Page 85 of Austen Persuaded

“My big Bookshop event today. The book signing.” Rainn’s smile faded, which was peculiar, but I continued, “Rafael was going tocome for moral support, but, well, look at him. He’s got a cake hangover.”

“A cake-over,” Rafael said.

“Would you come, Rainn?” I asked with pleading eyes. “I don’t know why I didn’t think to ask you before.”

His jaw seemed tight, and his eyes avoided mine. Finally, he said, “I don’t know.”

“Oh. Uh, do you … have other plans?”

He crossed his arms, pointing to his gym bag. “Gym.”

Rafael rolled his eyes. “Please. You’d rather go to the gym than help out our girl?”

I didn’t miss the scowl that Rainn shot in Rafael’s direction. “It’s not that. It’s … there’s …” he trailed off. After closing his eyes for a moment, he exhaled loudly and looked back at me. “Fine.”

With this great start to the day, Rainn and I headed to Bookshop for our very first public event, a book signing. The store had held signings occasionally in the past, but it had been a long while, and the events had usually been thrown together somewhat haphazardly with little effort.

I regretted putting less time and effort into this internship than I’d originally hoped, but it couldn’t be helped—the agent promotion was the most important for my future. I probably needed to scale back even more or give up the Bookshop gig, but … I wasn’t confronting that decision yet. I liked being busy, but I was nearly running on empty between the three jobs. At least I hadn’t fallen asleep in anyone’s back seat lately.

Hakeem had agreed to kick off the event. He introduced himself and me to the decent group of people gathered and then spoke briefly about some promotions and other store information. When he gave the floor to me, I gave a brief background on Sara Erickson, a native Minnesotan author who had just published her ninth historical fiction novel. After the introduction, I sat at the signing table with Hakeem and Sofia while Sara performed a brief reading from her latest novel.

My eyes wandered the room and landed on Kylan, as they often did, against my will. He was sitting in the back behind the rows of chairs we’d set up, next to Rainn. My heartbeat quickened. What were they talking about?

Calm down.

They’re probably not talking at all—they’re listening to the author.

If they do talk, it wouldn’t be about you.

Still, my eyes were frequently drawn to them, and Sofia had to repeat my name several times to get my attention after the reading when the signing had actually began.

“Oh, sorry, Sofia, what was that?” I asked.

“I’m just giving you props, girl! This event, you did all this? On top of the agency stuff? Mind-boggling. This will be a big boost to Sara’s local sales, which she said was really key for her earlier books when she worked with Laina.” Apparently Laina was her original agent, but she was reportedly much happier with Sofia. I’d smiled upon hearing that. Laina was smart, successful, capable, tough … but abrasive. Laina and I still hadn’t warmed to each other. Fortunately, I didn’t have to work with her that much longer, so I was able to smile and nod through all the busywork the senior agent dumped on me.

“I’m not sure if it’s the publicity or the author herself, but the turnout is far higher than I allowed myself to imagine,” I said, smiling with satisfaction. Again my eyes drifted over to Kylan and my roommate, and this time, theyweretalking. Possibly enjoying a joke. Both in a good mood? Interesting. Kylan was rarely in a good mood in my vicinity, and Rainn had been grumpy all day for some inexplicable reason.

Once the event concluded and the author had been sent home happy, I strolled over to the manager, who was tidying up some handouts on a display table. “Hakeem, hey, don’t worry about cleanup! My friends and I from the agency can take care of it all.”

Hakeem glanced up, scrunching up his brows. “Not on my watch. The bookstore staff can clean up.Youcan go home.”

My smile faded. “Oh. Um. Well, thank you … for the opportunity today.”

His sharp eyes landed on me again. “Thank me? All I did was speak to a crowd for like 30 seconds. You did all of this.”

“Oh, uh …” I trailed off, confused. Was he thanking me? Or blaming me for something?

“Thank you, Annie. Great job.” He sighed loudly. “Sorry, I should’ve led with that.”

My face relaxed into a slight smile. “Yeah, probably. You’re welcome, but also thank you. I’m glad you gave me this opportunity.”

Hakeem nodded stiffly. “Sai’s around here somewhere. I’ll get her to help, or one of the shelvers. Speaking of Sai, well, I don’t like to beat around the bush. How do you feel about slowly transitioning the coordinator duties to her? When you first came to me for work, you didn’t have any other job, but now you do, and it sounds like a pretty demanding one. I thought you might be looking to offload this obligation at some point, but we hadn’t really spoken about it yet.”

He’s so direct. If only everything else in my life were so clear and direct.

“You’re right. I was vaguely thinking in that direction too. Do you think Sai is interested? I think she could handle more responsibility.”

“She’s interested.” Hakeem looked to the side and then back to me. “Look, we’ll talk about this next week or soon. Right now, I want you to go relax or celebrate with your friends, and I’ll handle my bookstore. Got it? Manager’s orders.” He even offered a small smile.

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