Operation Cinderella

by Hope Tarr

  Plaintive eyes latched onto hers. “What am I gonna do?”

  It was the first time Sam had asked for her help or even her opinion. Having her do so now warmed Macie to the tips of her toes. It also scared her shitless. Acting as someone else’s moral compass put her definitely out of her element, far out. And yet here she was with the poor kid literally looking up to her, casting her sad, hopeful gaze on Macie, waiting for her answer as though she were the Dalai Lama.

  She reached over and laid her hand on the kid’s cold one. “The way I see it, there’s only one thing you can do.” She drew a deep breath, bracing herself to deliver the message that no child under any circumstances ever wanted to hear. “You’re going to have to come clean and tell your dad the truth.”

  Predictably, Sam’s eyes bugged. “Tell him I’m the one who’s made the whole world think he’s a perv? He’ll kill me.”

  Feeling like the biggest hypocrite on the planet, Macie squeezed her hand. “You don’t have to tell him alone. If you want, I’ll be there standing beside you. We’ll tell him together.”

  Sam sniffed into her fisted free hand. “Really?”

  “Yes, really. Now go grab your book bag so you’re not late.”

  Other than the car radio, the drive to Bethesda was made in silence. Driving Mannon’s Ford Explorer down commuter-clogged Wisconsin Avenue, catching nearly every red light, Macie mentally calculated the damage already done. If a Google Alert had picked up the post, it had likely already gone viral. She had to call Starr and set her straight.

  What about “interim update, extremely confidential” hadn’t been clear? More to the point, what had possessed her to send that e-mail so quickly? As a professional, the very first thing she should have done was to ask herself who besides Mannon had access to his computer. She should have dug deeper, ruled out every other possible person, before releasing her findings as fact. She should have…

  The sign for Sidwell Friends was before them. She put on her turn signal and pulled into the school’s drop off lot. For more than 125 years, the nation’s finest minds had been formed on this campus of weathered stone and sprawling lawns. Sam, whether she knew it or not, was being groomed to take her place among them. Macie might be in the girl’s life for just six weeks, but she was suddenly struck with the gravitas of the charge she’d been given.

  Glum-faced, Sam opened the car door and got out.

  Impatient as she was to make her call, still Macie beckoned her back. “Sam?”

  Backpack slung over one shoulder, Sam turned around. “Yeah?”

  “It’s going to be okay—really.”

  “Yeah, right, for you maybe. Once Dad kills me, you two can dump my body in the Potomac. With all the pollution, I’ll probably dissolve.”

  Macie sighed. So much for a definitive détente. “It’s a good suggestion, thanks. I’ll pass it on to your father after I’ve finished sharpening the kitchen knives.”

  “Or maybe an acid bath like in Pulp Fiction,” Sam added with a smirk.

  Despite the dire situation they were all in, Macie found herself holding in a chuckle. Mannon’s kid was a character all right. Not many people would appreciate Sam’s morbid sense of humor, but Macie was starting to.

  “I’ll consider it. For now, off to school, Morticia.”

  Sam closed the car door, but not before Macie spotted her small smile. Feeling fractionally better herself, she reached for her BlackBerry.

  Starr answered her cell on the third ring. “What’s up, Cinderella?”

  “You tell me,” Macie said. “I send you an interim update and you explode the story, my story, without me?”

  “Upset I let Terri have the byline, huh?”

  Teeth gritted, Macie answered, “It’s not about that. That e-mail was meant as an update only. It turns out Mannon didn’t visit those websites. His…someone else with access to his computer did.” Mentioning Samantha might make things even worse.

  Starr’s snort struck Macie in the ear like a spitball. “Yeah, right, and I’m Mother Goose. Are you sure you’re not starting to take this fairy-tale metaphor a little too seriously?” When Macie didn’t respond, she added, “Look, I made a strategic decision, one that will, in all likelihood, build buzz for your exposé. In the meantime, we’ll hopefully also generate enough interest to ramp up sales so we recoup our lost ad monies. In a word, winning!”

  It was hard but Macie let her finish. “So, it’s all about the bottom line.” So much for Upton Sinclair, so much for seeing herself as a serious journalist. She was nothing more than a revenue generator, not so very different from the sales reps who sold the actual ads.

  A sigh sounded. “Don’t tell me it’s taken you five years to get that, but yes, Macie, we’re in the magazine business. Not a charity but a business. Next time, don’t send me something you haven’t one hundred percent checked out.”

  Gripping the steering wheel with her free hand, Macie firmed her voice. “You need to know that this time Mannon’s not going to be satisfied with attacking us verbally to his listeners. If you don’t take down that post and issue a retraction, he’s going to sue.”

  Starr scoffed. “Let him bring it on.”

  Macie knew her boss better than to expect an apology, but this callous disregard for the truth, and the consequences of continuing to support a lie, stunned her. “He won’t be alone. The network has deep pockets and his contract ensures they’ll use every last dollar to fight to clear his name—not to mention sue for damages.” The latter might be true. It might also be a bluff. Whichever—she only hoped it would work.

  Starr hesitated. “I’ll have the IT people take down the post. As for the retraction, I make no promises.”

  “But I just told you—”

  “Did those sites show up in his web history or did they not?’

  “Yes, but I know for a fact that he didn’t visit them. It was someone else. Okay, it was his kid. She did it as a prank.”

  “And you know this how?”

  Macie hesitated. “She told me.”

  “Has it not occurred to you she might be lying to cover for her old man?’

  “She’s not like that.”

  Starr scoffed again. “You’ve been there what, a few days, and already you’re an expert on their family dynamics? Are you a psychologist or a reporter, Graham?”

  The question didn’t merit a response, but Macie gave one anyway. “I’m a reporter.”

  “Great, then bring me a story the public can sink its teeth into. I want it real, and I want it big.”

  Starr ended the call before Macie could answer. It was just as well. What more was there for her to say?

  It was a good thing she’d decided against driving and not only because she didn’t have her hands-free device and earbuds with her. She laid a clammy palm on the cool steering wheel and focused on calming her racing heart. She’d first come to New York to be a serious journalist. The same desire had brought her back to DC, yet suddenly and in so many ways she felt a long way from “home.” Worse, she didn’t know what “home” meant anymore.

  By noon, the blog post had been taken down, albeit without apology or explanation. That was something, Macie supposed, if not exactly enough. Predictably a few regional liberal media outlets had latched onto the story but as far as she knew it had slipped beneath the radar of the national news—at least so far. She only hoped Ross’s PR people were sufficiently savvy in reputation management to have begun burying the story.

  Evening rolled around. As usual, Stef had outdone herself—oven-baked barbecue breast of chicken, rice pilaf, and cilantro pineapple salsa for the carnivores and tofu sliders with rosemary-and-sea-salt-dusted fries for Sam—still, everyone picked at their food.

  It took several aborted attempts, but finally Sam got the sentence out. “Dad, I have something to tell you.”

  Ross looked up from the pineapple square he’d been pushing around his plate. “What is it, honey?”

  Macie reached across and took Sam
’s hand. “Go ahead.”

  Looking between them, Ross said, “Now you’ve got me worried.”

  Squeezing her hand hard, Sam drew a shaky breath and started spilling her story. Predictably, Ross was at first shocked and finally steaming mad.

  “In sneaking to those sites, you put my computer’s IP address out there to be captured by everyone and anyone. The son-of-a-bitch who reported me probably also hacked into my computer, and now my career and reputation are on the line. I’ve been in consultation with the attorney for damned near half the day. Do you even realize how many hours of people’s time and thousands of dollars have been wasted? No, of course you don’t. Well, you’ll have lots of time to think about it because you, young lady, are grounded. You go to school and back and that’s it.”

  Sam released Macie’s hand at last. Now that she was neither cast out nor killed, she looked like she might dissolve into a puddle at any time.

  Flexing numbed fingers, Macie looked to Sam and said, “I think we can work with that, can’t we, Sam?”

  “Yeah, I guess so.” Mouth trembling, she asked, “For how long?”

  “For as long as I say,” Ross snapped. “Now come here. Come here.”

  Slowly she got up from her place and rounded the table. Stopping in front of him, she lifted wary eyes to his. “I’m too old for a spanking, right?”

  He released a weary breath. “I don’t know about you, but I surely am. And I know we could both use this.” He opened his arms—and enfolded his daughter in a seriously huge hug.

  Samantha sobbed into his chest. “Oh, Daddy, I’m so sorry.”

  Patting her back, he said, “I know you are, honey.”

  Looking on, Macie felt as if her heart were squeezing in on itself. Whatever else Ross Mannon was—conservative talking head, sexist pig, the man who might yet get her fired—he was also a really good father. And he deserved to hear it.

  She waited until Samantha went to her room before saying, “You’re an awesome dad.”

  He grimaced. “Thank you, that’s nice to hear. Especially when a healthy portion of the American public will probably end the week thinking I’m a pedophile.”

  “I mean it. Sam’s lucky to have you. After today, I think she realizes that, too.”

  Leaning back in his chair, he stared at her for an unnervingly long time. Finally he said, “How do you do it, Miss Gray?”

  “Sir?”

  “How do you manage to make me feel better in the midst of one of my blackest moments?”

  Embarrassed by receiving praise she so clearly didn’t deserve, Macie got up to clear the table.

  “No, leave it.” Mannon waved her back into her seat. “Talking to you is a hell of a lot better than any therapy.”

  Warmed, still she forced herself to remember that she had dirt to find—and a story to write. “What would you know about being in therapy?”

  The second the words were out, she felt her face flame. Open mouth, insert foot much? He’d already revealed to her that Sam was seeing a psychologist. Christ, he’d even included the weekly “doctor’s” appointment in the schedule he’d given her.

  “That was tactless of me. I am so sorry.” Crazy as it might be, she really was.

  He shrugged. “Actually Sam’s mom and I logged in some time in family counseling after the divorce, trying to work through our ‘anger issues’ as the therapist called them, so we could co-parent Sam.”

  Remembering the lipstick smudge, she said, “I guess therapy worked.”

  He hesitated. “It helped some but what helped more than anything was the two of us talking one-on-one. Late one night when we were both really stressed out and fed up, we called a truce, sat down over a pot of coffee for me and tea for her, and made a pact. No matter how many hours it took or how tired or pissed off either one of us felt, we didn’t get to leave until we’d fixed things to the point where we could be good parents to Sam.”

  “That’s really inspiring.” It was.

  “I thought we had a pretty smooth sailing arrangement until Sam showed up here in the middle of the night. I’d started to lose hope—and then you came to us. I know you haven’t even been here a full week, and yet already I’m beginning to wonder how we ever got along without you.” The warm look he sent had her heart turning over—and her guilt ratcheting.

  Speaking over the lump lodging in her throat, she said, “I’m just the housekeeper. I don’t do anything special.” Other than working double time to ruin your life…

  But Mannon was adamant. “That’s where you’re wrong, Miss Gray. Everything you do is special.”

  …

  The awards dinner was on Saturday, just three days away. Almost a week had passed, and Ross had yet to ask Martha Jane to go. Sure, he’d been busier than a one-armed bandit, staying late at the station and putting out the last of the fires over that damned blog, but if he were honest with himself, it wasn’t time he lacked. It was courage.

  Drumming his fingers on the kitchen countertop one evening in the wake of yet another mouth-watering meal, he wondered what the hell he was afraid of. He was Ross Mannon, the same Ross Mannon whose voice and opinions found their way inside tens of thousands of American households every week. So, why was he suddenly acting—and feeling—like a sweaty-palmed high school kid about to ask out the prom queen?

  “Miss Gray, you have a minute?”

  Martha Jane closed the cupboard on the coffee cup she’d just put away and turned to him, piercing him with her blue-gray gaze. How did women do it, stand there looking so serene and cucumber cool when the man was sweating bullets into his shirt collar?

  “Certainly, what can I do for you?” she asked.

  Talk about your loaded question.

  He hesitated. His hands hadn’t been this sweaty since he’d first struck up the nerve to touch a girlfriend’s breast. “I have something to ask you, a favor really. First, though, I want you to know it’s perfectly okay for you to say no.”

  She sent him a gentle smile. “Maybe you should just tell me what it is?”

  “I have this…thing coming up on Saturday night, an awards banquet and well, it’s not really the kind of event you go to alone. Not that I can’t go by myself—I can—it’s just that I was wondering—”

  “Dr. Mannon, are you by chance asking me to go with you?”

  “I guess I am. But look, if I’m out of bounds here, you just say the word and I’ll back off. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.” Asking out his housekeeper, his hot, young housekeeper…if there was ever a textbook setup for a sexual harassment suit, this had to be it.

  As if reading his mind, she said, “Easy, professor, I’m not about to hit you with a sexual harassment suit if that’s what you’re worried about. And yes, I’d love to go.”

  The relief rushing him was beyond reason. Until now, he hadn’t realized how much he’d been dreading going dateless.

  “That’s terrific. Only I don’t know how much fun you’ll find it. It’s one of those stuffy formal affairs, an awards program with speakers. We’ll be sharing a table with six others, so it’s not like you’ll be stuck with just me.”

  She looked amused. “Thanks, but I wasn’t worried. I assume it’s black tie?”

  “Yes,” he admitted, feeling so much like his former pimply-faced teen self that it took a conscious effort to keep from shuffling his feet. “I hope that doesn’t present a problem.” He paused, thinking he should probably offer to pay for a dress but at a loss as to how to offer without offending her—or embarrassing them both.

  She saved him with a single headshake. “I’ll pull something together.”

  “Thanks, you’re saving my life here. We don’t have to stay all that long, just until the awards are handed out.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, why are you going if you dislike it so much?”

  “Because, I’m uh…” He hesitated, feeling sweat break out on his forehead. “I’m receiving one of the awards.”

  Her eyes wi
dened. “Wow, congratulations. May I ask in what category?” He hesitated and she let out a light laugh. “If you’d rather, I can wait and read it in the program.”

  “Republican of the Year,” he admitted, feeling shy—make that mortified. His work life was one thing, but socially he’d always been more of an introvert.

  “That’s quite an…honor.”

  He shrugged, feeling his ears heat. “Ordinarily I would skip it and let them send me the trophy or plaque or whatever the hell…heck it is by mail. But in light of the situation with the blog post, the network is pretty insistent that I go. Considering the money and man hours Sam’s escapade has cost, I can’t very well bail.”

  “I see.”

  “It won’t really be a date. You’ll be my dinner companion. And of course I’ll compensate you for your time.”

  Her smile thinned. “You want to pay me to go out with you?” The color flooding her face confirmed he’d stepped into a pile of it. “Please understand, Dr. Mannon, I’m happy to be your dinner companion for the evening, but I wouldn’t dream of billing you for my time.” He started to protest, but she silenced him with a look. The only other woman who’d ever pulled that off was his mom. “It’s not every day that a girl from Heavenly, Indiana, gets to rub elbows with Washington’s power elite. Really, it’s you who’ll be doing me the favor, giving me the chance to play Cinderella for a night.”