question hit Sam Richards right between the eyes, just as he was swallowing down the last of his coffee, and he almost choked on the coarse grounds in the bottom of the cup.
Frank Evans strode into the corner office as though he had a hurricane behind his back and waved a colour magazine in front of Sam’s nose.
Sam sniffed and gave his new boss a one-handed hat tip salute. Frank had made his name in the media company by being one of the sharpest editors in the business who only worked with the best, but Sam had already been warned that Frank had not earned the editor’s desk through his personnel skills.
‘And good morning to you too, Frank,’ Sam replied. ‘And thank you for your warm welcome to the London office.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’ Frank shooed a hand in Sam’s direction and pointed to the desk. ‘Take a seat. Monday madness. Worse than ever. You know what it’s like. The chief is on my back and it’s not nine o’clock yet. Time to rock and roll. You talk. I listen. Let’s hear it. Show me that you’re not completely out of touch with the London scene after all those years out in the wilderness.’
Sam stifled a laugh. So much for an easy first day in the new job.
Frank settled the seat of his over tight suit onto the wide leather chair on the other side of the modern polymer table and ran his short stubby fingers through his receding grey hair before drinking down what must now be cold milky coffee.
His cheap tie was already tugged down a couple of inches and his shirt sleeves had missed the iron, but in contrast his eyes sparkled with intelligence as he leant his arms on one of the cleanest and most organised desks Sam had ever seen.
Bambi DuBois? The shock of hearing her name kept Sam frozen to the spot, cup in hand, before his brain kicked in and he frowned as though thinking about an answer. A few manly coughs gave him just enough time to pull together a casual reply to the editor who he had previously only spoken to twice on the telephone.
The editor who had the power to decide whether he had a future career in this newspaper—or not.
This was definitely not the perfect start to his dream job that he had imagined!
Lowering his cup onto a coaster, Sam assumed his very best bored and casual disinterested journalist’s face. His career depended on this man’s decision.
‘Do you mean Amber DuBois? English concert pianist. Blonde. Leggy. Popular with the top fashion designers, who like her to wear their gowns at performances.’ He shrugged at the newspaper editor and new boss who was staring at him so intently. ‘I think she was the face of some cosmetic company a few years ago. And I would hardly call Los Angeles the wilderness.’
Frank slid a magazine across the desk. ‘Make that the biggest cosmetic company in Asia and you are getting close. But you seem to have missed something out. Have a look at this.’
Sam took his time before picking it up and instantly recognised it as the latest colour supplement from their main competitor’s weekly entertainment section. And any confusion he might have had about Frank’s question vanished into the stiflingly hot air of the prized corner office.
The cover ran a full colour half page photograph of Amber ‘Bambi’ DuBois in a flowing azure dress with a jewel-encrusted tiny strapless bodice.
The shy, gangly teenage girl he had once known was gone—and in her place was a beautiful, elegant woman who was not just in control but revelling in her talent.
Amber was sitting at a black grand piano with one long, slender, silky leg stretched out to display a jewelled high heeled sandal and Sam was so transfixed by how stunning she looked that it took him a microsecond to realise that his new boss was tapping the headline with the chewed end of his ballpoint pen.
International Concert Pianist Amber DuBois Shocks the Classical Music World by Announcing her Retirement at 28. But the Question on Everyone’s Lips is: Why? What Next for ‘Bambi’ DuBois?
Sam looked up at his editor and raised his eyebrows just as Frank leant across the desk and slapped one heavy hand down firmly onto the cover so that his fingers were splayed out over Amber’s chest.
‘I smell a story. There has to be some very good reason why a professional musician like Amber DuBois suddenly announces her retirement out of the blue when she is at the top of her game.’
Frank aimed a finger at Sam’s chest and fired. ‘The rumour is that our Amber is jumping on the celebrity bandwagon of adopting a vanity charity project in India to spend her money on, but her agent is refusing to comment. As far as I am concerned, this is a ruse to get the orchestras begging her to come back with a solid platinum hello. And I want this paper to get in there first with the real story.’
Frank sat back in his wide leather chair and folded his arms.
‘More to the point—I want you to go out there and bring back an exclusive interview with the lovely Miss DuBois. You can consider this your first assignment.’
Then Frank shrugged. ‘You can thank me for the opportunity later.’
The words stayed frozen in the air as though trapped inside an iceberg large enough to sink his new job in one deadly head-on collision.
Thank him?
For a fraction of a second Sam wondered if this was some sort of joke. A bizarre initiation ceremony into the world of the London office of GlobalStar Media, and there was a secret camera hidden in the framed magazine covers behind Frank’s head which were recording just how he was reacting to the offer of this amazing opportunity.
Sam flexed out the fingers of both hands so that he wouldn’t scrunch up the magazine and toss it back to Frank with a few choice words about what he thought of his little joke, while his normally sharp brain worked through a few options to create a decent enough excuse as to why Frank should find another journalist for this particular gig.
Sam inhaled slowly as each syllable sank in. It had taken him three months to arrange a transfer from the Los Angeles office of the media giant he had given his life to for the past ten years. He had worked himself up from being the post room boy and sacrificed relationships and anything close to a social life to reach this point in his career.
This was more than just a jump on the promotion ladder; this was the job he had been dreaming about since he was a teenager. The only job that he had ever wanted. Ever. No way was he going to be diverted from that editor’s chair. Not now, not when he had come so far.
Sam blinked twice. ‘Sorry, Frank, but can you say that again? Because I think I must have misheard. I’ve just spent the last ten years working my way from New York to Los Angeles on the back of celebrity interviews. I applied to be an investigative journalist not a gossip columnist.’
Frank replied with a dismissive snort and he bit off a laugh. ‘Do you know what pays for this shiny office we are sitting in, Sam? Magazine sales. And the public love celebrity stories, especially when it concerns a girl with the looks of Amber DuBois. It’s all over the Internet this morning that orchestras have been lining up and offering her huge bonuses to come and work for them for one last season before she retires. And then there is her publicity machine. The girl is a genius.’
He raised one hand into the air and gave Sam a Vee sign. ‘She has only ever been seen with two dates in the last ten years. Two. And not your boring
