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CHAPTER 8
BREE
The cursor blinks at me,teasing me about my blank page.
I’ve been sitting at the desk in Fletch’s small home office for over an hour, and I have nothing to show for it. Not one word.
My romance heroine, Lorna, is supposed to be meeting her mail-order husband for the first time, but every scenario I write feels too close to my current reality.
Wasn’t that the point? So why isn’t it working?
Fletch’s voice keeps echoing in my head.“It’s the one time of year when everything seems possible. Even fake marriages turning into?—”
He didn’t finish the sentence, but I can guess what he was going to say. The way he looked at me kindled something inside that I’m not ready to acknowledge. I tell myself that what could be perceived as interest is still just a joke to him. A continuation of that ridiculous comment he made back in college.
“I’m going to marry you someday, Bree Darling.”
The worst part of it was that every time we’d cross paths, he’d repeat it until the entire campus thought we were an item.Some of the girls in Fletch’s crowd would call me the little librarian in training and tease me about how it was unlikely that someone like me would land the hunky hockey star.
Once, we were at a hockey game victory party. Well, I was there interviewing players for the college paper. He spotted me across the room, pointed, and before I could hide, he repeated that absurd declaration to the amusement of his teammates—not to mention it was already printed in the school paper. Which was kind of my fault, but I’m not in the business of editing or abridging. I tell it like it is.
I’d rolled my eyes and started to walk away, but then someone was playing the bridal march and throwing rolls of toilet paper at me like a veil, a gown—I don’t know. And as much as I’ve tried to erase the memory, it has remained lodged in my brain all these years.
And now, by some cosmic joke, we’re actually married.
Fletch, with his sporty, all-American Clark Kent superhero looks and build, has the same swagger that the girls in my dorm tripped over themselves for. Not me. I wasn’t an enterprising Lois Lane who once saw him in class wearing reading glasses and thought to myself,Wow, he’s attractive. Okay, I did briefly. Boy, was that a mistake.
I quickly learned that his personality is the P.I.T.S: Pompous, Idiotic, Thoughtless, Stupid.
Fine, it was immature of me to make that up, but what he did was worse.
Even though he’s well-groomed and grown up now, he’s probably just a 2.0 version, but the updates aren’t the kind that matter.
I close my manuscript document with a sigh. There’s no use forcing the words today. Instead, I open my external hard drive and browse through old files. Past manuscripts, abandoned story ideas, notes from writing conferences—artifacts ofa career built on crafting the kinds of love stories I don’t believe will ever happen for this girl.
The irony isn’t lost on me. Nina and numerous other friends have analyzed my love life—or lack thereof—without me even having to pay an hourly fee for therapy.
I write romance for a living, creating perfect love stories with guaranteed happy endings. Nina says this makes me either a cynic or a hypocrite. I prefer “professional skeptic with an excellent imagination.”
They saidit’s become my way of influencing potential intimacy narratives as a result of not being able to control real relationships—or open up and let someone special get close to me. My characters get the happiness I don’t believe is possible for myself.
Not only did I get that psychoanalysis without spending a dime, but my editor, Meredith, once told me I write, and I quote, “With the edge of someone who’s never been burned by love.” She meant it as a compliment—praise for my technical skill and emotional clarity. But the comment buried itself deep, exposing a truth I try to hide. I’ve spent years studying romance from the outside, observing patterns and dynamics in other people’s relationships because my own, albeit limited, experiences have left me wary.
The truth is, I have been burned by love. Just not the romantic kind. Since my parents had me later in life, an unexpected surprise that disrupted their well-ordered existence, I was more of an afterthought—or in the writing world, an afterward.
They weren’t cruel at all, just distant. As if they never quite figured out how to incorporate a child into their established routines. Love existed in our house, but it wasconditional, measured, practical—like every other aspect of their lives.
“Ready to go?” Fletch’s voice startles me from the doorway, reminding me we’re going to the very house I grew up in to grab a few of my things. I nod.
“How’s it coming so far?”
“Meh.” But no sooner does the sound come out of my mouth, I realize that not a single guy in my life has ever inquired about my work.
He grips the top of the doorframe, muscles flexing. I will myself not to blush as his shirt lifts slightly, revealing a tease of his trim waist.
