As I rolled over and got ready for sleep, I wondered what the real truth was. Why had Jake said those things? If he believed them, why did he even want to carry on writing romance books? Just for more money? There was a bitter taste in my mouth about having to help him pull the wool over romance readers’ eyes, readers who somehow all felt like friends to me – and all to help my own career. It kind of felt like I was being just like Jake and Hayley. But it also seemed like I had no choice.

I had agreed to go to New York with Jake Richards. Talk about something I would have never believed while I was at university reading his books and dreaming of finding the kind of the love he wrote about. The way he had poured scorn on all of that had really hurt but if he and my boss could be selfish and only care about making more money out of romance readers, I needed to push that hurt away. I needed to be as cold about my own career.

Even if I had never been cold about anything or anyone in my life before. My mum had once told me she was worried that the world might chew me up and spit me out, and as I’d grown up, I’d tried to become tougher. Moving to London and getting this job had helped me stand firmer on my own two feet.

So, I just needed to push my feelings aside and not think about the fact that the person who had been my instruction manual for romance didn’t believe in any of it. Otherwise, I was never going to get through this trip in one piece.

And if Hayley was using this trip to assess my future at the company and my ability to be an agent myself, I had to not wear my heart on my sleeve but be like Hayley and Jake and treat it all as business.

But when my eyes fell on my shelf of romance books, I knew that wasn’t going to be at all easy to do.

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