His Sugar Baby

“I’m going to call my daughter now. I think tonight’s dinner will be me trying out the braciole recipe I found. I’ll start the marinara now.”

The Gritti Palace calls back and confirms the reservation. Everything is in place.

My cell phone rings and I check, worried one of the hotels has changed something. It’s Marshall. “Hey, man, what’s up?”

“Are you busy? You know what, I don’t care. I need to talk to you. Can you come by now? Like right now?” His voice is practically vibrating with stress.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be right over. Give me 10.” I’m heading to my room to get grab a shirt since I’m only in jeans.

“Thanks, man.” Marshall hangs up.

Shoving my phone in my pocket, I wonder what’s up with him. He rarely lets anything get to him.

Anne is on the couch reading, unaware or uncaring that her shirt has moved up and the swell of her round breasts are peeking out. When she sees me she smiles. Until she takes in my concern. “What’s the matter? Are you leaving?”

Sitting down at the edge of the couch I run a fingertip over her the line between her eyes. “I’m not sure what’s wrong. Marshall is in a mood and he needs to talk. I’m headed over to see him. I shouldn’t be too long, but just in case, don’t wait to eat dinner, okay?”

“Okay, you’ll be home to make good on those promises you made this morning in the shower, won’t you?” Her hand runs over my cheek as she pulls me down for a kiss.

Trying to remember my best friend waiting for me, I keep the kiss brief, too brief her pout tells me. “Of course, I won’t be gone that long.”

As I leave I try not to build up my hopes for our time in Italy. Depending on what’s going on with Marshall I think I’ll ask him what he thinks about how to make sure the trip ends the way I want it to. If he’s as much of a mess at the end, like he sounds like now, I won’t bother him.

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nbsp; The doorman asks if I want a cab, startling me, I decline. The walk is only a little more than five minutes to Marshall’s place. It’s a smaller five floor building, with an apartment on each floor, on Cedar street. The place is not what I had expected when he bought it almost six years ago. His old place had been a high rise condo like my own. Marshall said he couldn’t take all the glass and chrome, and not being able to open a window.

He bought the fifth floor and opened it up. There was already a deck opening out from the kitchen and dining area where he had a massive container garden. The garden was his pride, he relied on his housekeeper to keep it alive when he was too busy.

He added another deck off the master bedroom and put in a hot tub. When he was done I was reminded of a high-end home in suburbia. Not at all the home of a man with his hardline no marriage, or kids decree.

Marshall buzzes me up and I climb the stairs. His door is open, waiting for me. I go in, finding him on the deck outside staring into his glass. A bottle of scotch that was in the house for Marshall’s dad is open. Before I say a word, he throws back the two fingers, his face contorting at the taste and no doubt burn. Well, hell, this was a big deal. Marshall doesn’t drink, anything, not even a glass of wine.

I grab the bottle as I sit on the deck chair across from him and wonder what pushed him this far. Was his company in trouble? I can’t imagine the Rachel issue sending him into this state. Before I finish the thought I find I’m wrong.

“She has a kid. Rachel has a kid, a kid with cancer, a three-year old with cancer. Fuck man, she’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. A mini-me of Rachel, only without the hair just a little fuzz of black hair because of the chemo. She has this smile that lights up her tiny face with these chubby cheek dimples. It’s fucking insane how happy she is plugged into an I.V. It’s so fucking twisted.

“She lied to me. Rachel fucking lied to me. She wasn’t doing the sugar daddy thing for school. She was doing it to cover her living expenses so she could spend her days with Cara in the hospital.”

I take a drink from the bottle. “And?”

“And what man? She lied to me. I have to cut her loose. The only reason I found out about Cara was because after finding out Diana lied to me yesterday, and the whole acting weird thing, I dug deeper. I caught Diana in a lie yesterday, she’s married. You know I hate liars, but married too? Hell, no.

“Then I called Rachel, thinking it might settle her whole hot and cold if she knew it was only her, but it also meant I might need her more often than just a few nights a week. Rachel went off on me, told me it was what I deserved and a whole lot of other bullshit.

“I’m a dumbass, it takes her yelling at me to figure out once she hung up on me the hot and cold thing was because she has feelings for me. Instead of her doing the hinting thing, she was trying to hide it. Her trying to hide it didn’t make sense to me, after finding out Diana lied, it made me wonder if Rachel was hiding something, too. I called a private investigator, he got me her life story.”

“So, is the bottle of scotch because she lied or because you’re going to cut her loose?”

His shoulders hunch over, he shakes his head. “If I end it then she can’t be with Cara.”

“Maybe you could throw some money her way as a parting gift, you know?” I suggest helpfully.

He looks at me like I’m an asshole. “Throw money her way? Cara is only three years old, with childhood leukemia. They both need more than money. Last night Rachel talked for hours about all the stress, the fear she’s been going through all alone.

“Her mom was one of those Asian tiger moms and freaked out when Rachel didn’t get into an Ivy League school. The fucking woman kicked her out when she was only eighteen. There she was, waiting tables and her boss knocks her up while she’s trying to go to school. It was nuts, man, hearing her cry until she fell asleep. I’ve never had to go through that, a woman started crying and I was out. Only I couldn’t leave her, didn’t even want to.”

The torture he’d endured listening to her and holding her while she cried is clear on his face. It explains the bottle of scotch. It also explains more than he’s ready to admit. Marshall’s smart though, it won’t take him long. “So, if in this one case in your life money isn’t the answer, what is?”