Another Notch in the Beltway (11 page)

“I can't say,” Morris said, looking at his hands.

“Right; for all I know, you two could be screwing each other simple. As I recall, you and Byron have a taste for the same women.”

He chuckled. “Not the same innocent girl that you were twenty years ago.”

“No. Maxwell saw to that in more ways than one, didn't he?” she retorted, but acid was churning in her stomach. Maybe she could make herself throw up on him. She'd had a character do that once, all over a suitor's expensive riding habit.

Morris reached forward and brushed a stray strand of hair away from Lenore's face. When his finger touched her skin, she jumped as if she'd been burned.

“Don't touch me,” she hissed through clenched teeth.

“Would you have married me, Lenore, if I had left Maxwell behind all those years ago?”

“I honestly don't know, Gerald. The fact that you told me you wouldn't, didn't make the offer worth my contemplation. I think you should go now.”

He looked at her a moment. “I'll call your attorney and make arrangements.”

“Do not ever show up here again, Gerald, either you or your boss. I'll get a restraining order. Is that clear?”

“Very.” Morris left and closed the door quietly behind him.

As MP was leaving the kitchen to join her, she was making her way to him.

“
Mo chuisle
, are you all right?”

“I'm pissed. Why after all these years are the bottom dwellers rearing their ugly heads?”

“Morris have a thing for you, too?”

“Why do you ask?”

“He looked at me like he wanted to do me bodily harm.”

She gave a weak laugh. “I don't know if he did or not. He tried to warn me about Maxwell before I got involved with him and then asked me to marry him when Maxwell treated me like a street corner whore.”

“He did?” MP asked surprised.

“Yes, I don't know why. At the time his proposal, if you can call it that, surprised me. Now I don't know if he was trying to clean up one of Byron's messes, if he was being chivalrous, or if he wanted to put one over on Maxwell.”

“You mean, like I have your woman and your kid, too?”

“Yes, or maybe he did care for me on some level. I don't know. But I asked him if I agreed to marry him whether he'd leave Maxwell's staff, and he said no. So there was nothing to consider.”

“Another fool.”

“I'd like to think so.”

The following Wednesday, Lenore and MP were in the kitchen breakfast nook, enjoying crepes with fresh berries. The early morning light cast a warm glow on the table.

“You're spoiling me,
a chuisle
. I like it.”

“I seem to like spoiling you too. Makes me feel good.”

“You make me feel good.”

“Ditto.”

Her home phone started ringing.

“It's Nikko,” she said looking at caller ID.

“Probably checking in to see if we got any.”

“Hello, Nikko,” Lenore said with a smile in her voice.

“Hi, Lenore, is MP there by chance? I tried his hotel and he's not answering the phone or his cell.”

“Yeah, hold on. MP, Nik is looking for you.”

A puzzled expression crossed his face.

Lenore shrugged and handed him the phone. She motioned that she was going to the office. He shook his head and pointed to her seat. Instead of sitting, she poured them each more coffee.

“Have you heard from anyone on the other side of the pond this morning, or afternoon there, now?” Nikko asked.

“No, why?”

“There's a news article in a London gossip rag,
The Sentinel,
do you know it?”

“Hard not to,” MP replied with disgust.

“There's a piece you need to read. We need to get on it and do damage control.”

“Nik what is it about?”

“I don't want to talk about it, given where you are and who you're with. It's your private business.”

“We're beyond that,” he said, looking at Lenore.

“All right, LaSandra is mentioned, too, but only as an afterthought or maybe not, I don't know.”

“Give me a hint.”

“It has to do with a child that was yours, then your sister's and brother-in-law's, then your brother-in-law split, and your sister and son/nephew died in an auto accident. I'm guessing this is the child you went into debt to care for.”

“Jesus H. Christ where did that come from? It's true.”

“I'm sorry, so very sorry, MP, and I'm sure what's been reported is not the way it happened,” Nik said.

“Jesus.”

“MP, take a few minutes and read the article, tell Lenore, and then the three of us can have a conference call.”

“All right, thanks for the heads-up.”

“We need to get out in front of this. If we have to, we'll get legal involved. I have media contacts in London, and the quicker we squash this, the better,” Nikko said adamantly.

“I hear you, lass. We'll be in touch.”

“What is it?” Lenore asked. “I can tell by your face it's something horrendous.”

“Horrendous is too strong a word. I've known horrendous, and I'm pretty sure while it's awful, it's not horrendous. Nikko shot me an e-mail link to
The Sentinel
.”

“The British rag that puts any of New York's to shame.”

“Yes, there's an article in there about me and according to Nik, you're mentioned or LaSandra is.”

“Terrific.”

As they ascended the stairs to her office, the warm glow disappeared, she was feeling chilled to the bone, and the hair on the back of her neck was standing up. While she had no clue what the article was about, she thought she knew who could have been behind it. A shiver ran through her.

“Sweetheart, are you cold?” MP asked.

“An American endearment, is that good or bad?” She was trying to make light of the situation.

“Any endearment I call you is good, honey.”

“Okay, handsome.”

A laugh escaped from deep in his throat as he bent over to ignite the gas fireplace. Then turning, he took her hands, and they sat on the couch in front of the fire.

“I want to tell you everything about my nephew and sister before we read the article. I'm sure the article will portray me as some kind of a monster and—”

“You're anything but a monster. I've known monsters in my time and some of the scariest have been dressed in pinstriped suits and Armani ties.”

“Thank you for your vote of confidence.”

She shook her head, eyes glistening. “Don't thank me.”

He gave her a wink and a weak smile. “I guess we're both guilty of thanking one another for our natural tendencies.”

“Don't let anyone know my secret.”

“You have my word.” He crossed his heart and kissed her lightly.

“Okay, here is the story of my nephew. You already know the ending so—”

“No, wait before you start; I think I know who could have planted or instigated an inflammatory, ugly article.”

“I already thought of that and figured you'd make the leap, even though I hoped you wouldn't.”

“I'm sorry. Even when I was an intern, Morris was the king of mean. He ran smear campaigns even when they weren't needed. It's as if he's avenging his family somehow. His grandfather, Donald Morris I, had political aspirations, but he was also promiscuous with not only women but men, and even though it wasn't common forty years ago to discuss such things, Morris's grandfather was the topic of much discussion. The Republicans shunned Donald the First.

“Once they were through trashing the grandfather, they moved on to Morris's father, Donald II, who apparently had a bevy of beauties, his all female apparently, but the gossip was devastating to Morris's mother, and she took her own life.”

“Tragic.”

“Yes, but that does not give Morris license to rape and pillage.”

“Why hasn't he gone after Maxwell then?”

“I personally think that Gerald likes to be the puppeteer and pull Maxwell's strings to do his bidding. He's the real power behind the power. Rumor has always been that Maxwell couldn't care less one way or the other about abortion, but that Gerald Morris has an ax to grind with all women, because one of his girlfriends aborted his child.”

“Maxwell is a puppet. That's a subject that ninety percent of the population has a strong opinion about. It may even be higher than that.”

“I agree.”

“Right now, you need to know the story behind my nephew, and we need to call Nikko. We'll deal with Morris and Maxwell later.”

“Okay.”

“My nephew was biologically my son.”

She maintained eye contact, encouraging him to continue.

“Mary, a woman I was casually dating for over a year, became pregnant. When I found out, I asked her to marry me. She told me she wasn't interested in marrying me. She had her eyes set on a bigger catch. At the time, I was a teacher at the local secondary school, not making very much money.”

Lenore reached over and took his hand, squeezing it lightly.

“She told me I was good in bed and nice to look at, but she had no wish to become leg-shackled to me. If I'm not mistaken, that's one of your VR terms. She read a number of historical romances and I think that's where she got it.”

She smiled slightly.

“We talked about options: abortion, putting the baby up for adoption, my having sole custody. There was no way she wanted to be responsible for the child. About the same time, my sister, Eva, and her husband, Ian, found out they couldn't conceive and badly wanted a child. Eva was several years older than I, was settled, and seemed to have a great marriage. The four of us talked and decided that Eva and Ian would adopt the child and raise it as their own.”

“Why didn't Mary have an abortion?”

“Ireland is still a very Catholic country, and abortion is only legal in very specific instances, like when the life of the mother is in danger, and that's subject to strict interpretation. While we could have gone to London for an abortion, she couldn't do it for religious reasons.”

“I understand that. While I'm strongly pro-choice, it wasn't my choice. I've never regretted having my son.”

“I know you haven't, Lenore, and I never regretted the fact that my son was born either. Eva and Ian adopted the baby and named him Ian Michael.”

“After both you and his adoptive father,” she offered.

He nodded. “Everything went well for the first eight years until Ian Michael started getting headaches. It took several months of waiting lists, tests, and appointments and then more of the same before he was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor the size of a lemon. He was declared terminal, as I said before, and didn't qualify for chemo, radiation, surgery, or a combination of those things under socialized medicine. The only thing he qualified for was hospice.” He said this with some bitterness.

“By that time, I'd had some success with my writing and had some money saved. I took him to Sloan-Kettering in New York City. Brought my sister and her husband, too. But the treatments were long and painful and my brother-in-law couldn't take it. He left his family and headed back to Ireland.”

“That happens a lot when one parent can't deal with a child's illness.”

“Yes, but his departure sent my sister into a tailspin. They had been married over fifteen years, and she didn't know how to live without him. Not only was her child gravely ill, but her spouse had left her and filed for divorce. She started drinking and taking pills to sleep. Eva became an alcoholic and a prescription drug addict.”

“I'm sorry, Michael Patrick,” she said in a voice barely above a whisper.

“I know you are. I even told Eva she should go back to Ireland and get herself together, try to set things right with Ian. By that point, Ian Michael was starting to show signs of progress. The radiation and chemo were shrinking the tumor, and the doctors were hoping to do surgery soon. Ian was a trouper and no matter how sick he was, he always had a smile for anyone who came in contact with him.” MP eyes were welling up now.

“I was able to keep writing while I was in New York, and my books were selling well. But the medical costs kept increasing. I sold my house in Dublin to help pay the bills. My sister and her husband sold theirs as well. My parents died years ago, so it was the two of us.”

“It had to be tough on you, being strong for Ian and your sister.”

“Yes, and I was starting to become more worried about my sister as the days went by. I was concerned that Eva wouldn't be fit to take care of Ian when he was ready to go home. While Ian got well, my sister got sicker.

“I was Ian's guardian in the event something happened to her. When Ian was released from the hospital, the three of us moved into a house in White Plains that I rented. I thought that once Eva saw Ian was making progress, she'd get her life in order too. She had a child to take care of.”

Lenore could see the conflicting emotions warring on his face: anger, frustration, and hope. She soothed a thumb across his knuckles, wanting more than anything to embrace him.

“When Ian finally got the okay to travel back to Ireland, my sister was drunk pretty much 24/7. She had lost weight; her hair was coming out in handfuls as if she was a chemo patient. Eva was destroying herself not only before my eyes but Ian's as well. He was a smart little guy, and he knew his mum was sick.”

“Do you have a picture of him?” Lenore asked on impulse.

“I do,” he said, digging out his wallet. “This was taken about a month after he got out of the hospital.”

“He was beautiful.” Truth was, he looked like MP but she couldn't bring herself to say it. She was so moved by the photo, she had to swallow a lump in her throat.

“A real lady killer,” he replied ruefully. “All the nurses loved him.”