by Cynthia Dane
Still, nothing could fully prepare me for what I found at Mercy Springs Assisted Living And Retirement Home. Especially since Erica had spared no expense to put her mother up in her own private wing with a whole staff of nurses and orderlies to watch after her all day.
I suppose it sounds ideal on paper. Who wouldn’t want to retire to a pleasant, sunny wing the size of most houses? Martha occupied the westernmost wing that garnered spectacular sunsets every evening. She also had a great view of the carefully manicured lawns and gardens surrounding Mercy Springs. Plenty of life abounded, between the local fauna and the other residents going for walks by her floor-to-ceiling windows. The receptionist at the entrance to the Martha Wing only looked at me twice before recognizing me from the photo Brooke had forwarded.
“Is this your first time meeting with Lady Mann?”
That sort of phrase shouldn’t have taken me aback anymore, yet it did. Lady Mann? I had yet to hear that title in reference to Erica’s mother. “Yes,” I said, signing my name on the guest log and following it with a small stack of NDAs. “Ms. Pentecost asked me to fill in for her since she’s in the hospital from food poisoning.”
“So she told me in her email. I’m so sorry to hear that.” The receptionist summoned a spry nurse with a touch of a buzzer. “This is Lyla. She’s in charge of Lady Mann’s daily care, and will give you a brief tour before taking to meet her.”
“Hi.” A firm, tanned hand reached out to shake my pale hand. “Lyla Shay. You must be Natalie Chen. Come with me, and I’ll take you through what I usually show Ms. Pentecost every other week.”
I didn’t know what to expect beyond proof that Erica’s mother was still alive. What else did I need to know? For one, Brooke had forwarded me a brief checklist. “Are the nurses competent?” Check. “Is Mrs. Mann clean and as healthy as we can expect?” Hopefully that would be a check, too. I was also to facilitate any financial issues and decide if Erica should be contacted about her mother’s latest health mishaps. Brooke’s file said that Martha hadn’t been brought up in about a year. Erica never talked about her, either.
Soon, I found out why.
Martha sat in the main living room overlooking the gardens. Her frail body was propped up in a green Victorian dining chair so her milky eyes could watch the polo players riding by and the landscapers trimming a nearby hedge. One of her paid companions rose from another chair and introduced herself to me before going on break. The idea was that I would talk to Martha privately for a few minutes to ascertain how she was doing.
“Mrs. Mann? Martha?” Lyla sat on a nearby ottoman and gestured to me. “This is Ms. Natalie Chen. She works for your son, Eric.”
The milk was blinked away from her eyes. Suddenly, I gazed upon a sixty-five-year-old woman who had a few wits still about her. Compared to the old crone who didn’t look long for this world in her Queen Elizabeth-inspired dress suit and pink-diamond brooch? I’d take it.“Where’s Brooke?” Her voice croaked between us. Her perfectly coifed gray hair almost lost its volume when she looked at me. No, I was nowhere near as tall, blond, or white-skinned as Brooke, that was for sure. “Where’s my daughter-in-law?”
My eyes widened. Lyla took me to the side and explained, “Lady Mann has always been convinced that her son is married to Ms. Pentecost. We don’t bother to correct her anymore. Go with it. It’s easier that way.”
I nodded. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Mann.” I made sure to use the sweetest voice I could muster from my arsenal of fake personalities. “But Brooke is sick right now. I’m filling in for her. I do work with your son, though. Eric personally asked me to come by and visit you this week.”
“Who are you?”
“I’m one of his personal assistants. I’m number two to Brooke.”
“Oh.” Martha leaned back against her chair. “So you are my son’s mistress. How candid of him to send you here to see me. Not surprised he picked an Asian. He always had strange tastes. Lyla, did I ever tell you about the girlfriend who looked like a man? My husband put an end to that right quick. If only he were still alive.”
Well, Brooke had been right about more than one thing…
Lyla assured me she would only be a shout away if I needed anything. She assured me of this twice, making me wonder how badly I would need her assistance.
“Is everyone here treating you well, Mrs. Mann?”
She blew that question off with a flip of her hand. “How much does my son pay you? Did you work for him before you became his mistress? Or did you get your job because of how good you are in bed? I always told my husband that if he took up a mistress he better not employ her around me…”
“So how is Lyla? She seems really nice. They told me she’s been working here as long as you’ve been a resident. Didn’t Eric hire her?”
“My son has such strange tastes. You’re not the first Chinawoman he’s been involved with. Although at least you’re pretty. Not as pretty as my daughter-in-law, but not everyone can have such pretty hair.”
“Has your doctor been by to see you recently?”
“You should’ve seen some of the women my son dated when he was a teenager. I was terribly worried that he was a homosexual for a while. I thought some of the women he dated were actually men! But I guess at that age boys don’t really care who they sleep with, as long as they have air in their lungs and a gash between their legs.”
I shifted in my seat. No wonder Erica didn’t want her anywhere near Mann Manor. My lover already had enough problems with how she presented herself to the public.
Which made me wonder… didn’t Martha know the truth? About Erica, that was? Surely she did.
“I wish you could have known Eric when he was little. He was such a fine gentleman in training. I used to dress him in the cutest sailor suits and tiny tuxedos.” Martha looked wistfully out the window, that forlorn expression she espoused soon tying knots in my stomach. “He was so protective of his sister. Did you know he had a sister? I bet he doesn’t talk much about her. He was there when she… when she…”
The milk returned to her eyes. I almost called for Lyla when Martha stood up and braced herself against the window.
“Do you see her out there? That’s my little Erica right there. The one in the white dress and ponytail.”
I looked, but didn’t see any children. What I did see was a group of grown grandchildren horseback riding with another resident. The elderly gentleman attempted to show the youngest woman of the three how to make her horse trot. The other two women giggled to each other. One of them wore a white blouse and pants and had her hair up in a loose bun.
Did Martha really think that she saw her grown daughter out there? Did she know that Erica was downtown right now? That she could go see her anytime?
“Such a sweet girl.” Martha pressed her nose against the glass. “I bought her one of those dollhouses from Sweden. Handcrafted. The carpenter fells his own trees and prepares everything from start to finish. He created a miniature version of my house so my daughter could pretend it would be hers one day. My husband is already talking about who to marry her off to. Don’t you think a young lady should be unattached for a while? I didn’t get married until I was thirty. It was a miracle we had twins when we did…”
“Mrs. Mann.” I joined her by the window. “Do you know the truth about your children?”
She barely glanced at me. “Eric was there when his sister died. Such a traumatic day. So, so sad. He cried for so long. I thought he wasn’t going to be okay. You know how twins can be. So attached. When my husband…” Martha stopped talking. When she finally spoke again, it was with a wisp blowing from her throat and tears falling from her eyes. “It was so wrong what he did! My husband… oh, God, every day I am so thankful he is dead. The bastard is dead.”
Lyla erupted from the doorway with the speed of a frightened deer. “Come here, Martha, let’s get you settled down…”
“Child killer.” Martha pushed Lyla away from her, although she wasn’t strong enough to hurt
the nurse trying to do her job. “Child killer! My husband is a child killer!”
“Let’s have a seat, Martha.”
I backed away. What the hell should I tell Brooke when I emailed her my report? Was this something that happened every visit? Or had I unlocked something unholy?
“He killed her! He killed my daughter!” Martha shoved Lyla away, this time with enough force to send the nurse off balance. “Why won’t anybody do something? He killed her!”
Two male nurses arrived to assist with Martha Mann. It took all three nurses to escort her out of the room, one of them mumbling that they might be out of the sedative they regularly used when poor Mrs. Mann was having “one of her spells.”
She looked at me once more, eyes clear with that elusive thing called clarity.
“Ask the man who came here!” Martha shouted. “Ask the man! He’ll tell the world! He’ll tell the truth and bring my daughter back!”
I remained by the window until her shouts and pleas subsided. “If only you realized that she’s alive right now,” I muttered. “Wait… what man?”
But Martha was gone, and when I asked the receptionist about this supposed man Martha blathered on about, I was given another shrug and a vapid look. If anyone knew anything, they weren’t going to tell me, a person they didn’t know from Eve.
“How long has she been like that?” I asked Clyde. We were already heading back to the office. “Mrs. Mann, that is.”
He spared me one glance in the rearview mirror. “Mr. Mann’s mother has been ill for a long time, Ms. Chen. Beyond that, it’s not really my place to say.”
No, I suppose not. It wasn’t anybody’s place to say, was it? Seemed like every time I asked for more answers, the only one to say anything – if at all – was Erica. Which didn’t do me any good when I wasn’t supposed to bring this visit up to her at all.
We reached the office right before three. I entered with hardly a skip in my step, although I was certainly glad to see Erica behind her desk. Or Eric, I should say. When at work, I struggled to remember what was really going on. If I were tired enough, I wouldn’t even question that Eric was really a man in that tailored suit and tie. God knew he had that posture down. He sat like every other man in the office.
Even Aiden, who slouched at this desk and passed me a knowing smile.
Creep.
“Get your errands done?”
I had shut the door in Erica’s office when she asked me that. “Yup. Anything you need from me?”
“Besides the obvious?”
Naturally, I took that as sexual innuendo. It didn’t help that we had spent half the week making out and getting into bigger trouble in this office.
“Maybe in a few minutes,” I said.
Erica cocked her head before laughing. “I didn’t mean that,” she assured me. “I meant needing you for the conference call I’m about to make.”
“Oh. Right.” With all the drama at Mercy Springs, I had forgotten about actual work. “No problem. Give me a few minutes.”
I couldn’t imagine speaking like that to my boss only a month ago. Now here I was, speaking as if it were nothing for me to address Erica Mann in such a way. Casually. Flippantly. As if she were a big fat nuisance in the middle of my work day.
She knew exactly what I meant. Which is probably why she came to sit next to me on the couch.
“Do you know why I wanted to make sure you were back before quitting time?”
I snuggled up next to her, my mouth muffled against her shoulder. The fine fabric of her suit jacket didn’t irritate my skin. Not like the fabric of those lesser suits I would never be able to touch again after dating someone like Eric Mann. “Because you love looking at my pretty face?”
“More like kissing it, but that’s a good start.”
I snorted. “Why, then?”
Her arm wrapped tightly around me. “Because I want to take you out tonight and have a good time. No work. It’s Friday night and I don’t have any businesspeople to entertain, so why don’t we go out and get into a little trouble?”
“Trouble? What kind of trouble?”
“For starters, I’ve already made reservations at Bridgeport. The balcony table.”
“Bridgeport? That’s…” It was one of the nicest, most exclusive restaurants in the city, yes, but it wasn’t like the place we went to a week ago. “Public.”
“Yes. We will definitely be seen together, if you’re all right with that.”
I looked away. Common sense told me to turn the offer down and suggest somewhere more private, like Mann Manor. I wasn’t even thinking of Erica’s image when I considered that. I was thinking of my image.
If we were seen together having a nice dinner on a Friday night, everyone – and I mean everyone, from the other diners who didn’t recognize us and the tabloid-thirsty assholes who would make a big deal out of it – would assume we were on a date. It would hit the gossip train as soon as it came into station at midnight. We would wake up in the morning and discover ourselves the next big it couple on the west coast, possibly in the whole country.
People would wonder who I was. They would discover that I was one of the new interns at Mann-Garret and have a fucking field day. What scandal! How inappropriate! How nice was it to be a pretty female intern and get to fuck a billionaire who snatched Texan lands from beneath an oil magnate’s nose? Because, yes, that had hit the business news tickers as soon as Mr. Longhorn signed the dotted line.
Would I be okay with that? What kind of protections did I have?
“You want to be seen with me?” That was the first thing out of my mouth.
Eric kissed my knuckles, as gently as one would sprinkle dew on a rose petal. “Of course. You’re the realest thing I’ve had in so long. It seems only right to be seen in public with you.”
“I’m more worried about you. This is a big deal for you. Wouldn’t you have to…”
“I would have to keep presenting male, yes, but that didn’t seem to bother you the last time we went on a date in a restaurant.”
“No.” I marveled over how well she could pass. Obviously she could, if she had fooled not only me but someone like her own fiancée for years. I had yet to meet the trainers and acting coaches she employed to help her keep up the façade of effortless masculinity. I had yet to watch her put her state-of-the-art and custom made binders on. I didn’t know to what extent she psychologically psyched herself up until she fully believed that she was a man.
I had yet to discover how I was responsible for that dismantling around her – because I had yet to fully see it for myself.
Even her asking me out on this date, when I knew the truth, was a giant gamble. I could give her away. She could falter around me. One moment she would kiss my hand over a candlelit table, and the next she would giggle like a little girl and the gig would be up.
“If you’re fine with it, then I suppose I am too. But what about the fact that I’m your employee? If it informally gets out that we’re dating, that could be a legal nightmare for you.”
“I haven’t mentioned this to you, but I’ve been working with my PR agency and some of my lawyers to come up with a response to that should the need arise. Don’t worry about it. Let me handle it. Your only job tonight,” she kissed my cheek with little abandon, “is to be my alluring girlfriend who turns every head in the room.”
Here I had been thinking about her giggling, and I started doing it instead! “In this old thing?” I was hardly dressed for a hot date out. I had run out of Brooke-inspired outfits and had come into work wearing my usual blouse and pencil skirt ensemble. Perfectly acceptable for the executive office, but hardly a head-turner in an after-hours abode.
Erica lowered her head and nipped the navy blue tie on my blouse. “Of course, I think you’re the most gorgeous and sexiest woman I could ask to go out with, but I’ll spare you some work this afternoon if you promise to buy a nice cocktail dress across the street.”
“What?”
E
rica pulled her wallet out of her inside jacket pocket and handed me one of two black credit cards. Two! I didn’t know there was more than one! “I’ll call ahead and let them know you’re coming. Buy a new outfit on me.”
“Across the street?” I barely looked across the avenue when coming into work. The neighboring building was comprised of luxury apartments and condos, but the bottom storefronts were designer boutiques and jewelry shops. There was no way anything in those windows cost less than a thousand dollars. Way out of my pay range! The only reason I owned a Chanel dress was because I bought it the moment it went off-season and wasn’t yet old enough to be considered “vintage.” There’s a huge difference between a dress that costs two thousand dollars and one that’s the price of only half the rents around here!
“I bet you would look amazing in a little black dress, but you could surprise me with a bright color like that orange you wore the other day. Honestly, you have the complexion and hair color to pull off anything. I think the only color I have yet to see you in is neon pink.”
There was a reason for that. Namely, I did not care much for pink outside of some soft coral and salmon colors. Guess I needed my pinks to be infused with oranges. “I couldn’t possibly…” Trust me. I wanted to.
“I insist. Tell them you’re dressing for a night at Bridgeport’s and a possible tabloid photoshoot. They’ll know what to do.”
“How do you know?”
Erica didn’t think twice before saying, “Brooke used to go to them when she didn’t have enough time to stop by her favorite shops.”
“Uh…” I took her hands in her lap and decided to give it to her straight. “Protip: don’t mention what your ex used to do to get ready for dates.”
“Got it. Sorry.” That giddiness I had come to adore bubbled up into my lover’s face. “I’m still new to a lot of this. It’s been a long time since I had a real dating life like this.”
“It’s been a long time since I last went on a shopping spree with my boss’s black card.” I gave her a small peck to the cheek before standing up. “I’ll pick something amazing out, don’t you worry. Next time you see me, you’ll barely be able to keep your hands off me.”