The Immaculate Deception

by Sherry Silver

  I gasped for air. Was she offering to buy it? Oh my gosh! She must be. She wouldn’t call to tell me nanny nanny boo boo. Or would she? Oh my gosh! I heard the beep.

  “Message two.”

  “Oh-Donna! Turn on the TV! Little Mount Vernon is burning! Oh-Donna! Pick up!”

  I heard sobbing. Well, Tammy did sound genuinely upset. Not like Perry. I heard the beep.

  “Message three.” Click. I heard a beep. Must have been a telemarketer.

  “End of Messages.”

  I hung up and dialed again. I had shivers hearing Elizabeth Claytor’s voice. I tried to read something between the words but couldn’t. Tammy sure sounded rattled about the fire. I couldn’t float on the call from the editor because of my darned old family crisis du jour. Dag nabbit.

  I peered out the wall of windows. Wow. The Atlantic Ocean. Aquamarine, teal and midnight blue farthest out. Two people on personal watercrafts. One parasailer. Brave soul there. People playing in the surf.

  Closer to the hotel, I looked right down onto the free-formed rock grotto pool. Palm trees. A waterfall. Couples floating, holding hands on rafts built for two. Seeing this was surreal. It was so similar to what I remembered from my dreams. And oh my goodness, the lobby was spot-on to what I had dreamed.

  Someone knocked on my door. I trotted over and peeked through the little view hole. I saw an elderly Katherine Hepburn look-alike in fuchsia lipstick dressed in resort wear and a straw hat. I flung the door open.

  “Momma!”

  “Hello, little doll. How are you?”

  “I’m terrible actually, Momma. Come in. How are you? I was so worried about you.” I tugged her into the room and shut the door. “Sit down, Momma.”

  “Thank you.” She femininely perched on the end of a bed.

  I said, “How’d you know I was here?”

  She grinned, “A little chicken told me.”

  “A little chicken—the bellhop?”

  “I don’t reveal my sources.”

  “Momma, where have you been?”

  “It’s the first full week of August.”

  “Palm Springs?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “So then why are you in Miami Beach?”

  “Palm Springs is Miami Beach.”

  “What?”

  “My cover.”

  “Your cover?”

  “So your father wouldn’t pester me.”

  I smiled at her. I was so relieved to have found her. Well, she’d found me. “Hey, you want a drink? Some coffee or something? A martini? I could open the honors bar and see what we have.”

  Momma laughed at me. “This I gotta see. You pull a hot cup of coffee and a martini outa the little computer-rigged fridge.”

  “Oh I guess that was pretty stupid. You want a soda? Or I could figure out how to use the in-room coffee maker.”

  “How ’bout we go down to the lobby bar for a drink?”

  I’d never been to a bar with my mother before. “All right, Momma, why the heck not? I’ll get my purse.” I picked up the big tote bag. I yanked my fanny pack out and I also wrestled Momma’s beige pocketbook out. “Here, I brought you your purse too.”

  She searched my face. “Oh. Did you?”

  Okay, that worked. I felt shame. “Well, you see…” I couldn’t explain my way around this one, not yet.

  She grabbed the purse and began rifling through. Great. I really felt bad. Now she was checking to see what I’d stolen.

  She finally said, “I thought I had a stick of gum left.”

  “Guilty as charged. Sorry, Momma, my mouth was so dry. Here, I’ll treat you to a pack of gum from the in-room thingy.” I retrieved a pack and handed it to her.

  She snatched it and smiled, dropping it in her purse. “I might as well wait until after the martini.”

  ~*~

  We sat on a big comfy loveseat, near the window wall overlooking the lushly landscaped pool. It was perfectly illuminated, providing a romantic backdrop of palm trees and tropical flowers and more palm trees. “I just love palm trees,” I told Momma.

  The waitress brought Momma’s dry vodka martini with a twist and my frothy pink cosmopolitan.

  I said, “Thank you. Umm…our candle blew out.”

  The waitress apologized and said she’d take care of it.

  We looked outside and sipped our beverages. The band was warming up.

  “Hey, the guy at the piano looks like Dino,” Momma said.

  “He was your favorite, wasn’t he?”

  “You’ve been listening to your father too much.”

  I didn’t know where to begin. So much had happened. All right, I’d start at the beginning. “Momma, Daddy passed away.”

  She stared across the room.

  “Momma, he had a cardiac arrest.” I cried.

  “I know,” she said.

  “How?”

  “They told me at the hospital. Your brother tried to commit me, you know.”

  “I know… He told me that you murdered Daddy.” I swallowed hard and studied her reaction.

  “That is why they locked me up. We had a hell of a fight. Yes, I did hit the son-of-a-bitch over the head with his cane. But I didn’t kill him. He ran down the street, screaming like a girl. He was alive and telling his tall tales when they locked me away. When did the old fool die?”

  “Four days later. Monday, July thirty-first.”

  “I seriously doubt I even gave him a goose egg bump on his head. That is too big of a stretch to say he died from that injury four days later.”

  “No, Momma, he had other injuries. Someone turned the freezer over on him.”

  “When?”

  “I don’t know. But when I found him lying there, he told me that you murdered him.”

  She crossed her arms and legs. “That son-of-a-bitch with his tall tales set me up to take the rap for his death. He was a doctor, he no doubt knew the end was near. He was ninety-two years old and had those mini-strokes and high blood pressure. He must have really hated me. Well, it was mutual.”

  I thought about her scenario. It made sense. It would be like Daddy to go ahead and pull one last great performance before he died. He never seemed to like Momma very much either. Still, what an awful bitter man Daddy must have been to pull that one off. Must have been a hell of a fight they had to make him wanna take revenge on Momma like this.

  “Why did you fight? Why did you hit him?”

  “I don’t want to talk about the son-of-a-bitch. Drop it, Oh-Donna.”

  I had never seen Momma so angry. “Tammy had him cremated. No autopsy. So we’ll never know what caused his death.”

  “He’s dead. Good riddance.” She blew her nose on a paper napkin from the cocktail table.

  “Momma, why did you disappear?”

  “First week of August.”

  My mind was racing with wild questions. “But you just disappeared without telling anyone. I was so worried. How could you do that? Do you have any idea what was going on at home? Perry accused you of murder and Tammy cleaned out the whole house. And you just conveniently disappear because it was the first week of August? That’s just not good enough an explanation. I need some straight answers. Now. What have you been doing all these years in Miami? Why did you need a cover?”

  “Where were you when Perry locked me away? Where was Tammy? Where was Nathan? Nobody cared about me. Nobody came for me,” she shot right back at me.

  I felt the wave of shame wash over my body. I stammered out about the accident and how I did come for her but she had been released. Her bitter expression showed she didn’t believe me.

  We both downed our drinks.

  I asked, “How did you get to Miami with no money anyway?”

  “I called a friend.”

  “Who?”

  “The only man who ever loved me.”

  “Who?” This story was getting wilder by the second.

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “None of my business. You
leave me in a mess because of this guy, whoever he is, and it’s none of my business? You have to come home to get things sorted. I need you there.”

  “Don’t even get me started. You need me. Ha. I haven’t even seen you since Christmas Eve. You live your big life and ignore your poor mother.”

  The waitress brought a new little silver tea light. She grabbed the spent one and white wax slopped out on the mahogany coffee table and onto her hand. She gasped.

  I said, “Are you all right?”

  The waitress said, “I’m very sorry. I’ll clean it up.”

  Momma creaked as she jumped up. She grabbed the waitress’s hand and said, “Come on. Let’s go to the kitchen. I’ll make a paste out of corn starch and get it on that burn.”

  “Really, I’m fine.”

  “I’m a nurse. Let’s go.”

  And so they did.

  I waited forty-five minutes. Momma didn’t return. The waitress came back, bandaged. She brought hot water and a cloth to scrub the wax off the table.

  “Where’s my mother?”

  “She administered first aid to my hand and left.”

  “Left?”

  “I watched her walk out through the revolving door.”

  Well, she told me. Momma obviously didn’t want to answer all of my questions and come clean. She had been living a double life and I was not welcome in it. I signed the tab, charging it to my room. I rode the elevator up to the seventh floor. My room was just three doors from the elevator. I inserted my key into the lock and slipped it out. The little green light blinked. I opened it. I turned the light on and immediately closed the door behind me. Switching on the bathroom light, I checked the shower. Empty. I slid the mirrored closet door and checked inside. All clear. I checked under the beds and then peeked behind the drapes. Okay, Donna. No boogey boos. And no Momma.

  Perhaps it was too much for Momma. All my questions. But I needed answers. She couldn’t just disappear like that. Not again. It wasn’t right. But…my eyes burned with tears. She was right too. I had avoided visiting her all year. Because I didn’t want to get cornered by Daddy. He just upset me too much. He always had a terrible tale of woe and always found an opportunity to get me aside and whisper horrible things about Momma. That she needed to be put in a nursing home. That she was crazy. That she was dying of lung cancer. If Momma had lung cancer, she’d, at the very least, be coughing. I point-blank asked her once and she denied being ill.

  But none of this was any excuse. No excuse for staying away from Momma. And no excuse for Momma to just run off and leave me to sort out her mess of a life.

  I tried to process it all. Momma had been carrying on an affair with a man who truly loved her—once a year. She told us she was in California but she really was in Florida. I guess she didn’t want Daddy to find out. Why did she stay in a loveless marriage if she had a wonderful man? Maybe he was married too.

  My dream man had told me about some of this. Something about the Secret Service not allowing marriage in the ranks. Hey…that old bellhop mentioned he had retired from the Secret Service and had fallen in love with another agent on Make Believe Island. The old geezer could be Momma’s boyfriend. Annulled husband. Secret lover. Mike Taurus. That’s why he looked familiar. I now recognized him. No wonder I had dreams and made a beeline to this hotel. I was predestined to meet Momma’s special friend. Perhaps he was my real father? After all, my mate had told me I was supposed to find out about my origins.

  Could Momma be right and Daddy staged his so-called murder? I bet Perry helped him. Did that make sense? Was Tammy in on it? Was that why she had him quickly cremated? No… There were a whole lot of things I didn’t like about my sister but I didn’t believe she would knowingly help frame Chloe for murder. I bet she just did as told by Perry after the fact, without being let in on the master plan.

  Now what could Perry’s motive have been for framing Momma for murder? Right, how silly of me. So he could inherit the house and everything. Greed. He never liked her anyway. But would he really do that? He was my brother after all and Momma had always been kind to him. Maybe this was all in my mind and I was trying to get back at my siblings for being complete narcissists.

  I shuffled into the bathroom and wiped my eyes on tissues. I quickly undressed. I still had the Band-Aid on my shoulder. Farts had told me to take it off today. I yanked it off forcefully. That made me cry even harder. Then I went to bed. I tried crying myself to sleep. Almost succeeded. And then I heard the piano.

  ~♥~

  Aquamarine waves. Midnight blue stars. The wind roaring through the surf. And the music. “Who’s Sorry Now?” Great. So appropriate. A song about cheating on your spouse. I could almost hear the singer Connie Francis. The irresistible momentum propelled me forward. I opened my eyes. And there he was. Making tea in Vera Blandings’ kitchen. I didn’t say anything.

  Mr. Jones said, “Well, aren’t you gonna invite me in?”

  “I don’t care.” The tears were choking me.

  “You’ve gotta invite me in, Cinderella.”

  “I…can’t.”

  “Invite me in,” he insisted.

  “Fine. Stomp on into my living nightmare.”

  And so he did. Bearing a soft white handkerchief and a big strong shoulder to rest my head on. He wiped the deluge from my eyes and then turned the cloth and smothered my nose. “Blow.”

  I did. I took the cloth and fumbled it to another corner. And I blew again. That felt better. At least I could breathe. I carefully folded it, eight times. I offered it back to the dream weaver.

  “Keep it.”

  I tossed it on Vera’s white marble-like countertop with stainless steel edging. He hugged me. I buried my face in his big strong chest. Everything about this guy was super-sized. He rubbed the top of my head, stroking my hair. “There, there, love. You’ll get through this. Honest, you will. Just believe.”

  “I found Momma.”

  “Wonderful.”

  “Not really.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I thought if I found Momma, we’d hug and kiss and everything would be bucolic.”

  “But?”

  “Butt is right. I’ve been a regular butt hole to Momma. Over the past few—oh God, might as well admit to all my forty-two years.”

  He kissed my forehead. “Go on.”

  I blew a big breath out of my lips as I drew away from him.

  He used the opportunity to serve tea. I tasted a sip. And another. It was warm and soothing.

  “If I can find Momma again, I’m going to have to invite her to move in with me. Oh that sounds horrid! Why am I so damned selfish? It’s not like Momma would cramp my style. I mean what life do I have? None. Zip. Zippo.”

  Mr. Jones lifted my chin. He stared into my eyes and waited for me to meet his. They were a beautiful brown color. So safe looking.

  He said, “No one can hurt you more than your family can.”

  “And apparently I do a pretty good job at hurting them back.”

  “It’s not you, Donna. Don’t you understand? You do the best you can given the circumstances you are surrounded by. And everyone makes mistakes.”

  I shuddered out a whimper. Snuffling up the last runny mucus, I said, “Come on. Let’s get this over with.”

  “Thanks a lot.”

  “Oh you know what I mean. Nothing personal but I haven’t had any fun in these dreams for a while now.”

  “It’s all in the execution.”

  I huffed, “Now you sound like an editor. Are you trying to say I’m the one responsible for my parents’ history?”

  “Hey, that would be an interesting twist. Ever thought about writing a paranormal romance?”

  “New York won’t buy anything set in the twentieth century. Not from me anyhow.”

  I paced around the kitchen. I picked at some breadcrumbs on the countertop. “Momma never baked. Vera had many talents, evidently.”

  Dream boy said, “Don’t eat that!”

 
I rubbed my hands together until they were all brushed off me. “I wouldn’t eat crumbs from a stranger’s counter. Besides, I don’t do bread. Not on my diet.”

  A young Dick Fiddler passed by the kitchen with a paper sack. He couldn’t see us. He carefully brushed the crumbs into the sack and wiped the countertop. And then he left through the kitchen door.

  Dream boy said, “All right, where to, Cinderella?”

  “Is that it? That’s all we needed to see? The murderer returning to the scene of the crime to clean up? You have shown me this already. Poison bread. The party with no name. Dick Fiddler murdered Perry’s mother via poison bread.”

  Dream boy winked. He wrapped his arms around my waist and nuzzled my neck. “Sorry to have brought you back for a redundant piece of history. I just wanted an excuse to be with you again and also to make very sure you know to stay away from Dick’s baked goods.”

  He kissed me full on the lips, tickling the roof of my mouth with his tongue in a way that made me intoxicated. All too soon, my dream lover pulled away and took me by the hand.

  We stepped out the front door and stepped into a surrey with the fringe on top. I giggled. “Hey, can I pedal?”

  “You’d better. It’ll take both of us to get you to Mars.”

  And so we pedaled. I felt like ET from the movie.

  Mr. Jones said, “So what did you learn?”

  “That Dick Fiddler would do anything to get the counterfeit money. You know, he put it in the trunk of Daddy’s Chrysler and then kidnapped me. He disappeared and left me stranded on the bus. Thank God, otherwise I might be in worse trouble now.”

  My mate said, “He wanted to retrieve the money but first he had to get you out of the way. I wouldn’t let him hurt you, ever. You know that, right?”

  I nodded and smiled. Shoot. I heard the “Donna” song. “Quick, kiss me!”

  ~*~

  Too late. I opened my eyes. I focused on the red light of a ship anchored out in the Atlantic. All alone in my hotel room. Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream, merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream. Ain’t that the truth? Or dare? Dare I dream again?

  No worries there. I couldn’t fall back to sleep. The clock indicated it was early Friday morning, so I went down to the health club and spent the thirty-minute limit on the elliptical machine. An attendant brought me a thick lavender towel. Service with a smile and all that important stuff.