Air Time by Hank Phillippi Ryan Read Free Book Online

plan. Shower. Clean clothes. My second-best jeans, high-heeled black boots, a black cashmerev-neck with a lacy come-hither camisole underneath. Grab a power bar. Sneak past Botox. And then, I’m going to Josh. After all. This morning I made a vow.
     
     
    Just as I have my hand on the doorknob, finally headed for some potentially life-altering answers and a memory-making night, the phone rings.
    Answer it . It might be Josh. The phone rings again.
    Don’t answer it . It’s undoubtedly a telemarketer. It rings again. I can’t stand it. And I can’t resist.
    Rule one in journalism, every phone call might bring a good story. Rule two, it most likely won’t. Rule three, if you don’t answer the phone, refer to rule one. Another ring. I dash to the kitchen and grab the receiver from the red wall-mounted phone.
    “McNally. I mean, hello,” I say. But I’m too late. My voice mail has started. I hear my recorded self saying “We’re not here to take your call right now…” Now the machine and I are both talking, in a double-talk babble that must be annoyingly confusing to whoever is on the other end. “Sorry, hang on,” I say, raising my real voice to compete with my recorded voice. “The message will be over in a second.”
    When there’s just one of me, I continue. “Hello?”
    “Charlie McNally, from Channel 3 News?”
    The voice is low. Almost gruff. And unfamiliar. Which is strange, because I’m obsessive about keeping my home phone number private.
    “May I ask who’s calling?” I say. Don’t need to confirm who I am.
    “You think you’re on to something, don’t you, hotshot? You and your hotshot buddy.” The voice continues. There’s a sound in the background, like a clicking? But I can’t place it. “I’m going to warn you just once,hotshot. Knock it off. We saw you at the airport. Got me? And that’s not all we know about you.”
    Clutching the phone, I look out my third-floor window, through the birch tree leaves and past the glare of the streetlight to the well-tended square of garden and sidewalk below. Scanning. Searching. Nothing.
    I have to be smart. Keep whoever it is on the line. I can call 911 from my cell phone. If I can keep this guy talking, the police could trace the call.
    I guess.
    “Who is this? What do you want?” I ask. I try to sound afraid, which isn’t actually that difficult, but I figure my “weakness” could convince whoever it is to keep threatening me. And buy me some time. Problem is, the tote bag with my cell is in the other room, still parked by the front door.
    Of course I’m on my landline. Stretching the curly cord around the corner, pulling it to the limit, and then stretching out one arm as far as I possibly can…I still can’t get to my bag. “Just tell me what you want,” I say. My voice is as taut as the phone cord.
    “You know exactly what we want,” the voice says. It’s muffled and raspy, but definitely a man. And there’s that sound again. “We want you and your hotshot pals to stay away from our business.”
    I stretch one leg backward toward the bag, manage to hook the heel of one boot around the loop of a handle, and drag the black canvas across the sisal rug toward me. Got it. Tucking the kitchen phone under my chin, I dig through the bag for my cell. Got it. I check the window. Now a dark-colored car is pulling up. My eyes widen, contemplating who that might be. And why they’re here. I flatten myself against the pinstriped wallpaper, away from the window, out of sight.
    “I’m so sorry, I just don’t understand,” I say. Suddenly I can’t hold back the genuine tremor in my voice. Then I frown at myself, regrouping. This is just some jerk. I’ve handled worse. And I have a plan. Just keep this guy talking. “Your business? What’s that, exactly?”
    I get the cell open. Smash the green on button. Finally, finally, I hear tim-tee-tum of the power up music. And so does he.
    “Smart,” he says. “Cell phone.” And the line