yellow police tape. “I think that’s where it exploded. There have been a couple of CSI people using tweezers to pick fragments off the sidewalk.”
“And what is your name?”
“Anita Byers.”
Jennifer scribbled her name in the notebook she’d taken out of her coat pocket.
“Am I going to be in the newspaper?” Ms. Byers asked, full of life.
“Not unless you shot that guy down there,” Jennifer replied nonchalantly. She took another quick look at the scene below and planned her next move. “Thank you, ladies. You’ve been more help to me than you could know.”
Jennifer exited the building and backtracked down the street away from the crowd. She proceeded to a side entrance of an old art deco structure - The Kingdom Entertainment Building - adjacent to the NCN complex, and took the stairs to the third floor. The building, a city landmark, was built in the 1950’s and still had outdoor fire escapes running down the sides.
She entered the third floor lobby and made her way through a small throng of people huddled near the windows.
“Is this fire exit alarmed?” she asked no one in particular, pointing to a door at the end of the hall.
A handsome male in his mid-20s turned toward her.
“No. That’s where we have our smoke breaks,” he said, eyeing her from head to toe.
“Thanks,” she said, hoping to bump into him at a more opportune time.
Without another word she walked down the hall and pushed the door open. She scanned the windows of the building across the street and noticed Anita Byers and her friends watching her. She gave them a quick wave and flashed a smile in their direction, which they returned.
“See, I told you you’ve been helpful,” Jennifer said as she began to descend the stairs of the metal fire escape.
Stepping off, she quickly checked her reflection in the windows of the NCN building.
Harried looking, yet still intact, she thought.
As she was technically behind the police-sanctioned perimeter, she had an unobstructed view of the scene of the crime. Sure enough, there was a deceased male bleeding from the side of his head, only a few inches from the stand-up microphone. And as her new office girlfriends had pointed out, several forensic techs were scouring the area where a ratty gym bag lay on the sidewalk, a faint line of smoke emanating from it.
She scanned the crowd and also noted the officers present. She knew two of them well: Barry Kendall and Detective Mario Stancu, both of whom were standing near the body.
A promising sign, Jennifer reasoned.
She turned her back on the crowd, pulled a small micro-recorder out of her pocket and pressed the record button. She then placed it into a specially-made pocket sewn inside her jacket close to the collar. After stating the date and time, she walked toward the crime scene, hoping no one in authority would stop her before she reached her destination.
“And what do you think you’re doing?” a male voice asked.
Jennifer turned and came face to face with Michael Speers, who had exited the building behind her.
“Detective Speers, I thought this looked like your handiwork.”
“You know the rules, Malone,” he said, unsuccessfully trying to convey his disapproval.
Jennifer looked around and pleaded innocence, which both of them knew had been lost many stories ago.
“Do you mean . . . that I’m on the wrong side of the police tape? I don’t know how this could have happened, Detective Speers. As you know, I’m a simple farm girl from a small town where these big-city crimes don’t happen.”
“You’re telling me you’re lost?” Speers asked as a smirk crossed his lips.
“No. I’m telling you that if I don’t find out what happened here today, my big mean boss is going to send me back to Kansas on the first available bus.”
“Carson is right. You do have bigger stones than most men.”
“Well, I don’t like to brag . . .”
“You know, Jennifer, I could stand here and talk all day—”
“Really? I thought you had a murder investigation to run.”
“As I was about to say . . . but I have a murder investigation to run.”
“You know I’d never think of getting in your way while you’re doing your job, right?”
“Enough already, Malone. I’m going to escort you right to the front of the line, where you can have the best view in the house. And do you know why I’m not sending you all the way back to 103rd?”
“Because you respect me as a woman?”
“Hardly,” he laughed. “Because I respect you as a reporter—unlike some of your colleagues.”
Walking beside the swelling masses, both saw Mark Orr pushing his way to the front of the tape, still a hundred feet away from the action.
“Speak of the devil,” Speers said with a smile.
Orr stood in disbelief as he watched Jennifer and Speers pass him.
“I hate to say I told you so . . .” Jennifer said to Orr, letting the sentence trail off, satisfied with the dumb look on his face.
During the next 15 minutes, Jennifer interviewed five shocked eyewitnesses to the shooting. By day’s end, their faces would be familiar to everyone who owned a television set.
None had spoken to the man before he’d stepped up to the microphone, although one elderly woman recalled watching him briefly, as he kept fiddling with the brim of his hat.
“What do you mean fiddling?” Jennifer asked.
“Tugging it a little at the front, as if he were trying to cover his eyes. You know—so no one would recognize him.”
“You think he was hiding from someone?”
“I don’t know. It happened so fast. Maybe he was getting the brim the way he liked it.”
Jennifer wrote down the woman’s account and drew a star beside it. Although it could be nothing, something about the hat had piqued her interest. She turned and scanned the multitude of people behind her. Not a man with a hat in sight.
Was the man trying to hide something? And if so, why do it in front of millions of viewers?
Jennifer also circled the statement to remind her to keep its contents front and centre in her mind. She saw Barry Kendall looking in her direction and flashed him a smile.
“Officer Kendall—any word on the getaway vehicle?”
“I’ve
