The Other Woman

6

If she were giving advice to a friend, Amy or Margery or someone, she’d tell them poking the place that hurts is no way to make it heal. Easier to say than do. Jane ignored the blinking screen of computer newsprint on her desktop monitor. How had doing the right thing backfired so disastrously?

What if she’d been on vacation, or busy, or out on a story? Sellica might have called someone else, or decided to keep quiet.

But no.

Back then, Jane picked up her ringing phone. And back then, that ordinary move, that no-decision decision, landed her in journalism hell.

“Is this Jane Ryland?” The voice on the other end had sounded guarded.

“Yes. How can I help you?”

Silence.

“Ma’am?” Jane had prompted.

“It’s Arthur Vick.”

Jane frowned. The voice was a woman’s, most definitely not the grocery store mogul calling, unless he was brilliant at disguising not only his gender but the trademark Boston accent he exploited in his ubiquitous television commercials.

“Arthur Vick… what? I’m so sorry,” Jane said. “You lost me.”

“They’re all like, he didn’t do anything wrong. Like I’m some kind of slut-bitch who trapped the guy into, whatever.”

The voice spoke quickly, tense, the words rushed and crowding one another. “He promised me I could be in the commercials. Then, like, he was outta there. And now the judge is like, yeah, oh sure, Mr. Big Shot, we wouldn’t want your wife to be upset. So we’ll keep your name out of it. Seal the court documents. Like, that’s supposed to be fair? I want what was coming to me. And you help people, right?”

Jane instantly knew what this was about. Sellica Darden, “the other woman” in a headline-grabbing sex case, was calling her. Why?

She gripped the phone, white knuckled. She couldn’t record it: Massachusetts law made that illegal. If this woman hung up and disappeared, she would never find her. But if Sellica Darden kept talking, Jane predicted, it could make her career.

Jane Googled up a newspaper article as she listened. It had been a lead story, all lust and lies. Sellica had threatened to expose her high-profile big-name john to his unsuspecting wife if he didn’t fork over big bucks. He refused, and ratted her out to police. She was arrested for extortion, her name plastered across the news-but the judge had sealed the john’s name, even though he’d also broken the law. Even though the names of other men who hired hookers were often made public.

Back then, Jane had felt her fingers cross. Please let it be Sellica. “Miss Darden? Is this you? And yes, I can help you. It was-unfair, that the judge kept the man’s name secret. And threatened you with jail if you told. Can we meet in person? As soon as possible? When?”

It had been Sellica on the phone. And she said “yes,” and “tomorrow.” Soon after, Jane had gotten everything she wished for.

And soon after that-everything she feared.

Jane’s big story outed Arthur Vick. He sued, saying Jane had named the wrong guy. Sellica disappeared. Jane refused to give up her source. Vick won. The station lost a million dollars. And soon Jane was the one who was out.

Jane’s shoulders sagged under the weight of the memory.

Someday Sellica Darden would reveal the truth. Give Jane her life back.

She had to.

Jane’s cell phone buzzed.

Wouldn’t that be funny if-? She grabbed it, clicked, fearing to hope.

Amy. Texting.

U not home? Called U! Even Brenda Starr went home! TTYL.

Amy’s right, as usual. Jane clicked away the headlines, wishing she could as easily delete the past. Things would be better when she was reporting again. Jane brought up the Lassiter newsletter. It had a new headline.

LASSITER FUND-RAISER RESCHEDULED. Jane reached for her hair, worrying a strand over one ear. The Lassiter campaign was imploding. No wonder Moira was hiding. Probably shopping for a new husband, or a new life. Probably Lassiter was off with that girl in the red coat. They all do it, Alex had said. As if somehow that made it okay.

She paged through the file folder of archive photos Alex had given her. Was there something she’d missed?

Moira showed up in the earlier ones. Front and center. Owen’s shadow. That ballerina posture of hers, salon-silver hair and nonchalant tailoring. Radiating wifely approval.

Jane bent over in her chair, sorting the photos chronologically on the gray carpet of her cubicle. And there it was. Suddenly, a month ago? Moira was missing. Jane stared at the images, trying to imagine. Had Jackie Kennedy known about Marilyn? Had Gary Hart’s wife been told about that girl on the Monkey Business? Elizabeth Edwards suspected John and Rielle, she’d said, but rationalized it away. Until she couldn’t anymore. What would Moira do if she discovered that her husband-in the midst of an election, in front of millions of the very voters he was asking to trust him-was cheating? Who else knew about it? And who was helping Lassiter hide it?

Someone’s phone ringing. An elevator bell. The heat kicking on. Back to reality. Was she the last to leave? Wasn’t Tuck supposed to be working nightside? No sign of him, except for the array of grisly eight-by-ten photos of the Bridge Killer bodies-where’d he get all those?-posted with multicolored thumbtacks across the entire bulletin board. She peered at them, interested in spite of herself. The Charlestown girl had a tattoo. The other victim didn’t.

The other woman. Exactly what I’m working on, too. Jane smiled as she yanked her black wool jacket from the hook and cinched the belt around her waist. It was late, close to midnight, but her weariness was evaporating. She was beginning to feel like a reporter again.

They all do it. So what? Cheating was unacceptable. For anyone, much less a U.S. Senator. The public had the right to know about it. Before the election. And she would be the one to tell them.

No mistake about that.

What did he expect to find here, anyway? Jake stuffed his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket, scuffing his work boots through the layer of slimy leaves under the Charlestown Bridge. Where the body was found. The place was deserted at this hour. What was he thinking, some coked-up asshole would show up? Drawn back to the scene of the crime, confessing all as he realized super-detective Jake had him dead to rights?

He’d made his gold shield, younger than most. The public explanation, two years ago, was that a thirty-three-year-old detective might bring some street cred. Privately, the brass and the street cops understood Jake’s being grandson of a former police commissioner was a powerful-and unavoidable-legacy.

Not what they usually mean by blue blood, Jake’s mother always said, disapprovingly. She was a Dellacort, a real blue blood, and Dellacorts were not in law enforcement. She still sniffed-elegantly, of course-at Jake’s “unfortunate” career choice.

But an adolescent Jake and his grandpa had watched every episode of NYPD Blue together on the plush sofas of the Brogans’ Back Bay living room. Jake soaked up every nuance and every roll call and every takedown, and even at Harvard, he’d never wavered in his resolve. Grandpa had lived just long enough to see his graduation. Jake’s financier father presented him with an extravagant post-college trek around Europe, a thinly disguised effort to dissuade him from his career choice, but the year after he came home, Jake aced the exam, powered through the academy, and got his badge and gun.

Now, though his parents reluctantly accepted his occupation, Jake still needed to prove he’d earned his spot on the squad. Deserved it, Grandpa Brogan or not. To do that, he needed to crack some cases. About this one, for now at least, he had no idea.

The lights of Boston glowed at him. Jake’s flashlight scraped across the browning grass and broken weeds. The crime scene guys were long gone, taking their yellow tape with them. He had their report stored in his BlackBerry. Nothing left here. Nada.

It was night, same time as when she must have died three days ago. Things looked different at night. You saw things. The way the light hit. Where you could be invisible. Jake stared at nothing, letting his mind go. Reconstructing. Why would a girl be here, that time on a Sunday night? Monday morning, really.

Water in her lungs, the ME had confirmed. So she wasn’t dead when she got here. Big bruise on her back, one on her shoulder. Clothing intact. Jake tilted his head all the way back, considering the Erector Set structure of the bridge above. Headlights, creeping along then surging by, headed into the labyrinth of Boston’s North End. Could she have jumped? Thrown herself off the bridge because… because of what? To kill herself? Escape?

Wouldn’t someone have seen that? He looked at the cars, playing out the scene, screening a movie of the crime in his head. Someone would have seen that. Someone would have reported it.

But if she jumped, where did she leave her purse? Her car? How did she get here? If she was trying to get away from someone, who?-and why?

Wouldn’t someone have seen that, too? Who was she? Why hadn’t anyone reported her missing?

Maybe it wasn’t about the bridge.

A sound.

Jake snapped off his flashlight, easing into the shadow of one of the ramshackle lean-tos townies used as fishing shelters. His left hand snaked under his jacket, feeling for the holster and his weapon inside. He waited. Heard the sound again.

Then-a flash of light. And another. Christ. Someone was-taking photos?

“Boston Police. Hands in the air. Now. Now. Now.” Jake took a step forward, then another, commanding. Weapon aimed dead ahead. Flashlight in the other hand, same direction. Then he lowered the weapon.

“Tucker, dammit.” Jake holstered the Glock, adrenaline still rushing. He clicked off the flashlight, wiped a hand on his jeans. I’m gonna kill that- “Lucky I didn’t kill you, ya know? What in hell are you doing out here?”

Tucker snapped another photo, the flash right in Jake’s face. “Might ask you the same thing, right? You out here looking for the Bridge Killer? You ID the victims yet? Care to comment?”

“You’re over the line, Tucker.” Unbelievable. These reporters think they’re- “Use that photo, any of ’em, and I’ll nail you for trespassing on a crime scene. See how you like being the big reporter from the Nashua Street Jail.”

“Okay, off the record, then.” Tucker stashed the camera in a pocketed canvas bag and started toward him.

Jake crossed his arms over his chest. Holding his ground. “There’s no off the record. There’s no on the record. There’s nothing. There’s no Bridge Killer. And you’re on your way outta here. Now.”

“I’m just saying,” Tucker persisted. Talking and walking backwards at the same time. “If you don’t know who the dead girls are, and you don’t know why they were killed, how ya gonna stop the Bridge Killer from killing again?”