18. Ivy
Ivy
An acute chilling sense of unease goes down my spine when I step into the room.
I don’t know what to expect and based on what Ty just told me, whatever happens here and now will not only decide my life, but Emmett’s fate.
I don’t particularly care about that jerk’s fate, but there are things I’ve held on to for years that he doesn’t know about…
But no, now’s not the time to feed my guilt. I’m up against the Grand Poobah.
I enter the room with my heart in my throat, back straight, shoulders set, only to feel like I’ve been flung from some static existence into an incredible fantasyland.
“My God.”
It’s like I’ve just been teleported into a completely different world. From the ruins into serenity.
“Wow,” I croak, gawking at this gorgeous, huge library.
It’s not just any ordinary home library. This is something else altogether.
I have always wondered what the great Library of Alexandria must’ve looked like. Looking at this now, I’m persuaded this is a pretty good taste of that wondrous beauty.
This is incredible!
I have seen many libraries in my life, but nothing tops this one.
The gold trimmings on the rich, dark wooden panels. The soft beige and cream rugs placed strategically around the perfectly spaced sitting areas, and a desk up on the little platform at the edge of the room.
There’s even a huge black chalkboard on one wall and it’s filled with some scribbles I can’t read from this distance.
With each step I take, a bubble of excitement blooms in my stomach.
Everywhere I look, it’s shelves upon shelves of books, stretching across the huge length of the room.
The ceiling is dome-shaped with an open glass window, like an observatory because right in the middle of the room is a raised platform with an elegant, expensive, and well-maintained telescope that looks so much like it’s out of a fantasy book.
Without thinking, I walk toward it, drawn by its luster.
Like a child in forbidden territory, I tentatively reach out to touch the telescope, knowing damn well that I shouldn’t, but I continue anyway.
It’s cold to the touch, but the majestic feel of it, coupled with the detailed notes on the table next to it are enough to show that someone uses the instrument regularly.
Something else catches my eye.
A huge black-and-white painting, twice my height, encased in a golden frame, and displayed in a glass case in the middle of two huge shelves next to the platform with the telescope.
This painting… it’s like the backdrop of an empire or a castle in ruins, with statues falling over the high walls… but some beings stand over it, watching.
At least that’s what I think I see. I might be very wrong.
In Emmett’s Westbrook Blues home, there are a few paintings like this one, all kept in a locked room.
I’m not sure of the artist, but I have a pretty good idea.
Emmett has made it a point to never let anyone see his work, no matter what.
Even when I popped in unannounced when we were kids, he’d quickly hide his work and ignore me when I asked to see his it… and now, looking at this, I’m pretty sure I know it’s his work.
“That’s my daughter’s last piece of art,” a sudden booming voice speaks behind me, shaking me out of my haze.
Quickly dropping my hand that was about to touch the glass, I turn around and spot Grandpa Armando seated silently in a high-backed chair by a fireplace that I hadn’t even noticed on the other side of the room.
He’d been watching me all this time.
A wave of unease goes down my back, but I pretend, as always.
“Uh, it’s incredible,” I say in a slightly louder voice, which feels like a violation in this sacred room. “I’ve never seen such art.”
“Well, she copied her own son.”
Amazed, I stare at the old man who flips to the next page in the book he’s silently reading, as if he didn’t just say the most absurd thing.
“You’ve never seen Alessio’s work, have you?” Grandpa Armando questions.
“I’m not sure I know who Alessio is, sir,” I murmur. This earns me a withering look.
“You don’t even know his full name? What good are you, then?”
My heart jumps in my chest.
This is bad! Very bad! How do I get out of this? And who even is Alessio?
“You have a gorgeous library!” I blurt out.
Grandpa Armando glances at me, silently observing before he speaks again.
“I take it you’re what they call a bookworm , then?” he says grumpily. “Do you like it?”
“Sir, I don’t think there’s a bookworm in this world that wouldn’t fall on their knees for this place,” I say, turning to look around. “It’s simply breathtaking!”
“How long will you gawk then?” Emmett’s grandfather questions in a bored tone. Is he unhappy with me? “You’ll have plenty of time for that later. Now, come here.”
Everything in me is screaming for me to run. This man is bad news, but I know better.
I quickly force myself to calm down and walk over to him, trying not to look like a scared mouse as I do so.
When I get closer, he’s still flipping through a thick hardcover book, not even looking at me.
“Sit.”
“Uh, yes,” I mutter like an idiot, but you can’t blame me. I’m about to have a coronary! Breathe, Ivy! “Thank you.”
“For what?” he fires back.
Jesus, does he want to give me a panic attack?
“For your hospitality?” I say it like a question. I’m sure he already thinks I’m a blithering idiot.
At this, Emmett’s grandfather looks up at me and studies me. “Interesting. No one has ever thanked me for my hospitality before. This is a first.”
My palms are damp, but I’m fighting to not rub them down my dress.
“Well, I’m kind of nervous, sir.”
“Grandpa Armando,” he corrects in his thick Italian accent. “Am I that scary?”
“Do you want an honest answer?”
“What do you think of honesty?”
What sort of question is that? Is he testing me and my mental fortitude?
Looking around, I scramble to find something to say, so I blurt out something I read years ago that stuck with me.
“I think rigid honesty is a root virtue.”
As I stare, scared to my tits with fright, the head of the Easton Family smiles, just barely, but a smile nonetheless.
“That’s not the full saying,” he says, watching me, calling me out on my nonsense with ease.
I freeze. I thought my response was simple but turns out he’s familiar with Theodore Roosevelt’s words. This old man is by no means easy.
“I… I kind of forgot the ending.” Actually, I didn’t but I didn’t think he’d know…
“And yet the ending is what I remember best.”
Fear like no other strikes me in the pit of my stomach.
Breathe! Don’t let him see.
“Would you mind reminding me?” I ask as softly as I can, trying to stay afloat.
Emmett’s grandfather watches me silently, then he turns to look at the fire.
“‘ Honesty, rigid honesty, is a root virtue; if not present, no other virtue can atone for its lack .’”
He quotes the saying with a gentle but firm tone that hints at his sharpness.
“Ahh, yes, I remember now!” I say dramatically with a faux smile, trying to ease the tension in the room.
“It’s not that you forgot,” he calls me out smoothly. “Although if you really did, I already know it’s because you want to forget.”
Oh no, no, no…
“You have an aversion for confrontation that demands of honesty and accountability, don’t you, Ivy Marie?”
Stunned and somewhat feeling like I’ve just been slapped, I stare at him.
He’s basically saying what I already know and admitted to Scar… I tend to be delusional.
“I’m not sure I know what you mean,” I stutter, my heart thundering hard and painfully in my chest.
I should’ve known better than to play the fool in front of the head of the Easton Family, but I have to.
And as Scar pointed out, the position is not just about power. There’s a whole lot of cunning, calculation, and ruthlessness one has to possess to take that seat.
The thing is, I have to pretend and act the fool if I want to survive this.
But just like back then… I’m completely out of my league here.
If Emmett is inexplicably intelligent and scheming, what more his wily fox of a grandfather?
“Tell me, Ivy Marie, are you familiar with the Holy Bible?”
“I… I’ve read a few verses every now and then.”
“With that force of a woman who raised you, I’m sure you have read more than just a few verses here and there.”
My head whips up so fast that I’m sure I just fractured my own neck. “W-what?”
Emmett’s grandfather looks at me steadily then he flips the pages of the book he’s holding.
“You know my grandmother?” I croak, but the old man doesn’t answer.
I realize then that the book he’s been reading is in fact a Bible, because he starts speaking, or rather reading, from it.
“ When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away all childish things.”
When he’s done, a heavy silence falls between us. The only sound is the crackling of the fire, and the hard pounding of my heart.
“Do you know who wrote that?” he asks in that deep gravelly tone, heavy with his Italian accent.
“It was Paul the Apostle,” I answer silently, my palms damp and body riddled with shivers and goosebumps. “To the believers of Christ Jesus in Corinth.”
“You’re knowledgeable! Good!” he praises, but I can’t breathe anymore.
By mentioning my grandmother, he’s basically telling me that he kept his word from long ago.
But I commit to the act of my life. Breaking character now will mean the end for everyone I love.
“The woman who raised me, my grandmother, she’s always been adamant about us having a personal relationship with God,” I tell him, forcing myself to hold his gaze.
“And by us, you mean you and Samuel Jr.?”
There it is again, his blatant knowledge of my life.
“No need to be alarmed,” he says dismissively. “I haven’t harmed your grandmother in any way. Good old Samuel Sr. would have my head for that.”
Anger, fast and hot, courses through my veins when Gramps is mentioned.
“Are you talking about…”
“Your grandfather, of course,” Grandpa Armando says with a chuckle. “That wily old fox! Can you believe he left first? That selfish bastard!”