by Debbie Burke
Tillman shrugged. “Chell will reschedule. That’s her department. I just get stuck with the bills. The cancellation penalties will be fat for this fiasco.”
Tawny recalled Judah’s nervousness about chanting in front of a big audience. “Can you do a smaller ceremony? Just family?”
“A bar mitzvah is about a boy becoming a man in his community. He now has adult responsibilities.” He pulled on his chin. “But this celebration got way out of hand. Chell is obsessed with impressing her colleagues.”
“Why is she so insecure?”
He faced Tawny, amusement tugging at the side of his mouth. “You’re pretty damn sharp, you know that?”
She tilted her head. “It’s pretty damn obvious. She’s beautiful, rich, a college professor, yet she needs to build herself up by making fun of a nobody like me. That’s insecure.”
He growled, “Never say you’re a nobody, Tawny. Never.” He squeezed her hand, hard.
She smiled and leaned into him for a kiss. “OK, boss.”
Back in the SUV, as they headed toward the mall, Tawny asked, “How did you two meet?”
His lower teeth bit his upper lip, a tic she’d noticed with Arielle. “I was clerking for a judge in Seattle. At a party he threw, I see this stunning brunette on the arm of an old stumblebum drunk. I figure he’s her sugar daddy. Turns out he is her daddy, for real. Once upon a time, he’d been a premiere constitutional scholar who’d argued before the Supreme Court. I’d studied his opinions in law school. Brilliant mind, stellar career, all lost to Jack Daniels. Anyway, I’m watching Chell and she’s watching me. The old guy’s watching both of us and I can see him thinking, up-and-coming young Jewish attorney would make a fine son-in-law.”
Tawny grinned. “He knew how to pick a winning racehorse.”
Tillman snorted. “We started dating. When I took her home to meet my mom, that clinched it. Chell fell completely and hopelessly in love…with the estate she knew I’d inherit. Of course, I didn’t realize that until later.”
Tawny frowned, wondering how the eternally cynical Tillman could have been fooled.
Steering through traffic, he glanced sideways at her. “I know what you’re thinking, that my other head took over. And Chell could be as beguiling as Scheherazade but it was more than that. She’d had rough breaks but she was really strong, resolute. Her mom died of breast cancer when Chell was sixteen, same age as Mimi. Her dad crawled into the bottle and never came out. He lost a couple million-dollar malpractice suits that cost him his license. After that, he couldn’t even get a job vacuuming the carpet in a law firm.
“Chell goes from living on Lake Washington Boulevard, being class president at her private school, to a roach-infested Section Eight apartment. She had to grovel for college scholarships. But she always stuck by her dad, even at his worst.”
Tawny swallowed hard, surprised by an unexpected kinship she shared with Rochelle. “My dad was a drunk, too.”
Tillman pulled into the mall lot and parked. “You never told me that.”
She shrugged. “Never came up.”
Questions played in his eyes that she didn’t want to answer. Her dad—and mom—were dead. That was in the past. Nothing to be done. Right now, the problems with Tillman’s children needed attention.
She got out of the SUV and started toward the entrance. “So what happened to Rochelle’s dad?”
He was beside her in an instant, clasping her hand. “After the girls were born, Chell goes on a mission to rehabilitate Daddy. She demands I take him into partnership with Kemp and me, even though he’d torpedoed his last firm. I always liked the old guy but no way would I risk my children’s security with that liability. She was pissed that I refused.
“Later on, he was living in a dumpy trailer park in Spokane, still drinking. He tried to fill up the leaking radiator in his car while the engine was running. Stuck his arm in the fan blades, chopped it right off at the elbow. Neighbors were so used to seeing him lying in his yard, passed out, that nobody checked until after he’d died from shock. Chell blamed me.”
Tawny paused at the mall entrance. “That’s horrible. But why is that your fault?”
Tillman grimaced. “If I’d given him a second chance, she’s sure he would’ve quit drinking.”
Tawny gazed out at parked cars, heavy remembrance weighing on her heart, and shook her head. “Second, third, fifteenth chance. None of them worked for my dad.”
At the far end of the lot, she caught a fleeting glimpse of a gray car, moving slowly. “Tillman, look.” She pointed but it had disappeared behind a van. “I think that’s the same Ford that’s been tailing us.”
****
Two minutes after Rochelle hit send on the cancellation texts to the four hundred guests, her cell trilled. She sighed with relief and answered. “Darling, I’ve been dying to talk to you.”
“Are you all right, Rochelle?”
With her free hand, she dabbed moisturizer on her neck and massaged upward. The esthetician had advised that technique to discourage sagging. “God, it’s so horrific. My baby, trying to kill herself. You can’t imagine.”
“I know, angel eyes. It’s terrible for you. But we’ll get through it. How’s Mimi?”
In the mirror, Rochelle inspected the skin across her chest, noticing small bumps, hives breaking out again. Damn. “They took the ventilator tube out this morning. Stable, they say, whatever the hell that means. But she refuses to talk. Not to me, not Dr. Tapler, nor her father, although I can’t fault her for that.”
“How’s Tillman reacting?”
She smoothed gloss on her lips and pressed them together. “Like he always does. Furious, swearing, accusing me of letting Mimi overdose. As if I’m to blame for not keeping my Valium locked up. How could I know she’d do this? Dr. Tapler told him I couldn’t have anticipated it but Tillman’s still holding me responsible, like I’m a negligent mother who fed Drano to her toddler.” Her insides burned and churned because she had seen warning signs but didn’t recognize them until now, looking back.
“I can’t stand the way he treats you. You should be cherished, respected, held in esteem.” His silky voice reassured her. “The prick is with that woman right now, leaving you alone in your grief and anguish.”
His words of comfort soothed the pain in her stomach. It wasn’t her fault. “Dr. Tapler also discussed the genetic predisposition to depression. And that’s from Tillman’s side, his unbalanced mother and sister, not mine. But you don’t see him taking any responsibility for that, do you? No, it’s so much easier to blame me.”
“I wish I could hold you right now, make this agony go away.”
“That’s not the half of it. It wasn’t bad enough he brings that woman into my home without even telling me. Last night, after we got back from the hospital, I find her sleeping with my children, like they’re her babies, not mine. How dare she?”
“Unforgiveable. Rochelle, you deserve more, much more.”
Fear crawled across her stinging skin. “I’m afraid Tillman’s going to move her in and shove me out. I can’t lose my home. I couldn’t bear it.”
“I swear, darling, I’ll make sure you can stay. This isn’t going to last much longer. Just remain the strong, brave woman I’ve always loved. We’ll get through this. You will prevail. And he’ll be face down in the dirt where he belongs.”
Rochelle gazed out her window at the view of Billings, the entire city at her feet. She remembered her naïve, young expectations of how glamorous her life would be when she married Tillman. Instead how ugly it had become. How he’d hurt and disappointed and tried to destroy her self-worth. “Oh, Steve, I pray you’re right. I just want this over.”
“I’m taking care of it. Just hang on, angel eyes.”
Chapter 7 – Lying in Wait
Tawny stood at the window of the suite at the Northern, checking cars on the street ten stories below. Who was following Tillman? And why? Was that same gray Ford now circling the block, stalking them?
Behind her, Tillman sat in the barrel chair with his tablet, canceling her plane reservation to go home to Kalispell. Next, he called Consuelo and put the phone on speaker so Tawny could listen.
Fausto’s neck was broken, along with several vertebrae in his back. He was scheduled for surgery the next day to stabilize his spine with rods.
She gripped the window ledge, pondering how an accident with a falling boulder had, in one second, changed the rest of the couple’s lives. Even if he made it through the operation, a long, difficult rehabilitation lay ahead for them.
After he disconnected, Tillman came up behind her and massaged her tense shoulders. “Still looking for that Crown Vic?”
She leaned back against his muscular torso. “How’d you guess?”
His arms circled her waist. “I texted the tag number to my P.I.”
“With those black wheels and spotlight, it looks like a cop car.”
“Might have been, once. Too old now. Guy probably bought it out of a police auction.”
“What does he want with you?”
“Don’t know.” He tongued her ear lobe, his warm breath making her shiver before he spoke again. “If you hadn’t gotten pissed off at me and jumped out of the car, we might not have nailed him. Good catch.” He unfastened her braid.
She closed her eyes and savored the sensuous pull of his long fingers combing her hair loose. “I don’t like fighting with you.”
“Doesn’t bother me. The making up is worth it.”
For a sweet hour, they forgot about being followed, about hospitals, and Mimi.
****
After an early dinner at an intimate bistro, Tawny and Tillman sat in his Mercedes at the entrance to the hotel. “I can spend the night,” he suggested, a gleam in his dark eyes.
She sighed. “Go home, Tillman. Give Judah his gift. Spend some time with him. Show him how to fly it. He’ll be so happy.”
His jutting jaw moved sideways. “He’ll be happier if I just hand it to him and leave him alone.”
“Please, give him a chance to be with his dad. If you play with the drone with him, maybe that will help build a bridge between you.”
“You don’t play with a thousand-dollar drone, you manipulate it.”
“You know what I mean. It’s about quality time with your son.”
“Yeah, his idea of quality time is when I’m not around.”
The afterglow of their lovemaking evaporated. How could a man be so aggravating? “Just give it a try.”
His expression remained unconvinced, stubborn. “Tomorrow morning, we’ll have breakfast before Chell and I pick up Mimi to skip off to suicide camp.”
Tawny couldn’t change his certainty that the retreat wouldn’t work. She only hoped the counselors helped Mimi, with or without Tillman’s support.
She opened the car door and started to get out but his touch on her back made her pause.
“Come home with me,” he said.
She rolled a look over her shoulder. “You’ve got to be kidding. Didn’t you learn anything from last night?”
“Yeah, if you hadn’t been there, my daughter would be dead.”
She recognized the same triumph on his face when he gave a closing argument that won over a jury.
He was right, but also so wrong.
“See you in the morning.” She pressed his cool palm to her lips, climbed out, and closed the door.
She passed through the vestibule into the art deco lobby of the Northern and paused to admire a massive arrangement of pastel tulips on a dark wood table. Outside, Tillman’s Mercedes waited a few moments in case she changed her mind. Finally he drove away.
She moved toward the far wall to an elongated fireplace behind glass. Chilled by worry and exhaustion, she stared into the blue and yellow gas flames and longed to go home to Kalispell. Why couldn’t Tillman just visit on weekends for hot sex and, afterward, she’d lie in his arms and listen to his family woes, comfortably out of her sight?
Because she wasn’t wired that way. If she was in, she was all in.
Her mother had once told her, “When you’re involved with a man, you’re involved with all his problems.” Mama’s words had never rung more true than now.
****
From the First Avenue North entrance of the hotel, Steve Zepruder watched Rosenbaum’s Mercedes turn from Broadway onto First and disappear into traffic. Frank Grand had called Steve five minutes earlier to alert him and he’d walked the four blocks from his office to the Northern.
He stepped inside and spotted Tawny across the vast lobby, staring at the fire, lost in thought. He leaned against a chair and studied her. No wonder Rosenbaum was acting like a twelve-year-old with his first crush. She was too tall for Steve’s taste, but had a nice body he would enjoy exploring. He imagined her glossy, copper-colored hair hanging loose and tickling his chest. She’d look even better if she touched up the few streaks of gray.
Her posture said worry—the pensive tilt of her head, the slight slump of her shoulders, as if under a weight. Good time to catch her off-guard.
He strode across the lobby, the rubber soles of his ostrich moccasins making no sound on the marble floor. “Hi, Tawny.”
She whirled, surprise in her wide-set brown eyes. “Steve, what are you doing here?”
He turned on his most ingratiating smile. “I was just about to ask you the same thing.”
“Tillman got me a suite. You?”
He waved toward the other entrance. “Walked over from the office. The Northern is practically the annex for the law offices of Rosenbaum, Withers, and Zepruder. We work out at the gym here, shower here, entertain clients here. Want to join me for a drink?”
He watched her consider for a second, then answer, “OK.”
He touched her back, guiding her toward the TEN bar and restaurant, where they settled into a booth. She ordered Moose Drool, low brow for the elegant surroundings. The server already knew his order, Glenfiddich 18.
“How’s Mimi?” Steve asked.
“OK for now, I guess. Still in the hospital. Tomorrow Tillman and Rochelle are taking her to a wilderness camp for troubled teens.”
Steve interlaced his fingers and flexed his hands, stretching. Rochelle had already filled him in on the retreat. “Terribly sad. Mimi’s a wonderful young woman, International Baccalaureate scholar, talented rider, the whole world ahead of her.” He shook his head and stared down at the table, blinking back a tear that had caught him unaware.
The server delivered drinks. Steve raised his glass and clinked Tawny’s. “L’chaim.”
“L’chaim.”
“Life,” he murmured, irony tinging his tone. “Y’know, I’m her godfather. At least as much as one can be in Judaism. Not like the Christian tradition, promising to raise the children in the faith. It’s really a legal agreement. Rochelle and Tillman stipulated if anything happened to them, I’d be the kids’ guardian.”
“They must trust you a lot, to put their children’s lives in your hands.”
“Pretty weird, if you want to know the truth. I’ve never been married. No experience being a parent.”
“Nobody has experience until you actually do it.” Tawny’s smile felt like warm Caribbean waves flowing over him. “Even then, you still fumble around blind.” She tipped her head with a flash of mischief. “Is your mother always trying to marry you off?”
He grinned, knowing she’d notice the single dimple that dented one cheek, the dimple women jurors always focused on. “How’d you guess? A totally accurate stereotype, I’m afraid.”
Tawny chuckled. “That’s not a stereotype. It’s a mom thing that crosses all religions and all cultures. It’s in our DNA, we can’t help it.”
He tilted his chin down. “Do you bug your kids to get married?”
She shook her head. “I know better. But that doesn’t mean I don’t wish for them to find the right mate.” A slight frown crinkled her brow.
“What is it?” he asked.
“What happened?”
“My daughter got pregnant. The father went to prison. She decided not to have the baby.” She swallowed. “That was the practical choice, but…”
He murmured, “But you wanted a grandchild.”
“I loved that baby from the moment she first told me.” She shrugged. “Spilled milk. It was her decision to make, not mine.”
“You don’t look old enough to call ‘Granny.’”
She smiled. “Thanks.”
He sipped his drink. “I doubt I’ll ever have kids, let alone grandkids. Workaholism is a requirement for partnership in this firm. Doesn’t leave much time for extracurricular activities.”
“Never?” she asked.
“Just casual dates, here and there.” A handful of women but no one had ever reached deep inside him as Rochelle had, seizing his heart and refusing to let go. “I suppose if I met someone really special, I’d make the time.” He sent her a significant look that hinted someone like you, and moved his hand slightly toward hers, a test.
She grasped her glass of beer, clearly not interested in taking the bait, even though he knew she liked him. Too bad she wasn’t seducible. That would have made a good inroad to destroy Rosenbaum. Steve needed to find another strategy.
She asked, “How long have you and Tillman been partners?”
He leaned back, relaxing as the Scotch slid languidly down his throat and warmed his chest. “Eleven years. But we go back farther than that. Rochelle and I went to school together in Seattle.”
His first vision of Rochelle still burned hot in his memory—she stood silhouetted in the stage lights of the auditorium at the middle school they both attended. She was wearing a short green skirt and tight black sweater as she auditioned for the role of the Stage Manager in Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, the tiresome play every theatre class was obligated to perform.
