The Sandstone Affair

The food came and it was delicious. I have good taste in places when someone else is paying the tab. Mark continued with his gentlemanly manners, offering me more wine, picking up my napkin when it fell.

This is actually the first meal we have had in public together. In all the chaos, we skipped the dating and went straight to the heart of the matter. This dating thing is kind of nice, and yet–I keep looking down at his lap as we sit here, imagining myself just leaning over impulsively and taking him in my mouth. When did I start having sex fantasies over lunch?

“So, let’s do this. I’ll see if I can look around Blake’s office and find where he’s keeping the records. Janice you have two jobs. Access your network’s history page and start printing out every transaction, website, or change that’s been made since the transition, and see if you can get your friend Kevin to reverse the backdoor so we can see all of my brother’s dirty little deeds.”

“What about me?” I ask. “I know I’ve made a mess of things since this started, but I need to be proactive and be a part of saving Lynx.”

“Your job is to figure out what Valerie James is looking for, and give it to her.”

“What?” Both Janice and I speak in unison.

“Look, she isn’t hanging around Lynx to transition it into her magazine. She has people to do that. She’s looking for something you have. A source or a lead or something. The only way to get her hands out of the mix so we can do this safely is to give her what she wants. Do you have anyone or anything you think she might be after?”

“She probably wants the—” Janice began but stopped abruptly, quite possibly because of the sharp pain she felt in her leg from my shoe.

“The T list,” I blurted out. “The T list is a collection of people around town… um… everyone from street people to cops to shop owners who give us tips. We get a lot of our exclusives from folks on the T list.”

Janice stares at me making it painfully obvious that I’m making this crap up as I go along. But, Mark seems to buy it for now.

“And you don’t keep this list in your computer?” he asks.

“No. It’s too valuable. Can you imagine what someone would do with our list of secret sources? The only copy is at Janice’s house. I don’t even keep it at home because I don’t want anyone finding it,” I babble. Now the crap is really flying. “But, I can’t give it to Valerie James. It would cut my heart in two.”

Mark looks over at Janice to see if any of this is true, but she has buried her head in her crab lasagna and won’t look up. Still, she’s not denying it.

“Okay. So Julia, you and Janice go through your ‘T-list’ and redact any source you can’t afford to give up, but don’t take all the good stuff out–you need to make it seem legit. Then Janice can tell Valerie when she comes in that she found it in a file and thought Val might need it. That will back her off.”

We finish lunch chatting about music, interests and plans for Lynx if we get it back from Blake in time. Mark is cordial, charming and Janice is clearly smitten by him. He pays and excuses himself from the table so he can get back to work and figure out a way into Blake’s office.

“What in the world?” Janice asks the minute he is out of hearing range. “You nearly took my leg off!”

“Look, I trust Mark,” I start.

“You trust him? You’re freaking in love with him, but you don’t trust him.”

“Take two: I am learning to trust Mark. You know Greg messed me up. Anyway, you and I both know Valerie is looking for the Wall Street story. But I’m not ready to give that up yet. It’s the only thing of value that Lynx has left. Mark isn’t a journalist. He doesn’t get how much difference the right story makes. He would want me to turn it over, and I don’t want to argue with him about it.”

“Since when?”

“What?”

“Since when do you, Julia Sharp, genius raging editor of Lynx not want to argue with anyone?”

“Look, if we get through this, a lot will change. I want to do things differently. I want Lynx to be a different kind of place. I want to have a different kind of life.”

“So, the wildcat of Lynx has been tamed,” Janice coos.

“What makes you say that?” I haven’t really been with Mark around anyone else and didn’t realize the changes in me would show so clearly. Balancing the submissive with the assertive is going to be harder than I thought.

“Julia, for the first time in your whole life since I met you, you look... content.”

“I am,” I admit. “My dad is dying, my career is in the balance and I am going through hell right now, but I guess I’m more content than I have been in some time.”

“Then all I really can say is: don’t blow it.”

Chapter 14

“Tim Tebow is still working on his passing game,” the TV in the next room blares. Thank goodness for inspiration. I write “T-BONE” on my list and make him a street informant who hangs out by the Bronx Cathedral. Then I add “not very accurate” beside the name.

“I don’t think you’d like this very much,” I say to my sleeping father as I sit besides his bed. I sit with him and work on the fake “T-list” for Janice to give to Valerie James. Like all good parents, he taught me to be honest, fair and giving. I don’t think he’d especially care that I’m giving a total fraud to Valerie, but he would be profoundly disappointed I lied to Mark about its existence. Still, I’m actually making one up instead of just telling Janice to drop it.

I look at my silenced phone to see the text light blinking. It’s from Mark. Again. I’ve been avoiding him the past two days. Not because I don’t want to see him. I’d love to see him. But, I need to get this lie done with before I’m face to face with him.

“Come over tonight,” he writes. I decide I can’t put him off forever and answer him.

“Sitting W/Dad. Cnt Lv.”

“Has there been a change in his condition?” Mark’s too classy for text language, which only makes me want him more.

“No Change. Just 2 Tired.”

“Too tired to hear about Lynx?”

“Be there at 9”

I sit with Dad and talk to him a bit longer. There’s no response. I tell him I love him, hide the fictional list in my car and head over to Mark’s. The ride through traffic, the walk from the parking lot, lying to the attendant, and the service elevator journey leaves me even crankier than I was before.