When Ole Miss turned them loose, Mercer and Thomas packed up the dog and their shorts and headed for the island. Larry had finished the repairs to the cottage and Mercer was eager for a week away from the classroom. She was also excited about her first book party since Leo had ruined her last one. For weeks, Bruce had insisted on throwing a “major author event” and wouldn’t take no for an answer. The paperback of Tessa had just been released and Mercer had signed on for another grueling summer tour to promote it. Bruce insisted that the first stop be at Bay Books and harangued the publisher into underwriting half of it.

The party began on Saturday afternoon with barbecue and a bluegrass band on the sidewalk and street in front of the store. The locals needed some fun, and the crowd was large and continued to grow. At 3:00 p.m., Mercer took her spot downstairs behind a table, with stacks of books all around her, and greeted her admirers.

She chatted them up, posed for dozens of photos and selfies, autographed the paperbacks and some hardbacks as well, held a couple of babies, signed the cast on a broken arm, answered questions from people who claimed they knew Tessa, did a quick interview with the island’s newspaper, and all in all had a delightful time being the popular author with a long line of fans snaking out the front door.

When Bruce wasn’t working the crowd and selecting other titles for certain preferred customers, he and Thomas and Bob Cobb sat outside on the balcony and sipped tequila. The music switched to reggae late in the afternoon and the air was filled with soothing music and plenty of laughter. Benny’s Oyster Truck arrived at five and a crew began shucking on the side street. Two kegs of beer materialized from somewhere and attracted the faithful.

It was springtime and the weather was perfect.

At six, Mercer moved upstairs where a hundred folding chairs had been arranged for her reading. Three years earlier during her brief sabbatical on the island she had attended several author talks in the same space, and at the moment she couldn’t help but remember the twinge of jealousy she had felt for those touring writers who were publishing, selling, and drawing crowds. Now, it was her turn at the podium.

Leigh and Myra were in the front row, as always, and they beamed at her like proud grandparents. Leigh appeared ready to cry. Next to her was Amy Slater, the vampire girl, present with her husband and all three kids. Andy Adam stood in a corner with a diet drink and smiled at Mercer. Jay Arklerood, the sour poet, was in the second row and looked out of place, as always. Mercer was certain that Bruce had threatened him to compel his attendance. His last book, a thin collection of incomprehensible free-verse poems, had sold only a thousand copies across the country. Bay Books was responsible for half of them. If Bruce wanted a favor, Jay couldn’t say no.

Back in the good old days, before Leo, the store hosted several author events each week. Some of the writers were popular with large followings that made for easy draws. But others were the rookies or mid-list authors wanting desperately to sell more, and for them Bruce guaranteed a crowd. He did so by calling, cajoling, charming, and strong-arming his friends and loyal customers. To him, a small turnout was a crushing defeat, one he simply couldn’t tolerate.

And he was determined to make Mercer Mann a success. He admired her as a writer and adored her as a person, and with her he dreamed of doing something he had never fully accomplished: to make her a literary star, one who could slay the critics while selling books. He, Bruce Cable, wanted to be responsible for her greatness. No one knew this, not even Noelle, though she knew he was quite fond of Mercer. She had the talent, but he wasn’t sure about the drive, the ambition.

She smiled at Bruce and Thomas near the back and began her talk. She was delighted to be back, as always, and impressed with the resiliency of the island. It had been six months since her last visit and she marveled at the recovery. She was grateful for the thousands of volunteers and hundreds of nonprofits who had rushed down to help. She switched gears and talked about her summers on the island—every summer from the age of seven through nineteen she stayed with Tessa, her beloved grandmother. Her parents were divorced. Her mother was ill. For nine months she suffered at home in Memphis with a father who had no interest in her. She begged him to let her live with Tessa permanently, but he wouldn’t yield.

Thomas watched and listened with enormous pride. He had accompanied her the previous summer on her thirty-four-stop book tour, and he had heard these stories at least as many times. Her transformation, though, had been remarkable. Never timid, she had gone from being a chatty speaker who ran out of things to say after thirty minutes, to a seasoned raconteur who could tell the same story three different ways and draw tears with each telling. By the end of the tour, no audience wanted her to stop after only an hour.

And Thomas knew a deep secret that one day soon everyone else would know. Mercer was hard at work on her next novel. She had written half of it, and it was brilliant, by far her best work to date. Bruce, of course, had, over drinks, already tried to pry out anything to do with the next novel, and Mercer had warned Thomas about this. So he admitted only that she was working but keeping it all to herself.

She opened up the discussion with questions from the floor, and when it became obvious they might go on for hours, Bruce pulled the plug at 7:30 and said Mercer needed dinner. He thanked her, hugged her, and made her promise to return soon with the next novel. The crowd stood and applauded loudly. Both Leigh and Myra were in tears.

6.