The center stage wasn't my thing.Now don't get me wrong. I was grateful to my fans and not just for the money. But I didn't enjoy the spotlight – and enjoyed lying even less.
Everyone had a history. As for mine, there was the real version and the one written by the publisher's P.R. people.
Those histories didn't match.
That was fine by me. The less people knew, the better. But that didn't mean I enjoyed standing on a stage, shoveling shit to people who deserved more honesty than I could give them.
As Becka handed the microphone to a gray-haired woman in a flowered dress, I smiled to put the stranger at ease. She'd been waiting with her hand raised for a while now as Becka went from person to person, trying to give everyone a fair shot.
I had to admit, Becka was doing a good job of it, too. She had a way of putting people at ease, making them smile through their nerves. I'd seen it yesterday at the book-signing and more so today as she dealt with a crowd of people all wanting the same thing at the same time.
She was better at this than I'd expected.Smarter, too.
This would've been a good thing, if only I hadn't counted on the opposite – meaning someone who saw only what they were meant to see.
But that wasn't Becka.She was too curious, and noticed far too much.
Across the crowded auditorium, the woman in the flowered dress turned toward the stage and clutched the microphone tighter. "I was wondering… " She gave a nervous giggle. "Do you write your own sex scenes?"
The crowd laughed, and I smiled.No need for me to be a dick about it.
Okay, my books had sex.Not a lot, but enough to keep it real – and to balance the brutality of the other parts. The truth was, my characters were more likely to lose their heads than their hearts – and I didn't mean metaphorically.
With my smile in place, I replied, "I write it all, the goodandthe bad."
She was still holding the microphone. "If you ask me, it's all good." Her eyes brightened. "Especiallythosescenes."
My gaze drifted to Becka, whose cheeks had just gone rosy.
She was a blusher, all right.
I liked it.
And I hated it.
The truth was, I was more attracted to her than I should be, even if shewasa pain in the ass.
When the laughter died away, I thanked the woman for the compliment and waited for the next question. And then, the one after that, and so on.
Most of the questions were fairly basic.Where do I get my ideas? How do I name my characters? What's the back story of this character or that?
These were the easy questions.
But others, they were more complicated.
My books – I could talk about just fine. But when it came to the topic of myself, I said as little as I could without being a prick. The questions continued hard and fast as Becka hustled from person to person.
Where did I call home?A cabin in the mountains.
Except the cabin was more like a fortress. And it was large enough to host a small army.
Favorite color?Black.
Not because it made me happy, but because it was best for melting into the shadows.
Favorite reading material?Non-fiction.
Not because I didn't enjoy a good story, but because information equaled power, which could be used for goodorbad. And then, there were the murky spots in the middle, where people did good things for bad reasons, or vice versa.