The Rom-Com Agenda

Acknowledgments Authors always have so many people to thank for getting their latest book baby in tip-top shape. I have so much gratitude for everyone who contributed to this book. Giant pink and purple fuzzy hearts to… Glynis Astie for the Big Idea when we just happened to be in close proximity to a Very Famous Actor: “He’s really tall. You should write a book with a tall hero that he can play in the movie version.” Done and done, my friend. The Rom-Com Agenda wouldn’t exist without you! My cousins Mary Benvenuto and Nina Burgess for helping me understand what it’s like to survive a Thousand Islands winter. Any errors in describing just how dang cold it is there are my fault alone. The very kind, welcoming (and unsuspecting) residents of Clayton, New York, for patiently answering all my weird questions about life in the Islands. Alyse, owner of the McKinley House Bed and Breakfast in Clayton, for giving this writer the gorgeous turret room. It was perfect! Store manager Rebecca, who recognized a heartbreak of a scene when it unfolded in front of her—good eye, my friend—and shared the story with me. I hope Sad Valentine’s Day Teen has finally found someone who appreciates him. Editorial consultant Angela James, for helping me figure out this story’s purpose. Because sometimes you need help with the big picture. Editor Alex Sehulster and everyone at St. Martin’s Griffin for getting The Rom-Com Agenda on its feet and out the door! As always, Jordy Albert, agent extraordinaire, for finding my books a wonderful new home… and for listening to me whine, like, all the time. About the Author Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark JAYNE DENKER is the author of romantic comedies. When she’s not hard at work on another novel (or, rather, when she should be hard at work on another novel), she can usually be found frittering away stupid amounts of time on social media. SIMON & SCHUSTER simonandschuster.com.au www.SimonandSchuster.com.au/Authors/Jayne-Denker Leah Keegan was positive she was not meant to be a superhero. Or an alien. Or whatever other life-form came in a peculiar shade of near-fluorescent lime green. A disturbingly large amount of her skin was sporting the lurid tint at the moment, proving that this was not her color. Besides, the last time she had seen this particular shade on a humanoid, the poor thing was being pursued by one Captain James T. Kirk, and no thank you to that. The green had to go. She plopped down on the narrow boards ringing the inside of Ward Peterson’s tiny, rustic bare-bones boathouse, just the right size for a small motorboat and nothing more. The interior was now painted said screaming alien-green, solely so Ward could more easily locate it and navigate his boat back in after a long day of fishing. His eyesight wasn’t so good these days, he had told her, especially at dusk. Leah preferred not to speculate on how much his eyesight was affected by how many beers he had indulged in on any given fishing expedition. Leah picked at the dried paint that had somehow managed to cover almost as much of her as it had the inside of the boathouse. But doing that tugged on the fine hairs of her forearm, which just plain hurt, so she let it be for now and admired her handiwork instead. Seventy-five dollars and flights of fancy about being a different sort of creature. Not bad for a day’s work. Now it was time to pack up the paint and brushes and rollers, haul her butt out of the boathouse, and get home to a cool shower. She forced her tired bones to move but paused mid-boost, a wash of melancholy knocking her back down to the boards. Except for the siren song of that shower, there was no need to rush home. She kept forgetting. It was a strange thing to get used to, and she hadn’t succeeded just yet. It would come. In time. She knew that—in her head, at least. Her heart was still catching up. She sat quietly, leaning back against the coarse boards of the boathouse, watching the gentle flow of the water. From here all she could see were other docks, other modest properties huddled up along the inlet. Follow this stretch of water, however, and it soon opened out onto the vast, powerful St. Lawrence River, moving northeast to the Atlantic Ocean. Beyond the huge vessels in the shipping lanes and the various small bits of land in the river that gave this part of New York State its name, the Thousand Islands, lay Canada. On this side of the river, the lush green flatlands gave no hint that the Adirondack Mountains would poke up, ancient and imposing, less than a hundred miles away. But here, in this boathouse, on this inlet, a bit of peace—from the tourists, who were starting to wrap up their summer vacations as each day grew progressively cooler and shorter, from the river traffic, from the thoughts that filled her head day and night. Leah took a breath. This was okay. This was good. By tonight she’d have money in her “gettin’ outta Dodge” jar and food in her stomach. She’d scrub the alien tint off her skin, wash her paint-spattered clothes—er, throw away her paint-spattered clothes—and spend the rest of the night watching trashy TV. But for just one minute she closed her eyes, relaxed her aching muscles, and listened to the soft blipping sound of the tiny waves lapping the wooden posts under the boathouse. “Aren’t you going to miss this place?” The voice was so close Leah almost answered the question. But it was just a trick of acoustics, sound bouncing off the water’s surface and funneled straight into the boathouse. Whoever it was wasn’t talking to her. Nobody could even see her in here unless they were out on the water, pulling into the boathouse or cruising past it, and there wasn’t much more to the