CHAPTER THREE
Jonah had several questions buzzing around in his brain and wasn’t sure which one to ask first.
He decided not to choose. “Why the hell am I here?” He leveled the first question at his ex-wife before turning to face the whip-smart woman with the sleek mahogany hair and the lips he hadn’t stopped thinking about for a month. “And why are you here?”
Kate flinched, and Jonah felt like an asshole. Okay, so that came out a little gruffer than he meant it to. The question—or maybe the bluntness of it?—seemed to catch Kate off guard. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out, leaving Jonah staring at those perfect, soft lips for a little too long.
Way too long. Jesus.
He swung his gaze back to Vivienne. “What’s going on here?”
“You two know each other?” Vivienne looked genuinely perplexed, which wasn’t like her. That killed his initial theory that this was some sort of weird matchmaker scheme, which was totally something Viv would do. Helping her ex-husband find love again would make a great bestselling self-help book.
“I—we—” Kate was still fumbling for words, and Jonah couldn’t help remembering how cool and composed she’d been for their newlywed playacting in Ashland. That meant she was really rattled.
He looked back at Viv again, trying to make sense of things. His ex-wife gave a stiff smile and swept an arm out over the parlor. “Please, Jonah—have a seat.”
Christ. She only used his full name when she wanted something. After the publishing house had slapped him with that ridiculous “Average Joe” moniker during edits for On the Other Hand, Viv had taken to calling him Joe all the time.
At least until she needed something from him.
“I’m sure we can get this all sorted out,” Viv was saying as she poured him a glass of cucumber water. “Can I get you something else? A beer, maybe?”
She was really laying it on thick. Beer? Really? At ten in the morning, when she used to flip him shit for drinking the stuff at all?
She’d tried for years to make him a passionate wine connoisseur instead, signing them up for a couples’ pinot noir tasting class and booking a romantic vineyard getaway when all he’d wanted was a goddamn pale ale and a quiet afternoon with a good book.
And now here he was getting worked up over the beer issue again when he still had no idea why Kate was sitting in Viv’s living room.
Jonah shook his head and took the water glass. “Water’s fine, thanks.”
He surveyed the array of seating options in the parlor and selected a leather club chair the color of squash puree. It looked new, something she’d acquired in the months since their divorce, along with this house. He’d been here only once before to pick up a cookbook that had belonged to his mother. They’d been cordial enough then, but something told him this was a different sort of meeting.
He set the glass on the sleek glass coffee table, deliberately avoiding the coaster just to watch Viv blanch. Then he sat back with his hands on his knees and looked from one face to the next—Viv, Kate, and a curly-haired blonde who seemed so flustered she’d forgotten to introduce herself.
“So what’s going on here?”
The words came with an echo, and Jonah realized he and Viv had spoken them at the same time. He stared at her for a moment, resisting the urge to call “Jinx!” the way they might have in the early years of their marriage.
Viv looked away first and focused on Kate. “I’m confused. You told me yesterday that you’d never met Joe. You were even joking about how you couldn’t find photos of him online.”
“Jonah,” he muttered, not that anyone was listening.
The blonde gave a vigorous nod and stared at him like he’d emerged from a spaceship. “It’s true about the photos. The only things we found when we Googled you were a couple pics from college and this one where you had a big lumberjack beard.”
Jonah frowned, wondering why the hell any of these people would be Googling him. “The military required me to keep a low profile for a number of years,” he said.
“And then he refused to have photos in the books,” Viv said in a tone that suggested she was still irritated about it.
“Oh,” the blonde said as realization seemed to dawn. “We were also Googling Joe Porter, not Jonah.”
Kate seemed to find her tongue at last. “Vivienne. This is—wow, such a coincidence.” She looked at Jonah then as though expecting him to correct her, but he apparently knew even less than she did.
She licked her lips—a nervous gesture that sent his libido reeling—and flicked her gaze back to Viv’s. “So, uh—Jonah and I met four weeks ago in Ashland. We stayed at the same bed-and-breakfast and ended up going to the same play that afternoon and—”
“Oh dear.” Vivienne raised a hand to her lips, eyes wide with amazement. Someone who didn’t know her well might mistake the look for dismay, but Jonah knew better. Viv lived for serendipitous shit like this.
She looked at Jonah. “You two slept together?”
“No!”
This time it was Kate whose words came out in an echo of his, and Jonah looked at her again. She was shaking her head like the thought of sleeping with him was only slightly less repugnant than the thought of bathing in a pit of raw sewage. He tried not to take offense.
“Definitely not,” Kate said. “We saw a play together and had dinner together and—”
“Pretended to be married,” Jonah supplied.
Hell, might as well put it all out there.
“That’s not as scandalous as it sounds,” Kate said with exaggerated patience. “There were these two old ladies talking about the people next door having really loud sex, and Jonah and I—” She stopped there, probably realizing that any additional detail would make things sound more meaningful than they were. Kate cleared her throat. “Anyway, we saw a play together and had dinner afterward, but we didn’t even exchange phone numbers.”
Jonah watched her speaking, intrigued that she didn’t mention the kiss. And that’s all it had been. Just a kiss, or more accurately, several long, drawn out, passionate kisses. Making out, if you wanted to call it that. The sort of kissing-for-the-sake-of-kissing that most people forget exists sometime between, “Are you taking the SAT prep course?” and, “I now pronounce you man and wife.” Kissing as the endgame, rather than foreplay.
God, he’d loved that.
But if Kate wasn’t going to say anything about it, he wouldn’t either. He still didn’t know what the hell was going on here, but he sensed he was better off not volunteering too much. He turned back to Viv, who was studying them both with that clinical, analytical look she always got when she was trying to burrow into a client’s brain and wiggle her fingers around in the dark, slippery layers.
But she didn’t press for more information, so it seemed like a good idea to get on with whatever the hell had prompted her to invite him here.
“So,” he said to Viv. “Want to tell me what this is all about?”
Vivienne folded her hands in her lap and nodded. “Of course. In a nutshell, the Empire Television Network would like me to star in a new unscripted television program called Relationship Reboot with Dr. Viv. They’ll follow one couple each episode from the point where they first appear in my office for counseling to the point where they leave with a decision to save the marriage or mindfully disentangle themselves from the union.”
Mindfully disentangling themselves from the union was exactly what he and Viv had done, or at least what she’d suggested when she’d brought up the idea of divorce in the first place. The words still grated on him, and brought out his inner chest-thumping caveman the way it always did around her.
Maybe that’s what she wanted. Why he was sitting here right now.
“Let me take a guess,” he said, pulling off his glasses so he could polish them on the hem of his T-shirt. “You want me to be part of this show.”
He regretted the words the instant they left his mouth. He’d look like a dick if he’d guessed wrong.
But he wasn’t wrong. He could see from the way Viv pursed her lips, and the way Kate shifted uncomfortably on the sofa and looked down at the floor.
Viv cleared her throat. “Based on the success of our co-authored book, and the fact that—”
“No.”
All three women frowned, but it was Viv who spoke first. “Jonah—”
There she went again, using his full name. To this day, he regretted that stupid Average Joe moniker. Playing the Neanderthal to his ethereal, educated wife had seemed like a good idea at the time. But now . . .
“We were able to function beautifully together during the publicity push for On the Other Hand, despite our separation,” Viv continued in her soothing-therapist voice. “Very maturely.”
Jonah put his glasses back on and folded his arms over his chest. “Not that maturely.”
“Having you as part of the show would lend an authenticity to it,” Viv said. “A relatability element.”
Kate cleared her throat. “For what it’s worth, the focus groups we’ve tested the concept with so far found a male element to be vital for a show like this. Your contributions to On the Other Hand were some of the most compelling, heartfelt sections in the whole book. They literally changed my life.”
She was selling it pretty hard, though there was an earnestness in her voice that almost sounded real. But hell, she knew how to act. He’d seen that firsthand.
He looked away, needing to keep his focus on the subject at hand instead of the lushness of Kate’s thighs crossing and uncrossing under that snug little skirt. Jonah tugged at his collar and turned his attention back to Viv. “You swore when we finished that publicity tour that we’d be all done. No more.”
“I know that,” she said. “It was a promise I meant at the time, but things change.”
“No shit.”
God, he sounded like a bitter ex-husband. He wasn’t really. The divorce had been friendly enough, and they’d parted on decent terms. What was it about sitting here with her that made him turn into a goddamn cretin?
“Jonah,” Viv tried again. “Just hear us out.”
“I don’t think so. Have you forgotten the fact that I hate TV appearances? Remember how many we did during the push for On the Other Hand?”
“Zero.” Viv pressed her lips together. “We did zero. You also wouldn’t pose for a book jacket photo. Not even the hands on the cover are ours.”
A flash of hurt shot through Viv’s eyes, but she looked away before he could even think about apologizing.
“Exactly,” Jonah said, trying to soften his voice but not succeeding. “I hate having my picture taken. So what makes you think I’d agree to do a fucking TV show?”
Viv sighed. “We’ve been apart for almost two years, Jonah. I’ve certainly changed in that time. I was hoping maybe you had, too.”
She was baiting him, he knew. Trying to gain the upper hand in the game of who’s-the-most-mature-and-enlightened-party-in-this-divorce.
It was a game he’d never won, never tried to win.
He glanced at Kate and the woman sitting next to her, though it was Kate who held his attention. Kate, whose copper-colored eyes made him think that even though he damn sure wasn’t doing any television show, sitting here in her company for a few more minutes wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.
She held his gaze a few more beats, then folded her hands in her lap. “Would you like to at least hear the proposal?”
Jonah hesitated. Recalled how willingly she’d gone along with his harebrained acting scheme in Ashland. Recalled the feel of her lips brushing his, the softness of her hip as he’d skimmed his hand up her body as they kissed.
Not the most helpful memories, under the circumstances. Jonah sighed.
“Not really,” he said. “I’m sorry to waste your time.”
The blonde winced as Jonah started to stand, but Kate’s expression didn’t falter. To his left Jonah heard Viv’s voice again.
“Jonah, please give this a chance,” she pleaded. “The network executives will be here in less than two hours.”
He frowned. “And that’s my problem?”
Viv folded her hands in her lap. “I thought you’d be open to hearing about this,” she said. “Keeping an open mind.”
“Huh,” Jonah said. “I guess you thought wrong.”
The afternoon light was waning and so was Kate’s energy by the time she caught up with Jonah walking a red-and-brown fox-sized dog along the waterfront pathway in Alki Park.
At least, she assumed it was Jonah. She’d never seen him with his shirt off, so she hung back a good twenty paces behind to make sure it was really him.
Okay, maybe she was checking him out. Good Lord, the man was chiseled. He had muscles in his back that Kate hadn’t known existed, and a tattoo of a sword on one shoulder blade. The contrast of that tattoo against his tanned flesh and against Kate’s own memories of the cultured bookstore owner she’d met a month ago made her palms clammy and her pulse drum in her head.
How had she not noticed before how ripped he was?
Kate wasn’t the only one noticing.
“Oooh, can I pet your dog?” A buxom brunette approached from Jonah’s left and didn’t wait for an answer. Just stooped down to pet the cinnamon-colored mutt wearing an orange vest that read Adopt Me!
Jonah stopped walking and shifted the leash to his other hand, preventing his canine charge from clotheslining his new admirer. “That’s Buster,” Jonah said, reaching up to adjust his glasses. “He’s up for adoption at Clearwater Animal Shelter.”
Kate moved closer and watched the brunette make an extra effort to provide a glimpse down the front of her top. “I just love little doggies,” she said. “You want to come home with me?”
Her gaze lifted to Jonah when she said it, and Kate watched his face to see if he’d taken it as an invitation. He still hadn’t noticed Kate, and studying him now gave her a voyeuristic thrill.
But Jonah seemed unaffected by both the cleavage and the flirtation, which only seemed to pique the brunette’s interest. Her eyes widened as he fished into the pocket of his navy athletic shorts and pulled out a card.
“Here’s the info for Clearwater Animal Shelter,” he said. “They’re just three blocks that way, and they have a lot of other great animals up for adoption.”
“You work there?” The brunette straightened up, glancing once at Kate as though assessing the competition. Finding it lacking, she returned her gaze to Jonah.
That’s when he seemed to notice her. Jonah turned to look her direction, holding her gaze as Kate took a few steps closer. He didn’t smile, but she could have sworn she saw a warmth that hadn’t been there two seconds before.
“I’m a volunteer,” Jonah said, sliding his gaze back to the brunette. “Will you excuse me? I need to make sure Buster gets his exercise.”
“Absolutely.” The brunette gave a chipper little wave, then turned on her heel and flounced away.
Jonah didn’t watch her go. Instead, he turned his gaze back to Kate and watched as she covered the few steps that still separated them. Something about the way his eyes swept her body made Kate feel as topless as he was.
He was first to speak. “Either Viv told you where to find me, or the level of coincidence here has just gone from ‘crazy’ to ‘I need a restraining order.’”
Kate shook her head and offered a nervous smile. “Nope, it’s still just crazy.” She wiped her palms down her gray pencil skirt and wished she’d stopped at the hotel to change. She felt stiff and overdressed standing in heels and a navy silk cowl-neck top beside a shirtless man with pecs she really should stop ogling. There was a faint dusting of hair on his chest and Kate wondered if it would feel as soft as it looked.
She cleared her throat. “Viv told me you’d be here,” she continued. “I felt bad about the contentious turn things took back at her place.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” he said. “I apologize. Sometimes I can be a little hotheaded when I’m caught off guard.”
Kate nodded, remembering one of the chapters in On the Other Hand where Viv and Jonah bantered about each other’s most unfavorable traits. Temper and forgetfulness had topped Jonah’s list.
Bossiness and self-righteousness had topped Viv’s.
“It’s okay, I understand,” Kate said.
“No, it’s not okay. I’m sorry. I don’t always react well to surprises.”
“Understandable,” Kate said. “Those were two pretty big ones.”
“Thanks!”
Kate turned with a start as a busty blonde jogged past with a wave for Jonah. With a grimace, Kate ordered herself to keep her voice down. She turned her attention back to Jonah, who seemed oblivious to the awkward exchange.
“Mind if I walk with you for a bit?” Kate asked him.
Jonah shrugged. “Suit yourself. It’s a free country.” He turned on his heel and started walking again. Kate fell into step beside him, hustling to keep up with those impossibly long legs.
“It is a free country,” she repeated, glancing up to watch his expression. “Interesting choice of words. One might say your military service played a role in the whole ‘free country’ thing. You might have mentioned that when we first met.”
“Why?” He looked at her. “It was a long time ago, and not what I’m doing for a living now.”
“It might have given me a clue who you were,” she said, though the odds seemed slim she would have put the pieces together even then. “Anyway, I was hoping we could talk alone for a minute.”
Jonah raised an eyebrow at her. “Yes. I seem to recall the conversation flowed a little more smoothly when my ex-wife wasn’t there.”
The comment sent a flush of heat through her face and throat, which was dumb. He was talking about conversation in general, not where the conversation had led that evening on the porch swing.
“Right. There’s that.” Kate took a deep breath as she hurried to keep up with him. “Look, I had no idea who you were when we met in Ashland.”
“The comic relief guy from a shitty relationship guide?” His tone was dry, and Kate felt an unexpected surge of defensiveness.
“You know, that book has changed a lot of people’s lives,” she snapped. “The advice about communication and honesty and—”
“Hi, can I pet your doggie?”
Kate turned to see a woman with a blue-blond pixie cut approaching from the right. Jonah stopped so fast that Kate nearly ran into him. She put a hand out to catch herself, grazing a shoulder blade that felt like flesh-covered steel.
“Sure,” Jonah said to the blonde, fishing another business card out of his pocket. “Buster is a terrier-heeler mix, and he’s available for adoption at the Clearwater Animal Shelter.”
“So sweet!” The blonde glanced at the card, then knelt down and stroked the dog’s ears, earning herself a lick on the cheek. She smiled up at Jonah, and Kate caught a smolder of suggestion in the woman’s eyes. “I’ve been thinking of getting a dog. Which days are you there if I wanted to come by and check out what you have?”
“My schedule varies, but the shelter is open nine to five on weekdays and ten to four on weekends.”
“What a sweet, sweet puppy.” The woman accepted a few more sloppy kisses while the dog wagged and wriggled and seemed genuinely thrilled at the attention.
“So I’ll see you around,” she said to Jonah as she stood, beaming as she stole a quick glance at the broad expanse of his chest. She ignored Kate completely, probably assuming based on their mismatched attire that she was his boss or sister or parole officer. Kate straightened her skirt and watched her sashay away.
When the blonde was out of earshot, Kate looked up at Jonah. “This must happen to you a lot?”
He grunted and gave a curt nod. “That’s the idea.”
“The idea?”
He stooped down to adjust the dog’s Adopt Me! vest, then gave the little guy a quick booty scratch before straightening up.
Since Jonah didn’t reply, Kate was forced to guess. “You’re whoring yourself out for dog adoptions?”
“Pretty much.” He started walking again, putting an end to that line of questioning.
“So why didn’t you mention it when we met?”
“That I’m a shirtless dog walker?” He shrugged. “Didn’t seem relevant.”
Kate rolled her eyes. “That’s not what I meant and you know it. You’re smarter than you’re pretending to be right now. For the life of me, I can’t figure out what the hell that’s about.”
She thought she saw him flinch, but he kept walking, not missing a stride. He said nothing for a long time. She’d just decided it was pointless to keep pressing for information when his voice came out in a low rumble.
“You’re asking why I didn’t mention I’m the co-author of a bestselling relationship guide?” he said. “You figure that’s the sort of thing that might have come up during several hours of conversation, followed by an hour of heavy petting?”
“There was no heavy petting!” she argued, earning herself a startled look from the middle-aged joggers running past. She glared and lowered her voice. “You might have had your hand under my jacket—”
“My jacket—”
“But you certainly didn’t grope me or even—” She stopped and frowned up at him. “Wait. Are you trying to distract me?”
Jonah sighed. “It was working until you decided to get technical. I may have learned a technique or two from four years married to America’s leading authority on communication strategies.”
“Unfortunately for you, I’ve read all those books.”
“That is unfortunate.”
He walked a little faster, and Kate had to pick up her pace to keep up.
“I’m just saying,” she continued, struggling not to sound too breathless. “That night in Ashland—we talked about literature and careers and even my breakup,” she said. “Hell, I even quoted from But Not Broken during dinner.”
“You did,” he acknowledged. “Though I didn’t write anything for that book.”
“But you were in it,” Kate argued. “You were part of her happily-ever-after at the end.”
Jonah grunted but said nothing, and it occurred to Kate she was arguing the wrong point entirely. “Jonah, come on. Why didn’t you say anything?”
He raked his fingers through his hair, but didn’t look at her. He kept walking, but his pace slowed just a little.
“All right, fine. Look, I wasn’t thrilled with the way I was portrayed in the book.”
“But Not Broken?”
“No, On the Other Hand.”
“The way you were portrayed?” She frowned. “Didn’t you write it?”
“I wrote the sidebars. The comic relief. And yeah, the words were mine—mostly—but not the spin. The whole Average Joe thing—that wasn’t me at all.”
“How do you mean?”
Jonah shrugged and caught her hand. For a second she thought he was trying to hold it, but she realized he was guiding her around a puddle of spilled milkshake, saving her expensive Prada heels. He let go the instant they were past it, and Kate hated the small flutter of disappointment in her belly.
“I did counterintelligence work in the Marines,” Jonah said slowly. “I was trained in elicitation techniques—ways of evoking trust and comfort in a subject to procure information.”
“You mean like interrogating spies?”
“Something like that. There’s more to it than that, but the bottom line is that I’ve studied communication techniques from some pretty unique angles. The book was supposed to reflect that. To give my insights from that perspective.”
“It did mention you were a Marine,” she said. “Right inside the dust jacket, it said you were a military veteran.”
“It didn’t say what I did in the military,” he pointed out. “Just that I was a Marine. And a football fan. And an avid fisherman. And a ‘handy guy’ who stomps around the house in a tool belt, fixing shit.” He cleared his throat and glanced over at her. “For the record, I don’t own a tool belt. And I haven’t been fishing since I was eight.”
Kate frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I’m saying the publisher decided I was more marketable as an everyman. A regular fella. Not as a cerebral guy, but a blue-collar one. The all-American, Average Joe.”
“You couldn’t be both?”
She watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed, but he didn’t look at her. “Not according to the publisher.”
“And you went along with it,” she said. “You pretended to be someone you weren’t.”
He shrugged. “I was star-struck and love-struck and blinded by newlywed bliss,” he muttered. “The publisher said the book would sell better that way, and they were right.”
Kate kept walking, trying to digest the new information. “So you’re saying you’re not really the guy in the book. The guy who wrote, ‘A relationship is like a fart: if you have to work real hard and strain and force things, it’s probably shit.’”
Jonah laughed. “Actually, I liked that one. And it’s true.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
He sighed, but didn’t say anything. Kate was getting used to these long stretches of silence. In a way, it was nice knowing he cared enough to take the time to formulate a response instead of blurting out the first words that came to mind.
They kept walking, passing a pair of twentysomething women on a park bench who cooed and leaned down to pet Buster. Jonah doled out the business cards and ran through his spiel about adoptable pets at Clearwater Animal Shelter. Kate watched him, mystified by these dual versions of the same guy.
And by his abs. God Almighty, the man should never wear a shirt.
They started walking again, and Kate waited, wondering if he’d pick up the conversation where they’d left it. When he finally spoke, his voice sounded defeated. “Look, I just can’t go back there.”
“To that persona, you mean?”
“The persona, the role—the relationship with Viv.”
She felt a dull ache in her belly and a sharp pang in her chest. Physical manifestations of feelings she couldn’t quite name. Sympathy for him, maybe, and something a little like jealousy. That was dumb. It’s not like she had any claim on Jonah, or any reason to resent his ex-wife’s claim on him.
“Sit with the feelings!” Viv called in her brain, an echo from chapter five in But Not Broken. “You don’t need to analyze or categorize or judge them. Just feel them.”
Kate took a deep breath and ordered herself to keep an impassive expression. “You still love Viv?”
“God, no! Not like that, anyway. Don’t get me wrong, we’re still friendly. And I don’t hate her either, if that’s your next question.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“I’ve moved on. She’s moved on. It’s better that way for both of us.”
“I see.”
She was trying to see, anyway. Part of her wished he’d tell her more, that he’d explain the arc of his love affair with Viv and how they’d reached this point.
But part of her—a tiny, jealous part—didn’t want details. Didn’t want to imagine the two of them together laughing, touching, exchanging loving glances across a crowded room.
She was still thinking about it when Jonah spoke again. “What do you remember about the way Viv described me in But Not Broken?”
His voice was so soft and the question so random that Kate thought she’d heard wrong at first. “Um—well.” She thought back to chapter twelve, the point in the book where Viv had healed her broken heart was getting to know the man who would become her husband. “She liked that you were rough around the edges,” Kate recalled. “That you were so different from the abusive asshole she’d been with before—that Ivy League professor?” She took a deep breath of salt-tinged air, feeling more than a little awkward. “She loved that your size and your strength made her feel safe instead of scared.”
“Right,” Jonah said, glancing over at her. “Here was a man who’d served his country with dignity and honor,” he recited, startling Kate with the sound of Viv’s words spoken in the low rumble of the man they’d been written to describe. “A man who didn’t need cocktail parties or college lectures to validate his self-worth. A man who could sit for hours with my feet tucked under his thigh on the sofa, comfortably enjoying silence without needing to fill it with the sound of his own voice.”
Tears pricked unexpectedly at the edges of Kate’s eyelids. She blinked hard, wanting to stay professional. “That’s beautiful,” she said. “I always thought so.”
“It’s bullshit.”
She turned and gave him a sharp look. “What?”
“I mean she fell in love with an idealized version of me,” he said. “The opposite of her, the opposite of the guy she’d been with. But that wasn’t the whole me. It was a caricature.”
Kate opened her mouth to protest. To defend Viv’s intentions or meaning. But Jonah got his words out first.
“Look, I’m not saying she was the only one who screwed up,” he said. “I did the same damn thing. We both had this idea that our differences complemented each other. We liked the idea of each other, but not the day-to-day drudgery of it.”
“I can see that, I guess.” Kate thought about her last relationship. How she’d started out fascinated by Anton’s passion for expensive Scotch and glamorous parties, but in the end, those were the things she’d grown to resent.
“The only thing opposites really attract is misery,” Jonah said softly. “And I just can’t go back to that.”
“Oh.”
Well, hell. She couldn’t really argue with that. If the guy didn’t want to work with his ex, who was she to tell him he ought to? She couldn’t blame him. The thought of having to work with Anton made her stomach knot up in a big, sour ball.
Still, the circumstances were a little different. Jonah might not know how different. She owed it to him to spell it out.
“Look, Jonah. There’s something else you should know.”
“What’s that?”
“After you left Viv’s place, we had a meeting with some executives from the Empire network. She, uh—let them know you’re uncertain about being part of the show.”
“Uncertain?” He frowned down at her. “What part of fuck no sounded uncertain to you?”
“I’m just relaying what she said,” Kate replied evenly. “But I was also going to share what the executives told me after we left the meeting.”
“Which is?”
“They want you. Obviously. And they’re willing to pay handsomely to get you.”
“I’m not hard up for money,” he said. “Between the royalties from On the Other Hand and profits at the bookstore, I’m doing just fine.”
“I’m sure you are,” she said. “But the kind of money we’re talking about—it’s more than ‘just fine.’”
He didn’t say anything to that, but she heard an invitation in the pause. Kate reached a hand into her purse and slid out a large stack of paper. She stopped walking, hoping he’d do the same. He got three steps ahead, then turned.
“We worked up a series bible and budget before we approached you,” she said. “This afternoon, the network asked us to sit down and hammer out a new set of numbers. A budget that accounts for the possibility of you joining the lineup.”
Jonah glanced at the sheaf of papers in her hand. “I assume that’s what you have there?”
Kate nodded. She hesitated a moment, knowing this was a risky move. But the execs had told her to do what it took to get Average Joe on board. That’s what she was doing.
“These documents are confidential,” she said. “I’m not allowed to distribute them at all. In fact, I was specifically asked not to show Viv at this stage in the game.”
Jonah frowned and shoved his glasses up his nose. “But you’re offering to show me?”
She hesitated, then nodded. “I think you should have all the information before you make up your mind.”
Flipping the folder open, she let her gaze drift to the page on top of the stack. The word confidential was stamped in red ink across the top, and under that, the words Proposed talent budget for Relationship Reboot with Dr. Viv.
She flipped to the page with his name at the top, then turned the folder around so he could see it. Then she looked up to watch his face. The amber-green eyes drifted slowly down the page, back and forth, taking in the information, the columns of numbers she’d seen for the first time only an hour ago.
“Holy shit.” Jonah glanced up and locked eyes with her. “That’s per year, or—”
“That’s per episode,” she told him, flipping the folder closed. “If the pilot takes off, the network intends to order fourteen episodes in the first season.”
He stared at her. “But that’s insane. That’s more than ten times what I’ve made with On the Other Hand.”
“I know. That’s why I wanted you to see what they’re proposing. This isn’t some third-tier programming on a no-name network. This is prime time, Jonah. The big leagues.”
His hand drifted to the center of his chest and he scratched absently at the edge of one pectoral muscle. Kate ordered herself not to look. Not to let her gaze drop even an inch. Not even for a peek.
“How much do you get?”
Kate swallowed. “What do you mean?”
“Are you being fairly compensated for this as well?”
She nodded. “Fair enough.”
“What else is in it for you?”
She hesitated. “A chance to do something meaningful. These books—Dr. Viv’s whole outlook on things—they changed my life. Changed my outlook on relationships and the way I interact with the world.”
He quirked an eyebrow at her. “That’s a lot of meaning to ascribe to a bunch of paperbacks you bought for five ninety-nine on Amazon.”
“I bought them in hardback,” Kate shot back, pretty sure he was trying to distract her again. “Besides, this show would be a big feather in my cap career-wise. A chance to work with my favorite author. Authors.”
He smiled. “That was never really my book. You know that.”
“Your part in it was important. Just because you’re not the one with PhD behind your name doesn’t mean your contributions didn’t touch people.”
Jonah cleared his throat. “Speaking of touching people, why didn’t you tell her?”
She thought about pretending she didn’t know what he was talking about. But asking “Who?” or “What?” would just be a forestalling mechanism or a game, and she was too old for that.
“I didn’t tell Viv about the kiss because it seemed irrelevant.”
“Beeeep!” he shouted, making the dog’s ears prick to attention. “Incorrect answer. Try again.”
She sighed. “Is this one of your spy-catching techniques from the Marines?”
“Yeah. We’re trained to say beep when they lie to us,” he deadpanned. “Come on. The kiss was not irrelevant.”
“Okay, you’re right,” she said. “Maybe it’s because it seemed entirely too relevant.”
“How so?”
“If Vivienne Brandt is considering inviting her ex-husband into her television program—into her home, for crying out loud—it’ll complicate things if she knows the producer and her ex played tonsil hockey once upon a time.”
He nodded. “Now there’s an honest answer. A good one, too.”
“So you agree. We probably shouldn’t mention one innocent little kiss?”
Jonah snorted. “I was there, babe. That was no innocent kiss. And there wasn’t just one.”
Kate shivered, but ordered herself to keep her composure. “Fine. But now that you’ve seen the numbers, is your interest piqued even a little?”
He looked away, his gaze drifting out over Puget Sound. “A little.”
Okay, so that was a start. Kate slid her hand into her bag and pulled out a business card. Since he wasn’t looking at her, she pressed the card into his palm and watched as his gaze swiveled back to hers.
“All my contact information is here—my cell, my e-mail, everything,” she said. “And in case you want to talk privately, I’m staying at the Westin in Bellevue. Room 906.”
Now why had she said that? It wasn’t on the card, and she hadn’t planned to just blurt it out. Jonah stared at her for a few beats, then looked down at the card.
“If I say no, are they going to pull the plug on the show?”
Kate looked at him, not sure how to answer. “Are you asking because you want to help her out, or because you like knowing you can kill your ex-wife’s TV show?”
He shoved the card in his pocket and met her eyes. “The fact that those are the two possibilities that occur to you means I’m probably not going to get a straight answer.”
“I don’t know,” she said, ordering herself to hold his gaze. “I don’t know what’ll happen to the show if you won’t do it. That’s the truth.”
He stared at her for a long time. So long Kate couldn’t help letting her gaze stray from his, drifting quickly down his bare chest and then back up to those amber-green eyes that seemed to be staring straight into her soul.
“I’ll be in touch,” he said.
Then he turned and walked away, the little fox dog trotting along beside him.