“It has everything to do with what happened to Cynthia. Everything,” he said, his eyes now ablaze with anger. “I’ve got something to show you, Mr. Benson.” Lutz stood and walked over to a vanity in the corner of the room, unlocked a drawer, and removed a thick envelope. “Cynthia gave this to me for safekeeping, but I can’t keep it a secret any longer.” He handed Ethan the envelope. “This will explain everything. Why we were at the Standard Grill that night. Why I had to leave her alone at the restaurant. And why her father needs to be punished.”
Ethan opened the envelope and pulled out a stack of documents. He quickly thumbed through each one, his expression changing from shock to astonishment to fury. Now he understood what had happened to Cynthia. Now he understood what she had been doing in the Meatpacking District. Now he understood the truth. He carefully slid the documents back into the envelope and tucked them into his briefcase. “Are you ready to tell us the rest of your story, Jacob?”
Lutz nodded.
“Good. Let’s roll the cameras.”
• • • • •
Ethan pushed into the edit room and handed Joel the disk. “This is the Jacob Lutz interview, and it’s fucking explosive. We’re gonna use it in every act of the hour. Where’s Peter? Where’s Mindy? I want to show them right away.”
“Well, you’re just gonna have to wait,” Joel said as he continued fine cutting a sequence of pictures. “They’re upstairs with Paul dealing with some crisis that came up right after you left.”
“Shit, what now?” Ethan said, dismayed. “Lemme see what’s goin’ on. I’ll be back in a few minutes. Then we’ll screen the interview.”
Ethan rode the elevator up to the eleventh floor and headed straight to Paul’s office. “Glad you could make it,” Monica said in a condescending voice. “They’re duking it out in the conference room. Paul’s waiting for you.”
Ethan ignored her comment and slipped into the room. Paul was sitting at the head of the table across from Peter and Mindy. To his right was Jamie Summers, and to his left, Douglas Fitzgerald—the president of the news division. They were poring over the script, circling words and writing notes in the margins.
Sampson looked up and smiled. “Sorry, Ethan. We couldn’t wait for you to get back. Paul wanted to meet right away. So Mindy made copies of the script, and we’re all going through it line by line.”
“But this is a rough version,” Ethan said as he sat in a chair next to Mindy. “It’s too early to show it to management. I just finished the Jacob Lutz interview and haven’t cut it into the story. Everything’s gonna change.”
“We can talk about Lutz later,” Paul said acrimoniously. “We’ve got a much bigger problem. The deputy mayor has seen our promos and had a heart attack. Fill him in, Doug. He doesn’t know what’s going on upstairs.”
Fitzgerald sipped a cup of coffee. “I’m not going to pull any punches, Ethan. George Pierce, the chairman of the board, isn’t happy.”
“Why?” Ethan said, beginning to worry.
“He had dinner with the deputy mayor last night. They’re close friends. They golf together, vacation together, and hobnob in the same social circles.” Fitzgerald paused and finished his coffee. “Jameson accused you of twisting the facts, of manipulating the truth, and demanded that we cancel the special. He called George again this morning after seeing today’s promo—the one that implies the Russian Mob was connected to the murder and conspired with the assistant district attorney to throw the case. Jameson said, and I quote, ‘It’s all pure poppycock.’ Then he threatened to sue Global Broadcasting and you for libel and slander and defamation of character.”
Ethan listened, appalled.
“I know your work and reputation as an investigative journalist,” Fitzgerald said placatingly, “but you make some serious allegations in your special that are going to turn this city upside down and destroy a lot of lives. I need to be certain that every fact is accurate. We can’t afford to make a mistake.”
“I can guarantee you there are no mistakes,” Ethan said unbendingly.
“And I’ll second that,” Sampson said, for good measure. “Ethan’s a pain in the ass, but he’s thorough. He doesn’t leave a stone unturned.”
“I expect nothing less,” Fitzgerald said, eyeing the two of them. “But George has asked me and Jamie to take a look at your documentation, and then he wants to sit down and talk to us before he makes his decision to run or cancel your special.”
“I’ve put together a notebook of documents for the lawyers,” Ethan said with confidence. “I just need to insert some new evidence from Jacob Lutz before I give it to you.”
“Fine, fine, Ethan, but the sooner we get it the better,” Summers said, speaking for the first time. “I’ve been on the phone with George since late last night fighting to save your hour, but I gotta tell you it’s been an uphill battle. Without the deputy mayor’s interview, I’m not sure even the documents will convince him to air your show.”
“But Jamie, we can’t kill the special,” Ethan said, pleadingly. “Pavel Feodor is innocent. He didn’t murder Cynthia Jameson. The documents don’t lie.”
“Ethan’s right,” Paul said, chiming in. “This is the biggest story we’ve produced in years. The whole nation’s gonna watch. It’s a little late to be questioning its veracity or the ethics of my producer. I’ve been grilling Ethan for weeks. He’s done his homework. He knows the facts. We can’t pull the hour just because the deputy mayor doesn’t like what we’re saying.”
“I don’t disagree,” Summers said forthrightly. “But we still have to convince the man who runs this company. He’s gonna make the decision. Not us.”
There was a knock on the door, and Monica poked her head into the room. “Ethan, the deputy mayor is holding on line one. He wants to talk to you and only you. He says it’s urgent.”
A hush fell over the room as Ethan picked up the phone. “Mr. Deputy Mayor, this is Ethan Benson.”
“I’ve been looking all over for you,” the deputy mayor said, seething. “My press secretary finally found your researcher, David Livingston, and he told her you were in a meeting with your senior staff, or I never would have found you.” There was a short pause. Ethan held his breath. “Is your offer still on the table?” Jameson said lividly. “My wife and I have changed our minds. We want an opportunity to respond to your litigious allegations and salacious innuendos.”
Ethan cupped the mouthpiece and smiled. “I think we just hooked our big fish.” He removed his hand. “The offer still stands, Mr. Deputy Mayor. There’s plenty of time to sit down and do the interview.”
“Good. Here’s what I propose.”
Ethan listened as Jameson laid out his ground rules. “Okay, okay. We can do that.” There was another pause. “We’ll shoot the interview to time, so there’ll be no editing.” Ethan continued listening. “Yes, sir, I understand. I give you my word. Thank you, Deputy Mayor.”
He hung up the phone.
“What did he say?” Summers said eagerly. “Do we have the interview?”
“He and his wife will do it,” Ethan said triumphantly. “He wants a chance to defend himself against what he calls my ‘baseless lies and blatant inaccuracies.’ But he wants to do the interview live to air on Thursday night, and he wants to do it from his apartment. Those are his conditions. And I agreed to them.”
“That doesn’t give us much time,” Paul said. “Can you finish the editing and get the shoot set up in two days?”
“I won’t sleep much, but yes, I’ll get it done,” Ethan said.
“And how do you plan to make room in the special?” Paul said, still worrying. “Mindy says you’re already running three minutes too long, and you still have to cut in this new character, Jacob Lutz.”
“I’ll squeeze out the time,” Ethan said, quickly skimming through the script. “The bigger question is how we structure the show to make room for a live segment.”
“Any suggestions?”
“Can we ad
d a commercial pod and create a sixth act?”
“Sure. I’ll call the network and get them to change the format.”
“So that’s what we’ll do,” Ethan said with conviction. “I’ll shave a minute and a half out of each act, and if we lose the promos and bumpers, that’ll give us nine minutes for the deputy mayor and his wife.” He looked at Paul. “That should be enough time, don’t you think?”
“Plenty,” Paul said, waving his hand. “But Ethan, I still don’t get what happened. Why did the deputy mayor change his mind?”
“Because he’s got a big ego and is worried about his political future,” Ethan said smoothly. “He wants the airtime to convince our viewers that Feodor is guilty and that there’s been no cover-up and no conspiracy to get the conviction. He’s adamant we’re wrong, and he wants the face time to appeal to his constituents.” He turned to the chief counsel. “Jamie, this should help us with Mr. Pierce, don’t you think?”
“It should ease his biggest concern,” Summers said, turning to Douglas Fitzgerald. “Let’s go tell George about the interview. And Ethan, get me the documents so I can show George the proof if he has any questions.”
“Right away, Jamie.”
Paul waited a moment for them to leave, then smiled conspiratorially. “We just dodged a bullet, Ethan. When Doug first called this morning, he said outright that Pierce was pulling your special and replacing it with a rerun of some crime show called The Investigators. I thought we were toast.” He picked up his script. “Is there anything I should know about this guy, Jacob Lutz? Anything important?”
“Let me show Peter and Mindy the interview first, then I’ll come up and tell you.”
“Okay. Surprise me.”
“That’s my plan, and I think you’ll be more than just blown away once you know what he has to say about the deputy mayor.”
CHAPTER 36
BERNARD JAMESON PACED AROUND the formal library on the top floor of his penthouse, torn with self-doubt. Why had he listened to Sandy and agreed to the interview? Why had he changed his mind? He’d spent all that time working on George, telling him the promos were a pack of lies, threatening to sue if the special made air. So why in God’s name was he about to sit down and talk to Peter Sampson? He was the deputy mayor of New York. He owned one of the biggest corporations in the world. He was rich and powerful and didn’t have to answer to anybody. Not anybody. Especially The Weekly Reporter.
Grabbing his cell phone, he dialed Nancy McGregor’s private line, but the call went directly to voice mail. He cursed and left a short message. “Goddamn it, where the hell are you? What did you tell Sampson? What does he have on me?” He slammed down the phone and sent her an email, no longer worried about covering his back. Had she betrayed him? Had she implicated him in the cover-up? Had she told Sampson about his daughter? Well, he’d bury her if she did. If she’d uttered one word about Cynthia. One word about his secret.
He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples.
The GBS production crew had been setting up in his apartment all evening with that pushy producer, Ethan Benson, putting up their lights and cameras and turning his home into a television studio. What was he going to say if they knew? How would he defend himself? How would he break the news to Sandy? He needed to come up with answers, and he needed to do it fast.
Wendell, the butler, knocked on the door. “Mr. Jameson, your wife asked me to inform you that Mr. Benson needs you downstairs. He’s ready to start the interview.”
“Thank you, Wendell. Tell Mrs. Jameson I’ll be down in a few minutes. Please shut the door on your way out.”
The butler nodded and left.
He dialed Nancy one last time, but there was no answer. Shit. He was on his own. Standing, he stared at his face in the mirror. His eyes were puffy and bloodshot, his visage drawn and slack. Somehow he had to pull himself together for the cameras and look powerful—like the deputy mayor of New York. After straightening his tie, combing his hair, and putting on a blue blazer, he took a deep breath, stood up straight, and made his way out the door.
• • • • •
Ethan looked at his watch. It was just after ten. The show had just hit the airwaves, and he wasn’t close to being finished—the crew still setting up lights, the grips still running cables down to the remote truck, the cameramen still tweaking the electronics in the four Sony HD cams Ethan was using to broadcast the interview. He peered into his bank of monitors. There were no pictures, only dark empty screens. He turned to his lead cameraman. “Herb, are we going to make it?” he said, trying to hide his anxiety. “We have less than forty-five minutes until we go live to the network.”
“I’m working as fast as I can,” Herb said as he checked the color settings on his camera. “I usually get a full day to build a set like this. Not just a couple of hours. But I guarantee you it’s gonna look great once we’re done.”
“Okay, that’s all I need to hear.” He sat down at his command station, put on his headset, and checked his communications, flipping the talk switch on his control panel. “Mindy, are you there?” There was no response. “Mindy, answer me.”
“I’m here, Ethan. Hold on a second,” she said, chaos in the background.
“Is the feed up yet?” he said, yelling into his headset. “Can they see us at the Broadcast Center? Talk to me, Mindy.”
There was another long pause. “We just linked in, Ethan. They have bars and tone. We’re good to go.”
Mindy was sitting in a mobile control room next to Stanley Kramer, the show’s director, who was switching the cameras and feeding the interview back to the network from a remote truck parked outside the Jamesons’ building on Fifth Avenue. “Hey, Ethan,” Stanley said in a soothing voice, “I’m talking to Paul at the Broadcast Center. We’re headed into the first commercial break, and he says the switchboard is lighting up like fireworks. People are calling in from all over the country, outraged by your story. Just about everybody thinks Pavel Feodor was framed and that Nancy McGregor should be fired. Your story’s blowing the lid off corruption in our legal system.”
Paul chimed into the conversation. “Let’s hold off on the self-congratulations. We have a long way to go before the show’s off the air. And I don’t want to risk fucking up your live insert. Has Peter arrived yet?”
Ethan searched the room. “He’s here, Paul. Lemme go talk to him.” He pulled off his headset and rushed over to his anchorman. “Peter, I was starting to get worried you weren’t gonna make it. Have you gone over the new questions?”
“Of course. Ten times since we screened the Lutz interview. I’m ready for the Jamesons.” Sampson gazed into his monitor. “I look pretty good, don’t you think?” He turned back to Ethan. “Reassure me one more time. We can prove all this stuff, right?” He waved his questions. “I gave George Pierce a heads-up on the telephone this afternoon, and he wasn’t happy we were going to ask Jameson all these personal questions about his daughter. You don’t have any doubts, do you, Ethan?”
“None,” he said adamantly.
“And Lutz is for real?”
“David did a thorough background check on the guy. There are no skeletons in his closet.”
“Let me see Jacob’s proof one more time.”
Ethan handed him a folder.
Sampson quickly read through the documents. “Well, I guess there’s enough here, and since you’re positive it’s the truth, so am I.” He put the documents back into the folder and handed them to Ethan, who nodded, then slowly made his way back to his monitors. “Herb, we’ve got fifteen minutes. We ready to roll?”
“What do you think, guys?” Glickstein said, peering at his crew.
Everybody gave him the thumbs-up.
Ethan smiled, then leaned over to David. “Time to get the Jamesons,” he said succinctly. “Herb, take the extra HD cam and go with him. Paul wants a walking shot as they come onto the set. He’s gonna use it as a live tease going into the commercial break just before we start the intervi
ew.”
“And you’ll cue me when you want them to start walking?” Herb said, grabbing the camera.
“I’ll wave you in,” Ethan said as he checked the time. “Listen up, everybody. We’ve got less than five minutes. Turn off your cell phones and take your places.” He put on his headset and listened as Paul and Stanley screamed at each other.
Everything was moving along.
They were ready to go.
• • • • •
Bernard Jameson made his way past a gallery of Renaissance art and down a formal staircase to a marble foyer on the main floor. Sandy was already standing there with Sylvia Rosenberg, surrounded by members of the production crew. “You still wanna go through with this?” he said, peering deeply into her eyes. “We still have time to pull out.”
“Oh, I wish we could, Bernard,” she said fretfully. “All these lights and cameras make me nervous. But we have to do the interview with Mr. Sampson for Cynthia. We owe it to her memory.”
Jameson sighed deeply. “Don’t you worry, dear. It’ll all be over in a little while, and then we can get on with our lives.” But the deputy mayor wasn’t so sure. Not on the inside. He had a sinking feeling they were about to walk into a buzz saw. After introducing himself, he turned to David, who was standing next to Herb Glickstein. “Will we start soon?” he said pleasantly.
“Yes, sir. We just need to wire you up for sound.” Anthony Petulla clipped a microphone to Jameson’s sports coat and snaked a cable through his shirt and down to a portable transmitter attached to his belt. Then they made their way through the apartment and to the door of the great room. “We’ll wait here until we get the go-ahead from my producer,” David said, pointing to Ethan. “Then I want you to walk into the room, introduce yourselves to Mr. Sampson, and sit down in the seats opposite him. Herb here is gonna follow you with his camera, and we’re going to broadcast the entire sequence live to the network as we go into the commercial break. Then you’ll have a couple of minutes to get comfortable before we start the interview.”
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