Read Debts for Free Online

going.
    Emmett had told her about the ordinance violation from a few weeks ago and this morning she saw on the daily blotter that he recently received a second one. With Bender droning on about the deep friendship he shares with Morth and his high ambition to protect the morality of Hamilton, Miriam suddenly makes a connection. Could Bender be the one behind the campaign to re-designate city ordinances and the harassing violations Emmett is charged with? Morth never seemed like he had the destructive sneakiness to engineer the plan he was pushing. She scribbles a note to herself in the margin of her pad to look into whether any email exchanges between the mayor and the judge qualify as public record.
    Craig sits quietly by her side, listening to the interview. From time to time, he glances over to study her pad and the notes she’s taking. Miriam doesn’t mind; one of the hardest things for a journalist is writing down a subject’s quotes during an interview. It’s a skill to know which key words will re-create the quote once back at the office. Craig reads the note she jotted in the corner and looks visibly surprised. He slides a glance over at the judge and the atmosphere in theroom abruptly changes.
    Bender, with the instincts of a brawler, immediately picks up on Craig’s surprise while reading the note. It’s obvious from Craig’s expression that Miriam has written something unfavorable about Bender. He narrows his piggy eyes threateningly at Craig and turns them on Miriam. Busy jotting the latest quote, she’s oblivious to the exchange, so she jumps when Bender’s large, fleshy hand pats her leg familiarly. The pen leaves a worried squiggle as her hand jerks.
    “You know, I saw the booking sheet from your arrest,” Bender mentions, squeezing her leg like a vise. “I can’t begin to tell you how something like that hurts a reporter’s credibility, their trustworthiness.” Miriam feels the blood drain from her face. “People count on a reporter being unbiased. When it seems like someone’s got an agenda, it compromises things. Don’t you agree?”
    She glances at Craig, who’s carefully looking down at the floor. Beads of sweat have formed on her upper lip in the warm office and her back tickles where moisture runs down between her shoulder blades. “There’s no official record of the arrest,” she says. Her pad lies on her lap and she feels oddly vulnerable without the mad scribbles to hide behind.
    “You’d be surprised what stays in the system.” Bender smirks. “A person like you, new to the community … It’s a terrible way to make a first impression.”
    “I didn’t do anything wrong,” Miriam says. “The community knows that.” Miriam was arrested while trying to stop the previous intern, Jason, from bringing several guns to Warfield Prep, the school he attended so miserably. In the confusion of the police raid on his place, she was accused as his accessory but was cleared when the editor of the paper explained she’d been working on a story. No one has mentioned her arrest to her since, and she assumed there were norecords of the police error.
    Bender shrugs, his hand slides an inch up her leg. “All I’m saying is I’ve been here more than thirty years. I’m a known quantity, so to speak. What do you think you are?”
    “Honest,” she says, removing his hand, fed up with the veiled threats.
    Bender’s face grows pinker as he sits back. “You be careful, young lady. People don’t appreciate having their pillars knocked. It makes them feel …” He looks at her with an unfriendly, flat gaze. “Unsafe.”
    Swallowing, Miriam closes her notebook. “Thank you for the interview, Judge, I’m sure you’re busy and we won’t take up any more of your time.” Unable to bring herself to shake hands with him, her hands clench around the notebook instead. Bender’s eyes narrow at the obvious slight.
    “Your editor Frank Hale and I go way back,” he says. “I’ll be