This was because he’d expected she’d contact him soon enough, forget the argument and offer to help him, now that he had hit a bad patch.

They’d tour together or co-write a novel, or she might even mention his book on a talk show. She appeared on so many shows, including that idiot who made them mime to hit songs and take part in stupid games. What people did to sell a book, play or film was humiliating.

A decent, grateful person would contact their mentor, no matter how egregious the disagreement. Surely she viewed her past now through rose-colored glasses perched on that perfect nose. Did she not have a forgiving bone somewhere?

She didn’t call though, and after months he couldn’t look in the mirror anymore. Whenever he dared, the man who stared back was not a heartening sight. Unless baggy under-eyes, sallow, jaundiced complexion and hair that defied taming, was a good look. He recognized only a complete and utter fool; someone used for another’s gain.

So once again he clicked on the Amazon link and waited the tortuous seconds for Orelia’s author page to open. For convenience sake, he’d saved the address as a favorite in his browser bar. Each time it loaded, he held his breath and wished and wished, and hoped and wished. Could this be the instance her number one author ranking in the Mystery and Thriller genre slid downward?

Every visit to her book’s page was a gut-wrenching experience, the smile on her author’s photo taunting him.

Hadn’t anyone ever told her that thriller authors should carry a serious and moody demeanor?

Her photo, complete with a big-toothed smile and oh-so-fashionable pixy hair, reminded him of a young Audrey Hepburn, and that didn’t fit. She stood out among the day’s transient best sellers, an apple among plums. Legends such as King, Patterson, Lee Child and the one hit wonder Paula Hawkins (Cliché on the Train, as he’d renamed her big one) didn’t smile. They glared.

Why couldn’t she be transient?

Where he’d once thought, Good for you Orelia, be your own person, he now believed her smile reeked of self-satisfaction, self-involvement and, to be honest, fakery. He imagined anyone would grin like that, knowing they hadn’t put in the hard yards.

She expressed with that smile something dark and twisted and mocking.

“Ha ha William. Here I am and there you are. Bite me.”

Possibly not “bite me.”

Her message was more likely “I’m exactly where I intended, and don’t you forget it William Barnes.”

As he glared at the picture before scrolling through her reviews—for one and two-star ratings—he thought maybe she wasn’t saying that at all.

Far worse, she might not even think about him anymore. Her life, filled with interviews, signings and keeping up with her fans on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, might be so full there was no room for thoughts of him.

Those God-awful posts on social media, how he hated them. Every announcement from her ended with May luck shine on you or Shine, shine, shine, as if she was a goddamn angel or something heavenly.