Front Page Fatality Read online

  “We should have something Monday,” Aaron said. “Probably not any earlier, though.”

  I made a face. Monday didn’t do me much good when I wanted the story for Sunday’s early edition.

  He walked away after I thanked him, both for the phone call and the interview, and I tried to stand taller in my ridiculously unsuitable shoes, scanning the rest of the crowd for another familiar face.

  Jenna was still wobbly and still silently hanging on my arm, and my teetering attempt to see better was all it took to throw her off balance. She probably would have ended up with a broken ankle if Parker hadn’t reached for us, his hand catching my elbow as I started to fall with her. Leaning on him, I grabbed Jenna’s left arm with both hands and pulled. She weighed next to nothing, and my grip was enough to help her get her feet back under her.

  “Nothing like nearly busting your ass on a big rock to kill a buzz,” she said.

  I twisted my other hand around and grabbed Parker’s forearm, jerking my heel out of a crevice between two rocks. I imagined the blue stilettos I’d so painstakingly cleaned wouldn’t look quite as fabulous after hiking along the waterfront.

  “Thanks.” I smiled at Parker as I regained my balance and let go. “Turns out my shoes aren’t suited for traipsing around slimy rocks in the dark.”

  “Shoes like that are only suited for one thing: making a woman’s calves look good,” he said, the grin that garnered thousands of readers three mornings a week making his eyes crinkle at the corners. “That’s what my mom always says, anyway. Were you looking for someone? Before, I mean. I am a little taller than you. Maybe I can help.”

  “Oh, I…no one in particular. I was just checking to see if there was anyone else here I wanted to talk to.”

  He nodded, stepping up onto a bigger stone and surveying the riverbank himself. The rocky shoreline dissolved into overgrown grass, and the grass gave way to mammoth trees, their hulking outlines creeping right up to the water’s edge a few hundred yards downstream.

  “Hey.” Parker stepped down and pointed through the crowd. “That’s Katie DeLuca. She is—was—Nate’s new wife. They got married in March.”

  I followed his gaze to a striking young blond woman standing near the crash site with two uniformed officers and an older man in a Richmond Generals baseball cap. She nodded at the officers as they talked and gestured toward the river, her face frozen in a mask of horror.

  We picked our way toward her and as we got closer, I could see the tears streaming down her face. The patrolmen walked away, deep in conversation themselves, before we reached the little huddle.

  “I hate this part of my job,” I grumbled, my stomach lurching as my foot slipped a fraction of an inch on another rock. “I can get on a tight-lipped cop like a duck on a June bug, but just exactly what are we supposed to say to this woman who went from star pitcher’s bride to twenty-something widow in the past hour?”

  “Beats the hell out of me,” Parker said. “This is your gig. I’ve met her a few times. You want me to try first?”

  I started to say no, but a closer look at the young woman made me think twice. Maybe a familiar face would be a good thing, for her and me both.

  Jenna bumped into me when I stopped short, motioning Parker ahead of me as we approached Katie. She’s probably not even as old as I am, I thought. Parker nodded at the man who had his arm around Katie’s waist and I thought I recognized him from the sports section as the Generals’ head coach.

  “Katie?” Parker’s voice was low and smooth; soothing. “I’m Grant Parker. We met at the team’s playoff celebration last fall. Do you remember me?”

  Katie looked lost. She tilted her face up, gazing at Parker like he might tell her the way out of this nightmare.

  “Aren’t you from the newspaper?” she asked.

  “Yes, I work at the Telegraph,” he said.

  It put me in mind of the way you would talk to a frightened child, surprising coming out of Parker. Ultra-confident and a little smartassed is how I’d describe his normal conversational tone. I stepped forward so she could see me, and Parker continued seamlessly into an introduction.

  “This is Nichelle Clarke. She works with me at the paper. We’re handling the coverage of the accident tonight.”

  Katie furrowed her brow as if she didn’t quite understand why he was telling her that. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying, and flicked from one group of people to another with almost manic speed, as if searching the riverfront for something, anything.

  We watched for a long minute, but she gave no indication she wanted to talk.

  “Can you get me a phone number where I can reach her tomorrow, Bill?” Parker asked finally, exchanging a sad look with the coach over Katie’s head.

  I might have protested under more ordinary circumstances, but it would’ve taken a meat cleaver to hack through the raw emotion cloaking Katie DeLuca. Maybe she’d be up to talking later, maybe not. That was more important for Parker’s human interest piece than it was for my accident coverage, anyway.

  Katie’s eyes lit on the wreckage, and sorrow overran her silent stare. She pulled in ragged breaths that issued back anguished sobs I wouldn’t soon forget.

  “Nate!” she screamed, then crumpled to the ground, reaching toward the flames that still danced on the water.

  Parker and Coach Bill tried to pull her up, and I was sure the rocks were slicing into her bare knees, but she just sagged when they tried to lift her and they let go. My hand clapped over my mouth and I felt tears well up in my own eyes as a lump blocked off my throat. I had never seen anyone in such agony.

  “No,” she moaned between sobs, her head tossing back and forth hard enough to shake her whole torso. “Not Nate. No. We were going to spend our whole lives together. He’s not dead. He’s not.”

  All right, dammit. I couldn’t lift her, but Parker’s hours in the gym ought to be good for something besides making the interns giggle and blush.

  Elbowing him none-too-gently in the ribs, I swallowed my tears and balanced—or tried to—on my tiptoes to get my lips close to his ear. “Do something. She’s not in any shape for any of this. Get her out of here.”

  Parker nodded, concern plain on his face as he watched Katie drop her blond head to her knees. He knelt next to her and laid a hand on her back. “Katie? You can’t do anything out here, honey, and you’re hurting yourself on the rocks. Let me take you to your car and Bill will drive you home.”

  “Nate,” she dissolved into a fresh round of sobs.

  “I know. I’m so sorry.” Parker scooped her into his arms and looked at Bill for direction.

  I gasped when Parker stood up. The blood streaming down Katie’s shins testified her legs had indeed been mangled. She didn’t seem to notice.

  The coach pointed in the general direction of the gravel road, and Parker walked that way, Nate DeLuca’s widow cradled against his chest.

  Jenna pulled on my arm and I turned. She looked like someone had backhanded her. So much for Mr. Cuervo.

  “That was horrible,” she said.

  I sighed. “She didn’t ask to be newsworthy tonight. She’d much rather have her husband walking in their front door right now telling her about his boys’ night. And no matter what kind of story we’re doing about the victim, I can never quite get past feeling like an ass when I ask the family to talk to me.”

  “That’s officially the uncool part of your job. I couldn’t do it.”

  “You think you’ve seen enough now?” I slung my arm around her shoulders. “I’m not going to get much more tonight. I can take you home and call Aaron for an update in the morning when I get to the office.”

  She nodded, and we turned toward my car and ran into Parker. His face was pained. This was pretty far from the kind of story he usually worked on.

  “Bill’s taking her to her mother’s house after the fire department finishes patching up her legs,” he told us, gesturing behind him to a red BMW coupe where Katie was slumped in the pas
senger seat, a crouching paramedic tending to her wounds. “Thank God her parents live around here. I didn’t really want to think about her going home alone tonight.”

  “You’re a good man, Charlie Brown.” I nodded sympathetically. “That was nice, what you did for her.”

  “What I am is out of my element. And I have to say I much prefer talking to my players and covering my games and writing my column to moving in your world. This shit is depressing.”

  I laughed. “I guess to most people it would seem that way. There are accidents and murders and people dying every day. Is it terrible that I’m pretty happy most of the time?”

  “On the contrary, I’d say it’s admirable,” he said.

  “I’m going to take Jenna home now. Her girls’ night out has become a little more than she bargained for, I think.”

  “I think I’m gonna go home and try not to have nightmares,” he said. “I want that column in on Sunday, though, so I guess I’ll see you at the office tomorrow?”

  “You’ll like it,” I said. “It’s quiet on Saturday.”

  He moved off through the still-bustling crime scene with the unconscious grace of the professional athlete he should have been. I watched him go, impressed by the way he’d dealt with Katie and wondering for a second if it was sad for him, writing about people who did what he’d always dreamed of doing.

  I helped Jenna into the car and then climbed in myself and started the engine.

  “Sorry about all that,” I said.

  “Don’t apologize. I got to go to work with you. And I got to meet Grant Parker. He’s so gorgeous. And he seems nice. Do you think you should—”

  “Don’t start,” I interrupted. “What would I even talk to Grant Parker about? I like baseball enough, but that will only take a relationship so far.”

  “But —”

  “Jenna, seriously. I never said a dozen words to the man before today, and I’m sure I won’t say a dozen words to him in the next five years, either. I’m glad you thought it was fun to meet him, but leave it alone. I’m not some twit who’s going to go chasing off after biceps and a killer smile.”

  She opened her mouth and sat there for a split second, then closed it again. “Whatever.”

  I stayed quiet, running back through the interviews I’d gotten at the accident scene and focusing on the long list of phone calls I needed to make the next morning. The silence wasn’t uncomfortable, lingering until I slowed the car to a stop in front of a lovely white colonial nestled in a wooded suburban neighborhood with great schools.

  “We’ll do it better next time,” I said as she hopped out of the car.

  “I had fun,” she called over her shoulder as she walked a pretty straight line up her sidewalk. “At dinner, anyway. Really. Thanks for a great girls’ night. Chad will be disappointed I’m not still blitzed, but he’ll live.”

  “Next time,” I repeated, inching the car away from the curb. “I promise to return you suitably intoxicated.”

  The porch light flickered on automatically when I pulled into my driveway. Drained, I dropped my keys on the counter and grabbed a tall glass from the overhead cabinet, pushing the door shut with enough force to make it stick even though several layers of paint made it difficult.

  I gulped the lukewarm tap water and set the glass in the farmhouse sink. Yawning, I untied the bow on my hip and tugged my wrap shirt off as I walked through the house, pausing at the archway to the living room.

  “Sorry, girl,” I told my tiny Pomeranian, patting her head. “It looks like you’re going to be a bachelorette again this weekend.” Unless Jenna wanted a playmate for the little ones. I brightened at the possibility.

  “You want to see Gabby?” Darcy hopped in a circle and barked. Jenna’s daughter was a tireless fetch partner.

  I shuffled to the bathroom and scrubbed my face, pulling on boxer shorts and a tank before I shut off the lights. The imposing cherry four-poster that dominated the floor space in my bedroom beckoned with mounds of down pillows wrapped in lilac silk and a sage green duvet so soft it could make a cloud jealous.

  It was coming up on three, according to the glowing numbers on my alarm clock. Good Lord. I bet the White House Press Corps gets to go to bed at a decent hour.

  I flipped onto my stomach and snuggled deeper into my pillows, the backs of my eyelids playing a montage of Darryl Wright’s blown-out baseball cap, Katie’s grief-stricken stare, and the burning river. It had been a long day, and I had a feeling there was a longer one coming. I slowed my breathing, dreading the nightmares that often came with covering tragedies. But I was so tired, I didn’t even dream.

  4.

  Curiouser

  By the time I made it to the office Saturday, I’d nearly mowed down an unfortunate cyclist who’d thought better of crossing the street just as I’d careened around a corner with my passenger side tires off the ground. Minutes later, I barreled through the half-open elevator doors to the newsroom, and some surprisingly sharp reflexes were the only thing that saved Bob from getting better acquainted with the tacky seventies carpet.

  I stopped so suddenly I dropped my bag, and he dodged to one side and waited until I had collected everything before he looked pointedly at the big silver and glass clock on the wall between the elevators.

  “Good morning, sunshine,” he said. “Sleep well?”

  “Chief! I didn’t think anything short of another Kennedy getting shot would get you in here on a Saturday.” Shit. If memory served, I’d heard the last time my boss came to work on a Saturday was when the space shuttle Columbia came apart in the skies over Texas in 2003. “I’m sorry I’m late. I didn’t set the alarm. I can’t believe I overslept.”

  “You’re behind on the biggest story of the year,” he said, his eyes disappointed. “You’ve got five dead people, two cops and a ballplayer among them, and an explosion half the city either heard or saw last night. Charlie had four and a half minutes on the early show, and she’s done two newsbreaks since. The last one said something about the FBI being out there this morning.”

  Damn, damn, damndamndamn. And after all the nice things he said to me the day before. Bob was undeniably the father figure in my little pseudo-family in Virginia—the closest thing I ever had to a father, period, when you got right down to it—and I didn’t want to let him down.

  “I really am sorry, chief. I’ll get it. They can put it on the web as soon as I’m done, and I’ll find you something she hasn’t had for tomorrow. Everyone was gone by the time I got Aaron’s message last night or I’d have sent something in from the scene. You’ll have it by four, I swear.”

  “Really?” Shelby’s drawl came from behind my left shoulder.

  And the hits just keep on coming.

  “This is huge, from what I’ve been watching on Channel Four this morning. Charlie’s got a good head start on us.” Shelby kept her eyes on Bob as she talked. “Are you really going to have it ready in just a few hours? Maybe I could help you. I’ve been here since before eight, and today is my day off.”

  “I think I can handle it, but, wow, it’s so nice of you to come by on your day off.” I fixed my best attempt at a put-upon smile on Shelby and imitated her syrupy tone. “I would have been here early, too, but I was working until three o’clock this morning, covering an accident. Those unpredictable hours are the most inconvenient thing about reporting. Though I don’t suppose the garden club ever had a midnight meeting.”

  Bob cleared his throat. “Don’t go home, Shelby,” he said, cutting a glance at me. “If Nichelle can’t get it together in time, we may need you to pitch in. Nice of you to offer.”

  I stared at him. Over. My. Cold. Corpse.

  Shelby assured Bob she’d be available and tossed a smirk at me before she sashayed off.

  “Nothing personal, kid. Just the wrong day for you to sleep in,” Bob said. “We have to have it nailed down. It’s leading page one.”

  “A lesser reporter might feel pressured by that,” I said. “I was ju
st on my way to pester Aaron.”

  “Don’t let me keep you,” he said. “I’m looking forward to reading.”

  “You’re staying all day?”

  “This is a big story. Call me a micro-manager, but I’m going to see it before it goes. The TV has been all over it since early this morning, and I want to make sure that between your piece and Parker’s piece, we have them outdone.” Bob winked. “He has a good start on that. There have been reporters camped out at the pitcher’s family’s houses all day today, but no one’s said a word to any of them. Somehow, he’s on his way to interview both the guy’s parents and his in-laws. I love it.”

  Scooped on a news story by Mr. Baseball? And Shelby Taylor on standby to help me get my story out? Oh, yeah. This was shaping up to be a helluva day.

  “Find me something great, Nicey. Anything Charlie hasn’t had,” Bob patted my shoulder as he walked back toward his office. “You outdid yourself all week. But Ken and Barbie have gone out with the recycling.”

  “Twenty column inches of greatness, coming up.” I spun on my heel and hurried to my desk, grabbing a pen and the phone before I even sat down.

  Aaron’s uncharacteristic grouchiness told me his day wasn’t going any better than mine was.

  “I’m tired of talking to reporters about the accident last night,” he said when I asked how he was. “I wish I was out on my boat with a beer and a fishing pole. No offense.”

  “None taken. I don’t exactly want to be here, either. Has the daylight given you guys anything new? I saw you told Charlie they sent a unit from Quantico.” My inner Lois Lane did like the sound of that.

  “I told Charlie no such thing,” Aaron said. “She saw them in their damned logo-emblazoned hats and windbreakers and probably frigging boxers, out there picking through every black rock lining the shore of the James.”

  Damn. She’d been back to the scene. The only thing keeping me from pulling my hair out was the knowledge that FBI agents are about as welcoming of TV cameras as a PETA convention would be of Michael Vick.