Secret Keeper

by Harlan, Christopher

  Holy shit. “And why’s that?”

  And the next thing he does sends the throbbing between my legs into the stratosphere.

  He reaches down, takes my hand, and presses it gently into his chest. I stand there, frozen, with this strange and beautiful man’s hands on my own, not knowing what to do.

  “Can you feel that?” he whispers. I nod my head as I get lost in his eyes. “It hasn’t beaten that fast in a very long time.”

  I think I just died.

  He turns and walks away like nothing even happened, with nothing but one last confident grin to make me melt before the whole encounter is over.

  I didn’t just step into a new building, I stepped into an alternate reality.

  The scary part is, I think I’m excited about that for the first time yet.

  2

  Dylan

  Present Day

  I’m just a working-class kid from Queens, New York. Nothing more, nothing less.

  That’s what I tell myself to stay humble.

  I was supposed to turn out like everyone else in my neighborhood—working class, making barely enough money to get by, struggling with bills for the rest of my life. That was fated, but that’s not how things turned out. Why? Because despite what Graham calls my ‘humble beginnings’, I’ve always had three resources that helped me become successful at whatever it is that I chose to do with myself.

  Most people only have one or two of these, but I’ve been blessed with the full package—the unconditional love of the grandparents who raised me, a mind as sharp as a razor’s edge, and an endless ability to hustle my ass off.

  The name’s Dylan, by the way. Dylan Murphy—working class kid turned personal assistant to one of the richest men in the city.

  But I’ll get to all that soon enough.

  First, you should know a little bit more about my story.

  If my life was a book, it would either make you laugh or cry—maybe both—depending on what chapter you were on.

  I was raised by my grandparents, Rita and Angelo, after my parents died in a car crash when I was nine years old. I was especially close with my granddad, Angelo, who I always called Pop. He taught me how to be a man, and was there with me through some tough times growing up. Pop was the greatest person I’ve ever known, and when he left this world I was heartbroken. Not only did I have my own sadness at losing him, but he left me to look after my nonna Rita, which I do as much as I can when I’m not busy with work. I’d do anything for that woman, and it was Nonna who taught me the most important lessons of all—how to love and respect women.

  I spent most of my twenties messing around, not sure what I wanted to do. I grew up in a tough, working class neighborhood, where no one ever becomes anything but what their parents were, or what the neighborhood turns them into. College degrees are rare where I come from—family businesses or the streets are where all of my friends ended up. Plumbing, cooling and heating, extermination, auto repair, or hanging out on the corner doing nothing good—that’s where every guy I know ended up making a living.

  But something in me always wanted more than what my surroundings told me I deserved.

  Today, you’d say I was ‘entrepreneurial’, like those people who go on that show Shark Tank with the next great business idea, but back when I was a kid we just called it a hustle.

  I was always hustling.

  In elementary school, I used to buy candy with birthday money I’d get from my aunts and uncles. I’d go the local candy shop, bargain with the store owner to discount his bags of M&M’s and Snickers if I bought him out, then I’d take my discount candy to school and sell it for a nice profit at recess. I had a thousand little hustles like that, and as I got older I’d save more and more of what I made so that I could start a business one day.

  I was one of the few guys in my neighborhood to go to a four-year school—yup, you guessed it, Queens College—where I got a degree in business management. I was going to set the world on fire, but reality turned out differently.

  I rolled my money into a bunch of business ideas, but none of them worked out. Some never got off the ground and others looked promising but fizzled out, but none of them turned into anything that was going to get me a place on Park Avenue. I learned the hard way that business is a cold, cruel world.

  But between those failed ventures and the knowledge that I wasn’t a nine-to-five kind of guy, I decided to do something that no one in my life saw coming—I joined the military.

  After a four-year stint that included a one-year tour in Afghanistan, I came back to the U.S. an even more disciplined man than I was before I left. I was luckier than most of the guys I served with, in that I never had to deal with all the trappings of battle that you usually hear about. No PTSD, no brain trauma, no loss of limbs. I was lucky enough to never see the worst of what that conflict had to offer, but I did see things that I’ll never forget as long as I live, and, more than anything, it made me appreciate the freedoms that we have here in America. Honorably discharged, I came back to New York with even more ambition and a hell of a lot more discipline than I had before I walked into that recruitment office.

  Only one problem.

  Well, two, actually.

  The first problem, which wasn’t really a problem to anyone except my grandparents, was that I developed an expensive habit of getting tattoos—a lot of them. All up and down my arms, and even on my hands. On my right hand is a skull that reminds me of how precious life is. Everyone who sees that one thinks the opposite-that I’m in some kind of satanic cult or something crazy. But the truth is that I saw a lot of death in the Middle East, and that tattoo serves to remind me that life is precious.

  My second problem after getting discharged was way more of a real problem than my tattoos—and that was my complete lack of employment.

  That’s where my Uncle Pete comes into the story. Pete’s a character, man. My Pop’s brother, Uncle Pete’s an old school New York Italian who has one of the best work ethics I’ve ever seen. Before Pop died he told me to contact his brother, who worked in the city as a driver for what Pop called a ‘big wig’ —his way of telling me Uncle Pete worked for rich people.

  What Uncle Pete really did for a living was helping out a man by the name of Graham J. Morgan. Mostly my uncle was his driver, but he also did other things for him behind the scenes that I would learn all about later on. But at the time, after I called him for a job, he told me that he was thinking of retiring, and asked if I wanted him to put in a good word for me about taking over his job.

  That’s how I met Graham, the man who would change my life forever.

  I sound like I really revere the guy—and I do—but when I first met him, he was a complete asshole. Our interview for his driving gig—if you want to call it an interview—went something like this:

  “So you’re the shithead nephew, huh?”

  “Excuse me?” I wasn’t used to being spoken to like that, but what I really wasn’t used to was being in an office like this. The whole place smelled like success—from the decor, to the address of the building, to Graham’s office being bigger than any apartment I’d ever lived in. Half of my mind was focused on that and the other half was trying not to be that kid from Queens who’d easily smack any dude who called me a shithead.

  “Not my words, you understand? But. . . fuck, I hope I’m not betraying a family confidence here, but that’s how your uncle described you.”

  “As his shithead nephew?”

  “That’s right.”

  Now, you have to understand how my mind works to understand what happened next between me—working class grunt—and the multi-millionaire Manhattan business mogul I’d met about thirty seconds earlier. I can sniff out bullshit like a bloodhound can sniff out a bird that’s been shot from the sky mid-flight. I can smell it like my nonna’s cooking on Thanksgiving—from a goddamn mile away. And when I smell it, I smell weakness. And that’s when I pounce.

  “All due respect, Mr. Morgan.”
r />   “Graham, please.”

  “Fine, Graham. All due respect, but no fucking way my uncle said that to you.”

  When I pushed back like that he looked at me sideways. I could read him right away. Graham Morgan was a man used to getting what he wants. And a man used to getting what he wants, forgets what it means to have to fight for that thing. Me? I’m a fighter by nature—I had to scrape and claw and work like hell for everything I got—so I still look at every encounter like a boxer looks at his opponent—reading opportunities to land a blow.

  “Excuse me? What did you say?” he asked.

  “I said that there’s no way on God’s green earth that my uncle referred to me as a shithead in front of you. No way.”

  That retort could have gone two ways, and I was ready for both. If this Graham Morgan guy was just another blue blood with a successful company and an entitled attitude, he could have just told me to get out of his office. I was ready for that outcome. The alternative was that he could respect that I had the balls to push back a little while still being respectful.

  “Okay, I’ll play along, Dylan. Why’s that?”

  That’s when I knew I had this job in the bag. Not only because being a driver didn’t require an expertise that I didn’t already have, but also because he didn’t tell me to fuck off right then and there. If he wanted me out, he would have done it. Him entertaining me told me everything that I needed to know.

  “Because, Mr. . . excuse me. Graham. We don’t talk about family like that to outsiders. If my uncle was going to call me a shithead—and believe me he’s called me much worse than that—it would be around the dinner table on a Sunday night, not in your car or in this office.”

  He looked intrigued. Not only that I had the balls to not be intimidated by him, but also about what I was saying. “Like what?” he asked.

  “Excuse me, sir? What do you mean?”

  “No ‘sirs’, please. And you said he’s called you much worse. What other names did old Pete have for you?”

  I saw a grin creep across his face, which up to that point he’d kept intentionally stern. “Jesus, where do I even start? There’s shithead, like you mentioned. There’s ‘dumb fuck’—that’s one of his favorites.” Graham started laughing. “He actually called me ‘shit for brains’ at Christmas dinner one year. And, when he got a few more drinks in him, he told me that I should have been a blow job.”

  That last one got him. Graham started cracking up hysterically, and the rest is history. The remainder of the interview went great, and before I left his office he hired me as his full-time driver.

  That was two years ago. Six months after that first meeting, I graduated from being his driver to him hiring me as his personal assistant—and that’s when things got really interesting.

  3

  Dylan

  I’m about to lose my job. I know it.

  A text like the one I just got makes me move my legs a little faster than I’m accustomed to moving them. I don’t rush like this for just anyone. But Graham is my boss. He’s not just my boss, he’s a straight up boss, in all the ways you can be. Dude’s seriously my idol in so many ways—confident (some would say stuck up, but those are just the haters), rich as hell, and married to an amazing woman named Soraya.

  If you don’t know Graham Morgan, let’s just say that he’s not a man who likes to wait for others, so when I get a text that reads “Here. Now.” I move my ass from the lobby to the elevator like there’s a gold medal waiting for me inside. The last thing I need is someone like him angry with me.

  I hit the UP button on the elevator and wait, my heart beating fast from the adrenaline pumping through my body. The light around the button comes and goes without the doors opening, and each passing second gives my body a little more time to be anxious.

  Five seconds doesn’t seem like a long time, but trust me, it’s plenty of time to let panic seep in. I start hitting the button frantically, and so hard, that the other people in the lobby start looking at me sideways.

  I can’t take it any longer. I count up to three-Mississippi. When the elevator doors are no more open than they were a minute ago, I say screw it and sprint for the steps. I’m not above a good run up some stairs if it means keeping my job.

  Graham and Soraya live on the tenth floor of this very exclusive Manhattan building, and right now that means ten flights of steps taken at a full gallop, like I’m trying out for the next summer games. When I hit the eighth floor, my legs go to jelly and my lungs start to burn. Thank God I’m a gym rat in my spare time, but, even so, I’m feeling these steps.

  The tenth floor comes. I feel the sweat already accumulating in weird places all over me. I must be a fucking mess right now, but I’m here, and that’s all that matters. I don’t knock—Graham hates knocking. I text that I’m outside, and seconds after I hit send the door opens up. I’m expecting the angry face of Graham, but what I see instead is the very beautiful face of Soraya.

  “Are you alright?” she asks.

  She’s the best—the perfect balance to all of Graham’s qualities. He’s rough, harsh, and doesn’t take shit from anyone. Neither does she, but she can deliver her no-bullshit attitude in a less intimidating way than he can.

  “Never better,” I tell her, my breathing beginning to steady. In her arms is their baby, Lorenzo, who isn’t so much of a baby anymore.

  “Come on in, we have something to tell you. I’m just going to put this one down for his nap. He needs it, trust me.”

  Soraya walks away with Lorenzo, leaving me alone in their living room. I’m comfortable in my job at this point, but I always have this feeling that I’m always in a perpetual interview. Maybe that’s the little bit of insecurity I have left in me.

  This job can feel like a continuous episode of some strange reality show—the kind where a guy like me—a kid raised in a working-class family—can actually make the kind of money my pop only dreamed of. I keep thinking that my first misstep is going to be the moment in the show where I’m pulled aside and fired, but in reality, I’m being paranoid because both of them have been nothing but great to me.

  Soraya comes back into the living room. “The elevator is still being weird, isn’t it?” I nod, not wanting to complain. “And you took ten flights of stairs to get here, didn’t you?” I nod again, this time letting a little smile creep in. “You’re too good to us. Here, come and get some cold water from the fridge.”

  “No, no, it’s fine.” I try to brush it all off, but she sees right through me.

  “I’m not so sure that’s true.”

  I follow her towards the kitchen where she hands me an ice-cold Evian bottle from their very fancy fridge. “Thank you, you really didn’t have to.”

  “And you didn’t have to rush up here like that. Was Graham being dramatic with you?”

  “No, not at all.”

  “And now you’re lying to your boss’ wife. Tisk Tisk.”

  This time I give her a full smile. “He just made it seem a little. . .”

  “A little what?”

  I hear his voice behind me and I spin around. “A little urgent,” I finish. “Unless I’m misinterpreting.”

  That’s when Graham steps into the room. We’re both tall guys, him just a little taller than me, but it’s his presence that makes him seem even taller than his actual height. I don’t move. I just stand there, looking into a very stern face, waiting for him to vote my ass off the island.

  “Dylan, the last thing I need you to do is interpret my words. Just try following them instead.”

  I knew it. I fucked up somehow, in some way. And now I’m about to be let go. That’s what I expect, but that’s not what happens. Instead, he smiles and hands me a champagne drinking glass that he’s been holding behind his back. I jerk my head backwards when he brings his hand within an inch or two of my face.

  “What’s this?” I ask.

  He pulls his hand back just enough so that my eyes can actually focus. I saw that it was a glas
s, but now I see it has writing on it. I squint my eyes to read it, but before I get the chance I hear Soraya’s voice again.

  “I’m pregnant!”

  I spin back around. “What? You’re pregnant again?”

  “That’s right,” Graham says. “We’re pregnant.” Before I open my mouth to congratulate them I hear. . .

  “Woah, what’s this ‘we’ stuff you keep telling people? I’m pretty sure it’s not you who had your head buried in our toilet this morning.”

  I laugh. I can’t help it. I love when Soraya puts him in his place.

  “Alright, fair enough.”

  “Oh my God, congratulations!” I wrap my arms around her without even thinking about it. Normally I wouldn’t grab my boss’ wife and kiss her on the cheek, but I liked Soraya the minute I met her, and she made me feel like more than just the hired help. “How long?”

  “I’m a little over three months now. We’re only telling a few people.”

  “And I’m one of them?” I ask, a little shocked. I mean, I’m honored, but I wouldn’t think that I was on the short list of people they’d tell early about their new baby.

  “Of course we’d tell you,” Graham says from behind me. “But there’s something else we need to tell you also.” I let go of Soraya as Graham walks next to us. “Can we talk in the other room?”

  “Sure.” I’m pretty sure a phrase like ‘can we talk in the other room’ can’t be a good thing, but he doesn’t sound angry or frustrated with me. He sounds strangely compassionate. “What’s going on?”

  “I’ve always been a pull-the-band-aid-off-quick kind of guy, Dylan, so I’m going to pull it off. We’re moving.”

  “Oh.” I don’t mean to say ‘oh’—that’s the wrong reaction. I’m supposed to fake being happy, but I know what this means. “That’s great.”

  “Come on, Dylan, stop fucking with me. It’s okay to be disappointed. But we can’t raise another baby in the city, not with a beautiful place out in the Hamptons waiting for us. It seems that we’ve outgrown this place.”