by K. N. Casper
The compliment, coming from Renn, especially in association with Clark, sent a warm glow through her, followed immediately by the sadness of his absence.
Renn put his hand on the door handle at the top of the stairs. “Let’s see what the dragon lady has to say.”
They stepped into the carpeted hallway and walked down to the VP’s suite. The outer reception area was empty; Maxine had already left for the day.
“Let me handle this,” Renn whispered, as they approached Faye’s open door.
Marlee hated the idea of standing mutely by while someone else defended her, but Renn wasn’t just anyone. He was her boss. She trusted him, and he could probably get away with things she couldn’t.
“Depends on her and what she says,” she murmured in reply.
“Please,” he implored.
She nodded to acknowledge his plea, but she still reserved the right to speak in her own defense.
Faye was pacing behind her desk. There were two guest chairs. She didn’t invite either of her employees to take them.
“Do I have to remind you, Marlee, that this is ratings month?” she asked in a scathing tone. “When things are supposed to go smoothly around here, when people aren’t supposed to screw up.” She paused to catch her breath. “Your sportscast tonight was a disgrace. You embarrassed yourself and made this station look ridiculous. You also did a shameful disservice to the memory of Clark Van Pelt, the guy you claim to respect so much.”
Marlee was stunned by the vitriol of Faye’s attack. She could understand her outrage at the screwup, but invoking Clark’s name against her was more than Marlee could bear, especially after Renn had just complimented her on the way she’d handled the situation. She started to open her mouth to speak.
“Just a minute,” Renn cut her off. “That last remark was totally uncalled for, Faye. You owe Marlee an apology.”
His boss glared at him.
“Yes, the tapes got mixed up,” he continued. “It’s unfortunate, but those things happen. I don’t know exactly why, because you didn’t give me a chance to find out. I’ll investigate and make sure it doesn’t happen again, but putting the blame solely on Marlee is unreasonable and unfair.”
Faye was clearly flustered by the force of his reaction.
“It was her broadcast,” she argued back, her voice raised. “She’s responsible for what goes on during it.”
“So if a tape breaks or the power fails, it’s her fault? Come on, Faye. You know better than that. This station and everything that happens here is a team effort. Each of us has to depend on and have confidence in the people we work with. Let me check into this and find out where the weak link is.”
“You better.” She peered at Marlee. “I’m putting you on notice, as of now. If our ratings fall, it’ll be because of your sportscast today, and I promise you, it will have consequences. The same goes if any more of your segments are messed up—for whatever reason. Is that clear?”
Marlee worked her jaw, not in shame, but in building anger at the woman’s immoderate attitude.
“Now, get out of here. And Renn,” she added, as he turned to leave, “I’m holding you personally responsible for this, too.”
At the bottom of the stairs, Renn gazed at Marlee, his expression sympathetic. “Don’t let her diatribe bother you. She’s just blowing off steam. Ratings week isn’t a good time for the system to go FUBAR.” He smiled.
Marlee didn’t. “She blames me.”
“Because you’re the easiest target.” He put his arm around her shoulders. The warmth and gentle strength of his touch smothered for a moment her anger and hurt.
“Relax,” he murmured in her ear. “We’ll straighten this out.”
She wanted to believe him, and with his body so close to hers, not falling under the spell of his confidence was hard. But someone had sabotaged her.
They returned to the newsroom. Most of the day staff had gone home, replaced with the much smaller evening crew. Mickey Grimes was sitting at his desk, sorting through messages and notes.
He glanced up and tilted his head toward the stairwell door. “I guess she’s on the warpath, huh?”
Marlee snorted. “In full paint.”
“Mix-ups happen,” he said. “The timing on this one was really rotten. You handled it like a pro. I’ll give you that. Keeping your cool…ya done good, girl.”
“Thanks,” Marlee said with a wry twist of her mouth. “Now, if only Faye and our viewers see it that way.”
He rose to his feet. “I’m getting ready to take my dinner break. You guys care to join me? All-you-can-eat spaghetti and meatballs tonight at Luigi’s.”
“You’re not going home to eat?” Marlee asked. “Where’s Lilly?”
“Visiting her sister in Abilene. Cassie had a baby girl a couple of days ago, and Lilly couldn’t stay away.”
“Congratulations, Unc.” Renn held out his hand.
He laughed. “I didn’t have anything to do with it, but thanks anyway. You coming?”
Renn shook his head. “Maybe another time.”
“You’re missing great garlic bread. See you later.”
He snaked out from behind his desk and with a wave headed for the front door.
“Let’s talk to Dex,” Renn suggested to Marlee.
As soon as they entered the control booth, Dexter Lamont held up his hands and backed away. “I swear I put those tapes in exactly the way they were given to me. Marlee,” he implored, “you know I wouldn’t mess up your broadcast.”
“Do you still have them stacked in the order you showed them?” Renn asked him.
“Right here.” He motioned to the work counter of the equipment console a couple of feet away. “Just like they were handed to me.”
Renn nodded to Marlee. “Could the sequence have gotten reversed?”
She shook her head. “I considered that when we were talking to Faye, but my first two clips appeared in the right sequence. It was only when I got to the local stuff that everything went haywire.”
“I swear,” Dexter repeated, “I played them exactly the way Quint delivered them to me.”
“Quint?” Marlee’s head shot up. “I gave them to Wayne.”
Renn’s eyes darkened. “Did he say anything to you when he handed them over?”
The technician’s dark brows narrowed. “Not as I recall. Just said they were for Marlee’s segment and left. Usually, he hangs around to gab. Sometimes, he helps me load them. But today, he seemed to be in a hurry.”
Renn thanked him.
“Maybe Quint put them down somewhere,” she speculated when they were in the hall, “and somebody checked to see what they were and got them out of sequence. Or he dropped them and didn’t realize he’d picked them up in the wrong order.”
She was groping and they both knew it.
“Possibly.” Renn said without conviction. “Let’s go find him.”
Quint ran into them in the hall. “I’ve been looking for you,” he said. “I don’t know what could have happened.” It was becoming a much repeated refrain.
“How did you get the tapes?” Marlee questioned him. “I gave them to Wayne.”
“He brought them to me in the editing bay and asked me if I would drop them off for him. Said his wife called and he had to run home. Something about the baby being sick.”
“What did you do with them?” Renn questioned.
“Took them directly to Dexter.”
“You didn’t put them down anywhere, maybe leave them for a minute to go to the rest room?”
He shook his head emphatically. “No. Even if I had, I would have taken them with me.”
“You’re certain you didn’t rearrange them?” Renn asked.
“Absolutely.” He looked worried. “Why would I?”
The guy had come a long way in the past two and a half months, thanks largely to Marlee, who’d assumed the role of coach and mentor, very much as Clark had for her.
“I don’t know. That’s why I’
m asking. Did you drop them on the way?”
“No.” He was angry now. “I took the stack exactly the way Wayne handed it to me and immediately walked down the hall and gave it to Dexter.” He fingered back his sandy-brown hair. “If I’d dropped the tapes I would have checked with you to make sure they were back in the right order. There was plenty of time.”
She touched his hand. “I believe you.”
Quint gazed at her a moment, nodded and returned to the editing bay.
“Come to my office and let’s discuss this,” Renn said to Marlee.
She followed. Her later sportscast would be essentially a repeat of the one she just did, except this time she would make certain the tapes were in their proper sequence.
“I don’t understand.” She took the seat across from her boss. “I can’t imagine Wayne doing this, not intentionally.”
“Especially after the way you went to bat for him,” Renn agreed.
“I suppose it’s possible he did it inadvertently.”
“More likely Quint fumbled and doesn’t want to admit it,” Renn posited.
“I don’t know. It seems out of character for him. If he was at fault, I think he’d own up—”
Renn saw the note on his desk to phone Glenda Soames. It was important. The time marked in the top-right corner indicated she’d called when they were upstairs with Faye.
“I wonder what she wants,” Marlee commented.
“You can never tell with Glenda.” He picked up the phone and dialed the number on the paper.
“Hi, Glenda, what’s up?”
“Is Marlee there with you?”
Smart woman. “She’s sitting across from me.”
“Have you figured out what happened to her telecast?”
“We’re looking into it now.”
“What I have to say is for both of you, so close the door and put me on speaker.”
He couldn’t help but smile. Always in charge. He was also intrigued. “Yes, ma’am.”
He obeyed orders.
“I caught the sportscast this afternoon,” Glenda said, “and saw what happened. Honey, you handled it perfectly. Clark would have been damn proud of you.”
Marlee bit her lip. “Thanks.”
“But that’s not the reason I called. I overheard something this morning I didn’t think much about at the time. I suspect now it might be significant.”
Renn exchanged glances with Marlee, both of them equally baffled.
“This was before you came in, and Renn, I don’t think you’d returned from lunch yet. Anyway, I stopped by to oversee a commercial that was being shot. When I pulled up in the parking lot, I was surprised to find Tag’s car there, since he doesn’t usually deign to show his pretty face on days that he isn’t due to go on the air.”
“Did you know he was here today?” Marlee asked Renn.
He shook his head.
“He was in the lounge,” Glenda continued, “with Wayne Prentice.”
Renn and Marlee stared at each other.
“They didn’t see me,” Glenda went on, but I managed to overhear part of their conversation. Taggart was playing the big-daddy role, if you can believe that, telling the kid he had great talent with a camera, but that the real money was on the other end of the lens.”
“I don’t imagine that took much convincing,” Marlee commented. “Wayne’s never made any secret of his ambition to be a reporter.”
“Well, here’s the important part. Taggart said you’d blown any chance of becoming sports director with all your screwups, and that Faye was only waiting for the dust to settle to give the job to him. He said if Prentice wanted to stay on at KNCS when Tag took over, he’d have to make up for ruining the Parcells interview and show he wanted to be on the winning team, not Marlee’s. If he did, Tag promised to make him a reporter, with plenty of airtime.”
Marlee lowered her head.
“What did Wayne say?” Renn asked, after a pause.
“Mumbled something I didn’t catch. Whatever it was, Taggart didn’t sound pleased. I figured Prentice had enough loyalty and integrity to tell him to take a flying leap, so I didn’t give it any more thought.” Glenda huffed. “After what happened this afternoon, I’m beginning to wonder. Whoever sabotaged your telecast, you can be sure Taggart was behind it. Maybe Faye, too.”
Renn didn’t agree. “She wouldn’t undermine her own position as VP by doing something like this during ratings week.”
“Taggart, on the other hand, has nothing to lose,” Glenda observed.
The room and the telephone line remained silent for a long minute while Renn watched Marlee. She was hurt and had every right to be. He looked for anger, but it hadn’t surfaced yet. He knew it would in time.
“Thanks, Glenda,” he finally said. “I appreciate your calling.”
He hit the button that ended the connection.
Marlee worked her lips in and out, her eyes pink, her expression blank. Renn waited.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
MARLEE REACHED for the phone and dialed a number.
“Hi, Kim,” she said into the receiver. “Haven’t talked to you in a while. How’s that sweet little three-month-old? I heard you called because Johnny was sick. You didn’t? Oh, I guess I misunderstood. Must have been somebody else. I’m glad to hear the little guy’s okay. Uh, Kim, is Wayne there? I need to talk to him. He’s not home yet?” Marlee looked over at Renn. “Well, when he does come in, would you let him know I figured out what went wrong this afternoon. He’ll understand. Yes. Tell him I’ll see him Monday. Yeah, you have a good weekend, too. I’m glad the baby’s doing so well.”
“She didn’t call about a sick kid,” Renn stated, when Marlee hung up.
“Johnny’s fine and Wayne isn’t home yet,” Marlee reiterated.
Renn shook his head sadly. “I’m sorry, Marlee. You went to bat for the guy, and this is how he repays you.” His tone hardened. “Well, you won’t have to worry about him sabotaging you anymore.”
“Don’t fire him,” she pleaded.
“What?” He gaped at her. “Why the hell not?”
“For one thing, we’re already shorthanded.”
“Darius Smith can take up the slack until we hire someone else.”
“The guy’s already pulling down nearly twenty hours of overtime a week. If you fire Wayne, the wrong people will get hurt.”
“You mean his wife and son.”
She nodded. “Besides, we really don’t know for sure. It’s a matter of finger-pointing. We can’t prove who rearranged the tapes or that it was intentional.”
“The circumstantial evidence is pretty convincing, Marlee. After what Glenda overheard… Stop and think about it. Why would Wayne even give the tapes to Quint when all he had to do was walk a few more yards down the hall and give them to Dexter himself?”
“I don’t think firing him is necessary,” she persisted.
He cocked his head to one side. “Mind telling me why?”
“People will figure out he was the one who mixed up the tapes, and everybody’ll be looking over his shoulder to make sure he doesn’t do it again. Under that kind of scrutiny, he may decide to quit on his own, but that’ll be his choice. I don’t want the reputation of getting him fired.”
Strange, Renn thought, some people would relish the power trip of being known as a hard-ass. Her approach, however, while it bore some merit and was filled with compassion, smacked to him more of weakness than strength. She was letting Prentice get away with stabbing her in the back.
“Are you sure?” he asked. “The guy did a number on you. You don’t owe him a damn thing.”
“I’m sure.”
He mulled her recommendation over for several minutes.
“I disagree with you on this, but I’ll respect your wishes. If you change your mind, let me know. Prentice can stew this weekend, but Monday morning, I’m putting him on probation. This is two strikes against him. If there’s one more incident in which he’s even remotely invo
lved—whether he’s directly at fault or not, he’s out of here.” It suddenly occurred to him that he sounded just like Faye. Had Marlee noticed? Did she think less of him for it?
“I’ll also inform Wayne he has you to thank for his job—again,” he said a moment later.
She nodded without saying a word.
Saturday, April 19
AUDREY’S WEEKEND had been delightful. Marlee had come over Saturday afternoon, and they’d gone shopping at the mall. Not that she bought much. The companionship was what mattered. Afterward, they’d rented a movie—a comedy—picked up some Thai takeout and returned home to relax with a bottle of premixed margaritas. For a few hours the numbing loneliness of widowhood had been banished.
She watched the sports news every evening to see how Marlee was doing, so she was aware of Friday’s debacle and was pretty sure it was at least partly responsible for Marlee’s surprise visit. That she used it as an excuse to drop by didn’t bother Audrey. Being needed and sought after for advice was what counted. Patiently, she waited for her adopted daughter to bring the subject up, which happened with the second salt-encrusted tequila drink.
“Renn was great,” she said happily. Audrey sensed more than pleasure at a compliment from her boss. “He said Clark would have been proud of me.”
“He’s right. You handled the situation like the pro you are.” Audrey managed a chuckle. “He’d probably have his chest puffed out like a proud papa, telling anyone who’d listen he taught you everything you know.”
“He did.”
When Marlee teetered on the edge of becoming maudlin, Audrey asked, “So what happened? How did your tapes get out of sequence?”
The explanation shocked her. “That ungrateful little twerp. I assume Renn fired him on the spot.”
“He wanted to, but I talked him out of it.”
“Why?”
Marlee’s rationale made a certain amount of sense. Audrey liked her compassion for Wayne’s family, the innocent victims of his dishonor, and she said so.
“But I really wonder if it was a good idea, honey,” she commented. “Renn’s right. You’ll spend all your time looking over your shoulder when he’s around. What about Taggart? Is Renn going to confront him?”