Yes, I know I'm terribly slow! I'm sorry

xoxo

There had been many, hundreds even, and every single time she'd looked Death dead in the eye. Demons, angels, the Devil itself – she'd seen them all. Yet, Alandra now sat reduced to nothing but an anxious mess beneath Jandro's furious gaze. He'd done what he had said he would and she was now booked on the next plane to Los Angeles. They packed her up and got her into the car in the midst of tension so thick, it was almost excruciatingly painful. He barely said a word – uttered a grand total of two, actually – as he, albeit grudgingly, drove her down the sandy streets of Mexico.

The ride didn't take long and for that, she was almost certainly grateful. Nothing could've had her scrambling any faster than she did when the car pulled up in front of the airport. If it came right down to it, it'd have probably taken her twice as long to pull on a pair of pants or to pull her hair into a ponytail.

'Thanks, Jandro.'

All she got in reply was what sounded remotely like a zebra's attempt at a growl, a somewhat inaudible warped grunt of sorts.

'Oh come on, at least say goodbye.'

His eyes narrowed.

'You're paying for all the hospital bills. Keep that phone with you.'

She rolled her eyes, then gave him a quick peck on the kiss. Fat load of good that did, of course. It didn't even seem to leave a mite smidgen of impression on his growing aggression towards her leaving.

'Yes, I'll miss you too, Jandro.'

She made a big show of releasing a long breath of frustration and swung the car door close, merely earning herself a glare from Jandro as he pulled from the curb. She returned it with a smile. That, undoubtedly,was a big mistake and it left her standing alone with her green suitcase, nose wrinkling viciously at the clouds of dust that attacked when the car raced off.

Well.

Stupid Jandro.

The next hour went by uneventfully. She'd collected her plane ticket from a rather unappealing flirt of a receptionist – and by this, she was already doing the silly toothpick great justice – and tiredly stumbled her way to the waiting lounge. She sent Constantine a text, covering the details of her flight. She received, of course, no reply. It was at that moment, exactly when she'd felt relief to be having a gloriously normal peaceful albeit boring day, she was forced to believe that God had an indisputably rotten sense of humour, no matter how great a sin beliefs were.

'Ally!'

She could shoot herself, she really could.

'Balthazar.'

The usual expensive striped tailored suit was donned perfectly, hair of richest hazelnuts sleeked back to complement a jaw so chiselled and teeth bleached white. She had one word to describe the relationship they shared; or at least, the relationship she had with him. One simple, easy word.

Loathing.

His loathing, on the other hand and much to her chagrin, had probably been saved and concentrated on someone entirely different. Who knew such a creature could run out of loathing, of all things?

'Come, sit!'

Well, it wasn't someone entirely different, but that didn't really matter because wherever else it had gone – and she did know exactly where it went – left her with a rather annoying pesky little buzzard who now sat, legs stretched and crossed leisurely almost in an outright effort to show of them shined derbies. He grinned at her and the smile did, in fact, reach eyes that were rimmed a tell-tale red. He had a copy of El Economista rolled up neatly in his hand.

She didn't know his kind could do all languages.

Hmm. Mental note indeed.

'No, thank you.'

That, simply, was the curt reply that accompanied the warning glare she shot him. Perhaps it was the fact that he did not usually face rejection – she would bet all she had that the toothpick lady had earlier fallen head over heels and, of course, hadn't been the only one to. Or perhaps it was the mutual acquaintance they shared that he wished to drive her from. Whichever it was she couldn't help but hate thoroughly. It now had him traipsing after her smartly as she crossed the room, and it had him making himself comfortable in seat beside her when she'd finally settled on a cosy – well, it had been cosy when she'd spotted it – corner in the lounge.

'Haven't seen you in a while.'

He leaned in towards her, his searing breaths coming out in short puffs against her cheek. And by searing, she really did mean searing. Honestly, had the thing not once heard of personal bubbles? Personal space?

Alandra got up, then settled a seat down.

He chuckled.

'Come now, Ally girl! We've had some fun. We could have so much more!'

That got him another glare. Dim-witted bugger.

'You shoved your tongue down my throat, and I kicked you.'

He grinned right back.

'It was a great kiss, you have to admit. What? You caught up with that doctor now?'

That was sudden, but it bit in good. That bit in way too good. She was up and at him in seconds, a hand at his throat and the other bundled tightly into a sound fist high above their heads, the Ring of Solomon glinting in ominous mockery beneath the poor fluorescent lighting. She had her eyes on his smouldering dark ones, watched as the masked confidence slipped for bare moments as the Ring was considered apprehensively. The eyes of everyone else, on the other hand, were glued on the both of them. It was domestic violence – only all twisted and feministic.

Well, she didhave those cuts and bruises.

'You've been watching me?'

'You like that thought?'

The mask had slipped right back into place, accompanying a deviously sardonic smirk as he relaxed beneath her grip. Alandra snarled at him.

'Go find some other damsel to distress, Bally boy.'

He reacted inhumanly quick. She had had her face pushed into his in a moment and the next, it was pressed rather uncomfortably into his long cologne-ridden neck. Her back smarted from his hard shove and her sneaker-clad feet flailed viciously at the momentary loss of contact with the tiled floor. The next few hundred gazamillion words that flew from her mouth were ones she would have never shared with her grandkids, even if the threat of Hell hung just above her head.

It took her three whole seconds to struggle off the messed up retard, took him two to get up after her and took them both one to have her pressed up in the corner, cadged in and suffocated sufficiently by his strong stripe-clad arms.

Dear Lord, this was getting annoying.

'So why are we wondering off to LA to be all buddy buddy with John Constantine, my dear?'

'Why were you following me?'

He laughed. That stupid thing laughed in her face, splayed her with tobacco filled spit. He brought his arms closer, diminished the cage.

'John Constantine, Alandra? After what he did?'

He was blatantly riling her up, she knew that through and through. It took her all the strength she could muster to hold herself back from shoving her Ring-clad fist up his nose.

'Yeah, John. We had a thing once. What a great little thing that was,' she replied through gritted teeth.

That, of course, was a downright lie. She never had anything with Constantine - hadn't even so much as shared a sandwich – and not in a million years would she have one.

'Oh? Rekindling it?'

'Ah yes, rekindling old flames. It's very therapeutic.'

There was nothing to rekindle.

He chuckled down at her. It was times like these that had her wishing she had different, less vertically challenged parents. If she tiptoed, her nose would only come up to his pink-tinged lips. Such were the tragedies of her existence.

'Well, I see I've got some flight details to rearrange.'

She didn't care to think what or why. She was too dizzy from the tobacco stench and the heavy frustration for either to matter. He released her from his built cage, still chuckling and distastefully threw a cheeky wink her way before spinning on his heels and marching off in a direction that she could only wish had a grinder of sorts that would do away with him for good. But before she could so much as drawn up the image of a Balthazar-free existence, much less enjoy such a fanciful thought, a call for the boarding of her flight blasted and resonated throughout the lounge. Alandra made no hesitance to pull her belongings together and scramble her way on to the plane, made no hesitance to get as far as she could from the Balthazar wretch.

Her seat turned out to be neither by the window nor by the aisle. She didn't really mind. Of course it would mean that she'd face a horrendous ride to LA should her seatmates be horizontally blessed. Horrendous wouldn't even begin to describe it, actually. If anything, she'd be smooshed, she'd be pulp. But she didn't really mind. Just as long as she was far, far, very far away from Balthazar, she could survive anything. She settled back into the seat, eyes closed, mouth drawn across in a wild joyous grin.

Unfortunately, it seemed that the Lord enjoyed His sense of humour very much. Alandra, of course, didn't have to face a three hour long ride squashed between huge seatmates. Whilst that she could have counted her blessings for, the alternative made no such gratitude even remotely possible. She'd napped dreamlessly through the plane's departure from the airport and through most of the time it'd spent airborne. Most of time, regrettably, meant no where near the whole time. The plane shot through its fair share of turbulence and had her jolting awake, eyes wide and lips pursed. Said eyes found themselves staring into dark chocolate browns and said lips themselves pressed up quite unpleasantly against a smooth pink deathly cold tongue.

'Morning, Sunshine.'

She screamed, out of fear at first, then out of comprehensive horror and then out of pure unadulterated anger. She couldn't care nuts about all the attention they were getting.

'Succumb, Ally. Our time is coming.'

She didn't even stop to think.

'Get off me, bastard!'

She fought against the safety belt and shoved him as hard as she could. She shoved him, then slapped him, then sent a vicious punch his way with the Ring brandished formidably. His head swung back violently, sleek hair now a fine-looking mess about his head.

'Ow,' he said ever so mildly as he massaged his jaw. Already, a sharp red was forming where the Ring had connected with his skin.

She glared. She seemed to be doing that a lot recently.

'Don't you 'ow' me, you bloody twit. That didn't hurt.'

She knew it didn't. Except for the slight scalding the Ring would have given him, the strength of the swing she had taken would have had no impact on him whatsoever. She, on the other hand, was going to be sporting swollen brilliantly purple knuckles in a half hour or so.

'No, it didn't. So why bother?'

He had his face in hers again; so close, oh so close – the tobacco on his breath, his clear slightly tanned complexion, the crimson rims of his eyes. His lips were slightly parted, barely grazing her own, yet again.

'You know something.'

It wasn't question, but she wanted the answer. She kept her eyes intent on his, brows knitted together in a downright frown. She didn't back down. She was confused.

'Maybe.' His eyes made their way down her nose, to her lips. 'Maybe not.'

She didn't need to think, just raised her fist again, held the Ring an inch from his neck. Dear Lord, if he continued, she'd be pushed right over. There'll be no more Balthazar for the world to know, and she'd be sentenced to Hell for the rest of her miserable afterlife. Hesitation passed across his features ever so briefly as the intolerance and annoyance fought its way onto her face, but it was veiled quickly by a full-fledged very male smirk.

'Well?'

He retreated, settled back into his seat beside her. Her fist was still held looming, threatening.

'There is nothing.'

She arched a brow.

'Didn't quite catch that.'

'Nothing moves through the shadows, Alandra Jaine Reeves.'

He didn't look at her. She lowered her fist.

'Good.'

'Not just yet.'

Her fist shot right back up, the other hand clenched at his starched collar. This time though, he shrugged it off indifferently without even a hint of a smile passing those lips.

'Don't be silly. We plot your demise every other day.'

That much she had to concede. She dropped her hold on him and watched as he smoothed out the creases she had inflicted upon the expensive stripes. But she leaned towards him all the same.

'What do you mean nothing moves through the shadows?'

He turned to her and leaned in as well, eyebrow delicately arched.

'I mean just what I mean.'

'So all the threats and the dreams – they're not your work? Not your little chum chum geezers?'

'We do not threaten Alandra.'

'But – '

The rest of her words disappeared behind the long manicured finger he held to her lips.

'We go straight for the kill.'

Before Ally could so much as mouth her retort – and she'd actually succeeded in thinking up a rather clever comeback too – the plane ran smack into yet another wave of turbulence and they were both thrown almost painfully back into their seats. A wave of nausea stabbed through her – yet another reason to hate the miserable trip she was having – and sent her scrambling for the brown paper bag that had been folded and kept neatly in the seat pocket. What exactly happened next she couldn't quite comprehend, nor could she figure out how all that vomit had come about. What she did know was that as soon as she had completed the vicious upheaval of the contents in her supposedly empty stomach, the plane had landed and Balthazar had somehow dropped off the face of the earth – or so she wholeheartedly wished. Of course, he had in fact disappeared without a trace from the seat beside her.

Praise the Lord.

Alandra didn't even think to waste any time in gathering her things from the overhead compartment, stuffing the vomit-filled paper bag into the seat pocket and racing as fast as she could down the miniscule aisle with the green suitcase trailing after towards the exit.

Always, always as far away from Balthazar as she could get.

She found her way around the airport with competence. Constantine, on the other hand, was no where in sight. She whipped out her cell phone – yes, she saw its importance now – and sent fingers flying over the numbers.

Ringing.

Still ringing.

Still –

By God woman, can you never leave me be?

He did not sound like he'd just woken up from a nice long snooze. He did not.

'Did I wake you?'

Obviously!

There was a loud thump on the other end, followed by a good nice long string of words that could have had Balthazar blushing.

'Rolled off the bed? God, Constantine, you were supposed to pick me up, twit!'

She rushed all the way down, and now she had to wait? Get a knife, get a gun. She was going to kill the man.

It's bloody two!

'Yes, in the afternoon.'

Her reply was met with more swears, faint mumbles and a retching cough.

Give me a half hour.

Alandra Jaine Reeves was not a happy woman. Nor did was she any happier throughout the half hour she spent moping about the Starbucks outlet with Balthazar at her heels. She was really beginning to wonder how the thing kept such accurate tabs on her. One moment she had the cell phone pressed her ear and the next, his lips had replaced it, his arms wrapped – and she hated to admit – comfortably around her waist.

'Rekindling?' he asked, scalding her ear.

'Role playing,' she grunted, before freeing herself violently from his hold and making her way briskly to the café.

So there she sat, with an empty cup. And there he sat with a far from empty cup. He didn't need to drink. They'd been that way for a good twenty minutes or so. He had his eyes on her and not on her face either; somewhere much, much lower, that made her regret ever slipping on those shorts. It was a game he was winning; his sitting there just smirking was really beginning to irk her.

'What do you want?'

'You.'

An eyebrow shot up so fast, she almost cramped up her brow.

'What do you want?'

She made the effort to draw out the words for as long as she could. Drum it into his thick half-blooded head.

'You.'

With eyes that brimmed unaddressed hunger, she found no logical way to discern that he was indeed lying. Well, for that moment at least.

It was for that sole reason that she could've jumped right up and proclaimed her undying love for John Constantine. Again, for that moment at least.

'Fraternizing. I should have guessed.'

Undying love, indeed. He was pressed up against her back, a hand placed almost protectively on her shoulder. It was strange John Constantine to do so but such an oddity diminished considerably when their adversary in question was considered.

'John.'

'Bally.'

Silence. They were staring each other down she presumed – she couldn't quite tell what Constantine was doing behind her. Either way, Balthazar seemed to notice the hand on her shoulder and with a fairly arched brow, threw them both a mocking grin.

'Ah, rekindle away, my dear.'

She saw the fury etch its way onto his handsome features as got up, nodded at them both and promptly disappeared.

Constantine's hand was still clutched at her shoulder.

'Hand. Thanks for saving me by the way. Could've jumped right off the building.'

She was already gathering her belongings once more. No help there, not from him. What a surprise.

'What did he mean rekindle?'

She shrugged off his seemingly immobile hand, pulled herself to her feet, then looked at – no – looked up at him. John Constantine was not a tall man, not a tall man at all. Damn.

'I seriously doubt you really want to know. Where's the car?'