"What's your favorite book?" Drake twirls noodles around his fork, his gray eyes watching me with genuine interest. "And don't say what you think I want to hear. I want the truth."
I consider the question while I chew, surprised that he's asking at all. Jonah never asked me about books. Jonah never asked me about anything that didn't directly involve him.
"Jane Eyre." I set down my fork and meet his gaze. "I know it's predictable, but I've read it probably thirty times. There's something about a woman who refuses to compromise herself, even when the easier path is right there in front of her. She walks away from the man she loves because staying would cost her too much of who she is."
"And she goes back."
"She goes back on her own terms." I adjust my glasses and feel heat creep into my cheeks. "That's the part most people miss. She doesn't return until she's financially independent. Until she can stand beside him as an equal instead of beneath him as a dependent."
Drake is quiet for a moment, something unreadable flickering across his features. "You've thought about this a lot."
"Books were my escape. When everything else was falling apart, stories were the one place I could breathe."
He nods slowly, then asks, "What do you think about the shift to digital? E-readers, audiobooks, all of it. Good for the industry or the death of something sacred?"
The question surprises me with its depth and it hasn’t slipped past me that he’s obviously read Jane Eyre. Most people don't care about publishing trends. Most people don't realize there's an industry behind the books they read.
"Both, honestly." I reach for my water glass and take a sip. "Digital opens doors. People who can't afford hardcovers canaccess libraries on their phones. Audiobooks let people read while commuting, while working, while doing a hundred things that used to eat into reading time. But..."
"But?"
"There's something irreplaceable about paper." I trace my finger along the edge of the takeout container. "The smell of a new book. The weight of it in your hands. The way the pages yellow over time and hold the memory of every place you've read them. You can't press a flower in an e-reader. You can't flip back to your favorite passage and see the coffee stain from the morning you first read it."
Drake's mouth curves into something that's almost a smile. "You should have been a writer yourself."
"I thought about it. But I realized I'm better at finding magic in other people's words than creating my own." I shrug, suddenly self-conscious about how much I've revealed. "I'd rather be the person who helps a writer's dream come true than chase my own."
"The dream of owning a publishing house."
It's not a question, but I answer anyway. "One day. Maybe. If I ever dig myself out of..." I trail off, not wanting to bring Victor into this moment.
Drake reaches across the small space between our chairs and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, his fingers grazing the shell of my ear in a touch so light it might have been accidental.
It wasn't. Again.
"What would you call it?" His voice has dropped lower, rougher. "Your publishing house. If you could have anything."
No one has ever asked me that. I've barely let myself think about it, the dream too painful to examine when reality kept crushing it beneath its heel.
"Ember House." The name slips out before I can stop it, a secret I've kept buried for years. "Because stories are sparks. And the right book can set your whole world on fire."
Drake's gray eyes hold mine across the candlelight, and I see something shift in their depths. Something that looks almost like a plan taking shape.
"Ember House," he repeats softly. "I like that."
I find it easy talking with Drake. Answering his questions honestly is a whole new feeling. It makes me realize just how much of myself I’ve closed off since Victor's shadow fell across my life and taught me to guard every word. And Drake listens. Really listens. Not waiting for his turn to speak, but absorbing everything I say like it matters to him.
Like I matter to him.
Drake passes me a napkin, and his fingers brush against mine during the exchange. The contact lasts only a second, but awareness sparks up my arm and settles in my chest like an ember refusing to die. I press the napkin to my lips and try to focus on anything other than the way my skin tingles where he touched me.
"What made you want to be a publisher?" Drake sets down his chopsticks and gives me his full attention. "Specifically. Not just working in the industry, but owning your own house."
The question catches me off guard with its precision. Most people don't bother to distinguish between the two.
"I want to grant wishes." The words come out before I can filter them, raw and honest in a way that makes me want to take them back. "Not like your Red Letter Syndicate. But in my own way. Writers pour their souls onto the page and then send their work out into the world, hoping someone will believe in them enough to say yes. I want to be that person. The one who sees the potential in a story and helps it find its readers."
Drake's expression shifts, and I see genuine interest kindle in his gray eyes. "You want to help people live their dreams."
