Page 125 of The Hopelessly Bromantic Duet

“You need to make the wound big and gaping and raw.”

Ouch. My agent is mean.

“And once you’ve done that, then let’s get him moving the fuck on.” Mason claps his hands. “Chop, chop, hero! Time to put on your big boy pants. Find a new man.”

As if that’ll happen. “Easier said than done. It takes time for certain heroes.”

But I don’t have much more time to figure out this book. I’ve been trying to start the engine of the story for nearly a year, and I’ve stalled out every time. Now and then, I think I know why this car won’t turn over.

But it hurts too much to admit it out loud.

So I haven’t.

Mason shoots me a dead-eyed stare. “It takes time in real life. This is fiction. You write fiction. In make-believe la-la land, I want you to make all the readers happy as love saves the day. Make them so damn happy they buy copy after copy of your book. But this book?” He grabs the laptop and waggles the silver machine like he’s trying to shake pennies from a stingy piggy bank. “There’s zero romance. Zero dates. Zero setup,” he says. I hate that he’s right. I hate it so much because I can’t get there anymore. I can’t muster the enthusiasm. “I don’t even know what the trope or the plot is. Is it enemies to lovers? Second chance?”

I cringe at the last one, rejecting the idea. No way would I write a second chance, not after what went down with my second chance with Jude. I won’t get into that in a story. Might as well slice a vein open and watch myself bleed.

Pass.

“I don’t write second chance.” I cross my arms, holding my ground on this front. Forever. “Or third chance for that matter.”

He rolls his eyes. “Fine, fine. But then whatisthe story? Is it opposites attract? Forbidden romance? Fake romance? Friends to lovers?”

As I answer no to every question, my stomach churns.

My head hurts.

And the truth of the last year rears its ugly head.

I slump in the chair and drop my forehead into my hand. There isn’t a shred of romance inTenRules for Dating My Exbecause there isn’t a shred of it in me.

I thought I was writing an epic follow-up, and instead, I’m an ice fisherman, and I chopped off a block of my frozen heart.

I’m empty. I’m broken. And I don’t know how to fix... well, me.

2

BIONIC SHARKS DESCENDED FROM MOUNT OLYMPUS

TJ

I shrug helplessly. “I don’t know what the hell to do,” I tell Mason, confessing what I think my agent already suspects. “Everyone’s expecting anotherTop-Notch Boyfriend.”

That romance vaulted me from mid-list to bestseller. The love story made my apartment, lifestyle, and freedom from worry possible. The “guy meets guy and falls head over oxfords” tale was full of so much longing, passion, and heart.

I wish I could write like that still.

But the last year has proven otherwise. I can’t write a dog-falling-for-a-bone love story. I have nothing in my dead heart but memories of a guy who was poised to ruin me if I let him.

I would like to get over Jude Fox once and for all. I would desperately love to write again. “What am I missing, Mason?”

His intensity vanishes, and in its place is concern. “You were in love, TJ. It drove you to write. To feel. To dig deep into your soul for your art. But it didn’t last, and that sucks. I get it. I’ve been there before.”

I turn away, peering out the window of his Amsterdam Avenue offices, staring at the city below.

He’stechnicallynot wrong.

But like the rest of the city, he thinks Flynn the Chicken King broke me. He believes the guy who inspired the story that topped bestseller lists and made me a mint dumped me publicly, painfully, and with disastrous consequences for my career.

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