Free The Queen and I by Russell Andresen Page A

person and was not much of a collector or hoarder of any unnecessary items. Her home was almost what you would expect from a minimalist and not a vibrant, thirty-year-old woman. She didn’t even have many pictures strewn about the place; one of her parents, who were both dead, and one of her and Jeffrey at a premier, that’s all that she would allow herself to be sentimental over.
    Rachel had fashioned her life in a way that even the most power-hungry women in the workforce would probably see as a bit harsh. She allowed no time for friends, did not cry at movies, and thought that pets of any kind were a nuisance that could be lived without. Jeffrey had once bought her a Siamese fighting fish and she promptly forgot that she had it and it wound up starving to death.
    Her qualities were not those of a woman Jeffrey had ever thought he would fall in love with, but it was her strength and conviction that was so sexy and appealing to him that he found himself almost craving her company whenever they were apart. She provided the strength for both of them in this relationship, and he credited her privately for much of his more recent successes, as it was Rachel who often was the driving force keeping him working when he felt burned out and had lost the will to write.
    Now his problem was not that he had lost his will, it was that the will had lost him. Try as he may, there simply was no flow of ideas or creative thought coursing through his veins. He was as devoid of an original idea as in any time in his life, and it was scary. He felt as if things were beginning to turn for him with the thoughts of revenge dancing around in his mind, but there were no real concrete ideas that he could work with yet and that was beyond disturbing. Usually at this point in the creative process, he would have already been burning the midnight oil and ignoring both sleep and sustenance in favor of writing, but the only thing that interested him right now was getting out of the city and to the little town of Zion where his newly purchased home was.
    He watched television as he waited and texted her again to let her know that he was still waiting. She finally got back to him and said that she was on her way and that he should order Chinese take-out. He wasn’t planning on spending that much time there tonight, but also did not want her to become suspicious about the real reason why he was leaving.
    Jeffrey knew that he was being completely honest with himself when he said that he was going upstate to write and get some privacy, but there was the little voice of negativity in his head who was calling him a failure and a coward and that he was only running from his problems. There may have been some truth behind those words that came from his subconscious, but he chose to ignore them—or at least tried to.
    Another option was that he could invite her to come with him, and the two of them could live together as Zion’s first official power couple. That was a reach, but he thought he might give it a try.
    He ordered the food, and Rachel arrived home a couple of minutes later. She looked beautiful as always, those dazzling green eyes of hers shining brilliantly from behind the glasses that she wore whenever she had a meeting or an interview to conduct. She believed that they made her appear more intimidating; Jeffrey thought that they made her look sexy. She was one of the few women he had ever seen who could make the pantsuit look attractive, and he often joked with her that she should give Hillary Clinton some pointers, but Rachel would just laugh and say, “I’m good; I’m not that good.”
    She changed out of her work clothes in front of him, and he marveled at the form of her. She was truly the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, and what was more, she was truly only interested in him. She was flirted with at every turn in her daily life and shot down advance after advance from these would-be suitors, telling them that she preferred a real