A Family Affair (21 page)

“If you mean from the ghetto where I was living, then yes, I have. Of course, we both know who was responsible for putting me there, don’t we? And we both know there was no earthly reason why it had to be done the way it was, the way you and that shyster you employed chose to do it. That’s something I will never forget. Nor will I ever forgive you for that, Jeff. These last five years were not good for me. So, whatever you’re about to ask me, just remember that.”

“I’m sorry, Emma. I really am. I wish I could turn the clock back and undo a lot of the things I did back then. Unfortunately, I can’t do that.”

“Oh, I just bet you’re sorry.
Now.
And if you think for one minute I believe you’re really sorry about what you did to me, then you must have me mixed up with someone else. Now, why are you here and what do you want? Don’t make me ask you again.”

“I want you to call off the dogs. You’ve made your point. You’ve brought me to my knees. I understand you want your pound of flesh for the way I treated you, and you got it, plus a few pounds extra.”

“What are you talking about? What point? What dogs? You don’t look like you’re on your knees to me. You’re sitting in my house, in my chair, on your ass and talking in riddles.”

“Like you don’t know what’s going on. It’s your sister. She’s ruined me and International Alliance Capital. This is a personal vendetta on her part. Money talks, and she’s got more money than God. I know who she’s married to. Why did you try to keep that a secret, anyway, Emma?”

“Because my family is none of your business, that’s why. You may have stolen my daughter, you bastard, but she is the one and only member of my family you will have any contact with.”

“Well, your sister damn well ruined us, all four of us. The whole damn company. Somehow, she managed to erase our identities. She confiscated our bank accounts. The money is gone. IAC is being charged with money laundering, the Feds are on our backs, they confiscated our passports, our credit cards are no good, the country club canceled our memberships, our houses are in foreclosure, and the mortgages are now owned by some Belarusian yahoos, and they want their money. Belarusians no less!”

There was such outrage in Jeff’s voice that Emma smiled.

“Ah, you’re smiling. I knew it. You were in on it, too. I want to know how she got to the bar association for them to lift our licenses.”

Emma shrugged. “Boo hoo!” She got up to pour herself a cup of coffee but didn’t bother to offer one to her ex-husband.

“I’m going to go to prison. I don’t have the money to hire a lawyer, and that’s another thing. She got to Solomon, too.”

“That skank lawyer who took us to the cleaners? Well, I can’t say that I’m sorry to hear that. Oh, boo hoo again. Can you prove any of this fairy tale?”

“You really are a coldhearted bitch, aren’t you?” Jeff snarled.

“Appearances can be deceiving sometimes. My friends don’t think I’m a coldhearted bitch. In case you happen to have missed it, Mr. Jefferson Davis, so-called great-great-grandson of a traitor, I hate your guts. If that makes me a coldhearted bitch, so be it. Do you understand that?”

“Yeah, I do, and that’s why you put your sister up to all of this. You just wanted to get even. Well, you got even, okay? So now call off the dogs so we can both get on with our lives. This is some fancy house. How’d you afford something like this?” Jeff snarled, not liking it that his ex-wife had the upper hand.

“Maybe I won the lottery. It’s really none of your business how or why I got this house. It is mine, and it is paid for. That means there is no mortgage that Belarusians, or anyone else, can claim. By the way, that’s hysterically funny. Belarusians? Who would have thunk it?

“And just for the record, my little sister wouldn’t have a clue as to how to do all the stuff you just mentioned. I think you might have pissed off a few people during the past five years, the way you pissed me off, and now they’re retaliating against you. I can just see you languishing in a federal penitentiary. In the general population no less.”

“Where’s my fucking money, Emma? I want it back,” Jeff shouted as he came up and out of his chair, his face dark with hatred.

“I don’t know where your fucking money is, Jefferson, nor do I care.”

“Stop lying to me. I’m ruined. For God’s sake, Emma, appeal to your sister. I know you two are behind this. Please, help me out here, or we’re all going to go to prison. Me, Jason, Josh, and John. You don’t want that on your conscience, do you?”

“I think this is where I tell you to hit the road, Jack. Enlist the aid of your trophy wives to help you out. Or maybe you can send Missy out to get a job to help pay the rent. We’re done here.”

Emma stood up and was starting toward the front door when Jeff grabbed her by the arm and swung her around.

The door to the laundry room swung open as if a tornado had invaded the room, and three women, brandishing brooms and mops, started swinging them. It wasn’t a pretty sight. When Jeff Davis was firmly on the floor, spread-eagled, with stilettos pressing on his neck, Robin asked sweetly, “Now can we strip him naked and toss his ass out in the snow?”

“Well, yeahhh,” Emma drawled. While the girls were proceeding, she looked out the front window. “I think it might take him a good ten minutes to clear off his windshield.”

“Is that a fact?” Alice grunted as she and Robin hauled Jeff to his feet.

“I am so tempted to shove this mop up his ass,” Clare singsonged, pushing the mop handle into Jeff’s back to push him forward. Emma opened the front door wide, and together, they all gave a mighty shove; Jeff was propelled forward like he was shot from a cannon. Emma threw his outerwear and boots after him, then locked the door and shot the dead bolt.

“I think that went rather well, don’t you, girls?” Emma said.

“We drank all the wine. You got any more?” Alice asked.

“I do, but it’s not as good as the other two bottles.”

“Oh, who cares? It’s wine, isn’t it? Right now, I’d drink that stuff that comes out of a box to celebrate,” Clare said.

“Would you really have shoved that mop up his ass, Clare?” Robin asked.

“I would have given it my best shot,” Clare responded smartly.

And the party was on, with toast after toast, all of them to Trish in one way or another.

I
T WAS THREE O’
CLOCK IN THE MORNING WHEN
E
MMA DONNED
her robe and tiptoed downstairs, but not before she looked in on her guests to make sure everyone was sleeping soundly. They were. In the kitchen, the fire that had blazed all evening was just hot embers, the flames long gone. She threw in two logs, made herself a cup of hot tea, then sat down in the rocking chair next to the fire. She stared into the flames as she tried to calm down. The meeting with her ex-husband had stirred up all the old hatred, the five long years of not knowing if she would make it or not. So many times she had thought she might have to apply for public assistance or food stamps. Even now, five years later, the thought made her cringe in shame.

She didn’t think she’d ever be able to let go of the hatred for her ex-husband, but somewhere, somehow, at some point in time, she realized that she had, in fact, let it go. Then, when she was sitting in front of him earlier in the evening, she’d been stunned to realize she felt sorry for him.
What goes around comes around.
She smiled to herself in the near-dark kitchen. She looked to the window and realized the floodlights were still on. She got up and walked over to the garden window to see mountains of snow. It looked beautiful, clean, quiet, and peaceful, and it was still snowing. She took a moment to wonder how Jeff had made it home and if he had hypothermia. Did Simone wrap her arms around him to give him her own body warmth? She laughed out loud at the thought. Simone was stick thin, without an ounce of fat on her lean frame. Poor Jeff.

Emma looked into the teapot; satisfied that the tea leaves had steeped long enough, she poured a cup and added some honey. She carried it back to the rocking chair. In the early days of her marriage, after Missy had come along, some of the best, the most pleasurable moments of her life were rocking in the chair, her child cuddled to her chest. So long ago, so many memories. All gone now. She hoped that new memories would surface, that her life would settle down and she could be happy again.

Happy? Exactly what was happy? She had to admit to herself that she didn’t know the meaning of that word. At that moment. Emma closed her eyes and thought about Trish. She calculated the time difference in Dubai, reached for her phone, and pressed the number one on the speed dial. She listened to the phone ring on the other side of the world. She was about to hang up when she heard her sister’s voice.

“It’s Emma, Trish. I’m calling to give you an update. Are you okay? I haven’t heard from you. By the way, it’s snowing to beat the band here. I think we probably have around eight or nine inches by now, and it is still snowing,” she babbled nonstop.

Her sister’s voice was crystal clear, but it sounded strained to Emma’s ears. She repeated her question. “Are you okay? Did you and Malik talk? Did you resolve things?”

“We did. Listen, Emma, can I call you back in, say, an hour? This isn’t a good time, and yes, I do need to talk to you, but not right now. I promise I will call you back, okay? By the way, why are you still up at this hour? Maybe I should be asking you if you’re okay, instead of the other way around.”

“That’s what I wanted to tell you. Jeff came here in the middle of the storm. But all of that can wait for you to call me back. Are you sure you’re okay, Trish? I’m not liking what I’m hearing in your voice.”

“I’m fine, Emma. You know me too well. I will call you back. Good-bye.”

Emma looked down at the phone in her hand. She blinked. “Well, little sis, I don’t believe a word you just said.” Emma’s thoughts turned wild and crazy. Then, as she tried to imagine what was going on, on the other side of the world, that would make her sister sound so . . . Her mind searched for the right word, and
sad
was the best she could come up with. Whatever it was, she’d know in an hour.

With nothing else to do, Emma decided to cut the pie, which, in the excitement following dinner, no one had touched. She cut a generous slice, replenished her tea, and took her seat again by the fire, but not before she added another log. She loved the niche carved into both sides of the fireplace, which was stacked high with good-burning hard oak wood. She made a mental note to call someone to deliver more wood later in the week. So many things to do. So much to tell Trish.

Her teacup empty, her slice of pie finished, Emma leaned back and let her thoughts take her back to her past. Eventually, she dozed off, only to wake when her phone, which was still in her hand, chirped to life. She blinked and clicked it on. She heard her sister ask if she was still awake.

“I am. I dozed a little while I waited for your call. Something is wrong. Am I right, Trish? I could hear it in your voice.”

“Tell me your news first, and then I’ll tell you mine.”

Emma let loose and told her everything that had transpired during Jeff’s visit. She expected her sister to hoot with laughter, but she didn’t. Instead, all she said was, “It serves him right.”

“How did you do all that, Trish? I’d really like to know. And, someday, I’d like to shake your hand for doing it. I had no idea marrying a sheik would make you so powerful. The girls are over the moon with what’s going on. They keep saying karma is a bitch. I guess it is. Now, tell me how you did it?”

“Emma, I didn’t do it, but I did pay someone to do it. I guess he deserves the reputation he has, because he pulled it off and made it work. All it took was a lot of money. Now, listen to me. Check your e-mails daily, and if you see some strange ones, check them out. Do not assume they’re spam. Open them, and you’ll get instructions as to where your . . .
severance
money is. Three million each. Make sure you all get a good tax man to represent you. Did you find a building for your new venture?”

Emma’s brain was reeling. “Did you say three million
each?
”

“I did say that, and did you hear the part about getting a good tax man?”

“I heard that. I will. We will. Oh, my God! I don’t know what to say.”

“About the building . . .”

“Yes, I did find one right on Main Street, but the rent is ridiculous. We would be better off buying the building. There’s an apartment on the second floor. We could rent that out, and it would help with the cash flow. The first floor is seven thousand square feet. The building is in good condition. Now, mind you, I haven’t had time to look at it in person—I just took the virtual tour online—but I think it’s perfect.”

“Then by all means, let’s buy it. Set it all up and let me know. One other thing. Connie is sending you all the things that I brought back with me. It’s coming by UPS, so you should have it all by the middle of next week. I’ve already talked to Soraya, and she’s excited to help. She needs a few weeks of downtime. She just had her new baby, a girl, and she’s calling her Patricia Ami. She named her after me. Isn’t that sweet?”

“Very sweet. Now it’s your turn. Tell me what’s wrong. Is it what you thought, what you worried about?”

“Not even close, Emma. Malik is dying. He doesn’t have . . . long. When he went away, he . . . he was going from doctor to doctor all over the world. His mind was someplace else, and he didn’t want me to know. That’s the bottom line. And before you can ask, I’m handling it. Maybe I should say that I’m trying to handle it. I swear, Emma, Malik is handling it better than I am. Rashid is . . . a basket case. Soraya and I are the strong ones, if you can believe that.”

“Oh, dear God! Do you want me to come over there? I will. I can make plans to leave as soon as the snow lets up and the airports reopen. What can I do? I need to do something for you. The girls will agree.”

“I appreciate it, Emma, but there’s nothing for you to do. There’s nothing I can do but be here. Malik is holding on well right now. He takes a lot of medicine, and he sleeps or naps a lot. He is doing his best to eat. We sit in the garden, we talk, we laugh, and we drink beer, which he is not supposed to do, but he said he doesn’t care. He lets me drive the rattletrap, and we go for drives. We watch a lot of old movies. Soraya brings the kids over a few times each day, and Malik holds them and sings to them. It’s beautiful to watch.

“Oh, Malik changed that crazy-ass rule that was in place about me not having a baby in five years. That’s now off the books. And listen to this, when Malik . . . when Malik is . . . gone, I’m going to be the ruler of this emirate. Imagine that!” Trish said as she burst into tears.

Yeah, imagine that,
Emma thought. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she listened to her sister sob her heart out. There was nothing to say or do, so she wisely remained silent until Trish was done crying.

“Sorry, Em. I can’t let Malik or the others see me cry. There’s no place here that is secret, where I can go and howl my guts out.”

“Yes, I’m sure, Emma.”

“No, Emma. I think Malik would think the end is nearer than it is if you showed up. I appreciate the offer, though. The time will come, I’m sure, when I will need your shoulders to cry on. But until then, let’s just leave things as they are, okay?”

Emma sniffled into a paper towel she’d ripped off the roll and managed to say, “Okay, if that’s the way you want it.”

“That’s the way it has to be, not that I want it that way.”

“Did you tell Malik’s friends? You mentioned how close they are. Do they know?”

“Not to my knowledge. I agree with you, though. I don’t think Malik wants them to know. I’m thinking that he’s thinking the whole bunch of them would drop everything and hightail it over here. Guys are . . . Guys are guys. You know what I mean, Emma. They can’t handle things like this. At some point, I will get in touch with Zack. I just don’t know when that will be.”

“Do you know—”

“No one will tell me. But then, I haven’t actually asked, because I don’t want to start counting days and hours, that kind of thing. Listen, Emma, I have to go now. If I don’t call you, don’t worry.”

“What?” Emma all but screeched. “You drop something like that on me, and then you tell me not to worry! Let’s get real here. I was born to worry. Okay, okay, I’ll try not to worry.”

The sisters, both crying, told each other how much they loved each other, and then the call ended. Emma swiped at her eyes, then looked up to see her friends standing in the doorway. She wailed louder now that they were all awake, her shoulders shaking. They swooped down on her like avenging angels, wrapping her in three sets of arms.

She told her friends the news between her broken sobs. And then they, too, cried and wailed for the unfairness of it all.

That was what friends did. They rallied around in support, Emma thought. And that was the mark of a tried-and-true real friend. And then she had a second thought. She thought about Malik’s friend Zack and how upset he was going to be when he found out his best friend was dying and no one had told him so he could tell the others. What was that old adage?
Sometimes the best-laid plans of mice and men . . .
Emma never finished that thought, because she didn’t want to cry again.

“What would you like to do now, Malik? How does a banana split sound? We can go to town and sit at one of those little outdoor cafés and watch the world go by. Are you up to it?”

“I am, but I’m not really in the mood for a banana split. I’d much prefer a nice cold bottle of beer and some really salty chips, and I’d like to do it out in the garden. That’s if you don’t mind. And I think it’s time for you to tell me something that I can see is bothering you. You should know by now that anything you do or say is not something I will be uncomfortable with. So, what do you say?”

Trish laughed. “And what palace snitch told you something is bothering me?”

Malik laughed. “The snitches, as you call them, would be terribly upset if I didn’t listen to them when they feel they have news to report. Most times, I don’t even listen. I just pretend, to keep them all happy. It’s a way of life, Trish. Tell me what is troubling you. It isn’t the money you spent, is it?”

Husband and wife walked along, arm in arm, down the palace halls and out to one of the many gardens. Trish bit down on her lip. How much should she confide, or should she just blow it all off? If she did that, Malik, she knew, would drop it, but she felt the need to unload her worries. At least some of her worries. She struggled as to how to respond to his question.

“In part. In the whole of my life, Malik, I never spent more than fifty dollars at a time without hours and days of anguish. Should I? Shouldn’t I? That kind of thing. Then in a few hours I blew nineteen million dollars and didn’t bat an eye. I did that, I spent nineteen million dollars of
your
money, and you never once asked me what I did with it. That just blows my mind, plus the fact that you replenished the money. So, to answer your question, partly, yes, it bothers me, but I did not spend it on myself.

“Sit down and drink your beer. See? That’s what I mean. We were whispering, and here is the beer on the table even before we got here. Someday, I want to know how that
really
works. Someone around here must be clairvoyant.”

Trish waited until Malik was halfway through his beer and salty chips, which he wasn’t supposed to be drinking or eating, before she continued, “Do you want the long or the short version?” she quipped.

“We have all night, my dear, so let’s go with the long version.”

Trish started to talk then. She was like a runaway train as she recounted her and Emma’s life up until her last visit home to Princeton. Malik listened intently but said nothing as Trish purged herself. When she finally stopped to catch her breath, Malik asked a question.

“First of all, it is your money, not mine, and you can spend it any way you want. Why didn’t you step in sooner?”

“I tried. Emma is so proud. She thinks because she is the big sister, she has to do it all. And she was humiliated, ashamed, embarrassed. I understood all that. As for Jeff, that’s a whole other story. Until this last visit home, I had no clue that there was anything I could do other than give her money, which she simply would not accept. Networking, Malik, is where it’s at.”