by Ewens, Tracy
“Why did you major in history?”
Grady thought a minute.
“Huh, I wasn’t expecting such a personal question. I guess it’s the context. I like seeing my life within the context of history. It’s comforting, gives me perspective.”
Kate put her spoon down and swallowed the bite of Honey Nut she had just put in her mouth. “Who the hell are you?”
Grady laughed and poured himself a little more. “That’s a loaded question. Is that really a question?”
“I’m really not sure what to make of you. One minute you’re dating cheerleaders and the next I get this.” Kate set her bowl down and suddenly looked serious. “Grady, both of these guys can’t possibly exist, so I’m wondering, do the cheerleaders get to try cereals? Do they see what I’m seeing right now?”
Grady seemed to stumble for a moment. His spoonful of cereal hovered near his mouth, and a drop of milk dripped down into the bowl. Kate didn’t think it was possible to catch him off guard, but he quickly recovered and said, “No. I do the cereal routine for special guests. Usually only in hotels, actually.”
“I’m serious.”
“I know, but now is not the time for serious. We are surrounded by all of this delicious sugary mess and you’ve already gotten an answer to your question. Toss your bowl because we are now going to try another one of my top ten. Fasten your seatbelt, Galloway, because you are about to experience marshmallow stars and clovers.”
Kate laughed and reached for her next bowl, but Grady held it and asked his question.
“When you were a little girl, what did you want to be when you grew up?
“Seriously?”
“Do you want the marshmallows, Kate?”
She sighed. “I . . . I wanted to be a lot of things. When I was really little I wanted to be a PE teacher.”
Grady laughed.
“Hey, no laughing. I really did. I remember having these fantasies about organizing the locker room the way I wanted it and having all of my own balls. All different kinds for all of the sports. I even imagined that the balls would have a property of stamp.” Kate laughed at herself and then looked at Grady, who smiled and handed her the next bowl. She took a bite.
“Eh,” she said. “These are not my favorite.”
“Are you insane?” Grady said, chomping through his bowl. He looked like a kid waiting for Saturday morning cartoons.
“I’m just not feeling it. The cereal part is kind of bland and the marshmallows are weird. It’s not blended.”
“It blends in your mouth, that’s the cool part.”
Kate shook her head, leaned over and dumped the bowl in the trashcan. Grady had a longing expression as if someone had just run over his puppy.
“Unbelievable. Maybe we should have had your taste buds checked before this.”
Kate laughed and said, “Okay, next question.”
Grady added a little more to his bowl.
“Ready?” she asked.
He nodded.
“What is your relationship like with your sister? Are you close?”
“Look at you go with the personal questions, Kate. I think you want to know me. Is this a date?”
“I ate the yucky marshmallows. Answer, Grady.”
“Let’s see, are Kara and I close?” He paused for a minute. “Yes, I would say we are close. We are two years apart and when we were younger we were very close. She was a tomboy, if you can believe it, so we did a lot together. I remember one time we tried to run away and she insisted on taking her cat. It was the middle of the night and we put the cat in a pillowcase. By the time we got to the door the damn thing was howling. Woke the whole house up.”
They both laughed.
“Kara has grown into something I’m not quite sure I can relate to most of the time, but that’s recent. She studied to be a chef, you know?”
“I didn’t know that,” Kate said, finishing up her coffee, hoping it would wash the Lucky Charm taste out of her mouth.
“Yes, but then she gave it up. My parents hadn’t known, so when they found out they were pissed. Kara was never really the same when she came home.” Grady seemed to go off in his thoughts for a moment. “Anyway, the answer to your question is, yes. I am close with my sister.”
“Do you ever think about getting married again?” Grady asked, and Kate could tell he was expecting her to sidestep.
“No,” she answered, as truthful as she knew how. That was the game, right?
“You never want to, or you never think about it?” Grady asked, while he seemed to look around for his next box of cereal.
Kate made an obnoxious buzzer sound and said, “Oh we’re sorry, Mr. Malendar, but this is a one question per bowl game.”
Grady shook his head and poured the next round. They went on like this, back and forth, for the next two hours. Grady eventually learned that Kate didn’t completely rule out getting married again, but she had not thought about it at all since her divorce. Kate learned that Grady cutting his knee open, when he fell in the wash behind his house, was the scariest thing he’d experienced as a child. Grady showed her the scar from twelve stitches.
Kate shared that she went to both of her proms with guys she barely knew. She was never asked, so her dad set her up with sons of the guys on the force. One of them didn’t dance with her once. That little gem was her answer to, “What was your most humiliating moment in high school?”
“I should have just stayed home or gone with my friends. Oh, if I only knew then what I know now,” Kate added.
Grady agreed and told her that he didn’t walk in his high school graduation because he got into a fight with his father about Stanford and took off for two weeks to drive through Mexico. All in all they got through ten different cereals, ten sets of questions, and maybe a few extra. Kate finally settled on Fruit Loops as her favorite sugar cereal, citing the crunch and the rainbow milk as a bonus. Grady agreed that “Loops,” as he called them, were in his top three, but told Kate nothing would replace his Honey Nut Cheerios. She laughed herself silly when he explained that he had a favorite bowl and spoon that he used and still ate them for breakfast every morning.
The following morning, Kate answered emails and finished Grady’s speech, but also made time for a massage and a pedicure while Grady left for some mystery “details” he needed to take care of. When he returned, they hiked through Vista Hermosa Park. Over a late lunch, on a little bench at the top of their hike, Grady listened to the closely-guarded story of Kate’s first marriage.
He checked her out of the hotel, after she said goodbye and thanked the staff, and his driver delivered Kate to her apartment. The weekend, as promised, had pampered her and it was fun. Fun, one of life’s little treasures Kate had forgotten all about. Grady was smart and generous. She felt safe with him and was pretty sure he did with her. It was so strange to find that the person she was responsible for sheltering, making look good, was actually doing the same for her. Kate didn’t know what to do with all of the feelings floating around inside of her, but she was certain of one thing while she unpacked her bag and started a load of laundry. Real life was very real and nothing about her time with Grady felt real.
Chapter Twenty
The report was in her email when she got out of the shower on Sunday night. Kate put on her pajama bottoms and a tank top. She made some of the Chamomile tea the spa had sent home, opened her laptop, and sat on the floor by her large living room window to catch up on what the real world had been doing while she was playing make-believe. Even after a shower, she could still smell the hotel, feel the oils from the spa on her skin. The first sip of tea burned her lips, so she set it on the window ledge and pulled up her work email. Kate scanned the screen. Basic stuff, meeting minutes from the week before, a couple of new meeting requests, the latest poll numbers showing the senator now only two points behind his opponent, and then her eyes landed on the subject line: Complete Background (Malendar, G) CONFIDENTIAL. Kate clicked on the email, opened the attac
hment, and sipped her tea again. Her stomach growled, and after a weekend in la-la land, Toaster Strudel seemed downright boring. Maybe she would order take-out.
The report filled the screen. Background, demographics, organizations, things Kate already knew. Some affiliations from college she didn’t know about, tax information and contacts. Criminal background check, nothing. Incidents or altercations, nothing. Possible scandals, fraternity connection during college and possible exposure (i.e., photographs, experimental drugs). Each heading listed resources and additional information links. Kate knew most of it; there was nothing that would help the campaign, and thankfully nothing that would hurt it either. It seemed that on paper Grady Malendar was pretty clean. Most of his mess came from his own doing, surface really, but always shy of real trouble. Kate skimmed the rest of the report, past tax reports, and then she stopped dead, teacup en route to her mouth, when she saw the Businesses/Corporations section. She put her cup down and clicked on the link titled “Roads Foundation.”
“I found large sums of money each year on Mr. Malendar’s tax returns from 2002 to present that appeared on the surface to go nowhere. Looking for possible tax fraud exposure, I did some digging and found the sums are sent to a trust, which is linked in a very clever but entirely legal way, to The Roads Foundation. The Roads Foundation was founded in 2002 and is headed by three prominent LA businessmen, Jason Black, Bryce Saunders, and Eric Dampier. All three went to Stanford with Mr. Malendar and they appear to have remained close friends. Mr. Malendar is not listed on any of the foundation paperwork, board of directors, etc., but it is clear he funds the foundation’s annual budget. I see no exposure issues,” the report said.
The Roads Foundation, The Roads Foundation, one of the largest foundations in Los Angeles, hell, California. They were everywhere. There was not a community center, hospital, inner city arts program that didn’t mention the generosity of The Roads Foundation. They spent tens of millions of dollars every year on Los Angeles and the surrounding areas. They never gave to political campaigns, they had no government connections at all. No special interest, no crap. Jason Black, the president, was brilliant and completely innovative. The Roads Foundation was the gold standard around the country. They just finished an entire parent living facility at the Los Angeles Children’s Hospital. The senator was there last week, at the dedication. She remembered because Grady was supposed to be there, but he never. . . Holy Shit!
Kate needed strudel. She stood up, pulse pounding now, and walked to the kitchen. The cool rush of the freezer calmed her bouncy nerves. Unbelievable, she thought, opening the plastic wrapper and popping two frozen blocks into the toaster. She walked back into the living room, mind spinning, replaying the last few weeks, and grabbed her cup. Returning to the kitchen, she made another cup of tea, took a strudel out of the toaster, and sat on the counter. She’d been doing that a lot lately. It was actually a great place to think. Kate scanned her memory, was there anything, any way she could have known? How is it that no one knew? More importantly, why was he hiding?
Halfway through her second strudel, she remembered. Bo, the dog, Grady had said he got him when he was at the construction site. He was meeting a friend for dinner. He had stumbled over his words, he never stumbled. One more time . . . Holy Shit! Kate jumped off the counter and dialed Grady’s number.
“Wow, that was quick. Miss me already?” he answered on the second ring.
“I need you to come over.”
“Really?”
“This isn’t a joke. Can you be here soon?”
“I . . . yeah, is something wrong?”
“No, I just need to talk with you and it can’t wait.”
“Okay, I’m fifteen minutes away.”
“Great.” Kate hung up, decided to take the plastic off her new dining room table, and called to order some real food. It was going to be a long night.
The doorbell rang twenty minutes later. She opened the door to Grady holding two bags from Malaysian Mama’s.
“The kid was coming up the walk at the same time. I just saved him a few steps,” he said, walking into her house, glancing at the table with a smile, and bringing the food into the kitchen.
Kate closed the door. “I owe you money, Bag Man. How much?” Kate asked, sitting on one of her still-wrapped dining room chairs.
“Really?” Grady said coming out of the kitchen. “You’re not going to let me pay for the food I’m sure you bought so I wouldn’t have to eat pop-tarts?”
“Toaster Strudel, there’s a big difference.”
He laughed and took a seat next to her. “New table.”
Kate’s face flushed. Stupid. She got up and grabbed her teacup, planning on putting the relaxing effects of Chamomile to the test.
“Yeah, I bought it at that place in North Hollywood,” she said, sipping her tea and curling her feet beneath her.
“Mid-Century?”
“Yes, they were great. It’s repurposed. Used to be an old bank door.”
“Really?” Grady ran his hand over the wood and Kate’s face grew warmer. “It’s beautiful. What’s the occasion?”
Kate was still looking at his hand, so when she looked up, their eyes met. “Sorry?”
“The table, why did you buy a table?” Grady asked.
Kate took another sip and decided Chamomile was no match for Grady Malendar.
“To move on?” Grady asked, looking right through her. Soft eyes that were so much more than their color. She was really starting to like what was behind them even more. The way he looked at her.
“I guess. I needed a place to sit.”
“It’s a pretty big table.”
“Yeah, well I have friends that come over and . . .” She was picking at the plastic covering her chair
“Kate.”
She looked up.
“I’m glad you bought a table, really glad to see you’re moving on.”
“Thanks.”
Grady broke eye contact and stood.
“I’m starving, what’s in the bags?”
Kate snapped back. Why were they talking about her table? She needed to talk with him. Why did he always manage to take her off task?
“Fish-ball soup, those sliced chicken things. What are they called?”
“Lor bak?”
“Yes, those, and some curry.”
Grady came in with the bags and paper plates. Kate forgot he knew his way around her kitchen now. She grabbed napkins. The sun was setting. Grady took a candle out of a box he passed, lit it, and put it on the table.
“Nice,” he said taking a seat. Kate opened the containers and pretended not to notice that every time she was near him lately she felt something. Bursts of it really, floods of feeling she held back, kept under control. Work, Kate, for God’s sake. Work! Right, she had called him over for a reason, but now she didn’t know how to bring it up. It wasn’t a bad thing, in fact it was incredible. What he’d been doing for the last twelve years was noble and so worthy of praise, but he clearly didn’t want it. This was a secret he’d tried very hard to protect. Kate wasn’t sure how he would react to her knowing. She jumped right in.
“So, I had our research department look into you a couple of months ago.”
Grady laughed. “Okay, and did they find out about those three illegitimate children, because I can explain.” He grabbed another piece of chicken and then looked up when Kate was silent.
She was looking at him. “No, but they did find out that you have, well you pretty much are, The Roads Foundation.”
Grady held steady. Perhaps he’d been asked this before? “Um, not sure who your research guy is, but he’s got that wrong. I’m not part of the, what did you call it again?”
“The Roads Foundation. Grady, I know you know what it is. The children’s hospital, you were supposed to be there when your dad was at the dedication? You never showed up.”
She could see him exhale, his energy change.
“Well, there you go. If I was, as you
say, this foundation’s leader, wouldn’t I show up?” He wiped his hands with a napkin.
“Not if you’ve spent the last twelve years funneling money through a multi-layered trust structure to fund a foundation run by three of your friends from college.”
Grady’s smile fell, and Kate knew her research guy was spot on.
“Peter, your best friend, sits on the board,” she added gently.
Grady said nothing.
“Grady,” she touched his hand, “what’s going on? Talk to me.”
“Who did you tell?”
“No one. I saw the report when I got home and I called you.”
“Was anyone copied on the report?”
“No. The only reason it was noted is they were looking at potential exposure with taxes. My background check guy noticed the sums, dug deeper, and then noted there was nothing illegal and no exposure. He had no idea what he was uncovering.”
“Shit.”
“What? Grady we just spent all weekend together. Why are you doing this? Why is this all a secret? Christ, people bend over backwards to make sure they get press for their good deeds. Why can’t you let—”
“You don’t understand. You and I, we live in different worlds.”
“I’m clear on that, but you are a public figure—”
“My father is a public figure.”
“Right, but you, by association, are in the public eye and the public thinks you are something quite different than you are. I don’t understand why someone would want people to think less of him than the reality.”
“Leave it alone, Kate.”
“I can’t. I’m sorry you don’t see value in this, but your father hired me to do a job and that’s exactly what I’m trying to do. You would be celebrated. The work your foundation does is amazing and honorable. Why would you—”
“It’s best to not let anyone in.”
“Grady, what does that mean?” Kate said, dropping her fork, no longer interested in eating.
“In my world there are a handful of people I let in. The rest are kept at a safe distance by the image and persona I feed them. I don’t care if people think I’m an idiot.”