Page 49
They put me in a cell in the basement of the courthouse. It is clean, at least, and separated from the other prisoners. The cop who found the vial practically shoves me in, but David, who met him at the courthouse door, is kinder.
“I’m sure we’ll get this all sorted out soon,” he tells me with a worried smile. “Sit tight. ”
The door clanks closed behind them, but I don’t sit. I sink onto the cot bolted to the far wall and curl up into a ball, as tight and small as I can make myself. It’s hot in the airless cell, but I shiver uncontrollably, clench my teeth to stop their chattering.
I have to be prepared for whatever happens next. I can’t falter now. I tell myself that whoever comes into my cell, I will be ready. It could be my father, the president, Bishop himself. Whoever it is, I will be strong.
I’m not sure how much time passes. Long enough that bright sunlight is slanting in through the tiny window at the top of the cell. It’s almost unbearably stuffy now and tiny dust motes dance in the bright shaft of light. If I stare at them long enough, I can pretend I’m floating among them, transported somewhere far away from here.
“Ivy?”
I jerk up to sitting, blood beating against the backs of my eyes. It’s Victoria in the doorway. Not who I expected. She closes the cell door behind her and leans back against it. Her eyes are sad.
“Your father and sister are here,” she says. “They’re upstairs being questioned. Then they’ll meet with the Lattimers. They say they had no idea what you were planning. ” It’s not a question, but she asks it like one. Waiting for me to sell them out.
“They didn’t know,” I say. My tongue is dry and feels several sizes too big for my mouth.
“I assume you don’t want to talk to the police without an attorney. So this afternoon, we’ll get a lawyer assigned to you. Then you can—”
“No,” I say, too loud. I temper my voice. “No lawyer. ” The legal system is not the same as it was before the war. We are not entitled to an attorney or to refuse to speak to the police. But my friends in the courthouse are giving me special treatment I neither need nor want. Victoria probably thinks she is helping me. “I want to plead guilty. No trial. ”
“Ivy,” Victoria says, taking a step toward me. “I don’t know what’s going on. But I do know what will happen if you plead guilty. And so do you. ”
I nod. Breathe past the terror sitting in my chest like a boulder. “I’m guilty. No trial. ”
Victoria stares at me for a moment, then reaches behind her and unlocks my cell. “Come with me,” she says.
I hesitate. “Where are we going?”
“Come on,” she says. “Hurry. ”
I don’t want to leave the relative safety of my cell, but Victoria has never hurt me. I stand and follow her out of the cell. “We’ll see what we can do about getting you some shoes,” Victoria says, glancing at my bare feet. “And some other clothes. ”
We walk out of the cellblock and through another door Victoria has to unlock with a ring of keys attached to her belt. David is waiting on the other side, and his eyebrows shoot up when we come through.
“I’m putting her in one of the interrogation rooms,” Victoria says.
“Okay. ” David seems confused, but he doesn’t argue.
Victoria leads me to a door on the left of the hallway, indistinguishable from all the rest. The room beyond the door is small, holding only a card table and two chairs. “Sit,” Victoria says. “I’ll be back. ” Before she leaves, she flicks a button on the wall intercom. She locks the door behind her.
There is a two-way mirror on the far side of the room, but I don’t think anyone’s watching me. I sit on the metal folding chair and cross my arms, using my hands to try and bring some warmth to my skin. The intercom on the wall buzzes to life, static shooting through the room, startling me and making me jump in my seat.
“She says she’s guilty. ” Victoria’s voice from the intercom. What is going on?
“Bishop! Are you listening? Did you hear what Victoria said?” Erin’s voice this time. The intercom distorts the sound, making everything fuzzy and slightly indistinct, but I still recognize the voices. I pick up my chair and move it closer to the wall.
“It doesn’t matter what she said. ” Bishop. He sounds exhausted. “She didn’t do it. She wasn’t going to kill me. ”
“Then why was there poison in your house?” Erin demands.
“I don’t know,” Bishop says with a sigh. “I don’t have an explanation for it, but I know she’s not guilty. ”
I want to reach through the intercom and touch him. It’s a kind of torture knowing he’s right upstairs and I can’t get to him.
“She says she is, though,” President Lattimer says. They must all be here. Are my father and Callie up there, too?
As if the thought summoned her, I hear Callie speak. “I didn’t want to say anything before. But now I think I have to. ”
“What is it?” President Lattimer asks.
“Ivy’s always been…different,” Callie says. My hands curl into fists in my lap.
“Different?” Erin’s voice is sharp. “What do you mean?”
“Unstable,” my father says, and with that word I hear the last brick fall. My fate well and truly sealed. It’s what I wanted. It’s what had to happen. But my family’s betrayal still cuts like a sharp blade. “We did what we could for her,” my father continues. “But she’s always been up and down, impossible to predict. We hoped that she would outgrow it. That it wasn’t a permanent part of her personality. ”
There is silence for a moment, and then Erin bursts out, “Just like her mother. Crazy like her mother!” I am glad we are not in the same room, because right now my fists have a mind of their own.
“Erin, stop it!” President Lattimer barks.
“Ivy is not crazy. And neither was her mother,” my father says. “But…it’s not completely out of character for her to do something like this. ”
“She felt very strongly about the arranged marriages,” Callie says. “That they were wrong. She might have thought this was an appropriate response. There’s really no way of knowing exactly what was going on inside her head. ”
There’s a moment where no one speaks. “Bullshit,” Bishop says flatly into the silence. “That’s utter bullshit. ”
“Bishop!”
Even with my entire life spiraling out of my hands, I have to smile at Bishop’s words, at his complete faith in me, at his mother’s appalled response. He can still, after everything, make me smile when I least expect it.
“I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but what you’re saying about Ivy isn’t true,” Bishop says. “Either you don’t know her at all or you’re lying. I lived in that house with her every day. I slept next to her. And there is nothing wrong with her. She—” His voice breaks and I turn away from the intercom. I know how carefully Bishop guards his emotions, protecting them from those who don’t deserve to see beneath his surface. I hate that I am the one who has forced him to reveal himself this way.