Page 31 of The Ruling Class

“Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked Vivvie.

“I should go.” She couldn’t meet my eyes. “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine.”

All I could think as she disappeared into the house was that Vivvie was a miserable liar.

CHAPTER 20

That night, I did an internet search on Vivvie’s father. He was a decorated soldier, a former trauma surgeon in Afghanistan and Iraq. From what I could tell, he’d been the head of the White House medical clinic—and the president’s personal physician—for just over two years. Unable to get the image of Vivvie’s haunted expression out of my mind, I clicked on the video of Major Bharani’s statement to the press.

“It is with great sadness that I inform you that Chief Justice Theodore Marquette died on the table a little over an hour ago.”Now that I knew to look for it, I could see a resemblance—a faint one—between Vivvie and her father.“This was our second attempt to fix a blockage in the justice’s heart, and there were unforeseen complications with surgery. This country has lost a great man today. We ask that you respect his family’s privacy in this time of grief.”

Nothing in the twenty-second clip told me what was wrong with Vivvie. I thought back to World Issues, when I’d seen theclip for the first time—the stares directed at Vivvie, the way she’d gone stiff in her seat.

Her father had operated on one of our classmates’ relatives, and now Henry Marquette’s grandfather was dead. Did she think people would blame her?

Don’t. Embarrass. Me.The words Major Bharani had hissed at Vivvie echoed in my mind.

“Everything okay in here?” Ivy poked her head into my room.

“You’re home,” I said.

“I am.” She paused. “I wanted to say thank you. For coming today.”

I looked down at my keyboard. “No big deal.”

I could feel her wanting to make it a big deal, wanting to take the fact that I’d gone with her as an indication that the two of us were going to be okay.

“I sent you an e-mail,” she said, instead of pressing the topic further. “With treatment options.”

For Gramps.I weathered the impact of that blow.

“There’s a chance we could get home care, hire nurses either here or in Montana.” Ivy presented the option calmly and neutrally. “Or there’s a clinical trial. He’d stay in Boston, but they have an assisted living facility, so it wouldn’t be inpatient exactly.”

She was waiting for me to say something. I’d asked to be involved, but now that the information was in my inbox, my mouth was dry.It wasn’t a good day today.I willed my eyes to stop stinging.

“Thanks,” I said, staring holes in my keyboard.

“Take a look. Then we’ll talk.”

I managed to force my eyes up as far as my computer screen. The image of Vivvie’s father stared back at me.

“Do you know the White House doctor?” I asked Ivy, as much to change the subject as because I couldn’t rid my mind of the look in Vivvie’s eyes.

“Major Bharani?” Ivy replied. “I know he’s got the patience of a saint. According to Georgia, the president makes a horrible patient.” She leaned against the doorjamb. “Why do you ask?”

WhywasI asking?

“His daughter was assigned to show me around at Hardwicke.” That wasn’t an answer, not really.

“Vivvie, right?” Ivy said. If I was surprised she knew Vivvie’s name, I shouldn’t have been. Ivy offered me a small smile. “Washington is a small world. And HardwickeisWashington.”

I was beginning to get that sense. Vivvie’s father was the White House physician. Henry Marquette’s grandfather had sat on the Supreme Court. I’d just been to a funeral where the eulogy was given by the president of the United States.

“How did you know him?” I asked Ivy. “Theo Marquette?”

There was an almost imperceptible shift in Ivy. She stood a little straighter, the set of her features completely neutral. “I worked a job for him. We stayed in touch.”

Ivy was the master of answering questions without really telling me a thing.