When she turned and walked away, I stared down at the neatly stacked papers and laughed to myself, thinking Jerry had truly lost his mind giving me a real assignment. I looked up to find him peering over the partition.

“You like? It’s an exclusive,” he said, arching his eyebrows.

“Why me?”

“Kate, what do you know about that guy?”

“Nothing except that you’ve been hounding his people for a story, and I can tell you that Beth would have easily sacrificed a limb for this assignment.”

He nodded slowly and then looked up at the ceiling as if he was thinking. The large warehouse-like room was separated by about a hundred cubicle partitions. The huge space rattled and hummed with the sound of writers chatting and typing frantically at their computers. Jerry pumped different kinds of music through the overhead speakers, creating a cocoon of creativity, but I hadn’t felt creative in a long time, and it was nobody’s fault but my own. At that moment, a sad version of the song “Heartbeats” by José González was traveling through the airwaves. I watched Jerry as he continued to look up pensively.

He was forty years old and he looked exactly like Richard Dreyfuss circa Close Encounters. He wore his bifocals on the very last millimeter of his nose, which aged him, but he thought it gave him a look of credibility. He was in love with his wife and kids, a true family man, but he had no filter at all, so it didn’t surprise me one bit when he finally looked back down and said, “You’re a good writer, Kate. You have what it takes, and you have a nice ass, too.”

“Jerry! What does that have to do with anything? I don’t want you to give me a huge assignment because I have a nice ass.”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s not what I meant. I said you have what it takes. R.J. is a thirty-year-old bachelor. Looking the way you do can’t hurt.”

“Well gee, thank you,” I said sarcastically.

“You don’t want it?” He reached for the stack.

“No. I want it. I just can’t believe . . .”

“It was a compliment, Kate.”

“Okay, fine.” He didn’t mean any harm by it. Like I said, no filter. He was the most loyal man in the world, and he wasn’t trying to objectify me. I think he thought that with R.J.’s history of turning down interviews—the only thing I did know about him, based on what Beth had told me—Beth’s aggressive approach to getting a story wouldn’t be a good fit.

“Fine?”

“I would love this opportunity, Jerry, thank you. Honestly though, I’m curious. Why in the world did he agree to give us an interview—and an exclusive one, at that? We’re not exactly a nationally recognized newspaper.”

“I just bugged the hell out of him,” he said triumphantly. “I kept on sending requests until he finally replied. He said he was impressed by my persistence, and he felt our paper had more integrity than others. He most likely checked us out. He seems eager to spread the word about the winery’s sustainability and their environmentally friendly practices, which sound pretty cutting-edge. The only thing is that his e-mail stressed how extremely private he is and how he would prefer the article to focus on the wine, not his personal life. But, Kate, a story like this could really launch the Crier into a whole new league, especially if you can get the dirt our readers want. That means finding out everything there is to know about R. J. Lawson.”

I swiveled my chair out from my desk, crossed my legs, and leaned back. I was intrigued. “Tell me what you know about him.”

“Hold on to your seat, this guy is truly a conundrum. In 1998, Ryan Lawson was a young MIT graduate, computer engineering prodigy, and cofounder of the largest technology company in Silicon Valley. He had the potential to be Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak rolled into one—a savvy business mind and a technological genius.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah, he invented some computer server that’s used in almost all government agencies, banks, and large corporations. It’s impossible to hack.”

“So you expect me to interview a tech mogul when I’ve been writing articles on lipstick and wine?”

“That’s the thing, Kate. In 1999, he sold his share of J-Com technologies and fell off the radar. No one knew where he went or what he was doing with his three billion dollars. Rumors surfaced that he took the money to Africa and was building schools all across the continent with his own hands, but that was never confirmed.”

“So how did you know where to find him . . . and what is he doing now?”

“I started hearing about him three years ago when it was leaked to a California newspaper that he had purchased a nine-hundred-acre ailing winery and outdated bed-and-breakfast in Napa Valley. He managed to keep things quiet until this year, when his wine started winning every award known to man.”

The pieces were coming together slowly. “R. J. Lawson,” I said. “Yes, that Pinot is fantastic!”

“Right? It’s like everything this guy touches turns to gold.”

“Why in the world would Beth want to interview a winemaker?”

“Because he’s refused to grant interviews and hasn’t been photographed in more than a decade. Imagine if Bill Gates or Steve Jobs had disappeared at the peak of their powers. It’s a huge story.”

“I still can’t believe you’re giving this to me.”

“Well, I’m not gonna lie, Kate. You’ve been producing crap lately. Did I hear that you submitted a proposal to write a feature article on the myth that fruit gum gives you fresh breath?”

“It’s true, though. Fruity gum does not give you fresh breath. It gives you disgusting breath, and people need to know. Come on, that’s what special interest is.”

“Key word being interest. Our readers don’t care about the worthlessness of fruity gum. They want interesting stories—stories that will make them feel. Even if you’re writing a story about wine, you need to touch readers’ hearts. There has to be an element of humanity in every piece you write.”

“No, I know what you’re saying. I just haven’t been motivated since . . . Rose died.”

He looked sympathetic for a millisecond. I got the feeling that excuse was wearing thin. “You’d have to leave for California tomorrow. He’s agreed to do the interview in two parts. Tuesday and Thursday are the only days he has available, so you’ll stay at the B&B there. It will be peaceful, and you can probably knock out half the article while you’re there. Go home and talk to your boyfriend about it and let me know.”

He won’t care. He couldn’t give a shit.

“I’m in, Jerry. I don’t need to talk to Stephen about it. How long will I be out there?”

He paused with that profound look in his eyes again, and then in a low voice he said, “You’ve lost your spark, Kate. Don’t come home until you find it. Bring back a great story.”

My boyfriend Stephen and I lived in the same apartment building. We met on a Monday two years ago in the basement laundry room and had done our laundry together every week since. I could barely call Stephen my boyfriend because, aside from our weekly laundry sessions and the occasional Friday night dinner, we rarely saw each other. He was a workaholic and moving his way up the ladder at a prestigious marketing firm. He called his firm a creative agency, but really¸ they were a moneymaking agency. He spent way too much time dreaming up ways to convince clients to sell out and change the look of their products so everyone could make more money. He was dedicated and had drive, but his work schedule left little time for a girlfriend. We had more sex in that basement laundry room bent over a washer than in an actual bed.

That day, I left the Chicago Crier early to begin packing for my trip. Stephen met me in the basement at six, our usual time. We would switch off picking up dinner for each other—that week he picked up Thai food.