Page 109 of No More Heartbreakers

Now the room did roar with laughter. Not Mr. Aubrey’s laughter, of course, but as with every other crazy thing about this station, the rest of us were all in it together.

Would we be fired for it? With Mr. Aubrey’s reputation, who knew? It was a very real possibility he’d kick us all out, padlock the door and let the station go dark.

* * *

Well, hehadkicked us out of Janet’s office, but after speaking privately with her for a half hour, he must have decided there were some things that eclipsed the rules.

Like a second bout with breast cancer. And advertising dollars.

After Mr. Aubrey left, Janet gave us our assignments, directing Aric and me to work together as we’d done so often.

He went very still for a second after she said it, but then nodded and carried on with getting his things together for the shoot.

An electric excitement filled me as we walked to the news car, him a few steps ahead of me and very purposefully not slowing down.

Here was my chance at last to explain to Aric what had happened on Friday night. And to apologize. For that night and for all of my hard-shelled resistance of him over the past few months.

And to finally admit how I really felt about him.

I only hoped he’d listen to me.

“So… we need to talk—” I began once the car was in motion.

Aric held up a palm. His voice was raspy and dark. “Heidi. Let’s not. Okay? Let’s…” He blew out a long breath. “Let’s just work.”

“But—” I tried again.

“No. There’s nothing you could possibly say about it that I’m in the mood to hear.”

So, obviously I’d have to come up with some creative way to get him to listen to me on the subject of us.

In the meantime, I tried to fill the frosty silence in the car with more benign topics.

“How was your visit with your dad?”

He sighed deeply but then deigned to answer. In a monotone. “It was fine. The usual.”

“Oh.” When he didn’t elaborate, I prodded a little. “What did y’all do?”

Aric’s tone was sour and exhausted-sounding. He wore a black look.

“He slept and watched sports most of the day, then at night he wanted me to take him out to troll for Southern ‘hotties’ at the local bars. It’s his favorite activity on those rarespecialoccasions when we get together. He figured out when I was seventeen that I might finally be useful to him… at least as far as picking up young women.”

“Useful? You mean… as bait?”

His lips formed a bitter grin. He had yet to look at me, keeping his eyes on the road ahead of us.

“Something like that.”

Wow.I suddenly felt a need to apologize for all the complaining I’d done about my own dad. He was controlling, yes, but he’d never tried to use me for his own benefit.

It also hit me again that Aric might have some serious abandonment issues from his childhood. And my running off with Hale and “getting engaged” had probably triggered fears in him that he had a hard time dealing with.

I’d be lucky if he’deverlisten to me or even agree to work with me again.

He didn’t offer any further information on his visit with Peter, and I didn’t ask any more questions. My mind went back to the problem at hand—how to explain something to someone who wasn’t interested in explanations.

Aric hadn’t let my constant “no’s” stop him when we’d first met, and I wasn’t going to let his stop me.

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