Boss Girl

Boss Girl Nic Tatano ~Sydney Hack is the single, thirtysomething VP of news for a failing network… and she also has a taste for younger men.She soon realizes a whole lot of over-thirty female viewers do as well, so she sets out to give these women what they want; a chiseled, trophy buck in his twenties sitting on the anchor desk next to a woman…Just.Like.Them.With nothing to lose she does the unthinkable; along with three female managers who happen to be her best friends she brings out the casting couch and turns it into a sleeper sofa. Doesn't matter that the men have no television experience. As long as they look good. And there’s a hint of romance in every newscast.Ratings skyrocket as a result, but Sydney and her female cohorts discover something else along the way…True love is not always age appropriate. Boss Girl Nic Tatano A division of HarperCollinsPublishers www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk) Contents Nic Tatano (#u86a7c0f6-76a1-516a-88de-e0294d491514) Dedication (#u341defe3-ed38-51a8-b2ac-9fc00eb9a252) CHAPTER ONE (#ue3138066-1d7e-59ee-99e2-29b77b87596f) CHAPTER TWO (#ub283cb5a-6e06-528e-b119-eaabc46f97a4) CHAPTER THREE (#u1be856c8-6c8e-5b20-b466-14eb1c9bc90e) CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER NINETEEN (#litres_trial_promo) CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo) EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo) It Girl (#litres_trial_promo) About HarperImpulse (#litres_trial_promo) Copyright (#litres_trial_promo) About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo) Nic Tatano (#u2e8e3d97-6683-50b1-9e76-7312739992b9) I've always been a writer of some sort, having spent my career working as a reporter, anchor or producer in television news. Fiction is a lot more fun, since you don't have to deal with those pesky things known as facts. I grew up in the New York City metropolitan area and now live on the Gulf Coast where I will never shovel snow again. I'm happily married to a math teacher and we share our wonderful home with our tortoiseshell tabby cat, Gypsy. For Myra, my love and source of inspiration. CHAPTER ONE (#u2e8e3d97-6683-50b1-9e76-7312739992b9) I used to think I was Eve in a previous life. But then again, if that were true, I would have made the serpent eat the apple. Doesn't really matter. These days, no Adam stands a chance against me. Because I'm the new keeper of the Garden of Eden. Right now it's known as a television news network. I, Sydney Hack, a/k/a Neutron Syd, (Okay, okay, so I've fired a few people) have been running it for a year and a half. I'm the Boss Girl. And the ratings have not budged one inch with news anchored by the pageant fembots (those beauty queen androids.) If they don't move in six months, I'm out of a job. That scraping sound you hear? Someone upstairs sharpening the guillotine. Sydney Hack, white courtesy phone, please. Your career is calling. Time for a pre-emptive strike. So I'm changing the rules tonight. I'm going to start giving our target demographic, women over thirty, what they really want. And what they want on their "to-do" list is on his way from the front door. He struts, as if in slow motion, a chiseled six-foot-two trophy buck with tousled black hair and a chin that could carve granite. I cross my legs and playfully rock a Kelly green four-inch heel on my toe and smile, calling my dimples and high cheekbones into service as he makes his way through the crowded, dimly-lit restaurant. The brass rails and colorful Tiffany lamps are suddenly painted in sepia tones as his powder blue eyes stand out like they were surrounded by black velvet. His five o'clock shadow is a light brushstroke of virility. Members of my target demographic drool, posture dramatically improves as c-cups raise their hands for attention, and forks are suspended in mid-air over cr?me br?l?e as he passes. I can see it in their eyes as they note my bar stool is his destination. He's ten years younger than her. Why not me? And I know he's the key to the ratings. Damn, it's so simple. Robbing the cradle. Age inappropriate. Cougar newscast. Or call it whatever. Older woman, younger man. I shove my long copper tangles back behind one ear, widen the eyes that have been dipped in the Caribbean (thanks to the kind folks at Eye-World, with several convenient locations to serve you) and stand to greet him, my heels taking my five-ten slender frame up to his level. I'm the long-stemmed Red Queen of the Garden. Scott Harry extended his hand. "Good to see you again, Ms. Hack." His deep, smooth voice flowed, the edges of the words smoothed over as they segued into one another. "Sydney, please," I said, sliding back onto the stool. "Our table won't be ready for a half-hour. Would you like a drink?" "Never drink on a job interview," he said, smiling, dimples to match mine, then hopping up onto a bar stool. He leaned toward me, and the faint scent of his Polo cologne followed. "The interview was this afternoon," I said. "This is the negotiation." He tried to hold back a smile, but couldn't. The twenty-nine-year-old Ken-Doll didn't have a poker face. "So, you're making me an offer?" "Well, I'm still considering two other candidates." I paused, watched the color drain from his face as if I had pulled a plug. Gotcha. I ran my eyes up and down his body. "But I like what I see." I turned my attention to my glass of bourbon and took a sip. "Your agent tells me you've been looking for an anchor gig for a while." "The job market's tough." "Well, to be brutally honest, your reporting skills aren't the best." His head dropped. Okay, he's ready to swallow the hook. "But you're a decent enough anchor for our purposes." The head raised up, a hint of hope crept back into those powder blues. I downed the rest of the drink in one gulp and checked my watch. "Tell you what, Scott. I don't feel like waiting here thirty minutes for dinner, and the service is slow anyway. I'm thinking room service." He furrowed his brow. "Huh?" I reached into my beaded bag, pulled out a Montblanc pen, and grabbed a cocktail napkin from the stack on the bar. "Tell you what, if you want to continue our negotiations, here's my room number at The Plaza." I wrote 1634 on the napkin and slid it over to him. "If not, well, I'm sure you'll have a nice career in Indianapolis." His face remained a twisted puzzle. "Ms. Hack… are you—" Geez, the man needs a road map. But, if the other head works and he can read a teleprompter, I'm good to go. I slid my toe inside one cuff of his slacks, gently running it up his shin. "If you want the job, just bring yourself to my room. I need to check your… references." I hopped off the barstool, smoothed my short green halter dress and headed out, zigzagging through the tables. Watching my target demographic look at me like I was nuts. I had them. And I was pretty sure I had him. Two hours later, his references checked out. * * * As an attractive 38-year-old woman, I didn't need focus groups or expensive research to know what women want in a newscast. They sure as hell don't want a blonde pageant fembot who is prettier than they are. And they don't want to feel past their prime. So here's a newsflash for the next generation. I'm giving them news delivered by a woman who is one of them. Middle-aged, smart, experienced, attractive. And for dessert on this news buffet, male eye candy. But not just any confection. They want a late twenty-something with a body so hard you could give him an hour-long massage and a bottle of wine and still bounce quarters off his ass. A guy with a chiseled face and a smile that can melt a heart. Eyes that can look through the camera and caress a soul. Buffed shoulders that could easily carry you into the bedroom. And they want that sitting on the anchor desk next to a woman… Just. Like. Them. They want to know a woman on the back nine still has a chance against the fembots. Yes, we're still interested in sex. We're mature, not crypt keepers. Our drivers’ licenses may say we're over thirty, but the libido is still in high school. For years, male news executives had their casting couch. Now it's our turn. And when you've got an anchor in your stable like Scott Harry, well, membership has its, uh… privileges. Weekly. * * * The female-owned network that hired me as Vice-President of the News Division gave me carte blanche my first day, but thanks to the incredible ratings spike provided by Scott Harry in his first month, I've been upgraded to platinum. The powers that be want me to take the woman-on-top co-anchor theme national, opening chapters in our other three affiliates in Los Angeles, Chicago, and Dallas. (They don't know about my current "benefits package" regarding reference checking, and as long as the ratings stay up, they won't care.) Thank goodness I was smart enough to hire women as News Directors for those stations. All between 35 and 40. All intelligent, attractive and single. May as well give you a line-up card as I lead the gals who will change the face of the news business into our conference room, for those of you scoring at home. And if you're not, you should be. (If there were a drummer in my office, I would call for a rim shot after that one.) "Tawk to me, Syd," said Rica, coffee-with-a-little-cream eyes searching my face for more information and somehow getting female-only telemetry that I'd gotten an infusion of Y-chromosomes the night before. "Did'ja have a pahty afta woik?" she asks, in an accent so sharp it makes fingernails on the blackboard sound like classical music. One perfectly plucked eyebrow goes up like an extra question mark. The girl does love details. If a pastrami sandwich could talk, it would sound like Rica Carbone, who is the youngest at thirty-five and runs the chapter on the left coast. This petite, raven-haired Brooklyn paisan could slice Tony Soprano in two with her death stare, and has enough confidence in her body that she once marched up to a jukebox and played Brickhouse. Every man in the bar thought the lyrics fit perfectly as she strutted back to the table smiling like she not only ate the canary, but the canary thanked her for it on the way down. Everything on this woman's Pilates-whipped body points east and west without any Lycra scaffolding, with no indication of various parts heading south anytime soon. All that and she's a brilliant journalist to boot. "Yeah, she's got someone new," said Jillian, using one hand to curl the ends of her straight, strawberry blonde, chin-length cut in towards her face. "Her skirt's on backwards." I snapped my neck down to check. "Made you look," said Jillian. "At least that answers the question." Damned reporter's tricks. You'd think I'd know better. Trust fund debutante Jillian Charles is the black sheep of her family. Because she actually has a job. With no desire to pitch Krugerrands with her Massachusetts Ivy League neighbors, Jillian actually went to a state school (such a scandal in the gated community!) and likes getting her hands dirty. She's an inch shorter than I am, but all legs and none of it fat. I think her age (thirty-seven) matches her inseam; meanwhile, not a wrinkle on her gently freckled face and no Botox receipts on her tax return. Beneath those soft blue eyes lurks an executioner who enjoys the sight of heads tumbling down the steps of the Mayan temple, which is a handy trait to have in a Chicago News Director. "So, c'mon Syd. Y'all don't keep us waitin'. Dish." The whiskey two-packs-a-day Southern accent you just heard comes from Neely "Vodka" Collins, the former hard-boiled reporter from New Orleans who doesn't smoke but believes that Russian alcohol is to a liquor cabinet what WD-40 is to a toolbox. If you run out of either, you'll get rusty and won't be able to screw anything. She looks like Demi Moore, sounds like Demi Moore if Demi Moore had been cast in Gone with the Wind, and therefore logic dictates that she hangs out with younger men like Demi Moore while running our station in Dallas. Neely first went against the grain in the eighth grade, shoving a sixth grader into a coat closet and giving him a free tonsillectomy. Her long, dark hair and innocent emerald eyes might lead a guy to think she's the girl next door, but there's nothing but lust embedded in her vocal chords. Like a good Irish Catholic she goes to confession every week, the old-fashioned way, in a booth, and must take a legal pad with her. I can only imagine her saying, "Bless me… Father… for I have… sinned," giving sinned three syllables with that scratchy drawl and having some priest on the other side breaking into a sweat while she enjoys torturing one of the few men in the state of Texas who can't load his gun. "I've got good news. Take a seat," I said, as I grabbed the burgundy leather chair at the head of the long, mahogany table. Floor to ceiling windows on an entire wall turned the room into a greenhouse, which had the air conditioning blowing full blast. The gals sat down, all away from the sunny side of the room, backs toward the dark green wall that was covered with colorful posters of network shows. I grabbed a remote, swung my chair around, and fired it at the flat-screen monitor that hung on the wall behind me. "We want details about last night, not more newscast airchecks," said Jillian. "You're getting both," I said. The picture cleared and the face of Scott Harry filled the fifty-inch plasma screen. "Hot damn," said Neely, though damn came out "day-umm." "Damn hot," said Jillian. "Fuhgeddaboudit," said Rica. (Which, depending on your interpretation of the term, can mean either hot damn or damn hot in Brooklynese.) The video cut to a two-shot as Scott shared the desk with Caroline Jensen, a veteran brunette anchor in her early forties with laser beam ice-blue eyes. "This is what's getting you a ratings spike?" asked Jillian. "Madonne," said Rica. "I don't think I've ever seen a major market anchor team where the man is that much younger than the woman," said Neely. "How do the demos break out?" "They're a hit with women 18-34," I said. "And 34-49 is off the charts. Check out our sweeps series on beach safety." I flicked the remote and the video cut to a shot of Scott Harry walking on the Jersey Shore in a bathing suit, talking about the importance of sunscreen. "You don't need sunscreen if he's providing the shade," said Jillian. The other two still had their jaws hanging open like the mouth-breathing shoppers at Wal-Mart, as the shot tightened up for a high-def look at Scott's pecs. "Are the guys watchin'?" asked Rica. "Not that it really matters." "Incredibly, they're holding steady," I said. "They apparently don't miss the pageant fembots. And considering our network's prime-time lineup, it's nice to see people switching over to catch our news product." "Yeah. Trailer Park True Confessions isn't exactly a great lead-in," said Jillian, cocking her head toward a poster that featured a rusted Camaro and a cheap blonde woman whose roots had been dyed brown. "Enough with the ratings," said Neely, who was staring holes in the monitor. "Just how did you manage to hire this young buck for our fledgling network?" I muted the sound and turned back to them. "His agent told me he couldn't get arrested by the big networks and he'd do anything to get to New York. So I appealed to his sense of ambition. Then I checked his… references." Jillian cocked her head to the side. "Syd, are you saying—" "That's part of my new hiring manual," I said. "What made you pair him with Caroline Jensen?" asked Neely. "Do you want to watch women who are younger and prettier?" I asked. "If you could find women who are younger and prettier than us, no," said Neely, sticking her nose in the air. "And what do women our age want?" I asked. Slowly, all three began to nod. "So, this is our new playbook?" asked Jillian. "Find our own versions of Scott Harry and partner them with a competent middle-aged woman?" "Exactly. Your guys don't ever have to report, just read. I don't care if you find them at a modeling agency. Hey, the men have been hiring that way for years. If I had a nickel for every beauty queen anchoring on local television I'd be rich. And there are plenty of talented women out there who have been put out to pasture by the old boys club." "Do we get the same… benefits package… as you?" asked Neely, playfully batting her eyes. "I mean, do we get to check… references… during our job search?" "Of course," I said. "You don't want your audience buying a product you haven't tried yourself, do you?" * * * Nine months later our network, Consolidated Broadcasting, had raised several eyebrows in the industry. The four top affiliates of a network best known by its programming for the sophistication challenged (a politically correct television term for rednecks) were showing remarkable ratings growth in local news. Jillian had turned the Windy City on its ear with her hire (after what she calls an exhaustive search) of twenty-eight-year-old J. T. Farrell, a sandy-haired, blue-eyed anchor from East Deliverance, Arkansas who had put himself through college as a male stripper. When pictures of Farrell wearing nothing but a collar and cuffs were leaked to a local tabloid (amazing how that happens, huh?), photos of his perfect six-foot physique (with a discreetly added black bar) were splashed under the headline Chicago Bare. Overnight ratings jumped twenty percent that day, while "Farrell nude" became the top Google search in the metro area. Jillian paired Farrell with forty-one-year-old Jennifer Lorton, a spunky brunette with devilish green eyes framed by a few character lines. Lorton had been out of the business for three years but got with the program real quick, knocking out a three-part series titled "Sex in a Flash" that featured three local forty-something women and their trophy bucks while discussing the effects of hot flashes on the libido. As a reward, Jillian threw Lorton a bone (sorry, bad choice of words, but accurate) by delegating the reference checking duties of the current search for a weekend anchor. I'd really thought Rica would have the hardest problem, Southern California being obsessed with youth and all. But the real Silicon Valley surprised me. Since Angelinos are used to such hard-hitting journalistic fare as "Smiling Naturally White Using Botox" and "Regaining Your Balance After Large Implants", one would think they'd have little use for a female anchor who actually qualified for a ten-year high school reunion. But apparently Hollywood's aging actresses (those over twenty-nine who found roles hard to come by) saw the debut of Rica's new anchor team as a watershed moment. Rica found a Meg Ryan lookalike named Carolyn Baynard, who is in her mid-forties but remarkably well preserved. She's also the master of the double entendre ad-lib, which, when directed toward her co-anchor, sends a clear message to the viewer that the man sitting next to Carolyn is her catch of the day. (The other part of the subliminal message is, "Honey, this could be you.") Carolyn's co-anchor arrived with a built-in promotional campaign. Rica bypassed the viewing of resume tapes and those pesky journalism requirements, Los Angeles being what it is, went directly to an advertising agency and tabbed well-known underwear pitchman Dirk Anderson. Southern Californians couldn't go a mile without seeing a billboard that featured his ripped abs being caressed by tighty-whiteys that left nothing to the imagination. Thirty-year-old Dirk had amazing chemistry with his co-anchor, and the two were an immediate hit. On one occasion Carolyn said, "Dirk Anderson is on assignment tonight," paused, raised one eyebrow, and had every woman in LA wondering if the guy was under the anchor desk. His five-part series, "Boxers or Briefs" was simply a no-brainer. But teaching Carolyn how to shop for men's underwear using a tape measure and a balloon was a stroke of genius. Rica, of course, said his references were perfect, and that he made the gum fall out of her mouth when she had an orgasm. (I'm still not too clear on Brooklyn sex metaphors, but she smiles when she says it.) Neely took a page out of Rica's book, but reversed things a bit, since Texas is, after all, the beauty pageant capital of the world, as well as the setting for weird cheerleader crimes. For her female anchor she chose former NFL cheerleader Dawn Mullaney, a sultry brunette Texan in her early forties who had retained a body that still cried out for hot pants, boots and a halter top. So Neely got them for her, then sent her to try out for a cheerleading squad with women half her age. Her dance moves had every cowboy wondering if the hitching post outside the barn would be better served standing vertically in the bedroom. Since Texans like things bigger, Neely reached down into a tiny market and came up with Iowa sportscaster Nick Hallinger, a twenty-nine-year-old former linebacker who had blown out his knee during his rookie year with the New York Giants. At six-foot-five and 240 pounds, Hallinger looked as though he could bench-press Toyotas, but his kind blue eyes and wavy dark hair led you to believe he'd save a stray kitten. Then Neely took things a step further, deciding to ditch the traditional anchor desk and have both anchors stand during the entire newscast. Dawn barely came up to Nick's shoulder, and between his impressive stature and her killer legs, they looked like the top of a wedding cake. Dawn made it a habit to always sign off first at the end of the newscast, then turn and look up longingly at her co-anchor who told viewers, "Have a great night," before looking down and smiling at Dawn. As always, a local tabloid managed to dig up pictures of Dawn on a cheerleader swimsuit calendar and Hallinger during a bare-chested weigh-in from a bowl game (there are those damned leaks again!). Under the headline Rah-Rah and Ga-Ga,the photo splash made the anchor team hotter in Dallas than jalapenos. So at this point you're probably thinking, "Hey, Syd saved her job with great ratings and women over thirty all over the country are rethinking their sex lives." And you'd be right. But given enough ointment, there's always a damned fly. It's Scott Harry, the trophy buck who helped save our New York affiliate. He's in love. And you won't believe who the object of his affections is. * * * "He's in love? With you?" asked Jillian. I bit my lower lip and nodded slowly. The endless sound of slot machines provided audio wallpaper as I turned my attention back to the casino buffet breakfast. I shoveled a forkful of pancakes soaked with syrup into my mouth and savored the rush of the sugary sponge. The conversation stopped, I looked up, and saw three women who had stopped eating begging me for more details with their eyes. "You can't just drop news like that and go back to your breakfast," said Neely. "Details," said Rica. "Now." I swallowed, took a sip of water, and looked around to make sure we were out of earshot. Sin City was crawling with television executives for the annual convention, and news like this sure wouldn't stay in Vegas. Two huge old women with fanny packs, who had bathed in Jean Nat?, occupied the nearest table and were totally focused on their food, shoveling it in so fast that sparks were probably imminent from their knives and forks, so I figured we were safe. "Okay," I said, lowering my voice a bit. They all leaned forward. "Last week he shows up at the hotel room after the Friday late newscast, just like always. Only this time he's got a dozen roses." "Sounds like a real gentleman," said Neely. "He also had a ring," I said. "Oh, shit," said Rica. "An engagement ring?" I nodded. "What did you do?" asked Jillian. "Well," I said, "let's just say that after I told him our working relationship was just that, he would have needed a tub of Viagra and a forklift." "He really believes that you're romantically interested in him?" asked Jillian. "Scott Harry is not exactly Stephen Hawking," I said. "One day I was talking about how you remember where you were on important days in history, like on 9/11 or the day Kennedy was shot. And he says, ‘Ted Kennedy got shot?'" "Good God, what a complete moron," said Neely, who then added the Southern disclaimer. "Bless his little heart." "What exactly does that mean anyway?" asked Rica, turning to face her. "What?" asked Neely. "The bless his little heart thing," said Rica. "You always say that." "It's considered impolite in the South to say something bad about someone else," said Neely, "so you just add bless his little heart at the end and it cancels out the insult. Why, how would you say it?" "He's a friggin' idiot," said Rica, just before taking a bite of a bagel. Jillian started frantically waving her hands. "Can you two stop with the North and South stuff? We're dealing with some serious shit here. Syd's eaten two plates of pancakes because she's not getting any Y-chromosomes, and her main anchor is hopelessly lovesick while trying desperately to remember what the hell he was doing when Ted Kennedy was shot." "If this convention were in Dallas, they'd turn that into a country song," said Neely. "So what's his current status?" asked Jillian. "His performance has slipped," I said. Neely furrowed her brow. "You already told us he couldn't—" "On air, for God's sake," I said, shaking my head. "He looks like a lost puppy." "So waddaya gonna do?" asked Rica, spearing a sausage with her fork. "He's got a two year contract," I said. "His ratings are great. There's really not much I can do." * * * You see trophy wives all the time in New York. The couple always looks the same. Rich old fart who could raise a "separated at birth" question with a Sunsweet prune, and a twenty-something vapid blonde on his arm. He only wants sex, she only wants money, bada bing, bada boom, let's draw up a pre-nup. She multitasks in the bedroom, either counting the cracks in the ceiling or the days till she can bail with enough for a Palm Beach condo. Old joke about trophy wives: Man walks into a bar and sits next to a really attractive woman. "Would you sleep with me for a million dollars?" he asks. "Absolutely," she says, suddenly sitting up straight on her barstool. "How about a hundred bucks?" he asks. She gets indignant. "What kind of a girl do you think I am?" "We've already established that," he says. "Now we're just haggling about the price." So now I sorta know how a man feels, except, being a woman, I'm not as shallow. (Stop laughing. Stop! Okay, you got me.) While I need a trophy buck, actually sharing the rest of my life with someone who could moonlight for Chrysler as a crash dummy isn't on my to-do list. Scott showed up at my townhouse after the late Friday newscast like nothing happened, the wrong head in control. He apparently (like any man would) thought that all I needed was a reminder of how much he belonged on my list. Then I would come to my senses. While my senses suffered the usual high-speed blowout on the sexual Autobahn, and the Zorro outfit he wore was a nice new wrinkle, I regained my faculties during re-entry. "You look like you enjoyed that, Ms. Hack," he said, looking down at me while propped on one elbow. I let my body melt into the five hundred thread count Egyptian cotton sheets as my brain synapses continued to fire sparks. "That's an understatement." I closed my eyes, my face still flashing like a firefly, hoping he would just shut the hell up and let me— "You can have that every night for the rest of your life." Annnnnnd…. Cue the cold shower! I slowly opened my eyes and saw the puppy dog with the granite body just inches from my face, about to kiss me. I sat up before he had the chance. "Scott, I thought we already resolved this." "I thought you might miss me in Vegas and change your mind." "No, I haven't changed my mind." He leaned over to the cherry end table and picked up a glass that had a touch of scotch left in it. "Maybe you need some time to think." He downed the rest of the liquor. "Maybe you need to remember who hired you." I leaned back against one of the four posts of the bed, which had moments before served as an impromptu stripper pole. "I'm your boss. Why do you call me Ms. Hack in the bedroom if you think I love you?" "I thought it was part of the dominatrix thing you had going." Dear God… "So that's all I am to you? A piece of meat?" Oh, man, I wish I'd had a camera rolling. Coming from a man that would have been the sound bite of the year. Hey, great idea for cable… an entire network with older women and younger men. But back to our regularly scheduled sexual encounter…. "In return you get to anchor in the number one market in America." He threw back the covers, grabbed his underwear from the ceiling fan blade, and started to get dressed. "You've been leading me on." "I've done no such thing, Scott. When I interviewed you, I told you that if you wanted the job you should come to my room." "I thought you were attracted to me." "I am, physically, but not in a romantic way." The hurt in his eyes grew and he turned away. He finished getting dressed and started to head for the door. He stopped a few feet from it, picked his car keys off the dresser and turned to face me. "I want out of my contract," he said. "Not gonna happen," I said. "We'll see." * * * "So let me get this straight," said Jillian from the speakerphone. "Young man who has trouble spelling IQ is offered a job anchoring in New York City. But wait! There's more! As an added bonus, he got to sleep with his hot, red-headed boss to get the job. And there's a problem?" "Apparently," I said, wishing they were in my office instead of just voices on the weekly Thursday conference call. It was Neely's turn. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't most men jump at the chance for mind-altering sex on a regular basis while bypassing the usual dinner and courtship stuff?" "Courtship? That still exists?" asked Rica. "In the South it does," said Neely, turning on the drawl. I could almost see the dreamy, faraway look in her eyes. Rica laughed. "In Brooklyn, courtship's when a guy says, ‘Meter's running. You wanna have sex, or what?'" "Then most men are from Brooklyn, 'cause that's what they want," said Jillian. "No holding car doors open, no cuddling, no ‘so, what are you thinking?' questions, just clean-out-the-pipes-air-out-the-brain-blast-furnace-sex with a woman who looks like she needs a bail bondsman and a public defender." An image of a black leather miniskirt and red platform heels that Scott liked flashed through my brain, along with a picture of a blast furnace blowing his hair out of place. I shoved it to the back burner for later. "And guys say women are hard ta figure out," said Rica. "Fuhgeddaboudit." "So what should I do?" I asked, looking at the speaker like it was some sexual magic 8-ball. "Screw him," said Rica. "She'd like to keep doing that," said Neely. I heard chuckles all around and couldn't help but smile. "You know what I meant," said Rica. "So what's the situation this week?" asked Jillian. "He's not speaking to me," I said. "Though yesterday he went from brooding victim to looking like he's up to something." "Think he'll show tomorrow night?" asked Jillian. "We'll find out soon enough," I said. * * * Actually the answer swatted the front door of my townhouse around five in the morning on Friday. It arrived in the form of a New York tabloid, complete with a front page picture of Scott Harry and a headline that made my jaw hang open like a trophy bass. Anchor Goes "Undercover" to Keep Job Ho. Lee. Shit. I dashed back inside the heavy oak front door, slammed it, and pressed my back against it like I was hiding from a firing squad. Then I quickly unfolded the paper. It got worse. Cougar Boss Turns Scott Into Dirty Harry By Cassandra West Apparently the news business is no longer couched in secrecy. It's simply a couch. Of the casting variety. That's the story from local anchor Scott Harry, who claims that he was hired by News Director Sydney Hack in return for sex. Harry adds that weekly trysts with his boss are a requirement should he wish to keep his job. "I've spent every Friday night with Ms. Hack at her home since I was hired, and I only got the job after sleeping with her," said Harry, who has pumped up ratings for the station since his arrival but has grown tired of the arrangement. "I recently asked to be released from my contract, but was told that providing sexual favors was part of my job description." The attractive, copper-haired thirty-something Hack, known as both Neutron Syd or The Red Queen in the broadcasting industry, raised eyebrows when she hired twenty-nine-year-old Harry and paired him with middle-aged Caroline Jensen, creating what is often referred to in journalistic circles as The Cougar Report. Curiously enough, the biggest ratings increase for the station occurs in the middle-aged female demographic. Hack could not be reached for comment. "Yeah, you can't get a comment if you don't pick up the damn phone," I said aloud. Just as the phone rang. * * * It was so quiet I could hear my pumps crunch the royal blue carpet that led to the CEO's office. I could also hear my heart pounding in my head as I opened the glass door to the reception area. "Ah, Ms. Hack," said Kendra, the young Asian receptionist who had been busy opening mail. "You're expected. Go right in." "Thanks," I said. Then Kendra did something I didn't expect to see at a career wake. She smiled at me. Okay, I've never done anything to this woman. She can't possibly be happy that I'm getting fired. I knocked softly, opened the heavy mahogany door and entered the executioner's den. Thankfully the CEO was on the phone and I got a stay for a few minutes. "Yes, thank you," said Madison Cartwright, the founder of the network. The slender forty-year-old blonde smiled at me and extended an open palm toward the chair in front of her desk. I took a seat in the red leather chair and hung on to the arms for dear life as she continued the conversation. Her pale blue eyes matched her silk blouse, both lit up by the bright sunlight that poured into the corner office through windows that offered a terrific view of the Chrysler. "Stroke of genius, if you ask me," she said, twirling a slim silver pen in her long manicured fingers. "She's here right now. I'll call you a little later." She hung up, brushed her shoulder-length hair back and looked at me. "Sydney, I'm sorry I didn't get to meet with you Friday but I had a family emergency." She slapped her hands face down on the desk. "All I can say is that I sure never expected something like this from you." "I'm really sorry, Madison," I said. "I should have—" "Actually I'm glad you didn't tell me because I'm terrible at keeping secrets." She leaned forward and lowered her voice, even though the office door was closed. "So tell me, how'd you get Scott to go along with it?" Now I'm really confused. "Go… along…" "Syd, the phones have been ringing off the hook. Half the women calling are congratulating you and the other half want to know how to get into news management." Then she held up a printout that I recognized as the daily ratings chart. "And the overnights for this past Friday are through the roof." "So, you mean, you're not—" "What? Mad? Are you kidding? We're the talk of the industry. You proved that women don't have to be put out to pasture at forty." She flipped the ratings printout to me. "The young women love him, the old women love him, and they all love you for giving him a mature co-anchor and letting them know the rules can be the same for women as men. You've empowered us, Syd. You turned back the clock to the 1950s so we can make up for lost time and chase the cute men around the desk. Frankly, I'm wondering why the hell I have a female assistant." I exhaled for perhaps the first time in three days. "Just one more thing, Syd." "Yes?" "I know you were the one who found Scott and all, but I was wondering if—" "Yeah?" Madison's smile grew, bringing out her perfect cheekbones. "Maybe one Friday when you're out of town. Would you be willing to… share?" * * * I was done with Scott, having "given" him to Madison. So back to checking references. The leading candidate to anchor our new five o'clock newscast weaved his way past the tables, leaving a trail of hanging female tongues in his wake. The dark gray pinstripe vest draped from Jason Deller's broad shoulders, while his slim hips carried him through the room. Here we go again. I sat up straight on my bar stool, crossing my left leg over my right to take advantage of the slit on that side of my royal blue dress. Just in time for the six-foot-three slice of prime beef to notice. He extended his hand as he reached the bar. "Sydney?" "Yes," I said as I shook his hand. "What's a nice News Director like you doing in a place like this?" he asked. Good. Sense of humor. "It's a good place to relax after work," I said. His cobalt blue eyes stole a glance at my legs, then locked on my own, looking right into my soul and almost putting me in a hypnotic trance. He smiled, revealing dimples that ran like trenches along his rugged twenty-eight-year-old face that bristled with a three-day growth. A shock of coal black hair cascaded over his forehead. He hopped onto the bar stool next to mine and swung it around to face me. His knees gently brushed mine, sending an electric charge through my body. Damn, he makes Scott Harry look like a Boy Scout. "You're not what I expected," he said. "I hope that's good." "Oh yeah." "And you look good in clothes," I said. His face flushed a bit as he shook his head. "I can't believe you actually saw that Off-Broadway disaster." "Hey, Shakespeare in the nude wasn't all that bad." "Right. That's why I'm still waiting tables uptown after playing opposite Lady McBare." "Did you have a problem doing nudity on stage?" "Nah. I just needed the work. At least I got discovered by you, right?" "Right." "I'm frankly surprised you'd actually consider an actor to be a news anchor." "Well, we've had an actor as President and one was the Governor of California. It's all about being able to communicate. What's the difference?" "True." He looked off to the side for a moment, then turned back to me. "I do have one question that we didn't cover during our phone conversation." "Shoot." He bit his lower lip, then fired away. "I've read the tabloids about your… hiring practices. And the regular weekly—" "Let me answer your question with a question," I said. "Okay." I leaned forward and slid my hand on the smooth bar toward his so that our fingers lightly touched. "Hypothetically, mind you. If you were to be offered a job, a great job that paid really well, and one part of the interview process was to take care of the sexual needs of your future boss, how would you respond? "Hypothetically?" "Of course." He shrugged. "Well, that depends." "On what?" "On who the boss is. If the boss is some twenty-five-year-old ditsy blonde looking for a commitment, then I'm not the guy. Romance can't be part of the picture. If it's some wrinkled sixty-year-old prune, forget it." He looked around, then leaned closer while putting his hand on top of mine. "The boss would have to be, say, a very attractive tall redhead with a great pair of legs and spectacular eyes. It would also be nice if she were a little older than me. I like women who are… seasoned." Well, rub some spices on me and toss me on the grill. "So," he continued, "to answer your question. If I were to be offered a great job that required me to have sex with my hot boss, and no romantic strings attached, well…" "Yes?" "I'd jump on it." Gulp. (I don't even want to describe the image that flashed through my head, but let's just call it the really Off-Off-Broadway nude production of Taming of the Shrew.) "Really," I said, feigning surprise. "You wouldn't consider it any sort of sexual harassment?" "Oh, please. Hell, I'd let her be in charge in the bedroom too. Great job, free sex, where do I sign? Hypothetically, of course." "Of course," I said. "You know, the service at this place is really slow," he said, looking around at the lack of empty tables. "I oughta know, I used to work here. And the food's not that great either." "True." I reached into my beaded purse, pulled out a ten-dollar bill and tossed it on the bar. "You know, I think we should continue our conversation elsewhere. I have a room at the Plaza." "They have excellent room service there." "They do. Are you hungry?" He licked his lips, hungry eyes looking directly into mine. "I think I will be in a couple of hours." He hopped off his stool and extended his hand. I took it and slid off the chair, then stood straight and tall, inches away from his face, breathing in his musky cologne. "Oh, I do have one more question," he said. Uh-oh. "Sure." "All I have to do is read and look good, right? No reporting in the field, no journalism stuff, no writing. I mean, I'm an actor, not Edward R. Murrow." "That's the deal. You're not a real news anchor, you just play one on TV." "Okay." "You only have to remember one thing, Jason," I said. "It's not brain surgery. It's just television news." CHAPTER TWO (#u2e8e3d97-6683-50b1-9e76-7312739992b9) If you get the punchline to this joke, you probably understand the mission statement of the Consolidated Broadcasting Network's entertainment division: What do a Mississippi divorce and a tornado have in common? Somebody's gonna lose a trailer. As networks go, Consolidated Broadcasting is not what you'd call the purveyor of highbrow programming. If your idea of a big night is a six-pack and a bug zapper, you're part of our target audience. Congratulations! (Of course if you're reading this, and your lips don't move when you read, you're obviously not. I am presuming the only books in the homes of CBN viewers are sitting next to a box of Crayolas, so I feel pretty safe in sharing our secrets.) CBN prime-time shows have simple formulas. Every show needs at least one, and preferably more, of the following: —Women with multiple tattoos, a bad dye job, and a lit cigarette at all times. —A male star with so many body piercings it looks as though the phone rang and he answered the staple gun. —A home with wheels, that may, or may not, change locations due to a storm. (The network once actually created a spin-off series in this manner when the Georgia mobile home of one secondary character sailed away in a hurricane and landed on a beach in Boca Raton.) —A truck, vintage Trans-Am, or Camaro, preferably having one door of a different color than the rest of the vehicle. One part of the car should be held together with duct tape. —At least one character with missing teeth. If there is just one missing tooth, the character should use the space to spit tobacco juice. —The word "confessions" or "naughty" in the title. (Both were used in one series titled, "Confessions of Naughty Trailer Park Queens.") And if you live in a state in which you can be arrested for driving without a gun rack, we want your eyeballs every night after you bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan. Well, that was CBN's strategy. Until today. Since even the sophistication challenged haven't been tuning in and the network could possibly have fewer viewers than PlayStation at any given moment during prime time, the powers that be at the network have called a meeting to discuss the future. Two days ago Madison told me, "Changes are coming, but in a good way." That's usually the equivalent of a Sicilian kiss in broadcasting, so for the past forty-eight hours I've been hitting the liquor cabinet like Neely on a weekend bender, while looking around corners for hit men with dark shirts and white ties lurking in the shadows. Even though Madison assured me that I was in no danger, you always worry in this business that someone is going to send you a dead fish wrapped in a newspaper. You're only one bad ratings book away from decapitation. But then Madison threw a curveball at me, and told me to summon the gals to New York for an eleven o'clock meeting. Again, no other information. So we're here, at one end of the conference room, ten minutes early, trying to place bets on a: what the network is going to do in prime time; and b: what this meeting has to do with the news division. (Well, three of us are here; we're waiting on Rica, whose plane was late, but she'll be here shortly.) Jillian has been driving herself nuts, speculating, while burning through calories at an alarming rate. Neely took the more casual approach. "Hey, a free trip to New York is just another excuse to get together with you guys," she said, sipping a bottle of sparkling water. "What time's happy hour?" asked Jillian, drumming her fingers on the table, as she grabbed another jelly donut from the large basket in the middle of the table. (The girl can eat all day, by the way, and never gain an ounce.) "If we're not having lunch with corporate, it's in about an hour," I said. "By the way Syd, how's your new hire working out?" asked Neely. "Jason? Terrific. He picked up the prompter really quick," I said. "Not what I meant," said Neely, as Rica blew through the door carrying her briefcase. "Made it," she said, as she dropped her valise on the floor and brushed a few strands of hair from her face. "Did I miss anything?" "Just more endless speculation about our possible futures," said Jillian. "Where the hell else can we work and get the benefits package we've got?" "Anything new since I left LA?" asked Rica. I shook my head. "Nada. You know as much as I do. But I'm betting—" The giant wooden doors swung open and Madison Cartwright entered the room, followed by an entourage of sharply dressed women in their thirties and forties that I recognized as the corporate staff. With one exception. They circled the table and all took their seats as Madison stood at the front of the room. The exception, a sharply dressed striking brunette in her middle thirties, sat in the chair to her immediate right. "You recognize her?" whispered Jillian, just before shoving the remainder of the donut into her mouth. I shook my head. "Thank you all for coming such a long way on such short notice," said Madison. "I know that you've all been trying to figure out what's in the works for the past few days, and I'm sorry to have been so vague, so I won't keep you guessing any longer. Let's start with the entertainment division. You may have noticed that Carlie Hammersmith, the head of prime-time programming, is not here. She tendered her resignation this morning." Jillian leaned into my ear, so close I could smell the strawberry jelly on her breath. "I told you heads would roll." "But fear not," continued Madison. "The rest of you are not in any danger of losing your jobs. In fact, quite the opposite. You're all about to play bigger roles in this network. To tell you about that, I'm going to turn the meeting over to Amanda Bain, who has been named our new head of the division and will totally revamp the prime-time line-up, which will hopefully give you a much better lead-in for your local newscasts. She has fifteen years experience with the major networks in Hollywood, and I know she'll do great things for us. Let's give her a big welcome." The slender brunette with Carolina-blue eyes stood up and was greeted by polite applause. Her shoulder-length straight cut curved in around her chin and framed her thin, oval face while dusting the shoulders of her deep red business suit. (Well, the suit part was business. The very short skirt was pleasure.) Her dangly hoop earrings looked more appropriate for a night on the town instead of a day in the boardroom, but they worked with the outfit. "She's one of us," whispered Neely, noting the woman had a body like a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, though she wasn't terribly tall, maybe five-five. She took off her jacket and draped it on the back of her chair, revealing a tight, eggshell silk blouse. The outfit screamed "woman in charge." "And she brought her own party hats," Neely added. "Oh yeah," I said, noting the chilly air and her lack of a bra had provided two impressive points to the front of her blouse. "She could dial a phone with those things," whispered Rica. "Like you couldn't," I said. "Thank you so much," said Amanda, who took Madison's place at the front of the room as my boss stepped aside. "Madison is right about one thing, and I hate to throw stones at my predecessor, but our prime-time programming couldn't be any worse. So I'll get right down to it. I'm sure you'll all be happy to know that the days of redneck entertainment at CBN are over as of today." A mild cheer erupted with more applause. "I like her already," said Jillian. "Damn," said Neely, "I guess that cliffhanger of Bubba Does Boca will never be resolved." She smiled, looking around the room and making eye contact with several women. "I know, I know, tens of viewers will be disappointed." We all laughed at the old joke about ratings and the tension we'd felt about our jobs began to dissipate. "CBN is about to undergo several major changes in the coming weeks, some of which will be made public, some which must be done in secrecy. I'm going to need help from each of you to make that happen. But first, I must say that none of this would be possible if it were not for the incredible vision of Sydney Hack." Huh? Whaaa… She turned and looked right at me. "Sydney, we haven't been formally introduced yet, but I must compliment you on the way you turned things around in the news division for this network. Your work is nothing less than inspiring, and it takes a lot for someone in a news department to inspire someone from Hollywood. Anyone who can grow the ratings with that disastrous prime-time line-up as a lead-in is a genius. What you've done is the basis for the changes that we are going to start implementing today." Twelve pairs of eyes looked at me for an answer. I just smiled and nodded. "Thank you," I said. "You're very kind." "Don't be modest, Sydney," said Amanda. "Your changes have given us the road map to take this network in a new direction. One that is going to change the face of broadcasting and kick our competitors' asses. One that is going to make the entire country rethink the way business is done, one that will change the way men and women look at relationships. The premise is very simple, and one I know you are all going to like. Here's the deal, and it will be written in stone. All of our prime-time shows this fall are going to mirror the current theme of our local newscasts." She paused a moment, letting it sink in. "Got it?" she asked. Heads began to nod. Oh. My. God. (That crazy idea I had for a network the other night in the bedroom while Scott was pulling his laundry off the ceiling? Should have copyrighted the damn thing.) "In other words," said Amanda, "the shirtless, tattooed men who have starred in CBN's shows are being replaced with very attractive, smart, professional, sexually aggressive women over thirty who don't see age as a boundary in a relationship. Every show in prime time will be female-driven. Every single one. There will still be good looking, shirtless men of course," she said, pausing as the women in the room laughed, "but they'll be playthings. They'll also be classy, well-educated, have full sets of teeth," she paused as the group laughed again. "And they'll also be…" She stopped and looked around the room and put her palms up. "Anybody?" "Younger?" I said. She pointed her finger at me and smiled. "You got it, Sydney. Welcome, women of CBN, to a network where women are always in charge." Several "woo-hoos" went up around the room as the group exhaled all tension collectively. No one was getting fired, except the people who had produced the God-awful stuff we'd been running in prime time. And my grand little experiment was about to take on a life of its own. "Oh, one more very important thing," added Amanda. "We're going to be known as the Consolidated Group from now on. And you'll see why down the road." Neely gave me a gentle elbow. "I can understand why you're here Syd, but what are we doing here?" "I'm glad you all seem so receptive to the idea," said Amanda. "And I think America will feel the same way. When the fall rolls around, you won't be able to recognize this network. Everything will be new. Every single show now on the air has been cancelled, and most will be yanked off the air immediately. We're basically rebooting, rolling out a new network, which is another reason for the name change. And that brings me to the second part of our plan, which entails synergy with the news division." She turned toward me and smiled. "And that's why we needed you here, Sydney, along with the news directors of our major market stations." Neely, Rica and Jillian all sat up straight and leaned forward in unison, as if on cue. Then Amanda dropped the bombshell. "We're going to launch a 24-hour cable network based here in New York. And I'm asking the four of you to run it." * * * "Oh, we're definitely having an agenda on this network," said Amanda, who speared a forkful of grilled salmon that was drenched in bourbon sauce. Aw, shit. There goes paradise. "Republican or Democrat?" I asked, suddenly losing my appetite at the prospect of tormenting the American public with political scream-fests. The petite sirloin that had just arrived was still spitting at me, sending out a call to my growling stomach. She shook her head as she chewed her salmon. The brightly lit midtown restaurant was still crowded at two o'clock, and loud, filled with too many business people talking either to each other, on their cell phones, or both. The bar was elbow-to-elbow with men who were maintaining their liquid diets during lunch, while watching a rare Mets day game and cheering the occasional good play. Amanda flagged down a young waiter and pointed to her empty wine glass. He nodded at her, smiled and disappeared into the kitchen where he was swallowed up by the sound of clanging plates and silverware. Finally she took a sip of water and gave me my answer. "Nothing so pedestrian as politics, Syd. Let the other networks go right or left and alienate half the audience. Our only agenda is women. Women over thirty are the target demo specifically, but women overall. Remember, young women will eventually become older. In the back of our viewers' minds, subliminally, must be the concept that men are simple playthings, just accessories that any woman can have, like a designer purse. Just as the shoes must match the dress, the younger man must match the older woman. No knock-offs, either. The men must be the real thing, the dream guy, not something they'd settle for to avoid a life as a spinster with a houseful of cats. All you have to do is time-warp yourselves back fifty years to the days of weather bunnies on the news, when women stayed home and did all the cooking and cleaning, and men routinely slept with their secretaries. Then just reverse the sexes. It's that simple. And that's what I want from you. That's what our viewers will want from the network once they get a taste of it. We're going to turn the damn country upside down in the bedroom, and the boardroom. Let the world know women have had enough, that we're taking over, and we're changing the rules for good. It's a seller's market, and we're the only store in town. If you're a man, and you want sex, you play by our rules. And we take what we want." "You know," said Jillian, stabbing a bit of her blackened chicken salad and pointing her fork at Amanda, "I think I like her." "Fuhgeddaboudit," said Rica. "I'm in love." An attractive young man walked by our table while his eyes made the rounds. He locked on Neely, who smiled back at him. Then she turned back to Amanda. "So, what you're basically saying is that women are the new men," said Neely. "Oooh, I love that," said Amanda, grinning wide. "And there needs to be an underlying tone in the broadcast as well. I mean, you still need anchor teams like the ones you have in your stations, but the stories all have to reflect our agenda. You can't just do a regular style newscast. The product has to have a lifestyle feel to it. Viewers need to sense that women are in control of everything and that men are—" "Oooh, oooh!" Neely put up her hand and waved, chewing fast, making us all wait till she swallowed. She gulped, took a swig of water, and almost jumped out of her chair. "I've got it! Men are the new women!" "Yes! I think I love that even more," said Amanda. "Neely, we might have to turn you loose on the promotions department." "So basically it's all women, all the time," I said. "Twenty-four seven," Amanda said as she nodded. "If I turn on our news network at four in the morning, I want to see a hot middle-aged woman with… what did you call them?" "Trophy bucks," said Jillian, through a mouthful of lettuce. "Right," said Amanda. "And I want to see a story talking about the lifestyle that is possible for a woman who takes charge. Viewers need to come away with that notion when they're done watching." "Oh, Amanda," said Rica, "I meant to ask you something. What are we going to be calling the news channel?" Amanda's face lit up. "Well, I was saving that for down the road, but since you guys are going to be running the thing…" Her eyes sparkled. "This is the best part, and it's going to leave no doubt as to our agenda. We're the Consolidated Group Report. But we're just going to call the channel CGR." Oh, you gotta be kidding. "C…G…R?" I asked, speaking each letter slowly. She smiled and nodded. "Yeah. Get it?" "Not exactly a brainteaser for the Jumble," said Rica. "If you're a woman who can't figure that out, you shouldn't be watching anyway." "I like it. It's really sort of in your face," said Jillian. "Subtlety is not my strong suit," said Amanda. "In business or in life." My appetite switch turned back on. Suddenly I was ravenous and attacked my steak, savoring the hot, juicy rare beef that had been seasoned with fresh peppercorns and topped with garlic butter. I saw in Amanda a woman who was supremely confident in what we were about to do, and I liked her immensely. We all did. She was obviously very smart and had a plan that made sense, incredible as it was. If it actually worked, it really would change the face of broadcasting. That face wore eye shadow and bright red lipstick. That face was over thirty and might even have a few character lines. It would speak words that told the world who was in charge. But I couldn't help but wonder. Had Madison briefed Amanda on our benefits package and reference checking? "Amanda," I said, wiping my mouth with my white cloth napkin and dropping it back in my lap, then folding my hands. "I need to ask you about—" She put up her hand and stopped me. "Syd, I don't care how you hire people or anything about any… arrangements… you might have. Yes, I've read the tabloids. Madison told me how the system works. The point is, it works very well. I could care less if you turn your offices into Caligula's palace as long as you deliver the product we need. No one's going to give it a second thought if ratings are good. Put anyone that you like on your to-do list." I relaxed and sank back into my seat. I could see my girls all doing the same. Hello, Jason? Yeah, we're still good to go for tonight… A young, attractive waiter with light brown hair, deep-set blue eyes and a strong chin arrived with a bottle of wine and began to refill Amanda's glass as she quickly glanced down the length of his body and back up again. "Would you all like to see the dessert cart?" he asked. "The tiramisu is fantastic." Amanda lightly put her hand on the man's hip, then tilted her neck so she could get a better view of the man's tight backside. "What I want isn't on the menu," she said, staring up into his eyes. She reached into her purse, pulled out a business card, wrote a number on the back, and handed it to the waiter. He looked at it, turned it over, and smiled. "I get off at nine tonight," he said. "Apparently, so do I," said Amanda, who locked her eyes on the waiter's. Whoa. And I thought we were slick. Eyes widened and jaws dropped around the table as the young man nodded, dropped the check on the table, mouthed "see you then" and walked away. "Oh, you're smooth, Hollywood," said Rica. "Long flights wipe me out," said Amanda, swirling her wine around in the glass. "A little… exercise… always perks me up. He looks like a good workout buddy." "You know what they say. No pain, no gain," said Jillian. "Go for the burn." Now I was the one who wanted details. "So Amanda, are you—" "I wouldn't call myself a cradle robber," said Amanda, "but I do primarily date younger guys, and I tend to think of men as Kleenex." "One blow and y'all are done?" asked Neely, laying on the accent pretty thick. Everyone laughed. "Neely, you really do have a future in promotions," said Amanda, shaking her head as she finished her wine. "By the way, what exactly was your job in Hollywood?" asked Jillian. "Well, I wore many hats," said Amanda, "but I spent seven years as a casting director. It has its… perks… when men really want the part." She took a sip of wine and glanced at her watch. "I assume all your questions about business practices have been answered?" “Actions speak louder than words,” I said. CHAPTER THREE (#u2e8e3d97-6683-50b1-9e76-7312739992b9) ONE MONTH LATER… Getting all the girls to move to New York in May wasn't a problem, though we all had to work on Rica a bit when it came to finding new living accommodations. Jillian and Neely both settled in on the Upper East Side near me, each renting a townhouse. For whatever reason, Rica actually considered moving back to Brooklyn. Neely finally hit her with a dose of her own medicine one night and yelled (or tried to yell) "fuhgeddaboudit", which was so long and drawn out it didn't carry the same punch as it did coming from a New Yorker and sounded more like a Southern belle come-on to a man searching in vain for a condom. ("Sweetie, just fuhgeddaboudit and get on top of me before y'all start floppin' around like a catfish.") Rica finally relented and agreed to live in Manhattan, on the condition that Neely, as she put it, "Leave my slang alone, and I won't try to say y'all." Though Rica's y'all sounded more like a plea for help from an adenoidal patient in the office of an ear, nose and throat specialist. Living arrangements taken care of, now to the hard stuff. Building a news department from scratch, I've done. Building a twenty-four-hour network, well, that's another story. Thankfully Madison and Amanda had taken a lot off my plate, renovating our new home while coordinating the things like sets and equipment. They told me to focus solely on hiring air talent. (Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that in television news, people in front of the camera are referred to as "talent", regardless of whether they possess any. Often they don’t, but then again this isn't rocket science. I can't remember the last time I heard the word "journalist" in a newsroom. So in reality, it really is a lot like Hollywood.) We put our four pretty heads together and figured we'd need two dozen full-time anchors to cover all the shifts and allow for sick days, mental health days, vacations, etcetera. Twelve mature female anchors with experience. Twelve trophy bucks to sit next to them, read, and look good. In case you hadn't guessed, no experience necessary. (Don't look at me in that tone of voice. The pageant fembots have been operating under those rules for years.) And once the word got out that we were staffing a new network and had two dozen openings, the floodgates of the United States Postal Service, FedEx, and UPS opened in a nanosecond. Every former female anchor who had been put out to pasture at thirty-five dusted off a resume tape and overnighted it to me. Every male anchor over thirty who thought of himself as distinguished or authoritative or experienced sent a tape. Which meant just about every man in an anchor position in the United States. Jillian took care of sorting the mountain of tapes that filled the mailroom. She promptly threw every tape from the men over thirty in the trash. Men under thirty were put aside. The reverse was true for the women. By the way, I'm always amazed at the way women, especially those with pageant or modeling experience, apply for jobs. They don't seem to understand, we are hiring people to work on television, yet they send eight-by-ten glossies, bikini shots, modeling portfolios. Geez, do they think we're gonna hire people based on their looks alone? (Okay, don't answer that.) Anyway, we weren't close to being done. We now had to start sorting out the hundreds that were left. Though I'm using the term "sorting" in a way you've never encountered. (At this point you're about to see how incredibly shallow news executives are. We make guys at a singles bar look deep and thoughtful. And we learned all this from men, so please, don't blame us.) We took all the tapes (actually, they were mostly DVDs with a few scattered VHS cassettes) to the conference room, ordered pizza and beer for the evening, and began our own personal gong show. What, you're thinking we're going to sit down and watch twenty minutes from every job applicant and evaluate their journalistic abilities? Rate them one-to-ten on things like interviewing skills and mastery of grammar? Pfffft. Ah, grasshopper, you have much to learn before you may roam the earth. You could have the interviewing skills of Mike Wallace, but if you look like Jabba the Hutt you're gonna get gonged. Of course, every News Director in America will deny this because they'd get sued out the wazoo, but if it comes down to a choice between a credible Quasimodo and a woman who looks like she could suck a golf ball through a garden hose without smearing her lip gloss, the woman who can pass the oral exam wins every time. The rules of a television news resume tape gong show are similar to those of a courtroom, in which lawyers have peremptory challenges when choosing a jury. If an attorney doesn't like a prospective juror, said attorney can send that person packing without justifying the reason. But lawyers have a limited number of jurors they can dismiss without cause. In teevee land, any manager can veto an unlimited number of candidates for an unlimited number of reasons. And we always have cause. And it's always, always, always superficial. Too fat, too old, too young, too wrinkled, bad teeth, bad hair, wrong color hair, not enough hair, big ears, Samsonite under the eyes, no chin, too many chins, no neck, pockmarked complexion, too flat-chested, too top-heavy, too bottom-heavy… Got it? Ready? Now a gong show has to be a well-oiled machine if you're going to deal with hundreds of resume tapes in a short time. So I'm at the front of the room, about to feed tapes or DVDs into the machines, while Jillian and Rica sit on opposite sides of the table poised to fire away, gongs at the ready. Neely has set up three large cardboard boxes on the credenza at the other end of the room and is stationed next to one of those five-foot giant plastic blue dumpsters on wheels. She has labeled the boxes "hot damn!" "doable" and "exponentially cute." Two steaming pizzas loaded with every imaginable topping sat on one corner of the table and made the room smell like an Italian restaurant. The scent of garlic hung in the air along with the anticipation we all had of finding twelve Mister Rights. (We would take care of the women tomorrow. And we're just as brutal on our own gender, lest you think we're gonna hold anything back. But now that the rules have changed, we have actually gonged the pageant fembots without looking.) It was going to be a long night. I twisted open my bottle of ice cold beer, grabbed a slice of pizza and took a bite of the hot pie before tossing it on a paper plate. Rich sauce did battle for my taste buds with sausage and mozzarella cheese as I grabbed the first DVD. "You guys ready?" I asked, talking through the pizza. I got three nods and grunts from the girls who were as impressed with the pizza as I was and were shoveling it in. (Note to television viewers: the hardest video to get isn't some politician cheating on his wife or a corporate CEO taking a bribe or even a UFO landing. The toughest video to get is that of women eating. Take a camera to a shopping mall, park it in the food court, aim it at the tables and the eating magically stops among females. If you left the camera there, all the restaurants would go out of business. Take the camera away, and you've got the scene in this conference room. Four women chowing down like they were about to be contestants on Survivor.) I shoved the DVD into the slot and unfolded the corresponding resume as I waited for the disc to load. "Leading off… Todd from Wichita," I said. The monitor filled with the image of a mid-twenties man who already had the beginnings of a second chin to accessorize his lovely receding hairline. I glanced at his paper resume. "Three years as a reporter, one as an anchor." "None on a to-do list at this network," said Rica. "Gong." The other two nodded. I ejected the DVD, put it back in its plastic box, and slid it down the table. Neely grabbed it like she was pulling a cold draft off a bar counter and deftly deposited it into the trashcan in one sweet motion. "Next up, Carl from Idaho." Tape in machine, man with noticeable overbite appears on screen. "Gong," said Jillian, before five seconds had elapsed. "Looks like he could eat an apple through a picket fence," said Neely. I slid the DVD down the table. Neely grabbed it and made an exaggerated slam dunk with it into the trash. I shoved a VHS cassette into the VCR. "Next up, Walter from Peoria." "C'mon, Walter!" said Jillian, shaking one fist like she was warming up the dice at a crap table. "Momma needs to check some references." Walter's moon face and bug eyes filled the screen and told us why he was still in Peoria. "I don't need to check 'em that bad," said Jillian. Neely made a cross with two fingers like she was warding off a vampire and leaned her head back. "Gong. Good God, y'all, that face could stop a clock." "Bless his little heart," added Rica, without missing a beat. Even Neely laughed. I slid the tape down the table and she grabbed it with two fingertips, held it at arm's length like some lab experiment from a bachelor refrigerator, then dropped it in the trash. "Not off to a very good start," said Jillian, slugging down her beer. "Fear not," I said. "We have hundreds more from which to choose." "It has occurred to me," said Neely, leaning on the end of the table with both elbows, "that this would be even more fun if we had an honest to goodness Chinese gong." "If you can find one, I'll authorize the expense," I said, sliding another DVD into the machine. "Mario from Colorado." I reached for another slice of pizza as I heard the disc whirring in the machine. I didn't hear anyone call for a gong. "Hello there, Mario," said Jillian, with a little lust in her voice. The monitor was filled with a lean, rugged face that sported dark brown hair and eyes to match. The man's voice was pure dark silk pouring from his mouth, a deep baritone you wouldn't expect from someone under thirty. Kind of a Sylvester Stallone type, without the accent. "No gongs?" I asked. "He's a possible," said Jillian. "What's his story?" I glanced at his resume. "Three years anchoring in middle-of-nowhere Colorado." "Put him in a box," said Rica. "Which one?" asked Neely. "I think he goes under doable," said Rica. "Agreed," said Jillian. I slid the tape down the table. Neely grabbed it and gently put it in the appropriate box. Rica turned toward Neely. "Would you explain exponentially cute again?" she asked, as I popped another DVD in the machine. "I'm still a little confused." "It's a guy who is beyond cute," said Neely, sipping her beer. "Cute to the tenth power. Not scorching hot, but incredibly good looking with an underlying boy-next-door appeal. If the boy next door regularly showed up in your bedroom wearing a Chippendales outfit, carrying two cans of Reddi-wip and a riding crop." "And hot damn is the same as scorching hot?" asked Jillian. Neely nodded. "One and the same. Top of the line." "Michael from California is next," I yelled, trying to bring order. A blonde, blue-eyed anchor in a pastel suit filled the screen. He looked more suited to a surfboard than to a news desk. "Eh, doable," said Rica. "I was thinking exponentially cute," said Neely. "Doable," said Rica and Jillian in unison, as I slid the tape the length of the table. "Let's see if we can get two in a row," said Jillian. "Say hello to Bill from Bristol, Tennessee," I said, as the tape rolled. "Good face for radio," said Rica, about two seconds into the tape. "Bless his little heart," cracked Jillian, getting into the Southern spirit of things. "Edward from Florida," I said. The screen filled with an extremely tall, extremely skinny man. "Looks like an advance man for a famine," said Neely. "Gong." Twenty tapes later (including one which featured co-anchors that left some doubt as to which was the man and which was the woman and was followed by Neely's tomahawk jam of it into the dumpster) I finally popped in a tape and watched a glob of pizza almost fall out of Rica's mouth. "Whoa," said Rica. Twenty-seven-year-old Vance Hiller's face jumped off the screen and grabbed our undivided attention. With no anchoring experience, the tape featured the reporter out doing a variety of stories in the field, one of which included him in a pair of tight running shorts that revealed tan, sinewy legs. Tall, slender but well built, nearly black hair and piercing sea-foam green eyes which peered out of a face that was all angles and planes. "Is he real or computer generated?" asked Jillian. "Really, it looks like someone designed him," said Neely. "He's a virtual reporter. But I wouldn't mind checking his virtual references." "Gongs?" I asked. (Kidding of course.) "You outta your friggin' mind?" said Rica. I slid the DVD down to Neely and she placed it in the "hot damn" box without any argument. She patted the box's first occupant for good measure. By eleven thirty we'd gone through more than four hundred resume tapes, two large pizzas, two six packs of beer, and had seen Neely toss tapes into the dumpster with incredible flair. (We all agreed her jump shot was impressive, but the behind-the-back swish into the trash with an anchor from West Virginia could have been a hit on YouTube.) "Done," I said, plopping down in the chair. The dumpster at the end of the room was overflowing with DVDs and VHS tapes. "So where do we stand?" asked Jillian. "What's the grand total of the guys who are left?" Neely looked through each box and began counting. "There are half a dozen hot damns… four exponentially cutes…. and twenty who were considered doable." (It should be noted there would have been twenty-one doables but Neely unceremoniously dumped the first surfer dude when she found another California anchor she liked better.) "So," said Jillian, "Where do we go from here?" "Fly them all in as soon as possible and get rolling on the interviews," I said. "Hang on a minute, guys," said Neely. "I'm a little concerned." "About what?" asked Jillian. Neely picked up a DVD from the doable box and held it up. "There is a great deal of quality that separates the hot damns and the exponentially cutes from the doables," she said. "If I know I can have someone from the first two boxes, I don't really want anything from the other box." "You know, she's got a point," said Rica. "If I'm stuck in the Peoria airport, then a doable is… well, doable. But if there's lobster on the buffet, I sure as hell ain't eatin' tuna salad." Jillian nodded. "So if I've got this straight, we should ditch the doable box or our viewers will be stuck eating tuna fish instead of fantasizing about someone who is exponentially cute." "I'm not even gonna try to figure that out," I said. "So just dump the box." Neely took the box and sent twenty careers careening into the dumpster. Which left us with ten guys we really liked. To fill twelve slots. Do the math. We're hittin' the streets. * * * "I heard you had a gong show last night." I looked up and saw that my first visitor of the morning was Scott Harry, who was standing in my doorway, hands in pockets. What a surprise, he didn't look happy. "Hi, Scott. What can I do for you?" (Oh, by the way, gong shows are no secrets among the rank and file. As for Scott, I know exactly what he wants, but I'm going to make him say it. He wants to be part of the network, so bad he can taste it, but we're keeping him right where he is, taking care of local… and his spot on Madison's to-do list. However, I can't let him know that he hasn't a prayer of getting on the network, so the carrot must be dangled at a discreet distance.) "I assume you're getting around to staffing the new network." "Yep," I said, pausing to take a sip of my coffee, which had gotten cold. "Lots of people to hire and not much time to do it." Oh, you should see his face. It's killing him. He looks like a man who's been constipated for a week only to find out all the laxatives have been pulled off the market by the FDA. "I…uh…" Scott stopped and walked into the office, taking the seat directly in front of my desk. (The chair is a low-boy, by the way, two inches shorter than normal. A little psychological advantage.) "Yes? Something on your mind?" (I wear my best "playing dumb" look. All women are born with this innate capability. It's embedded in our DNA, just like the shoe chromosome. The equivalent for men is the not-listening, bobblehead nod.) His shoulders were hunched and his neck taut as he looked at me with his now patented "wounded doe" face, despite his lack of brown eyes. "I was hoping to be considered for one of the anchor slots on the network. I mean, I love working local, (forced smile) but this is a great opportunity." "Don't worry, Scott, you'll be considered." (I'll have to ask Neely what the penance is for a blatant lie.) Scott exhaled and the tension melted from his body. "Thank you. I mean, I hadn't heard anything. So I assumed—" Watch this. "So how are you enjoying your time with Madison?" Ah, such a joy to watch the color drain from his face like the last strawberry Slurpee coming out of the machine at Seven-Eleven. "She's very nice. But… I miss you." Aw, shit. And the day had started off so well with Jason and I doing our little Cirque de Soleil number before breakfast. I got up and walked around the desk, leaning on the edge and extending my legs so that they nearly touched his. If he was going to screw with my day, I was going to torture him. "Scott, we've been through this. Several times. Our relationship is purely professional." "I just—" "What are you gonna do, Scott? Try another trip to the tabloids? Did you really think anyone would see a man who has to sleep with his hot boss as a victim? Every guy in New York thought you were an idiot to complain. And then half of those called me wanting a job here." "It seemed like a good idea at the time." "Just keep Madison happy." (And I know she's happy from her note that read, "Thanks for the leftovers.") "Just Madison?" "Yes. Madison is a great gal with a rockin' body and you should consider yourself lucky that I don't make you sleep with Carla the producer." His face tightened and I could tell the image of the overweight troll in a state of undress was flashing through his mind. "Now go," I said. "Do your job, keep Madison entertained, and we'll keep you posted on the network gig." He got up, turned and shuffled out of my office without saying a word. Men. * * * The term "meat market" is a throwback to the eighties, but never seemed more appropriate as we occupied the corner table in the back of one of Manhattan's trendiest bars. The electricity in the place sent a charge through my body, while various expensive colognes and perfumes made the room smell like a walk through the Bloomingdales fragrance department where the Stepford girls spritz you. In reality, our hunting expedition tonight wasn't much different than trying to pick someone up. The men and women in the bar were looking for someone attractive to sleep with, and I was looking for someone attractive to sleep with, under thirty, who could read a teleprompter and knew that Ted Kennedy had never been shot. I sipped my Bailey's and tried to unwind as the cream with a bite ran down my throat, but things were getting too exciting. Tomorrow New York's top modeling and talent agencies were going to fill our office with male models and actors. (I know, I have such a tough job.) "What time do we start tomorrow?" asked Rica, not looking at me but scanning the crowded uptown bar for any hot prospects. One attractive man in his forties smiled at her, but was repelled by the force field of her death stare. He bounced off, shook his head, and headed out the door, letting in the sound of New York's heartbeat: car horns and police sirens. "Nine o'clock," I said. "We'll do a preliminary screening, then call back the ones we like for reference checks." It was wall-to-wall people and noise but one man at the bar somehow managed to connect with Jillian across the packed watering hole. "Oooh, I just got a shiver," she said. "Which one?" asked Rica, trying to follow Jillian's line of sight. Jillian nodded toward the bar, her eyes still paralyzed by the man's stare. "Sitting at the corner talking to an older guy but looking right at me. Gray pinstripe vest. Dark hair. Light eyes. Five o'clock shadow." Rica glanced around, trying to look through the wall of people. Finally she spotted him. "Damn, he's cute." "He's even beyond exponentially cute," said Jillian, suddenly possessing Neely's dreamy-eyed look. "It's a whole new level of cute." Rica turned to me. "Waddaya think, Syd? Should we go talk to him?" I was about to answer "yes", when the man hopped off his bar stool and headed across the floor to the men's room. I finally got a good look at the total package and my smile faded. He was short. And I mean really short. Five-three, five-four tops. "Aw, dammit," I said. "What?" asked Rica. "He's just a little thing." "So?" asked Neely. "He's an exponentially cute little thing. We just sit him on a Manhattan phone book and tilt the camera up at him when he's on set." "You're missing something. That plays havoc with our plan to have our anchors stand during part of each hour," I said. "No, you're missing something, Syd," said Neely, just as our waitress arrived. "Another round, girls?" asked the tall, slinky brunette in the short black spaghetti strap dress. "Make it so," I said. The waitress, who looked around thirty, wrote our drink order on her pad, shoved a pencil behind her ear and was about to leave when Neely touched her arm. "Excuse me, can we ask you a couple of questions?" The waitress shrugged. "Long as they're quick," she said. "I got a lotta tables." Neely looked back at the men's room just as the man emerged. "How tall are you?" she asked. "Five-eleven. About six-two in these heels. Why?" "See that guy walking to the bar?" Neely pointed at him. "Real cute, dark hair." The waitress craned her long, slender neck around the crowd and squinted. "You mean the little guy in the dark vest?" "Yeah," said Neely. "What about him?" "Would you ever consider going out with him?" asked Neely. "I mean, being as tall as you are, do you find him attractive?" "I'd do him in a New York minute," said the waitress, licking her lips. "He'd make a great Friday night snack." "You don't have a problem with a man that much shorter?" I asked. She shook her head. "Hell, I date shorter guys all the time. Most of the ones taller than me are pretty stuck on themselves. The shorter ones try harder, they're more polite. Better personalities and sense of humor. And they don't try anything funny 'cause I'm bigger than they are." Suddenly she put her tray down on our table, leaned forward, and lowered her voice. "Plus, I'll let you in on a little secret. They obey." "Excuse me?" I said. "They're so afraid you'll ditch them for a tall guy they'll do anything you want. I guess I feel more in control with a guy like that. It's sorta nice being the man in the relationship, if that makes any sense." She looked back across the room at the man, dark eyes suddenly steamy with lust. "But yeah, I wouldn't mind bending him across my knee and spanking that tight little ass." Interesting mental picture I hadn't considered. "Thanks," said Neely. "What's the deal?" asked the waitress, picking up her tray. "You guys taking a marketing survey or something?" "We work in TV," I said. "Just keeping in touch with how women think." "Let's put it this way. They're all the same height lying down," said the waitress. "I'll be right back with your drinks." She turned and headed back to the bar. "Syd, we are really missing something here," said Neely. "If we want to convey the notion that women are in charge, why can't a few of our female anchors be taller than their male co-anchors?" "She's got something, Syd," said Rica. "A lot of women wouldn't mind takin' that guy home, even if he is a munchkin. And look at Jillian. She looks so possessed I'm gonna have to call a priest." I turned and saw that Jillian was in some sort of schoolgirl trance, which I might expect from Neely. But Jillian, I'd never seen her this way. The cool, always in control girl looked like she was in the ninth grade suffering from her first crush. "Jillian? Earth to Jillian?" "Huh?" she said. "Have you heard a word we've been saying?" I asked. "Yeah. Sort of. Not really," she said, still staring at the man. I looked up at the guy who had returned to the bar. He shook hands with another man who handed him an envelope, then paid his bill, picked up his drink, and headed for our table. "This oughta be fun," said Neely, cocking her heard toward Jillian. "Woman hit by Cupid's arrow. Film at eleven." "Someone reel in her tongue before he gets here," said Rica. I elbowed Jillian who snapped back into reality just as the man reached our table. He stood between Jillian and Neely but it was obvious he had his sights on Jillian. "Hi, I'm Shawn Carlyle," he said. Whoever said good things come in small packages must have been talking about this guy. Mid-twenties, perfectly proportioned, slim hips, broad shoulders accented by a tailored white French cuffed shirt. Turquoise eyes you could get lost in. Rugged square jaw, long dimples covered by a day's growth. And yes, a tight little spankable ass. Yeah, I'm starting to see Neely's point. Jillian was still too busy staring to answer, so I picked up the ball. "Hi Shawn. I'm Syd, and this is Rica, Neely and Jillian." "So, girls night out?" he said. "This is actually an extension of a business meeting that started this afternoon," I said. "Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt," he said. "No problem," Neely said. "We like to mix a little pleasure with business. We'd just wrapped up the business part anyway, so you can hopefully provide the pleasure." "You guys all work together?" he asked. "We run the news division for CBN," I said. "That sounds like a neat job. I took a journalism course in college and it seemed like a lotta fun." "So what do you do, Shawn?" asked Rica. "I work on Wall Street," he said, eyes suddenly filling with a tinge of sadness. "I've been there three years since I got out of college and it feels like thirty." Jillian still hadn't said a word, hadn't stopped staring, and her freckles were lit up like they were on fire. He glanced back in her direction and shot her a quick smile. "Not happy with the career?" I asked. He shook his head. "I just need to find something else to do. I'll be dead by forty if I keep this up. And honestly, my heart's not in it. Money's good, but I'm not happy. It may look exciting on TV, but the job just wrings you out." "Well, you know," I said, "we're in the process of hiring a bunch of people for our new cable network. In fact, we start interviewing local candidates tomorrow." "I read about that on Page Six. I already watch your local news. You guys do a good job." "You like our news?" asked Rica, furrowing her brow. "Yeah," he said. "You guys keep it simple. No agenda, no one trying to tell me how to think or how to vote. No one trying to shout someone else down during an interview. And the women on your station are credible, not a bunch of beauty queens. I mean, don't get me wrong, they're extremely attractive, but I get the feeling they actually know what they're talking about." That click you just heard was Mister Edison turning on a thousand-watt light bulb over my head. There's a young male audience for our product. Who knew? The guy was not only extremely cute but smart. I wanted to know more. "Have you ever been in front of a camera?" I asked. "No. Why?" "Like I said, we're hiring a lot of people." He smiled and looked down at the floor. "I'm sure I don't exactly fit the traditional anchorman profile." "We're very untraditional, in case you hadn't noticed from watching our newscasts," said Rica. "Well, yeah, I guess you are," he said. "Speaking of untraditional, what made you walk over here?" Rica asked. "We're not exactly girls right out of college." His hands went into his pockets as he slouched, and suddenly I saw a sheepish teenager about to ask a girl out. "Well, I knew it was a long shot, with me being… well… me. But I… how do I put this without offending you?" He pulled one hand from his pocket and placed it on top of Jillian's, patted it a few times, then stared directly at her. "The, uh, women my age aren't terribly… stimulating." Jillian gulped. Her longing eyes faded deeper into a dream state, as her head tilted to one side. She still hadn't said a damn thing. He pulled an envelope from his pocket and held it up in front of us. "Listen, I have an extra ticket to a new Broadway show this evening. It's a musical. My boss couldn't go and he just gave them to me. And…" he turned back to Jillian. "I just thought you looked like the kind of classy woman who might enjoy a night at the theater. No strings attached. I'll take you right home afterwards. But I insist on stopping for cheesecake after the play." Cupid was still apparently holding down the mute button on Jillian, but a smile grew across her face. I was about to grab her head and move it up and down like a bobblehead doll when Neely saved the day. "Jillian loves Broadway musicals," said Neely. "And we can vouch for her; she's very classy." "Uh-huh," muttered Jillian, looking like a willing subject from a hypnotist's show. The sphinx speaks! "Tell you what, Shawn," I said. "We're pretty much finished up here with the business stuff so why don't you take Jillian to that play and on the way she can tell you about the opportunities at our network. Maybe you'd be interested." He looked at Jillian. "That okay with you?" he asked. The waitress was right. He was asking permission. This stuff isn't in the tall girl playbook. How in the hell did I miss this? "Yeah," she said, voice cracking. He looked at his watch. "Okay then, we'll need to get going if we're gonna get a cab," he said, and extended a hand out to her. She took it, hopped off the bar stool and stood up next to him, towering over him in her four-inch heels. The top of his head reached her shoulder. He looked up at her like he'd just won the tall strawberry blonde lottery, then turned back to us. "It was nice meeting you all. Maybe I'll see you again." "That would be nice. Good meeting you, Shawn," I said, as they turned and left. "And you thought all our viewers were gonna be women," said Rica. I watched them leave the bar, her arm around his shoulder, his arm around her waist. More important, a whole bunch of guys in their twenties looked past the vapid, mini-skirted bimbos that filled the bar and stared at Shawn with envy. So much for blowing off the male demographic. * * * The walk through the large reception area was like going through a buffet line of men. Models and actors filled every chair, while a few stood and lined the walls. I made my way to the meeting room just off the front door that we'd designated for interviews. A cloud of cologne filled my lungs. Our middle-aged, impeccably coiffed, blonde receptionist, the only woman in the room, was obviously enjoying the attention she was getting as two of the men leaned on her desk and were chatting her up. Oh, this was going to be fun. A quick glance around the room told me there were plenty of possibles in this bunch. I reached the door to the meeting room just as the receptionist buzzed me through, turned around and said, "Guys, we'll be starting shortly." They all straightened up as I headed through the door. Inside, I found Rica and Neely already in place at the long maple table which dominated the room, enjoying coffee and donuts. The deep red walls were bare, faded squares showing the previous locations of prime-time posters that Amanda had thankfully ditched. "Pretty nice-looking bunch out there," said Rica. "Not too shabby at all." "I never knew New York had so many hot men," said Neely. "Between Madison Avenue and Broadway, what did you expect?" I took a seat at the end of the table, next to a black metal cart on wheels that held a monitor, a DVD player and a VCR. "By the way, anybody seen Jillian?" The door opened and she appeared on cue, newspaper under one arm while carrying a dark leather portfolio. "Morning, guys," she said, trying to hold back a smile as she made her way around the room and took a seat next to Rica at the far end of the table. Rica immediately turned to face her. "So?" she asked. "What?" said Jillian. "How was last night?" asked Rica. "Pffft," she said, with a wave of her hand. "The play was a disaster. We left at intermission." She then pulled a blank legal pad from her portfolio, placed it on the desk in front of her, and pretended to stare at it. "Terrible choreography. Just terrible. I can't believe they can get away with that on Broadway." "What a bunch of horseshit," said Rica. "What?" said Jillian. "You know what we mean," said Neely. "How was your Pocket Chippendale?" I smiled at Neely's dead-on description of Shawn, leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms as Jillian began to squirm in her seat. "Yeah, Jillian. Did you manage to speak the rest of the evening?" "You guys leave me alone," she said, blushing. "And yes, we talked quite a bit. He's very sweet, incredibly smart. Perfect gentleman. And his references are impeccable. By the way, you should know that not everything about Shawn is proportional." "Really," I said, raising my eyebrows. "What a pleasant surprise for you." "You have no idea what you're missing, Syd," said Jillian. "You need a Pocket Chippendale of your own." "That good, huh?" asked Neely. She nodded. "Oh yeah. He tortured me for an hour on the couch and finally I couldn't take any more, so I just threw him over my shoulder like a cave girl, carried him to the bedroom and took him. You have no idea how empowering that is." Rica's mouth dropped. "You actually carried him to the bedroom?" "Sure. I'm really strong, and he's pretty light." She flexed her muscles, revealing well-toned biceps, and lowered her voice. "Me woman, you sex object." "So the waitress was right?" asked Neely. "You enjoyed your little snack? Jillian nodded. "Very much. And he obeys like a trained seal. Does whatever I ask. Worshiped me like a goddess." "You are a goddess," I said. "Is he anchor potential?" "Yes, and he's very excited about the benefits package." "Can you keep him in line?" I asked. "You know about the problems I'm having with Scott." Jillian shrugged. "If he needs a reminder, I'll just give him another spanking." "You actually spanked him?" asked Neely. "He was a bad, bad boy," said Jillian, eyes gleaming, while both eyebrows went up. Rica started fanning herself with her pad. "Syd, can you turn up the air in here?" I got up and moved toward the thermostat. "Okay, I guess we'd better get started with the interviews." * * * "It occurs to me," said Neely, pulling her chair up to the table, "that this is just like a reality show. We are lined up here at this table, facing a single chair in the middle of the room and we'll rank each contestant on a scale. The winners move on, the losers skulk out or throw fits. We ought to put a reporter in the outer office to interview them as they leave." "I wanna play the British judge," said Jillian. "They always have some guy from London on the panel, who says something like, ‘Your performance tonight was just ghastly' with that accent, before they send the poor sap on his way." "That might be a line you should save for the hotel," I said. "I hope I never have to use it," said Jillian. "You guys ready?" "Let's rock," said Rica. I punched a button on the intercom. "Yes?" said the receptionist. "Start sending them in," I said. I turned to the girls. "Remember, the code word for gong is doable." They nodded. The door opened and a tall, very beefy man in his mid-twenties entered the room. "Good morning," he said, brushing his wavy dark hair out of his eyes. "I'm Brian Fairfield. I'm an actor and model here in New York." And you're a model for… let me guess… Michelin Tires? "Good morning, Brian," I said, gesturing toward the chair. "Please have a seat and tell us about yourself." He moved toward our table and handed each of us a manila envelope, then sat down. "I brought each of you a portfolio from my agency. I've been doing print ads for quite a while, though I did audition for a television commercial last week. I'm hoping to break into TV." I slid the portfolio out of the envelope and opened it. One side featured a full eight-by-ten headshot of the model, a beautifully lit photo that had obviously been air-brushed or Photoshopped or whatever. It didn't look anything like the guy sitting in front of us. The piercing blue eyes in the photo weren't nearly as dark in person. The other side featured three photos from different ads. He wore a tux in one, a bathing suit in another, and a sports jacket in a third. He also looked like he'd gained a good bit of weight since the pictures were taken. The face was much fuller now, the beginnings of a second chin evidently having cancelled out the jawline that was so prominent in the photos. "How old are these photos?" asked Rica. "About three years," he said. "I, uh, haven't had a gig in quite awhile." "Do you think reading a teleprompter is something that's… doable … for you?" asked Neely, accenting the code word for my benefit. "Sure," said the man. "Thank you," I said, getting Neely's vote. "We'll be in touch." The man's head dropped, he exhaled audibly and a sad look grew on his face. "Ohhhh… kaaay. Well, thank you for your time, I guess." He got up and left the room. "That didn't take you long," said Jillian. "You could have at least asked him a few more questions." "He'll be a doughboy in two more years," said Neely. "If he wants to break into TV he can get a gig selling crescent rolls. Why waste time with him?" "I still like gong better," said Rica. The parade continued, with plenty of hot damns and exponentially cutes sprinkled in the mix with those who looked closer to their driver's license photos than the ones in their portfolios. We got into the spirit of the chase by getting creative with the code word when we needed to gong someone. From Rica: "I'm sure an anchor position might be doable if you spend three years behind the scenes. We do have some entry-level gopher jobs." (The guy left skid marks.) From Jillian: "I'd be curious to see how you'd look if you dyed your hair bright red. Would that be doable?" From Neely: "As we say in the South, if it's doable, it's worth doin' right." By noon we were almost done and had at least nine viable candidates. And that wasn't counting the people with actual television experience who were flying in later. Then the door cracked open and the man who entered seemed to suck all the oxygen out of the room. About six-three, with ripped arms straining at the sleeves of his baby blue, short-sleeved polo shirt, while his pecs tried to escape the fabric. Thick, dark brown hair, deep-set hazel eyes, square jaw, slightly crooked boyish grin that led you to believe he was up to something. If there was such a thing as a cross between hot damn and exponentially cute, this guy was it. "Hi, Denton Hale," he said. He handed me a DVD, resume and portfolio, then grabbed a chair and took a seat. "Denton, I'm Sydney, and this is Rica, Neely and Jillian." (Incidentally, you should know that even though I didn't expect any gongs, I do retain supreme veto power in extreme circumstances. Just in case one of them loses her mind.) I opened the portfolio and had to fight to keep my eyes from bugging out as the pictures jumped off the page. After about ten seconds I heard this clicking sound as Rica's fingers tap danced across the table and deftly snatched the portfolio and dragged it down the table, where Jillian and Neely leaned over to take a look at the man who didn't appear to have a visible flaw or an ounce of fat. "Those are from my print ads this year," he said. "The DVD has my television work. Mostly exercise equipment infomercials and some voiceovers. You might have seen me if you're up in the middle of the night." I popped the disc into the player and the monitor filled with Denton Hale extolling the virtues of a new home bodybuilding system. I assume he was pitching the thing, because I never actually heard the words. I was too busy locked on a glistening body that had been cut from suntanned marble by Michelangelo. I looked down at the girls and knew there would be a battle later on to decide who Denton Hale would get to bench press at the Plaza. Конец ознакомительного фрагмента. Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес». Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/nic-tatano/boss-girl/?lfrom=688855901) на ЛитРес. Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.