Step On A Crack

Chapter 29

THE ELATION THAT New York Times reporter Cathy Calvin had felt at being released from the cathedral was quickly being burned away by her annoyance at having to wait on line with everybody else to be interviewed by the police. The NYPD had all the detainees corralled outside of Saks Fifth Avenue, and they weren’t letting anyone go until they’d been debriefed by one of four detectives sitting at a row of folding tables set up on the sidewalk.

Calvin noticed for the first time the news-van microwave towers beyond the blue-and-white sawhorses. They rose above the crowd like the masts of some invading armada.

Wait a second. What was she thinking? And complaining about? She was where everyone else was trying to get. Inside the ropes!

Calvin quickly calculated the strategic advantage of her position. She’d been in the cathedral before, during, and after the takeover. She was an eyewitness to the siege, which would make it her exclusive.

Then she spotted Carmella, the lingerie supermodel, three people back in line. Not super A-list, but a good start.

“Carmella? Hi. Cathy Calvin from the Times. You okay? Where were you when it happened? What did you see in there?”

“I vas near da front on da left,” the six-foot-two blonde said in her best Austrian American accent. “Poor Caroline’s casket had jus come past our pew. Zen Eberhard, my security man, vas shot right in his crotch vith a tear gas canister. Now I can’t find Eberhard anywhere. I keep texting his cell, but he von’t answer. Have you seen him?”

Cathy Calvin looked at the towering model curiously. Maybe she was in shock. Hopefully, that was it.

“Um. I don’t think so,” Cathy said. “Rumor has it that not all of the hostages have been released. You know anything about that? What have you heard?”

“Hel-lo,” the blonde said. “Have you seen John Rooney? How about Laura Winston, or zat little slut Mercedes? Zey are still inside. Zee mayor is still inside. Deez hijackers have no taste. Vy else keep such losers and let me go?”

Vy else, indeed, Cathy Calvin thought, nodding as she carefully backed away from the model. This psycho woman was actually complaining that she wasn’t still inside. Even if the VIP room was under siege, she wanted in. Yeah, celebrities were normal. They were just like you and me.

Calvin turned away as a hush rolled through the crowd. She peered with the rest of the craning heads toward the cathedral.

Over the hood of a Sanitation Department dump truck, she could see the top of one of the cathedral’s main doors coming open again. Now what? She ran forward, hustling to get as close as she could to the hot breaking news.

And then, for the second or third time already this morning, the Times reporter couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

“Oh my God,” she whispered out loud.