Excruciating.
Worse, the photograph continued to show up everywhere. I couldn’t go online without seeing it at MSN. Couldn’t turn on the TV without hearing it discussed on The View. Overnight I became a national figure. Because my beloved husband, Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Keith Heaton, was dead. Shot by a sniper in Afghanistan.
“Darling, you still there? You haven’t fallen asleep on me, have you?”
I put a hand to my eyes. Although dry, they burn. I can see Keith— the gleam in his eye, that cocksure smile of his. He was brave, so brave, and so foolish. I once loved his bravado. His sense of immortality. He was larger than life, and it enchanted me. Nothing would happen to Keith. Nothing could. And because of that I learned to live larger, too, taking risks I never would have taken before. But now those risks appear to be backfiring. Everything I worked so hard for is about to be yanked away. I could lose everything all over again.
Eyes stinging, chest burning, I take a deep breath and then another. Dammit, I don’t want to feel this way. I hate feeling this way. Too much of my life has been sad. Too much of my life has been spent grieving.
“Not asleep,” I answer huskily, sitting upright and struggling to inject some life into my voice, even as I remind myself that covers of magazines must be heady stuff for Trevor. He’s young and he’s hungry for fame. “You look like a movie star.”
Madison, my assistant, pops into my office. “Hey, cougar,” she mouths, dropping yet another magazine on my desk. It’s one I haven’t seen before, Star, and they’ve got the same shot of Trevor and me, and this one’s headlined COUGAR ON THE LOOSE!
I glance up at Madison and roll my eyes. She reaches up to claw the air like a big cat.
Shaking my head, I try to push away the magazine, but she opens it up instead to a two-page spread with more photos from our weekend. Trevor and me cuddling on the Seine riverboat. A photo of us lip-locked in the rain. Another shot of us disappearing into our hotel.
It’s so weird, because I never saw one camera this trip. I didn’t feel anyone’s eyes, didn’t feel much of anything except pleasure that I was out of L.A. and in Europe and just free. Free to be a kid. Free to play.
But now my weekend in Paris has been turned into a celebrity photo spread with saucy captions.
“Trevor, something’s come up. Can I call you back in a few minutes?”
“I’m heading out for the evening, but why don’t you try me before you go to bed.”
“Okay. Have fun.”
Off the phone, I hand the magazine back to Madison. “Keep it or I’ll toss it. I’m not interested.”
“Don’t you want to see what they say?”
“I saw enough.”
“There are more photos, too, on their Web site.” She pauses, then growls, raking the air with another imaginary claw. “Cougar.”
“Madison, you’re fired.” I make a shooing motion. “Now go away.”
She just laughs and opens the magazine again to read aloud, “Who’s Purring Now?” She pauses to look down at me. “Hollywood hottie Trevor Campbell and veteran entertainment anchor Tiana Tomlinson continue their romance in the City of Love. With displays of affection like this, can the pitter-patter of little cubs be far behind?” She stops reading, looks at me. “Cute.”
“It’s revolting and you know it.”
“You have to appreciate how hard they’re trying to run with the cougar theme.”
“No, I don’t.” I grimace, seriously nauseated by the piece. “Now do go away before I do fire you.”
“You won’t fire me. I’m your Valium. I keep you sane.”
“Uh, not right now.”
Madison leans over my desk, plants the open pages in front of me. “You have to admit he is yummy. Look at him— ”
“Madison.”
“Everybody says he’s the next Brad Pitt.” She straightens, snatches back the magazine. “Oh, and what I came to say was that Glenn wants to see you.”
I’m instantly on guard. I’ve already had one tense meeting with Glenn. I’m not ready for another. “Why?”
Her thin shoulders shift. “Why do you think?”
“Why don’t you just tell me?”
“He wants to know why every magazine and show is running this story but us.”
My phone buzzes and I pick up. Madison waves good-bye and I watch her leave, noticing she’s leaner than ever.
When Madison first started interning at the station two years ago, she was your typical midwestern college grad: smart, honest, earnest, and hardworking. She also looked like a healthy, normal American twenty-one-year-old. After two years in L.A. her hair is blonder, straighter, and she’s lost probably twenty-five pounds. Five, ten pounds ago I complimented her on her transformation, but now she’s just skinny. Not good. L.A. already has too many bobble heads.
The call is from Andrea, Glenn’s personal assistant. “Yes, Andrea?”
“Glenn wants to know why you’re not already in his office,” Andrea announces cheerfully. “He said to tell you that no woman makes him wait the way you do.”
“Tell him it’s good for him.” I take a deep breath, inject warmth into my voice. “And let him know I’m on the way.”
I grab a bottle of water from the break room and head for Glenn’s office. His door is open, and he motions for me to sit down.
“I want to run the story and photos, Tia,” Glenn says without further preliminaries. “He’s hot, you’re ours, and everyone else is talking about your trip. Why can’t we?”
Good old Glenn. Tall, thin, with curly graying hair, he’s smart and tough and a great producer. But it’s not his life he’s wanting to put on the seven o’clock show.
I cross one leg over the other. “Because it’d be like discussing your daughter’s sex life on TV, Glenn.” I smile sympathetically. “It’s just not right.”
“Trevor’s not my daughter.”
“And I know I’m not your daughter, but where are our ethics? Journalists aren’t supposed to make the news, they report the news.” I lean back in my chair, smile pleasantly. Glenn’s an old bat, but we’ve been through a lot in the past six years, not the least being his son’s suicide and his wife’s battle with ovarian cancer. Thank God he still has his girls. The twins are twenty and smart and loving, and they completely dote on Dad. “But I’m feeling generous, Glenn. We can make a deal. You keep Shelby off my show and I’ll agree to gush a bit about sexy import Trevor Campbell.”
“Can’t make that deal, but I do want to run with some Paris romance on today’s show.”
Clutching my bottle of water, I close my eyes, hold my breath, and tell myself I’m not a sellout. This is business. This is what I have to do to stay alive.
And then I think about the show idea I’ve been working on these past few months in my free time. A show profiling extraordinary women, women with courage, strength, passion, and heart. Those women have to matter. Real women must matter.
Jaw set, I look at Glenn. “Will there ever be a place for real human interest stories in our format again? Or are those days long gone?”
“I don’t see those stories working with the new format, no.”
My heart sinks. Not just a proposed co-host, but a new format, too. I can’t believe it’s all changing so quickly. I can’t believe I have so little control. “What is the new format?”
“Hollywood buzz, high energy, lots of fun.”
“But we do that already.”
Glenn looks at me from beneath his bushy brows. “And you don’t like it. If you had your way, we’d be CNN and you’d be Anderson Cooper.”
He’s right, and I wrinkle my nose. “Would that be such a bad thing?”
“Not if you were a man on a news program. But we’re not the news, we’re entertainment, and we’ve got to entertain the folks, Tia, and that’s the part you have a hard time doing.”
But I didn’t always. “I’m still fun,” I say without too much conviction.
“Maybe i
t’s time you took a break. Did something different for a while— ”
“No.” I get to my feet, give him a tight smile. “I don’t want to leave and I don’t want a break. This is my home.”
Home, I find myself repeating during the taping of tonight’s show. Home. A sensitive topic for me.
I was fourteen when everything changed. Fourteen when I learned that life is precarious and death just a shadow beyond our doorstep. We’d just spent the day at the beach and were driving home. I was mad at the time, I forget why, and wasn’t talking to anyone. But I remember being mad, remember saying over and over beneath my breath that I hated them all, that I couldn’t wait to grow up and move away, that I couldn’t wait for my real life to begin.
And then in one instant it all changed. In one instant I lost them all— Mom, Dad, Willow, and Acacia. Willow, sixteen and the oldest of us, was at the wheel, but they say the accident wasn’t her fault, that it was the other car that swerved into our lane. I can’t help thinking though that if Dad had been driving he might have had better instincts. He might have braked or swerved the other way instead of plunging off the road and down the cliff.