Page 20 of The Business Trip

“That’s a good idea,” I said. “Let’s try it.”

I typed those exact words into a text to Steph and hit send, then waited for a reply. There was nothing for over an hour, but as I was walking across the newsroom to talk to the assignment desk manager, her reply came in.

Tell them I’m out of town.

I felt as if the blood all drained from my body at that moment into a pool on the floor. I had to grab the back of a nearby chair to steady myself. I really thought for a moment I might faint. Nora came up next to me.

“Did you get something?” she asked in an urgent whisper. Hand shaking, I handed her the phone. Her eyes grew wide and she grabbed my arm.

“Come with me. We’re getting Bruce and going to Dave’s office.”

We motioned for Bruce and pulled him into the back conference room. When we briefed him and showed him the texts, he blanched.

“Listen, guys,” he said. “There’s another problem. Dave asked me not to say anything about this, but I didn’t know that at first. If he thinks the whole newsroom is talking about it, he’ll blow a gasket.”

“The whole newsroom is not talking about it,” said Lucy. “It’s just the three of us. I haven’t said a word about this text thread to anyone but you two. I know how fast gossip spreads in a newsroom.”

“Bruce, I’ll fall on the sword if need be,” said Nora. “Dave can’t be mad at us for this. It’s information he’s going to want.”

CHAPTER 19Dave

The Tuesday After the Flight

I had called Steph again that morning just in case she was finally in the mood to answer, but there was nothing but voicemail. I was thinking about her being with some guy in Atlanta and completely ignoring her very important job, and I was just contemplating my next move—should I call HR?—when Bruce, Nora, and Lucy burst in. Lucy was talking very fast.

“Dave, we’re sorry to bug you, but we think something bad may have happened to Stephanie. There is no way this is her responding to my text.” She shoved her phone my way and I tried to absorb the information. All three were staring at me.

I scanned their faces and stopped my eyes harshly on Bruce, who had clearly disobeyed my orders not to say anything. He knew exactly what I was thinking and looked down. Nora jumped in.

“Dave, it’s my fault. I told Lucy. We’re only trying to help, though. Please look at the texts.”

“And who told you, Nora?” I couldn’t help but unpeel this onion to see who had violated my orders.

Bruce gulped but stepped forward and said, “I mentionedit to Nora when it first happened, sir. I didn’t know at the time that we wanted to keep things quiet.”

“Things like this always need to stay quiet,” I scolded them. “Some things are private, the entire newsroom doesn’t need to know. Bruce—we’ll talk more about this later. Now what am I supposed to be looking at?”

“This text, about Susan and Frank,” Lucy said, pointing.

“Who are Susan and Frank?” I asked, my hand starting to stroke my mustache.

“Those are my parents’ names,” replied Nora. “But Steph doesn’t know that. We just threw names into a text to try and trap her. We think someone else might be controlling her phone.”

“I’m sorry, what?” I asked. “Controlling her phone? Like acting like they are her?”

“Yes,” Lucy and Nora said almost in unison. Bruce was very quiet.

“Stay calm,” I said, channeling the voice I used with my three-year-old grandson. “Sit down and let’s talk this out.”

The three of them perched nervously on the edges of their chairs and looked at me expectantly.

“Let’s think rationally,” I began. “Maybe Stephanie knows a Susan and Frank that we don’t know, so it makes sense to her. She was obviously at the conference, so are you saying something has happened to her since then?”

“Yes, that’s what I’m saying,” said Lucy.

“Hmmm…” My mind was whirling. Could someone actually have her phone? I couldn’t show my worry to Nora, Bruce, and Lucy, though, so I tried to think of another plan. “If you truly believe that someone else has her phone, we need a bit more evidence.”

“Wait a minute, I have an idea!” Lucy called out. “She onlyhas one sister, right? What if we texted something about a brother and see what she says?”

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