Right as Raine (Aster Valley 1)

He flapped his hand. “No. It didn’t turn out to be a thing. I misunderstood and overreacted. I don’t want to talk about it.”

I changed the subject by asking him about the meeting he’d arranged with the Civettis.

“I don’t want to talk about that either,” he said with a nervous laugh.

“Why not?”

Mikey shrugged. “It’s my dream come true, you know? But I don’t know what their vision is, and I don’t know if I want to work for someone else. I have a dream of how I’d do it if I was in charge. But what if their vision is different? What if they want to micromanage me? I wish I could afford to do it myself.”

“Then do it yourself.”

He looked at me like I had three heads. “I don’t have that much money.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to say I did, but I knew he wouldn’t agree to letting me help him. If I gave him a choice.

I froze as an idea started to form in my mind. A way Mikey wouldn’t have to give up his dream and I wouldn’t have to give up mine. But there were too many unknowns—his family, my health, the situation with the Civettis—for me to talk to him about it. Yet.

“Then start small. Start with a small cabin and your catering business. Once people in Aster Valley discover your talent, you can grow until you open your own place.”

“Can we talk about something else?” he asked.

I asked him about the call he’d had scheduled with his editor. Mikey’s face lit up with excitement as he told me about his plans to meet some food stylists and photographers online the following week.

“The stylist can’t Zoom until next Friday, but he’s the one who did the styling for the Giles Gatterman cookbook.”

“I don’t know who that is,” I admitted. “But from your smile, I can tell we’re excited about it.”

Mikey pointed to the kitchen shelf where his favorite cookbooks were stashed. “The orange one? The one that has your favorite beef-and-corn taco cups recipe in it?”

I walked over and wrapped my arms around him again. If he was here in the same room with me, I wanted to have my hands on him.

“Baby, I don’t know where you get the recipes you make,” I admitted. “Honestly, I assume most of them come from a combination of your imagination and sadistic experimentation, but the result is delish.”

I pulled his earlobe into my mouth and sucked. He shivered before nudging me away. “Stop or we’ll starve to death.”

He was right. I left him alone long enough for us to get dinner on the table. While we ate, we talked a little more about his book plans. Mikey’s responses were a little more short than usual, but I chalked it up to nerves. I knew how much was riding on this project for him. He’d spent so much time studying to be a nutritionist and practicing his culinary craft. Being able to put those things together by putting out this book was a dream come true for him, not to mention validation that he had something important to say.

“Will you get to travel around to bookstores and sign copies when it comes out?” I asked. “Is that something cookbook authors do?”

He nodded. “My publisher said they’re planning a multicity release tour. They’re even going to try and book me on some morning shows.”

I pictured him dressed up and adorably flustered on the set of The View. “You’re going to be amazing. I can’t wait to get my own personalized copy and brag to everyone on the team that my boyfriend is a best-selling author.”

His eyes widened in worry which surprised me. Maybe I thought he’d like the idea of being claimed as mine. “You can’t tell anyone, um, yet. And we don’t know it will be best-selling.”

Oh. My stomach clenched a little. Maybe I was reading more into this than he was. Maybe I needed to slow down and find out what he was thinking.

I swallowed the bite of chicken in my mouth and tried to smile. “Pfft. Of course it will be. Publishers don’t send authors on tour unless they think the book is going to do great. Are you supposed to keep it quiet? When can we tell people?”

He seemed uncomfortable and couldn’t give me a straight answer. I knew the deal had already been published in some kind of book industry magazine because he’d squealed when he read it.

I put my fork down. “Mikey… I’m a little confused here. Are you upset at me referring to you as my boyfriend, or are you warning me about mentioning the book project?”

His hesitation made my stomach knot even worse. I pushed my plate away. “Talk to me.”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m feeling. I’m just… this is all happening fast, and with everything else going on—the book, your injury, the thing with the Civettis, my parents…” His eyes darted around, not really ever landing on my face. “And apparently my family planned a whole ‘Christmas in Galveston’ thing without telling me, so that made me feel like shit, too. Leave it to my family to plan a big family get-together and not include me. It was like my senior year in high school all over again when I came home late from a yearbook meeting to an empty house. I had to learn from the neighbors that everyone had gone to Disney World on the spur of the moment.”