Writes of Submission (10 page)

The look on Nikki’s face stopped him. She was staring in horror at Dante, who gave Kane an apologetic shrug.

“Sorry, dude. Didn’t mean to step on any toes. I just thought she might be more comfortable with me. You’re a little intimidating, you know?”

Kane forced himself to calm down. Nikki certainly didn’t look like she was about to take Dante up on his offer. That might be a good sign. Of course she hadn’t shown any signs of wanting to do anything with him, either, but that could wait. The most important thing was the book right now. If they couldn’t work together, there wasn’t any point in trying any other kind of relationship. He needed a cowriter more than he needed a girlfriend.

Or did he? She was obviously submissive, even if she wasn’t aware of it yet. Maybe if they got involved it would be easier to work together. Then there would be less of this attitude from her, as if she had to assert herself before he started oppressing her or something.

“If she wants to experiment, wouldn’t it be better to do it with someone who’s more familiar with BDSM?” Kane asked reasonably.

“I don’t know,” Dante countered. “It seems like—”

Suddenly Nikki was on her feet. “I’m still here, you know,” she said, sounding genuinely angry. “Don’t you think I should decide for myself who I want to play with—if anybody?”

They both stared at her. “I was just saying—” Dante began again, but Nikki’s face was bright red and she seemed to be shaking as she grabbed up her papers and turned away from them.

She stopped at the doorway and spoke over her shoulder. “Please refrain from deciding who I am or am not going to sleep with while I’m gone. I’d like to be part of that conversation.”

Chapter 8

Nikki picked at her lunch, trying not to look at Kane sitting across from her. She’d spent the remainder of the morning in her room, trying to come up with plot ideas for the book, but it hadn’t gone well. She was so intimidated by Kane that nothing seemed to be good enough to present to him. This was ridiculous.

For a few minutes this morning, she’d had hope that the partnership might work. He’d said that her writing was good, even though he hadn’t really liked the characters she’d come up with. But then he’d taken her characters and written a beautiful sex scene, complete with all of the elements Allie and her guys had done the night before. He’d even asked for her critique of his writing. There was no way
that
was going to happen. He’d been a little mean during their discussion, but she’d begun to suspect that was his way of joking around.

She could deal with that, if she knew that he respected her as a writing partner. But they just weren’t there yet. Then to have them start arguing over who she should experiment with. That was just too much.

If she allowed herself to, she could have been flattered. Kane had obviously been offended that Dante offered to do a scene with her. Did that mean he wanted her for himself?

No, it couldn’t be. It wasn’t possible. He had to be ten years younger than her, successful, and he was gorgeous. Why wasn’t his girlfriend with him?

Dante came out of the kitchen. He plopped himself down next to her, sipping on some oddly-colored drink. “So, what’s the plan for this afternoon?”

Kane shrugged. “Since somebody went off in a huff this morning before we could do any brainstorming, I think that’s what we’ve got to work on. We might as well start now. Nikki, do you have any ideas about where you want the book to go?”

Nikki took a deep breath. Why was he expecting her to come up with all the ideas? He was the experienced writer here. Maybe he was testing her. She tried to think through all the writing books she’d read over the last few years.

“Well, we need some motivation for the main character,” she began.

“You’ve already started to set that up,” Kane reminded her. “Remember, she has a young daughter that she’s afraid is going to be taken away from her?”

“You want to use that?”

“Of course. It was a good start. She’s recently divorced, moved to a new city, and got a job with our tall, handsome, and oh-so-rich CEO, who may or may not be a secret deviant. Now, who or what is going to try to take her daughter away?”

When she didn’t answer, he turned to Dante. “Care to help us brainstorm? A fresh perspective is always good.”

“Can I read what you’ve got so far?” Dante looked eager.

Nikki realized with a start that the first scene was upstairs in her trash can. Oops. She’d thrown it away thinking that Kane didn’t like it. Now she remembered that he hadn’t actually said that. He’d seemed to like it for the most part, but because she was mad she’d assumed that everything they’d done previously was junk.

“I’ll go get it,” she said, jumping to her feet.

“You can finish your lunch first,” Dante offered, but she was almost to the staircase already, an irrational fear taking hold of her that Allie would have emptied her trash and the papers, along with Kane’s suggestions, would be gone forever.

When she came back, Kane and Dante were discussing possible plot points in very serious tones.

“No, I don’t think a kidnapping would be a good idea,” Kane was saying. “I like to stress the emotional aspects of the relationship, and that would be too much of a distraction.”

“That’s what I love about your books,” Nikki heard herself saying. Both of the men turned to her. “I don’t mind a good suspense story, but you do such a good job showing people’s motivations and how they change, your stories don’t need all the drama.”

She sat down and handed the pages to Dante, taking the opportunity to finish her sandwich while he read. Kane reached under the table and brought out his iPod and speakers. He shrugged at her raised eyebrows and started the music.

“I like it,” Dante said finally, putting the pages down. “Your character Laura is likeable, even though she’s obviously deluded about men.”

“Really? Why do you say that?” Nikki turned to him in surprise.

“Well, because she’s assuming that since—Dirk, was it?—is rich and handsome that he’s only going to go for supermodels.”

Kane grinned at Nikki’s expression. “Go on.”

“That is
so
not always the case.” Dante sounded like this was a soap box he got on regularly. “Yes, on television it’s always the tiny little women that get the guy. In real life, though, beautiful women come in all sizes and shapes. Only the really shallow guys don’t see that.”

Nikki suddenly couldn’t look at either of them. There seemed to be an unspoken comment hanging in the air. If either one of them said, “Look at you. You’re not skinny, but you’re attractive enough,” she was going to scream and go throw up.

“It’s not a bad assumption to start with, though,” Kane said finally. “If she’s convinced that Dirk and—who was your goofy pilot? Alan?—Alan couldn’t possibly love her because she’s not anorexic, we have one conflict area already. They’ll have to convince her that she’s desirable. But that’ll come later. Speaking of later, we still need to make these two into regular guys somehow.”

“Don’t we need some kind of external conflict?” Nikki asked, desperate to get off the topic of desirable women.

“We could do that,” Kane conceded. “Something that she does or is involved in that will look bad.”

“Like BDSM,” Nikki said. “Allie said that people can easily lose their kids if they’re outed for being kinky.”

Kane frowned. “Maybe, but it’s way too early in the book for her to discover that she’s kinky. She can get involved with it later. But we need more for the beginning.”

They sat there while Allie came out and took their plates and brought them coffee. For another hour, they came up with mediocre ideas and suggestions, always shot down by Kane. Nothing else seemed to please him, and nothing sparked any new ideas in any of them.

Finally, Kane reached over and turned off his iPod. “This isn’t working,” he said. “I’m going to teach you a trick. Let’s go outside. Dante, you’re welcome to come, too.”

Exchanging a look, Nikki and Dante followed him out the front door and around the side of the house to the back yard.

Nikki wanted badly to ask if he was taking them to the barn for a kinky scene and to let him know in no uncertain terms that she was not ready for that kind of thing. But then she was glad she hadn’t said anything as he led them to the trailhead at the back of the lawn.

Kane stopped and looked down at their feet. “Sorry, I should have asked if you had suitable shoes for hiking.”

“Hiking?” Nikki stared in horror at the path that led down between the trees in a fairly steep incline. She hadn’t been hiking in years, and had never been particularly athletic.

“Yes, hiking,” Kane said firmly. “When you’re out of wine, you have to improvise. Getting out and doing something physical is the next best thing to stimulate ideas.”

“I like it,” Dante said enthusiastically. “Not that I have anything against wine.”

“Of course not,” Kane said. “Who would? But then you take the chance of being labeled a drunk who throws empty bottles out the window at noisy neighborhood kids.”

Nikki shot him a look, trying to decide if he was joking or not.

Dante laughed. “That sounds like it should be in a book.”

Kane had the grace to look embarrassed. “Not yet. The community service is done, but not the time on the deferred sentence. I have to wait until that’s up, but then I guarantee there is a judge who will meet a creative and very painful end in a novel.”

Nikki felt a need to get him out of that conversation, although she wasn’t really sure why. “I’m not really up for a hike.”

“Of course you are,” Kane said with a grateful look. “Don’t worry. We can carry you back if you don’t make it.” He led the way into the forest and Dante swept a hand for her to go ahead of him.

“Yeah, because
that
wouldn’t be humiliating at all,” she muttered under her breath as she shook her head and accepted her fate.

Chapter 9

“That was great!” Dante grinned happily. There was nothing he loved better than a good, long exercise session. Neither Nikki nor Kane seemed to have enjoyed it as much as he had, though. Nikki’s face was red from the exertion of the uphill trek back and Kane was panting a little, gazing longingly at the liquor cabinet as they reentered the dining room.

Allie met them with a tray containing three glasses and a pitcher of iced tea. “You went for a hike without taking water with you?”

“It was a spur of the moment kind of thing.” Kane accepted the glass she poured him and downed the contents in one long swig. He handed it back for a refill. “Thanks. I think I need to make a run into town before this evening. You can’t go.” He gave Nikki a meaningful look. “It’s your turn to write. Remember, you need to tone down the heroes. Wealthy, okay. Billionaire, no. Did our brainstorming session give you enough ideas for this afternoon’s writing?”

She looked annoyed for a minute, but then nodded. “Yeah, I think I know where I’m going.”

“Good. Then I’ll look at it after dinner, we’ll do a quick debrief and I’ll do the next scene tonight, when my brain is a little more lubricated. I’ll leave it here on the table so you can read through it at breakfast and make any corrections you want.”

Allie looked at his “Write Drunk. Edit Sober” T-shirt and seemed to be about to ask if it was his actual philosophy, then she shook her head and put the pitcher on the table. “I’ll just leave this here for now. Let me know if you need anything else before dinner.”

“Do you mind if I take it to my room?” Nikki asked. “I don’t think I’ve sweated that much in years. I need to shower and then get to work.”

“Sure. No problem.” Allie headed back to the kitchen.

“So you’re going to talk to your publisher today?” Dante reminded Kane.

“Yeah, okay.” Kane looked at his watch. “I’ll go do that now.”

“Cool.” Dante slapped Kane on the shoulder. “Tomorrow we’ll try some yoga while we brainstorm. It’ll be easier to talk and take notes.”

Kane stopped in the act of fishing for his car keys. “Yoga? Seriously?”

“Why not?” Nikki said. “It sounds easier than climbing that friggin’ mountain out there.”

“Later this week we can do some rollerskiing,” Dante went on. “Do you have any disc golf courses around here, Allie? Oh—she left, didn’t she? I have some tree-climbing gear in my trunk. That would be a blast!”

They were both staring at him now as if he were suggesting they put on capes and start fighting supervillains at night.

“Look, I wasn’t exactly suggesting a course in extreme sports,” Kane said, holding his hands up. “I usually just get drunk and walk around the house naked.”

Nikki closed her eyes as if trying to picture anything other than what had obviously flashed through her mind. “I don’t know,” she said after a moment. “The yoga might not be a bad idea. It’s been a while since I’ve done it, but I think I can manage not to kill myself.”

“Are you sure?” Kane asked her, still staring at Dante. “He has a mean look in his eye.”

“You know what they say,” Dante told them cheerfully. “There is no art without suffering.”