The Quotable Evans

by Richard Paul Evans

  “That’s a very personal question.”

  “It’s a very personal matter.”

  “All right. Need, yes. Want is a different matter. I wouldn’t complain if McKay paid me more. Especially since I’ve given every breath to this company and I see how much they bring in at some of these shows. So yes, I’d like to share a little more in the wealth.”

  “What is he paying you?”

  “Seventy-five. And health and dental. The dental kind of sucks. Where are you going with this, Charles?”

  “What if I offered you two hundred thousand a year, with a fifty-thousand-dollar signing bonus?”

  There was a long pause. “Doing what?”

  “Doing exactly what you’re doing now.”

  She again hesitated. “Is this real?”

  “Yes.”

  “For who?”

  “For me.”

  “And who else?”

  “I can’t tell you yet.”

  She was quiet for a moment, then said, “What are you up to?”

  “Do I have your attention?”

  “Yes.”

  “More important, do I have your discretion?”

  There was another long pause. “You were right,” she said. “There is no middle ground. I’m now guilty either way.”

  “I warned you. Do I have your discretion?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. We’ll talk tonight if you can get away.”

  “When do you land?”

  “Three forty.”

  “I’ll tell McKay that I’m picking you up. We can talk then. What should I tell him about you being late?”

  “Make up something,” I said. “It won’t be your first time.”

  “All right. I’ll handle it. Just don’t let me fall without a net.”

  Chapter Forty-One

  A traitor is always looking for allies.

  —CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY

  By the time I landed in Des Moines I had two new e-mails. The first was from Chris.

  Charles, we’re ready to move. We’ve set our show in Vegas in forty-five days.

  We need to create product ASAP. We need you here. We’re under the gun. When do you tell McKay you’re leaving? Can you be back in Birmingham by Friday?

  The second e-mail was from Mila.

  Hey, Gorgeous. I ran off so fast I didn’t properly thank you. I hope I get the chance again soon. Love, Mila P.S. You’re not just good on stage.

  Amanda picked me up at the arrival curb of the Des Moines airport. She looked nervous. Nervous and guilty. “What have you gotten us into, James?”

  “Big money, big lights,” I said.

  “How did this happen?”

  “After the Montgomery show, a man approached me. He’s the president of a large investment company with more than a billion dollars in holdings. He offered me my own seminars.”

  “How much are they paying you?” she asked.

  “I’d rather not say.”

  “I told you mine,” she said. “If we’re going to cheat together, there can be no secrets.”

  “A million dollars a year,” I said. “Base.”

  “Whoa,” she said. Then added, “You deserve it.”

  “You’re fine with that?”

  “Of course. I just want openness between us. So why do they want me?”

  “It was my idea. Because you’re the most competent person McKay has. You know everything.”

  “Not everything. I don’t know how I’ll tell McKay. It will be like a divorce. He’ll take it personal.”

  “Tell him it’s not.”

  She laughed. “Right. So when are you going to tell him?”

  “Tomorrow after the show.”

  “When will you quit?”

  “I’m sure he’ll quit me immediately, don’t you?”

  She nodded. “He will. And me. Can you buy me a plane ticket home?”

  “No,” I said. “But I’ll buy you a ticket to Birmingham.”

  Chapter Forty-Two

  I don’t know what I was looking for from McKay. Absolution?

  —CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY

  McKay was already in a foul mood when I went to talk to him. It didn’t help that the Des Moines seminar didn’t go well. Even though I was again the top money-earner, we brought in about half the usual take, meaning we barely broke even.

  McKay had already been drinking for several hours when I got to his room. My announcement only made things worse. Like dropping-an-atom-bomb-on-his-head worse.

  “You’re quitting,” he said, looking at me spitefully. “You’re really quitting.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me why.”

  “To pursue other ventures.”

  His lips pursed. “Other ventures. You’re being purposely vague. What are you hiding? What other ventures? Quit hiding behind semantics, you coward. Seminars to compete with mine?”

  “Not to compete with yours. But yes. Seminars.”

  “Finally you’re being honest. Stupid, but honest. Unless you’re selling tonics and snake oil, you’re competing with me.” He snorted in anger. “The success has gone to your head, my stupid friend. You have no idea how much time and capital it takes to put something like this together. Millions. And I will bury you.”

  “I understand.”

  “And you’re still going ahead with it.”

  “I have investors.”

  This made him livid. “What did I say when I first met you? Everyone’s out for themselves. And you said, ‘Not me. I’m different. I could never be your competition.’ ” He shook his head in disgust. “How many months have you been scheming this?”

  “It’s not that way. It’s been only a few days. Some investors approached me in Montgomery.”

  “And you jumped for the opportunity before talking to me?”

  “They offered me a million dollars.”

  He took a drink. “You would have made that with me in a few years.”

  “That’s to start. I also get a cut of the show. They’re naming the seminars after me.”

  I saw his face tighten. Then he turned to me with a dark smile. “Congratulations.” He looked at me for a moment, then said, “Now tell me this. Are you planning on taking any of my people with you?”

  I hesitated. “Amanda.”

  He threw his glass against the wall, shattering it. “Get out of here!”

  “I’m sorry, McKay.”

  “You will be. I’ll see you in court.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  As anyone who has ever been on a diet can attest, psychologically, once you break down and eat that first cookie, there’s little keeping you from finishing off the batch.

  —CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY

  Amanda and I left Iowa the next morning, flying directly to Birmingham. That evening, I told Monica about the new venture and the million-dollar salary. She wasn’t as excited as I had hoped she would be, which made me angry. I thought she was ungrateful. But that was only one way of looking at it. I should have seen that I meant more to her than a million dollars.

  “Does this mean I’ll see you even less?” she asked.

  “For a while,” I said.

  “All right,” she said with a sigh. “Thank you for being honest.”

  This made my heart ache. I was being anything but honest.

  I didn’t go home for more than two months. The truth was, it wasn’t all because of the new venture. Chris and company would have understood if I had hopped a plane home to see my wife for a weekend. They would have paid for it. It was me. I was afraid to face Monica. I couldn’t. She knew me too well. She would know what I’d done.

  Part of me reasoned that if it was just a onetime mistake, Monica would forgive me. But I failed that too. Mila didn’t leave me alone. I tried to put her off, but she was as persistent as she was beautiful. And she was as masterful at seduction as the men she worked for. Maybe more so. It seemed that the more I pushed back, th
e more persistent she was. I don’t suspect that she had ever had anyone tell her no before. In the end she won and I failed. Miserably.

  Businesswise, things came together just as we planned. Better, even. We had product and people. Our first seminar was in Las Vegas. It was a rush seeing my name in eight-foot-high letters in the lobby of the MGM Grand. The last time I had been in Vegas was on the Greyhound bus with Monica. The city had intimidated me then. Now I felt like I was part of it.

  The show’s profits exceeded everyone’s expectations. We brought in more than a million dollars in sales our first day. That night, Chris and his partners threw a wild party in Chris’s penthouse suite. I had heard of parties like that but had never been to one. Just about any indulgence you could think of was offered.

  During the party Chris took me aside. His face was flushed from drinking. “Our success is only part of the good news.”

  “There’s more?”

  “Turns out your previous boss isn’t doing too well. Since you left, McKay’s last four seminars have lost money. And—twisting the knife—the FTC just filed against him for false claims.”

  The news didn’t make me happy.

  “We didn’t have anything to do with the FTC, did we?”

  “We might have had a little influence,” Chris said, raising his glass of vodka to his mouth. “The beauty of it is that even if McKay wins the suit, his company won’t survive the investigation.”

  “There is no God but me,” I mumbled.

  “What?” Chris asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “You need a drink.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  I was getting better at drinking, if you can get better at that. At least I could hold more.

  There was a hot tub in the suite, and around three in the morning two women in string bikinis pulled me into the tub and tried to undress me. Mila became furious and stormed off. Dripping wet, I ran down the hall after her. I ended up spending the night with her again.

  My world felt completely beyond my control.

  The next morning the seminar offices were subdued—almost as if everyone was suffering from a collective hangover. I sent Amanda off to get me a new phone, as mine had been in my pocket when I was pulled into the tub. I spent the morning in Mila’s room drinking coffee and sharpening my presentation.

  I arrived backstage forty-five minutes before my presentation to speak to the tech people about making some adjustments to lighting. Then I grabbed a can of Coke and sat at the side of the stage watching the running presenter, Bradley Bowen, sell a specialized legal product. Like everyone else in our show, we’d pilfered him from another seminar company.

  Just fifteen minutes before I was to go on, I noticed a shadowed female figure approaching me. There was something familiar about the woman’s gait and silhouette. Suddenly I realized it was Monica. I stood.

  “Monica. What are you doing here?”

  Her face was tight and her eyes were puffy. “I came to see if I still had a husband.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “For four days you haven’t returned my calls. Where were you last night?”

  “I’m sorry; Chris threw a big celebration party. Things have just been nuts. We brought in more than a million dollars yesterday.”

  “I don’t care,” she said. “Why didn’t you answer my calls?”

  “I don’t have a phone,” I said emphatically. “It fell in the tub. Amanda just went to get me a new one.”

  Monica just looked at me, her arms folded at her chest. I went to hug her, but she stepped back.

  “I wish you had told me you were coming,” I said. “I could have made reservations at one of the Cirque de Soleil shows. We could have celebrated.”

  “I’m pregnant,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I’m going to have your baby.”

  For a moment I was speechless. Then I said, “How did this happen?”

  “That’s a good question. I must have seen you sometime in the last three months. Or maybe I just imagined that and it’s an immaculate conception.”

  My mind spun like one of the casino slot machines. Just then the stage manager shouted, “You have ten minutes, Charles.”

  “Got it,” I shouted to him. I turned back to Monica. Her eyes had welled up and she looked pale, as if she were about to faint.

  She wiped her eyes, then asked, “Do you have something to tell me?” She was looking at me with an intensity I’d never seen before.

  “What are you talking about?”

  There was an angry but desperate look in her eyes. “Charles, I’m giving you a chance. Do you have something to tell me?”

  I feigned a smile. “Monica, I don’t know what you’re getting at. Really.”

  She looked down for a moment and put her hand over her eyes and started to cry.

  I reached out to comfort her. “Honey . . .”

  “Don’t touch me!” she screamed. When she looked back up, her eyes were wet but hard. “Who is Mila?”

  My chest froze. And my mouth. I couldn’t speak.

  “McKay sent me the e-mails from your account. Who is she? Other than your new love.”

  It took me a long time to answer. “She’s no one important.”

  Monica’s voice came out angry and broken. “Apparently she’s more important than me.” She took off her wedding ring and set it on a stool. “I’m not your pearl.”

  That was the last time I saw Monica.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  In my quest to have it all, I have lost it all.

  —CHARLES JAMES’S DIARY

  Dr. Fordham sat back in her chair. “How long ago was that?”

  “About eight years.”

  “Did she have the baby?”

  “A boy. Gabriel.”

  “Have you seen him?”

  “Not in person. I’ve seen pictures.”

  “Why didn’t you go back to her?”

  “Pride. I kept waiting for her to reach out.”

  “How long did you wait?”

  “A few months. Until the tour ended.”

  “And when she didn’t come back?”

  “I was angry. I couldn’t believe that after all I’d given her she could just leave me like that.”

  Dr. Fordham cocked her head to one side. “All you’d given her?”

  “The money, the car, the home in Santa Monica . . .”

  “A baby?”

  I looked at her.

  “She needed you, not things. Especially once she became pregnant.”

  I took a deep breath. “I know.”

  “What happened then?”

  “I felt desperate. I called and texted her at least fifty times, but she wouldn’t answer. After that I think I went into a depression for a while. Maybe I’m still in one. That’s where we are now.”

  “Do you realize that what you just described are the stages of grief?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “A psychiatrist named Elisabeth Kübler-Ross described a series of emotional stages that people go through when confronting a death. They’re basically what you described: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. The only thing I haven’t heard yet is acceptance.”

  “Maybe because she’s not dead,” I said tersely.

  “Someone doesn’t have to be dead for you to mourn them.”

  I shifted uncomfortably on the couch.

  “Have you ever thought of just going back and talking to her in person?”

  “Many times.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  I lowered my head. “Shame. It’s been eight years. You can’t go back to how things were. Nothing stays the same.”

  “You’re right,” she said. “Nothing stays the same. Everything changes. But sometimes for the better.”

  “I don’t think she’d take me back.”

  “But you don’t know that.” She shifted in her seat. “Let me ask you something. If Monica
called right now and asked you to come back, would you?”

  I looked down for a moment, and then the words spilled out almost as if by their own will. “Yes. I would.”

  Dr. Fordham paused to let the epiphany settle in my mind. “You know better than anyone that some things are worth fighting for. You’ve spent your whole life fighting. You’re a fighter.”

  I let out a deep breath. The conversation had exceeded my pain tolerance. I raked my hair back with my hand. “I don’t know.”

  “I know it’s a lot,” she said. “It’s okay to think about it.”

  I nodded slowly, then I looked up at the clock on the wall. It was three minutes to the hour. “We’re out of time but can I ask you one more thing? If you have time. You said you’re meeting a friend.”

  “I’m okay,” she said. “Go ahead.”

  “I had the dream again last night. Only it was worse.”

  “How was it worse?”

  “It was more real. There was more fire. There were sirens.”

  “What kind of sirens?”

  “Emergency vehicles. There were dozens of them like there had been some kind of catastrophic accident.” I took a deep breath. “I want to ask you something. It’s a little out there . . .”

  She looked at me intently. “Yes?”

  “Do you believe that dreams can be prophetic?”

  She hesitated before answering. “If you’re asking if I think you’ll find yourself walking Route 66 surrounded by flames, no, I don’t.”

  “I meant in general.”

  “I usually don’t comment on psychic phenomena—not because I don’t believe that it exists, but because I don’t have any means to prove that it does or to understand it. Having said that, I don’t rule out the possibility that, in some cases, prophetic dreams and intuition could exist. There are certainly historic precedents. If you believe the Bible—”

  “I don’t,” I said quickly.

  “Even if you take the Bible as an archetype, it’s still an indication of humanity’s belief in prophetic dreams, like Daniel and King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of a stone cut without hands, or Joseph interpreting Pharaoh’s dream about Egypt’s future famine.”