Smoke Screen (15 page)

It would be dark before she got back to the city. The sun had already set. A few stars had appeared. Not nearly as many as were visible above his cabin. The breathtaking night sky was one of the benefits of living so far from a large city.

That, and the pervasive quiet, and the absolute privacy.

Although the price one paid for absolute privacy was loneliness.

Britt was taking in the scenery through the windshield. “Pretty.”

“About seventy yards that way is the river,” he said, pointing with his chin. “The Edisto,” he said, reading her perplexity. “It forms the eastern edge of the ACE Basin. The Combahee, the western side. The Ashepoo sorta splits the difference.”

“I’ve never really gotten out and explored the area.”

“You should.”

She smiled apologetically over her indifference to the topography. Then, “What happened between Jay and Hallie?”

He looked in the direction of the river. “He broke her heart. She expected faithfulness, which wasn’t in Jay’s character. Not even in his vocabulary. He got what he wanted, which was a hard-won notch on his belt. Maybe two since Hallie was my fiancée. In effect, she and I both got fucked by Jay Burgess.”

He realized he had clenched his hands into fists and was feeling the rage he’d felt when he learned how his best friend had betrayed him with Hallie, then discarded her. To Jay, she’d been just another conquest. “She caught him cheating, scooped up the pieces of her broken heart, and left Charleston.”

Feeling Britt’s inquiring gaze on him, he said, “I waited a couple of years and then decided to try and contact her. I used a pay phone at the general store and called her folks, the only way I knew of reaching her.

“Soon as I identified myself, I got an obscene tongue-lashing from her dad. See, they believed what your news stories had implied about me. But before he hung up, he told me—no, he
crowed
it, proudly, triumphantly—that Hallie had married an extremely successful orthopedic surgeon in Denver and they were expecting their first child.”

Even insects had abandoned the airstrip. Without their night music, there was nothing to break the heavy stillness. The clock in the dashboard ticked. That was all.

Raley heard the rustle of fabric as Britt shifted, turning toward him. She bent her left knee and tucked that foot beneath her right leg.

“Before I go back and throw myself on the mercy of Clark and Javier, I think you should tell me about your investigation into the police station fire.”

F
IRST
, I
HAVE A QUESTION FOR YOU,”
R
ALEY SAID
. “W
HO
was your source? Who tipped you about me and the events of that Sunday morning?”

Britt took a deep breath and released it slowly. “Jay Burgess.”

He didn’t slam a fist into the dashboard or start cursing a blue streak. Nothing like that, nothing that she might have expected. But she saw his jaw clench so tightly that even his beard couldn’t hide it. “I figured. How did that come about?”

“I met him on my first news assignment in Charleston. I was sent to report on a fatal stabbing in a seedy bar in a seedy part of town. After I’d finished doing my stand-up, Jay, who was investigating the crime scene, came over and introduced himself. He said something corny like ‘Do you come here often?’”

“You thought that was cute.”

“It
was
cute. We introduced ourselves, made small talk, then he asked me if I had a significant other. He said if so, he was going to throw himself off a bridge. If not, would I meet him later for a drink, in a better bar.”

“And you went.”

“He was good looking and charming. A policeman, which I considered safe. So, yes, I went and I liked him.”

He arched his eyebrow.

“No, Raley, I didn’t sleep with him that night.”

“Second date?”

She refused to be provoked. “A few days after that initial meeting, Jay called me at the TV station.”

She answered her newsroom extension with a bright and chipper, “Britt Shelley.”

“This is your lucky day.”

“I’ve been chosen to enjoy a weekend in the Ozarks to look at time-share property?”

“Better.”

“I’ve won the lottery?”

“Journalistically speaking.”

“I’m all ears.”

“I’d rather you not say my name.”

Of course she’d recognized his voice instantly, but it no longer had a smile behind it. “Okay.”

“Ever.”

That tone couldn’t be mistaken for anything except dead serious. “Are we talking about a story?” She reached for her notepad and a pen.

“A dilly. And it can’t be divulged that I’m your source.”

“Understood.”

“I can’t talk now, and not over the phone.”

They set the time for eleven forty-five that night, after the late news broadcast and giving other personnel time to leave the building and clear the parking lot.

She wasn’t surprised that Jay Burgess had called her again. She’d expected it. They’d had a good time over the first round of drinks—well, he’d had a second, but he hadn’t become intoxicated. It had been an easy, comfortable, getting-to-know-you date. Where did you grow up, attend school? Do you like sports, movies, books, spicy foods? Ever been married? Favorite vacation destination? Fantasy vacation destination?

They’d closed out the pleasant evening with his promise that he’d be in touch soon, and she’d believed him.

She had assumed that his follow-up call would be to ask her out again, not tip her to a “dilly” of a story. But she wasn’t disappointed. She was far more interested in building a faithful following of viewers than in entering into what she knew would be nothing more than a compatible fling. For both her and Jay, hormones might have become agreeably involved, but never hearts. She had determined that within half an hour of meeting him.

Over time, she’d realized that, among many young professionals on their way up, there was an unspoken understanding that any kind of romance was a frivolity. She had come to recognize men who were of a similar mind as she, those who weren’t looking for a permanent partner, those to whom dates were occasions for relaxing and unwinding, or sometimes, by mutual consent, for assuaging sexual impulses. Nothing more.

Among this unspecified group of upwardly mobile people, rarely did anyone enter into a relationship that was expected to withstand the demands of two careers and the ambitions of the individuals driving them. Lasting relationships required time and attention that was, instead, channeled into professional pursuits, which took precedence over
amore.

She liked men. She enjoyed their company. Periodically she enjoyed sleeping with one. But she had moved frequently, sometimes staying at a station for no longer than a year before sending out her résumé to see if there was an opportunity for her to advance to the next level.

There had been neither the time nor the desire to develop anything more meaningful than a handful of friendships, most of which had, by her design, remained platonic and, most important, uncomplicated. She was able to give notice, pack, and leave a town without a backward glance, without regret, without a broken heart, either hers or an abandoned admirer’s.

On the horizon of her mind she would occasionally glimpse herself meeting someone irresistible, someone who would become as important to her as her work. Commitment and marriage, a sense of belonging to someone else would be nice, especially since she’d spent almost half of her life alone.

Yes, certainly, she would like to have that kind of intimacy with a man, one who would anticipate her needs, know her feelings, appreciate her ambition, receive and reciprocate her love. She would love to have children, more than one, because she wouldn’t want to leave a child of hers without a family, as she’d been left without one when her parents died.

But for now, all that could stay on the distant horizon. That life belonged to “someday.” Today, she was happy to be unencumbered.

She immediately recognized that Jay Burgess subscribed to the same policy. He was an unconscionable flirt, obviously a man who liked women but who probably would never settle for one. He was fun to be with, but woe be to the woman who fell in love with him.

But as she sat inside her car in the darkened parking lot of the television station, waiting for him to arrive, she was squiggly with the excitement of a spinster waiting on her first beau to call.

He pulled his car into the empty slot next to hers, got out, and after taking a cautious look around at the deserted lot, opened the passenger door and got in.

“Hi.” He leaned across the console and pecked her on the lips.

“I never kiss my sources, Jay.”

“Really?” His expression was one of actual surprise. “I kiss everybody. Girls, I mean.”

“I’ll bet you do,” she said, laughing. “This isn’t a scheme to get me alone and in the dark, is it?”

“That scenario has distinct possibilities,” he said, giving her a wolfish grin. “I’d definitely like to pursue it sometime.” He paused, his smile faltered. “But not tonight.”

“Then you really do have a story.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“‘Afraid so’?”

“I’m part of the story, Britt. It’s not a nice story, and before I say anything else, you’ve got to give me your word that you won’t use me as a source.”

“I already have.”

“This meeting never happened.”

“I get it, Jay. You can trust me.”

He nodded and began by asking if she’d heard anything about the recent death of a local young woman named Suzi Monroe. Britt recalled reading a story about it inside the newspaper.

“Cocaine overdose, wasn’t it? I’m vague on the details.”

“There’s a reason for that,” he explained. “The PD didn’t release any details to the media. Her death was passed off as a routine drug overdose. But there’s more to the story, much more, that we kept under wraps.”

“Who are ‘we’?”

“The detectives who were called to the scene of her death. And me.”

“Why was the information withheld?”

“Because she died in my apartment.”

The implications of that weren’t lost on Britt. She began to envision a spike in her ratings.

Jay talked nonstop for ten minutes, telling how the girl had died while in bed with one of the city’s firemen, who happened to be his lifelong friend, a man named Raley Gannon.

By now her journalistic radar was blipping like crazy. If this were fiction, the plot had just thickened.

“This is a guy who should have made every attempt to save her,” Jay said, sounding almost angry. “Except that he was so intoxicated he was unconscious.”

He went on to admit how wild the party had been, how much alcohol had been consumed. “I’m famous for my…hospitality,” he said sheepishly. “Live here long enough and you’ll learn that. But…” He hung his head, shaking it sorrowfully.

“This party got completely out of hand. I was having a whale of a time, celebrating being alive.” Here he paused and glanced at her. “You know about the police station fire?”

She nodded. “You were one of the heroes of the day.”

He appeared flattered that she knew that but continued without further comment. “I wanted this to be the best party in history. But, I should have stayed sober. I should have kept tabs on how much my guests were drinking, how drunk they were getting. I’m a cop, for crissake. Protecting people is part of my sworn duty.”

She said nothing as he castigated himself. At one of the stations where she had previously worked, an old pro had advised her that when someone had something to tell, and he was telling it without any prompting, it was better not to prompt.

“I should have especially been keeping an eye on my best friend,” Jay said. “I didn’t realize how wasted Raley was getting. I shouldn’t have let him drink that much. He’s been working too hard, taking on extra responsibility, and it’s a bad habit of his to take responsibility for every damn thing that goes wrong in the world. Planets collide, he’s at fault. It’s his nature. He’s too hard on himself.

“So here he’s got one night where his main squeeze is out of town, he can let off some steam, get a little wild and crazy for once, and…” He exhaled a gust of air. “Shit. I even goaded him into it.” He rubbed his eye sockets tiredly. “We’re both to blame. I’m as guilty as he is.”

“For Suzi Monroe’s death?” She couldn’t help herself. The question popped out before she could stop it.

“For the way she died, yeah.”

Shocked by the admission, she listened as he detailed how this Raley Gannon had got blitzed on margaritas and taken the equally drunk Suzi Monroe to Jay’s guest bedroom.

“Did you supply the cocaine, Jay?”

“No! Christ, no. And knowing Raley as I do—I’m telling you, he’s a freaking Boy Scout and always has been—I would swear on a stack of Bibles that Raley didn’t do any drugs with her. I would come close to swearing that he wouldn’t allow her to do any, either. I think what happened is exactly what he said. They had sex a couple of times, he passed out, and didn’t know anything until he woke up the next morning and found her dead.”

“What do the investigators think?” Britt asked quietly.

“The same.”

He told her that the district attorney himself was carefully reviewing the case, but that he doubted it would result in Raley Gannon’s being charged with a crime. The autopsy revealed no evidence of foul play except for a lethal ingestion of cocaine, which in all likelihood was self-administered.

“We didn’t supply the drugs, and we didn’t push that stuff up her nose. What’s eating at me is keeping our involvement hush-hush. It feels furtive. It smacks of a cover-up, and I can’t, in good conscience, participate in it anymore.”

He was right, it was a great story, the kind that an investigative reporter usually had to dig for, Woodward and Bernstein style. Amazingly, it was being served to her on a silver platter. She, the rookie. She, the one trying to earn her spurs in a TV market of respectable size and reputation.

She wondered if she was dreaming. But, no. When she reached out to give Jay Burgess’s arm a consoling squeeze, it was tangible. “What happened wasn’t your fault, Jay. The individuals who stumbled into your guest bedroom were adults. They were responsible for their own actions.”

“I know that, but—”

“Actually it’s a credit to your character that you’re shouldering some of the responsibility, much less coming forward and telling me about it.”

He glanced at her and gave a weak smile. “So what’s it to be? Forty lashes, or a hundred Hail Marys?”

She smiled but was all seriousness when she said, “The story needs to be told.”

He sighed and leaned back against the seat. “That’s why I’m here. Meeting you the other night was like providence or something. Like you were sent so I’d do what my conscience was dictating.”

“The story will have explosive impact. You realize that, right? Especially for your friend. As you said, he’s supposed to save people.”

“That’s why I and the other detectives kept it quiet in the first place. It’s going to create a shitstorm for Raley, and he’s a hell of a guy. Truly,” he said, detecting the skepticism behind her frown.

“Everybody likes Raley. He’s a stand-up guy. This is going to damage him, and he’s taken it so hard already. I mean, this girl was in bed with him, and she fucking
died.”
Looking at her directly, he said, “I don’t want him ever to know that it was me who blew the whistle. It would destroy our friendship.”

“I understand, Jay. But you also have to understand that once the story of his complicity becomes public knowledge, it can’t be recalled like a bad batch of canned beans. It can be denied, or refuted, or debated, even retracted, but it’ll still be hanging out here, forever.”

“I know what you’re saying. Hell, I know there will be fallout, for me, too. But I’m at the point where I say, bring it on. My conscience won’t let me live with this subterfuge any longer.”

Britt stopped talking and took a deep breath, then looked over at Raley. Throughout the telling, he hadn’t moved. She leaned toward him now, much as she had that night in her car with Jay, and laid her hand on his arm.

“His contrition, his willingness to assume some of the blame for Suzi Monroe, placed me in his camp immediately. It made him a sympathetic and totally credible source, Raley. I didn’t question him because he was implicating himself as well as you. Why would he put his neck on the line, expose himself to public censure, if what he was telling me wasn’t the absolute truth and a matter of conscience?”

“Because he knew it was my head that would be chopped off. Not his. His timing was no accident, either. No doubt he wanted to get in your pants as soon as possible—”