To Love Jason Thorn (Page 16)

“Of course. Actually, it would help me a lot, too.” As much as I hated giving in to Marcus’ words, I didn’t want him to be right about what he said, especially when I was so close to graduating early.

“Your book is still doing amazing on the rankings!” A jumping and screaming Lucy came barreling toward me.

“Here we go again,” Char muttered with a smile in her voice as I braced myself for impact.

Two seconds later, Lucy’s arms were around my neck and we were jumping up and down, celebrating her excitement over my book for the…thousandth time? If it wasn’t already the thousandth, we were surely getting pretty close.

The truth was I was staying away from checking reviews and rankings and all that stuff because I was scared shitless that all of it would tumble down on me at any moment. Lucy was like a bloodhound anyway; she had refreshed those pages almost every hour, on the hour ever since the book had gone up on Amazon two months before. My fear was also the reason I was trying to lock down my excitement about the possibility of seeing Isaac and Evie on the big screen. Once Dream Catch Studios provided me with the contract—if they were serious about it—and I signed it…then I would either sit down and cry for a few days—happy tears, of course—or I would pull a Lucy and go crazy all over the town—naturally, with her by my side.

“Still in the top hundred?” I asked, the slight tinge of hope in my voice more than clear.

She flicked her hair over her shoulder. “Try top five, woman. You’re still killing it.”

I’d stayed as the number one bestselling book on more than a few platforms for almost six weeks, and I was still in the top five after two months? I gave in to the urge and completed another jumping session with Lucy, not noticing Marcus leaning against the doorframe and watching us.

Then we were out of there to celebrate with lattes and croissants.

It was well worth every damn calorie that went straight to our hips.

***

It was almost four o’clock when Jason’s name flashed on the screen of my phone. I was alone, sitting in our living room, staring blankly at an empty word document, trying to figure out which direction my mind and heart wanted to lead me this time around. Needless to say, neither of them was speaking to me at that moment.

Urging my heart to stop fluttering around like a wild bird in my chest, I took a deep breath and answered the call—at the same time wondering if it was weird of me to get so worked up over a simple phone call.

“Hi.”

“Hey, little one. I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”

“Nope. How can I help you?” I asked before tipping my water bottle against my lips to wet my suddenly parched throat.

“So formal.” He clucked, and I could almost see him shaking his head as a small smile stretched across his face. “Soon enough, I’ll win you over. You already loved me once; I’ll make it happen again.”

Sputtering water all over the cheap Ikea coffee table that was stationed in front of the couch, I coughed until I could speak without gulping breaths.

“What?” I wheezed out when what I wanted to say was, Oh, Jason, I’m still head over heels for you, maybe even more so.

“What’s going on, Olive? Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah,” I replied in a rough whisper. “Just water down the wrong pipe. I’m fine.”

“Well, okay. You scared me; I thought someone was strangling you.”

“Yeah, nothing that exciting.”

“Being strangled is exciting to you?”

“Not for me, but definitely for some people. Don’t knock it ’til you try it and all that.”

He seemed to think about it for a second, then cleared his throat before speaking again. “Ok, we are not going anywhere near that. You shouldn’t even know about stuff like that.” I did a ladylike snort but he ignored me. “You never answered my texts last night.”

“Yeah, I didn’t want to bother you.” I got up and went to stand next to the window, counting the cars that passed on our street.

“I was the one who texted you; why would I be bothered when you actually went ahead and answered them?”

“It was late. I just thought you would be occupied, or out. Why did you say you were calling again?”

“You’re terrible at trying to change the subject smoothly, little one. From now on, you can answer my texts whenever. I forgot to tell you yesterday, but please make sure no one else gets my number from your phone, all right? It’s pure hell when somebody gets a hold of it.”

“If you are worried about my friends, don’t be. Lucy is the only one who knows my password and she would never do anything like that. She might’ve looked a little crazy with all the jumping and screaming yesterday, but she isn’t someone who would steal your number and then bother you.” I paused and thought about it for a second. “However, she might grope you if she ever sees you again so you can worry about that if you want to, but that’s as far as she would go. Still, if you are regretting giving me your number, I can delete it right now.”

“This trying to get rid of me thing is a huge blow to my ego, little one. I hope you’ll stop before you do some permanent damage.”

“I didn’t mean to sound…well, mean, I just don’t want you to worry about it.”

Feeling too wired to just stand in one place, I started pacing the living room from wall to wall. Why wasn’t he just telling me what he thought of the book? Even if he’d read a few pages, surely he would have an opinion on it.

“I’m not worrying, and the reason I’m calling right now is because I wanted to let you know that I talked to Keith, the guy from the movie studio, and they will send the optioning agreement to my agent instead of directly to you.”

I stopped my pacing. “What? Why would they do that?”

“Because I don’t want them to take advantage of you. Tom will go over the contract for us then we’ll meet at my house so you can sign it if you are happy with everything they are offering. Just let me know when you’ll be free and I’ll arrange it. It needs to be in the next few days because I have to leave for Canada on Friday. I’ll be out of town for a few months.”

“Oh,” I mumbled, mostly to myself. That little piece of news settled down in the pit of my stomach, so I bit down on my thumb and tried to come up with the right thing to say. “This is too much, Jason. Despite what I said yesterday, I’m sure you don’t have this kind of time on your hands to babysit your old best friend’s little sister.”

He coughed and roughly cursed on the other end of the line.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yeah. Sorry. Look, this isn’t about Dylan. This is about you. Wouldn’t you let Dylan help you if he was in my place? At the very least, you can see me as a stand-in for your brother. I won’t let anyone take advantage of your work, Olive. You’ll get what you deserve and nothing less.”

What he’d just said hurled me back to my heartbroken fifteen-year-old self again. It looked like no matter how much I grew up, he would never see me as anything but a sister.

I dumbly nodded and realized he couldn’t see me through the phone so I forced my mouth to open and give him the words.

“Thank you, Jason. I appreciate it,” I said, in a dull tone. “Uh, I have to go right now. My friends are waiting for me, but I’ll text you to let you know which days I’ll be free. You can arrange the time according to your schedule. I don’t want to be a bigger burden then I already am.”