Sadie Sinclair's Arc

Chapter 1 of 5

Sadie Sinclair spread the stolen invoices across the newsroom table and understood, for the first time, that she could ruin the wrong person by Friday. The camera around her neck knocked against the wood as she leaned in. Forty percent overcharges. Kickbacks routed through the district office. And, on three separate lines, a signature line labeled only FACULTY SPONSOR, with initials she could not read. Her editor, Mr. Sorrentino, stood at the copier with a mug of tea, watching her the way he watched students about to do something expensive. He ran the paper the way other teachers ran detention. His striped tie was crooked. His glasses had slid down his nose. He had already killed one of her leads this semester, and he had already saved another. "You said you had a name," he said. "I have initials." Sadie tapped the page. "J.M. or T.M. It's smudged. Could be Marsh. Could be Molina. Could be a dozen people." "Then you don't have a name." "I have everything else. The vendor. The percentages. The kickback route." He set the mug down. "Sadie. If we print Marsh and it's Molina, Marsh loses her job. Her mortgage. Her kid's braces. And the real one keeps eating." She already knew this. That was why her stomach hurt. She had been called into the principal's office twice this week for less than this. Printing a guess would not just end her at the paper. It would end a teacher who had done nothing. She stared at the smudge until the ink stopped meaning anything. Then she pulled the invoice closer and looked at what was under it. A second page. A purchase order she hadn't unfolded yet, stuck to the back by old coffee. She peeled it free. The purchase order had a printed name. Not initials. A full name, typed clean, next to the words AUTHORIZED BY. She read it twice. Her mouth went dry. "What." Mr. Sorrentino came around the table. "It's not a guess anymore." She turned the page toward him. "It's him." He read it. He read it again. He took his glasses off and pinched the bridge of his nose. Sadie had never seen him do that before. "You're sure this came out of that folder," he said. "The one you won't tell me about." "I'm sure." He put his glasses back on. He looked at the name on the page, then at the door of the newsroom, then at her. "Then we have a bigger problem than a wrong name," he said. "Because I know him. And so does the principal." Sadie picked up her camera. She photographed the purchase order, front and back, twice. Whatever happened next, the name existed now outside the folder. That part, at least, no one could pull.