“Hi,” Sydney said.
“Hey.”
“I was thinking…could we get some footage of you working?” She stepped into the room to allow Jeff in, and Anna pushed in after him.
“I thought it’d be a good idea to get some shots of you at your desk, you know?” Anna said, wandering the room, arms outstretched as if directing.“Maybe gazing out the window or—”
“No gazing,” Sydney said, wrestling control back from Anna. “Sitting at your desk, doing what you were just doing. That’ll be fine.”
“Really?” Anna said, cocking her head to the side and parking a hand on her hip. “You don’t think it’d make a cool shot to have her standing, like, here?” She went to the window and positioned herself near the frame, adopted a pensive expression. “Like this?”
“I think we’re good,” Sydney said, then looked to Connor for help.
“Sydney’s right,” he agreed belatedly. “At the desk is fine.”
Jessica watched this whole exchange as if she were at a tennis match, her head pivoting from one side of her office to the other, keeping her opinions to herself…though she almost burst out laughing when Anna actually pouted.
“Okay, Jeff,” Sydney said, arms out in front of her, hands forming a U. “I want you to walk in the doorway, start here on this wall. Make sure you get some of these drawings and letters. Then pan left toward the desk where Jessica will be sitting, doing…” Her voice trailed off for a moment as she looked at her. “Paperwork?”
Jessica grinned and gave a nod. “I do that.”
“Perfect. We’ll do a couple takes, okay?”
It didn’t take long. They were finished within twenty minutes, Sydney adding a tweak or a slight change here and there, moving things on the desk, adjusting the blinds for better lighting, things like that.
“I just have to say,” Sydney commented while Jeff packed up his equipment. “The camera loves you.”
“Doesn’t it?” Anna jumped in before Jessica could respond, though it didn’t stop the blush that crept up Jessica’s neck. “I’ve said that from the beginning. That’s why we began focusing on her when I came on board. It was my idea to make her the face of Junebug Farms. It’s impossible to photograph her badly.”
“I completely agree with that.” Sydney gave her a wink, which settled low in Jessica’s body, then took a deep breath and blew it out. “Okay. I think we’re done for today.”
Anna glanced at her watch. “Hey, what do you all say to hitting Happy Hour?”
Jeff and Connor immediately nodded. “We got in at six a.m.,” Connor said, gesturing to the cameraman. “And I’m pretty sure I speak for my friend here when I say we could both use a drink.”
“I know I could,” Anna said. “Sydney? What do you say?”
Much to Jessica’s surprise, Sydney turned to her. “How about you, Jessica? You up for it? I am if you are.”
Something about those blue-green eyes made it impossible for Jessica to say no, so she simply nodded.
“Great.” Sydney turned to Anna. “You have a place in mind?”
Half an hour later, Jessica pulled her car into the parking lot of The Dove House, continually thanking the Universe that Anna hadn’t chosen Sling, the local gay bar where she and Sydney had first met. The Dove House was fifteen minutes from the shelter, a suburban bar and grill, simple in its décor of dark wood and brass. Nineties pop emanated from the hidden speakers in the ceiling and the bartender was a substantial man named Mike who had a graying goatee, a neck tattoo, and who mixed a very good martini. Not Henry good, but good enough.
The five of them found a round table and took seats, Sydney situated between Anna and Jessica. Connor, Jeff, and Sydney all had beer. Anna was drinking a vodka tonic, which she lifted in toast.
“To a good day’s work that’s going to lead to a very successful telethon.”
They all clinked their glasses together at the center of the table with various words of agreement, then sipped.
For the next hour, they joked and laughed and the bar got busier, people stopping by on their way home from work. Jessica liked this group, she realized. Jeff was sort of quiet, but really nice. While he didn’t say a lot, Jessica got the impression he didn’t miss much. Connor had a dry wit and would send an unexpected zinger into the middle of a conversation that had everybody cracking up within moments. Sydney was pleasant and charming, surprisingly easy to talk to, even as she did her best to politely deflect the subtle flirting Anna was doing…which was getting less subtle by the minute.
“Seriously,” Anna was saying. “Have coffee with me. Just coffee. So we can get to know each other…a little better than last time.”
Jessica pretended to be listening to the conversation Connor and Jeff were having about stouts versus porters, but she kept her ears tuned to her right.
“Oh, I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” Sydney said quietly, obviously not wanting the entire table to hear.
“Come on,” Anna coaxed, not at all subscribing to the same volume control. “It’s just coffee. I won’t bite.” She paused for effect. “At first.” When Sydney didn’t respond, Anna softened her approach. “I promise. Just coffee. Please?”
Jessica couldn’t fight it any longer; she turned to them. And made direct eye contact with Sydney. Their gazes held for a beat until Jessica pulled hers away and made a point to refocus on the guys. She could almost feel the temperature drop near her right arm and she clenched her molars together when she heard Sydney say, “You know what? Yes. Let’s do it. Coffee it is.”
“Fantastic,” Anna said as she clapped her hands together once. “This weekend?”
“Let’s bump it to next week,” Sydney said, and Jessica had to commend her. Coffee on a weekday would take up much less time than on a weekend. She gave Sydney one imaginary point on the scoreboard in her head. But just one. Accepting the invitation at all had gotten her negative ten points, so she still had some recovering to do.
“Here, give me your phone.” Anna took Sydney’s phone from the table in front of her and began dialing. She handed it back and said, “There, now you have my number and I have yours,” as her own cell began to ring. She grinned widely as she pressed Accept.
That was enough. Jessica had reached her limit and she stood, her chair sliding back loudly on the wooden floor. “I’m exhausted,” she announced. “And I still have some work to get done, so I’m out of here.”
“Already?” Jeff asked, then blushed as he must have realized how that had come out.
“I’m afraid so,” she answered, but laid a hand on his beefy shoulder and squeezed. “Thank you for the drink.” She took in the rest of the table, carefully avoiding eye contact with Sydney, and shouldered her purse. “Everybody get home safely, all right?” With a wave, she hurried toward the door, not able to move fast enough, suddenly feeling as if all the air had been sucked from the bar and she couldn’t get a full breath. Once outside in the parking lot, she stopped next to her car, braced herself on the hood, and sucked in a huge lungful of air, feeling instantly better. Well. A little better.
By the time she got home, she felt almost like her normal self. She wasn’t a stupid woman, so she didn’t have to question why the evening had bothered her. She was slightly attracted to Sydney Taylor. Slightly. It wasn’t complicated math to do. No big deal. It happened. And it probably wouldn’t even ping her radar if it hadn’t been for Anna’s blatant fawning. But she had encouraged Anna to go after Sydney, so what was she so upset about?
“Did she have to be so freaking obvious?” Jessica asked Scooby as she held him up so they were nose to nose. “She was kind of pathetic,” she told him in a baby voice. “Yes, she was. Yes, she was.”
Nope. No big deal. A little bit of a crush, that was all. For God’s sake, the woman was a television news reporter. Most people probably had a crush on her; Jessica was not unique. She was sure of that. She shrugged it off, made herself a cup of decaf French vanilla coffee, and settled on he
r couch with her laptop, intending to work and channel surf.
She was twenty minutes into Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives and wondering if there was room in her backyard for a meat smoker when her phone dinged, indicating a text. It was from Anna.
Thnx for the encouragement. Coffee with Syd on Monday at 11. So psyched!
Jessica pinched the bridge of her nose for a full ten seconds, then typed back.
Good for you.
Tossing her phone to the couch cushion, Jessica stroked her hand over Fred’s soft fur and realized that, for the first time ever, she wished the telethon would hurry up and get here.
So that it would be over and she’d never have to see Sydney Taylor again.
But then she picked her phone back up to check her calendar and realized that she’d see Sydney again soon. Very soon.
Like, Monday morning.
At nine.
CHAPTER NINE
Monday morning, Sydney felt like she’d been run over by a steamroller. She’d hardly slept at all and when she had, it had been fitfully with weird dreams that she couldn’t remember now, but knew hadn’t been pleasant ones. The sound of her alarm had nearly given her a heart attack, and when she’d stumbled to the bathroom and gathered up enough courage to look at her reflection, she barely recognized the worn, haggard woman looking back at her. Coffee had helped. But not much.
The day was gray, clouds the color of an old, beat-up furnace hanging low in the sky. The forecast didn’t call for rain, but the air was heavy with moisture and Sydney could actually feel her hair frizzing on her head the second she stepped out of her car in the parking lot of Junebug Farms.
Sydney had spent the weekend surfing the Internet, checking the sites of stations she was interested in. She’d come across a couple that were requesting reels from prospective reporters and, after researching details on the cities, she’d sent hers off to three places: two in California, one in Indiana. She was trying hard not to obsessively check her e-mail, as it was way too soon for a response, but she couldn’t seem to help herself.
Like right now. She thumbed through the screens on her phone to give a glance to her inbox. Nothing. She blew out a breath, shouldered her bag, shut the car door, and headed into the shelter for her update meeting with Jessica Barstow.
I don’t know that I’d ever get used to this, she thought as she entered the front door and had her ears assaulted by the daily noises of an animal shelter. As had become her habit, she stood still for several moments, letting her brain acclimate to the shift in sound. Barking, whining, and the hum of conversation were standard, and she just needed a moment or two to find her footing, to steady her nerves, like allowing your eyes time to adjust to the dark.
“Hi there, Ms. Taylor!” The cheerful voice came from in front of her and to the right, and Sydney saw Regina – Volunteer waving at her, that huge smile of hers splitting her plump face in two, just like always. Seriously, how could you be sad with Regina – Volunteer grinning at you like that?
Sydney smiled and waved back as she headed toward the horseshoe-shaped front desk.
“You’re here for Ms. Barstow?” Regina asked her.
“I am.” Sydney leaned on the counter as Regina dialed her phone and then spoke into it at a totally normal volume. Sydney wondered how Jessica even heard her.
“She said to wait in the conference room and she’ll be right with you. Can I get you some coffee?”
“I would be forever indebted to you if you did,” Sydney said, knowing there wasn’t enough caffeine in the world to make her feel awake this morning, but she was still willing to give it a shot.
The door to the conference room was made of something heavy and it did a nice job muffling the cacophony of the lobby. Sydney sighed with relief as she sipped the coffee Regina had brought her. It was strong and sweet and could have used another creamer, but Sydney was happy just to have something that might help her feel more present. It was a big might, but it was there.
Sydney had just glanced at the clock on the wall, noted that it was nearly 9:10, when the door opened and Jessica came into the room wearing her usual perfectly fit jeans and a white button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to just below her elbows. The first three buttons were undone enough to entice Sydney to want to know what lay farther down. Thankfully, that was overshadowed by the fact that Jessica was followed closely by Anna, and a large, bald African-American man Sydney hadn’t met before. She stood, greeted Jessica and Anna with handshakes, and pretended not to notice the lack of eye contact from Jessica, even as she held onto her hand a beat longer than necessary, tightening her fingers just slightly enough when Jessica tried to pull away to force her to look up. Their eyes held for one delicious moment and Jessica’s cheeks tinted a soft pink.
“Sydney Taylor, this is David Peters,” Anna said by way of introduction. “He’s in charge of our fundraising, and he and I work together much of the time, so I thought he should sit in on this.”
“Absolutely. Nice to meet you, David.” Sydney shook his hand, watched as her own seemed to disappear in his huge palm. His grip was gently firm and his smile was warm. Sydney sat back down and opened the folder she brought, then touched her tablet so it woke up. “Okay, so this meeting is basically to update you guys and keep you in the loop as far as what we’re thinking for the telethon, what kinds of hooks and stories we’re working on, show you the path we’re taking, and make sure it all sits well with the shelter.” Nods went around the table and Sydney began her pitch, showing a list of short video stories they’d already done and more they had scheduled. Interviews with both volunteers and adopters would pepper the entire broadcast, hopefully bringing in more of each. “One of the biggest issues is that we need to skew a bit younger,” Sydney explained, finding David Peters’s intense eye contact and periodic nods reassuring. “That means shorter clips, a faster pace.” She snapped her fingers as she spoke.
“Janet was never about that,” Jessica said quietly, pulling Sydney’s focus her way.
“I know,” Sydney said with a nod. “I get that. But today’s attention span is very short. You have mere seconds to grab somebody or they’re on to the next thing, flipping the channel or leaving your stream to check their Twitter feed, so we have some ideas for that.” She went down a list she’d made, showed them a few examples of things other productions had run to give them a general idea what she was thinking. Anna and David both enthusiastically jumped on board. Jessica was a different story.
Sydney finished going over things, then turned fully toward Jessica, whose beautiful face of smooth, porcelain-like skin was marred by a deep, scowling frown as she shook her head back and forth almost imperceptibly. “What is it?” Sydney asked gently.
“Janet didn’t do any of this,” Jessica said.
“I know that.”
“Don’t worry, Jessica,” David said, resting a huge hand on Jessica’s bare forearm. The color contrast was almost shocking. “This is good stuff. I think pulling us more into the present, the whole shooting for a younger audience thing is really smart.”
“It really is,” Anna agreed, her smile almost comically wide. “Sydney has great ideas. Fantastic ones.”
If she hadn’t been watching at that very second, Sydney might have missed Jessica’s near-eye-roll at Anna’s words. But she saw it. And it was irritating.
What the hell is her problem?
“You have no reason to worry,” Sydney told her quietly, working hard to keep her voice steady and professional and not to show the annoyance she felt at Jessica’s sudden dissatisfaction.
“Well, I am worried,” Jessica said, her brow furrowed. “It’s very different.”
“Sometimes different is good, Jess.” Anna shifted in her chair, looked from Sydney to Jessica and back.
“Listen,” Sydney said, doing her best to keep her voice professional, to not sound annoyed at the sudden resistance, to not remind Jessica how freaking hard she had been working. “You don’t have to worry because
you’ll be very involved.” Sydney clicked on her tablet and went back several pages, showing some of the ideas she’d presented earlier. “This one, this one, this one, here, here, here. You will be directly involved in all of these things.”
Jessica’s brow furrowed further, creating a divot above the bridge of her nose that Sydney wanted to smooth away with her thumb. Which bugged her. Jessica looked at the screen in Sydney’s hand.
“Also,” Sydney said, pointing to the screen. “I think your tour video is great…”
From what she’d learned from Brad, Janet Dobson had had Jessica give her the basic tour of the shelter, but she’d brought a cameraman along and filmed the whole thing. At the beginning of each telethon, they played it to give viewers who might be unfamiliar, or who’d never visited, a chance to see the whole place. “I sense a ‘but’ coming,” Jessica said, not quite stifling her sigh.
“I think it’s time to update it. This is, what? Three years old?”
“Maybe four.”
“Exactly. We need to snazz it up a bit. Update it.”
“I think that’s a great idea,” David said. “Make it a little more modern. Add some music. Quicker edits. It’ll help us connect to our younger demographic.”
Sydney liked this guy. He got it.
“Exactly,” Sydney said with a nod and a grin. Jessica avoided her gaze, which was a little frustrating and…if Sydney was going to be honest, stung a bit. But she put on her best coaxing voice.
“Look,” Sydney said, softening her tone. “You’re the boss here. If there’s anything that’s not working for you, you just say so.” Sydney watched Jessica’s face, watched her absorb the words. “Okay?”
For the first time since the meeting began, Jessica finally looked her in the eye. The intensity of her gaze was so heavy, Sydney literally felt it in her chest, had to force herself to hold the contact. It felt a little…weird. And unnerving. And delicious. And Sydney felt her thighs clench reflexively. Damn it.
Dare to Stay (Puppy Love Romances Book 3) Page 9