Page 71

Chapter thirty-three

Leap

P oppy traced a hand over the painted ants on the side of Café Legend, knowing she was procrastinating but not quite ready to go in.

It had already been a long morning, and she was exhausted, but also oddly light.

Like she’d been carrying the whole world on her shoulders, and she’d finally flung it off into the void.

Like she’d stood outside in a monsoon storm and been washed clean.

She had wanted to write a huge manifesto calling out Brendan for everything he had ever done.

Had typed and deleted a dozen openings before she’d decided that less was more.

Besides, chances were the reviewer would just delete her comment to protect his literary idol, Brendan Fucking Beaumont, sure to be a Nobel Laureate someday.

So in the end she’d just left a brief, concise comment.

That pull quote is amazing! At least I thought so when I wrote it last year. I wonder how much of this book was stolen? #plagiarism

She’d added a link to her Instagram post—it wouldn’t be clickable, but people could type it in if they wanted, or just go to her profile—and put her phone to sleep.

And then she’d put it out of her mind. Or mostly out of her mind.

Every so often as she was cooking and eating dinner with her mom, or gratefully-yet-miserably working on the transcripts that had finally popped up on the market, she’d flared a little spark of rage, thought Brendan, you fucking fucker , and then gotten back to what she was doing.

When she’d been getting ready for bed, though, she’d checked her phone out of habit, and there had been replies. Not just one but several, ranging from shocked disbelief to vitriolic counter-accusations. And at the very top of the thread had been a reply from Brendan himself.

Nothing like a jealous ex-wife to try and sabotage a man’s hard-won success. If anyone is plagiarizing here, we both know who it is. Good thing you were fired for cause, or you’d have stolen the whole thing. #liar

She’d ignored everyone else and replied to only him, drawing on all her petty rabid-ferret energy. Because if she was going down, Brendan was damn well going to feel the teeth marks.

My employment with Beaumont Book Group, and thus my access to your files, ended for NO cause at the same time as our marriage did—January of 2022.

You hadn’t even started talking about writing a third book yet.

But I’m sure you have the dated Word doc of your first draft to prove your libel?

Or more to the point, to prove you didn’t steal those words from the dated post I linked?

(Hint: my comment wasn’t libel because it was true.) I realize it’s part of your brand to have pull quotes written by me, but maybe you should move on and hire an actual ghostwriter next time.

#EveryAccusationIsAConfession #WriteYourOwnDamnBookForOnce

She had actually been laughing by the time she finished typing it.

She wasn’t sure why, even now. She hated confrontation.

Hated it. And her reply absolutely hadn’t been professional, or mature.

She was taking a chance, too, because it was entirely possible he’d started a document for his third book before giving her the heave-ho.

Was there a level of career death below blacklisting?

Well, it didn’t fucking matter. Not anymore.

She’d gone to bed, falling asleep surprisingly quickly given how pissed off she was, and awoken to even more notifications. She’d ignored them all and focused on Brendan’s latest reply. Which was right to the point.

Prove it. #lyingbitch

To her credit, she’d thought about it. Thought about the fact that all the working files she had on her computer were legally the property of Beaumont Book Group, that they could and would absolutely sue her for copyright infringement, libel, slander, nondisclosure agreement breach, and probably a whole pile of other legal issues that she couldn’t even spell and definitely hadn’t done.

Thought about the fact that if they succeeded in suing her, they’d probably manage to yoink her mom’s house from under them, put them on the streets.

This wasn’t just not being safe. This was flinging herself off a cliff and expecting the clouds to save her.

Well, she’d told herself, maybe they would. They had once before.

She shouldn’t do it. She’d known she shouldn’t.

She should roll her eyes, chalk it up to her past shitty decisions, and get back to editing transcripts.

Do what she had to do to survive and throw away her pride, like she’d done over and over for almost two years.

Roll into a ball like an armadillo and stay safe.

But he’d said prove it.

Right after he’d accused her of his own damn crime.

And this morning, she’d decided she absolutely was that #bitch. Just not a lying one.

So she’d leapt. Even more to her credit.

She’d kept it simple. She had the Word docs with both his original text and her dated “suggestions” changing what he’d written to the final published words, with her name right beside them.

And she had the graphics with all his pull quotes, because she’d made them.

So she’d compiled the screenshots and graphics in Canva, added some personal notes about the ones he’d actually fought her over then bragged about later, and uploaded them all to Instagram as a single post. There were exactly ten, five per book, which she’d thought was poetic.

And to forestall any accusations of Photoshop falsification, she’d then saved read-only versions of both of the Word files, leaving all the tracked changes and their timestamps intact, and uploaded them to her Google Drive.

All the proof she needed was right there in the metadata for anyone to see.

She’d put a link to the files in her Instagram bio, tagged Brendan and the reviewer and—because if she was going to get sued, she might as well go big—Beaumont Book Group in the post, and posted a link to the post in the reviewer’s comments.

Here’s your proof. #bitchplease

And then she’d turned off Instagram notifications entirely and headed to the coffee shop.

She still felt giddy. And sick. And terrified.

Just like she had the first time Rai had taken her flying.

But she’d done it, well and truly, and there was no taking it back.

Even if there had been, she wouldn’t take it back.

She’d been letting Brendan’s betrayal fester inside her for far too long, poison everything she’d done since, and she needed to truly heal.

Lift her fucking arms to the azure sky and live. It was well overdue.

And now she was free.

Well, except for the potential legal consequences.

But it wasn’t like she had a lot of money for them to take.

And maybe getting sued by a prestigious publishing company would give her enough notoriety to build a new career.

Maybe she could have Heather add that fact to her artist bio, and her drawings would sell like hotcakes.

Tucson loved an outlaw. Hell, maybe she should take her own advice and write her own damn book. The future was wide open.

She shivered and realized she was still caressing a painted ant on a brick wall. Which was honestly just silly. She yanked her hand from the brick and hurried around the corner, into the shop.

It was relatively busy, and she spent the time waiting in line scanning the other art on the wall, trying not to get egotistical over the space that had been hers, since she knew it wasn’t a real sale.

The drawing of her hand on Rai’s gorgeous stomach.

Of course he’d picked that one. She’d meant it for him from the start, been disappointed when he’d insisted she sell it.

She’d kind of wanted to keep it, too. Had regretted having only a few cell phone photos to remember… She wasn’t even sure she could define her time with Rai in words. In the end, all she could truly remember was love. Unknowing, then unwilling, then unbearable, but always love.

He’d been a liar, but he’d been her liar. And she missed him.

But it was finally her turn, and Heather greeted her with genuine enthusiasm.

They’d always had an amicable relationship, but Poppy hadn’t felt comfortable stopping in when she couldn’t afford even a drip coffee, and so they hadn’t had a lot of opportunities to talk.

They’d spoken more during the weeks she’d been with Rai than they had in the two years previous, even with the negotiations for the gallery representation, and Poppy felt suddenly a little sad. Heather could have been a true friend.

Too bad Rai’s betrayal was between them.

But Heather’s eyes lit up at seeing Poppy, and she put her hand over the terminal when Poppy made to insert her card. “Today’s coffee is on me. Just grab a seat. I’ll be with you in a sec.”

Poppy managed a half-smile and went to the booth under her vacant space on the wall.

Heather showed up a few minutes later with her cup of coffee. “You like four raw sugars, a quarter inch of cream, sprinkle of cinnamon, right?”

“Careful,” Poppy said with a laugh. “I’m gonna think you value me as a customer. ”

Heather rolled her eyes. “Well, obviously I do. Anyhow, here’s the paperwork. You have a new piece?”

Poppy tried not to curl into herself as she brought out the best of what she had left.

Heather looked at it for a moment, then raised serious eyes to Poppy’s face. “You sure?”

Poppy stared studiously over Heather’s shoulder. “Yes.”