“Consider relocating to a new zip code, because you’re about to get very popular.”
Sam could have sworn she heard Mel snicker under his breath right outside the office door.
Chapter 24
Across the city, in Morewood Heights, where the yards were so manicured they looked like tv show sets, and the streets clean enough to eat off of, Thomas Cook sat at his usual morning spot on the veranda overlooking his million-dollar neighborhood, sipping his rich espresso, and picked up today’s copy of the Pittsburgh Post. Within five minutes of opening the paper to page one, he jumped up from his seat, spat out his drink, and threw the paper down on the wicker table.
“Guadalupe!” he screamed to the closed front doors, where the lion’s-head knocker glared back at him.
Moments later, attuned to Thomas’s voice even through brick walls and closed doors, Guadalupe rushed to his side, still clutching the July 1970 copy of Women’s House Magazine she had been reading over sangria. If only Dr. Cook understood real problems, like the one she had been reading about Worrywart Wanda and the discrimination she was experiencing. Men like Thomas Cook were above such trite snags in life.
Her summer sky blue maid’s uniform rode dangerously high. Why men insisted a woman wear a miniskirt to handle housekeeping work was beyond her, for instead of bending over to pick up something, she had to cumbersomely lower herself to avoid showing the entire house staff her bloomers. And instead of having the free mobility to reach up to grab something off a high shelf, lest she once again expose her rear, she had to waste precious minutes retrieving a stepstool upon which to carefully step up on. It was ridiculous that even a maid could be sexualized, as if she needed to be debased any more than she already was.
“Yes, sir?” she asked, fingering the peter pan collar of her dress.
Then she glanced at the spatter of coffee on the patio floor, the newspaper thrown down, and the red blotches across her boss’s cheeks.
Thomas had just read today’s front-page headline:
Cook Pharmaceuticals: Safe or Scandalous?
And for some reason he had beckoned her for what? To clean up his mess? To threaten the paper’s editor-in-chief? To break the journalist’s kneecaps? Some days she felt like his subservient, and others she felt like his mother, God rest her soul.
“Can you believe this?” He gestured to the paper, which Guadalupe picked up.
Below the headline was a photograph of his ledger displaying all the evidence they needed to shut Cook Pharmaceuticals down. At least temporarily, until Cook’s lawyers paid off the right people.
“I’m sure you can fight this,” Guadalupe consoled, knowing nothing about the situation, or if it was even fightable. Though she knew quite a bit about personal injury law, her breadth didn’t extend to corporate law.
“You wouldn’t understand the ramifications of this. You’re just a simple-minded, illegal Mexican—”
“Actually, I’m not Mexican. And I’m legally here,” Guadalupe corrected. Not that it mattered to Thomas, if the labor was cheap enough. “I’m named after my Spanish ancestors who immigrated to the Caribbean island of—”
But Thomas was too busy plotting how to deal with the woman he once loved—but now hated—to hear a thing Guadalupe said.
“If I’m being honest,” Thomas rambled over her, “it’s not her exposing the ledger that I’m most upset about. It’s about losing the woman who broke my heart.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but I’m not following. What does the ledger have to do with a… love interest?” Certainly no woman was behind the hugest story to hit newspaper stands since the Apollo 13 explosion. And since when did Thomas Cook have a heart?
“Samantha Stanton, the one who got away,” he lamented.
Guadalupe almost detected a tear in his eye before his face went stoic and his jaw clenched. The name rang a bell, but it was too distant and faint to grab hold of.
“She did this. She rejected me after she made me fall in love with her.” Then he turned to Guadalupe with earnest, gripping her hand. “Where did I go wrong with Samantha? What can I do to win her back?”
“I can’t imagine you did anything wrong.” Guadalupe could easily imagine a dozen offensive things he had done. “Perhaps some nice jewelry would work?”
Diamonds were indeed the best friends of the women Thomas usually went for, but Guadalupe doubted it would work on this one that got away… and hopefully stayed away.
Then Thomas did something he had never done before. He hugged Guadalupe. Like a son hugged a mother… if the son was a grown man who treated his mother like a housekeeper. Which was pretty much most men.
Her hand moved up and down in a clumsy pat, reiterating her role as makeshift mother when it came to Thomas Cook’s love life.
“I am sure she will want you back,” she continued, fairly confident the young lady would not, “but whether or not Ms. Stanton reciprocated the feelings, there are plenty of gold-digging women who would do anything for your affection.”
