Page 3 of The Big Scoop

“Of course,” I replied.

“And I’m here for the story,” she continued. “Just the story.”

“Of course,” I said.

That may have been what she came for, but I had a whole lot more I was going to give her.

A whole lot more…

2

Gwen

Three days earlier…

“Come on, Tony!” I shouted as I raced across the parking lot toward the man who was doing his best to look like he wasn’t power walking away from me. “The people of Derby want to know why you’re choosing to destroy a beloved landmark of the community!”

“No comment!” Tony shouted over his shoulder. He was closing in on his car. I picked up the pace but he already had a good head start on me.

“If you’d just sit down with me for five minutes—”

“No comment!” he roared back as he snatched open the door to his car and hopped in.

“What will the people say when the Pines are gone!?”

The door slammed in my face. I sighed and stepped back as Tony switched on the engine, flipped me the bird, then stomped on the gas and peeled out of the parking lot.

“Shit,” I hissed as he sped away.

Tony Russell was an out-of-state land developer who’d recently come to Derby and started buying up property. The town was small and going through an economic downturn, so people were willing to sell off land to him at prices they normally would never have taken. There were rumors he had been paying people off on the town development board to re-zone land that was already classified as residential or protected for public spaces as commercial so he could break it up and sell it off to franchise businesses.

In short, he was here to ruin Derby and make as much money as he could doing so, and I was determined to do everything I could to stop him. As a reporter for the Derby Tribune, I figured if I could get a big story about him in the paper and expose him, the townspeople would rally behind me and throw him out of town—or at least the corruption in the planning board would be exposed and maybe we could do something to save Derby. But so far Tony had managed to duck me every time I tried to talk to him, and everyone associated with him had too.

My phone buzzed in my purse and I checked it. It was Jeff, my editor:

Can you get to the office in fifteen? Got a story for you.

I sighed.

Sure. What else do I have to do right now?

I texted back:

Be there in five.

I felt defeated. I’d graduated from UNH last year with a Journalism major, submitted some articles I’d written in school to the Tribune, was quickly hired on as a freelancer, and then six months later was taken on as a full-time reporter.

This is it! I remember thinking on my first day when Jeff showed me my desk. Time to change the world!

But so far all I’d been doing was local reporting and puff pieces for the website to attract readers. Finally, I had my eye on a real story, but I was being thwarted at every turn.

I’d given up so much for my degree and my career; I’d sacrificed my social life, spending my late nights (including weekends) working, reading, and practicing my writing.

I’d had one boyfriend freshman year—who’d ended up cheating on me—and then remained single after that.

There will be time for that later, I’d told myself. But here I was, twenty-three years old (almost twenty-four), and still single, still a virgin, and nowhere near where I wanted to be with my career.

So, when I got to the office, I was hoping Jeff had a story for me that would light a fire inside of me, and this time, it turned out he did.

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