by M. D. Melai
We had just settled into our lounge chairs when Emilio asked me how Jamaica was. He knew all the unexciting parts and none of the exhilarating ones. I was excited to tell him everything Violet and I actually did.
“That sounds like a lot of fun. I’m glad you had a good time,” Emilio said once I was done telling him everything we did.
“It was. After being cooped up here for the past two weeks all I can think about is going back there. Sometimes I wish I would have never left,” I admitted.
“I know this is hard on you, but let’s make a deal. If you can make it through the next few months with us beta testing Elle as you, then I will take you back to Jamaica or anywhere else you want to go. Deal?”
“A few months? I don’t know if I can make it that long. Two weeks has already been long enough,” I retorted.
I appreciated the gesture, but a few months was too long. How was I supposed to trust that a few months wouldn’t turn into a few more months, or even a year?
“Okay. Let’s say around Thanksgiving then? That’s less than three months. Do you think you can do that?” he asked.
I took a deep breath and thought about it.
Could I do it?
“Okay, on one condition,” I replied. I had piqued his interest and he waited for me to continue. “We have to have more evenings like this. I know you’re busy and you have a lot to do outside of the house, but once a week or so if we could do this, just you and me, with no distractions, then I’d really appreciate it.”
“I think that can be arranged,” he said as he took my hand and smiled.
“Oh and one more thing.”
“I only agreed to one condition,” he said, smiling.
I grinned at his witty comeback before responding. “Just make sure you keep your PDA moments with Elle outside of this house.”
“Oh you mean the home wrecking whore?” he laughed.
My eyes grew wide and I looked at him. He and Elle had heard me the other night. At that time, I didn’t care if they had heard me or not, but now it made my face turn red from embarrassment.
“Don’t worry. I’ve talked to her about it,” he continued, “and it won’t happen again. I promise.”
“I guess I should apologize to her,” I said as my cheeks still burned with humiliation.
“It’s okay. She knows how hard of a time you are having with this. She apologized and said she would work on it,” he explained.
I smiled at him as I turned to look back towards the property. The sun was setting and everything was becoming so tranquil outside.
We eventually made our way into the Jacuzzi. We talked about nothing in particular, just laughed and relaxed.
It had been dark outside for a while when I climbed out of the nice relaxing water. I was starting to get sleepy and decided it was time to head to bed. However, I did make a mental note to start using the Jacuzzi more often.
When Emilio climbed out of the water, I couldn’t help but stop and stare at him. I would never get tired of seeing our story tattooed across his chest. He added two new teardrops while I was gone. It made me happy, yet sad at the same time. I was happy, because he continuously had a reminder of me every time he looked into the mirror. But, it also made me sad, because he tortured himself with each new teardrop that was added, which signified each bad thing he had done to me. I wished in that moment that there were more reminders of the good and less of the bad.
Shortly after, Emilio walked me to the staircase. He said he had some last minute paperwork he needed to fill out, and told me I would see him in the morning. Then he kissed me goodnight and I headed up the stairs.
There was something in his eyes that told me he wasn’t quite telling the truth.
He waved goodnight to me when I reached the top of the stairs. Then he headed down the other set towards the basement. I watched as he disappeared down them before I made my way back down to the first floor.
I was about to follow him down into the basement when I stopped. I heard him moving about and then I heard the panels move and the keyboard shot out. I could even hear him as he punched in the code and the click of the door as it opened.
I wanted desperately to go down there and see it myself, but I couldn’t risk getting caught. Whatever it was, Emilio was going to great lengths to keep it hidden.
In that moment, I made it my daily mission to figure out the password and find out what exactly was behind the big black door.
Chapter 5
Every day for the rest of the week I visited the safe. I was becoming obsessed with finding out what was behind that door. Once breakfast was over with and everyone left the house, I would walk down to the basement and stare at the keypad, type in a word, date, or phrase, and when it didn’t work, I would walk back upstairs and work until something crossed my mind. This would go on for hours. I was starting to think I would never figure it out.
When Friday arrived Violet decided she had had enough over the past week and told Emilio and Dante that she was staying home with me. She instructed them to do whatever with Elle, just keep her out of the office today.
Violet’s exact words were, “I don’t have time to clean up any mess she might make! Keep her busy. Take her shopping. I don’t care. Just keep her the hell away from the office.”
Elle was getting worse with trying to ‘help.’ Violet had come home and locked herself in our room the last two nights. She refused to talk to Dante, and when I would make my way up to see her, all she would do was yell and scream about Elle and how incompetent she was. When I asked why she was mad at Dante, all Violet would say was she didn’t want to talk about it.
I wasn’t going to push her. When I was in that state, she never pushed me and I already felt bad enough as it was. She was running our business outside and I was trying to run it from the inside. We had the business calls routed to the house, so all she had to do was meet with the clients and check on the progress of the contractors. I tried to take as much stress off her as I could.
We decided all we needed was rest and relaxation for the day. We would listen for the phone, but other than that we wouldn’t be working.
I had made it through the morning without walking down to the basement. I was proud of myself. After lunch, we crawled up on the couch and turned on a movie. It was on a channel that frequently had commercials. When an amusement park commercial came on, it immediately reminded me of Lucas. I didn’t want to think about him, so I quickly pushed that memory out of my mind. A few commercial breaks had passed before a commercial of a cruise line came on and once again Lucas fluttered back into my mind.
“Why does every commercial today have to remind me of him?” I asked annoyed as I threw the remote to the ground.
“Of who?” Violet asked confused.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Violet thought about it for a second before her face lit up. “Oh, you mean Lucas.”
“Yes, him.”
“Do you want to talk about it yet?” she asked.
“Nope,” I said.
“Well, I think we should talk about it. It’s time,” Violet said turning towards me.
“I’m not—” I began before Violet hushed me.
“Shut up!” she half yelled at me before bringing her volume down. I stared at her and didn’t make another sound.
“You’re making him out to be a bad guy when he really isn’t,” she said with a sigh.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Did I miss the memo that said people who lie to you, hurt you, and have their family kidnap you, are amazing people?” The annoyance in my voice was clear.
“If it wasn’t for Lucas the boys would have never found you,” she said as she stared at me intently. “He was the one who texted Emilio and told them exactly where to find you!”
“It still doesn’t excuse what he did, and honestly I don’t want to hear any more about this. I’m grateful he helped them, but I can’t look past what he did before all that,” I said with finality in my voice
.
Violet let it rest… for now at least.
I had a lot of unresolved feelings about Lucas. I knew, in this moment, I strongly disliked him. I hated the fact that he lied to me, that he was the one who pushed me down the steps, and that he was a Heinrich. I hated myself just as much when it came to him, because I still had positive feelings toward him as well. Lucas always made me feel so free and he introduced me to new things. If we were on speaking terms, he would probably be able to turn my situation into something positive. He was creative and always came up with a surprise that I never expected.
I thought about him for a few more minutes before I turned my attention back to the movie and let Lucas slip out of my mind.
Before I knew it, the ending credits were rolling and Violet was sound asleep. I waited another fifteen minutes before I decided to head to the basement. I had thought of two new dates and a word I wanted to try as possible passwords.
I was starting to get weary. I had racked my brain all day trying to think of what the password could be. I punched in both dates and neither one of them worked. I took a deep breath before typing in my final thought. I was hoping with all my being that it would flash green and I would hear the click of the door unlocking.
I hit enter and once again a red light flashed up at me with the words ‘access denied.’ I hung my head and punched the wall with my fist.
What the hell could the password be?
I had tried everything that I could think of. What was I missing? Maybe I didn’t know Emilio as well as I thought I did. This should have been easier than it was.
I walked back up the steps and found Violet standing at the top of them.
“What were you doing in the basement?” she asked curiously.
“I was just looking for something. I didn’t find it,” I replied. It was half the truth.
“Come on, Lily. I know you well enough to know when you are lying to me,” she said with raised eyebrows.
I debated whether I should show her the door or not. The reason Emilio kept it so hidden was because he didn’t want anyone to find it or to figure out what was inside. I happened to find it by accident, and if I told Violet, that would make three of us that knew, and that didn’t count Dante, whom I still couldn’t figure out if he knew or not.
“Okay, but you can’t say anything if I show you this. I don’t even think Dante knows about it,” I explained.
She grinned and I could tell she was intrigued.
“Promise,” she said.
I turned and she followed me back down the stairs to the basement. We passed by the downstairs refrigerator and I laid my hand on the first panel. I looked at her and she gave me a smile. I could tell she was ready to see what I had to show her.
I pulled the panels sideways, and as they overlapped, they revealed the door. She looked at me confused until I tapped on the screen and the keyboard shot out.
“Whoa!” she said surprised.
“I know!” I said.
“So what’s in there? What’s the password?”
“I have no idea,” I responded sadly. “I’ve been trying to get inside for the past week. The password is impossible. Any word, phrase, song title, date, or event that I can think of I’ve tried, and every time it pops up denied.”
“Well, this is Emilio we’re talking about. He wouldn’t make it that easy. There must be something pretty serious behind the wall for him to hide it behind these panels and make the password so difficult.”
“If you have any ideas, let me know.”
Violet replied with several suggestions, but either I had already tried them, or we faced the denied screen again. After spending a few minutes trying, we gave up and headed back upstairs.
We made lunch and ate in silence. Both of us were still thinking about that door. Violet was now more obsessed with it than I was. She would give suggestions and each time I would tell her that I already tried it.
Once we had finished eating, we cleaned up the dishes and went back into the living room.
Originally, we promised not to talk about work, but with having two big projects, we were crunched for time and needed to talk about them.
One of the projects was running on time, but the other was about two weeks behind. I knew it was due to me being cooped up in the house and not out actually doing the work, so we devised a plan to shorten the two weeks down to one. That was the best that we could do.
I had also decided that I would participate in the two new buildings my father acquired. I had been on the fence about them, but decided it was time to just work and not worry about anything else.
We spent the next few hours discussing how we would design them and what exactly my father wanted out of them. I hadn’t spoken to him since he came and revealed Elle to us. Everything I knew about these buildings came from Violet. She had talked with him once or twice, but Dante was the middleman and had done the majority of talking to my father.
We finished our work and spent the rest of the time catching up on how our days had gone. I didn’t have much to tell her. All my days were exactly the same: self-defense class, work, cleaning, and cooking.
Since she had locked herself in our room the past few days, I filled her in on my and Emilio’s evening together. I told her about how nice it was to have him all to myself.
She caught me up on her and Dante’s relationship. It was a little strained. Violet said Dante was trying to play peacemaker between her and Elle and it was causing friction between them.
“I mean I know why he is doing it, but damn! He just pisses me off when he talks about how I need to control my temper and that Elle is only learning to do things and that I need to be more patient with her. I just want to rip his tongue out!”
I suggested that her and Dante go on a date tonight and just get away. They needed alone time, just like Emilio and me. She needed to connect with him outside of work right now. Violet thought that it was a good idea.
“So, how are the new attack drills going?” she asked.
“I haven’t had any. Am I supposed to be having attack drills?” I asked.
“Oops, I guess I just ruined it,” Violet confessed. “Emilio told Dante the other day that he was going to start the attack drills again. But, since I told you, you can start preparing. Do you at least remember how they go?”
“Yeah.” I grimaced. “Out of nowhere there will be a loud alert that signals someone unexpected has made their way onto the property. I do what I can to get to the nearest safe zone and then I type in my password and wait for Emilio to—” I abruptly stopped. I couldn’t believe that I had forgotten.
I jumped up off the couch, raced to the foyer, and ran down the basement staircase. I made my way to the panels and quickly slid them aside and touched the screen.
“What’s going on?” Violet asked as she caught up to me. “Lily, do you know the password?”
“Yeah, I think so. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before. It makes sense now,” I replied.
I typed in those three simple words and I finally saw the green light flash as the word ‘accepted’ blinked at me.
“Midnight in Paris, that’s the password,” I told Violet.
“How did you know?” she asked.
“Because it’s the safe word that Emilio and I used after each attack drill,” I said.
She smiled at me and waited as I opened the door. It creaked and made a pop as it swung out toward us. We immediately heard beeps and clicks coming from inside. The black door revealed its secret and Violet and I took a step inside.
The room was covered in screens showing different places. It showed my and Violet’s business, club Insanity, our house back in Toronto, my parent’s house in Toronto, the house we were in right now, and what I can only think of to be my father’s business headquarters. Below the TV screens was a table attached to the wall that wrapped around the room. There was a switch board in the middle of it that controlled everything. This was Emilio’s control room.
/> I could see everything going on outside of the house, and it made me feel so powerful. I walked to each television and just stared at the screen. Anything and everything I wanted to see was here.
Originally, when I was told that the house had new security, I never imagined it would be this advanced. I wondered how long Emilio had had this. Did he have it before we moved in, or did he get it after my kidnapping?
“Wow,” Violet said.
“I know. I don’t even know what to think right now,” I replied.
“So Emilio has been keeping tabs on everything this whole time?” she asked.
“I guess so,” I said.
“Look!” Violet said as she pointed to a screen on the right wall.
It was Emilio, Dante, and Elle in a room that I didn’t recognize. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, so I sat down in the chair at the desk and looked at the control panel. There were so many switches and I didn’t know which one controlled the volume.
“Here,” Violet said as she leaned over my shoulder and pushed a button. Soon their voices slowly filled the control room.
“How did you know?” I mouthed to her.
“Lucky guess?” she mouthed back.
“That was Pop,” Dante said as he ended his call. “He wants me in his office. I’ll be right back.” He walked out the door seconds later.
I glanced at Violet. Emilio and Elle were alone. I didn’t know if I wanted to see this or even know what might happen.
“How are you holding up?” Emilio asked Elle.
“I’m doing okay. It’s been a rough week. Violet hasn’t been in the best mood. I just wish she could accept me and stop being so rude,” Elle replied.
I heard Violet snort.
“This is a hard situation for her to be in. She has to act all buddy-buddy with someone she barely knows. She is juggling a lot right now and without much help,” Emilio responded.
That made Violet perk up a bit. I could tell she liked that Emilio had her back and could explain how she felt perfectly.
“It’s not like I don’t try to help, I do. She just shuts me down every time. I know I'm not Lily and I'm not very creative, but I'm really trying.”