Indirection (Borealis: Without a Compass Book 1) by Gregory Ashe

Author:Gregory Ashe [Ashe, Gregory]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hodgkin & Blount
Published: 2021-03-18T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter 25

SHAW FOUND JD THROUGH her Facebook page: she was selling her services, offering to listen to book pitches and provide critiques. Meet me in the Kayak’s Coffee.

“Fifty dollars for a fifteen-minute pitch?” North said. “That’s fucking highway robbery.”

“All the slots are full, so apparently some people think it’s a good deal.”

Shaw and North rode down in an empty elevator car. It smelled like overdone roast beef and wet carpet. The steel panels muddled Shaw’s reflection.

“That’s two hundred dollars an hour,” North said. “We don’t make two hundred dollars an hour.”

“Sometimes we do. When you jack up our rates for those creepy Ladue doctors who want us to spy on their wives.”

“You aren’t spending enough time on your library porn.”

Shaw tried to figure out if his reflection was as surprised as he was. “What?”

“Shaw, two hundred dollars an hour. Just to listen to people tell you about Alpha A jamming his dingdong into Beta B.”

“Actually, there is a whole snack cake series where someone does shove a dingdong—”

“How many library porn books have you written?”

“North, they’re not—”

“Are you ready to publish them?”

“I really mostly write drabbles—”

“Maybe I should take you to the library and fuck you. For inspiration.” North ran a hand through his mess of blond hair. The faint perfume of American Crew gel wafted off him. “Or you should tie me up in the stacks and leave a vibrator in me until I’m sobbing for you to take me apart with your dick.”

The elevator dinged.

Shaw shouldered off the camel hair duffle coat, folded it, and held it in front of him.

“Really?” North said.

“I’m very attracted to you. And these harem pants are, um, revealing.”

To Shaw’s surprise, North wrapped him in one arm, kissed his neck, and then muttered, “God, I love you.”

“Because you gave me a stiffy?” Shaw asked as the doors slid open.

A horde of children stared up at them.

North looked at the children; judging by their matching t-shirts, they seemed to be on some sort of field trip. Then he looked at Shaw.

“Oh,” Shaw said. “Right.” He cleared his throat. “A stiffy is a natural thing the body does when—”

Sighing, North steered Shaw away from a situation that, Shaw suspected, might have been going downhill.

Outside the Kayak’s Coffee, a line snaked down the hall: men and women with sheafs of pages, tablets, laptops, notebooks with flowery covers. One woman, holding her hair as though afraid it might slip off, had a poster with a tripod display. In black Sharpie were the words: Beta C*ck Learns to Code.

North was still shaking his head as they moved inside. The fragrance of brewing coffee met them; an espresso machine hissed sharply while a terrified-looking young man jabbed buttons. The line of people continued here, and now Shaw realized that they were not waiting for coffee.

“Seriously?” North said. “Fifty bucks?”

The line terminated near a rack of Vickie’s potato chips. A lost-looking man, his sweater unraveling at the hem, was poking the salt-and-vinegar bags. Next to him, a printed sheet of paper announced PITCH CRITIQUES - $50 – LINE FORMS HERE.

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