By the Book (Meant to Be #2)(10)

“Got it.” She was embarrassed now that she’d asked. “Sorry, I was just…wondering.” She should probably get out of Beau Towers’s house now and stop asking his assistant questions. “I should go. Oh, wait—you should take some ibuprofen. Do you have any?”

Michaela hesitated, then shook her head.

“Okay, hold on,” Izzy said. “I think I have some in my bag.” She turned to grab her bag from where she’d set it on the counter and rummaged through it for a minute. Finally, she found the bottle.

“Who the hell are you, and what are you doing in my house?”

She slowly looked up. And that’s when she saw him. Leaning against the kitchen door and staring at her.

He was big; that was the first impression she got about Beau Towers. Tall, muscular, solid. How had she not heard him walking toward the kitchen?

He looked like an unkempt, unstyled, and very unhappy version of his publicity pictures. Light brown skin, curly hair, a very unruly beard. Gray sweatpants that looked like they’d seen better days, a black T-shirt, and a hoodie that probably cost more than Izzy’s entire outfit.

And he looked furious. Angry and mean. Before she’d worked for Marta, she might have been scared of that look. But now she just smiled and walked over to him. What did it matter if this guy was mean to her? She might as well introduce herself to him, since she was here. And she’d better do it before he yelled at her.

“Hi, Mr. Towers, I’m Isabelle Marlowe, Marta Wallace’s editorial assistant. I’ve sent you a few emails, you might recognize the name? I came here to—”

“I said I didn’t want to talk to you. Did you break into my house to ask me about a book? You should leave.” He raised his voice. “Now.”

She’d expected him to yell at her, and now he had. She hoped Marta would be happy, at least.

“She didn’t break in,” Michaela said. “She helped me inside after I did this.”

Beau looked over Izzy’s head at Michaela, and his whole face changed. He rushed over to her.

“Oh no, Kettle, what happened? Are you okay?”

Michaela gestured to her ankle. “I’ll be okay, but only because of Isabelle here—I went out to check the mail, and I slipped. Thank goodness she was there. She saw me fall, got me inside, and got me ice. Otherwise, I’d probably still be sitting out there shouting for someone to help me in.”

Izzy waved that away. “I was happy to help.”

“Have you taken anything?” Beau said to Michaela. “You should take some ibuprofen.” He looked around, like it was going to appear in front of him somehow.

Izzy sighed. “I was just saying that. I have some right here.”

Beau smiled at her for a half second, before he apparently remembered who she was and scowled again. “I’ll get water,” he said to Michaela, and stalked over to the cabinet.

When Izzy handed the bottle of pills to Michaela, Michaela gave her a very pointed look in Beau’s direction. Was she trying to tell her to do what Izzy thought she was trying to tell her to do? Michaela nodded. She was apparently a mind reader. Izzy might as well try, right?

She turned around to face him. “Mr. Towers, I’d love to chat with you about your memoir. It’s okay that you’re behind on getting it to us, really. We just want to open the lines of communication and help you with it, in any way we can. We can set you up with a ghostwriter—that would be totally confidential, of course. Or Marta or I can talk through an outline, or pages, or a particular chapter with you, whatever the bottleneck is. And I’m great at pep talks, so I’m always available for those, if that’s what you need—there’s no shame in it!”

Beau set the glass of water down in front of Michaela, that furious look back on his face. “Now it’s time for you to go.”

Michaela caught Izzy’s eye and motioned for her to keep going. So, for some reason, she did.

“Mr. Towers, we understand that it can be scary for authors to admit what the problem is, but we’ve seen it all, really. We’re happy to help, in whatever way you need.”

She’d given some version of this speech—either via email or on the phone—to various authors of Marta’s, the ones who’d seemed stalled, or had fallen behind, or had sent her those emails where she could feel the panic between the lines. Marta never said anything like this to her authors—it was far too encouraging for her—but Izzy had started giving pep talks like this after she’d overheard other editors and their assistants on the phone with authors. It always seemed to help; this speech usually made people feel better, reassured. But Beau somehow looked angrier than when he’d walked into the kitchen. He let out a bark of laughter.

“You? You’ve seen it all? What are you, like twenty-two?”

Izzy forced herself not to roll her eyes. She had good genes, okay?

“I’m twenty-five.” Not that it was any of his business. Plus, she happened to know he was exactly one year older than her. “But when I say ‘we,’ I’m not talking about just me; I’m talking about the collective knowledge of the team at TAOAT.” He was still staring at her, with that superior, disbelieving look on his face, and she’d suddenly had it with him. Instead of being nice, she said exactly what was on her mind. “You may have realized that a memoir is too much for you to handle. That’s okay, we understand that! Not everyone is cut out for this! We can easily connect you with a ghostwriter to do the heavy lifting. You won’t have to worry about a thing.”