Chapter 8: Chapter 8: Quentin Blackwood and Ivy Sherwood Are About to be Caught in Bed
The room was empty. The door to the bathroom was closed, and the sound of rushing water spilled out from inside.
Ivy Sherwood tried to open the door, only to find it was locked from the outside. She couldn’t pull it open no matter how hard she tried.
Outside the door, Sylvia Blackwood sneered. ’Ivy Sherwood is finished this time!’
She unlocked the door, then hurried to the ancestral hall to find Silas Blackwood.
"Brother, stop kneeling here. I just saw Ivy Sherwood, and she..."
At the mention of Ivy Sherwood’s name, Silas Blackwood’s face filled with disgust. "Is she dead?"
"No, she went into Uncle’s room! She must be trying to seduce him. Brother, hurry up and go look."
"That bitch!" Silas Blackwood scrambled up, his face contorted with rage. But having knelt for so long, he almost collapsed back to the floor.
...
The sound of running water from the bathroom stopped abruptly. Soon after, the door opened from the inside. Ivy Sherwood glanced over. A man stood there, a single bath towel wrapped around his lower body, his torso completely bare.
Fresh from the shower, his hair dripped with water. Droplets traced a path down his handsome face, over his sharp Adam’s apple, and pooled at his collarbones, exuding an ineffable sensuality.
The man had an incredible physique. His well-defined eight-pack abs radiated a primal strength. His back was covered in red marks—scratches from fingernails. And further down, beneath the towel, was a considerable bulge. Having been intimate with him just last night, Ivy Sherwood knew all too well how breathtaking it was.
"Why... it’s you." Ivy Sherwood finally understood.
No wonder Sylvia Blackwood had insisted on bringing her up personally, pushing her inside and locking the door.
’So this wasn’t Silas Blackwood’s room at all.’
"I should be the one asking you that question, niece-in-law." The man’s voice turned frigid, as cold as the dead of winter.
"I thought you were bold enough last night. Did you really think you could climb into my bed again today, right under the Blackwoods’ noses?" Quentin Blackwood narrowed his eyes, his expression laced with disgust.
In his eyes, Ivy Sherwood had come in here on purpose. Her goal was obvious—to use him to climb the social ladder.
"Why would you think I have that much nerve, Uncle? Why can’t you imagine that it was the Blackwoods who deliberately set this up?"
"Heh. At dinner, your hand brushed against mine twice. Are you telling me that meant nothing?"
Ivy Sherwood froze for a second. ’When did I ever touch Quentin Blackwood’s hand?’
"Someone from the Blackwood family locked the door from the outside. I couldn’t open it. If you don’t believe me, try it yourself."
As she spoke, Ivy Sherwood placed her hand on the doorknob. She turned it and pulled. The door that had supposedly been locked just moments ago swung open with ease.
Quentin Blackwood watched her coolly, then commented with two words: "Nice act."
Ivy Sherwood: "..."
She felt like a hundred mouths wouldn’t be enough to explain her way out of this. "Fine, don’t believe me. I’m leaving."
As Ivy Sherwood turned to leave, a large hand grabbed her arm and yanked her back. With his other hand, Quentin Blackwood slammed the door shut, pushing her against it and blocking her escape.
"Do you think my room is a place you can just come and go as you please?"
The distance between Quentin Blackwood and Ivy Sherwood was dangerously small. When he spoke, she could feel his warm breath on her skin.
The man was so tall that her gaze fell directly on his bobbing Adam’s apple.
If she looked up, she saw his sensuous, thin lips. If she looked down, she saw his powerful pectoral muscles. There was nowhere for Ivy Sherwood to look that didn’t feel inappropriate.
She was tiny in comparison. If anyone else were present, it would look as though the two were locked in an embrace.
’It doesn’t matter how I explain it; this man will never believe me. No one in the world would believe my words—not even my own father. Why would I expect him to be any different?’
Ivy Sherwood threw her head back, her beautiful eyes meeting Quentin Blackwood’s gaze directly.
Her red lips parted slightly as she said with deliberate provocation, "Then what do you want, Uncle? You won’t let me leave, and now you’re playing this whole domineering CEO game. Could it be you developed a taste for what we did last night? You can’t bear to see me go, but you’re too shy to admit it?"
Quentin Blackwood’s gaze fell to her lips. As she spoke, a faint smile played at the corners of her mouth.
Her face was rather plain, her complexion sallow, but her eyes were exceptionally bright and captivating.
The way she kept calling him ’Uncle’ imbued her words with a forbidden thrill.
She had a pleasant, natural scent, entirely different from perfume.
"Ivy Sherwood!" Quentin Blackwood growled her name through clenched teeth. "You’re asking for it!"
"Marrying Silas Blackwood is a fate worse than death anyway. If you’re going to kill me, Uncle, could you at least pick a burial plot with good feng shui? I’d like a better shot in my next life. And could you burn some offerings for me?"
"I like good food, so make sure to burn plenty of that. And I get lonely, so could you make a little voodoo doll of Silas Blackwood for me? So I can torture him for fun."
Hearing the self-deprecating tone in her voice, Quentin Blackwood felt an inexplicable surge of irritation.
Quentin Blackwood’s lips thinned into a tight line, but before he could speak, a knock sounded at the door.
"Uncle, I need to see you about something." It was Silas Blackwood’s voice from the hallway.
Ivy Sherwood wasn’t surprised by this turn of events. ’She knew Sylvia Blackwood wouldn’t bring her here without some kind of follow-up act.’
"Uncle, you’re not asleep yet, are you? Or are you too scared to open the door? A servant told me Ivy Sherwood is in there." Silas was growing impatient, his eyes burning with a rage that made him want to smash the door down.
’That damn woman, Ivy Sherwood. She must have seen how respectful the family is to Uncle and gotten the delusional idea to seduce him.’
’If she dares to cuckold me, I’ll kill her.’
On one side of the door was her fiancé in name only. On the other, pressed against the wood, Ivy Sherwood was in Quentin Blackwood’s arms—a man wearing nothing but a bath towel.
Ivy Sherwood looked at Quentin Blackwood with pleading eyes. "Please, help me. I don’t want their plan to succeed. You don’t want to get tangled up with me either, right?"
But Quentin Blackwood’s gaze was indifferent, as if to say he didn’t care.
’Even though I was framed, if word gets out that I was in a room with Quentin Blackwood, no one will blame him. I’ll be the only one to suffer the consequences.’
"Why should I help you?"
"If my father finds out about... us, he’ll definitely force you to marry me. I’m guessing you don’t want that to happen, right?"
Quentin Blackwood scoffed. "You’re thinking too highly of yourself. Even if you were a woman I’d slept with, Silas Blackwood would still have to marry you if that’s what’s expected."
Ivy Sherwood: "..."
’So this was the crushing weight of power.’
She bit her lip, then raised her arms and hooked them around his neck. Bringing her lips to his ear, she threatened, "In that case, why don’t we let them see us just like this? Afterward, I’ll spread the word that ’Uncle’ is working with less than an inch and can’t last three seconds."
Silas thought he heard voices inside. He couldn’t worry about etiquette now. If Ivy hid or ran away, he’d lose his chance to catch her and Quentin in the act.
The door locks in the Blackwood estate were all electronic keypads. Silas Blackwood entered the code directly.
"Forgive the intrusion, Uncle."
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