Then they saw her in action and stopped smiling.
Today her punches were as fast as lightning strikes, each one fueled by frustration. She knew the backs of her fingers would ache the next morning, that all the muscles of her upper arms and shoulders would be sore. But it was worth it. She put her stress behind every jab, uppercut, and hook, grunting with each punch. Then it was on to combinations, left hook, right uppercut, double left jab. The thing about boxing was that you put your whole body into it. It wasn’t just your arm. You punched with your leg, hips, and back. You punched with your mind and your heart.
When she stepped close to the bag for a series of uppercuts, Nic imagined she was driving her fist into Fairview’s soft gut.
SENATOR FAIRVIEW’S OFFICE
December 31
It was a media circus—and exactly the kind of thing that Cassidy reveled in. The city of Portland had gotten smart and started renting sidewalk space in front of Senator Fairview’s office to the various networks that wanted to cover the Fairview story. And that’s what it was gradually becoming—the Fairview story. Not so much the Katie Converse story. Because every day brought a half dozen new developments related to Fairview, as reporters started digging up his past.
Station management, sensing that the senator himself was the new news, had switched many of its resources to Fairview. Conventional newsroom wisdom held that no station ever got to be number one unless it owned whatever the big breaking news story of the day was. The rule was to throw everything at a potential story, then pull back if need be.
As for Katie Converse? Katie was still missing, but there were no new sightings, no new clues. And how many times could you plow the same ground?
But each story about Fairview spawned a half dozen new ones. Anyone with an old grudge or a new desire to swing the evenly divided Senate was coming forward with tawdry tales. And some of them were even true.
Now each small square of space on the sidewalk in front of Fairview’s office was covered by a tentlike structure stuffed with hundreds of thousands of dollars in equipment. Inside each tent was also what they called the “soapbox”—a box that lifted the reporter above the crowd when each filmed his or her live hits.
Word had come down that there was going to be some kind of statement handed out this morning. They’d had to scramble so fast that Cassidy’s hair was still wet in the back—but the camera would only get a front shot.
Everyone thought TV makeup and helmet hair were about chasing after beautiful perfection. Instead, it was all about eliminating distractions. Sweaty foreheads, five o’clock shadows, and hair hanging in your eyes made viewers stop paying attention to your storytelling. It wasn’t about looking pretty—it was about looking professional.
Cassidy’s adrenaline was pumping as she stepped up on the box. There was nothing like being on air live. Nothing. Factually, you could never be wrong. You also had to go quickly with what you knew. You needed to be able to speak coherently and to organize and write the story even as you were still telling it.
The cameraman gave her the signal, and Cassidy said, “Reporting to you live outside Senator Fairview’s Oregon office. Yesterday, transcripts of what are purported to be Fairview’s instant messages—or IMs—to a Senate page who served the year before Katie Converse were leaked to the media. The content is too graphic to discuss on air, but you can go to our Web site and read them. You should be warned, though, that they are, as I said, graphic and disturbing. It is not clear whether Fairview had a sexual relationship with this second girl. What is clear is that it is no longer simply a question of Fairview’s political career. This investigation has now shifted into the legal arena.”
All around Cassidy, she could hear the babble of other reporters doing their stand-ups. It was so noisy that she had to resist the urge to shout. She knew the microphone picked up her voice above the crowd behind her. “The FBI has announced that it is looking into whether Fairview broke federal law by sending these inappropriate e-mails and instant messages to underage girls.”
Being above the crowd meant Cassidy could see past them. The main door to the building opened, and out came Michael Stone. She almost felt sorry for him. No matter what Fairview was paying him, surely today it didn’t seem enough. Then again, this story was pumping his career up too.