The Muse (29 page)

Kate got her answer almost thirty minutes and two hundred words later. That’s when Erato knocked on the door and, full of breezy confidence, swept inside only after being granted permission to enter. She dropped off a glass of water and a plate of pancakes with maple syrup, wearing a wide, toothy, adorably sexy smile, then left with a chirped “Good luck!” and a brief squeeze of Kate’s shoulder. The simple touch seemed to naturally loosen the tense muscles in Kate’s back, helping her relax, and simultaneously sparked a fierce, focused desire to dive right back into her fictional world.

The worst part about Erato’s maddening rules and restrictions and directives, Kate decided, was that they kept her from enjoying the genuine benefits of her muse’s company. No matter who Erato was, or
what
she was, her mere presence inspired Kate to be at her creative best, always. Despite what she’d decided in anger the night before, the gifts Erato had to offer were far from useless. It was an awful, stupid twist of fate that she’d happened to meet Erato
and
fall for Olive all at the same time, because without her desire to maintain control over her romantic life, she would probably accept nearly any stricture Erato imposed. Even though she’d asked her to leave, Kate hated the idea of having to relearn to write without the clear-headed inspiration her muse provided.

“This sucks,” Kate muttered under her breath, then took a grudging bite of pancake.

She let her mind wander as she chewed, thinking about Olive with all the defiance of an intentionally disobedient seven-year-old. It had now been over twenty-four hours since they’d last spoken, and no doubt at least twelve since Erato had decided to send those text messages. Where was Olive’s head at right now? Was she devastated? Understanding? Pissed off? She wished for some way for her to check, to smooth things over as necessary.

As she’d predicted, writing through her anxiety about what Erato was doing to her and Olive wasn’t exactly easy. But, surprisingly, it was apparently very possible. Even if her progress had slowed considerably, the words that did end up on-screen actually satisfied her always-harsh inner critic, with very little additional editing required. She was both surprised by how natural it felt to channel her own tumultuous emotion into the inner lives of her characters and irritated by the idea that, yet again, Erato’s bullshit theories had some merit.

In the past, Kate would have allowed her current level of turmoil to yank her out of her characters’ heads for the rest of the day. At least. With Olive’s feelings at stake, that simply wasn’t an option. If she couldn’t devise some covert way to evade Erato’s control, finishing the book could be her only ticket back into Olive’s life. She had to plan for any eventuality, and unfortunately, it was possible—even probable—that Erato would be able to predict and deflect any trickery or deceit on her part. That uncomfortable truth—along with the hard reality that her deadline cared not about her love life—would keep her honest about working even as she plotted in silence.

Besides, Erato might suspect the rebellion in her heart if she didn’t continue to boost her total word count—and that wouldn’t do. Her best chance at success depended upon preserving the element of surprise. If such a feat was even possible.

Kate finished her pancakes quickly, then waited for the knock that came almost immediately after she swallowed her last bite. “Come in,” she called out, and mustered a pleasant but restrained smile. Too over-the-top with her affability and she’d arouse suspicion; too surly and she’d invite unwanted attention. She wanted only to hand off her dirty plate so she could bask in the two to three hours of solitude she’d have before Erato came to check on her again.

Erato took the plate with a small curtsy. “How were they?”

“Delicious.” Kate placed her fingers on her keyboard, ready to type. “Back to work.”

“That’s the spirit!” Erato blew her a kiss, then flounced out of the room with an enthusiasm undeniably pleasant to watch. Especially as reflected in the subtle movement of her firm, round ass.

“For fuck’s…stop looking, Kate,” she grumbled under her breath as soon as she was certain Erato wouldn’t overhear. “
Stop looking
.”

And that’s when she had a brilliant idea, one she was embarrassed not to have landed upon last night. She might not have access to Olive’s phone number, but why else did Internet search engines and social media exist, if not to solve conundrums exactly like this one? She knew from Olive’s father that her last name was most likely Davis. They owned a bakery, and what business didn’t have some presence on social media these days? Olive could even have a personal profile somewhere, which would offer an easy way to send her a message.

Forcing herself to stay calm—lest Erato feel the psychic vibrations of her anticipation through the walls—Kate opened a browser window for the first time that day. She navigated to her favorite search engine and spent a moment composing the most foolproof string of key words that she could imagine: Olive Davis bakery Sonoma County. Before she clicked the search button, she took a moment to send a silent plea to the universe to let this plan work. She might still have time to soothe Olive’s hurt feelings, but only if she got a chance to explain before another day of radio silence from her end destroyed whatever goodwill might remain between them. Taking a deep breath, she initiated her search and held her breath as she waited for the results.

The default search engine screen remained open, her criteria plastered across it. Kate shifted uncomfortably, glancing over her shoulder at every random noise she heard, terrified Erato might sneak up behind her and discover her transgression. After nearly a full minute of waiting for the results page to load, Kate frowned and stopped the page from executing. She tried again immediately. Her stomach twisted when the page instantly refreshed to display a cute ASCII graphic and the ominous message
Unable to connect to the Internet
emblazoned across the top.

At first she wasn’t sure
what
to think. Until now, even with the threat of derailment via cute animal videos, Erato had allowed her access to the Internet. Truthfully, she hadn’t been using it nearly as much as she normally did. Per Erato’s advice, she’d been avoiding the news sites that only depressed her, along with social media and other forms of pointless distraction. She’d mostly stuck to checking her email during breaks and occasionally searching for research purposes. She had given Erato absolutely no reason to justify cutting her off now.

Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe her provider was simply down, or she needed to reboot. She clung to her last vestige of hope as the computer restarted, then cursed when, after a few minutes of detective work, it became clear that this was no accident: it was sabotage.

Her gut instinct was to confront Erato, although that meant admitting she’d attempted to go online in the first place. But that wasn’t exactly an admission of guilt, was it? Despite the light subject matter of her books, she had to conduct all sorts of research. Sexual positions, rope-bondage techniques, and BDSM best practices were frequent areas of interest. Depending on the tale she was spinning, she might need to look up details about weapons, surnames, the careers of her characters, real-world locations or events, as well as anything else she wanted to be accurate about. In fact, the more she thought about Erato’s latest punishment, the madder she got.

With this, Erato had flat-out interfered in her ability to work.
The art is her only concern, my ass.
Simmering, Kate tried to decide if it would be better to pretend she hadn’t yet noticed that the wireless router had been disabled. She risked alerting Erato to the real reason she wanted Internet access, which would surely make life even harder. Then again, Erato was most likely already perfectly aware of the way her mind worked, hence the blatant pulling of the proverbial plug.

As soon as she decided she had more to gain than lose at this point, Kate closed her browser (lest she leave behind incriminating evidence) and left the office in search of her muse. She found her in the guest room, sitting cross-legged in bed with the newest model of Kate’s five-year-old laptop balanced on her knees. A pair of pink headphones obscured the sound from whatever she was watching, but judging from the smile on her face, it was pretty spectacular.

Erato lit up when she noticed Kate standing in the doorway. “Oh, Kate! You have to come watch this, seriously. This tiny, adorable kitten is
so
surprised, over and over again…”

Kate walked to the bed, craning her neck to confirm what she didn’t want to believe. Apparently the Internet outage was limited to her computer alone. A familiar—and yes, spectacularly adorable—viral video was streaming in all its full-screen glory, evidence that what was good for the gander was apparently unacceptable to the muse. Kate watched until the end before speaking. “I came in here to tell you that our Internet connection was down, but apparently it’s a fairly localized outage.”

Clicking on to the next video, this one starring a baby goat, Erato didn’t tear her attention away from the screen for even a second. “
Very
localized. Your computer, specifically.”

This time Kate had to count to twenty before she could speak, which gave them both plenty of time to watch the exuberant cuteness of brand-new goat-hood. Finally, she raised her voice to make sure Erato would hear her over the sound of the video. “You cut off my Internet access?”

Erato snorted at the baby goat’s antics, then clicked over to a different video before the current one ended. “I sure did. You tried to search for Olive?”

Wishing she’d prepared a cover story before opening her mouth, Kate blurted out the first excuse that came to mind. “No, I wanted to read more about…” She flashed on the scene she was just beginning to write: Rose visits with her mother, then goes to find Molly in the room of a dead patient. How did the patient die? What in the world did she need to learn about so badly? “Bowel cancer.” She winced. “Or is that too much to even hint at in an erotic romance?”

Erato pulled the headphones from her ears and studied her intently. “What’s your gut feeling?”

“Too much. You’re right.” She hesitated, then when it looked as though Erato might resume her viral film festival, said, “Even so, I really do need to be able to get online when the situation demands it. You may not think my silly sex stories require any real research, but I happen to take pride in being accurate about even the most minor details.”

“Hey, hey.” Erato touched Kate’s wrist in an obvious attempt to soothe. “Believe me, I recognize that your stories—which are anything but silly, by the way—require serious thought and even some occasional nonfiction reading. The good news is,
I
have access to the Internet.” She angled her laptop toward Kate, beaming. “If you need to get online, I’m happy to let you do it from here.”

“While you watch over me like I’m some sort of prison inmate?” She covered her frustration over the ruining of her plans with a minor eruption of righteous indignation. That Erato had correctly guessed her true motivation had no impact on her ability to generate a healthy dose of legitimate outrage. “
Nice
. Really respectful.”

“I don’t see what the big deal is, if you weren’t intending to try to contact Olive anyway.” Erato set the laptop aside but remained seated on the bed. “Look, having limited Internet access is a
good
thing this close to your deadline. It removes temptation.
All
temptation.”

“It also makes my job harder if I have to yank myself out of the story so I can come in here and talk to you every time I want to pursue a stray thought. Did you think about that?”

“I hear what you’re saying.” Erato’s placating tone only heightened Kate’s irritation. Where did the woman get off? “Unfortunately, this is a delicate case. I’d rather risk distracting you with longer research breaks than deal with the fallout of a well-placed search on social media for Olive or the family bakery.”

Even though she’d anticipated that Erato would try to block any attempt she made to circumvent her missing-cell-phone problem, Kate still felt shaken to have been bested so quickly and effortlessly. “You’re a real jerk sometimes, you know that?”

Erato responded by releasing a sweet peal of laughter totally at odds with the harsh comment that preceded it. “You’re not the first writer to tell me so.” She smiled pleasantly, then picked up her laptop and waggled it in the air. “Still need that search engine?”

Kate was too mad to care about keeping up her cover story. “Forget it. Too much, remember?”

Chuckling, Erato said, “All right, then.” She slipped the headphones back over her ears, winked, and returned her attention to her screen. “Unless you need something else, I suggest you get back to work. The day is still young, and I know you want to get a lot more accomplished than you’ve managed so far.”

Swiveling on her heels, Kate stomped silently out of the guest room. She started back toward the office out of habit, then stumbled to a halt as another thought occurred. Her truck. Out in the parking lot sat her ticket to the outside world. All kinds of places offered Internet-enabled computers for public use—she could find one. An even more earth-shattering realization set her heart racing. Of course! Her wireless provider’s website would have a detailed list of her voice usage charges, each one identified by the associated phone number. Locating Olive’s contact information would be easy, as long as she found a way to get online.

Kate dashed down the hallway and into the kitchen as quickly and quietly as possible. Thus commenced a frantic search: the hook where she was supposed to hang her keys, the bowl full of spare change where they usually ended up, the counter, her purse, then into the living room, the coffee table, beneath the couch cushions, by the front door—until finally she stopped, sweat dripping from her forehead, and accepted the obvious. Erato had anticipated this plan, too.

What other ideas had Erato already worked to counteract? For all she knew, the passwords to her online accounts had already been changed, including that of her wireless provider. It was possible, even probable, that Erato’s devious, detail-oriented nature had enabled her to preemptively undermine even the most brilliant gambit Kate might think up. Perhaps she’d even found a way to remove every trace of Olive Davis from the Web. If anyone could, it would be Erato.