Page 1 of Kill Your Darlings

Chapter One

“Regarding Adrien English…”

I automatically glanced from Rachel—Rachel Ving, Ving the Merciless in New York publishing circles—to the panel discussion table where Adrien English was still chatting with Christopher Holmes.

“What about him?”I glanced back at Rachel and did a doubletake.“Do you represent him?”Because that would be news.

“I do now.”Rachel smiled.It was a cat that got the cream sort of smile, which surprised me.Nice for Adrien to finally have serious representation, but he wasn’t what one would call a heavy hitter in mystery fiction, the occasional tabloid-worthy film option notwithstanding.

I said wryly, “Now I understand the reason behind the delays in signing the new contract.”

“I told Adrien to signnothinguntil we spoke.”

Presumably Rachel meant until she and Adrien spoke.She and I spoke on a regular basis.

I said neutrally, “I appreciate your steadfast commitment to your clients’ best interests, but we both know things are a little different now.”

“You mean with the merger between Millbrook and Wheaton & Woodhouse?”Her shrug was dismissive.

I’d have loved to be able to shrug off that new reality, too.I said, “Despite the press release inPW, it’s more of a buy-out than a merger.”

I hoped that didn’t sound as bitter as I felt—as bitter as we all felt now at Millbrook House.

Rachel’s dark eyes studied me shrewdly.She said softly, and with equally uncharacteristic frankness, “You’llbe all right, Keiran.Chin up.”

“Oh, hell yeah,” I said as quickly as if I really believed it.I regretted saying as much as I had, but the fact was, W&W was already talking about “trimming the fat” from our lists.

“Great panel!”said a woman in the kind of hat you’d expect to see at Ascot—or maybe inMy Fair Lady.

I smiled in reflex.“Thank you.”

On my right, Rachel was saying, “As a matter of fact, you—and your editorial list—were probably a major incentive in W&W’s decision to bail out Millbrook.”

My laugh was caustic.“I doubt it.”Given W&W’s neo-pulp, er,sensibility, that was pretty unlikely.

“Nonsense.While, he may have the literary taste of a Neanderthal, Vaughn Woodhouse is no fool.He wants W&W to start winning awards again.You’ve spent years curating one of the most respected author portfolios in crime fiction.You’d better believe he wants to get his hands on that list.”

My list maybe.Not necessarily me.In fact, during my first official meeting with Vaughn and Lila Penderak, my counterpart at W&W, Vaughn had informed me the “game plan” was to divide my editorial list between Lila and myself.

Lila had all but licked her chops.

Was there a little bit of payback there?I’d started my career in publishing as an intern reading the slush pile at Wheaton & Woodhouse.I’d quickly worked my way up to editorial assistant to Lila, then assistant editor, then editor before I’d left to take the senior editor slot at Millbrook House.

“Even when W&W does win awards, it’s largely thanks to you,” Rachel was saying.

She was referring to the Miss Butterwith cozy mystery series which, after a brief lull, had brought home the Agatha Award for best novel at this year’s Malice Domestic.Christopher Holmes had been my discovery way back in the day, so Rachel was once again being uncharacteristically, unnervingly kind.She must truly think my days at Millbrook were numbered.

I said, “I think Christopher gets the credit there.”

“Thatgoes without saying.”Rachel cast a benign, if proprietorial, glance at her most successful client, now shepherding Adrien toward the exit, and—unless I missed my guess— the hotel bar.

“He’s very much looking forward to working with you again.”

“Likewise,” I said automatically.

In fact, before the ink had dried on Millbrook’s intellectual property and contract transfers, Christopher—well, Rachel—had requested that he be moved from Lila’s stable to mine.Which, come to think of it—and through no fault of Christopher’s—might actually have proved the inciting incident leading to that unpleasant “orientation” meeting with Vaughn and Lila.Four minutes in, Lila had joking-not-joking suggested she’d trade Christopher Holmes for Finn Scott.

And I’d joking-not-joking replied, “Over my dead body.”

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