ERICA ARRIVES AT STARBUCKS AT five forty-five. In a nod to her new reality, she’s wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses. They work—she gets some second glances, but with her blonde hair hidden and her unmade-up face obscured, people can’t quite place her. She orders the latest frappa-whatever and sits on a stool at the back. Even at this hour the place is jammed with early risers, a mix of groggy construction workers and bushy-tailed young A-types determined to get to the office an hour before everyone else. Since she got about an hour’s sleep, she feels more kinship with the groggy crowd—but as she sips the coffee and inhales the city’s energy, her adrenaline starts to kick in.
Of course she didn’t have a drink last night—but she did have a moment where she just wanted out. A low-level fear has lodged itself at the corners of her consciousness. This ferry story feels radioactive, carrying risks not only to her work but to her life. Is she in real danger? She pushes the thought out of her mind. She wants to use her time developing her own show, building a platform for the long career. But walking away from the story is out of the question. So she spent a restless night fighting for sleep as various scenarios—none of them pretty—galloped through her head.
But now she’s up, alert and ready for whatever news Mark brings. She’s certainly impressed with him—he’s smart, fearless, thoughtful, and amazing at what he does. One of the good guys. And at GNN, she needs every good guy she can find.
It’s six and he hasn’t shown up. She watches the baristas—they turn fulfilling coffee orders into a ballet. Then her mind flits back to the kiss with Greg, her hand on his cheek, the light stubble, the taste of his tongue, his arm around her waist, their bodies pressed together in the doorway, the city disappearing around them. She wants another kiss . . . and then another.
Now it’s 6:22 and there’s still no sign of Mark. She fingers the prepaid cell phone she bought at the twenty-four-hour Duane Reade on Fifty-Seventh Street. Should she call Mark’s? She does. It rings and rings, no answer, no voice mail. She hangs up. What could Mark’s news be? He said it was important. A thought that has festered at the edge of her mind—half formed and willfully ignored—pushes its way to the fore.
It was an incredible coincidence that she happened to be reporting from Battery Park when the ferry crashed. Fine. Coincidences happen. But then for her to be interviewing Kay Barrish at the moment she had a heart attack. Does lightning strike the same person twice? Can fate be that random?
It’s 6:34. Where is Mark?
Suddenly the coffee shop seems chaotic—it’s so noisy a gun could go off and you wouldn’t hear it. And everyone is so impatient, so intense; there’s a woman with greasy hair carrying six bulging plastic bags, mumbling to herself. A wave of paranoia floods Erica. She looks around her. Why is that man staring at her? And so intently. Then he smiles—the excited smile of a fan. Erica manages to smile back, but now other people are looking at her. She feels exposed, vulnerable. She’s famous now; she has to be careful. People want a piece of her. There are a lot of crazies out there.
It’s 6:42. No Mark. She grabs her bag and flees.