Callie Endicott - Moonlight Over Seattle

“I was out of order,” he said quickly. “I genuinely want to listen to what you have to say. I can’t promise not to have other biases, but I’ll do my best not to let them influence what I write or my approach to the interviews.”

For a long moment Nicole regarded him suspiciously, then she nodded. “Very well. I have my own prejudices about reporters.”

“I’m not a reporter.”

“Right,” she drawled with patent disbelief.

“Okay, for the moment I’m sort of a reporter. I’ve been one in the past and might be again, on a limited basis.”

“Acknowledging your problem is the first step on the road to recovery.”

Jordan glared. “Very funny.”

“I thought so, but I’m just the total idiot who didn’t even know to use a primer when painting over bright colors, right?”

“I never said that.”

“You didn’t have to, your tone said it all. Not to mention the expression on your face.”

He wanted to deny it, but he had been surprised she didn’t know something that seemed basic to him. Yet even Syd—who was a very sharp lady—hadn’t known about primer, nor her husband, who was a brilliant neurosurgeon. All at once Jordan was reminded of an editor he’d known when starting in the business. Fred had been fond of saying “intelligence and information are different beasts.”

“In case it’s too basic for you to understand, everybody has to start somewhere,” Nicole continued. “The clerk was frantically busy at the hardware store when I bought the paint and somehow he didn’t tell me about primer.”

“Did you get better advice when you went in this time?” Jordan asked, wondering if the clerk had been distracted by Nicole’s physical attributes. His own brain had short-circuited earlier that afternoon for the same reason, though he didn’t think he’d been obvious about it.

“I hope so. This time a woman helped me. She was very professional. Tell me, is it possible for a woman to be as smart as a man about painting?” Nicole’s voice dripped sarcasm.

Oh, Lord. Jordan felt a chasm opening at his feet. Not only had he opened himself to claims of journalistic bias, now she was challenging him about male chauvinism.

“Absolutely,” he said. But a measure of self-honesty made him wonder if he still possessed caveman attitudes on some level. His sisters teased him about it now and then, but he’d figured it was just sisters being sisters. After all, if he was a total caveman he would have run Chelsea’s latest boyfriend off with a bat and told him to stay away from her.

“I’d forgotten you were a runner,” he said, pushing the thought aside. He wasn’t crazy about doing emotional inventories at the best of times.

Nicole flashed a smile. “What’s wrong, didn’t the research department include my being a runner in their file on me?”

“What makes you think I have a file?”

“Jordan, no matter what some people assume about models, we have brains. A file comes with the territory. The PostModern research department must have worked overtime to get you all the available details.”

“Does it bother you to think I have a file?”

“Being a reporter makes you bothersome, the rest just goes with the territory. I’ll admit I wouldn’t mind checking it for accuracy. Reporters have gotten things wrong so often it’s laughable.”

“I don’t understand how you can complain about reporters when you’ve benefited from them making you even more famous. PostModern is also publishing these articles because of your fame, and your agency will profit by it.”

“Fame isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” she returned. “I haven’t sought out publicity and have always tried to have a private life, which the press seems to resent. Sure, I’ve modeled clothing, represented various products and said lines in television commercials—that’s my job—but I’ve never been on reality TV and haven’t cared if my name was known to anyone except photographers, agents and people wanting to hire me.”

“Don’t be a hypocrite. They wanted you in those ads because everyone knows who you are.”

“Not everyone. My face is known in some circles, but my name wouldn’t be familiar if it wasn’t for the paparazzi following me around and trying to dig up saucy little fictions to titillate their readers. Which, by the way, the legitimate press has often repeated without an ounce of proof. I hope PostModern won’t follow suit.”

Jordan closed his eyes, partly to collect his thoughts, and partly to shut out the impact of Nicole’s well-formed figure. For years—in the rare times he thought about her—he’d seen her as a face in a photograph. A face that reminded him of old annoyances. In person, she exuded a vibrant energy that sent his senses reeling.

“I’m doing a genuine interview,” he said, looking at her again. “PostModern doesn’t want sensationalistic stories. The editor demands in-depth material about real people. Right now she’s interested in individuals who make radical changes in their lives, what their challenges are and how they find fulfillment.”

Nicole’s chin rose. “If that’s really the story you’re planning, then I’m in, but don’t expect me to put up with any garbage. I’ll give as good as I get.”

Somehow, Jordan didn’t doubt that for a second. She stood there, devoid of makeup or glamorous trappings, angry and full of life...and he was struck by her beauty in a way he’d never felt before today.

It annoyed him all over again.

Of course she was beautiful; she’d been the classic golden-haired tot and had grown into a sexy, gorgeous woman whose image was used to sell products around the world. He’d seen her on magazine covers and in television ads for most of his life. But he had never been personally attracted to her when looking at photos or watching ads, and hadn’t expected to be on this assignment.

But his hormones had jumped to attention, the lousy traitors. He left as quickly as possible to go home and take another shower.

A cold one this time.

* * *

NICOLE RESISTED SLAMMING the door as Jordan left. She’d been foolish to let him into her house to either eat or paint. It would have been best to keep things formal, meeting at the office and doing standard interviews.

But at least he’d revealed his biases ahead of the game. And as she’d admitted, she had her own biases when it came to reporters, particularly the ones she classed as paparazzi. She shuddered, remembering the woman who’d gotten a job as a hotel maid and then gone through her letters, even sneaking a photo of her coming out of the bathroom wearing only a towel. That member of the “press” had worked for one of the sleaziest rags going.

But Jordan wasn’t sleazy. However sardonic he sounded in his columns, they were also intelligent. Initially she’d expected to make fun of his writing and ideas; instead, he had mostly impressed her, tending to look at subjects from a different point of view and make his readers think about the ways things worked in the world. Maybe his articles weren’t always as deep as they could be—with a breezy, entertaining tone—but how much depth was possible in such a short format?

He was also quite clear about where he was coming from. If he wrote about kids, he reiterated that he wasn’t a parent himself and never expected to be. The same with marriage, saying he was happily single and intended remaining that way. Maybe he’d do something similar with the articles he planned to write for PostModern, being frank about their dislike for each other as kids and how that could affect what he was writing.

It might even be better this way. Another reporter would probably have preconceptions as well, but it would have been harder to get at them. With Jordan everything was out in the open from the get-go.