Secrets Of The Guilty [Nanowrimo 2019]

FOUR

Editor Robert Bates watched her expectantly, everything about him is charged and pissed off.

He says nothing. Despite the fact or maybe due to the fact that he'd smoked through two packs today waiting for her to come into work, he makes her wait. Robert was a compact, bull of a man, two hundred and twenty pounds. Commanding behind his desk. His striped dress shirt was rolled at the elbows and his cigar was hanging from his mouth. He smoked in here with the window open because his wife wouldn't let him smoke at home. It didn't help much with his blood pressure; neither did his contact need to bark at people.

Taking his time, Robert leans back from his desk before he removes a folder from on top of it. He drops it in front of Eli before speaking.

"Detective something called today," He waits a beat. "He wanted to remind me that you can't comment or report on anything that you saw yesterday. Before or after giving your statement. I informed him that I'd see to you keeping your nose out of it. Which is what you're going to do. Ryan is taking this story. You, however, are free to work on anything else. Anything that catches your interest, new or passed." Eli looks at him and shakes her head.

"Anything?"

"Of course." Her editor inclines his head at the folder. "But I need you to cover the fundraiser. The Belmonts are good friends of mine and I said I'd send someone with an impartial but informed opinion on both the homeless situation and the police climate in this city."

"Robert-" She holds in a groan. She should have come here instead of meeting Ryan. The punishment was worse than the crime.

"I've already let them know I picked you. Your tickets are in the folder. Let Tammy know I need her on your way out. Oh, and Marlow? Impress me."

Tammy, a mousy girl with pen on her cheek, slides past Eli as she leaves the office. A stack of papers slipping from her grasp. Robert kicks off before the door closes.

Eli through the folder into her desk drawer stripped off her coat and opened her computer. Pissed off and grateful. When she started here, with her desk beside the elevator, she was shiny and hopeful and wore flats. She used to watch people when they stepped into the office. The prominent and powerful, the not so prominent and sleazy. Now she works with them instead of just watching while wearing heels longer than her ex-boyfriend's favourite body part.

Bates had almost rescued her if she was going to be dramatic about it. She owed him. Big time. So she'd attend the stupid party and write the editorial and drink expensive champagne and do exactly as he asked.

Looking into passed articles included. She opens her interoffice search typing in Charlie Fenton, the docks, and Detective Tanner. She pulled the mouse around ticking off boxes to narrow her search a bit. She wanted anything that came up with the name but nothing recent. It wouldn't surprise her if Ryan had already started his copy.

Only twenty matches flag her specifications. Not one coming up under Fenton. In this system, he's a ghost. No mention of court appearances, trial cases, payoffs or dirty laundry. Nothing. Most of the search filled under docks.

The ones under the detective showed his spotless record and a few photos in the database of him standing alongside the Mayor for a speech. Probably hired security for the day or as the Mayor says 'mandatory community service.'

The detective doesn't look as ruffled as he did yesterday.

Eli drags the files onto her hard-drive opening a few before her email icon starts to bounce at the bottom. She clicks it open to find an attachment from Anderson. The subject line on the email reads: Consider this a favour. She'd gone to visit him earlier under the pretence that Robert needed something.

What she really wanted was a look at the surveillance footage. Anderson obliged. He's shown her the slow stream of people using the side street as a short cut, either to get to work or to stumble down drunkenly instead of walking the long way around the block. He'd dipped through the footage until she-herself- stepped off the concrete sidewalk followed behind by her visitor.

Shoulders out of frame like she knew he'd be. Until the Eli on tape, moved farther into the street forcing him to step off the sidewalk and right into the shot.

Eli clicked open the attachment to find a still of the screen. Date and time-stamped at the bottom. His image stares back at her from the screen. He certainly was ridiculously handsome. His hair black and neatly parted. Shoulders tight in a well-tailored suit. He looks dangerous, of that she's sure. She bites back a no doubt smug smile.

A cleaner and crisper screen capture then the one she'd grabbed on her phone. This she could use.

Eli forwards the email to her work phone, promptly deleting the original, and cleaning out her trash folder at the last second. She pulled open The Gazette's website as the processing bar filled. The trash taking longer to delete then intended.

A knock at the office door snapped her back into focus. Ryan leaned his shoulder into the frame, legs crossed at the ankles. His press lanyard dangling from his neck.

"How was the Mayor's speech?" Eli says, clicking the screen off.

"Same as always." Ryan pats his pockets, emptying the contents on her desk. He shifts through his wallet, pulling out a slip of yellow paper. "Any discipline for Robert?"

"I have to attend the Lyle fundraiser. Play politician for a bit maybe rub a few elbows." Ryan stops what he was doing and looks up at me.

"That's cruel and unusual punishment." He says evenly. His stern expression lasts about three more seconds before he's cracking up. No doubt from the expression on her face. Eli flips him off before smiling. "Before I forget, that detective, the one with the dock cases? He was at the speech for a bit. He got a phone call just before one of the mayor's security guys pulled him off the podium. Looked unscheduled. Probably a real thing this time and not just the mayor forgetting his lines."

Ray taps her desk twice before leaving her office. Eli wakes her computer, checking for the progress. The email erased from the work server.

A couple of hours later, inside the elevator on the way down to ground level, she dialled a number.

"It's me. I need you to look into someone for me. There's a picture coming your way. He showed up at my place of work, I'm calling in a favour, Tess. Please call me back." 

11/04/19