A Family Affair
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters of Witchblade. Somebody else does. I mean no disrespect. I am just playing around. Enjoy! dragongrrl
Chapter 21.
Ian Nottingham had to struggle for a moment to gather his wits. It was dismaying how easily distracted he was by Sara Pezzini's proximity. He didn't think his fever was sufficiently high enough to account for the disturbing tendency he had of losing his train of thought whenever she was close to him. He was beginning to think sharing his vehicle with her tonight was not such a good idea. These lapses of concentration would surely be exacerbated by the enforced intimacy of the car ride. It was essential that he stay focused if he was to successfully execute the plan of action he had come up with.
Sara was staring at him expectantly, waiting to hear the details of said plan.
"Remember the miscreant whose arm I broke the other night?" he asked her.
She nodded. "How could I forget him? I thought you were gonna blow his head off with one of those cannons of yours."
"Well, it is a good thing I refrained from doing so, because I believe he is the key to finding Angel Medina."
Sara frowned as she put the thermometer back in her godparents' medicine cabinet. "How so?"
"Do you recall what he said to you after you insulted he and his friends?" Ian inquired.
She thought about it for a moment. "Uh, something about it not being right that I came into their hood, poked my nose where it didn't belong, and then had the nerve to insult them, I think."
"That second part is what leads me to believe that he might know where Angel Medina is. His words indicated that he was aware of just what the building you searched had been used for, so it follows that he knows the new location where Angel has set up shop. In all likelihood, Medina did not move his operation very far because of the territory that he supplies and collects for. His drug den is probably still in the same neighborhood."
"Are you saying Broken Arm was Angel's lookout?" Sara asked him. In the vision in which she'd seen events unfold from Paco Gutierrez's perspective, she remembered how someone had come right behind the doomed drug dealer and replaced the padlock on the door to the condemned building. Sara was fairly certain that person had been a lookout.
"Hopefully, he still is. If we can find him tonight, I am pretty sure I can persuade him to tell us where Angel is."
"Nottingham, by any chance, will your method of persuasion involve another 'extremely painful' anatomy lesson? Wait a sec, don't answer that! I don't wanna know!" Sara said quickly, shaking her head. "But you realize this means we now have to find two people: this guy and then Angel. I guess you're good at remembering faces, hunh?"
"I would recognize all six of your would-be assailants if I saw them again," he informed her. "But identifying this particular man will be very easy given that he will be sporting a brand-new cast on his right arm, courtesy of yours truly." Nottingham flashed her a wolfish smile.
Sara's heart skipped a beat at the way it transformed his usually somber features.
She suddenly became aware of how small the bathroom they were standing in was. The tall assassin stood so close to her, she could feel the feverish heat radiating off of his big body. Sara inhaled, and the black-clad man's scent -- a pleasing combination of sandalwood, vetiver, balsam, and something else she couldn't put a name to -- filled her nostrils.
"What is wrong, Sara?" Ian asked, instantly picking up on her sudden nervousness. A moment ago, he had noticed her pupils dilate and her nostrils flare.
"Uh, nothing. Nothing's wrong. We'd better say our goodbyes and then get this show on the road," she murmured, abruptly turning and leaving the bathroom. 'Get a grip, Pezzini. So what he has a gorgeous smile. He's still your psycho stalker!' she sternly reminded herself.
Sighing, Ian followed her. Wistfully, he wondered what he had done to unnerve her this time. He thought back over his words of the past few minutes, but couldn't recall any inappropriately sincere declarations of devotion. Perhaps his implied willingness to inflict more damage on the man they were about to go in search of in order to obtain the information they needed had put her off. After all, as an officer of the law, she really wasn't supposed to condone violent methods of coercion.
Downstairs, the Siri family had gathered in the living room once again. Sara's eyes immediately went to her nephew, and she could barely restrain herself from rushing over to him and hugging him tightly. Joey smiled at her when he noticed her looking at him, and she forced herself to smile back even though what she really wanted to do was burst into tears. As it was, she knew that it was obvious that she'd been crying. A glance in the mirror in her godparents' bathroom had confirmed that her eyes were red and puffy, and that her mascara had run.
"Marie, sorry to eat and run like this, but I'm beat and Nottingham's fever is on the rise," Sara said to her godmother, who rose from the sofa and accepted a hug from her goddaughter.
"Oh, that's quite all right, sweetie," she said, patting her on the back. "Ian, you must come back and visit us again when you're feeling better. Do you have any plans for Thanksgiving?" Marie Siri asked as she went to the closet to retrieve their coats.
Sara bit back a groan. 'Could you be any more obvious, Marie?' she thought, irritated.
"If my employer does not require my services that day, I would be delighted to join you and your family for Thanksgiving dinner," Ian told his hostess, taking his and Sara's coats from her. "Thank you for having me, Signora Siri." He performed one of his courtly bows and once again brushed her hand with his lips. "I feel obliged to once again offer my apologies for the fact that my ill health prevented me from doing justice to the magnificent meal you prepared this evening."
"Oh, you sweet boy! You are most welcome!" she gushed, beaming. "Sara, don't forget what I told you," her godmother said, winking at her.
Sara felt her face redden. "Yeah, yeah. Goodnight everybody!" She snatched her coat from Nottingham and bolted for the door, completely ignoring the fact that he had clearly been intending to help her into it.
"Goodnight, Sara!" the other members of her family called after her.
"It was a pleasure meeting all of you," Ian said to them, shrugging into his overcoat and pulling on his gloves. He leveled a stern look at Joseph Siri, Jr. "Be good, young Joseph."
"Later, Ian," the teen said, grinning.
"G'bye, Ian!" Gina Marie Siri chirped, waving. "See you at Thanksgiving!"
"It was nice meeting you, too, Ian," Robert and Paula Siri said, almost in unison.
"Feel better soon, son," Joseph Sr. said, walking Ian to the door and shaking his hand again.
"Thank you, sir. And thank you for having me. Goodnight." He turned and followed Sara out the front door.
The Wielder was standing on the sidewalk in front of the house, looking a bit sheepish.
"You didn't have to humor my godmother, you know, Nottingham," she told him, taking her knit hat from her coat pocket and pulling it over her gleaming hair.
"I was not humoring her, my Lady. I meant what I said. I would consider it an honor to join you and your family for the Thanksgiving meal," he said quietly, putting on his own hat. Automatically, his eyes scanned the dark street for any sign of danger.
"Even after the third degree she laid on you?"
"That was grueling," he admitted wryly. "But, yes, even in spite of that."
They began to walk in the direction of where he had parked his SUV.
"I'll bet she asked you if we were, ahem, more than friends."
"Yes, she did," he confirmed, eyes on the ground directly in front of him.
"What did you tell her?" she asked curiously, watching his face.
"The truth." Ian shot her a quick sideways glance. "That we are simply business associates," he said, leaving out the part about calling Sara his friend, as well as the bit about the fact that she did not think of him in a romantic way.
"That's what I told her, but I don't think she believed me."
"She only wants you to be happy in life and love, Sara," he told her. "Is that not what all mothers want for their daughters?"
"Yeah, I guess so, but what bothers me is Marie practically has us married off already. God forbid she should get it into her head that I have feelings for you," Sara said. "Luckily, there's no chance of that happening. Otherwise, I'd never hear the end of it."
Ian closed his eyes for a moment, his heart constricting with pain in his chest at her careless words. "Yes," he said flatly, "luckily there is absolutely no chance of that."
Sara frowned at him. "Gee, Nottingham, you didn't have to be so quick to agree."
Ian glanced at her in confusion. "But you just said --"
"I know what I said," Sara cut him off, "but you make it sound so, so," she waved her hands around vaguely as she searched for a word, "so damn cold."
"I am sorry if my response came across as callous. I was merely agreeing with you that I am not someone you could ever learn to care for, that is all," he said quietly, eyes on the ground.
"Now you make me sound heartless. How soon you forget who arranged for you to have someplace warm to stay this morning!" she snapped at him. 'What are you getting so upset about, Pezzini?' she asked herself. 'It's not like you care what he thinks about you.'
"On the contrary, until the day I die, I will remember your kindness toward me this day. Your compassion was and is undeniable, my Lady, and it is just one of the reasons I would willingly give my life for you."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on there, cowboy! Nobody's gonna die tonight or tomorrow, if I can help it!" Sara said quickly. "We're catching Angel, saving Joey, and getting you that antidote. End of story." There was an air of resignation about the black-clad assassin that disturbed her. She got the distinct impression that the prospect of his own death held absolutely no fear for him, and this bothered her more than she cared to admit.
"Besides," she added before she could think better of it, "I never said I didn't have feelings for you. I just said I'd never hear the end of it if my godmother ever found out that I did."
Ian's eyes met hers, astonishment plainly visible in their fever- bright, hazel depths. "You have feelings for me, Sara?"
She shrugged self-consciously. "Well, they're not warm and fuzzy or anything, but, yeah."
"'The miserable have no other medicine, but only hope: I have hope to live, and am prepared to die,'" Ian murmured, his spirits soaring at her gruff words.
"This death wish of yours bothers me, Nottingham," Sara blurted out. "You can't protect me if you're dead."
"No matter how much I wish I could spare you from life's cold, harsh realities, my Lady, I cannot lie to you: Death is, and probably always will be, my constant companion. Usually, I am the one who metes it out, but, lately, I have felt its shadow growing longer, dimming my own light." He shrugged. "Maybe this is a function of the poison that is slowly but surely killing me. Or maybe it is a function of who and what I am. You are a good, kind, and honorable person, Sara, who was raised to revere and uphold the law. I, on the other hand, am a highly trained assassin. I know a hundred different ways of taking a life in less time than it takes to draw a breath. My very existence is an insult to the law. I am, and always will be, unworthy of your admiration. That is fact. There is absolutely no shame in admitting that you could never learn to care for a creature such as me, Sara. I am under no illusion that it could ever be otherwise."
Sara stared at him in silence for several moments after this speech, the longest she had ever heard from him. "Geez, Nottingham, lighten up!" she finally said. "You can be such a downer sometimes, what with the gloomy Shakespearean quotes and whatnot, you know that?"
"I am just calling it as I see it, my Lady," he said softly, quoting Gabriel Bowman.
"Uh, yeah. Right. Whatever. Open up the freakin' car already. It's freezing out here!" she said, shivering, but not just from the cold. Her dark knight, indeed!
More to come! Feedback, as always, is greatly appreciated.
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters of Witchblade. Somebody else does. I mean no disrespect. I am just playing around. Enjoy! dragongrrl
Chapter 21.
Ian Nottingham had to struggle for a moment to gather his wits. It was dismaying how easily distracted he was by Sara Pezzini's proximity. He didn't think his fever was sufficiently high enough to account for the disturbing tendency he had of losing his train of thought whenever she was close to him. He was beginning to think sharing his vehicle with her tonight was not such a good idea. These lapses of concentration would surely be exacerbated by the enforced intimacy of the car ride. It was essential that he stay focused if he was to successfully execute the plan of action he had come up with.
Sara was staring at him expectantly, waiting to hear the details of said plan.
"Remember the miscreant whose arm I broke the other night?" he asked her.
She nodded. "How could I forget him? I thought you were gonna blow his head off with one of those cannons of yours."
"Well, it is a good thing I refrained from doing so, because I believe he is the key to finding Angel Medina."
Sara frowned as she put the thermometer back in her godparents' medicine cabinet. "How so?"
"Do you recall what he said to you after you insulted he and his friends?" Ian inquired.
She thought about it for a moment. "Uh, something about it not being right that I came into their hood, poked my nose where it didn't belong, and then had the nerve to insult them, I think."
"That second part is what leads me to believe that he might know where Angel Medina is. His words indicated that he was aware of just what the building you searched had been used for, so it follows that he knows the new location where Angel has set up shop. In all likelihood, Medina did not move his operation very far because of the territory that he supplies and collects for. His drug den is probably still in the same neighborhood."
"Are you saying Broken Arm was Angel's lookout?" Sara asked him. In the vision in which she'd seen events unfold from Paco Gutierrez's perspective, she remembered how someone had come right behind the doomed drug dealer and replaced the padlock on the door to the condemned building. Sara was fairly certain that person had been a lookout.
"Hopefully, he still is. If we can find him tonight, I am pretty sure I can persuade him to tell us where Angel is."
"Nottingham, by any chance, will your method of persuasion involve another 'extremely painful' anatomy lesson? Wait a sec, don't answer that! I don't wanna know!" Sara said quickly, shaking her head. "But you realize this means we now have to find two people: this guy and then Angel. I guess you're good at remembering faces, hunh?"
"I would recognize all six of your would-be assailants if I saw them again," he informed her. "But identifying this particular man will be very easy given that he will be sporting a brand-new cast on his right arm, courtesy of yours truly." Nottingham flashed her a wolfish smile.
Sara's heart skipped a beat at the way it transformed his usually somber features.
She suddenly became aware of how small the bathroom they were standing in was. The tall assassin stood so close to her, she could feel the feverish heat radiating off of his big body. Sara inhaled, and the black-clad man's scent -- a pleasing combination of sandalwood, vetiver, balsam, and something else she couldn't put a name to -- filled her nostrils.
"What is wrong, Sara?" Ian asked, instantly picking up on her sudden nervousness. A moment ago, he had noticed her pupils dilate and her nostrils flare.
"Uh, nothing. Nothing's wrong. We'd better say our goodbyes and then get this show on the road," she murmured, abruptly turning and leaving the bathroom. 'Get a grip, Pezzini. So what he has a gorgeous smile. He's still your psycho stalker!' she sternly reminded herself.
Sighing, Ian followed her. Wistfully, he wondered what he had done to unnerve her this time. He thought back over his words of the past few minutes, but couldn't recall any inappropriately sincere declarations of devotion. Perhaps his implied willingness to inflict more damage on the man they were about to go in search of in order to obtain the information they needed had put her off. After all, as an officer of the law, she really wasn't supposed to condone violent methods of coercion.
Downstairs, the Siri family had gathered in the living room once again. Sara's eyes immediately went to her nephew, and she could barely restrain herself from rushing over to him and hugging him tightly. Joey smiled at her when he noticed her looking at him, and she forced herself to smile back even though what she really wanted to do was burst into tears. As it was, she knew that it was obvious that she'd been crying. A glance in the mirror in her godparents' bathroom had confirmed that her eyes were red and puffy, and that her mascara had run.
"Marie, sorry to eat and run like this, but I'm beat and Nottingham's fever is on the rise," Sara said to her godmother, who rose from the sofa and accepted a hug from her goddaughter.
"Oh, that's quite all right, sweetie," she said, patting her on the back. "Ian, you must come back and visit us again when you're feeling better. Do you have any plans for Thanksgiving?" Marie Siri asked as she went to the closet to retrieve their coats.
Sara bit back a groan. 'Could you be any more obvious, Marie?' she thought, irritated.
"If my employer does not require my services that day, I would be delighted to join you and your family for Thanksgiving dinner," Ian told his hostess, taking his and Sara's coats from her. "Thank you for having me, Signora Siri." He performed one of his courtly bows and once again brushed her hand with his lips. "I feel obliged to once again offer my apologies for the fact that my ill health prevented me from doing justice to the magnificent meal you prepared this evening."
"Oh, you sweet boy! You are most welcome!" she gushed, beaming. "Sara, don't forget what I told you," her godmother said, winking at her.
Sara felt her face redden. "Yeah, yeah. Goodnight everybody!" She snatched her coat from Nottingham and bolted for the door, completely ignoring the fact that he had clearly been intending to help her into it.
"Goodnight, Sara!" the other members of her family called after her.
"It was a pleasure meeting all of you," Ian said to them, shrugging into his overcoat and pulling on his gloves. He leveled a stern look at Joseph Siri, Jr. "Be good, young Joseph."
"Later, Ian," the teen said, grinning.
"G'bye, Ian!" Gina Marie Siri chirped, waving. "See you at Thanksgiving!"
"It was nice meeting you, too, Ian," Robert and Paula Siri said, almost in unison.
"Feel better soon, son," Joseph Sr. said, walking Ian to the door and shaking his hand again.
"Thank you, sir. And thank you for having me. Goodnight." He turned and followed Sara out the front door.
The Wielder was standing on the sidewalk in front of the house, looking a bit sheepish.
"You didn't have to humor my godmother, you know, Nottingham," she told him, taking her knit hat from her coat pocket and pulling it over her gleaming hair.
"I was not humoring her, my Lady. I meant what I said. I would consider it an honor to join you and your family for the Thanksgiving meal," he said quietly, putting on his own hat. Automatically, his eyes scanned the dark street for any sign of danger.
"Even after the third degree she laid on you?"
"That was grueling," he admitted wryly. "But, yes, even in spite of that."
They began to walk in the direction of where he had parked his SUV.
"I'll bet she asked you if we were, ahem, more than friends."
"Yes, she did," he confirmed, eyes on the ground directly in front of him.
"What did you tell her?" she asked curiously, watching his face.
"The truth." Ian shot her a quick sideways glance. "That we are simply business associates," he said, leaving out the part about calling Sara his friend, as well as the bit about the fact that she did not think of him in a romantic way.
"That's what I told her, but I don't think she believed me."
"She only wants you to be happy in life and love, Sara," he told her. "Is that not what all mothers want for their daughters?"
"Yeah, I guess so, but what bothers me is Marie practically has us married off already. God forbid she should get it into her head that I have feelings for you," Sara said. "Luckily, there's no chance of that happening. Otherwise, I'd never hear the end of it."
Ian closed his eyes for a moment, his heart constricting with pain in his chest at her careless words. "Yes," he said flatly, "luckily there is absolutely no chance of that."
Sara frowned at him. "Gee, Nottingham, you didn't have to be so quick to agree."
Ian glanced at her in confusion. "But you just said --"
"I know what I said," Sara cut him off, "but you make it sound so, so," she waved her hands around vaguely as she searched for a word, "so damn cold."
"I am sorry if my response came across as callous. I was merely agreeing with you that I am not someone you could ever learn to care for, that is all," he said quietly, eyes on the ground.
"Now you make me sound heartless. How soon you forget who arranged for you to have someplace warm to stay this morning!" she snapped at him. 'What are you getting so upset about, Pezzini?' she asked herself. 'It's not like you care what he thinks about you.'
"On the contrary, until the day I die, I will remember your kindness toward me this day. Your compassion was and is undeniable, my Lady, and it is just one of the reasons I would willingly give my life for you."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold on there, cowboy! Nobody's gonna die tonight or tomorrow, if I can help it!" Sara said quickly. "We're catching Angel, saving Joey, and getting you that antidote. End of story." There was an air of resignation about the black-clad assassin that disturbed her. She got the distinct impression that the prospect of his own death held absolutely no fear for him, and this bothered her more than she cared to admit.
"Besides," she added before she could think better of it, "I never said I didn't have feelings for you. I just said I'd never hear the end of it if my godmother ever found out that I did."
Ian's eyes met hers, astonishment plainly visible in their fever- bright, hazel depths. "You have feelings for me, Sara?"
She shrugged self-consciously. "Well, they're not warm and fuzzy or anything, but, yeah."
"'The miserable have no other medicine, but only hope: I have hope to live, and am prepared to die,'" Ian murmured, his spirits soaring at her gruff words.
"This death wish of yours bothers me, Nottingham," Sara blurted out. "You can't protect me if you're dead."
"No matter how much I wish I could spare you from life's cold, harsh realities, my Lady, I cannot lie to you: Death is, and probably always will be, my constant companion. Usually, I am the one who metes it out, but, lately, I have felt its shadow growing longer, dimming my own light." He shrugged. "Maybe this is a function of the poison that is slowly but surely killing me. Or maybe it is a function of who and what I am. You are a good, kind, and honorable person, Sara, who was raised to revere and uphold the law. I, on the other hand, am a highly trained assassin. I know a hundred different ways of taking a life in less time than it takes to draw a breath. My very existence is an insult to the law. I am, and always will be, unworthy of your admiration. That is fact. There is absolutely no shame in admitting that you could never learn to care for a creature such as me, Sara. I am under no illusion that it could ever be otherwise."
Sara stared at him in silence for several moments after this speech, the longest she had ever heard from him. "Geez, Nottingham, lighten up!" she finally said. "You can be such a downer sometimes, what with the gloomy Shakespearean quotes and whatnot, you know that?"
"I am just calling it as I see it, my Lady," he said softly, quoting Gabriel Bowman.
"Uh, yeah. Right. Whatever. Open up the freakin' car already. It's freezing out here!" she said, shivering, but not just from the cold. Her dark knight, indeed!
More to come! Feedback, as always, is greatly appreciated.