Fire Within - By Ally Shields Page 0,54
his actions on the earlier press accounts? Or was this personal? Andreas must have enemies.”
“Good questions, but I don’t have the answers yet. Give it a rest, Eddie. Take off your reporter hat, and tell me how you’re doing. And how Lorraine’s doing.”
“Oh, well, it’s amazing how sweet life can look after being locked up for days.” He laughed, the sound a little forced. “And my sister? She’s getting by. I still don’t understand how my gentle sister could fall in love with a vampire, but I’m trying to be supportive. Mother’s no help, not now that Lorraine knows how much she hated Jules. But don’t try to change the subject. How’s this trouble at Shale’s agency fit it with the murders? Or does it?”
“What trouble do you mean?” she asked cautiously.
“You haven’t heard? Saw it coming to work. Somebody spray painted their building in big red letters, HOUSE OF MONSTERS.”
* * *
When she arrived at Shale & Associates, Ryan and Shale were locked in a heated conversation and most of the paint had been removed. Ari saw the upper tips of the H and M. The two-man crew stood by their ladders and cleaning supplies, waiting for the outcome of the men’s dispute. Ari joined the discussion in time to hear Shale say it was nothing more than racial graffiti. He’d called his insurance carrier, and they’d told him to take pictures and clean it up. He hadn’t thought to tell the police. Ryan was steamed. He’d heard about the vandalism when TV Channel 12 called for a statement. He stalked off in disgust, and Ari returned to work. There was nothing left to see, but Channel 12 could expect a warrant for their film.
The incident warranted only a 30-second spot on the evening news, but the next morning The Clarion broke the expanded story on page one. Local Agency Dubbed HOUSE OF MONSTERS. It wasn’t the main headline, but the drama was bound to capture community attention. Ari worried about public reaction. The article stopped short of stating Riverdale had a serial killer or rogue vampire hunter, but it laid out, and by inference connected, the four incidents: the murders, the drive-by, and the vandalism. Ari wanted to strangle Eddie. As promised, he hadn’t printed anything that wasn’t public information, but she doubted Ryan would find any comfort in that. She found very little herself.
* * *
After reading the article, she checked her overnight phone messages and found a long message from Ryan about irresponsible reporters and keeping them in jail where they belonged. Despite the seriousness of the situation, Ari suppressed a chuckle. Ryan’s second message, left ten minutes after the first, said, “Never mind. I’ve had my coffee now,” and she laughed out loud.
By 10:15 that night, however, none of them were laughing. The three local TV channels led the news with the vampire story, including interviews with many of the witnesses. Cameras spotlighted the parking lot at the Woodland Inn, the shelter in Goshen Park, even the exterior of Club Dintero. Channel 12 ended their piece with a display of the spray-painted agency in full living color. The clear message in every report was Riverdale had a serial killer eliminating vampires.
Late into the night and early the next morning, Ari’s phone rang several times. Ryan was called to the station, and the public was in full outcry. She had called Eddie right away, and when she quit berating him for an instant, he denied sharing information with anyone.
“Look at my article,” he said. “Do you see the names in there? Do you think I want them hounding my sister?” He’d been indignant that Ari’d thought he would even consider leaking the details. “My story was scooped.”
When Ryan reached the news desk at Channel 12, the station that filmed most of the witnesses, he was told they’d received an anonymous email detailing the crime scenes and listing names or possible locations of witnesses. Realizing this information could only have come from a few sources, including the killer, the PD tech department jumped on the task of backtracking the email through cyberspace. Ari and Ryan weren’t optimistic they’d find the killer this way. He’d been too careful in everything else.
“If this was our suspect,” Ryan asked, in a late afternoon phone call with Ari, “why the sudden craving for publicity? Why now? What’s he want?”
“Could be a psycho who’s escalating,” she said. “Wants the world to know how smart he is. I wasn’t convinced the vandalism was