Chapter 13 – Letting the Dust Settle
Parker stretched and rolled to her side, amazed that a mere mattress could make the difference between a restful night's sleep and twelve hours of tossing and turning. The morning sunlight was streaming in through the sheer curtains of Sydney's guestroom, making the act of waking up one of almost celebration. She settled back into her pillow, clutched the covers to her in the chill of the morning and enjoyed the fact that there was nobody standing over her, urging her to get up, eat, and get ready to go to work immediately.
And yet, as she lay there, she knew that life was going to be getting far more complicated for her in the near future. In the Centre, every aspect of her day had been regimented, scheduled, pre-determined by others – where now, SHE was solely responsible for making the decisions about what she would do, where she would go. Perhaps this wouldn't be such a bad thing except for the fact that she knew next to nothing about this huge world outside the cinderblock walls of the Centre sublevel that had been her home for months. What was even more remarkable – and frightening – was that there was a young child that was her only family that would be depending entirely on HER, and she had no idea whatsoever how she was going to manage that.
Her hand smoothed over her flat abdomen and the life that she knew instinctively was growing inside her. She didn't have the vaguest idea how she was going to be able to be a decent mother for her baby either. She couldn't remember what it was like to be a child or how her own mother had treated her, so she had no guide to behavior or attitudes. So much was riding on her shoulders now – the lives of two people at the very least depended on her. She had never felt quite so lost and alone, even as she took in a deep breath of air that was fresh from the outdoors and not dry or processed. Sydney and Jarod seemed very fond of her – or at least of the person she had once been, the person that had died when her memories had been stolen from her – and if they abandoned her because she couldn't live up to their expectations, or couldn't be brought to remember…
From beyond the closed wooden door of the bedroom, Parker could hear the sounds of voices as the rest of the household began to stir. If her ear wasn't mistaken, she could hear Sydney and Jarod conferring in the hallway about breakfast – and a high-pitched voice chimed in that must be her little brother, newly awake. He sounded a little scared too – with good reason. If what Sydney and Jarod said were true, he'd never seen the outside of the Centre for his entire life either – and if that thought scared and excited her, it must terrify HIM.
Parker sat up, pushed her covers away and reached with a shiver for the flannel robe Sydney had loaned her – and then started giggling when she discovered in pulling it on that the difference between his height and bulk and hers meant that she was going to swim in it. The comic relief moment had helped her mood, however; and she experimented to see just how far she'd have to wrap the robe around her before she wouldn't look like she was swimming in it – until she'd nearly doubled the robe around herself. Still chuckling, she pulled the belt tight around her and padded across the bedroom floor in her bare feet. When she pulled the door open and stepped out, she was met by three men with faces that dropped into very guilty expressions at the sight of her.
"I told you we'd wake her up," Sydney chided his former student.
"I was awake before then," she shook her head, smiling at Jarod to take him off the hook. "I was just laying there enjoying the fact that nobody was hanging over me making me do things for a change."
"Oh yeah," Jarod nodded understandingly. "I can remember waking up after my first night outside the Centre too. I almost didn't GET up that day."
She frowned. "You were stuck in the Centre too?" He seemed to be so comfortable in this big world! What else had she forgotten? Hadn't he told her that they'd been friends since childhood? How long had the Centre been a part of her life anyway?
"Jarod and Angelo in Centre," Angelo told her with a nod. "You too – just not like us."
"Sissy!" her little brother ran into her side and clung to her waist. "What am I going to do today if I don't have problems and studies?"
"I'm not entirely sure," she admitted, dropping a hand to his shoulder and holding him to her. "Remember, I told you that I don't remember a lot of things – what we do when we don't have people telling us what to do is one of the big ones I've forgotten."
"Are we going to have to talk to the policemen again like yesterday?" the lad continued nervously. "They asked a lot of questions I didn't really understand… and I know what happens when I don't know the answers to questions…"
"I'm not sure…" Parker looked up into Sydney's face. "Are they going to want to talk to us some more?"
"I'm sure that if they have any more questions for you, they'll stop by – but that you don't have to sit around and wait just in case they think of something else to ask you," the older man replied in his musically accented voice. "You didn't do anything wrong – you have nothing to worry about from the police, either of you." Sydney smiled down at the little boy clinging to his sister. "I'm thinking of some very pleasant activities that you might want to consider for your first day in the real world."
Parker blinked at the strange reference, but the little boy seemed to respond to the very idea of doing something enjoyable. "What?" he coaxed.
"Well, there's a park right across the street that you might want to go play in," Sydney suggested with a gesture that indicated an invitation to begin moving downstairs. "It has lots of trees and grass…" He glanced at Jarod. "I'm thinking, maybe, a picnic lunch might not be a bad idea…"
Jarod smirked. "I think that sounds like a wonderful way to 'break the ice' of being free again, Parker," he told her confidently. "One of the things I couldn't get enough of when I was first out was fresh air and sunshine. And YOU…" he bent to poke the little boy gently in the chest, "…could use a chance to learn to run around and not have any walls to run into. Maybe I'll even show you how to climb trees." He glanced at Angelo. "You too."
The boy gazed up into his sister's face hopefully. "Do you think I can?" he asked eagerly. "I've never seen REAL trees up close – just the ones in movies and when we were driving here yesterday…"
Parker caught the look that Jarod and Sydney exchanged – and marveled at the sadness in it. "Tell you what – since that's what Jarod and Sydney want to do today, why don't we let them make our plans for us?"
"Right now I think our plans include getting ourselves a good breakfast," Sydney once more gestured to get the group moving toward the stairs. "I don't know about any of you, but I could use my morning cup of coffee."
"Coffee?" Parker's brow furled again. "Do I like coffee?"
"You used to," Sydney told her with a hand on her shoulder to guide her towards the stairs, opting for honesty at that moment, "although you have an ulcer that would probably appreciate it if you didn't drink quite so much of it…" He thought for a moment. "How about I let you taste mine, and you can decide for yourself?"
Parker nodded and moved forward toward the stairs obediently, tossing Sydney's idea around in her mind. Deciding for herself what she did and didn't like – what she did or didn't want to do – sounded like a reasonable plan for dealing with questions about her former self. The present moment was all she had – and reconstructing a sense of self would be best done on HER terms, not on terms dictated by someone who wasn't around anymore.
oOoOo
"What do you mean, you won't do it?" Raines' wheezing grew worse as his stress levels were climbing through the roof. He would rather have been seated, but instead was standing at the pay phone at the end of the cell block that had been his accommodations the night before. What was more, his hope for getting out of this dank and dreary place and back to his comfortable apartment was fading fast.
"I mean," Charles Hazelton's smooth voice came back to him over the telephone receiver, "that there is nobody at the Centre currently empowered to retain me for your defense at Centre expense."
"What about Lyle? He's officially second in command…"
Hazelton cleared his throat. "Mr. Lyle has his own legal worries to contend with. It seems that evidence and information has been turned over to the FBI pertaining to several murder cases in a number of states over the past few years, and he has been arrested as well. I just turned down representing HIM for the same reason I have to turn you down: the Centre has nobody authorized to write the checks at the moment."
"Miss Parker…" Raines began and then wilted back in his chair. Miss Parker couldn't even remember her own name – and it was he who had put her in that position. In typical Centre fashion, nobody else had ever been allowed close enough to the 'throne' to qualify as a signatory on a Centre account, much less given enough authority to qualify as a temporary replacement in time to get him out of here. No, there would be no looking for help from Centre forthcoming whatsoever – and it was ultimately HIS fault that there wouldn't be.
"I'd advise you to accept a public defender as soon as possible," Hazelton told the man who had once held the reins of power beyond his imagination. "From the looks of the evidence against you, you'll need all the help you can get."
"The Centre used to have an entire legal team," Raines wheezed painfully again. "They can't all have vanished…"
"Considering the information that has been made available to the news media, frankly there are a lot of people who would prefer to keep their professional connections to the Centre quiet," Hazelton commented dryly, "myself included, as a matter of fact. It's entirely likely that the only chance you'll have of receiving a fair trial will be for a change of venue to some rural part of the country that doesn't have much by way of television coverage – because that's probably the only place you'll be able to get a lawyer who'll be willing to defend you."
"This is just a temporary setback," Raines complained.
Hazelton coughed to hide his gasp of surprise. "With all due respect, Mr. Raines, I think, considering the circumstance, you'll need to reassess your definition of the word 'temporary' very soon." He cleared his throat again. "And now, if you'll excuse me, I have other pressing matters that I need to attend to…"
"Don't you dare hang up on me," Raines shouted in outrage and then gasped in a breath of oxygen noisily. "I own you, you slime. You work for me…"
"Not anymore." And with relish, Charles Hazelton hung up the phone on his former client and patted himself on the back at the neat way he'd extricated himself from what could have been a very embarrassing situation. He felt sorry for whatever poor slob from the Public Defender's office or Legal Aid got handed this case, because the evidence against Raines and the rest of the people now under lock and key was overwhelming.
oOoOo
It was almost like a dream. Parker closed her eyes, leaned back on both her hands and focused all her attention on the way the gentle spring breeze lifted her hair away from her face with a soft touch that brushed past cheeks and nose. The picnic had been a success as far as little brother was concerned – with Jarod around to teach him how to play on the equipment, he was soon whooping and laughing and running as if he'd never tried such a thing before. The satisfied, goofy grin she'd caught from Jarod told the story – he was remembering his own first day of freedom and helping the boy get a good memory of HIS first day of freedom to hang onto.
Not long after breakfast, Jarod had vanished only to return about an hour later with a couple of bags of clothing he claimed to have fetched from her house. He handed her the bags and invited her to take them back upstairs to the guest room and unpack. When she did, she discovered that the person she'd been before had indulged in expensive tastes when it came to clothing. Accustomed now to the soft cotton of the olive drab shirt and blouse and serviceable cotton undergarments that the Centre had provided, the feel of lace and silk made her uncomfortable. What would she do if she suddenly regained her memories only to discover that she herself had ruined her own nice things? What was more, she had evidently lost a considerable amount of weight, for some of the clothes just hung on her frame like expensive, oversized sacks.
She'd brought her worries back down the stairs – and Sydney had simply bundled both her and her little brother and Angelo into his comfortable car and driven them all to a department store. By the time he'd brought them back to his house again, all the refugees had minimal wardrobes of low-cost and low-maintenance fabrics. Parker had immediately headed upstairs to don a light-weight cotton shift-dress after overseeing her little brother into jeans, a wildly colorful tee shirt and new sneakers. Angelo reappeared after a few minutes in the bathroom in a western snap-down shirt and jeans, grinning from ear to ear – and had immediately taken his old Centre drabs and tossed them pointedly into the fireplace. "Sydney burn?"
Sydney had chuckled. "Tonight, Angelo, I promise."
The picnic itself had been an experience. Sydney and Jarod had clucked together as they compiled sandwiches and drinks and packed them carefully in an old basket brought out of the garage, covered by a blanket dragged from the linen closet. Then, with Jarod holding the little boy by the hand and Sydney placing Parker's hand in the bend of his arm, they marched across the street and into lush grass and fresh-leafed trees.
The first thing that happened – almost before Parker could say a word – was that brand-new sneakers and socks had been hastily removed, and a little boy had experienced the sensation of walking across green grass with his bare feet for the first time. Without missing a beat, Angelo shed his shoes and socks as well, and then danced across the green with arms spread wide in the sunshine, humming to himself. Sydney had watched Parker watch her little brother and Angelo a little jealously and then quietly slip her own foot out of her sandal and test the sensation of grass against the soles of her feet too. When she'd looked back up at him, startled at the prickly-soft beneath her feet and the way the blades insisted their way between her toes, she found him smiling at her with just a touch of sadness.
Now, with sandwiches eaten and fruit juice drunk and a little boy back at the swing sets squealing with happiness every time Jarod gave him a shove that sent him flying higher while Angelo swayed gently at his side, Parker was hard-put to remember a time when she'd been so happy. THIS was freedom.
And yet…
"What if I never remember," she worried at Sydney, who sat off to the side observing her patiently, quietly, not intruding on her thoughts without invitation.
"We haven't really started to work at trying to help you remember yet," came the response. "Don't worry about crossing that bridge until..."
"But I'm already there," she insisted, sitting up straighter again and tipping her head so she could look at her companion. "I keep bumping into the back of the person I used to be every time I turn around. Do I like coffee? What kind of clothes do I want to wear?" She shook her head, remembering the grimace of distaste at the sip of hot liquid Sydney had given her that morning. "I don't think she and I are very much alike at all."
Sydney's graying brows rose slightly. "That's been known to happen among amnesia victims. It's completely normal, Parker."
"But SHE'S the one you and Jarod are fond of – not me." Parker stated the fact with quiet firmness. "I know this."
"I have been very fond of you for a very long time," Sydney admitted, "but I must admit that there have been times that I didn't like the way you behaved or how you treated me and others very much. When I look at you now – the way you are now…" He sighed. "I see the kind of person you might have turned out to be, had it not been for the way you were raised. If anything, I feel closer to you now than ever."
"Was I a bad person, then?" she asked hesitantly.
"No," he replied slowly, "just a very damaged and defensive one. You've had many tragic things happen to you – things that had made you bitter and hard in some ways." He glanced over at Jarod, knowing that they had discussed finding a good time and place to begin the nudging at mental barriers. "For example, you were nearby when your mother committed suicide in a Centre elevator – this happened when you were eleven."
Parker's eyes widened, remembering that hole in the top of the elevator car that she and Greg had been commenting on only a day or so earlier. "That was my mother?"
Sydney nodded. "You were heartbroken – you were an only child, and you loved your mother very much." He watched her face carefully, but the nudge had accomplished nothing. Despite bringing up one of the strongest and most painful topics he could think of, Parker's memory remained locked away tightly.
"But my father – he took care of me, right?" she asked in concern.
"Your father was always more interested in the welfare of the Centre than in yours," he told her, voicing criticism he'd held secretly within for far too long. "And when I or others would have helped you – given you emotional support – he sent you away to boarding school."
"But…" Parker's eyes will filled with confusion. "You said…"
"There was a space of time, between when your mother left you and when you were sent away, that you spent a great deal of time in and around the Sim Lab where I was working with Jarod. You and he and Angelo became fast friends – and I quietly gave you three the time and the space to be children for the time you were together. You started to come to me with your problems and we talked long talks while you'd be waiting for your father to pick you up to go home." His face softened as he remembered.
"Who was my father?"
Sydney's face hardened. "He was the Chairman of the Centre – the top man. He ran the place – he was my boss, and Mr. Raines' boss."
"Where is he now?"
Sydney watched her face carefully. "You were on an airplane together – he opened the door and stepped out into the storm. They never found his body." Once more, the nudge toward a strong emotional moment had no effect whatsoever.
"Did I ever have a husband at one time?" Parker asked softly, thinking of the vague face that came often to her mind when she tried to remember the husband they'd told her she'd lost – and of the gentle arms that sometimes held her in her dreams.
"No," Sydney shook his head, "but you came close. You were in love with a man named Thomas Gates – he was murdered." Again her face stayed merely troubled – she exhibited no signs of the mental and physical upheaval that accompanied memories returning en masse.
"Is this his child, then?"
"Thomas died years ago, Parker. No, the child you carry is Jarod's."
She turned and stared at him. "Jarod's?"
"They captured him about the same time they took you – they stole his memories too. And while they had control of him, they stole his… genetic material… in order to make you pregnant. You carry the genes that make you the same kind of genius that Jarod is – and they were training you as I had trained Jarod years ago, remember?" He watched her nod, eyes wide and almost startled. "I suspect they kept you unconscious only until they could be sure that you WERE pregnant, and then awakened you with the story of the car accident and a dead husband to explain the baby. It was likely that they intended to take the baby away from you after it was born on the suspicion or assumption that it would be what they called a 'Super Pretender' who would be a genius like its father and have the psychic talents of the mother."
"So Jarod and I… we've never…?" Parker blushed.
Sydney shook his head. "No, not to my knowledge – although you've been much fonder of him than you've wanted to admit, and he's never made any bones about his caring about you."
Something Sydney said suddenly registered. "What did you mean by 'the psychic talents of the mother'?"
"I meant that, like your mother before you, you are – or were – able to hear the voices." Sydney looked away. "You asked me to help you learn to listen and understand better – but then stopped those lessons rather abruptly a few years ago."
"Voices?" Now she was confused. "Whose voices?"
"Your mother's, for one," he replied easily. "As for the others, you'd have to ask your half-brother Ethan. He has your mother's gift too."
"I have a half-brother?" The fine, dark brows arched high. "I thought this little one was my only family." She pointed to the little boy on the swing.
"You and Jarod share a half-brother," Sydney told her, knowing that much of what he'd been saying was entirely fantastic. "Ethan is the result of what happened the LAST time they tried to get their Super Pretender – only that time, they used your mother and Jarod's father as the biological parents."
"Where is… Ethan?"
Sydney nodded toward the play equipment. "For the answer to that one, you'll have to ask Jarod. Ethan has been with his family for several years now – they've been keeping him safe from Mr. Raines and anyone who would try to manipulate him."
Parker turned and watched the two playing on the swings again. "I don't remember," she murmured softly. "All of this, and I don't remember a thing. Of course, from some of what you've said – and what you haven't said, I'm not exactly sure remembering is all it's cracked up to be…"
Sydney's hand landed gently and comfortingly on her shoulder, despite his disappointment. "Despite the way in which the drug has interfered with your memories, the truth is that amnesia is rarely permanent – and the chances of this fugue of yours lasting for the rest of your life is fairly small. Besides, the duration of the effect of the drug you were given was never fully investigated – nor do we still have a full accounting of how much of the drug you were given or how often it was administered. For now, we'll keep trying to nudge loose the memories – and one day we'll trip over the key, probably when we least expect it. Until then, we'll just keep on taking things one day at a time."
She nodded. It was all she COULD do.
Sydney sighed silently. He'd have to tell Jarod that Parker's amnesia was taking a different form that that of the men. Perhaps it had to do with her being female – or perhaps being female AND pregnant – perhaps it had to do with the frequency and amount of the dosage she was given that was different than what the others had received. He frowned. There was just too much about this that wasn't known yet – the only thing he DID know was that getting Parker to remember wasn't going to be as much of a cakewalk as the others.
oOoOo
"Hi, Miss Parker," Debbie called out into the house as she and her father stepped through the door. The tall brunette rose to her feet with a slightly confused look on her face.
Parker turned to Sydney. "I thought my name was Parker," she complained.
"Parker is your last name," the old psychiatrist explained, "although Jarod and I and your brother Lyle have generally called you Parker."
"She still doesn't remember?" Debbie asked, her face falling.
"Debbie," her father chided. "We weren't all lucky enough to have strong memory links close-by to kick us back into shape mentally." He looked around. "Isn't Sam here yet?"
"He called," Jarod stated, walking out from the kitchen. "He said he'd be here a few minutes late."
"What's my first name?" Parker leaned toward Sydney.
He shook his head. "You never told me. Jarod knows, though…" Parker turned and gazed at Jarod – he held so many of her answers, and had yet to offer any of them without prodding. As if reading her mind, Sydney bent toward her this time. "We didn't want to overload you with information just to see what will work because we knew that the experience of memories returning is overwhelming by itself. We didn't want to compound that with upset and distress over things you couldn't' remember beforehand We had originally hoped that seeing me – or seeing Jarod – would have done the trick, but it didn't. And now that we've even mentioned some of the strongest memories and topics without any reaction from you, we're both a little at a loss as to what to do."
"You don't think hearing my own name wouldn't do it?" she asked in surprise.
"You never used the name in all the years I've known you, Parker," he replied honestly. "For all I know, there's no attachment to it at all for you."
Broots noticed the intense discussion going on in the corner and made his way to them even as a heavy knock on the door announced Sam's arrival. "Everything OK, Miss P?"
"Just fine," she replied with a slightly sarcastic tone. "Just trying to figure out my place in the scheme of things."
"Miss Parker." The voice of the sweeper was soft, but it held such an amount of respect that Parker turned to it immediately. Sam's blue eyes washed over her and caught on the fact that her gaze showed no recognition at all. "They must have done you differently than the rest of us."
"Must have," she replied, sarcastic tone still in place. She raised her voice. "Will somebody PLEASE tell me what my first name is?"
Broots backed away with surprise, and even Sam seemed taken aback. Jarod, however, merely shook his head. "I'll tell you privately later," he promised, "but I think that maintaining everyone calling you either Parker or Miss Parker will make it easier once your memory DOES come back."
"What about mine? What about MY first name?" Parker's little brother piped up from where he'd curled on the sofa into Angelo's side to stay out of the way of the other adults in the room. "I haven't even got one!"
Sydney smiled and went over to sit down by the boy. "We have many things to talk about this evening," he said, putting a gentle arm around the small shoulders, "and I think this might be a good place to start." He looked around the room, and everybody seemed willing to settle down into seats around the room. "Anybody got any suggestions for a name for this young man?"
oOoOo
Parker stared at the lawyer. "But I don't know anything about all this!"
"It really doesn't matter. We need someone who can be responsible for handling Centre affairs, Miss Parker," the distinguished-looking man with the silver fringe and goatee replied, pulling the papers back across the kitchen table. "As you are the only member of the Parker family old enough to be responsible, it falls to you to take care of…"
A shudder went through Parker from head to toe – and she could think of no good reason for it except that she just *knew* she didn't want anything to do with owning or running the organization that had stolen her life and her memories from her. "I don't want it," she announced flatly. "Talk to somebody else."
"Fine," the lawyer responded with his calm façade only slightly marred by the intransigence of the nominal Chairman of the Centre, "then perhaps you'd like to appoint someone to act in your name?"
Parker rose to her feet and went to the sink to get herself a glass of water as a way of disguising how upsetting the entire idea was to her. "I'll think about it," was all she said.
The lawyer gazed at her for a long moment, and then realized that he'd gotten about as far with her that day as he was going to. "I'll be in touch in a couple of days to hear your decision," he sighed, filing paperwork back into his valise that he'd hoped to get taken care of immediately. "Please don't take too long in making up your mind – these matters are pressing and won't wait, and those doing the pressing aren't going to give a damn about whether you do or don't remember anything."
Parker whirled, storm-grey eyes snapping. "Get out!" she demanded in a soft voice, her finger pointing to the front of the house and the door. "I told you I'd think about it – but that's about as far as I'm going today. I will NOT be pushed, no matter how 'pressing' any of those papers were." The two of them glared at each other for a moment, then, "GET OUT!" she ordered with a touch of panic.
Sydney had risen from his reading in his den and come to the kitchen at the sound of Parker's voice being raised, and he looked at the tall brunette with concern. "Parker? Is anything wrong?"
The lawyer gave the psychiatrist a withering glare. "I'm just leaving," he announced regally, and then glared back at Parker for a last time. "Don't forget," he warned. "I can't hold off all these lawsuits for long – and they'll be coming after you whether you like it or not, mark my words." He turned on his heel before Parker could do more than just open her mouth.
"Parker?" Sydney stepped closer.
As much as she wanted to run to and dive into a sheltering embrace and stay there for the rest of her life, something was driving her to stand tall. "They want me to go in and take over," she gave a quasi-hysterical chuckle and shook her head. "They – the lawyers – want someone they can talk to at the Centre – and they've decided that person has to be ME. ME – and I can't remember a damned thing…"
"Sit down," Sydney soothed and led her by the arm to the table again. "This kind of stress isn't good for you or the baby."
"I feel like I'm in a huge SIM." She put her head in her hands the moment she was seated and leaned her elbows on the table. "I have all the information I'm going to get, and Bryon is telling me that I can't quit – that somehow I have to fly this damned… Centre… just because my last name is Parker… Only this time, it ISN'T a SIM – it's real!"
Jarod came into the kitchen, using his thumb to point over his shoulder at the front of the house. "I just about got run over by a suit," he quipped – and then saw the expression on Parker's face. "What's going on?"
"It isn't taking long for the lawsuits to start," Sydney explained in the few words it would take to get the Pretender to understand the situation entirely. "She's the only Parker left."
Parker looked up at the two men on whom she'd been forced to learn to rely over the last few days. Neither had abandoned her as her memory continued stubbornly to resist all efforts of being nudged back into operation – and both had remained solidly supportive of whatever decisions she'd made. "What am I going to do?" she asked plaintively. "
"Appoint a representative and let THEM handle the mess," Jarod suggested casually and headed for the refrigerator and dug in the freezer for the box of ice cream. "Go to a notary public and appoint someone your official legal representative and let THEM have at it. Keep your sanity – the Centre ain't worth losing sleep over, trust me!"
"I would, but the only people I could trust to do it right are either you or Sydney," she pointed out in a simple statement that shocked both me. "So maybe you can tell me which one of you wants the job?"
Jarod and Sydney stared at each other, and then Jarod's eyes grew wide as he realized the only logical answer to her question. Sydney was now deep into the research that had created Formula 837A, trying in the company of a Centre biochemist colleague to unravel what made it work and how to counteract its effects for Parker. Dr. Morrison, the original creator of the formula, had been transferred BACK to the Renewal Wing, where Sydney could care for her more directly and oversee her anticipated recovery – and this task, combined with the research, consumed the old psychiatrist's every thought at the moment when he wasn't at home.
But HE, Jarod, was the one with the experience of being a lawyer – temporarily – and a corporate executive – temporarily. Only he had what it would take to handle representing Parker responsibly. "What a helluva Pretend that will be," he commented dryly, "I get to be a Parker and sit in the Tower directing traffic." He sighed. "I guess I'd better call my folks and tell them I won't be coming back to California anytime soon after all."
"You were going to do that anyway," Sydney reminded him chidingly. "Didn't you tell me you didn't want to go anywhere until at least after the baby came anyway?"
Parker's gaze darted to Jarod's face, and he nodded. "All the more reason for me to do this Pretend to be the Centre Chairman," he remarked thoughtfully. "I'm protecting the future of my son or daughter."
"Daughter," Parker replied absently, too pleased to be out from under such an onerous task to notice much. "That's what they told me…"
Jarod glanced at Sydney, a smile slowly growing. "A daughter," he repeated to himself. Suddenly, sitting in the Chairman's office taking care of all the inevitable lawsuits that would eventually cripple and destroy the Centre piecemeal didn't seem all that bad. He could view THAT as his ultimate payback on the place and people who had taken so much from him and those he loved – and maybe be finally able to stop looking for ways to balance the scales. "OK, Parker," he said, literally and figuratively. "Let's get this mess taken care of and be done with it."