After You (Because of You 2)

“Wow, thanks boss,” Nadia sends back.

“Sorry, that’s not what I meant. The cover is good, but the font needs to be a different color. White on white? It’s like a snowstorm for my eyeballs. We need to up our game here, I’m expecting good things from this book. Give me something colorful for the title.”

“We did white on white intentionally, remember? Juliana had a vision.”

“Ok, but I have a vision too, and it’s her selling lots of books. This is too forgettable. Let’s do something more eye-catching. Let’s try textured gold. That will still fit her vision, but it’ll be easier to read,” I type back.

I’m pulled out of the conversation with my cover designer by the sound of my name being called in the other room. I type a quick “brb” into the window and push up out of the wooden chair. It was comfortable enough when I first sat down, but after four hours without movement, my tailbone loathes me.

Last time I got out of this chair, it was to put Cassidy to bed. It took 45 minutes. Did not expect that, but apparently she has a whole routine—I brush her hair while she sings at the mirror, then she brushes her teeth. That’s followed up with 15 minutes of stalling while she picks out a bedtime story, then we read the bedtime story, interrupted with bursts of unrelated questions, and for the grand finale, five minutes of “why do I have to go to sleep?” before I was finally able to turn off the light, kiss her forehead, and come back to my makeshift office in the kitchen.

Now the big Noble is calling my name, so I head into the living room and stop in front of the couch. “Yes?”

“Are you almost done?” he asks.

Not even close. “I’m almost done with the most urgent things on my list. I’m having a minor panic about the blurb and cover for one of my upcoming releases.”

“The Dreamcatcher one?”

“No, not my book, one of my authors. She’s very hands-on, which I get, but I know more about this than she does and she’s not trusting me.” I don’t have time to explain all this. Nadia is waiting. “What do you need?”

“It’s frustrating when people don’t trust you, isn’t it?” he says dryly.

I narrow my eyes at him. “Don’t get cute, Noble.”

“Can’t help it, I was born this way.”

Lifting my eyebrows, I point back to the kitchen. “I’m leaving in two seconds if you don’t tell me what you need.”

“I’m tired. I want to go to bed.”

“Then go to bed. You want me to help you up?” I offer.

“I want to go to bed when you go to bed. You’re here. I can’t fuck you, but I can at least sleep with you.”

“I don’t think we have the same bedtime,” I tell him. “I’ll probably be up for at least two more hours.”

His blue eyes go wide. “What? It’s 1am.”

“Uh huh,” I say with a nod, the “and?” more or less implied.

“So, how in the hell do you still have 2 hours of work at 1am? I thought you said you delegated some stuff to Louisa.”

“Louise. I did. But I lost three hours driving here, I had to go grocery shopping, cook dinner, put Cassidy to bed. I won’t even be done in two hours, that’s just when I’m cutting myself off. I’ll pick up the rest of the slack tomorrow.”

“I can’t wait until 3am to go to sleep. Do you know what time I got up this morning?”

“Hey, this is a work day, not a Derek day. I didn’t plan on some guy you worked with trying to kill you. I mean, I understand the impulse, but I didn’t schedule for it today.”

“You work too much,” he states.

“Do you know what a swear jar is? I’m going to start one of those for you, except instead of putting a dollar in it every time you swear, you have to put a dollar in it every time you complain about my job. I’ll be able to retire in no time.”

“Your hours are ridiculous. I’m not being an asshole here, I’m repeating myself because it’s still true. You put in, what, 12 hours already today?”

“No, I’ve only put in 10 hours today because of all the stuff I had to do for you.”