by Dave Daren
“What!” Vicki exclaimed. “What is this?”
“I don’t know,” I muttered. I clicked on the image, and we all watched the video with rapt attention.
“Do you support SB1110?” Jerry’s voice boomed from off camera.
“I couldn’t give an honest opinion,” was my heavily edited reply.
“Are you kidding me?” I mused.
The screen flashed a graphic, of a still frame of me, with animated jail bars around my scowling expression.
How about a ‘dishonest’ answer Mr. Irving? The caption appeared over my face.
“Oh, my God,” Vicki said. “Really?”
I groaned and rubbed my face.
“Do you know that Earnie Green suddenly retired as soon as the news hit about Iakova supporting SB1110?” Jerry’s voiceover said.
“I consider Earnie Green to be a good friend,” the video had me say.
“You said that?” Landon asked.
“Holy shit!” I laughed. “This fucker even retaped the question.”
Let’s recap, a slide read. SB 1110 would change media censorship and libel laws, to allow fake news and hate groups to disseminate information with little to no consequence.
“I have you tied to Marvin Iakova on no less than five occasions,” them there was a time sequence jump in the clip. “Your buddy Iakova supports the bill, do you?”
“I have no comment,” I said.
“No comment?” Jerry’s manufactured voiceover said. “On a bill to effectively ban media law?”
The clip jumped to me. I looked disgusted, irritable, and completely unsympathetic, and then it had a contorted clip of me saying, “You can argue media law all the way to jail. I don’t care.”
“How could you get that out of…” I trailed off. This was just too mind-bafflingly moronic for words.
Then, the film stopped, with a freeze framed expression of me, totally pissed off at Jerry, and looking like a real asshole.
“Wow,” I said. “Someone had fun with their video editing software.”
I skimmed the story that followed. It described the incident in the coffee shop, framing my deflective comments to make me sound like a shallow, insensitive jerk. He misused my comments and framed them around inflammatory prose to create an entirely different story. He even threw in a few bystanders to make comments I suspected were heavily edited.
“But,” Vicki said, “The thing is, you actually said nothing, and he’s trying to turn nothing into something.”
“This is the problem with free speech,” I said. “You can do that. That’s why in actuality I don’t support the bill. Although I would never go public with it, especially after that.”
“This, though,” Vicki said, “is straight up libel.”
“Textbook,” I said. “But what I don’t understand, is why The Herald would publish it.”
“And why would they deliberately misrepresent a lawyer?” Vicki mused.
“I don’t know,” I said. “the’ve got to be blackmailed, paid, or just straight up stupid.”
“That’s fucked up,” Landon said. “I think it’s cause you’re getting too close. This is so cool!”
“That video is not cool,” I said. “That’s my reputation, my career.”
“No,” he said. “This means we’re onto something. We’re getting shut down. Discredited. This is what they do. It’s like, you know, that’s why they killed George Bush.”
“George Bush?” I asked. “What?”
“Yeah,” he said. “He was about to go public, he was going to blow the whole cover off the Illuminati, and so they killed him. Michael Jackson, too. Bill Cosby, Bill O’Reilly, all the stuff the women said about them, all made up.”
“Sexual assault is not made up,” Vicki piped up defensively.
“No,” he said. “Sexual assault is terrible, and women shouldn’t have to put up with that. No one should have to put up with that. But, what I’m saying is that the elites, they plant women to seduce these men early on in their careers. Then, they get photos, videos, taped calls, and whatever. And then, the elites own them, and use it to blackmail them their whole careers. If they ever want to go ‘off message,’ then the elites’ leak ruins them, and discredits them.”
“I think you’ve watched too many movies,” I said. “This is just a sloppy filmmaker that walked into a murder investigation at the right, or wrong, time. It’s not anything more than that.”
“You’re not seeing the whole picture,” he insisted with a pound of his fist on the table. “This is what I’m trying to tell you. This is what they’re trying to do to you, to us. We couldn’t expose the illuminati unchallenged. Now, they know, and it’s a whole new game. Everything’s changed.”
I pulled out my phone, I didn’t have time for this.
“You’ve got Matt Chelmi’s number, right?” I asked Landon.
“Yeah,” he said and pulled it up.
“Good,” I said as I dialed it. “That video is coming down.”
“The Herald,” a receptionist answered.
I sighed, I thought Landon had his personal number.
“Matt Chelmi, please,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” the receptionist said. “Mr. Chelmi is not available.”
“Uh-huh,” I said. “That’s fine. This is Henry Irving. Would you mind giving me that address to your office? I’m on my way to the court to file a defamation suit, and I just need to know where to send the subpoena. That address is…”
There was a brief silence. “I’ll get Mr. Chelmi right away.”
“I thought you might say that,” I chuckled as she put me on hold.
It took several minutes before Matt answered. He sounded flustered.
“Look,” Matt Chelmi told me. “I didn’t see the story until just now. We don’t want any trouble. We’re a Starbright affiliate, and I really, really, really would like to stay off Iakova’s radar. I cannot tell you how much I do not want Iakova on my ass.”
“I can understand that,” I said. “So why was it posted?”
“It was Jerry Steele that posted that,” he said. “We were unaware of the content.”
“How does that work?” I asked.
“Jerry’s a freelance reporter for us,” Matt said, “which sounds a lot more sophisticated than it is. He was our news editor years ago, and then he went indie with his video production studio.”
“I see,” I said. “I thought you guys had better editorial standards than that.”
“And we do,” Matt sighed. “It’s just our Herald family was proud of him for following his dreams and all of that, so we were trying to be supportive. When he left the team, we arranged that he could keep his login and post things as a legacy alum kind of thing.”
“Ah,” I said.
“And it’s worked both ways,” he said. “He’s always been a great videographer, and Steele Productions can from time to time capture some edgy subjects. So he’s had carte blanche with the site. We’ve got our own editorial flow we’ve got our reporters and editors working on, but whatever Jerry does, I don’t keep track of. We don’t pay him, so it’s all about the exposure for him, and getting his material a following.”
“What about Iakova? Jerry just posts libelous rants about the boss?” I asked.
Matt laughed. “You don’t know Iakova that well, do you?”
“I’m learning,” I said.
“Iakova is his own species of rich old coot,” he said.
I laughed. “I’m starting to understand that.”
“He doesn’t care what we publish,” he said. “As long as it gets pageviews. You’ve heard of the bill he and John Malone are engineering, right?”
“Yeah,” I said. “The anti-censorship bill.”
“Absolutely,” he said. “That’s the way he sees media. He doesn’t give a shit, and no one loves Iakova more than Iakova. So, if he’s at the center of a controversy, he practically wets his pants with glee.”
“I get that about him,�
� I said. When I spoke with Marvin earlier, he said the case was bad publicity, but he comes off as an ‘all press is good press’ type of guy. So did he say the bad publicity comment to seem fake sympathetic to me?
“To hear him talk about media,” Matt laughed. “He thinks all the world’s a game, one giant media game. He talks about it all the time, ‘playing the game,’ or ‘our next move.’ And I talk shit, but in a way, he’s inspiring. The energy he gets from what he does. It makes me remember why I became a reporter in the first place.”
“I remember that about you,” I said as I had a sudden recollection of my high school days. “I had totally forgotten that was you, back in high school. You were on the paper staff.”
“Yeah,” he laughed. “I didn’t know if you’d remember me. You were always with the edgy, theater snobs, and I was the newspaper nerd with my laptop and a voice recorder.”
I laughed, because he wasn’t wrong. It was odd how much those high school days and stereotypes defined people as an adult. They shouldn’t, but they do.
“These days,” I said. “I live by my laptop and voice recorder, too, no judgment here.”
He laughed. “I’ll bet you do. I heard about the whole Laryn Overmire thing.”
I sighed. Laryn Overmire was a college student that had been blackmailed and almost killed over a recording she inadvertently made of a conversation between a drug dealer and city councilwoman. The recording happened to be a large piece of the case we were working on. Once she sent it to us, we were able to bring justice not only to our client, but to her in the process.
“I’m just glad we got to the bottom of that mess,” I said.
“Look,” he said. “You’ve been on our list of people to watch for a while. You’re an up and comer in town, and we’ve been looking for a good angle to do a feature on you anyway. I’ve already taken the video down and deactivated Jerry’s login. I don’t care how good a videographer you are, you can’t be reckless with the content. But, let me make it up to you. Let us do a feature on you and your team.”
“A feature?” I said.
“Yeah,” he said. “Sedona native goes to the big city, makes a name for himself, comes back home, and kicks small town ass. It’s a compelling narrative.”
“Well,” I said. “I don’t know about all of that.”
“Are you kidding me?” he said. “The case you did for your sister? We followed that here. No one thought she had a chance. You turned it around and proved everybody wrong. An art scam and a Russian mobster here in Sedona? You gave us headlines for weeks!”
I laughed. “I guess that would have been quite the sensationalist event.”
“Then there was Clifton Melbourne’s murder,” he continued, “or death rather, and that was insane. There was a shootout in the middle of the film festival. We had reporters camped out here all night, doing write-ups as the information came in from the cops, the witnesses. This was some sexy stuff for Sedona. I was in Virginia when it all went down, and I flew home for the story. They were blowing up my phone in the airport.”
“I think I ended up in one of those stories,” I briefly recalled.
“Did you?” he said. “Yeah, I think we may have reached out to you for a quote. Look, you’re a compelling figure, and people like you. And they don’t just like you. They like Vicki, too. They think you’re a young, cool, L.A. power couple come to set justice right. They love her. Women copy her fashion tips.”
“Really?” I said dubiously. Vicki was always fashionable, but I didn’t think she was a trendsetter or anything.
“Yeah,” he said. “She’s hip, cool, modern, beautiful, and smart. Women are ordering stuff online just because she wears it.”
“I had no idea,” I said.
“She’s the Kate Middleton of Sedona,” he said.
“Uh…” I said. “I don’t--”
“Look,” He said. “Let them get to know you guys. Let’s do a feature.”
I sighed. This guy was good for the ego, I had to give him that. But the Kate Middleton of Sedona? Whether it was all bullshit or not, I didn’t know. But, it sure felt good.
“Yeah,” I said as I stroked my chin. “That would be great.”
“Good,” he said. “Let’s set a time next week for you guys to come in. We’ll do a video feature here in our studio.”
“Perfect,” I said.
We pinned down on the specifics of the interview, and then I got off the phone. Now, all I had to do was explain all of this to Kate Middleton.
Chapter 11
“Kate Middleton of Sedona?” Vicki laughed. “Really?”
“That’s what he said,” I replied.
We were in our cottage now, surrounded by takeout from Fifth Avenue Bistro. We lounged in our bed, and Downton Abbey ran in the background. Vicki deliberately stuffed her mouth full of rice, talked around it, and tossed her head.
“Do I look like a Duchess?” she garbled.
I laughed. “Prince William doesn’t know what he’s missing. Which is good, cause otherwise I’d have to kick his ass, and I don’t know if that’s an international crime.”
“I don’t know what happened to that guy,” she said. “When he was young, he was good looking, and cool, and he was literally Prince Charming.”
“And I want to hear this, why?” I replied.
She laughed. “Are you jealous I’m going to run off with Prince William?”
“I wasn’t until now,” I chuckled.
“I actually thought about it,” she said.
My eyes widened. “You’re joking.”
“No,” she said. “He’s not a whole lot older than we are, and before he was married, he was the most eligible bachelor in the world. Every girl our age thought about it. So, I applied for a study abroad in London, thought I had as much a chance as anyone.”
“Really?” I asked. “Was this before or after your groupie phase?”
“Okay,” she said. “I was never a groupie. I just liked going to shows, and loved the energy, music, and people. And my study abroad attempt was right in the middle of it all. I thought I’d see some cool British underground bands, too.”
“So, the future King of England was going to marry an American punk rocker?” I clarified. “God had better save the queen, after the coronary that would give her.”
“Eh,” she said. “It was just a fun fantasy. What girl doesn’t want to think she has the opportunity to be a real life princess?”
“And then you met me,” I said.
“And then I met you,” she said. “And besides, Prince William kind of lost it somewhere along the way. I don’t know, once he hit thirty, he just… Ugh. I don’t know what happened to that guy.”
“Married life is what happened to him,” I said.
“Is that your idea of what marriage does to people?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe to some people, not all people.”
She cuddled up close to me, “Do me a favor.”
“What?” I responded.
“Don’t ever let us get like that,” she said.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Be in our thirties?”
“No,” she said. “One of those couples that changes so much as they age, they lose a part of themselves.”
“We won’t be like that,” I said. “We’ll be like us.”
She laughed but didn’t say anything. Something had changed with her. She would usually respond to that with some sort of witty retort. But tonight, she just leaned into me, and we watched wealthy British aristocrats in the 1920s navigate their love lives.
Tonight, she had her dark hair piled on top of her head in the sexiest messy bun I had ever seen. She wore a blue tank top, and black spandex boyshort underwear. She had a box of nail polish bottles discarded on the bed table, where she had just finished painting her toenails, and now the fresh scent of nail polish lingered with the food aroma.
I kissed her hair, and she smiled contentedly. My heart was comple
tely out of my control. I had fallen for her, and fallen hard. There was nothing I could do about it, except enjoy the ride.
It was two more days before we had any real movement on the case. The development came none too soon, as it was the day before the arraignment.
Vicki and I were having breakfast at Jitters before going into the office. AJ and Landon were doing a pretty good job researching all of our suspects and had uncovered more dirty laundry on all of them than I would ever care to know about anyone.
Not that they were particularly of the criminal element, it was just the usual fare of dysfunctional humanity. Messy divorces, therapists, financial problems, unfinished schooling, and the like. But we still weren’t really any closer to any truth. The only solace all of this brought me was that the more we uncovered, the less they had dark secrets to hide.
But, the big item on the agenda today, was an afternoon conference call with Senator John Malone.
“I think it’s a bit dickish for him to arrange this interview by phone,” Vicki said. “We could have just as well driven up to Flagstaff and met with him in person.”
“It’s definitely passive aggressive,” I said. “But, he wanted to have his lawyer on three-way.”
“He knows what he’s doing,” she said.
“He does,” I replied.
“It still means he can end the conversation at the press of a button,” she said.
“What about the arraignment?” I asked her, in a change of subject. “Are we ready for that?”
“The last time I talked to Julianna and Gabriel was when I explained the plea bargain,” Vicki said. “But other than that, I haven’t had much interaction with them.”
My phone buzzed with a call. It was the police station.
“Hello, Mr. Irving,” I didn’t recognize the voice. “This is Hal Durant, the chief of police. How are you doing this morning?”
“I’m doing well, Officer Durant,” I said. “What can I do for you?”
“Well,” he said, his voice was slow. “We’ve had a development in the Beowulf murder case. We haven’t taken it to the prosecutor yet, because we’re not sure what to make of it. But we think your client should be aware of it.”