Page 62 of Bending The Rules

But I didn’t.

I stayed as still as I possibly could, and held my breath until he finished what he was doing on the computer.

“Okay,” he said, reclining back a little in his chair. He propped his arms behind his head, putting his biceps atjuuustthe right angle. “Check that out, and let me know what you think.”

My eyes went wide. “What? You’re…are you serious? I get to see the book??”

“You are thefirst personI’m letting see the book.”

“Why??”

“Do you not want to?”

I glared at him. “Of course I do! I’m just… surprised, is all.”

“Why? You have any idea how much I value your opinion? You’ve never led me wrong. Your feedback would be doing me a favor.”

I bit back the smile trying to spread over my face, and nodded, not really knowing what to say. Instead, I turned to look at his computer.

“Okay, you get the gist,” I heard from behind me, what seemed like two seconds later, breaking the spell of the words on the screen. Justin reached around me to flip the laptop closed, but I smacked his arm, trying to move it away.

“What are you doing, I didn’t even have time to see anything!”

He twisted his lips at me. “You aren’t fooling me Tee, I know how fast you read. You scrolled through like five pages!”

“I read two paragraphs!”

“Stop lying.”

I sucked my teeth. “Alright fine! I saw a few pages, but that’s not nearly enough to get a feel. You play too much.”

“What did you think of what you saw?”

“You didn’t let me read enough to thinkanythingabout what I saw.”

“Come on, girl.” He gave me a gentle swat across the bottom, undoubtedly meant to be playful, but it set off a lust-bomb in me. Thoughts of much harder smacks, while he was inside of me, had me fidgeting in his lap again. “Tell me what you thought about that opening scene,” he insisted. “And stop squirming in my lap like that.”

“Why?” I met his eyes… wished I hadn’t when I saw the way he was looking at me, like he wanted to strip me out of my clothes.

“I think you know.”

I cleared my throat, then slid out of his lap, returning to my leaning position against the desk. “I think it’s good… but you know that already, Mr. Bestseller.”

He blew out a sigh, turning his gaze up toward the ceiling. “Do I?”

“Uh, you should,” I said, nudging his foot to get him to look at me. “What’s going on? I know you’re not worried about this, are you?”

He let out a dry, humorless chuckle. “Yes the fuck I am. I mean… this is different for me.”

Justin wasn’t beyond fishing for a compliment, but looking in his eyes… his concern was genuine. And I understood it. So many authors stuck with the genre that got them noticed, even when their muse was pulling them in other directions. I knew Justin – I would bet good money that he felt a sense of loyalty to the fans that had gotten him where he was, and there was nothing wrong with that. Part of why his readers loved him was because he made sure they knew they were appreciated.

But on the flipside, he had to be able to branch out, and try new things. And from my experience, when an author was talented – and Justin wascertainlythat – his fans would follow.

I nodded. “Yeah. The whole thriller, suspense vibeisdifferent for you. But there’s nothing wrong with different. It’s a good look for you. I think people will be excited about it.”

“That makes exactlyoneof us,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t even know if anybody would pick this up.”

I scoffed. “Boy,bye.” I moved in front of Justin and bent over his chair, grabbing the arms for leverage. “I would pick something like this up in a heartbeat. From an author withyourtalent? Half a heartbeat. Donotsit your ass here and try to play me like you’re not amazing. Any publisher that turned you down would befoolish. And they wouldn’t deserve you anyway.”

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