Nora Roberts - Night Tales 01 - Night Shift.pdf

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Night Shift
CHAPTER 1
All right, night owls, it's coming up on midnight, and you're listening to KHIP. Get ready for five
hits in a
row. This is Cilia O'Roarke, and darling, I'm sending this one straight out to you."
Her voice was like hot whiskey, smooth and potent. Rich, throaty, touched with the barest
whisper of
the South, it might have been fashioned for the airwaves. Any man in Denver who was tuned in
to her
frequency would believe she was speaking only to him.
Cilia eased up on the pot on the mixer, sending the first of the five promised hits out to her
listeners.
Music slid into the booth. She could have pulled off her headphones and given herself three
minutes and
twenty-two seconds of silence. She preferred the sound. Her affection for music was only one of
the
reasons for her success in radio.
Her voice was a natural attribute. She'd talked herself into her first job-at a low-frequency, low-
budget
station in rural Georgia-with no experience, no resume and a brand-new high school diploma.
And she
was perfectly aware that it was her voice that had landed her that position. That and her
willingness to
work for next to nothing, make coffee and double as the station's receptionist. Ten years later,
her voice
was hardly her only qualification. But it still often turned the tide.
She'd never found the time to pursue the degree in communications she still coveted. But she
could
double-and had-as engineer, newscaster, interviewer and program director. She had an
encyclopedic
memory for songs and recording artists, and a respect for both. Radio had been her home for a
decade,
and she loved it.
Her easygoing, flirtatious on-air personality was often at odds with the intense, organized and
ambitious
woman who rarely slept more than six hours and usually ate on the run. The public Cilia
O'Roarke was a
sexy radio princess who mingled with celebrities and had a job loaded with glamour and
excitement. The
private woman spent an average of ten hours a day at the station or on station business, was
fiercely
determined to put her younger sister through college and hadn't had a date in two years of
Saturday
nights.
And didn't want one.
Setting the headphones aside, she rechecked her daily log for her next fifteen-minute block. For
the
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space of time it took to play a top 10 hit, the booth was silent. There was only Cilia and the lights
and
gauges on the control board. That was how she liked it best.
When she'd accepted the position with KHIP in Denver six months before, she'd wrangled for the
10:00-p.m.-to-2-a.m. slot, one usually reserved for the novice deejay. A rising success with ten
years
experience behind her, she could have had one of the plum day spots when the listening audience
was at
its peak. She preferred the night, and for the past five years she'd carved out a name for herself in
those
lonely hours.
She liked being alone, and she liked sending her voice and music out to others who lived at
night.
With an eye on the clock, Cilia adjusted her headphones. Between the fade-out of hit number
four and
the intro to hit number five, she crooned out the station's number four and the intro to hit number
five, she
crooned out the station's call letters and frequency. After a quick break when she popped in a
cassette of
recorded news, she would begin her favorite part of her show. The request line.
She enjoyed watching the phones light up, enjoyed hearing the voices. It took her out of her
booth for
fifty minutes every night and proved to her that there were people, real people with real lives,
who were
listening to her.
She lit a cigarette and leaned back in her swivel chair. This would be her last quiet moment for
the next
hour.
She didn't appear to be a restful woman. Nor, despite the voice, did she look like a smoldering
femme
fatale. There was too much energy in her face and in her long, nervous body for either. Her nails
were
unpainted, as was her mouth. She rarely found time in her schedule to bother with polish and
paint. Her
dark brandy-brown eyes were nearly closed as she allowed her body to charge up. Her lashes
were
long, an inheritance from her dreamy father. In contrast to the silky lashes and the pale, creamy
complexion, her features were strong and angular. She had been blessed with a cloud of rich,
wavy black
hair that she ruthlessly pulled back, clipped back or twisted up in deference to the headphones.
With an eye on the elapsed-time clock, Cilia crushed out the cigarette and took a sip of water,
then
opened her mike. The On Air sign glowed green.
"That was for all the lovers out there, whether you've got someone to cuddle up with tonight or
you wish
you did. Stay tuned. This is Cilia O'Roarke, Denver. You're listening to KHIP. We're coming
back with
our request line."
As she switched on the tape for a commercial run, she glanced up. "Hey, Nick. How's it going?"
Nick Peters, the college student who served as an intern at the station, pushed up his dark-framed
glasses and grinned. "I aced the Lit test."
"Way to go." She gratefully accepted the mug of steaming coffee he offered. "Is it still
snowing?"
"Stopped about an hour ago."
She nodded and relaxed a little. She'd been worrying about Deborah, her younger sister. "I guess
the
roads are a mess."
"Not too bad. You want something to go with that coffee?"
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She flicked him a smile, her mind too busy with other things to note the adoration in his eyes.
"No,
thanks. Help yourself to some stale doughnuts before you sign out." She hit a switch and spoke
into the
mike again.
As she read the station promos, he watched her. He knew it was hopeless, even stupid, but he
was
wildly in love with her. She was the most beautiful woman in the world to him, making the
women at
college look like awkward, gangling shadows of what a real woman should be. She was strong,
successful, sexy. And she barely knew he was alive. When she noticed him at all, it was with a
distractedly friendly smile or gesture.
For over three months he'd been screwing up his courage to ask her for a date. And fantasizing
about
what it would be like to have her attention focused on him, only him, for an entire evening.
She was completely unaware. Had she known where his mind had led him, Cilia would have
been more
amused than flattered. Nick was barely twenty-one, seven years her junior chronologically. And
decades
younger in every other way. She liked him. He was unobtrusive and efficient, and he wasn't
afraid of long
hours or hard work.
Over the past few months she'd come to depend on the coffee he brought her before he left the
station.
And to enjoy knowing she would be completely alone as she drank it.
Nick glanced at the clock. "I'll, ah, see you tomorrow."
"Hmm? Oh, sure. Good night, Nick." The moment he was through the door, she forgot about
him. She
punched one of the illuminated buttons on the phone. "KHIP. You're on the air."
"Cilia?"
"That's right. Who's this?"
"I'm Kate."
"Where are you calling from, Kate?"
"From home-over in Lakewood. My husband's a cab driver. He's working the late shift. We both
listen
to your show every night. Could you play 'Peaceful, Easy Feeling' for Kate and Ray?"
"You got it, Kate. Keep those home fires burning." She punched the next button. "KHIP. You're
on the
air."
The routine ran smoothly. Cilia would take calls, scribbling down the titles and the dedications.
The small
studio was lined with shelves crammed with albums, 45s, CDs, all labeled for easy access. After
a
handful of calls she would break to commercials and station promos to give herself time to set up
for the
first block of songs.
Some of the callers were repeaters, so she would chat a moment or two. Some were the lonely,
calling
just to hear the sound of another voice. Mixed in with them was the occasional loony that she
would joke
off the line or simply disconnect. In all her years of handling live phones, she couldn't remember
a
moment's boredom.
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She enjoyed it tremendously, chatting with callers, joking. In the safety of the control booth she
was
able, as she had never been able face-to-face, to relax and develop an easy relationship with
strangers.
No one hearing her voice would suspect that she was shy or insecure.
"KHIP. You're on the air."
"Cilia."
"Yes. You'll have to speak up, partner. What's your name?"
"That doesn't matter."
"Okay, Mr. X." She rubbed suddenly damp palms on the thighs of her jeans. Instinct told her she
would
have trouble with this one, so she kept her finger hovering over the seven-second-delay button.
"You got
a request?"
"I want you to pay, slut. I'm going to make you pay. When I'm finished, you're going to thank me
for
killing you. You're never going to forget."
Cilia froze, cursed herself for it, then cut him off in the midst of a rage of obscenities. Through
strict
control she kept her voice from shaking. "Wow. Sounds like somebody's a little cranky tonight.
Listen, if
that was Officer Marks, I'm going to pay those parking tickets. I swear. This one goes out to
Joyce and
Larry."
She shot in Springsteen's latest hit single, then sat back to remove the headphones with trembling
hands.
Stupid. She rose to pluck out the next selection. After all these years she should have known
better than
to freak over a crank call. It was rare to get through a shift without at least one. She had learned
to
handle the odd, the angry, the propositions and the threats as skillfully as she had learned to
handle the
control board.
. It was all part of the job, she reminded herself. Part of being a public personality, especially on
the night
shift, where the weird always got weirder.
But she caught herself glancing over her shoulder, through the dark glass of the studio to the dim
corridor
beyond. There were only shadows, and silence. Beneath her heavy sweater, her skin was
shivering in a
cold sweat. She was alone. Completely.
And the station's locked, she reminded herself as she cued up the next selection. The alarm was
set. If it
went off, Denver's finest would scream up to the station within minutes. She was as safe here as
she
would be in a bank vault.
But she stared down at the blinking lights on the phone, and she was afraid.
The snow had stopped, but its scent lingered in the chill March air. As she drove, Cilia kept the
window
down an inch and the radio up to the maximum. The combination of wind and music steadied
her.
Cilia wasn't surprised to find that Deborah was waiting up for her. She pulled into the driveway
of the
house she'd bought only six months before and noted with both annoyance and relief that all the
lights
were blazing.
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It was annoying because it meant Deborah was awake and worrying. And it was a relief, because
the
quiet suburban street seemed so deserted and she felt so vulnerable. She switched off the
ignition, cutting
the engine and the sounds of Jim Jackson's mellow all-night show. The instant of total silence
had her
heart leaping into her throat.
Swearing at herself, she slammed the car door and, hunched in her coat against the wind, dashed
up the
stairs. Deborah met her at the door.
"Hey, don't you have a nine-o'clock class tomorrow?" Stalling, Cilia peeled off her coat and hung
it in
the closet. She caught the scent of hot chocolate and furniture polish. It made her sigh. Deborah
always

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