Vengeance Road by Rick Mofina Read Free Book Online Page B

me.”
    â€œThe hell I do! As an employee conducting business for this company, you are required to advise your managers of your source, or be considered insubordinate.”
    â€œJack,” Wallace said, “just tell us who your source is and where they work.”
    â€œI can’t. My source would lose more than their job.”
    â€œJob?” Fowler said. “Let me tell you about jobs,Gannon. If we print a retraction, we rupture the paper’s credibility at a time of eroding readership. At a time of possible staff cuts. Do you understand what’s at stake here?”
    â€œI do. I swear my story’s good.”
    â€œIs it? Without so much as a thread of evidence, you’ve accused an outstanding member of this community of murder! A man recognized for putting his life on the line, a man who volunteers to help street people. Your story claims he killed a goddamn prostitute!”
    â€œA human being. A troubled nursing student, that’s what she was.”
    â€œA drug-addicted hooker.”
    â€œMy story’s not wrong, you have to trust me.”
    â€œTrust you? We’re way beyond that.” Fowler thrust his finger at Gannon’s face, then the door. “You’re gone!”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œI’m suspending you indefinitely, effective now and without pay.”
    â€œMy story’s not wrong, Nate.”
    â€œThen give me your source.”
    â€œI can’t.”
    â€œThen get the hell out of my newsroom.”

11
    G annon left the Sentinel struggling to make sense of what had hit him.
    Blood drummed in his ears as he walked through the parking lot to his car. He rested his arms on the Vibe’s roof, letting time pass as he contemplated the building and his options.
    He had none.
    He’d given his word that he would not give up his source to anyone. Not even his editors. There was too much on the line.
    Sentinel workers were arriving. Oblivious to his trouble, some waved. As he watched them, Nate Fowler’s ominous words about staff cuts made his stomach tighten and he drove off.
    Navigating through Buffalo’s downtown traffic, he dragged the back of his hand across his mouth, adrenaline still rippling through him.
    The fact was Nate Fowler refused to believe his story. The guy had no respect for his own reporters. He didn’t care for the truth. He kowtowed to politics and could not be trusted with sources.
    Gannon recalled the advice of Sean Allworth, the paper’s Washington bureau chief, when they’d teamed uplast month for a story that never saw publication. It was on state and county real estate contracts.
    Fowler had spiked it and that set Allworth off in one of their calls.
    â€œJack, never give that guy your sources. He’s a snake. When I broke that land development story last year, I had to give him my source. A week later, Fowler’s brother bought some key property. The whole thing stunk.”
    Allworth said he’d heard rumors that Fowler was going to run for some state office, and through his wife, was cozy with big backdoor players. “He’ll give up your sources to build alliances. Be careful.”
    A popular hero cop like Karl Styebeck could give Fowler a ton of community support, Gannon figured as he stopped at a 7-Eleven lot.
    Okay, he was suspended, so now what?
    He’d pursue the story on his terms, as an outcast.
    Start at square one.
    He made a call from a public pay phone and it was answered by the third ring.
    â€œIt’s Gannon, you read today’s paper?”
    â€œYup. Big story.”
    â€œI need to see you.”
    â€œAll right, the usual spot, say, half an hour.”
    He took the New York State Thruway south to Lackawanna, the former steel town, which was now harvesting the wind. When he got there, he entered the south section of Holy Cross Cemetery.
    One of the area’s largest cemeteries, it held over one hundred thousand graves,