Bad News

  Copyright 2019 Amy Cross

  All Rights Reserved

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events, entities and places are either products of the author's imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual people, businesses, entities or events is entirely coincidental.

  Kindle edition

  First published: May 2019

  A missing girl.

  A man with a past.

  And a reporter who'll do anything to uncover the truth.

  When she's fired from her job at a TV station, Maggie Carter sets out to prove that she's got what it takes. Determined to be as devious, deceptive and duplicitious as her most successful colleagues, she heads to the small town of Ridge Falls on a one-woman mission to discover the truth about the disappearance of 15-year-old Kimmy Duchette.

  But Ridge Falls hides dark secrets. Kimmy isn't the first girl to go missing in the area, and soon Maggie is drawn to the man who was suspected of killing another girl ten years earlier. Is Thomas Roper a murderer who got away with his first crime, or is he an innocent man who fell victim to rumors and innuendo? And did news coverage of the previous case prevent it ever being solved?

  Bad News is a horror story about a horrifying disappearance, a town living in fear, and one reporter's determination to discover the truth and make a name for herself. But how far is Maggie really willing to go, and what will she find when she reaches the dark heart of a terrifying local tragedy?

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Epilogue

  Bad News

  Prologue

  Suddenly I hear a faint snapping sound over my shoulder.

  I spin around, still holding the knife up. All I see is the dimly-lit house in the distance, and there are no murderous, silhouetted figures, but I'm certain I just heard someone stepping on a twig.

  So I run.

  I turn and I race out through the dark forest, struggling on my injured leg, half-slamming into tree after tree, almost falling as the ground regularly dips and then rises beneath my feet. The sound of my own breath, and the sound of my steps against the forest floor, are all I hear as I rush out into the great darkness. I'm running so fast, I almost trip over my own feet, and finally I thud straight into a tree with such force that I almost fall backward and hit the ground.

  Almost.

  Steadying myself for a moment, as I struggle for gulps of air, I look over my shoulder. There's no sign of anyone, but then again someone could be rushing right for me and I wouldn't necessarily know until it was too late.

  What if he has night-vision goggles?

  I turn to run again, but my right leg almost buckles as I feel a burst of pain crackling up through my thigh.

  Reaching down, I immediately feel blood on the side of my pants, and I realize that the injury to my leg must be worse than I'd guessed. Still, there's no time to stop and patch myself up, so I start limping out once more into the darkness.

  Suddenly, hearing a rustling sound, I turn and look back again. And this time, I see someone running this way, just about visible against the distant glow of the farmhouse. Somehow, I recognize him immediately.

  I turn and start running again, pushing through the pain. I know I'm making a lot of noise, but I can't help that as I race between the trees. I barely even manage to keep hold of the knife, but somehow I keep going until finally I hit another tree.

  I look back, but now there's no sign of him.

  Desperately trying to catch my breath, I glance all around. The pain in my leg is intense now, throbbing wildly, and for a moment I feel as if I'm just going to collapse here. I guess, if I passed out, he might not find me.

  And then, just as I feel myself starting to weaken, I hear a rustling sound.

  I turn, and I'm just about able to make out the sight of a figure rushing this way. In an instant, I can tell that it's him, so I force myself to keep going. I race out between the trees, stumbling slightly on my injured leg, and I somehow find the strength to run and run and run. I manage to keep going, until suddenly the ground seems to disappear beneath my feet. I let out a shocked gasp as I fall, and then I slam into the mud and roll down a steep slope that eventually levels out and sends me crashing into another tree, and I can't help myself.

  I scream.

  Chapter One

  One year earlier

  “Fake news,” I say as I continue to clean under my fingernail with a pen lid. “I didn't touch your candy, Terrance. I don't know where it went, but if I had to hazard a guess I'd say you probably ate it while you were drunk.”

  “I think I know when I've eaten my candy,” he replies gruffly from the passenger seat. “It went missing. Someone took it.”

  Sighing, I look out the window and see that there's been no movement on the steps of the Sheriff's office. It's almost 10pm and the promised statement is about two hours overdue. A lonely streetlight picks out the steps at the front of the office, but there's no sign of movement and when I glance at the building's only lit window I don't see anyone inside. If I didn't know better, I'd be starting to think that Sheriff Aiden Malone might've skipped out the back door and avoided us entirely on his way home. Then again, he'd still have to come around through the front gate, unless he decided to scale the fence at the rear. He can't be that desperate to avoid answering a few questions.

  Can he?

  “Did you take it, Daryl?” Terrance says suddenly, and I hear the seat creak under his weight as he turns to look round to the back seat. “Just 'fess up if you did. I won't even be mad.”

  “I didn't touch your candy,” Daryl says, sounding even more bored than I am. “I don't even eat that junk.”

  “Come on,” I whisper under my breath, still watching the main door that leads into the Sheriff's office. “Don't make me go in there and force a statement out of you.”

  “Someone ate it,” Terrance continues. “It has to have been one of you two.”

  This is taking forever. What's so hard about writing up a few lines and giving them out to the media? It's not as if anyone expects them to have made a major breakthrough in the case. In the few days since I arrived in this godforsaken nowheresville, it's become abundantly clear to me that Sheriff Malone and his people are completely out of their depth. I guess this is the biggest case they've ever had to deal with, and they're probably used to only having to deal with their buddies from the local paper. Too bad for them that we've been sent down from the big city to come poke around and see what's going on. I swear, I can smell the resentment in the air when I walk these streets.

  Malone and his buddies are probably searching online for “press release template”.

  “I
bet you just ate it and forgot,” Daryl says. “Did you check your beard for crumbs?”

  “There!” I shout, and I've got the driver's door open even before the solitary figure has made it out of the Sheriff's office and over to the top of the steps. “Camera! Sound! Let's go!”

  I wipe some sandwich crumbs from my top as I hurry across the empty road, and then I reach into my pocket and pull out my phone. A moment later I hear one of the car's other doors slam, then another, which means Terrance and Daryl are already lagging behind. I swear, with a half-decent crew I'd have already toppled Rolinda Derringham as the station's top reporter and I'd be the one presenting the evening news broadcast. As it is, I have to make do with a pair of idiots who wouldn't know actual news if it bit them on their respective, flabby asses. And as I get to the sidewalk in front of the building and stop right in front of Sheriff Malone, I already know it'll be at least ten, maybe fifteen seconds before the guys join us. Maybe I can leverage that fact. Maybe I'll seem less threatening.

  “Is that statement ready now?” I ask, just as I manage to set my phone on to record.

  “Ms. Carter,” Malone says with a heavy sigh, “I thought maybe you'd called it quits for the night.”

  “You promised us a statement at eight o'clock,” I point out. “What's the latest on the investigation?”

  “I said I'd try to get a statement out at eight,” he replies, “but that it might not be ready until tomorrow morning.”

  “I don't recall that wording at all,” I tell him. “You said eight o'clock tonight.”

  “There's no news,” he continues. “Nothing I can share with you guys, anyway.”

  “Have you found anything significant in the forest?”

  “If we had, I wouldn't be at liberty to tell you.”

  “Are you any closer to finding out who kidnapped Kimmy Duchette?”

  “No arrests have been made, but we're following up every lead that we have and I'm confident that we're making real progress. Now if you don't mind, I have an early start tomorrow so I'd really like to get home now.”

  He turns to walk away, just as Terrance finally arrives with the camera. A moment later, Daryl catches up with a microphone, which he quickly shoves toward me. I grab his wrist and turn the microphone so that it's pointed toward Sheriff Malone.

  “Isn't this overkill?” he asks, raising a skeptical eyebrow.

  “A little girl is missing,” I remind him, “and a lot of people are wondering whether your department is capable of conducting a thorough investigation.”

  “Who's wondering that?” he asks.

  “A lot of people.”

  “Such as?”

  “People who are saying that your investigation isn't going anywhere.”

  “Who's saying that?”

  “That doesn't matter. It's all around town. It's a week since Kimmy went missing, and five days since traces of blood were found in the forest. You should have someone by now, or you should be calling in help from other agencies. Is it true that you turned down an offer of help from -”

  “I'm not doing this right now,” he says, waving a hand at me dismissively and then turning to walk away. “I have a wife and son at home, Ms. Carter, and I don't intend to spend the rest of my evening out here talking to you. I'll be back here in the morning, and I've got a funny feeling that you will too. You're not my priority, though. My priorities are finding Kimmy safe and well, and catching anyone who might be involved in her disappearance. Good evening to you, Ms. Carter. Take care.”

  “That's not good enough!” I call after him, but I already know there's no point chasing him down. Sighing, I turn to find that Terrance and Daryl are behind me. “Did you get all that?” I ask.

  “Of course,” Terrance replies, still looking through the camera's viewfinder. “Most of it, anyway. Definitely the last part.”

  “That asshole thinks he can just float along at his own glacial pace,” I mutter, watching as Malone disappears around the far corner. “Meanwhile a girl is missing, almost certainly dead, and no-one's actually doing anything. Coming to this hellhole of a town is like going back in time thirty years. They're living in their own little bubble.”

  “So are we heading home tomorrow?” Daryl asks, with a hint of hope in his voice.

  I turn to him.

  “It seems like we've got as much of a story as we can,” he continues, “and we can always come back later if there are any big developments. There's just doesn't seem to be much point hanging around all day every day, waiting for someone to hand us a press release. We're not really getting anywhere, are we? Frankly, we're doing about as well as the police.”

  “It's not a competition,” Terrance adds.

  “Say who?” I ask. “It's all because of the stupid -”

  I stop myself just in time. On the way down here to Ridge Falls, I was convinced that this story would be huge, that we were going to be in the right place at the right time to capture all the developments in the search for Kimmy Duchette. Now here we are, a few days later, and all we've got are a few quotes from Sheriff Slow-Ass. Last night we were the broadcast's fifth story, tonight we'll be no higher than eighth. At this rate, by tomorrow we'll be getting bumped if the sports news overruns. Meanwhile, Rolinda Derringham gets all the big stories. I'm sure she'll have won a few awards while we've been away.

  “Maybe we should get back to the motel,” Terrance says. “I don't know about you guys, but I'm tired and hungry, and I get cranky when I'm tired and hungry.”

  “You guys can take the van,” I reply, turning to them. “I think I'm gonna walk.”

  “You? Walk?” Daryl furrows his brow. “Since when did you walk anywhere?”

  “Since I needed some fresh air,” I say, taking a step back. “I just want to clear my head and figure out where we go from here. Maybe you're right, maybe this story isn't going anywhere.”

  As they head back to the van, I'm left standing alone outside the shuttered Sheriff's office. I want to scream, but I manage to hold it all in and I watch as Terrance and Daryl drive away.

  “Check the local property records!” I call after them. “Check anything we haven't already checked!”

  I know they heard me, but they don't reply and soon the truck is taking a right turn and I watch as it goes out of sight.

  It's a good three miles to the motel, and I hate walking at the best of times, but I really need to be alone. Besides, the motel doesn't even have a minibar, let alone an actual bar, and as I turn and starting walking along the street I realize that I desperately need a drink. Whiskey makes other people drunk, but it sobers me up and makes me feel more like myself.

  A few minutes later, I reach the old-fashioned bar opposite the gas station. I'm exhausted, but I head inside to the bright electric light, and then I make my way to the bar.

  “Whiskey, please,” I tell the woman who comes over to greet me. “No ice. Just whiskey.”

  I feel like such a cliché, but the truth is, I really need to be alone right now.

  I wait as the waitress gets my drink. Spotting my reflection in the mirror behind the bottles, I see that I look like death. I'm exhausted, my hair is a mess, and I look more like forty-seven than thirty-seven. In fact, I think there are even rings under my eyes, although after tilting my head a few different directions I just about manage to convince myself that the rings are just an illusion caused by the lighting in this joint. After paying for my whiskey, I turn and head over to find a booth, which shouldn't be too difficult seeing as how there's only one other customer in the whole place.

  And then I stop as I spot the one other customer, and I see that it's Sheriff Aiden Malone eating a huge strawberry sundae. As soon as he sees me looking at him, he freezes.

  Chapter Two

  “I don't want to talk about this right now,” Malone says as he dips his spoon back into the sundae. “Thank you for asking before you sat down, by the way.”

  “I thought you were going home to your wife and kids?” I reply
.

  “I stopped off here to get something to eat.”

  “Is that your dinner? Isn't your wife waiting patiently in the kitchen with home-made pie?”

  “Is that your dinner?” he replies, glancing at my whiskey.

  “I had a burger earlier,” I tell him, “but nice try. Now come on, we're off the record here, you can tell me what's going on. You can't be as incompetent as you seem, so spill. Who are you eyeing for Kimmy Duchette's kidnap and murder?”

  “I told you earlier, I -”

  “And now we're off the record,” I remind him. “Anything you tell me will not leave this bar.”

  “I doubt anything's ever off the record with you,” he replies. “No offense.”

  “None taken. But here's the thing, I work in the TV news business and at some stage the Kimmy Duchette story is going to get a lot more attention. Probably when the body's found. Twenty years ago, a missing girl was big news. These days you really need a body if you want to hit the nationals.”

  “We don't know that she's -”

  “Come on, of course she's dead,” I continue. “Let's cut all the hogwash about hope and about there being a chance of finding her alive. You and I both know that this is going to end up being a murder investigation. You just need to pull your act together and actually find the body.”

  “You don't mince your words, do you?”

  “Things can get out of control. The media loves to create villains, and you might end up in that role.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Work with me, and I can make sure that you come across in a sympathetic light.”

  He sighs, and I realize that I'm in danger of losing him here.

  “What happens if it turns out that you missed a chance to save Kimmy?” I ask. “You'll be vilified. You might have noticed, people online have time on their hands, and they like to criticize. Whereas if you work with us and let us get a little deeper into your investigation, we can do certain things to make you seem good. We can even make you seem a like a hero, if that's what you want.”