Free Fall

Thirty-Three

Manhattan, New York

The fresh coffee Kate gulped at her desk scorched her throat.

She’d gone to the newsroom early that morning, riding a wave of anger and hammering at her keyboard.

Who was following me and why?

She had to cool off and think clearly. She looked at her notebook again, thankful she’d gotten the stranger’s New York license plate and gone on the offensive. Before leaving her building for the subway that morning, she’d taken action.

One of her sources was Ivan Vestrannicki, an NYPD detective, who’d had twenty-one years on the job before his squad took down an armored-car heist in the Bronx. Ivan had taken two bullets in his left leg. It’d left him with a limp and a cynical view of the world. After he’d retired he’d set up his own PI agency. Kate had interviewed him for a series on the challenges cops who’d been wounded on the job faced with disability payments. Ivan never forgot that.

You got a friend here, he’d told her.

This morning Kate had reached out to him for help with the plate.

Leave it with me. I’ll get back to you.

While waiting, Kate had searched the plate online, but struck out. Then she’d thought of Grace and Vanessa. Without revealing that she’d been followed, Kate had questioned them at breakfast. They’d said that they hadn’t received any strange calls or hang-ups, or seen anything odd. They hadn’t seen anyone following them. Nothing appeared to be out of the ordinary.

She’d considered all of the recent stories she’d written.

Who would do this?

Twice in the past she’d been the target of private investigations. A corrupt millionaire stockbroker who’d been scamming seniors had hired an agency to follow her. It had also happened with a story she’d done on people trying to break away from a cult. In both cases they’d tried to find dirt on Kate to scare her off the story. In both cases they’d failed. Their tactics had become part of the story. Her line rang.

“Kate, it’s Ivan.”

“Hey, what’d you find out?”

“The plate belongs to a woman who works for a private investigation agency, who subcontracts for a larger one.”

“Any idea who her client is and why she was hired?”

“I won’t be able to get that info. It’d be like asking you to name your sources. I can tell you the larger agency is Infinite Guardian Shield, a global security operation.”

“Really? Do they have offices in London, England?”

“Yup. Say, aren’t you working on that airline story?”

“You think it could be related to that?”

“Maybe, maybe not. Could always be something you wrote about prior to that. Hard to say.”

Kate glanced around the newsroom.

“Ivan, could they bug my phone, intercept my emails?”

“It wouldn’t be easy, given your office environment, but it wouldn’t be impossible, either.”

“What about at home?”

“Quite possible.”

“Holy crap.”

“Look, Kate, the fact you challenged this woman and made it clear to her that you knew what she was doing means her surveillance of you was blown. That could end the case right there.”

“Think so?”

“Again, anything’s possible. Let me do a little digging and see what I can find out. Meanwhile, try not to piss off anybody.”

“Very funny.”

“Thought you’d like that.”

Kate took another sip of coffee and pulled her thoughts together. She had to tell Chuck what was going on. She went to his office. His jacket was draped over his chair but he wasn’t there. On her way back to her desk she saw Sharlese Givens from the news library.

“Oh, Kate, I’ve got those printouts of the articles you requested on airline security. I just dropped them off at your desk.”

“Thanks.”

The clippings were in a yellow legal-size folder. Kate had just sat down and opened the thick bundle when her phone rang.

“Newslead. Kate Page.”

“Kate, Tim Yardley at the Washington bureau. Got a minute?”

“Hi, Tim. Sure.”

“I didn’t want to put this in an email. You know Chuck assigned us to help out on your EastCloud stuff, look into the companies involved and any political connections, anything we could find.”

“Right, but I thought nothing came up.”

“It was looking that way until we got an interesting lead. It concerns Sloane Parkman, who’s working at headquarters with you.”

“What about him?” Kate looked across the newsroom just as Sloane was arriving at his desk. “I can see him now.”

“Are you good to talk?”

“I am. Go ahead.”

“It turns out Hub Wolfeson, who sits on Richlon-Titan’s board of directors, is Sloane’s uncle.”

“What?”

“That puts Sloane in a serious conflict of interest when working on stories concerning Richlon-Titan. Newslead policy states that you cannot report on issues or subjects where you, or your family, have a direct personal or financial interest, or can be perceived as having one.”

Looking more closely at Sloane, Kate saw that he was wearing a jacket over his Brooks Brothers shirt. Every hair was in place but there was no gleaming white-toothed grin today. In fact, he looked somber.

“Does Chuck know?” Kate asked.

“He does. This all came up last night. Very few other people know and since you were working with him, I wanted to give you a heads-up, Kate.”

Sloane had placed an empty cardboard box on his desk and was putting personal items in it.

What’s going on?

At that moment, Chuck Laneer stepped into the newsroom, which was still largely empty because it was so early. He gestured for Kate to come into his office.

“Kate?” Yardley said on the phone. “You still there?”

“Yes, Tim, thanks. I appreciate the heads-up, but I have to go.”

“Shut the door,” Chuck said. “Have a seat.”

His collar button was undone and his tie was loosened. He remained standing and rolled up his sleeves.

“I just met with Lincoln and Fitzgerald in Human Resources. We’ve let Sloane go this morning.”

“He’s fired?”

“Yes, for violating Newslead policy. He not only failed to disclose his direct family connection to Richlon-Titan, he tried to direct coverage in a manner that deflected any criticism of the company. We’ll post a memo to staff underscoring Newslead policy on conflicts of interest.”

Chuck tossed his pen on his desk and put his hands on his hips. Stress lines cut deep into his face.

“I can’t tell you how much this sickens me,” he said. “Sloane’s uncle is a senior board member at RT.”

“How’s Reeka taking this? Sloane was her hire.”

“She was advised to take some time off and reflect,” he said. “We can’t afford this kind of bullshit at a time when we’re trying to strengthen our credibility. That’s why I was pushing you hard on getting confirmation.”

“I get that.”

“So where are you at on the story? We could use a big score right now.”

“I’ve reached out to my best sources, but something’s come up.”

“What?”

“I was followed last night.”

“Followed? By whom? Have you been threatened?”

“No, nothing like that.”

Kate brought Chuck up to speed on what had happened the night before. While listening, he ran his hand over his face. Then he interrupted her several times to ask questions, staring hard at her when she finished.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked.

“Yes. I’ve been through this before.”

“This is what we’re going to do. We’re going to talk with Newslead’s lawyers and you’re going to report this to the NYPD. I doubt there’s much they can do, but I want this on the record. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“If, at any time, you want off this story, or want help of any sort-”

“Thanks, I’ll let you know.”

Kate went downstairs for a fresh coffee.

The morning had barely started, but she felt as if a week’s worth of stress had washed over her. Back at her desk, she resumed reading the batch of articles the librarian had left for her. Kate tried to push her concerns aside and focus on her research. She paged through story after story, but she was familiar with many of the reports. Not much here, she thought, but then she came to one story that was written shortly after September 11, 2001, and froze.

“Oh my God! How did we miss this?”