The Last Mrs. Parrish(32)

She turned to leave, but Amber called out, “I’ll walk down with you.”

They walked in silence to the elevator bank, and when they got on, Amber gave her a shy smile.

“I want to thank you for giving me this chance. You don’t know how much it means to me.”

Battley raised her eyebrows. “Don’t thank me. I had nothing to do with it.”

“Mrs. Parrish told me how valuable your opinion is to Mr. Parrish,” Amber said. “She made it quite clear that I was here on a probationary basis. If you don’t find me up to snuff, then I’ll have to look elsewhere.”

Amber could tell that the woman’s pride made her believe this bullshit. Battley stood a little straighter. “We shall see, then.”

Yes, we shall, Amber thought.

*

After a month, she’d still had no direct contact with Jackson, but Old Battle-Ax had begun to rely on her more and more. Amber would arrive at least fifteen minutes before her, so that she could bring Battley her morning coffee with a little something extra in it. Amber had a three-month supply of Elavil from her internist. She had told him that she was having panic attacks, and he’d recommended it. He did mention some possible side effects: short-term memory loss and confusion. She’d started dosing low, and hoped that Battley’s predilection for flavored creamer obscured any trace of the pills in her coffee.

Battley arrived that morning, seemingly more confused than normal. Amber noticed that her pace had become slower and that she paused often, looking around her desk as if unsure of what to do next.

When Battley got up to go to the bathroom, Amber quickly went into her office and took the woman’s keys from her purse and moved them. She then refiled a folder that was sitting on her desk. Battley came back to her office and searched for the missing file, panic in her eyes. At the end of the day, Battley opened her purse and looked inside. Amber watched as she moved the contents around and finally poured everything out on her desk. No keys. She looked stricken. “Amber,” she called. “Have you seen my keys?”

Amber hurried into Battley’s office. “No, I haven’t. Aren’t they in your handbag?”

“No,” she said, almost in tears.

“Here,” Amber said, taking the purse from the desk. “Let me look.” She pretended to root around. “Hmm. You’re right. Not here.” She stood a moment as if thinking. “Have you looked in your drawers?”

“Of course not. I never take them from my pocketbook. I would never put them in my desk,” she insisted.

“Why don’t we look, just in case.”

“Ridiculous,” Battley huffed, but opened the drawer. “See, they’re not there.”

Amber leaned over to look and then glanced past them, at the wastebasket next to the file cabinet. She pulled it toward her.

“They’re in the trash can.” Amber reached in and pulled them out, handing them to Battley.

Battley stood still, staring at the ring of keys in her hand as she swallowed hard. It was apparent that the woman was distraught, but all she said was good night before turning and leaving without another word. Amber smiled as she watched her walk away.

A few days later Amber rearranged the cards in Battley’s Rolodex—she must have been the last person on earth to still have one. As the weeks wore on, the stress was having the intended effect—a haunted look of constant worry was in the older woman’s eyes. Amber felt a little bad about what she was doing, but the woman really needed to retire. Her time would have been much better spent with her grandkids. She’d told Amber she had five and complained that she didn’t get to see them enough. Now she’d get to be with them more, and Jackson would probably give her a good retirement package—especially if he believed she had dementia. Amber was doing her a favor, really.

And didn’t Jackson deserve someone more hip and this-century helping him out? He was probably keeping her on out of loyalty. Amber was doing them both a favor, when she thought about it. This morning, she’d printed off a paper with gibberish and slipped it in between the pages of a report Battley had just finished. She knew the woman would think she’d really lost it when she saw it, and of course, she’d never mention it to anyone. Amber figured it would only take another few weeks. Between her eroding self-confidence and the mistakes she was soon to make, arousing Jackson’s suspicions, Amber would be sitting pretty in Battley’s office in no time.





Twenty




It took much longer than Amber anticipated, but after three months, it had all become too much for Battley, and she handed in her resignation. Amber was now filling in while Jackson began the search for a new head assistant. She was still in her tiny cubicle, while Battley’s office remained vacant, and while it bothered Amber that he hadn’t yet considered letting her step in permanently, she was confident he would soon find her indispensable. She had already spent the past seven nights learning everything she could about his newest clients from Tokyo—it was amazing what people put on their social media profiles. Even if they did have the smarts to set up their privacy settings properly, what they didn’t realize was that every photo they were tagged in linked to someone else’s page, and not everyone was as diligent. Between using her background-check software and trolling all the social sites, she had a comprehensive picture of each of them, including their disgusting predilections. She had also conducted a thorough search of their recent business deals to get an idea of their negotiating skills and any tricks they might have up their sleeves.