by Jo Leigh
“Speak English, Dan,” Eve suggested, clearly trying to keep her temper.
“Meetings in the park, Eve?” he asked, eyebrows rising. “And at your home? Come on.”
“I’ll have my meetings wherever I want. We’re talking business.”
“If I were meeting with Mackenzie Roussos in my apartment, would you say that about me?”
“Yes. And I’d mind my own business, and so should you. Have you got somebody following me, or what?”
“I have sources all over town,” he pointed out. “If one of the tabs happens to call me with a question about Eve Best’s latest arm candy, it’s my job to know.”
“That comment was derogatory to Mitch,” she snapped. “And you have no right to talk to a journalist about me. That’s been our policy from day one.”
“Times have changed,” Dan replied.
Mitch decided it was up to him to step in before one of them said something that couldn’t be taken back. “I think each of our positions is very clear,” he said. “I recommend that we table this discussion. Eve will consider everyone’s offer and let us know what she and her people decide. Isn’t that right?”
He put all the appeal he could into his gaze, begging her not to lose it and back Dan into a corner he couldn’t get out of without loss on both sides.
Eve pushed her sandwich away and got up. “That’s fine. Excuse me, gentlemen. I don’t mean to cut this short, but I have video to screen and a script to prep for Dr. Birdsall tomorrow. I’ll talk to you both later.”
She laid a hand on Mitch’s shoulder, as if trying to communicate to him that she wasn’t angry with him. He saw Dan Phillips register the gesture and frown before she was out the door, leaving it swinging shut behind her.
13
EVE COULD ONLY be grateful that watching the video cut into segments for her by the show’s editor required every ounce of her concentration. The script for their male/female communications show, which she’d been working on this morning, didn’t need much support from her. She’d structured the show so that Dr. Birdsall’s commentary on these video clips would be the highlight.
She was glad that for once, the focus wouldn’t be on her.
Sitting in one of the station’s three editing booths, she and Cole approved the segments they would send to Dr. Birdsall, which had been promised by 8:00 p.m. Try as she might, though, every time the editor finished a clip and saved it into its own file-“Cole, don’t let me forget to follow up and see if Nicole got that stripper housewife booked”-the anger and guilt bubbled up out of the cracks in her concentration.
If she’d been alone, she could have fumed at Dan aloud. But as it was, she had to stuff him in a box in the back of her mind. She’d take him out later and yell at him in private-in her imagination.
Or better yet, she could call Mitch and they’d yell at him together, in absentia. Maybe she’d do that, as soon as she and Cole were finished. Any excuse to hear that voice one more time.
“Four clips, right?” The editor ran the digital counter under the last frame and clicked the mouse. “One for each five minutes?”
“I think so. If we keep them to two minutes each, that gives Dr. Birdsall time for her analysis and me time to elaborate. Plus a minute each for the opening monologue and my close.”
“Have I told you lately how brilliant this idea is?” Cole watched the editor save the four clips up to the production server, where two of their five camera operators would run them at the times Eve had indicated in her script. “It’s something new. I bet that you’ll get a boatload of letters asking that the town halls be moved permanently to Thursday. The chance that an audience member can star in their own segment will be a big draw. Reality TV comes to Atlanta.”
“We’ll see. If the lines get any longer, we’ll have to hire bouncers.”
Cole thanked the editor for his work, and when the kid had made his escape, he opened an e-mail screen. “What’s Dr. Birdsall’s addy?”
She gave it to him, and watched him type a message letting the psychologist know where she could view the clips. When he hit Send, she glanced at the clock. Eight-fifteen. A little late to call Mitch. She’d make it an early night. Lord knew she could use it, after getting next to no sleep the night before.
Had it only been the night before? It seemed a week ago.
“Everything okay with you, Evie?” Cole asked, leaning back in his chair as the e-mail went off into cyberspace. “You seem…preoccupied.”
What a sweetheart he was. He had his own problems with being a single dad, not least among them the fact that he’d had to arrange child care in order to stay here with her tonight. And still he could take the time to show her his concern, the way he had since the earliest days at the station when they’d both been green as beans.
“I am,” she admitted. “I didn’t mean for it to show, though.”
“About the buyout? Or about…other things?”
“Both.”
“I figured so.” He stretched his big frame, making the chair squeak. Not for the first time, Eve wondered what kept him in this industry when he was so much happier bushwhacking around the wilderness or loading his kids and the dog into a canoe in the north woods. “Word in the halls is that Dan’s got his panties in a twist about us choosing CWB.”
“Word in the halls is right. But what’s worse is that SBN and CBS have come back and said that they’ll let us stay in Atlanta, too.”
Cole lifted an eyebrow. “And this doesn’t make us jump for joy because…”
“Because I don’t think they mean it. I think it’s a bait and switch to cut CWB out before any signatures go on paper.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Could be. From what you said, they seemed pretty adamant about New York in the beginning.”
With a sigh, she said, “I have to admit this is getting to me. I thought we had a decision we could all be happy with. Now I have to call another meeting and present the new offer to everyone. And goodness knows how that will go. It’s pretty hard to turn down more money plus staying here if that’s all you see.”
“I think Nicole sees the big picture. And Jane and Zach would, too. But yeah, it’s still a risk.” He paused. “Word in the halls didn’t stop there.”
“Oh?”
He grinned at her. “You have that innocent look perfected. It’s me, remember?”
Someday, some lucky woman would convince this guy that she could be trusted. Eve looked forward to that day.
“I never forget,” she said, smiling back. “Come on, out with it.”
“It’s kind of personal.”
Obviously it was. It had probably gone around the station at the speed of light. “I can handle it.”
“Word is that you and the CWB guy have a thing going on. That being the reason you want to go with them instead of the big guys.”
“Is it, now?” Keeping something on the down low around here was like keeping M &M’s in your desk. It wasn’t a matter of if someone would find them, but when. “Are people saying he’s romancing me to get the deal? Do they know how insulting that is?”
“I don’t know, Eve. It seems too pat that he’d appear out of nowhere like this and sweep you off your feet, just when they need you on their roster.”
“And I’m ripe for the picking, being totally inexperienced where good-looking men are concerned.” Her tone dripped sarcasm, but Cole only reddened slightly. She had to give him credit. He wasn’t ducking and running.
“You know that’s not it. You have a good head on your shoulders-not to mention more knowledge about the subject than any ten women. Besides, God help any guy who hurts you. After you’re done with him, the rest of us will run over his remains with the camera dolly.”
“You think Mitch is going to hurt me? Are you giving me relationship advice, Cole?”
“No, I’m passing on the dirt is all. I thought you’d want to know.”
“Well, if it should come up again, you can let the hallway gossips know that if-and I stress the if- there were anything between me and Mitchell Hayes, it would have occurred after the team agreed to the deal, not before.”
“If?” Again that questioning eyebrow.
“So maybe there might be now. I don’t know.”
“No kidding.” A slow grin, different from the previous one, spread across his face. “Good for you, Evie.”
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” she asked quietly. “What they’re saying.”
“Who cares? If the guy honestly makes you happy and he’s on the up-and-up, it’s nobody’s business. I’d be careful, though. You don’t want to compromise the deal.”
“I’m not giving anyone any ammunition. We don’t see each other very much, and when we do, we keep it private.”
“Except for those lunches in the park.”
“Where we sit at opposite ends of a hard bench and talk. Good grief, are people saying we’re at it like rabbits under a bush?”
He laughed, the sound burying itself in the egg-carton walls of the editing booth, which was part of the recording suite. “I wouldn’t go that far, but there was much interested speculation. Not everyone is suspicious. Some of us are happy for you, Eve. We think you work too much.”
Maybe that was true. “Y’all will be happy to know I’m not working on the weekend, then.”
“Got something fun planned? The girls and I are taking the boat out.”
“I was thinking of Mirabel.” At his puzzled look, she elaborated. “It’s a plantation house south of Social Circle.” She hesitated and then decided to go on. This was, after all, the man she trusted day in and day out with her public self. Why shouldn’t she trust him with a glimpse into her private self? That’s what she planned to do with Mitch, right? “A hundred years ago, my family used to own it.”
Now both eyebrows rose. “You’re from a plantation family? How did I not know this? On what side?”
“My dad’s. Bests farmed Mirabel for something like a hundred years, until my grandpa lost it in the sixties. Couldn’t pay the mortgage or the taxes or something. I don’t really know. I’ve never been there.”
“Why don’t you have Dylan do some research on it? He’s good at that stuff.”
“No.” Eve dropped her gaze to the keyboards behind Cole. “I’d rather keep it just between us, if you don’t mind.” A second too late, she realized what she’d said when he grinned again. “And don’t even think about putting that up on the board as an idea for the show, because the answer is no.”
“Aw, come on. It’s perfect. The hidden history of our favorite celebrity.”
“It’s personal. Never you mind.”
“You’ll let me know if you decide otherwise?” He got up and picked his khaki jacket up off the back of his chair.
“You’ll be the first.” She let him usher her out and walk her back to her office, where he waved and headed down the hall toward the stairs. Cole Crawford never used an elevator if he could help it.
Ha. That would be the day that she made an episode all about her discovery of her family-or not. Mirabel, she’d discovered during a couple of Google searches, was open to the public on the weekends, but nobody lived there now. During the week, one of the charity trusts held events in the drawing room and had an office upstairs. Chances were low she’d discover anything about her ancestors there, but she wanted to check it out anyway.
It was something to share with Mitch. With him, she was discovering all kinds of things about herself. Maybe she’d discover something more if they did this together.
EVE HAD BARELY opened her eyes Saturday morning when the phone next to her bed rang. It had to be Mitch. None of her friends would think of calling before ten o’clock on a weekend unless they were hoping for a ruptured eardrum.
“’Lo?”
“Oh, no, I woke you.” His voice was as deep and dark as corn syrup, and just as sweet.
“No, you didn’t. But not by much.” She yawned, and then caught herself. How rude was that?
But he chuckled. “I’m only sorry I wasn’t there to do it in person. I called both your numbers last night but got no answer.”
“You should have left a message. I wanted to call you, but I got home pretty late.” She stifled another yawn, and stretched instead. “I wondered who those hangups were. Are you coming over?”
“Would you think I was a dork if I said I was parked outside?”
“What?”
Mitch laughed and hung up. With a thrash of her legs, she kicked the sheet off and dashed into the bathroom. A quick swipe of toothpaste was all she had time for before she heard him knock on the door.
Hair! Three licks with the hairbrush made it lie flat, at least, and then she had to answer the door or he’d think she was putting him off.
Naturally, he looked good enough to eat in a pair of soft, faded jeans and a light shirt open over a white T-shirt. His hair was loose and tousled, as though he’d been driving with the windows open.
Sigh. She had no idea where this was going or how long it would last-or even if it could, considering the fact that people were talking already. But she had today-and she’d promised herself she’d enjoy the heck out of it.
“My dream come true.” He stepped inside and slid both hands around her waist.
“Right,” she said. “Lucky for you I had toothpaste handy.”
“Lucky for me all the way around.” He leaned in and explored the sensitive skin under her ear. “You are finally not wearing a bra or some miracle of modern engineering.”
She slept in a tank top and a pair of seersucker drawstring pajama bottoms that were probably wrinkled to a fare-thee-well. But from the heat building in his eyes, Mitch wouldn’t have cared if she slept in chain mail, as long as there wasn’t a bra under it.
With a delicious sense of her own power, she backed out of his reach. “Just let me get dressed.”
“Oh, no, you don’t.” He followed her down the sunny hall, stalking her like a big, casual cat.
“No, really. No Southern lady would ever greet a guest in such dishabille.” She reached her bedroom door and pushed it open with one hand. “I’ll only be a-”
With a growl, he tackled her, and she shrieked with laughter as she landed on her back on her bed. He rolled her on top of him, both his arms around her waist, and she kicked and slid off, landing on her side and wriggling away.
He grabbed her again from behind and this time he pinned her down with one leg thrown over hers. Breathless with laughter, she pretended to struggle as he pushed her hair aside and nuzzled the nape of her neck.
Shivery kisses, she thought with delight as goose bumps prickled on her shoulders. And that wasn’t all. Her skin seemed to come alive in response to the touch of his mouth and her nipples hardened as well.
A sound of satisfaction rumbled in his throat. Looking over her shoulder, he eased his grip on her waist and cupped a breast with one hand. And oh, it felt good to be fondled and shaped like this, as if her body had been waiting for his hands ever since that mad rush out of his hotel room yesterday morning.
He caressed her shoulders and bare arms, and slid his hands down to the hem of her top. With a whisper of fabric, he pulled it over her head and tossed it away. She rolled to face him and did the same with his shirt. “It’ll get wrinkled,” she whispered in explanation as it landed partly on the floor and partly over the arm of the wicker chair next to the window.
“Like I need an excuse to get naked with you.” He toed off his tennis shoes. After he snagged a condom out of the pocket, his jeans followed the shirt through the air to the chair.
She wiggled out of her pj bottoms and then his big body lowered itself to hers. His hips fit into the cradle of her thighs, forcing them apart, before he turned his attention to her breasts. Her eyes slid closed with delight as he stroked pleasure
from her skin with his tongue, swirling and tasting and sucking. Her nipples ached with impatience as he took his time getting there, as though he were saving the best for last.
“So hard for me,” he whispered, his lips hovering an inch away from the aching peaks. “So sexy.”
“Mitch.” She arched her back, but he drew away, teasing. “You know how sensitive I am. Don’t make me wait.”
“I want a promise first.”
There could be only one thing he could torture her for like this. “All right,” she said, her breath coming fast. “No bra today.”
“That’s my girl.” His voice was rich with satisfaction as at last he lowered his mouth and gorged himself on her. She marveled at the delight he took in her body, at the sweet fire he could ignite inside her with only his eyes and his mouth. His tongue swirled over her areolae and the slick abrasion made her moan. When he tugged, she gasped, and when he nibbled, it drove her mad.
Who would have thought that the part of her that gave him the most pleasure would be the part that felt pleasure the most?
This man is made for you.
Oh, no, she couldn’t think that way. She couldn’t think at all, because now he was rolling on the condom and positioning himself between her legs. And she couldn’t wait another second. She was so ready-so wet and soft, her body demanding his.
Eve pulled up her knees to give him easier access and pulled him toward her. “Now,” she gasped. “I need you now.”
In a single stroke, he plunged into her, and she shrieked. Again and again he drove home, his gaze locked on her face and yet turned inward as though his own pleasure were taking over his senses. She slipped her hand between their bodies and touched herself, finding the center of her pleasure and adding the stroking of her fingers to the rhythm of his body.
“Eve-” he choked.
A red explosion of pleasure erupted inside her and she clenched around him like a vise, shuddering and making incoherent little cries. He cried out, too, and found his release as he rocked into her one last time.
