I let out a puff of air. “Bummer,” I whisper.
So much for the stakeout. The car is clearly staying put. I leave my gearshift in Drive. We’re done. And we’re out of here.
“Tomorrow night?” I say. Like I’m asking for a date. Stakeouts don’t always work. You’ve got to expect that and embrace it. You have to hear no before you hear yes. And tomorrow we’ll be more experienced. I know all the rationalizations, chant them like some journalism mantra. “Same time, same place?”
“You’re on,” J.T. replies. He gets it. “Take two.”
“Are you already awake? How late did you get in? How’d it go? Did you get any sleep at all?” Josh, bleary-eyed and half-groggy, turns over to face me. “You’re reading?”
I’ve got my back against the headboard, one leg crossed over my knee, wearing Josh’s socks and a toobig Bexter sleep-shirt. I close the Bexter fundraising report, holding my place with one finger, and lean over to give Josh a good-morning kiss. It’s almost eight, but my brain is too buzzy to sleep any more. Too much to think about.
“Yeah, I’m looking at the—Tell you later. Too complicated,” I say. “Stakeout was a bust. We’re trying again tonight. I have to go in late, again, sweets. I’m sorry.”
“Hmm.” Josh plucks the pamphlet from my hand and tosses it onto the floor beside the bed. He slides one hand, slowly, slowly, underneath my Bexter shirt. “What can you do to make it up to me, I wonder?”
Finally. A question that’s not difficult to answer.
A tiny terracotta pot of white chrysanthemums, tied with a thin white ribbon, is in the middle of my desk. And next to the flowers, a steaming latte.
“My bad,” Franklin says. He’s standing by his desk. Looking sheepish. “I heard about the stakeout last night. I’m sorry it was a no-go. And, Charlotte…”
He blinks a few times, watching me hang my coat and staticky muffler on the hook. It’s late afternoon, and since we’re working overnight again, I’m just arriving. I had a very lovely morning.
I decide to let Franklin say what he wants to say.
“Charlotte, I’m truly sorry about standing y’all up last night. It was, well, it won’t happen again.” Franklin’s southern accent only slips out when he’s upset or nervous.
“These are from you?” I hold up the pot of flowers, sweetly pristine, a peace offering I instantly accept. “Is everything okay, Franko?”
Franklin nods.
We’ve worked together for almost three years and I really can’t remember another time when there’s been any animosity. Sure, we’ve disagreed over story ideas, and planning, and strategy. But that’s typical reporter-producer. If you didn’t disagree and discuss and debate, no good ideas would ever emerge. But what happened last night? He didn’t show up. That’s a new one. And I wonder what’s going on.
“Is it Stephen?” I venture a guess. “Your family? You know, you can tell me anything. Work isn’t the most important thing, Franko. If there’s something going on in
your life, you can tell me. Or, you know, don’t, if you feel more comfortable that way. We managed last night.”
I take two steps and give Franklin a one-armed hug, still holding my flowers. “But it wasn’t the same without you. You’ll be there tonight, right?”
“I’ve already rewound the tapes so we can use them again,” he replies. “No need to keep three hours of nothing. At least we know the setup works. Sorry you had to be alone with Mr. Network.”
I swivel into my chair and make a spot for the flowers on top of my little TV monitor. Franklin’s avoiding my questions. So I’ll let him off the hook. Talk about our story. “You know. Franko, J.T.’s not half-bad, once you get to—What?”
Franklin’s leaning into his monitor. He’s clicking his mouse. He’s typing. And he’s completely not listening to me.
“What?” I repeat.
“Come with me downstairs,” he says. “To ENG Receive.”
ENG is television shorthand for electronic news gathering. “Receive” is the control room where satellite, microwave and KU-band transmissions from around the country and the world are fed into Channel 3. The walls in Receive are covered with monitors, each one showing nonstop pictures. It all has to come through ENG receive before it gets on the air.
ENG Joe, a lumbering old-timer in plaid flannel and jeans, has watched over ENG since before I can remember. He’s still got a cigarette tucked behind one ear, and it’s probably the same one he parked there years ago when the suits made the whole station nonsmoking.
These days, when TV is all breaking news, all the time, Joe juggles hundreds of feeds a day, each one flickering on a different monitor. Each monitor has a number
taped above it. Each monitor is attached to a tape machine so Joe can record the ones the producer requests.
“We are receiving Sat 6 on L-4.” Joe pushes a button, and talks to a producer through a microphone snaking metallically out of the wall. Shaky pictures of what looks like a small plane crash sputter into view, then settle down. “We have audio. The window’s open till 4:00 p.m.”
“And I have Van Alpha on 2. I’m loading tape. Ready to record. Standby, Van 2.” ENG Joanna, whose real name no one knows, was assigned to Receive a couple of years ago, ostensibly to learn the ropes. Everyone predicted they were moving Joe out, replacing him, like they do everyone else, with someone younger and sexier.
But Joe stayed and so did Joanna. Now they’re a team. Yogi Bear and Betty Boop. As long as the feeds come in as planned and the video is solid, ENG Receive is their domain. The room has no windows. The only view of the outside world is through the dozens of 19-inch screens.
“Franklin?” I can’t figure out why he brought me down here.
“One second…” Franklin holds up a hand at me, and turns to Joanna. “Joanna. Hey. I read the ‘incoming’ bulletin on the producer e-mail. Where’s the video?”
“Bravo’s putting up their mast now. They should be radiating in two from Eastie. It’s a bounce from Chopper 3. Taking it in on monitor 14.”
In two minutes, Microwave van B will be transmitting video via our helicopter from someplace in East Boston. Got it. But video of what?
I stage-whisper, “Pssst. Franklin. What?”
Franklin, wordless, points to monitor 14.
It’s a high-and-wide aerial view, our helicopter banking over what looks like a parking lot. The aerial camera zooms down closer. Smoky flames. Flashing blue lights. Flashing red lights. The chopper hovers. The
camera zooms to a close-up. Out of focus. The photographer is struggling to get the shot.
I step closer to the monitor, squinting as if I can get it into focus myself. Then the video snaps into perfect clarity.
A blue Mustang is melting down into a pile of twisted rubble.
I only get the frustrating beep from the voice-mail system. I’d called Michael Borum immediately. And immediately got nothing.
“Borum never answers the phone, we know that,” Franklin mutters, pacing. Three steps across our office, three steps back. “Charlotte, there are more than three hundred blue Mustangs in Massachusetts.”
“Remind me to tell you what I found out about another one,” I say, hitting Redial again. I still haven’t told Franklin about Taylor and Tyler, and my theories about their blue Mustang. I can’t focus until we get an answer from Michael Borum. One toe of my boot is tapping on the mottled gray carpet. I stop it. It starts again.
Voice mail again.
“I’m leaving a message this time.” I lean over to get closer to the speaker. Maybe Borum will pick up. He did before.
“Hey, team.” J.T. appears at our door. He has the hidden camera in one hand, the lens to the hidden camera in the other. He’s holding both pieces of equipment as if they were contagious. “I have good news and bad news,” he begins.
I wave both hands to stop him, then point to the speakerphone.
“She’s leaving a message,” Franklin explains, his voice muted as if he’s calling a golf match.
J.T. leans against the doorjamb, waiting. His eyes register increasing understanding as I speak.
“Mr. Borum? It’s Charlie McNally. Are you home?
Just checking to see if you’re there. If you’re there, pick up, would you? It’s important.”
The sound of nothing fills the room. We wait.
“Mr. Borum?” I try again. I give my office number once more, my cell, my home. “Call me as soon as you can, okay?”
I turn off the speaker and send a silent prayer.
“Guess you can’t say, hey, we’re checking to see if you got incinerated in a flaming—”
“Shush.” I frown at J.T. “It’s not funny.”
Then I cock my head at him, quizzical. “Wait. How’d you know why we were calling?”
“ENG Joanna,” J.T. says. “Anyway. We’re screwed for tonight. The undercover cams are trashed. The health people. I don’t know how they broke them. The good news, they’re fixable. Engineering says it’ll be tomorrow, at least, before they’re up again. Maybe Sunday.”
“Fine with me if we do it tomorrow or Sunday,” Franklin says. “I’m in, anytime.”
“Me, too,” I say. “There are no—”
“Weekends in TV,” Franklin and I finish the sentence together.
I
’m trying to keep the grease on the red-printed brown paper bags of Chinese food away from my new camel coat as I dig for my keys to open the front door. Impossible. I bang on the door with my shoulder, but only produce a muffled thud.
“Hello? It’s me. Come to the door, okay? I’m home early, didn’t have to work late.”
I try to ring the tiny doorbell with my woolen elbow. Failure. If I put the bags down on our front steps, they’ll get wet from the snow and disintegrate before I get to the kitchen.
“Hel-lo?”
Botox responds from inside, meowing miserably as if she’s been abandoned forever. Which means—no one’s home?
I prop one stapled bag on the porch railing, and holding it with my chin, extract my keys and open the door. I push it open with one foot and one shoulder and, finally, step inside. Botox curls through my legs, insistent for attention. It’s probably more my shrimp than me.
“Anyone? Guys?”
The light in the living room is off. I flip it on. The dining room is dark, too. I flip it on. We always leave a light on in the kitchen to fool the burglars. Nothing is out of place, so it seems to have worked.
I deposit my fragrant, oil-spotted parcels on the kitchen counter. Maybe Josh and Penny are at a movie, like a normal family on a Friday night. Or out to dinner. I thought my coming home early would be a fun surprise. Now they’re out having the fun. And the surprise is that it’s only me with hot-and-sour soup for three.
I should have called first. Which reminds me.
I find my cell phone and check for messages, hoping for word from Borum. Nothing.
Dumping my work clothes into the dry-cleaning pile on the shelf in Josh’s closet, I steal a pair of his black sweatpants and my favorite Nantucket sweatshirt. Josh’s socks. I see Penny’s crayon drawing of us, pouffy-dressed bride and top-hatted groom, taped to Josh’s mirror. Our mirror. And there on the bedroom floor, where Josh tossed it this morning, is the Bexter fundraising report.
Suddenly solitude is a good thing. I grab the pamphlet, head downstairs to the kitchen and pry the lid from a plastic container of still-hot soup. Pulling up a stool to the counter, I open the report and look again at the circled names on the donations lists. Five names.
Fiona Rooseveldt Dulles on one page. Randall Cross Kindell on another. At least I know where to find those people.
Alice Hogarth is circled. Brooks Fryeburg. Lesley Claughton. Never heard of them.
Each one is a Bexter donor. Did they go to Bexter? Do they have children at Bexter? Why are they circled?
“Chinese food!” Penny’s voice echoes through the front door.
That girl has a terrific sense of smell.
“Sweets, are you home?” Josh’s voice.
The two arrive at the kitchen door. Each is carrying a red-printed brown paper bag.
By the time we stash my white containers of moo shu
shrimp and egg rolls into the refrigerator, and put Josh and Penny’s containers of exactly the same items into the microwave, I’ve explained to Josh about my visit to Millie, and her suspicions, and the names on the fundraising report.
“You just took it?” Josh says.
“Millie wanted me to look into things. You’re missing the point,” I say, giving him a chopsticks poke in the ribs. At least he’s not annoyed I went to her house. “The more important question is, do you know any kids with the last name Hogarth?”
Josh shakes his head.
“Or Fryeburg? Claughton?”
“No, and no.”
“Rats,” I say, gingerly taking the cartons of now-steaming food out of the microwave. “How am I supposed to—Oh.”
I stop, hot food in midair. I’m a genius. “Does Bexter have a yearbook? Like, an archive of yearbooks?”
Josh takes the boxes from me. “Get with the private-school program, honey. The last thing Bexter wants is photos of their students easily accessible to nosy-reporter types like you. Bexter has the BEX.”
“Sounds like some kind of disease.”
“They take a group photo of each class, starting in first grade, at the awards ceremony in the spring,” Josh continues, ignoring my crack. “Then they put the photo into the BEX. Which, Miss Know-it-all, is a big leather photo album. It’s kept in the Head’s office. Are we eating in here or the dining room?”
“Perfect,” I say, pointing him to the dining room. “Then I definitely need to have a look at this BEX. Darn. Tomorrow’s Saturday. And the Head won’t be in till Monday, right? Why are journalists the only ones who work weekends?”
“Wrong again,” Josh says. “In fact, he’ll be at our faculty meeting tomorrow afternoon. Penny! Dinner!”
“So I’ll come to the meeting with you. Dutiful fiancée. I’ll smile and be enthusiastic, bat my eyelashes and say, golly, I’d love to know more about Bexter history. Maybe see who’s in Penny’s class.”
“Who’s in my class at Bexter, you mean?” Penny flops sideways into her dining room chair, her flannel shirt predictably inside out, tucking one bare foot underneath her. “I can tell you that. Annie says fourth grade rocks. There’s Tenley, and Sigrid, and Eve…”
The rest of the names get smothered by egg-roll chewing. Penny recently expanded her acceptable eating options from “white food only” to include anything fried or crunchy. Annie’s influence, apparently.
Josh looks at me, peering over his chopsticks. “I suppose it can’t hurt. But keep in mind that…” He pauses. Flickers a glance at the carb-occupied Penny. “‘He’ doesn’t know that I told you about the ‘things.’ And he doesn’t know about the other things.”
I nod. The Head doesn’t know Josh told me about the phone calls. And he doesn’t know about the extortion demands to the Dulleses and the Kindells.
“I’ll think of something by tomorrow,” I say.
“I hate to watch our newscast.” I’m obsessed with TV news, can’t live without it, but too often I cringe when I actually see it. Leaning back into the couch cushions, I wave one socked toe at the screen. “Can’t anyone write? Why is everything alliteration? And look at that outfit. What’s Tia thinking, wearing that jacket? There’s no cleavage in journalism.”
Josh props his legs on the coffee table, scooting the fortune-cookie wrappers out of the way. He puts one arm around me and draws me nearer, snuggling,
burying my face into his sweater. I feel a kiss on the top of my head.
“We’re having a ‘Friday-night couch date,’ as you always put it,” Josh says into my hair. “Penny’s upstairs. How about you try to relax. Instead of watching the eleven o’clock news, we’ll put in a movie. And then you can fall asleep in the middle of it, as usual, and forget about the—”
“Give me the clicker.” I wrest myself away from him and hold out my hand, eyes glued to the screen. “Really. I missed what they said. I have to play it again.”
“No, you don’t,” Josh says, holding the remote above my head and out of reach. “I promise, whatever you missed will be in the paper tomorrow morning.”
“Josh.” I can hear the tension in my voice. Josh apparently can hear it, too. He hands me the remote.
I push Rewind—thank goodness for TiVo—and our otherwise reasonably dressed anchor starts from the beginning again. Tia’s on camera, reading the prompter. I’d only heard part of what she said, but even that was enough to rev my fear level into high. Even though the video is going backward, I can read the garish black-and-red animated graphic behind her: Carjacking: Cause for Alarm.
I push Play.
“Police are asking for witnesses in an apparent carjacking and murder in the South End this afternoon,” Tia intones. The graphic changes to a live shot of a sleekly serious African-American woman, bundled against the cold in a red hooded parka with our 3-in-a-circle logo embroidered on the front. I can’t tell where she is—it’s pitch-dark outside, and the one blasting spotlight illuminates only her. She could be anywhere. “Our reporter Elizabeth Whittemore is live now at Boston police headquarters with the latest. Liz?”
Liz nods, all business, as her image comes full screen.
“Well, I can tell you, Tia, right now police are working two shocking crime scenes. And sources tell me they suspect those two events will turn out to be one deadly crime. Let me show you now, this is video you saw breaking first on Channel 3…”
The screen switches to the same aerial pictures Franklin and I saw come into ENG Receive.
“…a car fire burns out of control in an East Boston parking lot. Police this afternoon are baffled because they find no victim in the fiery conflagration.”
“What’s this about, honey?” Josh asks. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I push Pause, freezing the flames into place and stopping Liz in midsentence. I turn to Josh. “I haven’t told you about this yet, I was going to, but anyway, this video is from this afternoon. That’s a blue Mustang on fire. And Michael Borum didn’t answer the phone this afternoon, and—” I shake my head. “I’ll tell you the rest in a minute. I need to see this.”
I push Play. The camera is back on Liz.
“Now, some hours later, we’re told, police get a call from a worried South End resident. They report a body in the bushes behind a South End brownstone. Now, I can tell you, this area is known to police for its high crime stats. Two shootings in the same block within the past two weeks. Those, sources tell me, were drug related. Let’s show you the video we shot moments ago of the scene where police say the victim was found.”
Nighttime. Streetlights illuminate some narrow apartment-lined street, the camera swaying as the photographer walks toward a barrier of cops and crime-scene tape. The front of the brownstone flashes into view as the camera light blasts on. And I’ve been there before.
“Damn,” I whisper.
“What?” Josh says.
“One more sec,” I say, never taking my eyes from the screen.
“Police are not allowing us into the parking lot behind this building, that’s where they suspect person or persons still unknown apparently shot and, what we understand, killed the victim. Crime-scene techs are still examining the area. The victim’s name is being withheld pending notification of next of kin, but I can tell you, residents here are saying he is the owner of that fiery blue Mustang we showed you earlier. Bottom line, this investigation is still a wide-open—”
The camera comes back to Liz, who suddenly looks distracted, then triumphant. “Stand by, Tia. I see Deputy Police Superintendent Frances Rivera arriving here at headquarters. If you’ll bear with me for one moment. Deputy? Liz Whittemore from Channel 3? We’re on live now and…”
“Fran Rivera’s coming in, this time of night?” I say. “This must be huge.”
“Why?”
“One more second.”
Liz walks out of the light. A fraction of a second later, she’s back in the frame. Next to her is a Valkyrie in a Boston cop’s uniform. Behind her back, cops call Frances Rivera “the Goddess.” To her face, if they know what’s good for them, they call her “ma’am.” Deputy Rivera towers over Liz. She adjusts her patent-billed hat, which on her somehow looks chic, then looks at her watch. She murmurs something into the radio Velcroed to her shoulder.
Liz is unclipping the tiny microphone from her Channel 3 parka.
“Go Liz,” I say. I stop, remembering why I’m watching. Michael Borum may be dead. Someone who owned a blue Mustang certainly is.
“Deputy Rivera, thanks for joining us. What can you
tell us about this situation?” Liz moves the mic toward the officer, waiting for her reply.
“At approximately 1830 hours, Area B officers responded to an anonymous call of a body found in the vicinity of Welkin and Ott Streets. Upon arriving at that address, a Boston police officer discovered one apparent victim. Male. That’s the extent of what we can release at this time.”
“We know the medical examiner was on the scene at the brownstone. Can you confirm the victim is dead?” Liz persists. “Do you have a cause of death?”
“We are not releasing any more information at this time, Liz.” Rivera, her posture rigid and her voice tough and final, obviously thinks this interview is over. She takes one step, putting her face half in darkness.
But Liz, well trained in the tactics of local news and unwilling to let an exclusive interview end so soon, holds on to Rivera’s arm and draws her back into the light. “Can you confirm, though, that the incident in the South End is connected with this afternoon’s car fire in that East Boston parking lot? Did the victim own that car? Is this a carjacking gone wrong?”
“No comment,” Rivera says. Her tone is chillier than the January night.
Liz lets go. Rivera disappears into the darkness.
“And there you have it.” Liz is wrapping up her live shot with a final recap. But I don’t wait to hear the rest. I click off the television and stare at the blank screen.
Liz had a good news night. She scored a big exclusive. She can go home happy.
Me, on the other hand? Not such good news. Has our search for a big story somehow resulted in Michael Borum’s death?
I instantly call Franklin. Even over the phone, I can tell he’s concerned. We’re both trying to stay calm.
I’m failing. Josh heads upstairs, officially ending our couch date.
“Are you kidding me?” I say, my voice rising. “One blue Mustang, demolished. One blue Mustang owner, dead. One plus one equals murder. Even I can do that math.”
Franklin sighs. “Yes, I suppose you’re right. I even tried calling him again. Still no answer. But let’s say it is Michael Borum, his car. What we don’t have—”
“I know,” I interrupt. “We don’t have a connection between what happened today and the valet parking thing.”
“I can hear the cops now,” Franklin says. “They’ll say, ‘It’s a Mustang.’ They’ll remind everyone Borum lived near the projects. That’s their ‘one plus one.’ Shiny car plus urban gang thugs equals carjacking. They’ll figure when the jackers heard Borum was dead, they ditched the car and torched it so they couldn’t be connected. Actually, the cops might have a point.”
I stare across the living room, seeing nothing, trying to sort out the whys and what-ifs. Franklin must be doing the same thing at his place. For a few moments, there’s only the hum of our phone connection. Music from upstairs. Running water. Everyone’s getting ready for bed. Except me.