Page 19 of Shopping for an Heir
“He’s fine,” McCormick grunted.
She gave Gerald a no-nonsense look. “James had an adverse reaction, so we’re halting treatment today.” She patted McCormick’s hand. “It happens.”
“It hasn’t happened to me before,” McCormick said weakly.
“Self-care for the next week is mandatory.” She looked at Gerald. “We gave him some anti-anxiety and anti-nausea medication. He shouldn’t be left alone for the next twelve to twenty-four hours.”
“Quit talking about me like I’m not in the room. I’m fine,” McCormick snapped.
“Your labs say otherwise, Mr. McCormick,” the doctor announced. She shrugged and left.
He made a dismissive noise. “Let’s go,” the old man said, gruff and angry.
“Sir?”
McCormick began to stand, then keeled to the right in an alarming fashion. By his side in seconds, Gerald grabbed him in time, keeping him upright.
“I could use a sit-down,” McCormick said, as if he were asking for a martini. With great care, Gerald spent the next ten minutes moving him to the main foyer, then out to the SUV. It was like moving a box you can’t lift, one shove at a time, except Gerald had to be gentle.
“I hate these machines,” McCormick growled as Gerald worked to find the smoothest way in. He had to give McCormick credit; it was much easier helping a sick person into a traditional limousine vs. an SUV.
“Home.” The simple word carried so much.
“Sir, should I call one of your sons to help—”
“No! Absolutely not.”
“I’m sure they would want to know—”
“Did I ask for your opinion?”
Any other man would have been cowed by James McCormick’s tone, but Gerald took it in stride.
“No, sir.”
“I don’t appreciate my chauffeur telling me how to live my life.”
All right. That was it.
“If I were just a chauffeur, sir, I would agree. But I am your security detail as well, and I would be remiss in my duties if I left you alone while compromised.” Gerald pulled out his best commanding voice, planning on the spot, figuring out all the moving parts as they rolled out so he could find a way to make sure the old man was going to be okay.
“Excuse me?” The belligerent tone was fading, though McCormick’s demeanor was stiff.
“It’s a matter of corporate integrity, sir.” Thinking on his feet, Gerald decided the best approach was to appeal to the man’s sense of pride and his business acumen. “Anterdec needs you. I work for Anterdec. I would hate to have to face the board of directors in the future to explain why I left one of their most valuable assets ill and alone.”
“Their most valuable asset,” McCormick corrected him with another harumph.
“Of course.”
“Andrew may be CEO now, but I built this company from the ground up. I sacrificed and deferred.” He paused, taking in a slow, deep breath. “I gave everything to my company.”
“And your results are admirable.”
McCormick watched him, eyes narrowing, as he breathed slowly and thoroughly, clearly working on managing whatever physical state made him so pale, so angry.
“Yes. They are.”
“And a man of your stature should have someone here to help take care of any matters that might require assistance, like phone calls, rescheduling, errands...”
“That person is you.”
“Sir, I have a two p.m. appointment. I have to leave by half past one.” He looked at the clock. 11:15. “Should I call Becky?”
“Becky?” McCormick’s eyes flew open. He looked like someone shot him in the chest. “Hell, no.” Rumor had it the old man had been sleeping with his executive admin for a few years, and Gerald had wondered.
Confirmation comes in the strangest moments.
“Then who?”
While McCormick closed his eyes and refused to answer, Gerald realized he had the answer.
Pam.
When you work for wealthy people long enough, you learn an important lesson: time really is money. Make yourself valuable enough, and you can get away with murder. Being irreplaceable is a form of job security, because for the wealthy, the transition of training someone new to handle their quirks was more painful than almost any employee behavior.
He took a calculated risk and sent a quick text to Pam Warrick. Her daughter Amanda, Andrew McCormick’s fiancée, had given him the number a long time ago when he’d been tasked with picking up Pam. Gerald liked her. Quiet, smart, easy to talk to, and humble.
The opposite of what he expected in a friend of James McCormick, but the world had a way of continually surprising Gerald.
So did people.
Bzzz.
Be there in thirty, she typed back.
Gerald’s shoulders loosened with relief. He’d rather incur McCormick’s wrath at reaching out to Pam without permission than deal with the guilt of knowing he’d been ill and alone.
“Gerald,” McCormick said, his voice gaining strength. “Get me home. The Back Bay.”
“Can you handle the drive, sir?” Not that driving him to his house in the suburbs would be any easier.
He let out a shaky breath. “I’ll manage.”
Twenty minutes later, Gerald was parked in front of McCormick’s brownstone, a stand-alone building with a private garden. The estate in Weston was for entertainment and show. Most of McCormick’s time was spent here, in the five-bedroom, three-bath home with an English courtyard garden maintained by two master gardeners.
Unfortunately, the building involved stairs.
Stairs that loomed large in Gerald’s eyes. He could carry the guy easily, but McCormick would never, ever agree to that.
Not, at least, while conscious.
“I’m fine,” McCormick protested, as if reading Gerald’s mind. “Just winded.”
It took a while, but the guy made it into the large front room of the first story and settled into a comfortable leather wingback chair.
Gerald sprang to action. Unable to get ginger beer in time, he resorted to making lemon tea for James McCormick, delivering it just as the front buzzer rang.
Busted.
And yet, McCormick just looked at him and said, “Get the door.”
He did.
Pam Warrick stood there, purse on her arm, tiny teacup Chihuahua named Spritzy peeking his head out.
“Ma’am.”
“Call me Pam, Gerald.”
“Hello, Pam. He doesn’t know I texted you,” Gerald admitted in a soft voice.
“He texted me three minutes after you did, Gerald. Your secret is safe.”
Without meaning to, he smiled.
“You look so different when you grin!” Pam exclaimed, walking with great care as she made her way to McCormick’s living room. Gerald was surprised. She seemed to know her way around.
“Pam? Is that you?”
At the sound of McCormick’s voice, Spritzy leaped from the purse on Pam’s arm and scampered across the marble floor, onto the Persian rug, and clambered up McCormick’s leg.
“There you are,” he muttered. “Best medicine any man could have.” Cracking one eye open, James McCormick looked at Pam.
“You should have texted me sooner, James,” she chided, walking to him, planting a sweet kiss on the crown of his ash-colored head.
“I’m fine. I just needed some doggie love.”
Pam quirked an eyebrow at Gerald.
Who shook his head.
She nodded. Message received.
“What went wrong?”
“Stupid doctors,” McCormick grumbled. “Fools. Something about my labs. Blah blah blah kidney problem, so they halted treatment. Said I could try again in a few weeks.” He harumphed again, sounding like a walrus with strep throat.
“But the cancer?”
“It’s holding steady. No growth. This is just maintenance.” He waved a lazy hand.
The audible sound of relief from Pam made Gerald pay more attention to the dynamic between the two of them. People-watching wasn’t a habit.
It was a job requirement.
“Then what’s wrong?”
“Nausea,” James McCormick finally confessed. “And fatigue. You know how tiring running a Fortune 500 company can be.”
Pam gave him a look Gerald couldn’t discern. “The doctors gave you something for the nausea, I assume.”
“Yes. Didn’t help.”
“That I understand. Medicines that don’t work.” Gerald knew that Pam suffered from fibromyalgia. He’d helped her to walk up her porch stairs before.
“I wish the damn doctors could find a way to make this go away.”
Pam’s eyes darted to Gerald, then James. She leaned over and whispered in the old man’s ear.
He jerked so quickly that Spritzy leaped off his lap and skittered to the ground, nervous.
“Pamela! I cannot believe you would suggest such a thing.”
Her cheeks pinked.
Gerald started to slowly move toward the kitchen. Apparently, he’d underestimated their relationship. He had no desire to be around when they went to the bedroom and—
“You mean,” James McCormick asked stiffly, not making eye contact with Pam, “you want me to inhale The Reefer?”
James McCormick’s expression made it clear that Pam might as well have just asked him to vote for Bernie Sanders.
If the man had been wearing a set of pearls, he’d be clutching them.
And Gerald was off. Way off.
Thank God.
“Haven’t you—haven’t you ever tried it, James?” Pam asked.
