The Writer's Romance Read online

  The

  Writer’s

  Romance

  ELSA KURT

  Copyright© 2018 Elsa Kurt

  All Rights Reserved

  ISBN-13: 978-1986477093

  DEDICATION

  To my husband, always.

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TALL, DARK, & IRRITATING

  TWO

  FROM BAD TO WORSE

  THREE

  MEAN GIRLS GOOD

  FOUR

  COME DANCE WITH ME

  FIVE

  DON’T BREAK THE SPELL

  SIX

  WELL THAT DIDN’T GO AS PLANNED

  SEVEN

  UNINTENDED PLANS

  EIGHT

  NOT ANOTHER SHOWDOWN

  NINE

  THAT WOMAN

  TEN

  CROWD CONTROL

  ELEVEN

  PUSHED TOO FAR

  TWELVE

  IT’S NOT ME, IT’S YOU

  THIRTEEN

  SOCIAL MEDIA SKILLS

  FOURTEEN

  LIFE OF THE PARTY

  FIFTEEN

  UP ALL NIGHT

  SIXTEEN

  AVOIDANCE

  SEVENTEEN

  BLAST FROM THE PAST

  EIGHTEEN

  CARY GRANT CURE ALL

  NINETEEN

  ONCE A TROUBLEMAKER

  TWENTY

  TWO TO TANGO

  TWENTY-ONE

  REGRETS, I’VE GOT A FEW

  TWENTY-TWO

  THAT’S WHAT FRIENDS ARE FOR

  TWENTY-THREE

  ANOTHER MISSED OPPORTUNITY

  TWENTY-FOUR

  READ ME

  TWENTY-FIVE

  IT’S ABOUT TIME

  TWENTY-SIX

  ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL

  EPILOGUE

  ONE YEAR LATER

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  First and foremost, my gratitude goes to the town of East Hampton, Connecticut, for being such a charming and perfect setting for my story. It was from the very first time we drove along Lake Pocotopaug that I knew I wanted a story based there. Thank you to Sheri Spalding, owner of the historical 95 Main building—once the site of Siebert’s Opera House and place of my very first book signing event—for letting me include the location. I’d have been remiss had I not sent my characters to ECO coffee shop across the street and Po’s Rice and Spice next door, so thanks for being such cool places. Similar thanks go to Angelico’s Lakehouse. We’ve enjoyed our many visits there, where we did indeed see the legendary CT Blues Hall of Famer Jeff Pitchell on several occasions. Thank you to Jeff and Betsy Pitchell for allowing me to give Jeff a cameo. Lastly, thank you to my team of Beta readers who help me make a better story. Mary Ellen, Jen, and Carol…you guys rock.

  Despite having plenty of ‘visual inspiration,’ The Writer’s Romance is a work of fiction. Aside from the aforementioned, the characters are fictional and not based on any one specific person, but rather a composite of many. Any similarity between them and real persons, are coincidental.

  PROLOGUE

  Mitch watched Katharine dash from the stage but could do nothing to stop her. The hosts had drawn him into a conversation—none of which he could recall after—and he’d missed his chance to speak to her. This was supposed to have been the moment when they shook hands and let bygones be bygones, and yet Mitch was once again left ravaged in the wake of Hurricane Katharine. He said as much to Sam when he pulled up to the station’s front entrance.

  “So, how’d it go?” Sam asked as Mitch closed the passenger door.

  “That woman—” he began, throwing his cap onto the floor mat at his feet.

  “Uh-oh. Here we go.”

  Mitch ignored Sam’s lament and launched into a thirty-minute diatribe of Everything Awful About Katharine Evans.

  “Uh-huh. All I really hear is, you really, really like this chick.”

  Mitch opened his mouth, ready to rebuke the accusation, then sighed and laughed a little. “Yep. I suppose I do. She’s smart, beautiful, in great shape, and turns out she’s philanthropic, too. I mean, who’d have thought that?”

  “Yeah, well—”

  “But she’s also hot-tempered, rude, and demanding. Don’t you think so?”

  “I kind of—”

  “I mean, I guess I did provoke her a little bit. But we made up for it with that video. Right?”

  Sam said nothing.

  “I said, right, Sam? Why aren’t you answering me, Sam?”

  “Oh, are you done? Can I speak now?”

  Mitch looked contrite. Yes, he’d gone on a tangent. Katharine Evans seemed to have this effect on him quite often. He let Sam speak. Halfway through, his mind wandered back to that confounding woman and what she might be doing right then…

  ONE

  TALL, DARK, & IRRITATING

  Katharine Evans blinked slowly, her eyes wide and unfocused. Everything in her peripheral was fuzzy, but the window sill, where her gaze had transfixed, was sharp and clear. A deep scratch against the dark wood grain. A fine layer of dust. A thumbtack. Why is there a thumbtack on the window sill? The words ‘window sill’ began repeating slowly in her head, drawn out. A distant little voice in her head sang out, ‘you’re stalling.’ Still, she didn’t move. The house was quiet, the world outside her window equally so. It wouldn’t last much longer. As if on cue, a loud clack echoed across the lake, bouncing off the houses in a quick staccato. Katharine jumped, then sat up straighter in her home office chair. Focus, now. Ugh. She looked at the computer screen. Five hundred words, that’s all I’ve written. I can barely sit still for five minutes, let alone the hours it’s going to take to get this done.

  Katharine’s editor expected twenty thousand. By tomorrow. The all-too-familiar fluttering of moth wings in her chest began, but Katharine quelled it with sound logic and reason. Relax. You’ve got twelve pages of archived material. Send them some of that, if you must.

  At the rate she was going, she might have to do precisely that. The loud noise seemed to have worked as an alarm clock for not only Katharine but for Mother Nature’s creatures as well. The chatty whistles of chickadees, the harsh squawk of a blue jay, and the caw of a crow in the trees had begun in earnest. She’d pushed open the curtains the moment she walked into the room, and now a gentle breeze trembled the edges of the thin, lacy material, carrying the scent of freshly cut grass and adding even more distraction for Katharine. No matter how many times she tore her eyes away, the view of the lake kept calling her attention from the keyboard and the blinking cursor on the screen. Outside the window, down and across her lovingly landscaped, rectangle yard, the early morning sunlight danced on the rippling currents. The blue sky gave the dark water a cobalt hue. Her mind drifted again. Twirling a long strand of caramel-colored hair between her thumb and fingertip, she leaned back against the chair’s backrest and stared forlornly through the mesh screen. Well, when you live year-round in a lakeside house, these are your distractions. Better than the city any day. Slowly, Katharine pulled her gaze away, but a glimpse of cherry red through the row of privacy bushes caught her eye. Her kayak. It was a perfect morning for a paddle around the lake. Hardly anyone would be out there on a weekday. Abruptly, Katharine forced herself to sit up straight and spoke aloud.

  “No. Nope, not an option, kid. Katharine Evans, get back to work.”

  As a rule, Katharine avoided talking aloud to herself, but she needed a jolt to get focused. With a dramatic sigh, she looked around the sunny room, seeking the inspiration her storyboard wasn’t offering. Her office was like another universe compared to the rest of her small bungalow. The other rooms were decorated in rich, warm earth ton
es, conveying a warm cabin-like atmosphere. This space was bright, with floral prints and lace accents. Shabby chic. That’s what they called it. Whoever ‘they’ were. It wasn’t really her style, but it was her book’s main character’s style. Chelsea Marin, teen ‘it girl.’ Now into book three of a series with no definite end in sight.

  Not that Katharine was complaining, of course. Sure, young adult wasn’t the genre she set out to write, but it was the one that brought in the money for her to live the way she liked. Alone. Secluded. Undisturbed. The doorbell rang. Of course, the doorbell would ring right now. Katharine ignored it. Then the knocking began. Incessantly. She stood with a scowl and tip-toed down the stairs and into the living room, so she could peek out the window. These curtains were still drawn against the morning sun, so she pushed them aside enough to peek one eye out. A long-faced young man stood at the door and looked right at her. It was her handyman…whose name she’d forgotten immediately after he introduced himself on his first day working for her. Since he reminded her of Shaggy from Scooby-Doo, she’d taken to calling him that. Not to his face, of course. Shaggy smiled brightly with a lopsided grin and waved as if anything about her manner was welcoming. Katharine dropped the curtain back in place and jumped back.

  “Hello? Uh, good morning,” his voice cracked on ‘morning.’

  So fitting, he sounds like Shaggy, too.

  “Go away. No one’s home.”

  “Mrs. Evans? You— I know you’re home. You just answered me.”

  Katharine swung her front door open so hard it blew back her hair.

  “It’s Miss Evans, and there is a sign—see it? Right there,” She rapped a short, unpolished nail on the hotel style door hanger for emphasis.

  “I—yes, I know. But you said if—”

  “I said, if you had an emergency, you could knock. You’re not bleeding, are you?”

  “No, I—”

  “No broken bones?”

  “No, but—”

  “But what? What could be so important, that you have to disturb me after I specifically said not to?”

  “Well, uh, there’s a guy here? I mean not here, but next door. He asked me to give you a message?”

  Katharine blinked at the man-boy posing statements as questions at her. What the heck was his name again? Think, Katharine. Brad? No. Brennan? No. Brandon! That’s his name. He’d been her handyman for the past six months, longer than anyone else had lasted. She supposed the least she could do was remember his name.

  “Brandon. Do you recall what I said to you when I hired you?”

  “Uh, yes.” He held up a grass and dirt streaked hand and ticked off each rule as he went. “Do not disturb you unless I’m bleeding, broken, having a heart attack, or being murdered. Payment is in the mailbox. Text any questions or concerns.”

  Brandon nodded and smiled like he’d correctly recited the Gettysburg address. Katharine closed her eyes and pinched the thin cartilage at the bridge of her nose. After she’d counted to five in her head, she looked up again at Shaggy—Brandon.

  “So, why. Are. You. Here? On my doorstep?”

  “Oh, right! Well, the guy— the one next door—he said I should, um, give you a heads up? Or something like that.”

  Brandon frowned a little, perhaps trying to recall what ‘the guy’ told him to say. Katharine’s patience, what little there was to begin with, was at its end.

  “Okay, listen. First, the only person next door is a crotchety old man—Vincent Genoma. Second, Genoma and I have spoken once in all six years that I’ve lived here. It was to agree on Arborvitae bushes as a divider between properties. His property is a blight, mine is private. We leave each other alone. That’s the deal. There is no ‘heads up’ to give here.”

  “Oh, this guy—the one I talked to? He’s not old. I mean, not old like that. He’s older than me. Maybe like your age. Or old—”

  “Brandon?”

  “Right. Yeah, anyhow. He’s the guy on T.V. You know, the one who fixes up houses for people? Cool, right?”

  “The guy who what? I have no idea what you’re talking about, Brandon. Do me a favor. Tell him to do whatever the heck he wants, so long as it doesn’t affect me.”

  Brandon looked over his shoulder, then back at Katharine. His disheveled, strawberry blond hair fell over his eyes, and he shook it away. He shifted from one work boot-clad foot to the other and scratched the small, stubble-free circle on his chin. His mouth opened and closed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed, but no sound came out. It seemed he had more to say but hadn’t yet worked out what it was.

  Katharine had all she could take, so with a terse smile, she stepped back into the safe confines of her home and began to close her door on the lanky man. She ignored Brandon’s attempt to step forward, and the envelope he held up. The second before the door clicked shut, a loud motorized whine ripped through the quiet. Katharine whipped the door open again and sprang through the frame, nearly knocking Brandon over.

  “What is that? What the hell is that?”

  “That’s what I was trying to warn you,” he yelled over the noise. “He, uh, he’s clearing the overgrowth on Mr. uh, Genoma’s property. They’re gonna fix up his house.”

  “Fix his house?”

  Brandon shrugged and backed his way off Katharine’s front porch, dropping the envelope as he did. “Sorry, Mrs.—I mean Miss Evans, I don’t know anything more. You’ll have to ask him, I guess.”

  Katharine grabbed the dirt-streaked paper from the porch, turned on her heel, and stomped back inside, slamming the door against Brandon’s apologies. She ripped the seal open, muttering to herself the whole time. “T.V. guy. House fixer-upper. Overgrowth. Give me… a break.” Then she quickly unfolded and read—or rather skimmed—the notice inside.

  The date in the corner told her it had been hand-delivered several weeks ago and stated the intentions of DGTV to film an episode of one of their reality shows in the neighborhood. Why it was in the hands of her handyman, she had no idea. At the very end of the notice, it stated that—if she had a complaint to file— she had ten days to do so. That would have been two weeks ago. She was out of luck.

  We’ll see about that.

  She pulled on her garden boots as she grumbled, not caring if she was still in her pajama shorts. Or that her off-the-shoulder t-shirt practically screamed ‘I heart the eighties.’ Then she threw her long hair in a quick, high pony-tail. A fast glance in the hall mirror told her she looked like she was a thirty-four-year-old going on fourteen, but she didn’t care. There was no way she could work with that kind of racket going on.

  “It’s not even eight in the morning. This is not happening. Not today, damn it. No way, buddy. No way.” She was out the door and stomping across her lawn in a flash, muttering and swearing the whole way. Brandon had busied himself at the lilac bushes, giving surreptitious side glances at her as she stormed past. He knew better than to say anything more. She was terrifying for such a tiny woman.

  Katharine shoved her way through the deer-sized opening between the two yards. Once through to old man Genoma’s side, she began to look for the source of the horrible noise. The front lawn—if that’s what it could be called—halted her. It had at least a full summer’s worth of tall, dry grass. Car skeletons and old tires littered the ground like a forgotten graveyard. A moss-covered birdbath leaned against a rusted metal ladder like two drunks in a bar. There was an ancient looking lawnmower at the edge of the cracked asphalt driveway where it had likely died on the spot. The house itself—once a charming bungalow like hers—was weather worn and sagging. A long strip of rusted aluminum gutter had pulled away from the roof and hung at a jaunty angle. One distressed, barn-red shutter dangled beside a cardboard blocked window. Like everything else, they were faded by sun and neglect.

  Katharine shook her head in disbelief. She knew it was run down six years ago—when she and the old man had their one and only run in—but it had gotten much worse since. Like Katharine’s house, Genoma’s home was set way
back from their narrow, winding road. Tall evergreens and thick bushes blocked all but the sudden opening of the driveway, which curved in a way that made it near impossible for a passerby to casually see in. To view more than a sliver of property, you would have to pull into the drive and follow the bend. It was precisely why Katharine had fallen in love with her own house the first time she looked at it with the realtor.

  “Wow, Genoma. This is bad,” she whispered.

  The clamor of machinery had momentarily stopped, and male voices volleyed back and forth from the backyard. Katharine followed the sounds, taking cautious steps over and around the debris, thankful she’d worn her boots. There were several fresh, deep tire tracks in the trampled grass alongside the house, leading her into the back. Katharine stopped short at the sight that met her when she rounded the bend. A television crew, excavation machinery and a dozen or so of workboot and helmet-clad men milled about. A few had chainsaws, two had large video cameras, and others had clipboards. They were all taking orders and instruction from a man in an old baseball cap and faded blue jeans. He leaned casually against a large, mustard-yellow piece of equipment, gesturing at various points around the yard.

  The moment Katharine’s eyes alighted on the man in the baseball cap, she trudged over to him, determined to put a stop to the ruckus. She ignored the stares and a couple of low whistles aimed in her direction, keeping her eyes on the target. A voice in her head spoke unbidden.

  Hello, Mr. Nice Jeans. She shook her head against it. Nope.

  By the time she reached him, he’d already climbed back into the cab of the yellow beast and had started it up. It roared to life, setting her teeth on edge.

  “Hey!” Katharine’s voice broke as she called out. She didn’t have the kind of voice meant for yelling. It had a rasp to it and was a little on the low side. It embarrassed her growing up with a voice like that. People always laughed a little and made comments like, ‘what’s a dainty thing like you doing with that voice?’ As if she’d had a say in the matter. It was no surprise the man in the baseball cap could neither hear nor see her. She tried again, twice more. Katharine looked around. No one seemed to be paying the slightest bit of attention to her now. Frustrated, Katharine grabbed the first thing her eyes landed on—a filthy, deflated soccer ball—and whipped it at his leg. It whopped him on the side of the head. He threw his hand up in surprise and looked for the source of the projectile. When his eyes met hers, her heart did the cliched somersault. They were cornflower blue and seemed to look right inside her. Cornflower blue? Wow, how lame. Some writer you are. Oh, my God, he’s good looking. Stop staring, you dummy.