Page 171 of Smoke and Fire
With time zones,Wanderlust is a Battlewould launch in Australia first. Preorder e-book sales would hit on the hourly sales report page starting before midnight tomorrow. Before that, however, the pre-launch marketing would likely show an uptick in sales on the other books in preparation for book twenty-one.
The page finally loaded. Sure enough, a spike in the sales graph clawed higher than usual. Jess often sold upwards of thousands of books a day, but the launch would push her into the tens of thousands. I shook my head and navigated away.
The launch hadn’t even begun and madness already started.
For several minutes, my thoughts roamed to Dahlia’s bright energy, her in the social media groups, and finally to the fire that awaited me again in the morning.
While I dug through the soil and broke my body with hard labor, she'd be launching my novel into the world. Dahlia created safety for my family now. So what was I doing here? Maybe I should finally pull the plug on wildland firefighting.
That would throw me into the writing business full time. I’d eventually have to let my friends know the truth, and embrace the obvious and most successful path.
Even as I thought it, the building darkness in my body prevented me from believing it.
No. Writing was an escape and I often loved it. But it wasn’t my sole path. Would never be my sole path. I didn’t like the idea of ever settling into one sole path, like my friend Grady.
Grady married, found his career, and thrived in his new happily-ever-after. Me?
I wanted more change than that.
Besides, writing wasn’t real. None of it. Jess’s stories? They were all . . . constructs. Maybe even buried hopes of being the man that one of those women wanted me to be. Or the life IwishedInessa could have lived or the life I would have given Dad after Mom died.
Whatever my motivation for weaving such complex romances, it wasn’t something I wanted to survive on for the rest of my life.
At least, I didn’t think so.
But maybe.
Sounds from fire camp filtered back through my mind. The steady day had given a gentle reprieve from the previous fire push, but the monster was drawing it's breath. In a few days when the wind kicked back up, it'd throw fire like a dragon. Thinking about fire is when I felt the answer all the way down to my bones.
This is why I fight fires,came the thought.Because it’s real.
17
DAHLIA
Launch day dawned with a glittering pink sunrise and gentle wind out of the west. I closed my eyes, breathed in the smell of the forest, and sighed.
Inner Me crooned gently in the back of my mind.This,she said.We want more of this and we want it with Bastian.
I didn’t correct her. Instead, I sat with the thought for a moment and didn’t hate it.
“We can try,” I said.
Then I scrambled off the bed with a happy little shout and headed to the counter, where my phone charged. “It’s launch day!” I cried to no one in particular.
No messages from Bastian yet.
Dahlia:Thanks for taking my shift today. Let me know if things crash and burn.
Mav:No problem. I needed to audit some processes anyway. It's been awhile since I had to work here. Now I can update the binder.
Dahlia:GIF
A GIF of a little girl with bouncing ringlets blowing a kiss showed up on the screen. With Maverick covering my shift, I didn’t have to worry about the launch happening without me. Asking him had felt a bit desperate, but now I was glad I did. I wanted my wholeattention on the launch.
With the fire, tourism in Pineville had almost halted entirely. Hardly anyone wandered in for coffee yesterday, and Katrina didn’t show herself again. I thought I saw her down the street from Bastian’s house when I fed his cat. The person disappeared before I could be certain.
As his assistant, I felt like an extension of Bastian. He’d hired me to help things roll smoothly, and I couldn’t do that while tamping beans and carting around gallons of milk. I wanted to be here for him.
