The Inside Edge, page 2
Jeez. You get twitchy about people being late a few times and you’d never get any slack. “Yeah, yeah,” Nate said. “Point taken.” He took another three steps—
And stopped.
Someone was sitting in his chair.
A handsome—very handsome—dark-haired man had his elbows propped on the desk as he leaned forward, grinning at something Carl the camera operator was saying. Carl gestured with his hands, and the handsome brunet laughed, tossed his head back, and turned a million-watt smile on Carl. If Nate didn’t know better, he’d think the guy was flirting with their straight, married, sixtysomething grandfather of three. Whatever. The guy was in Nate’s chair, and Nate needed to politely inform him of the fact and give him the opportunity to move… and maybe to introduce himself, since no one else was going to tell Nate who he was. Where did they get him from? Nate squinted as he approached. The guy looked vaguely familiar. Local news? A weatherman maybe?
“Nate!” Carl intercepted him before he could make his case to the usurping newcomer. “Glad you made it! I thought I was going to have to join Aubrey up in front of the cameras tonight,” he joked.
“Uh, yeah.” Nate pasted on a smile, more confused than ever. He tamped down on a surge of change-induced panic. “You kn—”
“And Emmy would’ve loved that,” Carl continued, still chuckling.
“Well, I’ll make sure she gets that autographed picture,” the guy—Aubrey—said. “Always happy to hear about a fan. Give her my love, Carl.”
There was more batting of eyelashes until Carl ambled back to his station.
“Hi.”
And now the guy was making eyes at Nate. Nate, who’d just spent twelve hours in travel with a dead phone. Nate, who hadn’t been able to wrangle a straight answer out of his producer all day. Nate, who had no fucking idea what was going on and needed to be on the air in minutes.
Right now Nate didn’t care if Aubrey was the only other gay man on the planet. He wasn’t going to flirt with him. Definitely not at work, and especially not while he was sitting in Nate’s chair. “You’re in my seat,” Nate said.
The eyelashes stopped fluttering and instead narrowed around clear gray eyes. “My apologies,” he said smoothly, and all the warmth of his initial greeting faded. “Ms. Chapel told me to sit here.”
Why would she do that? Nate knew ratings had suffered with John. Had Jess decided to go in a totally different direction? Would she call him to set just to fire him?
The guy in Nate’s chair leaned back, eyes still narrowed in assessment. The movement drew Nate’s eye to his suit—cut very close, expensive too, and Nate knew expensive suits. This one had a silver line of stitching around the lapels. Flashy, but with class. John would’ve hated it.
“I’m Aubrey Chase, by the way,” the guy said, holding out a hand, and oh. That was why Nate recognized him.
“The figure skater.” It came out sounding a little more cringeworthy than Nate intended. He had nothing against figure skaters. He knew what kind of tremendous athleticism the sport demanded. But this was a hockey show. “Uh, nice to meet you,” he offered belatedly and shook the guy’s hand. “Nate Overton.”
“My pleasure.” Aubrey’s smile was polite, if not warm, as if he could read Nate’s thoughts. “You’re the senior now, so I guess that’s why you get John’s old spot. Kind of surprised it looks just like a normal chair, you know? It’s not like it’s velvet or ermine-lined or anything.”
Nate adjusted his earpiece since he couldn’t manage to adjust the nagging sensation of disorientation.
“Two minutes,” Gina’s voice said in his ear.
Nate glanced over the paper in front of him. To his right he noticed Aubrey smoothing his own sheet and shrugging and shaking out his shoulders a bit as if he were about to step into a spotlight on the ice. He was getting ready for his audience, obviously. Just Nate’s luck that after all the times he’d dreamed of getting rid of an overbearing bigoted buffoon like John, the replacement would be a different sort of diva.
“I see we’re hashing out Kazakov’s new contract.”
“That’s what it says,” Nate replied. He hated that he felt he’d gotten off on the wrong foot, but somehow blaming Aubrey for his own lack of grace made him feel better.
“Five and a half by five. That’s going to be a squeeze with Dallas’s cap issues,” Aubrey offered.
“Well, it’s not like top-four defenseman grow on trees, and Popov’s not getting any younger.” Nate probably sounded more definite than he felt about the issue, but it had been a long day.
“Dallas wouldn’t know if they did grow on trees, unless they were trees in Russia. They can’t seem to draft one from anywhere else.” Aubrey clicked his pen for emphasis.
Nate swiveled on his chair to glare at the handsome but misinformed face. “They traded for Svensson at the last deadline!”
“Trading for a thirty-four-year-old isn’t the same as developing or draft—” Aubrey insisted, but Gina’s voice interrupted.
“Forty-five seconds.”
Nate felt like his nose was going to hit the desk in forty-five seconds. He should have chugged an energy drink or three, and now a figure skater was trying to debate him on the finer points of building a blueline.
Worse, he wasn’t entirely off base. At the very least he was competent, which was better than John, and unlikely to spout some of the more offensive bile that seemed to fall like flowers from John’s mouth. Nate needed to focus on that and on staying awake and alert, and then he could apologize to his new cohost and try to start over.
“I really need a coffee,” he grumbled, and Gina piped in over his earpiece.
“I’ll get you one for commercial break.”
“Thank you,” Nate said fervently. He made a mental note to buy her something really nice for Christmas this year.
“Thirty seconds.”
He took a deep breath. He’d be fine. He could talk about hockey in his sleep. He had, in fact, done so on enough occasions that he’d chased Marty out of bed to the guest room, which probably hadn’t helped when everything went to hell. And wow, he needed to think about something else. Anything else.
“Are you okay?” Aubrey asked, one eyebrow raised. “You look a little… gray.”
Despite himself, Nate prickled. Now Aubrey was calling him old. Great. As if he needed a reminder that he’d just stepped into the senior role. Nothing like feeling your age. “I’m fine,” he snapped. “Let’s just get this over with.”
“Live in ten!”
“I love your enthusiasm,” Aubrey deadpanned. But then Gina held her hand up for the countdown, and Nate could see the moment he switched into broadcast mode. He sat straighter, corrected his posture, and his features relaxed into something open and friendly instead of just openly hostile. He brushed a hand through his hair and somehow avoided messing it up. Instead it looked like he’d just paid a hairdresser a hundred dollars to do it. Nate would have sworn his skin even looked nicer, which was patently ridiculous.
Of course. On top of being a charming, shmoozing flirt, his new cohost was hot. Fuck Nate’s life.
The red broadcast-indicator light came on and Gina gave them the signal—they were live.
“Good evening and welcome to The Inside Edge. I’m Nate Overton and this is Aubrey Chase. Tonight, the Chicago Snap take on the Toronto Furies. We’ll have that game for you live, as well as news updates, scores, and highlights from around the leagues. The puck drops in ten. For now we’re going to our women’s correspondent, Kelly Ng, live with Snap Captain Dominique Ryan. Kelly?”
Chapter Two
WHEN THEY broke for commercial, Aubrey let his smile relax and eased back in his chair. Samira, their makeup and hair tech, swooped in to check for strays, casting sideways glances at Overton every now and again.
Aubrey didn’t blame her. Their animosity had to be obvious, and she’d only just met Aubrey. She couldn’t exactly ask him about it. But maybe she was judging whether she could ask Overton.
Probably not, he decided, if his own read of his cohost could be trusted. The guy was shut down, mask in place. Handsome but unapproachable.
Aubrey didn’t know what he’d expected. More professionalism, yeah. And a smile wouldn’t have killed the guy. A little more recognition—the figure skater, really? Aubrey was vain, all right. He liked to know people recognized him and his accomplishments. He liked to be looked at—not just looked at but checked out the way he’d checked out Overton. Not lecherous but appreciative. Aubrey couldn’t help that Overton was his type.
Married, though, he reminded himself. Like a model gay. Straight-passing haircut, conservative suit.
Ass that wouldn’t quit.
Still, some show of solidarity might be nice.
Maybe they just got off on the wrong foot. Aubrey’d had a day or two to get used to the idea of being on the program with Nate, but according to Carl, Nate hadn’t even known Jess fired John until this afternoon. Maybe he was pissed she’d left him out of the loop, and Aubrey being in the know just made it worse.
“Hey,” he said tentatively as Samira shifted over to Nate. “Look, I’m sorry if, uh, you were expecting someone else or whatever.” Hell, Aubrey would be surprised he’d gotten this gig too, if he hadn’t filled in for John once before.
Overton didn’t look at him—couldn’t, as Samira was touching up his makeup.
“Sixty seconds!”
“Who else would I have been expecting?”
Aubrey shrugged. “I don’t know, maybe one of your old hockey buddies wanted the job. Hockey’s an old boys’ club. I know how it works.”
Overton scoffed. “You don’t know Jess, obviously.”
“Hey, she let John Plum sit in that chair for eight years despite the excrement that spewed out of his mouth—”
“Forty seconds!”
When Nate didn’t react, Aubrey pushed on. He didn’t want his cohost to hate him. “I’m just saying, I didn’t mean to step on any toes, but I also didn’t get here through nepotism. I’m good at this job, if you think you can unclench long enough for me to prove it.”
A muscle worked in the corner of Overton’s jaw. Aubrey bet he ground his teeth at night. Probably drove his husband nuts. “If you’re done insulting me—”
Samira finished with him and scampered off. He reached for the water bottle the PA held out.
“Insulting—?” Damn it, where had Aubrey gone wrong? Did Nate think Aubrey was implying he’d gotten the job through nepotism? Talk about delicate. “Excuse me for trying to make conversation. You know, you could stand to loosen up,” Aubrey said, then added under his breath, “Someone needs to get laid.”
The set went dead quiet, and Aubrey remembered for the first time in twenty seconds that he was wearing a hot mic. Everyone had heard him.
The blood drained not just from his face but from the entire upper half of his body. Fuck his stupid temper and his own sensitivity about being overlooked. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
The PA called, “Thirty seconds!”
Overton took a long, deep breath. He didn’t look at Aubrey. “We have an update on the Nielsen situation?”
Gina answered from just off camera. “Bob McKenzie is reporting the ask is Simmonds and a second-round pick. Not sure if they’re going to take the bait yet.”
“Keep refreshing his Twitter feed and get ready to call him if this goes through. I want a soundbite.”
“Ten seconds!”
Aubrey couldn’t even open his mouth to apologize, not that Overton would look at him anyway. Not that Aubrey blamed him. Shit, was he going to ignore Aubrey unless the camera was on? That would make this even more uncomfortable. Probably only for the next two hours or so, though. Good thing Aubrey didn’t actually need this job.
The show’s theme played, and the teleprompter counted down the seconds to air. Aubrey sat up straight again. If this was going to be his only show, he at least wanted it to be an entertaining one. “Welcome back to The Inside Edge. I’m Aubrey Chase. If you’re just tuning in, the Chicago Snap leads Toronto 2-1. Puck drops for the second in five minutes. Meanwhile, around the league….”
They played a few clips from yesterday’s and tonight’s games, including the Colorado-Dallas shocker, and Aubrey managed to find the same reserves of professionalism that let him get up and keep skating when he missed a jump, even though inside he was dying.
“I expect the Stars will announce a partnership with Cuisinart, as the coach gets out the line blender at the first sign of trouble,” Aubrey quipped.
Apparently Nate didn’t find that to be terribly substantive, but instead of trying to make an in-depth response, he just went with, “The line blender works.” Yawn. Boring.
Aubrey couldn’t let it go. “Yes, turning a 5-0 deficit into a 5-4 regulation loss is progress which—let me check—you still get zero points for.”
“And those are points the Avalanche need more than the Stars now,” Nate asserted. Was this guy joking? It was the second week of October. A little early for the playoffs race. But he doubled down with, “Let’s pull up the Central Division standings.”
It was going to be a long night.
NATE WAS still bristling when he closed the door to Jess’s office behind him.
Jess raised an eyebrow and gestured to the chair in front of her desk as she lowered herself into her own. “Have a seat, Nate.”
She was playing it cool, so Nate was probably about to have his ass handed to him for being a dick. And he probably deserved it. Who the hell talked about the points race not even two weeks into the season?
People who were so disoriented from having their show rearranged immediately after their divorce they didn’t know which way was up, that was who.
He sat.
But instead of taking him to task for the clusterfuck of an episode, or even better, addressing Aubrey’s heinously inappropriate comment, she just asked, “How was Houston?”
Damn it. Nate slumped in his chair and rubbed a hand over his face. He could feel the makeup smearing. He should’ve taken it off first. Instead he’d sat in his dressing room, stewing.
“That good, huh?” Jess said sympathetically.
Nate pulled his hand away and drew a deep breath. “I mean, what do you want me to say, here? I went. I signed the papers. It was a long time coming.”
“It’s less about what I want you to say and more about what you need to say.” Jess loved to pull lines like that, ones that sounded straight out of a Psych 100 class. Unfortunately she actually meant them.
Even more unfortunately, Nate fell for it every time. “Marty’s getting married.” It didn’t hurt exactly. It didn’t feel good—the ink hadn’t even touched their divorce papers when Marty made the announcement—but they’d been separated for years. Nate didn’t love him anymore.
But seeing his ex comfortable in his gorgeous new house with his gorgeous new husband-to-be, getting ready to start the family he’d put off having with Nate—Nate was never home, he said; they could wait until Nate retired, he said, except somehow they never made it that far—okay, Nate could admit it. It hurt.
“Ouch.” Jess winced. “And then I sprung these changes on you while you were gone. I thought I was giving you time and space to sort out some personal things, but I should’ve called. Are you okay?”
No, Nate thought. He was thirty-six and he’d spent the best years of his life with a man who’d left him as soon as Nate started being home more often. He’d done everything right, and it hadn’t mattered in the end.
“I’m fine,” he lied. “Let’s talk about the show.” Because yes, she should’ve called, though he knew why she hadn’t. The internet gave people a forum to show their whole asses, John had done it, and Jess had to react to that in a certain period of time or risk being seen as endorsing his behavior. And obviously she didn’t want to bother him while he was taking personal time to get a divorce. The timing just… sucked.
“Wow, you really don’t want to talk about it.” Jess shook her head. “Fine, let’s talk about the show. You want to tell me what your problem is? I could tell you had a chip on your shoulder even before it all went truly to hell. I thought you’d be grateful to get rid of John, move up to the lead role.”
“I am. But is Aubrey Chase the right guy to replace him?”
For a long moment, Jess held herself absolutely still, inscrutable. Then she slowly leaned back in her chair. “You know I can’t comment on the discussion I had with him, but I promise you that I’ve addressed it, and if it happens again, he’s gone, no questions.”
In his three years in the industry, Nate had heard a lot of horror stories. “Thanks.” Aubrey didn’t strike him as that kind of problem—more like a guy who sometimes had trouble holding his tongue—but it comforted him to know Jess had his back.
“I’m more concerned about his qualifications,” she went on shrewdly. “You think he doesn’t know hockey?”
“I’m just saying—I know John had to go, he was awful, I hated working with him. But we already alienated a lot of people when we got rid of him, and now….”
“Now I’ve replaced a conservative windbag with a flamboyant figure skater?” Jess suggested.
Nate had to be on the only mainstream sports news show with two gay hosts—and probably the only gay guy to question whether that was the right decision. And he couldn’t figure out how to object without feeling like an asshole. Without being an asshole.
“Look, we’re not alienating anyone by hiring Aubrey that we didn’t already piss off when we let John go.”
With a slow exhale, Nate admitted to himself she probably had a point. But in the meantime, Nate’s divorce was bound to become a minor news item in the near future now that they’d signed the paperwork, and he knew it wouldn’t take much for people to jump on Aubrey as a possible reason. Marty and his new fiancé weren’t famous; they’d easily fly under the radar.
People online will think we’re dating and that annoys me would not fly as a legitimate objection, unfortunately. “All right,” he said finally.
