Page 16 of Kiss Me Now
“Great. This should be a short call then. Let’s start with the basics.” I launched into a few questions for a standard reference check, and Brooke definitely sounded like a model employee.
“I find it interesting that her undergraduate degree was both in biology and political science,” I noted. “That’s an unusual pairing.”
“Not really, not when you understand why,” Ellen said, in her polite, professional voice. “She added political science late to her major after she took her semester of personal leave.”
“Personal leave? Like a gap year?”
There was a pause. “Not like a gap year, no. But I don’t think her reasons are relevant to an employment check.”
Ah, here was another thread to follow, but I could sense that Ellen Brown was sharper than most. I would have to step carefully. “Back to her double major, what reason did she give for it?”
“Circumstances in her personal life prompted her to take on Big Tobacco, so—"
“Whoa, I’m sorry, did you just say she took on Big Tobacco? InVirginia?” She said it like someone might say, “Brooke decided to go on a Sunday walk.”
“Yes. I’m surprised this isn’t in her resume.” Ellen’s voice had grown a degree cooler.
“She was being modest, I guess. Tell me about her advocacy work.”
“She lobbied Delegate Leeds to introduce a bill to the General Assembly to ban the marketing of flavored vaping products to underage consumers. I think she thought studying political science would help, but she didn’t need it. She was so effective that the delegate drafted the legislation based largely on Brooke’s arguments and research, and it passed, making the Commonwealth the first state in the nation to explicitly outlaw some of the questionable marketing tactics of Big Tobacco. It was quite a feat given our state’s long history with tobacco companies.”
I had to concede that it was. “She sounds like an impressive young woman.”
“I assume that’s why you’re considering her for a position with...”
“My company,” I supplied, appreciative of her efforts to fish.
“Yes, your company. Well, as I said, she was a truly gifted young woman, and that’s why we recruited her to our staff. It wasn’t a surprise when Senator Rink’s chief of staff lured her away, but it was a blow nonetheless.”
There was no mention of Senator Rink’s office in her Linked In profile. This was it. The missing piece. I pretended I knew this already. “So she went directly from your staff to his if I’m reading her resume correctly?”
“Correct.”
Bingo. I’d found what should go in that employment gap. Why would Brooke choose to omit a prestigious job from her professional profile? The answer, I suspected, would unlock the whole mystery.
“Thank you for your time, Ms. Brown,” I said. “You’ve been very helpful.”
“Don’t mention it. That’s a young lady who deserves a fair shake.”
We hung up with me pondering Ellen Brown’s final words. “Deserves a fair shake,” I mused aloud, using her same inflection. Something in the way she said it implied she felt Brooke hadnotbeen treated fairly, and I’d bet my next paycheck that she was referring to the time in the senator’s office that Brooke had tried to scrub from her history.
Unfortunately for Brooke Spencer, like the finest Virginia bloodhound, I had caught the scent of a trail, and I would chase down the truth. She would regret the day she’d ever crossed my path.
