- Chapter Sixty-Seven -

It Only Ends At Death (Cycles)

Clock a sundial in the mint green grove, the shadows spun and slithered as time sped around the duo in the heart of it. Birds of common browns and frequent blacks and blues flew about and sang their jovial songs; bugs came, went, and died; toads and frogs and lizards and bees and centipedes were there too, rustling the bottom of the fertile floor. Rabbits and badgers abound, there was life everywhere you looked, however it was the hairless mammals that simultaneously took up the most room and made the smallest splash.

Obsessed with continuously touching her own face, it was like when you lost a tooth and couldn't keep your tongue from exploring the hole. No matter that you had never really paid much mind to your mouth before now, it was just... strange. Except instead of finding a gap that wasn't there before, it was the pain that kept you coming back for more. Half a distraction and half because something about it was just that alluring, the heiress brought her fingertips to her inflamed cheek once more.

Why does this feel so... Good? Unable to stop or maybe just super unwilling, the young woman lingered over the injured spot on her face before it became too much to bear. None of her other injuries had felt like this, but then again, she hadn't needed to find a way to kill the time.

Reprieve short-lived, it wasn't long before her eyes wandered again.

Created as carelessly as an old wine stain, the man-made mark hovering just above an uneven field of scruff was beginning to fade; at the same time, her own badge of honor was glowing new and bright. On the same side even, there was something poetic about their bruises. Not anything earth-shattering that would be remembered in five years, but there was something.

Lips parted enough to see the tiniest bit of tooth, the heiress could feel her fingers twitch at the lowbrow idea that had crawled from the top of the gutter. Starting from one corner and caressing the slight curve of his lower lip, as the sapphires drank their fill, she wondered something she probably shouldn't have. Rather, two somethings, with the more innocent being the question of how many people had gotten to kiss those lips. More than capable, they were made for cracking jokes and passing along lost oral history; but most importantly, she thought that they were made for kissing.

I hate that I can barely even remember what they felt like. Recognizing that it was her own fault for displaying such poor judgement, the heiress wished that she could at least have one memory of what it was like. I could do it now, and no one would ever have to know... Although knowing her luck, that wouldn't be true at all.

Sam, why do I...?

Picturesque as the final frames of a barber and his wife, the thief and the heiress were breathing statues of painted marble, frozen in time. Worn topaz no less blue than the day it had been mined, the semi-precious gemstones were fixated upon the sleeper, his masculine form tossing every now and again to regain the consciousness that had been taken. Ludo... viko, was it? He was just as strong as he looked. Shuttering the winter storm, the young woman wished that she could be stronger.

Why do I...?

Embrace deeply personal, even though some of her fear had found a way out through the corners of her eyes, as she held him in her arms it was plain to see that the feminine figure was terrified to let go. More latch than lace, Dells had every reason to be scared; if terror were the sea, the past would be the conjured manacles keeping her from swimming ashore, Jian the shark that had caught the scent of blood in the water.

Doomed to replay the events over and over inside her mind while she waited, one thing was becoming inescapably clear to the heiress.

Petrified at the thought of what would happen if Angel and Ashley were to get their hands on her a second time, when the young woman saw Sam laying there, an even worse fear had come over her. It griped her heart like a vice, refusing to ever let go. Summed up best in one question, what if that had been the last time she ever saw him again? Events could play out however they might, but at least if they both came out of this thing alive there was the slim chance that they might somehow come back to one another. Death was kinda final.

Left to ponder such gems as how she could never want to look at him ever again and yet couldn't imagine a world without him in it, Dells was more than overwhelmed at the thought of somehow losing the one anchor she had left. Frankly, she was more concerned about when her thief might wake up more than if Jian came back with reinforcements. Hell, she was more than terrified that everything from before could come bubbling back up to the surface, making it impossible to keep holding him like this. If there was something to fear, odds were that it was nothing in relation to how scared she was when it came to Sam.

Yesterday, when two psychos with drills and knives were her biggest problem, she might have welcomed that. But in the present? Even though the heiress knew better, all she could think about was telling him that she was scared of never seeing him again.

Bold in the private space of her mind, she could kiss the thief a thousand times and do more for him than swat away curious insects. Brave enough to trace the shape of his mouth, Daniella could see herself bending over his forehead and planting a light peck over each line. She could follow every curve, from the hard set of his nose to the scratchy stubble on his chin, all the way around to the... the dying shiner she'd given him.

Pads gliding over the top of her skin to meet more texture than resistance, her fingertips knocked away yet another clump of dried mud. Brushing the fallen remains from where it scattered over Sam, the heiress lingered for only a moment before gingerly tending to a silver-capped auburn tuft that fallen into his face. At least, she pretended that it had, giving in to that smallest little part that was willing to do anything to be close to the man. To touch him tenderly and show that she cared too.

If she could, she would have fallen straight into his arms and just stayed there for the rest of forever.

What have you done to me, Sam? Echoing the same sentiment as when she had broken at the revelation of her father's final days, the heiress would have traded anything in that moment to... to... have some other life? Feel even half of what she felt now? Gods, she knew that things must have been bad if she were willing to face her mother right about now.

Thankfully for all involved, the historian woke up before he could be counted as another piece of history.

Squinting against the sun beating down on the baked soil, in the filtered light of the jade ceiling the first thing that greeted him were the sweater twins. Hovering right over the top of his head and confined to a baggy yellow thing perfect for yoga, it was not the worst way he'd ever woken up. Oh, right, the girl attached to them was there too, but the last thing the guy remembered was how upset she had been with him, so, yeah...

Attempting to sit up against the weight of at least four heiresses, it was Sam's turn to be the woozy one. Guided back into the covered comfort of her lap, as he eased himself into a more comfortable position, the man figured that the girl could survive another five-ten minutes stuck like this. Odds were she was responsible for this too.

Head throbbing like hell from the surprise wallop, the grizzled brunette wonder what had happened out loud. "What I miss?"

Biting her lip, Daniella hadn't really planned on what she would tell Sam about what had transpired. It wasn't as if Jian had done the classic villain thing and threaten that she not tell anyone about their conversation while twirling his mustache, but what good would it do? The triad leader was there on the island too, somewhere, but it seemed unlikely that they would see him again... At least, not until it was time to go...

"If not for me, then do yourself a favor and seriously think about who it is you leave this island with." Jian's words reverberated from both sides of her skull.

"Um..." Uncertainty all she had in that moment, Daniella flinched from the pain when Sam's thumb brushed along the side of her cheek.

Light as he was with her, there was no hiding the wince caught in his palm; tender as the skin was, it was the context that hurt worse. Touching the breakable young woman as if she were made of something more fragile than the finest china, he had it backwards - it was her insides that were the most screwed up.

Don't look at me like that, her lips were curved around the first letter and she could almost taste the reproach, and yet Dells couldn't bring herself to do more than think them. Don't let me believe that you care, she was so close to going back to that place where she had to second-guess his motives, so dangerously close.

Fear and anger and that damn pink emotion so often associated with hearts and dirty sheets, there was so much swirling through her head that it was impossible to concentrate on any one feeling. Logic and sense would have been screaming at her to back away then, but neither of the two were there to tell her better. Even grief was overshadowed by these recent occurrences.

Finding the irony without any assistance, just as the thief was getting cozy on his burrowed headrest, for whatever reason he spared a quick glance at young woman. Promising himself that it was merely to weigh where they currently stood, the last thing Sam had expected to see was the bright pink mark glowing like a beacon. Drawn straight to it, he had to feel it for himself, rubbing off more of the mud from her pretty little mug.

Questioning where precisely all that dirt had come from, the bigger issue at hand was the angry sigil burning up beneath. While others might have thought to approach the subject with more tact, Sam cut to the chase, exclaiming, "Jesus, Dells, your face!"

So much for pretty, Sarcastic Sally snorted, finding it rich that he would go there of all places. Brushing that aside to the trash icon in her mind, the heiress grinned as if getting pistol whipped were no big deal. "Oh, this? Just something else that we have in common."

Not overly amused by her act of nonchalance - okay, maybe a little, as it was something he would have said in the same position - Sam knew that the mark would heal, but in the meantime he was going to get a lot of funny looks. More than he usually did. "I think we have enough in common."

Had anything about this situation been remotely near the proximity of normal, the young lady would have made some scathing retort about her parents not counting. Too busy dying inside, there were bigger fish to fry. Like trying to explain the origin of this bold new look. "Do we? I guess."

If that had had been his little brother attempting to hedge away from the truth like that, that would have earned a charlie horse. Thankfully, the heiress was in no way related, so in celebration of that fact the veteran explorer simply rolled his eyes instead. Had things been on less shaky ground between them, he might have contemplated a more severe punishment. A pinch of the uninjured cheek, a flick to the side of the head, something along those lines. As it stood, probably a bad idea to prod a magnet for bandages...

Dells was a soft thing, and he had to treat her as such.

Boston accent still a strange and alluring thing to the young woman, he had to go and make it worse by cupping the source of so much of the hurt. Holding his position, Sam didn't so much as skip a beat when she tore her eyes away. "Hey, it's me you're talkin' to, remember?"

Cue that cheeky grin of his.

"So you gonna tell me what happened, or am I gonna have to get Chloe to come in and spank you? Scratch that, Chloe would enjoy it too much..." Tip-toeing a line so thin it might as well be invisible, the man thought up a better proxy to teach the girl a lesson. "Elena. You do not want to get on her bad side, believe me."

Tempting as all of that talk about spanking sounded, the problem was that Daniella did believe Sam, even after everything that he had come clean about. "Something tells me that my fiancé might be worse."

Oops.

Never one to remember names when it didn't benefit him, it was less apathy and more blinding rage that condensed the sleazy bastard's name, "Ryan did that to ya?" Not normally one to throw stones at glass houses, it had been bad enough that the triad prick had wanted to marry the girl; armed with this new information, Sam was ready to end the pimple on the warthog's ass. "I'm gonna kill him-!"

Consumed once more by the thought of losing Sam before it was time, Dells whimpered and held him as if he were her long-lost security blanket. As a woman grown, she was obviously too old to believe that a little strip of fabric could keep the boogeyman at bay, but as a kid dancing through a minefield, it was perfectly acceptable to cower.

Unlikely to complain about a perfectly good pair of breasts getting all up in his business, the historian allowed the hug to go for a number of minutes, possibly a number of minutes too long. But hey, if the girl was gonna just grab him out of nowhere like that, who was he to gripe? Although, something nagged at the back of the man's head, whispering incessantly that something wasn't right. For one thing, this wasn't just your run-of-the-mill 'glad to see you' kind of hugs (but getting one of those might have been nice). For another, for how bent out of shape Dells had gotten the last time they spoke, she must have had a good reason to just abandon her grieving process so quickly.

More pieces falling into place as Sam thought about it, if that triad prick was the one that had laid hands on her, then it stood to reason that it was either the man himself or one of his goons that had gotten the drop on him. Which meant that there was an Orange Tiger there on the island. Which meant that there was danger-

As if reading his mind, the heiress shook her head, causing a rain of dirt to cascade from the silver sun. "Not Ryan, Ruan Jian. And it's fine, I don't think he's going to hurt anyone." If he had wanted to, Jian could have harmed them both before he left, but he didn't. It would appear that he really did only wish to discuss the matter of their prospective marriage. "He only had you knocked out so we could talk. If he truly had wanted it, he could have..."

Throat constricting at the unthinkable, she had been trying to say that he could have gone after Sam (or had his man Ludo do it), but that was beyond her. All of this was over her head, and she was about ready to burst open at the seams.

Pupils contracting from an abundance of anxiety, anyone could tell that the girl was deep fried. Battle one as old as time itself, the old man ignored the pounding drum that was his own head in favor of another's pain, forcing himself into a slightly slouched sitting position. Her panic attacks could start any minute now - honestly it was a small miracle that she had held together this long - however he had found one way to help.

Bringing the young woman into his arms, her trembling frame fell into his chest so they were two separate halves of a whole. Fingers clasping across her back to reduce the trembling fits, Sam knew that she needed this. He needed this.

Clinging to all that was wrong with her world while the rest of her head tried to sort out everything else was rather taxing. Woods spinning from more than surpassing her known limit, the heiress couldn't trust herself to just keep sitting there without giving out completely. Without falling right back into his arms.

Oh wait...

[Back In The Semi-Real World]

Hotel looming over the horizon like a sinner outside church the day before the Rapture, it was a welcome sight after row upon row of buildings that looked to be made of either sand or metal. The coffee shop was also great to see, up until pale eyes had spotted the closed sign denying all costumers a steaming caffeinated beverage. Legitimately crushed, the heiress had really been looking forward to soothing some of her problems in a tall caramel...

Maybe next time, she lamented with a cross look at her water bottle, as if it were somehow to blame.

Better than blame me for that too, he thought to himself, pausing behind the woman long enough to agree that some kind of desert would be the perfect distraction.

Too close, he caught a full whiff of the hotel's shampoo; bombarded by generic lavender, they might have been back in the shower. Hair coiled up in a floral wreath at the top of her head, the sudsy lather trailed down the back of her neck before dividing off, his eyes predominately glued to the path between her shoulders. Hand around her waist, Sam remembered just holding the young woman close as the water washed over them.

"You know, a shower could be nice." Rolling his shoulder to give the impression that his joints were the only thing that had gotten stiff, the adventurer saw no problem in making the suggestion.

Daniella merely nodded, throwing one final looking of longing over her shoulder at what she couldn't have.

It was early enough in the morning that they could both squeeze in a quick shower, however it was debatable who could use the hot water more. For all the moves he made in his head, Sam's neck and back really were sore after spending all that time on the ground, and Dells had gone through hell and hand-basket case. Temptation on a Monday, taking a shower together was a vividly-imagined possibility that had crossed both of their minds yet had gone unspoken.

Truth be, there was a metric ton of things that had gone unsaid by the pair. Ask either one why that might have been, and they would both probably say that after departing from the murder-park, there hadn't really been all that much to say.

Outside of the obvious. Apology maybe not the exact word he would use per say, Sam figured that he should probably try to say something to the young woman about what had happened. And Dells... now that she had cried so much of her frustration out and things were back to a more familiar place, it was simpler to just shove it under the rug. Eye contact was overrated anyways, and now that she wasn't speaking to her companion, there was more opportunity for her to engage with the others. Or just shy away behind either Chloe or Elena. Whomever she happened upon first.

Yep, things were definitely getting back the kind of healthy that worked.

Then they got up to their room, where the very first object to greet them was their wreck of a bed. And the minibar. Dells had reached that point where she had sworn off drinking again (until she didn't), and Sam figured that all the good stuff was already gone. Too late for the late-shift when they had left, the empty plate and glass of ginger ale were still on the nightstand; as if they weren't enough of a reminder, her towel was still drying in a ball on the mattress, the sheets kicked all over.

Pretending like he hadn't just been watching her reaction to being back, Sam's first impulse was to throw himself on the bed. Even when it wasn't entirely her fault, the girl was just too much for his poor body. Realizing how close that sounded to defeatist talk, the grizzled brunette scratched at the stubble on his chin. "What are the odds of you giving me a massage?"

"Not good." More caught off guard by the randomness of the request than flat-out refusing it, the heiress arched her brow in his general direction. Of course he was already on the bed. "What about the shower?"

Jokingly feigning as if he'd forgotten, the thief started his process with his boots, watching from the corner of his eye as she shrugged out of her coat. When he moved on to remove his own jacket, Sam noted that she was fiddling with her bra straps, going back and forth over if she should take off the tank top first or not.

"That an offer?" Hopeful that it was, he perked up enough to wear that coy smirk that had won over many a partner.

Scandalized like a good girl should be, it was clear that she definitely was not amused that he would joke like that when things were so twisted between them. "No!"

"Spoilsport." Basically an absolute no-go that she wouldn't budge on, he ripped off his shirt and threw it at her feet. Pouting, the petulant thief would have tugged at any available part of the young woman that he could reach until she relented to at least one of his soft demands. But no, Dells had to be standing just inside the door, her hand mere inches from the knob as if she meant to steal away when he wasn't looking. "Come on, I do you favors all the time!"

While that may have been true - technically speaking - the heiress pointed at the bathroom with its open door. "Well, if you take the first shower, the hot water should do the trick."

"I'm too sore to get off the bed." Not entirely bullshit, the springs, coils, and synthetic feathers were a hefty improvement over the fresh mud. Jury was still out on whether or not he preferred a regular pillow or curling up on her cotton candy thighs.

Sighing because his charm was getting the better of her all over again, the young woman stopped snapping herself long enough to roll her eyes at his dramatics. Shirt coming off awfully quick for someone that could barely move, if it weren't for how long they had been stargazing, the heiress would have had a hard time swallowing any of his claims. Slipping out of her own shoes before treading over the relatively clean top and deeper into the room, the faux blonde hesitated between the heart and the head... er, bed and shower.

Doubtful that anyone would win the war, the heiress knew that if there was one thing that could beat pure charisma, it was logic. "If I give you a massage, that cuts into both our showers."

"Well, we could always-"

"No." That was too dangerous, and the ice was thin enough where they were standing. Hell, the water was up to her ankles already, who was she trying to kid?

"Hey!" Indignation a skill as well as a second language, the man scoffed at her rude assumption. "I was just gonna say be late." He wasn't, but she didn't have to go and actively cut him off like that. What was she, raised in a barn by a pack of wild wolves? Right, worse.

Closer to the bed now but still too far to touch, the heiress snorted, "Yeah, let's pretend I buy that for a single minute. Please." Shaking her head so that there was more work for the poor maid, the girl glanced over her shoulder at the shower that was slipping further and further away. Honestly she didn't even care who had the first one, she just wanted to get clean. "You don't even know if I'm any good with my hands."

Maybe not, but he knew she was better than decent with her mouth.

Brought up by an ill-tempered great white mounted with a laser, due to that fact that Bai worked too hard to be pampered, there was a slim chance that the daughter might not have lived such a glamorous life that there was an on-staff massage therapist. Sure, he ceded that it was possible, but he refused to believe that the heiress had never gotten a professional massage in her luxurious life on the outside. Daniella could figure it out.

Picking up that the young woman was on the verge of relenting to that much, if she was so skeptical, he offered a fair form of reimbursement. "Then you can give me first crack at the hot water."

"You're impossible." Dells said that, but he could see the smile peeking through the obscene layer of dirt that was still falling off her.

"You love it." Doing more than leaving it at a mischievous wink, the one-time magician's assistant figured screw it, the heiress was too fun to mess with.

Blushing what looked to be a healthy shade of rosemary beneath the earthy tacking, Dells grumbled something at him under her breath. Pretty sure he had a good idea what it was, he let the matter drop when she agreed to his deal. "Shows what you know... Fine, I'll do it. But only because you do so many little things for me!"

Grinning ear-to-ear like an infamously green-haired clown prince, this was a victory. Would have been an even bigger victory if he had been able to talk her into taking that shower together, but he knew better than to press his luck. All things considered, he was just fortunate that she hadn't taken things the wrong way and thrown the rest of the room at his head when he first opened his mouth.

Ushered into position on his stomach with his head resting on his arms for support, Sam was pleasantly surprised when he felt a familiar weight pinning him down to the bed.

About to open his mouth on the matter, the thief felt hot breath tickling the shell of his ear when she leaned over, a hand falling inches in front of his face in a way that was meant to be menacing. "Don't misunderstand. It's just easier to do things this way than have to run round both sides of the bed."

Pretty sure that the professionals did that anyways, he smirked up at the young woman, "If you wanted to climb on top of me, you could have just asked."

Lips pursing, the heiress was going to retort that real massage therapists had special beds that they used (and certificates, usually), him saying it like that stole the argument away. Replacing cold, hard fact with mental images of how many ways this could go wrong, Dells squeezed her thighs into his sides to express her opinion on the subject. "It's not too late for me to call this whole thing off, you know."

"I'll behave," making a promise that he clearly had little intention of keeping, that smirk only grew wickeder, "if you do."

Contemplating being cruel and leaving him in a compromising position while she skipped off into the happy land of steamy showers, the heiress refrained. Far from altruistic, she didn't trust herself to start down that path and not finish it... That missing tooth all over again, the pangs of an addict crept along her veins, willing her to remember just how good it would feel to submit. Submit to baser instincts, submit to that warmth in her core just waiting to be sparked to life... So she began the massage instead, focusing her efforts on the man's neck and shoulders.

Kneading the muscle down to the tissue, Sam had been carrying more tension than she had realized, although that made sense. Regardless of whatever had been between them these past couple of weeks, he was technically on the job, and with that had come an insurmountable amount of stress she could imagine. Plus with everything that Logan had brought forward... She admired Sam's strength, that he was moving forward every day and not collapsing into a puddle.

You really are incredible, Sam Drake.

Drinking in the intoxicating drug that was hero worship, as her hands continued to ease away the little kinks that had been building up inside, the heiress got a little... distracted... by one of his tattoos. Longing to trace the rough line work with her tongue, Dells accidentally - "accidentally" - dug her nail into his back as she raked her fingers across the expanse.

"Whadda think you're doing back there?" Hurt the last word to come to mind, Sam knew exactly what he wanted her answer to be. Dreaming of reliving the magic that had happened in the confines of a tiled box (without the puke would be nice), the man was relieved that he was the one face-down on the bottom for a change. You know, unless she changed her mind. In which case he was so ready it was starting to hurt.

"Sorry..." Words softly spoken as if she didn't even trust her own voice, Daniella couldn't get it out of her head that they were so close. Without thinking, she pressed her lips down into the skin to kiss the scratch better.

Okay, so that was better than what he had been hoping for. Not entirely thrilled about the prospect of how long it was going to take to come back around to this place - if indeed they ever could find their way back - the ex-con was more than happy to oblige the princess. Snatching up the offending extremity, he brought each digit to his lips, slowly to let her drown in the shock waves.

Closing her eyes to savor the ten sparks that had lit her blood on fire, when Dells opened them again it was to find Sam facing her. Curious to know how he had pulled that one off, the girl melted a little more when he ran his own hand up the length of her arm.

Taking it slow, he gradually brought his hands up her sides, lips and tongue distracting her from realizing that he had been taking off her shirt as they went. Silvia the only thing connecting them when they pulled apart for oxygen, Sam ripped it over her head and tossed the dirty thing on the floor. Over the ink and around his side, her own paws had been roaming, discovering the boundary at his waist. Catching her hand and bring it up over her head, he continued working his magic and rolled the pair over so that she was on the bottom.

Virtually at his mercy, the young woman arched her back until their bodies melded into one single entity, divided only by what remained of their clothes. Sweet torture as the frantic swaying of her pelvis teased the bound length, it was painfully evident how badly he wanted her when their hips began grinding together in delicious friction. Ravenous to taste more of the man, the further they went the more she thought about the grove, and all of the questions that had popped into her head.

What if this was the last time they ever saw each other? Even if nothing else came off, just so long as they kept going the way that they were, she could die a happy woman.

How many other people had gotten to kiss those lips? Driven by the wild throes of jealousy, the heiress wanted to be better than all of them and show Sam something he had never seen before. But how can I do that when I am everything he's seen and done before?

Insecurity the least of it, the further he pushed her along to the peaks of bliss, the more that her mind wandered back around to her parents. Tongue twisting intricate circles around his own in a desperate bid to purge the interlopers from her mind, she realized with dismay that it only made them cling on that much harder.

Looking down at the pretty little flower wilting away before his eyes, Sam saw a woman beneath the dirt, a woman that might have resembled someone he had once known but had long ago forgotten. Battered and bruised, he couldn't get enough of her; call it what you would, but he wanted to discover every face she could make, every sound he could coax out and experience every shape she could contort herself into. He wanted her, and once wasn't enough.

Returning the embrace without really appreciating what it meant to her, the thief kept her fist balled up over her head as he moved away from her lips to explore every other inch that had so far gone neglected. It wouldn't happen today, but he knew that he he would taste every last part of her.

Getting so low as her jaw, he paused when he felt her pull her neck the other way. Obviously trying to get away from the heat that was simmering in both of their bodies, Dells could barely get the words out, "No, Sam."

Breaking her heart (as well as other parts) to do it, the heiress had to get him to stop, because she couldn't stop thinking about her parents. Normally it might have just been disapproval from her father's shade and spite for her mother, but this wasn't a normal situation. Granted, with her level of experience there literally was no bar for what was considered 'normal', but she doubted that it was right to picture your partner tangled up with your parents.

"You can have that shower. I..." Still seeing some phantom picture show of the man wrapped around her father while her mother hovered just within the limits of the frame, the young woman shook her head, trying to rid herself of the ghosts. Was it odd that she could so vividly see something that she had no idea if it had happened or not? Betting that it was, her body wanted nothing more than to stay in that bed, but her mind was kind enough to remind her that more had come out of her father's relationship with the thief than just rumpled bedding. "I gotta get out of here."

Pushed away quite literally, by the time his brain could process that she had gone away, the heiress had scrambled out of the bed, darting from the room before he could even begin to comprehend what had transpired. Holding the empty air where she had been, his lips were still puckered. "What just happened?"

Acutely aware of what she was doing, Daniella slowed down long enough to grab her shirt off the floor. It was just as dirty as she was, but it was still better than walking around in her bra.

Replaying the scene back in her mind as she sought out any room other than her mother's, the heiress wondered if he realized that she had hesitated to leave. Pausing once to give him the chance to say or do anything that might change her mind and make her stay, more than anything else she wished that he had stopped her. She needed to feel him inside of her, to hold her so that the demons couldn't win. No, a different voice chimed in, you did the right thing.

Did I? Doubtful beginning to feel like her other default setting these days, as the heiress hurried out of the room and pulled on her top, she set out to find the one other person in the building she felt comfortable with. Vaguely recalling where the woman's room was, the girl started knocking on doors. Right off the bat she got some random stranger that she didn't know, so she apologized and scuttled on to the next one.

Hardly holding her breath that the outcome would be any better this time around, at least the person to answer the door was someone that she had actually met before. "Rafael? Hey-"

Cutting the girl off before she could come begging him to rescue her from her relic, the group medic kept his door shut so you couldn't even see all of his face. "Nope. Sorry Princessa, today's no good for me. If you wanna play hide and seek, go try someone else's room."

Holding her hand out so that he couldn't slam the door in her face, Daniella vigorously shook out her head in a cloud of dust. "Wait, do you know which room is Chloe's? I was actually looking for her."

Charmed to hear that this visit was the bastard product of a mistake, the man peered over his shoulder before answering in his usually snarky way. More distant than he regularly was, the girl might have thought more of it if she weren't on the lam. Thanking him for the help, he had closed the door before she could finish expressing her gratitude. Shrugging it off, the heiress headed in the right direction.

Outside the allegedly correct room, Dells glanced around before knocking on the wooden portal, hoping that just maybe Sam would chase after her this time. But there was no sign of him anywhere to be found, so it was with a heavy sigh she knocked on the door. When the door opened to reveal the dark haired beauty, the heiress yielded to impulse once more, hugging the pickpocket the instant she verified that it was indeed her.

"Hello to you too." Mildly surprised to be greeted in such a fashion, Chloe was still in a silky negligee of deep plum. Shower running in the background, Nadine was just finishing up her morning routine. Onyx eyes taking in the backwards yoga top and the grubby little paycheck beneath the mountain of dirt as she returned the clingy need for solace, the woman cocked her head at the heiress, "Bit early to be burying anyone, isn't it?" Smile kind, she welcomed the younger female into the room, "Not that I can blame you. Between us, I can't even begin to count the number of times I thought about killing his brother when we were together."

"No, I..." Was just threatened by my enemy, given an ultimatum, and then tried to fuck the brains out of the guy that killed my father. That sounded about right, but it would have been simpler to just agree that she had been burying a body in an unmarked grave. Searching for a less shady explanation, or even a way to deny that she had been caught in any illegal activity, the heiress could have smashed her face into her palm. Of course it was just a joke. Chloe tended to do that. "Right. No, I just fell into a hole."

"This hole have a name?" Chloe's smirk was so cat-like, sometimes the heiress expected to see ears and a tail. "Because somehow I don't see Sam taking you anywhere you might might get hurt."

Dells snorted, "Well that rules out just about everywhere then."

Serious for once, the older woman shook out her head, the silver streak in her hair catching like starlight. "I mean it." Observant, the woman had been a round the block before, and in all the years she had known them, the Drake brothers both had a certain way they dealt with the quote unquote 'fairer sex', "Sam's different with you. Extra careful-"

"Like I'm made out of glass." Daniella finished the locksmith's sentence for her, "Maybe someday I should apologize to him for making the job so difficult."

Deceptively quiet on her feet, Nadine had exited the shower and was standing there in nothing but a towel with a scowl on her face. Glaring at Frazer as if she had invited the girl, the former mercenary wasn't about to put on the kid gloves before she put on pants. "Ugh, you're thicker than Rafe! She's not talking about the job, she's saying that Drake cares about you."

Following events happening concurrently, Chloe's words fell on deaf ears, "She's right. If he didn't..." It was at that point that she realized that the youngest was too busy collecting herself to hear, so as the wisest and most lovely, Frazer tucked her advice away for later. Honestly though, she found it rather perplexing that the heiress would doubt how invested Sam was - if the girl was indeed just a job, he wouldn't have stayed there by her side after the whole pool thing. Ah, well, sometimes you just need to see these things for yourself.

Startled by Nadine's sudden arrival, the heiress spun around to face the second woman, "Gah, warn a person! Jeez!" Clutching her chest to calm her heart, she took the time to really look at Nadine. Actually really pretty beneath all the muscle and various scars, it was the curly hair that rang a bell in the back of her head. Was this really that scary lady?

"Welcome to the club." Chloe had once offered to go halfsies on making coats, but like the urban legends, the mercenary-turned-explorer had appeared out of nowhere to give her a heart attack. "Survival is apparently good enough."

Golden almost for how light of a hazel they were, Nadine rolled her eyes at her partner, "Why would I pay to have a jacket made for something so stupid?"

Chloe shot back, "Says the woman that collects stuffed dolls."

Coming under heat more than once for her collection of Beanie Babies, the more fit of the two had made the argument that it was a legitimate pastime more times than she cared to count. It was a cutthroat hobby, and the adorable little animals lining her shelves were worth a pretty penny on the right market. Chloe just wasn't listening when she made her case, but that was her loss (and less competition for the really rare ones).

"Dolls, really?" If this was indeed the same friend of her father that had once been so prominent in the picture that she had seen the woman more than her own flesh and blood, the girl remembered a night when it was just the two of them. Everyone else was too busy for the little tyke, but the woman had made time to watch a movie and play dolls. "Any chance one of them was missing an arm?"

Make believing that the broken toy was the victim of a shark attack, the pair had stayed up until dinner watching 'The Little Mermaid' for like the fourth time and playing pirate princess. One of her dearest memories that had had nothing whatsoever to do with her father, the heiress was aghast that she had forgotten that night until this moment.

Annoyed at Knot at the time for being unable to watch the girl like was routine, in the end Nadine had ultimately been grateful to the child for the rare night of joy. "Ariel saved her at the last minute."

Genuinely smiling, it wasn't worth digging any deeper into the other pieces of that night, but her brain did it anyways. Her mother was out of the country and her father was hard at work for the night with his other work partner... Sam. It had to have been Sam, yet it felt surreal to think that he had ever been a part of her life before now.

"Looks like we found a way to come back to each other." Glassy almost, the invaluable vase from a lost dynasty looked at the dirt covering the cracked handle. "Like magnets."

"Or destiny?" Seeing where this was going, Chloe was kind enough to add her two cents.