Sex and the Billionaire Crime Boss - Season 2

Ch. 30: Panic

By Wednesday, my grandparents and I have settled into a routine. It's going really well. I work hard all day - Dylan is still out of town so no further incidents - then come home to quiet evenings. My grandmother seems calm, even serene. Sometimes she fumbles for a word, or suddenly looks around in confusion, but overall she appears content. And in a lot of ways, I feel like I am the anchor that keeps her moored to reality, even though it's a reality that lives 20 years in the past.

I ask my grandfather about Dylan, and he tells me that in fact it was Dylan who brought up working with me on the art gallery deal, not the other way around, and my grandfather simply told him to discuss it with me.

"Is something wrong?" he asks me, and I find myself not wanting to burden him with my suspicions about Dylan. Things are going so well at home that I feel like he deserves a little piece of mind.

"No," I say, "I was just wondering."

And besides, what could I really tell him? I don't know for sure whether my office was locked and even if it was, the cleaning staff certainly could have left it open. And can I swear the file wasn't on my desk as Dylan claimed? It's unlikely, but possible. I decide to just let it go, rather than stir up drama over who said what to whom, and Dylan's presence in my office without an invitation, which was at the very least rude, but maybe nothing more than that.

I'm just going to be on alert whenever he is around, and be damn sure never to leave my door unlocked or any files sitting out in the open. And I'll speak to the cleaning staff to confirm that I want them to re-lock my door every evening when they are done.

We have a lovely dinner. My grandfather grills salmon, and I handle the vegetable and potatoes, plus one of those ready-to-bake loaves of bread that fills the kitchen with its delicious scent. My grandmother sits at the kitchen table, drinking ginger ale from a wine glass while my grandfather and I prepare the meal.

She doesn't seem to care what is in the glass - it's the familiar routine of sipping from a wine glass before dinner that comforts her. We opt for eating casually right there in the kitchen. The formality of the dining room sometimes leaves her overwhelmed by place settings and silverware.

Before I moved in, my grandfather was mostly ordering takeout, or Olivia would prepare a simple meal before she left for the day.

But a home cooked meal served later in the evening fits the lifestyle Andrew and Patricia used to live, and seems to give her the comfort of normalcy.

"Who was that woman?" she asks me, after Olivia leaves.

"Oh, that's just Olivia. She helps out sometimes," I tell her, and she nods then tells us an anecdote she heard at her garden club.

She hasn't been to a garden club meeting since shortly after she was diagnosed, but to her this meeting occurred yesterday.

Patricia stops mid story and looks at me anxiously and asks when I "have to go back."

I tell her I'm on a long break and will be here for weeks, and she is content again.

Tonight, she seems to have an appetite. I know my grandfather has been concerned lately that food just doesn't seem to appeal to her - another one of the side effects the victims of dementia struggle with. But she actually goes for a second small serving of the salmon, and eats most of the potatoes and asparagus on her plate.

When she turns down the dish of yogurt with fresh strawberries I offer for dessert - I read that yogurt is healthy for people with dementia - and says she'd rather have cake, I promise to bake a chocolate layer cake with her tomorrow and she beams at me.