“Don’t panic on me, please.” Greta stepped closer and put her hands flat on Kaelee’s chest.
“Okay.” Kaelee stared at her. “I don’t want to fuck up and hurt you.”
“Same.” Greta rested her cheek against Kaelee’s chest, and she wrapped her arms around Greta to hold her there.
“I’veneverdated,” Kaelee whispered. “Are there rules?”
“Treat meexactlyas you already are,” Greta suggested. “Don’t overthink this.”
Kaelee nodded, but the panic still filled her. The only examples of relationships she’d had growing up were ones she now considered toxic. More recent, she’d seen Toni and Addie, who functioned a lot like friends who couldn’t stand not to touch. Was their relationship an oddity or was it more normal than ones like her parents’ marriage?
She hadn’t seen her father hit her mother often, but she’d seen the handprints on her arms often enough to know that he squeezed too tight in anger. Her mother typically wore long sleeves year-round.Kaelee remembered the flinches when he raised his voice. Her aunt and uncle were much the same. Kyle had expected the same. Plenty of women she’d seen reacted with that haunted deer look.
Not Granny Kay, though.
Not Toni and Addie.
Not any of the girls that Evander brings around.
Kaelee countered her own gut fears with a steady stream of facts. She’d done so for years. Logic didn’t erase panic, but it made it crawl back into its box typically.
27Greta
By early afternoon, Greta was so lost in the new manuscript she was reading that she called Emily. Admittedly, Greta felt vaguely tempted to walk over to Toni’s office and ask for her quiz, but the snow was falling faster than before and the thought of sliding through it seemed less than appealing. And, of course, Greta thought she’d better handle the business part first. Emily had already emailed in response to the offer Greta had sent that morning.
“I’ve read more than enough to know I’m buying Toni’s book,” Greta said in lieu of a proper greeting.
“One or two pages?” Emily teased.
Greta was relieved that they were able to talk as if the awkward conversations about her personal life had not happened. “I’ve read the first two hundred so far.”
“Well then. You reallydidprioritize it.”
“I took two days out of office to read.” Greta stared out the coffee shop window at the light fall of snow on the campus grounds. “What are Toni’s counterdemands?”
“I haven’t told her you offered yet. She is genuinely serious about you reading it first.” Emily sounded somehow both amused and exasperated. It was a mix of emotions Greta thought of as the “Toni reaction” at this point.
“Okay, so what areyourdemands?”
“Better escalation clause on paperbacks. Higher royalty overall on paperback and flat fifteen percent on hardcover.” Emily paused before adding, “Less of a tour clause.”
“Emily.”
“She’ll ask. You know she will, so I’m putting it on the table.”
Greta smiled. She’d already told the contracts team that this would be a sticking point, so she had authorization to decrease the requirements. She wasn’t going to admit that yet in case she needed it later. “I’ll see.”
“She will want either only a one-book deal or the second book to have more flexibility.” Emily sounded less sure of herself now. “She’s considering a spin-off stand-alone.”
“This book ends unfinished,” Greta objected.
“I thought you were only at two hundred?”
“I read the end already,” Greta admitted.
Emily laughed. “Three books, then.”
“Sold. Seven fifty each.” Greta had the leeway to go higher on the advance, but she’d save that if she couldn’t get all the other clauses. Having something in her pocket to bargain with was standard tactics if she needed to counter any other objections.
