“It’s the first feedback on my book,” she said, voice low, and for a moment, his brows lifted in surprise before they settled back into his permanent scowl. “I haven’t read it yet.”
“Why not?”
“What if they hated it?”
Mac took a deep breath and glanced from Maggie’s phone to her face. “It’s their job to help you strengthen your story, right?”
Maggie nodded.
“So the feedback should be constructive, not negative.”
“It could still be negative.”
Mac tilted his head, his eyes warming her skin like a physical touch. “Would you quit if it was?”
“What?” Maggie asked.
“Would you abandon the book? Stop writing?”
“Of course not.” Walking away from her first novel was unthinkable. She’d re-write it and re-work it if she had to, but she couldn’t walk away. She’d poured her soul into the words, the story, and the characters. She’d spent hours of her life agonizing over the pages.
“Then there’s nothing to be scared of.” Mac reached a hand out as if to touch her. He stopped and let it fall to his side, balling the fingers into a tight fist.
Maggie’s chest heaved as her breath sawed in and out of her lungs. She tangled her fingers in the hem of her cardigan. “Will you still read it for me?” Her voice cracked at the end.
“Read it out loud? Or summarize?”
“Out loud, please.”
He met her eyes and the very edge of his full lips tipped into a smile. “Tell me when you’re ready.”
“I’m ready.”
Mac looked down at the screen in his hands and tapped something, probably the email, with one blunt finger. He scanned the top and then scrolled down. His eyes flicked up to Maggie’s again, deep brown colliding with cornflower blue. Mac took a deep breath, and Maggie watched his shoulders rise and fall as the air filled his lungs.
“Thank you for sharing your novel with me. I have attached a copy of your draft with my notes to this email. I wanted to say that I think you have some real potential here. Your plot is new and interesting, and your characters are lovable and have some real promise. My only real worry is that I’m not feeling any chemistry between your main characters. There are some missed opportunities to show their emotions or how they are experiencing different situations as opposed to telling the reader.
“The result is a relationship that comes across rather forced. It reads like you focused more on what you thought should happen between your characters, as opposed to what they needed to bring them together. Write scenes that are real, not only the tropes you see in every romance novel. I’ve marked the places where this seemed the most problematic for me, but it was particularly noticeable at the end of chapters five and twelve. I think it’s a matter of getting to know your characters better. That way they can lead you, and us, to where they need to be together. I also found some spelling and grammar errors. I marked them for you, but nothing egregious—”
Mac trailed off as he took in Maggie’s blank expression. All the blood had seeped out of her face, and there was a rushing in her ears. Was the room spinning? It might be spinning. Or that flipping sensation could have been in her stomach. A pair of strong hands wrapped around her biceps, grounding her body, but her mind continued to spiral. Her book was a failure. A flop. They hated it.
“Maggie,” Mac’s voice cut through the panic. She focused on his face, her eyes meeting his worried ones. His fingers squeezed into the nonexistent muscles of her upper arms before he released them. “Hey,” he said. “It’s not bad. They see a lot of potential.”
Maggie shook her head. “My characters are flat. It’s unbelievable. There’s no romance.”
“Hey,” Mac said again. “Don’t start that shit. You said you weren’t going to quit.”
Maggie shrugged. That had been before the feedback had been negative. Before she’d felt like her soul had been torn out and trampled. In theory she knew she was overreacting, but she was having a hard time reining her brain back into compliance. “I’m not quitting, but—”
“No buts.” Mac framed her face, his hands warm against her skin. “You need to get to know your characters better. How do you do that?”
“I don’t know.” Her voice was weak, quiet. She hated it.
“You do,” he said. When had he gotten so close? “When was the last time you had a great date or fell in love? Channel that.”
That was going to be a problem, wasn’t it? Maggie had never been in love with someone who loved her back, so it probably didn’t count. As for dating, she’d grabbed dinner with one of Cal’s coworkers about a year ago. He’d left halfway through, and she’d been stuck paying for his surf ‘n turf even though she didn’t eat meat. Shay had laughed for thirty minutes after hearing that and informed Maggie she should have only paid for her own meal and provided her date’s contact info to the restaurant for the rest of it. But yea, Maggie wouldn’t have done that, ever. She was a romance writer who was basically a romance virgin.
“I—” She looked at Mac. He wasn’t particularly tall, and the beard and permafrown definitely gave a distinct “back off” vibe. His lashes were the longest she’d ever seen. He was always respectful to other people. And the muscles in his arms rivaled Thor’s. He was also wickedly smart but not at all condescending. Maggie was sure he had plenty of girlfriends, plenty of dates. She blushed. She couldn’t admit to Mac that she was a romance-less romance writer. She couldn’t tell him she was a fraud. Was she a fraud?