by Nina Bocci
What annoyed me, yet again, was that Cooper had had two days to come clean and tell his mother the truth. Why hadn’t he told her that I had said no?
Because he’s trying to get you to say yes and is shamelessly using his mother to get you to agree.
Smart plan. He knew that I respected his mother tremendously and would be hard-pressed to tell her no.
I spent the better part of an hour dissecting what all of it meant. I narrowed it down to two possibilities:
1. There is no underlying jackassery on Cooper’s part, and she wrote me this email out of the goodness of her heart.
2. Cooper is employing his degree in jackassery and really wants me to help, so he’s using his mother’s influence and his knowledge of how much I respect her to get what he wants.
EMMA THOUGHT: This is smart on Cooper’s part, and you would do the same thing.
Damn it.
• • •
ON MY WAY into Borough Building, I struggled to carry my three new projection mock-ups and a half-eaten banana for breakfast because in all my errand running over the weekend, I’d forgotten to buy milk for my Cheerios. Turned out, the delirious and exhausted Nancy had put the gallon of milk in the cabinet Friday night, and we had both forgotten to move it.
All in a typical Monday morning.
Speaking of Nancy, she was waiting for me with coffee when the elevator door opened on my otherwise empty floor.
She started pulling the charts from my arms, dropped them to the floor in piles, and handed me the cup that she’d put on the counter. “You’re a lifesaver,” I sighed gratefully.
“Remember this when you’re shopping for my Hanukkah gifts in a few months,” she teased, pushing me toward the receptionist’s desk.
“Noted,” I said as I made my way to my office.
She lingered in the doorway.
“Something up?” I asked, and took a sip of the coffee.
“We, uh, had a visitor before you got here,” she replied, pulling out a file folder from under her arm. “This was taped to the front door.”
I eyed the folder suspiciously. Nancy wasn’t the nervous type, but something was making her edgy. The front of the folder was stamped PROOF, and I could see the telltale font of the Hope Lake Journal, our local newspaper, poking out from the top.
I swallowed thickly. The governor’s message about the current reporting echoed through my mind.
“Did you open it yet?”
She shook her head. “But this was stuck to the front, addressed to your dad.”
AS A COURTESY TO ENRICO
It was typed on the editor in chief’s letterhead. A hundred scenarios presented themselves to my mind. Did it have something to do with my father? Had the paper decided to drag Mayor Dad through the mud for supporting Cooper? Maybe it was something unrelated to the campaign—but why would they deliver it as a mock-up and not just run it?
Then a feeling of dread settled in the pit of my stomach. What if it was about Cooper?
“Open it and see,” Nancy said quickly. “The suspense is killing me.”
As I opened the folder, the headline screamed out at me.
NEW DIRECTION FOR HOPE LAKE ROGERS VOWS TO END FRIVOLOUS SPENDING AND STRIP DEPARTMENTS OF OVERLAP
My blood boiled as I scanned the article. Certain words jumped out at me: Fraud. Scam. Backhanded deals. With each line, my blood pressure climbed.
“Who the hell wrote this? This is full of lies!” I shouted, grabbing a pen from the desk to underline the blatant fabrications. “We did not spend tax dollars on the fountain project—that was a grant that Cooper got! We busted our asses to get that money! How are they allowing this to be printed? If Rogers is behind this, it implicates the council as also being complicit in shady dealings, because this is beyond shady! Who was the editor on this? When is it running? Has anyone tried to call Peter yet?” Peter was the editor in chief of the paper, and he’d always stood by printing only the facts. At least he had until now.
Nancy stood with clenched fists, her eyes wide. “I wish I could say I can’t believe they’re printing this, but it’s going to sell a ton of papers, so that’s probably why they’re running it. I’ll make sure I get ahold of Peter this morning to ask him about it!”
“It’s irresponsible of Peter to do this. As editor in chief, he shouldn’t be publishing anything without seeing this information sourced. Had he come to my father with this, we could have provided a dozen documents showing him it’s bull. Good Lord, what happened to legitimate journalism? I could say that the sky was pink with polka dots every Tuesday and that the giant spaghetti monster in the sky told me so, but that wouldn’t make it true!”
Nancy grabbed the article from me, scanning it. She huffed a sigh, pointing to the last paragraph. “The freelancer claims to have sources confirming everything.” She turned to me. “Did your father and Peter have a falling-out? He’s always been so fair to him. Even if they disagreed in the past, he’s never run anything potentially harmful against him and certainly never patently false. I’m not sure why he’s letting this go to print.”
I took the article back from Nancy and read it carefully, seeking out the buzzwords I knew would be in there. Sure enough, not only was it strewn with falsehoods about how my department and others within Borough Building were indiscriminately spending tax dollars, but they were also slandering my father and his years of scandal-free public service by claiming that he had received kickbacks and possibly skimmed money off his projects. They even managed to call into question his ownership of the land surrounding my family’s house and where Cooper was getting his campaign money from. According to the article, the tax money claim was a part of an embezzlement scandal that went as high up as the governor.
“Has my father seen this yet? Has Cooper? Has the governor?” I asked, fumbling for my phone to call Mayor Dad. My father and Peter, like many people in Hope Lake, had gone through school together and knew each other well. They’d had some run-ins over the years about the direction of the paper, but never like this. “Shit. Straight to voice mail.”
“Your dad walked in with Cooper this morning. Sun wasn’t even up yet. I was outside with Larry when I saw them heading in,” Nancy explained.
“I wonder if Peter sent Cooper a copy, too,” I thought aloud, wondering if they were meeting to try to work up a plan of defense. “Attack ads are one thing, but being on the receiving end of an onslaught of bullshit and having to defend yourself against slander is something that no one wants to do.” Especially when you were already balanced on a tenuous and fraying tightrope to begin with.
“Why is Cooper even doing this to himself? It might have been fun for him to run in the beginning, but now it just seems like he’s being pummeled with a constant deluge of malicious gossip. You couldn’t pay me enough to deal with that,” Nancy said, fanning herself with the folder.
“The lead-up to the primary was fun for Cooper,” I clarified, remembering the excitement surrounding his announcement. People had been thrilled that another Campbell was entering the political field, especially locally. “I think the buildup and excitement were what he thought would continue.” I sent off a quick message to Cooper and my dad asking where they were. “Not all of this mudslinging.”
“Hell, I hoped it would continue, and I wasn’t even running. It looked like a blast. It’s got to be hard, though, having so many love you and then turn on a dime. I thought he was moving beyond being plain old Cooper, Governor Campbell’s only child and the legacy of Hope Lake, to become Cooper the politician, a relatable yet politically savvy guy.”
“Maybe that’s what he needs to go back to,” I said, thinking about the differences between the primary and now. “More public events; volunteering; showing the town that he cares and that he wants to be involved in supporting it firsthand. If he only does positive things, the paper will have no choice but to print it.”
Nancy nodded but looked skeptical. “Kirby is out for blood, though, and it looks like
he’s found an ally,” she said. “I can’t help but think this is only the tip of the iceberg.”
“You’re right, but there are ways around the paper: Facebook, social media, all the viral crap the kids do nowadays. Why not fight fire with fire?”
I thought about the damage the bachelorette photo could have caused had it stayed online and been leaked to the public. For now, Kirby—who so far seemed the opposite of social media savvy—was grasping at straws as far as Cooper’s social life went. There were rumors, of course, but nothing concrete. Conjecture was fine until there was proof to back it up. Thankfully, Kirby hadn’t been in town when the Jackson scandal had hit. Now that the election was in full swing, I was hoping that wouldn’t be dragged back up from the sewers. Especially not with the Jackson family considering us again.
“What are you thinking?” Nancy asked.
I sighed. “I’m thinking of how bad this could get. There are people out there who can make this into a total circus instead of a political race. Cooper’s an easy target. Hell, he’s never hidden the man he is. It’s just a matter of when and what people find out.
“I’ll be back,” I Schwarzeneggered.
I took the emergency stairwell instead of waiting for the elevator, bouncing down the stairs with my phone and the proof. By the time I got to the landing on the first floor, the wheels in my head had started turning.
Walking a bit more calmly now that I had a plan, I stepped into my father’s deserted hallway but stopped dead when I saw who had just stepped out of my father’s office.
I hadn’t seen Whitney Andrews in years, but I would have recognized her anywhere. She hadn’t changed at all. Her long blond hair was still blown out in perfect waves. She was still as well put together as ever, every bit the high-powered attorney in her fitted black suit and Louboutin heels.
Whitney had been my first college roommate, best friend, and part of the reason that my friendship with Cooper had imploded so many years ago. I didn’t know what she was doing there, but if I had to guess, given the early hour, she’d stayed in town last night after a drive over from Philadelphia.
With Cooper, most likely.
Is she here because of the conversation we had at my parents’ about his love life? I wondered. Cooper and Whitney had a long shared history. They’d met during my first family weekend in college, when Cooper, Henry, and Nick had joined my parents for the festivities. Whitney and Cooper had hit it off and ended up dating for a few months.
And he’d never told me.
Had I not walked in on them one night, I’d likely never have known. So after freshman year, I had requested a new roommate. Seeing them together wasn’t exactly enhancing my college experience. It seemed silly, maybe, but I wanted no part of their relationship, whatever it was or wasn’t.
Why is she here?
Why do I care?
Straining to listen to the low murmurs still coming from my father’s office, I waited until Whitney disappeared down the hallway and into the corridor near the elevator before I tiptoed toward the door.
The large oak door was ajar, a thin stream of light falling onto the patterned carpet outside. “Cooper, son,” my father was saying, his voice taking on the tone he’d used with me only a few times in my life. He saved it for when I had done something monumentally stupid, which, thankfully, wasn’t often.
In Cooper’s case, he used it a lot.
“You need to make changes. Look at this article! I feel like this is only the beginning. I know you know this, but you don’t seem to actually get it. Every little thing you do will be used against you. Anything that even remotely seems like it could be detrimental has to be nixed. Your friend Whitney is right. I’m glad you’ve brought her in to help.”
Cooper mumbled something that I couldn’t make out. I heard a laptop close and a chair scoot back over the floor. I moved from the carpet runner to the sliver of hardwood right in front of my father’s office, so my footsteps would announce my arrival. I heard my father clear his throat just before I walked in. They were both staring wide-eyed at the door. Maybe they expect Whitney to reappear.
They visibly relaxed upon seeing me, the air leaving them in a whoosh.
“Emma, good morning. What are you doing down here? And so early,” my father said, pulling me into a hug. “Go easy on him,” he whispered, too low for Cooper to hear.
“Am I interrupting?” I gave my father a sidelong glance, trying to read his expression. It was closed off, like shutters were drawn over his emotions. There was no way for me to glean anything from his silence. Had I not overheard the bits of their conversation, I would have had no idea what I’d just walked into.
“We were just finishing up,” Cooper explained, walking behind me to close the door. “I’ve got another meeting to run to in a few minutes.”
“Yeah, I bet,” I mumbled.
“What?” he asked, his eyebrows furrowing.
Maybe he sensed the shift into argument territory, but my father changed the subject. “You got one, too?” he asked, gesturing to the folder in my hand. He walked around the desk to hold up his own proof.
“Has Peter said anything about this, Dad?”
Shaking his head, he took a seat behind the desk. “No, and I’ve called and emailed. I’m about to walk down the street and knock on his front door.”
Cooper looked to my father nervously before clearing his throat. “If these headlines keep running—”
“—they’ll do irreparable damage,” I finished, stepping around him to stand by the window.
The breeze ruffled the thin drapes. This room held so many memories for me, from my childhood through getting a job here right out of college.
Turning to look at Cooper, I thought about his taking up residence in this office someday. Would he be able to hold himself to the standard that my father had for all these years? My father had been the mayor for the better part of my life—could Cooper be the mayor for that long? Did he have twenty-six years of scandal-free governing ahead of him? Could he command respect and treat everyone fairly—do everything necessary to ensure that Hope Lake continued to thrive and blossom to its full potential?
The answer to that wasn’t exactly black and white, but I did believe that he was far better suited for the job than the alternative.
I couldn’t imagine someone like Kirby sitting in this office. He was shallow and malignant and, from what I’d witnessed the other day at the press conference, willfully ignorant. And this office meant a lot to me. I’d practically grown up in here. I’d colored pictures on the floor when I was in preschool, I’d pretended to be the mayor during “take your child to work day,” and the desk, unbeknown to anyone except my father, still had a collection of crayon drawings beneath it from when Cooper and I were seven. One year we’d ditched the babysitter who was watching us while our parents attended a small holiday party upstairs and drawn a picture of ourselves holding hands on the underside of the desk.
No matter how much Cooper infuriated me, I couldn’t let Kirby win this office. I was going to go through with my plan.
I turned, looking at them both sitting in pained silence.
Cooper looked like he’d been through the wringer. Whether it was just this newspaper article, the campaign in general, or some other force that was causing him to look stricken, I didn’t know. I was trying not to care, but I kept thinking back to the article that would run tomorrow. The newspaper proof was rolled in my hand. I hated that it carried so much power.
Tossing the paper onto the desk, I said, “I’ve got some things to work out. Cooper, enjoy your meeting, then come find me before you leave for the day. We have to talk.” With that I shut the door behind me as I headed back to my office.
Deep down, I knew what I had to do—I just needed to work up the gumption to do it. On the way back up to my office, I pulled out my phone.
I typed a response to the governor, telling her that I would help however I could.
Then I started a list of
requirements that I would take to Cooper. If I was going to do this—be his campaign manager—he would need to toe the line. I had conditions, and if they were not met, there was no point in my even entertaining the idea.
I just hoped I wouldn’t regret it.
11
* * *
My day had gone from bad to worse. Just a few minutes after leaving Mayor Dad’s office, I found an email waiting in my inbox stating that the town council had rejected the theater proposal. The one I’d spent my entire Friday night working on. And their reason was bogus: budgetary concerns. The decision had Kirby written all over it, and it only reinforced my choice to help Cooper.
Just after lunch, Nancy popped into my office, carrying another cup of coffee for each of us.
“Hey, how goes it?” I asked.
She smiled dreamily. “Got to talk to Javier about three in the morning. I’m exhausted but so damn happy.”
That explained the tired yet lovesick eyes. One of the things that I needed to get better at was making sure that I wasn’t monopolizing her time, especially on the weekends. Just because I was a crazy workaholic didn’t mean that I had to turn Nancy into one, too.
“Why is it so quiet?” I asked, scoping out the empty office.
“Cooper treated everyone downstairs to ice cream after lunch—he asked if you and I wanted to come, but you were on the phone. He brought you back an Emma Special—it’s in the freezer,” she explained, and I didn’t miss the faint smile. “It seems he’s already listening to your advice. We’ve got the place to ourselves for at least a little while—something that’s way better than ice cream.”
I haven’t given him any advice yet. Why the thoughtfulness?
“Why didn’t you go? Larry loves Viola’s,” I teased, expecting to hear his little nails clicking across the hardwood. Since adopting him, Nancy let Larry spend a few days a week with her in the office, since otherwise he’d be too lonely by himself all day: just one of the perks of working for an organization that cared about all of Hope Lake’s citizens, including its four-legged ones.
