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Above the Fold
Author: Corrina Lawson
Published by: City Owl Press
Publication date: June 20th 2023
Genres: Adult, Mystery, Romance
In 1980s New York City, a crime reporter with little to lose risks the only thing that matters to uncover the truth….
Trisha Connell’s journalism reflects her punk rock lifestyle: relentless, confrontational, and bitingly honest. It’s a style that scores front-page headlines but has her forever teetering on the verge of victory or disaster. Now one crime will forever change Trisha’s life.As she charges into the story of a sensational theft at an art museum, she discovers a murdered guard is someone she knew, a former foster kid who was adopted and supposed to be living a good life. To make it worse, the guard is suspected to be one of the thieves.
Determined to uncover the truth, Trisha bulls her way into the story, risking her life and career on what could be the story of the decade, if her editor doesn’t fire her first. She finds an ally in Edmund Grayson, a security expert assigned to the museum, who’s driven by his own guilt in failing to stop the murder.
Chasing the story will take Trisha from the punk clubs to the high society to the inner workings of newspapers of New York in the 1980s. It will take all her street skills to survive.
an excerpt
“Nothing to do but wait.” The low, deep voice of the second man sounded seriously pissed.
“We,” David had said. That meant the second man belonged to David’s security firm.
Keep talking, guys.
“Are we all suspects?” David asked.
“We have to be considered such, especially with a murder investigation.”
Trisha winced. Someone’s family would open the door to a grim-faced police officer today. She placed a hand over her Celtic cross necklace and shivered. No one deserved that knock on the door.
“Maybe we should search the museum on our own. Dorothy doesn’t have enough men to secure the whole place,” David said.
The second man grunted. “If we had a good lead, I’d agree. Better to ask forgiveness than permission. But we’d need a place to start.”
Her cue.
“I know where to start.”David and the stranger rounded on her.
“Dammit, Trish!” David’s voice echoed around the stone columns.“What the fuck are you doing here?”
“My job, same as you.”
“We don’t need you screwing around with this, not with—”
The second man stepped forward and cut David off. From his voice, she’d pictured him as an older, retired cop but this guy was dressed like an upscale Wall Street trader. Still, classic rugged face and a nice head of hair, though peppered with gray. His tailored gray double-breasted suit showed off some seriously impressive shoulders. His white shirt was pristine, and he was wearing cufflinks, for God’s sake. Who the hell used those anymore? His wingtip shoes gleamed.
He’d sounded angry and frustrated. But he looked calm and collected.
“David. Fill me in. Now,” Wingtips said.
David unclenched his hands. “You are so dead, Trish.” He sighed. “Edmund Grayson, this is my friend, Trisha Connell. She’s the crime reporter for the New York Herald. I’ve mentioned her before, remember?” He shook his head. “Trish, Edmund Grayson.”
Grayson? David’s boss? This was him? At least her sunglasses hid her shock. Given how David talked about him, she’d imagined Grayson as an uptight, humorless guy. Not some dignified, dynamic, and dangerous man in a suit.
“You brought a reporter here?” Grayson said.
“I had nothing to do with it,” David muttered.
“Hi.” She put out her hand to Grayson.
He ignored the gesture. “You have two seconds to explain what you meant about where to start the search.”
Oho. Yep, once a cop, always a cop, even if he had gone private.
She took off her sunglasses and stared at him, holding the eye contact.
Nice brown eyes. “I know how someone could break into the museum.”
“How?” Grayson crossed his arms over his chest.
“Whatever you’ve got, spit it out, Trish,” David said.
“Get me into the museum and I’ll show you.”
Grayson glared at her, impassive. “I could always call over the police have you arrested for trespassing.”
She shrugged. “You could but then you wouldn’t know where the entrance to the hidden subway tunnel is.”
Grayson snapped to attention and stepped closer to her, giving her a chance to study his face. His chiseled features would be attractive if his jaw wasn’t clenched shut.
Okay, he was attractive despite that.
“Where?”
An order, not a request. “I’ll show you,” she repeated. “Inside.”
He shook his head. “You want to go inside, give me more.”
Aha. He’d taken the bait. Now they were just negotiating. “I’ve done stories on the homeless people who live in the subway tunnels. I learned about the entrance from them.” Okay, she’d lied on that one. But the truth of the sneaking in with Nicky wouldn’t add to her credibility and neither would the confession that she’d been homeless at the time herself.
Grayson turned to David. “Can we trust her?”
David nodded. “Yeah, she’s a pain in the ass while working but she wouldn’t lie about something this important.”
Grayson grunted. “We did a thorough security check of the museum last month and found no evidence of a hidden entrance.”
She forced her hands to stop twitching for a cigarette. “The entrance is covered over by ordinary floor tiles. You’d never spot it if you didn’t already know it was there.”
“Are you sure?” Grayson said, with no expression at all. A good poker face. She wondered what it would take to make him smile.
“Positive.” Sorta. It had been a long time.
He let her word hang in the air, appraising her, as if checking off points on a tally sheet in his head. “If you tell me where this tunnel entrance is, I’ll come back out and give you the full story of what happened. On the record.”
Tempting. But no guarantee Kimba wouldn’t scoop her while she waited for Grayson. “I go inside or nothing. And while we negotiate, your murderer has more time to escape.”
Grayson stared at her some more, his glare resembling a wolf sizing up his prey. She resisted the urge to growl at him just to see what he’d do.
He glanced back over his shoulder at the main entrance. “The police aren’t going to let the three of us past them.”
Gotcha! “I bet you know another way to get in.”
His lips twitched, as if fighting a smile. “Maybe.”
“Easier to apologize than ask permission,” she repeated.
Surprisingly, he smiled. “All right. Follow me around this side.”
Yes.
Grayson led her and David around the side of the museum. The marble steps tapered off, leaving them standing on a wide ledge. She blinked and realized they were standing next to a metal door that had been painted white to blend in with the marble.
Grayson leaned over the lock and pulled out a set of keys. Master keys, she guessed.
While he worked the lock, she leaned close to David. “Thanks,” she whispered.
“If you’re wrong, we’re all fucked,” he whispered back.
“I’m right.” I hope.
The lock clicked and Grayson pushed open the door. She and David followed him inside.
Corrina is a writer, mom, geek and occasional superhero. She’s a former newspaper reporter with a degree in journalism from Boston University, she works from home writing romance novels with a geeky twist and as the Content Director of GeekMom.com.
Her novels include The Curse of the Brimstone Contract, a romantic steampunk mystery; the award-winning and USA Today-recognized superhero romance series, the Phoenix Institute, which includes: Phoenix Rising, Luminous, Phoenix Legacy, Ghost Phoenix, Ghosts of Christmas Past, and Phoenix Inheritance; and the erotic Freya’s Gift, a tale of Vikings in North America and a fertility ritual.
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