Karli’s voice dipped to indicate that the story was over as she signed off, “Live, from the Three NewsFirst newsdesk, I’m Karli Lewis. Stu?”
“Riveting video, Karli,” Stu fairly crooned into the camera. “Great work by you and Three NewsFirst photographer Jake Gibson, with an exclusive on the largest Iowa drug bust in years.”
Karli heard Stu go on to thank her for the report and heard Chuck call for her mic to be closed. She took her earpiece out and sighed with relief as Mary Rose switched off the portable lights that had been trained on her at her desk.
“Thank you, Mary Rose, for the editing and the lighting in here and everything. You did a great job with all of it.”
“Hey, no worries, Karli,” said Mary Rose, running her hands back through her blended blue and pink hair. “You wrote a great story, tailored right to that video and audio—it was easy-peasey. And Jake kicked ass, didn’t he?”
Karli was grateful for Mary Rose’s easy-going response. The day had been so fraught with different, intense emotions that she didn’t think she could’ve handled one more temperamental coworker. Not only had Jake gone bonkers on her right after the bust, she’d had to coax her news director, producer, and assignment editor into letting her do the follow-up series of reports. Which was crazy, since she had enterprised the whole thing, doing preliminary research on drug-induced homicide, cartels in the midwest, addiction rates, and overdose deaths all in addition to the story and all in a single day.
Well, whatever. This was going to be the series that busted her out of Des Moines and into a real market. She had thought deeply about it, and the stories had all the ingredients: her writing and Jake’s shooting would bring out all the sweeping effects and deep public interest in the state’s—no, the region’s—drug problem, as well as the effects that almost certainly were felt as far away as, say, Chicago. Karli knew where this was headed: straight to a major market.
Karli spent the rest of the newscast going over the printouts of her research and her handwritten notes, making to-do lists and outlines for the upcoming series. As she was wrapping up her work for the day and putting her papers in a folder to be organized later, the newscast ended.
“What the hell do you think you’re up to?” Sophia Refai’s deeply feminine voice rolled across the newsroom like autumn thunder. Karli saw the lean, dark figure striding across the room toward her with less of Sophia’s usual runway-model’s stride and more the march of a uniformed officer about to enforce the law.
Oh, no, thought Karli. I’d forgotten about this angle. She looked around, as though the question must have been directed to someone else. But there was nobody else in the newsroom.
“Yes, you, Karli Lewis. The police beat is MY beat, and I do not appreciate you elbowing your way onto my turf,” Sophia said. Karli could tell that the anchor was only barely in control of her anger. “And I’m glad you’ve started the background on the series. Your research will come in handy as I report those stories.”
Karli was taken aback to see Sophia’s elegantly manicured hand outstretched, palm up, waiting to receive her notes and research. “You can’t have this stuff,” Karli gulped. “This is my work.
And Jerry already assigned the series to me.” Karli slid the folder between the chair seat and her rear end, then leaned back and folded her arms.
“We will see who gets the series. But I warn you, stay off my beat, or life here will become very difficult for you.” Sophia turned and marched back to the news set to record the evening’s promos to air during prime-time commercial breaks for the 10 o’clock show. Mary Rose, returning to the newsroom after putting away the camera and light kit, turned to watch the pacing fury, then turned back to Karli with her eyebrows raised in unspoken question.
“Just a little jealous that I covered a police story without her permission,” Karli said in answer to Mary Rose’s eyebrows.
“Just a little?” Mary Rose asked. “That’s enough that I’d change all my passwords and lock my desk if she was stomping around pissed at me like that.”
Not wanting to show that she’d been intimidated by the anchor’s fury, but grateful for the suggestion, Karli began clicking and typing to change her login password. She looked up at Mary Rose while she was making sure she could remember the new password and said, “I’d invite you out for a drink to celebrate the story, but I have to get my hair done. Maybe tomorrow?”
“That would be fun,” Mary Rose said, grinning while holding her lip-ring between her teeth. After a pause, she let go and said, “I really enjoyed working with you on the edit today and that animation a while ago. I’d like to do more stuff like that, but they always have me stuck in the studio or the control room. Let’s try for tomorrow.”
“Great,” said Karli, gathering her notes and purse and phone and stuffing them into her pack. “See you then.” And she grabbed her diet Dew and headed for the door before Sophia could come back off the set.
Once in her car, Karli’s day came rushing back at her. Jake had been such a hero this morning, coming back to work from leave to shoot amazing video for her. And he had put his vest on her before the action started. The video was exciting for her professionally: it was the kind of footage that could make major-market news directors sit up and pay attention, and it had obviously paved the way for her to get approval for the heroin series. The thought of the series revved her reporter’s motor and just had to be the fast way to a major market reporting job. It was exactly the kind of hard-hitting news that great careers were built on. If she could get someone to shoot video and edit the pieces as well as she was going to research and write them, there was every chance that the series would propel her to a genuinely good job in a real market.
But Jake was the only reliably great shooter and editor on staff, and he had gone all weird on her. Karli remembered the first encounter with the boss cop in the morning, and how very hostile he had been. Jake’s hands had been so strong and supportive when he’d strapped her into the vest right afterward that it felt almost as though he had caught her from a faint and lifted her into the vest. She had watched his soft brown curls wave around just under her chin as he’d checked the fastenings, and the wind had tossed them ever so slightly. That spicy smell, with maybe some vanilla mixed in, had wafted into her nose, too.
The memory of it caused her eyes to close and her head to tilt back to better re-live the sensation. With a quiet shudder, she realized that the day’s fatigue had made her unusually susceptible to sensations that she was usually too busy and preoccupied to give any attention at all. Jake’s scent hadn’t made any impression on her during the frantic action of the drug bust, but the memory of it came on with a rush.
But he’s such an asshole. He does all this great work and he looks like the regional representative for P90X and he smells like men’s magazines want to smell...and then he ditches me.
AGAIN.
And leaves me hanging out to dry with another HUGE story.
AGAIN.
He. Is. An. Ass. Hole.
Chapter Twelve
Salon Cut it Out!
Ingersoll Avenue, Des Moines
Tuesday evening, October 15
As Karli walked from her car to Trevor’s salon, she saw him recognize her through the window, give her a broad grin and wave, and practically skip to the employees-only door in back. After the stunning young receptionist had checked her name off the appointment book and walked her back to the chair, Trevor emerged from the back with clinking glasses in one hand and a foil-topped green bottle in the other. He set the flutes down at his station and began exposing the cork’s basket. “I know you just got off work and haven’t been to the gym yet, but Bailey was in at 5:00, and she said you scooped ‘em all today, so it’s time to celebrate.” He eased the cork out with a small pop and a wisp of cold gas.
Startled at the champagne treatment, Karli stuttered, “Trevor, you know I’m not much for drinking—and I’m going to the gym right after we’re done here.”
“There’s nothing to tell about anything, you goon.” Karli chuckled with warmth at the realization that Trevor really appreciated her and was kind enough to want to celebrate her accomplishment.
She took a sip of the champagne, at first reflexively in response to Trevor’s silent toast, then more deeply because the drily fruity wine was so much better than she’d expected. “I got a good tip,” she said, “and we went out and covered the bust, then I did the follow-up work, then I did the live shot from ten feet away. Ta-da! No biggie.”
“I know about the live shot—I actually watched the news tonight after Bailey told me to. You were great. And she says nobody else had video of the bust. That was exciting stuff. Did Mr. Hot do that for you?”
“He didn’t do it for me, Trevor. It’s his job to take pictures.” Karli realized that she was implicitly agreeing that Jake Gibson was, in fact, Mr. Hot. Oops.
“But he hasn’t been to work in ages, has he? Didn’t he come back just to shoot that story for you?”
“Of course not, Trevor.” Then Karli realized she wasn’t being entirely truthful. “Well, I did ask Vince to get him in, but that was for the story, not for me.” Even this, Karli knew as soon as the words were out of her mouth that she still wasn’t telling the whole truth. “Well,” she started again, determined this time to get it right, “I asked Vince to get Jake in to shoot this story so I could have it on my reel. The other shooters aren’t as consistently awesome as he is.”
“So he did come back just for you—I knew it!”
Oh. My. God. Karli thought to herself, hiding a surprised smile behind another sip of champagne. Champagne that was beginning to have, she noticed, a warmly dizzying effect. And the warmth increased as she finished her first thought: He came back to shoot for me.
Her iPhone buzzed: another text from her father. “Some of the BMOCs from your high school were at the golf outing yesterday—all out of law school or MBAs by now. All I had to do was mention your name and they were standing straighter and looking like the girls still in town could wait.” She shook her head in disgust and clicked the phone back to sleep.
“Anyway,” she said aloud, trying to get Trevor off the Mr. Hot subject (How many nicknames is this guy going to have?), “the story sets up a whole series on the heroin trade around here that I’m going to do during ratings sweeps next month. I’ve already started the background work, and it’s going to be awesome.” Hold it, Karli! she thought to herself, suddenly suspicious of the various warm feelings brought on by champagne and the thought that Jake had done the story especially for her. Do I have some obligation to Jake because he condescended to shoot my story? Am I supposed to be all ready to sex it up with him, like Trevor seems to think, just because he did his job and took pictures?
“Yeah, yeah,” Trevor’s voice cut off her grouchy line of thinking, and she brought her eyes back from the indefinite distance to see him deftly topping up her flute. “Tell me about today’s story. It looked scary on TV. What was it really like?”
“It was scary, Trevor.” Karli closed her eyes and thought back to the morning’s excitement. It was hard to believe that the long day’s deadline pressures had pushed the morning’s adrenaline-laced events nearly out of her memory. “The stun grenades and guns and doors crashing down and the shouting and shoving and stuff— that was crazy, and it happened so fast and furious.
“But that was so scary it was surreal, like an action movie come to life, you know?” Karli paused, recalling all the adrenaline that had crashed through her system during the bust. “And the boss of the cops—even he was scary. He tried to kick us out of the neighborhood, he tried to arrest Jake, and he tried to bully me. But he wasn’t all that. He folded when I called his bluff.” Like a video replaying in her head, the scenes with the In-Charge Man played back through Karli’s memory. Jake even took his Kevlar vest off and put it on me when I was talking to that man. That was dumb. He was about to launch into that bust, and he stopped to put his Kevlar on me. Why would he be so stupid?
After a longish pause while Karli went back over the morning’s excitement, she looked into Trevor’s kind eyes, paused, swallowed deeply, and said, “Jake took off his bulletproof vest and put it on me. That may have been the scariest thing that happened all morning, and I didn’t even know about it until we were on our way back to the station. I thought he’d brought a vest for me.”
Trevor’s face gaped in surprise. “Wow. He really gave you his bulletproof vest? That’s serious, Karli. That’s really a serious thing, isn’t it?” Then Trevor’s eyes flashed with realization: “So all those pictures of guns and drugs and cops drawing down on the guys—he shot all of that without a vest on? Inside the house and everything? Or did he put it on you after that?”
Smirking to herself, Karli thumbed her iPhone back to life and quickly tapped out a message to her father: “The men here have walked in front of loaded guns for me, just lately.”
“No, it was before he went in.” Karli took another deep drink from her flute. She really wasn’t going to go to the gym tonight after all this wine. “And I don’t know whether to feel contempt because he was so stupid or to feel like he’s some kind of modern-day knight in shining armor. I hate feeling stupid for not asking about vests beforehand and then showing up all clueless and damsel-in-distress.”
“Contempt?” Trevor shrieked. “He was ready to lay his life down for you and you’re turning your straight little nose up at him because he was being stupid? You really have no appreciation for what that means, do you?”
Surprised and feeling on the defensive because she hadn’t expected that reaction from Trevor, Karli tried to backpedal. “Not contempt, Trevor, not really. But it wasn’t the brightest move, after all, was it?”
Trevor’s mouth opened and shut like an aquarium fish’s. After a few seconds, he evidently decided that saying nothing was better than saying anything, so he put his glass up to his mouth by way of filling it with something other than the words that wouldn’t come.
Karli watched and tried to get hold of her racing emotions. He came back just for me, and he gave me his vest, and that probably makes him a real hero.
Trevor had evidently given up on the conversation, as he had set down his glass and began wrapping a cape around Karli in preparation for her trim. While he busied himself with brushing out and oiling a clipper, she emptied her glass with a long, steady series of swallows. She took a hard look at herself in the mirror. Why is contempt so much more convenient?
Her phone alerted again: “Rational men play on the golf course, not in front of loaded guns.”
Chapter Thirteen
Three NewsFirst Six O’Clock News broadcast
Coda Lounge, Savery Hotel
Saturday, November 16
The monitor over the bar showed Stu Heintz’s eyebrows riding high on his heavily made-up forehead. “That’s all coming in the next week, Sophia?” he asked, his thin baritone betraying genuine surprise. “I’m sure everyone in the Three NewsFirst viewing audience will be tuned in for your series. Heroin throughout Iowa—that’s a story that has been under-covered for some time, and I for one had no idea how far-reaching the drug’s effects have become. Where will you be for your report on Three NewsFirst’s six o’clock news on Monday?”
The director cut from the two-shot of Stu and Sophia on set to a head-and-shoulders shot of Sophia, who answered, “We’re starting at the end, where there’s some hope about heroin. A federal judge recently decided not to send Latrece Robinson to prison, even though she had pled guilty to selling heroin. Between the time she was first charged and the date of her sentencing two weeks ago, she had turned her life around. She not o
nly sought treatment to beat her addiction, she got a full-time job doing honest work. She also volunteered in a number of treatment centers, where she told other addicts about the hope she has found. We’ll meet Latrece and some of the people she is trying to help up and out of addiction. And we will hear what the federal judge had to say at her sentencing.”
Karli turned her face from the television over the bar at the Coda Lounge and furiously hissed to Bailey Barber, who sat on the bar stool next to her, and Mary Rose Mayer, who sat on her other side. “That’s all my work. I found her before the judge ever made her an easy story!” She lifted a full glass to her lips and drank deeply.
“Everyone who matters knows who did the work, Karli. Jerry, Vince, Holly—they all know,” Bailey replied.
“They don’t matter!” Karli shrilled. “The news directors at the networks matter. The news directors in Chicago and New York and San Francisco matter. Jerry, Vince and Holly do not matter.”
“Karli, get some perspective, girl,” Bailey said in tones of patience tried. “You haven’t even been in Des Moines six months yet. Don’t you think it’s a little soon to anticipate your meteoric rise to a top market?”
Mary Rose raised a significant eyebrow to the vigilant bartender, then indicated toward Karli with a slight tip of her head. He reached for bottles and began dispensing more of the evening’s remedy.
“Are you saying it’s too soon to be ambitious? Or that I’m too wet behind the ears? Or that I’m not good enough? Or what?” Torn between anger and frustration and humiliation, Karli reached for her half-empty glass, drained it, and set it down with a little more emphasis than she’d planned. Prepared for all contingencies, the consummately competent bartender placed a fresh drink in front of Karli while effortlessly swiping a bar towel around the spilled ice cubes and taking the empty away.
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