"Stupid question, isn't it?" Jack asked with a sigh. He pushed his half eaten plate away and Ianto gave him a quizzical look. "Look, I'm not asking to convert you to anything, if that's what you're thinking. I just think that this has to be a hard way to live."
Again, Ianto shrugged. "I do okay," he said, trying not to sound defensive. He was feeling confused and wasn't sure where Jack was headed with this. Jack sat back and poured some more coffee. Drinking from the mug, his eyes went to his wallet again. Reaching across the desk, he pulled it towards him and opened it. That got Ianto's attention. Rifling through the cash he had in there, he came to a decision.
"Who says money can't buy happiness?" He asked softly. He pulled out all the money he had in there and put it on the table next to Ianto's plate. Ianto's eyes grew large as he saw the thickness of the stack. "I want you to have this," Jack said.
Ianto looked down at the stack of money and then back up at the man seated at the table. While he knew that some of this was owed to him, it was clearly more money than he had ever seen at one time in his life. "Why?"
Jack shrugged. Why indeed? He wondered if he could tell the other man the truth yet. He really wanted to, but this Ianto was so skittish, he didn't want to scare him off right away. "Because you deserve a little bit of a break. I have it, so why not?"
Ianto looked down at the money and put his hand on it. He rifled through the stack and swallowed. Most of it was large bills. He looked up at Jack and then back down again. Who was this man that he walked the streets of Cardiff with this much money in his pocket? After a long moment he took only a portion of the money and pushed the rest back at Jack, surprising him. "I can't take this. We agreed to one fifty. That's good enough for me."
Jack stared at him for a long moment as Ianto raised his chin and looked back almost defiantly. "Why not?"
"I'm not here for charity," Ianto said firmly. He nodded in the direction of the money he had pushed back towards Jack. "That's charity."
"No it isn't," Jack said quietly. "It's a gift." Ianto shook his head and Jack recognized one of his Ianto's more obstinate looks. He sat back with a sigh, knowing he wasn't going to win this one. "You feel that strongly?"
"Yes," Ianto said. He had finished his food and reached over for the coffee pot, adroitly making his way past Jack's money to snag the handle and pull it closer. He poured them both fresh coffee and took a sip. It was good, and he was happy to enjoy that. But he had to draw the line somewhere. "I don't want something I didn't earn."
"Well, we have the room until noon," Jack said with a glance over at the bed. Ianto rolled his eyes and Jack burst out laughing at the younger man's expression. "Oh come on, I wasn't that bad, was I?"
"No," Ianto said. He looked up from the table with a twinkle in his eye. "Not that bad at all."
"Wow. Thank you, I think," Jack said as he shook his head ruefully. "Usually the praise is a lot more effusive." He was a bit nonplussed at Ianto's reaction, though at the same time he was pleased that Ianto had done what he did. It showed a strength of character that despite his circumstances, he still had some values that he wouldn't compromise on. When he put his cup back down he looked at the other man. "But come on, you can't say you've had better."
"Are you that insecure?" Ianto asked, shocking himself with his own question. There was something about Jack that goaded him to tease the other man. He barely knew him, yet he found himself bantering in his altogether with the other man, and enjoying himself while he did. "Surely a man such as you doesn't need that sort of confirmation from the likes of me."
"Why not?" Jack asked. "A guy likes to know he's good at something." Ianto snorted softly as he went back to finishing up the last of the food on his plate. "Well?"
"Wow," Ianto replied, amazed that Jack was still fishing for information. He put down his knife and fork and sat back. "Alright, you're right. I haven't had better." Jack smiled at him and pulled his own plate back, finding his appetite had returned now that they were back on some sort of more comfortable ground with one another. Ianto just shook his head, silently wondering about Jack's ego and how easily he was mollified by a few words. Though, Ianto thought to himself, it had been fantastic. He glanced towards the bed, thinking about Jack's comment of having the room until noon but immediately rejected the idea. No, anymore and he'd be looking like a mercenary. And at this point he was only taking the money to survive. He wasn't going to lead Jack to think that he wanted more sex just for the money. He sighed softly, not wanting Jack to notice. At this point he'd shag the other man for free, it had been that good. He gave a self depreciating smile, lost in thought.
Jack sat back with his cup and watched the thoughts flit across Ianto's expressive face. Unlike his own Ianto who had often hid behind a mask that showed nothing of how he felt or what he was thinking, this man kept it all on the surface, even when he didn't want to show how he felt. He had never learned those harsh lessons that Ianto had learned about holding everything inside and not showing the outside world how he felt. For all of his living on the streets, this man was essentially younger in many ways than the Ianto he had known. Perhaps it was Torchwood, Jack mused as he took another sip of his coffee. A secret organization would by its nature spawn employees who were also secretive in their own personal lives. And his Ianto had had a lot of secrets to deal with. At one point it was what had initially intrigued him. He had wanted to pull back the layers of subterfuge in an effort to reveal the true man beneath. If there was one thing he could be happy about it was that he had succeeded in that. He had known the true depths of the man called Ianto Jones, and it was those memories that he cherished now.
Ianto saw that Jack was lost in thought. He was looking straight at him, but it was like he didn't really see him. Ianto wondered what was going on inside the other man's head. He looked young, but his eyes seemed incredibly old, as if he had seen the world and all it had to offer and it had aged him. He fascinated Ianto. He wasn't like anyone he had met before and Ianto felt like a moth drawn to a flame. There was something about Jack that didn't seem on the up and up, but he found that he didn't care. He just wanted to be able to see him again.
"So, what now?" Jack asked, finally focusing fully back on Ianto. They had both finished eating and the coffee pot was empty. "I could ring for more coffee."
"No thank you," Ianto said. "I'm already sloshing about with what I've had." Jack smiled at his comment. He really didn't want any more himself, but was looking for reasons to hold Ianto here with him. He closed his eyes when the sun glinted off the windows opposite and shone directly into his face. Involuntarily he glanced at his watch to check the time.
Ianto saw that and shifted. "Right," he said as he threw his napkin onto the table. Leveraging himself up, he leaned over to give Jack a kiss. "I'll take my shower and be off. No doubt you have work to see to, somewhere."
"Yeah," Jack said with a sigh. Unconsciously he licked his lips and could taste the slight traces of coffee from Ianto. "Want some company?"
"Is that wise?" Ianto asked as he leaned closer to the other man. Jack lifted his face up and Ianto pushed closer. "We're out of condoms. You were a bit energetic last night."
"I was?" Jack asked, incredulous. Ianto only laughed and pushed off the arms of his chair as he meandered over to the bathroom. "Hey!" Ianto turned and looked over his shoulder, making Jack swallow at the look he saw on the other man's face. "We used up the shower gel, so what are you going to use to wash up?"
"I'll improvise," Ianto said with a wink as he went through the door. Jack could hear the rest of his comment drifting out to him. "I'm good at that."
"Yes, Ianto Jones, you certainly are," Jack said in a low voice to himself...
Jack shook himself out of his reverie as he heard the door alarms go off. He saw Owen coming back through with some bags in his arms and it made him focus on what he was doing, rather than what he had done. He logged into the computer system and did a quick scan of the night before, working his way backwards. He stopped when he saw Toshiko do something at her console shortly before he had arrived. Going to the internal CCTV camera footage that was focused on her screen he zoomed in the resolution until he could see what she was doing.
"Clever, my little Japanese flower, but you have a long way to go to outsmart me," he murmured with a smile. He saw that she had created a spider program to go out and search the city's CCTV network. While he wasn't a computer programmer, he knew the Torchwood mainframe unlike anyone else. After all, he had been the one to build it and integrate the sentient computer wetwear into the system. There wasn't anything she could do that he couldn't stop if he wanted to. Opening up a separate window he stopped for a moment and looked at the blinking cursor. She was clever, so he had to be careful. Grinning to himself, he began typing, his fingers flying across the keyboard. Though he didn't show it often, he could very well program anything on his own. And this was one of his fortes, which was to outsmart his own staff. He had been doing it for centuries, so he had had a lot of practice.
When Andy came upstairs with some coffee for the team, he carried a clean mug with a steaming French roast into Jack's office. Jack had a look of concentration on his face and he was typing away. Just as Andy was about to knock on the door to warn him Jack sat back with a satisfied smile on his face. He looked up and grinned as he got a whiff of the coffee that Andy was bringing in.
"Ah, my lifesaver!" He declared. He looked at distaste at the take away cup that he had only half drunk. "I was anticipating an ulcer if I drank anymore of this swill."
"Can't have that, sir," Andy said with a smile, happy that things seemed to be back to normal with Jack. He loved their banter when they were working. He satisfied a deep seated need within him to both serve and entice Jack. It was, after all, what had brought them together. As he put the steaming mug on Jack's desk he smiled.
"Good to see you smiling," Jack commented as he sat back in his chair and stretched. The springs protested vocally, but he didn't seem to notice. "Feeling better?"
"Yeah, thanks," Andy said with a nod. He perched himself on the corner of the desk, not noticing Jack's twitch at his familiar movement. "Nothing that a hot shower and a little paracetamol couldn't help. Go on, drink up."
Jack picked up the mug and drank, closing his eyes in appreciation over the rich taste. While Andy wasn't the master at gourmet coffee that Ianto had been, he did well enough with what he had. And that was a far sight better than what Jack had been drinking earlier. "Ah," he said as he smacked his lips. "I think I feel somewhat human again."
"Only somewhat?" Andy teased. It had been debated amongst the staff on several occasions just how human Jack was. Although Owen had done scans and he definitely showed up as human on those, they all suspected that there was more to the story that Jack wasn't telling them.
"One can only expect so much of perfection, right?" Jack said with a grin that turned into an outright laugh at the expression on Andy's face. Andy shook his head and twisted his torso to look at Jack's screen. There was a lot of text that looked like Tosh's screen when she was compiling something.
"Anything I can help with?" He asked. He wasn't going to ask Jack any questions. Maybe it was because he didn't want to know the answers, even if Jack was willing to share with him. He turned back to Jack who shook his head. "I didn't know you could program."
"Oh that? That's nothing," Jack said dismissively. "Just doing a little parameter search. It's not programming at all." He hit a series of keystrokes and the screen blanked briefly before returning with a search of artifacts in the database. "See? Just looking for something. I ran into some stuff last night and it reminded me of some pieces we had in storage. I was doing a parameter search to see if I could get any matches. Look like I was right," he said, pointing to the screen. Andy peered closely and nodded as he saw the designations.
"Want me to retrieve those?" He didn't recognize the allocations, which meant it was in the lower levels of the archives that he didn't normally go into. It would take some time to retrieve the stuff if that was what Jack wanted.
"No rush," Jack said blithely. "I just wanted confirmation that we did have some more of this stuff in storage. If we need to, we can get them later." He cleared the screen and the squiggling screensaver kicked in, obscuring the screen. "Now, tell me what you and Owen picked up last night," Jack said, changing the subject and effectively distracting Andy from what he had been doing.
