Trevor wasn't rich. He was loaded and moneyed and affluent and opulent and prosperous put together. Riddick eyed the villa he was standing in front of. It could be a medium size hotel or some smaller palace. There were acres of beautiful garden surrounding it; and dozens of security guards patrolling around. Hmm, complicated.
Considering the circumstances it didn't seem like the best plan to break in and start looking though the 200 bedrooms to find the Trevor guy. Riddick walked up to the heavy gates. There were security cameras and scanners aimed on him. A man stepped out of the little guard room and approached him warily. I guess they know about the shivs and knife and maybe about my name too, Riddick thought dryly. For a second he wondered which of those aspects could bring him the most nuisances.
The guard stood 3 feet from the gate and stared at the goggled Riddick. As if that could work on me, Riddick humored. "Name, invitation and ID!" the guard ordered angrily. Definite attitude problem; and I thought all of that was reserved for MY trademark, Riddick added to himself.
"Listen, dickhead! You do not talk to me like that. If you do, I will take out that shiv you know I've got in my belt, and I'm gonna get really, really shiv-happy on you before you even know what's happening. Got it?" Riddick asked straight and stern. The guard only nodded. "Now run along and tell Trevor he has a visitor concerning Jackie Cheche!" he said. The guard turned quickly to fulfill Riddick's order.
It took half an hour! Half an hour to first find Trevor, secondly to get him to accept seeing Riddick, then to unarm (yeah, right!) Riddick and finally to get the room ready with the proper biscuits and old English tea. Such formalities! Riddick almost regretted not breaking down the gate and finding the monarch dandy himself.
Trevor held the door to the library open for Riddick. "Hello. Johnny told me you're friend of Jackie's. How can I help you?" he said subtly.
Riddick looked him over once again. Trevor wore expensive-looking casual clothes, but still managed to pull off being majestic. Guess that comes with being born into hundredth generation of wealth, Riddick thought and decided his own trashcan adventure 5 minutes after his birth hadn't been that bad after all. Just look what had happened to Trevor.
Riddick walked past him and said then: "It's not me you can help, but you."
Trevor was surprised. His mouth hanging open kind of gave that away. He recovered fast enough and flapped the door shut.
"It would be polite of you to inform me of whom am I talking to," he said and sat down behind his large wooden desk. Trevor made a big deal out of not inviting Riddick to take a seat. Too bad, Riddick wasn't the one to care about civility. He sat and gazed at Trevor, who squirmed under it a little.
"Since you don't know my name I take it that my girl Jack hasn't spoken of me. I'd leave it at that," Riddick said casually, but his thunderous voice was anything but.
"My girl Jackie could never be friends with … a person like you," Trevor stated with disdain. "I have no interest in why you are here or what you may hope to gain. Now, if I may show you to the…" he was saying when Riddick interrupted him.
"I don't give a fuck what you want. And the reason I'm here is to protect Jack from a double-dealing SOB as yourself," Riddick said calmly. "So let's do talk about the little fact you're already married, OK?"
Trevor's face went completely white. His agape surprise and horror was evident. He squeezed the armrests of his armchair until his knuckles where also white. For the longest time he couldn't get a word out. He had lost all of his arrogance and seemed to be completely lost.
"How… How…" Trevor stuttered. Riddick still looked as calm as ever, although insides of him were burning with rage and disgust. This made Trevor's guts tremble even more. Riddick meant a real threat.
"How I found out?" Riddick helped Trevor to finish his question. Riddick sounded so merciful that it could only mean one thing. He was going to crush Trevor like a bug.
So Riddick continued: "Let's just say I can put one and one together. Great dynasties do not survive without proper breeding. You were married off as a child to another suitable heir."
Trevor jumped up and tried to reason with this new hazard: "So you see! I had no chance to NOT get married. I do not love Isabella! What's a paper anyway? You're a man; have a heart!"
Riddick smiled cruelly. "I don't have a heart. Compassion and understanding are alien terms for me," he informed the heated young bastard in front of him.
Trevor moaned and his face twitched. He tried again: "Isabella is my wife only formally! She doesn't even live here! But I love Jackie! She is the true love of my life! Should I deny my heart just because my parents made one decision for me? A decision I regret more than anything in my life?"
Riddick got up too and sighed tiredly. "I don't give a fuck about your heart. You are only going to hurt Jack, so I'm going to make things real clear and simple for you," Riddick said. Trevor looked at him with horror as Riddick continued.
"You will make Jack dump you. And not by telling her that you are already married. It would hurt her too much. You will behave as an even bigger jackass than you already are and you're going to play it Oscar worthy. If you don't –" Riddick said and eyed the younger man with true fury "- I'm going to kill you."
Trevor was shocked. Riddick could smell his anger, nervousness and despair all around in the big room. He was ready for the weak counterattack when it came.
"I am not going to be a subject to such primitive blackmail!" Trevor barked and spitted while doing so.
"OK. The price just went higher. I'll kill you and your whole family," Riddick informed him businesslike.
Trevor gaped again. "You… You…" he stated to say something when Riddick interrupted him again.
"I'd be really careful with throwing any words at me. I ain't a man to be taken easily," Riddick said and walked off to look at some family photos hanging on the wall. He took one with a smiling woman in her 40s and held it up for Trevor to see. "How much do you love her?" he asked and picked another one. His wicked smile while doing it all sent shivers down Trevor's spine. One by one Trevor looked at the photos of his entire family in Riddick's deadly hands.
In final desperate attempt Trevor opened his mouth. "You're doing it just to get Jackie to yourself! You're some psycho fan dreaming of getting close to her!" he said. It made Riddick chuckle – what Trevor said was just so damn ridiculous.
"Jack and I go back a long way," Riddick only said.
It seemed to only anger Trevor even more, because he shouted: "DON'T CALL HER JACK! SHE'S JACKIE, YOU MORON!"
In a split of a second Riddick had Trevor in a death-grip. With his free hand Riddick pulled off his goggles and stared into the weaker man's fear-filled eyes. "You don't have any options to choose from, so don't act like you do," Riddick suggested him. "I've just about had it with you."
Another silent second passed. Then Riddick had to turn his head away in repulsion. Trevor had pissed himself.
This was night off for Jack from The Torch. So her birthday party was planned for today. Trevor had booked the VIP lounge at the city's most popular club La Vida Loca. Jack liked that place, liked a lot. Now she walked around the place making sure everything would be ready for the guests.
She had dressed up. It was a theme-party – angels and demons. It hadn't been Jack's choice for Trevor had put veto on "famous killers and their victims". Now she wore all red tight leather costume that went well with her emerald green eyes. The stares she got from the club's personnel indicated what she already knew – she was smokin' hot!
Trevor walked up the stair in his angel's costume with frizzy blond wig and little bow. "Honey," he greeted Jack and they kissed.
"I'm glad you were the first to arrive," Jack told him lovingly. She was always up on cloud nine when she was with Trevor. She had never expected to be this happy.
"Our friends will come soon," he replied. They kissed again and Jack smiled blissfully.
Riddick arrived in the mass of Jack's guests. He looked around the place first to make sure he had a clear exit if needed. Only then did he scan the place to find Jack. The moment he saw her, Riddick's heart skipped a beat.
Riddick himself hadn't changed his outfit at all to fit into the theme. Wasn't he a real personification of the devil himself? He knew at least one person in the room to agree with him on that one. The blond Cupid. Jerk, Riddick thought immediately when he was reminded by Trevor. Riddick was puzzled by how Jack could have possibly fallen for such a bloke. And then prefer him to Riddick…
He walked closer to Jack. Her costume seemed to lack material, Riddick examined crossly. The skintight low fit pants and the open back seemed to pull Riddick's eyes straight to her ass even though Riddick would have preferred not to give all that much fuel to his horny imagination.
"Hey, birthday-kid," Riddick said with his low voice behind her back.
Jack turned over and looked at Riddick with well hidden surprise. "Big Bad," she greeted him. It was an automatic reaction not to use his name in a public place. 5 years of strict discipline and drilling can make sure of that. "No costume?" she asked mockingly.
"Why to ruin the authentic thing?" Riddick asked back and both of them had to smile.
Trevor was standing near. Oh, how he had wished this dangerous stranger would somehow die and could never come to interrupt his nice life again! How he hated him, but knew he had no aces up his sleeve to fight against him. It felt absolutely frightening to know someone has you by the balls; that you can be so weak, even with all the titles, connections and money.
Time to earn my right to live, Trevor thought bitterly. He took his place by Jack's side. "Jackie, who's your friend?" he asked as if it was his first time to see Riddick.
Inwardly a knot in Riddick's stomach eased off. Jack introduced him as Grant Melville. Riddick was close to laugh out loud for this name mean in old English indeed Big Bad.
"It's pleasure to meet you, Mr. Melville," Trevor said and the men shook hands. Riddick had to give Trevor one thing though – he was a better actor than Riddick had imagined him to be.
"Likewise," he said and turned back to Jack. The men in white and black formed a weird kind of triangle standing in front of the lady in red.
Riddick pulled out a little simple white box from his black cargos. "Happy birthday, although a little late," he said and handed his present over to Jack. She took it with unexpected warm feeling inside. In the box, there was a thing she recognized immediately. The code-chip to Riddick's ship.
Jack kept looking down at it and there were tears in her eyes threatening to burst out. This meant so much! This was yet another invitation to take off with him, to be partners in crime again. She didn't know what to say to that. So she managed only to mutter a plain ´thank you.
Trevor gritted teeth with anger. He didn't know what there was in the box, but seeing Jackie so affected by it made him jealous. She hadn't been like that when he had given any of his presents!
That's why he blustered: "Well, we should mingle now, Jackie."
Jack nodded, but didn't look up. And when she did, it was to look at Riddick. "We'll talk later?" she asked him. Riddick nodded. At this moment he would have wished to touch her, kiss her more than he had wanted anything in his life. But he knew this would only make Jack back away from him. Riddick hoped there would be plenty of time for that in the future.