A Man of Distinction

by Sarah M. Anderson

  All the air whooshed out of Tanya’s lungs as Nick flipped on the lights. There, before her, was a series of floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over Lake Michigan shimmering with the reflection of the city lights. The apartment itself wasn’t half-bad either, but she was so busy looking at the view that she hardly noticed the lap of luxury she’d walked into.

  “You…view…wow.” She didn’t know much about the Chicago housing market—okay, so she knew nothing. Even so, she knew this place had to have cost a fortune—a real, actual fortune. Views like that didn’t come cheap.

  “You like it? It’s beautiful at dawn.” This statement—which should have been romantic and seductive—was punctuated with another raspberry.

  Maybe she’d left reality behind, maybe not. Whether she was dreaming or this was all happening wasn’t entirely relevant. Tomorrow would suck, no other way around it, and the days that came after would only get worse and worse.

  It didn’t matter. Right now, she was in a beautiful place, her baby was happy and Nick was taking care of both of them. She didn’t want this moment to end.

  When she finally tore her eyes away from the sky and the lake, she was greeted with the sight of Bear riding Nick around a very expensive-looking carpet like a horse. “Giddyap!” Nick said, and then he whinnied. “Come on, pardner, let’s show Mommy around!” And he took off down a hall, talking in a thick cowboy accent the whole way.

  The image of a high-powered lawyer, who pulled every string he could with doctors and hospitals, galloping around the floor was the funniest thing yet.

  She had no idea what was going to happen tomorrow, or the day after that. And even if everything worked out, she couldn’t imagine Nick giving up this place for her little house, or even that nice house he was renting. This was what he’d always wanted.

  She shook her head, trying to dislodge the what-ifs because they would have to come later. Whatever happened then wouldn’t take away this moment now, where they were a happy family.

  * * *

  Tanya struggled to hold on to that moment in the coming days. There were countless visits with various heads of pediatric this and oncology that. Nick was with her for all the appointments, but after they were over, he’d put Tanya and Bear into a cab and send them back to the apartment so he could go to his office and work on his case. She felt like she never got to see Nick—only Nicholas Long. She didn’t think she liked Nicholas Long. He wasn’t fun or silly or the least bit tender. In other words, he was the same man who’d shown up on the rez—was that really less than two months ago?—and not the man she’d welcomed back into her bed.

  Except at night. For the first few nights, he made passionate love to her in a bed that was as big as her living room. But even that was different—more aggressive, if that was a way to describe sex with Nick. Like he was still trying to prove himself to her.

  Then the surgery happened. With the same talk-around-her-in-circles that she was starting to recognize as Nick’s true lawyer persona, he convinced her that she shouldn’t stay in the hospital with Bear 24/7. “You’ll wear yourself out, and what good will you be then?” he’d asked, leading her to yet another cab. “It’s like on the airplane, where the flight attendant said to secure your own mask before helping a kid—you’ve got to secure your own mask.”

  Which had almost made sense. Then Tanya was back in the cab—could have been the same one, could have been different, she didn’t know—and on her way back to where Darius the doorman was waiting to open her doors for her.

  Nick stayed all night, every night with Bear, and then went to his office during the day. Tanya was at the hospital by six-thirty every morning, desperate for good news. Nick had gotten her a cell phone that she couldn’t operate, and kept reminding her that no news was good news, but she still arrived at the hospital every morning, convinced that the worst had happened.

  It hadn’t—not the very worst anyway. The doctors had operated on Bear for over eight hours. The prognosis was good—they got all of the growth. But they had to keep Bear under for a while to give his body time to heal. “Toddlers don’t understand IVs,” as a nurse had explained it.

  So Bear slept. Tanya stayed by his side every day for a week. She sang him songs and rubbed his hands and feet—the only parts of him that didn’t have tape and tubes attached. She told him every story she could—how she met his daddy, what had happened to her father, and even Lakota folktales of Iktomi the trickster that she’d thought she had forgotten years ago.

  Through it all, she tried to hold on to that happy-family moment. She clung to the thought that after this was all over, they’d go back to being a happy family again.

  She was deluding herself, she knew. The more time she spent in Nick’s mansion in the sky, the more she realized she’d never be able to hold him. For the last month, Nick had been not just the man of her dreams, but the man she needed—he got the appointments, asked all the right questions and was the rock she leaned on. But she couldn’t compete with his place. His life. Nothing she did would ever make Nick forget about the lap of luxury he lived in.

  She wanted to think that maybe, just maybe, he’d ask her to come with him again. He’d proven that he could take care of her, after all. And if he was right, and the water was contaminated, wouldn’t she be smart to bail? In fact, she’d be stupid to stay on the reservation. It was just land.

  Her land, the quiet but insistent voice in the back of her head kept whispering. Her people’s land. She didn’t know if she would be able to leave the green grass behind to live in a glass tower, with nothing to see but the sky and the water. Assuming Nick even wanted her to come to Chicago with him.

  And what about Bear? If Nick didn’t stay on the rez, and didn’t ask her to come with him to Chicago, then…who would get Bear? Nick could still sue her for custody, and now that she’d seen how he lived, she’d be hard-pressed to argue that Nick couldn’t provide for Bear as well as she could. Nick could give their son everything—he’d already gotten him the best medical care possible. Nick could give Bear the best education, food and clothes, all sorts of cultural stuff like plays, concerts, orchestras…

  But here, in Chicago, Nick couldn’t give Bear the most important culture—his own. Bear wouldn’t know he was Lakota if he lived here with Nick. Only Tanya could teach him that, on their homeland.

  Tanya tried to shake a little sense back into her head. She was getting ahead of things. She needed to focus on the here and now.

  The doctor had come in at ten this morning. He’d said the swelling had gone down, and the scans from yesterday hadn’t showed a trace of any growth. “We got it all,” the doctor had said, and for the first time, Tanya had seen the man smile. She wished she could remember his name, but that wasn’t sticking. The thing that stuck was that he was going to start bringing Bear out of his medically induced coma.

  In other words, her son was not only still alive, but he was getting better.

  But he hadn’t woken up yet. The only things moving in this room were Tanya’s hands and Bear’s tiny chest. Which was fine—as long as his chest was moving, he could take his time. “You can have all the time you need,” Tanya told her baby. “Just keep getting better.”

  She looked at the clock again. 5:50 p.m. Nick would be here soon. He’d call the nurse in and get all caught up on Bear’s progress, then talk with Tanya about their days. After that, he’d call a cab for her and send her back to his huge, empty condo with a kiss and an order to “get some sleep.”

  She was waiting for Nick in more ways than one. She knew Bear had to come first, but she was surprised by how much she missed Nick—his sharp smiles, the way they fit together, the way he handled everything without even blinking. She didn’t like being a shadow he passed in the hall between shifts.

  The problem that she couldn’t resolve was that as soon as they left this hospital, or as soon as they left Chicago, or as soon as the case was over—at some point, Nick would come back to his super-rich life here and
she’d go back to her struggling-to-get-by life there and Bear would…what? Shuffle between them? Spend half his life on planes?

  Then she and Nick would be shadows passing again. Not apart, not like they had been, but not together. And every time she saw him would be like losing him all over again. She might get to have him every so often, but she would never get to hold him.

  Struggling once again to remain in the here and now, Tanya waited. She was getting good at it. Waiting for Nick to come. Waiting for Bear to wake up. Waiting to see if he’d still be Bear, or if the surgery had…changed him. Waiting to see if he’d talk, if he could hear.

  Her life, on hold.

  Nick walked in half an hour later. He was wearing the kind of suit that she guessed lawyers in Chicago wore—a cut-close suit that screamed custom-made. It was a dark gray wool with a faint pinstripe that she wouldn’t have thought went with the checked shirt or the striped tie, but somehow worked anyway. He looked dashing, which wasn’t a word she’d used in a long time without discussing one-horse open sleighs. His tie had been loosened, and she could see the edges of dark circles under his eyes, but those were the only two signs that he was tired. It wasn’t fair, Tanya thought. She knew she probably looked like hell warmed over, and he was still the most handsome man she’d ever seen. Another way they didn’t match up.

  “Hey, babe.” Nick came to her first and kissed her on the forehead. Maybe she was just extra tired, but the gesture almost hurt. What would be left of her and Nick once the Bear emergency was over? Then he went to the other side of Bear’s bed and rested his hand on Bear’s. “How is he today?”

  “Better.” Sticking to the facts, she told Nick what the doctor had said about Bear’s swelling and coma. “But he hasn’t. Woken up yet, that is.”

  From across the hospital bed, Nick looked at her. For a moment, she saw the high-priced lawyer fall away from his face, and instead, she was sitting across from the boy she’d loved in high school—the one who’d talked about all the things he’d buy her when they grew up. “He will wake up, Tanya. You’ve got to believe that.” Just then his cell phone buzzed. He looked at the screen, grimaced and said, “Sorry, I’ve got to take this,” before he went out into the hall.

  She didn’t mean to listen, but the room was silent except for the beeping of the machines, which left plenty of space for Nick’s low, serious voice to carry.

  “No—no. Absolutely not.” He was silent for a moment, then, in an even lower voice, said, “I don’t care what you want—and crying won’t work. I’m busy.”

  Tanya’s heart did a swan dive. That didn’t sound like a business conversation. That sounded like a personal conversation—a very personal conversation.

  Things had happened so quickly. She and Nick had just started to reconnect when Bear’s illness had taken over their lives. There hadn’t been time to really discuss a future outside of this hospital room. Tanya had never even found out if he had been involved with someone—if he was still involved with someone. She’d assumed—believed—that Nick wouldn’t two-time anyone. He wasn’t that kind of man.

  But she realized that she might have been wrong. The old Nick, the one who took her on joyrides in the middle of the night—he wouldn’t cheat on her, much less on anyone else. But the new Nick? The one who owned lakefront condos? The one who wore custom-made suits and won major lawsuits? The one who decided things for her without telling her?

  She didn’t know what this Nick would do.

  You’re being ridiculous, she scolded herself. You shouldn’t jump to conclusions right now—you’ll jump right off a cliff. Nick was here with her and Bear because they were important to him. Whoever was on that phone wasn’t winning his or her argument, because Nick was busy with Tanya and Bear. He was here. That’s all that mattered right now.

  She forced herself to start humming so she wouldn’t listen to the rest of Nick’s conversation. The fact that she was even worried about another woman was probably just an indicator of how deeply tired she was. Getting worked up over what was probably nothing didn’t do anyone any good—least of all her. She took a deep breath, attempting to regain her calm. Whatever the problem was, they could deal with it when the time was right. That’s what she had to remember.

  When Nick came back into the room, he was shaking his head. “Is everything okay?” she asked, trying to keep her tone light. She didn’t want him to think she’d been eavesdropping.

  He flopped down into the chair and ran a hand through his hair while he looked at her. Tanya began to squirm under his gaze—there was something intense about the way he was staring at her, and that intensity made her uncomfortable. “Tanya,” he began, his tone serious.

  Her heart dropped down another notch. Was this about that phone call, or was it something else Nick had “decided” for her? She’d meant to have a discussion with him about his doing things without telling her, but that conversation had gotten lost in the urgency of the past few weeks. Maybe this was just the precursor to the end. She knew she couldn’t hold him. The sooner they both acknowledged that fact, the less pain there’d be in the end. She steeled herself for the conversation she’d been dreading. “Yes?”

  She didn’t get it. After another long look loaded with meaning she couldn’t interpret, Nick half spoke, half mumbled, “You look tired. Go home, get some sleep. I’ll call you a cab.”

  She felt like she should press him—she shouldn’t let him off the hook. But what did she know? Not much beyond the facts. And the facts were, it was late and she was exhausted. If she hounded him on that call, she’d look insecure at best, and at worst? Well, she didn’t want to push Nick any further than necessary. Maybe tonight, she’d sleep. Then tomorrow she could try to figure out what was going on. That was the best plan.

  “Daddy’s here,” she told Bear as she kissed his hand good-night. “I’ll see you in the morning, okay, sweetie? I love you.”

  Nick walked her out to the hall. “He’s going to be fine,” he said again. Then he kissed her with more force than she’d come to expect from their little evening ritual. She wanted to get lost in him, if only to forget being worried and tired and scared. When he pulled away, he rested his forehead against hers and said, “Everything is going to be fine.”

  This time, Tanya wasn’t sure if he was trying to convince her or himself.

  * * *

  Tanya would say this: she was, well, maybe not getting used to the cab ride and the insane amount of traffic and the sheer noise of going from the north side of the city to Nick’s condo. But she was less terrified by the whole thing, so that had to count for something.

  “Evening, Ms. Rattling Blanket.”

  Tanya looked up, expecting to see Darius the doorman again. Except it wasn’t—it was someone she’d never seen before. That he knew who she was made her nervous. “Hello.”

  The doorman tipped his hat as he held the door for her, which made Tanya feel weird. Was she supposed to be giving him money for that? Or not? She nodded and smiled and said, “Thank you,” as she hurried in.

  Once inside the elevator, she punched in Nick’s floor—thirty-first. The ride up was another thing she was getting used to.

  The hallway was silent, but something had the hackles rising on the back of her neck. Nothing looked out of place. But her level of paranoia wasn’t healthy. Maybe a glass of beer or wine in Nick’s expensive-looking bar would let her sleep.

  She unlocked Nick’s door, and instantly she knew she wasn’t being paranoid at all. Music filled his apartment, competing with a weird mix of lavender and…garlic? Who broke into someone’s apartment to cook?

  Something wasn’t right. Before Tanya could back out and get the doorman, a flirty feminine voice called out, “Nicky? Is that you?”

  Nicky? Nick hated that name. He’d settle for Nicholas when he had to, but Tanya had several clear memories of him brawling with guys in high school because they’d call him Nicky just to piss him off.

  Then the body to match that voice ca
me around the corner. Tall was the first thing Tanya thought, followed closely by blonde. Skin was third because this woman certainly was showing a lot of it. She had on a lacy apron and not much else—maybe just a bra and panties. And heels. Who the hell cooked in heels?

  “Nicky, I—” The nearly naked woman pulled up short when she saw Tanya. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. “You’re not Nicky.”

  Thoughts crashed around Tanya like cymbals in a parade. This wasn’t a break-in—this woman had a key. She was probably the person Nick had been talking to on the phone. He had dated her—might still be with her, for all Tanya knew. And she was, for lack of a better term, hot. Gorgeous.

  Another reason for her to believe she’d never be able to hold Nick. Not when he had a woman like this parading around this place in her underwear.

  But that’s not what came out. Instead, Tanya said, “Who are you?” which wasn’t the most brilliant statement ever, but it was all she had.

  “Who am I?” For a woman wearing next to nothing, she managed to pull off a surprisingly indignant tone of voice, like she couldn’t believe that Tanya didn’t recognize her. “I’m Clarissa Sutcliffe. Of the Chicago Sutcliffes. If you’re the maid, you can come back tomorrow.”

  Oh—the Chicago Sutcliffes. Of course, Tanya wanted to say. She managed to keep that retort in, but not by much. “I’m not a maid.”

  Where had she heard the name Sutcliffe? Oh. Oh, no. Sutcliffe—as in Sutcliffe, Watkins and Monroe. As in Nick’s boss.

  He’d been screwing the boss’s daughter.

  Clarissa Sutcliffe unfolded her arms and struck what could only be described as a supermodel pose—feet shoulder-width apart, hip popped out, chest puffed up. Damn, she had a hell of a body—one that Tanya would never be able to get close to. The worst part was, they both knew it. “Oh, that’s right. Daddy said Nicky had brought some Indian people into town for the case he was working on. I didn’t realize he was letting a witness stay with him.”