Ethan had also hired Mark Baker, as well as a couple of people whose specialties were the local art and music scenes. We all got along well, and Ethan had us working together as a team in no time.
I was seeing a whole new side of Ethan. I had always known that his interests were wide-ranging, that he was bright and creative. Even in his earliest days at the paper, he had been ambitious and competitive, but-in large part because of problems of his own making-the Express had never allowed him a leadership role. KCLP, on the other hand, had given him major responsibilities and power. “All the rope I need to hang myself,” he’d say to me with a rueful smile.
So far, he was using the rope to climb higher. After a little more than a month at the station, he was offered the position of news director-KCLP had fired the previous one, who had resented the power Ethan had already been given to cover local news on his show.
Not long after that, he called me into his new office, which was small, but at least it was an office. He hadn’t had one before. Now he even had a narrow window that looked out onto the parking lot. He was standing behind his desk, looking through some paperwork.
“Yes, Mr. Shire?”
He looked up and winced. “You know I hate it when you do that.” He looked at my arm and said, “How’d you get that nasty bruise?”
“Rachel’s teaching me self-defense.”
He seemed ready to make the obvious retort but changed his mind. “Have a seat.”
I took one on the couch that occupied most of one wall, but he stayed standing. “I have a request,” he said.
I waited, and for once in his smooth-talking life, he seemed to have a hard time coming up with what he wanted to say. Finally, he said, “You know John and Stuart made it clear to me they want to stay retired.”
“Yes…,” I said warily.
“It kind of surprised me.”
“They were in the newspaper business longer than the rest of us. I don’t think they wanted to try to start over here.”
He paced the two short steps the office allowed him, then said, “You’ve been best friends with Lydia since grade school, right?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“I’m thinking that you’ll be able to explain something to me. When I started the evening show, you and Mark were the only people from the paper that I wanted here and had budget enough to hire. Since then, about half the former staffers of the Express have asked me for jobs, but she hasn’t even stopped by to say hello.”
“You don’t take that personally, do you? You know she likes you-she probably just thinks you’re busy.”
“I’m more worried she was insulted that I didn’t ask her to work here.”
“No, not that she’s mentioned to me.”
“Do you think she wants out of the news business for good?”
I hesitated. “I don’t think so. But she knows that the chances of landing another job as a city editor are slim to none.”
He was silent for so long I figured we were done and started to get to my feet. He motioned me back down. “You’ve never taken an editor’s position?”
“No,” I said. “I’ve covered for people a few times, but I didn’t enjoy it. It’s not what I do. I’m a reporter. Lydia-she’s a good reporter, but writing and editing are where her real interests are. Can I ask where this is leading?”
“I have the title of news director now, but when they offered it to me, I didn’t accept it right away.”
“No? I thought you would’ve jumped at it.”
He smiled. “I wanted to, but I negotiated.”
I couldn’t repress a laugh.
His smile became a grin. “Yeah, I know. A little over a month ago, I was out of work. Now I’m making demands. Anyway, the conditions were that I could divide the previous director’s salary, take some for myself as a salary increase but use most of it to hire an assistant director.”
“Ethan-I don’t get it.”
“The deal is, I can hire an assistant, and if the station starts to get better ratings and support, they renegotiate my own salary in six months. Otherwise-well, otherwise, up to them.”
I just stared at him for a moment, then said, “I assume you have a plan?”
“I’m hoping Lydia will take the assistant’s job. She… she has skills I don’t have. Yet. I think if we all work together, we can pull it off. I know she’s getting married and all that, and the pay won’t be close to her old salary, but-do you think she’ll be interested?”
As it happened, she was thrilled. On her first day at work, she sighed contentedly and told me she had missed that feeling of being at the center of the flow of information that comes with being in a newsroom.
“I know,” I said. “The first week at home, every time I heard a fire engine-”
“It made you crazy not to know where it was headed and how big the fire was and if there were injuries and what type of structure-”
“Exactly.”
Not many days later, I was again sitting in my boss’s office, going over some possible stories, when his new assistant came rushing in, looking shaken-reminding me that when the news is especially bad, being at the center of the flow of information isn’t such a fine thing.
SEVENTEEN
Josh Enwill, one of the four guards sent on this trip, sat back on the narrow bench seat. The prison could hardly afford their absence in these underbudgeted days, but the warden didn’t want to take any chances where Nick Parrish was concerned. Bad enough that their regular ambulance had broken down months ago-there was no money to repair it.
There had not been any problems with this ambulance company, though, and it did have experience in transporting dangerous patients. This was not your typical ambulance. The walls of the van were thick and windowless. The van was separated from the cab, where the driver and Stan Rawls, another guard, sat.
They would be followed by two more guards in another vehicle. Josh could remember times when twice as many guards would be detailed to a trip like this. Luckily, Parrish was in no condition to put up a struggle.
Even so, the ambulance had been searched before the prisoner was loaded into it. Parrish was secured on the gurney, although there seemed to be little need for that-he was barely conscious. In the middle of the night, Parrish had fallen, screaming, to the floor of his cell. He received a brief examination by the prison doctor, who decided that he was out of his depth, and that the person who was best qualified to evaluate Parrish’s spinal problem was his surgeon at the prison hospital. So Parrish was loaded up with painkillers and strapped onto a support board. He was now being transported back to the prison hospital where he had spent years before being transferred just a few weeks ago.
Josh didn’t have a problem with Parrish. You worked around the prison population, you knew you weren’t keeping an eye on angels. He knew Parrish’s history, and that he had attacked both men and women. But in the short time Parrish had stayed at their facility, he hadn’t caused trouble. He could even be charming. Which didn’t fool Josh for a minute.
It was going to be a nine-hour drive. Josh was back here with Parrish and one of the paramedics. Air-conditioning kept it cool, but Josh was worried that he’d get carsick. Maybe Stan would switch with him.
The paramedic didn’t seem bothered by it. He was a friendly young guy, full of curiosity about Parrish but professional. He had red hair and wore black, heavy-rimmed glasses. Geeky kid.
Josh hated not being able to see the road or where they were. The ambulance, which was about the size of a mail truck, had a specially reinforced patient compartment with no access to the driver’s compartment. Which made it safer for prisoner transport but not much fun to ride in. Josh was just wondering why they couldn’t have put in a few small windows near the tops of the side panels when the ambulance braked and swerved sharply.