she’d kissed him. She’d stood in the parking lot and glommed onto him like a limpet. And made it totally clear she’d liked it. Forget like, she’d loved it, and he’d known. She remembered the feel of his mouth curving against hers and she suddenly had a new appreciation for the phrase seeing red because she swore she could see the ruddy haze of anger like a fine mist over everything in her view.
A dozen flavors of fury, humiliation, betrayal layered over one another, and underneath, deep underneath lurked a dark, sneaky disappointment. It had felt so right. This was the one that she’d thought was actually going to work, the one that was going to happen the way it did for everyone else, meeting a guy, going out and, who knew, maybe getting involved, maybe even, God forbid, having sex for once in her life. It wasn’t too much to ask for, was it? Was it?
Instead, she’d gotten Gil Reynolds playing his tricky game and probably laughing at her the entire time.
Relax, Jillian reminded herself, taking a deep breath as she changed sides and sank back into the pose. Exercise was supposed to soothe, not give her a chance to get more agitated.
The worst part was that she’d liked him, really liked him. He’d seemed genuinely interested, as though he’d been attracted to her, wanted her. What if he hadn’t been?
What if he’d only been trying to pump her for a story?
And at that thought, all possibility of relaxation flew out the window. Forget yoga, she needed to learn something more violent. Kickboxing, maybe, something where she could hit and kick and…
Release, she reminded herself. Let it go.
The phone burbled. Jillian struggled out of her pose and made it over to the handset. As a social worker, answering the phone was never optional for her.
“Hello?”
“Jillian? Gil Reynolds.”
Let it go? Not likely. “Why, Gil,” she said silkily, “what a coincidence. I was just thinking about you.”
“Great minds,” he said. “Having a good week?”
“All right. How about you?”
“Ah, keeping busy.”
“Oh, I just bet you are,” she said.
He stopped a moment. “Yeah. Well.” He cleared his throat. “I was wondering if you still wanted to get together. How about dinner tomorrow night? I was hoping we could talk.”
“We can talk now.”
“Face-to-face is a lot more fun,” he said. “Come on, let me buy you dinner.”
“How about lunch?” she countered. He was right, face-to-face was a lot more fun, and she couldn’t wait to see his when she dropped the bombshell. “Let’s go somewhere downtown,” she added.
“All right. How about noon at Conroy’s?”
“Great. I’ll meet you there.”
“I’m looking forward to it,” he said.
Not nearly as much as she was, Jillian thought grimly as she hung up the phone.
“Reynolds. My office, five minutes.” Russell Gleason, the Gazette’s publisher, barked the words through Gil’s open door.
“I’ve got—” Gil began but he was already gone. Gil bit back a curse. He was supposed to be leaving for lunch with Jillian, not sitting in a meeting all afternoon. And with Russ, you never knew. The discussion could last five minutes. It could just as easily last an hour and forty-five, depending on how many tangents he wandered off on.
The topic was sales and circulation. Or, more to the point, what Gleason thought they ought to do to editorial to provide him with better sales and circ.
Like controversy.
“I’m just saying, we need stories that sell.”
“Stories that sell?” Gil stared at Gleason. “We’ve just lit a big enough fire under Nash and his cronies that the state’s threatening an audit. What more do you want?”
The publisher tapped his fingers on the black slab of his desk, dissatisfaction coming off him in waves. “That’s politics. That doesn’t sell papers in this day and age. We need something juicier.”
“Politics doesn’t sell papers? This is Portland we’re talking about. People here live and breathe politics. Take a look at your reader surveys.”
“All I know is when you broke the story about that football player’s kid, our newsstand numbers went through the roof.”
Gil bristled. “First of all, I didn’t break that story. I was on vacation when it hit. And if you remember, we had to print a retraction on parts of it. Sloppy researching, sloppy editing and it was just your pure damned good luck that Lisa Sanders didn’t take legal action.” And that he hadn’t lost one of his closest friends over it, Gil added silently.
“There wasn’t anything actionable,” Gleason scoffed, but his eyes flickered.
“Look, Russ, you take care of the business end and let me deal with editorial. Separation of church and state, right?”
“I’m just saying we’ve got stuff going on around here. What about that Logan thing?”
“I’ve got Mark Fetzer on it.”
“So why haven’t I seen any more stories?”
“They have to do something before we can write about it,” Gil reminded him wearily.
“Look at that Weekly Messenger. They run a Logan story on the front page just about every issue.”
“When they’re not writing about Elvis sightings. Russ, for Christ’s sake, the Messenger is a tabloid. They don’t need facts, they print tripe. We’re Portland’s primary newspaper. We’ve got a responsibility.”
“Yeah, to our advertisers and shareholders. I want Logans,” Gleason said obstinately. “That family sells newspapers. Besides, it’s a public service. With all the fiascos that clinic has had, it should be shut down.”
“Funny, the state and federal regulators don’t agree with you.”
“Yeah, well, our state senator does.”
“Showboating.” Gil dismissed it. “Look, it’s not our role. Our role is to support the news.”
“Our role is to support our shareholders,” Gleason countered.
“Circulation was just fine the last time I checked. And ad sales. In fact, I seem to remember cutting a story last week because the ad count ran over. You do what you do well, Russ, and leave me to what I do well. Look—” Gil checked his watch “—can we get back on this in the afternoon? I’ve got a lunch meeting.”
“Skip your lunch meeting. Go ask Nash what he thinks about a babynapper running a day
