Ivy Secrets (42 page)

“Perhaps you can share him.”

“Perhaps not,” Alexis answered. “Not if it means Marina and I will have to live under the same roof.”

She stormed from the room, leaving behind a wake of anger, and a wave of pity for the second daughter, the second-in-line, the second best.

    The palace soon took on new life. King Andrei pronounced Nicholas too old to serve as a full-time bodyguard: he would be available only if a special need arose. He assigned two new guards: Reggie to Marina, Olaf to Alexis. The following week, Alexis, Jonathan, and the boys moved to the king’s spacious quarters in the heart of the city where, Alexis noted, “there was a hell of a lot more excitement, anyway.”

Marina soon began working in earnest with Jorge on his plan that could help rescue Novokia from the edge of disaster. They would start with cosmetics, then expand into fragrances. They would market worldwide, and they would restore self-esteem to the people—her people, the people of Novokia. Every day, Marina grew more sure that coming home had been the right thing to do.

“I think we should call it Princess Cosmetics,” Jorge announced after he’d reviewed the proposal with her.

“I think not,” Marina answered. “I think it should be more of a tribute to the people.” They had spread out his
plans in the music room of the palace. She walked to the window now and stared out across the land.

Jorge shook his head. “No. Your people look up to you. By naming it Princess Cosmetics, we would encourage their hope.”

“My people look up to me?” Marina laughed. “Where have you been for the past few years? Have you not followed the idle tabloid gossip?”

“I don’t care about gossip and neither do your people. They will be endlessly forgiving when it comes to their royalty.”

Marina scowled.

“Trust me,” he added.

“Why should I?”

“Because I want nothing from you, except the opportunity to develop a strong, positive company.”

“You want nothing more?”

“No.”

“They all say that at first.”

“I’m not them.”

Marina turned and studied his blond hair, disheveled now after hours of talking, of sharing his enthusiasm, of electrifying her spirit. “You are not interested in having a princess for a wife?”

Jorge laughed. “That’s the last thing I need.” He stood and went to the window beside her. “Look, Marina, before this goes any further, we’d better get something straight. This is a business venture, nothing more. I’ve had one bad marriage; I don’t want another.”

Marina was stunned by his bluntness. Yet when she looked into his eyes, she did not miss the spark that danced between them. She wondered how long it would be before she would have to tell him he did not have a chance. For the princess of Novokia would never, ever, marry again, no matter how much pressure she felt to produce an heir to the throne.

Charlie’s shoulders were so knotted with tension she could barely steer the Mercedes off the I-91 ramp onto Route 5 to Northampton. The air conditioner blasted; still, heat blazed in her face. Jenny was missing, Jenny had run away. She should have known something like this was going to happen; she should have known she couldn’t trust Tess with the responsibility. It didn’t matter that Jenny had been coming to visit Tess for years: this year was different, Jenny was different. She was a teenager, filled with teenage insecurities and vulnerabilities.

She slapped a hand on the steering wheel. Damn Tess. And damn Peter. Damn Peter for being too busy—too tied up with “important” negotiations to come to Northampton.

“Our daughter is missing!” Charlie had screamed at him when he told her she’d have to make the trip alone.

“I’m sure Tess is overreacting,” he’d said. “Jenny probably went to a friend’s house.”

“She doesn’t have any friends in Northampton.”

“We don’t know that, Charlie. She may have made friends this summer.”

Charlie had thrown her clothes in a suitcase. She would have preferred to throw them at him.

As she stopped at the sign at the bottom of the ramp, she wondered if Peter would have reacted differently if Jenny had been his flesh and blood. She winced at the reminder of her miscarriages—three in all—that had left her with a hysterectomy and them with no children of their own. Peter had never seemed bitter and yet … and yet …

Charlie pivoted her head to stretch her neck. Something
pulled—a muscle—just above her shoulder. She reached to rub it, but the pain only intensified. She lay her forehead on the steering wheel and began to cry. Damn Peter. He was busier now that Elizabeth was dead. She’d left their lives but had made sure they would still be miserable.

Behind her, a car blared its horn. Charlie jerked her head. Pain shot through her shoulder again. She glanced in her rearview mirror, gave the driver behind her the finger, then aimed her car into the street without looking either way.

Thankfully, no one was coming.

She continued up Route 5 toward the center of town. It had seemed easier to drive; faster, certainly, as there were no flights into the area until tonight and the bus was out of the question. Too cramped, too many people breathing the same stale air. At least in her car, Charlie felt she had some control in getting there as fast as possible. Even at that, it had taken three hours.

“Jenny will probably be back at Tess’s by the time you arrive,” Peter had said. “Why don’t you stay here and wait for Tess to call?”

Damn you, damn you, damn you
, Charlie muttered now. How could he have expected her to wait?

She took a left in the center of town and headed toward the college, toward Round Hill Road. Maybe, she thought, Peter had expected Charlie to wait because they didn’t have the same priorities. Maybe Peter had never truly accepted Jenny as his daughter. After the miscarriages, after the realization that they would never have children together, maybe he had come to resent Jenny.

Charlie gripped the steering wheel and tried to hold back her tears. If Peter did resent Jenny, he wasn’t alone. Charlie knew she blamed Jenny—well, maybe not Jenny herself, but certainly the issue of Jenny—for her volatile relationship with Elizabeth. Because of the child—the dark-haired child—Elizabeth had never given Charlie a chance to prove she was worthy of Peter, deserving of the Hobart name.

But now Elizabeth was gone and Jenny was missing.

Maybe God was punishing them. Maybe God was punishing them for not being more grateful to have Jenny, for not cherishing her, for not recognizing that because they
could not have children of their own, Jenny should have been more special to them.

“God,” Charlie cried out, “forgive us. Forgive
me
. For being so selfish. For not being a better mother.”

She drove past the small shops and boutiques along Main Street and barely noticed the changes in the town. “Please let Jenny be all right,” Charlie pleaded. “Please let her be safe at Tess’s when I get there.”

A pedestrian stepped in front of the car. Charlie slammed on the brakes. Her heart stopped. She’d nearly forgotten that in Northampton, pedestrians had the right of way. Always. Her hands trembled on the steering wheel. Then she looked up and saw College Hall, perched on its authoritative hill, peering down onto the town below, preening its status. For the first time, Charlie hated Smith College. She hated Smith College and the time she’d spent there. She hated that she’d ever met Peter Hobart, that she’d ever known Tess Richards or the princess of Novokia. She hated them all. If only she’d stayed home, she could be living in Pittsburgh now, where the pressures of little money must certainly be far less than the pressures of position and power and of trying to be someone you were not.

The traffic inched its way up the Elm Street hill.

Charlie’s breath came in short gasps. She craned her neck to see if she could spot Round Hill Road; the pinch in her shoulder returned.

The car in front of her stopped. Charlie slammed on her brakes again. “Damn pedestrians,” she shouted. “Get the fuck out of my way!” But her words echoed only to her, within the closed-windowed, air-conditioned car.

Finally, the traffic crawled again. And then she saw it. Round Hill Road. Tess’s street. The place she’d left so long ago, with a bridegroom and a baby. Marina’s baby. The baby she had pledged to nurture and raise and love. Jenny. The place where she’d dumped Jenny each summer because it had been more convenient, less stressful.

She edged down the street and forced her breathing to slow. She pulled into the driveway of Tess’s house as if she’d done it only yesterday. The place looked the same: still small, still white with black shutters, though now gravely in need of fresh paint.

A shaggy dog bounded from the back porch, yapping
Charlie’s arrival. The dog from the picture. The picture of Jenny on her vanity. The dog who had been a puppy when Charlie ran here from Peter. She didn’t remember the dog’s name. Jenny would probably not he surprised.

She turned off the ignition and slumped against the steering wheel once more.
I made it
, she said to herself.
I made it, and now I have to see if Jenny has made it, too. If Jenny has returned. If Jenny is okay.

She opened the car door and stepped into the driveway.

“Hello, dog,” she said as she patted the dog’s tangled hair. “Please tell me Jenny’s come back.”

    “She hasn’t come back,” Dell said when Charlie let herself in through the back door. “I think she’s run away.”

Charlie stared at the woman who had seemed to stop aging fifteen years ago, who looked as old and as tired as she had back then, but no more. The deep jowls around her jaw line remained the same, the same jowls that had been tightly set when she handed Charlie the bundle, the infant they named Jenny.

Charlie leaned against the counter. It was still Formica: Tess had never updated the kitchen the way she’d planned. The walls were still the color of eggshells, darker now with time and, no doubt, grease. Charlie remembered the ivy paper she’d planned to put up. But then she’d learned she was pregnant. She did not—could not now—let herself imagine how her life would be different if she had not returned to Peter. She glanced around the room and noticed that Tess had not, in fact, changed, improved, or added anything in the fifteen years she’d lived here. Tess had only accumulated junk: piles of newspapers and magazines, corners filled with “stuff.” It looked like the back room of Dell’s bookshop. She cleared her throat and looked at Dell.

“If Jenny ran away, she’d have left a note.”

Dell took a chipped enamel teapot from the stove and filled it at the sink. “Maybe. But she didn’t.”

Charlie twisted her hands together. “Dell, where could she be? Does she have any friends here?” Peter’s words echoed in her mind. She tried to push the sounds of them away.

“Not that I know of. Tess has kept her busy in the studio.”

“The studio?”

Dell scowled and placed the teapot on the stove. “She’d been teaching Jenny to blow glass. Didn’t Jenny tell you?”

Charlie shook her head. The notes from Jenny had been short and few. Charlie had tried to call three times—maybe it was only twice—but there had been no answer. She remembered now how she’d cursed at Tess for not having an answering machine, for seeming to prefer to remain in the dark ages. Still, Charlie should have tried again.

“Where’s Tess? Is she out looking for her?”

Dell pointed toward the hall. “She’s in her room. Resting.”

Resting?
Charlie wanted to scream. She turned and headed for Tess’s room. How dare she be resting when Jenny was missing?

She pushed open the door without knocking. The blinds were drawn, the room was hot and stuffy. Tess lay on the bed, her back to the door.

“Hello, Charlie.”

“Tess,” Charlie answered, then moved to the other side of the bed to face her friend. What she saw stopped her. Tess looked like hell. Her skin was like putty, dark smudges lined her eyes, and her hair hung like dull flax crumpled across the pillow. Charlie wasn’t sure how much could be attributed to age, and how much to Jenny. “I didn’t think you knew I was here.”