Sweet Anger(27)
Eagerly she followed him into his private office, which he rarely frequented. The glass-walled room sat adjacent to the newsroom and provided the news director a view of what was going on, who was available, who was busy, who wasn’t. When Pinkie summoned someone into the inner chamber, it was usually for a serious discussion. After closing the door, he sat behind the desk and Kari took the chair across from it. “Why?” he asked without preamble.
She blinked. “Why what?”
“Why do you want the city hall beat?”
“I had it before I married Thomas. You know why I gave it up then, and you also know it’s always been my first love.”
“Uh-huh,” Pinkie didn’t sound convinced. He lit another cigarette and watched her through the rising smoke. “You’ve made a niche for yourself on that entertainment beat.”
“But I’m bored with it, Pinkie. I miss the city hall. I still have well-placed sources over there.”
“That’s a helluva sales pitch, Kari, but this ain’t no dumbo you’re talking to.” He propped his stocky arms on the edge of the desk and leaned forward. “You want that beat so you can cook Hunter McKee’s goose.”
Guiltily she looked down at her hands. “I’m a good reporter, Pinkie. I wouldn’t let my personal feelings color my journalistic judgment.” He glared at her suspiciously and she cried, “I wouldn’t!”
He sat back in his chair and hitched one foot over the corner of the desk. “What’s going to happen to your spot on the news? Hypothetically. I’m not saying you’ve got the other job yet.”
“Give the entertainment segment to Sally Jenkins. She did an okay job while I was away.”
“You know the business, Kari. It’s cutthroat. Sometimes you come back from vacation to learn you have no job. If you give up that peachy spot to Miss T. and A. and screw up over there,” he hitched his head in the direction of downtown, “there’ll be no coming back. Are you prepared to take that chance?”
“I won’t screw up. Don’t you believe in my ability anymore?”
“Yes. But I also believe that you’re a woman who thinks and feels things passionately. You’re also stubborn. You’ve got this grudge against the D.A. and—”
“It’s not a grudge.”
“The hell it’s not!” Pinkie snapped. “Don’t play word games with me. Grudge is probably too mild a word for what you feel toward him.” He aimed his index finger at the tip of her nose. “I don’t want this newsroom to get in a battle with McKee.”
“I would never let that happen.”
“You’d better make damn sure you don’t,” he said, as his feet hit the floor.
Her eyes lit up. “Then I have it?”
“You have it.”
“Thanks, Pinkie,” she said, surging to her feet. “When?”
“Dick’s leaving at the end of the week. Monday?”
“Monday.” She spun on her heels to leave, then paused. “Can I reserve Mike Gonzales as my cameraman?”
“Are you going to ask for more money?”
“I hadn’t planned on it.”
“Then, you can have Mike.” He smiled at her and she laughed, fairly dancing with excitement. Pinkie came to his feet and took a drag of his cigarette. He didn’t look happy. “I love you like a daughter, Kari, so I’m going to warn you about something. Revenge is a two-sided blade. It usually comes right back and smacks you in the ass.”
She winced. “I’ll remember.”
Pinkie doubted seriously that she would.
“Kari, I don’t like this.”
“Come on, you big coward. Where’s your sense of adventure? Besides, what can they do to us if they catch us?”
Mike Gonzales moaned as he hauled the heavy camera and recorder up the stairs. A video camera on a hospital elevator attracted too much attention. That was what they were trying to avoid. “It’s not the hospital staff I’m worried about, it’s Pinkie.”
She laughed softly. “If we deliver him a tear-jerking story for the six o’clock news, he won’t care what we did to get it.”
“But the D.A. is going to raise hell. He didn’t keep this man’s whereabouts a secret for nothing, you know.”
“That’s what bothers me. Why the big secret? Why haven’t any of us seen this man since he was arrested for murdering his wife? What’s McKee up to?”
“How did you know this guy had a heart attack in his jail cell?”
“I overheard it at one of the coffee machines in the courthouse.” Mike chuckled. “My unwitting informers said he’d been taken to the hospital.”