Free Just Her Type by Reon Laudat

of
colleagues was unprofessional and petty. While she’d shared her pet peeves with
Dominic that day over lunch, she usually saved all business-related petty rants
for confidantes such as Brittany and other close friends in the business.
    Piper and two other agents at the table hardly
stopped to take a breath as they gossiped about Dominic’s latest coup.
    If truth be told, Kendra flip-flopped on how she
felt about the super-sized, headline-making advances for brand-spanking-new
authors. Some days she thought the practice was ludicrous, especially in the
current publishing climate.   Other
times, well, she wasn’t so sure it was always such a bad thing. It depended on
the circumstances and the book, she supposed. Penelope’s critically acclaimed
debut had scored noteworthy sales. Her second project had been sold as a
completed manuscript—not just a synopsis with sample chapters.
    After a thorough examination of the contract and
finding no potential trapdoors, Kendra would also advise her client to accept
such a deal with life-changing cash attached. But she held her tongue.
    “And for those who disagree,” Piper went on, “have
you forgotten about Dominic’s uncanny knack for spreading auction fever. Not to
mention his double-speak and cutthroat tendencies. He’s greedy, all about the
ridiculous advance.   And what is up with his wardrobe? Who does he
think he is?”
    “Rainbow Brite?” Sheila zinged.
    “What’s wrong with his clothes?” said Zoe. “I
think he’s sexy, cool, and edgy. He can pull it off. He’s handsome. And has
swagger with it.”
    Kendra blinked at Zoe’s bold confession and
protectiveness of Dominic. Chomping on bacon, she glanced at Zoe’s bare ring
finger and sized her up. Her sun-kissed skin highlighted huge blue eyes in a
way that would garner appreciative double takes.   And she had a fabulous figure. Had
Dominic noticed? Zoe clearly had it bad for him.   Perhaps she would make a suitable
distraction and Dominic would give up his pursuit of Kendra. Sounded good in
theory, but she felt some ambivalence about it.   When Piper referred to Dominic as “the
douche” for the tenth time in the last fifteen minutes, Kendra’s reticence to
join the debate faded.
      “C’mon
now, Piper, how often does ‘auction fever’ actually happen these days? And those outrageously high advances don’t come around
nearly as often now that the industry is in flux. It’s the wild, wild west, if
you will. Markets tightening, houses consolidating, staffs shrinking, not to
mention the popularity of ebooks and self-publishing.”
    “Ebooks have been lucrative for houses,” Zoe
added.
    “No need for Piper to stoop to name-calling,
that’s all,” Kendra said, though a time or two, she’d come close to calling
Piper Sandpiper because of her
twittery avian-like manner. “Dominic’s competitive, but that’s not always a bad
thing. Aren’t we all, when it comes to business, especially these days. We have
to be.”
    “I know as well as anyone how rapidly and
drastically the business is changing so spare me your lecture and
condescension.” Piper narrowed her beady eyes.   
      Kendra
held up her hands in surrender. Now that she had the opportunity to luxuriate
in the land of the aloha spirit, she would try to think and express only
positive feelings toward others, including Piper.
    “Wow, this bacon is primo!” Kendra told Piper, who
had a mountain of fruit before her. “You should try it!”
    “I’m pescatarian,” Piper sniffed, looking down her
beak at all the pork on Kendra’s plate.
    “What does being Presbyterian have to do with bacon?”
Sheila asked.
    “I said pescatarian .”
Piper seemed to relish rolling the word off her tongue and telling everyone how
she abstained from eating meat, with the exception of fish.   Maybe Piper was like Ogden, Kendra’s
pompous next door neighbor, who’d made a point of mentioning he was “strict
pescatarian” during every conversation