Page 119 of The Perfect Rom-Com

“You’re going to be fired. You’re going to be sued,” I reply.

And at this, that confident little grin lights up his face. “Bryony.” He dips his chin down. “I’m a little better at contracts than you think.”

“Speaking of, how about that threat of suing me?”

“I tried every which way to get you here. And legally to pull this off you needed to be clueless. It was a last resort. Well, aside from cameras in your face at four in the morning and Amelia saying, ‘Good morning, BRYONY PAGE!’ They did like that idea.”

I shudder, imagining it.

“No, but once they heard this plan they were pretty hooked,” he continues.

“You’re at least going to lose your reputation. You can’t just rat out your authors. And Amelia Benedict at that.”

He shrugs. “I knew the risk.” A significant pause follows. The crow’s-feet at his temples crinkle as he looks at me with those proud green eyes. “Worst-case scenario, it was still worth it.”

And I feel the walls around my heart crack a bit more.

He’s risked everything. Who knows what the fallout of betraying Amelia Benedict will be? Who knows how much that will cost him?

“I hear The Bridge could be hiring. I’m very good at English,” he says.

And I laugh. It’s the first laugh between us since all this happened.

I put my hand on his arm. Laugh some more, picture Jack standing at a board, growing furiously impatient over the explanation of an orange. Shouting eventually, “Or-ANGE. This is an OR-ANGE!” I shake my head. “No.”

He smiles at my laughter, all the way till my laughter runs out.

“Hey,” he says more seriously, jokes aside now.

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry. I was wrong for lying to you about sending the manuscript off. That was on me. And it’s not an excuse, but to be clear, after the books under Amelia took off, I was told to keep you at all costs. And at the time, for a long time, I let the excuse of your book needing work and your resistance to work on it lead the manipulation.

“And for some of that time, for a long time, I lied to myself. Telling myself you were in a great place. You had growing success. I upped your margins. You had a steady stream of income. And publishing out there, in the big world, 99 percent of the time would get you nothing. More than likely, you’d be paying in time and energy for the privilege of making a few bucks in an overly saturated market. Particularly with the way Meet Me Under the Bridge looked when you first sent it. It had”—he shrugs—“it was just going to be extremely difficult to get it sold in that condition. And I don’t blame you, Bryony. People love their first novels, but they also tend to cling too hard to them. They become their untouchable project. Their baby. Especially when there’s a deeper purpose behind it.

“To be honest, it wasn’t until I met the students themselves that I could understand your attachment to the place, and your mission. And by the time I was completely on board, I realized we had gotten ourselves so deep in a web within the Amelia world that it would be near impossible to get you out—unless I did something drastic.

“I spent the past four months trying to get you out, though The Foundry Literary resisted all my efforts. I was trying to convince them still when you found out.

“So. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything. And I was wrong to make decisions for you instead of with you. I was wrong for not being 100 percent honest. I was wrong for choosing to deceive myself for a long time and tell myself this was better for you when it wasn’t my choice to make. And I’m not asking for anything here, anything bigger.” He shrugs again and gives a vulnerable rub of his chin as he works out his next words. “I just . . . hoped . . . you could forgive me. Because I am really sorry, Bryony.”

I stare at him for a long time, my face frozen. This. This is what Jack does. He can convince you of anything.

“Are you crazy?” I say at last.

This takes him by surprise. “What? Well.” He’s rubbing the back of his neck now. “I just . . . hoped . . .”

“You think I would let you go after you risk your entire career for me? You are stupid—”

“Painfully so.”

“And it was very, very, very, VERY wrong to lie to me—”

“I know, Bryony. I’m so sorry—”

“But the stupidest thing of all here is to risk your job for me. To threaten to sue me just so . . . I could be . . . happy. You must think I’m an idiot.”

His eyes are clouded, confused. “Well. I—”