Chapter 11 #2
She leans over the dog, and he scurries into her lap, those goddamn puppy dog eyes so trusting, so searching, so sad. Or maybe
she’s projecting that last part.
She needs to do a hell of a lot more googling. Including on how to take care of a dog. And get urine out of linen because the furball did have to go. Christ.
Now, why hadn’t she thought of that? This Mallory punched through the walls on either side of her original office to make
a suite. A lounge area with a couch, wet bar, kitchenette—she could live here. Or at least, Harley could.
She opens the front of the carrier, and he lazily stretches himself out of it, as if knowing he’s won. She needs to set a
reminder to walk him, or better yet, have Noreen set a reminder, and she really, really hopes she has not just a Noreen equivalent
here but her Noreen, craving the familiarity. The shaking of her hands has traveled up her arms and into her neck, and she’s on the verge
of becoming one of those plastic bobbleheads.
Mallory breathes in and out as she circles her office suite, Harley her shadow. Her eyes land on a glass bowl filled with
individually wrapped chocolates bearing the blocky AIM logo she saw on the morning show. It’s not the sleek, somewhat abstract
logo the three of them had landed on all those years ago. It’s better.
Shit. She shoves the bowl, and chocolates fall to the floor. Harley scurries back. Yet his nose quickly overcomes his fear, and
he begins to flip one, end over end. Mallory picks up the chocolate, peels the paper back, and Harley sits. A slight smile
creeps in as she imagines Grayson training him, or more likely, paying someone to train him. Those cloudy eyes. That blue skin. Mallory can’t breathe. She breaks off a piece of the chocolate.
“Don’t!” echoes through the office as Ilena comes rushing in, though Mallory mentally puts air quotes around the “rushing.”
“What?” Mallory says. “I know the no-pets rule was mine, but it’s not like I could leave him in my condo.”
“So instead you decided to kill him too?”
Mallory recoils. “You think I killed Grayson? You actually think that?”
(Because Mallory does too. A little.)
“Why shouldn’t I?” Ilena shoves a long strand of hair behind her ear. “The rest of it happened, didn’t it?”
Mallory grips the chocolate and blinks through an uncharacteristic stinging in her eyes.
Ilena stares at her, the two of them suspended in a silence that holds their history of more than twenty years, filled with
broken hearts and broken toes, Tequila Tuesdays and Hangover Wednesdays, wedding vows and watering each other’s plants (Mallory
forgetting to), and absent fathers and birthday after birthday, so many things, big and small, but nothing like this.
Ilena’s tone still carries an edge as she says, “You push boundaries, Mallory, you always have. But this? Can I believe you
killed Grayson on purpose?” A sigh inflates her chest, which is now approaching Mallory’s cup size thanks to the fetus inside
of her. “Of course not. And yet none of us meant to do the things we’ve done here. But they’ve happened all the same.” Ilena’s
eyes settle on Mallory’s arm and the red fingerprints now covered by a long-sleeved orange blouse that completely washes her
out but was the least offensive thing she could find. “We need to figure out how to deal with it. And I say that as someone
who’s spent the morning peeing herself every time she breathes too deeply.” Ilena reaches for the chocolate in Mallory’s hand.
“Chocolate’s toxic to dogs. Onions too. If you’re going to watch him, you should probably do some due diligence.”
Mallory swallows hard. “Right, thanks.”
“Yes, well, at least we’re here together.”
“Wasn’t sure you’d think that was a good thing.”
“Twenty-one years, Mallory. We don’t abandon one another, no matter what.”
Except Ilena had threatened to do just that.
Ilena had presented her ultimatum as a choice, but it wasn’t a choice at all. The direct listing or her. Mallory could call
her on it, but then they’d start fighting and the only fight left in Mallory is for getting the fuck out of here. And back
to their world, where Grayson isn’t dead. But where she has reason to want him to be.
Mallory juts her chin at Ilena. “You’ve always been a self-righteous snob.”
“Same as you’ve always been a self-centered egomaniac.”
They stare at each other until Mallory gives her signature grin, and Ilena rolls her eyes. She lowers herself into one of
the coral brushed-velvet chairs across from the sofa with her usual grace. Ilena’s rich dark hair is the longest it’s been
in years. Seeing Ilena’s skin smooth and dewy, her eyes weighed down with worry but still with a brightness that’s long been
missing, Mallory thinks the cliché of glowing when pregnant maybe isn’t a cliché after all.
Mallory softens. “Ilena . . . a baby. After everything.”
Ilena’s hand reflexively cradles her stomach, and she gives a half smile before her face returns to its neutral state. “It’s
not right, Felix and all this. I’m not sure, but I think I—or she . . . this Ilena . . . well, something’s off. There was
a note on my desk, and James clearly despises me. I understand why you think we shouldn’t call the police, but pretending
to be people we aren’t isn’t going to work. Do you honestly think Aubrey can do it?”
Mallory wraps her arms around her torso. She thinks of those goddamn impossible nut crackers, and she isn’t sure she can do it, let alone Aubrey. “We have to at least try. Besides, it’s only temporary.”
Ilena’s eyebrow arches. “Grayson’s temporary?”
“Temporarily what?” a chipper voice says. “Oh, sorry. I should have knocked.” A sturdy-looking woman in her late fifties with poofy white hair and rosy cheeks ambles through the office door she opened without asking.
Mallory curbs the flaring of her nostrils and offers a generous smile to this woman who belongs in a yarn store, not at AIM.
“Good morning.”
“More like afternoon!” The Mrs. Claus lookalike taps an analog watch on her wrist. “Mr. Fields may not always be on time,
but he’s never a no-show. He lets me know if he’s going to be late. Did you say he’s temporarily delayed, Ms. Latham?”
This woman knows her, which means Mallory must know her too. “You haven’t heard from him?”
“Not since last night. He let me in on your little secret.” Mallory’s face momentarily falters, and the woman hurries to add,
“Oh, I swore not to tell a soul until the news was out this morning. But my gosh, how I wanted to call my sister. I dare her
to go on about how I can do better than being the secretary to the man about to become the most well-known VC in the country
now!”
So Mrs. Claus is Grayson’s secretary, the complete opposite of Patrick, the crisply dressed and expertly groomed twenty-five-year-old
Stanford graduate he poached from Snapchat’s CIO in their world.
“I never doubted you for a moment,” Mallory says.
“Thank you, Ms. Latham. Heidi Hoffman doesn’t let you down.” When neither Mallory nor Ilena responds, she continues, “And
there I go talking about myself in the third person again.” The woman—Heidi Hoffman, it seems—places a hand to her heart.
“Mea culpa. Mr. Fields hates that.”
“Well,” Mallory says, “fortunately he’s not here. At the moment, I mean.”
The woman’s brow furrows. “I have to admit, I’m starting to worry. He said a prep session had to begin first thing.”
Ilena’s head cocks, and Mallory realizes she never told her about The Shandy Shane Show, about only Mallory and Grayson being on it.
Mallory steps forward to escort Heidi Hoffman the hell out of her office. “Yes, well, schedules are—”
“Cleared,” Heidi Hoffman says. “Noreen and I made sure of it.”
Noreen.
Relief floods Mallory’s veins.
Heidi adds, “She knows how flighty you can be.”
Flighty? Mallory draws back, and Ilena laughs like it’s a joke, but Heidi Hoffman just keeps on going.
“So we put appointments in everyone’s calendars to meet in the AIM conference room, and I’ve got the nut-free rice bagels
all set out.”
Is that a brag or an indictment?
What it is, at the very least, is confirmation of Grayson’s nut allergy and AIM’s commitment to their employees’ health in
this world, same as in hers. That’s good. Great. Terrific for AIM, more than a little worrying for Mallory. Because odds are,
this Mallory also knew about Grayson’s allergy.
“And now . . .” Heidi claps. “Where’s my little munchkin?”
This draws Harley out from under the desk, which, unlike in Mallory’s office in her world, is positioned to give her a view
of AIM’s interior, not the river.
“Harley!” Heidi Hoffman says. “There you are!” She holds up her phone. “Wi-Fi collar never fails. It’s why I thought Mr. Fields
was here. He dropped Harley off, then?”
“Not exactly,” Ilena says. “He’s—”
“On an unexpected trip,” Mallory says.
Heidi Hoffman’s forehead could double as a topographic map. “But he didn’t mention anything to me.”
“It was very sudden.”
Skepticism clouds Heidi’s eyes. “Business or pleasure?”
“I didn’t want to pry,” Mallory says.
Heidi dips her chin. “Oh, yes, yes, certainly not.”
Mallory hadn’t meant it as a criticism of the woman, but if that’s what it takes to make her relent, so be it. “Right then,
so any materials you have regarding preparation can be directed to me.” Ilena’s lips part, and Mallory adds, “Us, to us.”
“You can count on me, Ms. Latham, Mrs. Singh.”
Ilena winces at being called by Felix’s surname, and Mallory covers with, “Another Braxton-Hicks?”
Heidi swoops in, arms extended, as if ready to wrap Ilena in a chunky wool blanket. “Come now, Mrs. Singh, just breathe through
it.” She sets a hand on Ilena’s shoulder, pressing down, and counting.
Ilena mercifully fakes it, though her eyes bore into Mallory’s.
“That’s it, Mrs. Singh.” Heidi pats Ilena’s shoulder as Harley scampers toward her. She bends to tickle his chin. “What a
sweetie you are.”
Mallory realizes her opportunity. “Perhaps you might take—”
“If only my building allowed pets, I’d steal Mr. Harley right out from under you!” Her jaw slackens. “Mea culpa, Ms. Latham,
that was inappropriate. But how about while I’m here I take him for a jaunt? Feed him his raw chicken nuggets?” Heidi gestures
to the wet bar.
Mallory shakes her head. “I need to stop at a pet store, I guess.”
“Oh, no, no. Mr. Fields only feeds Harley an organic, allergen-free raw diet. I have a subscription sent to his home each
month.” That brow draws the Eastern seaboard. “He must have been in quite the rush, indeed.” She straightens her spine. “No matter. I’ll just scoot on over to his penthouse, pop open his cold chest,
and be back before Harley’s tummy can grumble.”
Shit, shit, shit.
Mallory digs into the side of the carrier and presses the leash into Heidi’s hand, wishing she’d paid more attention to the pile of frozen foods they’d sifted through in the chest in Grayson’s apartment, stuffing some into his normal freezer, tossing the rest. “I couldn’t ask you to do that. Walking him is more than enough.”
“Nonsense. I’ll even use the code for the service elevator so I don’t get waylaid by Archie.”
Mallory crosses her arms in front of her chest. That first night, in their world, after the nut-free vegan meatballs and greasy
Shake Shack burgers, Grayson had taken her up the service elevator, explaining after the tearing off of shirts and arching
of backs that he often used the service elevator to avoid getting drawn into an interminable conversation about the security
guard’s sciatica, and other times when he needed to sneak in a repair company not on the condo association’s approved list.
Some ongoing conflict with the cleaning staff and the condo board meant no cameras had been installed at the back of the building
or in the service elevator. Grayson had said riding in that elevator, unencumbered by stock tip solicitations and pleas for
angel investments, was one of the few times he felt free to truly be himself.
He became someone else in that moment, someone she understood on a level she didn’t even want to admit to herself. She’d traced
her fingertip down his cheek, across his lips, parting them slowly, letting their kiss begin softly this time, and their touches
followed suit until they could no longer go slow. She shivered beneath him, the second time even better than the first. She
felt so close to him, in a way she hadn’t with anyone, not since she and Ilena first met.
“Actually . . .” Mallory makes a show of opening her phone. “Let me. It would be hyperefficient for us both. Ilena and I have an appointment right near Grayson’s building, and I’m sure you have a lot to do, rescheduling Grayson’s commitments.”
Heidi, who’s been burying her fingers into Harley’s underbelly, snaps her head up. “Of course, thank you, Ms. Latham. Role
reversal today. Me off my game and you spot-on!”
Mallory grits her teeth, missing Patrick, but plays into whatever this Mallory’s got going on here. “Well, to stay that way,
I better not risk Archie.”
Heidi nods emphatically. “His disc history alone will have you there until next Tuesday.” She pulls a sticky and a pen from
her pocket. “Use the service elevator.”
Perfect. Code in hand, Mallory closes the door behind the cooing Heidi Hoffman and this stuffed animal of a dog that won’t stop with
those goddamn puppy dog eyes.
“Just what are you up to?” Ilena says.
Mallory’s and Ilena’s approaches to life increasingly diverged as the years went on, Ilena’s black-and-white rules growing
thicker while Mallory’s philosophy of “ask forgiveness not permission” turned to “ask forgiveness never.” Grayson understood
that, didn’t judge it. They were both always on, waiting for the right moment or cataloging information that might be useful
later. It’s a skill that brought them together and separated them, starting with the moment she overheard Grayson in his penthouse
and ending at the outing when he threatened to ruin her best friend.
“Text Aubrey to meet us.”
“Why?”
“Because if this morning’s any indication, you’re in no shape to help me move a body.”