The Write Place (Leade Park, #1)

by Allie Samberts

I can see her laughing as I take a drink of my beer, and after a few seconds, she sends: You should see where it goes. They say the only way to get over someone is to get under someone else.

I’m so painfully bad at small talk, and it’s definitely not easier with all this noise, but Evan is ridiculously attractive.

Next to me, Daniel speaks up. “One might say fate has brought this opportunity right to your doorstep.” One side of his mouth tilts up into a wry grin, and I narrow my eyes at him ever so slightly.

He gets to school before me and I come in to find him sitting at his desk, wearing one of his seemingly endless supply of well-tailored suits and brightly colored ties. He is always buried in a notebook or his laptop by the time I walk in, and there is always a cup of black coffee on my desk waiting for me.

“You weren’t going to let that guy make you feel anything less than your full worth. It was inspirational, if I’m being honest.”

“That’s the beauty of literature. It makes us feel. Or maybe a better description is that it allows us to feel in a safe space.

I read books like yours when I want to live more deeply in it. When I want some discomfort to remind me that we all experience uncomfortable things and live through them. When I want to feel things more honestly.” My tone is light, but when I look at him again, his expression is strangely serious. “What?” I look down at my half-eaten meal, my thumb rubbing against my ring. “That might be the best thing anyone has ever said about anything I’ve written,” he says softly.

there is a fierceness in his gaze that wasn’t there before. “But I need you to know, Mackenzie,” the sound of my full name on his lips sends a shiver up my spine, “that I have had flings in my life, and not one of them has gotten stuck in my head like you have.

“Don’t cover yourself. Don’t shrink away. You can say no to me, but don’t for one second think that you need to cower or feel embarrassed. You are fucking beautiful. You are beautiful tonight, and you were beautiful when I scared the shit out of you on your run, and you are beautiful every damn day from the minute you walk into my line of sight until the minute you walk out.

Daniel keeps a respectful distance from me when Jenny and Ben are looking, but when they aren’t, he finds all sorts of excuses to brush his fingers against mine or place his hand on my back.

“Mac, you’re allowed to feel things, and you’re allowed to let people in. Daniel wants to help, I’m sure of it.”

When I wake up the next morning, I feel hungover, despite not having had a drop of alcohol the night before. I drag myself to school, probably looking like something the cat dragged in.

These past few weeks have been an absolute whirlwind, but one thing I know clearly is that I want to be here with you, Mac. With all of you. Even the messy parts.”

I’m not moving back there. I decided that the night I took you to dinner. You said my happiness was a good enough reason to leave the city. You made me feel like I mattered.

They have talked to you. Some of them say hello to you every day. You’ve become a part of their routine, which means a lot to them.

“When someone comes into our lives who sees into our souls in a way Mr. Evans’ manuscript would suggest he saw into yours, we hang on and don’t let go.”

There’s no doubting it after reading this draft, Mac. The man is hopelessly in love with you, and I’m pretty sure I know you well enough to know that you feel the same about him.”

I adjust my suit coat, brushing my hand against a little box in my breast pocket that contains the ring I’m going to give Mac later tonight—a thin band with a small sapphire flanked by two tiny diamonds because, as she said, “If you give me some gaudy diamond that will drown me in the bottom of the ocean, I’m going to say no on principle.”