[b]“Vega opted to scream into the microphone with the intensity of an alley cat on LSD- “

“Vega dresses like an overly emotional teenager- “

“His greatest achievement is getting blonde bimbos to fall for his tortured act- “

“A living breathing STD- “[/b]

Steven stopped reading the quotes and looked up at her, “Laura, what the hell were you thinking?”

Laura shrugged. “You tell me. You’re the one who decided to print it.”

Steven chuckled. “You’re damn right I printed it. I’ll admit you didn’t so much write about the concert as
used 2000 words to slaughter Derek Vega’s character, but it’ll sell like hot cakes.”

Laura smirked. Score. After the embarrassing ordeal that was their one night stand. Laura had been hell-bent on getting some good old-fashioned vengeance. Even after the dust had settled for a week, she still couldn’t believe him. He’d fallen asleep.

Asshole.

She didn’t understand what had happened to her. Why the hell had she slept with him? She could
blame the tequila all she wanted, but deep down, she knew she’d wanted it. At least she was on the pill.
She stifled a groan, not wanting Steven, a professional gossip, to find out any more than he should.

“When are we getting the preliminary numbers for the circulation?” Laura asked.

“Sometime next week. Seriously though, you’ve written lots of pieces for us before, but never anything
like this one.”

Laura narrowed her eyes, “What do you mean?”

Steven raised his hands in defense, “Don’t get me wrong, you’re a perfectly adequate writer, but your
pieces have just lacked…passion. Like you haven’t really been paying attention to what you’ve been

writing about.”

Laura rolled her eyes, “It’s hard to get excited over Heidi Montag’s new boobs.”

Steven hit his desk lightly with the rolled up magazine. “But for some reason, you got excited about
Derek Vega, didn’t you?”

Laura’s eyes bugged out comically. Oh she’d gotten excited. “I don’t think so.”

“Oh don’t try to deny it, he got under your skin, didn’t he?” Steven asked, innocently enough.

She’d never wanted the earth to open up and swallow her like just then. “I don’t know, I just really didn’t
like him.”

“I’m surprised you managed to get these quotes from him though, I mean, this is outrageous stuff, even

by your standards.”

“I’ve told you before, Steve,” Laura sighed, “I can do my job and I can do it well.”

Steven nodded to himself. “I’m starting to see that. I know the tabloid industry isn’t perhaps the best fit
for you, but we just need to find you suitable pieces like this one.”

Laura couldn’t help the tiny smile that broke out on her face. “I don’t think another story like this is going
to magically fall into my lap, but I appreciate the vote of confidence.”

Steven looked uncomfortable and smiled at her awkwardly. “Yeah, about that…”

She was beyond suspicious now. Steven had always been like a father figure to her, ever since she
first started at Glitterati. He was never scared to give her critique or tell things to her straight. What was
so awful that he was having trouble forming into words?

“Just spit it out, so I can yell ‘Nooooooooooooo’ obscenely loud.” Laura sighed.

Steven grinned, “I’d prefer it if you didn’t and rather listened to what I have to say. The manager of The
Immortals called me two days ago.”

Laura perked up at that. She knew that a lot of the other reporters had been pulled into long court
cases for slander and other misdemeanors, but she’d always managed to keep herself out of trouble.
Until now. She couldn’t think of another reason for Derek’s manager to be contacting her boss.


“Was he mad?” Laura asked, unsure of what the protocol was. She couldn’t get into any legal trouble or
lose her job, she had a teenager to feed!

Steven shook his head, “Surprisingly, no. He actually wanted to call and thank us.”

Laura looked at him disbelievingly, “Is this a joke? I tore his lead singer a new one!”

“I was shocked too, believe me. Apparently all the buzz surrounding your article has been excellent PR
for the band. I guess it’s true what they say about any publicity being good publicity.” He laughed to
himself.

Laura was furious. She’d wanted to destroy the jerk, not lift him up to new heights! Why was she being
punished? She was a good person. She flossed, gave money to the poor, and made an effort to stop
her little brother from turning into a complete stoner. Life just wasn’t fair.

“Laura, are you listening?” Alaric roused her from her thoughts.

“Yeah, sorry, I just needed a minute to clear my head,” Laura said and tucked a stray strand from her
tight bun behind her ear.

“Well anyway, we got to talking and we decided we should…for lack of a better term, collaborate.” He
looked at the ceiling as he finished his sentence, obviously having an issue looking her straight in the
eyes.

Laura crossed her arms across her chest and raised her eyebrows. “Collaborate how?”

Steven grinned. “Here’s where the story gets really funny. You’re joining The Immortals on the first leg
of their tour.”

“No.” Laura replied immediately.

He had to be out of his mind. There was no way she’d ever spend another minute in the presence of
that low-life scumbag, even he had kind of called her beautiful. Laura shrugged the disturbing thought
to the back of her mind and gave her attention back to her boss.

“Now, I know you said you don’t like him, but…”

“But what? It’s my call, Steven, I won’t do it. Besides, even if I wanted to, I couldn’t just leave Jeff alone
for that long.” She worked very hard to keep her voice steady.

“Laura, I’m your boss. I can’t exactly force you to do this, but I strongly recommend it. And Samantha
and I can easily accommodate Jeff for a few weeks, it’s not an issue.”

Laura exhaled deeply and closed her eyes, “When you say you strongly recommend it…”

Steven shook his head quickly. “Don’t worry, I’d never make you choose between your job and this
piece, but Laura, this is for you own good.”

She looked at him skeptically.