[Jordan Fox 01.0 - 04.0] False Truth

by Diane Capri

  She stepped into the hallway still slightly dazed. She’d been transfixed by a dead man. That must have been why she’d allowed herself to be knocked to the floor, too. She just didn’t have her wits about her.

  She shook herself off. She could figure out her feelings later. What did the politicians call it? Compartmentalize. Yes. Good plan.

  Okay. Start with the basics. Report the news to the station.

  But how?

  Possibilities flashed through her mind and she rapidly rejected them, one after another.

  She couldn’t even call the station to give them an update with her smartphone in its current condition. She had her personal phone, but the only number she had for the station was the recorded Tip Line, which was fully automated and might never be reviewed. She didn’t know the phone number to get a real human being on the line. She couldn’t even send an email from her ancient personal phone.

  She’d get through to the assignment desk faster if she simply dashed back to the station and turned the story over directly. It was her best option. If she failed to get the word back, Channel 12 could miss the story entirely.

  Jordan rummaged through her purse and found the keys as she rushed out to the Jeep. Her eight-minute drive to the station was a blur.

  The moment she shifted the Jeep into park, all the adrenaline hit her at once. She didn’t have time to deal with it yet, so she shoved those feelings aside again.

  She grabbed the keys from the ignition, rushed through the superheated air through the back door to the newsroom, jogged up two flights of stairs, and hurried over to the assignment desk. Slightly breathless, perspiration dotting her forehead, her body fairly humming along every nerve ending, she willed Patricia to get off the phone.

  The moment Patricia hung up, Jordan opened her mouth to speak.

  Before she could utter a word, Patricia said, “Where the hell have you been? We’ve been calling you for the past fifteen minutes about the body in the Aquarium Room. We didn’t give you that smartphone so you could ignore my calls.”

  “I, I didn’t hear the phone ring—” Jordan stammered. How did Patricia know about the body already? Police scanners, maybe?

  “Well turn up the volume or something next time,” Patricia stuck out her hand. “Now, let me see the video.”

  “Video?” Jordan knew her face must be broadcasting pure fright, but Patricia didn’t seem to care. Her impatience boiled over.

  “This is television. We need video. Of the body. Tell me you got video. You were standing right there.” Patricia’s desk phone rang again. She turned to pick it up. “Never mind. Take the video straight to the editors. We’ll need whatever you’ve got for eleven p.m.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Jordan didn’t hurry off to editing. No reason to. Instead, she ducked into the restroom seeking a quiet space to figure out what to do next. Seated on the stool behind a locked stall door, she slowed her rapid, shallow breathing before she hyperventilated or something.

  Okay. So take stock. Work it out.

  First assignment and she’d been an eyewitness at a crime scene. Very cool beginner’s luck, really. Her philanthropy story had developed into a major deal. Not only that, she now had one-up over Drew in their job competition.

  She was feeling better.

  In fact, if the floating body turned out by chance to be missing man, Ted Garfield, she may have even scooped Drew on his own story. Unlikely. But possible.

  She grinned. Even better.

  Was that the case? Was it Garfield? And could she prove it first, before anyone else?

  She shrugged. She couldn’t even begin to guess the height of the floating body. As for other details, he’d seemed pretty average, even through the distortion of the water. Average build, Caucasian, and no obvious tattoos. He might have had some on his back, though. She only saw the front side.

  Did that description match up with Ted Garfield? Probably. Did it also match hundreds of other men? Definitely.

  Without fingerprints, facial features, or dental records, this could be a complicated identification case for Tampa P.D. even when they recovered DNA. Maybe she could get assigned to follow the story as it played out. That would be really cool.

  So she would need to give Patricia some evidence that she could handle the story. She could get something ready for the eleven o’clock newscast. If she hustled her butt.

  Jordan dug around in her bag, retrieved her pen again, and quickly jotted down all the details she could remember. She’d write up a couple paragraphs to accompany the pictures she’d uploaded and give that to the web team. She should even get a byline for it. Her first one ever. The grin snuck across her face again.

  After that, no more procrastinating. She had to tell one of her bosses what happened to her phone. Now that she thought about how it happened, it wasn’t really her fault. The crowd jostled the phone out of its snug hold inside her bag. She couldn’t have known that would happen. No one would have. It was an accident. Surely no one would be that mad at her.

  Which boss to talk to, though? Linda handled big picture stuff. Richard. He was the guy with employee responsibility and the one she’d be reporting to for most day-to-day issues.

  Although destroying company property wouldn’t become a regular issue. Definitely.

  She stood, took a deep breath, and left the stall. At the sink, she washed the grime off her hands. She smoothed her hair and freshened her lip gloss, straightened her posture and walked into the newsroom. She dropped off the notes and then went to face the music.

  Jordan entered Richard’s office and sat in one of the two black chairs in front of his desk. He didn’t look up.

  “Can I talk to you for a minute?” Jordan asked.

  Richard was deeply involved in something on his computer. “One second,” he said, briefly glancing her way.

  Jordan tried to relax by exploring a bit. Richard’s office was decked out in University of Missouri colors. A black and gold paperweight, a black and gold clock, a gold pen holder next to a black paper organizer. The giant “M” on his mouse pad. Jordan guessed the answer before she confirmed it by glancing at the diploma hanging on the wall behind his chair: University of Missouri.

  He’d graduated only seven years ago. He’d moved up the ladder to Executive Producer quickly. Advancement at Channel 12 could come swiftly, if she showed she had the right stuff. Good to know.

  Finally, Richard clicked one last time and bestowed his attention on Jordan. She couldn’t read him, though. He seemed neither displeased nor happy. Just attentive. Probably an expression he’d mastered in some leadership course. She wondered if he knew yet about the body at the casino.

  Jordan cleared her throat, which she knew was more stalling. Like ripping off a Band-Aid. Get to it. “So, there was a little mishap at the casino.”

  “Mishap?” Richard smirked. “Is that what they’re calling decapitated floating bodies these days?”

  So he’d heard about it, too. How did they get the story so fast? She made a mental note to find out.

  She still couldn’t get a read on him, though. Was he angry she hadn’t called the story in? Maybe he kept a cool demeanor all the time to help him handle the day-to-day stresses of working in news. Maybe it was a coping strategy. Was it possible that he truly wasn’t annoyed with her? Nah. Pure wishful thinking.

  “Actually, it’s possibly worse than a decapitated body. I mean, it’s not worse than that really. But to me it is. I mean, okay.” She looked down, steadied her nerves, and willed herself to confess. “I broke my smartphone. The station-issued smartphone.” She tensed, as if bracing herself for a punch.

  “What do you mean you broke your phone? The one we gave you a few hours ago?” His brow furrowed and he sounded borderline angry. Finally, a hint of emotion she could read, but not what she’d hoped for.

  Jordan sheepishly pulled the very expensive, very broken smartphone out of her bag. “It fell and someone stepped on it in the chaos.”

  R
ichard raised his eyebrows and pressed two fingers to the crevice between them at the bridge of his nose as he squeezed the stick pen he’d been playing with so tightly the cap bent. “You dropped your phone in the exact moment you were supposed to be shooting video?” His voice had lost any teasing quality. The tone was hard. “What the hell, Jordan? You panicked at a shoot? Seriously?”

  “The crowd got really tight when everyone was trying to escape and things got jostled around. I’m not trying to displace the blame but someone must have bumped into me.” She felt like she was about to get smacked across the face. She knew he wouldn’t actually hit her—for one thing, he couldn’t reach that far from behind the desk—but still.

  Richard was silent for a moment. Then he laughed a brief, low humorless chuckle. “We trusted an intern with a camera.” Richard shook his head as if he couldn’t believe it. “We actually trusted an intern with a brand new, four-hundred dollar smartphone. On her first day!” Another burst of incredulous laugher.

  Jordan sat, completely motionless, feeling outraged, holding onto her hot temper. She wasn’t reckless. What had happened to her could have happened to anyone. But she didn’t want to make Richard even madder, so she squeezed her limbs against her body, to take up less space, hoping she could completely disappear. She tried to apologize. “I won’t let it happen again.”

  He sat up straight in the leather swivel chair and leaned over the desk toward her.

  “Damn right you won’t. You won’t be going out on any more assignments alone, either. This is unprecedented, Jordan. We’ve never had an intern be so irresponsible. I don’t even know what the policy is on this. If we even have one.”

  He swiped a hand over his head and sighed. Somehow, he’d run out of steam and seemed a bit calmer. “I’ll have to talk to the news director about how to proceed from here. We’re the only station in the southeast that corporate supplied these phones to as it is. And you’ve already destroyed one. Unbelievable.”

  He took a deep breath and stood up. “For starters, you’ll pay for that phone. You know about our budget cuts. We won’t be able to replace the phone for you.”

  She looked down at the floor, hoping a huge sinkhole would open up and swallow her before she said something she’d really regret. No such luck. “It was my mistake.”

  “Even our news director doesn’t have that phone.” Richard’s tone had calmed, but that was worse, somehow.

  “I’m sorry.” She could barely bring herself to meet Richard’s eyes, lest he see she was holding her anger in check. “I hope to have a chance to make it up to you.”

  He looked at her steadily for what seemed like forever. “I’ve got work to do. You can spend the rest of the day helping at the assignment desk.”

  Jordan swallowed hard, and without saying anything more, she walked through the door, closing it gently on her way out. Ten steps later, she remembered all the things she should have said. Damn!

  She should have told Richard he was totally unfair. There was no way she could have predicted that a decapitated man would appear in an aquarium and the crowd would stampede. One minute she was at a tranquil award reception, and the next minute she was at a gruesome crime scene. Who would expect that? And what would he have had her do to safeguard the damn smartphone, anyway?

  Should she go back in there and defend herself?

  No. Richard was wrong, but she should probably wait until he calmed down to point that out.

  Four hundred dollars. How the hell was she supposed to come up with that? She hadn’t even gotten her first paycheck yet. Maybe she could talk Richard into some kind of cost sharing…but she’d need to do something stellar to prove her worth first. If that didn’t happen, maybe she could borrow the cash from Claire or Sal.

  She’d figure something out. She had to. For now, she’d work quietly the rest of the shift and try not to screw anything else up.

  The Real World was turning out to be a real messed up place.

  CHAPTER 4

  Jordan trudged over to the assignment desk and took a seat next to grumpy-pants Patricia, who ignored her completely. Which was fine.

  She signed on to an open computer and clicked onto Channel 12’s website. Right there on the front page was a huge headline: BREAKING NEWS: DECAPITATED MAN FOUND FLOATING NAKED IN CASINO AQUARIUM.

  Jordan gasped. Her story, her laughable pitch, was now the station’s biggest, most important headline! And underneath the headline was one of her pictures from her crushed phone. A shot of the Aquarium Room, mid-party, pre-incident.

  This was huge! Her story. On the front page. Wow!

  She scanned the page, reviewing the couple paragraphs of information that had been pulled together so far, probably by phone conversations or emails between the assignment desk and Tampa Police.

  And then, she saw it. Small print. Beneath the photo. Right freaking there!

  Photo by JORDAN FOX.

  Jordan beamed like she’d swallowed a spotlight, even as she felt foolishly giddy and tried to contain herself. Yeah, that wasn’t gonna happen. She gave in and let foolish giddiness take over. On her first day! Photo by Jordan Fox! She took a quick screen shot. She could barely wait to show her dad. Hell yeah!

  The Real World was looking a whole lot better.

  Jordan turned to Patricia. “I’ll type up my notes from the casino incident, okay? Then we can incorporate them into the article that’s already online.”

  Patricia grunted. Jordan ignored grumpy’s lack of enthusiasm, and instead turned up her nose and started typing, that much more determined to impress.

  While Jordan typed, she remained alert to the newsroom’s noisy soundtrack. Police scanners emitted streams of static and intermittent voices. Televisions tuned in to various stations underlined the competition and importance of the news. Workers on the main floor exchanged barked commands as they prepared for the eleven o’clock newscast. The assignment desk phone rang louder and shriller than all the other noise combined, simply to be heard.

  Patricia picked up the call. “Channel 12.” Her voice strained, conveying the exhaustion of a hundred years. “That’s correct.” She paused. “Yes, we can confirm that.” Another pause. “Sure, we’ll send them over to ya. No problem.”

  Patricia hung up and nodded in Jordan’s direction. “Our station affiliate in D.C. They called to confirm the Florida Casino story and asked to use our pictures and video.”

  Her work went national! On the first day!

  “Sweet!” Jordan responded, with as much cool as she could muster. “Did they need me to confirm anything?”

  “I think we’ve got the facts,” Patricia said, dismissively.

  Jordan was at the scene. Shouldn’t they be asking for her input? “But—”

  “Did you shoot any video?” Deadpan.

  Crap! “Well, my—my—”

  “Your phone broke? I heard. So, no video?”

  She shook her head, deflated.

  Jordan was disappointed in herself, too. There she was, at a story that was now becoming national news, and she failed to get video. She should’ve put the smartphone in a more secure pocket of her bag. She would get a protective case for the phone next time. Next time she’d be more careful.

  Assuming she’d have a next time.

  Jordan felt a presence behind her and turned around. It was a guy in khaki cargo shorts and a white Channel 12 polo—probably a photog—and he was grinning at the Channel 12 website’s photo on her monitor. The photo she took of the Aquarium Room, mid-party, pre-incident.

  “Who’s that joker?” He chuckled, pointing at a creepy guy in the back corner of the picture staring directly at the camera. “He looks like he wandered into the wrong room from an all-nighter, doesn’t he?”

  Jordan looked closer. She saw people wearing suits and dresses, mingling and sipping. But this guy was standing alone facing the room with his back to the Aquarium. Loose curls rested atop his head like a messy bird’s nest. He wore a faded, unbuttoned polo under hi
s blazer. A hardened beer belly protruded above his tan slacks.

  “Um, no clue. Definitely don’t remember seeing him,” Jordan said. “Then again, I was a little distracted by the headless body.”

  Before he wandered away, the photog smiled. “You’ve got a good eye, though. Nice shot.”

  It was the first nice thing anyone had said to her about her work since she’d arrived. “Thanks.”

  For some reason, she felt tears spring to her eyes. She blinked furiously and turned her gaze back to her photo on the screen before anyone noticed. MMJs don’t cry. That much, she knew for sure.

  Odd that the guy was staring at the camera like that, though. Why was he watching Jordan? She made a mental note to ask Salvador if he knew that guy.

  CHAPTER 5

  It was 8 p.m. and all of the dayside crew had left for the day. Jordan and a few nightside crew members roved the newsroom. Although it was much quieter now, the day’s electric energy still sparked the air. A light buzz seemed to punctuate everyone’s activity.

  Jordan had been at work for less than six hours. Already she’d made her first pitch, been demoted, seen her first murder victim, witnessed a crime scene, and destroyed her equipment. That had to be some kind of record. Never in her wildest dreams—or nightmares—did she imagine her first day in the Real World would be so exciting. She smiled again just thinking about the good parts. But she was tired. She’d sleep well tonight, if she could keep the floating torso from invading her subconscious.

  Calls from news sources around the country about the casino incident continued to flood the station. Media outlets wanted pictures, video, and fact confirmation. Channel 12 lacked video, but provided the rest.

  So far, Tampa police hadn’t released any details other than those Jordan witnessed and reported. Investigators were probably in the process of sweeping the casino for evidence and rounding up security video. Maybe they were looking into any possible connections to Ted Garfield, too.