Charlie's Angel – Chapter Seven
(Again with special thanks to Jo Taylor - my own special fairy god-something & beta - who keeps me honest when it comes to the 3 C's - continuity, content and commas)
Charlie dropped the phone onto the seat beside him. He sat in his darkened car outside Dani Reese's house, where he'd been for a couple hours now. He tried to shake the feeling he was stalking her, but that was what it felt like - to him.
His relationship with Dani Reese was balanced on the blade of a knife. She was a very private person and pushing her would cause her to shut down, shut him out - and that Charlie did not want. But if the Captain was to be believed, Dani was struggling with her internal demons again and Charlie knew what that fight was like.
It was a knife fight - dark, dirty and with no discernable rules. Luckily, Charlie was a knife man himself, not by choice, but out of what seemed like a lifetime of practice.
He knew calling would not do it - Reese would not answer. She could be incredibly stubborn and intractable when she wanted to be. Hell, she could be that most of the time, but it was one of the many things he loved about her. He couldn't very well break in, so that meant he had to talk his way into her house. That would not be easy, he reasoned. She'd made it abundantly clear she wanted to be alone when she left the station without him. His lips still burned from her kiss, he could still smell orange and swore it was her shampoo on the wind, but she was not there.
As luck would have it, his thoughts were interrupted as a yellow cab pulled up outside, honked twice and Dani Reese emerged from her house and poured herself into it. Charlie's jaw dropped when he realized she was going out. Clever girl, he thought, not driving, but that, he reasoned, meant she was already drinking. He dropped his head and shook it in disappointment. This was going to seriously suck, Charlie realized.
He waited for the cab to pull down the block and edged his dark car out behind it, tailing her to a club called, appropriately, "Sin City." Dani left the cab and walked in like she was on a mission - and maybe she was. He parked down the block and hugged the shadows to the entrance out of habit, more than necessity. He smiled politely and held the door for a couple leaving.
It only took him a moment to spot her at the bar. She'd already found a mark; a handsome, dark man with a thick head of hair and a very obvious wedding band. He was buying Dani drinks and looking her up and down like a cattleman does a steer at an auction. Betcha he thinks this is his lucky night, Charlie thought.
Dani looked at herself in the mirror behind the bar, her eyes sad and disconnected. Charlie watched her countenance and considered that she appeared like she felt - damned, though he could not envision what for. He recalled what the girls at the wedding murder had said about Anna Silvers – that she seemed to be "punishing herself". Was that what Dani was doing? And why – he wondered.
The man was loud, boisterous and impressed with himself. Dani looked bored and slightly angry. Charlie had already decided there was no way that cretin was putting his hands on her, his shirt felt hot and suit too tight as the man leaned in and placed his mouth on Dani's neck. She just belted back another shot and suppressed a shudder.
Charlie leaned against a wall, unobtrusively observing his partner. He snagged a longneck from a waitress' tray as she walked by, while he loosened his tie. He intended it to slake his thirst, well aware beer wouldn't come close to satisfying him. As the crisp $50 hit the tray, Charlie said softly "keep it" and watched distractedly as the waitress' dirty look morphed into an appreciative smile. He barely saw her, and couldn't describe her beyond 'female' if his life depended on it; all his attention was focused on the short, dark haired woman at the bar, in her tight jeans and leather jacket.
The handsome man, Charlie figured him for a "Joe", slid his arm around Dani's back and he watched her shudder with revulsion, but did nothing as the man's hand slid southward. He knew she felt what the man was doing because she broke contact with her image in the mirror, just before the hand reached her ass. She shook her head unconsciously in the negative and the man grabbed her by the hair and kissed her hard.
Charlie watched Dani flinch as the brutal kiss aggravated her busted lip and at that moment he saw red – not pink, not mauve, blood red – he crossed the room in five steps and yanked the man from the bar stool.
Once he was clear of the bar and Dani, Charlie unleashed a punishing right hook that broke the man's nose and opened the floodgates, blood poured down the man's shirt. He was a stocky guy, about 6'2", and easily had 40 pounds on Crews.
Weight and strength, however, do not compare to sheer blood rage, which is where Charlie Crews lived in that moment. Not jealousy for the man touching Reese, but rage for him hurting her. Jealousy took time for him to consider, rage came to him like a bolt of lightning the minute his partner flinched. This was the bastard who hit her – him or someone like him. They needed punishing and this guy? Well, he'd do.
Dani was stunned at the speed of Crews attack and had yet to register it was him. Charlie's face was set in a sneer, resembling a snarling animal, as the handsome dark haired man charged Charlie, lifting him off his feet at the chest with a football tackle and driving him into the wall behind the bar as people grabbed their drinks and fled.
"Joe", as Charlie decided to call him, was as strong as a bull and once the initial shock wore off, his hands which were the size of sledge hammers, delivered a couple of strong cracks to Charlie's jaw and was aiming a blow to his mid-section when the bar went entirely silent as the sight of a pistol cocked to Joe's head froze everyone.
"Let him go," Dani Reese pronounced through gritted teeth.
"Joe" released Crews, who slid slightly down the wall before righting himself and standing erect. "What are you doing here?" Dani hissed at him as she lowered the gun.
"I saw her first pal," Joe taunted. "You can have her tomorrow night," the man jeered at him and Charlie lashed out with a vicious jab to the man's eye.
"Crews," Dani barked. "Stop it."
He looked at her again with those luminous blue eyes and her heart just couldn't take it. She simply turned on her heel and walked out.
For a long couple of seconds no one moved, then Charlie turned to follow his partner and the bar fell away from him as he walked back into the darkened city street. He looked left and saw nothing, but the bouncer gestured to his right and he could make out the angry, determined walk of his partner down the block.
He caught her in half a block and fell quietly into step with her.
"Give me one reason why I shouldn't shoot you," she shot the rapid-fire question at him, annoyed at the lack of cabs on the street at this time of night. Charlie grabbed her elbow and wheeled her around to face him. She instinctively raised the pistol and drew a bead on his chest, her dark eyes dangerous and the look she gave him fierce and mildly terrifying.
Charlie swallowed his anxiety and stepped closer, placing the barrel of her pistol against his heart.
"Go ahead," he taunted, "if it will help, just shoot Dani."
She actually seemed to consider doing just that for longer than Charlie thought she would, before dropping the pistol and telling him so. "I'm not going to shoot you, Crews. Just go home, leave me alone."
"No" he said simply. "I won't do it. Whatever this is, whatever you need, I won't leave you alone. You're my partner and I won't do that."
"Don't give me that crap." She turned and advanced on him. "You didn't hit that guy for me – you hit him for you. I'm tired of being something men fight over. I'm just…" she trailed off.
"What? Just what, Honey?" he quietly inquired.
"Not worth it," she pronounced.
"Is that what you think?" he asked softly. "You know, you actually amaze me at times, Reese. You may be the dumbest person I've ever met if you can't see what I see in you," he said angrily.
"You just wanna fuck me," she taunted, taking herself close to him, under his chin, in his space. "That's all guys ever want – to fuck me."
"Is that what you think I want?" he said breathlessly, placing his hand over hers on the now forgotten pistol. If she wanted to play, he could play he reasoned.
He leaned very close, his hot breath on her ear and in her hair at the neckline. He lowered the timbre of his voice until all that remain was a deep, gravely and slightly threatening tone and spoke to her as his lips whispered across her skin.
"That word," he refused to say it, "doesn't even come close to describing the things I want to do to you, sweetheart," he taunted deliberately. Two could play at this game.
"Tell me what you want, Charlie," she said seductively as she reached up with her lips and captured his bottom lip in her teeth. His body responded to hers, his breath deepened, his heart raced and he desperately wanted to cover her lips with his. His other hand even reached for her unconsciously before he forced himself to back away.
Charlie teetered precariously between desire and concern, but his maturity and discipline overcame his libido.
"I want you to give me this gun," he said with a deep commanding voice, barely over a whisper. "Give me the gun Reese and let me take you home."
Dani withdrew slightly and looked him in the eye.
Men didn't refuse her; when she turned on her sex kitten voice she was virtually assured a night of meaningless sex. It was rote. It always worked. Crews just smiled a tight smile at her and closed his hand tighter over her pistol. She looked down and let go of the gun. Charlie took the gun and put it in his coat pocket and turned her gingerly around by the shoulder and steered her up the street to his car.
What she failed to realize was that Crews didn't do meaningless - not with her – she meant something to him and he wasn't going to take that free shot. He would wait and make her come to him.
