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And, at the moment, Joss would rather lie on the runway and let a plane roll over her than call Vivian McBride. No doubt her mom would have had the forethought to travel with her ensemble for the evening, just to be safe. Plus, if Joss phoned, Vivian would automatically ask about the results of the business trip. Nothing solidified the thrill of failing quite like sharing the failure with her mother.
“Just let me know what to grab,” Emily said. “We want to make sure you look fabulous for your big win.”
As Joss listed everything she needed, she experienced a twinge of anxiety. First, Nick’s remark about Joss taking home the trophy, now Emily’s assurance of a “big win.” Optimism or not, the word jinx came to mind.
She was proud of her work—you didn’t succeed in advertising by feigning modesty—but underestimating the opposition would be a mistake. Hugh Brannon could charm his way into a nunnery, and he often produced campaigns as slick as he was…even if some of his accounts with Kimmerman and Kimmerman did rely heavily on the marketing equivalent of name-dropping, substituting celebrities for creativity.
“Joss? You still there?”
“Yeah. I was just trying to think if there was anything else I need. Thanks again, I really appreciate this.”
“You’re welcome. And good luck tonight!”
She needed it, Joss thought as she punched in her home number to check her machine. Two messages, both for Bob—the apparent former owner of her new phone number. She tried not to think about the fact that he got more calls than she did, but her mind just wandered back to her nervousness about tonight.
Hugh Brannon had already beat her once, and even if he didn’t pull it off a second time, there were four other deserving nominees in the regional print-campaign category. Her stomach knotted. Where’s your winning attitude, Jocelyn?
Maybe it had taken the flight to Dallas without her.
SINCE HER PLANE from Chicago left on schedule and she hadn’t checked any luggage for the airline to lose, Joss arrived at the downtown awards site with eight and a half minutes to spare. And here I thought I’d be pressed for time to get ready. Despite knowing she didn’t have to be inside the ballroom at the exact time printed on her invitation, years of hearing “Perfection begins with punctuality, Jocelyn” rang in her head.
Ask not for whom the annoying voice tolls…
As promised, Nick Sheperd stood in the hotel lobby, shifting his weight and looking uncomfortable.
“Thanks so much,” she greeted him breathlessly. “I couldn’t very well wear this to the awards.” “This” was a utilitarian navy pantsuit perfect for business travel, over a crisp white blouse that had been rendered considerably less so when a fellow passenger dumped his soft drink on her midturbulence.
“I’m just glad you’re finally here,” Nick said, a relieved expression on his lean, unshaven face. “I was beginning to feel stupid standing with a dress and a bunch of flowers.”
“Flowers?” She’d noticed her garment bag draped over a nearby powder-blue love seat. Taking a second look, she saw the vase of red roses on the tiled floor, and sighed. “David, I presume?”
It was identical to the arrangement she’d received from her ex-boyfriend on Valentine’s Day, her birthday and their six-month anniversary. They hadn’t made it to seven.
Nick nodded, the overhead light reflecting off the mousse he’d used to carefully spike his hair tonight. “He sent them to the office, and I brought them with me so they wouldn’t wilt over the weekend.”
She studied the flowers. When you care enough to send the very cliché. Maybe she should be touched that David remembered her big night, but it was hard to work up any real emotion now when he hadn’t shown any throughout their relationship. While she’d given the relationship her customary one hundred and ten percent, David fell back on pat gestures.
He was the type of person who preferred the ease of gift certificates to actually picking out something personal and would buy ten copies of the same generic birthday card to send to friends and family. She, on the other hand, had already started looking for the perfect Christmas present for Emily, even though it was only October. Joss was in the habit of finishing her holiday shopping before Thanksgiving.
In all fairness to David, he’d never made an effort to hide his minimalist approach to relationships. One of the things she’d found attractive about him in the beginning was how different he’d been from charming ubersalesman Hugh, who gave women the same full-court press he gave prospective clients. Joss should have ended things with David sooner, but breakups were failures, and she’d been loath to admit another romantic defeat.
She scooped up her garment bag, needing to correct her soda-stained clothes and limp travel hair before anyone else saw her. “I’m going to dash into the ladies’ room and change. See you inside?”
“Or…I could wait here if you want. Then I can run your stuff out to your car while you go in and mingle with more important people.” His hazel eyes twinkled. “I know it’ll cause you actual physical pain if you’re late.”
Ignoring the teasing dig, she smiled. “That would be great, Nick. I’d love a chance to talk to Wyatt before the dinner presentation starts.” She was hoping she could pick up some clues in casual conversation about what was bothering her employer.
Perhaps she was overreacting to his recently quiet mood and a few frowns, but a little paranoia was understandable after her last employer had been indicted for fraud.
Carrying her dress and purse, Joss hurried toward the bathroom. She hung the garment bag on the inside of a stall door, then quickly stripped. As she wiggled into a pair of panty hose, the nylons snagged on her thumbnail, and the resulting run spread like a jagged fungus of tiny multiplying rectangles. Giving in to a rare impulse, she let loose a satisfying string of obscenities that summed up her day thus far.
“Ahem,” someone said from an adjoining stall.
Whoops.
“Sorry!” Joss called. “Didn’t realize anyone else was in here.” With the way her day was going, the person she’d offended was tonight’s awards presenter. Joss had a brief, painful picture of going up on stage in shredded hose to accept an award from a woman glaring at her.
Joss glanced hopefully at the bottom of the bag.
Nestled beneath the hem of her strapless muted red dress, with her shoes and travel jewelry case, was the wished-for extra pair. Bless you, Em. The slit in her calf-length skirt was meant to reveal a little leg, and Joss would have worried all night that the run was visible.
One shimmy, zip and shrugged-into bolero jacket later, she was fully dressed. She hung her discarded suit in the garment bag and opened the door, glancing sheepishly at the pinch-faced woman washing her hands.
What Joss would’ve liked was time to completely redo her makeup and put curlers in her shoulder-length layered blond hair. What she settled for was a loose chignon and fresh lipstick. She exchanged her small gold hoop earrings for a pair of elongated ruby teardrops, then returned to the lobby, where she found Nick pacing and jostling his car keys.
He stopped long enough to grin in approval. “You did that in five minutes? If you ever decide to have a meaningless affair with a much younger guy, let me know.”
Four years was not much younger. “I can’t think about you that way, Nicky. You’re like the annoying little brother I never had.”
He laughed and held out his hand for her stuff. “Keys? Wyatt and Penelope just went inside.”
Wyatt Allen, a grizzled veteran of the advertising world, ran Visions Media Group. His wife, Penelope, had made participating in various charities her full-time occupation, but she chipped in from time to time at Visions, helping with paperwork and receptionist duties.
Joss handed Nick her key ring, and he pivoted to go, pausing at the last second with an expression of endearing uncertainty shadowing his face. “How do I look?”
She smiled inwardly. Ad execs stuck to a professional dress code, but people who were strictly on the creative end were allowed, even encouraged, to project a less orthodox image. Everyone at Visions knew Nick aspired to a wardrobe that would help keep Ralph Lauren in business, but in an underdressed attempt to look the part, he now wore an iridescent unstructured blazer with a striped shirt and dark funky jeans.
“Like the opening act at a rock concert,” she told him.
“Thanks.” Nick turned toward the revolving doors. “I think.”
Joss went to the ballroom, pausing just inside the doorway to let her eyes adjust to the dimmed chandeliers and flickering candles on the white linen tablecloths. Bland jazz played through speakers in the back of the room, but it was mostly drowned out by the hum of conversation. Maybe being late was no longer fashionable—the impressive crush of people made it difficult to find the round table reserved for Visions Media Group.
“Quite a crowd tonight,” a man said near her ear.
She almost jumped. Taking a deep breath, she steeled herself against Hugh Brannon’s husky bedroom voice and the bubbles of nervous anticipation fizzing through her system. Obviously the crowd wasn’t big enough.
2
“HUGH.” JOSS TURNED, confident in her composed expression. She’d won plenty of poker games, this one was just played without cards. “It’s a pleasure to see you.”
Viscerally speaking, her words were true. What woman wouldn’t be pleased to see a tall tuxedoed man who looked like Hugh? With his thick black hair, short in the back but longer and sexily disheveled around his face, his laser-blue eyes and finely chiseled flawless features, he was hot without even trying. But then he’d smile.
Hugh Brannon’s teasing grin and accompanying dimples could convince female Eskimos to line up to buy ice.
“A pleasure?” he echoed. “My, how we in marketing do bend the truth.”
“Speak for yourself.” Joss smiled sweetly. “My ads use honesty and ingenuity.”
“And mine use…?”
“Overpaid celebrities, mostly.”
“Well, I do work for a large agency with the budget for network commercials and well-known stars.” His tone was annoyingly indulgent. “I guess you’re in a different position.”
The streamlined Visions Media Group might not produce glamorous spots for national television, but some of advertising’s most memorable campaigns, such as the milk mustache, had been print. And for all that Hugh liked to needle her, he oversaw his share of regional work. To hear him tell it, you’d think he was single-handedly responsible for the ads played during the Super Bowl.
She scoffed. “You’re not up against me because of national commercials.”
He swept his gaze over her. “I miss being up against you.”
His words caught her off guard, and a pang of desire tightened her midsection. Should she glare, which he fully deserved, or look away in case she blushed tellingly? Not an oh-I’m-embarrassed-by-your-sexual-references girlish blush. An oooh-that-sounds-good-to-me-too flush of color. She might have a great bluffing expression, but there wasn’t much she could do about her fair skin.
“So…” Hugh glanced around. “Donald’s not with you tonight?”
She didn’t bother correcting him since he knew perfectly well her ex-boyfriend’s name was David. There had been an uncomfortable encounter at a convention in Houston over the summer, and Hugh had childishly insisted on calling David “Dale” all night.
“We’re not seeing each other anymore,” she said.
He shook his head. “Broke his heart, too, huh?”
Please. As if she were the one who’d hurt him? “At least he had one.”
Instead of arguing, he brought out the big guns—the seductive smile that lit his eyes and managed to be both boyish and enticingly adult. “You look fantastic, Joss.”
So did he. “I certainly think so.”
He chuckled at her cool response, and the low, rich laugh turned her insides to traitorous goo.
“What about you, no date tonight?” Ordinarily, she wouldn’t have shown the slightest interest in his love life, but she was willing to make an exception since he’d broached the topic.
“Of course not.” He feigned shock. “What woman could compare to you?”
Infuriating man. Which, come to think of it, was redundant.
“I forgot how full of it you are,” she said.
“Really?” His smile vanished, and he brushed a finger across her cheek. “I haven’t been able to forget a thing about you.”
It was a pitch, she reminded herself, a sale. Hugh was an ad man who went with what he thought the target audience wanted to hear. She should end this exchange, but she didn’t want to be the one to walk away. If only Nick would come in, she could excuse herself gracefully.
Since it didn’t look as if anyone was bringing her a file in a cake, she’d have to spring her own escape. “We shouldn’t stand in the doorway like this.”
“True. Buy you a drink?”
“Very generous…considering it’s an open bar.”
“It sounded more gallant than, wanna go get a free watered-down cocktail with me?”
“Since when do you care about being gallant?” The old pain was numbed but still there, like emotional scar tissue. “I had you pegged more as opportunistic.”
His jaw clenched, but then he shrugged. “Have it your way. I just thought maybe you could use a drink before you take second to my first. Again.”
Not if there was any justice in the world.
Her nomination this year was a first for Visions Media Group, and though Wyatt was ecstatic about the added credibility it lent his small company, she wouldn’t be satisfied with anything less than victory. Somewhere deep down, she questioned how healthy her desire to win was, but her mom had taught her that “also-ran” meant nothing. Besides, knocking Hugh down a peg would be a favor to the universe, benefiting all mankind.
Womankind, at the very least.
And it’s not like I’ve taken ambition to an unwholesome level. She wasn’t some unscrupulous nut who’d smear her opponent’s reputation, or bribe judges or throw virgin sacrifices into volcanoes to appease deities. Good thing, since the Dallas-Fort Worth area was as lacking in volcanoes as her social circle was in virgins.
Inching away, she went with a more direct brush-off this time. “You’ll have to excuse me, Hugh. I see my boss over there, and he wanted a preview of my acceptance speech.”
“By all means.” He didn’t reiterate his prediction of winning, but his smirk conveyed the message all the same.
She ground her back teeth together as she walked away. Tuxedo, eight hundred and fifteen dollars. Cost of admission to ADster Awards Dinner, ninety dollars. Hugh Brannon’s ego, limitless.
“AND THE GOLD ADSTER goes to…” Tessa St. Martin, a curvy woman in a short sequined dress, opened the envelope.
Hugh waited along with everyone else for the winner’s name.
“Kimmerman and Kimmerman’s Life in Motion campaign for ATC Tires! Hugh Brannon, account supervisor.”
He shoots, he scores.
The crowd didn’t exactly go wild, but all around the table, Hugh’s co-workers began congratulating him. Individual awards were given out for specific creative contribution, but recognition for an overall campaign went to the person who’d coordinated the client’s branding with the agency’s work. In this case, Hugh. His friend Mike Denton slapped him on the arm, and Kimmerman Sr. himself reached across the table to shake Hugh’s hand.
Standing, Hugh nodded his thanks, but his mind drifted for a second to a fellow nominee across the room. He knew without seeing her that Jocelyn would be smiling graciously—as if she were actually happy for him—and clapping along with everyone else. He also knew she was crushed by her perceived “failure.”
She’s got to learn not to take these things so seriously, he thought as he walked to the onstage podium.
A competitive man himself, he didn’t mean to be hypocritical about Joss’s drive. He loved to win, and he was glad for the accolades. It wasn’t easy to make all-terrain tires memorable and entertaining, and he’d worked hard to integrate his team’s ideas with the client’s needs. But Joss worked hard at everything. If she kept up her pace and intensity, she’d have an ulcer.
Or worse.
His smile faltered at the dark thought, but he reclaimed it as he took his trophy and kissed Tessa’s cheek. Reciting his speech, he checked his impulse to look for Joss. Seeing her earlier tonight had been as galvanizing as the bell ringing at the opening of a boxing match, except fighting wasn’t what he wanted to do with her.
Not the only thing, anyway. There’d been a time when their verbal sparring had been a prelude to mind-blowing sex.
Despite telling himself he wouldn’t seek Joss out, he continued to subconsciously scan the crowd as he acknowledged the creative team he’d supervised. Ah—there she was, as gorgeous as ever and forcing herself to smile. Looking at her genial expression, no one would ever guess her fondest wish was to see Hugh shish-kebabbed on an open flame.
Last year, she’d shocked him by walking over from Mitman’s second reserved table to congratulate him. It had been the only time she’d voluntarily spoken to him between his landing the Stefan’s Salons account and their parting of ways during the investigation of Mitman.
He and Joss had worked in client recruitment, in no way associated with the departments accused of selling falsely manufactured data and using exaggerated focus-group numbers to cut costs and research time. But in spite of her blamelessness, after the industry scandal broke, Joss had become even more determined to prove herself than before—which he hadn’t realized was possible.
Knowing there were other awards still to be presented, Hugh wrapped up his remarks. “There are doubtless others I could thank, but you all don’t want to listen to me drone on when there are more important people in the room.” He winked at Tessa, who stood stage left.
Tessa was attractive, but she was no Joss McBride.
