Chapter Fifty: Upgraded
Day Ninety-Three:
Still unused, the condoms stayed in the top drawer of the nightstand under some papers.
Kilgrave took every opportunity he could think of to bring up something sexual around Jessica. He didn't have to catch her masturbating to know how badly she wanted it. But Jessica was stubborn and rejected every advancement he made towards her. It wasn't as easy as she wished it would be though.
It was almost routine now for him to try and pull some shit and for her to shoot him down. A scenario like this occurred at least once a day, if not more.
As for income, cases were running pretty smoothly now, which led to a steady cash flow. They got the hole in the bedroom wall fixed, they could afford more than fast food occasionally, and they took another trip to the supermarket. They didn't receive any case as unusual as the Murphy's and just got more typical stuff. Getting more clients was good for credibility and business.
At night, they continued to go out and rescue people together. Nothing too dangerous, but they were making a difference and Kilgrave was actually getting the hang of it. He consistently proved to be useful with his powers and it made Jessica's work go faster and much more smoothly.
It was pretty early in the morning and they didn't have any appointments scheduled, so it was a mystery as to who was gently knocking on the front door.
Jessica raises her eyebrow at Kilgrave, who shrugs in response. "It's open!" She yells, watching the door.
"Jackie, you can wait here." Elijah's voice is heard before he's seen. "You too, Nick." He says to the tall shadow of a man who appeared to be one of his bodyguards. When he enters the apartment, he closes the door behind him, holding a large paper shopping bag in one hand.
Kilgrave's face immediately reflects his disgust and he folds his arms over his chest. "What are you doing here?"
"Eli… this is a surprise." Jessica says, overlapping her words with Kilgrave's.
He looks between the two of them and laughs apologetically. "I'm sorry, I can't understand you when you talk at the same time." Assuming that Jewel would be the one more likely to talk, he looks at her first, coming in closer.
She gives Kilgrave a harsh glare that tells him, "Be-quiet," and then brings her focus back to their guest. "Hi, Eli. Can we help you with something?"
Extending his hand, he gives her the bag he was carrying. "You won the raffle." His smile is almost bright enough to lighten the whole room.
"Seriously?" Jessica stands up and takes the bag from him, setting it down on the desk. Inside, she pulls out a box the size of a laptop bag and stares at it. Sure enough, it was a package containing a virtual reality set. The back was a short description of how it worked and all the pieces inside.
Kilgrave peers at it over her shoulder, although he tried not to seem too interested in front of Elijah. He makes sure Eli is looking at him before he asks with an impolite tone. "Do you always personally deliver things to prize winners?"
Just by the way he cocked his head to the side, Eli could tell he was getting attitude, but he doesn't seem to care in the least and just responds with a smirk as if he was laughing at an inside joke. "No, I don't actually." He doesn't choose to elaborate any more on why this was a special circumstance.
Noticing that he wasn't turning around to leave, Jessica takes his focus again. "Uh, please, sit. Do you want some coffee or something?"
"Oh, thank you. I don't drink coffee though. Do you happen to have tea?" He asks, graciously laying his overcoat on the back of the chair before he sits down.
Kilgrave insisted last time they went shopping on getting tea, so she nods. "We do." Without even looking, she punches Kilgrave in the side of his arm. "Go get him some tea." She growls through her teeth.
"Ow!" Her partner whines overdramatically, rubbing the spot she hit although she didn't use anything close to full force. "Why do I have to do it? You're the one who offered!" She only as to give him a harsh glare for him to yield. "Fine!" Loudly sighing, he exits to the kitchen.
Jessica sits back down across from him. Being a welcoming host wasn't something she normally did, so it didn't come naturally to her. However, she was making an effort and that was clear. It only irritated Kilgrave further.
"So…" She drags out, trying to figure out what they were supposed to talk about.
Seeing Elijah sitting in their apartment didn't look as odd as it should have. A man with so much money seemed unbothered by the lower class living and appeared as though he could blend in with any of his surroundings. He was wearing a similar outfit to the one he had on at the convention a few weeks ago. The only things indicating his wealth were the large, various rings around his fingers on his right hand, and what presented itself as a solid gold pendant around his neck that represented the wing of an angel. His jewelry had gone unnoticed until now, simply because he didn't wear his rings to business-related events and the pendant was usually tucked in his shirt. Nevertheless, the necklace never came off.
When he realizes she was unsure what to say, he combs his hair back with his hand and confirms, "I see you two are in the private investigation business."
"Oh, yeah." Jessica starts, J & H -"
"- Investigative Services, I know." Eli finishes, his eyes twinkling. "Being a P.I. is not an easy job. I have to commend you for doing it so well. I've been hearing wonderful things about your agency."
Their client base wasn't that large, so she blinks at him. "You've heard things about us?"
"Well, not heard." He laughs in an infectious way. "But people are starting to talk about your service and it hasn't gone unnoticed by me." Constantly doing something with his hands, he twists one of the rings on his fingers. "I plan on recommending you to anyone who's looking for the best."
Knowing how many people looked up to him and how much his word counted, she raises her eyebrows. "Really? That's very kind of you…"
"It's my pleasure." Temporarily looking away, he glances at what was sitting on the desk. "Is this your equipment?" He asks curiously.
"Uh, yeah." Jessica mutters, although a slow laptop and a used camera could barely be considered as 'equipment'.
Kilgrave returns from the kitchen with a small teacup in hand and sets the saucer down in front of Eli without a word.
"Thank you." Eli smiles at him and picks up the cup. Kilgrave hadn't put any milk or sugar in it purposely, but drinking just the hot tea water didn't bother him in the slightest.
Kilgrave frowns.
Going on, Jessica decides to add, so she wouldn't seem so pitiful about it in front of him, "It's not the best, but it gets the job done."
For the first time, they see Eli frown himself, shaking his head slightly. "The truth is… I got you a bit of a late house-warming gift." Before either of them say anything else, he starts to smile again and stands up. Turning around, he calls to the door. "Hey, Nick. You can bring it in now."
The front door opens on cue and a broad bloke comes in, pushing a dolly cart with several large boxes and a few smaller ones on top. Nick wheels the cart to a stop, setting it down beside Elijah, and then stands off to the side with his hands clasped behind his back.
Elijah signs 'Thank you,' to Nick before picking up the first medium sized box, handing it to Jessica. The blank look on her face causes him to encourage her, "Go ahead. Open it."
Hesitantly accepting the gift, she tears through the cardboard box to reveal a new, professional camera, wrapped in bubble wrap. Taking it out, however, it was obvious to her how drastically different it was to the current one she had.
When her eyes widen, Eli casually sips his tea and starts to explain. "It's of my own design. There are a few marks that I made previously that are available to the public right now, but this hasn't been put out on the market yet. It's a 20-70 millimeter lens with seventy-two gigabytes of internal storage, fifty megapixels for resolution and a forty-eight hour battery life that can be recharged in about an hour."
"Holy shit…"Jessica mumbles under her breath, feeling it in her hands. The only way she would ever have gotten a camera this good was if she stole it. The last model she saw that was even close to this was well over £6,000.
"Oh," Eli goes on, "and there's a chip at the bottom there that connects the camera to your new computer system. That way, it will automatically upload to the computer without a cord."
"Computer system?"
Anticipating the question, he grins, pointing at the large boxes at the bottom of the dolly. "It's a dual monitor, 3D-capable program I developed. It comes with a master unit and obviously a set of keyboards." He squints at the stack, unsure what one of the boxes contained. When he suddenly remembers, he visibly brightens. "Right. And that one on the left there is your printer."
He seemed to be one-hundred percent oblivious to the shock on their faces, despite having to look at them to see if they were talking. They didn't open their mouths before he was moving on to the next item.
"I haven't forgotten about you, Hemlock." Taking another sip of hot, sugarless tea, he picks up the smallest box on top. His expression was as if he was amused by something unknown, extending the gift to him.
Kilgrave narrows his eyes and looks to Jessica, who didn't have a response to his gaze. With even more hesitation than her, he takes what's been offered to him.
Inside the cardboard was a much finer box made of leather. And inside that box, was a watch. No ordinary watch, undoubtedly.
"I crafted it after the Ulysses brand, but the style is a bit different." Eli says, peering at him. "It's twenty-four karat gold for the strap and outer rim. The inside base is actually made of a thin layer of zircon, which is a specific type of gemstone. That's where the orange-ish glow is coming from. Beneath the zircon, you can still see the gears, and the hands and the numbers are sterling silver. Under the gears is a GPS chip, meaning that the watch will automatically change it's time no matter what time zone you're in. Also, the battery recharges itself every time the minute-hand moves, so you'll essentially never need to replace it."
Still trying to understand what was happening, Jessica looks at it next to Kilgrave. It didn't seem like he was going to say anything, so she tries to channel her disbelief in a calm way, "This is… thank you for -"
"This last one is for the both of you." Having had put his teacup down, he turned around to get one of the other boxes on top, not being able to see that Jessica was talking. Pulling out the contents himself, he sets down the red glass bottle. When he turns the bottle around so they could see, Jessica's eyebrows raise.
"This was actually a gift given to me on the day I opened my first research building. Unfortunately, I don't drink alcohol." Elijah laughs to himself a little. "This particular Dalmore scotch is twenty-five years old, I believe?" He guesses with a shrug. "I thought it would be a shame to let such a drink go to waste, so maybe you could put it to good use."
Leaving the bottle on the desk, he motions to the computer boxes, "I can have my team come and set all this up for you if you'd like."
Jessica was still staring at the expensive whiskey on her desk. She answers absent-mindedly. "Oh… okay."
"Great." Eli gets his phone from his pocket and in an instant, he's saying into it. "Send them up." For evident reasons, he doesn't hold the phone up to his ear and just hangs up immediately. "Sadly, I can't stay much longer. I actually have a board meeting to get to." Picking up his jacket off the chair, he quietly puts it on before concluding, "It was wonderful seeing the two of you again."
Neither of them respond as he had already turned to face the door. Just as he opens it, with Nick behind him, three members of his tech crew march into the apartment. Without a moment to waste, they start unpacking the boxes of equipment.
With one last wave, Eli disappears with his bodyguard. "Thanks for the tea!"
*****UPGRADED*****
It took the tech guys a couple of hours to set up everything properly and test all the complicated features that the system had.
Just as Elijah said, it had dual monitors which took up most of the desk space. There was no computer processor and it simply had one cord that connected everything to the outlet. It had projection and holographic capabilities, which is what he meant by 3D-capable. It worked similarly to the stations at his convention, where you could manipulate images in the air. The master unit that he mentioned was a small, hand-held tablet. It could control both of the computer screens, separately, without even having to be in the same room. It could also wirelessly control the printer, proving that it was most definitely the master unit.
The workers offered to teach Jessica the basic programming, but she preferred that they didn't stick around. She probably should have at least paid attention to some of what was happening, yet she figured she would get it on her own eventually.
When the apartment is left to just her and Kilgrave once again, she stares at everything in front of her. The total value of what Elijah had left them had to be somewhere over £25,000.
Kilgrave, who had been lounging in the bedroom while the tech crew was over, emerges wearing the watch he was given. Despite being in jeans and a T-shirt, it looked… right on him. Something he most definitely would have worn in his previous lifestyle.
"It looks good on you." Jessica admits with a shrug, starting to explore the new computer.
To this, he scowls. "I hate it."
"If you hate it, then why are you wearing it?" Rolling her eyes, she states, "You don't hate it, you hate the fact that he gave it to you."
He rolls his eyes right back at her, although she wasn't paying attention enough to notice. "What's his deal anyway?"
"His deal?"
"Yeah, his deal. You don't find anything strange about what just happened?!" She shrugs and he gives her a frustrated glare. "You conveniently won some bullshit raffle and then he drops off a thousand 'late house-warming gifts' to someone he met exactly once for about two minutes." What he was implying didn't appear to connect with her. "If that's not trying to impress you, I don't know what is."
"Trying to impress me? He gave you a watch, you know." She smirks to herself, although he was clearly unamused. "He's generous with his money, so what? You can't go around stealing things anymore, so when someone hands out free stuff, just shut up and don't ask questions."
"I don't like him." He snarls, crossing his arms over his chest.
"You mentioned that." Choosing to ignore his shitty attitude, she continues looking at the computer.
Kilgrave grumbles something to himself before he decides to move on. "We got a new client by the way."
"When were you planning on telling me that?" She raises her eyebrows, only glancing at him. "Details."
Already extremely irritable, he tries not to snap back and just gives her the short version. "Samuel O'Meara called because his girlfriend, Elena is missing. I told him to come in tomorrow because we have two other clients today."
He was admittedly getting pretty good at this.
Still, Jessica furrows her eyebrows. "What's Elena's last name?"
"Uh," He scrolls through the notes on his phone to find it. "Danver."
Samuel O'Meara and Elena Danver. Two seemingly random names. So how the hell did they sound familiar to Jessica?
She racks her brain to try and think of where on earth she had seen those names before, but it didn't come to her. Either way, she couldn't focus on them right now, because Kilgrave was right. They had other appointments today that needed her attention.
*****UPGRADED*****
Days were long and nights were even longer.
Being a hero involved a lot more running than Kilgrave had expected. So when they get back to the apartment, he was just as physically tired as her, if not more.
"I think that's enough for tonight." Jessica sighs, sliding her phone back into her pocket. When she sits down at her desk, he flops down in the chair next to her. "You can go to sleep now." She only planned on wrapping up a few things for tomorrow.
But he stays in the chair. "Do I have to keep sleeping on the sofa?"
"Yes."
He groans in complaint, throwing a mini tantrum in his seat.
She had gotten used to neglecting his childish behavior and goes on with what she was doing. Pulling up the images that she had taken with her new camera earlier in the day, she stares at them on the computer screen. "Jesus." She mumbles to herself at how the pictures almost seemed clearer than reality.
Seeing what she was looking at, he groans again even louder. "Drooling over Glitch tech, eh?" Getting no dignified response, he mutters aloud, although he was only thinking to himself. "He doesn't deserve you…"
While she could've continued to ignore him like she normally would, she doesn't this time. He was starting to piss her off. "And what? You deserve me?!"
Eli could just truly be stunningly generous with money, or maybe he was trying to impress her. It didn't matter. Jessica would never go out with him. Dating wasn't her thing. Now… would she fuck him? If the opportunity presented itself, probably! He was rather attractive after all. Even then, it still wouldn't matter. Kilgrave being jealous was getting out of hand. It was time she put him in his place.
But for some reason, today, he doesn't back down. In fact, he has the nerve enough to raise his voice and answer with, "Yes! I do!"
Her eyes widen and she turns to face him completely. "What did you just say?!"
While trying to seduce her used to be a fun little game that they played together, internally, his emotions were on the fritz. And everything that he was about to say was what he had been thinking the whole time. "How long have we been doing this, Jessica? Two weeks?! I've done everything you asked of me and more! I've been good. And you barely even look at me!"
"You still don't fucking get it, do you?!" She stands, resisting the urge to throw something, as she would most likely damage their new equipment. "You aren't going to get rewarded for being good! You're going to get punished for fucking up! That's life, asshole. Deal with it. I'm not some goddamn prize you can win for doing the right thing!"
And yet, he still wasn't yielding. Standing up to face her, his muscles tense just as hers had. "All I've ever done since we got here is work, for you. What's the bloody point if it doesn't change anything?!"
"Can you do anything right without thinking of yourself first?!"
"For everything I've done, I deserve something in return." Shaking his head, he looks away from her. "Or… I won't do this anymore."
She scoffs, scanning him up and down with disdain. "So what? You're quitting?!"
He shakes his head once more and sighs, "I don't know."
When he tries to push past her, she grabs him by the shirt and shoves him back in front of her. "That's not a fucking option!"
"I won't do this anymore…" He mutters again, beginning to brace himself for what would come next.
Maybe he thought she was going to hit him. She sure as fuck wanted to.
But a small part of his statement made sense. She knew that going into this with him. She had to keep him interested. Because while she threatened that if he didn't cooperate, she'd kill him, she knew she wouldn't. That's why they were here in the first place. He obviously had to be bluffing about 'quitting'. But his willingness to participate would drop, drastically, and she knew that. Therefore, she really had no choice but to compromise with him.
Growling slightly, she lets go of his shirt and steps back. Before she speaks, she takes a deep breath to try and center herself. "You can sleep in bed with me… four days a week. Just sleep."
His eyes light up as he looks back at her, understanding what was happening. She was giving in. Figuring he might as well take advantage of the moment, he adds somewhat timidly, "Sex, once a week…"
"This isn't a fucking negotiation!" She snaps at him. Seeing him tilt his head, she decides to breathe again and backtrack a little. "You can kiss me once a week."
"Once a day." He counters, realizing that this was a negotiation. "Sex once every other week."
Her annoyance shows as she rolls her eyes. "You can sleep in bed with me every day. You can kiss me once a week. And I'll have sex with you whenever I damn well please."
To this, he finally smiles. "Deal."
When he extends his hand for her to shake it, she scowls and turns away from him. Without another word, she goes off to the bedroom and he trots after her.
Inside, he closes the door behind them, watching her to do as she does. Having her back turned to him, she pulls her tank top off and pushes off her jeans, dropping them both to the floor. Kilgrave's heart rate increases as he watches her strip down to her underwear and get under the covers.
She doesn't bother to look at him as he follows her lead, removing his shirt and his jeans. Once he gets into bed after her, she lets out another breath and switches off the lights.
Uneasy as ever, she lays on her side with her back to him, clutching the pillow under her. It didn't take long for him to curl up against her backside, the shape of her body almost perfectly fitting in his.
"Kilgrave…" She starts, instantly tensing from his touch.
"Yes?" He has no problem answering, his arms wrapping around. His head rests on the pillow behind her and his breath on her skin makes the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.
Despite how badly she wanted to get him away from her, the human contact that she hadn't felt in too long makes her practically melt. She resists the urge to whine and press against him, her eyes already beginning to close.
Feeling the way her body relaxes in his arms, he smiles silently and whispers against her skin, "Goodnight, Jessica."
Author's note:
I know. I know. I'm a whole-ass week late!
Last time I missed a week was at the end of December/beginning of January and that was because I was on holiday break! I'm sorry guys, I've just been really busy and overwhelmed with a lot of crap and I didn't wanna give you a half-baked chapter!
Anyway...
Holy shit, HAPPY 50TH CHAPTER EVERYONE! Can you believe how long we've been on this journey together?! Jesus, fuck!
As a 50th chapter mini-celebration, I'm going to highlight my favorite moments of the story so far! If you don't care, well... you don't have to read this :'D
1) The entirety of Chapter 5: Playing Hero - This is probably the most emotionally raw chapter in all of PK.
2) Chapter 11: Let's Have Dinner - The first step Jessica made in "trying to make a shit situation tolerable". The banter was golden.
3) Chapter 18: The Adventures of the Devil and His Mistress - I know you all hated Ruby, but I loved the entire scene with Tony!
4) Chapter 22: Who Knew? - It was a general consensus that Jessica begging to keep her memories was truly heartbreaking (especially with what happened between 10 and Donna :/).
5) Chapter 34: The Clumsy, The Suspicious and The... Seductive? - Come on. That ending scene on the table was hilarious.
6) Chapter 38: Turning the Tables - Pivotal moment, when Jessica lost control and became everything that she hated!
7) Chapter 46: Sign on the Dotted Line - Because... Kilgrave went down on Jessica... obviously.
There are definitely more I wanted to include but I didn't want my list to be too long! Please review this chapter and in your review, I encourage you to tell me YOUR favorite moments of the story so far! I'd love to hear what you think!
Chapter 51 should be out on time! I love you, fam!
