Girls' Guide to Flirting with Danger

by Kimberly Lang

  The call had come earlier than expected, but when Megan had seen the clinic’s number on her phone she’d known it was over. It hadn’t stopped her from hoping, though, that it might work out differently.

  At least Julie had called her last night to give her the heads-up so she hadn’t been blindsided by it. In the time it had taken to do one search on Google, the rosy afterglow of her weekend and her hopeful outlook had been scrubbed away by internet notoriety and its viral nature.

  Dr. Weiss had been calm and measured, never raising her voice as she lectured Megan on professional behavior, privacy issues, the clinic’s reputation and bad decision-making. She’d even allowed Megan a chance to explain, raising Megan’s hopes before shooting them down in flames.

  Then, in that same calm voice, Dr. Weiss had fired her. Megan could come clean out her desk and return her keys after the clinic closed this evening.

  Shell-shocked, she’d sat cross-legged on her bed and stared at the phone for a long while, unable to completely process that her career was, for all intents and purposes, over.

  But now Megan’s pity party was in full swing. Everything she’d worked for was in the toilet, and it wasn’t her fault. So she’d acted a little recklessly and made a bad decision, but this… This was beyond belief.

  Her first response was to blame Devin, but on second thought, this wasn’t his style. Plus, after the weekend they’d just shared, she couldn’t bring herself to believe Devin would callously sow the seeds to destroy her and then crawl into her bed.

  No, this had Kate’s manicured fingers all over it. She had to have some kind of personality disorder to do something like this. She wished there was an official diagnosis of Narcissistic Self-Serving Evil Witch Disorder. Antisocial Personality Disorder just didn’t seem quite strong enough.

  But knowing who to blame didn’t change the situation. She was screwed. No matter how she tried to look at it, there was no way to salvage her career. She’d worked so hard in school, fought tooth and nail to get a good internship and now she was at a dead end. Tears burned her eyes and rolled down her cheeks, but they didn’t offer any catharsis.

  Masochist that she was, she went back to the computer and checked the file on the Now Hear This website. She wouldn’t torture herself by listening to the clip again, but the counter showed another two hundred clicks in the past hour. Dozens more pingbacks from other sites. The speed of the internet was a dangerous force, but at least she could track the downward spiral of her reputation in real time.

  She clicked over to her email to find a message from Devin.

  Tried to call, but you’re still not answering the phone.

  That wasn’t entirely true. She’d seen his number on the caller ID, but she didn’t trust herself to talk to him at the moment. She might not blame him for this mess, but he was still hip-deep in it.

  Still under siege?

  That was one word for it.

  I’ll pick you up after I finish the show. Be thinking about where you want to eat. Oh, and pack a bag. Your place isn’t sturdy enough.

  Either Dev didn’t realize the extent of what that audio clip had done or else he was completely insane. Either way, she didn’t plan on leaving the house tonight. She’d go pack up her office as directed, but then she was going back under the covers for a good long wallow in her misery.

  Megan debated what to tell Devin. She decided the easiest way out was avoidance. If she confronted him, she’d break down; everything was just too raw right now. Maybe tomorrow she’d feel up to it.

  Dev—

  Not tonight. Maybe we can talk tomorrow.

  M

  Megan’s short, uninformative email left Devin confused, but since it hadn’t arrived until he was about to go on the air, he couldn’t follow up. Was she sick?

  His intro was playing and he had about four seconds—not enough time to send her an email. He was still planning to go to her place straight from here tonight, and he’d get some answers then, but he’d be left wondering for the next two hours.

  He plugged the book, discussed a couple of the celebrity divorce cases making the news, chatted with Kate about upcoming appearances and special guests, but he couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling something wasn’t right with Megan.

  But the listener queue was growing, and Kate was connecting his first caller. He needed to get his mind back on what he was doing.

  Thankfully, none of the first few callers had complicated or sticky problems. Devin could fall back on stock answers, recited from memory. Oddly, the question he’d been expecting didn’t come until just before the first break.

  “So where’s Dr. Megan tonight?”

  “Living her life, saving marriages, that kind of thing.” He tried to sound friendly and casual about it. “She might come back and visit at a later date, but this isn’t exactly her area of expertise.” He laughed. “Or interest, for that matter. What can I help you with?”

  “My ex-wife is about as psycho as yours, but my ex has no problem pulling out the crazy in public.”

  Psycho?

  “So what I want to know is how you manage to keep that crazy under control in front of other people. I don’t care what she says to me, but I’m tired of having an audience. You two were fine on the show last week, so how’d you get her to act normal?”

  This wasn’t the question he’d been expecting. He looked at Kate for confirmation this caller was off his rocker. Her shrug and grin set alarm bells ringing.

  He chose his words carefully. “If your ex is truly mentally ill—”

  “No, just bitchy like yours.”

  “Excuse me?”

  The caller laughed. “Dude, we all heard the clip. I give you major props for keeping your cool the way you did, ’cause damn—”

  Devin was missing a piece of the puzzle, but thanks to the caller, he now had a clue where to find it. He disconnected the call. “Caller? You there? Kate? We seem to be having some technical difficulties. I’ve lost the caller.”

  Kate looked at her board. “I’m not sure what happened….” She looked up, saw his signal and nodded in understanding. “Sorry, folks, something’s weird here. We’re going to go to break while I sort it out.”

  While Kate scrambled, Devin was already typing in the URL to the website where Kate uploaded what she called his “greatest hits”—the craziest or funniest or most ridiculous calls. It didn’t take him long to see which clip was getting the most traffic: “Behind the Scenes with Devin and Dr. Megan.” The counter showed thousands of listens, and the comment tail…

  “Okay, we went to tape.” Kate’s voice came through the studio’s speakers. “What’s going on?”

  His anger was simmering already, so he ignored her as he clicked play. Ten seconds later he understood the caller’s words. Ten seconds after that, he knew why Megan wasn’t in the mood for dinner.

  And the clip was five and a half minutes long. His blood was boiling by the one-minute mark.

  Kate was lucky she was on the other side of the glass and not where he could get his hands on her immediately. She might have killed the live feed on their mics the other night, but the ratings-chasing bitch had kept the recording going. With a little splicing and dicing, Kate had turned his and Megan’s private, off-air discussions into a juicy sound clip, totally distorting what actually happened. Thanks to Kate’s editing, Megan did sound a bit like a psycho.

  “Take it down.” Kate opened her mouth to argue, but he wasn’t interested. “Take it down now.”

  She pressed her lips into a thin line, but turned to her computer. A few seconds later she nodded, and when he refreshed the page, the clip was gone.

  “It’s still out there, you know. The internet never forgets.”

  “Then you’d better get busy on some kind of retraction or apology.”

  “Devin,” she argued through the glass separating them, “it’s been the number-one clip on Now Hear This since Saturday morning. It’s viral and people can’t get enough of it—or y
ou. The hits to your site have gone through the roof. Your book is number one on Amazon today.”

  Kate’s blindness to anything that couldn’t be ranked, rated or re-tweeted had never been so clear. Or so dangerous. She might not care about people, but she definitely cared about her job. He targeted his comment to that care. “Are you trying to get us sued?”

  Kate shrugged. “Megan has no grounds to sue us for anything. She agreed to be on the show. She agreed to be taped and possibly used for promotional purposes.”

  “She didn’t agree to have you edit her words into something damaging to her reputation, though. Somewhere there’s an attorney trying to get her to sue even as we speak.”

  “Good! Let her sue. The added publicity—”

  He leaned close to the microphone and spoke carefully. “You’re fired.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  “We’re in the middle of a show, Devin.”

  “I’ll handle it.”

  Kate turned mutinous, crossing her arms over her chest. “I work for this station, not you. You can’t fire me.”

  “Exactly who do you think this station values more? Me or the person who answers my phone?”

  That statement hit home and Kate turned an unflattering shade of angry red. “You son of a…” Her eyes narrowed. “I made this show a hit, you know.”

  “Then you won’t have any problem finding someone else to work for. But you no longer work on my show.”

  Kate tossed her headphones on the desk as Devin opened the door between the booths. “Go to hell, Devin Kenney.”

  She flounced out the door past him, leaving a trail of expensive perfume in her wake. He had no doubt he’d hear from the studio’s Powers That Be in the morning, pleading her case.

  He’d produce his own damn show before he had her back in the booth again.

  Speaking of, his show was currently running on tape and the listeners had to be confused.

  Sliding into Kate’s chair, he paused the tape and pulled the mic close. “Sorry, folks, but we’re having major technical difficulties this evening. Must be the full moon or something. Apologies to everyone on hold and out there listening, but we’re going to have to rely on some old favorites for the rest of tonight’s show.”

  Oh, he’d be hearing about this tomorrow, too, but right now he had bigger tigers to tame.

  Down the hall he found one of the sound techs messing with some ad spots. “Do you know how to run a board?”

  The young man nodded.

  “Good. Babysit my show, will you?”

  Devin waited only long enough for the shocked tech to nod again before he continued on. With Cover Your Assets covered, he dialed Manny’s number as he waited for the elevator.

  “Devin! Great show tonight. You were fab, as always….”

  Manny’s butt-kissing grated his last nerve. “The show is still on, you jackass. Why didn’t you tell me Kate had posted some hatchet-job clip on the web?”

  “Because you told me not to call you until noon today, and by then it was old news.” Manny’s sniff said he wasn’t over that insult. “But the good news is that your book has jumped to number one on Amazon.”

  Damn. What kind of idiots had he surrounded himself with? “You’d better come up with a stellar form of damage control for this.”

  “Devin, you have nothing to worry—”

  “For Megan, you fool. Could you think beyond your fifteen percent for just a minute?” The elevator started its descent to the parking garage. “You and Kate have the ethical standards of mob bosses.”

  “Kate and I only want to do what’s best for you and your career. And look! You’re the hottest thing right now.”

  “And Kate is looking for a new job.” He waited for Manny to connect the dots to the precarious position he was in at the moment.

  “Look, I know you and Megan are revisiting your younger years, and you’re feeling all nostalgic and lovey-dovey after your weekend…”

  How does Manny know where I’d spent the weekend? Damn tabloids.

  “But, Devin, you have a public image to uphold. A persona you’ve created that you have to honor for your fan base.”

  “I’m an attorney. My public image can’t be ‘screw everyone over.’ Do you even know what the term ethical means?”

  “Your fans don’t see you as an attorney.”

  “Then you definitely have some major work ahead of you fixing that situation.” Manny started to sputter something again, and Devin cut him off. The elevator doors opened, and Devin was nearly at his car. “We will talk tomorrow about future plans for my career and public image. In the meantime, you need to get busy with your spin machine and generate some pushback.”

  Not waiting for Manny’s agreement, Devin hung up and cranked the engine. He looked at his phone, then tossed it in the passenger seat. No sense calling Megan now; she wouldn’t answer and he’d be there in a few minutes anyway.

  He’d lost control over a large part of his life without realizing it, and this was his wake-up call.

  CHAPTER NINE

  AS DEVIN PARKED IN front of Megan’s apartment, a feeling of dread settled in his stomach. At least a dozen photographers had set up camp in front of Megan’s—drawing an interested crowd of neighbors to gawk at the circus. They converged on him before the car came to a complete stop, turning the short trip up to her building into a gauntlet of shouted questions and flashbulbs.

  He didn’t doubt the crowd had a lot to do with Megan’s earlier message. His fault or not, there was a very good chance Megan blamed him for this latest fiasco. If she’d been trying to become the most infamous ex in Chicago, his people couldn’t have done a better job achieving it for her. No wonder she didn’t want to see him tonight. Had she been dealing with this all day?

  He knocked on the door, calling her name so she’d know it was him and not another tabloid looking for a story. Then he held his breath. Moment-of-truth time. Would she even open the door? If she didn’t, they’d both be fodder for the tabloids tomorrow.

  Megan opened the door, but she didn’t look overly happy to see him. She was pale, with dark half-moons under her eyes as if she hadn’t slept last night, and he knew Kate—and by extension, he, too—was to blame. “Dev, I—”

  “Kate’s evil. I had no idea what she’d done until half an hour ago.”

  “I believe you.” She sounded sincere, but she didn’t open the door wider and invite him in.

  “I fired her.” Megan’s eyebrows rose in shock. “And I have Manny at work on damage control even as we speak. I’m sorry about this.”

  Megan nodded, accepting his apology, and her lips pressed into a line as she seemed to weigh it against the damage already done.

  “You have to let me in. Otherwise we’ll be on every gossip blog in minutes.”

  “You think we won’t be anyway?” She sounded disgusted, but she stepped back and held the door open for him.

  First major hurdle cleared. But Megan kept plenty of distance between them as she closed the door and crossed to the couch on the other side of the room. Changing her mind, she took the chair instead, presumably to keep him from joining her on the couch. So, the cold barrier circling Megan like a razor-wire fence will be my next challenge. Before he could decide how to approach her, though, he noticed the four boxes next to the door. Boxes that hadn’t been there yesterday when he left. That didn’t bode well. “What’s all this? Still planning that trip to Canada?” he joked.

  Megan’s humorless laugh chilled him. “I wish. Those would be the contents of my office. Kate isn’t the only one who lost her job today over this.”

  What? “You got fired?”

  She braced her elbow on the arm of the chair and propped her chin on it. “You sound surprised.”

  “Well, yeah. Some stupid audio clip makes the internet rounds and you lose your job?” He claimed the corner of the couch closest to her chair. “That’s insane.” But it did explain much more about her attitu
de and the pinched look around her eyes.

  “No, that’s what happens when you work in a profession where discretion is paramount and reputation is everything. My lack of the first has destroyed the second.” The even cadence and tinge of sarcasm made him think that might have been a direct quote from her boss.

  “The clip has been removed.”

  She nodded. “I appreciate that, but the damage is done.”

  “So you get another job, start rebuilding your reputation….” He trailed off as Megan shook her head. “Why not?”

  “I guess I didn’t explain this clearly the other night. Internships are really hard to come by. Good ones are even more competitive.” She leaned back with a sigh as she continued. “Internships paying a decent wage are few and far between, and unless I want to starve and default on my student loans, I’m not in a position where I could work at one of the nonpaying ones, even if there was one available. There’s no place for me to go to rebuild my reputation.” She snorted. “Not that it matters now.”

  Megan had to be overreacting—nothing was unfixable—but considering the day she’d had, he wouldn’t call her on it now. “Why?”

  “Dr. Weiss isn’t the only one concerned with the reputation of her clinic. No reputable therapist is going to hire an intern who’s been outed on the internet with borderline personality disorder.”

  “But you don’t. That was all Kate, and she’s going to admit it in public.”

  “Yeah, well, a retraction won’t spread nearly as wide or as quickly, and it will still sound fishy to anyone hiring.” She sighed. “And even if I could find someone to hire me and let me finish my hours, the state licensing board isn’t going to be impressed. They do background checks, you know. This mess has brought everything—my abilities, my education, my ethics, even my mental stability—into question. Even if they could look past the fact I was fired from an internship, do you think the state is going to grant a license to the infamous and possibly crazy Dr. Megan?”