Silent Fall

him.
    "He doesn’t like me. I don’t like him. Neither one of us loses any sleep over it."
    "Why the animosity?"
    He gave her a disbelieving look. "He doesn’t give a damn about the news. It’s a show to him." Dylan frowned. "You fell under his spell just like everyone else. I expected better from you."
    "I did not fall under his spell," she protested, knowing it was partly a lie. She had been a bit dazzled by the man, but only for a moment. She’d realized quickly that what Dylan had said was true -- without a script, Blake Howard didn’t seem to know what to say. "Okay, I know why you don’t like Blake, but why doesn’t he like you?"
    "He thinks I’m after his job. The Ravino story gave me some clout around here. I’ve been getting special assignments and more airtime ever since then. The next step up for me would be a weekend anchor job."
    "But you said you don’t want to be an anchor."
    "Howard would never believe that. Everyone in news wants to be an anchor."
    "Remember when I asked you if you had any enemies...?"
    Dylan stopped walking and shook his head at her. "Blake isn’t smart enough to set me up."
    "Are you sure?"
    Irritation flashed through his eyes. "Perhaps you just want it to be Blake so you can spend some time with him, do some hands-on research."
    She heard the note of jealousy in his voice, and it shocked the hell out of her. "Yeah, that’s it, Dylan. How did you guess?"
    "I saw your face. You can’t hide anything from me, Catherine."
    "Don’t be an ass. There’s nothing to hide. And you’re letting your opinion of Blake cloud your judgment."
    "Fine, I’ll keep Blake on the list of suspects, but right now he’s at the bottom." Dylan started walking again, not stopping until he reached a large desk where a middle-aged bald man was hanging up the phone.
    "Sanders, what are you doing here today?" the man asked.
    "Hello, Ron," Dylan said with a warm, friendly note in his voice that hadn’t been present when he’d spoken with Blake. "I’m showing my friend around. I heard there was a murder in the park last night. Who’s on it?"
    "Irina left about half an hour ago. She hasn’t called in yet."
    "Any stats on the victim?"
    "Well-dressed Caucasian female in her twenties is all I know."
    "Cause of death?"
    "Unknown." As Ron finished speaking, he answered the phone again. "News desk. Bill, thanks for calling me back."
    "Let’s go talk to the fact-checkers," Dylan said to Catherine as Ron continued his conversation. "Irina may have called in to ask them to get background information on the victim."
    "Which might bring up your name," Catherine said.
    "Hopefully not yet, but I want to know sooner rather than later what the police have. I’ve been thinking, too, that I’ve been so caught up in what this means to me that I haven’t considered what Erica’s death means to Ravino. The case against him could certainly be made weaker without Erica’s personal testimony."
    "Could that be the point?" Catherine asked, as a new angle suddenly opened up. "Maybe it’s not about revenge, but a way for Ravino to get rid of someone who is willing to expose all his secrets."
    "It’s certainly possible, although Erica already gave her taped conversation with Deborah to the police and made her statement regarding her affair with the senator. The other evidence tying Ravino to the physician who provided the poisoned Botox is much stronger."
    "It could still be about revenge on both of you," Catherine put in. "Ravino might have made Erica believe that by helping him nail you, she’d be protecting herself from payback."
    "When all the while he was planning to kill her."
    "Two birds with one shot."
    "Hopefully I can convince the police to look into that angle at some point. Certainly Ravino has more motive than I do for wanting Erica dead."
    "Did anyone know that you and Erica had an affair?" Catherine asked.
    "It wasn’t an affair. It was a one-night stand. But I didn’t tell anyone. Erica may have. Who knows?"
    "I think she must have, because someone had to believe that Erica could get you to do what she wanted."
    "Or Ravino just knew that because I’d worked with Erica before, I would trust her enough to go with her into the woods." Dylan pushed open the door to another office. Two of the four desks were occupied. The room was filled with books, computers, and the usual television