Perfectly Good Crime

by Dete Meserve

I wrapped my arms around his waist. “Homemade stew and Guinness. Some might think you’re trying to seduce me, Mr. Hayes.”

  “Is it that obvious?” he said with a sly smile, then slipped out of my arms and back into the kitchen. “Let me get you a real drink.”

  A large cardboard box was planted in front of the stone fireplace. Rising from a drift of Styrofoam chips scattered on the dark hardwood floor was a model sailboat with tall cloth sails and a wooden hull. I’m no expert on model sailboats, but this one was clearly handmade and meticulously detailed, down to individual wood planks on the hull and deck.

  “Brian’s assistant sent it to me,” Eric said, presenting me with a glass of wine. “He and I built it when I was ten or so. We couldn’t sail for a month while our full-size sailboat was under repair, so Brian and I spent weeks working on this one.”

  Brian was Eric’s only brother, who’d died a year earlier while sailing with Eric. Twenty-foot swells had pummeled their sailboat, and when it hit a reef, the boom swung loose, hitting Brian in the head and flinging both of them into the convulsing sea. In the midst of the howling wind and waves, Eric tried to rescue his brother but Brian died of massive head injuries.

  “I can’t believe Brian kept it all these years. And not buried in his attic but on a shelf in his office.”

  “It must have been important to him.”

  “We would sneak out of bed late at night to work on it.” He stepped over to the model and pointed to two tiny white lifeboats. “The kit didn’t come with lifeboats.” His voice shook a little. “But I complained so much about it—I had to have lifeboats—that Brian spent hours, weeks even, making them by hand. Carved them out of wood. Just for me.”

  “What a cool brother.”

  He brightened. “He probably did it to stop me from whining about it.”

  I took a sip of the wine. “I can’t imagine you were much of a whiner.”

  “Actually, I was. And if Brian were still alive, he’d tell you that I was a big complainer. Especially on the boat. If a line wasn’t pulled right, I’d be the first to point it out and complain about it.”

  “Those aren’t bad skills to develop if you’re going to be a fire captain someday.”

  “Maybe you’re right.” He squatted next to the sailboat and adjusted the masts. “I wish you could’ve met him. He was the keeper of my memories when we were kids. Like he could remember what we ate for dinner on a sailing trip we took to Catalina when we were in high school. I don’t have that kind of memory. Now that he’s gone, I…”

  His voice trailed off and his eyes locked on to the sailboat as if he was lost in his memory of it.

  “Sometimes it just hits me,” he said quietly. “And knocks the breath out of me. Out of the blue, you know? I can be fine and then…I get this sailboat and I’m back where I was when he died.”

  I sat on the floor next to him, placing my hand in his. “He may not be here anymore, but he’ll always be a part of you.”

  He adjusted the rigging on the sails. “I’d like to think that’s true.”

  For months after Brian’s death, Eric grappled with crushing guilt for failing to save him. He’d trained his whole life to rescue strangers in swift water yet was unable to save his own brother. But as the months went by, he talked less and less about Brian. I often believed that his silence about it meant he was over it, that his grief had gone away. But now I wondered if I was wrong about that. Perhaps his grief had only changed shape.

  My cell phone rang, ruining the moment. I ignored it, sending it to voice mail. But whoever was trying to reach me called back, and the ring seemed even more insistent this time.

  “You should get that,” Eric said.

  I pulled the phone out of my purse. Andrew Wright.

  “That was one heck of a report,” he said excitedly. “You got the story every network—every reporter—wanted.”

  I glanced at Eric still sitting there, adjusting the sails. “Can I…call you back? I’m in the middle—”

  “Let’s talk seriously about you coming aboard ANC, where you’ll have a bigger platform for your special brand of reporting.”

  I tried not to sound impatient. “I’ll call you in the morning?”

  “Actually, I’m still in LA. Let’s meet for breakfast. Tomorrow. Seven thirty.”

  “Okay,” I said quickly, trying to get him off the phone. “I’ll text you where we can meet.”

  “Terrific. Congrats again.”

  When I hung up, Eric was back in the kitchen, chopping carrots.

  “That was Andrew at ANC,” I said, snapping up a carrot from the cutting board. “They want to talk specifics about me about coming aboard.”

  “They’re moving fast,” he said with a catch in his voice. “Must really want you.”

  “It’s a bit overwhelming. Especially after getting an exclusive interview with the thief who was caught on camera in one of the heists.”

  “The story was everywhere. How did you find that guy?”

  “He found me. Said he chose me because he saw me being interviewed on ANC and thought I might give him a ‘fair chance.’”

  He was silent for a long moment, turning up the burners on the stove. “That’s more proof that you belong at ANC, Kate. But what happens to us if you go to New York?”

  When I was in college, my father had cautioned me about putting a relationship ahead of my career. On our Sunday morning five-mile runs together, he’d tell me stories of women he knew who had left college to get married or quit promising jobs in order to follow their boyfriends to other parts of the country. The stories always ended up badly, with the woman dumped and left without a way to support herself or turning thirty-five and regretting the career or goals she never attempted. I had the feeling my dad took liberties with some parts of the stories in order to make his point. Still, the message had sunk in.

  But as I drove to meet Andrew the next morning, I questioned whether that was good advice now that the relationship involved Eric instead of the boyish college guys I was dating back then. I couldn’t imagine leaving behind everything I loved—Eric—for any career opportunity.

  I had asked Andrew to meet me at IHOP in a sketchy part of Koreatown. He didn’t balk, even though it wasn’t on his list of preferred west-side restaurants. When I arrived, he was already waiting for me in a corner booth covered in faded red vinyl. With his sport coat and crisp white shirt, he looked out of place among the locals in their baggy shorts and flip-flops. He wasted no time getting down to business.

  “Very impressive report yesterday. That guy could’ve told his story to any number of journalists, but he chose you. It’s proof that viewers relate to you, Kate.”

  “Apparently criminals do too,” I said, pouring a cup of coffee from the thermos on the table. “You know, he saw me on James Russell’s show. He thought I came across as open-minded and was likely to give him and his side of the story a fair shake.”

  Andrew grinned. “See what a platform like ANC can do for a reporter like you?” He removed his sport coat and laid it carefully on the bench next to him. “Look, I want you on the ANC news team. I’m not going to be subtle about it. I know you’re under contract and I’m willing to wait until it expires next month.”

  “You’ve got some pretty good intel.”

  “The way I see it, at ANC you could expand beyond these breaking-news reports into stories of nationwide significance. Politics, the economy, education, national security—”

  The waitress, a middle-aged woman with smudged red lipstick and frizzy black hair in need of a hairdresser’s attention, came by to take our order. I scanned the menu, avoiding the dozens of thousand-plus calorie items, and settled on a vegetable omelet, easy on the cheese.

  “I’m flattered,” I said when she left. “But I’m not so sure those beats are for me. My real strength is covering breaking news.”

  “I understand why, Kate.” He leaned forward and lowered his voice.
“I know about your mother.”

  A nervous buzz coursed through my veins. I suddenly felt vulnerable and exposed and didn’t understand where this conversation was heading. “My mother?”

  “Reporter’s habit, I guess. But I did my homework on you.”

  “What does my mother have to do with what we’re talking about?” I said, feeling my face flush.

  “Look, I may be out of line here, but it seems to me that the way she died might be at the root of your interest—and perhaps even some of your ability—in breaking news. Not every reporter can handle the tragedy you witness every day. Unless they’ve been through what you have.”

  I felt my head go light. Before he’d become an executive, Andrew had been one of the best reporters in the business, so it made sense that he’d done some research on me. Then again, the story of my mother’s death wasn’t a secret; it had been widely reported in news media across the country.

  My mother had died in a fiery car crash caused by a hit-and-run driver on a busy highway north of San Francisco. I was barely five years old when it happened, too young to have formed many lasting memories of her or to fully understand what had happened.

  Because my father was a U.S. senator and my mother, Sarah Bradley, had been senior adviser on education and family to the mayor of San Francisco, the tragedy was covered in newspapers and magazines and on TV and radio around the country. For many years afterward, my father had shielded me from seeing any of the news reports. But in the summer before my junior year in high school, I interned in his senate office and I’d found a storage room stacked with notebooks my father’s staff had assembled of every newspaper clipping and magazine article, along with carefully cataloged videotapes they had recorded of news reports about it. I’d snuck the materials out of the archives, rereading the laminated, yellowed clippings and replaying the grainy news tapes over and over in the VCR until I had memorized every word, hoping that watching the reports might reveal something about the mother I could not remember—the mother my father rarely spoke about.

  In a strange way, most of what I knew about her came from those reports. There was videotape of her, wearing a red tweed coatdress and a chunky gold necklace, on the 1978 campaign trail with my father. Many reports showed a snapshot of her holding me days after my birth—a portrait I hadn’t seen anywhere else, not even at home. There were photos of her busily at work with San Francisco’s mayor during her years as senior adviser and a photo of her on her wedding day, wearing a white gown with filmy lace sleeves, all high cheekbones and raven hair, like a noblewoman in a European painting. And there were the inevitable photographs of the fire-scarred, mangled car—images that became indelibly carved in my memory.

  The stories were covered by some of the most recognized news reporters and anchors of the time: Dan Rather, Jane Pauley, and Tom Brokaw. For months, I’d watched the videotapes and searched through the notebooks in secret. Sometimes I would catch a glimpse of the way she held her mouth or the downward slope of her eyes and it was obvious that I resembled her. But most of the time, she appeared steeped in mystery, someone I only vaguely recalled in the corners of my memory.

  I had never considered that watching those news tapes had inspired me to become a breaking-news reporter, yet now I understood in some unconscious way that they had. It baffled me that Andrew had made that connection. He had known my father for decades, so perhaps he knew more about my childhood—and me—than I realized.

  “My father was a Marine pilot killed in Vietnam when I was in my teens,” he said quietly. “I have no doubt that’s the reason I studied political science and journalism in college and then covered overseas wars and conflict for most of my twenties. For me it was a way of looking for my father. Of understanding him. We’re alike that way.” He took a long slug of his coffee. “What I’m saying—in my very clumsy way—is that maybe it’s time for you to consider putting the breaking-news beat aside and try something new.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I was irritated that he thought he had figured me out even though he didn’t know me well at all. And if I denied it too vehemently, it would only prolong the discussion about my mother. A subject that was making me tense.

  I managed a smile. “It’s an interesting theory. But even if I wanted to change my reporting beat, I’m not all that excited about leaving LA.”

  “I can understand that too. Your father told me about the fire captain you met on the Good Sam story,” he said, straightening the flatware by his plate. “You know, they have a damn prestigious fire department in New York City too. Second largest in the world, in case you’re wondering.”

  I laughed. “With all the personal information you know about me, you’re sounding a lot like a stalker.”

  “I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I want to connect the dots and make a transition to ANC very appealing to you.” He clasped his hands together. “Look, I want you on my team at ANC, Kate. What do you think? Can we do this?”

  David had warned me that Andrew was in recruitment mode, but he was fast. And persistent. “What exactly would you see me doing?”

  “At first, we’ll have you cover a broad range of beats. You’ll be a correspondent for crime and justice—where you already excel—and a part of the national news reporting team. And, if you’re interested, you could take on the political beat. We’ll give it time to see what’s a good fit and then down the road think about developing your own show.”

  My own show. He said it casually as if it was something I’d thought about before, but I hadn’t. Unlike many reporters, I never imagined myself behind a desk or anchoring a newscast. I liked being in the field—digging up leads, interviewing subjects—and I lived off the adrenaline rush of the live news report.

  I steadied my voice. “Can I think about it?”

  “I probably don’t have to tell you that there are dozens of top journalists who would jump at an opportunity like this. Take a few days to think about it. But I won’t wait forever.”

  Chapter Ten

  Breakfast with Andrew made me late to the assignment meeting. Again. The Fish Bowl was less crowded than usual as several members of the news team, including Hannah, were absent—working on a breaking-news story in Venice, California, where lifeguards had rescued more than twenty-eight people caught in a single powerful riptide. The lower attendance made my ten-minutes-late-to-the-meeting hard to conceal.

  Russ was going on about something as I slid into a chair. Whatever it was, it was irritating David, who stood in front of the whiteboard, frowning and rubbing his right ear.

  “If the thieves keep this up, at some point they’re going to make a mistake and get caught on camera again,” Russ said. “These estates probably have cameras in places not even the smartest thief would expect. It’s a matter of time before the leader gets caught in the lens too.”

  “I don’t think he will be. Caught on camera, anyway,” I said.

  Russ turned to look at me. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because he’s not in the estate with his team. He’s leading them from somewhere else.”

  He shrugged. “Not sure why you think that. None of the other networks have put that theory forward. “

  “Think about it. The masked operatives don’t know each other. Or the leader. If one of them gets caught, the team stays intact. If you’re that leader, you don’t want to be calling the shots alongside your team. It would be too easy for them to identify you. The crew wore GoPro cameras so the leader could call the shots from somewhere else. Somewhere he can’t possibly get caught.”

  David clapped his hands. “People, we’re missing the point. It’s all well and good to theorize how they’re doing it but more important that we figure out who’s behind it. Any leads on that?”

  “The FBI is looking into a group from Oakland who has been on a bank robbery spree. They’ve hit twenty-six banks in eight months,” Russ said.

  “Track that,” David said, pointing at Rus
s.

  “The burglar-caught-on-camera told me he met the leader—who goes by the name of Locksley—through playing online games,” I said. “I’m going to look for Locksley online.”

  Russ laughed. “Good luck with that. No offense, Kate, but I’m betting you don’t know a thing about online games.

  Could I find Locksley in the online gaming world? Russ was right about it being a Herculean task and that I don’t play online games. But I knew someone who did: my cousin Max. His father was the mayor of Princeton, New Jersey, so Max was in college in Princeton. Not at Princeton but at Rider University, which is only eight miles from Princeton University yet far removed from the Ivy League education my uncle, his dad, had planned for him.

  At six-foot-two, with curly blond hair and an athlete’s physique, he didn’t look like the nerdy stereotype of a gamer, but Max was the closest thing to a true Internet native of anyone I knew. He ran his own YouTube channel within weeks of YouTube coming online and had owned every game console ever made over the last decade, from Atari to Xbox to PlayStation. I didn’t talk to him much, but in his texts or e-mails to me, he regularly used so many gaming acronyms that I had to look them up online to decode what he was talking about. I learned that MOBA meant “multiplayer online battle arena” and WoW was not an interjection with a typo but an abbreviation for World of Warcraft, an MMOG—a massively multiplayer online game, with over 7 million subscribers.

  Max was in his fifth year of college, working on the six-year plan, after wasting nearly his entire sophomore year playing video games and “forgetting” to go to class. My uncle had made him get counseling for his gaming addiction, and while he was getting to class more often, he still spent forty-plus hours a week playing video games.

  I called Max’s cell. It was the middle of the day in his time zone, a time when he probably should have been in class, but I wasn’t surprised when he picked up on the second ring.

  “‘Sup?” he answered. In the background, I heard a burst of gunfire, which, given the affluent area he lived in, was most likely coming from whatever game he was playing.