She had tears; transparent lines of emotion traveling down her cheeks.

“One step at a time okay? Lots of hurdles still,” he said.

He didn’t want her disillusioned or hurt. He needed her to keep writing because by peculiar osmosis, Orelia’s success had become intertwined with his own self-worth. If she failed, this might declare something he didn’t want to consider about himself. If he couldn’t judge great from mediocre, then how was he to ascertain the value of his own work?

Her success may well be his own validation.

“Yes, I understand,” she said.

Her next words exploded his heart. “William, you’re a dream-maker. Before this my life was empty, which I hadn’t realized. Terrible things have happened to me. I was meant for something else and I got waylaid. You’re an angel of destiny.”

At this, William’s back straightened, and a wisp of a smile found its way to his lips. He shook his head in what he felt portrayed casual, dignified modesty. Angel of Destiny had a nice ring. Maybe he was a sage, a fulfiller of the dreams.

This gave him the idea to look into creating one of those online courses advertised on Facebook. James Patterson had one. Imagine having thousands of authors claim you taught them everything they needed to know. And earning a pretty penny!

His mind raced with the idea of the extra income. The money from his books took forever to arrive and he wasn’t earning as much as he’d expected. The publishers’ contracts certainly weren’t created by angels. They kept a big chunk of change in case of returns. Unbelievable, but being a best seller didn’t mean you were automatically rich.

“Nonsense,” he replied, “You’ve done this yourself. I’m excited to have helped.”

Orelia’s face grew serious.

“I want you to understand how much this means to me. I will never ever, ever forget what you’ve done.”

“Well then,” he said, his words dripping with humility, while he thought, you had better damn well not or I’ll come after you. “You can autograph a copy of a first edition for me.”

“I will do better than that, I’ll dedicate it to you.”

Looking back now on that conversation, William mused on how obscenely fast she did forget. The greatest disgrace: her book, the one he helped shape, had been dedicated to her cat. Her cat!

13

Nem wasn’t sorry for what she’d done.

She still didn’t fully understand how she’d killed the man who’d murdered her mom. That he deserved his fate, and this was her doing, gave her a sense of pride. Guilt didn’t worry her at all.

Things were set in place the day she received Alan West’s attorney’s letter. The man had written, pleading with her to visit the prison, saying how sorry Alan felt for what happened. She didn’t believe his apology, and she didn’t care anyway. Sorry wouldn’t bring back her mother.

More than two years had passed since that night. In random moments, Nem’s mind still flashed to the terrible events, her memory set to automatic replay of the day she was orphaned.