Love on the Air (19 page)

Christie's adrenaline rush ebbed away, as if someone had pulled a drain plug inside her. Two hours
working side-by-side with Rick. They'd functioned
smoothly as a team, as if that was the way it was
meant to be. She couldn't have done it without him.
And now it was ending.

She studied Rick as he handled a stray phone callhis tousled brown hair, the studied concentration in his
eyes, just a slight weariness creeping in around their
corners. It was a face she'd grown all too fond of, and
if things worked out right, soon she wouldn't be seeing it any more. He'd been here for her at a moment's
notice. But then, that was his job.

Rick hung up. Christie turned away and went on the
air with the news that the immediate emergency was
over. "We'll have information as it becomes available.
Right now, back to more of your favorite music, here
on KYOR." She fired off a song, signaling the return
of normalcy.

She closed the microphone, and Rick took one more
phone call. Like a well-oiled machine, she thought.
For another minute or two.

He hung up and turned to her, grinning. "Think we
should air a report on a fallen lamp?"

Their eyes met, and Rick's smile faded as they
stood there, barely more than a foot apart. Suddenly,
a natural disaster was nothing. Being alone in this tiny
studio with Rick, at this hour-that was cataclysmic.
In spite of the music, a prevailing feeling of quiet settled over the studio. The phone lines stayed dark.

Rick tried another smile, but this one seemed
forced. "You've really had a baptism by fire, haven't
you?" he said. His conversational tone was jarring.
"Barely out of your probationary period, an EAS
alert..."

The boss makes a pass at you and acts like it never
happened...

Christie turned away and grabbed for the EAS
binder. The alert had to be logged. As she searched
for the right place to write it in, her hands started to
shake. "You can go now." She took a deep breath and
tried to make her voice steadier than her hands. "Get
some sleep. I really appreciate-"

She felt his hands on her shoulders. It was like
pushing a button; at his touch, her eyes blurred. Christie closed them tight. She was starting to shake, and
it wasn't from any EAS alert. She set the book down
on the counter before she could drop it.

"Hey," he said softly. "It's all right." Gently, he
squeezed her shoulders. "You did a great job."

Christie stiffened at his soothing touch, and a
thought hit her with violent force: she never again
wanted to hear Rick tell her what kind of job she'd
done. "I don't care." Her voice was choked.

"You don't mean that," he said. "You're exhausted.
And you're fed up. I know." Hands still on her shoulders, Rick gently pulled her backward to lean against
him.

She shook her head, not trusting her voice, trying
not to accept the firm support of his body against hers.
Rick's arms came up around her, and she didn't know
what to feel-frustration, exhaustion, anger. She tried
to feel anything but the warmth that enclosed her. "It's
okay," he whispered. "Just let it go."

What did he expect her to do? Cry? Melt into his
arms? She knew where that led. She'd spent the last
several weeks dealing with the fallout. He turned her
to face him, drawing her head toward his chest.

Christie started to pull away. "We can't-"

"Hush. It's three-thirty in the morning." He stroked
her hair, and she let him, the gentleness of his fingers
smoothing away her resolve. Once again he drew her
closer, and this time she settled her cheek against his
chest. He held her firmly, as if he would hold her up
all night if he had to. She clenched her teeth and closed her eyes tight, holding it in. Trying not to give
in completely.

"Breathe," he reminded her. Christie drew in a long,
slow breath, then let it out, shuddering. Some of the
tension went out of her. She let her body slump, too
tired to fight any more, too tired to hide any more. She
allowed herself to feel the warmth of his arms, the
firmness of his chest. And then she became aware of
the sound of his heart, beating much faster than his
soothing words would indicate. "I've got you," he
said. "It's all right."

Nothing's all right, she wanted to say.

Peripherally, almost like a sixth sense, she became
aware that the song was ending. Christie's hand shot
out to the control panel beside them to start the next
CD. Her hand bumped into Rick's as he reached for
the same button. Christie wasn't sure which one of
them actually started the song.

As the music started to play, he took her hand, twining his fingers through hers. He studied their hands for
a moment, then looked straight into her eyes. Christie's heart hammered at the naked, exposed look in the
gray eyes that searched hers. She tried to pull away,
but he held her firmly. "Rick, I have to-"

"Don't say it," Rick pulled her against him, and this
time she didn't pull back.

He kissed her. She didn't respond, not at first, but
that didn't stop Rick. His lips were insistent and persuasive. The night of the Christmas party might have
been an impulse, a fluke, but this was no impulse. This
was-something else. A gentle onslaught. Christie
tried to hold rigid against it, but she was losing the battle. The pressure of his lips sent a warmth through
her that made her weak.

Her resistance faded, then melted. As she dissolved
against him and returned the kiss, she felt something
loosen inside her. Weeks of holding back seemed to
fall away, bit by bit, leaving her emotions stripped
bare. She put her arms around his waist, just for something to hold on to, and the space between them closed
once again. That other embrace had been tender, melting. This one had a growing urgency, almost a desperation. And again, in the back of her mind, she knew
there was going to be a heavy price to pay. Christie
brought her arms up, clinging to the taut muscles over
his shoulder blades.

Rick felt the pressure of her fingers against his back
and wrapped his arms still more securely around her.
He heard the sound he remembered so well-that low,
tiny moan that seemed to come from somewhere far
back inside her. It filled his ears, and it echoed somewhere inside him. She fit so perfectly in his arms, soft,
firm and delicate all at the same time. He barely broke
the kiss before he started on a new one, determined to
keep her fastened to him. If he didn't let go of her,
she couldn't leave. It felt that simple.

There would be no going back after this, and he
knew it. But he didn't want to go back. He couldn't.
No more happy talk in the hallways, no more pretending to be just pals. This was all or nothing. He was
going for broke.

Because, for all he knew, he was kissing her goodbye.

When the kiss was over, Rick pulled her close, and
Christie felt his cheek rest on top of her head.

"Christie, I know."

She hardly recognized the husky voice as Rick's.
One of his hands tangled lazily through her hair. "I
know about the job in Tucson." This time he was the
one who let out a shuddering breath. "And I don't
want you to go."

It was like having two bombs drop in her lap at
once.

He knew. And he was asking her not to leave.

She hadn't known until now how badly she'd
wanted to hear that. And it didn't do her a bit of good.
If she stayed, what then? Quit her job? For a moment,
standing with the support of Rick's solid warmth, she
found herself considering it. But it should be a happy
choice, one she could make with a full heart, and she
didn't know if she could do that.

A strange, heavy silence filled the room. It took
Christie a moment to figure out why. The last song
had run out. And Rick Fox, the man who loathed dead
air, didn't move.

After a second or two, Christie couldn't stand it any
more. She wrenched away and hit the console to start
the next CD player. It was in CD-2, back from the
shop once again, and she was paid back for her efforts
by the familiar thrumming noise as the song stuck.
Christie clenched her teeth, advanced CD-1 to another
track, and fired it off instead. She scrambled to load
the next song, trying to get things back in order. If she
could just deal with things here in the studio-things
she had control over-she'd be all right. But her heart
was racing.

Rick laughed raggedly. "So who doesn't care any
more?"

She didn't want to turn around. It meant facing
Rick, and that meant facing the turmoil she was in. So
she didn't turn around. She tried to keep her voice
steady, even though she was still shaken from the intensity of his kiss. "Rick, I need you to go."

"That's it?" His voice was closer now. She was cornered in the tiny counter area, with Rick behind her
and the bank of CD players in front of her. "Just go?"

Christie crossed her arms tight in front of her,
clenched her fists and dug her nails into her palms,
trying for some external pain to battle what was going
on inside her. She felt as if she were filled with broken
glass. Everything hurt.

"Come on, Rick, what do you expect?" She forced
herself to turn and face him. He was closer than she expected, but she still managed to avoid his eyes. She
fixed her gaze instead on the rumpled shoulder of his
shirt, where her head had rested a few minutes ago.

He seemed to have recovered from their embrace;
his tone was insanely reasonable. "Look, I know it
hasn't been easy-"

"Hasn't been easy?" She'd never heard more outrageous words. "It's been easy enough for you."

"That's not true." She made the mistake of meeting
his eyes, and her heart thudded faster. They looked so
earnest, so sincere. She reminded herself how sincere
he could sound when he was advertising yet another
never-to-be-repeated offer on the car of her choice.
The voice was good, but those eyes could sell a whole
fleet of cars. Christie made herself look away again,
watching Rick's arm instead as he passed his hand
through his hair. "Christie, if you could just wait a
little while longer before-"

She shut out the calming voice before he could sell
her another bill of goods. "Wait for what? Why
wouldn't I leave? I can't keep doing this." She'd
wanted to keep the emotion out of her voice, but now
she couldn't even keep up with the words. They
rushed out ahead of her, while she just watched and
listened. It was like an out-of-body experience. "What
am I supposed to do? Risk my job so we go into another hot clinch for five minutes every month? Or
sneak off to the transmitter room for-"

"I never said anything like that."

"You never say anything." She looked at him again
and tried, as hard as she could, to feel nothing but the
anger and frustration she'd been cycling through for the past several weeks. "You just click on and off like
a light switch, whenever it suits you."

"Christie, stop." He took her by the shoulders. She
backed up against the counter, ramrod straight. He
closed his eyes briefly, and Christie watched him draw
in a long breath. "There might be another way."

"I know." Her eyes burned. She spoke around the
huge ache in her throat. "I know what your other way
is. One of us quits. Let's see-who would that be?
The one who's been at it all these years? Or the one
who just started a few months ago?" He started to
speak, but she cut him off. If she didn't, she knew
she'd cave in. She flailed for something to fight him
off. "Even if I did, how do I know you'd even be
around a month later? You've chucked one relationship for radio already."

It was a direct hit. Rick's hands dropped away from
her shoulders. His face changed. He'd never looked at
her so coldly, not even that first day he'd interviewed
her. That look had been preoccupied and slightly annoyed. This look was ice. She felt that chill all the
way through her-the pit of her stomach, the tips of
her toes, but most of all, her heart. And she knew
she'd destroyed everything.

He turned and walked out before she could say anything more.

She didn't move again until she heard the outside
door close behind him. Christie looked at the clock. It
was a quarter to four. Against Rick's long-standing
order, she cracked open the blinds. It was dark outside,
so she barely caught a glimpse of his rapidly retreating figure walking toward the parking garage. She'd
fought him off, all right.

From the speakers behind her, the singer whined out
yet another lovesick ballad.

Back at his apartment, Rick dropped onto the couch,
his arm over his eyes. So much for going for broke.
He'd stuck his neck out, been about to stick it out the
rest of the way, when she'd ripped his head off.

Masochistically, he'd listened to her on the short
drive home, as Christie recapped the earthquake and
the evacuation with smooth competence. There was
nothing in her voice to suggest what she'd just been
through, unless it was a certain fierce effort to sound
just as professional as ever. He recognized that trick
from the days after his marriage broke up. The more
miserable he got on the inside, the more defiantly
cheerful he got on the outside. At least while he was
on the air.