Ivy's Twisted Vine Redux Read online

  “I didn’t agree,” Ivy frowned profusely. “I won’t separate Nicola from this child if it is his just because of Grey’s insecurities.”

  “It’s not the child Grey’s trying to keep from Nicola,” Trina said grabbing a box from Ivy’s back seat. “It’s you.”

  “My God, Trina. You act like the guy is a blood-sucking vampire,” Ivy said defensively. She didn’t want anyone to spoil the fact that Nicola had taken time to call her.

  **

  Across town in the historic Central Gardens estates, Grey sat quietly in his father’s study watching his father smoke an Ashton cigar. As the smoke billowed up to the ceiling, Grey poured another glass of scotch and sipped it lightly savoring the taste and contemplating a plan of action for Ivy and Nicola.

  “You want to tell me what’s wrong with you, boy?’ Mayor Henderson said putting down his newspaper. “You’ve been here two hours and haven’t said one full sentence.”

  “Here’s one for you. Ivy is pregnant,” Grey blurted unconcerned with his father’s approval.

  “Oh,” his father said taking the cigar out his mouth. “Well, that explains the face.” Looking back at the newspaper, his father tried to let the news settle before he began his interrogation.

  “Go ahead. Ask your questions. I’ve been preparing myself all day,” Grey said feeling his father’s eyes glaring at him.

  “Alright.” Mayor Henderson sat up in his chair. “How does this affect the family?”

  “Negatively. The child could possibly belong to someone else,” Grey said irritated. “Some cop.” Grey gulped down the potent contents in his glass and set it down angrily on the end table.

  “Not Ivy!” Mayor Henderson folded his newspaper and pondered for a moment. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

  “Same thing I said.” Grey poured another glass of scotch.

  “Easy on that boy. It won’t help. Believe me, I know.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure Mom’s stepped out on you and gotten pregnant a few times,” Grey said sarcastically. Mayor Henderson shot back a brutal look that made him remember his place. “Anyway, the only thing that will help is an abortion. The problem with that is that even if I could bring myself to ask her to have one, I’m sure that she would not.” The thought sickened him.

  “Abortion is legal not moral. The Henderson men have been fighting abortion for thirty years. It’s a politician’s cash cow. More lobbyist pay to fight that than they do clean air or education just ask your uncle.”

  “Well, when I run for Congress next term, I’ll remember that.” Grey sighed heavily exhaling the large upheaval trapped air in his lungs. “Right now my issues include a pregnant fiancée, a bastard child and a postponed wedding.”

  “How far are you planning to push the wedding back?” It was already hard enough to keep Grey’s many indiscretions out of the hands of the wrong people, but it would be even harder to keep such a scandalous incident out of gossip columns. All of Memphis would be buzzing.

  “She’s not due until July 29th. The wedding was set for the end of May, so we’ll have to push it back until the middle of September.”

  “Why so late?”

  “I can’t bring myself to marry a pregnant woman. If we’re going to get married, I want to at least know what I’m up against. Besides that I’m not going to have some over exaggerated wedding and not enjoy the honeymoon. You know how irritating pregnant women can be.”

  “Do you really think that she will leave that child right after she has given birth?”

  “The child will be six weeks old. Mom can watch it, or Ivy’s mom or a sitter. Hell, I really don’t care.” Grey hadn’t given much thought to babysitting before and refused to do so now.

  “Your mother may watch the baby if the baby is yours. If the baby is not yours, someone else will have to baby-sit. Look into hiring a good nanny, now. And stop saying it. There is no it involved here. There is a child involved. Don’t be caught referring to a child as an it. You get quoted, and you’ll never live it down.”

  “Something else to remember.” Grey sighed. “This has been more than a notion.”

  “I can only imagine. I love your mother, but I can tell you now that she won’t be a damned bit tolerant with this situation.” With Mayor Henderson, everything translated into approval or disapproval of his lovely wife, Maple.

  Grey looked up surprised but in agreement. “You’re right. I’ll look into some reputable nanny’s later in the pregnancy.” His mother’s wrath worried him more than the situation.

  “Always remember to plan ahead.” Grey’s father smiled as he put his cigar back in his mouth. “And meet this man as soon as possible.”

  “Why would I want to meet this guy?” Grey didn’t want to lay eyes on him. He hated him already and didn’t even know him.

  “Don’t you want to know who this remarkable fellow is? After eight years, he steps in and in a matter of moments…steals your fiancée. Now, I don’t know about you, but I would want to know whom the son of a bitch was that so damned cunning. Plus, you need to evaluate who could possibly be in your life for the rest of your life, and decide if it’s worth it. Ivy’s a nice girl, but you should cut your ties now. It’s not like everyone won’t understand.”

  “I gave Ivy an ultimatum. If we marry, even if the baby is his, he can’t be connected to it.”

  “Did she accept?” Grey’s father looked surprised.

  “No. Not yet.”

  “She won’t either. Take my advice. Just go and meet the man face-to-face. Come to some type of agreement. Believe me, he won’t just go away.” Grey’s father picked his newspaper back up. “Besides that, don’t be so hard on her. If I recall correctly, you had a scare what two years ago now? The doctor from the abortion clinic that you were seeing on the side thought she was pregnant. You could have easily been in the same situation.” It was important not to let his son forget that he was no angel.

  “I wish that it was me. Maybe, I’d be able to take it better. Every time I think of another man touching Ivy, I swear to God I feel like killing someone.” Grey could feel his veins bulging out the side of his neck.

  “Well, let me ask this…why are you marrying her at all, if this is going to be such a big issue for you?”

  “Well, for one, I love her. And I think if the shoe was on the other foot, she would still marry me. Second, I can’t run for office next term with a bastard child in the limelight. The media will eat it up, especially the republicans here. They have been looking for a way to hang our ass since we moved into this house.” He knew that his father already knew that answer to the question, but Grey voiced it just to give him ease.

  “I just wish that you would have listened well to my advice,” Mayor Henderson said sighing.

  “What’s that?” Grey rolled his eyes again. He was in no mood to hear one of his father’s long drawn out speeches, but considering he was sitting face-to-face with him in his house, he had no choice.

  “Don’t let a woman wrap your personal life and career around her finger,” Mayor Henderson said with a slighting tone in his voice.

  “So, how do you explain Mom having you by the balls?” Grey asked frustrated. He had had enough of playing the role of the man. It was time to actually stand up and be one.

  Mayor Henderson lifted an eyebrow as his only response and finished his cigar.

  Inwardly Grey knew the cardinal rule of the Henderson men had been broken. It had been the one thing that the did not do. They never allowed a woman to absolutely control them under any circumstance, but Grey had failed. He would be the first of nearly three generations of well-respected, well-educated young bachelors in his family to allow the birth of a child out of wedlock to actually happen. However, times had changed. He knew what it would take to win the Seat, and he could do it as long as he kept a cool head, a clear vision and strong game plan that included keeping Ivy as close and quiet as possible.

  Chapter Ten: The Meeting

  Chapter 10

&nb
sp; THE MEETING

  “I need to meet this Nicola,” Grey said pulling a roasted duck out of his oven and setting it on the stove. He hated that he had waited until he and Ivy were about to sit down to a quiet dinner after a long day at work to discuss such a complicated matter, but that was the way the cards were dealt.

  Grey had finally thought through the entire situation and agreed that his father was right. As long as Nicola remained “successful and determined” in Ivy’s eyes, as she had described him that night at his father’s house, then he remained to be a threat. He had to somehow find out what Nicola’s real story was and make his flaws apparent to Ivy before he found himself married to someone else’s wife.

  “Why do you need to meet him?” Ivy asked shocked at his outlandish request.

  “Why?” Grey appeared calm on the outside even though inside he was reduced to rubble. “Because there is fifty percent chance that this child is his. And I have no idea what this guy is like or what his background is. All these are things that are important when raising a child…especially another man’s child. It’s sort of like when people adopt, they want to know what the biological parents’ backgrounds are to make sure that the kid isn’t certifiably psycho.”

  “So you still won’t hear me on not separating him from his responsibility if he is the father.” Ivy sighed and leaned against the kitchen table.

  “No, I won’t hear you,” Grey said grinding his teeth. He thought they had closed that subject.

  “Why must you be so unreasonable?”

  “What?” Grey clinched his fists. Wanting to call her ungrateful, considering that he was marrying her at all after her little escapade, he quickly bit his lip and put down the carving knife. “How sensible is it to allow him into our lives knowing that he would only ruin our marriage before we could get started.”

  “We don’t know that,” Ivy said tired of the subject.

  “I know it!” Grey screamed. “You know it too. Use your head, Ivy!”

  “Listen to me. You should meet him, and I will arrange it soon. But it’s not your place, although I know that you want it to be, to play God and decide who should be the father. For the sake of the baby, don’t interfere with that part of the child’s life. Besides the entire situation is hypothetical at this point. There is still a great chance that this baby is yours. And for the small chance that the baby is not yours, heaven forbid, the baby can love you and love his or her biological father as well. But if you try to interfere and damage that relationship, it will back fire. Mark my words, Grey.” Ivy turned away and finished setting the table although the candlelight dinner had definitely been ruined.

  “Look, I don’t mean any harm to you right now, because I know that you must be going through a lot. But I am at wit’s end with this entire situation. I need some type of control in this in order for me to go on. He’s already taken a piece of you that I will never be able to get back. I’ve got to make sure that I’m not running a losing race against this guy.” Grey’s anger faded into the dismal depression that was slowly taking over his spirit.

  “You will never lose…” Ivy turned around to find Grey overwhelmingly disgusted. “Oh baby,” she said walking over to him. “You’ll never lose me. I will always belong to you as long as you’ll have me. What happened was a mistake, but God put this child here, and it’s my responsibility to make sure that he or she is not only is born safely but raised safely.” She took his hand and kissed it softy. “Be confident in us, please. Meet him; talk to him; do whatever makes you feel better about the situation, and then let it go.” Her eyes met his as he rubbed through her long locks of hair.

  “Well, that’s a tall order,” he said wrapping his arms around her. “I just don’t know if I can do it.”

  “Grey,” she said with tears in her eyes. “I know that I don’t deserve you. And I’m so sorry for this entire mess. I know that you would never put me through this or do anything like this in a million years, but please don’t leave me.”

  How can she be so clueless? Grey thought to himself as he looked in her eyes.

  * *

  After Grey had dropped her off later that evening, Ivy sat across from her telephone staring into space and pondering on Grey’s uncomfortable disposition at dinner. Even though she felt totally free of guilt when she first returned to Grey, she felt a surge of guilt overwhelming her now that made her feel utterly ashamed of her actions.

  Have I really been so bad? Was it possible that Grey had never once cheated on me, and that all the little signs of infidelity had been imagined? Have I been the only one in our relationship to step outside of my boundaries? Suddenly as Ivy thought back to the tears in Grey’s eyes, she felt it to be so. After all the years that she had tried so desperately to be faithful to their relationship and to him, she messed up. Picking up her telephone, she sighed heavily and dialed Nicola.

  “Hello,” Nicola said looking at the clock on his nightstand.

  “Hi, it’s Ivy.” Staring at the clock, the time finally dawned on her. It was almost eleven.

  “Hey. What’s wrong?” He said hearing a peculiar sound in her voice.

  “Who said that anything was wrong?”

  “No one.” Sitting up in his bed, Nicola rubbed his eyes and picked up his watch.

  “Actually, the reason I was calling is to ask you a big favor.” Silence. “Grey, my fiancé, wants to meet you. It sounds ridiculous, but he’s concerned about what type of person you might be.”

  “Why does it matter? This guy isn’t marrying me.” The last thing Nicola wanted to do was get involved with her family any deeper before he knew whether or not the baby was actually his.

  “We finally had a talk about how we planned to handle this situation, and of course, the possibility of the child being yours came up in the discussion. So, he wants to meet you for the sake of the child. He wants…to know who he’s dealing with now.” Ivy couldn’t find a better way to explain it and instantly felt uncomfortable for asking.

  “Look, you know that I want your relationship to work with your fiancé, but I’m not going to be jumping through hoops for you too either. This is a problem that you two have to solve internally. I don’t want to…get more involved than I have to at this point.” Nicola wasn’t in the mood to get agitated, but Ivy was slowly helping to it anyway.

  “Just do this for me,” Ivy said softly. “Please, I won’t ask you for anything like this again,” she added grinding her teeth. “It would really help, Nicola.”

  After a long silence, he finally responded reluctantly. “Fine, but it’s not for him. I’m going to set things straight face-to-face, because I don’t have time for this kind of drama regardless of our little outcome.”

  “Okay.” Ivy just wanted to be out of it. “Is tomorrow around twelve good for you? He wants to meet you for lunch downtown at the Piatza Club, he’ll be in the VIP booths in the back of the restaurant. He’s reserved a table for you two to talk and have lunch.”

  “Yeah,” Nicola said yawning. He was getting tired of both Grey and Ivy at this point and regretted the entire situation. “Ivy, I’ll only do this once.”

  “I understand. Thanks. Really.

  There was a long silence on the phone.

  “Well I’ll let you go.” She was beginning to feel nauseous all over again.

  “Alright,” he said hanging up the phone.

  Getting out of bed, Kit looked over at Nicola and smiled. “I didn’t know that you had a child,” she said lighting her cigarette. “You don’t look like the type.”

  “I’m not the type. I don’t even know if I’m the father yet,” Nicola said pulling the comforter from his legs and sitting on the side of the bed. “Hey, put that out will you. I don’t want that smell in my fucking bedroom.” Women, he thought to himself as she stood up naked and walked to the bathroom.

  “Don’t get mad at me, because you’re suffering from baby’s momma drama,” Kit said slipping on her jeans.

  “What do you know about
baby momma drama?” Nicola said laughing as he stood over the toilet. Looking at himself in the mirror, he decided that he desperately needed to shave.

  “Let’s just say that I had my tubes tied after my first son, Nathaniel.” She said struggling with her French accent.

  “You have a son?” Nicola asked wiggling his leg and flushing the toilet.

  “Yeah. He stays with his father in Atlanta.” Kit pulled a picture of her son from her purse and handed to him as he walked out of the bathroom. “He will be five this February.” She smiled proudly.

  “Damn, he’s black.” Nicola said shocked that there was very little resemblance between Kit and her son.

  “You know what they say,” she said putting the picture back in her purse. “Once you go...”

  “Believe me, I already know the saying,” he said tired of hearing the same tired-ass cliché.

  *

  Noon came early for Nicola the next day. Pulling into the parking garage of the Redbirds Baseball stadium, he slipped on his shades and ran his fingers through his hair. As he walked into the Toyota Center that housed the Piatza Club, the receptionist pointed him to elevator where he was escorted to the second floor. Sounds of soft jazz, low chatter greeted him as the doors of the elevator opened. He was quickly taken to the VIP booths by a chipper Mexican hostess.

  Grey sipped an afternoon Mimosa and looked around the restaurant through the glass walls of the VIP area that set elevated hoping to spot his opponent. He had come early and prepared mental notes. He was ready to unleash boundary rules and make his territory known. He was prepared to be Grey Henderson. His confidence was soaring when he made eye contact with a cop that he had met briefly at his dad’s meetings at City Hall. He nodded first at him and then almost choked on his drink. Could it be? No. Hello no. Maybe Agosta would simply walk to another table and await a friend to meet him for lunch. But the guy kept approaching him as though he was going to sit at his table.