by Claire Adams
I made my way to the third office on the left and knocked on the jamb of the open door. “Hi, I was told to come see you. I’m—”
“Oh, Miss Blair,” the woman whose nameplate said simply “Mitsy” said. “Right.” She opened one of her desk drawers and rifled through some papers for a moment before finding what she was looking for: a keycard. “This will get you onto Mr. Carrick’s private elevator,” she told me, sliding the keycard across the desk toward me. “Would you mind shutting the door a moment?”
I did as requested.
“Okay, once you’re up to the floor, you’ll want to go all the way to the door at the end of the hall. I understand Hans McManus is already at work, but he shouldn’t bother you. When you get to the door, you’ll need to enter a passcode. You’ll need to remember it because Mr. Carrick insists the code never be written down anywhere.”
“Hans McManus? You mean the chef?”
“Yes.”
“This may sound like a silly question, but what kind of place is it?”
Mitsy blinked. “What do you mean?”
It occurred to me I was on the verge of embarrassing myself somehow, so I changed directions. “What is the code?”
“All right, it’s 196845. Then you’ll need to hit the arm button. Then you’ll press 933853 and press the arm button again. That’ll disable the electronic lock and,” she dug through another drawer, finally producing a key from within, “then, you just unlock the door with this key, lock it back up, hit 136842 on the keypad on the other side of the door to rearm it—and you’ll need to remember to do that or building security will be up there within a minute, police response in less than five. We know you’re supposed to be there, but it’s better if we can just avoid all the paperwork.”
“Okay, so the code is 196…”
Mitsy leaned forward a little in anticipation. When she realized those were the only numbers I’d remembered, she sighed. “Why don’t I walk up there with you just to make sure you get in all right? I won’t be able to go in with you, but it’ll at least get you in the door.”
“Thank you so much.”
I followed her to the row of elevators at the far end of the lobby. She pressed and held the button for the elevator on the far left. “Swipe your keycard, please.”
There was a little slot just above the button Mitsy was pressing, and I slid the card into it. The elevator doors parted and the card kicked back out of the slot. She took the card, handed it to me, and we both got onto the elevator.
“That card is yours to keep, but don’t lose it. If it gets stolen, no matter what else may be stolen along with it, we’re the first call you make and then the police. Is that understood?”
“It sounds like security is very important here,” I said, feeling more than a little intimidated.
“We value our tenants’ privacy.”
Tenants’ privacy, she said. “So, Mr. Carrick has a condo here?”
Mitsy smirked. “Sweetie, he owns the whole floor. Why do you think we gave him his own private elevator?”
This wasn’t the kind of world I grew up in, around, or even remotely near. “So this keycard is mine, you say.”
“Yes. If you’d prefer, you can store it here for security purposes, but it would only be accessible during office hours. It’s up to you.”
“I think I’ll hang onto it for now, but thank you.”
The elevator just kept on rising. The doors finally opened into a long hallway. “This is Mr. Carrick’s floor. Now, we’ll just need to punch in some numbers and you’ll be all set.” We got to the keypad by the door at the end of the hall and Mitsy repeated the numbers as she punched them in, “1-9-6-8-4-5, then press this button that says arm. See how the green light is flashing? Now you’ll need to enter 933853 and then we’ll press the arm button again. The green light is solid now; you can use your key to unlock the door.”
I fumbled a little, but got the key into the lock and I opened the door. “What was the code for the other side?” I asked.
“First, you’ll need to lock the door, itself, or the system won’t arm properly. Then, when you’re on the other side, it’s 136842. Do you want me to stay on this side of the door to make sure you’ve got it?”
“If you wouldn’t mind,” I answered. I was distracted by the chandeliers, the gray marble flooring, the floor-to-ceiling windows.
“Okay, you’d better be pretty quick, though. The system alarms in under a minute.”
I hurried through the door and Mitsy closed it behind me.
“Okay,” I muttered to myself, “lock the door first…” I locked the deadbolt and the lock on the door handle. “It’s locked!” I called through the door.
I could hear the tone of Mitsy’s voice through the heavy door, but not what she was saying. There was a video screen to the right of the keypad, showing a live feed of the hallway just outside the door. She was still there, but it looked like she was too busy trying to tell me the code through the door to provide any visual aid.
“I’m sorry, I can’t hear you!”
Of course, I wasn’t sure if she could hear me telling her I couldn’t hear her. I was about to unlock the door again to see if a second attempt was possible when my phone started to ring.
“Oh, this is so not the time.” I ignored the phone. A moment later, Dean’s face popped up on a video screen to the right of the keypad, startling the bejesus out of me. “It’s 136842. You’ve got like ten seconds, and I had it set up so it couldn’t be disarmed remotely,” he said.
“You’ve got quite the security system.”
“136842. There’s no time.”
I quickly punched in the numbers, but nothing happened. “What do I do?” I asked.
“Arm!” he said. “Two seconds!”
My hands were shaking, but I found and pressed the arm key. There was no alarm, no flashing lights or security to remove me from the building. “Did I make it?”
“Uh, yeah. No problem. Well done. Look, I’ve got to make a couple quick phone calls, but I shouldn’t be too much longer. Just go in and make yourself comfortable. I’d stay out of the kitchen, though. Hans is a bit of a pill when he’s working and you don’t want any part of that. I’ve really got to go. I’ll be there shortly.” The screen went black for a moment and then came back up with the live feed of the hallway just outside the door.
I could see Mitsy standing there, shaking her head and pulling out her phone. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, though, not until I spotted the volume knob underneath the video screen. Turning up the volume, all I could hear was, “This is so not how I wanted to spend the rest of the day.”
A few seconds later, whoever she was calling had answered, and Mitsy was saying, “I’m up on Carrick’s floor, and it seems his guest didn’t make it through the alarm on time. Call security and tell them to call the police and cancel the call. Authorization code 295842KJ.” A few seconds after that, eight or nine very large men in black, tailored suits came into view.
I stopped feeling quite so special. I would have loved to go out there and explain what happened, but I wasn’t sure that wouldn’t just cause more problems. After a few minutes of watching helplessly as security stood guard outside the door, I finally looked back to the interior of the—apartment wasn’t the right word. Condo wasn’t the right word, either. The ceilings were at least three times as high up as I was tall.
The furniture was a collection of antiques that I was far too afraid to sit on, and on every wall were multiple pieces of art. Some of the art looked very familiar. The place was a miniature palace, and I’d only seen the front room and hallway leading to the door. I wandered around, looking at the art and trying to orient myself within the apartment, or whatever he called it.
I could smell something enticing wafting down the hallway to the left of the entrance, so I started down the hallway on the opposite side. Dean had warned me to steer clear of Hans, and the last thing I needed was another embarrassment. This time, I actually w
asn’t looking to snoop; I just really needed to find a bathroom.
I found one about three doors down the hall on the right, and when I’d finished my business, I stood at the sink a little while, wondering if platinum faucets did anything specific for hygiene, or if Dean just thought they looked nice. The bathroom was bigger than my last apartment.
When I got back to the main room, I could hear the keypad beeping.
“Hey there,” I said to Dean. “I think I may have caused a slight issue with the building security.”
“Oh, don’t worry about it. I do that all the time,” he said and turned toward me. He came over to me and put his arms around me. He kissed me on the lips, the cheek, and with a wide smile on his face, he said, “So, what do you think of the place?”
“It’s…. There are no words. It is just amazing.”
“Hans hasn’t been giving you any trouble, has he? He’s a great guy when he’s not working, but walk in on him at the wrong time and you’ll start fantasizing about throwing him through a window.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said, resting my head against Dean’s chest. “I missed you.”
“I’m glad you could make it. Now, I know you wanted to talk to me about something later. Did you want to talk now or wait until dinner’s ready?”
“We should probably just get it out of the way.”
“All right,” said he agreed, releasing his embrace and removing his suit jacket. He tossed the jacket haphazardly over a chair that looked like it was older and better kept than most of the city. “What’s on your mind?”
“Well,” I said. I knew I had to tell him, but that didn’t mean I was looking forward to it, “I know you said you wanted to keep things discreet awhile, but Luke knows about us.”
“He does?”
“Yeah, it just kind of came out of me. We were arguing about…well, it doesn’t really matter. The point is I told him. He seems okay with it, but I wanted to tell you that. Are you upset?”
He sighed. “Well, I had hoped that we could tell him together, but I suppose he was going to find out one way or another. It’s fine. I trust Luke.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” I said.
A voice came from behind me, calling out, “Dinner is served!”
I turned around, and sure enough, straight out of the Travel Channel and pretty much every food magazine I’d seen in the last five years, was Hans McManus himself.
“Great, Hans. How was your flight?”
“I don’t mind coming out here to cook for you, but if I end up on another flight where first-class is a punchline, you’re going to have to find yourself another dancing monkey.”
“Hans, you’re a hateful bastard. It’s good to see you.”
“You, too, sir.”
Even Hans freaking McManus called Dean “sir.” It occurred to me I may have hit my head a couple of months ago and this whole thing was just an incredibly elaborate coma dream. Still, Dean’s hand resting on my waist felt real enough.
“We can eat in the dining room, or if you’d prefer, there’s a good space out on the balcony where we have an unobstructed view of the sky.”
I leaned my head against Dean’s shoulder, saying, “The balcony sounds wonderful.”
“Hans, we’ll take our meal out on the balcony if you don’t mind.”
Hans sighed. “You know with the added air flow, the food’s going to get cold much faster than it—”
“Thanks, Hans,” Dean interrupted.
Hans retreated back down the hallway. I said, “He looked pretty upset. You don’t think he’s going to spit in our food or anything, do you?”
“He’s a curmudgeon, but he’s not stupid.”
We went down the hallway in the direction of the kitchen and eventually reached the glass doors leading out to the balcony.
“Have you ever heard of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon?” Dean asked before opening the door for me.
“Yeah.”
“I did my level best to recreate a portion of it for out here. There’s only so much you can do given the limited space, but I’ve always found it a rather peaceful spot. What do you think?”
“Yeah.” I was hardly paying attention. I was overwhelmed with the lush greenery. There was a fountain toward the middle with eight golden fish around its circumference, the water for the fountain coming out of their mouths.
“It’s really something, isn’t it?”
“What?” I asked.
“Never mind,” he laughed.
“There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about, but if you don’t mind, I’d just like to enjoy this moment a little while longer.”
I didn’t get the chance. Before Dean could answer, the doors to the balcony came open and Hans, accompanied by two waiters, came out with plates covered with silver lids. Hans still had a grimace on his face.
I whispered to Dean, “Why does he look like he wants to punch you in the face and then throw you over the edge?”
“I wouldn’t worry about it. He’s just a fundamentally hateful person when food is involved.”
We sat and the waiters set our plates before us. Removing the lids, they revealed two plates of the most immaculate, aromatic food I’d ever seen. The waiters each held out a bottle of wine, one toward me, one toward Dean. I didn’t know what I was supposed to be looking for on the label, but said, “Very good,” anyway.
As they were pouring the wine, guilt started to set in. I’d gone snooping into Dean’s past without his knowledge. I may not have felt so guilty if I hadn’t found something, but that was just speculation.
“Thank you,” Dean said to the waiters, who then left the balcony, retreating inside. As the doors opened, I could hear Hans somewhere inside yelling curses. As soon as the doors were closed, though, we were left with only the sound of the wind.
“I have to tell you something, and you’re probably not going to like it.”
Dean, who was unfolding his napkin and setting it in his lap, looked up at me. “Hmm, that sounds bad. Should I sit down for this?”
He was being cute. It made me feel even worse. “I don’t know how to say it, so I’m just going to say it.”
His expression dropped. “Okay, so it is something serious. What’s wrong?”
“Call it curiosity or insecurity or…I don’t know. I started hearing things at work about your past. I didn’t believe it at first, but some people were pretty adamant.”
“Ah, the rumor mill,” he chuckled. “It’s always nice to hear what they come up with. What is it this time? Am I positioning myself to lead a coup d’état? I think that one’s my favorite.”
“It has to do with when you were just coming out of Yonkers,” I said. “They say you had something to do with a mafia crime family up there, and that maybe that connection’s still there.”
“So I’m a mobster, then, is that it?” His tone had changed. At first, he was playful, like he knew whatever I was going to say would be some outlandish thing he could tease me for believing. His patience seemed to be about dried up, though. “Have you ever stopped to consider maybe you should stop asking other people about me? It’s probably not the best way to get your information.”
“I know, it’s crazy, but a couple of the people I work with—”
“Who?”
I looked down at my dinner. “I don’t see how that’s important.”
“Is there something you wanted to ask me, or were you just telling me that to see if you could get me to laugh?” He wasn’t laughing.
“You haven’t really told me anything about yourself, and I’ve been trying to make this whole thing seem more real. I know if I keep casting it as temporary fantasy brought to life, I’m never going to enjoy it and I’ll probably end up ruining it.”
“That’s not really my problem, now is it?” he asked before dropping his fork on his plate. “You think you’re the only one this is hard for, but you never bothered finding out just why it might be hard for me, too. The diff
erence between you and me is I’m not going behind your back and digging through your past or what other people may say about it. If I want to know something about you, I ask you.”
“Yeah, but you never ask me anything. It’s like you so don’t want to talk about yourself that you’re avoiding getting to know me just to duck the conversation.”
“This really isn’t how I saw tonight going.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You say that so often, I’m honestly starting to wonder if it’s just a reflex, like when someone sneezes and everyone within earshot calls out ‘bless you.’” He got up from his chair.
“Hold on, I’m sorry if I….” He was right: I did say “sorry” a lot. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to get to know someone like you. As much as you might like to think this is all just totally normal for everyone involved, I’m still having a lot of—”
“Are you getting as sick of this conversation as I am?”
I sighed. “Yeah.”
“Yeah,” he said.
With that, he got up from the table and went inside, closing the door hard behind him.
Chapter Ten
Yonkers
That night, I had a long series of short dreams. When I woke up that next morning, I didn’t want to open my eyes. The dream symbols had vanished the moment my brain decided it was no longer asleep, but I knew the peaceful feeling throughout my body and consciousness would be set aflame the moment my eyelids parted.
Of course, my irrational fear of becoming one of those people who constantly hits the snooze button in the morning quickly overpowered my will to stay in bed.
The moment my eyes were open, my mood changed, but it wasn’t that seemingly infinitesimal act itself that did it. On the pillow next to me was a handwritten note. My heart thudded against my ribcage. Luke never came in my room. He’d probably decided he couldn’t deal with me and the boss hooking up, and that note was probably Luke telling me to find somewhere else to go. I picked it up and read it.
“Dean called. He says to meet him in Yonkers. He’ll be there all morning. If you’re going to be longer than noon, he said to give him a call and let him know.” There was an address at the bottom.