The Beginning of Always (5 page)

“My name,” I said.

She stopped and peeked over her shoulder at me. I licked my lips, tasting that cursed dust. The dust that had led me to this moment. “My name. It’s Alistair.”

“Al-esss-ter,” the girl repeated slowly. I braced myself. The boys at school mocked me and made fun of my name.

But Florence beamed widely, her arresting blue eyes twinkling in the high sun. “I love it. It sounds special.”

And with that, I gifted Florence Vita Reynolds with a rare occurrence.

A smile.

Chapter 3

“R
eynolds!” Gordon Jones bellowed across the floor. Tracy shuddered behind the newspaper she was reading in my office.

“What does he want?” Tracy asked while riffling the paper down to her lap.

“Probably my next assignment.” I clicked my mouse around to close my open Internet windows and turned off the computer display with my other hand.

“Man, doesn’t sound good. Godspeed, young one,” she whispered in a dramatic tone while making the sign of the cross against her chest.

As I stood up and reached for a pile of papers across the desk, I rolled my eyes. “He’s all bark.”

“Bark or not, better you than me. Now if you’ll excuse moi, I’ll be running away. Later.” Tracy swung her legs off my desk, hiked her folded newspaper beneath her arm, hopped up to her feet, and left.

I sucked in a deep breath as I exited my office and made the long walk through the newsroom to Gordon’s office. People were milling about, tapping on keyboards, murmuring in quiet tones close together, and paid me no mind as I weaved my way through. As I crossed over past the copiers, Tracy made eye contact from her desk and winked.

Gordon Jones

Editor-In-Chief

The bright brass sign on his door shimmered in the daylight for a second before I pulled back up my shoulders and pushed open the heavy door.

“Hey, Gordon.” I entered the office and went straight up to his desk. I knew better than to sit down. There was no reason to prolong this meeting more than necessary, and parking myself in his cold leather chair would just invite a conversation I wasn’t so sure I wanted to have.

Gordon Jones’s bald head gleamed as brightly as the name tag on his door, and his suit enveloped his beefy shoulders in impeccable style, neither an audaciously bold stray speck of lint nor a single unintended crease disrupting the fabric.

Without redirecting his attention from his computer screen, Gordon said gruffly, “Alistair Blair, what do you know about him?”

I flinched internally but kept my face impassive. This wasn’t the first time I’d heard Alistair’s name since I’d moved back. He was everywhere, but thankfully mentioned pretty exclusively in a few specific circles. Namely finance, tabloids, business. I could avoid those sectors if I tried.

And hell, I had been trying and for the most part succeeding. Except now, Gordon glanced up from his screen to me with an impatient furrow on his brow. “Reynolds?”

I erred on the side of vagueness. “Real estate guy?”

“Yep.” Gordon swiveled around in his tall black leather chair and leaned back with his hands folded over his stomach. He was like a villain from a late-night B movie. “His team wants a profile. He’s never given an interview in his entire career, not even a goddamn personal statement. This is huge. I want you to do it.”

My heart plummeted to my knees. To my credit, I at least stopped my visceral reaction of sputtering. Or my second reaction, screaming. Avoidance of both reactions was good.

“Why us? Why me?” I said in a calm voice.

“Us, because we’re the best, and you, because your piece on the mayor last year was solid. Aces. Don’t screw this up. One shot. I’m talking morning shows once this is published.”

I couldn’t stop the edge sharpening along my voice. “While I thank you for your flattering words about the quality of my work and your concern for my capacity for ‘screwing up,’ do we want to do this? I mean, he’s not exactly the type we go for.”

“What type do we go for? Famous. Powerful. Rich. He’s all three, and he’s a handsome mother to boot. There’s mounds of interest in him and I’m looking to tap it.”

Gordon held up an old copy of the
Post
with Alistair’s face splashed across the front cover. A high-zoom paparazzi shot while Alistair was walking out of some nondescript high-rise in Midtown, no doubt. That chiseled jawline and intense glare stared off the page, and I quickly averted my gaze. Gordon Jones was right, handsome for sure.

Not that I needed to be reminded of that.

“Humina humina,” Gordon purred at me with a wag of his eyebrows.

I groaned audibly. “Gross, Gordon.” I gave up on my resolve and dropped gracelessly into the leather seats in front of his desk. “I mean, come on …”

Gordon threw the paper on his desk with a loud sigh. “Look, I know it’s not ideal, okay? You’ve just gotten back from abroad, and the first major assignment I give you is this guy. I’m not sure if you’re looking for another politician or prisoner of state. However, this will get you back into the swing of things here stateside. It’ll afford you solid connections, get your name out there. Despite what you think, not sticking around for the major news cycles hasn’t been great for your visibility. Doing an exclusive interview and exposé on this guy? As visible as you can afford. You can’t bribe your way to this kind of exposure.”

As much of a bastard as Gordon acted like, he was actually a pretty considerate man. Fair, and despite the rumors, he treated his writers and staff well. However, right now, even though I knew he was coming at this from an altruistic point of view, I kind of hated him for it. His logic trapped me, and any further protestations would incite raised eyebrows.

Still, I decided on go on the offensive as a last-ditch effort. If I was drowning, I might as well make a good show of floundering in chin-deep water. “Why are you so insistent on me doing this?”

Gordon looked back at me coolly. “You won’t sensationalize it. I trust you to write it as it needs to be written. Everyone else will twist it into either some boring-ass finance piece or an
Enquirer
he-was-Liz-Tracy’s-last-husband kind of business. You?” Gordon shook his head. “You’ll get it.”

I fingered my hair back from my face nervously. “Can I think about this? Get back to you tomorrow?”

“No,” Gordon snapped, his patience wearing thin. “He has a charity event tomorrow, and the writer needs to meet him there.”

“Umm …”

Gordon gave me an annoyed furrow of his brow. “What’s there to think about? Good, neat, easy, high-profile—you’ll reap more than the measly brain cells you’d sow on this guy. You pretty much have a vacation with the generous deadline. Otherwise, I’ll give it to Smith, and you saw what happened with the congressman. Senator nearly broke his nose at his idiotic questions.”

Great. There was no way out. I leaned forward and rubbed my forehead with the heel of my hand. “Okay. I’ll do it,” I sighed.

Gordon threw his hands into the air in frustration. “Hell yes, you’ll do it. Have to be stupid not to.” He stooped over to pull a file out of his bag, plopped it onto the desk and slid it towards me.

“It’s going to be a month-long assignment. You’re shadowing him until May.”

Now I really sputtered around my protest. “What’s the deal? This is what, fifteen hundred words? Maybe two thousand? I need a day, two tops. I’m not writing a novel on the man.”

“His team wanted something lengthier, with more meat. They want to have an accurate portrayal, insisted on at least three weeks, if not four.”

I leaned forward and braced my hands on his desk, my heart slamming in panic in my chest. “You’re seriously going to put me on this? For
that
long? You’re going to pay my salary to follow a single guy? Pull me off everything? Is this even done?”

“The owner is insistent we land this interview, and if we don’t do it the way Blair’s camp wants it, they’ll go to the
NY Mag
, and you know I’d rather pull my fingernails out with pliers than to have that happen.”

“You talked to the owner about this?”

“I talked to his people, it came down the wire from up top. Point is, we’re bending over backwards for these people as need be. So three, four weeks it is.”

“This is not normal. This just isn’t done. It’s a waste of my time and totally unnecessar—”

“You’re not actually on anything at the moment, and besides, it’s exclusive-rights and the first ever. He’s never, ever given an interview. Press conferences, yeah. But personal crap? This is going to be some good stuff.” He grinned. “Good stuff.”

I dropped my head and sighed audibly. Gordon Jones had no idea.

Then … a thought skittered across my brain. Was Gordon in on something? This was too suspicious, too convenient … I was being forced to spend a month with Alistair in a wholly unconventional article setup. My first month back in the city and I was already being thrust into Alistair’s world. Either the universe hated me, or something smelled rank about this scenario.

I had to ask, Gordon’s questions be damned. “Did they request me? Did his camp specifically name me?”

Gordon’s brow knit in confusion, and I immediately knew. He had no idea what I was talking about. “No. They told me to find the best writer on my staff who could handle this assignment. I thought of you after I hung up with legal. Blair Properties doesn’t even know you exist.”

Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure about that. I sucked in a deep breath to calm my racing heart, then reached across the desk to pick up the file. As I got to my feet and turned towards the door, I heard that distinct squeak of leather as Gordon leaned forward in his chair.

“Hey. Reynolds,” he said. I turned around with one eyebrow arched in question. “Don’t screw this up.”

I give him a mocking thumbs-up. “I appreciate the faith. A real vote of confidence.”

Gordon brushed the comment away with a dismissive wave of his giant dustbin-sized palms in the air. “Yeah, yeah. But remember this: Blair is known as a heartless son of a bitch. Tread carefully. Record everything.”

Gordon went back to his computer and finished with one final statement.

“The man won’t be easy. Stand your ground.”

“
Alistair Blair?
” Tracy shrieked.

“Shh!” I waved my hands frenetically in front of her face. “Shut up!”

Tracy swiftly clasped both palms over her mouth and gawked. As soon as I’d returned from Gordon’s office, she’d ambushed me and all but bodily shoved me into my office.

“Oh. My. God,” Tracy squeaked behind her clasped palms. “I can’t believe it. Alistair Blair.” She lowered her hands slowly. “He’s like the hottest thing in Manhattan right now.”

That comment irritated me. I snapped, “He’s just a man.”

Tracy didn’t register my annoyance and instead splayed her fingers out on my desk and leaned into me. “Yeah! The richest self-made bachelor under thirty-five on this island! Doesn’t hurt that the man is freaking gorgeous!” Her fingers curled at the comment.

I glared at her hands, my anger mixing with dread. “Stop reading the tabloids. He’s not that rich. Nearly all of his assets are tied up in properties.” I didn’t argue about his looks. He was attractive.

But Tracy didn’t hear my protests. Instead she clutched her hands to her chest and sighed. “Ugh, envy! All I get is the city beat, where I’m interviewing old deli counter workers. I want a wealthy stud to shadow for a month!”

“Three weeks. Please, Tracy, stop. You’re being painfully shallow right now.” I was annoyed with Tracy’s reaction, but most of my ire was from the situation at large. Still, her excitement and desperate hunger was frustrating me. “You’re a grown-ass woman. Some rich idiot isn’t all that great.”

Tracy sighed and slumped back into the chair. “You’re no fun. So much for romance. Who knows, getting swept off your feet by a real estate prince might be just what you need. Hell, if you won’t do it, I’ll do it! Lord knows I need some.”

I slapped the table in frustration, harder than I intended. “Look, I’m going to interview the guy, write the profile, and then move on. Just like any other job.”

“Yeah, yeah, just like any other job.” Tracy pointed a long manicured nail at me. “Look, it doesn’t have to be this Blair dude, but you need to drop whatever baggage you have. It’s weighing you down … don’t you shake your head at me! You haven’t changed since college.”

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples, a headache oncoming. “Tracy … you might be right, but that’s not related to this job, or any job for that matter.”

“Oh, really?” Her incredulous tone made me pop my eyelids open, and she smirked. “You never thought of landing European royalty? Some Saudi oil tycoon? Businessman who owned half of Asia? You’ve met them all—you can’t tell me you’re immune to men in power. Especially the sexy ones.”

I wanted this conversation to be over.

“I don’t want to talk about this anymore. You asked what the job was, I told you. I’ll deal with the logistics myself. Besides, Alistair is the last guy I want to be around. I’ve had enough of him from ba—” I stuttered to a halt in midsentence.