“Yeah, it wasn’t enough.”
“What do you remember about that time, Charisse?”
“Why?”
“I just want to know what would drive a man to want to kill himself?”
“You didn’t know her.”
“I take it you’re speaking about your mother?” he questioned. “But you dropped out of college to take care of her. If she was the monster, why did you do it?”
It took a moment for her to muster her answer because she had never told anyone as to why. Her reasons for revealing this to Parker was really unexplainable, but since getting that picture from him she felt inclined to give him what he asked for which was usually just answers that Chyna and Cheyenne had refused to give him.
“She called a lot while I was at school. Crying about him. Cheyenne and Chyna could ignore her. They had their lives. We were all glad to be out of the house, but guilt made me. Her doctor contacted me and told me she was dying. She was dying of a broken heart. I guess having us around was strength for her to live, but being in that house alone with those memories of nothing had begun to get to her. She would often tell me he was the only man who’d ever love her. She told me how evil she was all her life and how he made her better.”
“This was all while you were living with her?”
“Yes. Soon she started calling me him. And on her deathbed, she told me that she hated me. That she knew guilt would bring me home and that she hoped it ruined my life like I’d ruined hers. She screamed how much she hated me on her last breath.”
He flinched at the horrible words and a cold chill filled the room.
“And that’s what made you kill yourself again?” he assumed.
Blinking her eyes as if she were coming out of a trance, she furrowed her brows and said, “No. Actually I was ready to go back to school until Cheyenne questioned why because my life would still be worthless.”
Parker couldn’t believe Cheyenne would say something like that. In all the time he’d known her she had never said anything evil like that.
“And during that time Chyna wasn’t much better. She told me– “
“Parker!” Chyna said coming in the room. “Don’t you have paperwork to do?” she asked. “Remember with no assistant you have to do a lot more work.”
“Why don’t you help him if he doesn’t have an assistant?” Charisse asked.
“Why don’t you stay out of married folks business, Charisse?” Chyna snapped.
Parker left the room and Chyna knelt down to Charisse with a cruel look. “The past is the past, Charisse. Why don’t you leave it there?”
“Why should I when you and Cheyenne did everything in your power to make me forget it. Parker told me you sold the house and threw away all my things.”
“We only did it for your own good, Charisse. We love you.”
Charisse knew bullshit and Chyna was full of it right now. “Or did you did it for yours, sister dearest?”
Parker had stayed on the outside of the door for this exchange, but left to go to the library wondering why would Cheyenne and Chyna want Charisse to forget the past so bad.
After he returned all the calls and emptied the inbox in his email, he checked to see where his employees were and if there were any problems.
There were none and he caught up with some outstanding issues. After a couple of hours, Chyna came in briefly to let him know she was going to meet with the decorator for the baby room. Rochelle had taken Charisse to walk for exercise.
He called Charisse’s doctor. The gruff sounding man was pleasantly surprised to hear from Parker.
“Rochelle apprised me of her intentions to carry your child. I’m shocked she agreed, but I’m happy. This is a positive step in her continued behavioral improvement.
“So you think we should be okay with her carrying the child?” he asked.
“No doubt.”
“What about her emotional state, doctor? Could it harm the baby?”
“There have been tests in the past that say the fetus is capable of feeling what the mother feels, but there have been other findings that say pregnancy can produce positive chemicals throughout the woman’s body. Either way it goes, Charisse will become connected to another and that’s something we have never been able to achieve. Human connection is what she needs the most.”
“What about the past?”
“From her reports, Charisse can’t remember a lot of details from her past – by choice. She remembers that day partially, and she remembers the days at the facility. She remembers spending the days with her mother before the woman died. And she remembers her college days. Everything else is splotchy.”
“And if she starts to remember?”
“That’s a good thing, but handle her with care.”
“As if I could.”
The doctor chuckled at the double meaning. “The orderlies are very familiar with the TLC they had to give her quite fondly.”
“Has there been anyone who even came close to making a connection with her? Male or female?”
“Not that I recall, but this one girl would pester her to the point that after a while Charisse wouldn’t mind her being close, but they never professed to like each other or being friends.”
“Is it possible for me to speak to her?”
“I can see what I can do.”
“Thanks, Doctor.” He paused a moment. “And Dr. Redmond examined Charisse and told us she was a virgin. Will that make an impact on her having the baby?”
“No it shouldn’t since you’re doing the pregnancy medically right, according to Dr. Redmond?”
He lied quickly because he was too embarrassed to admit the method they were really using and wondering why hadn’t Dr. Redmond told Charisse’s doctor the truth. “Of course. Yes.”
“Then if she has agreed to this, going through the impregnation process shouldn’t be difficult at all.”
“Would remembering hurt her? Make her regress?”
“I guess it would depend upon the memory. Call me, day or night if you need me.”
Parker promised and hung up. Going up to her room he looked around and noticed she had nowhere to put anything important. She wasn’t the type of person to place things out in public like she had been before. Going over to the bed, he lifted up the final mattress and saw the sex position book.
When he picked it up, the picture of her and her father dropped out along with a piece of paper recently written on.
“There are no monsters. Only people who want you to believe in them.”
Remembering how she had reacted when he had been thoughtful enough to give her the picture of her father, he decided to do something nice for her again. Carefully, Parker put everything back as he had found them and then went back down to his office to order a piece of furniture for her room.
***
Charisse noticed the floor lamp and the nightstand table with a drawer as soon as she walked in her room.
Rochelle noticed it after a moment. “What’s that?”
At the bottom was a collection of Jane Austen books and the drawer was locked. The corners of the table had been smoothed so they wouldn’t be sharp so someone had put some thought in placing the furniture in the room.
Parker’s car was still in the driveway, so she knew he was home.
“I’ll go ask,” Charisse said.
“Well it’s alright with me,” Rochelle said. “Except the locked drawer.”
She still wanted to know its purpose. There was no one on the second floor and she went to the first floor. The door beside the pantry was opened and through it was some stairs to the basement.
There was grunting coming from below and she descended down slowly listening to the noise.
Coming around a corner, she found him pressing a very large weight up as if he were trying to push out a demon. This was the least amount of clothing she had ever seen him wear. He was bare at the top and he only wore some loose shorts and tennis shoes. Sweat drenched out of every
pore on his body and accentuated every sculptured muscle.
She’d seen bodies like this in strong men competitions on television and men in some movies. He wasn’t too much though. Parker was just right. And it was too irresistible because the sight in front of her had to be a dream.
Her breath had caught in her throat and her eyes felt like they were about to water. That fake sick feeling encompassed her and she couldn’t tell if she had been pulled into a daymare or if this was real, but for the first time she wasn’t fighting to get out of it.
She had to touch him just to see if what she was looking at was real.
Chapter 14
Parker caught sight of her and put the weight back up. She stood in a trance staring at him as if she couldn’t believe what she was looking at.
He looked down at his person as if he were naked but when he found nothing amiss he looked back at her.
Now she was close to him – arms length close and she moved in slow motion slowly outstretching her hand toward his stomach.
He couldn’t move. Disbelief and fascination kept him still as her hand moved toward his stomach. He could feel the heat of her palm before it was about to touch and he clinched his stomach to brace for her touch.
“Charisse,” Rochelle called.
She froze and the jerked her hand away centimeters before it made contact. “I-I…” Her mouth stayed open for a long moment. “You’re real?”
Parker slowly sat up and grabbed the shirt he had tossed off. “Are you alright?”
She looked down at her hand as if she expected it to look burned. Even though she had not touched him her skin felt warm and the blood tingled. “The night stand,” she said, backing away from him.
Rochelle came down the stairs. “Yes, Mr. Mills. It’s a beautiful nightstand. I see you put child protective corners on it.”
“Yes, I did.” He reached over the weight stand and handed Rochelle a key.
“My sister-in-law may be treated with care, but she should also have her privacy as well. There are two keys. One for her and the other for you, but I do expect you to please respect her privacy. I’m sure Charisse will only use it for things she cherishes. When you leave our employ, please return all keys to me and no one else.”
“Yes, Mr. Mills,” Rochelle said respectively. “But where will she keep her key?”
“If you’ll allow me to take my sister-in-law for a couple of hours, I’ll fix that problem after she’s had lunch.”
“Is that alright, Charisse?” the nurse questioned.
Charisse was still revering from the daymare. No, it wasn’t bad. It was a daydream.
“I’m hungry, yes.” She hadn’t heard a word of the discussion and she didn’t want to be around him, so she hurried back up the stairs.
“Does that mean yes she wants to go?” he asked confused by her strange behavior and wondering what prompted it.
“The fresh air will do her good. Give us an hour.”
“Make it two, so I can take a shower and wrap up some work.”
The nurse took the key from him and left Parker alone.
He touched his stomach and wondered would her touch have been as warm as before.
***
She quietly ate lunch, but only because she didn’t care to speak as the nurse rattled off about things.
“Your sister has asked that you join them for dinner tonight. I’m laying out a change of clothes for you and your pajamas. I was going to check on some personal things unless you want me to stay.”
“No. I’m fine,” she said. “I’ll just read and rest.” She watched the nurse go back and forth placing her things on the bed. “Rochelle?”
“Yes, dear?”
“Can I start to put my own clothes out?”
Rochelle stopped moving and looked dumbfounded. “I could get them to put your other dresser out here, but no nylons. Just as a precaution, no nylons.”
Why she had asked this she didn’t understand herself. At the facility they always put her clothes out and she should have been used to it, but it felt silly to allow Rochelle to continue to treat her like a child when she wanted to feel independent.
“Mr. Mills needs to take you somewhere,” Rochelle said.
“I’m not in the mood to go anywhere,” she said tightly.
“The good air will do you good,” the nurse insisted.
Charisse didn’t know how to say, “I might touch him” in a way that didn’t sound hysterical and crazy.
So she dressed to go with her brother-in-law, all the while thinking of how shiny his skin looked when he perspired.
He opened the door for her in a way so she couldn’t get in the backseat again and even though he had a great looking suit on all she could think of was his powerful broad shoulders, his brawny chest and his six pack stomach. Or maybe it was twelve – she didn’t count. She just shivered.
“Are you cold?” he asked, sitting behind the wheel.
“No,” she mumbled. “Where are we going? Not another spa.”
“A friend of mine helped me order something for you. If you won’t be angry at me for finding your personal affects, I figured you needed somewhere to put things that no one can’t touch.”
“The nightstand was for me?” she asked surprised. “Just for me?”
“Yes, Charisse.”
“Why?”
“I felt you needed some place for your own.”
“You don’t have to be nice to me, Parker. I’ll have the baby.”
“Why do you keep thinking I’m doing things to use you, Charisse?”
“Everybody wants something.”
“And you just want to know what I want from you?”
“Yes, Parker, what do you want from me?”
***
Parker had known she would find his intentions leery and he knew even though Charisse looked innocent, she had a formidable bullshit detector. So honesty was the best policy when dealing with her.
“Two reasons, Charisse. One is because the health of my child not only depends on your physical state, but also emotional state. So I need to find things to make you happy.”
“Nothing makes me happy. You can’t buy me like you bought Chyna or whatever you did to Cheyenne.”
“That picture made you happy.”
“I never said that,” she said stiffly.
“You didn’t need to, Charisse.” He pulled in front of a brick building with a large black door.
She allowed him to come around and open her door just because she was reluctant to get out.
He nodded to the door and she proceeded towards it. “Knock,” he ordered.
She did and a large white man in a security jacket opened the door. “Ms. Mills?” he asked.
“No, Theo,” Parker corrected him. “This is my sister-in-law, Ms Sheridan. Simon is expecting us.”
Theo moved out of the way and allowed them to enter. After he locked the door, they followed him down a long brown hallway. Every once in a while they passed vault-like doors. Down some steps, they went through thick double doors that needed a twelve-digit security code to enter.
This hallway was paved with cream and brown swirled tile and the walls were wallpapered with velvet and pictures of jewelry.
“Where are –“
“Shsh!” Parker snapped her quiet with a playful wink.
Charisse didn’t like when he was like this. She preferred the serious and complex Parker. Not this man who had a hint of amusement below the surface.
Theo opened one final door to a black-carpeted room – even on the walls and a black marble table in the center. On the door was a gold nameplate that read Mills.
“This is your room?” she asked. “It belongs to you?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Why would you rent a room like this?”
“Security. Can’t keep everything in your home Charisse and sometimes you don’t want bank boxes to be responsible for some things,” he explained and then nodded to the table for
her to go closer.
On the left wall, which was the only one without carpet on it were gold drawers built into the walls. Each one had a lock on it, but that wasn’t what caught her attention.
On the table there was a velvet display and a gold chain with a locket on it that had her name on it.
“That’s mine?” she asked.
“You’re the only one I know named Charisse,” he responded.
She carefully picked up the locket and opened it. The right side was empty, but on the door to the locket was a picture of her father.
“I made a copy of the photo and had the jeweler place it in here after he handmade this piece specifically for you. The chain will break if stressed with a certain amount of weight but not just from being snatched off.”
“W-Why?” she asked earnestly looking up at him.
Parker took cloth gloves from his pocket and reached for the necklace. Reluctantly she relinquished it and looked up at him.
“Because there’s a second thing I want from you, Charisse.”
She raised a curious brow. “Are you trying to seduce me, Parker? Do you have some sick desire to sleep with all of us? Conquer us?”
Parker was now used to her bluntness, but it still made him flush and become embarrassed for his past mistakes. “No desire to sleep with you, Charisse.”
She over feigned disappointment clicking her tongue. “So what do you want?”
He turned her around so that he stood behind her. Slowly he brought the necklace down on her neck and then pinned it behind her.
“I need you to remember everything from the past, Charisse.”
She could feel his breath on her face and the fluttering that had started when she’d saw the necklace increased. That urge to touch him surfaced again and she gripped her wrist to stop herself because there was no other way to stop the tingles. If she could just stop the tingling maybe she could make the fake sickness go away.
Moving away from him to give them distance, she said, “Why?”
“Don’t you find it all strange that they did everything to make you forget the past?”
“Who?”
“Your sisters.”
“Why are you against them, Parker? I would think you would want to help them. You said you wanted to make your wife happy.”
His Substitute Wife... My Sister Book One Page 12
