I needed to control the conversation. “Look,” I interjected. “I don’t know if there was something more going on here. Frankly, I don’t really want to know. I just want out of this thing. I need to get a handle on Andersen, I need to know that I can go to the police with what I’ve got and come away from this thing clean. You know? I’m not trying to be a hero here. I’ve got a life I’m trying to get back.”
Ed listened with an expression of disappointment. “Wait a minute, man. You’ve gotta check under every rock before you go public. You can’t just know half the story when you go to the cops because they’re certainly not going to do the legwork. I mean, they already convicted Steele once, if you’ve got half the evidence you say you’ve got it’ll be a slam dunk to convict him again, regardless of whether he’s really guilty. Shit. Did it ever occur to you that you’re not really in any danger? I mean, they don’t know what you know. They went through your place to see if they could find anything. They’re watching you to see if you do anything crazy or if you turn up any real evidence.”
“I hope that’s all it is. I mean, Andersen’s a rich lawyer, why would he get mixed up in something like this?”
“Exactly.” Ed was back to pointing again when he spoke.
“Well, shit, so what’d’ya think? What now?”
“Okay, look, what’s going to protect you is publicity. If everyone is paying attention to you, then these guys won’t risk anything, they’ll have to leave you alone. What we’ll do is double team them. I’ll write the story. I’ll take what you’ve got here and I’ll write it. I may not be able to make tomorrow’s paper, so you might have to hide out for a couple of days, just lay really low. But the morning the story comes out, you go straight to the police and hand them all the evidence. They’ll arrest Steele and the media frenzy will focus on you long enough to keep you safe while the cops haul Andersen and anyone else they can think of in for questioning. Trust me, whoever the goon is they’ve hired to follow you ain’t going to do a damned thing with that much attention on you — and especially not without orders from whoever the boss is.”
It sounded good to me.
“So look. To make that happen we’re both going to have to move quick. I have to take what you’ve got here,” he patted the file, “and go through it, check facts, put something together, and talk with the editor. You need to go out to that place in Topanga and see what’s there.”
“Whoa! Whoa! I’m not about to—”
“Don’t worry, man. No one’s following you right now. No one knows you’re here. I’ll drop you off at a rental car place, you rent some four door Chevy or something and cruise on up and check it out. No one knows she bought this place. It’s cool. Look, it’s the only thing we don’t know a damned thing about. Shit, the place probably isn’t even there. But we need to know. It’s gotta be checked before we go to the press. I’m not gonna have time to go out there.”
Ed was the first one who’d made any sense in quite awhile. I took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and shook my head. “Alright, if we gotta do it, we gotta do it. You’re right, no one knows I’m here. I’ll just run up there and then lay low.”
Ed smiled. His eyes were wide and bright. His curly hair stuck out like a fluffy halo around his head. I could see his excitement, it radiated from him. It was at that moment that I realized I’d just handed a hard-working young reporter his first huge story.
Ten minutes later, Ed dropped me off at Hertz so I could rent an appropriate car. I lingered by the open door as I got out of his car.
“Okay, man. Sneak on up to that place in Topanga and let me know if you find anything. I’ll be shocked if there’s anything there at all. Call me as soon as you get back, leave me a detailed message if I’m not there. We gotta move quickly if we’re gonna get this story out in the next day or two.”