So...Yeah...I know. I've been really bad, but part of it was because I've been really ill on and off for like 4 weeks now and I've been in Spain with NO INTERNET for the last 2 weeks. Kill me now. Ugh. I'm so sorry though, I know it's not an excuse, so I'm not going to set a date I'll update by because I probably won't make it; I'll just do it when I can... Anyways, thanks for still reading this, I forever love you guys :*
I shivered as water dripping from me trickled down my spine. Jace saw this and took off his jacket and put it round my shoulders, just like they do in the movies.
We were standing in the balcony outside the front door of our room we booked out for the night in a grungy motel we found on the outskirts of L.A. The receptionist had given us some disapproving looks as we told her we wanted to book a room for two for the night, but didn't refuse us.
Jace wanted to put on a massive show for her, by buying a condom from the vending machine in the lobby, but a sharp hit to the head, courtesy of me, set his mind right, and we went to our room, number 609.
This brought me right back to where I am now–trying to see some stars through the dust and smoke of the city air. I could make out a few, however most of them turned out to be planes flying into the center. I decided I didn't like the city that much–I was more of a country girl, with the fresh air and beautiful nights.
"It's getting pretty late now, Cam." Jace said, knocking me out of my short trance. I looked around at him and nodded.
"Yeah we should probably get to bed if we want to catch our train in time tomorrow." I agreed. We had booked train tickets from Los Angeles Union Station to Amtrak Station in Richmond, on the edge of Virginia. The train was expensive but we had a couple grand of savings each that were in our suitcases, and it was much easier than driving, and much cheaper than flying. Our trains left at 9:00 from Platform 9 and we couldn't miss them. It would take 40 minutes to get to the station and on the platform, so we had to wake up at 7:30 to eat, shower, check out and get there.
We went back into our room and found they had given us a room with only one bed. I didn't understand why this surprised me, I mean, the receptionist wouldn't exactly have thought we wanted a twin room...
Jace noticed the problem as well–it was a very small double bed, and there was no sofa.
"Well..." He started, rubbing the back of his neck, "I can crash in the bathtub, and you have the bed." He started getting all his stuff and heading towards to the bathroom.
"Hey, hey, hey." I said, blocking his way with my arm. "There's no way I'm letting you sleep in the bathtub, I'll go there, you get the bed–you're bigger." He started to shake his head.
"No, Cam, you're getting the bed." He argued.
"No." I said defiantly, crossing my arms. "You are." I finished, and with that I lay down on the floor to make my statement. Knowing what I was doing, Jace only copied me. Eleven minutes of silence passed by with both us still lying on the floor, in our clothes, pretending we were asleep. I finally let out a sigh of exasperation.
"This is pointless." I stated, turning onto my side to face Jace. He turned onto his side so he was facing me too.
"I know." He agreed.
"Let's just share." I said. "There may not be that much room but it's fine." He raised an eyebrow at me.
"Sure you're fine with this?" He questioned me. I nodded in response and lugged my suitcase onto the bed, taking out a fresh pair of pyjamas as I'd been wearing my summer ones ever since we got out of base.
"No peeking." I said to Jace over my shoulder, and he nodded, holding up his hands in surrender and turned to face the corners. I made sure he wasn't looking then quickly took of my shirt and short, freezing in my bra and underwear for a few seconds, then putting on a gray tank, navy shorts and my maroon 'MORGAN' jumper of my dads from Blackthorne.
I pulled the sleeves over my hands, and turned around to see Jace lying on the bed in his boxers. Just his boxers.
"Jace!" I exclaimed. He looked up innocently at me.
"What?" He asked. I just shook my head in disbelief at him.
"Are you seriously gonna sleep like that?" I asked him with a raised eyebrow, trying to keep my mask on and my eyes as far away as possible from that extraordinarily well-kept six-pack. Mmm six pack... NO SHUT UP CAMERON! My mind screamed at me.
"Of course I am," he replied, raising the eyebrow back at me, "It's how I always sleep. Besides, it's hot in here." He continued. "Problem?"
"Not at all." I said sweetly, and smiled at him, loving the look of annoyance on his face for a split second. I climbed into the bed next to him and turned to look at him.
"You know what? You're right, it really is quite hot in here..." I trailed off, pulling off my dad's sweatshirt and chucking it across the room. I did a nice long stretch and lay down, so he could almost but not quite see down my shirt. I sprawled my long tan legs over the blankets, purposely putting them on his side. I flicked out the lights.
"Night night, Jacey." I whispered, and even in the dark I could see the pained expression on his face. Chameleon: 2, Shadow: 2.
I sighed contentedly as balance had been restored and drifted instantly in the dark and loving embrace of sleep.
The light filtered through the blinds, however, some had gotten through, hitting my face and pouring into the room, showing all the tiny dust particles. I tried to roll over out of bed, but found something in my way.
Upon opening my eyes I discovered that something was Jace. Somehow in the night I had ended up on his chest, and his arm had ended up around my waist.
I slowly tried to pry his arms off of me before he woke up, but with him being an assassin and all, it kind of didn't work. He opened his eyes into a squint and tried to look around groggily. When he tried to stretch, he discovered where his arms were and looked down at my awkward face.
"Oh. Sorry, Cam." He said, unwrapping his arms from me. I just gave out a small half-laugh and watched as he stretched. I then decided to do the same myself, and got out of bed and touched my toes.
I looked over at our alarm clock, which read 7:30am–right on time.
"I shotgun first shower!" I shouted, and grabbed a towel and sprinted into the bathroom, turning it quickly on before Jace even knew what was happening.
I stepped into the hot shower and put my head under the steamy water and pulled my fingers through my long hair, which was now a striking platinum blond. I shut my eyes and exhaled slowly in relief, feeling my muscles relax as the hot water pounded down on me.
After I finished showering, I wrapped myself up in a warm, fluffy white hotel towel. I looked into the mirror and stared at my reflection. My appearance change had now been completed, all blue gone from my eyes, replaced with a soft hazel.
I sighed and departed from the mirror, leaving the bathroom. I stepped back into the bedroom and read the clock–7:40am–and looked at Jace.
"Your turn." I nodded my head towards the bathroom, and he groaned and rolled out of bed, still in just his boxers. I got a little shiver down my spine, looking at him, but turned away to my suitcase, before he noticed anything. However, the little smirk tugging on the corner of his lips told me he'd seen my reaction. Despite this, he didn't comment and only dragged himself into the bathroom.
Once I'd heard the shower turn on, I dried myself with the fuzzy towel, smiling at its softness, and dropped my towel on the ground, walking over to my suitcase to grab some clothes.
I picked out an outfit of some high-waisted washed out denim shorts, and an off-the-shoulder maroon cropped t-shirt with three-quarter length sleeves. I put on my underwear and white lace bra, and was just putting on my shorts when Jace stepped into the room.
I hastily grabbed my towel off the floor and wrapped it around myself.
"What are you doing?" I shouted. "You've only been in there 2 minutes and 17 seconds, get back in!" I finished, causing him to hide his lustful expression with a cocky smile, raise his hands in mock surrender and get back into the bathroom before I murdered him.
I let out a sigh of frustration at his idiocy, but then a little smile came across my face, as I thought of the look on his face when he'd seen me with no top on.
Still smiling to myself, I finished changing, put on a little bit of makeup, because hey, I might be an assassin, but I'm still a teenage girl who's around a really hot boy. Once I finished putting on eyeliner, mascara and lip tint, I brushed my hair and put it up in a messy high ponytail.
I then banged my fist on the bathroom door to signal to Jace it was okay for him to come out. His eyes widened for a split second when he saw me but then went back to usual.
He was still in his towel, but he was dry enough now, only a few of drops of water hanging from his hair. I jumped onto the bed and put my hand over my eyes while he changed.
When I opened them he was dressed in a gray shirt, navy hoodie, jeans and some Nike high tops. To summarize, he looked really hot.
I smiled at him, and collected up my wash bag, emergency phone, iPod, guns, and knives and shoved them all back into my bag. I pulled on my navy vans and looked at him.
"Ready?" I asked.
"Yeah." He replied with a grin, and so we stepped outside and locked our room, checked out at reception and made our way to the train station.
Once we got Union Station it was just after 8:32–internal clocks were so useful–giving us 27 minutes and 48...47...46 seconds to eat breakfast and get to our platform.
We stopped off at a pancake house in the station and had waffles with strawberries and whipped cream along with coffee. We ate 16 waffles between us–hey, a girl's gotta eat what a girl's gotta eat!–and then headed to our platform.
"First class tickets! Seriously Jace?" I asked him with a raised eyebrow as we sat in our small cabin. I took a look around. It was all wooden with two small beds, a tap, shower and TV.
"Well, the salesman was very convincing, and it was only a few extra hundred so what the hell?" He said in a cool tone with a little shrug of his shoulders at the end. "We're gonna be on here for two nights, so we might as well."
I sighed inwardly at his lax attitude to this. Typical Jace. I swear if I stayed with him, I'd end up broke within the month.
I dumped my suitcase underneath my bed and jumped onto the mattress, sinking into it. I got up after a few minutes, and opened our window, sticking my head outside, loving the feeling of the rush of air passing by me. I shouted out of the window, loving the freedom it gave me, while Jace laughed quietly behind me. He came up and wrapped his arms around my waist and kissed the top of my head.
"Come back inside now, Cam." He murmured into my hair. I spun around, and kissed him sort and sweet, but he pulled me back in. "Not enough." He stated, so simply it made me laugh.
I'd tell you about the next couple of days on the train, really I would, but it was pretty boring to be honest. I got into a sort of routine in our little compartment– wake up, eat breakfast, shower, change, make out with Jace, watch TV, have lunch, listen to music, make out with Jace, have dinner, make out with Jace, go to sleep.
Yes, I know that's a lot of kissing, but seriously, if you were alone with your boyfriend in a compartment for three days, what would you be doing? Playing scrabble and bingo? Yeah, that's what I thought.
When we got into the station, we found a Starbucks and sat down with some drinks. Just as I sat down in the corner with my drink, a sudden wave of emotion overcame me.
Fear, pain, worry and guilt all swept over me like a tsunami. How could I have not realised until now? I felt sick all over my body, my stomach was in knots and a lump had formed in my throat. What was I going to do?
"Jace." I managed to choke out, past my lump. He looked at me with an easy grin that went away as soon as he saw my face.
"What's wrong?" He asked in a worried voice.
I didn't think I could speak, what was I supposed to say? "Joe." I managed to whisper, as tears started pooling in my eyes.
Jace expression turned to a look of horror as he realised what I was saying. "Oh god." He murmured.
"How could we forget about him?" I asked, my eyes wide.
"Cam, it's not your fault, Joe's not normally with us, it's normally just us, and I'm sure..." His voice trailed off. He swallowed. "Joe's one of the best we have. He will have made it out, just like we did."
Oh god... "We need to find him." I stated. "What if the enemy have him? They'd torture him, or... kill him. Just like they did to my...my..." I choked up. My parents. That's what I was trying to say, and Jace knew it. He looked at me sadly.
"Cammie, you don't even know they were the same people who killed your parents." He tried to reason with me. I just brushed him off, and shook my head.
"None of this matters right now, I need to find Joe. He's all I have left." Tears threatened to spill over my eyes, and I was vaguely aware of some off the staff whispering and pointing in my direction, but I didn't care. One tear escaped from the corner of my eye and slowly slid down my cheek. Jace reached out his hand and wiped it away.
"Don't worry, Cam, I promise we'll find him. But we don't know who the enemy are, so we can't just go bust into their base and look for Joe, and the chance they even have Joe is quite small, I mean, he's one of our best agents. Besides, it's most likely to be the CIA, and they think Joe's on their side, so we don't have much to worry about, okay?"
I slowly took in all of his reasoning, which calmed me down quite a bit. "Okay," I agreed, biting my lip, "What should we do?"
Jace shrugged. "The best thing to do would be to go down to Gallagher from here. We were due a few nights ago, but the exchange doesn't start until tomorrow. We can say that our flights were delayed from Australia. Once we get there, we can look for Joe. If he made it out, he might be there."
I started to nod my head. Hope began to blossom in my stomach and it sounded like a good plan. "Okay fine. We have just over one thousand dollars left, so let's get a cab to Roseville and the rest will be our emergency money."
He agreed to the plan and so we called for a cab, and got in.
"Where to?" The cab driver asked me.
"Roseville." I said, starting on my Australian accent. I gave Jace a wink.
He raised an eyebrow at us. "Where are you from?" He questioned.
"Visiting some relatives here from Australia." I replied promptly with an easy smile.
"You're a long way from home. Roseville's about a 45 minute drive from here, are you sure you've got that kind of money, kid?" He asked condescendingly.
I understood that this guy was probably just worried for us, and his money, but he was really starting to get on my nerves. I gave him a cold glare, and said a stiff "yes".
He could see I wasn't happy with him, so wisely he started to drive. We did up our seatbelts and I let out an angry sigh. Jace looked at me with an amused sparkle in his eyes. He rubbed his hands on my lower back, and sighed as some tension left my back. He let out a small chuckle, and I glared at him. It was just like our time back at base. Base. I really hoped everyone had made it out okay. All of them were like a family to me, and I didn't want anyone to be hurt, however with a break in of that scale, I knew that not everyone would have made it out like Jace and me.
I sighed, shut my eyes and drifted off into a light sleep.
Thanks for reading guys. Please review if you have time :')
