But why had Rosa been photographed with the Cranberry Cove residents? What was her involvement in their affairs? Was she corrupt, too?
For a little while, Elena tried to distract herself with other work. Rather than using her laptop, she used a pencil to write a pretty little article about the ballerinas set to perform in front of the courthouse that weekend. It was a silly article, truly, but it was also adorable to consider how important this sort of event was for the town of Millbrook. Plenty of people would come out to support them. They were the town’s future.
Halfway through the article, Elena heard a sound in the hallway, popped up, and accidentally dropped her pencil. Peeking out, she watched as two journalists—a man and a woman she didn’t know well—disappeared out the side door. She wondered if they were secretly dating. She suppressed a smile and returned to her office, prepared to carry their secret.
When she dropped down to grab the pencil, something flashed in the corner of her eye. It was under the desk, and something was stuck there. Elena crouched lower and twisted her head to see a piece of paper, secured there with several layers of tape. It read: BJ81342. Elena reached for her phone, took a picture, and returned to her chair. What kind of number-letter combination was that? Was it a password for something? Oh, but the paper was yellowed and old. If she had to guess, she’d say that it had been written pre-internet, as crazy as that was. Even though she was old enough to remember the pre-internet times, those years were blurry in her head.
Suddenly, Natalie knocked, and Elena called her in, asking her to look at the number. “I found it under the desk,” she said. “Any idea what it could be?”
Natalie got on her knees and turned to look. “Huh. That’s strange.” She got back on her feet and put her hands on her hips. “Do you think Carmen would remember?”
Elena shrugged. She didn’t want to tell Natalie that her mother had taken a turn for the worse.
“Didn’t your grandmother work in this office as well?” Natalie said as an afterthought.
Elena’s ears rang. Was it in this office that Rosa had made her decision to leave her toddler and husband behind? “She did,” she said. “And you’re right. I believe she wrote at this very desk.”
Together, Elena and Natalie glared down at Rosa’s desk, as though it were the answer to their simmering questions. But the reality was, it was just a desk. And they were stumped.
Chapter Twenty-One
Elena wrote the most powerful article of her career that night. Consumed with anger and fear for her mother’s life and memory, she stayed up till dawn, writing and editing and trying to pin down as much of the corruption she and Natalie had gathered thus far. She knew this would probably be the first of many articles, that it was really the beginning. It was meant to take the town's temperature, to figure out who knew what. She cited the mayor as a potential source of the corruption and spoke about Henrietta, Judge Baxter Drury, and their parents. “They learned well from the wealthy generation before them,” she wrote. “They learned not to care about the rest of us.” She also wrote about the mysterious circumstances surrounding her grandmother’s disappearance, but was prepared to take it out if Natalie thought it went too far.
When Elena met Natalie at the office the following morning, Natalie took one look at her, poured a mug of coffee, and handed it to her. “You need this,” she said.
“Do I look that rough?” Elena asked.
“Worse,” Natalie said.
Elena confessed to what she’d been up to. “It’s a kind of mania that comes over me when I care about a story too much,”she said. “It used to happen to me all the time back in Syria.” It had happened to Timothy, too. She remembered that they’d bonded over this early on, that he’d seen himself in her work ethic. It disgusted her to think of that now.
Natalie read the article standing up in Elena’s office. She was wearing different clothes than she typically did, a blazer and a pair of slacks, and she’d gotten a haircut that made her look straight from a Manhattan newsroom. She looked professional and sleek. Elena thought,She’s becoming a real journalist now. My mother would be proud. And when Natalie looked up at Elena, having finished reading, she came prepared with several notes that she thought would make Elena’s piece much stronger.
“But it’s good,” Natalie said firmly. “It says everything it needs to say.” She hesitated. “How are you feeling about revealing the stuff about your grandmother?”
“That’s the thing,” Elena said. “I’m not revealing much. I hardly know what happened to her. I’m using it as filler around the main story, which I see as a fight between the residents of Millbrook and those of Cranberry Cove over the land at Cranberry Cove. We have to make sure the last of the cove remains public.” When Elena closed her eyes, she could still visualize that gorgeous, sweeping beach, those frothing purple clouds overhead, and the water as it lapped against the sands. She refused to give it to the likes of Baxter Drury and his country club. She declined to provide the uber-wealthy with still more reason to celebrate.
“You’re going to make plenty of people very angry,” Natalie said tentatively.
“I’m used to that.”
That night, the article was printed in theGazette, and by morning, the story was on everyone’s lips, zipping through texts and highlighted all over the internet. Elena got on social media and read post after post from Millbrook residents discussing what she’d written, many of them revealing how shocked they were that something like this could happen in Millbrook. Others weren’t so naive.
GrantHaddox12: We all knew the rich folks at the Cove were taking advantage of us. But I can’t believe it extends to our elected officials. Thanks to Elena Vasquez for reporting.
BrittanyStrong: I literally voted for that mayor! He’s ripping money out of my pocket!
NateDeanHunter: TAKE THE COVE BACK.
But that morning, Elena couldn’t go to the newsroom to discuss further action. Carmen woke up with a migraine and fear of something amorphous she thought was outside. Elena did her best to calm her down, but telling her the same old Christmas stories didn’t work this time. When Carmen grew especially frightened, Elena administered the medication that Maxine had given her, then watched as her mother drifted off to sleep. Elena’s heart fell into her stomach. The war for Cranberry Cove seemed so small compared to the war going on in her mother’s mind.
But around noon, Natalie called with news. “People are organizing a protest at Cranberry Cove! From the looks of it,there will be at least a hundred people there. We’re all headed there now. Can you come?”
Elena was stunned into silence.
“It’s because of your article,” Natalie reminded her. “They get it now. They won’t let this happen without a fight. It’s great!”
Elena felt flustered. Stuttering, she said, “I don’t know if I can get away.” But of course, she knew her mother’s nurse would arrive any minute. The truth was, Cranberry Cove made her nervous, especially now that she understood there was a connection between her grandmother and those sinister people. Despite her best efforts, and maybe because she hadn't slept well, she’d begun to ask herself,Am I just as sinister and wrong as my grandmother? Do I have the capacity to accept corruption? Would I take money and turn the other way? She liked to think the answer was no. But who knew what they would do in such circumstances?
