If It Bleeds (2 page)

She raised one eyebrow but didn't say anything for a moment. “Hmmmm,” she said finally. And then again. “Hmmmm.”

“What?” I said, trying to be brave. “I haven't met him. So?”

“His uncle is a friend of mine,” she said. “I promised we'd cover his opening.”

I stopped myself from asking her what she'd been thinking. After all, she's not my boss. In the newspaper business, the sales department is equal to editorial, not above it. She really had no business even talking to me. She wouldn't, that is, if I was a real reporter, I reminded myself. I'd discovered that the society beat fit somewhere else. I wasn't sure exactly where. But it was clearly below both regular beat reporter and the sales department.

I didn't fool myself. When it came to being a reporter, I was as low as anyone could go and still carry a press pass. I was twenty-seven, not that many years out of journalism school. I had a union job. A lot of my friends were still covering school-board meetings and minor hockey for small papers in small towns. That was
when
they'd been able to find a job.

Even when the news industry is at its best, it's tough to find a job. This wasn't one of those times. I'd been at the right place at the right time and had ended up with my own beat on the largest metro daily west of Toronto. The fact that my beat was easy enough that Bryce the mail guy could have done it was something I tried not to think about. But it was the truth.

There's a rhythm to my job. When someone plans a public event for some company or organization, they hope the news agencies will send a reporter. If they hope it's someone from the
Vancouver Post,
I get sent. I arrive in party clothes with a high-end digital camera so small it fits in my purse.

When the publicist sees me, she puts a drink in my hand. Then she spends way too much energy trying to make sure I have a good time. But I'm not there for a good time, even if I'm partly there for the snacks. These are not my friends and coworkers. I'm doing my job.

Every event, I try to make sure I get at least one good boob shot. This was not my idea. My predecessor was an old guy. Like a lot of people at our newspaper, he was carried out of the building in a box. Union newspaper jobs are hard to find. No one leaves unless they have to.

It's not like the States, where the next metro daily is just across the street. In Canada, you can count the big papers on both hands. Maybe add in the toes on one foot if you're not too picky.

So the old guy before me blazed the trail. He let the publishing team know that breasts sell newspapers. My column always has to have breasts. Since I tend to cover evening events, they are usually in good supply. Plus, the society women have worked out the whole boobie angle and wave them in my face as soon as I walk in the door. Sometimes it makes me wish I was a guy or a lesbian. All those barely covered boobs are wasted on me. But I know the people reading the paper want to see them, so I get them into as many photos as I can.

It's not just boobs that make my column. I always get at least one handsome-couple shot. He'll have a strong jaw. She'll have a heart-shaped face. Both of them will have teeth whiter than the paper the picture gets printed on. Of course, any famous people who are there make the cut. People like to see the celebs as much as they apparently need to see boobs.

Some nights, I only have one event to attend. Most of the time, I'm running around town getting to all the events on my list. After my stops have been made and the photos taken, I go home or back to the office and choose which photos will run. Then I write all my clever captions and, if there's room, a witty couple of column inches on each event.

The stars were out tonight! Theater under the
stars, that is. Or, at least, anyone who's anyone
who works with them. Martinis flowed while
maidens delivered angels on horseback. This
reporter thought that was an entirely appropriate
touch, considering that the first production
of the season will be a musical version of
Equus.
Elsa Bergermeister glowed in a gown
by Vancouver's own Catherine Bert while her
daughters, Sara-belle and Jenna-belle, wore
Stella McCartney designs selected from the
current collection.

And other stuff like that. None of it high art. None of it what I trained for. None of it doing anything beyond scratching the well-dressed surface.

But then, who trains for this? Does anyone go to journalism school and say, “When I graduate, I want to be the chick who goes to parties and writes about everyone”? Everyone wants to report crime or war, which, these days, is almost the same. When you study journalism, you want to tame the mean streets. You want to solve the city's problems. To be like a cop with a keyboard and smartphone instead of a gun.

Then life happens. I was lucky. I wanted a byline in the first section. Sure I did. But not enough to kill for it.

Then a dead guy almost fell into my lap. And everything changed.

THREE

I
stood there for half a minute, looking at the corpse in Steve Marsh's Audi. Looking at the person that had
been
Steve Marsh until not so long before.

I stood there while I thought about what to do. And then I knew.

I pulled out my phone and looked at the crack zombies still shuffling my way. “Dead guy here,” I said in a loud, clear voice. “The cops are on their way.”

My words had the desired garlic-like effect, the way the mention of police always does with street people. They scattered. It would have been funny had I not been so scared. And I
was
scared. As much as I'd ever been.

I could have run into the gallery and gotten help. I
wanted
to. But part of me recognized that bad as this was, it might also be a chance. I dialed Mike Webb, the city editor. I hoped he'd know who I was.

“Mike, this is Nicole Charles. You might not know me, but we met at the Christmas party last year and…”

“Christ, Nic. Sure I know you. Everyone in the city knows you.”

I'd forgotten that my picture ran with my column every day. Plus sometimes I ended up in the photos I was supposed to be taking. The third wheel in the handsome-couple shot, for instance. Or standing next to a celebrity at some fundraiser. A local quasi celebrity, a face and name familiar to everyone who read the paper, even if they were never quite sure
why
my mug was known.

“I've got a…I've got a situation here, Mike.”

“Where's here?”

“Gallery opening. Downtown Eastside. The artist is dead. I found him. In his car. In the alley.”

“Christ,” Mike said again, but I could hear him thinking. “So you're on Skid Row with a dead guy. Who else knows?”

“That's why I called. No one knows, Mike. Not yet. I just found him. Like I said, in his car.”

“Natural causes?”

I looked at the tool sticking out of Marsh's neck. “I don't think so.”

“Okay, let me think. I'll send someone down, but I don't know who's available… maybe Cross, or Hartigan might be around…” I imagined Webb with a chart or computer file, looking for a reporter he could send over.

“That's just it, Mike. I want to cover it.”

“I don't know, Nicole…”

“I can do this,” I said. “And I'm already here. But I think you should send a photographer. The kind of pictures I take are… well, they're not the same as this.”

He kind of laughed, but it wasn't a funny sound. “I get your point. Okay. I'll see what I can do, but you better take what you can, Nicole. Case like this, your next call had better be the cops. I don't imagine they'd want us to camp on a body.”

“That's really the reason I called. I wasn't sure if there were rules…”

“Rules? When a reporter finds a stiff ? That's not in the book, Nic. We're never there
before
the news happens. Just take the pictures and make the call. Then get back here and we'll get you going on the story.”

I knew it wasn't right to smile over a dead man's body, but I couldn't help it. And me not getting the story wouldn't make Steve Marsh any less dead.

So I did what I thought needed to be done. I didn't touch anything, just used my little digital camera to photograph Marsh from a couple of different angles. I did it from outside the car, through the front and side windows. I even zoomed in on the tool sticking out of his neck. Reasoning that no one wants to run a corpse shot on page one, I backed up a few feet and took a picture of the car, Marsh's head just a shadow on the driver's side. And
then
I called 9-1-1.

“I've found a dead man in a car in an alley off Carrall Street.”

“Are you sure the man is dead, miss?”

“Quite sure. There is a tool sticking out of his neck.”

At the question, I had a sudden doubt and looked back at Marsh. And the doubt was gone.

“Quite sure,” I repeated.

There was more. I don't remember the details. I know I gave the address and said I'd stand by, and it seemed as though moments later, the scream of sirens filled the air. Multiple sirens, which surprised me. But then, maybe they didn't get dead bodies called in every day.

The cop behind the wheel of the cruiser had her dark hair pulled back under her hat. Her smile was reassuring and genuine. I figured her to be someone's mom. Her partner was a couple of years younger than me and looked pretty green.

An ambulance and a fire truck arrived at pretty much the same time, but it was clear this was going to be the cops' show.

The woman said she was Sergeant Itani. Her partner was Constable Vickers.

“You found the body? Called it in?”

I just nodded. For once, at a loss for words.

She checked the scene calmly. Marsh was dead. That was easy to see. But I didn't say anything. Itani looked like she knew her job.

“Yup,” she said quickly. “Dead.” And then to Vickers, “Tell the ambulance. Let them do their stuff.”

By now, the alley was more crowded. The meth zombies had moved on, but people from the gallery were beginning to come out to see why the cops were there. Some of them still held drinks. A few lit cigarettes as soon as their lungs hit the night air.

I ignored them all. I was focusing hard on keeping emotional distance from the whole thing. I knew I'd need that if I wanted to cover the artist's death. Reporters aren't meant to be part of the story. And I was aware of that, even while I gave Itani a brief statement. After all, I didn't really know anything.

It wasn't much of a statement. I'd left the gallery at about 9:30, looking for Marsh in order to take his photo for the paper. No, I'd never met him. Yes, I knew what he looked like and I'd been told what he drove. I'd spotted his car up the alley, had gone to it, seen him inside looking none too healthy and called 9-1-1.

It didn't take five minutes. And it was the truth. But somehow it didn't cover it.

The silence I'd felt in the alley, the sense of waiting and—yes—of beauty.

The look of the hair on the back of Marsh's neck.

The smell that had come out of the car with him. Blood. And dying.

The fear I'd had of letting him slide to the ground. It had been as though I needed to keep him in his car at any cost.

And, finally, realizing that someone I had once shared air with did no longer.

I knew that this night had held things I'd always remember. None of that made it into the police report. And I knew none would be in the paper.

It didn't have a place.

FOUR

W
hile I gave my statement, the ambulance guys tried to resuscitate Marsh. I could have told them he was beyond resuscitation, but they didn't ask me.

Once Marsh had been officially pronounced dead, Itani seemed to gather her troops. Constable Vickers trailed behind like a puppy.

I stood in the alley, alone and forgotten for the moment.

I took a deep breath. I knew a page-one story might never drop into my lap again. There were steps I needed to take to ensure I got what I needed to write a kickass piece on Steve Marsh's death. I knew that I
knew
what those things were. I am a trained journalist, after all. But now, faced with doing it, it was like I knew nothing at all. I thought about the things I'd learned in school and just drew a scary blank.

I put my hand on the cooling hood of a car that was parked in the alley and stood there, trying to clear my mind. Just as I felt myself begin to relax, I heard my name.

“Nicole.” A man's voice. I felt my heart sink when I recognized it.

“Hey, Brent. What are you doing here?” I already knew the answer. Brent Hartigan didn't go anywhere if he wasn't on a story. But if he was here, it meant he was working on
my
story. And
that
meant it wasn't really my story. At least, not all of it. Not anymore.

Another thing about Brent Hartigan: he is beautiful. He looks like an actor playing a hotshot young reporter on a television show where everyone is attractive.

Everything about Brent Hartigan's appearance is classical. His nose is aquiline, his cheekbones are high, his pale blue eyes are exotic. If that weren't enough, he is also tall and broad-shouldered, with the careless look of someone who doesn't have to work very hard to stay in shape.

Right now, Brent's beautiful face looked gently amused at my question. “Webb sent me to help,” he said.

Alone, the words were fine. But Brent Hartigan was no boy scout. I knew he'd be no help to me.

I didn't know Brent well. But newsroom stories about him were legendary. The only person Brent ever helped was himself. If I'd doubted those stories before, I didn't now. He really was a hell of a reporter, that much was true. I'd read his stuff. He was good. But he was looking at me the way a cat looks at a piece of lettuce. I wasn't even interesting. And I could see that whatever dreams I had of being a reporter, they weren't shared by Brent.