In seconds, the first responders and SWAT team rushed into the assembly hall. And an army of soldiers were upon him.
Chapter 70
Hannah and Jon arrived at the school to a horrendous scene. There were roadblocks in every direction. Swat teams and bomb squads were everywhere, along with a militia of police cars, fire, and rescue trucks. Several police helicopters hovered above as a stream of frightened teenagers filed outside of the building in a straight line, with their hands over their heads; some silent, others wailing. Jon and Hannah came to a complete stop at a blockade.
By the time they received clearance to proceed on through, the news teams had begun to arrive, uncoiling their cables and positioning their camera lights trained on the tiny brick school. Somehow, it looked small and vulnerable in the center of all the chaos and confusion surrounding it.
“Go around over there!” Hannah directed as Jon slowed the SUV past a swell of onlookers, who were standing on the curb. They inched their way slowly through the line of photographers and bystanders as the crowd miraculously parted to let them through as shouts of recognition caused a commotion all its own. Look! Hey, Dr. Hannah! It’s her! It was one time in her career that she wished that she was someone else.
The first bomb, a crude homemade explosive made of steel pipe and hobby shop fuses, detonated in Grant Leary’s basement early that morning, killing him, his parents, two sisters, and their cocker spaniel, who were all sleeping upstairs. Grant awoke to flames shooting through the floor beneath his bed and was helpless to assist the girls, whose muffled screams he could hear in the darkness as they were quickly consumed by the merciless smoke.
The second bomb was found after the evacuation. It had been planted in a gym locker at the school and was programmed to go off nearly six hours later—precisely at ten forty a.m., just after Eric would have finished his work—and left this world. Miraculously, it failed. It was intended to rip the roof off of the school and finish off the rest of the student body and faculty.
Thankfully, Hannah’s tip to Sergeant Nolan prompted an all-out siege, as undercover agents and local officers descended on the school just as Eric began his rampage, but far from in time to save his victims.
Eric Johansson was swiftly felled by an officer’s well-aimed bullet to the chest at close range, but not before twenty-one students, staff, and faculty were tragically slaughtered in the bloodbath. This, along with Grant Leary and his entire family, brought the total death count toll to twenty-nine souls. The cheerleader, Melissa Gates was badly wounded, but survived.
Following the siege, authorities combed the grounds for additional explosives or arsenal. Their investigation retrieved two small handguns and a hand grenade in Eric Johansson’s locker. He had lived only four miles from the school.
When the authorities arrived at his parents’ house, a search found additional weaponry and a “dummy bomb” used to fashion the explosive used in the Leary massacre. Eric’s computer had been left on, and a framed photograph of a cheerleader was smashed to pieces. A suicide note matching the one found on his body was typed on the screen in the form of a Word document. It was addressed to Dr. Hannah Courtland-Murphy, the syndicated radio talk show psychologist.
Words, she knew, that would forever haunt her, were blurred nearly illegible on the blood-soaked note found in Eric’s jean pocket: YOU BLEW IT, DOC. SO DID I . . . REMEMBER MY NAME!
No, she would never forget.
The Johanssons were stunned and paralyzed with grief. By evening, they were not talking to anyone, except the high-profile lawyer who saw the story reported on the morning news and had instructed them not to speak. Hannah, who avoided the press and police, sat with them and prayed with them. She shared the trail of emails that he had sent her; the cryptic clues that led her there. They wept in each other’s arms, disbelieving every second of the surreal events unfolding. Wayne Johansson knew that he would need to reconcile what he knew about his family history with his wife. On some level, he was left feeling that he singularly had let Eric down; a regret he would struggle the rest of his days to accept. One which he shared with the good Dr. Hannah behind closed doors at a non-disclosed location.
Hannah would miss the signing meeting with Global Network, having agreed to stay on to offer grief counseling in any way that she could. There would be plenty of time later to answer the barrage of questions from the chief of police and later, the district attorney. The media would continue to be relentless, but would have to wait.
Jon had managed to connect with Marney, who would arrange for her to conduct the signing meeting with Friedman and his cohorts via a conference call connection later that morning. Hannah’s lawyer, Patrick Cavanaugh, had power of attorney, and would be sitting in her place. Everyone had agreed that, under the circumstances, the station would postpone her ceremonially adding her own signature to the contract on a separate occasion.
“I’ll be staying on to counsel the kids who will want to talk to someone about what went on here,” she later told Friedman’s people collectedly on the call from her room at the Howard Johnson’s hotel near the school. “I will be staying on here for as long as they need me.”
Then, she hung up the phone and broke down in a torrent of silent and gasping sobs that had been years coming—an inexorable display of grief that racked her body until she could barely breathe.
She sat on the weathered carpet, slumped and exhausted against the wall, as the sirens, carrying the injured and newly minted souls, wailed in the distance.
Brady found his phone that had been rolling on the floorboard as he drove the car back to the police lot. There were fifteen messages from his mom. He decided that he would knock off a few minutes early and head to the hospital to check on Ostrowski, and then head home. He would quickly call her back to say he was all right.
When he walked in the door, his sergeant and a cadre of staff and other officers were there to greet him with a standing ovation. He was stunned. It was surreal and unnerving at the same time.
Several reporters were waiting to talk to him. “Officer Brady—a word. What was it like to stare down the shooter?”
“Is it true that you are a rookie with the force?”
“How are you feeling?”
Brady dodged the flashbulbs and questions as he made his way to his Mustang Cobra. “I did my job, that’s all,” he said matter-of-factly.
He just wanted to go home and have a beer.
Chapter 71
Global Studios
New York City
Marney paced around the small coffee table in the waiting area outside of the glass conference room quickly filling with people—important people. She looked nervous and peaked after a tough interrogation from the homeland security authorities. It was clear that she had no knowledge of Eric Johansson, or the emails sent to Hannah. In fact, she was shaken and sickened by the news flooding the cable and local networks about the bombing and shooting in Harrisburg that clearly were the actions of a deranged young man. She continued to text Jon Novotny for updates.
Hannah’s lawyer had just arrived, and the time was drawing near. Everything was riding on today . . . everything. She checked once again with a staff assistant to confirm that a conference phone would be in the room to patch-in Hannah’s call.
Everything was ready.
The elevator doors sprang open, and Bumpy Friedman and his designer-suited team emerged. He paused, and then approached Marney with an outstretched hand and a wide grin. Needless to say, the network was impressed with Hannah’s altruism and professional dedication. Bumpy himself was later quoted in the Times as saying, “Hell—our number one host is out saving the world, performing miracles of humanitarian and heroic valor. We’ll definitely hold her seat on the co-anchor’s couch here at The
Gab . . . for when her wings cool down. She is precisely the healing and light that we want—a modern-day woman with compassion and val
or, and grace.”
Marney beamed, shaking his hand with relief. “Hannah is where she needs to be right now, helping those students and their families—along with the nation,” she said.
“That’s for sure,” Bumpy smiled. “She’s America’s guardian angel!”
“That she is, Mr. Friedman . . . that she is!”
Marney looked over into the glass conference room and smiled. It would be a stunning cast, indeed. The women of The Gab were as fierce and beautiful as they come. She knew that no truer words had ever been spoken, and for Hannah, it was just the beginning.
~End~
About the Author
Jamie Collins, author of the “Secrets and Stilettos” series, writes larger than life fiction about the fast-track world of media and entertainment.
As a former model/actress, she infuses her stories with Hollywood grit, sizzle and heat reminiscent of the great women’s fiction writers (Jackie Collins, Sidney Sheldon, and Olivia Goldsmith) of decades past on which she cut her writing chops reading and emulating their iconic styles.
Collins brings a fresh, modern-day take on the throwback pocket novel tomes that defined an era of extravagance and excess in exchange for a world where women are more powerful, smart, and driven than ever.
Collins’s stilettos have been everywhere from nightclubs in Japan, to the Playboy mansion, to dinner with a Sinatra. Her aim is to delight and entertain readers of women’s fiction everywhere.
Visit Jamie Collins’s website where you can join her reader list and get started with a free copy of the prequel to the series, Sign On!
Link: www.jamiecollinsauthor.com
Then jump right in, starting with, Blonde Up! The first book in the four-part “Secrets and Stilettos” series—a behind the scenes look at the competitive, glamorous, and often exploitative world of media and entertainment—available now at your favorite eBook retailer. Look for Sexy Ink!—book four coming out in early 2019.
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