Page 105 of At the Heart of It
“I shouldn’t have slept with him again,” Kate whispered.
“Will you stop it? You’re both consenting adults. And don’t give me that bullshit again about how he’s technically still married. As far as he knows, he’s been divorced for a year.”
“Yes, but as far as I know?—”
“Don’t.” The elevator doors swished open, but Amy put a hand on Kate’s shoulder to hold her back. With her free hand, she hit two more buttons and sent the doors sliding shut again. The buttons began to light up once more, this time in ascending order.
Kate looked at Amy. “We’re going back up? What did you forget?”
“Nothing, but this seems like one of the few places for a private conversation.”
Kate glanced around, half expecting to see hidden microphones in the walls. How did that little emergency-call button work, anyway?
“Look, Kate,” Amy continued. “Don’t turn this into a moral issue. You know as well as I do that the marriage only exists on paper. This is a technicality. One we can fix easily enough with a good lawyer and some hastily filed paperwork from the couple.”
“But that’s not what everyone wants,” she said. “Not Viv, anyway.”
“So? You can’t force someone to stay married to you. This is reality television, not Vatican City. Jonah wants to be divorced, right?”
Kate hesitated. “Right,” she said, hoping it was true. God, it felt true last night when he held her in his arms, murmuring about how he wished he could stay there in bed with her forever.
“Besides,” Amy continued. “If you hadn’t slept with him last night?—”
“I shouldn’t have told you that,” Kate interrupted, prompting an eye roll from Amy. “I shouldn’t. I know better than to kiss and tell.”
“Please,” Amy said. “The man showed up with dinner and didn’t leave until two in the morning, which I know because I was up all night working on scheduling and heard him leave. You think I’m dumb enough to believe you ate cornbread for six hours?” She shook her head, not giving Kate a chance to retort. “Like I was saying, he would have just gotten suspicious if you’d eaten his dinner and sent him on his way home with a pat on the head.”
The elevator doors swished open again, this time on the eleventh floor. A man in black holding a room-service tray looked startled to see them. “Are you going down?”
Amy hovered a hand over the elevator buttons. “Which way are you going?”
“Down.”
“Sorry, we’re going up.”
She hit the close button and sent the elevator surging upward again. Kate looked at her. “I’m not sure whether I’m more concerned you think it’s suspicious I wouldn’t sleep with a guy for bringing me food, or more concerned that you’re treating the elevators as our mobile confession booth.”
“There are plenty of things to be concerned about in this situation,” Amy said. “Those aren’t the most important ones.”
“What are the most important ones?”
“Keeping the show running smoothly,” Amy said. “And keeping Chase Whitfield from doing anything stupid.”
And keeping Jonah on the show so he can help Jossy, Kate amended in her mind. She hadn’t told Amy about the accident or Jonah’s role in it. Unless Amy remembered that brief line in On the Other Hand, she probably had no idea Jonah’s dad was dead, or how that would have sparked Jonah’s urge to protect his sister.
That was Kate’s secret to hold. There were so few opportunities in this job for her to protect other people’s private stories. To protect their hearts. Something about that detail made Kate want to hold it tightly to her chest.
“I swear, Chase is like a bloodhound when he gets the scent of some juicy, heartbreaking storyline,” Kate muttered.
“It makes me hate him as a person,” Amy agreed. “But as a network exec, it’s what’s made him successful.”
The doors swished open again, revealing a tall, beefy figure standing in front of them on the fifteenth floor.
Speak of the devil, Kate thought as she pasted on her most professional smile.
“Chase,” she said. “It’s great to see you. I didn’t realize you were staying here as well.”
“I normally wouldn’t, but they were all booked at the Four Seasons,” he said. “That’s why we’re in the conference room here this morning.”
