Chapter 7 - Keep Taking The Blame

Time just didn't want to pass.

Ferus tried and tried not to look at his wrist watch every five minutes, but ever since he had ended that phone call, he had been fidgety and restless. He spent the night worrying about Jane, tossing and turning until the bed sheets were tangled around his legs and when he tried to get out of bed at the sound of the alarm he fell squarely on his face, nearly banging his head against the doorframe.

Nice way to start the day.

Slowly, after two cups of coffee and a cold shower, he woke up enough to be functional at work. Still, running a river of data on his screen station at his desk, he found it hard to concentrate on his task. The occasional vibration from his comlink, signaling a text from her made him possible to get out of his worry-fuelled daydreaming and get back to work, but it took him nearly until lunch break to be completely focused on his task.

But when his comlink vibrated against a credit chit he had in his pocket, making more noise that the usual, he received a quick nudge by the colleague that sat behind him at another desk. "Ferus, your phone's been buzzing all day, what the hell is going on?"

Sighing, Ferus turned on his chair and faced the colleague, a slightly older guy with spiky, messy hair and a jaw that would make his face perfect for drawing squares by hand.

"It's just… my girlfriend. She's having a bad day at work and I a little worried. I'm trying to keep tabs on her."

"Oh wow, a girlfriend? Man, how long have you been single?"

That earned him a low growl from Ferus. "Four years and because I wanted to be single, not because the chance hasn't come."

"Yeah yeah, keep repeating it maybe it will become true. Come on man! Who's the lucky gal?"

He hated that kind of discussion. There was a reason he kept his comlink on silent mode, because he was a private person that wanted nothing but keeping his personal life private. He barely spoke to his colleagues except for some mundane small talk during lunch, he was very careful not to let anything slip about his past and his present, if not strictly related to work. With time, they had stopped asking. With time, he had become accustomed at being considered the loner of the Seek And Destroy team, always bent over his computer doing criss-crossing researches on financial data and personal histories. Only his boss knew he was a Jedi dropout, because he had recruited him, but no one else knew about his previous life.

It worked fine. He was an introvert, he continuously wore a mask to hide it, but he was indeed a person that preferred to be alone than being surrounded by morons. And most of his colleagues were morons with an uniform.

Anyway, he needed to answer.

"I met her a couple of weeks ago." he lied. "On the bus, going home." Big lie.

"Wow… I wonder why things like this never happen to me…"

He wanted to reply with something like because you're a pig that can't keep his hands to himself but he didn't want to cause an internal issue so he kept silent. And the guy went on. "Is she cute?"

Ferus shrugged his shoulders. "Yeah well… you know, beauty is in the eye of the beholder but yes, she's cute."

"Man, you're a lucky guy. Good luck with her."

That last sentence startled him, he didn't expect anything nice from that one-way conversation, most of all from him, notorious for always harassing female coworkers and even suspects. "Thanks. Sorry but I need to go back to work. This case is big and I don't want the boss to get pissed off."

"Oh sure man, sorry to disturb you. Go back to work, don't worry."

He turned back and went back to his job himself.

That conversation was surreal, to be sincere. Seriously, it was nearly absurd, but anyway, it was over and they went back to work.

And the day went along as usual until five o'clock, when the shift ended and slowly everyone left the room. Time to send a text.

My shift ended but they don't mind if I stay here longer. How are you doing?

He had to wait some time before the reply came.

If a case doesn't drop my shift ends in ten minutes. It takes me thirty minutes to go home.

Quickly, he looked up at the buses he needed to get there. He made some quick calculations and there was no way he could have gotten to her place in less than an hour anyway.

It's going to take me an hour to arrive with every public transport combination I can fathom. Send me a text when you're sure you can get out.

I can pick you up if you want.

He shook his head. He'd have to explain that even though he didn't like the public transport because they were overcrowded, always late and forced him to go all around the city to reach his house every day just because there wasn't a straight bus line, he actually liked his independence. He liked to be independent to move around as he wished.

I'll come with the train. Don't worry. Just go home and relax. I'll get there as soon as I can.

The text confirming she was going out on time came ten minutes and thirty seconds later. Just in time. Without thinking twice, Ferus saved a bookmark, turned off his computer and grabbed his backpack before rushing to the elevator. He was virtually alone, except for security, in the building and the turbolift arrived in no time. If he ran fast enough, he could catch the train that left in fifteen minutes three blocks down the street. It was the fastest way, way better than the bus.

Walking as fast as it was possible in the normal, crowded airway, he found himself wondering if what Jane and himself were doing was the right thing. He was a mess and he had the feeling she wasn't exactly the most stable person in the galaxy. Mixing two explosive substances like them could be fatal, for both of them. And while he was pretty sure he could handle it, by the tone of her voice the other night she had enough on her mind with her family and he was terribly afraid to hurt her more than she could actually stand.

He boarded the train, still half empty, fortunately, with that thought running through his mind like the hyperspeed train he was sitting on. It was like an insect buzzing in his brain and suffocating every other thought. It was bad enough that it literally made him consider the idea of calling the night off and go home.

But he had made a promise, and he kept his promises. No matter what.

And yet, the thought that they were rushing things kept swirling around his mind and he nearly missed his stop. He nearly tipped over an elderly lady to reach the exit door. From there, it was another fifteen minutes walk, minutes he tried to put some order through his thoughts, with hardly any results, as soon as he found himself buzzing her from downstairs, he felt something rising, from deep down his chest and push away that thought of cutting it short and stop this "thing" before it could even begin.

When the sliding door of the turbolift opened, a brief but wide smile appeared on his face and by the time she opened the door of her apartment, that smile was fixed on his lips and there was no way he could stop smiling. But it was permanently fixed only when Jane wordlessly hugged him, wrapping her arms around him and hiding her face in the crook of his neck. She held him so tight he felt his breathing constricted. Something was wrong. Even more than the night before.

"Jane, what's going on?"

She didn't answer, she gently pulled him inside and closed the door with a click on the button. He dropped his backpack beside the entrance and held her as tightly as he could without hurting her.

"Did your dad hurt you?"

She shook her head. "No more than what he's been doing for the past five years."

"That long?"

"Since my sister died."

He ran his hand through her hair and placed a kiss on her forehead. He was right, it was bigger than just plain addiction to substances. "I'm sorry Jane…"

"Don't be. He did it on his own, we're just here to pick up the pieces."

He felt her tears trickling down his neck into his shirt. "Come, let's get somewhere more comfortable, shall we?" he said directing her towards the living room and the couch. He gently pushed her down so she could sit before getting comfortable himself beside her, slightly tilted so he could look straight in her eyes. "Do you want to talk about it?" he asked, wiping the tears from her cheeks with this thumbs.

Jane sighed and lay down in the corner of the large piece of furniture, sagging in its deep, soft cushions. "There's not too much to tell. My dad lost it when my sister and her husband were murdered. The police ruled it as a random act of violence but Max liked to gamble. Not so much that it was an issue, but enough to spend quite some money betting on me when I ran the swoop bikes."

Ferus had a really bad feeling about the place that story was going, but he didn't interrupt her when she paused to gather her thoughts and memories.

"Anyway, my dad took it hard and even with the police saying what they said he's convinced they were killed because Max gambled a too much high sum of money with the wrong guys and they had him killed. And that Johanna was killed because she was with him. So I keep taking the blame for everything that happens. A bad day at the office, getting up on the wrong side of the bed… It's always my fault."

"That's why you're not so fond of family dinner, right?"

She nodded. "Yeah. It's just like plunging back into the first few months after Jo died. After five years, my mom, Lena and Jav actually got over it. They miss her but not pathologically so. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place and my line of work doesn't actually help. The firm is doing fine but…"

"What firm?" he asked.

"Incom. My family owns 75% of Incom. The rest is just a bunch of shareholders. They don't do much but collect their earnings while my family does all the work."

He gasped at the name. One of the most important space travel company in the galaxy. She wasn't just ritch, she was packed!

"You said your dad was rich, not that you could afford to buy a small planet!"

"My trust found for college education is worth more than everything I'll ever earn in my whole life working as a cop. No matter what rank I'll reach. Damn, I could become the fuckin' chief of police and I'd still be a miserable poor bastard. And I'm inheriting only one third of that shit when my dad dies."

"That's a dark thought Jane, no matter what your father has done."

"Says the one with no family." she snapped, quite humorously actually, yet snapped.

"And you're right but… still dark."

She chewed on her lip for a moment, before replying. "In case you haven't noticed yet, I'm dark. And twisty."

He chuckled. "You think I haven't already realized that? Yeah, you're dark and twisty, there's no need to tell me that. I could clearly see it the first night when you did that thing…"

Her distracted eyes focused again on him, with a sly grin on her face. "You liked that?"

He rolled his eyes at the memory. "Like that? Make it more adored that. Also, you were right. I really had no idea."

"And yet you're here. You know I'm messed up and you're here. You could have run, you could have told me you couldn't come tonight… yet, you're here."

It felt like she had been reading his mind, while he was on his way there. Not even ten minutes before.

And she was right. He was there. He had the chance to back up, to save both of them from something that was possibly an horrible ending. Yes, they were just starting. Yes, they were still in time to call it off and get back to their lives without further issues. Alone.

Both of them.

But he was tired of being alone. He had been alone for the better part of his life, first only an orphan in the ranks of the Jedi Order, then a no-one under the tutelage of a Knight that had authority issues, then a drop out, an outcast with no contacts with the real world. And last but not the least, a loner on the job and outside of it.

And he liked her. Enough to lower his defenses and let her in just that bit necessary to get attached. To develop some really strong feelings for her.

Maybe, beneath the lust and the sympathy, there was love.

"Yes. I'm here. And if you will let me, I kind of intend to stay."

That was weird. One week ago, Jane was having the umpteenth argument with her ex boyfriend Josh about how he couldn't stand her brooding and how she still kept him in the dark of decisions and or even the minor events of her life. And he was right, because she had never revealed the real reason she didn't like family dinners. Josh, in one year, had never gone deep enough in her heart to deserve to know what had really happened. But Ferus, in three days, had treated her better than Josh ever did in one year, his concern on the phone the previous night was true and really heartfelt, and the way he actually paid attention to what she said and how she said it. And yet, knowing how messed she was, or maybe the tip of the iceberg of her messed up life (well enough for the majority of men to run away from her) he wanted to stay.

"Listen Ferus, I'm not easy. I wasn't always this way, I was a wild child, that's true, but I wasn't like this."

"I can bet. What we go through shapes us, and what happened to your family was terrible!"

"Yeah well… my sister and brother weren't as affected as I was. Not that they didn't grieve her but not as much as I did. Jo was only six years older than me and while Lena was already old enough not to care too much about me, Jo was there for me every time I needed someone. She was a quiet girl, all concentrated on studying, getting prepared for her law career, while I was a little, pea-sized punk that liked to play in mud and that got a construction brick stuck up her nose. When they discovered I had a talent for running with swoop bikes she was the one that convinced my dad to let me race. And then well…"

"Jane, you don't need to tell me this if it hurts you…"

She shook her head, sitting up straight in front of him. "No Ferus, I have to. You need to know what makes me so bitchy sometimes. I don't have wings, I'm not an angel although if you talk to my mother she will tell you that I used to be the one with the halo, even if I was a punk. You need to know who I am before you decide anything."

He groaned. "You're not bitchy. You're human. Also, I'm not exactly a saint, I don't have wings either and also I don't like to drive so…"

She threw him a pillow and giggled. "You're a jackass…"

"If it makes you smile, I'll be a jackass for the rest of my life."

"That's a long time."

"As long as it keeps that wonderful smile on your face, it's not that long."

She took a moment to consider his last few sentences. Gently biting on the inside of her cheek, she let those last words sink in, and it felt weird. She thought he'd be scared of her confession, even though she had kept the worst, like the depression, the shit she did before turning her grief to anger and actually accept that offer of joining the Police Special Forces as a driver and start a new life from there. He didn't need to know that yet. One step at a time.

"Thank you."

That tore a smile from him and he pulled her closer to hug her tightly. She settled comfortably in the crook of his neck and sighed, content and calm for the first time since yesterday. It felt like breathing again after a while underwater. He had a soothing effect when he was around, something she had not felt in years. Jane felt better with Ferus than with anyone else in the whole galaxy.

"Always…" he whispered, lips against her hair.

They let that word linger around them for a moment before Jane moved her head upwards and kissed him, slowly, tenderly, barely brushing his lips with hers.

"I wish I had met you earlier." she whispered.

"Should I take it as a compliment?"

She nodded. "Definitely. Now… I was thinking about making dinner. I had some time to go shopping for some groceries and…"

"Need some help?"

"That would be nice, but I can go with some company too, if you want to take a shower."

Ferus shook his head. "I usually shower in the morning but I'd really love to help you. Or just keep you company, as you said. Come on, lead the way."

A day that had begun as full of worry and uneasiness turned into a nice, calm and relaxed evening, a meal prepared together while chatting happily and a small marathon of a soap opera they both watched cuddling on the couch eating popcorn. As if they had been together for years and had developed a domestic routine that had been tested over time.

They had met less than a week earlier.

It felt like they had been together for ten years.

And it felt good.

It felt great.

But that pang of guilt kept gnawing at both Jane and Ferus, for different reasons. It wasn't enough to be called the proverbial bantha in the room, but it was like a ghost in there.

They had a rough road ahead. That was sure.


Again, sorry for the delay. Final exams are a bitch. Really. Off to work to Last Of The Runaways!