Читать книгу Dreaming Ivy - Rhonda Lee Carver - Страница 8

Chapter 4

Blowing off her frustration for the useless argument with a pigheaded man, Ivy headed straight for her food rations. She had a tendency to eat when she was upset. Chocolate was always top choice. She fumbled through her supplies and didn’t find one ounce of chocolate. Her choices: a granola bar or an apple. Grabbing the apple and her cell phone, she went to explore her surroundings. She was certain if she looked hard enough she’d find something to satisfy her curiosity. And she’d get a big kick out of finding something before Mr. Ghost Detective.

The kitchen was the first room on her list. It was in dire need of a caring touch and a broom. Besides old-fashioned wooden cabinets, cracked countertops, and an old stainless steel sink, there was a small decrepit table.

Opening each cabinet door, she peeked in, did a brushing of her hand inside and was disappointed to find nothing except mouse droppings and a box of matches.

Next place: upstairs.

She was excited to explore the master bedroom. Passing through the bedroom the first time, Ivy had assumed the door by the bed was a closet. Now, she opened it and was shocked to find a nursery. The antique wooden bassinet and rocking chair looked desolate in the barren room. Lacy curtains yellowed with age hung haphazardly at the window. Ivy’s heart pained. She knew the history.

Records showed that Marcus Thornton’s first child had perished in a fire around the age of five, along with his wife, Sarah, in their home in Boston. Years later he had married his second wife, Elizabeth, and she died during childbirth a mere year and a half into their marriage. There was no written history of a live child being born, so it was believed that the baby had died too. Fifteen months later, Marcus died. Townspeople said it was from a broken heart. The entire heritage had died away.

The story was a wretched and sorrowful history of loss and tragedy.

Ivy opened the door to the closet. A strong whiff of dust came barreling out. Coughing, she started to close it. She almost missed seeing something in the far corner. She stepped into the small space, opening the door as wide as it would go to allow light in. She saw it was a painting. Kneeling down onto her hands and knees, careless of her clothes on the grimy floor, she lifted the frame only to realize there was another behind it. Her heart raced.

“What did you find?”

She jumped. The deep voice behind her had startled her. She turned and eyed Max with fury. She hadn’t heard him come into the room. “Do you have to sneak around?” she snapped.

“A little jumpy, are you?” He cocked an eyebrow. One corner of his mouth lifted as if he were happy to see her unsettled.

The man had the ability to scrape her nerves like fingernails down a chalkboard. She wasn’t sure if it was because of his overinflated ego or the fact that every time he came near she felt an unfamiliar tingling down her spine. “Make yourself useful.”

Ivy fumbled with the paintings until they could easily be pulled through the doorway.

She lifted the first painting to Max. He stared down at it with narrowed eyes. He blew his breath across the dusty frame and a cloud of dirt surrounded them. She coughed again as her lungs filled with the particles.

“Nice,” he said sarcastically.

Then came the second. It was in worse condition.

“I can’t believe these paintings were tossed into a closet.” She swiped her dirty hands across the legs of her pants. They were covered in cobwebs and grime. It was too late to worry about cleanliness.

“It seems they should be hanging up instead of shoved into the darkness.” Max set the paintings against the wall and they stood back to stare at their find.

The first painting was a portrait of a beautiful woman. Her raven hair cascaded like swirling waves over her bare shoulders and along the exquisite green lace gown she wore. The ornate gown was the only sign of wealth. She was bare of expensive jewelry and the kind of trendy hairstyle that most women of riches would have adorned their bodies with, especially for a portrait. The woman’s enchanting green eyes spoke volumes in the finely painted portrait. It was Elizabeth Thornton.

The next painting was of a man. Ivy knew it was Marcus from an old picture she had seen of him. However, his exquisite good looks, intense dark eyes and hair like the midnight sky all seemed oddly familiar. He was standing by the fireplace downstairs, his chin rested on his fist. He carried an expression of a man in deep thought.

Both paintings were superb.

Ivy turned each of them over. To her surprise, scrawled in one corner on each painting was the name Elizabeth. “Elizabeth painted these. Marcus’s second wife was an artist. A good one, so it appears.”

“The paintings seem–” Max seemed perplexed. “–haunting.”

He was right. There was a quality to both paintings that exuded deep emotion. Ivy was overcome with such sentiment. Tears sprang to her eyes. She swiped them before they fell to her cheeks.

A draft of cold air passed through the room. The hairs on the back of her neck rose. She wrapped her arms around her chilled body as she kept her eyes on the paintings. She felt Max’s eyes on her. Minutes seemed to pass in slow increments until he finally asked, “What do you know of this house’s history?”

She swallowed as she searched for her voice. “I really know so little about Marcus and Elizabeth. There was only a minuscule amount of research I had luck in uncovering. Most of the information comes from years of rumors passed down from generation to generation. Each tale gets juicier and further from the truth, I’m sure. There is probably only a figment of fact left to any of them. But one legend still remains the same.” She looked up at him, hoping he couldn’t see the remnants of tears left in her eyes. “Marcus was known for his kindness. History labeled him as quite the charming gentleman who’d had more than a few single, and married, women interested. He was roguishly handsome, as we can see by his portrait–” She darted a glance back at the man in the painting. “–passionate, and exceptionally wealthy.”

“But as you said yourself, they could have molded his memory into a kind man. It seems a man can be shaped by the untruths of others.”

Ivy understood there was hidden meaning to his words. He was referring to himself and how the media had dogged him for months until he disappeared from the spotlight. And then he was criticized for running away. “I find that if a yarn gets twisted it’s usually to make the person bad, not good.” There was a flash of something that passed over his features. It was gone before she had time to investigate it. “Some of Morgan Sites’s oldest residents said that Elizabeth’s father worked here, on the farm. Marcus established his riches through an inheritance but acquired his fame by way of farming and real estate. The details of his career are vague, but he was known for building the economy of the town.”

“Do you know any particulars about his and Elizabeth’s marriage?” Max took a step closer to Elizabeth’s painting. He lifted it, holding it out for closer examination.

“Elizabeth was said to have been in her late teens and Marcus in his thirties when they married in the late 1800s. Age wasn’t of much concern, I’m sure. It hadn’t been unusual for an older man to marry a young woman, especially a man as wealthy as Marcus. He was probably the prime catch for young and old.” Aspects of the story that she’d heard and read became clearer to her. As if it had been only yesterday that she’d learned the facts.

Max set the painting back against the wall. He strode to the window and stared out. Ivy wondered what thoughts crossed his mind. She brought her attention back to the portraits. She couldn’t deny that she found the intensity of their eyes mesmerizing. It was almost as if Marcus and Elizabeth pulled her into their paintings, tugging her into the molten colors. Although it didn’t appear that Elizabeth had painted herself with the intention of seduction, Ivy thought that the young woman staring back at her from the canvas was bewitching by nature. Any woman, with even the slightest amount of pretension, would have been bejeweled with diamonds and gold in her own portrait. Marcus could have afforded to adorn her with the finest jewelry. Elizabeth had deliberately painted herself as a simple, demure woman. Her beauty was enough embellishment.

“I wonder what type of person Elizabeth was,” Ivy wondered aloud. “Was she madly in love with her husband? Was he crazy in love with her? Did they share great happiness before tragedy struck? Did Marcus die a heartbroken man after losing all his loved ones?”

Max’s chuckle reverberated off the bare walls. “If you believe in all that romantic bullshit.”

Ivy turned on her heel and swiped a stray tendril of hair off her cheek. “Some people do believe in love.”

He snagged her with a cold stare, then pushed away from the window and started for the door. It slammed shut before he reached it.

Ivy’s breath swooshed from her lungs. “Did you do that?” She wasn’t sure if what she saw was accurate.

There was a slight hesitation before he muttered, “What the hell?”

* * * *

Max had seen a lot of strange things over the course of his career as a ghost hunter. He’d seen enough outlandish events that he’d written books on haunting and mystical spirits, sold millions of copies, but he’d never been invaded with the kind of deep-rooted sense of unease he felt at that moment.

But even with everything he’d seen over the years, he still didn’t chalk anything up to paranormal unless he had proof. A slamming door wasn’t enough to have him calling it a ghost at work.

He jiggled the knob, but the door didn’t open. “It’s locked.” He gritted his teeth. “Damn old house. It must have been a draft.”

“Yeah, must have been.”

He could hear the speculation in Ivy’s voice. She looked a bit green around the edges. He laughed. “You scared?”

She turned her lips down at the corners and she shot him her priceless “I could slap you” stare. “No, I’m not scared.” She blew a long breath through tight lips. “How will we get out of here?”

“Relax.” He gripped the handle again but it wasn’t giving. Just when he thought he couldn’t be more miserable, something happened to prove that things could always get worse. When Ivy started tapping her foot in frustration, he knew it had gotten bad. He wanted out of the room.

Running his hands along the frame, he quickly realized that he wasn’t going to break the door. It was solid wood, thicker than doors made now. He turned and looked at the window. He sighed in irritation. “I guess I gotta do what I gotta do.”

“Through the window? That’s what your big idea is?”

“Do you have another way out in mind?” She remained quiet. “Didn’t think so.”

To his luck, the window rolled up easily and was large enough to accommodate his size. Once he placed one foot on the roof, he silently hoped that it would hold his weight. He didn’t trust its durability.

With both feet planted firmly on the wood, he tapped lightly and stomped and checked out the best way down. Nothing looked safe, but he’d been in tougher situations. Satisfied that he wouldn’t fall through, he made his way slowly across the unevenly-shaped shingles toward the edge.

And there he stopped. The only way to the ground was either jumping, which risked death–not going to happen–or the rickety trellis that looked to be a relic from when the Thorntons called this place home. The paint had chipped and parts were broken. Bending, he pushed the lattice and investigated its strength. It didn’t move, but that didn’t mean anything. It was nailed to the side of the house securely but he wasn’t sure how decayed the wood was. With great caution, he scaled the lattice, securing his footing with each step. The old wood creaked and cracked under his weight, warning him that an apparatus meant for a climbing bush wasn’t built for this.

Half way down, a loud splintering sounded seconds before he felt shaking and the loosening of the boards. “Shit.”

The lattice completely separated from the house.

* * * *

Ivy heard the stomping of Max’s footsteps long before he opened the door. She had a feeling something was wrong. When the door swung open and she saw his bitter expression and the disarray of his clothes, she had a good idea what had happened. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“As happy as a pig eating slop.” He had pieces of foliage in his hair. A long scratch ran down his cheek.

“Thank you for opening the door.”

“Was there another option?” With a turn on his heel, he marched back down the hall. She could hear the thumping of his boots all the way.

Her cell rang and she saw the ID was her mother. “Mom, you okay?”

“I’m fine, dear. Just checking in.”

“Great.”

“Is that old place safe enough for you to be staying in?”

“Besides a few cobwebs, I think it’ll suffice.” Ivy hoped.

“Where will you be sleeping?”

Ivy smiled at her mother’s sincere interrogation. “In the master suite. You wouldn’t believe how lovely it is.”

“Take pictures. Is there electricity? How will you eat? You’ll eat properly, right?”

“Yes, Mom. I’ll be fine. The house isn’t the problem. I have a much bigger issue.”

“Oh no, you sound miserable. Is it that bad? And please, don’t leave out the juicy details.” Her mother’s chuckle vibrated the phone line.

“Juicy details? I’m not sure they could be referred to as juicy,” Ivy said. “Although, we did have a small disagreement.” She glanced to make sure she was still alone.

“Oh really?”

“Now I understand what ‘bighead’ means. Max is the most egotistical, arrogant jerk I’ve ever met. I should have just let his arrogance slide in one ear and out the other, but you know me. I get long-winded when I’m upset or nervous. Why am I such a big-mouth? Is there something in our gene pool that causes us to talk too much?”

“That’s certainly not a bad thing, dear. Sometimes it’s necessary to tell others how we feel, to shine light on their bad behavior, just as long as we don’t lash out as a way to hide our own issues.”

Ivy didn’t want to ask her mother what she meant. She had a feeling she already knew. “Max and I just have to get along for the next two weeks. I don’t want to be here with him any more than he wants to be here with me. He is the most deplorable man I’ve ever met.”

“This is your biggest lesson as a writer. You have to grin and bear it, even when you think it’s impossible.”

“At least he’s nice to look at.” Ivy admitted. She would definitely enjoy watching him as long as he didn’t open his mouth. But good looks didn’t make someone nice. If a person was ugly on the inside it didn’t take long for the nastiness to seep to the outside.

Finishing the call, she went downstairs and into the sitting room where she found the devil himself sitting on the floor, slumped over his camera equipment in concentration. He either didn’t hear her enter or he was just simply ignoring her. If she had to bet she’d go with the latter. She saw that he had changed his shirt and picked the foliage out of his thick, dark hair.

Ivy meandered over to the fireplace and stood there for a few minutes. He still paid her no attention. She couldn’t understand why he was pissed at her. She hadn’t caused him to fall into the bushes.

With a dramatic sigh, she moved over to the small, flowered sofa, patted the cushions and took a seat. It was actually quite comfortable. She tucked her feet up and leaned her chin against her propped-up hand.

Ivy made an attempt to keep her eyes off Max’s profile. She found it impossible. Somehow the man was like a magnet drawing her attention. She watched his long, lean fingers as they moved deftly in unscrewing the converter lens from the camera. He had nice hands. Large, and his nails were clean. She wondered what those fingers would feel like on her body. Was he as much of an expert on lovemaking as he was hunting ghosts and writing about it?

She swallowed with difficulty. Was she crushing on the delusional man? She would never–nor did she want to–know what making love with Max Shepard would be like. So why would she even drift down that impossible path? She liked gentle and kind men. Would a man like Max take his bed rules as seriously as he did his work rules–serious and raw? Or would he rush through lovemaking like an adrenaline junkie needing a fix? Wam, bam, thank you ma’am. No thank you. She could imagine that he was skilled at sex but not in communication.

It did strike her that, while maybe she was being a little presumptuous regarding Max’s character, she doubted she was too far off target. She’d seen a few of his pictures in the tabloids since his divorce. He seemed to enjoy women who had more beauty than brains. Once he dated a popular actress who was known for her role as “the dumb blonde” on TV and off.

It wasn’t all his fault, she was sure. He probably had more than a few women who would find nothing more pleasurable than hitting the sack with him. He exuded masculinity and sexuality.

So why then did she notice these tempting qualities? She wasn’t interested in accompanying herself with fast men. Ivy had a clue why. She didn’t believe it had anything to do with his appeal. It was the bad boy attitude. It was intriguing. He was nothing like the men in Morgan Sites.

She gave a stretch of her arms over her head and sighed. It was starting to get dark outside and the room was falling into a shadow. The silence was irritating. “I guess I should take my bags upstairs to the bedroom.” No response. “Hmm, it’s getting late.” Just as she suspected, he still didn’t respond. “So no issue with me sleeping in the beautiful master suite, I hope?”

“If you talk in your sleep as much as you do when you’re awake, I’ll be happy that you’ve chosen the room farthest away from mine.”

She narrowed her eyes. Could the man say anything without proving he had a hair up his ass? “I don’t talk in my sleep.” At least she didn’t think she did.

“Good.” He took a soft cloth and rubbed the lens.

“Will you be up late taking pictures?” she asked.

“Yes.” He looked at her strangely. “There you are, trying to smooth things again.”

Ivy refused to allow him to anger her. “I guess I should ask, do you snore? I can’t stand to hear anyone snoring.” She pretended interest in a loose string hanging from the frayed material of the settee.

Max went back to cleaning his camera. “Why? Do you plan to sleep with me?” His voice held not even an ounce of humiliation.

She’d walked right into that verbal trap. He wasn’t even looking at her when he said his words and the sexual innuendo made her squirm in her seat. She was ashamed. Her body betrayed her.

She was beginning to expect everything and anything from this man who apparently had no mortification. “Only in your dreams, Max,” she stated firmly. “I must tell you, I don’t sleep around on the job. But no worries. I’m not your type, right?”

“Thanks for the clarification. I’ll remember that.” He set his camera down and looked her directly in the eye. Her breath quickened. “I have a rule that I don’t sleep around on the job either, especially with someone who I’m not even sure I like, but if you don’t quit looking at me like that I may change my mind. Now, you wouldn’t want that on your conscience, would you?”

His voice was smooth and confident. She eyed him curiously, wondering if he were joking. The set of his jaw went hard. “I think you’re forgetting that I’d have to be interested, which I’m not.”

“Oh, you’re interested.” He lifted the corners of his mouth into a perfect mocking smile.

“Go ahead and poke fun. Some people would think this situation could get a little awkward. I just wanted to make things clear and to let you know that I don’t plan on allowing intimacy to become an issue.”

He sighed and rubbed his eyebrows. “Do you feel that you must make everything clear to everyone as it pops into your mind? We are just here to do our individual jobs, not to share every aspect of our existence.”

“Oh, I’m sorry that I’m not as seasoned as you are in proper etiquette in a situation like this. I guess it’s the huge age difference that makes us so different.” She smiled. “No response?” she pushed.

“I’m not about to encircle myself in a verbal duel over age. I’d be the first to concede that I am older than you and have lived more life. If I had to guess, I’d say I’m older by at least ten years. So, I figure, since you’re expecting me to tolerate your non-stop chatter and candor, you should be willing to accept my solitude. If you’d like to rationalize it’s a matter of an age difference, I’m fine with that.”

Silence fell between them as he finished his work. She bit her bottom lip, controlling her words, but she hated the quiet. And the cold. The temperature was dropping and the room was growing bitter. “Wow, this place is really cold.”

He responded by clearing his throat.

“Alrighty, then.” She got up and went to the fireplace, busying herself cleaning out the cobwebs. The alcove looked to be in reasonably good working condition. It was obvious the place wasn’t insulated. She wanted to start a fire, but there was a problem. She’d never used a real fireplace before. At home, they had a gas fireplace and the flames came alive with a flip of a switch.

Grabbing a look at Max, she saw that he was still putting away the equipment. She supposed he was capable of starting a fire but she wasn’t about to ask him to lend a hand.

There was a stack of wood in a large wicker basket sitting next to the fireplace. She didn’t remember seeing it there before and wondered if Max had gathered it while she was upstairs. So, he did have some sense of responsibility and gentlemanly deeds.

She remembered watching a documentary on survival on a cable channel. There was a military man who demonstrated the best way to start a fire. Although she had no flint or dry grass or any other means that he’d used, she knew it couldn’t be that hard. All that she needed was a box of matches or a lighter. She had a lighter in her purse.

Retrieving the lighter, she strategically placed wood in the bay.