Into the Night

by Herb Scribner

  Contents

  INTO THE NIGHT

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Other works

  Lunch

  The Run

  The Talk

  Home

  Can it be?

  New beginnings

  The Call

  Next Day

  The Search

  The Interview

  The Breakuo

  Update

  Funeral

  Meeting the Sister

  Can't Believe It

  A Conversation With an Ex

  Bad Looks

  Lazy Day

  The Thread

  Lazy Day 2

  Up Sync

  Pieces

  Call Back

  Bail

  No help

  Heath

  Wake up

  Minny

  The Report

  Goodbye

  The Meeting

  The Agreement

  The Airport

  Coda

  Contact

  More by Herb Scribner and friends

  One more thing

  INTO THE NIGHT

  WRITTEN BY HERB SCRIBNER

  EDITED BY TESSA HUNT WILCOX

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled or stored in any means or forms, either electronic or mechanical, without the express consent of Herb Scribner.

  Copyright © 2019, Herb Scribner

  All rights reserved.

  For my grandmother, who always enjoys her political thrillers

  THE PEN ANTHOLOGY:

  The Pen

  Battle Born

  The Winter Darkness

  OTHER WORKS:

  Nessus

  A New Day

  Not Afraid of You

  Never Saw Me Coming

  SUNSET TO SUNRISE:

  Sunset to Sunrise (season 1)

  A Song For a Heart (season 2)

  Too Late For Apologies (season 3)

  HOLIDAY STORIES:

  ’Twas a Scary Christmas Night

  A Town Called Santa

  Christmas in LA

  Falling For Cupid

  Chapter 1: Lunch

  The government shutdown is actually nice.

  I don't mean to demean all the people who work for the federal government who are without work. That just wouldn't be proper. I'm a member of the media, and we all know we've received too many insults thrown our way lately. So I don't want to demean federal government workers.

  But it's so easy to get lunch.

  I walk into West Wing Cafe. A portly mans sits at the bench that is lined against the window. The tables spread throughout the restaurant are far from full. A person sits there, another one there. One man dressed in a suit bites down on a Reuben sandwich. A young, Chinese woman sips her water bottle. A trio of pimple-faced interns chat away about government solutions, even though they haven't even dipped their toes into the political pools.

  There's no line so I quickly walk to the deli counter at the far side. I order the special -- a Cuban panini. I wait about five minutes by the counter, evading the glances from the man standing beside me, who is waiting for his own sandwich. He must recognize me.

  I walk over to the counter to pay. The cashier, an older woman with salt-and-pepper stringy hair, invites me to pick up a bag of chips and a water bottle. I take a second and collect both of those things. All for the soft price of $9.52. Not too bad.

  "So, I think I recognize you," says the cashier.

  Of course she does. "Really? I've been told I just have one of those faces."

  "Nope. I recognize you. I saw you on CNN about six months ago promoting your book. The murder one. What was it called?"

  I want to sigh out my frustrations, but my booking agent told me I need to act calm when the waves of celebrity come through.

  "So, it's called 'Mining for Murder: Tales from the Road.'"

  "That's it! I've been meaning to read it. I just can't get around to it. Work has been so busy."

  I turn and look around the restaurant. It's baron. Mostly because of the shutdown, but who am I to place blame on someone.

  "Well, I can mail you copy."

  She waves me off, like I wouldn't be doing her a favor. "I have the e-book version. I got it from a free credit or something from Maximum Inc. Books. You heard of them? They put those other companies right out of business."

  I had heard of that company. It was one of the reasons I was in town in the first place.

  I thanked the cashier for her time and slowly walked away toward the bench at the window on the far side. Portly Man chomped away at his Dill Pickle chips. A mustard stain stood out like a star on his white shirt. I'm not going to tell him.

  The cashier's words don't leave my mind. It's been awhile since someone told me that they wanted to read my book. I didn't even think that many people heard about it, let alone cared to actually read it.

  Look -- I should probably get this out of the way now. I have a bit of a checkered past. I'll try and give you the short version. Trust me. There's a lot.

  So, in 2011, when I was a junior in college, my friends and I were the targets of a serial killer -- the Mountain College Killer. He slaughtered people at my school, including my best friend and his specific target was my boyfriend, Jason. The killer tried to kill me, but I survived -- only just, though. I ran away from town, went and hid up in a mountain town with some family. When I came back to my hometown, South Hills, I learned that Jason's good friend, Max, had been charged with the killings. Case closed.

  You can read more about that. Just look up the books about it. Not Afraid, or something.

  Anyway, I went on to start my own true crime podcast called Mining for Murder. I'd go into unsolved murder mysteries that came into my mailbox. Five years after the murders, I came back to my hometown after Mountain College invited me to give a speech to young people about success in journalism. And, yep, you guessed it. The killer came back to town -- and I was his target.

  So this is where it gets good. Me and my friend Chase and my friend Tom "The Tank" Tankkson worked to find out who the killer was. Was it a copy cat? Was it the real killer again? Had Max escaped? So many questions.

  Long story short -- and yes, I advise that you actually read about this stuff for the full story -- it turned out Jason, my ex-boyfriend, had a twin brother named Alex who was the Mountain College Killer. Alex and Jason were both plotting to kill me, too. We stopped them though. Thankfully.

  Having survived a serial killer, twice, I decided to move away from Massachusetts forever. I moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where I worked on my radio show with independent funding. The good news -- it actually gave me peace. No killers, no stalkers. Nothing. Just work.

  Until ... a police officer named McKay asked me to help her with a case she was working on. Again, you can read about this elsewhere.

  Anyway -- spoilers: Apparently this woman had killed her husband, but the husband didn't exist -- at least not in Minnesota. So I went over to investigate. And it turned out it was one nights of my life. Complete nightmare. The woman, named Marie, tried to kill me. Literally tried to kill me. And it was this twisted story where she and her family submitted an idea for my podcast but it never panned out. So they wanted to kill me.

  Weird motivation, but okay.

  So then I survived that, again only by the skin of my teeth. A random Uber driver named Paige helped me survive by saving my ass at the last minute.
<
br />   When all was said and done, I had to get away. So Paige and I hit the road. We visited a few court rooms, investigated a few true crime stories, and that led me to write my book. Just a bunch of true crime stories.

  You're probably wondering how I wound up in Washington, D.C. How does a small town New England girl move to Minneapolis, then go on a six-month-long road trip to uncover true crime, and then wind up back in Washington, D.C.?

  Well, there's a simple reason for that.

  My phone buzzes, and that reason's name appears on the screen. Ben Casselwhite.

  "Hey you," I say, picking up.

  "And how are you doing so far today? Sniffing out stories on Capitol Hill?"

  "That's what I have my super sexy boyfriend for. He feeds me the information I want."

  "Don't say that too loudly. I could get fired."

  "While the government is shutdown? Good luck. What are you up to?"

  "Just leaving Dulles. Sorry I've been gone for the last week. Senator Simmons wanted me to come back to North Carolina with her for a hot minute. We're on our way back."

  "So he's no longer on vacation? He's actually coming back to help Congress?"

  "Yeah. Something like that. He says it's going to be a pain to reopen Congress. Something to do with the tech company hearing last month."

  "Okay, so you can't tell me more than that, can you?"

  "You're writing the story on New Surge, babe. That is like the definition of conflict of interest."

  "I won't tell if you won't."

  "I really wonder why The Washington Scribe decided to hire you."

  "It's because I'm a household name, babe. You see me on CNN, you see me on MSNBC, I have a book deal. I have an audience. It's actually not that hard to see."

  "Well, you're definitely not an ethical journalist."

  "You know I'm kidding," I actually don’t know if he knows I'm kidding, but he knows about it. I couldn't imagine if he thought I didn't have integrity. That's the whole game when it comes to journalism.

  "Alright, well, I should be downtown in about fifty minutes. We're in a shared Lyft so it could take some time."

  "No worries. Just call me when you get here. I might go on a run or something."

  "Sounds good. Love you, babe."

  "Love you, too."

  Yes, yes, yes. Ben Casselwhite. Good old Ben Casselwhite. I don't want to go too much into it. But we met after Paige and I got home from our road trip. I contacted my former editor about the book idea, and he recommended me to an editor. You know how it goes. And if you don't, trust me. A lot of things in life are about who you know. You know?

  So once the book started to pick up steam -- I wrote the first draft while I was on the road, which made the editing a little easier -- I was brought on CNN to talk about it. Ben was there with Senator Joan Simmons of North Carolina, too. We met, we chatted, we got some dinner while we were both in D.C. And, yep, that's it. It's history since then.

  I set my phone down and chomp away on my food. I think about Ben and when I'll see him next. I briefly thought when we first started dating that he'd offer me a scoop or two. None of that panned out. Maybe one day. But not now. Our jobs are too closely intertwined.

  That's why I'm in D.C. I wanted to be closer with him, so I reached out to news organizations in the area for jobs. The Washington Scribe told me they had an opening for their tech reporter beat, and they wanted to test my skills before they put me on full-time. So I came in and promised to write a story about the tech hearings for the company New Surge, which owned a slew of different entertainment and media companies, but no one knew what they did with the data they collected. And apparently they had been swept up in a controversy beforehand too with the former tech reporter. I forget her name now. But she was so distraught by what happened, she quit the job.

  So, thank you, I guess.

  Anyway, now here I am, sitting in this cafe, grabbing lunch, preparing for a run. I really don't have much to complain about anymore. Just trying to live life as it comes.

  My phone buzzes against the table. I look up and see an unknown number calling me. Nope. I know better than to answer. Unknown numbers who call me are either serial killers, or people trying to prank or troll me. No way I'm reading that.

  I look away toward Portly Man. But there is no Portly Man. He's gone. His chair empty, his food gone. All the remains are specks of dust from the sandwich crust. Weird. I didn't even notice he left. I thought I would have seen his shadow move.

  I shrug and go back to eating. And that's when my phone buzzes again. Right after the previous call, another call comes my way. Two rings in a row? That's strange. It doesn't usually happen like that.

  I pick up the phone this time. Just to yell at the trolls on the other end. Sometimes a troll needs to be taught a lesson.

  "Look, tell me who you are, and this will all be over."

  "Annette?"

  The voice is easy to recognize. "Chase?"

  "Hey. You okay?"

  "Yeah, hey, it's been so long."

  "Yeah, sorry we haven't kept in touch. I've just been so busy with things."

  "Yeah, same here. Man, we haven't talked since like, man, like six months ago?"

  "Something like that, yeah. I saw you wrote a book. I personally loved the first story in it, but I thought the rest failed to live up to expectations."

  "And what expectations were those, ass?"

  "My own."

  "I love you."

  "You too. Hey, look, I just wanted to call and make sure you were doing okay."

  "Yeah. Why?"

  "Just some weird things going on back home. I saw some stuff on the news. No murders or anything. Just a lot of weird characters. South Hills Class of 2009 is about to have their reunion so, that's to be expected."

  "Yeah. I'm fine. I'm actually in Washington, D.C., right now."

  "No way!"

  "Yeah. I've been living here for about a month or so. Working as a freelancer."

  "Tell the government to open up."

  "I wish. It's a nightmare here when no one's working. But it's easier to buy lunch."

  "That's the spirit."

  A brief bit of silence arrives. The type of silence you have when you haven't talked to someone in awhile and you actually forget how to talk to them.

  "Well, look, just wanted to check in. Let me know if anything creeps up. We should talk more."

  "Yeah, we should. And I appreciate it. Love you, my buddy."

  "Love you too, my girl."

  And it's over -- just like that. I hang up and place my phone down on the table. I finish up my meal, thinking about Chase and everything we went through together all of those years ago. He was the one who helped me survive those murders. He helped me figure out who the killers were. He's been there at every turn.

  But he's also someone from my old world. I don't live that life anymore. I live my own life, in Washington, with Ben. This is who I am now.

  And I am damn proud of it.

  Chapter 2: The Run

  Runs always sound better when you're talking to someone else about them. You always want to go on a run when someone else is judging you.

  But when it comes to actually running, good luck. I could tell Ben one thousand times that I was going to go on a run. But I really don't want to. I probably should have went on my run before lunch. Now my stomach is full of a Cuban sandwich, stretching my belt to its limits. I'll probably get cramps if I start running now.

  I walk back to Ben's apartment. Well, I guess it's our apartment now. That's a little weird to say. I didn't really plan on moving in with him so soon. But it just made sense, you know? Moving to Washington can be a pain in the ass if you don't have any connections. Finding an apartment, choosing the right place -- it can all be such a hassle. So I was like, screw it, I'll just move in with Ben.

  I don't mind living with my boyfriend. It's not something I've ever done before. My only other ex-boyfriend was Jason, and he and I dated when we wer
e in high school. That's not to say I didn't date guys after Jason. But it's really hard to trust anyone -- let alone men -- after your ex-boyfriend is a psycho serial killer. And even before I learned about his checkered past, all the smell of blood and death didn't make me overly interested in dating people either.

  I check my phone on the way back to the apartment, scrolling across the screen, hoping that a text or call will come my way. I'm not sure who I want to message me. And I'm sure a lot of us don't care about that stuff anymore. We just want the text, the notification, the alert. We don't care where it comes from.

  Ben could be the first person to text me. But it could also be any number of sources, who want to spill the beans about what's to come once Congress meets again to talk about New Surge. I've heard some rumblings that there will be another hearing. I'm not sure what it'll be about. But New Surge and the government are somehow tied up.

  I don't know if I fully understand New Surge, which is terrible for a journalist covering the story. The company owns a number of media and entertainment companies. So that's cool news. But at the same time, they've been working with areas of the government to collect analytics and data.

  So the question came to my mind -- why is an entertainment and media company collecting data and analytics, and then separately working for the government? Is it all connected.

  That's probably the conspiracy theorist in me, or at least the dog-nosed journalist who's searching out a scoop.

  Hopefully I'll learn more about it when one of the dozens of sources I've reached out to calls me back. Seriously. Just one call could answer a lot of my questions. Just one. That's all I need.

  I head back to Ben's apartment after lunch and lazily hang around. I snap on the television and let CNN talking heads debate about the future of the government. I watch them for a minute, rolling my eyes every so often at the ridiculous hot takes they grill each other about.

  During a commercial break, I fall asleep to a commercial about some medication that'll make my life better. But be careful -- there are side effects beyond your control. Stomach bleeding, cancer, death, eyebrows falling off, Benjamin Button syndrome. So many problems. But the commercial bores me and puts me right to sleep.