SOMA
3.
Jackson's disquieting blue eyes widened considerably at seeing Lisa standing there in the elevator. At first he thought he was seeing things, but then she opened her mouth and darted forward to slam the close button. Jackson rushed into the elevator before the doors shut and slammed her into the back wall of the elevator.
Lisa winced as she collided with the hand rail. She couldn't focus on much aside from the sensation of being pressed hard into the wall by Jackson, feeling as if she was suffocating under his weight. This can't be happening, she thought in vain. But Lisa wasn't afraid, just angry. Very angry that all of a sudden that her calm world was once again disrupted by Jackson Rippner. She had felt guilty about hurting him and putting him in the hospital. She didn't like to see anybody in pain, even him no matter how necessary it had been.
But now that guilt was gone and was replaced with a violently uncharacteristic anger in the pit of her stomach. She just wanted to hurt him for invading her life once again. For causing her all the anguish that he had before.
"Get off m—!" she was cut off by his soft hand on her mouth, the slim fingers digging into the sides of her face.
"What," Jackson's voice wheezed slightly as he let the word hiss out of the back of his throat as if he hadn't quite decided what he would say yet. She noticed the wheezing sound with satisfaction, no doubt thanks to the pen she'd stuck in his throat.
Jackson's head felt as if it had been shaded in a kind of buzzing white noise. He didn't know why she was there or what he was supposed to do with her other than keep her quiet. An uncharacteristic sense of panic snuck into his chest as he realized that Lisa could be very dangerous to him. Not physically, the gun tucked into the back of his trousers was basically a safe bet against that. But legally. Jackson had avoided her for a good reason. He didn't want to get fucked.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded, still keeping his hand over her mouth. Lisa noticed that his normally clear blue eyes were slightly unfocused as he stared at her. She closed her eyes and tried to turn her face away from him.
The elevator gave a high pitched ding that startled both of them and started moving down. Jackson grasped her arm and keeping his hand firmly over her mouth he slammed her into the opposite wall where he could reach the emergency stop button.
They lurched to a stop and the elevator was suddenly filled with silence aside for Jackson's ragged breathing. Lisa kept her eyes shut, her face turned as far away from him as his hand would allow, which wasn't very far. Her mind pulled her back to the airplane bathroom—the familiar feeling of feeling trapped and claustrophobic between the wall and Jackson, the sugary and oddly calming scent of his cologne and the deceptively soft hands that could do much more harm than the thin fingers seemed capable of.
"Look at me," he demanded, and Lisa's gaze slowly found his. He looked confused and unsure. She realized this wasn't planned.
What were the odds?
She went slack in his grip, like the air being let out of a balloon. The hand that was wound tightly around her arm relaxed and after a moment he let the hand covering her mouth drop to her shoulder, strangely. As if he was checking to make sure she was still there.
Then for a long time neither of them said anything, they just looked at each other. Stalker and Victim. Assassin and Hotel Manager. Boy and Girl. Both with equally bewildered looks on their faces as their charmingly deceptive eyes depicted nothing but the truth for once.
Then suddenly Lisa made an angry sound in the back of her throat and she pulled back her hand to slap Jackson. He caught her wrist easily and pinned her hand to the wall above her head, his gaze suddenly becoming challenging and she met it with unequivocal sincerity.
Lisa threw her all her weight at his chest and managed to catch him off guard and slam him into the elevator doors, her small frame doing its best to get enough leverage to do some bodily harm to him. She didn't really think, her hands wrapped around his throat and she felt tears of frustration prick at her eyes as he pried them off and she batted his hands away in a frantic and womanly manner.
Jackson gripped the lapel of her jacket and with a slight sneer flipped her around so he had the upper hand again. His hands moved up to her throat and he rested them there, not finding the energy or drive to squeeze the breath out of her. He thought about how much he had wanted to kill her after chasing her through the airport and then around her half renovated house. How much pain he had wanted to inflict on Lisa Reisert's life as he lay in the hospital bed for a month. Then the rational side of his mind kicked in. Revenge was natural, but Lisa was different. Lisa could be his downfall in more than one way.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded again.
Lisa pressed her lips together in a thin line. "I'm here on business, what are you doing here. What do you want from me?"
Jackson gave a short laugh. "I'm not here for anything to do with you, Lisa" he said. "Although, I am afraid I'll have to do something with you now."
Lisa's mouth opened and closed but she couldn't seem to think of anything to say.
Meanwhile, Jackson's mind began to work overtime. He couldn't let her go. She would run to the police and then he would be screwed. He couldn't kill her… he didn't want to kill her. That left him with the option of keeping her with him, although he didn't know to what end. Perhaps just scare her into keeping quiet? God, this was so unfortunate and with such bad timing, too. The pay off for his current business venture was too big to let Lisa get in the way of no matter what he felt about his revenge for her. Having her around would jeopardize that as well. The others would want her killed, they all knew about what she'd done to him, after all.
"What are you going to do with me?" she asked
He looked at her wearily, "I'm not quite sure yet," he admitted and reached around to press the emergency alarm button off and then pressed the floor eight button again.
"You could let me go," she said hopefully.
He gave her a dubious look. "You're going to stay with me for a little while, I think." He saw her start to reach into her bag and before she could get whatever everyday object turned violent weapon out he had pulled the gun on her, pointed straight between her eyes. He noticed with some amusement that she went slightly cross eyed as she looked down the barrel of the gun.
Lisa felt a cold terror grip her stomach as Jackson swung the gun around at her.
"No, whatever it is don't try it. I was ready to dismember you last time I saw you, if I don't recall. Please, Lisa, don't make me kill you." He gave her a simpering smile and the elevator doors slid open to his floor.
Jackson tucked the gun back into the back of his trousers and motioned for her to leave the elevator. "Room 812" he said and she glanced back at him, seeming more annoyed than anything else.
In truth, Lisa was surprised at her feelings towards the situation. She wasn't scared, even after he'd pointed a gun in her face, something told her if he had any intention of hurting or killing her he would have done it already. It confused her, after all the pain she'd assumed to cause him, he was acting as if she was an inconvenience instead of… a prisoner. She was annoyed and angry with him, but couldn't muster up the energy to hate him entirely. There was something about his manner that was too much like the Jackson Rippner she'd had drinks with in the hotel terminal to really hate him. It disturbed her that she felt so…. Relaxed.
Jackson prodded her into his room, reaching around her to unlock the door with his room card.
Lisa stumbled on the carpet and surveyed the room as Jackson came in behind her. His hotel room was identical to hers in the clean minimal design that all the hotel rooms at the Tribeca Grand had. However, instead of her neat and orderly suitcases, situated perfectly on the suitcase rack with the clothes still folded inside, he had his case propped open on the desk, with a suit jacked hanging over the back of his chair and several shirts, ties and tee-shirts thrown casually on the bed. Little orange prescription bottles littered the bed side table and desk along with a half empty fifth of Jack Daniels and several empty energy drink cans. There were at least two New York times spread out across the room, which led her to believe he'd only been staying at the Tribeca for two days. The room looked like he'd been living in it for ages and smelled like that gentle, sugary cologne of his.
"You're rather messy," she noted
Jackson gestured for her to sit on the bed and he pulled the chair away from the desk and sat facing her. "We're in a bit of a predicament her, Lisa." He said evenly.
"Right, perhaps you should let me go." She said, matching his reasonable tone.
"Don't be cute," he said shortly. "You're here on business, right? I'm here on business as well."
Lisa's eyes narrowed. "What kind of business? Killing more innocent families?"
Jackson's jaw worked in frustration and he spoke slowly as if she were a child. "I don't kill people, Lisa. I told you before, I do my part and move on. No one gets hurt if everyone plays along."
"Oh, no one gets hurt other than a good man and hiswife and children!" she shouted indignantly.
"You may find this hard to believe but I had no desire to see Keefe and his family become history. I didn't care about Keefe. I cared about you and what I needed to get you to do to get the job done," his eyes trained on her face and she refused to look at him again. She stared out the window instead, her face showing tension and nerves. He sighed, as if reading her mind. "And I'm not going to try to kill you, in case you were wondering."
"Oh, really?" she scoffed, although inside she breathed a large sigh of relief. She still wasn't sure what he was capable of, but for some reason she knew she could trust his word. "Decided to rise above petty revenge"
Jackson sneered at her. Her petulance grated on his nerves like nothing else. "Yes," he snapped back, his tone clipped and deadly. "Although I did notice that you seemed to be taking out your anger for a certain parking-lot friend on me that day at your house. Was it cathartic stabbing me in the throat? I suppose I remind you of him? Come on, Lisa, I know you better than you think. That was pure female-driven hysteria, not self defense. You were exercising your demons on me."
His tone became indignant and she remained quiet. "You nearly killed me, you realize? Would that have made you any better than me? No, not at all."
She glared at him hard for bringing up… the parking lot. She hadn't even thought about that. Did Jackson remind her of him? She felt cold chills run down her spine as she tried to correlate the two in her mind. The answer was unequivocally no. Not at all. She didn't know why, but even though Jackson invaded her personal space like none other, she felt far less fear at the idea of tangling with him than the man that had raped her.
She couldn't think of anything to say. She entertained trying to defend herself but she realized there was no need for that. Jackson would have hurt her badly had she not done her best to stop him. But was he right? He didn't remind her of the other man at all…
"What are you, a psychologist now?" she sputtered indignantly
"Yes, actually." He said stiffly.
Lisa blinked. She couldn't help it. She had been sucked back into the Tex Mex with charming Jackson, not criminally insane assassin Jackson.
"You're a psychologist?" she asked incredulously, it seemed beyond her. Not so much the fact that could possibly be something besides a pathetic murdering con man, but that saying that made him seem so much more human. Human wasn't something she equated with Jackson the assassin.
He pursed his lips, feeling strange telling her that information. "Yes… I… got my—" he stopped talking and glared at her. "I finished my MA and started a private practice. Then… I changed my mind."
"How old are you?" she asked, still bewildered by this new information.
He looked startled. "Twenty-eight" he said slowly, cautiously. "Stop asking me questions like that."
Lisa cocked her head to the side, seeing that she'd struck a nerve. "Why?"
"Because you already know my name and that's enough reason for me, or any of my associates to give cause to kill you, Lise. You don't need to know anything about me." He tried holding her gaze as he said all of this in order for her to realize how serious he was but she kept letting her eyes flick away from his as if she couldn't handle the eye contact. Jackson moved over to sit next to her on the bed and she visibly tensed. He reached out and turned her face towards him.
She met his eyes evenly, and found herself a bit entranced by the endless blue of his eyes. She had never seen anything like them. Lisa set her jaw, still maintaining eye contact but focusing now. "You know everything about me, why can't I know anything about you?"
"You know why," he said impatiently and got up off the bed and walked over to his side table where he picked up a prescription bottle and took out a small blue pill. He swallowed it with some water from a glass on the table.
She talked as she watched him do these oddly routine things. She decided to try a different tactic to get information out of him. "What is your business this time."
He sent her a scathing look and she balked at him. "If you're going to steal me I need to know what is going on. You can't leave me in the dark on this."
He ignored her question. "So, you're saying you're willingly leaving yourself over to me, without a fight?" he asked her, a small smile playing on his lips. "Why do I feel like I'm about to be stabbed in the neck?"
"I just want to know." She said with a slight edge to her voice.
Jackson regarded her quietly for a long moment and then sighed. "Okay," he said, sitting back down next to her. "Do you know who Anna Carlton is?" he asked.
Lisa paused, and then nodded. "She's some real estate mogul's daughter, right? She's dating that singer…"
"That's right," Jackson nodded. "She's been held for ransom about four rooms down." His voice was flat, tonless, almost funny.
"What?" a small crease formed in the middle of her eyebrows as she tried to make sense of it. "She's here? In this hotel?"
"Four rooms down." Jackson repeated.
"You've kidnapped her?" she stated accusingly
"I didn't kidnap her," Jackson scoffed, "I'm not a common criminal, you know, Lise. I don't get paid to kill political officials and kidnap spoiled rich girls. I manage things. Keep things under control." He couldn't help but add. "Like you." Because even if he hadn't been able to control her, saying it made it hurt less.
Lisa wasn't sure what to say. Part of her wasn't remotely surprised that there was a kidnapped heiress in her midst. Another part of her realized that she should feel bad for the girl, want to help her, save her from Jackson and his associates. That part of her was weak though, for she was far more concerned with her own safety this time than that of a girl she'd never met. Lisa wondered how it was possible for her to feel so flippant about the situation.
I should want to help her, she thought. She couldn't help but believe it was the flippant manner in which Jackson regarded the situation.
"So how much is the pay off?" she asked, almost joking.
"Five million."
A silence so thick filled the room that Jackson felt his lips stretch into a real smile. She looked shocked. And… what else was that in her face? Was she impressed?
"Wow," she breathed, eyebrows arched high "You're really taking him to the cleaners."
"Not really." Jackson shrugged, "He made One-Hundred Million last year alone in real estate, not to mention his stock investments, his ties with NBC and the revenue from the financial magazine he's supporting."
Lisa didn't have anything to say to that.
"What, no moral high road from you, Lise?" he prodded, amused by her reaction.
She just shrugged.
Jackson checked his watch and glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "I need you to understand something." He said, leaning back on his elbows away from her. She leaned towards him without thinking about it. Jackson made his face void of any emotion. She did the same. He could see the tension ticking away behind her eyes, though. He wondered if she could see the amusement in his.
"What?" she asked at last, tired of his staring games.
Jackson bowed his head and looked back up at her. "These are dangerous people." He said. "You might not be afraid of me anymore, which is very unwise of you, I might add, but you should be wary of my associates." He coughed suddenly and pressed a hand to the scar at his throat before continuing, "If they found out you were Lisa Reisert they would kill you, Lise. They know what you did to me and that you were the reason Keefe is alive and that I have a very sour relationship with several Russian partners now. You're not only a threat in that you know who I am and who they are through me, but you know about Anna.
"Now, I don't trust you one bit so I can't leave you here. I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to leave you anywhere at least to the end of this week, Lisa." He saw the look on her face and e shrugged. "Sorry, at the end of this week I'll be on a plane to Switzerland and you can run home to Cynthia and Daddy." He said the last part in a rather nasty tone that made her cringe.
"I think it's fair to say that when my associates meet you they're not going to be very pleased that I brought you into this. Therefore, you're going to be posing as my girlfriend, Constance." He said, a slightly unpleasant look coming onto his face as he said the last part.
"Constance?" she repeated, and looked at him with her lips pressed thinly together. "I think you should understand that I am not going to comply with everything you have just directed me to do. You can't keep me here for a week. I have to go back to Miami tomorrow, I have to go to a business meeting this afternoon! And I certainly refuse to masquerade as your girlfriend." She huffed slightly.
Jackson stared at her for a moment, his lips pursed. Then he sighed heavily and swung the gun out again. "Lisa, please?" he said, voice sounding highly annoyed. "Do not make me shoot you, I really do not want to go through the bullshit."
Lisa drew back from him instinctively and glared at him. "What is wrong with you?"
He put the gun away and looked at her squarely. "Nothing. Self preservation." He said simply, and pushed a tuft of dark hair out of his eyes as he avoided looking at her again. Her eyes were so invading suddenly, he didn't want her to see what he was thinking.
Quiet filled the hotel room again and then at last she said. "What kind of a name is Constance? Couldn't you pick something better?"
Jackson looked at her, a very strange look on his face when she said that. "It's my girlfriend's name." he said shortly.
Lisa felt a cold jolt of surprise stab her in the stomach and she cocked her head to the side. So… Mr. Jackson Rippner had a personal life after all. It was weird. Weirder than anything he'd said to her yet. She tried to picture Jackson with a girl, maybe holding hands or kissing in the park. The only image she could conjure up was the one of him slamming her into walls in the airplane bathroom though. Come to think of it, she'd never seen him interact with another person aside from herself and briefly with other passengers on the plane.
She wondered if Tex Mex Jackson was what real life Jackson was like. She wondered if there was a real life Jackson at all, and if his girlfriend had to deal with him as he was now all the time. Or did she get the other version of him. The sweet, charming gentlemanly, handsome man from the airport terminal bar.
"You have a girlfriend?" she asked, green eyes as wide as saucers, he noted. Interesting. She seemed not only shocked by this, but slightly put off.
That was it. No more personal information, he decided.
"What--- what's she like?" Lisa asked, intrigued. She shook her head, determined not to sound as… well, fascinated as she felt. "Does she kidnap teenage heiress's and help kill politicians, too?"
Jackson sent her a look that she pretended not to interpret. "No, I suppose you should know. She's a model. She lives in Paris."
"Oh," Lisa echoed faintly, feeling very very small all of a sudden. Jackson didn't seem to mind talking about Constance, who Lisa was now envisioning a six foot tall statuesque blonde girl with a sexy accent and sexy lingerie. Well, that seemed a bit fitting, somehow for Jackson. He was, after all, from a purely clinical point of view a very attractive person. It did make a bit of sense.
"Is she French?" Lisa asked, quietly.
Jackson had an odd look on his face, as if he'd just swallowed a marble or something similarly awkward. "No, she's from New York, she's just working over there."
"It must be hard to keep up the relationship over seas" Lisa heard herself say. Okay, now things were getting very strange. She couldn't possibly be talking about her stalker and near murder's love life, could she? Yet some part of her was tragically fascinated and need to know more. Perhaps if she knew more about him she would understand him enough to know his weaknesses like he knew hers.
"No, I'm over there a lot." He said, and reached into his pocket for his wallet. Lisa remembered when he'd pulled her Father's wallet out of his pocket and placed it on the tray table in front of her. The shock that had coursed through her, there was a dull pulse of it in her veins now.
Jackson pulled out a folded up picture held it out to her. It was a small picture of Jackson and an extremely thin red head with large green eyes sitting together on a chaise lounge. They were wearing formal clothes and she had her legs kicked over his lap, her green eyes sparkling as she gazed into the camera and Jackson looked off in another direction, a small smile playing at his lips at whatever was distracting him. His hand was placed atop Constance's thigh.
Wow, thought Lisa. She couldn't bring up any other kind of coherent thought other than that. Wow. "She's beautiful." She said, unable to think of anything else.
"Yes, she is" Jackson said derisively as he took the picture back from her and stuffed it into his wallet, tucking it out of sight. "But she's also cheating on me." He shrugged
Lisa's lips quirked suddenly. Karma is going to kill you, Jackson Rippner, she thought meanly.
"Besides," he said flippantly as he got to his feet and straightened his jacket. "You're beautiful too. Alright, we're going to go over there now. Call me James. Respond to Constance," he leaned closer to her, close enough to make a point, perhaps to close. His hands rested on the bed behind her and forced her to lean back so she would look him in the eye.
"Don't do anything stupid."
Lisa stood up, ignoring the hand he offered her and followed him out of the room. She would respond to Constance and call him James but she tried to tell herself it didn't have to do with calling her beautiful, but because he had a gun in his pocket.
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A/N: Dude, LONG ONE. I'm spent. 1. Thank you to everyone who reviewed. I'm overwhelmed with love and thank you from the bottom of my heart. 2. Those of you who write Red Eye stories who are reading this—stop reading this and go write a new chapter to your story right now. Please? 3. If anyone feels so inclined to write a different summery for me, I don't like mine, so if you feel so inclined. I don't know, I'm just rambling now.
Okay, now that we're kind of really getting into the story I would very much like to know what you think. Is it going somewhere good? Or do you think I've bollixed it all up somehow? Let me know you guys, your reviews are important. Thank you. XXXX