Immoral Obsession

by Theresa Papa

I ignore my mother in favor of giving my daughter all my attention. Something my mother would know nothing about.

  “You’re feeding the ducklings. Have you named them all yet?” I ask Tess.

  “Named them?” she giggles. “No.”

  “I’m very good at selecting appropriate names for things. For instance, how about we name that one with the little butt that wiggles in the air, Wiggles?”

  Tess laughs again, and the angels are singing. “Okay, Eliz… um what should I call you?” she asks as she turns to look into my eyes once again to melt my heart.

  “What would you like to call me sweetie?”

  “Well, Nee nee calls you Elizabeth, and Richard calls you Beth.” She looks at each of them briefly. “But I would like to call you Mommy. All my friends at school have one.”

  Tears involuntarily rush down my cheeks as I nod my head at a loss for words.

  “Why are you crying, Mommy? See that sounds good!” Tess proclaims.

  Using my palms to swipe away my tears, I squat down to Tess’s level.

  “Yes, sweetie, it sounds wonderful. I’m very honored to be your mother. Would you mind if I hug you for a moment?”

  “The only person who ever hugs me is Richard. But since you’re my mommy, it’s all right.”

  I put my arms gently around her, and she hugs me tight. Richard stands behind her, and I shoot him a look of disdain. He hugs her to gain her trust, not out of love. It’s all part of his grooming her, just like he did with me.

  “Do you like my dress and my new sandals? Green is my favorite color.”

  She looks down at her dress and picks up her foot to show me miniature copper sandals.

  “I love your dress, and those sandals are so cute. I wish they made them in my size.”

  “Contessa, it’s time to go with Eva and do your studies for today,” Richard interrupts.

  Eva appears from inside the solarium and takes Tess by the hand.

  “Bye Mommy, will I see you later? Tess asks.

  “Yes …” I answer her. Richard cuts in.

  “Sweetheart, of course, you can see your mommy later if she is a good girl and so are you,” he glowers at me to make his point that he’s in control here. “Go on now with Eva and do well in your studies.”

  Then he waits until she is out of earshot before he continues.

  “How well you cooperate today will determine if I let you have dinner tonight with Tess. Although, I can use your father’s one-word command and put you under hypnosis to comply. It’s your choice. Either way, I get what I want,” Richard says.

  I press my lips together to stifle my real reaction to his declaration. I wish I could stab him now and just get it over with, but I have to let him think he has all the power first. Then when he least expects it, I will get my revenge and save my daughter’s life as well as my own.

  Chapter 47

  Elizabeth Pope

  The rest of the daylight hours are spent with Richard’s makeup team in the warehouse.

  “Ouch! That hurt,” I protest to the hair stylist who molds my hair into her creation.

  “You’re almost done, be patient with Margo,” Richard orders as he walks in.

  “I look like a twenty-dollar hooker! Any more hair extensions and I won’t be able to hold my head up,” I say with my outlined ruby red lips.

  “More like a porn star, exactly what I wanted. This film is going to be epic, the best in my career,” he declares in the mirror from behind my chair.

  I roll my eyes and flinch as another bobby pin sticks into my head. I try to see where Richard walks off to, but the false eyelashes obstruct my peripheral vision.

  “Here is your costume for the first scene, Ms. Pope,” Margo says.

  “Could they spare the fabric? Gee, I guess I shouldn’t complain. At least there is a costume,” I state the obvious and Margo just giggles.

  “I’ll leave you to change and then come back to position you in the scene.”

  While I’m alone, I take the chance to hide my weapon on the set under the mattress. God knows there’s nowhere to put it in my costume. It doesn’t leave much to the imagination.

  I adjust the straps of the bustier that matches the transparent thong when Margo comes back in. She holds a length of silk rope.

  “Is that rope to tie me up?

  “Yes miss, over on the four-post bed, please.”

  “I know the procedure… I used to work in a club where rope play was common,” I say as I blow hot air through my lips.

  I close my eyes, bite my bottom lip, and sigh deeply before I get on the bed. I make sure I’m closer to the side with the hidden mirror handle. Margo ties my wrists in one end of each rope and wraps the other ends around the bedposts. They are tight enough to keep my hands above my head. Almost all hope of using my weapon flies out the window without the use of my hands. I’m a chameleon. Adapt.

  As soon as Margo leaves, my breathing escalates. I can do this for the chance to save my daughter.

  “Just the person I was looking for. And all trussed up like a mythological sacrifice waiting for slaughter.” A female voice drifts closer from across the room.

  My head pops up off the mattress to find Amanda Harrington.

  “Very funny, Amanda. Don’t tell me your father has you in this film, too?”

  She sashays across the room to stand on the side of the bed and look down on me. Then she traces her index finger from my ankle up to my thigh as she says, “No way, girlfriend. My father doesn’t know I’m here yet. I have some unfinished business with you and also with your offspring.”

  “Why do you need to see Tess? Have you already met her? Why didn’t you tell me your father had my child? I raise my voice an octave.

  “Calm down Lizzie girl,” she says. Her face is scrunched, her eyes maniacal.

  I pull on my restraints, wriggling to get free.

  “I won’t calm down, you are supposed to be my friend. You did the unthinkable to help me before. Why wouldn’t you protect my child from what we both endured at the hands of our fathers?”

  “Your child is in my way, you’re both keeping me from what I want and need most. I let you believe that I killed Marcus Dent for you because you didn’t need to know any different at the time.” She paces alongside the bed as she rubs the pocket of her blazer repeatedly.

  When Marcus locked me in the bathroom, and I was standing on the sink to see through the transom, Amanda was the killer who knelt over him. She finished him off quite brutally and set me free afterward. I was so happy to get out of there that I agreed to keep her secret in a pact between two girls who were both victimized in the same way.

  “But I’ve never told anyone you were the killer and not Giselle Gourdan. We are supposed to be friends, two innocent girls who were mistreated together as children. I’ve always thought of you as the one person who gets me. You… you killed Marcus to free me and keep the players of the game from turning me over to your father.”

  “Exactly, I wanted you as far away from my father as possible. You see, Lizzie girl, my father has always placed me second behind you, and now I’m third thanks to that little clone you created. And stupid Marcus thought he was going to somehow step in front of me, too!”

  Amanda crawls up on the bed and kneels over me. She pulls a gun out of her pocket and points it at my head. The bed shakes under me from my struggles to get away.

  “This is a joke, right? Richard set this up, right? He’s filming us, right?” My voice gets higher and louder at the end of my questions.

  “This is as real as this gun I have to your head. First, I will kill you, and then I’m going to Tess’s room and getting rid of her. I will not be ignored anymore by my father! I will finally have the family I always wanted with your mother and my father. Irene is the only one besides Jaxson who understands me!”

  “Wait, what? You want to claim MY mother?” I ask in shock.

  “Mandy please put
the gun down! This is not part of our plan, Amanda!” Irene orders from the doorway.

  Amanda backs away from me and sits on the edge of the bed with her head down. My mother walks over and pries the gun out of her hand. She sets it on the nightstand.

  “Please don’t be angry, Mommy, Mandy was just trying to make things uncomplicated,” Amanda says to MY mother. Her voice is small and meek like she’s a little girl again. She must be off her meds.

  “What the hell is going on here?” Richard demands. “Elizabeth, are you all right?”

  “Of course you would only worry about her, Daddy! You never cared about me like you do for Elizabeth. Bradford cared about me, but then SHE killed him. I forgot that was the other reason Mandy wanted to kill you.” She whirls around and slaps me across the face hard.

  “Amanda! Stop it right now. I demand you take control of yourself. Have you missed a dose of your medicines?” Richard says.

  Amanda stands in front of Richard now. Childlike tears fall down her face as she whines to her father.

  “I’m sorry, Daddy. All I ever wanted was to have you all to myself sometimes. But you never gave me any of your time. All you ever did is nag me about my medication and send me away with Bradford or away to school. I just wanted your attention. Mandy even murdered Marcus so he wouldn’t take you away from me. We knew you would favor him for bringing that bitch back to you. So, Mandy got rid of him before he could. The game was supposed to take care of killing Elizabeth, but when you upped the prize to two million, I couldn’t buy off the players anymore. Mandy and I came here ready to get rid of her and Tess, too!”

  Richard’s forehead crinkles, and he presses his lips together.

  “Amanda, you really cannot be off your medication… it’s not safe to let Mandy come out at will,” he chastises her.

  The changes in her are happening right in front of me. Her demeanor and tone become assertive and angry. “No, Daddy! Do not talk to me about my medication! You just refuse to listen to me. I see now, it’s evident what has to be done. I resign myself to the fact that if I can’t have your attention, no one ever will again!”

  She raises the gun toward her father and shoots him. Richard never has the time to react before the bullet enters his chest. He falls backward and lands on his back. A shocked expression is carved in stone on his face.

  Amanda immediately falls to her knees beside him. She places her palms on each side of his face and looks into his eyes.

  “Now, Daddy, here’s where I will be your center of attention. I will be the last thing you ever see in this world because I’m the most important.”

  Chapter 48

  Jaxson Pope

  “Fuck, Nico that was a gun shot!” I yell out to my brother as we both sprint toward the noise.

  When we walk through the door of this huge warehouse, my brother looks back at me, his eyebrows meet his hairline, and his jaw drops. I zero in on Amanda Harrington the girl I’ve tried to protect my whole adult life. The guilt I felt when we were only five years old takes over again when I see her kneel in a pool of her father’s blood, holding his face in her hands. If only I was strong enough to tell someone what my uncle was doing to her, she might have been mentally healthy now.

  Nico runs to untie my cousin Elizabeth and cover her with his shirt when I find myself standing over a dying scumbag, Richard Harrington. He tries to talk, but no sound escapes him, then the life leaves his eyes, and he succumbs. Amanda is catatonic as I place my hands under her arms and lift her away from the body. She hugs me and buries her face into my chest just like when she was a fucked-up little girl. To comfort her has always been my job; she has never been far all these years. We made a pact. I promised to always be there for her when she needed me.

  “Oh, my God! I’m so happy to see you guys. Thank you for finding me,” Elizabeth exclaims.

  “We took a chance on the last location the bracelet showed you were. And we got lucky,” Nico says.

  “How’d you know that my bracelet was gone?’

  “Richard sent it to me with a note demanding we stop trying to prevent his game from working. He wanted to brag that he already had you in his possession,” Nico answers. “Let’s get out of here. Come on.”

  I stop in my tracks when she fails to follow us. Amanda pulls me down to sit on the bed as if she cannot stand anymore. Her head is in my lap, and her arms are viselike around my middle.

  “Wait! You don’t know about Tess. We have to get her first,” Elizabeth declares.

  “Who’s Tess?”

  “Tess is my daughter.”

  “You have a daughter? When did THAT happen?” Nico sputters. “Where has she been?”

  “I’ll explain all that later. Come on.”

  Nico looks to me, and I give him the sign to go with her and meet me back here to leave soon. Amanda hugs me so that I can hardly breathe.

  “Amanda, are you all right?” I ask.

  She nods her head but won’t speak to me. It pisses me off that she obviously has missed doses of her medication. I’ve witnessed the effects of a medication mishap before. I learned never to ask her directly if she has taken it because it sets her off. In those past instances, she never went this far to hurt herself or someone else. It is painfully apparent that she has finally cracked up. No one can say for sure what causes Dissociative Identity Disorder and, more specifically, what causes impulsivity. There is some evidence that DID is triggered by Post Traumatic Stress (PTSD), particularly if the trauma occurred in childhood. Our fucked-up childhood with uncle Bradford holding the puppet strings over us surely is to blame.

  I slide us over on the bed, facing us away from the blood. This is all kinds of fucked up as she continues to hold on for dear life.

  “Mommy made me stop my pills,” she mumbles into my shirt. “Mommy made me. Mommy made me. Mommy made me.”

  DID reflects a failure to cope with trauma. Certain circumstances or stressors can cause a particular alter to emerge. I’m guessing that Amanda speaking in a childlike voice after killing her own father means she has taken on an additional alter that I have never seen.

  Her voice is meek and quiet; her demeanor is that of a small child. When Nico and Elizabeth return, I pick her up into my arms and carry her out.

  My brother drives up in a large black SUV, I put Amanda in, and I hop in. There are a little girl and my aunt Irene in the back. Elizabeth hugs me around Amanda from the seat next to me.

  “Whew, I’m so glad you’re finally safe, cuz.”

  “Me too!” Elizabeth replies. “Jaxson, this is my daughter, Tess.”

  “Mommy do I call him uncle, too?” Tess asks.

  “Yes, sweetie, Nico and Jaxson are both your cousins, but out of respect you call them Uncle Nico and Uncle Jaxson.”

  Amanda shifts in my arms and holds on tighter. I wink at Tess and smooth Amanda’s hair to keep her calm.

  Chapter 49

  Elizabeth Pope

  We all spend the remaining time in Brazil on the same yacht I was brought into Guanabara Bay on with my mother. Tess plays with her new uncles and only asks about Richard once. I’m holding off to tell her until we get home. Amanda sleeps due to medication in a stateroom, and Irene and I are on another deck alone.

  “Mother, were you manipulating Amanda by suggesting to her that it would be beneficial to get off her medication?”

  My mother removes the silken scarf from around her neck and ties her hair up in it to keep the wind from ruining her hairdo. She presses her lips together and raises one eyebrow when she finally looks at me.

  “Well, darling, I guess there are some things I need to tell you.” She gracefully sits on the chaise lounge and reclines in the sunshine, head back, and eyes closed. “Elizabeth, out of all the people in the world, you know me the most. I’m not sure if that goes along with that mother/daughter bond or what, but it’s true. I guess you will see soon enough with Tess.”

  “Yes, Mother, but I thi
nk you mean I can see right through you.”

  She opens one eye, gives me a look, and then continues.

  “You see, after your father died, I recognized I had to do something to pave the way to my old age with funds to keep me in the luxury I’m used to. So, I made Richard a deal and used him as my personal bank after the money from your father ran out. I agreed to help him get Tess in our possession in return. Since I’m her biological grandmother, it was easy. He paid actors to impersonate the happy couple you handed your daughter to. Afterward, he convinced a judge friend of his to grant custody of Tess to her maternal grandmother.” She clears her throat before the next revelation. “During the last few years, I managed to use that to manipulate him into falling for me. Thus, he named me in his will. But you see Amanda is also named as his only daughter, which is why I needed to have control over the money by having her committed for her psychological problems.”

  “But she ended up murdering two people, Mother!” I remind her before I sit in the chair next to her. “Granted they both were the scum of the earth, but still she almost killed me, too.”

  “Oh stop, I got there in time to save you. She did our dirty work for us. Don’t you see? She killed Marcus to get you released, and she killed Richard to help me get my money faster. All the while helping herself get into the loony bin.” She lifts her head and shields her eyes from the sun to look at me. “I was the one to send her after Marcus when he contacted us that you were in his possession. That was just icing on the proverbial cake that the game smoked him out of oblivion. Now he will never turn up to challenge Richard’s will, and all of it will be mine.” She lies back again.

  “Were you part of masterminding that stupid game? You may be facing criminal charges.”

  “I never participated in any criminal activities directly. But if the police don’t see it that way, I’m sure you can persuade them to think otherwise on my behalf in exchange for a smooth custody transition of Tess to you.

  “And of course you end up smelling like a rose. Right, Mother? You used my daughter and me.”