“I’ll be honest, sweetie. At first I thought your uncle had smoked something funny but then he reminded me of a48 Hoursepisode where a civilian cracked the case using just this item. I don’t know, Liv, I worry about your safety but you do have more access than anyone else and I think we all suspect Matthew most of all, right?”
“As of now, yes,” said Olivia. Her temple was starting to throb.
“We’ll leave it up to you. As Jim said, the pen is here if you want to use it. We actually both stayed up so late talking about this that we called in sick today so we’re home. We needed the rest anyway after the whirlwind few days we’ve had. So if you want to look at it or play around with it, you can come over before your internship starts today.”
“Let me think on this,” said Olivia. “It’s quite the idea, Uncle Jim. I just need time to digest it all.”
They hung up and Olivia let out a low whistle. Her uncle and aunt were encouraging her to plant a spy device in the weather office to try and record and potentially frame the weekend meteorologist. And she was just an intern in her second week. It was bananas. The whole world had gone upside down. She curled into a ball and pulled the covers over her head. Part of her wanted to call in sick too, to hide under these blankets all day.
She could feel Gizmo walking up the blanket, and he let out a soft meow. She pulled her head out and said, “Giz… what would you do if you were me?”
He nuzzled his head into her hair. She reached out to pet him and he started to purr.
Olivia lay there for a good ten minutes stroking Gizmo and listening to his deep motor noise. The very sound of him soothed her. She had read that a cat’s purr was known to lower blood pressure, and she felt it doing it for her. Her mind started to slowly rake back and forth over people and possible scenarios. She thought of Faith. She thought of her mom and wished she had her advice. She thought of Carol and Jim, of Laura the executive producer, of Steve the weirdo, of this mystery woman Kelly. She thought of her career just starting and what would happen to it if she were caught spying on someone, but also what would happen if she turned in a killer and was a hero.
After ten minutes, one thought was dominating all others. There was a saying, “Well-behaved women seldom make history.” She couldn’t just sit by and be well-behaved when a person had been murdered.
The rascal side of her started to rise and the scared part was falling. She had to plant that pen. And she knew it wouldn’t bethat hard either. Faith’s desk had a cup full of pens sitting on it. Olivia could wait until Matthew was on dinner break that night and then wander into the closed-door office unseen and slip the pen in. Whether or not it would yield something on the video was unknown but she would do her part. And no one would ever figure that it was her. Even if someone found the pen they’d likely think Faith had planted it before her death.
She remembered reading about the civil rights activist John Lewis in a class the previous semester. His famous quote stuck with her: “Get in good trouble.” She was ready to do so.
Grabbing her phone, she texted her aunt and uncle back.
I’ll be over in an hour to pick up the pen
CHAPTER THIRTY
Olivia
June 5
Matthew was taking longer dinner breaks, so Olivia knew she had time to get into the weather office and be alone while he was out. Plus, if he returned and saw her there, she could fake that she had a question about something, something stupid that an intern wouldn’t know.
She watched him walk through the newsroom after the 6:30 show, heading to the parking lot. Waiting until many others had also left for dinner, she took her time casually strolling toward the weather office so she would look completely normal. The door was unlocked. She slipped in.
The first order of business was to plant the hidden-cam pen. That was easy. Every meteorologist had a cup full of pens on their desk. She walked to Faith’s and slipped in the pen, turning it on and rotating it so the lens would be facing out toward the main area. She checked the app on her phone to make sure it was working.
Standing at Faith’s desk she scanned the items strewn across and under it for a quick moment. Who would come and packall of this up? Probably HR. They’d send it to Faith’s family, she figured. Olivia felt a tiny sting of tears in her eyes. It was so unnerving to be looking at a desk preserved in time. Faith had gone out for dinner and never returned and her desk was still there but Faith wasn’t. Olivia had a hard time making her brain believe it all.
Before she could even help herself, her fingers traveled to the drawers of the desk and she gently pulled each one open. She just wanted to feel Faith’s life for a moment, be a little closer to her. Several drawers were jammed with all kinds of office supplies and quickie junk food, but one had newspaper clippings and magazines with articles about Faith or pictures of her.
THE EARRING QUEENsaid one headline.
THE BEST OF DETROIT…screamed another.
CHANNEL 9 ON CLOUD 9 WITH RICHARDS BOOSTING RATINGSread a third.
Olivia lifted them out and glanced over them. She was about to put everything away when her eyes spotted what looked like a leather journal under it all. Gently, she extracted it from the drawer, cocking her head and listening carefully to make sure she didn’t hear any sign of Matthew returning. She was ready to stuff everything back and act natural if she did. It was all silent in the hallway.
Flipping the journal open, she saw pages of writing in the same cursive script she recognized from Faith signing the autograph for Aunt Carol. Olivia couldn’t help herself. She started to read. It was almost like a diary format but not with dates, just with random musings.
Today has been excruciating, the anniversary of Charity’s death. Thirty years later and I can’t get over that I let go of her hand, that I turned my little eight-year-old attention away. Dad told Hope thathe trusted me. I had to take two sleeping pills last night to try and sleep and I’m so groggy today I can barely go on air. Charity, sweet Charity. My little sister. I can’t forgive myself. Can you forgive me wherever you are? I was only a kid, I didn’t know what I was doing. I have lived with this pain in my heart every day since. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I would trade places with you in an instant.
Olivia kept reading. There were more entries like that, all talking about a little sister and something that happened at a Lake Michigan beach all those years ago. It was obvious how painful this was for Faith, and that pain caused Olivia to feel a heaviness settle into her own chest. Wow. This was a side of Faith she would never have guessed about. Knowing this about one of the most popular talents in the entire city was a very weird feeling. Olivia wondered if others also had a clue. It made Faith actually human, it made her a sad and regretful person dealing with demons, not just a happy face on the news.
Glancing at her watch, Olivia saw that she had better wrap it up to be sure she wasn’t caught by Matthew. She replaced the journal and everything else in the drawer, closed it, double-checked the pen, and left the office. She needn’t have worried. Matthew didn’t return for another forty-five minutes. When he did, Olivia glared at his back after he passed her in the newsroom. Knowing this new information about Faith made her that much more likable, and him more of a target than ever. If he did something to Faith, Olivia was going to help convict him. She would check the hidden-cam pen app that night and every night to see if she could find anything.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
