Sally Harrington, former newspaper journalist now anchoring
a newscast for DBS, seems to have everything; a great
career, lots of money and a satisfying sex life with Paul
Fitzwilliam, the handsome police officer who followed her
from California. What seem to be the ingredients for a
perfect life do not factor in the sudden death of a
millionaire playboy who faced financial ruin after Sally
did a story on him and the bombing of her former place of
employment, not to mention the mysterious deliveries of
white roses.
Trying to stay focused on her career, Sally attends a
convention in California for the network and runs into
David Waring, a special man she can't get out of her mind
or heart. But the happiness is short-lived when another
dead body shows up, and there's a connection to Sally. Now
she begins to think she could be a target. Are the bodies
and white roses connected?
MR. MURDER, the latest installment in the Sally Harrington
mysteries, is filled with drama, mystery, murder and
sensuality. The story brings to life intriguing and
colorful characters in the network news business. Although
it's part of a series, Van Wormer's writing is so detailed
that the story stands well on its own. I look forward to
more in this series.
Life is taking some interesting turns as the fiercely
bright
and beautiful Sally Harrington starts her new job anchoring
a newscast created just for her: DBS News America This
Morning. For most people that would be enough excitement.
But not for Sally. She has to be the last person to talk to
a jet-setting millionaire who turns up dead shortly after
their interview.
Murder isn't the only distraction in Sally's world, though.
Her sexual liaison deepens with Paul Fitzwilliam, the
twentysomething police officer who followed Sally east from
California. And there's still unfinished business with
David
Waring, the fortysomething married man she sent back to
California.
And then suddenly the feds show up when an old acquaintance
is left for dead at Sally's home in Castleford,
Connecticut.
They've connected this attempted murder to the death of
Sally's infamous millionaire. And by the time anyone
realizes that Sally herself might be the primary target, it
may be too late to stop a killer from achieving his
ultimate
goal.
Excerpt
"I hate to be the bearer of less than good news," my
studio producer, Haydn Cooke, says, appearing in the
doorway, "but I wondered if you had seen this."
I glance at our chief film editor, Clem, who sighs and
drops his hands from the console to wait. This is our
third interruption since we sat down, but this is what
happens in television when you are a producer for DBS News
in New York.
I look at the papers Haydn hands to me to read:
Harrington Hammered In Hometown
Since my name happens to be Sally Harrington, I read on:
Everybody with a television set has by now seen the great
white hope for DBS News in the shapely form of the blue-
eyed, almost-blond Sally Harrington. You know the one. The
sensational witness from the Mafia Boss Murder Trial that
audiences found so compelling the network decided to
launch an early morning newscast to showcase her?
Unfortunately for DBS, however, a bitter debate has broken
out in Harrington's hometown of Castleford, Connecticut —
a debate that has pitted residents who believe Ms.
Harrington worthy of emulation against those residents who
believe her worthy of deportation.
I read on to an editorial that has evidently run in the
Herald-American:
The Castleford Women's Club recently awarded its highest
honor to part-time resident and DBS News maven Sally
Harrington "for her extraordinary professional
achievements, outstanding contribution to the community
and overall excellence as a role model." While the Herald-
American (as her former employer) is also proud of Ms.
Harrington's professional achievements, we must question
the motive behind the organization's selection. Given the
highly publicized trials and tribulations of
Ms.Harrington's personal life, one can only shudder at
what kind of role model the Women's Club would consider
unsavory. Scribbling a big check to the club from a
recently inflated bank account does not, in our opinion,
constitute a good role model.
I am left almost breathless by the attack. My old boss, Al
Royce, and I have always rubbed each other the wrong way,
but I served him and the paper well. Certainly I have done
nothing to warrant this kind of viciousness. At least I
don't think so.
I lower the paper and cover my eyes with my left hand for
a moment.Given the highly publicized trials and
tribulations of Ms.Harrington's personal life, one can
only shudder at what kind of role model the Women's Club
would consider unsavory.
Well, let's see now, what could be considered unsavory
about my personal life: I broke up with a Castleford
favorite to take up with a slick New York insider; a tape
of him and me having sex was distributed all over town;
the defense attorney in The Mafia Boss Murder Trial set me
up to come across as a nymphomaniac,making me an instant
media sensation;and,finally,that slick New York insider
was involved in a very messy and very public divorce trial
into which my name was dragged. "Sounds like sour grapes
to me," Haydn says sympathetically. Of course Haydn's
still pretty new and probably isn't yet familiar with my
unsavory personal life.
I drop my hand. I have a feeling if Haydn's skin was not
black, I might see that he is blushing on my behalf. He's
a good guy. "When I graduated from high school," I
explain, "the Women's Club gave me a renewable scholarship
for four straight years. I couldn't have made college work
without it."
"I'm with you," Haydn assures me. "Mine was from our
Rotary Club."
"So then my mother tells me that after a hundred years the
club can't meet in the cultural center anymore," I
continue, "be-cause the air-conditioning is shot and a lot
of the older women can't breathe without it. So fixing the
air-conditioning seemed like the least I could do."
I look down at the wire service release again — one can
only shudder at what kind of role model the Women's Club
would consider unsavory. I check my watch and look at
Clem. "Can you give me five minutes?"
"Sure,"he says,turning back to the console. "I've got the
Puget Sound piece to finish, anyway."
I leave editing and walk down the short hallway into the
central newsroom. "Sally —" an assistant begins.
"Give me five," I beg, swerving around him to head into
what we call the Fishbowl, a conference room constructed
of soundproof glass. I close the door, pick up the phone,
punch in my office ID number and make a long-distance
call. I look at my watch. It's 4:02 p.m., Friday. Mother
stays late at school Tuesday through Thursday to supervise
the English lab, but today she should have left right
after the bell.
"Hello?" Mother answers with her usual warm grace, giving
me, today, somewhat of a pang. How she ended up with a
daughter with a temperament like mine is beyond
everybody's understanding, although Mother maintains it is
our differences that allow us to be so close. (I think our
closeness is much more likely due to long-time combat
fatigue, the kind remaining family members share in the
trenches when the father dies young.)
"Hi, it's me."
Pause. "Oh, darling heart, I am so sorry.When I saw the
paper at lunch —"
"At lunch?" I yell. "Are you telling me this editorial ran
today and was submitted to the wire services yesterday?"
Son of a bitch, I'll kill him.
"Sally, what do you mean?"
"I mean that sleazebag Royce submitted the editorial to
the wire services before he even ran it because he knew
he'd have to write a retraction. And you can bet your
bottom dollar the retraction will never make its way to
the wire services."
"Oh, no," Mother says quietly.
"Oh, yes." I drop heavily into a chair. "And it beats me
what I've done to set him off."
"It isn't anything you did,Sally,"Mother says. "It's what
I did."
"Mother, it's okay, I'm a grown-up, I can handle this."
"No, really, darling."
"Alfred Royce adores you, he always has."
"Stop it, Sally, please," she pleads. "You're breaking my
heart." I blink, taken aback.
"Al wrote it to hurt me, not you. Al is mad at me. Do you
understand?"
"I don't understand at all," I tell her. The newsroom
assistant is trying to get my attention by waving his arms
at me through the glass. I make a swatting motion for him
to go away.
"He's been harboring this — this feeling about me for
years," Mother says. "It's ridiculous."
It's nothing new for a Castleford man of a certain age to
have a thing for my mother, not even now that she is in
her early sixties. Mother is one of those kind and gentle
beauties men always wish they had married.
"Something happened, Mother, didn't it?"
Pause. "Yes." Silence.
"Are you going to tell me what?"
"Only if you promise not to do anything, Sally. And to let
me handle it." She pauses for a moment, expecting a
protest from me, and incorrectly assumes my silence means
I agree. "He begged me not to marry Mack. He said he was
in love with me and it was our last chance for happiness."
I think I'm going to scream. Alfred Royce III is one of
the worst kinds of human being. He is one of those self-
centered brats who inherited enough money and power to
make every-one's life miserable.
"Does Al not remember, perhaps, that he already has a
wife?" I ask. "A second wife, I might add? For whom he
traded in the first?"
"Actually, he's been married three times," Mother says
almost conversationally, "but the first was over so fast
no one remembers it.She was some kind of lady of the
evening and your father thought it was just hilarious, and
of course his parents were beside themselves."
"Mother," I nearly shout. "Tell me what happened."
"I went to the club with the Levys Saturday night for
dinner. They knew Mack was at a conference and they asked
me if I'd like to join them." (I'm trying to be
patient.) "Al was at the bar with the golf committee, and
when our group was leaving he walked me out to the car."
Faintly. "He had had a few and he made a pass at me and I
told him to stop it, but then he grabbed my arms and said
all these things about us having one last chance."
What makes it worse, in my mind, is that I have no doubt
Al felt that he was entitled to Mother. That's the way he
is.
"I had to slap him across the face. And then he stared at
me, as if he couldn't believe it —"
I feel the stirring of rage. "And then he stormed off."
Her voice comes close to breaking and so does my
heart. "He said some loathsome and wicked things and I'm
not sure I will ever be able to forgive him, Sally."
The newsroom assistant is now moving along the glass wall
to keep in my line of sight, making entreating motions. I
turn my back on him. "Why didn't you tell me about this,
Mother?"
"You were in the field,Sally,"Mother says,upset. "I didn't
want to upset you."
Suddenly the conference room door bursts open and I turn
around to see the assistant. "I'm sorry," he says in an
exaggerated whisper. "Could you please hang on a second,
Mother," I say, impatiently covering the
mouthpiece. "What?"
"Somebody's been murdered," he says breathlessly, "and
Will says it's got something to do with you."
I rush across the newsroom — from much practice neatly
avoiding desks and computer stations — to reach our
executive producer,Will Rafferty,who is standing with
Haydn in front of the affiliate monitors we use to view
any "film"(everything is digital these days) our affiliate
newsrooms submit to use on DBS NewsAmericaTonight with
AlexandraWaring. Will is talking into a headset while
looking into monitor 4 at what appears to be the charred
remains of a small house or cabin. Monitor 4 means the
image has come from one of our affiliates in the Southern
Atlantic region. I grab a headset andWill looks over at me
gratefully while I plug it in. "Sally's here now,Kit."
He must be talking to Kit Whitehawk, a rookie reporter
from our affiliate in Gainesville, Florida. He recently
assisted me on a story I covered for DBS News Magazine.
"What am I looking at, Kit?"
"All that remains of Wilson Delafield."
I glance at Will and then focus back on the screen. The
story I did for the magazine had been about Wilson
Delafield, a jet-setting playboy and horse breeder who
lived outside Gainesville.
"You mean he's dead?"
"Someone locked him in his garden shed and torched it." I
flinch. "When was this?"
"About five before three."
Just over an hour ago.
In my story on Delafield I showed how he had been on the
verge of bankruptcy when his highly prized stable of
Thorough-breds burned to the ground, killing all seven of
the horses in it, and how he received a little over
thirteen million dollars in insurance money. Delafield
denied any connection between his pending financial ruin
and the fire, maintaining, "The insurance payment is proof
the entire tragic event was completely and thoroughly
investigated to the satisfaction of all parties."
Well, er, no, that wasn't quite right.Wilson Delafield had
been born Warren Drubber and, I discovered, was distantly
related to the supervisor in charge of the insurance
investigation. Not only did I learn that Delafield and the
insurance investigator supervisor had met four years
before at a wedding, but I even had pictures of them
sitting together at the reception dinner. That meeting
alone should have prompted the supervisor to abstain from
working on the Delafield fire,but he hadn't.Instead he
conducted the investigation himself with the assistance of
a relatively new company trainee.
I had no hard evidence proving Delafield arranged for the
fire. The evidence was circumstantial: Delafield's
disastrous financial situation before the fire, the fact
the supervising insurance investigator knew Delafield
personally, and a long trail of broken-hearted wealthy
women and furious former business partners who said
Delafield was a liar,a cheat and a crook.Because the
evidence was only circumstantial I was tempted to put the
story on the shelf until something more concrete turned
up, but then my boss, AlexandraWaring, who has always kept
horses, explained to me exactly what those poor animals
had to endure before they finally died in the fire. After
that I was ready to go with what I had.
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