“I’m quitting?’
“You did that before.”
“No.Not smoking.I’m quitting this job.”
She blinked.“What?”
“Quitting this job.Your contract has been nixed.”
There was no blink this time.Everything inside her went still.“What?”
“You heard.”
“But I signed it.”
“It hasn’t been countersigned.Now I’m told it won’t be.”
“What do you mean, it won’t be?”She didn’t understand.A contract was a contract.“We had an agreement.The house can’t pull out how.”
“The house,” he said with distaste, “can pull out at any point before signing.”
“No.A verbal agreement implies intent.”But thatwasn’t even the primary issue.“My book is good.You love it.Your editor-in-chief loved it.Your publisher loved it.”
“My chairman of the board thought it was too risky.”
“Too risky?What are you talking about?”
Arlan kept her waiting while he took another drag on his cigarette, but this time he didn’t do it out of defiance so much as raw need.With the last of the smoke curling from his lips, he said, “John St.George got to Templar.”
“What?”
“John threatened a libel suit if the house goes ahead with the contract.”
Hillary came out of her chair.“But he has no grounds for libel.There’s nothing I planned to say in my book that isn’t true.I can prove it all.He doesn’t have a case.”
“Templar thinks he might, and that’s all that counts.”
For a minute, she could only stare at him.She didn’t know which one to be most furious with, John or Simon Templar.But neither of them was there just then, so Arlan took the brunt of her rage.Planting her fists on his desk, she cried, “Dammit, Arlan, you can’t let them do this tome!”
“I spent the whole morning arguing, but it didn’t do much good.”
“Then you weren’t arguing the right things.Talk to Templar again.Tell him that he can’t pull out now.Tell him I’ll take him to court myself.Make him change his mind.”
“He won’t.He’s already put through orders to have the paperwork destroyed.”
“He can’t do that!”
“He’s doing it.”
“You can’t let him!”
“For God’s sake,” Arlan snapped, “I’ve done all I can.What do you want from me?”
Hillary forced herself to calm down.It wasn’t Arlan’s fault.She believed him when he said he’d tried.And she did know that he loved her book.With a deliberate effort, she sat down.
“Look,” he said in a more measured way, “we’ll both leave.We’ll take your story to another house.It’ll be snapped up in a minute.”
“That’s not the point.”He voice trembled under the force of restraint.“It’s a matter of principle.”
