My stupor snapped, and I threw my arms around him as the weight of my accomplishment sank in.
He laughed, his face wreathed with pride as I squealed and did a little happy dance.
I didn’t care how stupid I looked because after all the agonizing, the failures, and the setbacks, I was finally a published author.
Jill Sherman had loved the revised manuscript and officially offered me representation two years ago. She shopped the book around, and after a couple of nibbles but no bites from the big houses, I signed with a small but well-respected publisher who was building out their thriller imprint. Now, after endless edits and revisions, it was out in the world.
I wasn’t going to turn into Nora Roberts or Dan Brown overnight, but I didn’t care. I finished my story, I loved it, and that was all that mattered.
I was already in the middle of drafting the sequel. Kai read it in chunks as I wrote it, which made the process much smoother than the original. It was hard to get lost in my own head when he was always there to pull me out.
But even if he weren’t there, I’d have an easier time. I’d developed a routine that worked for me, and I put less pressure on myself to write a perfect first draft. Everything got edited and revised to hell before it went to the printers anyway.
Once I released my need for perfection, the words flowed. There were still days when I wanted to tear my hair out over sentences that wouldn’t form or a scene that wouldn’t crystallize, but for the most part, I was really fucking excited to work on the story.
After years of drifting, I’d finally found my purpose—to create, both for myself and others.
“Let’s take a picture,” Alessandra suggested. “We need to commemorate the moment.” She, Vivian, and Sloane had accompanied me for moral support.
I was no longer working at Floria Designs, but it was always supposed to be a temporary job.
Alessandra had built a great team since I left, and the small business was thriving. The same couldn’t be said of her relationship with Dominic, but that was a whole other story.
I plucked one of the copies off the shelf and posed with it. It was probably the cheesiest picture I’d ever taken; I couldn’t wait to print and frame it.
“Turn two inches to your left,” Sloane ordered. “Now lift your chin, smile…smile some more…
perfect.”
She was such a perfectionist that her photos took forever, but they came out so good that no one complained.
I held onto the book after the picture, reveling in its weight and texture. I’d received advance copies from my publisher, but until that moment, it didn’t feel real.
This was mine, from concept to execution. I’d taken an idea and created a whole world, one that other people could enter and get lost in. Every book was a footprint in history, and I’d made my mark.
A lump formed in my throat as my tiny seed of pride blossomed into a full-grown tree, roots and all.
My phone buzzed with an incoming FaceTime call. Felix’s face filled half the screen when I answered. Behind him, Miguel and Romero poked their heads above his so they could see too.
“Well?” he said, skipping his usual greeting. “Is it there? Show us!”
“It is.” I grinned, swinging the camera around to show the paperbacks of Mistress in Waiting sitting pretty on the shelf. “If you’re nice to me, I’ll autograph one for you.”
“We don’t get a family exception? That’s cold.” Miguel shook his head. “Just published and you’re already forgetting about us.”
“It’s a natural progression,” Romero said. “The cost of celebrity.”
“Oh, be quiet, you two. Stop teasing your sister.” My mother’s voice appeared before she did.
Felix stepped to the side, and her gentle features replaced his chiseled ones onscreen. “Oh, look at that,” she breathed. “Your name on the cover! I’m so proud of you. Now, make sure to send copies to your relatives in the Philippines, or I’ll never hear the end of it when I go back—”
“Isa!” My lola shoved my mother aside and peered at me. Her wrinkles seemed to have doubled since the last time I saw her, but her eyes were as sharp as ever. “Let me see. Hmm. Are those cufflinks on the cover? I can’t tell. Eyesight’s not so good these days. Arturo!” she yelled, calling my grandfather. “Get over here. Do those look like cufflinks to you?”
I laughed, warmth fizzing in my chest as my family shoved and argued on the other side of the screen. They were a mess sometimes, but they were my mess, and they’d been incredibly supportive of my publishing journey. Most of them anyway.
My smile faded when Gabriel showed up. He was the last to get on the call, and his stern, solemn demeanor was a marked contrast to my other brothers’ teasing.
“Congratulations,” he said. “Publishing a book is a big accomplishment.”
“Thanks.” I hugged it tighter to my body with my free arm. “Proved you wrong, didn’t I?” I said it lightly, but we both knew I wasn’t joking.
“You did.” To my shock, a tiny curve of his mouth softened the severity of his expression. “And I’ve never been happier to be wrong.”
My voice stuck in my throat. I was so thrown off by Gabriel’s answer I couldn’t summon a proper
response.
He hated being wrong. I thought he wanted to see me fail just to prove he was right about my flakiness, but he looked genuinely happy for me. Well, as happy as Gabriel could look, which was still dour by normal standards.
Maybe I wasn’t the only one in the family who’d underestimated a sibling.
“Oh.” I coughed, heat coating my skin. “Um, thank you.”
Perhaps I should’ve seen his reaction coming. I came into my inheritance last year after he and my mother agreed that my finished manuscript and book deal met the clause’s terms. My mother had done most of the talking during our call, but Gabriel had voted yes on giving me the money. That counted for something, right?
“You’re welcome,” he said. “I’ll see you in a few months for Mom’s birthday. Hopefully, you’ll have started your second book by then. You can’t make a career off of one.”
I rolled my eyes as our moment of sibling bonding evaporated. It was nice to see Gabriel hadn’t changed that much.
When I hung up, my friends had drifted over to a non-fiction display featuring Leo Agnelli’s new travel memoir and a former Black & Co. executive’s tell-all detailing the company’s demise.
Alessandra kept checking and pocketing her phone. It was probably Dominic calling—and getting ignored—for the hundredth time. Good. The man deserved to suffer a little. Kai, on the other hand, was flipping through the latest Ruby Leigh.
“No,” I said. “Absolutely not. You’re not allowed to ruin her by translating her into Latin.”
“I hardly understand how that would ruin her,” he said, sounding offended. “I can translate Wilma Pebbles, but I can’t translate Ruby Leigh? You love both of them.”
He hadn’t done many Latin translations lately because he was so busy at the office. The work of a CEO never ended, especially not after the DigiStream acquisition, and its integration with the Young Corporation had taken over his life for months. Fortunately, it’d gone as smoothly as he’d hoped.