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chair, and scrubbed at his jaw. Sighing, he came back to face Larry, shaking his head. “I never thought I’d see the day a pretty face could influence your business decisions.”
    Larry scoffed. “You never will. This Tate is all right in the looks department, tall, thin, short dirty-blond hair, nothing special, but she’s got grit, one of those real go-getters, doesn’t understand the word no. But she doesn’t cross the line, either. Reminds me of you when you were younger.”
    When he was younger…Jack stiffened. Larry had struck a raw nerve. Nothing to do with age. Jack was only thirty-six. But his recent complacency was starting to bother him. He’d let celebrity and money take center stage. He’d been ambitious once, single-mindedly chasing after the story of the century. Nothing could have stopped him in those days. Not even a multimillion-dollar contract.
    “So where does she want the shoot to take place?” Larry got to his feet and predictably pinched the creasedown the front of his slacks. “She hadn’t chosen a location when Ernie and I spoke to her. We left it open but that you’d have final say.”
    “Hush.”
    Larry’s eyes gleamed. “Brilliant choice. See? The woman’s got savvy.”
    “Yeah, just what my image needs.” Bad enough he was considered the pretty boy of the network, of the morning infotainment show no less, a bona fide heartthrob according to the media. He hated it.
    With a hint of a smile on his face, Larry laid the leather folders on Jack’s desk. “Talk to her and let me know what happens.”
    “I can tell you right now what’ll happen.”
    Larry sighed. “Read the contract later. You don’t need to meet Tate with an attitude.”
    Jack watched the older man leave. He walked with a slight stoop Jack hadn’t noticed before. The guy had never mentioned his age but he had to be in his mid-sixties, and he still worked just as hard as he had when he took Jack on as a client fourteen years ago. He clearly loved his job and gave it a hundred and fifty percent.
    Jack’s gaze went to the leather folder. Would he be able to say the same in thirty years?
     
    A S SOON AS M ADISON HUNG UP the phone, she let out a yowl. She stomped her feet a few times, going in a circle, doing the happy dance and then sank into the swivel chair she’d nearly sent flying across the small office.
    Nearby, Talia looked up from the article she’d been editing and peered over her thick, black-rimmed glasses.“You arranged a meet,” she said in her usual monotone voice. “Just a guess.”
    Out of breath, Madison nodded. Talia was good people, in spite of her odd sense of humor and even odder taste in clothes, and she did let Madison use her office sometimes, but, man, Madison wished Karrie were here.
    Madison missed her like crazy on a normal basis but at a time like this it was really hard to have her best friend living all the way across the country. Not that she wasn’t happy that Karrie had found Rob, but jeez…It had been months since Karrie had moved west to be with her guy.
    She glanced at her watch. Two-fifteen, which made it eleven-fifteen Las Vegas time. She wouldn’t call yet. She’d wait until after she met with him. The Jack Logan. She still couldn’t quite wrap her brain around the magnitude of snaring someone like the heart-stopping Logan.
    Talia snorted. “If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it.”
    “What?”
    “You acting like a star-struck teenager.”
    Madison laughed. “He’s only the sexiest man in the western hemisphere.”
    Talia shook her head. “I still don’t believe it.”
    “The only thing Jack Logan means to me is the cover of your magazine.” Madison locked her hands behind her head, leaned back and stretched her legs out. Wait until the other photographers found out whom she’d snagged. They’d drool like babies. Cry their eyes out. Or want to scratch hers out. An ugly thought struck her, and she looked at Talia. “Heard