From the Heart

he asked curiously. He picked up one of her hands to examine the delicately painted nails. “As being the underdog?”
    “You have the big budget,” she pointed out. “The large exposure, publicity. But that doesn’t mean we can’t have the same quality on a smaller scale.” There was a callus on his thumb. She could feel its light scrape across her knuckles. An unexpected chill shot straight down her spine. Carefully, Liv removed her hand and reached for her wine. “But that’s not the point.”
    “What is?” Thorpe smiled at her—the slow, personal smile that scattered her wits. Liv hastily pulled herself together.
    “You know how stories fly around a newsroom. Internal stories,” she specified as she returned to her dinner. “It’s a difficult place to have any privacy. Privacy’s important to me.”
    “Yes, it must be. There hasn’t been any mention of you in the papers or glossies since you were a teenager. The Carmichaels always make good copy.”
    “I didn’t fit the mold.” She hadn’t meant to say that, and was astonished it had slipped out. “What I’m trying to say,” she continued, as Thorpe kept his silence, “is that once someone in your newsroom or mine gets hold of an idea, the next minute it’ll be fact. Then the sky’s the limit. You know how a simple coffee date can become a torrid lunchtime affair after the third telling.”
    “Does it matter so much?”
    Liv gave a weary sigh. “Probably not from your standpoint, but from mine, yes. I have to deal with being the new kid on the block, and a woman. It’s still hard, Thorpe. Whateverprogress I make is always examined more closely than anyone else’s right now. Is Carmichael seeing Thorpe because she wants to jump on the national news team?”
    He studied her a moment. “You don’t have enough confidence in yourself.”
    “I’m a good reporter,” she countered immediately.
    “I was speaking about you as a woman.” He saw the shield come up and could have sworn in frustration.
    “That’s none of your concern.”
    “Isn’t that what we’re talking about?” he countered. “I sent a woman a rose, not a reporter.”
    “I am a reporter.”
    “That’s your profession, not your sex.” He lifted his wine and forced back annoyance. He knew anger was no way to get through to her. “It doesn’t do to have thin skin in this business, Liv. If newsroom gossip bothers you, you’re going to get a lot of bruises. Look in the mirror. People talk about a woman with a face like yours. It’s human nature.”
    “It isn’t only that.” Liv subsided a bit. She had wanted to talk to him. It wouldn’t help if she became angry. “I don’t want any personal involvement—not with you, not with anyone.”
    Thorpe studied her in silence over the rim of his glass. “Were you hurt that badly?”
    She hadn’t expected the question, or the trace of sympathy in it. It cost her a great deal to keep her eyes level and composed. “Yes.”
    He left it at that. That she had made the admission instead of freezing was enough. He would wait for the rest. “Why did you come to Washington?”
    Liv looked at him a moment. She had been prepared for further interrogation, but not for a casual change of subject. Warily, she allowed herself to relax again. “I’d always been interested in politics. That was my beat in Austin, though most of the time I did little but read the news on the air. When WWBW made the offer, I grabbed it.” She began to give her attention to the meal again. “It’s an exciting city, especially from a reporter’s viewpoint. I wanted the excitement. I suppose I wanted the pressure.”
    “Have you thought of doing national news?”
    She made a vague gesture with her shoulders. “Of course; but for now, I’m happy where I am. Carl’s the best news director I’ve ever worked with.”
    Thorpe grinned. “He does have a tendency to become emotional.”
    Liv lifted a brow as she toyed with the last of her spaghetti. “Particularly when some hotshot from upstairs steals a story. I had to step on the toes of one of your associates after the mayor’s press conference this afternoon.”
    “Is that so? Which one?”
    “Thompson. The one with the big ears and flashy ties.”
    “A flattering description.”
    “Accurate,” Liv countered, but a smile tugged at her lips. “In any case, I’d gone to a lot of trouble to set up a quick interview after the conference. He tried to cash in on it.”
    “You set him