Keeping Secrets & Telling Lies (29 page)

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Authors: Trice Hickman

BOOK: Keeping Secrets & Telling Lies
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Your Big Girl Panties ...
Tyler leaned back in the chair in front of Victoria's desk. After the tumultuous night she'd had, she called Tyler as soon as she dropped Alexandria off at school. He had just finished his morning workout at the gym and decided to drop by her office to give her moral support.
Tyler sighed. “I knew some shit like this was gonna jump off. This isn't good.”
“I know,” Victoria said, putting her hand to her head.
“So how bad did Ted go off?”
“He was pretty mad. He's not the type to rant and rave or raise his voice, but he was pissed for sure.”
“You're lucky you're married to a white boy, 'cause a brotha would've gone the hell off.”
Victoria rolled her eyes. “You know you're not right, right?”
“But you know it's true,” Tyler said. “It's not like we're talking about a casual friend who you haven't seen in years. This is a man you used to be in a relationship with, a man you used to sleep with, who your husband can't stand.”
“
Loathe
is a better word.”
“See, that's even worse.”
Victoria knew that Tyler was right. By the time she and Ted had reached their house, he was heated and she was remorseful. Fortunately, Alexandria was fast asleep, and the babysitter eased her way out so they could finish their war of words.
“I told you,” Victoria had explained for a third time. “Your mother had just passed away, and I didn't want to upset you any further. Then one thing led to another, and you were so distraught ... I just didn't say anything.”
Ted looked at her, trying to keep his voice calm. “We've always had a very honest relationship, and you know you can tell me anything, no matter what the situation, so why would you keep something like this from me?”
“You hypocrite,” Victoria threw back at him. “Not only have you lied to me, but you've asked me to be patient about it. And you still haven't told me the whole truth about the secret your mother was keeping. If we can tell each other any and everything, why haven't you told me that?”
“V, the situation with my mother is completely different.”
“How so?”
“It's about family business, something that my mother intended for only me to know. It has nothing to do with a third party outside our marriage. Parker is your ex-lover, and you felt the need to keep this from me, even though you've had contact with him on several occasions.”
Victoria crossed her arms. “Well, no matter how you want to couch it, keeping a secret is keeping a secret, simple as that.”
“Your entire argument about secrets is a misnomer. My mother was the one with the secret, not me.” Ted paused, staring at his wife with suspicion. “Do you have a secret that you're not telling me about? Is there more that I need to know?”
Victoria bristled. “Don't turn this on me when you're still withholding information.”
Their conversation wavered through a laborious back-and-forth for another hour before they agreed to call a truce. Ted assured Victoria that he would tell her about his mother's sordid past in due time, leading her to believe that Carolyn had committed some small indiscretion that was unethical but not harmful. And Victoria told him that he had absolutely nothing to worry about with Parker, giving him the impression that their interaction had been brief and strictly platonic, centering around their children. After all was said and done, they finally laid their heavy burdens on their pillows, falling into a restless sleep.
Just as quickly as they'd gotten back on track, the wheels started coming off again.
Back in the present,Victoria shook her head as she thought about the way they had practically avoided each other as they got dressed this morning, and about the small, passionless kiss that Ted had placed on her forehead before heading out the door.
Victoria rubbed her temples as she spoke to Tyler. “I can't believe that your new girlfriend is best friends with Alexandria's teacher. Why didn't you tell me?”
“ 'Cause I had no idea.You know I don't talk about your business, not to Sam or anyone else. All she knows about you is that you're my best friend, my ace. Any other information she's gotten has been on her own or through Parker. But honestly, Sam's not the gossipy type.That's one of the things I like about her. She doesn't get into that ‘he said, she said' nonsense. And trust, if she did, your shit would've been blown up long before now.”
“I can't believe that in the course of two months my marriage has gone from sugar to shit.”
“It's called trials and tribulations. Right now you're in a Splenda stage.”
“You think this is funny?” Victoria huffed.
“No, I think it's fucked up, but shit happens. As I recall, someone very smart once told me, and I quote, ‘Tyler, everyone makes mistakes.' ”
Victoria smiled, remembering the advice she'd given him years ago, when he had been lamenting over the mistake he made when he broke up with Juliet. The two friends observed a moment of silence in his dead wife's memory.
“How's it going with Samantha?” Victoria asked, drawing both their minds back to the present moment.
Tyler smiled but didn't show any teeth. “It's, um, okay.” He avoided Victoria's eyes.
She looked at her friend as she leaned forward, searching his face to confirm what her intuition had already told her. “You're falling in love, aren't you?”
Tyler knew he couldn't skip around the truth with the one person who had always been his closest confidant. With the exception of Victoria, he had been afraid to open up his heart to anyone, because it seemed that everyone he truly loved either ended up dead or walked out of his life.
But the connection he felt with Samantha was organic, and he couldn't ignore it, even though he had tried. From their initial encounter he'd wanted her. They'd made love that first night, and he was hooked. He liked the fact that Samantha was tough, yet gentle, and her genuine, authentically flawed nature had made him fall for her quicker than a New York minute. He had started looking forward to her phone calls and texts and thinking about her when they were apart. But the things he loved about her were the very things that scared him the most, making him reluctant to get any closer. He didn't want a bad fate to befall them.
“I'm not gonna lie. I'm feelin' her. She's a good woman. But I'm not sure that she's the woman for me,” Tyler answered.
“Why not?”
He shrugged. “It's complicated.”
“Falling in love usually is.” Just as Victoria was about to continue, she looked up and saw Denise walking through the door.
“I knew I heard the voice of one of the most handsome, intelligent, sexy men on the planet,” Denise said and smiled wide, walking toward Tyler with her arms outstretched for a hug.
“See, you know how to make a brotha feel ten feet tall. No wonder Vernon's been hangin' in there all these years,” Tyler replied and grinned, standing up to give Denise a big hug.
“You know that's right. How've you been?”
“I'm good.”
Denise leaned against Tyler's chair as she turned her attention to Victoria. She instantly read the melancholy in her friend's eyes and knew that something was wrong, especially given that Tyler had made an early morning appearance. “What happened?” she asked with caution.
“Tyler, Denise knows about my salacious rendezvous with Parker,” Victoria said. “So now everything's out in the open among friends.” If it weren't for the fact that Debbie was trying to rebound from her own messy affair,Victoria would have patched her in by conference call so she could have joined the powwow.
Denise and Tyler looked at each other and shook their heads, both full of worry. Then panic spread across Denise's face. “Oh, sweet Jesus,” she gasped, putting her hand over her mouth. “Did Ted find out?”
“No,” Victoria sighed. “But he may as well have.” She gave Denise a brief rundown of the incident that happened at last night's PTA meeting.
“See, I told you to leave Parker's slick ass alone. You should've stayed away from him from the very beginning. Remember, I told you he'd be trouble,” Denise said, sucking her teeth.
Victoria looked from Denise to Tyler, then back to Denise again. “I sure am lucky to have friends who like to continually say, ‘I told you so.' Aren't you the one who said I should stop focusing on what I can't change and move forward to try and fix things?”
Denise nodded. “Yes, I did. And I'll say this, too.... Yeah, I'm the kind of friend who'll tell you, ‘I told you so,' but I'm also the kind of friend who loves you enough to give a damn and tell you what you need to hear, when you need to hear it.”
“Amen,” Tyler said. “So dry up that sad face, put on your big girl panties, and start handling your business.”
Victoria could only nod her head, because she knew her friends were right. She didn't have time to sulk or contemplate. She'd made a litany of poor decisions, but now it was time to forget about the mistakes she had made and work hard to repair the dents that had pierced her marriage. She knew she had to act quickly if she wanted to keep her man.
Chapter Seventeen
The Shit Had Hit the Fan... .
A
n hour after talking with Tyler and Denise, Victoria found herself riding up the elevator to the twenty-fifth floor of the ViaTech building. She decided that she needed to start making up for lost ground. Her marriage was in need of repair, and she knew just the particular set of tools that would do the job.
She planned to strut into Ted's office and surprise him with a little midday pick-me-up—a quick afternoon romp on the top of his desk. And even if he was in a meeting, she'd wait, because at the moment there was nothing more important than doing whatever it took to jump-start their passion again.
She felt a sense of déjà vu when she stepped off the wood-paneled elevator and headed toward the opulence of Ted's office on the executive floor. She remembered the days when she worked at ViaTech and walked those very halls. It all seemed like a lifetime ago. She hadn't visited his office since she went to meet him there before the company's Christmas party last year, and now she had a party of her own in mind for him.
She greeted Ted's assistant with a huge smile. “Hi, Jen. How are you?”
Jen lit up like Ted had just given her the day off. She'd always liked Victoria. They regularly kept in touch about Ted's schedule. Jen was his woman from nine to five, before handing him over to Victoria to claim at the end of the day. The two had come to develop a great relationship.
“Victoria, it's so good to see you!” Jen said, nearly leaping from behind her desk to give Victoria a warm hug. “Ted didn't tell me you were coming by.”
“He's not expecting me. I thought I'd pop in and surprise him,” she said, looking at Ted's closed office door.
“Well, he'll certainly be thrilled,” Jen said, shifting her chipper smile to one of mild concern. “He needs a good surprise.... He's been a little on edge since he came in this morning.”
The one thing Victoria knew about her husband was that he was cool under any kind of pressure, and if he had allowed his mood to show, he was probably more upset from their argument last night than she had thought. “Is he in?” she asked.
“No, he had to step out at the last minute for an off-site meeting. But I'm expecting him back any minute. Would you like to wait in his office?”
Victoria nodded and headed toward Ted's door. “Oh, and, Jen ... don't tell him that I'm here. Remember, it's a surprise.”
Jen clasped her hands together. “Excellent! I'm sure his spirits will lift when he walks through the door and sees you.”
“Let's hope so,” Victoria said under her breath. She stepped into Ted's office and closed the door behind her.
She looked around her husband's spacious office, noticing the meticulous way he kept everything in order. “Why can't he keep his closet at home this tidy?” Victoria whispered aloud, examining a heavy lead crystal paperweight that rested atop a stack of perfectly centered, straight-edged papers on his credenza. Her eyes roamed over to the two pictures that sat on his desk.
I love this one,
she said to herself, picking up one of the framed photographs. It was her favorite, the picture they had taken the day they brought Alexandria home from the hospital. She looked at her family, holding the picture to her heart, and prayed it wasn't too late to undo the damage she had created.
She put the photo back where she found it and came up with an idea. She grinned as she slid into Ted's leather chair behind his desk, ready for a little fun. Knowing that he would walk through the door at any minute, she leaned back carefully, propped her seductively long legs on top of his desk, and raised her short black skirt up her thighs. She undid the top three buttons of her silk blouse to expose her lacy push-up bra and waited to give her husband a thrilling surprise.
When a few minutes went by with no grand entrance from Ted, Victoria began to relax her pose. She let her arm dangle off the edge of the chair and hoped that her husband would soon walk through the door.
After an hour of waiting, punctuated by Jen's periodic checks to see if she needed anything, and by eating a snack of fruit and juice from Ted's compact refrigerator, Victoria gave up hope that he was coming anytime soon. “His meeting must've run over,” Jen had offered twenty minutes ago. “Those last-minute meetings usually require more time ... putting out fires.”
Victoria knew that she needed to leave soon. She had an afternoon appointment with the director of Dress for Success, to help the organization plan its annual gala. She looked at her watch, knowing she was cutting it close.
Disappointment was an understatement to describe her mood. She wanted to do something passionate and spontaneous that would excite Ted and reignite the flame in their marriage, which was slowly fading away. As she looked around, something caught her attention, leading her eyes to fall beneath his desk. She had another idea that just might do the trick. She scooted the chair out and leaned forward, reaching for his attaché, which was lying on the floor, tucked away behind the small cabinet that held his files.
She knew from experience that Ted always kept his attaché with him when he was out on business. She thought it was strange that he had neglected to take it with him, but it was also her good fortune, because it was perfect for what she had in mind.
She bent down underneath his desk and retrieved the leather bag. “This should get him going.” She smiled, reaching over for his pen and stationery. She wrote Ted a quick erotic love note that detailed what she had in store for him when he came home that evening. She pressed her berry-colored lips against the parchment paper, giving it her sexy seal, then stood up and slid her silk thong down the length of her legs. She opened his attaché to place the note and her seductive undergarment inside and smiled again, thinking about the surprise that would greet him when he opened it. But her smile slowly faded when she examined the bag's contents. She put her panties back on and took a seat in the chair.
Victoria sat at Ted's desk in complete shock, confusion, and utter disbelief as she pored over the xeroxed documents in front of her. She reread each one, making sure that her eyes weren't playing tricks on her. She held a copy of Carolyn's birth certificate in one hand and her handwritten letter to Ted in the other. Her stomach formed into a ball of knots. “This is the secret his mother was hiding? This is what was so awful that he couldn't bring himself to tell me?” Victoria's heart sank as her temperature began to rise.
She sat back, letting the documents fall to Ted's desk, stupefied by her discovery. “He's been lying all this time because he doesn't want anyone to know that his mother was half black,” she whispered into the air. A sick sensation filled her, and just as she took a deep breath to hold back her emotions, Ted walked through the door.
He stopped in his tracks, surprised to see Victoria sitting behind his desk. He smiled at the sight of her open blouse and abundant cleavage, but he quickly lost the thrill of excitement when he saw the look on her face and the all-too-familiar documents that sat on his desk. He had been so busy rushing off to his meeting that he hadn't realized he'd left his attaché in his office until he was already halfway across town.
He could have kicked himself for not locking the copies away in a safe place, as he had planned to do ever since he'd stored the originals in the safe-deposit box. He cursed himself for walking around with the copies he intended to hand deliver to Abe Brookstein when he came to visit at the end of the week. He had appointed Abe as his sole attorney, and in the interest of client confidentiality, Abe was bound by law to keep what had now become Ted's secret, too.
But now the shit had hit the fan, and Ted knew he had to deal with it. He closed the door behind him and walked toward his wife.
Victoria stood up from behind his desk, letting her anger fly out with her words. “This is what you were gonna tell me in due time?” she mocked, holding the copy of his mother's birth certificate in the air.
“V, calm down. I can explain.”
“You should've explained when I first asked you about what you discovered in that safe-deposit box.”
“It's more complicated than you think.”
“Yeah, being black can complicate the hell out of things, huh? Right now I don't want to hear shit from you. Don't say another word to me.”
“Lower your voice,” Ted commanded in a tone that was as steady as if he'd asked her if she wanted a drink. Although the walls and doors were thick and well insulated, he knew they were no match for the pitch his wife could carry.
Victoria couldn't believe how calm he was acting, almost cavalier. “Lower my voice?” she yelled, ignoring him. “I'll turn this place the hell out if I want to.”
Ted had witnessed this side of Victoria before, particularly during heated arguments with family members and on the rare occasions that a rude, demanding client tried to take advantage of her services. But up until now he had never been on the receiving end of the wrath he knew she was capable of wielding, and it occurred to him that he didn't know if he could contain her. “V, you've got to calm down,” he urged. “This isn't the time or place.” He calmly raised his hands in surrender, but now his cool exterior was beginning to melt.
Victoria put her hand on her hip. She was getting ready to open fire, but something inside stopped her. She parted her lips, but nothing came out except a feeling of deep hurt. She knew she needed to get out of his office. Without a word, she grabbed her handbag and began to walk past him, headed for the door.
“Where're you going?” Ted asked.
“Don't say shit to me.”
“Where're you going?” he repeated.
Victoria didn't answer. Instead she opened the door and charged out like someone was chasing her.
Jen looked up as Victoria rushed past her desk, with her blouse hanging open. She'd heard the muffled sounds of what she thought was an argument, and when she saw Ted take off behind her, hot on his wife's heels, she knew there was no longer a need to wonder.
Ted reached the elevator and stepped inside, right behind Victoria. He held the button to keep the door closed as they rode down to the executive parking garage.
“V, I know you're upset, and I know what you're thinking.. . . ”
Victoria broke her silence. “You're ashamed to admit that you're black, even though you're married to a black woman and you have a black child,” she yelled in his face.
“Please calm down.”
“I'm gonna slap the shit out of you if you tell me to calm down one more time.”
Ted looked at Victoria in disbelief, but he knew his wife and what she was capable of, and at this stage he didn't want to tempt fate, so he changed his approach. “I just want you to relax so we can discuss this in a rational manner.”
Victoria rolled her eyes. “There's no need to discuss anything. I already told you, I don't want you to say shit to me.”
Just then the elevator door opened, and Victoria nearly pushed Ted aside, trying to get out. Again, he followed on her heels as she walked to her car.
“Stop following me. Just go away,” she yelled. She pulled out her key chain, pointing it toward the car as she pressed the remote. “Didn't I tell you to go away!” she barked.
Now Ted was beginning to lose what little calm he had managed to maintain. “V, please. Just listen to me.” He grabbed her arm, preventing her from opening her driver's side door. He didn't care about the security cameras that monitored the area; at the moment his only worry was centered on the situation in front of him. “I know you're upset, and I know I should've told you the truth before now—”
Victoria cut him off, jerked her arm away, and turned around to face him. “Yeah, you should have, but you would've had to admit that your mother was black and so are you... . Now I know why you have rhythm and a big dick.”
“Was that supposed to be a joke?”
“Nothing about this shit is funny.” Her voice became low and venomous. “It's fine to fuck a black woman, but it's another thing to admit that you're a black man, isn't it?” A small tear rolled down her cheek.
Ted reached for her, but she slapped his hand away. “Don't fucking touch me!” she screamed. He reached for her again, this time taking hold of her shoulders and bringing her into his embrace.Victoria squirmed and hit him repeatedly, but he wouldn't let go. Her tears began to flow harder as her blows dissipated. Finally, she stopped fighting, looking at Ted in dead silence. They stood facing each other, letting the stuffy air fill the small space between them.
“If you're so ashamed of who your mother was, of who you really are, what does that say about us?” Victoria said, pointing her finger into his chest. “What does that say about what you think of me ... of our daughter?”
Ted fought hard to hold back the emotions that were lodged in the back of his throat. He looked Victoria in the eye. “Let's go home so we can talk. I promise I'll answer all your questions.”

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