Melanie gives an airy little laugh. “It was Brad’s idea? Hardly,” she says. “No harm in you knowing it now, I suppose,” she adds, glancing at her gun. “It was actually an old boyfriend’s idea. The spam, the quotation response system, the Bible-verse code. He’s long gone, and anyway, would have been too much of a—” She pauses, as if select
ing the exact word. “Wimp. To make it happen.” She makes a gesture of dismissal. “Mother and I aren’t wimps.”
“And since your mother already had a high-level position at Rogers Chalmers,” I say, encouraging her, “it must have been easy for Andrea to convince her bigwig colleagues to come in on the deal. Wes Rasmussen and the rest.”
“It worked perfectly,” Melanie says with a smile. “We all had Bibles. We all had big money. And not a whiff of trouble.” Abruptly, she shifts from serene to staccato, her face darkening, her voice clipped. “Until Brad started piecing it together. Finding my Bible. Accumulating those files. Always searching. Always checking. Hacking into my computer.”
“Your—?”
“Of course. My computer. You think that study at my house was Brad’s? Of course I meant you to think so. I couldn’t have you snooping reporters suspecting I was involved.”
“And that’s why you did the interview?” I’m getting this now. “To convince us you were simply the despairing widow?”
She sighs. “He had to send that damn e-mail. To Mack Briggs, and your little Josh Gelston, and to you, of course. I was so thrilled when you didn’t answer it. Imagine, if you had just left well enough alone, we wouldn’t be here now, would we?”
I frown, thinking back over that first day at Melanie’s. “But you were upset I didn’t answer him,” I say. “You were so concerned that he was trying to tell me something.”
Melanie laughs. “Was I? That’s what you decided, perhaps. But I was actually wondering if you had con
tacted him, whether he had told you anything I wasn’t aware of. I was delighted you hadn’t answered.”
“But your house was ransacked,” I persist.
“Was it?”
I still don’t understand this. “You reported it to the Lexington police.”
Melanie laughs again. “Did I?”
I remember that morning in my office. Was it just days ago? I had assumed she was on the phone to police. But of course I’d never heard anyone on the other end. Had she only pretended to call? I was so worried about being summoned to Angela’s office, I hadn’t given her phone call another thought.
“But you gave Franklin and me the files—”
“Meaningless, unless you had the key. Besides,” she says quietly, “I knew you wouldn’t have them long.”
Something in my heart sinks so deeply, it takes my breath away. Knees weak, I lower myself onto the chair across from Melanie, and my eyes well with tears.
“You sent those men after Franklin,” I gasp. “And after me.”
Melanie unsnaps her purse again, draws out a package of Newports and a silver lighter. “May I?” she asks. Tapping out a cigarette, she flicks open the top of her lighter, the flame mirrored in her eyes. “Although I guess your house rules won’t be in effect much longer, anyway,” she says, lighting up with an exaggeratedly elaborate gesture. “Will they?”
I have an idea. I stand up and look around the room, acting nervous and upset, which isn’t actually that difficult. “Could I have a cigarette?” I ask.
Melanie briefly looks surprised, but offers me the pack and the lighter. “Knock yourself out.”
I reach for the two items, but Melanie is faster. “I see,” she says grimly, snatching back the lighter. “I’ll do it for you.”
Damn. I can’t use the lighter as a weapon. I need a plan B. Meanwhile, my reporter brain, apparently more fearless than the rest of me, continues to insist on answers.
I hafta know what happened.
“You sent those men after Franklin,” I say again.
Melanie raises her eyebrows, doesn’t answer.
“But—why did you give us the files in the first place?” I persist. “What if someone had asked us about them?”
“Come on, you’re the reporter,” she replies sarcastically.
“I’m the…” I think about this for a moment, all the while eyeing the glinty little gun. Then I understand. “Ah. Right. I’m the reporter. We promised you we wouldn’t tell anyone about the files. And even if a lawyer subpoenaed them, you figured we’d never give them up. We’d go to jail rather than give up confidential documents. So you get them out of your house and out of your life.”
“It has a certain…symmetry…doesn’t it?” Melanie smiles. “Your pitiful journalism-school ethics became my key to freedom.”
“And without the files, no investigators could crack your little code.” I shake my head, understanding her malevolently twisted thought process. “Wow.”
Melanie recrosses her legs, smoothes her chic cropped hair. She looks more like a post-deb blue blood than a cold-blooded mercenary. But I know she’s killed for money and to cover up her crimes. She shepherded me to Josh and
Mack Briggs, using me to find out what they knew. And obviously I’m not the only one in her sights. Josh will be next.
I take a puff of my disgusting Newport, trying not to cough, and step closer to the hallway, exhaling carefully. Plan B has just presented itself.
Melanie, watching me, curls her fingers around the gun.
I can see she’s tensing, wired, about to crack. I have about as long as this cigarette lasts or I’m going to be as snuffed as this Newport. And Josh will be next. My brain thrums as I try to battle my escalating panic.
“You sent those men to run your own husband off the road,” I continue, struggling to keep my voice even. “Your own husband. You were in ‘Vows.’”
Till death do us part,
she’d promised. No kidding.
Melanie gives a dismissive wave, smoke trailing from her gesture. “Brad,” she says coldly. “He had a choice. Could have kept quiet and cashed in. No outsiders had the vaguest inkling of our deal. That’s why I need those files.”
“But—Mack Briggs.” I shake my head, remembering the solemnly sad mourners at his funeral. “You sent them after poor old Mack Briggs.” I take one more step toward the hallway, now almost angry, glaring at her. “And you sent them after me, too.”
“Before I left Mack Briggs’s funeral, I told Mother to warn you to stay out of this.” Smoke from Melanie’s cigarette is spiraling up toward the ceiling. “But you wouldn’t listen.”
This sucks. Here I am, uncovering the biggest story of my life, and someone else is going to write it. I’ve got no notebook, no tape recorder, no camera, and it’s looking more and more like the only eyewitness to what’s apparently planned to be a fatal shooting, one Charlotte Ann
McNally, is not going to be around for the big interview. Because Charlotte Ann McNally is also going to be the victim. And dead.
I guess this is what my sixth-grade English teacher meant by irony.
But Mr. Thornburg also taught us about the surprise ending. Plan B.
I take an enormous drag on my cigarette, and then exhale a huge puff right into the smoke detector. In a heartbeat, it begins to shriek and wail. And less than a second later, so does every smoke alarm in my apartment, and then every one in the building.
Melanie’s face pales, then twists into fury. She leaps to her feet. “You bitch,” she seethes. She comes toward me, pointing the gun.
“Who, me?” I reply. I’m so not the bitch here.
Outside, I hear doors opening and slamming shut, footsteps running down the stairways, voices yelling, “Smoke alarm! Get out! Everyone get out!”
I can tell Melanie is assessing her options. I decide to help her.
“I wouldn’t fire that gun at me now, if I were you,” I say, raising my voice to be heard over the increasing commotion. “There’s no way out for you…except right into the arms of every firefighter in Boston. That alarm is wired to the fire station,” I tell her. “I’m afraid you’re trapped in a nonburning building.”
Now, as more people tramp through the halls, I can hear multiple sirens in the distance. My heart fills with triumph, but somehow Melanie has regained her composure despite the chaos I’ve set in motion.
She sits back on the couch, crossing her legs and taking another drag on her cigarette. “You’re right,” she says.
I can’t understand why she’s so calm.
“The building is not burning. All those firefighters will find that out soon enough.” She settles into the upholstery, still holding that gun in one hand, her cigarette in the other. “So we’ll just wait for everyone to go away. Then later I can say you invited me over, told me where the key was, I arrived and found you—well, you know.”
“That’ll never work,” I say. The shriek of the smoke alarm pauses, then picks up again.
“Won’t it?” she answers. “All those unpleasant characters you sent to prison in your little stories? I’m sure the authorities will wonder which one returned to take his revenge. But me? Why would I be suspected of killing you?”
“Listen, Melanie—”
Then, finally, finally, finally, the phone rings. I make a move toward the kitchen, but Melanie sneers and points the gun at me. I stop short.
“Don’t. Even. Think about it,” she says.
“If I don’t answer the phone, they’ll know something is wrong.” It’s a long shot, I know, but maybe this will work.
“And they’ll be right, won’t they?” Melanie replies. She looks at her cigarette. “I just have one more—”
Suddenly, there’s pounding on my door. People are right outside, waiting to see if I answer. I could yell, but just then Melanie stands, gun in hand. She looks at me maliciously and holds one finger to her mouth, signaling me to be silent.
I remember with dismay my car is in Josh’s garage, not in my assigned space in the parking lot behind the building.
There’s no reason for anyone to think I’m home. This may be my last chance. Just three steps to my front door. I’d have to get there, unclick two locks and yank it open. Could I do it before Melanie shoots me in the back?
C
“Charlie?” someone yells. “Miss McNally?” More pounding on my door, and my doorbell buzzes insistently. “Are you in there? Smoke alarm!”
I look at Melanie, trying to gauge my options. She’s impassive, unfazed. And absolutely crazy. She’s just decided to wait it out, figuring whoever’s outside will go away.
And suddenly, they do.
The smoke alarm stops. The voices cease. Footsteps fade away down the hall. The place is silent. The quiet is so profound, it’s almost a noise in itself.
Melanie smiles again, that arrogant and self-satisfied smile.
“Gone,” she whispers. “They’re all gone.”
We stare at each other. Her eyes are narrowed and calculating. Mine are filling with angry tears.
Botox peeks her head around the corner, her eyes tentative and wide. I wonder if she’s the last friendly face I’ll ever see.
At that moment, all at once, my world spins into fast-forward. Someone bangs on my front door again, then rattles the lock—but I know no one has a key. A clamor of voices shouts my name. One even sounds like Franklin’s voice. But that can’t be true. I know Franklin is still in the hospital.
I’m still trying to comprehend the chaos when Melanie crosses the room in a few quick steps and grabs me by the arm, holding me close to her. She hisses in my ear, “Not a sound. And do not move.”
She presses that stupid gun against my neck. I feel a chilling metallic circle on my skin, gag on her perfume, and for an instant I’m so woozy and panicked I think I see stars. Melanie’s grip tightens and I almost despair. But then, my adrenaline soars. She’s much smaller than I am. What the hell.
With a yell, I duck away from the gun, simultaneously stomping one clog-heavy foot as hard as I can onto her pretty little patent-leather pump. She screams and twists away from me. There’s an earsplitting crack—her gun? Am I shot? No. It sounds like—a tree falling, my brain insists, but I know it can’t be a tree falling. There’s a deafening thud, a whoosh of air, and voices yelling insistently. Who? Melanie—where is she? A fraction of a second later, I see Melanie wailing in pain, holding her shoulder, her gun spiraling across the floor.
I can’t figure this out. Why is she holding her shoulder when I stamped on her foot? Doesn’t matter—I’m free. I run toward the front door, but the door isn’t there anymore. The police are.
Two uniformed police officers crash through the newly created opening, both bellowing just like they do on TV—demanding, commanding, taking up all the space in the room with noise and brandished weapons.
“On the floor! Now!” one yells, pointing her gun at Melanie. “Right now, Mrs. Foreman.”
I watch Melanie assess her problem, realize her defeat and hit the floor. Actually she hits my Pottery Barn sisal, probably the closest her designer suit has ever been to dirt.
Gun still aimed at the now-prone Melanie, one cop circles around behind her, clicking a set of handcuffs from her belt loop.
Another officer, gold badge on his navy winter coat, arrives from downstairs, puts his arm protectively around me and shepherds me out toward the stairway landing. “You’re all right now, Charlie,” he says reassuringly. “We’ll take care of her.”
He glances back into my wreck of an apartment. “Door must have just missed her head,” he says, evaluating clinically. “Good thing you were out of the way.”
“How—?” I begin. “What—why?”
“But you should have called us, Charlie,” he says, scratching his head. “Catching the bad guys is our job, not yours.”
“I should have—?” I look at him again, baffled. Then I realize why he looked familiar. The navy coat fooled me, but now I recognize Cipriani, the leather-jacketed sexy detective from the hospital.
“But how—?” I can’t figure this out. How did they know to show up?
“We need a medic,” the first officer yells, as Melanie, now handcuffed, continues to wail. “Looks like some of that front door landed on our Melanie here. Her shoulder.” She looks again at her prisoner. “Sorry about the suit, ma’am,” the officer adds dryly. Her apology doesn’t sound very sincere.
I look more closely and realize it’s Officer McCarron,
Cipriani’s mousy little partner. With that big Glock, and holding Melanie in custody, she doesn’t look that mousy anymore. As for Melanie, I guess it wasn’t my intrepid clog maneuver that got her, but pieces of the door hitting her as Boston’s finest crashed through.
Cipriani turns to look at me again and gives a thumbs-up. “She’ll live,” he says sarcastically. “Though with what we know now, probably most of it will be in the state pen in Framingham. By the way,” he adds. “Smoke alarm? That your doing?”
I manage a weak smile. “I don’t smoke,” I say. “But when she lit up, it gave me the idea.”
He nods approvingly. “Very resourceful,” he says. “But she still would have killed you.”
And in that instant, I’m overwhelmed. Two minutes ago a money-crazed suburban socialite was holding a gun at my neck. My past hadn’t flashed before my eyes then, the way they say it does when you’re facing disaster, but now my future rolls by in Technicolor. Everything I would have missed. Josh, Franklin, Maysie, my kitty, my career, days of success and failure and new experiences. I feel the shock set in, and I can’t hold back my tears any longer.
I put both hands over my face as my fear and tension dissolve into watery relief. This all happened so fast, and I thought I knew what I was doing, but in the end, I was almost a casualty of my own curiosity.
Course they don’t teach in J-school: When the Sword Is Mightier than the Pen, the Bad Guys Might Win.
Then, through my sobs, I hear footsteps and a voice on the stairs.
“Charlie, you okay?” It’s Josh, who’s running up the stairway two steps at a time. He arrives at my landing and
puts his hands on my shoulders. “I never should have left you alone,” he says, gently kissing my forehead. “And I never…”
I’m eager to hear what he’s going to say next, but then another voice interrupts.
“Charlotte,” I hear. The most familiar voice of all is coming from around the second-floor landing. Franklin clambers slowly up the stairs, hanging on to the railing and pulling himself up, step by careful step. He stops and eyes me from below, his face the definition of relief.
“I was so worried we wouldn’t get here in time,” he says, getting a second wind and puffing up the last few steps. “It is Melanie, isn’t it?”
I wave them toward the scene in my entryway, where a handcuffed Melanie, face now smeared with tears and leftover makeup, is being read her rights by Officer McCarron.
Franklin uses his good arm to high-five Josh. “Score one for the good guys,” he says.
“You can’t know how glad I am to see you,” I say, still teary, “What if—?” For a moment, I can’t continue.
Josh takes my hand and tucks it through the crook of his elbow, pulling me closer to him. I lean into his body, grateful for his strength and support, but apparently my potentially deadly curiosity has nine lives. I still need answers.
“Just to make sure I’m not nuts,” I begin. “Didn’t I hear you on the landing a few minutes ago? Before—” I gesture through my newly destroyed doorway “—all this?”
“They made us go downstairs when they decided to break down your door,” Franklin explains. He’s still wearing a bandage over one eye, and one arm is in a fabric sling. “They figured if Melanie was in there with you, she probably had a gun.”
One more thing I need to know. “I’m incredibly, unfailingly, unceasingly grateful that you superheroes came to rescue me,” I say. “But how—how did you know I needed rescuing?”
A crisscross of yellow crime-scene tape blocks off my front doorway. Botox, apparently thinking this is some fabulous new cat toy, incessantly bats the crackly plastic with her paw. The police have promised a carpenter will replace my shattered door by the end of the day. Meanwhile, Josh, Franklin and I are sitting in my living room, drinking hot tea and guarding the place.
And I’m finally getting the scoop.
“The picture you took of the guys in the car?” Franklin begins, getting comfortable in his armchair. “You figured they were the two who broke into Melanie’s study?”
“Yeah, so?”
“So I had this great idea,” Franklin continues. “Call the Lexington police, and see if they’d recognize the snapshot guys as the ones who’d been doing the break-ins in Melanie’s neighborhood. Well—” Franklin leans forward “—turns out Melanie never called the police to report any break-in.”
“I know,” I reply. “She admitted that. Right before she put the gun to my head.”
Josh puts his arm across my shoulders, squeezing reassuringly.
“Anyway,” Franklin goes on, “when I heard she’d never reported a burglary, I figured there probably wasn’t one. She just made it up so she could come to Channel 3 and find out if you were on to her.”
“Then what?”
“Still, we did know your photo boys were the ones who
beat me up. So I called Detective Cipriani and McCarron. They were on duty, and came right over. I told them your whole highway escapade, including the coffee and the snapshot,” Franklin says. “They were very impressed, by the way. And then I showed them the photo.”
Franklin pauses. He does this on purpose, I know, to heighten the suspense. He’s in TV news, after all.
“Come on,” I whine. “Just tell me what they said.”
“Well,” Franklin says dramatically. “They each looked at the picture, then looked at each other. Then Cipriani says, ‘Martin Brown.’”
This is worth the wait. “Whoa,” I say softly, as the puzzle piece clicks into place.
“Right,” Josh puts in. “And you know who that turns out to be? Melanie’s—”
“Brother,” I finish.
Now it’s Franklin’s turn to look confused. “How did you know Martin Brown was Melanie’s brother?” he asks. “We didn’t even know Melanie’s maiden name was Brown.”
“I was going to tell you the whole thing this morning, but as you remember, I was so rudely interrupted,” I explain. “Hang on a sec.”
I retrieve the “Vows” story from my printer, and hold it out to Josh and Franklin. “I found this last night.”
I wait while they both read it.
“So when Melanie showed up this morning, it wasn’t a surprise.” I rethink this. “Well, it was a surprise that she was sitting on my couch with a gun, but it wasn’t a surprise that she was behind it all.”
Franklin laughs, waving the printout. “Got to give you credit,” he says. “Only you, Charlotte, could solve an
insider trading and murder conspiracy using clues from the wedding section of the
New York Times.
”
“Well, as we always say, journalism is all about the research. Got to keep digging.” I give a modest bow. “Anyway. So the police knew Martin Brown?”
“And his brother, Luke, too,” Franklin says. “He was the other one in the photo.”
“The cops told us the Brown brothers have ugly criminal pasts. Both have records, jail time,” Josh adds.
I think about this for a moment.
“But Brown is such a common name.” This doesn’t add up to me. “How would the police know they’re related to Melanie, whose name isn’t even Brown anymore? And to Andrea? She’s Brown, but there must be a zillion Browns.”
“That’s the cool part,” Franklin explains. “The cops pulled out their records, dates of birth, criminal history, all that. And the files also included their last known address—2519 Riverside Lane. Lexington. And I knew that was—”
“Melanie’s house,” I finish. I digest this for a moment. “Oh, I get the rest,” I say, making the final connection. “Melanie said her parents gave them the house after they moved to a condo. So it was also Andrea’s former address.”
“Just a little family affair,” Josh puts in. “Melanie must have been the older sister from hell.”
“Sunday brunch at the Browns’,” I imagine out loud, “must have been quite a scene. By the way, where are the Brown brothers now?” I ask. “And Andrea? In custody?” I glance up where my nice lockable door used to be. “I hope?”
“Oh yeah,” Franklin assures me. “After McCarron and Cipriani saw the snapshot, they sent SWAT guys to pick up
Martin and Luke. They’re both behind bars now, charged with all kinds of murder and conspiracy. Andrea, too.”
Botox, tired of battling the crime-scene tapes, trots in and jumps on my lap, stretching out one paw and resting it delicately on Josh’s thigh. “She’s very forward,” I explain. “Give her tuna fish, she’s yours for life.”
“Very cozy,” Franklin smiles, then wrinkles his nose. “Hope you’re not allergic.” He sneezes twice. Botox gives him a sinister look, which he shoots right back at her.
I take a sip of tea, warmed by the fragrant jasmine, and by the company of those I love. But I still have questions.
“I still don’t understand,” I begin, “how you knew I needed rescuing.”
“Well, as soon as the cops nailed Martin and Luke’s IDs,” Franklin begins, “I knew you were in danger. I called, but you didn’t answer the phone.”
“Melanie was already here,” I say. “Wouldn’t let me answer.”
“So then I called Josh to see if you were with him, but he told me he’d dropped you here.”
“So I came over right away,” Josh says.
“Meanwhile, the police had scooped up the boys, and Andrea, but Melanie wasn’t home.” Franklin shakes his head. “It did not look good for you at that point, kiddo,” he says. “I said to hell with the hospital, threw on my jeans and raced over here with my new cop friends. And I’ll tell you,” he adds, “your neighbors had decided you weren’t inside, since your car wasn’t parked in the spot.”
I curl up more closely in Josh’s arms, suddenly self-conscious. I begin to play back the morning in my head, remembering my first fuzzy glimpse of Melanie on the couch, my misguided sympathy, my realization of her past,
my understanding of her deadly goal. She fooled everyone. Including me.
“It’s hard to explain,” I say quietly, “how it feels to be that close to…”