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“And a picture you got here did that for you?”

“It did,” Abby confirmed.

“That’s pretty awesome,”

“I think so. But I’ll know for sure when I send off the pages and see what the publisher says. They might not like it.”

“Why not?” Quinn asked.

“You never know, really. I’ve been trying to figure out an ending for it as I write, which also isn’t like me, and I’m not quite there yet, so they might want to know that before I have it, or they might not like some of what I’ve done so farbecause I’ve skipped around a bit. I’ve been writing a moment here, a scene there, and I wrote my first book in order without that skipping, so they might find something wrong there. I won’t know until they give me notes.”

“When this one becomes another bestseller for you, can I put up a sign in the window or something that says, ‘Inspiration sold here,’ and put your picture and the book cover on it?”

Abby laughed and said, “Yeah, sure. Go for it. I’d do a book signing here, too, but I’m not sure where to put the people.” She looked around the shop again.

“I can move stuff around for a book signing,” Quinn told her with a little laugh. “And I can even do a giveaway. One old, possibly inspirational photo per person. What do you think?”

“I think that would be cool. Do you even have enough to give out, though?”

“Pretty sure of yourself there, aren’t you? Think you’ll draw a big crowd?”

Abby chuckled and said, “Most likely. I’ve had lines that went outside of bookstores before. Those were in big cities, but I’ve never done a signing anywhere close to here, so it’s possible that people may show up from all over.”

“Well, I’ll order more old photos, then. You just have to promise to come back and take whatever is left over after you sign so you can be inspired forever and keep writing.”

“Will do.” Abby laughed again.

Quinn wanted to stand there and keep talking, but she spied some perishables in Abby’s bags, and she also needed to get back to work. Despite the fact that her overhead wasn’t much, shedidstill need to make money to keep the doors open and pay her bills.

“Hey, I have to get back to work. I need to get these keys packed up for the driver to pick up soon, or I’ll miss the delivery window I promised my customer, and those drivers donotwait for you to get ready. Can you maybe stop back by tomorrow around lunch? I’ll try to take a break so that wecan talk more. It’s totally okay if you can’t, though.”

“I don’t know. It depends on my writing. Can I just stop by if I’m able to? I get in these moods where I kind of zone into the writing and lose track of time a lot, so I might be in one of those.”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Okay. I’ll do that, then,” Abby said before she picked up her coffee and her bags. “I need to get this stuff home anyway.”

“Maybe I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Abby replied with a soft smile that had Quinn wishing that it was tomorrow already just so she could see it again.

CHAPTER 13

“Fuck the ending. Just throw the whole damn book out the window,” she said to herself in a huff as she paced in her office.

Abby was in the part of writing that all writers hated. She understood this to be part of the process, but she hated it every time it arrived. It happened multiple times per writing project or book, though, so she should’ve been extra practiced with it by now. This was the phase of writingafterthe initial ‘this is the best idea in the world’ phase. And, normally, these phases were more spread out because she wrote a draft over several months, but this time, they were happening quickly. She’d gone from that initial phase, where she couldn’t believe this story had never been told before and couldn’t stop typing it, to this being the worst idea anyone had ever had, and she wasn’t sure why she was wasting her time.

She was now dealing with her brain trying its best to convince her to delete the whole file, throw her laptop into her yard, and let her automatic sprinklers take care of the rest for her. She could do that and then, go for a walk to recenter herself, come back, pick up her now ruined and soggy laptop, toss it into the trash, and use her phone to apply for another job somewhere in town. Maybe the convenience store was hiring. She could bag groceries there or push the popcorn sale.

A few minutes later, Abby sat back down at her desk, knowing that she’d never throw her laptop out of the window. There was no reason to ruin a perfectly good computer when she could just hit delete and empty her trash. Pulling up her email and ignoring the blinking cursor on the open document file, she found a new one from her publisher.

Hey Abby,

I’m hoping to get whatever you’ve got sofar. If we can get ahead, given the possible delays with this one, that’ll really help out your editor. I’ve already talked to everyone I needed to talk to on my end, and they’re all excited about the prospect of a historical romance from you, given the success of your first historical fiction. Everyone thinks it’s a good way for you to branch out a bit but still use that cred you built up with your first book because you know the time period so well. When can you get me everything you’ve got? If you have the outline, I’d love that most of all because I can get it to marketing, and they can start figuring out how best to promote it.

Thanks,

Margo