Moonlight Over Seattle. Callie Endicott
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on the go constantly, she also missed it. But a business couldn’t be run on an occasional basis.
Jordan’s head cocked. “You have an odd expression.”
“I was thinking about choices. This is probably the longest I’ve stayed in one place since I was a kid. It seems strange in a way.”
His gaze sharpened. “Then that’s one of the costs of your decision to change careers?”
Nicole didn’t want to discuss what she thought or felt, but she had agreed to the interviews and intended to follow through.
“Yes,” she said, “if you want to call it a cost. I’m responsible for taking care of the agency until there are more of us here to fulfill our commitments. Being more mobile the way I used to be might be nice, though I rarely had time to simply appreciate the locations where I worked. Still, I got to see a lot, even if it was on the fly.”
Jordan had pulled out a notepad and written a bit before looking up once more. For a minute she was afraid he was going to imply again that she felt sorry for herself, which would tempt her to send his pad into the yard for Toby to use as a chew toy.
“Do you think you’ll be able to resist the freedom of travel?” he asked instead.
“I don’t intend to stay in Seattle three hundred and sixty-five days a year. Once the four of us are here, there will be some leeway. In the meantime, I made a choice about what I wanted to do with my life. It means I can’t do some things, but can do others, such as have a dog.”
Jordan looked at Toby. “He’s a pretty nice choice.”
“Yeah. Originally I wanted a large dog, but this guy charmed me into taking him instead. Maybe I’ll get a cat to keep him company when I’m out.”
“Two animals? I can imagine the look on Helen’s face if she had to clean up after them.”
“Helen?”
“She comes in once a week to clean my condo. She jokes that I’m Felix Unger, the neat freak from The Odd Couple.”
“But didn’t Felix hope to get back together with his wife?”
“So I’m like him in some ways, not in others. Besides, I’m not exactly a neat freak, I just like to have everything in its place.”
Jordan fell silent again and Nicole made a few more notes, trying to ignore his very male presence on her deck. It wasn’t easy. Tension emanated from him, as if just sitting while she worked was taxing his patience beyond its limit. Though he’d claimed otherwise, she sometimes wondered if he’d already written the articles and if interviewing her was just a pretense.
Nicole mentally slapped herself. It was hypocritical to condemn the guy before giving him a chance to prove himself. If the PostModern articles turned out to be pure opinion, the same as his columns, then she’d know the truth.
She glanced at him from beneath her eye lashes. He was good-looking enough to be a model himself, though there was no telling how his looks would translate into photographs.
Saving her work after another half hour, Nicole looked at Jordan. “It’s nice that you didn’t just sit there watching me.”
“No problem.”
He exuded virile energy and she decided it was best that he was a reporter. She had never dated one, considering it far too much of a risk.
She was always frustrated when lingering pangs of longing for love and happily-ever-after threatened her peace of mind. It wasn’t that she wanted something like that with Jordan, but sitting on the deck with him was a reminder of the old dream.
Surely her disquiet was related to the radical changes she’d made in her life. She was no longer doing the work that she had enjoyed and her friends couldn’t join her yet in the enterprise they’d planned together. Naturally she was unsettled.
“Something on your mind?” Jordan asked. “You have another odd expression.”
“Nothing important.”
* * *
“I’D LIKE TO SAY—even though we’re understandably wary toward each other—” Jordan stopped and grinned at Nicole’s wry glance. “I am worried about Chelsea. You’re right that she’s had a tough time and I appreciate your consideration toward her.”
“I’m not being considerate, at least not in a sentimental way. One of our goals at Moonlight Ventures is to help people be at their best. The way I see things, that applies to our employees, too, not just our clients.”
“So Moonlight Ventures is trying to develop talent, not just sell it?” he asked.
“Some people may need help to make their potential visible. Advertisers don’t have time to look beneath the surface. They want someone who’s already professional and able to project their best.”
“Then basically being an agent is teaching salesmanship, like washing a car and doing a tune-up for a used car lot.”
“That sounds cynical...which doesn’t surprise me. What I’ve read of your columns suggests you have a jaded view of human nature.”
His lips twisted. “The critics say I’m cynical, too, though I’ve noticed it hasn’t hurt my readership.”
“So you went from angry teenager to cynical columnist. Was it due to one grand event, or a process of continuing attrition?”
“A combination,” he admitted, not wanting to discuss his parents and their inability to stay faithful to each other. But he also hadn’t found life beyond his family’s home to be much of a counterbalance to his attitudes.
All the same, he didn’t think he was cynical—he was more of a skeptic, or perhaps a realist.
“In other words, you don’t like talking about it,” Nicole guessed. “That’s understandable. Disillusionments are also about our vulnerabilities and most of us keep our most tender spots hidden.”
“True. Do you plan on revealing any of your vulnerable spots?” he asked. He’d interviewed people who were experts at shifting the focus onto the interviewer and Nicole might be one of them.
She ran the tip of her tongue over her lip and he found himself wondering what it would be like to kiss her. Every move she made seemed to have a seductive edge to it, though he didn’t believe she was doing it deliberately. Trying to bemuse or seduce a reporter didn’t seem to be her style.
“No soft spots on display for a while,” she said and he had to think a moment to recall the question he’d asked about revealing her vulnerabilities. “You have to really trust someone to uncover that part of yourself.”
A flash of annoyance struck at the inference that she didn’t trust him, but Jordan reined in his feelings. After all, she had no reason to find him trustworthy and he’d already revealed he had biases. A rational person wouldn’t trust him.
“Is there anything I can do to gain your trust?” he asked.
Reaching her hands high in the air, she stretched and yawned. “Who knows?”
Jordan’s muscles tensed. Her motions were alluring, but he still didn’t think she was being consciously seductive.
One thing was for sure—Nicole hadn’t dropped out of the fashion scene because her looks were fading, which was what a few disgruntled journalists had suggested when they couldn’t get an interview. In fact, she looked better than ever, with naturally gold hair and the same vibrant blue eyes he remembered—no enhancement from colored contact lenses needed. She also exuded sexy vitality, so he didn’t believe illness had led to her hiatus.
Another possibility was a personal issue, such as a love affair or a relationship that had gone bad. He’d tested those waters already and would return to it when the timing was right.
Settling against the high-backed