Betrayal (8 page)

“Of course, I have no problem with that.”

“Thank you, Victor. I’ll call you later.”

She sat thinking for a minute after the call to Victor, wondering again about the hotel bills. And then she called her father. As always, he answered on the first ring.

“Hi, Dad,” she said, trying to sound casual, but he knew her too well for that.

“What’s wrong?” He went right to the point.

She laughed at his question and tried to sound unconcerned. “Some stuff came up in the audit that I’m confused about. Maybe my accountant made a mistake. Would you look at it for me?” Her father was good with spreadsheets and figures, and his mind was still sharp. His body had failed him, but his brain was still operating at full speed.

“I’ll be happy to take a look. Send it over whenever you want. What’s the problem?”

“My accountant says I’m spending twenty-five thousand dollars a month in cash. I’m not spending it, Brigitte says she isn’t. I can’t figure it out.”

“Do you have a joint account with Hunt?” he asked her bluntly, although he liked Hunt immensely, and Hunt certainly had more than enough of his own money and didn’t need Tallie’s, and he’d been very generous with her and Max.

“No, I don’t. We haven’t commingled anything. But I can’t imagine that twenty-five thousand dollars is disappearing every month. I think it’s got to be a mistake, and I don’t want to get upset about it till I know.”

“Have your accountant send me the spreadsheets and I’ll take a look,” her father said in a concerned voice.

“Thanks, Dad.” He was always there for her. She didn’t mention
the
hotels to him, there was no point. It was either identity theft, or one of them was lying, and her father couldn’t know that. But he might be able to figure out the cash or see where Victor Carson had made a mistake. She called Victor back afterward and asked him to messenger copies of the spreadsheets to her father. He promised to do it immediately. And she felt better after that when she went back to work. She was sure that the mystery of the missing cash would be solved with another pair of eyes on the spreadsheet.

Brigitte drove her back to town that night. They chatted amiably on the way home, but Tallie was distracted, thinking about her conversations with Victor, and the conversation between them felt a little strained, which was unusual for them. She wanted to ask Hunt about the hotels, but when she got home, he was out with investors that night. He’d left her a note telling her he loved her. And she sat down on the couch, thinking about the hotels again.

She called Max in New York then just to chat. They talked for half an hour and then Max said she had reading to do for school, and Tallie reluctantly hung up. Tallie’s father called her as soon as they hung up.

“He’s right,” Sam Jones said, sounding disturbed. “You’ve got twenty-five thousand going out the door in cash every month, give or take a thousand. Can’t Brigitte account for it somehow? She’s always so organized and efficient. That’s a lot of cash to lose track of.” Her father sounded as concerned as Victor had.

“I know, Dad,” Tallie said. “I can’t account for it either. And I’m not sloppy with my money.”

“I know you’re not.” He was disturbed about it.

“She pays all the bills and signs the checks, and there’s never been any slippage before, or I thought there wasn’t. But Victor says it’s been going on for a few years.” The same length of time that Hunt had lived with her. But he had no access to her money that she knew of, so that didn’t solve the mystery either. She knew just enough to scare her now, but not enough to figure it out. And there had to be an answer somewhere. “And I know it’s not Brigitte, Dad,” she added. “Her family has a ton of money, and she makes a big salary from me. She doesn’t need to steal cash from me.” It hurt to even say it, but she wanted to get to the bottom of this. “Besides, she is the most impeccably honest person I know. I’ve never had a problem in all these years.” She had been paying Tallie’s bills for sixteen of the seventeen years she’d worked for her, and there had never been a concern or an issue about money. Tallie trusted her completely, and Brigitte had earned that by how reliable and trustworthy she was.

“Well, somebody is taking money from you, if you’re not spending it yourself,” her father confirmed. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Tallie said, sounding distressed. She had been hoping he would tell her that Victor had made a mistake, but he hadn’t, which complicated everything now.

She had no idea where to turn or who to ask. And the issue about the hotel bills was upsetting her too. Brigitte claimed she’d never been to the two hotels, yet she had signed the credit card slips, and Hunt had told Victor that he went there with Tallie, if Victor had understood him correctly. Neither of them was telling the truth, and she had no idea why. Or someone else entirely had
gone
to the two hotels and charged it to her, which was also possible. There had to be an explanation, but maybe it was one she didn’t want to hear. She lay in bed wide awake, torturing herself that night. She had been turning it round and round in her mind. And she always came out in the same place. Brigitte and Hunt were the two people she trusted most in the world, other than her father and daughter, and for the first time ever, in both relationships, she had the feeling that they weren’t telling the truth. It felt awful. She had never had any reason to doubt either of them before.

When Hunt came home, he slipped into the darkened bedroom, careful not to wake her, and she pretended to be asleep. She didn’t know what else to do. She didn’t want to talk to him about it and question him at that hour. And what if he denied going to those hotels? She didn’t want to catch him in a lie. She was afraid to ask him and hear what he’d say. She lay wide awake long after Hunt fell asleep, and she’d only had two hours of sleep when Brigitte picked her up in the morning. Tallie looked terrible, and Brigitte looked serious as they drove away. There was very little conversation between the two women, which was rare for them. Brigitte didn’t say anything all the way to Palm Springs after they picked up coffee at Starbucks, and then just before they got to their location, Tallie was startled when Brigitte pulled off the road. She glanced at Tallie with an agonized look, as Tallie watched her. Something was very wrong.

“I have to talk to you,” Brigitte said in a shaking voice. “I always wondered what I would do in a situation like this, and I hoped I
would
never have to find out. I have to talk to you about Hunt. And I have a small confession to make too.” The two women were sitting in the car, and Tallie dreaded what she was about to hear. Whatever it was, she already knew it wasn’t good. It was written all over Brigitte’s face. She looked as though she hated what she was about to say. For an instant, Tallie wanted to run away before she heard it.

“About three years ago,” she went on, “right after he moved in, Hunt asked me for some cash. He said you had asked him to pay for something. I can’t even remember what it was, but whatever it was, it sounded believable. He had just moved in with you, and you seemed madly in love with him.” Tallie had never been madly in love with him, it was something that had grown over time. But she had certainly been in love, enough to want to live with him and they had been happy and still were. Brigitte went on. “It kept happening. He kept asking me for cash. It wasn’t a lot at first. Just small amounts. He would tell me that he’d forgotten to cash a check, or that you’d asked him to get cash from me. It just kind of snowballed, and eventually I realized he was doing it all the time. I didn’t know what to do or say. I didn’t want to mess things up for you, after all you’ve been through, and he really is a nice guy. It’s just gone on and on and on. I had no idea how much it came to until you told me the other day. I don’t know what he does with the money. I guess he spends it on himself, or socks it away, or whatever. I figured if I said anything to you, it would be all over, and I didn’t want that for you, so I’ve been going along with it for all this time, worried sick about it and scared for you, and mostly sad. I
think
he’s a nice guy, but maybe not an honest one. Tallie, all that cash is going to him.” She looked mortified as she said it, because she had been giving it to him. “Now he just expects it.”

“And you just gave it to him and didn’t tell me?” Tallie looked horrified. The man she lived with and loved had been stealing money from her for three years, and her assistant and best friend hadn’t told her? Worse, she’d been giving him the money? Tallie felt like a total fool, and she was angry at Brigitte for not telling her sooner and hiding it from her. Three years was a long time to remain silent. Brigitte had become his unwilling accomplice, but his accomplice nonetheless. Tallie felt betrayed, by both of them.

“How could you do that and not tell me about it?” Tallie asked with a shocked look on her face.

“I didn’t want to screw up your romance. You need someone in your life, Tallie. You can’t do it all alone. And the picture you made together was such a big hit. I didn’t want to jeopardize that for you either.” There was a lot riding on their relationship now. Tallie knew it too.

“So you let him take money from me and didn’t tell me? Whose side are you on?” Tallie accused her.

“Yours,” Brigitte said without hesitation, with tears in her eyes. “I made a terrible mistake. I let him manipulate me, and I didn’t tell you. I didn’t realize until yesterday how much it had cost you. It’s always a few hundred, a thousand here and there or two, but I guess it adds up in a hurry.” It was a lot. Twenty-five thousand dollars a month was a huge amount to her.

“And he’s been doing it for three years?” Brigitte nodded in
answer.
“Do you realize that it cost me nearly a million dollars in the past three years? And why would he do such a thing? He makes more money than I do.” It just didn’t make sense, but Tallie believed her. The story was too ugly not to be true, and she knew Brigitte wouldn’t make that up. She still trusted her, although her faith in Brigitte had just taken a heavy hit. “Did he tell you not to tell me?” Tallie wanted to know everything now, down to the last word and detail, although she didn’t know what she was going to do, or what to say to him. Victor had been right. She was losing a huge amount of cash. And now she knew how, why, and to whom.

“Eventually, he told me not to tell you. He knew what he was doing, and so did I. Stealing from you, and it makes me feel sick that I helped him.”

“You call that a ‘small confession’?” Tallie looked appropriately shocked.

“That wasn’t what I meant.” Brigitte looked profoundly distressed, as well she should be. It was the most upsetting thing Tallie had ever heard about a man in her life, worse than discovering that her British movie-star husband was cheating on her with his leading lady, and reading about it in the press. What Hunt had done was profoundly dishonest. It was stealing. “My ‘small’ confession was that I did go to the Chateau Marmont once, and charged it on the card. I didn’t have my credit card with me. I’m not even sure now who I went with. I think it was that cameraman I was so crazy about. He was married, and you didn’t want me to sleep with him, so I didn’t have the guts to tell you. I paid back the money though, in cash, to the petty cash account, every penny.”

“Victor says there was more than one credit card slip with your signature on it from the Chateau Marmont and the Sunset Marquis,” Tallie said sternly. “He checked.”

“I may have gone twice, but I always reimbursed it. Maybe someone forged my signature on the other slips. Maybe even Hunt. And that’s the other thing I have to tell you.” She took a breath and plunged in. “I think he’s been seeing someone for about a year now. I suspected it at first, and I have a friend who works in his office. He confirmed it when I asked him. She’s some young secretary, very young I think. She has an abusive ex-husband and a child, a three-year-old boy. I think she’s about twenty-five or twenty-six. My friend says that Hunt must have been sorry for her, and tried to help her. Her ex came back to beat her up, and the kid, after she left him. Hunt was very sympathetic, and helped her find a place to live, and I guess it all started from there. They’ve been having an affair for about a year. He stays at hotels with her, mostly when you’re away, I think. And the maid says he never sleeps at the house now when you’re gone. Apparently that’s true. I checked.” Brigitte looked devastated as she told Tallie the details.

“The maid told you about this? Does everyone know except me?” He had played her for a fool, while stealing money from her and cheating on her. She never would have suspected it of him in a million years. Instead of being the best man she had ever had, he had turned out to be the worst one.

“What are you going to do?” Brigitte asked, looking desperately worried and remorseful. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I’m always trying to protect you. I knew you’d be upset about the money, but I thought maybe you’d think he was worth it, and I thought the
affair
with this girl would blow over. But it hasn’t. They say it’s very serious, and she wants to marry him as soon as her divorce comes through.”

“And when was he going to tell me that little piece of news? After their honeymoon? Jesus, he’s a shit.” Tallie looked as though the bottom had just fallen out of her world.

“And so am I for not telling you all this before. I only heard about the affair with the girl about six moths ago. I should have told you then. And about the money before that. I really made all the wrong decisions on this one.” Her confessing it now made Tallie feel a little more benevolent toward her, but she was badly shaken. Brigitte had hidden important information from Tallie, because she didn’t want to hurt her. But she had hidden Hunt’s cheating on her and stealing money from her. Both were serious offenses, and Tallie didn’t deserve it. Brigitte had never been in such a tough position in her life. She was crying as she sat in the car looking guilty and devastated.