Free Jane Bites Back by Michael Thomas Ford Page A

by holy water and then done in by a cross-shaped shadow added to her queasiness.
    She couldn’t help thinking back to the time when she’d been as innocent as Marianne. She too had trusted someone who had betrayed her. Unlike Marianne, however, she had not escaped.
    “No,” she said to the dark. “You’re not going to think about that. You’ve let it go.”
    She felt foolish speaking the thoughts out loud. It was a trick she’d learned during an est seminar in 1972. That was the year she’d decided to become self-actualized. Along with a perm and bell-bottom jeans, it was one of many things she regretted. The technique of getting rid of unhealthy thoughts by speaking them aloud, though, was actually helpful. It had helped her release some of the anger she’d carried inside her for so long.
    She turned on her side and focused her eyes on the window. Beyond the curtains the lights of Broadway blinked on and off and the sounds of car horns broke the stillness. “That was the past, this is now,” Jane said. “That was the past, this is now.” Another trick she’d picked up during that long-ago weekend.
    She repeated the phrase over and over, until the sound of her own voice drowned out everything else. When she felt her eyes beginning to close, she rolled onto her back. Across from the bed the cover for her novel still hung on the mirror. “I am Jane Fairfax,” she said. “I am Jane Fairfax.”
    Repeating this new mantra, she fell asleep.
    When she awoke, the room was filled with dirty gray light. A quick glance out the window showed that it was snowing again. Jane was tempted to pull the covers over her head and sleep somemore, but the numbers on the clock beside the bed showed that she was due to meet Kelly for breakfast in an hour to go over the rest of his editing suggestions. She was supposed to have looked through them, but the manuscript still sat untouched on the coffee table by the window
    She forced herself to get up and take a shower. Then, dressed in the fluffy white robe provided by the hotel, she raced through the manuscript, adding words here and there and occasionally muttering her disagreement with something Kelly had written. But mostly everything he’d done made sense, and she finished with just enough time left to get dressed and pack her suitcase for the trip home.
    Kelly had arranged to meet her in the restaurant in her hotel, so she had only to go downstairs. Still, she was five minutes late, and found Kelly already seated at a table.
    “I’m so sorry,” she apologized as he stood and kissed her lightly on cheek. “I was up late going through the manuscript.”
    “I only just got here,” he reassured her.
    As she sat down and placed the manuscript on the table, Jane couldn’t help noticing how put together Kelly looked. He wore a black suit with a white shirt and a blue striped tie. His hair was slicked back and he looked refreshed and impossibly handsome.
Meanwhile
, Jane thought,
I look and feel like the undead
.
    “Did you sleep well?” Kelly asked as Jane accepted a cup of coffee from the waitress.
    “Very well, thank you,” said Jane.
    “And is there anything in the manuscript you want to discuss?”
    Jane shook her head as she poured cream into her coffee. “It all looks good,” she said. “There were just a few little things. Nothing terribly important.”
    “I have to tell you, so far you’re a dream author,” Kelly told her. “I almost hope the book doesn’t do well.”
    “Why?” Jane asked, startled by the statement.
    “I’m kidding,” Kelly said, noticing her reaction. “It’s just that often when new authors have a bestseller they become, shall we say …” He waved his hands around as he searched for the right word.
    “Self-important?” Jane suggested.
    Kelly nodded. “Self-important,” he agreed.
    Jane raised her eyebrows and smiled. “I don’t think you have to worry about that,” she said.
    She and Kelly went over the final edits on her