If You Were Here: A Novel of Suspense

by Alafair Burke

  “Not a damn thing. I texted my husband from the car to make sure I had the right lingo. Oh, and I know Jeter’s the one who looks like a Cabbage Patch doll.”

  That earned her another smile.

  “Cervantes!” the coach yelled, holding up a hand. “Five minutes, okay, ladies? Don’t want his arm getting cold.”

  Nicky didn’t seem surprised that a reporter and a photographer wanted his attention. “Already had three newspapers come by my mom’s place last night. A magazine now?”

  The night before last, a story started making the rounds on the Internet about a teenager saved from a subway splat by a woman’s brave heroics. By yesterday morning, a more detailed version documenting the teen’s promising baseball career and the mysteriousness of the unidentified woman had hit the front page of every local paper.

  The upcoming edition of NYC magazine wouldn’t be printed for two more days. McKenna needed to find a long-form angle on the fleeting tale du jour. So far journalists had described Nicky as an honor student and star athlete who’d lost his footing on the platform. McKenna already knew from talking to Nicky’s mother that the honor-student label was pure spin. The only academic recognition Nicky had ever received was a certificate of perfect attendance the fall semester of his sophomore year. And when McKenna tried to interview Nicky’s boss, a storeowner named Arthur Robinson, she learned that Nicky—unbeknownst to his mother—had quit the job three months ago.

  There was another angle to the story. McKenna just had to find it.

  She watched as a beaming Nicky struck a series of poses for Dana’s camera. Hands on hips. Looking earnestly at the sky. Mimicking a windup.

  She didn’t really need the pictures, but the modeling session had him in the groove, feeling important. She gave a nod to Dana, who took her cue and headed back to the car, supposedly to grab another lens. Once they were alone, McKenna asked Nicky how he’d slipped.

  “What do you mean? I just fell.”

  “But how? Was the platform slick? Did you have a seizure or something?”

  The kid shrugged. “Not sure. Just went down.”

  “I’ve seen the MTA’s incident report. Bystanders said you were running frantically down the platform right before you fell. One said it was almost as if the woman was chasing you.”

  If the subway Superwoman actually knew Nicky Cervantes, the story would take on new complexity. Why were they running? Had they been fighting? Why did she leave? And why wouldn’t Nicky admit he knew her?

  “Whatchu trying to do here, lady?”

  What was she trying to do? She knew this was the kind of story everyone would forget in a month, like most of the garbage she wrote. She’d like to say she was fostering civic involvement through journalism, but she was simply doing her job: blurring the lines between news, voyeurism, and entertainment. The most entertaining stories needed a protagonist. So far the media coverage of the “1 train tragedy averted” had focused on the good fortune of Nicky Cervantes. McKenna wanted to know about the woman who’d saved him only to sprint away.

  The MTA’s security cameras had failed to capture any footage of the incident, but McKenna had the advantage of time. Her best lead was a comment posted online by someone claiming that his girlfriend had video of Nicky’s fall on her cell phone. McKenna had sent an e-mail to the commenter, hinting at the possibility of payment for the clip; she was still waiting for a response. In the meantime, her firsthand contact with Nicky was leading her to believe that her instincts were on track.

  “I know you give your mom money, Nicky, even though you have no obvious source of income.” McKenna also knew that, despite New York City’s record-low crime rates, robberies on the subway system were on the rise. The story of a mysterious Superwoman saving a promising young teen was media gold. But the story of a female crime victim who simultaneously pursued—and saved—her robber? Pure platinum.

  Nicky finally spoke. “You know what? Forget about the pictures, okay? I just want to live my life.”

  “And I’m trying to find the woman who made it possible for you to do so, Nicky.”

  “More power to you, then. If you find her, tell her I said thanks. And tell her I’ve changed. Don’t forget, okay?”

  “Why’d you need to change, Nicky? Was there a reason the two of you were running through the station?”

  He gave his right shoulder a quick massage. “Gotta get back to it now.” He returned to practice without another glance in her direction.

  CHAPTER THREE

  McKenna checked her cell as she walked to the car. No calls but two new e-mail messages, both from the same unfamiliar address, both with the same subject line: Big Pig. She skimmed them quickly.

  One of her contacts at the courthouse had come through. Big Pig was one of many nicknames Judge Frederick Knight had earned among the local bar, this one referring to both his massive girth and his blatant sexism. The messages were forwards of e-mails Judge Knight had sent from his judicial address. They must have come from someone with access to the network. If they were authentic, they were tangible proof to confirm rumors that had been whispered for years. She would have enough material to expose Judge Frederick Knight as the lazy SOB he was.

  When she took the driver’s seat, she could feel Dana staring at her. “What?”

  Dana continued to look at her expectantly.

  “I’ve worked with you for two years, Dana. If I’ve got something funky on my nose, you’re supposed to tell me.” She rubbed her face with her index finger.

  “You’re snot-free. I’m just wondering if you want to talk about anything.”

  “Such as?”

  “The article?”

  “We work for a magazine, Dana. There are a lot of articles out there.”

  “Your article. The article.”

  “No. I most definitely do not want to talk about the article. No one should talk about the article. I’m starting to think I made a huge mistake writing the stupid thing.”

  “Tammy told me you got a call from a literary agent. And from HarperCollins.” Tammy the editorial assistant always knew something about everything. Those calls had been to McKenna’s direct line.

  “Stop listening to Tammy. She’s a noodnik.”

  “Can a woman be a noodnik?” Dana asked.

  McKenna had no clue. She grew up in Seattle. Went to college and law school in the Bay Area. A dozen years since her move to New York, her Yiddish still couldn’t be trusted. “Whatever. Tammy’s not exactly an accurate narrator.”

  “Well, the narrator says you have a book proposal that goes to auction next week. The magazine piece was to start the buzz rolling.”

  As usual, Tammy knew just enough to get the story wrong. The publishing house had asked about a proposal, and the agent had talked about the possibility of an auction, but a proposal going to auction next week? Not even close. Not to mention, the agent had made it clear that the book would need to be more than an extended version of the magazine article. It would have to be personal. “Intimate.” “Maybe even in the first person.” “Like a novel but true.” “You were barely thirty years old—dating and drinking at night, facing down cops and DAs by day. That’s the book!” The dreaded “memoir” word had been raised.

  At first, when McKenna thought she’d be reporting real news, she saw journalism as an extension of her original work as a prosecutor. Attorneys and reporters both investigated facts and wove them into a compelling—and often spun—story. Ten years ago, when McKenna was an assistant district attorney, she made the mistake of becoming a character in one of those stories she was supposed to narrate. Two weeks ago, she had repeated that mistake as a journalist by writing a ten-page feature article about the same case. But a memoir? What was that saying about the definition of insanity: making the same decisions over and over, yet expecting a different result?

  McKenna’s phone rang from he
r jacket pocket. She didn’t recognize the number on the screen but answered anyway, eager for the distraction from Dana’s interrogation.

  The voice on the other end of the line sounded like a young woman. She said her name was Mallory. She talked the way all young women seemed to these days, slowing the pace of her speech and dipping her voice low into a “fry” at the end of her sentences.

  “Hiiii. My boyfriend said to call. I was on the subway the other day when that lady pulled that kid off the traaaacks.”

  “Has anyone else contacted you about it?” It seemed like every witness expected to be paid for an interview or at least to get on television.

  “No. After you e-mailed my boyfriend because of that comment you saw online, I told him to delete it. It happened so fast, the video doesn’t even really show anything.”

  “Well, I’d love to see it.” McKenna tried not to let her tone reveal her excitement. It was a stupid story, but at least it was a story. First Judge Knight’s e-mails, now a video of the subway incident that had the entire city talking. She might have enough material to meet her next two deadlines.

  “Yeah, okay.”

  “Can you e-mail it to me?” McKenna rattled off her address, but next to her in the passenger seat, Dana was shaking her head.

  “Our e-mail system’s for shit,” she said. “Won’t accept a big video file. Have her send it to my Skybox.”

  The details that came tumbling from Dana’s mouth were Greek to McKenna. Her attempts to repeat them to young Mallory were reminiscent of the slumber-party game Operator, where words lost all meaning when passed down a line of communicators. Frustrated, Dana finally extended a hand for the phone so she could speak to Mallory directly. Whatever had seemed so complicated to McKenna was cake to the two of them; Dana soon returned the phone with a satisfied smile.

  “Thanks for that, Mallory. Do you mind if I ask, have you shown this to anyone else? Put it on YouTube or Facebook or anything?” Nowadays, anyone with a phone was an amateur reporter. The video wouldn’t be of any value to McKenna once it hit a public website.

  “That’s so last year. Social networking is social not-working. I’m more into, like, privacy, so just leave my name out of it, okay? It was cool and everything, but I can’t believe people are making such a big deal out it. I mean, you’re a reporter. Last time I checked, our country was still at war, you know?”

  It wasn’t the first time McKenna had wondered about the merits of her career choices.

  Once McKenna was off the phone, Dana retrieved the iPad she had stored beneath the seat for safekeeping. “Don’t want to forget this when you return the car,” she said. “You got 3G on this thing? I can hook you up on my Skybox action.”

  McKenna nodded for Dana to work her magic, marveling at the woman’s ability to use the virtual keyboard for real typing. “I told Mallory to send the video to my public directory,” Dana explained. McKenna caught a quick peek at two heavily pierced twins holding fire hoses. She really didn’t understand Dana’s artistic impulses. “And I’m hitting bookmark so you can find it online without having to download to your device.”

  Within seconds, Dana had tilted the screen toward her so they could watch together. The video was typical cell-phone footage: shaky, staccato, grainy. A close-up of someone’s back. The cement platform. McKenna turned up the volume. Voices, mostly inaudible. Screams. Someone yelling, “Oh my God!” Someone else yelling something about the train.

  By the time Mallory had managed to point the lens toward the tracks below her, a woman in a white sweater, backpack secured tightly on her shoulders, was lifting a stunned Nicky Cervantes to his feet. As she grabbed him around the waist and hefted him halfway up the height of the platform, Nicky’s body blocked the camera’s view of the woman’s face. A man in a denim jacket took Nicky by the wrists and rolled him onto the concrete.

  The cell phone jerked toward the woman just as she finished hoisting herself onto the platform unassisted. She turned and sprinted barefoot toward the stairs, ponytail bouncing at the nape of her neck, just above her backpack. The footage returned quickly to Nicky before going black.

  Dana let out a whistle. “That chick’s kickass. Nicky probably weighs one-seventy. Did you see how she dead-lifted him?”

  McKenna wasn’t interested in the woman’s strength. She rewound the video and tried to stop on the brief glimpse of the woman’s face before she turned to run away. After three attempts, McKenna managed to hit pause at just the right moment.

  She couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

  She hit replay and watched the entire clip again.

  “So much for identifying Superwoman,” Dana said. The image was grainy at best. “Don’t worry. You’ll find another way to hook in the masses. You always do.”

  But Dana had misinterpreted McKenna’s expression. She wasn’t disappointed. She was in shock.

  She never thought she would see that face again. Susan Hauptmann had disappeared without a trace ten years ago.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  McKenna automatically clicked to her computer’s screen saver when she felt Bob Vance walk into her office, looming over her.

  Her editor laughed. “If you’re going to keep doing that, could you get some pictures of something that’s not food?” Her current wallpaper was a photograph of a fried-egg pizza. “When are you going to realize that one of the advantages of being a journalist is that you can look at whatever the hell you want and call it research. If you believe Walt, he’s been working on a big exposé of the porn industry for the past seven years.”

  Stanford undergrad. Boalt Law School. A federal judicial clerkship. Four years at the district attorney’s office. It had been a decade since she’d left those uptight surroundings, but old habits died hard. McKenna was a natural rule follower. Even as a child, she would lecture her parents for parking in loading zones.

  Today, though, she had a reason to hide the screen from her supervisor. She had spent the last hour searching for current information about Susan Hauptmann. There was nothing. In a sadly familiar pattern, Susan’s disappearance had consumed the media for a few weeks, with coverage steadily waning in the ensuing months. Now a search for her name pulled up only isolated comments from bloggers and true-crime addicts asking, “Whatever happened to that girl?”

  “I hear there’s talk of a book,” he said.

  She rotated in her chair to face him. “You were the one who suggested the article, Bob, and you know how I felt. I don’t think I’m up to writing an entire book about it, so don’t make me do it.”

  “I’m not your daddy, Jordan. I can’t make you do anything, especially when it’s not for the magazine. I’m just saying that if the rumors are true—if there’s that kind of interest from publishers—something like that happens once in a journalistic career, and only if you’re lucky. And this is real news, not the kind of stuff we usually get to do around here.”

  When McKenna had left the district attorney’s office nearly ten years ago, she had vowed not to do any further damage to the people and institutions she had harmed. But somehow, the career moves she’d made in the aftermath had managed to alienate her even more from a job that once was the core of her identity.

  It was Bob Vance who had given her a start at a new one. After McKenna had published one not so successful legal thriller and a few pieces on spec about city crime issues, he’d brought her on as a full-time writer. She had fantasized about specializing in local crime and courts, but had come to accept that it would be hard to provide legitimate coverage of the criminal justice system when almost every cop in the city hated her. Instead, she was a features reporter. Given the increasingly silly tone of the barely afloat magazine, she felt more like a paparazzo.

  The saving grace was that Vance was a real journalist at heart. The recent article had been his suggestion: a retrospective of the case that had ended her career at the DA’s of
fice—a police officer’s shooting of a nineteen-year-old named Marcus Jones.

  “It’s a bad idea,” she’d told Vance when he’d proposed it. “Honestly, no one will be interested in Marcus Jones all these years later.”

  “Ten years. It’s an anniversary, so there will be interest. People like anniversaries. They distract themselves with the controversies of old rather than fight the battles of today. In my humble and not so ignorant opinion, I think that if anyone’s going to tap in to whatever you might have to say, it should be you. You can control the story.”

  “I tried to control the story ten years ago, and look where it got me.” It wasn’t only McKenna’s prosecutorial career that had taken a hit. It was her general credibility. After her first big feature for the magazine, online commentators gleefully celebrated the irony that a woman who’d made false claims at the DA’s office was supposed to be a journalist. The criticism had been so intense that she’d stopped reading the comments before she broke down at her desk.

  Although McKenna had written the ten-year anniversary article reluctantly, Vance’s instincts had been right. There had been interest, so much that McKenna was getting calls from agents and publishing houses about possible book deals.

  “Look,” Vance said now, slapping a hand against the desk for emphasis, “all I’m saying is that if I were you, I’d jump at the chance. As your boss? I guess I’m here to tell you that anything you write for the magazine belongs to the magazine. A book’s got to be on your own time. You know what I’m saying?”

  He didn’t wink, and he didn’t nod, but he may as well have. Writing for a magazine wasn’t a nine-to-five gig, so they both knew that her time was fungible. Just like Dana—working on her artistic photography when she was supposedly photographing Zuccotti Park—McKenna could easily sneak in a few pages of a book during her daytime hours.