Dead Certain

a matter of time before some enterprising reporter realized that there was more than one way out of the Drake. We fled like the Romanovs, as fast as our evening clothes allowed, along the row of elegant apartments until we reached the haven of the lighted portico at the end of the block.
    “Evenin’, Ms. Millholland,” said Danny the doorman, touching his cap as he swung the big glass door open to admit us. “And a good evenin’ to you, Mr. and Mrs. Millholland,” he continued, his good-natured face splitting with a grin of pleasure at the sight of my parents.
    I breathed a sigh of relief, realizing that in Danny we had a solid ally. Danny’s father had been doorman when my parents lived in the building. When I was a little girl, Danny was a lanky teenager, always willing to carry packages and run errands to pick up pocket money.
    “It’s so nice to see you again,” beamed my mother, as serenely as if she’d just dropped in for a chat. “How’s your family? Is Michael still in the navy?”
    “Yes, ma’am. He’s stationed in the North Sea, off the coast of Scotland. He went back to see my gran’ just this past Christmas. He’ll be so pleased to hear that you asked about him.”
    “And your father and mother? Are they still well?”
    “Yes, ma’am, though now that they’ve retired and moved out to Arizona, we don’t get to see them nearly as much as we’d like.”
    Elliott and I both stood staring at my mother as if she was out of her mind. Without consulting a soul, she’d decided to violate the terms of the confidentiality agreement with HCC by dropping the bombshell of the year in front of a half a dozen reporters. Now, with the press on her tail, she was standing in the lobby of her old building catching up on family gossip with the doorman. I seriously considered strangling her.
    “Well, Danny,” she continued calmly, finally getting to the matter at hand, “we seem to have run into a little trouble with some reporters who are following us. Do you think you could be good enough to call us a taxi without drawing too much attention?”
    “You just leave that to me, ma’am,” he replied, growing half a foot at the thought of being of service in such an emergency. “You just stay right here and out of sight.”
    We waited together in the awkward silence of the lobby, avoiding each other’s gaze. Outside we heard the shrill sound of Danny’s whistle summoning a cab, though we waited until the doorman reported that the coast was clear before hustling my parents out and shoveling them into the cab. At the last minute Elliott thrust his cell phone into my mother’s hand.
    “Don’t answer your regular line at home,” he instructed. “Let your answering machine pick it up, or better yet, let it ring. I guarantee the only people who’ll be calling will be reporters. I’ll give Kate the number, and she’ll call you on this line.”
    My mother, who never did anything I told her without an argument, took the phone. As the cab pulled away from the curb we spotted a group of middle-aged men in raincoats who’d just turned the corner from Michigan Avenue at a labored jog. Elliott grabbed me by the hand and pulled me back into the shadow of the garage entrance to the adjacent apartment and enveloped me in a passionate embrace. Despite the circumstances I felt my body soften against his, the current crisis momentarily forgotten. I don’t know how long we lingered there until finally, reluctantly, he pulled away.
    “Are you sure they’ve gone?” I whispered breathlessly. “Perhaps we should wait a little while longer?”
    “You know very well we both have work to do.”
    “This was going to be the part of the evening when I invited you upstairs to see my new apartment.”
    “At least I got a chance to meet your doorman. I think you should wait in there with him while I go and get the car. I’ve got to get some of my people out to your parents’ house, or they’ll have reporters coming in through the doggie door.”
    I sighed and reached into my evening bag for my cell phone.
    “You know what the funniest part of all of this is?” I asked as he turned to head back toward the Drake. “What?”
    “I think my mother likes you.”
     
    As Elliott disappeared into the darkness I punched in the number Denise Dempsey had given me. I felt guilty enough about handing her the biggest public relations nightmare of her career without adding to it by having her hear about it on the news.