The Plan: A Standalone Off-Limits Romance

by Ella James

  I get off the subway at my stop and I practically jog home. The elevator in my building is notoriously slow; I can’t possibly wait for it today, so I take the five flights of stairs up to my small apartment three steps at a time. As soon as I’m through the door, I throw my keys on the dining table and tip my bag upside down, scrambling through my college books and papers, hunting down the envelope.

  And there it is.

  I wonder what People Magazine would pay for this envelope? The National Enquirer would give me at least a couple of hundred thousand and that’s low-balling it. I could sell the contents of this envelope for a small fortune and pay off my entire student debt in one fell swoop. The sensation that rushes through me when I consider that is dizzying. No debt whatsoever? Even if I do pass the bar exam, and even if I do become a partner in some high-powered law firm some day, it will still be a decade before I earn enough to demolish the debt hanging over my head. It’s almost too much to bear. I almost take my cell phone out and start Googling contact numbers, but then I remember Thalia’s words when she said goodbye to me just now: “I’m trusting you with this, Beth. Please…don’t do anything stupid.”

  I stop short, shaking my head. If Thalia thought selling the information she has on Raphael North was a good idea, she would have done it herself. And I can just imagine how angry and hurt she would be if she found out…

  No, it’s not worth it.

  I tear open the envelope, removing the papers from inside, and I sit myself down at the table, still wearing my jacket, and I read. The photograph that’s been included in the pack isn’t one of the infamous ones that have been plastered all over the news for years. It’s not the grim, severe, handsome picture of him in a suit, body angled to the left, chin slightly raised, giving him an imperious, cool, sort of imposing appearance—the one that’s used on all of his business related materials. And it’s not the one of him smiling politely, his eyes flashing with anger as he talked to a Hannah Albright, CRS’s anchor, in the infamous interview he gave before his accident. Nor is it the tired, haunted mug shot that was plastered all over the internet on January 1, 2014.

  This is a brand new photo altogether. He’s looking directly into the camera, and it feels, weirdly, as if he has his hand around my damn throat. His eyes… I take a moment, placing the picture down on the scuffed wood in front of me. His eyes are so arresting. Not just green. They’re the palest, brightest of greens. The color of spring and sea grass, the visual embodiment of what I imagine the smell of fresh cut grass would look like. They’re so bright, they almost look inhuman. His thick, jet-black hair is wavy, longer than the close-cropped cut he always used to sport back when he was frequently spotted out in public. Full mouth, with a perfect cupid’s bow. Narrow-bridged, straight nose. High cheekbones. Slightly crooked jawline. Huh. I never noticed that before. The left side is slightly less square than the right. Barely worth commenting on, but it gives his face a unique character that wouldn’t exist if his features were perfectly symmetrical.

  He’s wearing a Yankees t-shirt and a pair of black, faded jeans—completely at odds with the immaculately tailored suits that come to mind when I think of him. His hands are in his pockets, and he looks…wow. He looks kind of nervous. Over his shoulder: a wall of glass. New York City in its entirety stands at his back, the view from the impressive floor to ceiling windows behind him casting a striking backdrop.

  I’m not going to lie; I stare at the photograph for well over a minute, a little stunned. He is not what I expected. Not what I expected at all. Way more casual. Not relaxed, per se. But definitely…different. Women all over New York have been daydreaming and fantasizing about this man for years. I’ve shared a city with him ever since I moved here to study at Columbia, but Raphael North might as well reside on the dark side of the moon. He’s that unreachable. He’s that unobtainable. And now, here I am, flicking through a dossier on him, potentially about to meet him.

  How fucking strange.

  When I eventually look at the rest of the papers, I find most of it is the questionnaire Thalia was talking about. The bottom sheet is a criminal record check, which states that Raphael North, 05/05/1983, has no current recorded convictions or outstanding warrants. I set that to one side, and then I begin to read. The first items on the questionnaire are fairly straightforward.

  How old are you? 33

  Where are you from? New York, born and raised

  Do you have any siblings? No

  And then, the lying begins. Or at least I think he’s lying.

  What do you do for work? Astronaut

  Highest level of education? GED

  Favorite country to travel to? Serbia

  Where do you plan on being in 5 years? Dead

  Religion? Scientologist

  Jeez, that one gives me pause…

  And then, things take a more hostile turn.

  What is your greatest fear? None of your fucking business

  Have you ever had to make a tough decision that has affected you and those around you? None of your fucking business

  Who is your favorite fictional character and why? None of your fucking business

  Favorite movie? None of your fucking business

  Tell me three things you like about yourself: None of your fucking business

  What are you passionate about? None of your fucking business

  I could read on, but it would be pointless. There are three single sided pages of questions, and Raphael North’s response to each and every one of them is the same. He’s answered them in painstakingly neat, almost elegant handwriting. It’s not the rushed, slapdash cursive of someone rushing to finish filling out a form. It looks like he genuinely spent time forming every single word he recorded on the paper. At the end of the document, there’s a box that says, ‘Tell us about your ideal companion.’ Inside the box, there are three words: No fucking blondes.

  Just as Thalia said, then. For some reason he really has a strong aversion to blondes. I lay my hands flat on top of the papers, and I think. He really did not want to fill out the questionnaire, obviously. By the looks of things, he really didn’t feel too comfortable with the picture, either.

  Picking up the papers, I’m halfway through sliding them back into the envelope when I see black ink on the reverse of the final page.

  Look. I just want to play chess with an actual human being. Nothing weird. Nothing underhanded. Nothing intense or unpleasant for either of us.

  Send me someone real.

  The last line screams out at me from the page. I don’t know why, but it clangs around the inside of my head like a tolling bell. He wants someone real. What must it be like for someone like him, constantly under such immense pressure? Constantly avoiding the public eye? I imagine it would be quite lonely to be him, Park Avenue royalty, stuck in his tower, looking out over the city, so close and yet so far removed from everything going on at ground level. He must have been playing chess against his laptop for the longest time now that he just wants someone to engage in polite conversation while he kicks their ass.

  I don’t know why, but the coarse, brusque response he wrote to Thalia’s frankly rote questions have made me like him somehow. The short message he’s written on the back of the paper has done more than that, though. In a strange, awkward way, it’s made me want to understand him.

  I send Thalia a text, and my heart beats faster as I type the words.

  Me: Okay. I’m intrigued. I suppose I can give it a shot.

  She replies almost immediately.

  Thalia: I knew it! I KNEW you’d do it!

  And then…

  Thalia: Good thing I already told him yes ;) He’s expecting you at 4 tomorrow. I’ve emailed you the instructions. Don’t be late. And don’t forget to let him win!

  Continue reading here! (FREE in Kindle Unlimited.)

  A preview of On the Way to You

  by Kandi Steiner

  It was crazy to take a road trip with a stranger, but after years of standing st
ill, he was my one-way ticket to a new life, and I wasn’t going to miss it.

  We shared the same space, the same car, the same hotel room — and still, we were strangers. One day we’d be laughing, the next, we wouldn’t speak. Emery was surrounded by impenetrable walls, but I wanted in.

  Discovering his journal changed everything.

  I read his thoughts, words not meant for anyone’s eyes, and the more I learned about him, the harder I fell. It turned out nothing made Emery Reed happy, and I wanted to change that.

  I earned his trust by violating his privacy, and as wrong as it was, it worked — until one entry revealed a darkness I never knew existed, a timer I never knew was ticking.

  Suddenly, what made me happy was saving Emery from himself. I just didn’t know if I could.

  Available now–continue reading for your free preview!

  Chapter One

  Mobile, Alabama

  What makes you happy?

  Those were the words he said to me the day I met him. He asked me a simple question, one I should have been able to answer easily. There were plenty of answers, after all.

  My books made me happy, and my dog, Kalo, made me happy, too. Yoga made me happy. The way the sun always manages to come back, no matter how dark the storm, made me happy. I was the happiest girl in the world.

  Or so I thought.

  That day had started just like any other. I woke up with the sun, dragging my yoga mat out of my closet with a yawn to start my Friday. I fed Kalo and took her for a walk, ate breakfast alone, and checked to see if my parents were still alive. Referring to them as my “parents” is kind of a stretch, though, because that would imply they did some kind of parenting. In reality, I’d been taking care of myself since I was old enough to pour my own cereal. I was still amazed I’d managed to make it to see my twentieth birthday.

  Daryl, my father, had made it to work by some miracle that Friday morning and was already gone by the time I was packing up my backpack to head to work. Cindy, my mother, was doped up but breathing, which was a win in my book. She was sprawled out on the old, dingy, sunken-in couch in the living room of our trailer, and I didn’t say a word to wake her before I pushed through the creaky metal door and out into the fresh Alabama air.

  Well, it would have been fresh, if we didn’t live in the Longleaf Pine trailer park.

  Still, I had a smile on my face as the morning dew settled on my skin. With one last wave at Kalo, who was looking at me through the hole in my bedroom blinds, I hopped on my bike and started the short ten-minute bike ride to Papa Wyatt’s Diner, the restaurant I’d called home ever since I could remember, and my place of employment since I was sixteen.

  “I hate Alabama,” Tammy said as soon as I pushed my bike through the front door to a chime from the small bell above. Orange and black streamers hung from the door frame, each of them sticking to my forehead a bit as I passed by. Sweat was snaking its way from my damp hair down the back of my collared uniform shirt, finding a rather uncomfortable home where the sun doesn’t shine, but it didn’t matter.

  Alabama was hot, but Papa Wyatt’s Diner was exactly the same as it was every day. I found comfort in that, in the fact that I was able to work there at all, to get out of my house and do what I needed to do to make ends meet. I had plans to get out of Mobile, and I was so close to making it happen I could taste it.

  “No, not you!” I joked with a feigned shock face as Tammy helped me situate my bike in the back storage closet. “I just can’t imagine you hating anything, Tammy.”

  She glared at me, hands hanging on her hips. “It’s Halloween and it still feels like the inside of a sweaty jock strap out there. Fall doesn’t exist in this town.”

  “Well, I can’t argue with that,” I said, a longing sigh on my lips. “I’d kill for some sweater weather right now.” I pulled my long blonde hair into a quick braid and let it hang over my left shoulder, retrieving the orange hair tie from my pocket to add a little holiday spirit. My thick, black-framed glasses had slid down my nose in the Alabama heat, and I used one finger to push them back into place.

  I craved a true fall season, too, and I knew I’d find it in Seattle. It used to be if I made it, but now I knew it was when. I’d been saving for years, even after having to help my parents with the bills. I could have already been out of that town if I would have told them to shove off when they asked for rent or grocery money, but the truth was that I needed a place to live, too — and food to eat.

  Lily, my best friend, used to let me stay at her house all the time. Her mom didn’t even bat an eye if I was there when Lily wasn’t, because they knew my home situation. But Lily went to college right after we graduated, just like everyone else, and I stayed back, attending our local community college and saving for my dream school.

  If it weren’t for Tammy letting me crash on her couch on the nights when my parents’ fighting got really intense, I probably wouldn’t have had enough sanity left to joke with her every morning.

  “Yeah, well, at least you’ll get it soon. At Bastyr.” Tammy smiled, punching her log-in into the register as I prepped the coffee machines. “But for now, you get summer in October.” She glanced over my shoulder at the front door. “And weirdos who still want hot coffee, anyway.”

  I didn’t even need to turn to know Mr. Korbe was standing on the other side of the glass, hands resting easily in the pockets of his worn, brown dress slacks and what little hair he had left swept over his freckled head. I threw him a wink and a wave before smiling back at Tammy.

  “Just a few more months.” The words came out airy and light, riding on a fantasy I’d had since I was twelve. My dream school was three thousand miles away on the Pacific Northwest coast, and after years of saving, I was almost to the point where I could make the move.

  Almost.

  “Did you get your acceptance letter yet?”

  I swallowed, dusting off the front of my apron before heading for the door. “Not yet. But it’ll come.” I paused when I’d almost reached the lock, eying Tammy who was bouncing a little now, biting back a smile. “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “Something big is going to happen today. I feel it.” Tammy was older than me by thirty-two years, the dark bun at the nape of her neck peppered with hints of gray. Her eyes creased with laugh lines as her smile widened.

  “Uh-oh, did you read your tarot cards again this morning?”

  “Nope, but you know my gut feelings. My intuition is never wrong.”

  I laughed, because as much as I wanted to argue with her, it was true — she always had a feeling when something was coming, good or bad. I’d believed in her psychic abilities ever since I was a thirteen-year-old dirty kid with my feet hanging from the barstools in front of the cash register. She used to buy me a grilled cheese and a slice of pie out of her own pocket, and when I turned sixteen, she got me a job so I wouldn’t have to go hungry ever again.

  “Well, then, maybe my letter will come today.”

  “There’s my optimistic girl.” She whistled, hollering into the back kitchen. “Door’s opening!”

  “Strippers locked away!” our cook, Ray, yelled back.

  Tammy rolled her eyes and I chuckled, unlocking the door to welcome Mr. Korbe inside.

  And so the morning went. I refilled coffee and served up plates of scrambled eggs and pancakes to the same faces I’d seen day in and day out for years. I took a picture with little Sammy Jones, who was dressed up as an “Army guy GI Joe,” in his own words, and listened to Mr. and Mrs. Boone tell me about the new vegetables in their garden. I helped Tammy top off the ketchup and mustard when breakfast faded into lunch, and tried not to cringe when the old man known affectionally as Scooter checked out my ass as I passed his booth — it was hard to do, since I’d sat on his lap when he played Santa every year until I was ten.

  Yep, it was a completely normal day.

  Until it wasn’t.

  I heard the faint chime of the bell as I cashed out the B
oones. “Welcome to Papa Wyatt’s, just grab any open booth and I’ll be right with you,” I called without even looking up from the register. One finger pushed my glasses back up my nose as I popped the register closed and hurried back with the change, offering the Boones one last smile and letting them know I’d see them on Sunday. Which I would.

  I always did.

  My eyes were on my hands as I pulled the notepad from my apron pocket and the pencil from behind my ear, feet moving on autopilot to the newly occupied booth, but when I looked up at the person sitting in it, everything stopped.

  Everything.

  Time, my heart, the greeting that was two seconds from leaving my lips.

  We had plenty of travelers stop in the diner on their way through town — hard to escape that when we were less than two minutes from I-10 — but those travelers usually fit a code. They were the spring break road trippers on their way to the beach, or lonely truck drivers with sad, weary eyes, or a family of four with kids bouncing in their seats and throwing apple sauce while the parents begged me for more coffee. None of them, and I do mean none of them, looked like him.

  His sandy-blond hair was tussled, one hand absent-mindedly running through it as he looked over the menu. From the view I had of his profile, I noticed the deep dent of his cheeks, the smooth squareness of his jaw, the long slope of his nose, bent just a little at the top, like it’d been broken before. He was dressed like the men on the magazines lining the grocery store checkout lane, sporting a cerulean blue sweater over a button-up, plaid dress shirt, the sleeves of both shoved up to his elbows. My eyes followed the fabric down to where it gathered above the light brown belt around his hips. When he dropped the menu to the table, I snapped my attention back to his face.