Linda moved on. "Yesterday your finance manager resigned. This is the first obstacle in an otherwise picture-perfect campaign. Can you tell us what happened?"
Sterling sighed, looked down for a beat. "Thomas Sutton was one of my most trusted colleagues. He'd been with me since the very beginning. He was a student of mine, in fact. I would like to say that it was a simple disagreement. But I can't."
Erin caught her breath and cocked her pen over a blank page. He's going off script.
"I don't want to give you a politician's answer. I'm going to be honest and open with the public, because my position-the one I have now and the one I hope to be elected to-is based on trust. The truth is, Linda, Thomas was a little too committed to the cause. He wanted to falsify our contribution records-to make it look like a larger percentage of our corporate donations had come from individuals instead. That's an oversimplification, but the important thing is that no wrong was actually done. I dismissed him immediately because I will not tolerate any appearance of impropriety. Thomas Sutton violated my trust and the trust of everyone who works for my cause."
Difference of opinion indeed, Erin thought, scribbling fast. So that's what was bugging him the other day.
John Sterling looked directly into the camera, and as though he was answering her question, continued in what Erin knew was his professorial voice. "I hate to damage the reputation of a former associate. I was going to insist that the public respect his privacy. But yesterday, after being terminated, Mr. Sutton attempted to extort money from the organization. He claimed to have altered our records to make us appear guilty of fraud, even though we are not. I cannot protect his reputation any longer, because he put the integrity of all my employees at risk."
Erin almost tore an acid-free page from her notebook as she flipped it and kept writing. The bastard. Selling something you believe in-is that what he thought I meant?
Sterling continued. "I want to emphasize that no harm was actually done. I've opened the books to outside experts, and they assure me that every detail is aboveboard."
"What about Sutton?" Linda wanted to know. "He could have derailed your campaign. What would you like to see happen to him?"
I have a couple of ideas, Erin thought.
"I've thought about it carefully," Dr. Sterling said. "I'm not going to press any charges, Linda. He's guilty of misjudging my character, but he was stopped before he could do any real damage. He thought I was someone who would bend the rules to get ahead. That's not who I am."
The speechwriter found herself speechless. The boss's response was entirely too gracious. She herself would have thrown the book at Thomas Sutton. And a few other things, too. I respected him. It just goes to show that you never know who a person really is.
* * *
"Sears speaking."
"Bill, it's Thomas. Don't hang up, OK?"
"Look, Sutton, why do you keep calling me? You've got nothing on the mayor. Leave the guy alone already."
"How does he do it, Bill? His approval numbers are in the 90s. Nobody dares say a bad word about the guy. He's squeaky clean. He's too clean. And I'm telling you, he's lying about why he fired me."
"96 percent approval, to be exact. Crime is way down. People are talking about a run for Congress. You want to go up against all that because you guys got a call one day from someone claiming to be his long-lost mother? I don't. Even if I believed you weren't planning to cook the books like he said." Bill Sears ground his teeth and wished, for what had to be the two-hundredth time, that someone else had picked up the phone three years ago when Sutton had started calling the paper.
Sutton groaned. "I told you what really happened. When Sterling heard about that call, he told me to pay her off, keep her quiet until after the election and then he'd deal with it. I decided I couldn't do that. I asked him straight out if she was any relation. Then he fired me."
"OK, Sutton, what if you're telling the truth, and the woman's right? Then the mayor's got a mother he doesn't want anything to do with. So what? Families have disagreements. All politicians have secrets, but they're not all worth exposing. And I checked your story, way back when. I called every Sterling in the Charleston phone book. No one will admit ever talking to you."
"That was yesterday, Bill. I talked to her again today."
Sutton's voice was triumphant. He'd been waiting to drop this little nugget. Sears sighed. "Go on, I'm listening."
"Back then, I tried calling her back, several times. I could never get her to answer the phone. I figured Sterling went ahead and paid her off himself. Anyway, she called me this morning, and confirmed that. He talked to her, convinced her he was no relation, gave her some money to keep quiet. She wouldn't say how much."
"So she went back to looking for her kid. She read Sterling's book, and it said he joined the Marines in the fall of 1980, the same year her son went missing."
"But if he's not her son, what's he have to do with anything?"
"She was looking through news archives from around the time her son disappeared, hunting for unsolved deaths, stuff like that. She didn't find anything solid-but one thing she did find was a double homicide on the last night she saw her son. A bad drug deal. The dealer was shot and the buyer was stabbed. Apparently they did each other. The buyer was a kid about her son's age, and was involved in a domestic shooting earlier that same day. The dad came home drunk and picked a fight, but the kid got to Dad's gun. The same gun that was used on the dealer."
"I still don't see the connection, Thomas."
"She says the case was closed fast because it was two birds with one stone. A drug dealer was off the street, a domestic crime was solved. The gun and the prints checked out. But no money was found at the scene."
* * *
"Bill, call me when you get this. We need to talk about your story."
Sears deleted his editor's third voicemail and went back to his typing. The hotel air was stale and the light was fading. He'd recorded his interviews and notes, but preferred to hack out as much of a draft as possible before leaving the scene of a story. The hotel was a block from the old crime scene, and the neighborhood hadn't gotten any better in the last twenty-eight years.
After the conversation with Sutton three days ago, he'd taken a trip down to Charleston, interviewed the Sterling woman, and seen photos of her missing son. He'd pulled Sterling's Marine Corps record and found that he had indeed joined in 1980-weeks after the murder-with the minimum paperwork, and no next of kin listed. He'd been unable to find anyone still on the Charleston police force who remembered the double homicide. He'd scored a look at the case file, but the photos of the dead that he was hoping for were absent.
Before working the city desk, Sears had cut his journalist's teeth on the crime beat. It hadn't taken him long to learn that a drug crime with no money was not a drug crime at all. The police had concluded that the bodies had been picked over by a scavenger, but in that case-why leave the drugs that were worth so much money? Add the missing crime scene photos to the recipe, and you got the distinct aroma of coverup.
In short, he had a story.
When the last ray of sunlight had deserted his window, he closed his laptop and opened his phone.
"What's up, boss?"
"Pack up your stuff and get back to town, Bill. Your story's going on ice."
"Why? Everything I have checks out. It could be huge."
"We got word today that the mayor's planning a run for Senate next year. And it looks like your primary source is on his opponent's payroll."
"What?"
"We got a tip that Thomas Sutton's been receiving money from the incumbent. It's rock solid. Which makes your coverup circumstantial at best, and a total fabrication at worst. Either way, you've got a bigger story now."
* * *
"They're projecting the race for you. Congratulations, professor."
John Sterling froze halfway throug
h the lobby, steps from the car waiting to take him to his victory party. "Good evening, Thomas. Should I be calling the police?"
The younger man sat behind him in a leather armchair, beneath a floor lamp. His features were worn prematurely thin, like a garment that had been ironed too many times. "What's the point? You proved I can't touch you. What more can you do to me?"
"I did what I had to do, Thomas. I always have. For my cause and my family."
Thomas Sutton gave a mirthless bark. "Your family? What about that poor woman in Charleston? What about her family?"
Sterling stiffened and turned partly towards his accuser. "Thomas, all your snooping around her son's death found nothing. The reporter you sent after me found nothing. If anyone caused that woman harm, it was the two of you. I helped her by taking care of you."
"You admit that you set me up, then. You knew I wasn't on the take from your opponent. You made all that up. He had nothing to do with this. At least Sears got a good story out of it. I got my life taken away." Sutton's words spilled out faster, his voice plaintive. "I was happy working for you, you know. You gave me a purpose, and then you took it from me. For what? For doing the right thing? For refusing to make a pointless payoff?" Sutton leaned forward, gripping the arms of the chair.
"That was an investment in the greater good, Thomas," said Sterling, slipping into a lecturing tone. "We were at a crucial moment in our first campaign. We couldn't afford even the appearance of impropriety. You knew these things. I hoped you'd be a team player. Sometimes the right thing is to do a little wrong."
"I couldn't accept that then, professor, and I can't accept it now. I don't get how the man who taught me so much-history, business, how to make a difference-could stand there and say that with a straight face. You may not be a politician, sir, but as a liar, you've got them all beat. Enjoy your party. Oh, and by the way: her son is officially missing. Not dead."
Sterling turned back toward the door, his voice cold. "Thomas, in a curious way, you've turned out to be one of my best students."
He threw the light switch as he left, leaving Thomas Sutton sitting in darkness save for the small circle cast by the lamp.
* * *
The man known as John Sterling sat alone in the shadows in the back of his official car, sipping ice water.
It was so close now.
Years of planning and sacrifice were about to pay off on a monumental scale. First celebrity, then a city, now a national office-even a master planner like himself could barely fit his mind around the possibilities from here. He took pride in his ability to always look forward and move forward-the past was only the road you took to get to the future-but the troubling encounter in the lobby with Sutton fueled his memory.
His clumsy coverup had held over the years; there had been only the matter of an old woman and some photos that needed to disappear. By the time that came up, much later, he had the resources and was skilled at minimizing unintended consequences.
He barely remembered the boy he'd been, thirty years ago, fleeing his father's booze-soaked, mercurial regime. It had been easy to stash the man's gun and provoke him into a fight. He'd known just what buttons to push. The man had destroyed himself, really; he had only provided the bullet. It had been somewhat less easy to dispatch the silly rich junkie and his supplier, but he'd needed money and an identity to vanish into the refuge of military service. He'd later given most of the money to a street punk, who rose to his own kind of power as a gang leader. They'd done each other more than a few favors over the years; he was useful for certain tasks and excellent at keeping his mouth shut.
In all his time studying and teaching history, he'd seen a few certain paths to greatness. The truly great man had the stomach to do what the next man wouldn't. He'd also seen firsthand the difference between his Marine superiors who were loved and those who just wore more rank insignia. John Sterling would take love over fear anytime. He built the core of his army by winning the hearts of some impressionable college students. But to be loved by millions-for that he needed celebrity, and a cause to champion.
Each sacrifice was an essential step on the path.
It took years, but he rid himself of the nightmares. The only remnants of that night were the memories of his car, and the damned song. Iris.
He no longer thought about the moment he said goodbye for the last time, or the moment he'd opened his smashed front door knowing what he would find. Even the blood and the image of their ruined faces against the floor had mostly faded. But the song had never left his mind. Iris playing on the radio as he drove past the parked car, full of gang members. He had only hesitated for two or three beats before flashing his lights and sealing the fates of his wife and child. He had never regretted the decision; it had made him. But the Goo Goo Dolls would not leave his mind; he heard the melody in his sleep, and loud as a scream in his head every time he woke up.
It was a small enough price to pay for where he was going.
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