Chapter 31
When the call came in from Terry and I confirmed her location, my feet were already moving out of my plush office and toward the park where she was mugged.
“Take her back to the penthouse immediately. Have someone stay with her until I arrive. I’m on my way.”
“Yes, sir.”
Closing the door behind me, I stride toward Helen’s desk, where she sits with a bowl of steaming, homemade soup and a headset, transcribing notes from my earlier meeting.
“Mr. Mercer, are you heading out? You have a two o’clock late luncheon with your mother. She was very insistent.”
“Oh, I bet she was. Cancel it. And any of the papps she wanted to document our arrival. I’m assuming she booked Sercio?”
“She did, sir. Cancel everything?”
“All of it. The whole fucking circus, Helen. Thank you. I am unsure when I’ll be back, but I’m required elsewhere as a priority. I will be in touch when I can.”
“Yes, sir.”
The commute back to Onyx One takes an eternity I do not have.
Plows clearing streets are a help, but also a hindrance.
If it wasn’t coming down in icy sheets, making visibility arduous, perhaps traffic flow would fare a little better.
What started out as a calm, cloudless day soon descended into an icy tempest. It’s been an hour and forty minutes since Terry’s call to say Sabrina was in distress and couldn’t be comforted.
It has therefore been over two hours of pain and misery for her, which pains me.
George sent through pictures of Bri meeting with an elderly gentleman sheltering in the park gazebo; the man I recognize from the sketch piece Trystan alerted me to when he moved all of Bri’s things into the first minor bedroom.
She had told us she liked to sketch using charcoal and graphite mediums at her first interview for the EPA position.
Back then, I think both of us assumed, wrongly, that she was some dabbling drawer who filled pages with black and gray tones of whatever image had sparked her curiosity.
Why draw fruit or a vase of colorful flowers with only tones of grays and blacks?
Because she didn’t. Instead, she brought her subjects to life with a kind of hyperrealism I’ve never seen before.
Since the discovery of her portfolio, I have done more research into the art form and seen a slew of incredibly capable artists produce pieces that could easily be mistaken for a photograph.
“Bri? Bri!”
“She’s in the bedroom, Mr. Mercer. I believe Terry is in the hallway outside.”
“Thank you, Maria.” Thanking my staff is a new trend for me.
A trend I only began when I noticed Sabrina thanking everyone.
Waitstaff, cashiers, flight attendants. Every one of them was gifted with a smile or words of praise for their efforts.
A small gesture that went a long way, a gesture I’d since mimicked with positive results.
I shuck out of the jacket and loosen the tie before discarding both onto the back of the sofa as I cross the room. Then I undo the top three shirt buttons, so the ping-pong ball sized lump lodged in my throat doesn’t rob my voice when I need it the most.
Terry leans against the marmorino plaster walls, his concentration focused on whatever is occurring on the other side of the cracked door. His head swivels when he hears my approaching presence, pushing off the wall and meeting me in the corridor.
“How is she?” My question is pathetic. I’m trying to place how I felt when someone close to me died, and all that springs to mind is a vacuous chasm.
Not that I’m an insensitive asshole, because while I am that and more, no one close to me has passed before.
No one close. Mercer’s have nothing to do with Alice’s family, the Quinces, and that stipulation came from Malice herself.
She’d been groomed to snag the richest, most morally bankrupt sap she could find, and once that was cemented, her middle-class family was discarded like yesterday’s broadsheet newspaper.
Michael was a twin until his brother passed away in his crib as an infant.
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, or SIDS, the death certificate stated.
So, no uncle, no aunt, and no cousins to grow with like the Broe family.
“Very upset still, sir.”
“Thank you for your help and support, Terry, I’ll take it from here. Please let George know that you both can end your shift now.”
“But, sir?”
“It’s okay. Bri and I are safe in the penthouse. If she’s as distraught as you say, then we’ll be holed up here for a while. I will alert you, George or Clinton, if we move from here.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Terry, thanks again. I mean it.”
I tiptoe on socked feet, gently guiding the door open just enough to let me through and not an inch more.
As if I am the only one capable of comfort in this space when the reality is I have no such ability.
Bri sits on the floor with her knees tucked under her chin, arms wrapped around her bent legs for stability.
For sanctuary. Perhaps if she makes herself as small as possible, then the hurt and trauma won’t land on her smaller mass.
Her hair moves just a hint when she rocks in her daydreams.
“Bri,” I whisper toward the back of her head, crouching low.
Her head snaps to the left at my intrusion before she unclasps her hands and her legs uncurl.
With a tentative hand, I reach for her, touching my fingers to the crown of her head before sliding my hand down to her ear and cupping her face in my palm.
“I’m here for you. Whatever capacity you need, baby. I’m here.”
She turns to me, and the extent of her devastation is plastered all over her face like a brand.
Her shoulders are slumped, eyes puffy, red, and swollen from crying.
Losing this man has had a profound effect on her.
I don’t know how many times she visited that park or how they interacted as friends, subject and artist. All I can see here is how bereft she is.
I scoop her up and carry her into my bedroom, placing her down onto the bed before pressing a button on the remote to draw the drapes, and another to send flames dancing in the gas fireplace.
I fold and secure the cuffs of my clean shirt, which still looks new after wearing it all day. That’s the beauty of luxe weaves.
As the seconds tick into minutes, and become hours, I lay with her back pulled tight to my front rubbing soothing strokes over her exposed forearms, her shoulders, her mane of glossy, deep chocolate hair that looks as black as a raven in some lights.
Now, with only the fireplace for ambient light, she looks every bit the goddess, struck down by grief and guilt.
Her grumbling, empty stomach offers audible protest, which receives a hint of a laugh when my fingers cease their movements in her hair. Groaning, she throws a hand over her face to shield her embarrassment from me.
No, no, don’t hide from me. Not today. “Let me feed you. Maria will have left something in the refrigerator for dinner. Eat first, and then I’ll run you a shower, or bath, whatever you prefer. You must be exhausted.”
She stretches with leonine grace, perking up more with the promise of food and the use of the tub she commented on the first time she saw my ensuite.
Like everything in the penthouse, it’s oversized, opulent, and excessive.
Tonight, though, it may be just what she needs.
After a meal of Tuscan chicken, risoni, and green beans, I turn on the faucet for the bath, setting the ceiling-mounted waterfall cascade into motion.
Sabrina is mesmerized by the lasers of water descending into the marble the way gravity intended.
A squeeze of exotic-smelling bath foam adds suds, and a silky mix of floral, spicy, and unpeaceable scents.
I don’t purchase these products; they arrive from a high-end shopping service and are put in place by housekeeping services.
From Sabrina’s reaction to the swirling fragranced steam, I want to know every exotic ingredient, every base note, every reason the woman who lay distraught in my arms only an hour ago now looks lost in a heady mix of hooded eyes and languid limbs.
I divest her of her clothes before shedding mine, and we lower into the sumptuous water and collapse against each other, her back pulled to my front, my new favorite place for her to be.
Long moments pass in quiet conversation.
How she first happened upon two older gentlemen playing chess in a park one day and asked if she could observe them.
Hertio and Yusef waged a war across sixty-four alternating squares using sixteen chosen weapons per side.
Their English wasn’t well developed, and her Turkish and Greek nonexistent, so they communicated as best they could with a few broken words, the gift of soup, and smiles.
Bri tells me stories about rats with wings and the other man determined to defend their honor with his last breath and breadcrumb.
This is the story of two men in the park with a chessboard, and the young artist who asked to draw them.
This is the story of knowing, understanding, and respecting people on a first-name basis because surnames were irrelevant.
This is the story of knowing your opponent and respecting his history, beliefs, and skill level without clouding your own values.
A story of believing that the world is a better place for the diversity it offers, not fearing what you don’t know or understand, while committing to educate yourself and allowing your opponent to stay as true to himself as you do to your own identity.
Once the water cools, the suds have dissolved, and the tub is emptied, I wrap Sabrina up in one of the fluffy bath sheets and carry her back to my bed.
Her supple skin kisses mine in a whisper of satin.
I’m hard, painfully so. I have been since the last of her clothes landed on the heated bathroom floor.
All I want to do is drink in the scent of her skin as I bury my cock deep inside her until morning.
Bri slides along the bed as the towel falls away, her musky arousal mingling with the vanilla, spun sugar, and orchid from earlier.
We are drawn to each other like magnets, a combined attraction so potent and right.
Lowering to the bed over her splayed frame, I touch my lips to hers, my tongue probing her parted lips and demanding entrance.
She complies with a needy moan that shoots straight to my leaking cock.
“I need you.”
“You have me,” I reply, and spend the next hours comforting her the only way I know how: with my body inside hers.
I claimed her with my tongue, showed her with my fingers and cock how I could help her escape from her caged heartache until the first noises of morning alerted us to another dawning day.