"Rita, you haven't written anything close to real news in...months." If not longer, but he didn't say that out loud. He could see his last words had struck a nerve, and he didn't actually want this meeting to go the way their last altercation had. He still carried the scar from that one.
He just refrained from rolling his eyes. "How about the fact that your source is fictional. Is that a good enough reason for a retraction?" Oh, he didn't doubt that she had her sources in the Ministry, and that some of them fed her actual information, but she took that information and twisted it until it barely resembled the truth. And for what? Splashier headlines? "You'll write the retraction, and you'll do it without making things even worse. I'm sure you'll find some way to make yourself look like the intrepid reporter you wish you were."
If Rita could be counted on for one thing, it was that she always made sure to come out on top. In business, and in relationships.