Do You Promise Not to Tell? (6 page)

Farrell had known it was coming. Why, she wondered, did she feel the wind knocked out of her when it actually happened? A blow to the solar plexus. She inhaled deeply, but she’d be damned if she would cry. She dug her nails into her thigh.

“Don’t you think you should base such an important decision on fact rather than instinct?”

Farrell thought she detected a tinge of admiration in Bullock’s eyes. He seemed to consider her question.

“You’re right. True, your work is basically solid. There hasn’t been a story I can point to and say, ‘See, Farrell screwed up. She made mistakes, she left out
something important.’ But you haven’t been aggressive, either. I don’t see you going after stories, pursuing them vigorously. You don’t seem sold on your own work. Case in point, the Fabergé auction.”

“Hey, I told you we should do that story,” Farrell protested.

“Barely. You expressed no enthusiasm or commitment, no hunger. You could have sold me on it and you didn’t. In fact, sometimes I sense you’re almost relieved not to have to do a piece.”

Farrell snapped. “If there’s any truth in that, it’s only because I know that you won’t go for anything involving me. The cards are stacked against me in the first place.”

Range opened his mouth to say something, but stopped. He rose and walked back behind his desk.

“Well, then, perhaps we should write it off to bad chemistry,” he said coolly. “And that is a good enough reason for me. The
Evening Headlines
producers are part of a very well-trained, exclusive team. We have to play well together, anticipate and understand each other.”

“So. . ..” She trailed off. She was going to make him say it.

“Your contract expires in six weeks. It won’t be renewed. You better start looking for another job.”

Farrell skulked back to her office, Range’s dictum pounding in her head. In a funny way, she was relieved. At least it was out on the table.

What was she going to do now? She should start making some phone calls right away, start sniffing
around to see what was out there. She had connections at the other networks.

What was she going to answer when asked why she was leaving KEY News? She could say that after working at the network for fifteen years, she’d wanted to try someplace new, start something fresh, didn’t want to get stale. They might buy that.

Or she could just tell the truth. She hadn’t gotten along with her executive producer. Just about everyone in the industry had, at one time or another, an executive producer he clashed with. Personality conflicts were de rigueur in the television news business.

She supposed she might as well go with the truth. Whoever might interview her at the new place could easily pick up the phone and call Range. No point in lying when they would just find out the truth anyway.

Ugh. Looking for a job. The worst. Farrell marveled that some people actually liked it, enjoyed the search, the challenge of the hunt for better employment. She despised it.

But that could be symptomatic of the bigger problem. She hated to admit to herself that Range could have a point. Maybe she
wasn’t
hungry enough. Why hadn’t she insisted more strenuously about the Fabergé story?

The hallway leading to her office was deserted. She prayed that her office would be empty as well. The last thing she wanted to deal with now was Dean Cohen.

No such luck.

Dean was putting on his coat to go home.

If only she’d been a minute later, she’d have missed him entirely.

Don’t look upset
, she commanded herself.

“Everything okay?” Dean looked concerned.

Was he sincere? Maybe. But she didn’t want to go into it with him.

“Yup. Everything’s fine. Just fine.”

Sticky. That much blood was sticky. Despite the rubber gloves, despite the slicker and galoshes, despite the goggles and the cap, Misha’s blood found a way to ooze through the plastic, the plasma tacky and thick.

How did those guys in the meatpacking industry do it? Perhaps if you did it enough, it got easier, maybe you got used to it—hacking and sawing your way through skin and muscle, sinew and bones.

And the sound. That was the worst part of all. Joints snapped and popped. Bones broke with a sickening crack. And the saw droned steadily, back and forth, back and forth.

Piece by piece, section by section, Misha went into black heavy-plastic garbage bags. The body was dumped in a local landfill. The head was thrown into the Hudson River along with the fingertips, food for the fish newly returned to the cleaned-up waterway. All part of the plan.

It was filthy work, and exhausting. Funny how a human being could sleep so well after so gruesome an experience. It was the sleep of the deadly . . . and the desperate—

What an idiot! In the haste of disposing of Misha, one loose end had been left dangling. The design plans—they were still out there in Little Odessa.

The bony fingers of Nadine Paradise rubbed the milky enamel crescent she’d bought at the Churchill’s auction. Her eyes, eyes that had watched vigilantly for nearly eight decades, appreciatively took in every detail of the work of art that was meant to be worn.

Life was strange. After eight decades on this earth, she knew this. That she should now own both halves of the brooch, proved it.

There were some things she should cut back on, but the purchase of this pin was a necessity, not a luxury.

Nadine sighed and sat back in the comfortably worn, green velvet armchair, her old eyes falling on the silver-framed black-and-white picture sitting on the mahogany table beside her. A young ballerina in a feathered headpiece was caught in midair in one of a series of whipping turns from
Swan Lake
. Nadine remembered with pleasure that the most famous ballet critic of the time had called her dancing both “astonishing” and “frightening.”

The former prima ballerina closed her eyes, remembering how she and her mother had painstakingly inspected the stage to choose the exact spot at which Nadine would perform those notoriously difficult turns known as pirouettes. They prayed over the spot. Nadine’s pirouettes never faltered.

Mother. Nadine’s fiercest partisan and sternest critic. What a life she’d led. Raising a child alone in Paris after the Revolution, struggling to find a way to let her dark-haired Nadine study the dance.

Over the years, mother had accompanied daughter as she toured the world. Acting as dresser, laundress, cook, and chaperone, Mother had loved to play poker, believed in fortune-telling, faith-healing and, most of all, in Nadine.

“I didn’t disappoint you, Mother.” Nadine murmured the words aloud. It was a distinguished career. Dancing first with the Ballet Russe, followed by the American Ballet Theater for Balanchine, then dancing and acting in several motion pictures, and then, in an ironic turn of events, marriage to a man who had brought her back to Russia as the wife of a diplomat.

She’d been unable to have children of her own. But they’d adopted a beautiful Russian child. Victor. She wished her grown son was as smart as he was good-looking.

Nadine’s had been an interesting life, and though she was all too aware that she was in its final act, she felt an excitement as she held both halves of the crescent brooch. It had been a long time since she’d felt this way.

Life, even at this stage, continued to surprise. There was satisfaction in the knowledge that things eventually did come around, if one waited long enough.

Nadine knew who had owned the jeweled pin and believed the possessor to be long dead. But perhaps he wasn’t. Perhaps her father was still alive!

No, that couldn’t be. Her father would be over a hundred years old.

She rose from her chair and walked to the antique walnut secretary. Opening the paneled doors at the top, she felt beneath the shelf for the button. Pushing it, a small concealed drawer on the side of the secretary slid open. Nadine felt among the contents and gingerly lifted a small packet of letters, yellowed and flaking with age.

Yet again, she began to read the fading Cyrillic script.

My darling Nadjia
. . .

The days pass—slowly, achingly, and I long for you, my dearest one
.

Why did you go? How could you leave me
?

And yet I know the answer. St. Petersburg is a bitter, living hell and you were right to get out when you had the chance
.

Oh, my Nadjia, how I wish we were together. And how I pray we will be reunited someday
.

Until then, my darling, wear this pin. . .. I designed and executed it myself. . .. A big, round moon . . . of enamel and sapphires. Each month, when the moon is full, look up at the vast dark sky and wish upon it. Hope and wish and pray that we will soon be together again
.

Know, Nadjia, that I will be here in Russia . . . looking up, too. I have another pin, a companion piece to yours. Mine is the moon, too, but in its crescent phase. And I will be wishing on the slivered moon
.

Between us, the moon is ours, in its waxing and its waning. And when we are together again, we will slip the moons together, a masterpiece to behold
.

My love to you for all eternity
,
‘
V
.’

Nadine removed the round enamel-and-sapphire pin she had worn almost every day since her mother Nadjia had died. As she lay dying, mother had given daughter the round pin as she whispered the story of her true love, Nadine’s father. She had passed away before telling her daughter her father’s name.

Now, as she fitted the round moon to her newly acquired crescent, Nadine trembled as she realized that the two pieces did indeed create a masterpiece.

The round, full moon, joined to its crescent, together formed an oval—a miniature Moon Egg.

Maybe she should think about a whole new career. Flipping hamburgers at McDonald’s looked real good right now. You worked your shift and went home. No mind games.

Farrell stood in the tiny galley kitchen of her West Side apartment and twisted the can opener.

“C’mon, Walter. Here, Jane.” She put two small ceramic bowls on the floor, one red and one blue. In true anchor style, Walter Cronkat and Jane Pawley didn’t share. The cats each demanded, and got, their own.

Four years at Sarah Lawrence, graduating at the top of her class, fifteen years at KEY News, the pinnacle of broadcast journalism, multiple Emmys, and hundreds of thousands of miles logged covering fascinating stories, and now
this
.

What do I have to show for all of it?
she asked herself, glancing at the awards collecting dust on the crowded bookcase.

Her personal life was empty.

She thought of Rick and wondered what might have been. What if she had followed him to Atlanta when he had taken the job with CNN? At the time, they had thought a long-distance relationship could work out. How naive they had been.

Now Rick was married to someone else, with a
second baby on the way. And Farrell doubted she would ever have a child.

Thursday night, and the March weekend loomed gray and long. Farrell’s mind was reeling. The thought of looking for another job depressed her—big time. Nor did she want to dwell on Range’s words—or worse, consider that he might be right. Maybe she
wasn’t
aggressive enough, hadn’t gotten psyched enough about her stories. She had to admit that sometimes she found herself just going through the motions at work. And that wasn’t good enough.

Procrastination was always an option. She didn’t want to spend the weekend analyzing herself and thinking about her uncertain future. She could call Robbie. But the idea held little solace for her. In the sibling relationship they had, Farrell, as the older of the two, was the comforter. She did not think going to Robbie would make her feel better. She would feel guilty leaning on him when, in her opinion, he could barely take care of himself.

Farrell wanted to get away. She should get out of the city. A change of scenery, that’s what she needed. But where?

Someplace close by, but a world away from KEY News.

Olga lit a fresh white candle beneath the icon of the Virgin and Child that hung in the
krasny ugol
, the beautiful corner of her tiny living room. She closed her eyes and prayed, as she always did.

“Holy Mother, forgive us. Holy Mother, protect us. Holy Mother, pray for us.”

The frail old woman reached up to smooth the linen stole that draped the gold-rimmed icon. It was a white scarf on which, so many years ago, she had carefully stitched tiny birds, flowers, and trees with bright red threads. Then, she had been a young girl with good eyes. That was before she had escaped from Russia; before she made it to America.

The embroidery was one of the few things she’d been able to take with her. She’d used it to wrap up the exquisite pieces of Fabergé.