From the Heart (44 page)

T
here was a white rose on Liv's desk in the morning. It stood in a slender porcelain vase, a bud only, with petals tightly closed. Of course, she knew who had sent it. Baffled, she dropped into the chair behind her desk and stared at it.

When she had returned to the card table the evening before, she had promised herself she wouldn't think of her conversation with Thorpe. A sane person didn't dwell on the words of a lunatic. Yet there had been a long, quiet stretch in the night when she had lain awake in bed. Every syllable of their conversation on the terrace had played back in her head. And now he was sending her flowers.

The smart thing to do would be to dump it, vase and all, into the trash and forget it.

Liv touched a fingertip to a white petal of the rose. She couldn't bring herself to do it.

It's just a flower, after all, she reminded herself. Harmless. I just won't think about where it came from. Briskly, she pulled a sheet of copy toward her. She had a news brief to give in fifteen minutes.

“Liv, thank God you're here!”

She glanced up as the assignment editor barreled down on her desk. “Chester?” He was an excitable, usually desperate man who lived on antacids and coffee. She was accustomed to this sort of greeting from him.

“Take crew two and get out to the Livingston Apartments in Southeast. A plane just crashed into the sixth floor.”

She was up, grabbing her purse and jacket. “Any details?”

“You get them. We're going live as soon as you're set up. An engineer's going with you. Everybody's scattered around town or down with the flu.” His tone hinted that the flu was no excuse for being unavailable for assignment. “Go, they're in the van.” He popped a small, round mint into his mouth.

“I'm gone.” Liv dashed for the door.

 

It was worse, much worse than she could ever have imagined. The tail section of the plane protruded from the face of the building like the shaft of an arrow. It might have been taken from a scene of a movie, carefully staged. Fires, started by the impact, belched out smoke. The air radiated with waves of heat and smelled pungent. The building was surrounded by fire engines and police cars, and they were still coming. Fire fighters were geared up, going in or coming out of the building, or spraying it with the powerful force of their hoses. The lower floors were being evacuated. She could hear the weeping and the shouts above the wail of sirens and crackle of the fire.

Behind the barricades, the press was already at work. There were cameras and booms, reporters, photographers and technicians. All were moving in their special organized chaos.

“We'll stay portable,” she told Bob as he hefted the camera on his shoulder. “For now, get the building on tape, a full pan of these trucks and ambulances.”

“I've never seen anything like this,” he muttered, already focusing in on the visible section of the plane. “Can you imagine what it's like inside there?”

Liv shook her head. She didn't want to. There were people inside there. She forced back a swell of nausea. She had a story to report.

“There's Reeder.” She glanced in the direction Bob indicated. “Assistant fire chief.”

“Okay. Let's see what he can tell us.” Liv worked her way through the crowd. She was jostled now and again, but she was used to that. She knew how to snake through masses of
people to her objective. And she knew the crew would follow behind her. Coming to the edge of the barricade, she secured her position and took the mike from her soundman.

“Chief Reeder, Olivia Carmichael with WWBW.” She managed to get the mike out to him by leaning over the barricade and planting her feet. “Can you tell us what happened, and the status of the fire?”

He looked impatiently at the mike, then at Liv. “Charter plane out of National.” His voice was curt, gruff and as impatient as his eyes. “We don't know the cause of the crash yet. Four floors of the building are involved. Of the six floors, three have been evacuated.”

“Can you tell me how many people are on the plane?”

“Fifty-two, including crew.” He turned to bark an order into his two-way.

“Has there been any contact with them?” Liv persisted.

Reeder gave her a long, silent look. “My men are working down from the roof and up from the lower floors.”

“How many people are still in the building?”

“Talk to the landlord, I'm busy.”

As he walked away, Liv signaled to Bob to stop the taping. “I'm going to try to find out how many people are still inside.” She turned to the sound technician. “Go back to the radio; find out if the desk knows the flight number yet, the plane's destination, any clue to the cause of the crash. We'll set up for a live bulletin.” She checked her watch. “Five minutes, right here.”

She turned to push through the crowd again. There was a woman sitting alone on the curb. She was dressed in a worn robe and clutched a photo album to her breast. Liv backtracked from her search for the building's landlord and went to her.

“Ma'am.”

The woman looked up, dry eyed, pale. Liv crouched down beside her. She recognized the look of shock.

“You shouldn't be sitting out here in the cold,” Liv said gently. “Is there somewhere you can go?”

“They wouldn't let me take anything else,” she told Liv, pressing the album closer. “Just my pictures. Did you hear the
noise? I thought it was the end of the world.” Her voice was reed thin. The sound of it pulled at Liv. “I was fixing tea,” she went on. “All my china's broken. My mother's china.”

“I'm sorry.” The words were pitifully inadequate. Liv touched the woman's shoulder. “Why don't you come with me now. Over there. The paramedics will take care of you.”

“I have friends up there.” The woman's eyes shifted to the building. “Mrs. McGiver in 607, and the Dawsons in 610. They have two children. Did they get out yet?”

Liv heard another window explode from heat. “I don't know. I'll try to find out.”

“The little boy had the flu and had to stay home from school.” Shock was giving way to grief. Liv could see the change in the woman's eyes, hear it in her voice. “I have a picture of him in here.” She began to weep—deep, tearing sobs that pulled at Liv's heart.

Sitting on the curb beside her, Liv gathered the woman into her arms. She was fragile, almost paper thin. Liv was very much afraid that the picture would be all that was left of the Dawson boy. Holding her close, Liv wept with her.

She felt a hand on her shoulder. Looking up, she saw Thorpe standing tall beside her.

“Thorpe,” she managed as he stepped in front of them. Her eyes were eloquent. Thorpe lifted the old woman from the curb gently. She was still clutching the album. He slipped an arm around her, murmuring in her ear as he led her toward the paramedics. Liv let her forehead drop to her knees.

She had to pull herself back together if she was going to do her job. A reporter couldn't afford personal involvement. She could hear someone coughing violently as smoke clogged her lungs. The wind brought it still closer.

“Liv.” Thorpe took her arm and drew her to her feet.

“I'm all right,” she said immediately. She heard another explosion. Someone screamed. “Oh, God.” Her eyes flew back to the building. “How many people are still trapped in there?”

“They haven't been able to break through to the sixth floor yet. Anybody still on it, or in that plane, is gone.”

She nodded. His voice was calm and unemotional—
exactly what she needed. “Yes, I know.” She took a deep, cleansing breath. “I need something to put on the air. I have a stand-up to do.” She looked at him again. “What are you doing here?”

“I was on my way in to the station.” There was a smear on her cheek from the smoke and ash. He rubbed it off with his thumb. He kept his voice light. “This isn't my beat, Liv. I'm not here for a story.”

She looked past him to where paramedics were working frantically on a burn victim. “I wish to God I weren't,” she murmured. From somewhere to the left, she heard a child screaming for her mother. “I hate this part of it—poking, prying into people's pain.”

“It isn't an easy job, Liv.” He didn't touch her. He wanted to, but knew that wasn't what she needed.

She looked over as her crew made their way toward her. Liv took the scribbled note from the sound technician with a nod.

“All right, we'll shoot from here with the building at the back.” Drawing a breath, she faced the camera. “After I'm into it, I want you to pan the building.” She took the mike again and waited for the cue that would patch her into the station. “Then focus in on the plane before you cut back to me. Keep in the background noise.” In her earphone, she heard the countdown to cue.

“This is Olivia Carmichael, outside the Livingston Apartments, where at nine-thirty this morning charter flight number 527 hit the sixth floor of the building.” Bob panned the building as she continued. “The cause of the crash has not yet been confirmed. Fire fighters are evacuating the building and working to gain access to the sixth floor and the plane. There were fifty-two people on board, including crew, en route to Miami.” The camera came back to her. “There is no report as yet on the number of casualties. Burn and smoke-inhalation victims are being treated here by paramedics before being transported to the hospital.”

Thorpe stood back and watched as Liv continued the report. Her face was composed, but for her eyes. The horror was there. Whether she knew it or not, it added to the impact
of her facts and statistics. There were still traces of soot on her cheek, and her skin was dead white against it. A viewer looking beyond the words would see a woman, not just a reporter. She was good at her job, he reflected, perhaps because she constantly struggled to tamp down her emotions. The effort showed from time to time and made her more accessible.

“This is Olivia Carmichael,” she concluded, “for WWBW.” She waited until they were off the air, then whipped off the earphone. “All right, get some tape of the paramedics. I'll find out if they've gotten through to the sixth floor yet. Get a courier out here. They'll need whatever we've got for the noon news.”

Liv felt the control slip back into place. She wasn't going to fall apart again.

“Very efficient,” Thorpe commented.

Liv looked at him. He was all quiet intensity, all understated strength. It disturbed her that for just a brief moment she had needed him—simply needed to know he was there to lean on. It was a luxury she couldn't afford to allow herself.

“The trick is being good at it,” Liv repeated. “Let's say we finally have a point of agreement.”

He smiled and brushed a stray lock of hair from her forehead. “Want me to hang around?”

She stared at him, struck with conflicting emotions. Why was he so easily able to move her? “Don't be nice to me, Thorpe,” she murmured. “Please don't be nice to me. It's simpler when you're a louse.”

He bent and touched her lips with his. “I'll call you tonight.”

“Don't,” she returned, but he was already walking away. Swearing, Liv spun around. She couldn't worry about Thorpe. She still had information to gather and a story to finish.

 

Liv watched the tape on the eleven o'clock news. It was a different feeling than she had experienced during her own earlier broadcast. Sitting behind the desk, giving her report and watching herself on the monitor, she could separate her emotions from her job. Now, alone in her apartment,
watching the tape as any other viewer, the tragedy washed over her again. Sixty-two people had died, and fifteen more had been hospitalized, including four fire fighters. The reports weren't official yet, but it looked as though a pilot error had been responsible.

Liv thought of the woman she had tried to comfort on the curb—the precious photo album she had clutched, the stunned grief, then the mourning. There had been no survivors from the sixth floor.

The time of day had been a blessing. Liv had said so herself in her report. Most of the apartments had been vacant. Children had been in school, adults at work. But the little Dawson boy in 610 had had the flu.

Rising, Liv snapped off the set. She couldn't think about it, couldn't dwell on it. She pushed at her temples. It was time to take a couple of aspirin and go to bed. Nothing could change what had happened in the morning hours, and it was time to find her distance again.

It occurred to her, as she crawled into bed, that she had missed dinner. Hunger might be partially responsible for the severity of her headache, but she was too weary to take anything more than the aspirin. Shutting her eyes, she lay in the darkness.

This is what she had decided she wanted. Quiet, privacy. No one to depend on—no one to answer to. What she had now was hers; what mistakes she made were hers. That was the best way.

She opened her eyes to stare at the ceiling, wondering just when she had begun to doubt that.

The phone beside her shrilled, and Liv sat straight up. She fumbled for the bedside lamp, then picked up a pencil even as she lifted the receiver. Who but the desk would call her at midnight?

“Yes, hello.”

“Hello, Liv.”

“Thorpe?” Liv dropped the pencil and lay back. He was incredible.

“Did I wake you?”

“Yes,” she lied. “What do you want?”

“I wanted to say good night.”

She sighed, then was grateful he couldn't see her smile. She didn't want to give him any encouragement. “You woke me up to say good night?”

“I've been tied up. I just got home.” Thorpe yanked off his tie. If there was one thing he hated about the job, it was ties. “Want to know where I've been?”

“No,” Liv returned dauntingly, and heard him chuckle. Damn it, she thought, then propped her pillow behind her. She did want to know. “All right, where were you?”