too.
“Will, you call Dorinda. Charlie, of course take those clippings. And your copy of the tape. Let us know what you find out. Franklin, leave your number with my secretary in case he needs to get in touch with you directly. I’ll get my staff to do some digging, but you two are the front lines of Team Dorinda.”
I smile noncommittally. Team Dorinda? Situations like this are always sticky. Tricky. Franklin and I don’t work for the CJP, we work for the truth. We’ll follow the story whether it leads where Rankin and Easterly believe it will—or whether it doesn’t. If it turns out Dorinda is guilty, we might even go with that story instead.
It’s a fragile equilibrium.
I gather up the newspaper clippings, sliding them into their manila file folder and tucking them carefully into my tote bag. I can’t wait to read them all thoroughly, focusing to see if I can put the story together in a different way. In a way that means Dorie’s innocent.
Rankin and Will Easterly are moving toward the conference room door. “Oscar Ortega will be ripping some poor sucker for this one,” I hear Rankin mutter, patting Will on the back as he guides him through the room. “Governor’s chair? I don’t think so.”
I look up, surprised. “I’m sorry, Oliver,” I say. “Did you say Oscar Ortega? Would be…unhappy? Could I ask why?”
“Of course,” Rankin replies, changing his tone, affable again. “I thought you knew. You’ll see it when you read the articles. Oz was lead prosecutor in the Sweeney case. The A.G.’s office had jurisdiction because Sweeney was a public official. Oz wrapped up the case with that confession, now he touts it as one of his big successes. He says his law and order team is so powerful, miscreants simply surrender.” He pauses, then gives a sardonic smile. “If Dorinda’s innocent? There goes the law-and-order campaign.”
The four of us arrive at the elevator and I push the button. Then, because Franklin’s not watching me, I push it again. We hear the click and swish as the mechanism clicks into life. Ha. I wish Franklin had been looking.
“I’ll call Dorie right now,” Will says. “I’m sure she’ll talk with you.” He holds out a hand, shaking mine, then Franklin’s. “If you can get to the truth, you’re going to save her life.”
“I—we—” I begin. “Please don’t get her hopes up,” I urge him. “It would be tragedy on tragedy if she begins to rely on us, and then it doesn’t happen.”
The elevator arrives, and Franklin and I step in. “Thank you so much,” I say. “We’ll let you know what we come up with.”
The polished stainless steel doors begin to close, but then Rankin steps forward, clamping one confident hand into the opening. He forces the doors apart even as the elevator mechanism struggles to slide them together.
“You two are going up against the Great and Powerful Oz. You know that, correct?” he asks, pretending the elevator isn’t fighting back. “Not afraid of him, are you?”
Before either of us can respond to his challenge, he lets go of the door and it slides shut.
“I KNEW THERE WAS SOMETHING ,” I whisper to Franklin. We’re alone in the elevator, but it feels right to keep my voice low. “Maybe that’s what this is really about. Ortega.”
Before Franklin can reply, we stop at the twenty-fifth floor. A harried-looking woman tapping a BlackBerry gets on. She pushes 21. We wait, impatient for privacy.
Four floors down, the doors close us into seclusion again. “I mean, Will’s obviously obsessed with Dorie,” I continue. “What if Rankin’s obsessed with Oz? And if Rankin and Easterly hate Ortega, maybe they think—”
I stop as the doors open again. Two young women step on, deep into comparing the nail polish colors showing through the openings of their peep-toed pumps.
I decide to risk it.
“If they think you-know-who being innocent can derail the campaign of ‘that guy,’” I continue,