Previous – Jason recovers; Spinelli figures out the greater extent of the mob threat; Elizabeth gets mad at Jason for playing on her sympathies.
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Hack | 25Spinelli had asked him a million times what it was that he was looking for after Jason had hobbled back to his own penthouse and taken up residence in the master bedroom once more. But instead of getting some rest like Patrick told him to, the enforcer began to slowly and methodically tear the room apart as he searched for some unknown item.
Spinelli had wanted to help; hell, he'd tried to help, but his mentor refused to tell him just what it was he was looking for. He went through his night stand, he dumped the contents of his dresser onto the floor before neatly stowing them away again, and he went through his closets and the duffel bags that he and Spinelli used while on the run. And when he finally found it, instead of coming out into the room and showing his young friend the cause for their troubles, he merely hid the item in his palm, shoved Spinelli out into the hall, changed from his pajama bottoms into a pair of worn jeans and a t-shirt, and hobbled back across the hall.
Elizabeth had cleared out of Sonny's penthouse by now, of course, and headed back to her own. The door was slightly ajar as Jason made a beeline for it, having to brace a hand against the wall to steady himself. The unusual exertion after about a week of doing nothing but lounging in bed was not good for his leg, but he felt he needed to take care of this sooner rather than later.
Yeah, sooner was good.
Especially since 'later' carried with it the promise of certain retaliation on Elizabeth's part.
…Yeah, sooner was definitely better.
But as he neared her door, fully prepared to bite the bullet and say something he never intended to tell her – boy, he'd have to tamper it down so that it didn't come out sappy – he realized that she had company.
"So what are you going to do to Jason for being an ass?"
It was Ritchie's voice. He should have known it. Ritchie was always a pain in the ass when it came to Elizabeth. He'd heard rumors among the newer guards that when Elizabeth was a little younger, she had a huge crush on Ritchie, who'd found out about it but hadn't exactly reciprocated, and the incident had become a great ice breaker between them.
Goddamn Ritchie.
He could make out her reply, which told him that she was hovering somewhere by the balcony doors as her friends lounged on the couch.
"I'm not going to do anything."
Jason blinked. Surely, he hadn't heard that right.
Apparently, the guards thought the same thing.
"What?" Johnny asked incredulously. "Come on, Default, you've gotta be shitting us, right? You've always got a counter strike ready should the occasion present itself."
"As it usually does," Ritchie tossed in for good measure.
"You guys make me sound like a plotting, manipulative shrew."
A long pause.
And then, "Oh, I'm sorry, we haven't been introduced. I'm Ritchie San Marco, and this is Johnny O'Brien, and-"
"Yeah, yeah."
"No, seriously, what are you going to do to him? We wanna know."
"Yeah, we haven't seen the Boss Man tied up in knots like this since…ever."
Jason bristled, and he could hear Elizabeth let out a little laugh. "You guys get way too much pleasure out of watching him squirm."
"It's fun."
"You're awful."
"Hey, hey," Ritchie protested, "we're awful? Sounds like you're forgetting who gets stuck trying to distract Spaghetti when he wants to drop by your penthouse while your gentleman caller is here."
"Yeah," Johnny agreed. "And that kid's like a dog with a bone. I once had to shove him back into the penthouse and hold the doorknob because he kept insisting that he had to see you and wouldn't shut up about it. I believe this was the same day that Max walked in on you and Jason going at it on the dining table. Poor guy had nightmares for a week."
Jason, who hadn't known that the guards were running interference like that, could almost see Elizabeth rolling her eyes before she reluctantly replied, "Well, thanks, I guess I do owe you there."
"And we know the perfect way you can pay us back – tell us what crap you've got planned for the Boss Man."
He waited for one of those sardonic little chuckles that the brunette had perfected, but Jason only heard a beleaguered sigh. "Guys, I'm not going to do anything to him."
"What?!"
"Oh, come on," Ritchie protested. "You made such a great promise of retaliation; it seems almost cruel not to follow through. I was really looking forward to it."
"Hell, I was just shocked that you didn't tackle Spaghetti," Johnny admitted. "I was expecting you to just whale on the kid. Would have been funny. I've been shuffling papers at the warehouse all day – I could have used a little show."
She could be heard to sigh wearily. "What good would it have done, tackling Spinelli? Not that I didn't want to. I just didn't have a good reason to."
"Sure you did! The little sneak-"
"The little sneak helped Sonny and Jason out," Elizabeth cut in. "I was too caught up with Jason's leg – I thought that was the most important thing to deal with at the time. Spinelli, he went out and he got the information. He found out who was trying to hurt Jason. And whether I like it or not, that was exactly what had to be done."
"But-"
"But, nothing. Spinelli did exactly what had to be done. Because the only thing that matters here is keeping Jason from getting hurt. Spinelli found out who had spotted him and now Sonny can deal with it and eliminate the threat. Alcazar or Paolo or Don Salvatore will not have the chance to come after him again and finish the job."
"…That's really mature of you, you know."
"Yeah, yeah."
"…Who the fuck are you and where's our Elizabeth?"
There was a muffled sound, as if someone had been hit in the face with one of Elizabeth's colorful little throw pillows.
"So you're really not going to do anything to Jason?"
"'Fraid not, John-Boy."
"Damn."
"Although, I've been thinking…"
"What?"
Jason could practically see Ritchie pounce on that wistful little statement.
"What have you been thinking? Is it diabolical? Because I'm totally on board with diabolical."
"I don't know, I've been thinking that…" She let out a little huff, as if she were blowing her bangs out of her face. Jason leaned heavily against the wall, trying to make out her words.
"Maybe the little nerd's the better man for the job."
Jason's eyes bulged at the unexpected declaration, soft and unsure as it was, and Johnny and Ritchie were equally surprised.
"What?! Okay, now I know you're shitting me."
"You've gotta be kidding, Elizabeth!"
"I'm serious," she informed them quietly. "Think about it. He's beating me in the challenges by three, and I'm already behind on the current challenge because I've been wasting my time taking care of Jason. Spinelli already has it done because he wasn't the one worrying about getting someone's fever to go down, or keeping someone entertained and happy."
Jason cringed and scrubbed a hand over his mouth. Fuck.
"Plus, he uncovered the whole mess with Alcazar – you could tell that Sonny was really impressed. And on top of all that, he's…not a girl."
"And just what the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
"Yeah, one of the things I like best about you is that you're a girl!"
Okay, that settled it, Ritchie was going to have to go.
"Look, all I'm saying is that he's a guy, and he's so much better at compartmentalizing than I am. When Jason got sick, he stayed in the beginning and helped him get settled in, then immediately got out of the way and went to work. And what did I do? God, I hovered. I smothered that man. Ugh, I think about it now and I just want to kick myself! I can't believe I did all that – what was I thinking?"
Funny, he'd enjoyed all that she did for him. Appreciated it more than he was willing to say.
"I don't know, maybe Spinelli's right. Maybe this is why most organizations don't have girls in high positions. Look at how I acted with Jason – how embarrassing." He could hear her shudder. "Shoot me if I ever do that again."
"Agreed," the guards answered in unison, damn them.
"But what does this have to do with anything?" Ritchie wanted to know. "So Spaghetti's winning temporarily – so what?"
"Well, I've just been thinking…why not let him have the job? Why don't I just back off and let him take over?"
"…Are you insane?!"
"You're not serious, Elizabeth."
"Why not?" she asked impatiently, and Jason could just see her plant her hands on her hips like she always did when she was exasperated. "He wants the job so damn much – he's got such a hard-on for impressing Sonny and Jason – why not let him have it? There's so much more than I could be doing. I'm still a young woman-"
"-A very young, stupid woman."
"When I need an editorial, I'll ask for one, San Marco."
"Sorry."
"Anyway, I'm still a young woman. I haven't done so many things yet. I could be out seeing the world, getting into trouble, falling in love-"
"You don't believe in love," Ritchie cut in as Jason bristled outside. Elizabeth ignored him completely.
"Hell, I could go on my walking tour of Italy, and I could drive all the way to the West Coast, and I could drink espresso by the French Riviera and catch the Northern Lights and go whale-watching and-"
"We get the point, Default. And don't think I didn't recognize last week's lineup of the Discovery channel."
He could almost hear the air sizzle as Elizabeth undoubtedly skewered the Irishman with a ferocious glare. "Anyway, I could be out doing any one or all of those things. Instead, what am I doing? I'm sitting around in an empty penthouse, sparring with a stupid little nerd and his hulking, surly, Neanderthal of a mentor. Those two are both such a waste of my time."
"No argument from the peanut gallery."
"It's just that…I don't know, maybe I'd be happier if I were away. I mean, sure, I'd miss Sonny and Nikolas and all of you guys like crazy. You've been my family since I moved in here six years ago. But ever since Jason and Spinelli came to town…I don't know, things have been so different. And I don't think I like it."
Something twisted inside Jason's chest, and he rested the back of his head against the wall. Inside, Johnny was similarly struggling with these thoughts.
"But if you leave, if you run away, it's like you're admitting defeat and letting Spaghetti and Jason win."
Elizabeth sighed with the weight of the world on her shoulders. "Maybe I just don't care about that anymore. Maybe it's just…gotten beyond my control now."
A soft sigh and then quietly, "You know, sometimes I wish I had a girl friend."
Jason closed his eyes and winced. Oh, fuck.
He was a total ass.
"Someone who was like me," Elizabeth continued hesitantly. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you guys don't really know what it's like to be a girl."
"Yeah, unfortunately, we can't exactly add that to our resumes."
She ignored them. "I mean, I look around town at girls like Lulu and Gia and Maxie – girls I can't stand because they're just so horrible to me – and I sometimes think, I wonder what it would be like to have someone like that in my life. Someone nice, though. Someone that I could talk to without having to pretend that I was tougher than I actually am."
"…You pretend like that around us?"
A helpless sigh. "Yeah, sometimes, I guess. What else can I do? You're all guys, and you're all several years older than me, and you've all actually killed people with your bare hands. And sometimes the things you say…"
Jason could hear one of the men get up from the couch. "Elizabeth, have we ever made you uncomfortable with our jokes? Because you know we're just kidding, right? Anything we say that's even remotely chauvinistic – we're just kidding, I swear."
Silence.
"Shit. Come on, honey, you have to know we're joking. You're like one of the guys to us."
"Shut up, retard, I don't think that's what she wanted to hear," Johnny hissed, and he could be heard giving his friend a smack upside the back of the head. "Elizabeth, we all know that you're a girl. And if we make you feel sometimes with our jokes or our insults that you're somehow less because you're a girl, then we're really sorry. Because trust me, kid, none of us feel that way."
Jason closed his eyes and let out a sigh that came out half-growl. That was exactly what he and Spinelli did, but unlike Johnny and Ritchie, they didn't have the good sense to be honest with Elizabeth and tell her that they were sorry if they hurt her.
"I know, I know," the brunette replied, sounding suspiciously like she was sniffing. "And I love hanging out with you guys, I really do. And I hate sounding ungrateful. It's just that…sometimes, I just can't help wishing that I had a girl around here that I could talk to, someone that knew what I was going through and shared my interests and just…"
She sighed and shook her head. "Never mind. It's not important."
Except, of course, that Jason thought it was.
A long silence stretched out, until Johnny finally broke it. "So are you serious about leaving us?"
God, Jason hoped not. When he had first come to town, Elizabeth had seemed completely out of place and extraneous to their organization, and he'd remember back to a quieter, simpler time when it was just him and Sonny and the guys. Now, amazingly enough, he thought that things would be rather boring without the spirited brunette around to shake them up and keep them all on their toes. And if she left, that meant that Spinelli would be able to devote one-hundred percent of his time to bugging him…
Crap.
She had to stay.
"I don't know. I guess I'm going to have to think about it. I don't want to do anything rash just because I'm…depressed about how things turned out this afternoon."
His leg was starting to truly bother him, and Jason gritted his teeth and rubbed it, trying to ease the ache away. He'd been standing against the wall for too long and had to get back to his penthouse. Elizabeth had company and besides, he'd already realized that this was the wrong time for his visit.
So he pushed himself away from the wall and hobbled back over to Penthouse II where Spinelli was no doubt waiting for him, still hoping he might be let in on the secret of whatever it was that his mentor had torn his room apart searching for.
As soon as the penthouse door closed, the click sounding audibly in the hallway, Ritchie abandoned his seat on the couch and crept to the door of Penthouse VI. He quietly poked his head out and made sure the coast was clear before turning around with a satisfied grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.
"Mission accomplished, Default."
Elizabeth squealed and clapped her hands. "Awesome. Thanks for the help, guys. I think Jason got an earful, don't you?"
Johnny laughed and leaned against the back of the couch. "Did he ever. And that stuff about wanting a female friend and feeling out of place as a girl – classic. Oh, man, I would have paid good money to see the look on his face when he heard that part and realized what a jackass he was."
Ritchie tilted his head to the side and smirked. "Yup, she's a good little bull-shitter, just like her legal guardian."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes and flopped down on the hutch of the sofa. "That I am, but I still meant what I said about Spinelli doing a good job."
"…You're not serious."
"And I meant the other thing I said, too," she replied firmly. "About how the only important thing here is making sure Jason is safe. And all of us, too, by extension. I meant that."