It was ten minutes of 8:00 when Lisa rolled into the small parking lot of that cedar sided bungalow. When she had made the appointment, she'd been told to look for the sign with the crane standing by the marsh's edge and the electric blue trim on the side of the building as distinguishing landmarks, but with the late hour and the pouring rain, she hadn't been able to see either. One wrong turn and a mini panic attack later, she had finally arrived, early as usual.
"I can't believe I'm doing this," she mumbled as she watched the windshield wipers swish back and forth; the building fading from her vision only to reappear with every passing stroke as though it were a mirage.
But her father had been here before. He'd been coming here for years. He had been the one to talk her into it and had even given her the gift certificate to seal the deal.
Since her encounter with Jackson Rippner and the whole nightmare that had surrounded the, thankfully, failed Keefe assassination, Lisa had changed. Part of her felt as if she was in Jackson's debt; before they met she had spent the last two years or so floundering through life. True, she was the youngest manager in the history of the Lux hotel chain, she had a nice apartment, nice car, everything she wanted; but she wasn't happy. And the part that had always disturbed her the most was that she was not unhappy either. She was numb. There were pills to dull the pain of intense emotions, but none that could restore them and to go through life feeling nothing more than a vague sense of detachment had been the worst kind of prison.
Jackson had woken her up. She didn't know how. Probably because he made her remember how much she valued the things she had, how much she loved her family and life itself.
Thanks to him and her reacquired human emotions, she had exhibited such high levels of stress on the job that Cynthia and her father had seen fit to conspire against her. Cynthia had gathered donations from her fellow co-workers and then her father had done the leg work. They presented her with the gift two months ago during dinner and after an additional four months of nagging, Cynthia and her father had accomplished what Jackson Rippner could not; Lisa had made the phone call.
"Maybe he should have tried whining?" Lisa thought as she cracked a smile and opened the car door.
The parking lot had spaces for six cars, not large by any stretch of the imagination and Lisa decided that was a good thing since it was poorly lit. She was keenly aware of her surroundings, especially in parking lots and she knew it was more than just the driving rain that set her on edge and made her dash towards the front door.
Being inside quelled most of her fears but there was still one overwhelming concern; she'd never had a massage before and wasn't sure what to expect. In her younger years, she didn't have any aches and pains and it never seemed to come to mind; it was one of those things that only self indulgent people did. After the rape, she felt uncomfortable in her own skin and the very notion of lying naked on a table while a stranger rubbed oil all over her body seemed preposterous.
Again, it was Jackson who had unintentionally led her here. Lisa, who had spent months staring at that gift certificate with dread, had finally decided that living life meant taking a risk or two. After coming to that realization she had picked up the phone last Thursday afternoon and made her appointment. It didn't matter that she had almost called and canceled a dozen times, she was here now and that was the most important thing.
When she stepped inside, the soft lighting and faint scent of lavender that hung in the air immediately set her shaky nerves at ease, but then again, that was probably the whole idea.
Lisa took her coat off and noticed the clipboard on the counter. It looked like a standard health history questionnaire of some sort with a yellow Post It note stuck to it:
Lisa,
Please fill this out and I'll be with you in a moment,
Thanks
Noticing that the pen the therapist had most likely placed on the counter for Lisa to use had fallen to the floor; she bent down and picked it up before settling in a comfortable brown leather chair to fill out her paper work.
It was so quiet she suddenly realized, uncommonly quiet; no voices, no music. There was nothing but dead silence and when she heard a loud thump followed by footsteps and labored breathing ascending the stairs; Lisa's edginess increased ten fold.
This was the legacy of Jackson Rippner; the man who had given her her feelings back had filled her with fear and the need to by hyper-vigilant.
Somehow they had lost him. Five months ago he had used that irresistible charm, which seemed to work on men as well as women, to lure a lonely male guard just a little too close. That guard had long since been laid to rest and Jackson had disappeared without a trace.
Everyone assured her that he was gone. With his connections, he was probably out of the state or even the country by now. Coming back for something as pointless as revenge would be stupid and Jackson was not a stupid man.
Lisa should have felt comforted by those words. They were logical, they made sense.
But her friends hadn't been in her house when he had come after her. Not even her father had been able to see the look in his eyes as he shuffled down those stairs with a 12-inch blade in his hand. The sound of police sirens rang through the air but he didn't give a damn. She remembered that look; he knew he would be caught if he took the time to 'finish the job' as he so callously put it, but he didn't care – not as long as he went to prison with her blood on his hands. When she thought about their last two minutes together, and she thought about it often, she couldn't help but wonder what would have happened if that gun hadn't been there. The thought made her ill.
That's why she was up and halfway to the door when the someone who had been making all the noise in the basement entered the room lugging a laundry basket filled to the brim with sheets and towels.
Nope, it wasn't Jackson Rippner, charming assassination coordinator extraordinaire. This was a woman in her late fifties with dark red hair and brown eyes. She had a very pleasant look about her, just as her father had described. Her face seemed so familiar. She was most likely one of those people who was forever being stopped on the street and asked, "Don't I know you?"
Even her name was familiar; Cindy.
"Sorry to keep you waiting. In this business, laundry is a never ending battle," she huffed.
"Oh, it's no problem at all. I had just finished my paper work…I was leaving it here for you," Lisa said, placing the clipboard back on the counter and feeling a bit silly.
Cindy set the basket down in an empty room and did a few quick neck rolls before she stepped forward and shook Lisa's hand.
"It's so good to finally meet you," she said. "Joe talks about you all the time. He says you're quite the hero."
"Oh that," Lisa said, feeling herself start to blush. "It's not that big a deal really. You know the media; they blow everything out of proportion. Only believe a third of what you hear."
And that was true. Lisa had proven she came from strong stock, but if you went by news accounts, especially the local channels, what she had done seemed so grandiose; you would have thought she defeated Jackson while delivering triplets, curing cancer and decreasing the nation's dependency on foreign oil. She was tough, but not Superwoman.
"Believe me, I know. I stopped watching television years ago. You can't even find a reliable newspaper these days. I get most of my info from public radio," Cindy said in agreement.
A human being living in the United States that didn't own a television; impossible! Lisa stared at her in awe for a moment as if she'd just discovered the Minotaur or a unicorn.
"But I'm willing to bet you're sick of talking about it, so why don't we talk about why you are here; your massage," Cindy suggested.
"Sounds great," Lisa said, appreciating Cindy's discretion and her natural intuition. She was born for this job and Lisa breathed a deep sigh of relief as they made their way down the hall towards treatment room number four.
"There are three of us on staff most days, but at this hour, it's just you and me kid."
"I hope you didn't have to stay late just for me," Lisa said, feeling just a tad guilty for keeping this woman here when she should be home with her family.
"Oh no, no, no; I've had a full day today. Friday's are like that. Actually, you just missed my last client by minutes," she said, rolling her eyes.
"Is there a story behind that eye roll?" Lisa asked, curious to know what this woman had seen in her years working as a massage therapist and the stories she could tell. Heck, it would be nice just to let someone else have the floor for a while. Always interested in the who and the why, Lisa pressed a bit harder, "Was he or she a weirdo?"
"A minor weirdo; there are varying degrees of weirdness," Cindy laughed. "He fell into the harmless weirdo category, not a pervert or anything. No, this one was a type-A-ask-a-million-questions type of guy. He wanted to know about my technique; what I was doing, names of muscles, all of it. I started to feel like I was teaching him massage, not giving him one and he was a shy guy too; wouldn't let me pull the sheet down very far at all and didn't want me to work on his legs."
"It takes all kinds, I guess," Lisa reasoned.
"That's for sure," Cindy said as she glanced at Lisa's paperwork. "But he was a handsome devil, so that always makes it easier to take."
After Cindy gave her a mischievous wink, the two women chuckled and Lisa felt grateful for the cheerful banter and this woman's ability to make her feel so comfortable. There was only one other person who had been able to do the same in such a short amount of time but she didn't want to think about that right now.
"So, it looks like you're having some neck and lower back issues?"
"Yeah, the neck has been an ongoing thing, pretty much since college and the lower back since…,"
"The fall," Cindy concluded and Lisa knew that her father really had told her everything. She didn't feel 100 comfortable with her dad's need to share but at the same time, it was strangely comforting. Lisa didn't have to fill Cindy in on all the details, she just knew. She wondered if Cindy knew about the scar as well. Would her father have spoken about that? That was something Lisa had worried about the past week. Should she tell her about the scar now or wait? What if Cindy noticed it during the session? Would she say something then or ask about it later? What would Lisa say in response?
"That which does not kill us can only make us stronger," Cindy said knowingly and their eyes met. There was a moment of understanding between the two of them before Cindy went on; lightening the moment when it needed it the most. "Since your back is the most troubled area, why don't we start there?"
That sounded fine to her and after Cindy gave her a few more details about the session; which end was the foot of the bed, how to set her headrest just right and what that little bolster thingy was for, she stepped out of the room so Lisa could get undressed to her comfort level, as Cindy had put it.
"Okay, here we go," she said, trying to encourage herself while surveying her surroundings.
It was a small room, just enough space for the table with two feet of clearance around, two small chairs, similar to the ones in the waiting room and a bookcase loaded with sheets, towels, various bottles of creams and oils and a small portable stereo that filled the room with the gentle sounds of classical music.
All in all, it was very soothing but there was still the matter of getting naked to contend with.
Lisa had to psyche herself up for that part and she took so long that a knock at the door made her jump a foot.
"Are you all set?" Cindy asked through the door.
"No, I'm sorry, I was just admiring your space and…I just need a couple minutes, I'm sorry."
"No problem, I'll go throw a load of laundry in the dryer and then I'll come back."
"Thank you," Lisa said apologetically.
Knowing that she couldn't keep this poor woman here all night, Lisa quickly stripped down to her underwear. Then came the tough part; to remove the underwear or not to remove the underwear – that was the question.
Cindy had said she wanted to work on her lower back and hips so maybe it would be better if she just took everything off?
But then I'll be naked…
A sudden crashing sound made her jump again and Lisa started to wonder if she were slowly turning into a high strung poodle. What was next, chasing cars and barking at the mail man? It was just Cindy wrestling with the dryer door, nothing to worry about, and the sound of that machine humming seconds later proved Lisa correct.
That also meant that Cindy would come back shortly and if Lisa wasn't ready to go, she'd be added to Cindy's growing list of freaks; the couldn't-figure-out-how-to-get-undressed-and-get-on-the-table kind of weirdo.
"Too hell with it," she mumbled and removed her bra and panties, balling them up and throwing them onto the chair along with the rest of her clothing.
Feeling triumphant in her nakedness and the fact that she had overcome yet another inhibition, Lisa slipped under the sheet and blanket and set the headrest just where she wanted it.
Heavy footsteps echoed down the hall and stopped at her door. Cindy sure seemed to be in a rush, but it was getting late, Lisa guessed she could understand her eager stride.
The door swung open and there was a brief pause. Lisa was about to poke her head up and ask if something was wrong before the door shut and Cindy crossed the room, turning the music up slightly so it could be heard clearly over the pouring rain.
She had mentioned she would be using white flower oil and the scent of it filled the air as Lisa felt the sheet and blanket being pulled away. It moved lower and lower until she began to squirm with discomfort, feeling rather bare. Her father had warned her about all this but that wasn't giving her much comfort right now. Thankfully, the sheet was tucked under her hips before her modesty was compromised and the massage began.
This was the moment Lisa had been waiting for. Skilled hands slid up and down her back, easing her tension, causing each and every one of her concerns to melt away. She groaned, she couldn't help it; this was bliss and even though she'd never felt an attraction to the same sex, Lisa began to wonder if she should ask Cindy for her hand in marriage.
Funny how the mind can wander when the cares of daily life are taken away? Lisa was face down when Cindy came into the room. They didn't speak to each other; Lisa just assumed it was her. Wouldn't it be funny if Jackson were in the room with her now, giving her one of the best backrubs in the history of mankind? No, it wouldn't be funny at all. It would be terrifying and if she kept thinking like that, her massage would be ruined. Deciding to put her active imagination on hold, she told herself to relax, clear her mind and enjoy.
Fifteen minutes after if began, it was over and Cindy moved onto her legs. Lisa felt a bit disappointed that the backrub had come to an end at the same time that her mind stopped racing, but there was plenty more to come and now that she was hooked, she could always come back.
"You probably get this a lot but I love you, really, I do," Lisa joked, getting a low pitched huff in response.
The sheet moved higher up her right leg; high to the point that Lisa started to feel exposed again, but she quickly reminded herself that Cindy did plan on doing some work on her hips and glutes. In order to do that, well, she probably had to see what she was working on.
Still, however ridiculous the thought of Jackson Rippner returning to Miami to exact revenge and give her a rub down in the process may seem, it just kept eating at her and it quickly turned into one of those issues that, if not quickly and easily put to rest, would ruin the rest of her session.
Turn around, she thought. Turn around, he won't be there.
When she lifted her head, she saw a figure dressed in blue jeans and a white shirt, just as Cindy had been wearing, focused solely on her and her aching muscles. The crisis was over. She had just wasted countless minutes worrying about nothing but at least now she could truly begin to relax.
But as her eyes adjusted to the dimly lit room and her focus sharpened, she saw him. Like something out of her worst nightmares, he was here, lifting the sheet and peeking underneath at her naked body.
"Wow, Leese, you took it all off. I didn't think you had it in you."
His words cut through the air like a knife, like a 12 inch knife to be exact and Lisa's reaction was one of pure reflex. She rolled off the table, stumbled across the room and almost landed in the potted plant. All the while he watched her with a delighted smirk on his face. How could he be here, how could he know? Was he following her again, watching her every move and listening to her phone conversations?
It couldn't be. Those closest to her had said he would never take that chance. They had promised that nothing like this would happen.
But he was here and she…she was naked underneath this flimsy cotton sheet and her purse, along with her pepper spray, were sitting on the chair behind him.
He was so pleased with himself, standing there waving a bottle of scented oil at her. The reality of what had just happened here began to set in. He had practically seen her naked, he had rubbed his hands all over her body…she had moaned at his touch. It was revolting.
"Where…where's Cindy?" Lisa managed to ask.
"Downstairs," he answered calmly and she noticed that his voice had recovered nicely from her impromptu tracheotomy. No rasp at all; she felt cheated by that somehow.
"Did you…,"
"Kill her?" he asked, anticipating the question. "No, I have two rules that I live by, Leese; never lie and never…never kill a woman who's good with her hands."
It would seem those two gunshot wounds to the chest had done nothing to curb his sarcasm either.
"Relax, Leese; Cindy is downstairs with some rope around her wrists and ankles and a little bump on the back of her head. She'll survive. You on the other hand – you should be worried."
Throughout all of this, it was his expression that bothered her the most. It was so calm, so business like. It had her wishing that the anger she'd seen in the airplane bathroom and again in her home would make a comeback. When he was angry, he made mistakes, he could be outsmarted. Right now he was composed and she didn't know how to reason with him when he was like that.
"Nothing on under that sheet, nothing at all, Leese?" he asked playfully as he snatched at the piece of fabric that she had come to think of as a shield.
"People will come looking for me!" she blurted out, slapping his hands away and appreciating how horribly cliché that sounded.
A weapon, there had to be something in this room that she could use to defend herself. All she had to do was keep her wits about her; keep him talking until she found it. Lisa had seen Batman, Spiderman, even James Bond and that seemed to be the key behind every villain's downfall; they could never keep their mouths shut – going on an on while the hero made a plan. Why should this be any different?
"Let's think about it logically for a minute," he began. "You got here before eight, it took you about fifteen minutes to fill out your paper work, chat with Cindy, get undressed….I figure people won't start wondering about you or Cindy for another forty-five minutes or so. That's plenty of time for me to do what I came here to do."
"Which is?"
"Revenge, Leese. It's better than Christmas."
"Why?" she asked. Keep him talking, keep him talking.
Her salvation came in the form of another potted plant. A small fern nestled in a clay pot in the corner of the room, just a few feet out of reach. Lisa didn't know why it was there serving as a door stop, but she liked to believe that there were greater forces at work here. Maybe it was divine intervention?
"I know what you're doing, Lisa and we both know that I didn't come here to chat," he laughed as he reached for her.
Lisa ducked to the right and made for that plant, tossing it at his head without bothering to see whether or not she'd hit her mark, but his irritated grunt told her she had at least partially connected. This was not the first time she'd thrown a vase at him. Really, he should have known better. He should know how resourceful she could be when the chips were down. When he was in police custody again, she would be sure to remind him of that.
Lisa was almost out the door, knowing but not caring that she was about to run outside and into the rain wearing nothing but a white sheet. It didn't matter, nothing mattered but her freedom.
He gained on her quickly and grabbed her from behind before she even made it that far.
"No," she screamed repeatedly, but between thick walls and pounding rain, no one would ever hear.
"Sorry, Leese, you're not getting away this time," he said as he pushed her down the hall.
Lisa fought him tooth and nail, refusing to accept defeat even after he shoved her back into that room and she collided with the massage table.
My purse! She turned toward the chair, feeling so confident in her ability to retrieve that pepper spray and take him down before he could react that she wanted to thumb her nose at him and say, "gotcha!"
It was gone, her purse was gone and when she looked back at him, she could see it hanging over his left shoulder. She had been in such a frenzy to get away that she hadn't even noticed it. One more taunting grin and he tossed it behind him and shut the door.
"Well, that was fun," he said as he retrieved the discarded bottle of scented oil. "Now, where were we?"
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Author's Note: Yes, I am a massage therapist and this idea popped into my head while I was at work and it's also true that I have heard and seen things over the course of my career that you wouldn't believe! Perhaps I should write a book about it?
I hope you enjoyed this one shot. It's my first Jackson/Lisa story but hopefully, not my last.
Thanks to emptyvoices for her input and thank you all for taking the time to read and/or review.