Thrill Me(18)
She wondered if he ever thought about the past. Before meeting him, she would have guessed they had to clear the air. But he didn’t seem to be upset about what had happened between them. Nor could she figure out a good way to broach the subject.
“Hey, Del, sorry I was such a bitch when I broke up with you.” No, that wasn’t going to happen. Maybe she would wait and see if there was a more organic way to have the conversation.
“Any celebrity contacts you can use?” he asked.
“I did the studio work in LA,” she told him. “The celebrities don’t know me.”
“Sorry you didn’t get to meet Ryan Gosling?”
“The pain keeps me up at night, but I’m dealing.”
He chuckled, then the humor faded. “How’d you get away from news?”
A question she’d asked herself a thousand times. “I was tempted by the devil and gave in,” she admitted, knowing it was true. “I’d been working my way up in local news, producing more and more segments. The gossip show gave me a chance to be in front of the camera.” Sadly, her lack of chemistry had made that a short-lived solution. “When that didn’t work, they offered me a promotion working behind the scenes. With the wisdom of hindsight, I’m pretty sure that was their plan all along. But they knew I would never have left the job I had to take the producer job.”
“Hard feelings?”
“No. I made the choices. I get to live with the consequences.”
“And now you’re here.”
She smiled. “So far, so good.”
“Except for Eddie and Gladys,” he teased.
“I’ll figure out how to get them to toe the line. Just in a way that doesn’t break their spirit. I like that they push boundaries.”
“You’re taking their side?”
“I’m saying creativity should always be encouraged.”
His shirt pocket beeped. He pulled out his phone and glanced at the screen. “Mayor Marsha. She said to ask you about the videos you did of me.” Both eyebrows rose. “Did I make it onto your celebrity show?”
“No,” she said, lying before she could stop herself. “Strange. I have no idea what she’s talking about.”
His dark eyes gave nothing away. “She must have you confused with someone else.”
“I’m sure that’s it.” She glanced down at her open folder. “I thought we could do a segment on Priscilla, the elephant, and her pony, Reno.”
“Who and who?”
She wasn’t sure if the distraction worked, but if he was willing to pretend, then she was, as well. Before she showed Del any videos she’d done, she needed to have someone else look at them. Someone she could trust to have her back. The last thing she wanted was for her ex-boyfriend/fiancé to think she’d spent the past ten years unable to get over him.
* * *
DEL HEADED ACROSS TOWN. He and Maya had plans to work on the videos starting in a few days. She still had preproduction schedules to work out, including renting equipment. While the camera was important, the right lenses could make or break a shoot. She would be renting the ones they needed.