Chapter 7: Tamara

Tamara Osowski was at war with herself, albeit a very tiny war. If only her Edward were there with her, she would be the happiest she'd ever been. She was in the bosom of her family, almost all of them, in the same place at the same time. Arrangements had been made for the comfort and care of Rachel with blinding speed, and while it was good to have Merry and Annie Beth to take care of her, did leave Tamara with a little too much time on her hands. So she'd volunteered to the fiancees for work in housekeeping.

The size of the place constantly amazed and amused Tamara. It was large enough to make a staff essential – not surprising, given it was built by a House in Society – but there was a lot of staff in House Chorale, and so the staff scheduling had heavy traffic areas cleaned three times a day, most other areas twice a day, and only a few rooms but once a day. The family's new fiancees were firm believers in avoiding idle hands, and their efforts to employ everyone, and keep the house spotless, read more as desperation to show themselves capable, and worthy of their positions, than efficient.

They would learn, whether through gentle example, the verbal lash of Margo, or the literal lash of someone else.

But for a while at least, it wouldn't be Kelly's lash.

Tamara wasn't surprised by much, but she'd wanted to believe Kelly was less ... well, young and oh-so-human than she was. Tamara doubted anyone could find fault with the feelings that had led Kelly astray, but to act on them as she had ... realistically, it hadn't surprised her, but it had disappointed her.

And she told Kelly so, as she carefully fed and watered the young woman in the stocks.

"Truly, no one blames you for feeling the way you did, honey, but..."

"But to act as I did," Kelly finished, "that was crossing a line."

"Yes, dear one, it was."

' Preparations for Thanksgiving were many and involved, in and of themselves, and Tamara found herself getting pulled from household staff to work as one of Margo's assistants. Tamara had never dared to dream she'd run her own house, and so had absolutely no idea what being Queen of Central Texas Society might entail, but several days in to her new position, she began to grasp just what a job it was, and just how much Margo needed assistants such as her.

Returning to the compound from going with Margo to a meeting with House Werchan – a surprise in and of itself, there was trouble in the kitchen as the fiancees argued over the Thanksgiving menu, an argument that had been simmering for quite a while, but had finally reached the boiling point.

It felt like home, and Tamara went to her room, tears in her eyes, happy as she could be without Edward.

Tamara and her love talked twice a day. As there was a thirteen hour time difference between her and Edward's time zones, he called at his noon and midnight, her 11 AM and PM. She found the evening calls a reliable point to end her day, but his schedule sometimes made the mid-day call early, or late. He never skipped a call, though, no matter what, and made sure to call Rachel around mid-day as well.

And the news concerning the job itself wasn't encouraging. He and the crew weren't going to be home for Thanksgiving, as the head of security for the company they'd been sent to test wasn't happy about the testing, and was doing everything in his not-inconsiderable power to postpone any further test runs.

"Maybe embarrassin' his idiot ass first time through wasn't our smoothest move," Eddie said to her one evening. "But that's the goddamn job, an' if he can't handle his end of things, better the company knows it."

"So you think he should be happy to admit his incompetence?" Tamara gently asked.

"No, but there's no real way he can keep the board from seeing our final report, and if he's smart, which I'm pretty sure he is, he should be working with us to shrink or remove the holes ... and baby, we're talking great big ol' gapin' holes, in their security. Instead he's stonewalling us, an' from what I can tell, he's not doin' jack shit to fix things." She heard her lover sigh heavily. "Maybe he's skimmin' money an' about to flee the country an' is just bein' extra greedy ... I dunno."

Tamara had been a little worried when Edward left, and the delays weren't soothing her mood.

"Just be careful, my love. You're a long way from home, and he knows the country better than you."

"Yeah, we've all got the American embassy on speed dial, an' ever'body's keepin' their phones close. I don't think he'll get stupid, but it ain't like I never been wrong before."

She was headed in to visit Rachel when a loud and very strident voice proclaimed, "I don' wan' a bath, I wan' Eddie home now!"

Tamara was met at her sister-in-law's door by Merry.

"We're not having a good day, Milady. Perhaps it might be best if you visited her later."

"Pain?"

"Yeah, it's making her cranky as all get out. I understand her point – Master's been gone too long – but explaining it to her when she gets like this..."

"Maybe if I came in, talked with her, held her..."

"Milady, she's bitten Annie Beth, almost got me a time or two ... it's not a day for calming, it's a day for clearing the decks, and battening down the hatches. We're in for a blow."

"Aye aye, Skipper ... when it comes to Rachel, you two have become our experts."

"WAN' EDDIE NOW!"

"Milady..."

"Go, with my love," and with a quick hug, Tamara sent Merry on her way, hoping Annie Beth wasn't hurt too severely.

In a way, it was horribly unfair to Rachel to have moved home with her brother only to have his work take him away.

Tamara needed comfort herself, and so went in search of Carol.

"So I'm not the only one with a bad feeling about this?" Tamara said as she and Carol were massaged by two submissives.

"No," Carol replied. "I didn't like the vibe before he left, and I haven't started liking it any better since then. Still, it sounds like they're taking all the precautions and their boss is aware of the potential for trouble ... and none of that makes me feel any better."

"Me either."

"Cuddle some after we're through here?" Carol asked.

"Please," Tamara replied.

"Well, I'd tell these two to hurry," Carol said, "but we both need to let them finish their gentle ministrations."

"So, more pleasant topics of conversation then," Tamara replied. "Your fiancees are about to go to war over a menu."

"That's pleasant?"

"As long as we're not caught in the middle of it, it'll at least be entertaining," Tamara said, smiling at her old friend.

"True ... but as one of their intended, I'm pretty much guaranteed to be drawn into it," Carol replied. "I figure eventually Margo will make a decision just to shut the two of them up, but how much bickering are we going to have before then?"

"Have you noticed how the two of them, Magda and Lori, seem to have become not only interchangeable, well, except where this menu thing is concerned, but nobody's referring to them by their names? "Fiancee" seems to have become a title, and the sole means of addressing them."

"It's a lack of any true status," Carol replied. "They both tend toward the submissive, and yeah, they're in charge of this place, but other than as our intendeds, they have no status. They aren't being used sexually, they are no one's submissives, no one's dominants ... poor things, they're in limbo." Carol looked over at her dear friend. "Are you feeling in limbo as well?"

"Perhaps a little. Getting shifted to Margo's staff was a blessing, as the fiancees are going a bit overboard with their staff's duties. It will be better when Edward is here, and we can all go home."

She looked over to see Carol's expression sadden.

"Still no idea when that will be, huh?"

"No ... everybody's being hyper-vigilant and refusing to even consider going back to their homes until we know it's safe ... but will we ever 'know' it's safe? Margo wants to leave this one to the police, and I agree with her, but they've hit a dead end. Whomever hired the arsonists had them all killed, or at least we assume it's all of them, and left no evidence behind to implicate themselves ... so what do the police have to go on? Margo says the lead detective has admitted to her the trail's ice cold at this point. So, we wait for something else to happen? See if they get sloppy? In the meantime, yeah, this place is large ... but we've got a lot of people here who want to go back to their homes, and that isn't making for happy times."

"What about you?"

Carol smiled. "I'll be happy to stay here until we have a house built for us at the Corral, a place for the four of us, and our staffs ... and now that Harry's back, maybe we'll actually be able to get a blueprint finished, and the work started. But even so, it probably won't be ready until summer. Until then, I miss the city, I miss being close to everything, but my home, 'my house, ' it's gone. Yeah, we could move back into one of the other homes, and we may end up doing that sooner or later, but it won't be mine."

"Haven't you gotten attached to owning a home, Little Miss Couch-Surfer?"

"Shaddup, Tiny," Carol growled through her smile. "Yeah, one of the best days in my life was when Harry told me that house was mine to manage. I may not like having to be "Milady Carol", but I loved that house. I thought I'd understood 'home' before, but I hadn't, not really. That house, with all its history, its importance to Harry and Nicki, what it had come to mean for me, Margo and Kelly, the changes we'd made to it together ... it was 'home, ' and it was 'mine.' And God, do I miss it!"

"You know, this might be a little subversive of me," Tamara said, "but I propose you decide the specs for its replacement, with input from your spouses, certainly, but the final decision should be yours. Make the new house yours before work on it even begins. I doubt they'd deny you the privilege, and you're more than sensible enough to keep from designing some nouveau riche McMansion monstrosity."

"Tamara, sweetie, there are so many reasons I love you ... think we can propose the idea to my spouses before we cuddle?"

"Yeah, I don't think it'll take them long at all to say 'yes.'"

Galena

"Mama, I know you have a lot of questions..."

And that's where Galena's voice dried up, she froze, unable to say anything else, looking into the eyes of her mother.

Galena had wanted lunch to be just the two of them, but Kendry wasn't going to let that fly, so like everyone else in the family, she had to deal with a driver and a subtly armed escort.

And Anna Pessino saw her guardians, and though she didn't know the details, she knew her daughter was in danger.

Anna had turned a blind eye to a lot of what had changed in her youngest daughter's life once Galena had moved in with Karen and Patricia ... and sometimes it had taken all she had to keep her eye blind.

Then the Grimes home had been burned to the ground, and within days, overnight, Harry and his friends and family had disappeared, and she was cleaning Karen and Patricia's empty house. Margo had called her and she was cleaning several more empty houses in the neighborhood as their occupants cleared out after selling their homes to Margo. But she was cleaning for people who weren't there ... it didn't take a lot for Anna to connect the fire, and everyone's absence.

All Anna could do was worry, and wait for the young woman her little girl had grown into to call her. Anna never doubted she would. And Galena had.

"Are you safe?"

Tears seeped from Galena's eyes. Her mother's first question hadn't been about sex, or the Church, or sin, or Galena's disappearance ... all the things Galena feared.

"As safe as I can be ... as we all can be." Galena bit her bottom lip, a gesture her mother recognized all too well. "Do you want to know details?"

Anna recognized the question within the question, and not for the first time wondered how much she really did want to know about Galena's life.

"You are not a good Catholic, my dear one. I know this. Father Michael can't remember the last time you came to Mass, much less visited the confessional." Anna shook her head, her eyes closed, in silent prayer to God that she would be forgiven for her thoughts, and her coming words. "But to look at them, your sisters are very good Catholics, but I have illegitimate grandchildren all over the house, and Marilu is pregnant again, she's stopped going to meetings, so I'm sure she's on the drugs again as well. I do not doubt God, but I have to question if He has a plan, or if He has a plan, how well the Church is following it. And in the end, if how you are living, and who you are ... living with ... keeps you in school, and working, and happy ... I'm no longer willing to question that."

"What do you intend to do about Marilu?"

Galena saw the devastation in her mother's eyes.

"I told her to get off of the drugs, or get out, and leave her children with us. Your father and I are too old and too tired to go through this again."

Galena felt the love of her House surrounding and supporting her.

"Do you think rehab would help?"

"We can't afford that, not even with the generosity of Mr. Grimes."

Galena wanted to reach out and slap her mother's cheek, and her hand moved, the gesture becoming a caress as it reached Anna.

"Mother, I didn't ask if you could afford it. I asked if you think it would help."

"I don't think so."

"How far along is she?"

"Five months, more or less."

"Give me a few minutes, Mother."

Galena got up from the table, pulled out her phone, and made a call to Margo, another to Lawyer Daggett, one to the house, and a final call to her favorite salon.