Once upon a time, Eden Rutherford would have given anything to meet the Josella Frank. The woman was basically a pioneer. She’d heroically led the way for female journalists. She hadn’t had a style of journalism, because she’d done it all. She was a real-life superhero.
But that was back when Eden didn’t know any better, when she was young, dumb, and full of dreams. Back before she understood how the world worked. Back before Jos Frank had given everything up. The years since had changed Eden as well. Her starstruck awe had belonged to a child, and eventually it faded, ground down by age and maturity and the reality of having an adult mindset instead of that of a young, sheltered teenager who didn’t understand the way the world really worked.
Still, if it was anyone else, Eden wouldn’t have agreed to the meeting. When her dad called and told her that Jos Frank wanted to meet with her, she’d been so shellshocked that she’d found herself agreeing to the date and time her dad set without even really thinking twice about it. She didn’t have a chance to ask why Jos would want to meet with her.
Three days later, Eden sat across an uncomfortable metal table with matching and equally uncomfortable metal chairs from the one and only Jos Frank herself. Because Eden had the choice of venues, she’d purposely picked a dumpy hole in the wall coffee shop in a crappy part of San Jose, not far from the tiny apartment where she lived. She’d chosen it because she imagined how distasteful someone like Jos would find it.
This woman with the elegant, regal, old moneyed bearing used to walk through nations ripe with strife and razed by war. She would have cut out part of her own soul if was it readily available to get just one more interview with someone who counted. Someone who could be held accountable. Someone who could explain the horrors the world was sometimes just seeing for the first time.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet with me.” Jos finally opened up the conversation over two paper cups of black coffee. The stuff tasted like it had been filtered through garbage first. Honestly, Eden wasn’t sure it wasn’t made with some dubious ingredients. Jos had arrived at the same time as she did and had bought them both without asking Eden what she wanted.
She would have said black coffee anyway, and it made her vibrate with annoyance that Jos had read her mind. Or maybe black coffee was just an easy go to. Jos lifted the cup to her scarlet lips and took a tentative sip. She managed not to wince, but that was probably because her tough girl mask was in place, and she was here to show zero weakness.
Eden found her gaze slipping lower and lower, back to Jos’ red lipstick. Perfect lips. Flawless. Beautiful. She was annoyed with herself for noticing. She told herself that anyone with eyes would. That Jos’ perfection wasn’t just a trick of good makeup and good lighting. It was real in person, too. She was stunningly beautiful, and she probably would be to the end of time.
“I didn’t really agree,” Eden clarified in an artic tone. Her eyes shot back to her hands, clutching the disgusting coffee. “My dad said you wanted to meet with me, and I said yes because I was so shocked. I didn’t really think about it until after I’d hung up. My dad’s good like that. He’s good at getting what he wants.”
Jos’ throat bobbed as she swallowed. She tapped her coffee cup quietly. Her nails were real and done with a French manicure. Eden slowly let her eyes peruse Jos. When one goes to battle, one must know their enemy. With her tight, curve-hugging black dress revealing just a tasteful amount of her ample cleavage and a bright yellow blazer, she looked totally out of place in the neighborhood.
“Where did you park?”
“Just down the block.”
“In a lot?”
r /> “No.” Jos’ tone changed, the huskiness she never let creep through on-air seeping in. It did something to Eden’s stomach, sending a dizzying feeling straight to her head.
To cover up the way her body betrayed her, Eden let her lips curl up in an ugly sneer. “The chances of your windows getting smashed before we’re done here are high. You probably drove something entirely too visible because that was your only option.”
A quick blink told her just how taken aback Jos was, though she tried to hide it. “You’ve done your research.”
Eden shrugged. “I’m sure everyone knows what you drive. That’s the point of driving it, isn’t it?”
She was also carefully trying to hide the fact that she was still gobsmacked at meeting her one-time idol. Sure, it had been a long time since she was a thirteen-year-old girl, figuring out that she was attracted to other girls and not boys, crushing on that hotshot journalist who had taken the world by storm. By then, Jos had already been on TV for two years.
Eden inhaled deeply. She dragged in too much of the soft, floral scent Jos wore by mistake and leaned back an inch, like that would help anything. She didn’t like that she found the scent tasteful. She actually didn’t like that despite what she thought of Jos now, she found the woman more than attractive. She was also more than lovely.
Jos Frank might be forty-three years old, but she obviously had a great personal trainer and probably also hit the gym or yoga class six times a day. She was tall at five-foot-ten and endowed with lush curves and breathtaking features. Her sharp cheekbones, full lips, delicate nose, and tapered jawline were probably a dream for any makeup artist. She was so toned, so perfect, it almost looked like she’d been manufactured. That was absolutely not Eden’s type, but maybe old habits, or old crushes, died hard, and she found her heart beating just a little too fast.
Peeved with herself, she turned waspish. “I’ve done my research because I’m a real journalist. I hit the streets and I plug away, day after day. I write the stories of those who can’t speak for themselves. I give a voice to the people that society has thrown away, to the ones that have been forgotten. I always wanted to do investigative journalism and I’m doing it, working with San Jose’s homeless.”
“You’re basically living on the streets,” Jos said, her tone flat. Her expression didn’t change. She was too much of a professional to let the barbs dig in. If she was disgusted by what Eden had been doing for the past year and a half, she was too professional to show it. Then again, was Jos even capable of producing real emotions anymore?
Harsh. That’s way too harsh. You’re being petty. Catty. Don’t be catty. Being catty is gross. Being jealous is even worse.
She wasn’t jealous. That wasn’t why she was being snappish. “I actually have an apartment,” she shot back. “Small and hole in the wall, but that’s okay. I wanted to live as authentically as possible. I knew I couldn’t survive on the streets, and I’m not pretending that I do. Everyone knows I’m a journalist. The catch is that I’m a freelancer, so I set my own rules and boundaries and I think that people can respect that.”
Jos eyed Eden coolly, but a slight shuttering of her eyes was the only indication she was even listening to what she was saying. Josella Frank could be mistaken for a much younger woman, even without fancy lighting. She was truly gorgeous, but she was cold. So, so cold. So different than the Jos the public was treated to every night.
“I’m up front about everything,” Eden continued. She was even more annoyed with herself for noticing anything about Jos. What did that say about her? That she cared? She certainly did not care. “I don’t try to trick anyone into letting me tell their story. I’m not making a dollar off anyone. Any proceeds I make go to paying my living expenses and then all the money gets poured back into the community. I have never and will never lose touch with reality or become indifferent to what’s going on around me here in my own city or in the world in general.”
Jos’ cerulean eyes flashed. “That’s very noble.” Her tone said the opposite. Jos Frank was salty and kind of mean in person when she didn’t have to be fake for the eyes of the world. She was still perfect, salt or not.
Eden found herself momentarily transfixed after her outburst, then tore her eyes away when she realized that she was looking.
“I’m not doing it to be noble,” Eden sniffed. Her hand curled around her cup, palming the lid. She rubbed at the uneven ridges in the plastic. She’d worn an old purple hoodie with a college logo on the front, one she hadn’t gone to, and a pair of skinny jeans. She’d done her nearly waist length brunette hair up in a severe bun and had foregone makeup. She didn’t have anyone to impress.
She certainly hadn’t had to overthink anything. She hadn’t second guessed herself. She absolutely did not check the mirror before she walked out, tempted to put on just a base layer of foundation and add a touch of blush, some tinted lip balm, and mascara. The two women couldn’t have been more different, sitting there in the dingy coffee shop, staring each other down.