Air Time by Hank Phillippi Ryan Page B

course, don’t know anything about me, Charlie, being undercover. Sally thinks I’m Elsa. So wouldn’t it be one for the books if I’m secretly taping her? And she’s secretly taping me? And the real bad guys are getting away with it? Laughing all the way to the bank?
    “We don’t say outright the bags are fake.” Sally’s talking right over me. “So that makes it legal. Ya know? The way the law works, if you don’t make a promise, you can’t break a promise. And everyone is happy.”
    I mentally hold my nose and jump in. What Sally’s saying of course, is absurd. And wrong.
    “So, do you have more of the bags? Do you ever let—do you ever let anyone else sell them for you? Split the, um…” I pretend to be nervous, which isn’t all that difficult, since I’m still not one hundred percent sure I’m not the one being set up.
    I lean toward her, almost covering my mouth with one hand, speaking through my fingers. “Do you worry about being…” I look both ways, as if making sure we’re not overheard “…arrested?” I whisper.
    Sally eyes me, cagey. She crosses her arms in front of her T-shirted chest and tilts back in her chair, almost hitting the iPod-wearing teen in the chair behind her.
    “Where do you live?” she asks, flipping the heel of one high-heeled strappy mule against the sole of her foot. Tap. Tap. Tap.
    “Connecticut. Hartford. I’m an artist, just visiting the Berkshires, you know, for the fall colors.” I shrug, embellishing my cover story. “Can’t make much money doing watercolors, you know? And my ex-husband…”
    “What’s your phone number? Write it down for me.”
    Ah. Now I’m going to have to think of a reason why I don’t look in my purse. Although why should I necessarily have a pen? I’m not a reporter.
    “I—” I begin.
    “Look. Don’t make a big deal out of this,” Sally says. Her voice gets tough, dismissive. She clunks her chair back down onto all four legs, and plops her purse—a fake Coach, I can tell—on the table. “You ever hear of some mom in the suburbs hauled away to the slammer for selling purses? It’s like Tupperware, ya know? Don’t get hot over it. You want to sell purses?”
    That phony Coach had better not contain a hidden camera. She’d better not be taking my picture.
    Before I can decide on my answer, she yanks open the drawstring, and digs around inside, talking the whole time. “Listen. Who cares if those snazzy purse makers lose a little profit? We wouldn’t be buying their overpriced stuff, anyway. It’s not our money they’re losing.” Apparently not finding what she wants, she turns the bag on its side and shakes the contents out onto the table.
    And voilà. There’s no camera. She’s just purse-pushing Sally, suburban entrepreneur, and I’m the only one undercover. I feel my shoulders relax, and glance at my own purse. Even if the battery runs out now, I’ve got the shots we need.
    Sally plows through her belongings, and finally finds a slim black plastic cardholder. She extracts two business cards. They look like the one Regine gave me.
    She then selects a pencil, and offers it to me, eyebrows raised. “You want to work for me? Here’s the deal. I’m getting into this full-time. Frankly, it’s a gold mine. And perfect timing for you. I’m dumping my supplier and going on my own. You don’t need to know more thanthat. But if this all works out, there’ll be plenty for everyone. So. Write your number on one card. Keep the other. So you have my number.”
    She nods as I follow her instructions. One card has a phone number on the back, local area code, written in marker. I tuck that in my pocket. On the other, I write the number for the safe phone line Franklin and I have set up for exactly these occasions. And now, my “name.” Elsa, um. I consider using the last name Murrow, just for a little in-joke, then decide on Walters. Barbara won’t know.
    Sally’s stuffing her possessions back into her bag.