Jeffery Deaver - Hard News

She felt the silence from the other end of the line -his concentration as he weighed her words, the shock. But maybe also the excitement reporters must feel when they first sniff a lead to a hot story. When he spoke it was almost as if to himself. "And she was pretty smooth when she ad-libbed the broadcast."

Rune said, "Like she'd known all along she was going to have to do it."

A long pause. "This is a nuclear bomb we're playing with, Rune. You've got a lot of speculation. There's no direct evidence linking her to the killing."

"Iknow she did it, Lee."

"The way youknew Boggs was innocent?"

She said nothing to that. The producer continued. "Just let me ask you one thing. You're bitter because Piper fired you and ruined your story. If that hadn't happened, if you were an objective reporter, would you still be coming down against Piper?"

"Yes, I would. Maybe there're no eyewitnesses but there's plenty of circumstantial evidence."

Maisel was silent for a moment. "I'll have to call Dan Semple. I'll…" His voice was fading. "Semple…"

Rune asked, "What are you thinking, Lee?" She remembered Semple's picking Piper up in his limo after she and Rune had dinner at that French restaurant. "Oh, no, you think he's in on it too?"

"They had an affair, you know. Piper and him. Around the time Hopper was killed."

Rune said, "After Hopper was killed Semple got his job…! "What are we going to do, Lee?"

Maisel said, "Okay, stay on the line. I'm going to make some calls." She heard him use his cell phone to talk to Jim Eustice at home and tell him what Rune suspected. He then called Timothy Krueger, the Network lawyer who'd presided over Rune's unemployment. Then she heard a conference call as Maisel spoke to Krueger and, apparently, the police. She deduced that they were all going to rendezvous at the Network in a half hour – in Studio E, an old, unused space in the basement of the building where they could meet in private.

Maisel hung up his mobile phone and came back on the other line. "Rune, you there?"

"I'm here."

"I talked to Jim and our legal department."

"I heard."

Maisel confirmed that they were meeting two homicide detectives in Studio E.

"I'll be there," Rune said.

"Lay low until the cops get there. We don't want Piper to see you."

"Sure."

"Man, this's bad," he muttered. But that was the only emotion he showed. Instantly he was Edward R. Murrow again. He said to her, "You did a good job, Rune. Whatever the fallout from this, you did good. See you in a half hour."

These were the longest minutes of her life.

The hour was late but television networks never sleep and she was afraid that if she got to Studio E before Maisel or Krueger or the police, a security guard might see her and word would get back to Piper or Dan Semple.

So she sat in the booth at the Greek diner, bouncing her toes on the linoleum, feeling the terrible sting of betrayal.

Feeling fear too. Recalling all the time she'd spent alone with Sutton, inches away from her, a killer whose heart was as cold as her journalist's eyes.

After fifteen minutes Rune could stand it no longer and she left the deli and headed back to the Network. She slipped in through the door Bradford had doctored to let her inside then started down the corridor through a slightly more populated part of the studio.

A noise nearby. Rune froze.

But it turned out to be only Bradford.

"What's up?" he asked, noticing her troubled face.

She looked around. "Just between us, okay?"

"Top secret," he whispered.

"Piper Sutton had Lance Hopper killed."

"Are you serious?" the young man said.

"You bet I am," she answered. "He was going to fire her. She found out about it and hired Boggs and his friend to kill him."

"Jesus!"

"I'm going to meet Lee down in Studio E." Then her face broke into a smile. "And after she's in jail I'm going to talk Lee into letting me do the story for the Network."

"You?"

"Sure. Why not?"

Bradford apparently couldn't think of any reason why not and simply nodded. He said finally, "Brother, you've sure graduated from overturned ammonia trucks. Say, after your meeting, how 'bout that beer?"

"How 'bout somechampagne?" Rune said.

"It'll be on me," he said.

The Network building was like a warren – as complicated and big as a huge high school.

Rune got lost several times on her way to Studio E, which was at the end of a dozen dim corridors. At least she didn't have to worry about being seen now. The studio was in a completely deserted part of the Network building.

She pushed inside and waved to Lee Maisel, who sat at a battered swivel chair, engaged in a somber discussion with someone whose back was to Rune. This would be either Jim Eustice or the lawyer, Tim Krueger. The cops weren't here yet.

"Rune, come on in," Maisel said. He nodded at her hand. "You've got the files you found in Personnel?"

"Right here," she said.

"Good." Maisel stepped forward and took it from her.

Rune sat down at the table and turned to the other man as she started to ask when the police would be here. She froze.

The man was Jack, the killer.

He eyed her up and down and said, "There you go, Lee, Itold you them girls look alike. No wonder I shot the wrong one."

It was like the time she had three frozen margaritas, crazy drunk – her mind giddy and spinning, her body sick.

She tensed to leap up out of the chair. But Jack shook his head. "Naw, naw, don't bother." He showed her the butt of a pistol in his waistband.

She relaxed. He was right. There was no place to go even if she'd had the strength to get past Maisel, which she didn't. Maisel closed the door and leaned against it.

Her mind was racing, trying to pin down the speculation. "It was you?" she whispered.

Maisel sighed and nodded.

Rune said, "When I called you at home you justpretended to call Eustice and Krueger and the cops, right?"

"That's right, Rune. There won't be any cops."

"You did it just to get me here. So you could kill me."

Maisel didn't answer.

"You bastard," Rune hissed at him.

Jack wore a short-sleeved striped shirt over his huge belly and gray baggy pants and some kind of rounded, scuffed brown work shoes. He looked her over then picked up a cup of coffee, noisily drunk from it.

"Sorry, Rune. I'm so sorry." Maisel gave her a grim smile but the disappointment and disgust in his face overwhelmed it. He blew air slowly out through his rounded cheeks. Rune could see he was suffering.

Good, she thought.

Maisel poured his drink down in one swallow. "I don't know what to say to you. I tried to stop it all without hurting you."

Jack said, "Yeah, he's right. We tried to kill Boggs in prison. That would've solved-"

"Youtried to…" Rune looked at Maisel; he wouldn't meet her eyes.

"Paid to have a buddy of mine in Harrison kill Boggs. Then when you got him out I tried to do it myself. But that man just wouldn't die."

"It wasn't Piper? But she did everything she could to stop the story."

"Well, sure" Maisel said. "The story would've been bad for her image she didn't want the EEOC suits coming to light. She hated having to run to the courts to fight her battles for her. But just because she didn'twant it to run didn't mean she was going to stop it."

"Youencouraged me to keep going with it."

"There'd been rumors that there was more to Hopper's death than just Randy Boggs acting alone. We needed you to find the evidence, witnesses. We knew we could control you."

Rune said to Maisel, "Why did you do it?"

"What does it matter?"

"It fucking matters to me!" she snapped.

"Beirut," Jack said.

Shut up, Nestor," Maisel snapped.