A few minutes later, he received a phone call informing him that there had been a brutal rape near Central Park, the victim currently en route to the hospital.
Coop hit the ground running, arriving at the emergency room at the same time as the ambulance. The next few days passed in a flurry of interviews and activity, leaving him no time to investigate the ring’s history or Lexie’s grandfather’s possible involvement.
Finally, Friday evening arrived. He had one last article to pull together for the evening edition, then he was off for the weekend, unless something big cropped up that he didn’t want to miss out on.
Coop entered the lobby in the recently remodeled building. The news offices were on the seventeenth floor. Mirrored walls and trees lined the side walls and people were already leaving for the day.
As usual, Coop stopped by the security desk in the center of the lobby to say hello to his buddy, Chris Markov, the uniformed guard at the desk. The same age as Coop, the two had been friends for over five years and now played on the same summer softball league.
“Hey, man. How are you?” Coop asked.
Chris lifted his hat and scratched his head. “Not bad. Yourself?”
“Hanging in. Are you off duty soon?” Coop asked.
“Sure am. I’m taking my son to the Renegades’ home game.”
The mention of the team reminded Coop of his date with Lexie tonight. His mood, which had taken a beating with the depressing stories he’d been covering over the last few days, shifted gears and lightened.
“Great weather for a baseball game. The little man ought to have a blast,” he said of Chris’s seven-year-old son, who he’d been raising on his own since his wife walked out when the boy was three.
“He loves the Renegades,” Chris said, laughing.
“I hear you. Have fun. I’ve gotta go write my story so I can get out of here. Catch you later.”
Coop turned to leave, when Chris called out, stopping him. “I’ve been tossing the obvious gifts from the single ladies in this town, as you requested. But this came for you earlier today and it doesn’t look like female lingerie.” He pulled out a large brown box with the word Fragile stamped in red on the top and bottom.
Chris had been happy to take over handling the Bachelor’s goodies. But he was right. This package looked more legitimate. Coop wasn’t expecting any deliveries, but in his line of work you never knew who’d send you something they thought could be a lead on a crime. Although this was a little larger than anything he’d received before.
“Doesn’t look like the fancy blogger stuff from last week.” Chris, who’d gotten way too much enjoyment out of ribbing Coop about the gifts, chuckled yet again. “I imagine the fact that you’re engaged has something to do with the women backing off.”
Chris knew damn well Coop wasn’t engaged, but persisted in giving him a hard time anyway. “Back off,” Coop muttered good-naturedly. “And quit reading that garbage.”
But it still boggled the mind how many people in this city read the Bachelor Blog. Throughout the day, at the hospital where the rape victim had been brought, everyone from nurses to candy stripers to the woman who worked reception had recognized Coop as the Bachelor. Some had merely stared and whispered to their female friends. Others had tried their best to convince him outright to date them instead of staying with his current girlfriend. Humiliating, yet he had no choice but to suck it up.
And he wasn’t about to give Chris any more ammunition.
The other man laughed. “Of course I read the blog. Hey, I sit at a desk for eight-plus hours a day. What do you expect? Even if you’re not engaged, at least you’re getting some action.”
“I take it you’re not?” Coop asked his friend. From Chris, Coop knew how hard it was to date women when you had an impressionable kid around, not to mention the fact that Chris’s mother practically lived with them to help out.
“Nah. You’re definitely getting more than me if that photo is anything to go by.”
Oh, no. “What photo?” Coop asked warily.
“You haven’t seen today’s paper?”
Coop shook his head. “Been a little busy.”
Chris handed Coop today’s edition, already folded open to the Bachelor Blog page. Bachelor Gets Lucky, read the headline and beneath it, a photograph of Lexie and Coop kissing.
“You live an interesting life,” Chris said.
“Only recently.” Since Lexie had come into it.
Coop stared at the grainy photo of the kiss. There were only two places that had happened, one when they were alone in his apartment and again when they thought they were alone in her grandmother’s foyer. Apparently, Charlotte had a sneaky side.
He shouldn’t laugh, but he couldn’t help it. The old lady had guts, nabbing a photo and sending it off to the Blogger. Lexie would probably kill her.
The rest of the Bachelor Blog went on to mention how Coop had been seen entering Web designer Lexie Davis’s grandmother’s building, leading to speculation that he was already meeting the family. Nothing but truth in the facts reported. But the insinuation in the words, that Lexie and Coop were engaged and moving quickly toward marriage, couldn’t be further from reality.
Coop felt a sudden sympathy for celebrities who were hounded, followed and roasted by the press, giving him a new appreciation of celebrities’ resentment of the news media. He’d take gritty crime reporting over glitz, glamour and innuendo any day.
“Do me a favor,” Coop said to Chris. “Don’t believe everything you read in this particular section. Have fun at the game and say hello to Junior for me.” Coop picked up the heavy box and headed for the elevator bank and his office upstairs.
At his desk, he slit open the package, shocked to discover his laptop inside, well protected in bubble wrap.
“Well, well, well.” Instead of touching it, he immediately called the cops, hoping the police would find evidence that might lead them to the culprit. Sara was off, but the officer on duty promised to send someone over. Like Coop, however, he doubted they’d find any clues in a plainly wrapped package that had been through the postal service and God knew how many hands.
By the time he finished up with the police and sat down to write his article, Coop realized he’d be late getting back to his apartment to meet Lexie.
When she didn’t answer her phone, he called Sara and asked her to let Lexie in with his spare key. The whole idea of Sara and Lexie together put him on edge. Sara was closemouthed on the job, but off was another matter. And he could only imagine the tales she’d tell. Unfortunately, with a deadline looming, Coop didn’t have a choice.