WLUV Box Set: Ignited, Consumed, Burned (2 page)

Macy decided it was important for news organizations to see
what a professional network broadcaster looked like close up. She maintained
her whip-it thin figure mainly because she’d lost her appetite for food last
year during her humiliating fiasco with Phil, and it hadn’t returned. There was
an upside to heartbreak, apparently: she could slide into a size 6 black
designer business suit without too much trouble, despite being 5’6”.

She’d chosen a red silk blouse with a sharp collar to go
underneath.  These days she had to dye the hair at her temples because gray
hair peeked through what used to be all auburn. Now pushing 40, it took more
and more time to look the way she used to. If nothing else, she made sure she
wore heels, even in winter. That put her at 5’9.” It was good to be taller than
the people she wished to intimidate.

Small markets needed to see how to pull it together, and she
was a walking, talking example of what American News Consulting and Research
expected. It helped to put the local on-air talent on edge a bit. Her
appearance put egos in check. If they understood that she wasn’t just preaching
to them, that she herself could step in and do their jobs – blindfolded if need
be – a little humility entered the picture and the reporters and anchors were
more receptive to her coaching.

The lobby area was staffed by a college-aged kid who looked
Macy up and down and then let her stand there with her coat in hand.  After
buzzing someone named Bernie the girl proceeded to ignore Macy and attend to chewing
gum and texting.

Well
, Macy thought,
best to start with this kid
.

“What’s your name?” Macy asked.

“Brittany.” Of course it was.

“Brittany, from now on, when a guest enters the station,
you’ll take their coats, offer them coffee or water, and then let them know you
can get them anything else they may need. You are WLUV’s first impression, and
so far it’s not a good one.”

The girl blinked her eyes as though stung by the words. Then
she walked over and took Macy’s coat, “We don’t have coffee brewed, it will be
a minute.” Brittany said.

“It’s okay, I don’t need any. My job is to take things up a
notch or two around here, and you happen to be the first person I’ve met. I
think you’re going to be a fabulous receptionist, but you need to put the gum
in the trash and the cell phone down.”

Brittany fled down a hall. Macy figured her coat would be
flung on a floor somewhere.

A paunchy, balding man emerged from the same hall,
Brittany-in-flight barely registering with him.

“Ms. Green, hello. I’m Bernie Manfred, Executive Producer
here.” Bernie extended a hand past his rotund belly.

“Macy, call me Macy.”

“Macy, I was an admirer of your work at WNS. You were the
real deal.” People recognized Macy less and less these days; the public memory
was short. Usually, it was old-time news people –like Bernie, she figured – who
appreciated the hard news and investigations she’d done in her decade at the
network.

“Thank you.”

“Now you’re an evil consultant, almost as bad as going into
pee-arh.” Bernie laughed as he said it, but really he’d nailed down the general
feeling about news consultants— that they were to be hated and distrusted. Macy
didn’t expect her arrival to be met with good cheer. She was there to change
things and hold some feet to the fire.

“I’m too blunt to be in public relations, which you’ll
discover quickly.”  She thought she heard a faint groan of pain as Bernie led
her up a winding staircase in the center of the lobby to the station’s second
floor. Were the stairs hard on his knees, or was it the idea of the consultant
picking apart the station that had him groaning? Maybe both, Macy thought.

“The upstairs is sales and management. The first floor is
our studio, newsroom, and editing suites. We also do our commercial production
in there,” Bernie explained as they walked.

“Ya like the wallpaper? We’ve had the same stuff since
1978.” It was a Brady Bunch orange pattern, but Macy didn’t care about the
décor. She cared about the on-air product.

“Hi Mrs. King,” Bernie addressed the secretary outside the
owner’s office.

“He’s in there waiting.” Mrs. King didn’t get up but waved
them to the office door.

“Mr. Thompson?” Bernie offered a courtesy knock but since
the door was ajar he just pushed it open the rest of the way.

Macy tried not to let her jaw drop when she got a look at
Wes Thompson. She’d expected a middle-aged, overweight white guy in a crappy
suit, or a weak-chinned son-of-a-great-man.

Wes Thompson was none of the above; in fact, he looked more
like a well-built George Clooney. His crisp white dress shirt fit perfectly
over his muscular shoulders, and it was tailored so it skimmed his trim waist.
Thompson threw a distracted smile at Macy as he finished his phone call. Her
mouth went dry.

“If you could just get that sorted out, I’ll be in touch in
about a week.” He hung up with no further pleasantries. He was used to issuing
orders.

“Hi there, you’re the consultant?” Thompson stood up and
offered her a hand across his desk, locking his gorgeous blue eyes on hers. She
would kill for his lush eyelashes. But they were the only soft thing about his
face. From his strong jaw to his aquiline nose, Macy was afraid she was
staring. 

She’d seen thousands of attractive television faces but Wes
Thompson’s rugged good looks put them to shame. This man was quite possibly the
best-looking man she’d ever seen—but he wasn’t
pretty
in the slightest,
not like Phil. She estimated him at a couple inches over six-foot, since he was
a head taller than she was in her intimidating “network heels.”

Macy struggled to put her girlish reaction on lockdown. She
had a job to do and mooning over Wes Thompson was not on the WLUV rehab plan.
She felt a few flutters and clenches in places she didn’t want to think about
while at work, places that had been dormant for months...

 Why did she make a point of noticing he had no wedding ring
on? The very last thing she needed was a romantic complication in her life. She
put her coldest consultant face back on and got to work. She decided it was
best to barrel ahead with her plan of attack for WLUV.

“Hi. I’m Macy Green and I’ll be with you for about six
weeks. The normal way we operate is to come in and out,” Macy winced internally
at her own choice of words. “But since you’ve contracted with us at our gold
tier of service, I’m here to help you really get things ready for February
sweeps and then throughout the duration, if you like what you see.”

“I’m sure I do,” Wes said. 

Macy was pretty sure she was hearing things. Did he just go
right for double entendre? “What you see on the air, that is,” she clarified.

Bernie coughed a few times, and she thought she heard him chuckle.
This was not going exactly right. She stiffened her spine. Macy’s efforts were
always focused on things going exactly right.

“Yes, I told Dave Raynes we’d need the best and that there’s
a lot of work to be done here.” Apparently Wes and Dave Raynes, the co-owner of
ANCR, were acquainted. Macy reported directly to Raynes; she could not afford
to botch this job.

Bernie piped up, “I was going to give her the ten-cent
tour.”

“Actually Bernie, I’ve freed up my schedule this afternoon
so I’ll do the honors. I’m sure Macy here has a lot of questions and I know you
need to get back to the newsroom.” Wes effectively dismissed Bernie, and Macy
thought she saw the older man’s eyebrow lift as he turned to walk out. Even for
a washed-up newsman, he didn’t miss much.

“Yep, time to feed the news hole. I’m sure I’ll see you
later Macy. I’m at your service, consultant lady.” Bernie waddled out of the
office.

A small finger of panic arose as she realized she was now
alone with Mr. Wes Thompson. She’d never been so physically affected by another
person in her life. It was distracting, and it left her off balance. This is
what she got for living the life of a nun for the last year—she had the
internal reactions of a teenager when faced with a handsome man.

Edit that, a handsome,
sexy
man. No, no, a handsome,
sexy, muscular… Macy had to force herself to focus. She needed her brain right
now and it appeared her libido had taken control of the ship.

Wes walked from behind his desk and towards her.  She took a
reflexive step back, but he put his hand on the back of her shoulder to gently
pivot her focus to the wall of the office. Her nerve endings all jumped in
response. What was her problem? She couldn’t really feel his fingertips through
her suit coat and her silk blouse, but she swore each finger sent a jolt to her
skin. Out of nowhere, and instantly, this man thawed what she’d had packed away
in the ice box for ages. Since leaving Phil, she had no interest in any
entanglements.

Wes’s light touch moved to her shoulder blade to guide her
to where he wanted her to direct her focus. “Here, these pictures on the wall
will give you a little bit of history.  My dad was the original owner, but
things have gone to pot. I’d really like to see if there’s something to salvage
here if WLUV can be profitable.”

Macy looked at several framed black and white pictures on
the wall. A kid’s clown show, a cooking show, a weatherman doing his forecast
outside on a chalkboard, a couple of white guys with giant collars and
mustaches… either these were all nostalgic photos from the early days, or they
were photos of the cast of
Anchor Man.
“Great pictures, I can see why
the station is important to you and your family.”

 She knew she needed to minimize alone time with this man if
she wanted to stay in control. And she very desperately wanted to stay in
control. “Why don’t I get that tour that you mentioned? From there I can watch
tonight’s evening news product and see where to start.”

Wes directed a devastating smile in her direction, “Right
this way.” He shifted the pressure of his hand on her back while making a museum
tour guide gesture with the other.

Warning bells went off in her brain.
Danger, danger, Will
Robinson!
Wes’s sexy smile was clearly capable of melting even the coldest
corporate consultant’s heart. Macy feared that the tenuous grasp she had over
her new life was just waiting to unravel, and all he had done so far was smile
and touch her shoulder. 

She hoped Wes Thompson would be too busy to spend much time
with her in the next six weeks. Surely the station owner had better things to
do…terror gripped her chest when she realized he was looking at her like he was
starving and she was a juicy steak. Did he look at all women that way?
Probably. And it probably worked like crazy.

But if there was one thing she knew how to do, it was ignore
distraction and perform. She’d done live shots in battle zones, on the side of
highways, and even once while a steer took a shit behind her at the county
fair. She had a lot of work to do in this small-market disaster, and she could
perform the role of a cold-hearted consulting bitch no matter how steamy this
man was making her feel.

            Hopefully, Wes was a
hands-off kind of boss and she wouldn’t see too much of him. Except she also
hoped she’d see all of him. Somewhere inside, her subconscious was banging its
head against a wall.

The scent and sight of Macy Green stunned Wes. He smelled
Chanel No. 5 and something else, something uniquely her, as she walked in with
Bernie. She was fucking sexy as hell with a coiled up tension he hadn’t seen
from anyone he’d encountered in this sleepy town – or anywhere, really – in
years. She was sleek and professional in a business suit, but he was focused on
the button of her blouse straining in just the right spot across what he was
sure were beautiful breasts.

His jaw clenched as she sat opposite him and talked about
her time commitment to the station. He wasn’t exactly sure what she was saying
and tried not to notice her skirt hike upward a bit as she sat down. Who was
this vision?

Wes had been described as a playboy in his day, but Macy was
not his typical curvy little bombshell; she was something else entirely. He
reacted instantly to her face, he wanted to touch her hair…and God help him, he
wanted to release that button struggling against her breasts. It was an unfair
burden to put on one little button. He fought to repress the thoughts and urges
that had been ignited within just two minutes of meeting Macy Green.

When Bernie explained he was going to give the lovely Macy
the tour Wes decided that would be his job instead. He’d planned to let the
news consultant handle the newsroom and then meet with him a couple of times a
week as the term of the contract progressed. But the “he” turned out to be the
most delicious “she” he’d seen in years. After laying eyes on her, Wes mentally
rearranged his schedule so he could take a much more hands-on role with his new
consultant.

 As Macy gazed toward the pictures from the 1950s that
adorned Wes’ office he had the urge to plunge his fingers into that lush auburn
hair. Oh yes, he was going to be sure to work very closely with her. It was
good to be the boss for so many reasons, and right now Wes was relishing the
fact that he’d get to decide what to do with Miss Green‘s time— at least, he
hoped it was Miss. He glanced quickly at her hands. Likely, a woman who could
drop everything and live in another town for two months was unattached, but he
didn’t need to deal with that obstacle.

No ring. Ah ha.

Instead of enduring the coldest February in years at the
hands of his controlling father perhaps he’d have something much hotter, in the
form of Macy Green. WLUV was looking like it may turn into something much
better than the exile he’d anticipated.

Not that he was looking to complicate his life. He had
proven to be a preoccupied husband and made a much better ex-husband. But his
interest in curvy young blondes had waned in the last few years. Despite being
single, he’d lost interest in the women who constantly fawned all over him. This
woman was clearly not a fawner. He noticed, in fact, that she purposely
conveyed a no-nonsense style. It was admirable; she was focused on her job. It
was a job that would fail here at WLUV, ultimately, but she didn’t have to know
that.

As he walked Macy through the studio and the control room he
contemplated all kinds of things about her, like what color bra she was
wearing...

 “Do you one-man band it here?”

He heard her cultured and intelligent voice ask him the
question and he snapped out of his dirty thoughts. “Yes. We’re a small
operation so it makes financial sense.” A lot of stations had taken to
combining the photographer and reporter position so the reporter shot their own
material. It saved a lot of money on staff.

“I see a lot of resentment from staffers in one-man band
shops.  It really isn’t the best in terms of quality or news product. We’ll
need to talk about that.”

Great, she already wants to spend money at a station that’s
bleeding out. Of course. Why did women always want to spend his money? Maybe
Miss Green was just a higher-class version of the women he’d grown tired of,
the ones who liked him to buy them things.

Wes ushered Macy through a narrow hall and a producer ran
towards them. It was getting close to news time, and the pace was picking up
around them. The narrow hall meant that Macy had to press close to Wes so as to
not impede the frenzied producer. He pivoted her into an edit bay in one swift
move to avoid a collision. They were nose to nose in the small dark space.

“Whoa! I guess we’re almost to deadline,” she laughed, “I
like the intensity of some of the people here. That’s good. It’s half the
battle sometimes, getting that intensity.”

Wes watched Miss Green’s lips as she formed the word
“intensity.” It was a good description for her energy, actually. He wondered
what it would be like to be inside that intensity, and pretended not to notice
the more pronounced way her chest rose and fell while they were squeezed
together in the tight space.

“Urgency can be all the difference, in news – in a
newscast.” 

The cool Miss Green was slightly rattled. Good. That was
good news. “Urgency and intensity, number one and two on the list.” He made a
check mark in the air.

“Well, let’s watch the news. It’s almost six. I want to see
the live product today. Where do you suggest I do that?” Miss Green slid across
him without touching him, quite a feat in the closet-sized edit bay, until she
found herself in the hall.

“How about we watch in here?” Wes gestured towards the
glass-walled news director’s office. “He’s out today. Most days, actually,”

The office was a mess. The news director was one of the
biggest weaknesses of the newsroom, Wes thought. When he did show up, Pat
Walters usually smelled of liquor. It would be interesting to see how Miss
Green assessed the situation. Was she as tough as she tried to appear? Did she
have the guts to fire someone?

They sat in a few chairs at the conference table cluttered
with wrinkled paper and discarded coffee cups and turned on the newscast. Macy
then turned on the competitors in the other two monitors.

Her undivided attention on the monitors gave him the chance
to focus on her without seeming lecherous. He was certainly feeling lecherous,
but no need to scare the woman.

Macy’s hair sat in soft waves that fell just to her
shoulders. The auburn framed a pair of gorgeous green eyes that tilted slightly
up at the corners. He followed the line of her turned up nose to a set of
gorgeously full lips. He was imagining what they tasted like when she began to
mumble at the screens.

“Get off that shot. Where’s the video? Why are they just
standing there?”

Wes looked at the television. Apparently, these were all
things she was noticing as she watched WLUV Action News at Six. He wondered if
she knew it seemed insane, her muttering.

But it was easy to ignore her incoherent utterings by
letting his gaze follow her long neck to the hollow of her throat and the
collar of her silk top. She had ditched her blazer when the newscast started
and the look of her blouse tucked into her pencil skirt had him shifting in his
seat like a teenager. He was envisioning his hands gripping her by the hips.
She brushed a hand through her hair, absently.

Ever since he had set down roots in Grand City nothing had
caught his eye, no woman even remotely got him going, much less challenged him.
He had taken a few different women to events in the last few years, but no one had
ever blown him off course like this. Everything about Miss Green distracted him
from the work at hand. The last thing he thought he would be considering this
morning was how to get the consultant naked. But that’s exactly what he was
thinking about when he needed to be focused on ratings and demographics.

Miss Green had gotten up from her chair and had taken to
pacing in front of the wall of televisions. She leaned on the desk for a minute
and Wes noticed that while she was thin as a rail, her calves were muscled
nicely, and he wondered absently if she were a runner. He speculated what her
legs might feel like wrapped around his—uh oh, she was talking directly to him
instead of muttering to herself.

“Is there any reason why, Mr. Thompson? Have you ever
considered that?” Macy had caught him staring at her instead of the screen. But
he was no dummy. He knew exactly what she’d asked. His rational brain could
engage in conversation, even if other parts of him ached at the lovely sight of
her.

“Just Wes, really,” he answered. Her eyes flashed
momentarily. Was she trying not to blush? “Weather in the first block? Yes, that’s
a good idea. You have free reign here, so get into the rundowns with the
producers, coach the talent, whatever you think it takes—even staffing
changes.”

“Do you have a live truck?” She’d recovered herself quickly,
and was back to pacing in front of the monitors. Her heels made her calves
flex, and he tried not to stare at the lean muscle that climbed up her leg,
“The other stations in the market have three each. You need three.”

“We have one. And they don’t even use it half the time,”
Sexy calves or no, Wes was not looking forward to the money this woman was
already proposing he spend.

“I’m sure you’ve got a few reporters who are afraid of freezing
up if they go live. It’s too important for the station, though,” Macy paused
mid-step, shifting her focus, “But let’s get started with the basics. First,
I’m going to meet the night crew. Do consider adding photographers, though.”

She was throwing ideas out like darts, “And yeah, your live
situation is subpar, we really do need to get on that. You won’t win sweeps
with one crappy live truck.”

“Perhaps you should spend a day here before you start adding
hundreds of thousands of dollars to my budget?” Wes fired back. Her eyes
flared, and this time there was no accompanying blush.  All the women he knew
were pushovers, but not this one. It was going to be very interesting with Macy.

“You’re going to have to spend money. Either that or start
the garage sale now.” She didn’t back down.

Wes decided he would buy just enough to keep her around for
a bit. She didn’t need to know he’d pretty much decided to scrap this place.
Heck, though, if she made an impact in ratings maybe he’d get a little money
out of WLUV. A romp with the lovely Miss Green and liquidation for Thompson-Hardaway
during this year of exile? It probably wasn’t what his father had in mind, but
Wes figured he was just making the best of a bad situation.

Their brief battle was forgotten as Wes introduced Macy to
the night crew, then he let her work. If he hovered over her, she might spook
and he actually did have calls to make.

“Stop in upstairs before you leave tonight,” Wes instructed
her. He sensed she was the type that didn’t eat or sleep until a job was done.
The dark little hollowed-out space under her cheek bones was a clue that food
and sleep weren’t her main priority. He resolved to take good care of her while
she was at his television station— in ways she didn’t even know she needed.

He was thinking about running his tongue over her sharp jaw
line and paused, mid-fantasy, realizing that was the first time he’d thought of
it as “his” television station. Back to the fantasy, his tongue traveled from
her neck to her… work. Back to work. Macy was talking again. What now?

“I probably won’t leave until after the eleven o’clock, are
you sure?” her eyes met his. God, she was gorgeous. And he definitely sensed
something flirty behind those cat eyes. It stirred him just as much as that
strained button.

“I’m sure. I don’t want you walking to your car alone. The
staff is all in the gated lot, which is secure. You're parked in the visitor
area, which is not. I’ll make sure you get to your car safely and tomorrow Mrs.
King can get you a parking pass for the gate.”

Did Miss Green let out an exasperated ‘harrumph’ as he
walked away?
Saucy, very saucy
, he smiled to himself.

Wes stayed out of the way after that. He needed to do a
little research on Miss Green. It was best to know more before he leapt because
the sight and scent of Miss Green made the leap a near certainty. He couldn’t
wipe the smile off his face as he walked back to his office. He had been all
over the world and in every type of boardroom. Who would have thought that the
most intoxicating woman he’d ever met would be delivered to the doorstep of
this ramshackle, sentimental business he was tossing on the scrap heap?

WLUV might just live up to its call letters, after all.