Steven Womack - By Blood Written

Her state of mind and morale weren’t helped by having a houseguest all weekend. It wasn’t that Michael Schiftmann was such a bother. In fact, he was the most low-maintenance houseguest she’d had in months. But there had been the party she’d thrown for him Saturday night, and on Sunday afternoon she’d accompanied him down to the Village for his signing at a small mystery bookstore. After the book signing, she had taken Michael, the bookstore owner and his wife, and a couple of other hangers-on out for a dinner that lasted until nearly ten. By the time she got home, decompressed, and got Michael all squared away in the guest room, it had been past midnight before she collapsed into bed herself.

Sundays were almost always sacred to Taylor; a day when she often didn’t even bother to get out of her bathrobe until dinnertime. It was a day of lounging around reading the Sunday Times , catching an old movie on cable, drinking hot herb tea in the middle of the afternoon, and perhaps even taking a nap. Sundays restored Taylor Robinson, centered her, gave her that calm place deep inside herself in which to rest and recharge. She knew that by the end of the week, the loss of a Sunday was going to leave her ready to shut down completely. In essence, she’d already worked eight days without a day off, with at least four more to go.

Even tonight was shot, as Michael’s publicist had set up a signing at the Barnes amp; Noble superstore on the Upper West Side. It never occurred to Taylor not to accompany her star author to the signing; that sort of thing simply wasn’t done in Taylor Robinson’s way of conducting business.

Taylor heard a knock on the doorjamb of her office. She turned as Neil Macher, the head of contracts for the agency, stuck his head in. A lock of thinning, greasy black hair hung down over his forehead as he stared over the top of his smudged glasses.

“Bad time?”

Taylor looked around her tiny twelve-by-fifteen office, its floor-to-ceiling bookcases, and its one visitor’s chair piled high with manuscripts.

“Sorry I can’t offer you a seat,” she said, shrugging helplessly.

Neil stepped in, a stack of papers in his left hand. “Who’s got time to sit, anyway? Is Michael coming in today?”

“Probably not,” Taylor answered. “I’m meeting him for drinks and a quick dinner before his signing tonight.”

“And then he’s flying out tomorrow, right?”

Taylor nodded. “Boston.”

“Then you’ll have to get him to sign these tonight, okay?

Don’t let him get away without going over these contracts and getting his signature.” Neil leaned over a stack of manuscript boxes and extended his hand to Taylor.

“Have these incorporated the last-minute changes we talked about?” she asked, taking the half-inch-thick stack of papers.

Neil nodded quickly. “I’ve gone over them, Joan’s gone over them, and legal’s gone over them. Their legal department signed off on them last night. Everything’s cool and ready for signatures.”

Taylor smiled. “God, Neil, my first seven-figure deal.”

Neil grinned back at her. “Maybe a little celebration’s in order tonight.”

“I just hope Michael’s happy with all this.”

Neil backed out of the door frame, waving his hand dismissively. “If he’s not, he’s crazy.” He stopped, looked back at Taylor with a raised eyebrow.

“Then again, he’s a writer. By definition, he’s crazy.”

Neil closed the door as he left, leaving her to make one last review of the contracts. It was, by any sane and reasonable standard, a fantastic deal for the author and the largest book contract Taylor had ever negotiated by a factor of ten.

Under the terms of the three-book contract, Michael Schiftmann would receive one-point-five million dollars for the next book in his series, to be called The Sixth Letter . For the seventh installment, he would receive an advance of two-point-five million, and for the eighth book in the series, and last in the contract, he would receive four million.

“Eight million for three books,” Taylor whispered.

“Jeez …”

And, she reminded herself, fifteen percent of that eight million went to Delaney amp; Associates. One-point-two million in commissions, a percentage of which after expenses would go to Taylor in salary and bonuses.

Taylor smiled, but behind the smile was an undercurrent of tension. To her credit, Taylor had managed to negotiate a contract that not only provided a hefty advance for each book, but also built in a number of other provisions to protect her client. The contract was what Hollywood called “pay or play,” which meant the advances were nonreturnable. If for any reason-including turning in an unacceptable manuscript-publication of any of the three books was canceled, Michael got to keep the money. If the books exceeded their sales goals, there was a sweet performance bonus built into the deal, but if they failed to meet their targets, Michael in-curred no penalty. The publisher retained most subsidiary rights-foreign, paperback, audio, electronic-but had to split all sub rights revenue with Michael. And on top of that, her client had retained all film and television rights to the books and all the characters appearing in the books, which would mean additional revenue down the road.

All in all, Taylor felt, this was the kind of contract that would free up an author from ever having to worry about money again. It meant artistic and financial freedom. It was, Taylor mused, what Humphrey Bogart called “fuck you money.”

But Taylor also knew that this kind of book deal held some intrinsic dangers for an author as well. The industry was full of legendary tales of writers who’d received huge, phenomenal, record-breaking contracts and then crashed and burned. Fame and wealth were deadly if one didn’t have the psychological underpinnings to handle it. Writers were notoriously fragile, which was why in a profession that gave its top practitioners prestige, money, and freedom from the soul-killing strictures of traditional corporate life, there was so much depression, substance abuse, divorce, insanity, and suicide. The occupational hazards were real and very, very dangerous.

And as far as Taylor could tell, the jury was still out on Michael Schiftmann. Could he handle this? Would his ego explode over his intellect? Would he, in the greatest danger of all, come to believe his own press?

As Taylor’s eyes strained to read every word of the fine print, she couldn’t help but replay in her own mind that first conversation with Michael Schiftmann when he’d called her office just over five years ago. Taylor had been a literary agent herself for only a short while, having decided after several years as an editorial assistant that spending sixty hours a week for twenty grand a year simply wasn’t worth it.

Joan called her that late autumn morning and practically shouted, in her usual manner, that she’d made an appointment with a writer from Ohio or Illinois or some such place out there and now didn’t have time to keep it.

“You talk to him!” Joan ordered.

“But who is he?” Taylor asked.

“Shiffman, Pittman, Sheffield, Schmetering, something or other … Hell, I don’t know, just handle it!” Then Joan slammed the phone down.

“But I don’t even know who-” Taylor protested to the now silent phone.

Asking herself if any of this was worth it, Taylor had buzzed the receptionist and at least gotten the writer’s accurate name, then asked that she hold him off for a couple of minutes while she cleared a place for him to sit.

Five minutes later, Taylor walked out into the reception area and introduced herself to a man about her age and several inches taller, wearing khaki pants and a worn corduroy jacket. He needed a shave and a haircut, and the briefcase under his arm was scuffed leather with tarnished hardware.