Maddie resolved not to dwell on how bad she was at the New York experience. She had bigger things to worry about. Like staying employed. And tonight, she had her first shift back at work since the unfortunate run-in with Elena Bartell.

Maybe she should just take another nap and not think about any of it right now. She headed back to the couch, flopped down, and pulled the blanket up to her neck. No harm in that.

* * *

Maddie got to her desk at five minutes to five and combed her fingers through her cropped red hair. After dumping her canvas backpack on her desk, she rooted through it for her lunchbox that she’d prepped for dinner. She took it to the office fridge and returned with a steaming mug of coffee.

The graveyard shift was not as exciting as she’d first thought it would be when she’d won her job. That had been such a shock—a call out of the blue. Someone had seen the résumé she’d passed around everywhere when she’d first landed in New York. She’d been so thrilled. It was her chance to prove herself at last.

Her friends meant well with all the Facebook good wishes and emails, declaring she’d be doing Pulitzer-winning stories in no time. But it was all just pressure. She’d done her best and flung herself into stories, trying to get the notice of the paper’s bosses.

Instead, anything good she dug up overnight, the day-shift crime reporters would take and develop. They had the luxury of having people around they could interview at length. They even got to do their jobs embedded within the New York Police Department, which had set up an office for all the media outlets.

As for Maddie? Well, who was awake at midnight and wanted to talk break-in statistics with her or bat around a few crime trends?

Maddie pulled up the wire feeds on her computer. They were summaries of breaking news from the press agencies—such as AP, Reuters, and AFP—that the paper subscribed to. These slid across her screen in reams of type. As words filled her screen, she scanned them with a dispassionate eye, looking for stories she could expand on. They had to fit her beat. Crime. If the subject wasn’t dead, about to be, or in the process of getting its ass arrested, she moved on.

Seeing nothing that would interest the readers of the Hudson Metro News, she picked up her phone. She had a laminated list of seventy-seven police precincts across the five boroughs stuck to her desk divider. Technically, she wasn’t supposed to call any of them directly. So, her first call of the night always went to the deputy commissioner, public information—or DCPI as the job was known. Bruce Radley was usually on duty now.

“Hi, it’s Maddie at the Hudson Metro News,” she said, after Radley answered. “Anything happening?”

“The usual, Miss Grey. I’ve already emailed you the day’s media releases along with everyone else.”

Radley always sounded so long-suffering, as if she’d bothered him, even though it was his job to be called up by the media all night. He made a point of calling her by her surname and drawing out the title Miss, because it was never Ms. Some passive aggressive shit, probably.

“Yes, I see that,” Maddie said politely, tapping on one small briefing note that had caught her eye. “The serial jewel thief on Longley Ave—what are we talking, crown jewels, society women’s baubles or…?”

“A break-in at a couple of old pensioners’ apartments. I don’t think the stolen goods were worth much.”

She doodled on her page. “Okay. Hope you catch them. Hey, the drug bust two nights back was pretty impressive,” she said in her most casual voice. “Fourteen arrested.”

The key to drawing out an officious little roadblock like Radley was to slip in something you really wanted to know about as an afterthought to something you had no interest in. Sometimes the man had his guard down and didn’t notice and things slipped out. But not often.

“Mmm, yes, I did enjoy your little story, Miss Grey,” the deputy commissioner said, but Maddie picked up the wariness. Damn. “What’s your interest in rehashing it?”

“Oh, just wondering why thirteen of them have had their charges dropped. There was such a big show of it all over the news. Fourteen arrested! Major drug breakthrough! And now, nope. All of them free, bar one.”

“It’s all in the media release. It went out yesterday—your day off I gather.”

“It’s not in the media release, though.” Maddie frowned and called up the briefing email in question. “It just says charges are proceeding for one person. I’ve looked and…”

“What can I say, Miss Grey? It’s old news. Charges stuck on one of them; can’t speak to the others.”

“But…”

“Anything else? Anything that’s not yesterday’s news?” Extra snippy now.

Maddie wondered what she’d trodden in. Had the arrests been all bullshit to start with just to make the nightly news, and they knew it? And then, when everyone’s backs were turned, they’d dropped the crap charges and followed through with the only guilty person? Or was the remaining accused even guilty? This smelled fishy as hell. Maddie knew she’d have to follow it up, or the curiosity would kill her.

“Which precinct handles the area that the bust was done in?” She flipped back through her notes from two days ago. “101st?”

“Miss Grey, it is highly advisable for the media to direct all their calls to my office and not bother individual precincts, which will simply direct your inquiries back to me. As you well know.”

“I hear you.” She underlined 101 in her notes. “So you’ll send me a statement on why thirteen arrests were dropped? Otherwise I’ll just ring 101st and ask direct.”

“You can’t. It is strongly advised…”

He could advise her all he liked, but he couldn’t actually stop her from picking up the phone and calling them. She wondered whether his bluster worked on the rest of the media. Were the other journalists all compliant and went along with this arbitrary rule? That’s not how she’d been taught. Maddie tapped her pen on her notepad, interrupting his speech on NYPD regs. She’d heard it dozens of times.

“Okay, so when can I expect your statement?” She doodled a circle around the 101 and wrote “Queens” beside it.

“I’ll get back to you later, Miss Grey,” he finished, dismissing her, and hung up.

Maddie rolled her eyes. Sure. She wouldn’t be getting a statement from him tonight or any other night on this. Or, if she did, it would be one paragraph long, say a fat load of nothing new, and be emailed within the next thirty seconds. A straight-up copy and paste. She could set her watch to it. Maddie looked up the 101st Precinct and dialled.

“Hi, this is Maddie Grey from the Hudson Metro News, could I speak to the deputy inspector, please?”

“She’s left for the day.”

“What about whoever’s supervising there now?”

Maddie hit refresh on her email. Nothing.

“He’s busy. And besides, shouldn’t you be calling the DCPI?”

“Yes, but I need a small clarification that the DCPI can’t help me with. It’s just background about the drug bust at Redfern Houses two days ago. Could you get the desk officer to call me when he’s free? Won’t take a minute.”

“I’ll tell him you called. Name?”

“Maddie Grey at the Hudson Metro News crime desk. My number’s—”

Click.

She sighed at the unsubtle message that they wouldn’t be calling her back. Just then, an email from Radley landed.

Forty seconds. He was getting slack.

The NYPD has no further comment on the drug operations on Sunday at 00:40. Charges are proceeding in the case of one Ramel Aiden Brooks, 18, on multiple counts of possession of a controlled substance, namely, quantities of Vicodin, ecstasy, marijuana, and oxycodone. The arrest was carried out at an apartment in New York City Housing Authority’s Redfern Houses, Far Rockaway.

So—nothing new; no further comment. And if anyone at 101st Precinct rang her back, she’d buy a lottery ticket. Such was life. That’s why the day shift was where the action was. Deputy inspectors, for instance, worked regular hours and tended to return calls.

God, this job could be boring.

Maddie worked her way through the rest of the NYPD media releases in her inbox. A flasher was doing the rounds of kids’ parks. The description was laughable—trench coat and combat boots. Nothing else. There was a shooting in the Bronx, but no fatalities beyond someone’s hotted-up, black muscle car. Break-in stats made her pause. She wrote that one up, highlighting the safest and most risky areas in New York. No shocks. It was pretty much a standard evening’s haul.

Maddie checked her watch. That late already? She headed for the office kitchen and grabbed her lunchbox. It contained a basic ham sandwich, a sad little Tim Tam (the last of her chocolate treats from Australia until her mother sent more), and a can of diet cola. High living. Not the most appetising selection, but the staff canteen had shut hours ago, and she couldn’t face how many people would still be bustling around on the streets outside, even at this time of night.

Back at her desk, Maddie leaned back in her chair and contemplated her existence. She did that a lot lately. Why am I so bad at cracking New York—personally or professionally? What made me think I could ever do this? She was out of her depth and drowning.