The Girl Next Door

by Brad Parks

  * * *

  The headquarters of the International Federation of Information Workers–Local 117 were housed at 744 Broad Street, also known as the National Newark Building. Of the two skyscrapers that dominate the Newark skyline—744 Broad and the Prudential Building—744 is the one that doesn’t look like an architecturally bereft marshmallow.

  I found parking in a garage and made my way inside. Having seen on the directory that the IFIW’s offices were located on the twentieth floor, I announced myself at security in the lobby. By the time I made the elevator ride up and walked through a pair of smoked-glass doors with the IFIW logo stenciled on them, Jim McNabb was waiting to greet me at the front desk. He was wearing tan slacks, a golf shirt, and a wide smile.

  “Carter Ross!” He practically shouted, like I was there to shower him with winning lottery tickets.

  “Hiya, Jim,” I said, knowing his overly chummy welcome was merely the first part of his act. I actually have no problem with sources who try to spin me. For a guy like McNabb, it’s part of the job—just like it’s my job to have done enough homework to see through it.

  “Let’s go back to my office,” he said, then turned to the receptionist and added, “Janet, hold my calls. Mr. Ross is a very important reporter for the Eagle-Examiner and I don’t want any interruptions.”

  He led Mr. Ross the Very Important Reporter through a maze of cubicles and hallways. I could only imagine that the IFIW’s hundred thousand members generated no small amount of paperwork, all of which funneled to these desks. McNabb was overweight, but he was more thick than fat. So he was still able to walk fast, and at times all I could see was his bushy silver head peeking above one of the partition walls.

  “We call this the nerve center,” Jim said. “We’re protecting the rights of hardworking New Jerseyans all across the state, right here in this office.”

  I said nothing. Replying would only encourage him, and I’d end up wasting a half hour listening to an IFIW infomercial.

  “Like this beautiful young lady right here,” he said, stopping suddenly at one of the cubicles. It was occupied by a mousy, low-rent, bleached blonde whose eye makeup might charitably be described as whorish. She was in her early forties, desperately trying to cling to her youth, and looked up at Jim like she was grateful to be in his presence.

  “Do you know what this beautiful young lady does for a living?” Jim continued. “She makes sure the dirtbag insurance companies aren’t denying coverage to our workers. Isn’t that a wonderful thing? You should write a story about her someday.”

  “Hi, Big Jimmy,” she said in a singsongy voice.

  “Around here they call me ‘Big Jimmy,’” he said, in case I had missed the point that he was a man of great status. “Keep up the good work, honey.”

  With that, we were moving again. “Love that kid. We got her, what, six months ago?” he said, like she was a pound puppy who had eagerly taken to paper training. “She works her sweet little ass off.”

  Not wanting to engage in a discussion about the flavor or size of her ass, I kept my mouth shut until we entered Big Jimmy’s lair, a corner office with ten-cent furnishings but a million-dollar view of Manhattan.

  “Nice,” I said.

  “Not bad, huh?” he said, following my line of sight across the Hudson River, and we both got lost in the view for a second.

  “Anyhow, take a seat,” he said, and I did, selecting a wire-framed plastic chair, the only kind he had. Jim settled into his one piece of nice furniture, a high-backed, ergonomically correct, cushy executive chair. “What can I do for the Eagle-Examiner today?” he asked.

  “This is going to sound a little strange, but I’m hoping you could tell me a little more about your negotiations with my newspaper.”

  I thought this might trip him up a bit, but he rolled with it, the friendly smile still in place.

  “And why would I do that? You some kind of spy for Gary Jackman or something?”

  “Gary Jackman,” I said, not bothering to hide the grinding of my teeth, “has, in the last two years, been responsible for both cutting my salary and giving me involuntary furlough, which is the same thing as a pay cut. Plus, he’s making me pony up a lot more for my health care, which eats further into my take-home pay. I’m not exactly in the mood to do him any favors.”

  “Yeah, but he still signs your paycheck. I’ve been doing this union thing for a long time. People have all sorts of strange loyalty to the guy that signs their paycheck.”

  “Okay, so let’s do it like this: don’t tell me anything that Gary Jackman doesn’t already know. Does that work for you?”

  He rubbed one meat-hook hand over his face for a second, then said, “Yeah, okay. I can play that game. What do you want to know?”

  “Well, I’m told the negotiations are stuck. Where, specifically, are they stuck?”

  “It’s pretty simple. They’re telling us we’re way overpaid and that they need an across-the-board fifty percent pay cut and a freeze on future wage increases. And we’re telling them to go pound sand.”

  “Fifty percent? Wow. That’s a lot.”

  “Tell me about it. They keep saying our pay scale needs to be put back in line with the rest of the industry. But that’s ridiculous. These people rely on that money to pay their bills. They shouldn’t be punished just because deliverers at other papers don’t have as good a deal.”

  “Has there been any give-and-take at the table?”

  “Not really,” Jim said, grinning sardonically. “They’re making threats, and they think it gives them leverage on us, but they got nothing. And even if you are a spy from Jackman, you can tell him I said that. Find your savings somewhere else. Don’t balance your books on the backs of the paperboys. They’re not exactly making six figures here.”

  “You think your membership knows my paper is just rattling the saber?”

  Jim leaned back in his throne, his eyes scanning south to the Verrazano Narrows. “Some of ’em do,” he said.

  “But some of them need convincing?”

  “They always need convincing.”

  “Was Nancy Marino one of the chief convincers?”

  The breezy smile Big Jimmy had been wearing since I first came through those smoked-glass doors vanished off his face.

  “What’s she got to do with it?” he asked, like hearing the name brought up the hurt of her death all over.

  “Well, she was your shop steward there.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “So what was her role in the negotiations?”

  “What does it matter now?”

  I shrugged, like I didn’t know, like I was trying to play it off as no big deal either way. “Not sure. I’m just asking.”

  “I thought you said there was no smoke with the whole Nancy thing,” he said, turning his head to the side but keeping two leery eyes locked on me. In typical McNabb fashion, he was on the lookout for a handle on this situation so he could turn it for his own use.

  “Well, there might be a bit of smoke,” I admitted. “Or maybe it’s not really smoke, just steam. Definitely not convinced there’s fire. It’s still sort of hard to tell.”

  “Well, what are we talking about here? You’re beating around the bush.”

  “I am, I know, and I apologize for that,” I said, feeling myself shift on the hard plastic chair. Time to lay at least a few of my cards on the table: “I’m told Nancy had taken a very hard line that the union shouldn’t give in. I’m wondering if someone—maybe within management—might have taken exception to her line and decided to…”

  I let that thought linger out there. Jim knew what I was saying without me filling in the blank.

  “I thought it was an accident,” he said.

  “It was. But maybe it was more the intentional kind of hit and run than the accidental kind?”

  “Who’s saying that? The police saying that?” Jim asked, his dirt-groping antennae clearly extended as far as they went. But I wasn’t sure I wanted to give Big Jim
my too much information to work with just yet.

  “Not the police. The police are done with the whole thing. Let’s just call it a reporter’s hunch at this point.”

  “So you got a hunch maybe someone killed Nancy because of something to do with the negotiations?” he said, not bothering to hide his disbelief. “Boy, I don’t know.”

  “I don’t know, either. At this point, I’m really just indulging my curiosity,” I said, deliberately soft-selling it. “For all I know, it could have been something at her other job, at the diner. Or, heck, it could be some boyfriend no one knows about. I’m really not sure, to be honest.”

  He stopped himself like something had just occurred to him. I shrugged again, trying to stay as noncommittal as possible.

  “Let me think about it,” he said. “Make some calls.”

  * * *

  We small-talked a bit more but were clearly done with the meaningful part of our exchange. I was soon being escorted out of the IFIW nerve center. And really, it was just as well. It was nearing five o’clock. I retrieved my car from the garage and made the short drive across town, cognizant of the need to get back to the nest and babysit Lunky. I hoped he had managed to get a few decent quotes from bear-scared Newarkers over the last few hours.

  My main challenge upon entering the newsroom was to elude Tina until after I had found Lunky. Otherwise, she’d inevitably start asking me questions about my afternoon with Smokey the Bear, and I couldn’t just make up my reply. She’d get suspicious when my answers didn’t end up remotely matching the story I handed in.

  So I crept along the outer wall of the newsroom, a long distance from the glass office where Tina would be lurking, and worked my way toward the intern pod by way of the men’s bathroom. I needed the pit stop anyway, with the Coke Zero I drank several hours earlier now pressing quite urgently against my bladder. I was just taking aim at a particular piece of white porcelain when, from the next urinal over, I heard Tommy’s voice.

  “Doing some of your best work?” he said, having sidled up next to me to take care of his own business.

  “Excuse me, haven’t you ever heard of the Men’s Bathroom Code?” I said, keeping my gaze straight ahead—another part of the code. “Don’t you know there’s a prohibition against talking to a guy when his Richard is out?”

  “Is that true? In that case, I’ve had whole relationships where neither one of us should ever have said a word.”

  I sighed and shook my head.

  “For that matter, what about the entire institution of anonymous gay sex?” Tommy continued. “That’s not my scene or anything, but those poor guys would be out of business if they couldn’t talk to each other in men’s rooms.”

  “Yes, but think of how much better off Larry Craig would be right now if he had just stuck to the code,” I said as I stowed my equipment.

  “Oh, that old queen? Someone would have outed him eventually.”

  We flushed simultaneously—sort of like synchronized swimming, only in reverse—then I went to the other side of the bathroom to wash my hands.

  “So how are things coming?” I asked. “Learn anything new, interesting, or heretofore unknown about Nancy Marino?”

  “That depends. Did you know she was perhaps the most boring human being on the planet?”

  “I was unaware of that.”

  “It’s true,” said Tommy, who had started an elaborate hand-washing routine that began with turning on the water and leaving it running while he rolled himself a length of paper towel. “She doesn’t have a car loan. She pays her mortgage on time. She pays her tax bill on time. She pays everything on time—her credit score was a 740.”

  “You got her credit score?” I asked, impressed.

  “I have ways,” he said, lathering his hands for what seemed like an inordinate amount of time while I was drying mine.

  “So what else?”

  “No bankruptcy. No divorce. No lawsuits. No criminal charges. I couldn’t even find a speeding ticket.”

  Tommy left the water running as he went over to his prerolled towel.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, gesturing at the sink, “but what the hell are you doing?”

  “Do you know how many germs there are on that thing?” he said. “Everyone takes their dirty hands and turns on the faucet. Then they wash their hands and what’s the first thing they do? Turn off the faucet with their clean hands—except they’re not clean anymore because they’ve just touched the dirty faucet.”

  He used his wet paper towel to turn off the water.

  “It’s much more sanitary this way,” he assured me.

  “I’m so glad I have other things to worry about.”

  “Suit yourself. The next plague is coming. Only the clean will survive.”

  “I’ll take my chances,” I said. “So nothing at all stood out about Nancy Marino?”

  Tommy threw his sodden towel in the trash. “Well, I don’t know if it means anything, but she just took out a $50,000 loan against her house.”

  “Huh,” I said, trying to make it fit with the rest of her financial profile. And it didn’t. This woman had worked her sneaker treads off to buy that house. When it came to money, she seemed about as daring as an elderly shut-in on a fixed income. People like that generally don’t take out home equity loans. They’re too busy pressing leftover shards of soap together to make a new bar.

  “She’s probably just redoing her kitchen,” Tommy said.

  “Yeah, maybe. Well, it’s something to file away, at any rate. Thanks for doing all the scut work for me.”

  “Don’t I always? Give me a jingle if I can do anything else. City Hall is dead right now.”

  We parted ways and I continued to slink across the newsroom toward Lunky’s desk. I had made it most of the way—still undetected—when I was interrupted by having to answer my phone.

  “Carter, it’s Jim McNabb,” I heard.

  “Hey, Jim.”

  “Look, I didn’t want to say anything about this while you were still in the office because I just had to think about it for a little bit. But now … Well, I still don’t know, but I guess I’m going to tell you anyway.”

  “Okay.”

  “We’re off the record, right? Way, way off record. I’ll help you get it on the record later if I can. But for right now, this just has to be you and me talking, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “So, I was … I can’t believe I’m about to say this … are you sure you want to hear this? It’s kind of a bombshell.”

  “I’m a big boy, Jim, I can handle it,” I assured him.

  Then he dropped it:

  “I think Gary Jackman killed Nancy Marino.”

  He considered himself a good judge of people, the kind of man who could size up other men at a glance. That was the whole issue with Nancy Marino. She wasn’t a man.

  So he never really saw it coming with Nancy, never thought she’d be trouble, never thought things would be different with her than they were with everyone else. Maybe he had grown a little too used to having his way prevail, sure. But that happens to most men of import. He didn’t feel he needed to treat Nancy with any special deference.

  He actually liked her for a while. She was cute, like the proverbial girl next door, with that brown ponytail and quick smile. She had a lot of spunk and a nice little body. He liked watching her move. He was married, sure. But they could have something on the side. Just some casual fun. It wouldn’t have been the first time for him.

  Then Nancy Marino started to become a problem. Then she started to become an even bigger problem. She kept getting … emotional about things.

  And that really gored him. It was just like a woman to make it emotional, to make a big deal out of something that should have easily been sloughed off. Deep down, although he dared not say it, he thought all women should be like his mother and stay home. The workplace really was a man’s world. His father’s generation had been better off in that respect.

  Eventually, he kn
ew he’d get her under control the same way he got everything else in his life under control—by being smart, patient, and, more important, tougher than everyone else around.

  But he was surprised to learn he wasn’t tougher than Nancy Marino. She kept coming back at him, kept pushing her claims. Didn’t she know ultimately he would win—correction, that he had to win?

  It got so she was in his head, distracting him from his other work. And that simply wouldn’t stand. He had more important matters to deal with than her petty concerns.

  He was respected in the community, a man who pushed the buttons of the machine. He didn’t have time for this little cog jamming things up.

  It was the visit from the regional director of the National Labor Relations Board that really threw him over the top. The NLRB wanted a sworn affidavit. It was taking Nancy Marino—Nancy Marino!—as seriously as it was taking him, treating the two parties as if they were on the same level. He could stall the NLRB, but only for so long. It could subpoena him. And, ultimately, there was no arguing with a subpoena.

  Yes, once the NLRB was involved, it changed everything. It meant he wasn’t really in control of the game and he certainly couldn’t make up the rules anymore. With the NLRB, things would be by the book. It would put everything out in public, because any document generated by the NLRB became part of the public record. There would be some kind of settlement negotiated or some kind of mediation. There was no way he could tolerate all that.

  Something had to be done. He wasn’t going to risk losing everything he worked for because of the girl next door.

  CHAPTER 4

  There are places where a reporter can enter into the rather delicate discussion of whether his publisher is, in fact, a murderer. But the middle of the newsroom is not noted for being one of them. I had colleagues on every side of me, and while reporters are accustomed to hearing one side of some strange interviews—most of which they knew to ignore—I might attract a little too much attention if I started hollering questions like, “You really think Gary Jackman killed someone?”