"I will.Goodnight, Jillian."I hung up.
The control room was silent except for the hum of the monitors.Tomorrow, thirteen years of silence was ending, and I didn't quite know how to prepare for it.I knew Nelson was a total professional — that much was obvious.But given our history, would he be a team player?Or would he use every weapon at his disposal to punish me for leaving him all those years ago?
ChapterNine
Nelson
Harry had the file on my desk in fourteen minutes.
I knew because I'd been watching the clock on my dressing-room wall since I walked in, counting the seconds in the same part of my brain that counted beats between camera cues, and when he knocked twice and let himself in — Harry always knocked twice; once was the janitor, three was Bruce — he was carrying a manila folder thicker than I'd expected.
He set it on my desk and stepped back, arms folded, leaning against the door frame.He was watching me the way you watch someone approach a door they might not want to open.
"You already read it," I said.
"I skimmed."
"And?"
"And I think you should read it yourself."
I opened the folder.
The first page was a printout of the Beacon HR onboarding file.
Name: James A.Goodman.
Title: Executive Producer, Beacon News Tonight.
Hired by: Bruce Coleman, VP Programming.
The photo was a standard corporate headshot — auburn hair, green eyes, the ghost of freckles across the nose, an expression trying to be professional and not quite succeeding, because Jimmy's face had never been good at hiding what he was thinking.
I stared at the photo longer than I should have.
The second page was a résumé.It was extensive.Undergraduate degree in journalism from Columbia University.Thirteen years of international documentary work, published under the byline J.Goodman.Assignments in Syria, Yemen, South Sudan, Mexico, the Philippines.A Peabody at thirty-one for a documentary on civilian casualties that had triggered congressional hearings.Head of an independent documentary unit for three years, until its recent dissolution.
The third page was a collection of press clippings Harry had printed from various journalism outlets.Reviews of his work.Profiles.An interview in the Columbia Journalism Review where he was asked about the state of American media, and his answer — which I read twice — was a precise, articulate dismantling of everything cable news represented.He called networks like ours "entertainment machines masquerading as journalism."He said the twenty-four-hour news cycle had "replaced depth with volume and courage with calculation."
Jimmy might as well have been talking directly about me.
I closed the folder.
Harry was still watching me."Nelson."
"Bruce hired a man who has spent his entire career publicly attacking cable news."My voice was level.Controlled.The voice I used when I was at my most dangerous, which Harry knew, which was why he hadn't moved from the door frame."A man with no producing experience in live broadcast television.A documentary journalist."I shut my eyes a moment."To run my show."
"He's a Peabody winner," Harry said carefully.
"Jimmy Goodman is a Peabody-winning documentary journalist who thinks this network is an entertainment machine.He said that.In the Columbia Journalism Review."
"I saw that."
"And Bruce hired him to produce the flagship primetime broadcast."
"It appears so."
I stood, picking up the folder.