One-Off (34 page)

“I’m going to hold you to that, Skye. You can’t keep going like you have been. You’ll burn out. Then I’ll be stuck with some loser director who doesn’t know half the stuff you do.”

I laughed and pointed at the door. She took the cue and left. We still had an hour in the normal work day and I’d be here another two hours after that. I looked sullenly at the calendar on my laptop before deleting the vacation appointment I’d entered after the last one was pushed off. The original trip to Montreal had been canceled and I hadn’t bothered to book a trip anywhere else for next week. Nothing pressing was going on in Montreal. I just liked to explore different places on my vacations. I had yet to repeat a location. Montreal in June sounded wonderful at the time. Now I’d just have to find something good for September.

Forty-Five

Tabitha the Triceratops pushed through the air toward my face. Poppy’s little fist held the dinosaur, making her fly. Tabitha came in for a kiss on my nose and flew off to kiss all of the other stuffed animals. Tabitha Time helped kill a half hour of any babysitting gig. We’d already played Candy Land twice, Go Fish several times, finger-painted more than just the intended paper, and watched the first half of the first episode of Star Wars. Morgan was on a date, the first in more than a year since she’d gotten divorced. I was crossing my fingers that she’d have a nice time.

“Auntie Skye?” Poppy dropped Tabitha on the sofa next to me and climbed up to sit partly on me and partly on the dinosaur. “Are you going to bring Ainsley over again?”

I put my arm around her and tried not to let the lump that formed in my throat at the mere mention of Ainsley show in my voice. “She went back home, honey.”

“But can she come over again? Do you think she’d want to come to show and tell at school?”

“She went back home home, not her visiting home.”

Poppy’s hazel green eyes widened. “Where Merida lives? Far, far away.”

“Yeah, sweetie, far away. But I bet when she comes back to visit next year, she’d love to see you again.”

“Yeah?”

“You betcha, doll face.”

She giggled every time I called her that. “I like the way she talks.”

“I do, too.”

“When is she coming back?”

“Not until next summer, hon.”

“Oh.” She clutched Tabitha to her and laid her head on my chest. “I wanted her to read me a bedtime story again.”

I wanted that for her, too. I wouldn’t mind Ainsley reading me a bedtime story as well. “How about I read you your favorite tonight. I’ll try to do the voices you like.”

“Mm-kay,” she agreed and slid onto the floor like a jellyfish.

I followed and we chose her favorite book. I tucked her in and lay back beside her ready to get as animated as she needed to make the story she’d heard hundreds of times before like new. It took only ten minutes before her eyes closed and she’d dropped into sleep. I kissed her forehead, turned off the light, and made my way back to the living room.

The iPad beckoned from the coffee table. It would be so easy to use it to video chat with Ainsley right now. We’d talked once when she landed back in Scotland to make sure she’d made it safely home. It was awkward and painful, and I regretted that I’d followed her wishes and not gone to the airport to say goodbye again. Not only didn’t I get to send her off but Dallas and Colin seemed disappointed that I wasn’t there. I didn’t tell them why and since I hadn’t been grilled by Dallas, Ainsley hadn’t told them, either.

Other than making me miss her more when nothing could be done about it, I decided to pack away my tablet so I wouldn’t be tempted. It was after midnight her time anyway. I clicked through the television and checked our channel by habit. We were showing a rerun of one of the multitudes of news themed movies that we’d purchased to broadcast. I wasn’t a fan of following this model. We had enough original programming built up that we could rerun our interview shows or the two business revamp shows we produced a few times a week. I clicked over to another channel and found a show I liked. I spent more time watching television than most people I knew. It was part research and part enjoyment. I needed to keep current with all of television, not just newscasts or news stations. I also suspected that people watched a lot more television than they admitted to. At least I gained some professional insight from watching.

Morgan made it home about an hour later. She looked a little worn out and my heart sank. That wasn’t the face of someone who spent the last few hours euphoric about her date.

“Hey,” I said in a low voice. “How’d it go?”

She held up a hand before walking to Poppy’s open door for a quick check. When she came back she replied, “He’s nice.”

“No spark?”

“Not even a dud spark.”

“Damn.”

“It’s probably good that my first date in a hundred years didn’t turn out well. I’m still in the rebound phase.”

My eyebrows rose. It was more than a year since her divorce. I think she passed the rebound stage without experiencing it, but I could understand what she was saying. Any first relationship out of a serious one was almost doomed to fail.

“Don’t ask me. I’ve only had two relationships that lasted longer than a year and neither led to a rebound situation.”

“I’m glad I went out with him. There won’t be a second date, but it was good to get back out there again.”

“Dallas has been trying to set you up for months.” I waggled my eyebrows. “She knows a lot more men than just the ones who come into your store.”

“She did pretty well for herself. I might let her introduce me to someone in a month or two. Not now. One date is enough for now.”

I completely understood. Dating had become such a chore in recent years. It seemed like if you weren’t willing to open up and give away your deep dark secrets within a half hour of meeting someone, she’d consider you guarded and paranoid. If it took you longer than a minute to figure out if you wanted to have sex with her, you were a prude.

“What about you? It’s been a few months since your last date, hasn’t it?”

I looked away so she couldn’t try to read my expression. “Got kinda busy planning the wedding.”

“Understandable. Is there anyone on the horizon?”

My mind immediately went to Ainsley. We hadn’t dated per se, although pretty much every outing we had could be considered a date, and that last night most definitely was a date. I wasn’t anywhere near ready to start dating someone else right now. Not when I couldn’t think about a woman without first thinking of Ainsley.

“Dallas was talking about someone at the gym who was interested. Anything happening there?”

I snorted. Leave it to Dallas to bring up the flirt at the gym. “What Dallas forgot to mention was that thirty seconds after that woman asked me out, Blair made a move and they spent the night together.”

“Yikes, not a good impression to make.”

“That’s what I thought.”

“She wasn’t your type?”

“She was fine. I just wasn’t feeling it.” I shrugged. I hadn’t been feeling anything for anyone before Ainsley came back into my life. I blamed it on the promotion. Too much hard work and drive to think about finding a relationship.

“Not like that sizzle between you and Ainsley.”

My heart thudded to a stop at her name. “What?”

“On the dance floor. I told you that you guys looked hot together. That’s the kind of sizzle I want and you need.”

“Need?” I stalled. I hadn’t thought I’d been that obvious.

“To get you over your marriage blockade.”

I laughed. “It’s not a blockade.”

“It’s more than an aversion.”

“You really believe any marriage longer than ten years is because of deep-rooted love rather than inertia or fear of being alone?”

“I do. Love changes, sure, but not everyone stays together because it’s easier or nothing better is available.”

“I’ll work on that,” I agreed because for the first time in my life I felt something for someone that wasn’t going away any time soon and was stronger and different than I’d felt for anyone else.

“How was the munchkin tonight?”

“An angel.”

Morgan rolled her eyes. “She’s always an angel for you.”

“We’re buddies.”

“How many times did she ask if Ainsley would be coming over?”

I sighed. “Once.”

“She doesn’t quite get the concept of time and distance yet. She’ll probably keep asking.”

“Cute.” I stood taking my cue from her body language. She’d expended a lot of energy being anxious before and during her date.

“Thanks for looking after her tonight.” She walked me to the door. “Maybe we’ll both have better luck with our next dates.”

Not likely for me, but I wished all the best for her.

Forty-Six

A knock sounded on my office door before it opened and Dallas filled the room. That was how I always thought of her entry into any space. She tended to fill every room that she was in, her personality, her beauty, her humor, it was impossible not to notice she was there

“Come in,” I said sarcastically. Tori’s face appeared at the doorway with an apologetic look. Dallas didn’t follow the closed door rules in the office. I waved Tori off as she shut the door for us.

“Floyd is incompetent. Will you come back and be our EP again?” She folded her long frame onto a guest chair in a huff. She’d been asking me this same question since I got my promotion.

“What did he do?” She didn’t usually go far enough to insult Floyd. We both thought he was good enough, so it must be about something he wouldn’t give her.

“I pitched a story on corporate tax breaks and he won’t let me run with it.”

I sat forward sliding my forearms onto the desk. “At all?”

“Okay, he didn’t veto it totally.”

“He’s not letting you go full out, bring a two-camera team, and get the investigators doing background checks,” I guessed.

“Yeah. What’s up with that? You never handcuffed me.”

“I did the exact same thing. Until you produced some evidence that there was a feature story there, you worked on your own.”

“You’re supposed to agree with me.”

“I agree with you.”

“You’re just saying that.” When she caught my expression she smiled. We both knew she just needed to blow off steam. “We did the biggest story of our careers for this network and they’re not letting us follow leads freely. Do you know how many new advertisers our feature story brought in? Not to mention those asswipes using our wedding to beef up ratings on the reruns.”

“Yep.” I was the one who did the contract negotiations with the new advertisers and tried to talk the asswipes out of promoting the wedding.

“Yeah, so you know. Still he won’t let me off the leash.”

“Dallas, you’re the best reporter I’ve ever met.” She sat up straighter, swelling with pride. “When you started the story on the general, did you have more than what you have now?”

“No, but I’m tired of the small time attitude they have around here. You know because you deal with the budget every day. It’s all about money to them.”

I studied her for ten seconds. “You got another offer?”

She glanced at the closed door and leaned forward. “A broadcast network, not this cable setup that counts every penny. We’d get to do so much more.”

My heart thumped and my stomach filled with dread. She was right. A news show on a broadcast network only had to do moderately well to stay on the air because all the other programming would cover it. They wouldn’t be competing with every other news program on the same network for budget money. This was the opportunity every journalist looked for. Getting her own show, running the stories she wanted, those were wonderful achievements, but to have all that and triple the exposure and budget on a broadcast channel? It would be difficult to pass up.

“When were you approached?”

“About two weeks after we got back from our honeymoon. I was going to tell you, but we weren’t really taking it seriously, and you were, I don’t know, kinda out of it.”

Too much was wrong with that sentence I didn’t know where to start. I collected my thoughts before beginning. “It’s not just you they want? Colin, too?”

“Both of us on a new show in our current timeslot.”

“Interesting.” I studied her. She seemed as jazzed as she had when they were chasing their last story. “What does Colin think?”

“He’s been happy here. I’m happy here, but this is an amazing offer.”

“They’re willing to hold on for you both to be free agents?”

Her glance at the door was guilty this time. “I know I’m putting you in a bad situation telling you this, but you’re my best friend and the smartest businessperson I know.” She waited for me to nod, telling her I considered this a personal conversation, not a professional one. “My contract’s up at the December hiatus.”

My eyes widened. I’d forgotten that, when they first started the show, they gave it a twelve week trial. Her long-term contract ran from December to December. I ruffled through my memory and realized, we’d done the same thing with Colin.

“You said you weren’t taking it seriously at first.”

“We love it here, you know that. The network’s been good to us. It brought us together. We love the area and the people—”

“The area?” I cut her off.

“Washington. We’d have to move to New York.”

I blew out a breath. “Well, your housing disagreement would be resolved.”

She snorted. “Just when I got him to agree to stay at my house.”

“Is it the move that’s got you worried?” I didn’t want her to move. As I’d discovered, she was basically one of three friends I had in town. It would be awful to lose her, even if shuttles to New York were frequent. Moments like this wouldn’t happen anymore.

“We’ve already had so much change over the past few months. We’re just getting to solid ground thanks to those therapy sessions that force us to discuss the things we somehow ignored until now. Adding a new job and a new town? It’s like I’m asking for something that will break us up.”

It would be two of the top stressors anyone can go through, but it wasn’t like she was moving to New York and he was staying here. They’d both be going through it together.