SOMA
2.
The wake up call sounded at 3.30am. Jackson pulled himself out of bed feeling completely unrested and dreading spending another day—let alone another week – in his present company. He showered and put on a fresh suit, then made his way down to room 803 where he wasn't surprised to find Bradley watching porn on the hotel television. Anna was still bound to her chair and appeared to be unconscious.
They switched out shifts and Jackson opted for the news rather than the aforementioned entertainment. He wasn't surprised to see that Anna had in fact made the news, but it only said she was missing, not that she'd been kidnapped. That wasn't a surprise either.
Sometime around dawn Anna woke up and Jackson handed her some orange juice with a straw, still careful not to look at her. Her hair was what really did his head in. When he couldn't see her face he would have sworn it was Lisa. It annoyed him that she was in his mind so often lately. He'd managed to put her away so that he would have to think about the pain she'd physically caused him. And the large dent to his ego.
"What's going to happen to me?" Anna asked softly, taking Jackson by surprise. He didn't particularly like playing the bad guy. He wasn't a bad guy. He was just doing his job. There wasn't any point in trying to scare her or sugarcoat it.
"Your father is going to pay us a large sum of money and in return we're not going to kill you." He said shortly.
She didn't say anything for a long time. "You're not like the other two" she said at last, an oddly profound statement.
"Yes, well, they're idiots." He said, setting her orange juice down on the side table next to her chair.
"What happens if my father doesn't pay you?"
Jackson looked at her squarely. "Then you're unfortunately, going to die."
Anna started sniffling again and it made him cringe.
"Don't worry, that won't happen. Your father probably wouldn't let it happen." He reassured her, not really meaning it. What could happen is that Dad and the police would try to get their cake and eat it too. In the movies that always works out in the end for the good guys. In real life people got paid or people died.
"You don't have to do this," Anna said suddenly, seriously. "My father would pay you—a lot if you backed out of this now."
"Look, I'm sorry. It's really unfortunate for you. Please shut up."
Later that day he had a meeting with one of the police detectives that Carlton had put out to find his daughter. It wasn't a formal meeting—it was in a bar in Soho, set up by the people Jackson worked for so as to get the message across perfectly clear. Nevertheless, he was sure it would be one of the stranger conversations to be had. Hello, I'm an accomplice in kidnapping a young girl, you can arrest me but you won't because she'll die if you do. Jackson would lay down the sum his clients wanted from Carlton and then he would reassure that everything was strictly professional and by the book so long as everyone got paid and was happy.
He wasn't looking forward to it.
---
Lisa woke up around noon feeling unrested and dreading spending the entire afternoon listening to speeches about increasing customer satisfaction. She leisured in bed for a long time, flipping through television but finding nothing worth watching.
After a long time of doing that she pulled herself out of bed and dressed in a simple black skirt and matching jacket with a thin camisole underneath. It was an absurdly hot New York day, to nice to waste indoors. Lisa decided her best chance was to take a wander around the city before her meeting at 4 pm.
The news was on in the background as she got dressed. More terrorist threats that might just be practical jokes, Tony Blaire initiates new environmental standards, young heiress goes missing. Lisa continued dressing, and as she did her mind began to wander back to one of its favorite and most taboo subjects. The plane trip with Jackson. Lisa had run the three hours over and over in her head a thousand times until she remembered every detail and conversation. It gave her a certain kind of piece of mind to know that even when something had seemed as hopeless as all that, she had still managed to pull herself through, along with several other people.
Lisa started out the door to her hotel room and got into the elevator, intending to ride it down to the lobby. She was on the fifteenth floor, and the elevator stopped twice. Once, to let a rather fat man on his cell phone off.
The numbers jumped past in front of her eyes. 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9… she felt like she was waiting for a bomb to go off.
Floor 8. The doors swung open, revealing a thin man with soft dark hair and rather pretty blue eyes. He looked at her for just a moment, recognition flashing across those blue eyes.
It was him, Lisa realized. It was Jackson.
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write be a love letter and I'll be your best friend.