of his arms, falling asleep to a reassuring thought. This is not what love feels like. It doesn’t hurt nearly enough.
Chapter 9
Zach wasn’t surprised to discover that Rae had honest-to-God fans.
They lined up in front of her decorated table, buzzing with eager excitement, clutching books to be signed and sliding awed looks her way when they thought she wasn’t looking. He watched with a sappy smile on his face as a woman with dangerously pink cheeks squeezed her newly-signed paperback to her chest.
“I just loved Blood Court so much. Incredible, absolutely incredible. I can’t wait to read the rest of Myra’s story!”
“Oh, well, thank you,” Rae said, all sweet and flattered. He could tell she was tempted to curl into an embarrassed ball under the onslaught of praise—but she didn’t, because she was way too professional and completely badass.
“And your hair is so amazing,” the woman beamed. “You look like a princess.”
“Oh. Um…” Aaaand, Rae was officially broken, or at least rebooting. “Thanks,” she finally croaked, patting her head self-consciously. “Really, thank you.”
He’d thought that princess thing a few times, himself. She always wore her hair down in the back and braided at the front, strands of grey sparkling at her temples. Zach had his suspicions about why she did it—but he wanted to know for sure. He wanted to know everything about her.
"Do you think she’s okay?” The voice came from his left, where Rae’s agent, Neil, had been hovering like an anxious genie for the last five minutes. “I feel like I should be around more, but she’s technically done this before—or seen it before—on a much higher level, and I have a lot of clients here today...”
Zach let the lean, balding man shove out his worried, halting speech, hands wringing and frown deep. The guy was worn out and gentle like your grandpa’s favourite chair, and for someone whose job—as Rae had explained—involved being an author’s negotiator and protector, he sure did hesitate and bite his lip a lot. But then, Zach supposed, tons of people set aside their personal qualities in order to be good at their job. Neil probably managed to seem hardcore when it was time to talk contracts or whatever.
“She’s fine,” Zach told the older man, partly because it was true and partly because the guy’s darting, rabbity eyes were starting to make even Zach nervous. “She knows exactly what she’s doing. You can focus on the others.”
“I just like to make sure everyone’s taking rests,” Neil winced.
“I’ve got it.”
The older man paused, turning his dark eyes on Zach in a moment of unnerving focus. “Do you know, I’m sure you do.” Then he gave a mournful sigh and was back to his usual self, like that second of intensity had been a hallucination. “Well, alright then. I’ll be off. Perhaps I’ll see you at lunch.”
“Yeah,” Zach nodded, and Neil hurried away. Then Zach abandoned his post—a chair he’d dragged to the corner by Rae’s stand—and went to see his girlfriend.
His fake girlfriend.
She finished saying goodbye to another reader, and he bent down to whisper in her ear. “So, you’re kind of a big deal.”
She snorted. “No.”
“Yeah. Drink this.” He put a fresh bottle of water by her poor, curled-up signing hand and kissed her cheek.
She rolled her eyes at him, then smiled at the next person in the queue. “Sorry. I’ll just be a second.”
The reader, a kid with waist-length braids and her own copy of Blood Court ready to be signed, nodded happily. Rae uncapped the water and took greedy gulps. Zach tried not to stare too lustfully at the delicate bob of her throat with each swallow; a lot of the influencers at this event were teenagers, and the way he wanted to look at Rae wasn’t particularly PG.
When she put down the water, he waved a cereal bar at her. “You’ve signed a million books already. Your hand must be killing you.”
She shrugged, unwrapped the bar, and took a bite. Nodding at the commotion across the vast hall, she said, “I’m nothing compared to the big names.”
“Good thing I’m not comparing you to anyone. I’m here for you, and so’s this huge queue of readers.”
She bit her lip on a smile and looked away, pleasure sparkling around her. His body flooded with happiness in response, as if reassuring Rae was his life’s purpose.
That morning, he’d opened his eyes to see her face and been hit with a bolt of contentment. Then he’d spent way too long staring at her