The Attraction Distraction

  The Attraction Distraction

  A Museum of Literature Romance, Volume 2

  Jenn McKinlay

  Published by JMO Ink, 2022.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  THE ATTRACTION DISTRACTION

  First edition. June 7, 2022.

  Copyright © 2022 Jenn McKinlay.

  ISBN: 979-8201522216

  Written by Jenn McKinlay.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  TURN THE PAGE | For a preview of the first novella in the Museum of Literature series: | ROYAL VALENTINE

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  Further Reading: Royal Valentine

  Also By Jenn McKinlay

  About the Author

  For my mom, Susan McKinlay, for instilling in me a life long love of books and adventures.

  Acknowledgments: Huge thanks to my editor Traci Hall! She makes these novellas sparkle and shine and leaves me delightful "lols" all throughout the manuscript which does amazing things for my usual crippling self doubt.

  Many thanks to Lyndsey of Llewellen Designs for the amazing cover. She takes my ideas and ridiculous cut and paste images and comes back with a cover that dazzles. Every. Single. Time.

  Shout out to my amazing agent Christina Hogrebe! She never misses a beat when I come up with something new. She just turns around and sells the audio rights. Yes, you read that right -- these novellas are available on audio, too!

  And, as always, thanks to the Hub and Hooligans, for always cheering me on. You are the loves of my life.

  Chapter One

  “Sarah, what’s your vaccination status?”

  My head snapped up from the facsimile of a Mycenaean clay tablet on my desk. Claire Macintosh, the director of the Museum of Literature, stood in the doorway to my office. She looked spectacular, as always, in a Viking warrior sort of way. Strong chiseled features and tall, very tall—like supermodel tall—but with robust curves and shoulder-length thick blond hair that made her resemble a 1940s pinup model.

  “I’m up-to-date on all of my medical,” I said. “In fact, I just had a full workup last month. Tetanus, typhoid, meningitis, cholera, malaria, I’ve got them all and a few I can’t remember. Why?”

  “We need you to acquire a piece for the collection but it requires travel to a remote location,” she said.

  “Oh.” I perked up. I loved to travel. The more exotic the better.

  “I’d go but I have to attend that horrible fundraiser my mother is insisting upon,” Claire said. She looked peeved.

  Claire’s family was loaded. She lived in a penthouse apartment on Park Avenue and not from the salary she made here at the museum. But Claire had just turned forty and her mother, Hildy Macintosh, had made it her mission to marry her daughter off and have grandbabies within the year. I’m not gossiping. Hildy literally told every person she met that this was her agenda and then asked if they knew a nice man for her daughter.

  Claire simply rolled her eyes and then stepped over the men her mother threw at her feet. I’d seen it happen. It was painful to watch, actually.

  “Is she going to try and marry you off again?” Still seated, I stretched my back, which was tight since I’d been hunched over my desk all morning.

  Claire cringed. “Undoubtedly.”

  When she was thirty-five, Claire became the youngest person ever appointed Director of the Museum of Literature. Housed in a Georgian Revival mansion on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, along Museum Mile, it was formerly the private residence of industrialist Thomas Stewart and his beloved wife Mabel. An avid reader and book lover, Mabel Stewart had bequeathed the property to a private foundation with specific instructions to create the Museum of Literature.

  The director was a highly coveted position, and Claire had to prove herself time and again to the very exacting museum board. I knew if she was sending me in her stead to acquire a piece for the collection that the stakes would be high and failure not an option.

  “Just so you know,” Claire said. “I’m choosing you because the Classics is your specialty, but also, because of your personality.”

  I frowned. I was known for being a bit single-minded, and by a bit I mean utterly myopic when it came to curating the exhibits for the museum. I took our mission statement to “preserve the written word and make it accessible to all who want to learn” very seriously and I’d been told I could be rather strident and off-putting in my execution on behalf of the museum.

  “My personality?”

  Claire smiled. “Yes, you, Sarah Novak, are known for your tenacity, which will be very advantageous in this instance. Now come on, we have to visit Miles in Special Collections.”

  My eyebrows lifted. Special Collections was a wing of the museum that no one, and I do mean no one, was allowed to enter without clearance. Even after seven years as curator, I didn’t have access.

  My face must have betrayed my thoughts because Claire said, “It’s fine. You’re with me.”

  “Okay.” I rose from my desk and followed her out the door, locking it behind me.

  The museum is my favorite place in the entire world. Built at the height of the gilded age, it had opulence in abundance with its parquet hardwood floors, ornate wooden paneling, and embossed ceilings.

  Because we were open to the public, one side of the building was devoted to the display and care of the collection. Trained librarians and archivists maintained the books and managed access to the materials. The other side, where my office was tucked into a corner, housed the museum’s professional staff, education, marketing, and special collections.

  As curator, I put together exhibits, such as my extremely popular Jane Austen exhibition back in February. I was also tapped to acquire materials for the museum. My expertise was Ancient Greece and Rome. You have to love a good Heroic Period, am I right?

  “We’ll stop by wardrobe before you leave.” Claire started down the stairs. “You’ll need to be fitted for appropriate dress—”

  “Okay. Wait...what?” I stopped in the middle of the staircase. The steps were shallow and wide making each one a small landing.

  “I’ll explain as we go,” Claire said. “You’ll have to catch the red-eye tonight if you’re going to get there in time.”

  “Get where?” I spread my hands wide in exasperation.

  “Greece,” Claire said. “Sort of.” She started down the stairs again.

  “Sort of?” I hurried after her. “What does that mean? Am I getting dropped in the middle of the Aegean Sea?”

  Claire stopped, turned, and pointed at me with a wink. “You’ll see. For now, I want Miles and Olive to set you up with some survival equipment.”

  On any other day, I would’ve been giddy to finally be allowed in the Special Collections area. From afar, I had pondered this high security department, aching to get inside—yet I was caught on the word survival. What did that mean? Was death a possibility here? Or just injury? Exotic in my mind was more grass hut and beach, not machete and jungle. I would have barraged her with questions, but Claire quickened her pace and even though I’m not short, I had to hustle to keep up.

  Special Collections was in the basement on the museum side of the building. I don’t think I imagined that the temperature dropped twenty degrees as we wound our way down the spiral staircase to the floor below. This area was under Miles Lowenstein’s purview. Miles, tall and thin with tufts of white hair sprouting out of his head was intimidation personified, but his right-hand woman Olive Prendergast was straight-up terrifying.

  The access door was a massive rectangle of reinforced steel with a web of blue lasers running across it. Claire stepped up to a monitor which scanned her face with a creepy green light then she put her thumb on a tiny square built into the wall. A light over the door turned green, the lasers shut off, and I heard the door automatically unlock before it slowly slid open.

  A long circular hallway covered with rectangular white tiles was illuminated by track lights built into the walls and ceiling. The floor was concrete and Claire’s pointy high heels—yes, she wore four-inch spikes because she wasn’t tall enough at five-eleven—clacked as we made our way down the passageway.

  “So, this is Special Collections,” I said. If someone had asked me what I’d expected, I don’t know what I would have answered. This wasn’t it.

  “Charming, huh?” she asked. “They went for subway chic when they designed it.”

  I smiled and tried to convince myself that if Claire could crack jokes maybe it wasn’t so scary down here. I was feeling a wee bit claustrophobic and desperately missing my third-floor office with the view of the Jaqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir and the city beyond.

  The hallway abruptly ended at a second steel door guarded by another web of lasers. Again, Claire scanned her face and pressed her thumb on the small square. The door unlocked and slid open into what could only be described as utter chaos.

  The lower portion of the room was cast in a thick mustard-yellow haze that smelled like dead fish, rotten eggs, and dirty gym socks. I gagged and clapped a hand over my nose and mouth. Unf
azed, Claire pulled the front of her blouse up over her nose and gestured for me to follow her. I stayed close not wanting to lose her in the foul fog.

  “What were you thinking?” Olive Prendergast yelled at Tariq Silver. I could just see their heads above the noxious cloud. “I told you not to read any passages from the book aloud.”

  Olive had all the attributes of a beautiful woman—a heart-shaped face, long thick dark hair, and an excellent figure—but she also had a penetrating soul-sucking stare that unnerved anyone unfortunate enough to be the recipient.

  Tariq was her opposite in every way. With deep brown skin, amber eyes, and a wide warm smile, he was one of my favorite staff members from Special Collections. He was approachable and funny, and I rarely saw him without a book in his large square hands.

  “I was just trying to sound out the word,” Tariq yelled back, his English lightly accented by his Nigerian roots.

  Olive waved a hand at him, indicating that she did not want to hear it. “Just help me figure out how to get rid of it. If this thing takes on a physical form, we are screwed.”

  Tariq looked duly alarmed, and they disappeared into the stinky smog. At any other time, this would be when I’d decide to turn around and come back later, my curiosity about Special Collections appeased.

  But not Claire. Instead, she followed the wall until she reached a door. She knocked three times and it opened to reveal an office.

  “Quickly, please,” Miles ordered from behind a massive steel desk. “There’s no need to let that stench in here, too.”

  “So, you’re aware,” Claire said.

  “Of course,” Miles said. He pushed his reading glasses up onto his head. “That sort of thing happens every time Olive’s collection gets a new addition. Have a seat.”

  Books of Dubious Origin, aka BODO, was Olive’s collection. These were not items that ever made it to the upper floors and the rumors about what sorts of books existed in the collection ran rampant amid the librarians and curators. I’d heard the collection contained everything from ancient grimoires to books made from human skin. Terrifying, I know.

  Miles rose from his chair and gestured to a lounge area with a love seat and two armchairs. Claire chose the love seat and I sat beside her. Yes, I can admit it. I was counting on her to protect me from anything that clawed its way out of that dank yellow mist.

  “Sarah, what do you know about the Aegean Sea?” Miles asked.

  I glanced at Claire in surprise. She nodded and said, “You weren’t wrong when you asked if you’d be dropped into the middle of the Aegean.”

  “Okay.” I turned back to Miles. I felt like a fifth grader doing an oral report for my geography teacher. “It’s an eighty-three-thousand-square-mile bay off the Mediterranean Sea between Greece and Asia Minor. There are more than fourteen-hundred islands, of which Crete is the largest. There is volcanic activity along the south Aegean arc.” I paused. Both Claire and Miles stared at me. Miles waved for me to keep going.

  “Many of the islands are mined for iron and marble. Figs, raisins, and wine are farmed on some of the more fertile islands, but many are barren and rocky with no life.”

  Miles nodded. “Good. You’re well-versed regarding the physical attributes of the area. And, of course, you know its literary significance.”

  “Yes. Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey are the reasons I studied the Classics at university,” I said. I leaned forward with enthusiasm, now we were speaking my language. “The Aegean is the center of it all. It’s where the lost island of Atlantis is supposed to be, and the sea the Greeks sailed to Troy to reclaim Helen of Sparta, who was stolen from her husband King Menelaus by Paris, son of King Priam of Troy, thus kicking off the Trojan War. It’s also the primary location of Odysseus’s very long journey home.”

  Miles looked at Claire and said, “She’ll do.”

  I wasn’t sure if this was faint or high praise, as I had never worked with Miles before. I suspected it was the former, which chafed.

  A shout sounded from the main room behind us and we all paused. Claire turned to Miles. “Should I be concerned?”

  “No, that’s Olive’s happy noise,” he said.

  Claire and I exchanged a glance. It had sounded like a battle cry. If that was happy, I didn’t want to hazard a guess as to what Olive sounded like when she was upset.

  “What’s this all about?” I was anxious to get to the point.

  The door burst open and Olive strode into the room. “Sorry, I’m late. Containment.”

  “Understood,” Miles said.

  Olive focused her dark eyes on me. “Have you told her yet?”

  “We were waiting for you,” Miles said. He gestured to the remaining vacant chair and Olive sat down.

  She didn’t wait for Claire or Miles to invite her to talk, she just started. “Billionaire Elias Sarver has invited one person from our museum to his place on Santorini,” Olive said. “Once there, that person will be sent on a quest.”

  “A quest?” I asked. I was equal parts thrilled—Santorini is one of the most beautiful islands in the Aegean Sea—and terrified. Quests were never good in movies or video games. They always included bad guys trying to kill you, starvation, and very large bugs.

  “Yes.” Olive’s dark gaze seemed to pierce through my body into my very soul, as if assessing whether I was worthy. I sat up straighter. “Sarver has found something that he believes is the key to a much larger discovery about the Trojan War.”

  My heart almost exploded from my chest. I can’t tell you how many hours of my life had been spent speculating if the Trojan War was real, or not. Did Achilles exist? Did Paris really shoot him in the heel, giving us the expression “Achilles’s heel”, which is still used to this day?

  “Is he inviting scholars to verify his proof?” My voice came out higher than normal and I forced myself to take a calming breath.

  “No, he’s inviting scholars from all over the world to find the proof,” Olive said. “Apparently, on one of the uninhabited islands in the Aegean, there is an artifact of some monumental significance but that’s all Sarver will tell us. So, are you in?”

  Chapter Two

  My mouth dropped open. An artifact that proved the Trojan War was real. This was heady stuff. As a person who’d learned Ancient Greek just so I could read The Iliad in its original form, this was...everything.

  “When you say Mr. Sarver is inviting scholars from all over the world, what do you mean?” I asked. “Is this some sort of competition?”

  “That’s exactly what it is,” Miles said. “You will all meet at Sarver’s mansion in Santorini and he will share what he knows. Then you’ll go on your quest to find the proof.”

  My heart beat so hard that it was difficult to breathe. Claire must have sensed my struggle because she reached over and patted my arm.

  “What does the museum get out of sending one of our best and brightest on a possible fool’s errand?” Claire asked Miles.

  Best and brightest? That was nice to hear.

  “Sarver is willing to share the glory,” Miles said. “He isn’t the sort of billionaire who hides artifacts in a vault where only he can see them. He has art and antiquities in famous museums all over the world, including ours.”

  “But he wants ownership of whatever is found?” Claire asked.

  “Part ownership,” Miles said. “For sharing what he knows and for funding the trip, he’s willing to split the spoils.”

  Claire sat back in the love seat and considered the proposal. She glanced at Olive. “If you were going what would you do?”

  Olive’s gaze slid to me. One of her eyebrows had a scar running through it, slicing it in half. I wondered exactly how that had come about, but I was not an idiot. I had no intention of asking.

  “Find the smartest scholar in the group and build an alliance,” Olive said. “When you get close to finding the artifact, cut them loose, grab the treasure, and abandon them to their fate.”

  “Harsh,” I said.

  Olive shrugged. “My inside intel is that there are ten hungry scholars on their way to Sarver’s right now, including you. You’re going to need an ally, so choose wisely.”