As the Wicked Watch(110)

I don’t know where my courage was coming from. Maybe it felt good to be the one launching the surprise attack this time.

“You’re lying,” he said. “But I know one thing,” he said, taking a step closer, “you better keep my name out your mouth.”

“So you have a mole inside the police department?” I asked him.

Terrence was about to take another step toward me when my cell phone rang. I answered it immediately and held out my other palm in a “stop right there” pose.

“Hello?”

“Jordan, where are you? Are you okay?” It was Joey.

“No! I’m not okay,” I said, enunciating my words carefully. “I’m at Mad Cash Talent Management, next door to the Riviera on the second floor. Terrence Bankhead is in the room with me, and I feel threatened. You’re here? Good.”

“You need to go,” Terrence said. “Get out!”

I slipped past him and turned to face him while I was still on the phone with Joey. The creaky steps I had climbed moments earlier announced a new arrival. I held my breath and my heart pounced in my chest.

“Police!”

“In here!” I called out.

Terrence looked panicked. He scanned the room, but there was only one way out and I was standing in the way. He ran toward me, and I screamed and flung myself up against the wall to get out of his way.

“Police! Stop! Put your hands up!”

I heard a body drop to the floor. Terrence’s screams followed. The woman who’d greeted me came flying out of the studio in the back, flanked by the two girls. “Oh my God. Terry!”

She ran into the hallway. “Freeze!”

The next thing I heard was her body drop to the floor and more screams. Police used tasers to subdue them both.

“Angela!”

The girls tried to follow her.

“No! Don’t go out there!” I said, blocking the door so they wouldn’t suffer the same fate. “You’re gonna get hurt. Stay here and put your hands up.”

“We haven’t done anything!” one of the girls pleaded.

“It doesn’t matter! The police are here! Put your hands up and stay still!” I ordered them.

“Police!” said one of the officers who entered the office. “Up against the wall!”

I knew enough about police raids to know that whoever was in their line of sight was guilty until proven innocent. I thought about the cell phone I still held in my hand and dropped it to the floor. A Black woman had already been shot to death by police in this city in a similar situation.

“That’s my phone! I’m Jordan Manning with Channel 8! I called you! I called you!”

“Yeah, that’s her,” said one of the officers.

I reached down to pick up my phone.

“Jordan! Jordan! Talk to me!”

“Joey, I’m okay,” I said. “We got him!”





17




Without any evidence, in two days, Terrence Bankhead will be back on the street.

“Terrence has an alibi,” said Joey the morning after his arrest. “He couldn’t have killed Tania. He was out of town.”

“Yeah, but that doesn’t let him off the hook for Masey’s murder, and Brent could’ve killed Tania,” I said.

I would love to tell my attacker, “You thought you were taking me off the field, but not being on the air—no scripts, no deadlines, no live shots, no meetings with reporters—freed me up to block, tackle, and beat you before you could strike again.” Joey promised to pay Louise Robinson a surprise visit today to try and establish cause to win court approval to run a wiretap on her phones. I bookended his efforts by getting all the dirt I had on Terrence into the hands of Adele Constanzo, anonymously. All I needed was a burner phone and a Starbucks to hit send from, drop it in the trash bin, then out. She couldn’t know it was from me, but I made it detailed enough so that she would know the source was credible. Adele didn’t suffer fools gladly. Even if she knew it was me, she would never tell. Her heart was with the boys and whatever it took to free them.

If my instincts were correct, Adele would light the fire and spread allegations of police negligence to cast doubt on her clients’ guilt. But in the evidentiary world, her accusations would amount to conjecture. I needed something that would stick.

I forwarded April the lab results from my nail scrape the night of the attack with a note: “I have a favor to ask of Seth.”

April called seconds later.

“Can we meet today? I have something for you, but I have to give it to you in person,” I said.

“Is twelve o’clock good at our spot?” she asked.

“That’ll work, and invite Pamela, but ask her to meet us at twelve-thirty,” I said.

The coffee shop was packed, the worst time to be passing a bloodstained Band-Aid and a used condom in evidence bags across the table. April and I leaned in, nearly bumping heads as we tried to conceal the zip-top bags with our bodies.

“How soon do you need the results?”

“Yesterday,” I said.

“You want to see if there’s a match with your labs, I take it,” she said.

“Bingo! That’s why it’s so crucial that we track down the missing tissue sample from Dr. Chan.”