Page 17 of Beautifully Used
He would? “You would?” I found myself asking aloud. The idea of him reading my book seemed so… surreal.
He shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”
“I don’t know. I never pictured you as a reader. I mean a guy who likes to read novels. I mean … I’m sure you read.” Now I was babbling, but at least we were talking about something besides what had happened. I wasn’t entirely sure about what that was myself, so there was really no way I could explain it to Brodie, or anyone for that matter.
“I read. Stephen King, Tom Clancy, or Michael Connelly. Horror and mysteries mostly. From the way you were acting, your story sounds like it might fall into the horror genre. Is that what you’re writing? Horror? Because you sure scared the hell out of me.”
“Sorry. A little on the horror side, it’s mostly a romance, but with a very dark edge. It’s a stand-alone, but the main character is one that I had in my other novel.” I wasn’t lying about all that. I was toying with a new story like that. One I’d actually started writing the other night.
“A romantic horror story. Sounds intriguing. You have another novel?”
“Yeah. I accepted a contract with a publisher a few days before I came here. I told Lena about it this morning, but I told her not to mention it to anyone.”
“That’s really cool. Congratulations. But why did you tell her not to tell anyone?”
“I wasn’t sure if I wanted anyone to know. I was thinking of using a pen name.”
“Oh. Why don’t you want anyone to know you wrote it?”
“Let’s just say it has some stuff in it that I don’t want certain people to read.”
“That makes sense. I guess.”
“I can’t believe you thought I was on drugs.”
“I didn’t.”
“But you accused me of being on drugs and hiding them.”
“I had to ask. You were acting very strangely. We should still celebrate. About the book.” He smiled, but from the way his smile didn’t reach his eyes, I was pretty sure he hadn’t bought my explanation. Regardless, I was grateful that he hadn’t pressured me for any more information.
Chapter 13
Brodie
* * *
Gabrielle may be writing a story, but there was no way she’d been acting out a character’s response in the hallway with me. If she had been, she was one hell of an actress, academy award worthy, in fact. I should have suggested she give up the writing to become an actor. I suppose I should try to give her the benefit of the doubt, but it sure seemed like something was very wrong. For real.
I walked into the kitchen and found Jackson doing the old drinking out of the milk carton thing our mother always yelled at us for. “Hey, nobody wants your stinking germs in their milk,” I said, smacking the back of his head as I walked by.
He eyed me over the top of the carton and continued to drink. When he finished, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and smacked his lips. He crushed the carton until it became flat before tossing it into the trash. “It was the end of the carton.”
Rufus wagged his tail twice but didn’t move, not even when I stepped over him on my way to the refrigerator. He was a lazy dog most of the time, except for that episode with Lena when he’d tried to save her life. He’d been quick to come to her rescue that day. That was something we’d all been surprised about with our good ol’ dog.
“Good thing. I don’t think the women in this house would have liked your backwash,” I said, unable to hide the negative mood behind my tone. I opened the fridge, took out a beer, popped the top and guzzled half before stopping.
“What’s eating you?”
“Nothing.”
“Something.”
“Nope.”
“Are we going to continue this one word at a time conversation for long? Because if we are, I’m gonna need a beer, too.”
“Better have a glass of water first. I don’t have first-hand experience, but I’m not too sure a beer will settle very well with the milk you just drank.”
