Chapter 55
825 Words
The next Monday, I showed up for work in a crisp new black suit. Dudley had paid me a little something in advance for getting the bullet out of Garth and to keep the lights on in my apartment. My hair was straight and shining. I’d been to the salon. My stomach was full of blueberry waffles thanks to Dudley and mine’s my new relationship. He took me on a breakfast date for my first day. He was super nervous when he came to pick me up. I could tell. He’d forgotten to tie his tie and it hung around his neck, completely undone.
We strolled into the office, with my high heels making a racket on the tiling.
“So, you haven’t told me yet,” I reminded him. “Who’s your partner?”
“I think you’ve met him,” Dudley said playfully, slipping his arm around my waist.
Then a voice came from inside the empty office, “If you two are going to be all lovey-dovey,
I’m leaving right now,”
“Like you have anything better to do,” Dudley retorted.
I pushed off Dudley’s hand and went to the office door. Standing next to the filing cabinet in a leisurely way was Pierce Wagner.
I gawked.
He flashed his green eyes at me and said, “Did you fail to hear that I was sacked?”
“Yeah. I must have missed that. Why?”
“I was supposed to be helping with the raid when the building went up like a Roman candle? When I was in the third phase, I could stomach anything, but ever since I entered phase four I cannot stand the sight of blood,” he said pompously.
“So?”
“So the city decided they would rather not leave their community in the hands of a man who might be tempted to lick blood off the floor. Their loss really.”
I turned from Pierce, dressed to kill and looking as upright as a pencil in his pinstripe suit, to Dudley—looking a trifle shabby, but a little golden around the edges nonetheless.
“You guys want me to be your assistant? Is this a real job?”
Dudley was gruff and mildly impatient. “It’s legitimate.”
I didn’t know what to say when the ringing of the phone snapped me out of it. Pierce answered it, looked surprised, and handed me the phone.
I took it and was no less gob-smacked than Pierce when I heard the voice on the line. It was my mother. I’d sent her a text with my new work number in it the night before, but I didn’t expect her to make use of it so quickly.
“Hi,” I said, pulling a face for only Dudley to see.
He chuckled and turned away to give me privacy.
“Sweeper, I was just calling to see if you were all right,” she said.
I looked at Dudley. His hair was coming off his ears in tiny ski jumps and his toe was tapping cheerfully. Actually, he was dismantling the file Marshall had made up for London and running the pages through the shredder.
“I’m all right,” I said, feeling at greater ease with myself than I’d felt in a long time.
“That’s a relief,” my mother said. “Have you heard from London?” “No,” I said slowly. “She never called me back.”
Dear Reader,
Thanks for reading this book! It means a lot to me.
Let me tell you a bit about this novel. This is the sixteenth novel that I wrote to completion. It was also the first time I tried to get a book published with a traditional publishing company. I started sending out inquiries and I landed a publisher on the third try. I felt like a star.
Obviously, I did not continue to feel like a star. This book was not a success and for many years, I couldn’t look at it. What had gone wrong? Was it me? Was it my publisher? Had vampires gone out of fashion or was a book that wasn’t a romance novel simply doomed?
I still don’t know exactly what went wrong. It’s not important.
Ten years after writing it, I picked it up, brushed it off, and started posting it on a freebie website. I found myself looking at the chapters and reading little bits. I was surprised to see that I thought it was good. Whether it could enjoy commercial success was no longer a concern.
I like it, which led to the updated version you just finished reading.
I hope you enjoyed it too.
If you did, please give it a five-star rating. A review is nicer, but if you’d rather not write anything, a five-star rating is very helpful.
All the love in the world,
Stephanie Van Orman
Novelist
- Writer
