Finish The Job
Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Red Eye!
Chapter Five
What had he done? In all of his years as a manager, he had never, never slept with a target. Especially not one that he planned on killing himself for revenge. What had he been thinking?
He hadn't been thinking. He had been feeling!
Now, he had seriously screwed everything up! How was he supposed to finish the job now, when Lisa thought that he loved her and she thought that she loved him? Oh, what a tangled web they had woven. The one time he tried to understand his feelings just brought him into deeper shit.
What did it matter any way? After his employer used her for his job tomorrow, she was dead anyways. He had known since he made the phone call that Lisa was going to die tomorrow. If his employer did not kill her, than he would. That had always been a part of his plan. Not really a part of it, but it had always been in the back of his mind.
Could he still finish the job? Could he knowingly lead her into a trap that would ultimately kill her? Was he heartless enough?
Not heartless, but he would kill her to stop these feelings. He would kill her to end it all, even if he loved her. There could never be a happy ending for them. He would have to finish the job if someone else did not finish it for him.
Lisa started to stir and Jackson took the opportunity to get out of the room before she woke. It was complicated enough without her speaking to him.
But he was not fast enough to escape her voice. As he was locking the bedroom door, to keep her from coming after him, he heard her call.
"Jackson?" Lisa called. "Where are you?"
Jackson tapped his head against the doorframe lightly. He thought that sneaking away was going to be easy, but her voice, her voice was haunting him. She was haunting him. He could not stop thinking about her now. His feelings were trying to take over again, telling him that he should unlock that door and go back in that room. His mind was telling him to distance himself from her.
Lisa was going to die tomorrow—no today. They were supposed to meet his employer in a little over an hour. Shit.
Jackson stumbled to his feet and finished getting dressed. He had to pull himself together before facing Lisa. He could not let her see what she did to him.
A few minutes later, Jackson slipped back into her bedroom, carrying a peace offering of scrambled eggs to apologize for his disappearance. He could not afford to have a fight with Lisa and still make the meeting.
"Leese? You awake?"
"I thought you were never coming back," whispered Lisa in surprise. "I never expected you to come back. I wasn't surprised to see you gone."
"I went to make you this," he said with a smile, presenting the tray. "Now eat up."
Jackson gave her a light kiss on the forehead before heading to her closet. It had been an incorrigible urge; kissing her. He could not help himself. His brain told him not to, yet he refused logic and went for emotion.
Lisa did not say anything and she did not have to. He understood very well what she was thinking, just as she probably understood him. They were both confused and amused by the other's actions. It was a shame that things could not stay as they were.
"Once you're done eating, please get dressed. We've got an appointment that I would hate to be late for," Jackson told her off-hand, as he placed a pile of clothes on the bed.
'Where are we going?" Lisa questioned, semi-interested.
"To the waterfront," was all Jackson said before walking out of the room, making sure to leave the door open, an invitation to the rest of the house. It was also the polite way of telling her to get going.
Not but about ten minutes later, Jackson was casually leaning against a wall near the bottom of the stairs when Lisa came down, dressed stunningly as always. Jackson could feel the corners of his mouth slowly lift and form a smile.
"Ready?" he questioned.
"Yes, but what about shoes? I couldn't find any."
"I have some in the car. Let's go," Jackson said, grabbing her arm and leading her away and out the door, which he had already unlocked.
"What's the hurry?" Lisa questioned, slightly unnerved as she slid into the passenger's seat of the black BMW.
"I don't want to be late, Leese," he insisted, though he knew that she could see straight through his defenses. He was nervous and she could tell.
"Uh huh."
Thank god that Lisa knew when to leave things alone. Or at least she knew to leave him alone at that moment. All the thoughts in his head were colliding at the moment. A part of him still wanted to kill her with his bare hands and hurt her the same way that she hurt him. Another part of him wanted to let someone else kill her and yet another part of him wanted to protect her. There could never be any type of life for Lisa and Jackson. No matter how hard they tried.
The silent car ride ended when Jackson pulled up in front of the marina. Lisa had already found her shoes and put them on.
"Let's go. Now don't say anything to them unless I nod that it's okay," Jackson told her, giving her a warning look. These were dangerous people and they would not hesitate to kill them if either of them pissed his employer or one of his employer's thugs off.
"Okay," said Lisa, voice slightly strangled. She was frightened as well, but she did not know what he was really doing. He was going to finish the job once and for all. Lisa had to die and if his employer did not kill her, than he would finish it himself.
"Good girl," he whispered as he led her down to pier 3. He did not see anyone at first but a business-type man stood up in a motorboat and he knew what the plan was.
"Always right on time. Chalk that up as one for him," laughed Jackson's employer, a slightly heavyset man.
"Why would I be late?" questioned Jackson. "She wasn't getting away again."
"I heard she could be an uncooperative bitch," shrugged a thug.
"Sit down, Leese," ordered Jackson, leading her towards a seat on the motorboat as they began to drift away from the dock at first.
Lisa shot him a questioning and accusing look. She looked as if she had been betrayed.
Finish the job. Forget about the Reisert bitch. It will all be over soon and life will go back to normal. Then you can forget all about feelings and get back to managing. Provided that they do not kill you as well…
The boat drove out deep into the waters of Miami and eventually came to a sudden, jarring stop.
"Time to go," hissed a thug, grabbing Lisa from his semi-comforting hold.
Finish the job. Finish the job. Let them end it.
"Jackson?" her pitiful voice called as the thug dragged her towards the edge.
Her hands were bound. Jackson turned away, finding himself unable to look. After all the time he had spent dreaming about killing Lisa, he still could not bring himself to watch her die. Not after having feelings for her.
"Was this your plan all along?" accused Lisa, her voice with a biting edge. "Let me start to believe that you were actually a person, then watch me drown? You haven't changed a bit since the plane, Jack."
There it was. She knew exactly how to set him off. She was going to die, but not without pissing him off first.
"Throw her over," ordered Jackson's employer. "It's time to loose this particular piece of evidence."
"Jackson!" screamed Lisa as she was lifted, kicking and fighting, over the rail of the boat and dangled on the side.
Finish the goddamn job!
He could not do it. He could not sit there and wait for her to die. She was his to kill at a chosen time. Lisa was his.
Jackson snapped the neck of the thug holding Lisa and grabbed her bound wrists. He yanked her back inside the boat before drawing the KA-BAR. He then slit her bounds before attacking the two other thugs and hitting his employer over the head with the handle of the knife. He would kill his employer later.
"You okay?" he questioned, voice raspy as he stopped to look at her. He was taking a short break from finishing the job.
"I'm fine," she said with a smile, unsure if she should approach him or stay away.
Jackson nodded, until a fiery pain erupted in his back in several places. His eyes went wide in recognition. He had been shot. He heard Lisa scream.
Finish the job.
The only person who bothered to attend his funeral was Lisa Reisert. She was the sole mourner, clad in black, wearing one of his jackets at she had snitched at some point during her stay at his house. She was unable to leave his place, the place where she had, for a short time, seen the real Jackson Rippner.
Jackson had been shot five times in the back by his employer. He had died in her arms, whispering three words that shook her world once more.
"Finish the job," he had rasped with his dying breath. He had told her the same time three months earlier after the red eye flight.
Lisa finished the job. She killed his employer with a gun she discovered on the deck of the boat. She killed a man for killing Jackson. She killed him and slowly piloted the boat back to Miami, a dead Jackson upon her lap.
Jackson had finished the job, in more ways than he had intended. His employer had been killed, finishing the fight started aboard the boat. He had finished falling in love with Lisa. He had finished the battle waging inside him when he was shot. He had also in many ways, killed Lisa Reisert.
He had finished the job, even though it took his life to do so. It was only the way that things would have worked out. Or at least that's what they told themselves.
Author's Notes:
The end! I'm going to cry now because I kill Jackson.