The Fixer

by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

  “You used to do that when you were little.” Ivy appeared in the doorway, hovering there for a moment before taking a seat on the couch. “You’d do loops around Mom’s feet, the coffee table. Other babies learned to walk. You learned to pace.” She smiled slightly. “It drove her nuts.”

  Ivy and I had only lived in the same house for that one year, when I was a baby and she was a senior in high school. I wished sometimes that I could remember it, but even if I could, she’d still be a stranger—one who threatened everything I’d worked so hard to protect.

  “You should have called me when things got bad, Tess.”

  Called her? I should have picked up a phone and called her, when she couldn’t even be bothered to visit?

  “I’m handling it, Ivy.” I cursed myself, cursed the guidance counselor for making the call. “We’re fine.”

  “No, sweetie, you’re not.”

  She didn’t get to come here, after years, and tell me I wasn’t fine. She didn’t get to insert herself into our lives, and she didn’t get to call me sweetie.

  “There’s a treatment center in Boston,” she continued calmly. “The best in the country. There’s a waiting list for the inpatient facility, but I made some calls.”

  My stomach twisted sharply. Gramps loved this ranch. He was this ranch. It wouldn’t survive without him. I’d given up everything—track, friends, the hope of ever getting a good night’s sleep—to keep him here, to keep things running, to take care of him, the way he’d always taken care of me.

  “Gramps is fine.” I set my jaw in a mutinous line. “He gets confused sometimes, but he’s fine.”

  “He needs a doctor, Tessie.”

  “So take him to a doctor.” I swallowed hard, feeling like I’d already lost. “Figure out what we need to do, what I need to do, and then bring him home.”

  “You can’t stay here, Tess.” Ivy reached for my hand. I jerked it back. “You’ve been taking care of him,” she continued softly. “Who’s been taking care of you?”

  “I can take care of myself.”

  The set of her jaw matched my own. “You shouldn’t have to.”

  “She’s right, Bear.” I looked up to see Gramps standing in the doorway. “Don’t you worry about me, girlie,” he ordered. He was lucid—and intractable.

  “You don’t have to do this, Gramps,” I told him. My words fell on deaf ears.

  “You’re a good girl, Tess,” he said gruffly. He met my sister’s eyes and something passed unspoken between them. After a long moment, Ivy turned back to me.

  “Until we get things settled, I want you to come back with me.” She held up a hand to cut off my objections. “I’ve talked to a school in DC. You start on Monday.”

  CHAPTER 4

  “I’d tell you that you can’t stay mad forever,” Ivy commented, “but I’m pretty sure you’d take that as a challenge.”

  I hadn’t spoken to my sister once since we’d checked my grandfather into the facility in Boston. She kept telling me how nice it was, how highly thought of the specialists were, how often we could go to visit. None of that changed the fact that we left him there. I left him. He would wake up in the middle of the night, disoriented, and I wouldn’t be there. He would frantically start looking for the grandmother who’d died before I was even born, and I wouldn’t be there.

  He would have good days, and I wouldn’t be there.

  If the silent treatment was getting to Ivy, she showed no sign of it as we navigated the DC airport. Her heels clicked against the tile as she stepped off the escalator and glided into the kind of graceful power walk that made everyone else in the airport look twice and get out of her way. She paused for an instant when we came to a row of men in black suits holding carefully lettered signs. Chauffeurs. At the very end of the line was a man wearing a navy blue T-shirt and ripped jeans.

  There was a hint of stubble on his suntanned face and a pack of cigarettes in his left hand. In his right hand he, too, held a carefully lettered sign. But instead of writing his client’s last name, he’d opted for: PAIN IN THE *%$&@.

  Ivy stalked up to him and handed him her carry-on. “Cute.”

  He smirked. “I thought so.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Tess, meet Bodie. He was my driver and personal assistant, but as of five seconds ago, he’s fired.”

  “I prefer ‘Jack-of-All-Trades,’ ” Bodie interjected. “And I’m only fired until there’s a female you can’t sweet-talk or a law you won’t br—”

  Ivy cut him off with an all-powerful glare. I mentally finished his sentence: I’m only fired until there’s a female you can’t sweet-talk or a law you won’t break. I darted a glance at Ivy, my eyebrows shooting up. What exactly did my sister do that she needed a chauffeur willing to break laws on her behalf?

  Ivy ignored my raised brows and plowed on, unperturbed. “Now would be a good time to get our bags,” she told Bodie.

  “You can get your own bags, princess,” Bodie retorted. “I’m fired.” He rocked back on his heels. “I will, however, help Tess here with hers out of the goodness of my heart.” Bodie didn’t wink at me or smirk, but somehow, I felt as if he’d done both. “I’m very philanthropic,” he added.

  I didn’t reply, but I did let him help me with my bags. The cigarettes disappeared into his back pocket the moment my duffels came into view. Muscles bulged under his T-shirt as he grabbed a bag in each hand.

  He didn’t look like anyone’s chauffeur.

  Ivy’s house loomed over the pavement, boxy and tall, with twin chimneys on either side. It seemed too big for one person.

  “I live on the second floor,” Ivy clarified as she, Bodie, and I made our way into the house. “I work on the first.”

  It was on the tip of my tongue to ask Ivy what work entailed, but I didn’t. My sister had always been mysteriously close-lipped about her life in Washington. Asking for details now would be taken as a sign of interest.

  I’m not interested.

  Stepping into an enormous foyer, I concentrated on the sight in front of me: dark wood floors and massive columns gave the expanse the look of a ballroom. To my left, there was an alcove lined with bay windows, and behind that, a hallway lined with doors.

  “The closed doors go to the conference room and my office. Both are off-limits. The main kitchen is through there, but we mostly use it for entertaining.”

  We? I wondered. I didn’t let myself get further than that as I followed Ivy up a spiral staircase to what appeared to be a sparsely decorated apartment. “The kitchen up here is more of a kitchenette,” she told me. “I don’t cook much. We mostly order in.”

  Bodie cleared his throat and when she didn’t respond the first time, he repeated the action, only louder.

  “We mostly order in, and sometimes Bodie makes pancakes downstairs,” Ivy amended. I took that to mean that Bodie was definitely part of Ivy’s we.

  “Do you live here, Bodie?” I asked, darting a sideways glance at Ivy’s “driver.”

  He choked on his own spit. “Ahh . . . no,” he said, once he’d recovered. “I don’t live here.” I must have looked skeptical, because he elaborated. “Kid, I worked for your sister for a year and a half before she even invited me up here, and that was only because she broke the plumbing.”

  “I did not break the plumbing,” Ivy replied testily. “It broke itself.” She turned back to me. “Your room is through here.”

  My room? I thought. She spoke so casually, I could almost believe that I wasn’t just some unpleasant surprise that fate and Alzheimer’s had dropped in her lap.

  “Don’t you mean the guest room?” I asked.

  Ivy opened the bedroom door, and I realized that the room was completely empty—no furniture. Nothing.

  Not a guest room.

  The room was mostly square, with a nook by the window and a ceiling that sloped on either side. The floors were a dark mahogany wood. A series of mirrors doubled as sliding doors to the closet.

  “I thought you might
like to decorate it yourself.” Ivy stepped into the room. If I hadn’t known better, I would have said she looked almost nervous. “I know it’s a little on the small side, but it’s my favorite room in the house. And you’ve got your own bathroom.”

  The room was beautiful, but even thinking that felt disloyal. “Where am I going to sleep?” I asked.

  “Wherever you put the bed.” Ivy’s reply was brusque, like she’d caught herself caring and managed to put a cork in it.

  “Where am I going to sleep until I get a bed?” I asked, checking the impulse to roll my eyes.

  “Tell me what kind of bed you want,” Ivy replied, “and Bodie will make sure it gets here tonight. I’ve got some furniture catalogs you can look at.”

  I stared at my sister, wondering if she realized just how ridiculous that plan sounded. “I don’t think furniture companies do same-day delivery on a Saturday night,” I said, stating the obvious.

  Bodie set my bags against the wall and then leaned back against the doorjamb. “They do,” he told me, “if you’re Ivy Kendrick.”

  CHAPTER 5

  The next morning, when I woke up in the bed I’d selected more or less randomly from one of Ivy’s catalogs, there was no escaping the physical reminders of where I was. And where I wasn’t. The bed beneath me was too comfortable. The ceiling above wasn’t my ceiling. Everything about this felt wrong.

  I thought of Gramps, waking up in Boston and staring at a strange ceiling of his own. Pushing back against the suffocating wave of emotion that washed over me just thinking about it, I got up, got dressed, and pondered the fact that the mere mention of my sister’s name had been enough to make furniture appear within hours of being ordered. Back on the ranch, she’d managed to have herself declared my legal guardian and obtained our grandfather’s power of attorney almost as quickly.

  Who did that? And more importantly—who could?

  I should have known what my sister did for a living. I should have known Ivy. But I didn’t. Making my way out of the bedroom, I found the loft empty, a visceral reminder that it had always been my sister’s choice not to know me. She was the one who’d left. She was the one who’d stopped answering my calls.

  Whoever she was, whatever she did—she’d chosen this life over me.

  The muted sound of voices rose up from downstairs. At the top of the spiral staircase, I paused. The female voice was unmistakably Ivy’s. The person she was talking to was male.

  “You don’t think that this was, just possibly, a little bit impulsive?” The mystery man’s tone of voice made it quite clear that he thought little bit was an understatement.

  “Impulsive, Adam?” Ivy shot back. “You’re the one who taught me to trust my instincts.”

  “This wasn’t instinct,” the man—Adam—countered. “This was guilt, Ivy.”

  “I’m not debating this with you.”

  “Evidence would suggest you are.”

  “Adam”—I could practically hear Ivy clenching her teeth—“if you want me to look into your little friend at the DOJ, you’ll stop talking. Now.”

  For several seconds, there was silence, followed by a grunt of frustration.

  “What do you want me to do, Adam?” my sister asked finally, her voice soft enough now that I had to strain to hear. “Things were bad in Montana. I’m not sending her back, and I am not shipping her off to some boarding school. And don’t give me that look—you were the one who told me to bring her here three years ago!”

  Realizing that they were arguing about me turned my body to stone. And what did Ivy mean that Adam was the one who had suggested she invite me to live with her the first time around? Who was this guy? Why had she listened to him?

  Why had she changed her mind?

  Some memories were like scars. This one had never healed right. Just hearing Ivy talk about it ripped off the scab.

  “Three years ago, bringing Tess here might have been the right call.” Adam’s voice was terse. “But things change, Ivy. Three years ago, you were on speaking terms with my father.”

  I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, and the stair beneath me creaked. The voices below went suddenly quiet. They’d heard me. I had a split second to decide on a course of action. I went with “pretend you weren’t just eavesdropping and walk down the stairs.”

  “Ivy?” I called out. “You down there?”

  Ivy met me at the bottom of the steps. Her light brown hair was loosely coiffed at the nape of her neck. She wore a formfitting blazer as comfortably as most people wore sweatshirts. Even her jeans looked expensive. If she saw through my innocent act, she didn’t call me on it. “Good,” she said. “You’re up.”

  I had an excellent poker face, refined by years of playing actual poker with gruff old men. “I’m up.”

  Ivy smiled, gleaming white teeth covering for the fact that she didn’t look happy in the least. “Adam,” she called out, her voice so pleasant my teeth ached from the sugar in her tone. “Come meet Tess.”

  I had two seconds to wonder what the man would look like before he rounded the corner. He was a couple of years older than Ivy. If I’d had to guess, I would have put his height at exactly six feet. No more. No less. His posture was perfect; every muscle in his face was tightly controlled. His eyes met mine, and that control wavered. Just for a second, this stranger looked at me the way Ivy had looked at our grandfather when he’d called her by Mom’s name.

  The expression was gone from his face in an instant. “Tess,” he said, holding out his right hand, “I’m Adam Keyes. It’s nice to meet you.” His words sounded genuine. He looked like an honest enough guy. But given that Adam Keyes thought bringing me here was a mistake, I somehow doubted he was all that pleased to meet me.

  I took his hand. “Yeah,” I said. “You, too.”

  He waited, like he thought I might elaborate, but I didn’t say anything else.

  “Ivy tells me you’ll be starting at Hardwicke tomorrow,” Adam said, trying to make conversation. “You’ll like it there. It’s a great school.” He raised an eyebrow at the expression on my face. “Not a big fan of school, I take it?”

  “School’s fine.” Again, he waited, and again, I left it at that.

  “But you’d rather be outside,” Adam elaborated on my behalf. I glanced over at Ivy, wondering what she had told him about me—wondering how she even knew that about me, when the two of us were practically strangers.

  “My brother was like that,” Adam said, clearing his throat. “IQ off the charts, but his favorite subject was recess.”

  “And how’d that work out for him?” I asked, trying to decide whether or not I’d just been insulted.

  A small, fleeting smile passed over Adam’s face. “He joined the army the day he graduated from high school.”

  Bodie announced his presence by slamming the front door. “Somebody call for pancakes?”

  The smile hardened on Adam’s face. Apparently, he wasn’t as fond of my sister’s driver as she was. “I should go,” Adam said stiffly. “I need to stop by the office.”

  “On a Sunday?” Ivy pressed.

  “Like you’re one to talk,” Adam retorted. “You never stop working.”

  “I do now,” Ivy said, folding her hands in front of her body. “Sunday is the day of rest. This is me, resting. I thought Tess and I might go shopping this afternoon, get some clothes for her first day at Hardwicke.”

  Shopping? With Ivy?

  Bodie let out a bark of laughter at the expression on my face. “Hate to tell you this, princess, but the kid looks like she’d rather rip out her own thumbnails and use them to gouge out her eye than go shopping with you.”

  Ivy wasn’t deterred. “She’ll adjust.”

  Adam’s phone rang. He excused himself, leaving me staring down my sister, and Bodie watching the two of us with no small amount of amusement.

  “Have you heard from the doctors in Boston yet?” I asked Ivy.

  “Not yet.” For a second, I thought that migh
t be all she was going to say, but then she elaborated. “They’ll be doing a complete diagnostic assessment in the next few days.”

  Days. I swallowed, unable to keep my mind from latching on to the word. Days. And weeks. And months. And none of it good. I forced my expression to stay neutral. I couldn’t let myself go down that road. I couldn’t think about Gramps. I couldn’t think about the future.

  Adam walked back into the room. “Ivy.” His tone was low, serious.

  Ivy turned to look at him. “Everything okay?”

  Adam glanced at Bodie and me, as if to say, not around the children.

  “Let me guess,” Bodie drawled, poking at Adam like someone taunting a bear with a stick. “The Pentagon?”

  “That wasn’t the Pentagon,” Adam said curtly. “That was my father.”

  His father—the one Adam had said Ivy was on good terms with three years ago. The one she presumably was not on good terms with now.

  “And?” Ivy prompted, in a tone that told me that there was always an and with Adam’s father.

  “And,” Adam said, his face devoid of emotion, “he was calling to tell me that Theo Marquette was just rushed to Bethesda General. Heart attack. They’re not sure if he’s going to make it.” He let that sink in for a second before continuing. “They’ve got a lid on it for now, but the press will know in a matter of hours.”

  Ivy took a beat to absorb that information, then locked her hand around Adam’s elbow and pulled him to the side of the room for a hushed conversation. In less than a minute, Ivy was on her phone, barking out commands.

  Glancing back over her shoulder at me, she lowered her voice. “Sorry, Tess. Something’s come up. When I have an update on Gramps, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, Bodie can take you shopping for anything you need.”

  I should have been grateful for the reprieve—but really, it was just a reminder that Ivy could and would ditch me at the drop of a hat. I might not have known what my sister’s job was, or why news of some guy’s heart attack had sent her into hyperdrive, or even why the name Theo Marquette sounded vaguely familiar in the first place. But the one thing I did know was that Adam was right—Ivy never should have brought me here.