PW #126: Adult Fantasy: HARVEST MOON

Manuscript Status: Finished

Mentor Name: Caitlin Sinead

Mentee Name: Geni Phipps

Title: HARVEST MOON

Category: Adult

Genre: Fantasy

Word Count: 74,000 words

Pitch:

Single mom and federal prosecutor Amelia Rousseau is used to feeling torn, but being pulled into an alternate universe—and the arms of its guardian, Aiden Skye—shreds her heart. She must return to her four-year-old daughter, but finding a way home will require solving her toughest case yet—and leaving Aiden.

Excerpt:

September

5:09.

I was late again.

I shoved two files into my bag and slid grateful feet from heels into the sneakers stashed beneath my desk. The U.S. Attorney’s Office was twenty minutes from my daughter’s daycare—without traffic. I had twenty-one.

“Amelia? Got a minute?” Jason leaned around the door, a large cardboard box curled in one arm. The tattoo he wore for undercover work peeked out from the edge of his shirt sleeve, swirling black ink on smooth brown skin.

“No.” I rounded the end of the desk, angling the picture of my pigtailed four-year-old away from the sinking sun.

“Picking up Emily?” Jason’s ever-present smile didn’t falter.

Neither did my stride. “Yep. And I should have left five minutes ago.”

He pivoted, sending the top folder sliding against the box flap. “I’ll walk you out.”

“Look.” I wrestled a rogue hair back into my ponytail. “I want to hear about your case, but she’s waiting for me.”

Jason opened the reception door and popped the elevator button with his fist. “You’ll be fine. I walk fast.”

My feet bounced, measuring the seconds before the elevator’s arrival. No way would this conversation be quick.

Jason eyed my sneakers. “Am I making you nervous?”

“You wish.” I smiled despite myself. “It’s the five dollars a minute I’ll be paying if I’m late.” And the look on Emily’s face.

Jason reached for his wallet.

I elbowed it away.