Back to life! Nah.

So, finally, I managed to get the second part done. Thank God…………and all of the reviewers, you guys make me sit down in front of the computer even though I usually don't have even the slightest idea of what to write………..that's why the chapters always take me so long………….and work's tiring me, but that's not much of an excuse, I guess. Well, this is the second part of "Morning has broken" and I hope that you'll enjoy it because I really had to suck this out of my fingers.

Have fun reading it, kay?

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Morning Has Broken – Part 2

"Please, excuse this interruption, but, as you can see, I have to take care of my business",Carter Verone was sitting oppsite to Lilly at a table that was neatly set with fruit, juices, coffee and tea, croissants – pretty much everything one could want for breakfast. He had just ended a call and put his cell phone down onto the table, right next to his cup of coffee, while eying the 16-year-old nipping on her orange juice.

The girl had been quite content with Verone having gotten a call due to this giving her the time to reconsider on the talk they had had so far and to think of some kind of tactics for any upcoming conversation. How should she act and react? The girl had decided that she would certainly continue refusing him and any of his implied offers, but what could she tell him, if he came up with topics like family? How should Lilly present Brian to him? She would have to make Verone think that Brian wasn't much of a threat to him, that her brother would do the job as good and fast as possible without causing any trouble.

Sounds simple, Lilly had thought and watched the brunette opposite to her. So far, the man hadn't asked her any personal questions, yet, something that had really amazed her because she considered him to be that type of person who always wanted to know everything, so that he could place the people into certain categories, like a control freak. Enemy, impartial, ally, although Lilly could not quite imagine that Carter Verone accepted impartial. She guessed that he would somehow find a way to force the impartial ones to become his allies, maybe by threatening ot torturing them, and if they still wanted to remain neutral, he would just kill them.

Simple and cheap, yet, effective. I wonder what he thinks of me. Does he consider me dangerous? He obviously wants me to be his bed-toy, but that doesn't have to mean anything. Even if I was willing to have sex with him – what's never gonna happen – he might as well kill me afterwards, kinda like: a bullet into your head instead of breakfast. So, how to keep him off of me while making him believe that I won't escape, so that he would let me unguarded? Oh fuck, I can't think of anything when he's sitting right in front of me, that's………distracting. I'll just have to wait till I'm in that room again, after all, he said that I have to stay at this place until tomorrow evening, enough time left and I already got at least half of a plan to get outta here, but I know close to nothing about this house or this whole property, yet. Of course, I tried to notice as much as possible when the jerks brought me here, but at night, things soemtimes don't look the same as they do during daytime. Maybe I should just………

"So",Carter spoke up and made her look at him. He had his hands folded to support his chin on them, his elbows resting on the clean glassy surface of the table,"tell me a little about you, Miss O'Conner. What does a beautiful young lady like you do to entertain herself in Miami?"

"For once, I still go to school",Lilly hoped that, by saying this, he would be reminded of the fact that there was quite a difference in age between them,"therefore, my leisure time is kind of limited. On top of that, I also work after school and on Saturdays."She definitely wasn't into telling him about her going into clubs and dancing!

"You work? Doesn't your brother support you with enough money? An allowance, for example?"The fact that the girl worked really surprised Verone a little. He surely hadn't thought of the blonde as a spoiled little girl that got everything she wanted, but having to work?

"Yes, I work",she took another sip from the orange juice,"but not because my brother doesn't support me with enough money, but because I like to have a certain independence. It makes me feel better to know that I have money because I earned it for doing something. As for the allowance, well, my brother hasn't been giving me one since I was fifteen, but that is only because I don't want him to." It was true, Lilly really hadn't been getting an allowance since she had been around fifteen and a half, simply because she didn't consider it to be necessary. She paid for her stuff, she had always done that, even if Brian hadn't - and still didn't - liked it. If it came down to him, he would spoil her; clothes, generous allowance, books, furniture, anything she would need for her most favoured hobby – art – he would even go so far and buy her a $30.000 car – he had really offered one to her not even three months ago, telling her to look at it as a birthday present, but eventually, she had talked him out of it. The last car he had wanted to get for her had been a '92 Mazda. He would do that every two or three weeks, walking up to her and be like "you know, there's this car and it's quite good. Maybe you should have a look at it and, you know…….", but Lilly always turned his offers down, simply because she didn't want him to spend so much money for her or to risk losing his own car, if he decided to win the car by racing the owner. The blonde felt uncomfortable whenever a person, not only Brian, wanted to give something to her that was over $20. She had never had much as a kid, no expensive toys or clothing or anything, so it seemed wrong to her that people would give expensive stuff to her now, she didn't understand why people would want to give her expensive stuff. With Brian, okay, he wanted to spoil her and he would do it like mad, if she only let him, but Lilly thought that it was only because he felt guilty in some kind of way for her not having a normal life or that great a childhood. He had once said: "Baby, it's not like I don't have the money, you know. My average per night is like, lemme see, $30.000 or $40.000. You remember that one night, when I even made 80 G's? Okay, quarter of it is spent on the car, but as for the rest",he had shrugged and then almost whined,"lemme spoil you, just a little, please?" But Lilly wouldn't let that happen, after all, it wasn't the money or the gifts which made her love her brother, but the hugs, the, sometimes quite annoying, kisses on her cheeks or temples or forehead or the times when he cooked for her.

"Ah",again, one of these smiles which made Lilly feel anything but relaxed,"the knowledge not to depend on anybody. I appreciate that, especially in young people. What is your profession, then? A model?"

"Yeah, right",snorting, the blonde rolled her eyes heavenward,"I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I am definitely no model. I work at a garage."

"At a garage?"The brunette's eyes widened in disbelief, he looked kind of shocked."In the office of a garage?"

"No, well, actually",Lilly had a hard time fighting down the smile Verone's reaction had caused,"I was originally hired as a sprayer, so that every paint job is practically my job, but, of course, when I don't have any cars to paint, I work either as a mechanic or I take care of the card index or the stored parts. Adding new customers, recording what has been done on whose car, listing parts which need to be bought",she shrugged,"I have to admit, though, that I prefer working as a mechanic. The office may be easy, nonetheless, it kind of bores me."

"I am impressed",the dark-haired man shook his head slightly while smiling, the first at least half-honest smile the blonde had ever seen on him so far,"how come you have such an interest in cars, then? I don't know many woman who are even able to change tires or oil."

"I…..",Lilly paused. She couldn't remember anybody having ever asked her this question before, really. Most people just asked "are you into cars?" and when she said "yes" that was it, no more questioning, merely accepting. It was strange, but the girl had never really thought about this one question before."I've been growing up with cars due to my brother",although not being truly happy with her answer, she had the feeling that it had been necessary to say something before Verone was given the chance to pin her on that question. Lilly had always been into cars because Brian and Roman had been into them, but apart from that, why was she so interested in cars? Would she be interested in them as well, if her brothers hadn't been? Taking another sip from her orange juice, Lilly fought her mind down because she could feel how it started to race by thinking about Verone's question.

"It is a family affair, then?"

"Yes, one could indeed put it that way",the blonde felt slightly relieved that the man hadn't noticed her pausing and just continued with the conversation.

"I have a few cars in the garages and on the drive, you have possibly seen them when you have been brought here. May I hope that you are interested in a little tour?" He leant back against the backrest of his chair, now supporting his chin on the thumb of his left hand while his fingers covered his mouth…….something Lilly wasn't all too happy about due to her not being able to see his full face anymore what made it a little more difficult for her to guess whatever Verone was thinking or feeling. So far, she had already noticed several of his personal traits: first of all, she didn't consider him a man who would accept "no" as an answer, something that could get her into big trouble, secondly, he was, to bring it on a point, nothing but plain arrogant, an egoist for the Lord himself, this guy practically smelt of his self-confidence, not in a good way, though, because he, thirdly, seemed to be convinced by the fact that he was able to get every woman he wanted only by mentioning his name. Money was everything that mattered to him; the more he had, the more irresistible he felt. The blonde couldn't understand how a sane woman would actually want him, if he treated her like his personal whore!

So, if having sex with somebody was the only possibility for one to earn some money, to have something to eat, Lilly would always consider this to be prostitution, a way to get paid, a job, but if a woman that had other options left than having sex with other people only to get her life financed, Lilly would consider this to be whoring! The girl really distinguished between prostitutes and whores. If one had a job, then, fucking somebody else, whom one didn't love, for no other reason than to get a higher standard of living only because one was too lazy to work harder, Lilly would call these people whores. If one didn't have a job and really no other options left, then, the girl would say that having sex with other persons for money wouldn't make one a whore, but a prostitute. She had once tried to explain it to Crash, but he hadn't understood. Fortunately, her crazy little family had and they had discussed the topic when the DJ of that night had been shit.

"Well",a tour would certainly give her the chance to get to know this place a little better, especially this little house she had thought of as a garage when seeing it for the first time from the window,"it's not like I have got anything else to do, right?" Actually, by this time, the girl should be at school and write her final in Spanish, yet, the idea of getting a closer look on some nice cars appeared way more entertaining………….and Lilly was fluent in Spanish due to Cathy having been a Hispanic and therefore having taught the blonde everything, so missing this one final wasn't all that bad. Yesterday, she had already written her final in mathematics, something she had been quite grateful for, because it had distracted her from Brian's sudden disppearing over the weekend.

Carter Verone merely chuckled, rose from his chair and waited for the blonde to repeat his actions.

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"Look, if y'all really want to carry out this plan, this is the best place to do it. What do y'all think?"Tej stood with his front towards on of the glassy walls of the corridor high above the gate to the loading and unloading zone of a warehouse. To his left and right were Brian and Roman, both eying the space underneath them. At first, Tej had been confused when they had told him what had happened and he had been a little unsure about their "plan" but as soon as they had informed him in what kind of way Lilly was involved into all of this, the black man had immediately forgotten about his doubts. He knew that Brian was worried like shit, he could see a sad gleam in the blonde's eyes whenever his sister was mentioned, the usual "coolness" in his walk was missing and had changed into tension.

"I think it's perfect",Brian answered, his eyes wandering over the area lying in front of him. The plan Rome and he had worked out wasn't all that hard to carry out, nonetheless, the blonde man didn't want to leave this to pure chance, it was simply too dangerous not to worry about the consequences………..his baby being killed.

Lilly's certainly gonna be mad at me for letting her miss out on that, he thought and a sad smile crossed his lips.

"We could get Jimmy to install few cams to shoot the whole thing, man. That way, Chica would at least be able watch the hot shit her bro's bout to start",Tej looked at him, hands in the pockets of his pants.

The blonde man narrowed his eyebrows questioningly. Had he just spoken that last thought out loud? This whole situation was really getting through to him more than he had imagined it to do.

"As soon as she sees what we've planned and then done, she'll only be pissed even more",the man responded, already having the picture of a royally sulking Lilly in mind, telling him that he would have never allowed her to do anything likely and that he would be unfair and that she wouldn't be talking to him anymore because of this…………….no cameras, definitely no cameras for Brian's sake.

"Well, dawg, your sis is one with temper",Tej grinned. Ever since he had met the siblings a couple of months ago, he had seen Lilly only twice majorly furious and, fortunately, he had been wise enough not to be responsible for both times. The first time the man had seen the girl completely pissed off had been when one jerk hadn't stopped giving her shit about women not being able to handle cars properly. Oh, at first, she hadn't listened and tried to ignore it, but after an hour or so, she had been beyond boiling and she had walked up to that guy, who had been twice her weight and almost a whole feet taller than she, and yelled at him like mad until she had lowered her voice - and when Lilly was pissed off and lowered her voice, it would really frighten people, because, by then, her eyes would be burning with anger, all of her tensed muscles would vibrate, her breathing would get faster and way deeper than it usually was and her voice would be calm, totally calm – she had really scared the hell out of everybody back then, especially this guy. The second time she had gone like this, had been when Julius had started showing off his new gun. Tej knew why Lilly reacted quite sensitive on guns: she had lost her best friend, Cathy, and her first boyfriend, Jesse, to these things, therefore, she would go against every kind of being irresponsible when it came down to handling a gun. The girl was aware of the fact that most of her friends owned at least one, even Brian did, but she accepted that as long as the people would only use them to protect themselves and not to play with them like toys. So, at Tej's Garage, there was a complete ban on guns; people were either to leave them in their cars or not to bring them along at all………or not to spend their time somewhere else. Tej would always find himself quite impressed by the girl's strong will and that she was able to make people respect it, after all she had turned sixteen merely a few months ago.

"Yeah, enjoy yourself",Brian half-growled,"neither do you have to live with her nor will she be mad at you."

"Poor Brian",Roman failed badly in sounding as though he felt sorry for what he gained a glare out of blue eyes.

"Whatever",the blonde man sighed out, looking again over the space underneath them and tried to make the conversation turn into another direction by asking Tej what would be stored in there.

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I know, it's a bit short – sorry for that.