swallowed thickly. “Any word?”

“Yeah, see, here’s the thing,” Bill answered in that same excessively happy tone. “It’s not an outright rejection. When your editor at Triton took a pass, she steered me toward Anchor, their new ebook division. They just got back to me today, and they said they’re interested in
Enemy Mine
, but there’s a catch….” I blinked. “A catch?”

“Yep. See, they really liked the relationship between the two MCs, but the only way they’d consider publishing it is if you turned their bromance into a
romance
.”

“R-romance?” I squeaked, my voice several octaves higher than usual.

“Yeah, you know. Boy meets girl, they fall in love, have some sex, live happily ever after. That whole thing. Except in this case it would be boy meets boy.”

“B-boy meets boy?” I repeated in horror. My eyes felt ready to pop out of my head. “
Sex
?”

“Look, Erik, I know your books are usually smut-free, and typically that’s fine. But in this case they’re looking for erotic romance.

There would need to be at least one major sex scene.”

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Piper Vaughn & M.J. O’Shea

“B-b-but—”

“There are no buts,” Bill interrupted. “Male/male romance is their best-selling sub-genre. If you want in with them, you have to change the book.”

“Well, maybe we should t-try somewhere else.”

“We have tried, Erik. The sci-fi genre is flooded right now, and your books just aren’t selling as well as they used to. This might be your last shot before you have to start thinking about self-publishing.” I gave my head an adamant shake. Then I remembered he couldn’t see me. “O-oh, no, I really don’t want to do that.”

“So then maybe you need to think about giving this a shot,” Bill said happily. I’d noticed that his tone hadn’t changed in the slightest as we’d discussed the potential downfall of my writing career. “But this needs to be a full-fledged romance. Bottom line? Sex sells, and it’s what they want.”

“But I’ve never—”

“I know. So, here’s what I can do. I’m going to send you a few of the popular books in the genre. You read them over and think about it, okay? But if you want my advice, don’t sit on this too long. They’re interested right now, but who knows if they’ll feel the same way in six months.”

“Okay. Th-thanks, Bill.”

“No problem. Keep an eye on your e-mail, okay? I gotta jet, but I’ll be in touch. Let me know what you decide.”

“Will do.”

“Take it easy, kid.”

Bill hung up before I could say anything in response. For a long time after I stared down at my phone’s dark screen. Write a romance.

Me? I’d never even considered it before. There were romantic relationships in my books, of course, but they were always secondary to the main plot and way,
way
in the background. I’d never written anything more graphic than a kiss. And this wasn’t even an ordinary romance. Boy meets boy? I didn’t know anything about sex between a

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one small thing

man and a woman, outside of what I’d learned in health class. Sex between two men? I probably knew more about quantum mechanics, which was saying something since I’d almost failed physics in high school.

I had a sudden thought that Rue might be able to help. Maybe Dusty too. I didn’t know much about gay men, but what with all of the makeup and nail polish and some of the comments I’d overheard them make, even I could tell they probably weren’t… well, straight. Not that it mattered anyway. I could feel my face going up in flames at the very idea of bringing up the subject of gay sex to either one of them. There was no way I’d survive a conversation like that without melting into a steaming puddle of humiliation. Nope. That was never going to happen.

Looks like I’ll be on my own….
Well, I was used to that.

I opened the microwave and peered in at the bowl of ramen noodles I’d been warming. They were cold, but even if they’d still been hot, I don’t think I could have eaten them anyway, not with how tense my stomach was.

Sighing, I dumped the noodles in the garbage and quickly washed the bowl and set it in the drying rack. Might as well check to see if Bill had sent me any of those books yet. Just the thought of reading them embarrassed me, though I think I would have reacted the same way to traditional romance novels too. If I didn’t know the first thing about sex, I knew even less about love. At least sex could be researched. I hadn’t the vaguest idea how to go about making two characters fall in love.

I went into my office and booted up my laptop. When I opened my e-mail, I saw several new messages. I clicked the first one and went through the instructions to set up an account and claim my e-books.

The titles were innocent enough, but the
covers
…. My cheeks got hotter and hotter as I looked at them all. Headless torsos with massive pecs and rippled abdomens seemed to be a prevalent theme. I didn’t really think it was possible for all of the characters in those books to be beefed up, bodybuilder types, but maybe that was what the publisher wanted.

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Piper Vaughn & M.J. O’Shea

Guess I’ll have to read them to find out.
That would have to wait for another day, though. At that moment I wasn’t in any mood to try. I was worried Bill might call me with a request to turn the other manuscript I’d sent out into a gay romance too. Even more than that, I was confused. If the publisher had liked the book, why wouldn’t they just take it as it was? It didn’t make sense to me. But Bill was right—

my books weren’t selling as well as they had in the past. My royalty checks were getting slimmer and slimmer. If things didn’t change, I might have to give up on writing and start job-hunting, and that prospect didn’t even bear thinking about.

I shut down my laptop with trembling hands. It was time for my chair, and probably
Star Wars
too. I didn’t think sleep was going to be happening any time soon.

[58]

one small thing

Chapter 5

Rue

“OH, SHOOT!” My phone always seemed to ring when I had an armload full of stuff, and it was somewhere buried in the pockets of the coat I’d had to start wearing a few weeks before. November was a lot chillier than the early fall had been.