Every Second

46

Deer Kill River, New York

Less than an hour after leaving Manhattan, Kate glimpsed the hills flowing by as news photographer Stan Strobic pushed his pickup beyond the speed limit north on the New York Thruway.

A TV station in Kingston, New York, had reported that a car sought in the bank robbery in Queens was just discovered by a fisherman near the Deer Kill River. The Associated Press had picked up the story, and within minutes Kate and Strobic were driving to the scene.

Strobic’s truck was his prized possession, a Chevrolet Silverado 2014, regular cab with a long box cargo bed with cap, all in Victory Red, baby.

He loved to play his country music and was prone to peculiar behavior. Strobic never, ever cleaned out the bed of his truck. “As messy as a disorganized serial killer,” one of their coworkers had said. That’s why people were reluctant to work with him.

Kate had learned that Strobic’s assignments in Iraq and Afghanistan had changed him, but one thing was certain: no one could touch him when it came to shooting news. He was the best.

It was late in the day and Strobic bemoaned the growing shadows as they drove.

“We’re not going to have a lot of light left when we get there.”

Kate was on her phone watching for developments. She’d put out a lot of calls while digging for links between Lori Fulton and Blaine. Nothing had surfaced so far, doubling her disappointment because Varner had failed to alert her to the car at Deer Kill River.

Nick Varner.

Though his reluctance to help her had been frustrating, something about him seemed to fill her mind whenever she had a spare moment to think.

God, it’s been so long since I’ve been with someone.

Kate indulged herself with thoughts of Varner. She’d learned from a few police sources that he was widowed. His wife had died a few years ago, but they’d had no children and he wasn’t married or seeing anyone.

But why was she drawn to him? He’d done nothing but block her at every turn so far and yet…

He’s easy on the eyes. But it was more than that. She sensed that he had a good heart, even though he played the role of the hard-ass exceptionally well. But she had to be careful here. She couldn’t let emotion cloud her work and she sure as hell couldn’t depend on Varner to help her.

She was capable of doing her own investigating.

At that moment, Kate caught something on her Twitter feed.

“Whoa, what’s this?”

Help note left at gas station may be from fugitive banker.

She clicked on the link and read aloud a short news story from a local radio station identifying Weldon’s Gas and Grocery as the location. Kate Googled the store, got an address, and Strobic keyed it into his GPS.

“That’s Exit 16B, only a few miles up ahead,” he said.

“Let’s check it out.”

Several state police and Rockland County Sheriff’s Office emergency vehicles were parked in Weldon’s small lot when Kate and Strobic arrived.

A patrol officer stood at the door, blocking the entrance.

“I want to talk with the owner. We’re press.”

Kate and Strobic held up their Newslead IDs. Behind the officer, she saw crime scene technicians working deep inside the store.

“He’s over there.” The officer nodded to a corner of the parking lot behind a van where a couple of local news types were talking to a tall man with a thick, white beard.

Kate set her phone to record, Strobic got his camera ready and they joined a woman with a notebook and a man holding a microphone.

“Hi, Kate Page and Stan Strobic with Newslead. Are you the owner?” she asked the older man.

“That’s me, Roy Weldon, like it says on the sign.”

“You found a note related to the bank robbery in Queens?”

“Sure looks that way.”

“Sorry to interrupt,” Kate said, giving an apologetic smile to the other reporters, who didn’t seem to mind. From the look of them, she guessed they were news rookies. She turned back to Roy. “Can you tell us how you discovered it?”

“Like I was saying to these good folks, this customer came in a few hours ago, just a few minutes before a bus full of high school football players. After everyone left, I went to clean up and found the note in the restroom. I thought it was a prank at first, but when I remembered the news, I put two and two together and figured this was the real deal. I mean, the man was driving a green Chevy Impala and looked kind of tense. Wouldn’t you, if you were wearing a bomb?”

“What does the note say?”

“That he’s involved in the robbery, there were bombs and to call police.”

“Can you show us the note?”

“He wrote it on the stall. I let Robbie here take a picture. He got here before police-listens to police radios. You reporters are crafty that way.”

“Sorry,” Kate said, turning to the male reporter who looked like he was still in high school. “You’re Robbie?”

“Rob Cantly, Hilltop Radio News.”

“Can you show us the note, Rob?”

“Sure.” He cued up a clear image on his phone for Kate and Strobic, who both took a photo of it.

DAN FULTON GREEN IMPALA HH47H490 CALL POLICE!

“Did you show this to anyone or post it anywhere?” Strobic asked.

“Not yet. I was just going to put it on the station’s Facebook page.”

“Don’t. Listen, can Newslead buy it for exclusive use from you? It’ll go across the country-along with your photo credit.”

Cantly swelled and looked at Weldon, who winked.

“I’m just a freelancer at the station…”

“Then freelance it to us. You took the photo, which means you own it,” Strobic said. “We’re a wire service, this will go global. Just send it to me right now with your contact information, and we’ll take it from there.” Strobic tilted his phone, Cantly copied his info, and within seconds Strobic had Cantly’s original image. “Perfect. Now, you can’t show it or share it with anyone else,” Strobic said. “Our photo rights guy will get in touch shortly. You’ll get a photo credit and a few hundred bucks.”

After Kate asked Weldon a few more questions, she and Strobic returned to the Thruway and continued north. Kate worked on the story on her phone in between calls to Nick Varner that went unanswered. She wrote fast and clean, knowing that it was a red-hot exclusive for Newslead. Reeka loved it, but without missing a beat she continued pressing Kate to get to the car scene at Deer Kill River, which was another fifty miles away.

“Not much is coming out of there,” Reeka said. “We have to know if that is where this story ends.”

As Strobic drove faster, Kate stared into the forests.

Are we following the Fultons’ final trail? Will we find corpses in that car at Deer Kill River?

After leaving the paved highway, Strobic’s Silverado raced along a twisting gravel road.

He braked hard when they came to some two dozen media and police vehicles lining each shoulder. A group of people stood near a large rock formation where Kate saw a flash of plastic yellow tape that appeared to seal the mouth of a forest back road. New York state troopers and county patrol officers protected the way to the scene where the car was found.

Kate and Strobic trotted to the gathering, passing emergency vehicles, news vans and cars from Albany, Newark, Patterson and New York City. Two helicopters thudded overhead and dogs yipped from inside the forest.

TV cameras and newspeople encircled a man who was gesturing as he spoke. He was not in uniform and didn’t look like a cop to Kate. She approached the group, standing next to a woman who was taking notes while recording.

“Kate Page, Newslead.”

“Alicia Walker, Newark Star-Ledger. I read your stuff. It’s good.”

“Thanks. Who’s this guy?”

“Bruce Grover-he found the car. You won’t get into the scene and they’re not saying much. They’re waiting for the FBI to take control here.”

Kate listened as Grover repeated his story for the benefit of other reporters as they continued arriving.

“…a white SUV, it forced me off the road. Then, on my way along the trail-” Grover pointed to the woods “-I found the car… No, there was no sign of anyone inside, or near it and no sign of any money.”

Strobic nudged Kate after taking several frames of Grover.

“There’s no picture here. I have to get an aerial. I’m heading out with a TV crew-they chartered a plane at a small strip. I won’t be long. I’ll pick you up here afterward.”

Kate nodded as she got an alert on her phone and saw a story just posted by the New York Post with photos of the abandoned Impala taken by Grover, who, it turned out, was a former editor with the paper. No indication of a body, or money, or bombs found. When she looked up from her phone, Strobic was gone, but she glimpsed a car arriving in the distance.

She recognized Tilden and Varner stepping out of it and made her way over to them, careful to walk on the other side of parked vehicles so other reporters wouldn’t see her.

She caught up to them before they headed to the scene.

“Agent Varner, Detective Tilden, wait! Please, just give me a second.”

They stopped, though neither looked happy to see her.

“Can you tell me what you have here?”

“You tell us, Kate,” Tilden said. “You were here first.”

“Come on.”

“You know what we know,” Tilden said.

“Is there anything more than a car in there?”

“Maybe deer, rabbits,” Tilden teased, sticking out his bottom lip. “A bear or two.”

“Really, Marv? You want to play it like this?” Kate turned to Varner. “What’s the connection between Lori and your suspect, Blaine?”

“That’s still under investigation,” Varner said.

“They knew each other in California, didn’t they?”

“That’s under investigation,” Varner repeated.

“Well, I can’t guarantee I’m going to hold off reporting on your investigation. Seems like there’s a lot going on here, and if you can’t help me out…”

“We got work to do.” Tilden walked away.

“Dammit, Varner, give me something I can use. I’ve been keeping up my end of the deal. I think you owe me something.”

He spun around and gave her a long, hard look that softened, acknowledging that she was right. “I’ll tell you one thing, and it’s not for attribution. You got that?”

“Got it.”

“You’re further ahead on this case than any other press people. Our problem is we don’t want you tipping off the suspects to details that would help them.”

“I get that, so what can you tell me?”

“We believe that the motive in this case is more than a financial one, that it’s connected to crimes in the past and possibly other conspiracies.”

“What other conspiracies?”

“That’s all you’re getting.”

“Okay, thanks.” Kate wrote it down.