Page 1 of This Time I'm Keeping You
Chapter1
“I’d inject him with something that caused a slow, painful death.”
Poppy Sylvester looked up at the woman standing on the opposite side of the table.She was middle-aged, with a pretty face beneath soft blonde curls.Her dress had bright splashes of color, and she looked like someone’s mother or aunt—not a woman with murderous tendencies.
“Thanks, Sally.I’ll keep that in mind for when the time comes to kill off Mr.Cooper.”Poppy signed her name before handing the book back to the woman.She then looked at the line of people still waiting.
This was her first book signing, and since she’d published five novels, all of which had hit bestseller lists, it was time people met her, or so her agent told her.“The reclusive look is only cute for so long, Poppy.People need to see the real you,” Astrid had declared loudly down the phone last week.
It had been over a year since the man who destroyed her life made contact.Tentatively, Poppy had taken the first step toward putting down roots.Of course, if the threats resumed, she was prepared to run again.
Four months ago, she’d moved here to Brook.A place she’d never been but someone had once told her great things about.
For five years, Poppy had been on the move with her cat and her laptop.Now, Astrid, her agent, had forced her out of hiding, and she was feeling like a goldfish in a glass bowl, exposed.
Before her life had turned upside down, she’d liked socializing, but not now.Now she did that online and met her fans through social media, never once stating where she lived.
“Hi, Poppy.I’m Debbie,” the next person in the line said.“Can you sign this to my husband, Tan?”
Thirty minutes, and she could be out of here.Go home, make some chamomile tea, and snuggle her cat, Hercules.
Her agent had chosen Brook for this book signing to ease her into it.She’d agreed but said no one was to know this was where Poppy lived.
“Ooh, look at the man who just walked in,” Debbie said.“He’d be a lovely hero in one of your books.”
Poppy followed her eyes to the end of the line, where she saw several large blobs.Her reading glasses made things fuzzy, so she just nodded and smiled, hoping that would do.
“It’s Tan’s birthday, and he loves your books.I’m more of a romance girl myself.”
“Good for you.I love romance novels too,” Poppy said.She wrote an inscription that said,To Tan.Best wishes, Poppy Sylvester.
She kept chatting and smiling until her cheeks ached as she worked steadily through the next signings.She really needed to work on shortening her signature; her hand was aching.
“I’m the last,” a deep voice said, making her look up into the almost black eyes smiling down at her.She knew that face.
Oh, hell no!
“Hi, Poppy,” Nick Atherton said with a slow, sexy smile that once made her melt.“Nice to see you again.”
“What do you want?”Suddenly she was back there in college, humiliated at the hands of this man… not that he knew that.
“To have these books signed.One for my sister Gracie, another for my Aunt Jean, and the last one for me.”
She grabbed the first of the books he placed before her, and wroteTo Gracie, signing her name beneath.She then signed the book for his Aunt Jean.Handing it back, she managed a tight smile.“Happy?”
Ten years, Poppy.You care nothing for this asshole anymore.Besides, he wasn’t her type.She liked sophisticated men who cared about their appearance.Not this shithead with his linebacker’s shoulders, messy brown hair—which looked like it needed a good cut—and T-shirt with Oldest Atherton and a check mark next to it on the front.The small rip in the shirt was situated over one of his abs, which she could see was hard and defined.
“Ecstatic,” he drawled.“Just that one now, please, for me.”He nudged the last book closer to her.
Poppy gripped her pen so hard, it flew from her fingers across the desk, hit him on the crotch, and then bounced back to land just inches from her fingers.She felt color creep into her cheeks.
“To Nick.Love, Poppy, will do nicely, thanks.”
She didn’t acknowledge the drawled words, instead keeping her head down and writing,To the world’s most arrogant asshole.May he be tormented by bitey insects for the rest of his life.Poppy Sylvester.Standing, she then slapped it into his chest with as much force as she thought she could get away with before someone noticed, and then grabbed her things.
“Well, that’s original.I bet none of your other fans get such a personalized message,” he said, reading it.“I’m not sure ‘bitey’ is a word, though, which you’d think you’d know, seeing as you’re a famous author now.”
Poppy turned her back on him.She then exhaled slowly before slinging the strap of her laptop bag over one shoulder and her handbag over the other.Walking away, she located the bookstore’s owner, needing to get out of there and away from Nick Atherton.
