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“Look, I know you’re new in the business …,” Jake started.
Cassidy’s gaze sharpened, and Jake quickly reversed. Wrong tactic.
He started over. “I hear what you’re saying. I do. Women have always hated Oxford, and men hate Stiletto. Each side is objectifying the other sex, yada yada.”
Cassidy’s eyebrows lifted. “I don’t get the sense that you’re losing sleep over this.”
“No. Because it’s what we do,” Jake said, leaning back in his chair. “I’m not writing for chicks any more than the gals over at Stiletto are writing for men. There’s no reason to complicate shit.”
Cassidy silently leaned down and pulled an impressive stack of envelopes onto his desk. “See this pile? This is about two hundred reasons why we absolutely need to ‘complicate shit.’ The readers have spoken. The way it’s always been isn’t working.”
Touché.
Score one for the new guy.
But it didn’t mean Jake was going to be the one to bend over.
Journalism wasn’t about spoon-feeding your readers. Well, okay, sometimes it was. But mostly it was about having grit. It was about good writing, and going with your gut. And Jake’s gut told him that pussyfooting around with some short-skirted writer wasn’t going to help his resume any.
Jake Malone was a good journalist. A good team player, he was not.
He understood Cassidy’s situation. Really, he did. Times were changing, and there were probably a decent number of guys who swiped their girl’s magazine off the nightstand for a shitter read. Just like there were plenty of women who probably snuck a peek at their brother’s Oxford subscription to try to discern what men were “really thinking.”
But the way Jake saw it, both sides were bound to be disappointed.
Men didn’t want to hear that putting the toilet seat down was now considered nonnegotiable, any more than women wanted to know that yes, he does look at your tits first, and no, he probably doesn’t actually think you have “great eyes.”
However, Jake recognized the look on Alex Cassidy’s face. There was no way he was going to be talked out of his play-nice-and-write-a-joint-article-with-a-woman idea.
Jake switched tactics. “Cole should do it.”
“Cole Sharpe doesn’t even work here.”
Jake shrugged. “Have you told him that?”
Cassidy let out a sigh of frustration “I mean he’s not a full-time employee. He’s a sportswriter we have on contract from time to time because our Health and Fitness department has more turnover than a rotisserie chicken.”
Jake clicked his pen in triumph as though it had been decided. “See? Sportswriter. Women love that shit. Put him on a few fake dates with one of Camille’s man-eaters.”
Cassidy sat unmoving, holding Jake’s gaze in what they both recognized as a pissing contest.
“Bill told me you want the Travel gig,” Cassidy said, finally breaking the tense silence.
Jake went on high alert. Now they were getting somewhere. “I do.”
“Bill said you’d be great at it.”
“Then why the hell didn’t Bill make it official before he left?”
“We talked about it. Decided it would be fair if I had the chance to make that assessment for myself. Given your record.”
Jake felt tingling in the back of this hands—a sure sign his temper was stirring. “What record is that? The one that says that my name is the most recognized of anyone associated with the Oxford brand? The record that indicates I’ve brought in more advertising through a few happy hours than half the people on the sales team? That record?”
Cassidy leaned down slightly to pull something out of a side drawer. How much shit did this guy have hiding behind his desk?
His boss slapped a newspaper in front of him, and Jake carefully hid his wince. Oh. That record.
“Yeah. That record,” Cassidy said, reading his thoughts loud and clear.
