Chapter ten:

There was something magical about running in the rain. Even though one was already drenched through to their very bones. The shivers should have set in. Instead, Rose was scorching hot. The once baggy and misshapen brown dress now clung to every single curve upon her body and as she ran, narrowly avoiding potholes, crates and horse drawn carriages to race back to the Black Bull with Jack's fingers entwined within her own, she had never felt such exhilaration.

Every now and again, Rose moved as if through the layers of a dream. The dreams where a man kissed her, compromised her and then left her wits there on the floor. It was a dream but should have been a nightmare. Yet, it was a reality. Jack Dawson was a reality…

Thunder shook the clouds, as its loud rumble had echoed around the empty beach. The smell of the sea overpowered everything else. The cool winds whistled around every rock and under every doorway; not even warm houses could be protected from the chill of the storm. On the shore waves crash against rocks and onto the sand, shattering shells with its immense pressure. Wind still pulled at the sea splashing waves upon the shore, making pebbles jerk against one another. The trees released tension from their exhausted roots.

As fast as the lightning had struck, Rose was out of the shelter which they had taken beside a horse box. Her dishevelled and shapeless dress now completely saturated and yet, still she spun in a circle. Around and around, she went, as though she was a ballerina no longer in control of her own feet.

''Don't you ever just wish you could dance wherever you wished. I always wanted to be an artist. I feel it in me, like a dynamo. I should be a dancer like Isadora Duncan.''

Jack moved away from the shelter, to be met by the whipping wind and the rain which soaked his hair and shirt before he could even reach her.

''Or a moving picture actress.'' Jack laughed, joining her.

Once her hands were on him, there on the inside of his elbows, pulling at his shirt to hold herself up from the giddiness, Jack was aware of just how giddy she had become. Coming across a concrete pillar, she disappeared further towards the horse box and then he saw her shadow once more; she was playing with him. Watching her there, in the midst of the steaming rain, it felt as though no one else but them even existed. Just the sight of her winded him, like a massive blow to the stomach and chest all at once. It was just like the first moment that he had laid eyes on her merely days prior and took it within himself to follow her away from the maiden voyage of Titanic; the greatest opportunity a man like him could get.

But it failed to matter now.

He had seen her at that moment and took a chance. It had paid off, somehow.

Jack roughly caught her hand and shoved her up against the horse box. The rain slanted the opposite way, leaving Rose free to see Jack and how his eyes burned for her.

''Jack, I've never—never been kissed, not before you.'' Her strained voice, whispering against his sensitive ears was like torture. Pulling away, to crinkle his brow, he must have queried her with his eyes for she continued. ''Not even Cal..''

''Don't think of that now.'' His eyes were lit with such flames of love that they almost set her on fire there and then.

Both of his palms came up, flat to her face. Slanting his head, he targeted her lips softly, taking them ever so slowly, carefully and yet they felt utterly bruised as though he had kissed her for an eternity. Oh, how she wished that he would. The slow caress of his lips was torturous and so alluring that though she tried to escape the grasp of him, he slowed his pace even more before grasping her hand again and dragging her back out into the pouring rain where she dragged the hems of her dress through more puddles, mud and cobblestones before they saw the sign for the Black Bull looming.

Reaching her room, Rose slammed against the door, her stomach crunching from laughing so much. It felt as though she hadn't giggled in years; perhaps she had never had. It felt as though she was finally a girl of seventeen. Acting just the way that she should be. If her mother saw her now, or if Cal ever knew just the way Jack Dawson had kissed her. So lovingly, so indecently and yet she could detect the stark frankness of his feelings. And it was frightening. The depths of her own, seemed to be mirrored with his. Now, as his cornflour eyes, those beautiful beacons of light and her source of living were upon her, she felt how her cheeks flushed red. Suddenly, she was touching his chest and pressing the pads of her fingers against his buttons. There was a damned urge to take control, to take his clothes from his shoulders even though she could already see the white shirt clinging to the contours of his body. Just like her own hung onto her own. Rose couldn't look. It was suddenly as though she was longing for something which she had utterly no knowledge of at all. What were these silly, unfamiliar feelings which stirred within the darkest, deepest depths of her stomach. They lingered about. Startling her further. As Jack's hands came to her waist, she giggled again as she felt the weight of his hand there.

''So, how do you like your crawl through the less reputable parts of town, huh?''

''It was the look of the those guys faces.''

''The ones downstairs?'' Jack grasped his stomach. ''I don't think they've ever seen a lady drenched to the bone.''

''I don't think a lady has ever crawled through these parts before.'' Rose teased in response, recalling just how puzzled the regular customers of the Black Bull had been at their arrival from the pounding rain. ''But I don't believe that I can be called a lady at this very second, nor do I wish to be.'' Rose was aware of her flushed cheeks. ''Cal has a manservant, the most ridiculous man who you should ever set eyes upon. His name is Spicer Lovejoy-''

Rose caught a gaze of Jack's furrowed brow and the way he was about to burst into a laugh.

''He sounds so very serious.''

''Oh, he is. An ex police cop or so I hear, but his father hired him to keep his little boy out of trouble.''

''Is Cal not able to stay out of trouble?''

Rose shook her head. ''I hear that he has indulged in a crawl through the less reputable parts of town. To gamble, or visit the lowly places where a gentleman shouldn't be seen…''

Jack stepped closer to Rose, and a droplet of rain fell from a darkened strand to his cheek before it rolled down to his lip. The thought of her fiance dallying at such places should have caused displeasing feelings but she felt as though she was about to fall into a bad habit as Jack was so close. She shivered even though it wasn't so cold. His hand came up to her shoulders and he gently rubbed them causing even more goose-bumps to appear than before. Her eyes found him in the dim light of the room. It was late afternoon on a Friday but neither knew of the time. Neither cared. As he ran his fingers down her arms once more he linked their fingers loosely, like had at the beach, except his grip then tightened.

''So what would he say to us right now, huh?''

Rose wanted to speak, but she couldn't. Worrying her teeth between her lips, suddenly, she was unable to stop herself from needing to feel herself against him once more. The mystery of him now was arousing her, wishing that she could touch every single inch of his torso. As the droplets of rain fell from his hair, down to his chest she came to him in a dizzy stumble, her feet unable to even move properly.

Seeing him, this way, dazed and blinded by the sensual gaze upon her body now was feeding her infatuation. She could lose herself without redemption. This time, as his lips came down on hers it was frenzied, slanted to gain deeper entry. Their tongues sloshed together, sliding with the wetness of their faces and yet clammy from the nerves, the adrenaline and the intensity of being in such a space. In such a time. Emotions were driving her into some sort of a state. Somehow, as quickly as it had started, it slowed down.

''Jack, what are your plans once you have finished in Southampton?'' Rose mumbled against his lips.

Jack's face turned serious. He cleared his throat. ''I don't know.'' He answered honestly. His stomach sank as he realised this conversation was about to affect everything. It could affect everything.

''I should return to Philadelphia and marry a man I never have loved, nor will I ever.'' Rose's eyes shone with unshed tears thinking of that bleak future. It was beyond a life of misery now that she had tasted just two days with Jack. Two days in which she had experienced…something. Happiness. Living. She felt as though she was living.

Jack's left hand came up to touch her face. ''Then do not marry him.''

Rose swallowed the lump in her throat. She, from somewhere, found the strength to speak. ''Jack, I have no other choice. Except…'' Rose was startled. Completely and utterly striving to make sense of her own thoughts. Staring hard at the man in front of her, there had been some sort of a reason for their meeting perhaps and to think of even parting was painful. More painful than leaving behind her family, the only relatives which she had ever known, and putting an entire ocean between them.

''Will you stow away aboard a ship? Find work to pay for a passage?''

Jack blinked. ''I planned to be gone before the weekend was over.''

Rose nodded, solemnly, but she didn't pull back. In a moment, she was straight backed and filled with purpose.

''I want to come with you.''

In that moment, realisation hit him hard. She wanted a life with him. This could become their life. Together.

''This is crazy.''

''I know it doesn't make any sense.'' Rose couldn't help but laugh. Those wits which had scattered about before had somehow scurried away even further. ''But I trust it.''

''You trust the crazy?''

Rose tenderly placed her hands upon his damp cheeks. ''I trust you.''

Jack had to kiss her. She was giving up everything for a life with him. It wasn't soft, it was full of passion. Their initial hesitation had worn off and now his hands were in her hair and pulling her as close as could be. He threaded his fingers through her auburn dampness, made straighter from the rain. As he gently tugged at it, she was pulled away from his lips to face him.

''Are you sure you want this?'' Jack whispered against her forehead as he kissed it gently. He felt her nod. ''You said what little choice you had to marry that guy…''

''I have never opened up this way before, I have never trusted anyone like I do you.''

''I have nothing to offer you, you know that.'' He needed her to know that.

''You have the life that I want. Every day there is something new and I want to live that life with you.''

Jack had made her aware of just how hard that life could be. But perhaps, with Rose there, it could be made easier.

''I couldn't have walked away from you. Not knowing just how trapped you are in that world. I never expected you to be anything more than a girl I helped leave her old life.''

''On Tuesday evening, I was in London with Cal and my mother, alongside her friends,'' Rose sighed, ''all they did was speak of the silly wedding, of bridesmaids dresses, colour scheme and flowers I had never even heard of and I just turned to see a young girl, no older than four and her Mother was teaching her just how to eat cake, to put a napkin on her lap and to lay it out neatly.'' She narrowed her eyes, ''I never want that for my children and that was how I was brought up, with a tight hand around my throat, threatening to close in whenever I put an accidental foot wrong. I had my Mother's grip and then Cal's which would have got stronger after we married. I didn't want that for myself or my future children.''

''I couldn't watch that happen or let it.'' Jack caressed her face. ''It sounds like a world full of fools.''

Rose was silent for a moment. ''I shall have a telegram sent to Cal and my mother. They shall arrive by Wednesday at the latest to the Waldorf Astoria. I will inform them that I have ended my engagement and that I intend to return the ring.''

Jack couldn't help but smirk. ''Is that truly your plan?''

Blinking through her infatuated haze, she noted how Jack's heart beat had accelerated and his pulse was rapid against her face where she nuzzled in his neck. Placing a single kiss there, across the main vein of his neck caused him to twitch. His hands moved as his body did, one hand at her waist and the other in her hair.

''Yes.'' Rose whispered. ''Why couldn't I have been brought up amongst your kind? The people who are kind and thoughtful. Who treat everyone so equal.''

Jack didn't have an answer. Instead he touched her face. ''I can't change your past, Rose, but if you want me to, I can try to shape your future?''

''It is all that I could ever wish for.''

''I imagine Cal is the jealous kind, he won't take too lightly the fact that you have left him just weeks before you marry.''

Rose laughed. ''You haven't met him once and yet seem to know him so well.''

''I know his kind, they will always be men and women who are ruled by money, success and social status. His outward appearance and reputation is all he will ever care of.''

''Yet behind closed doors all he wanted was to take me to bed.'' Rose laughed, shaking her head as she remembered just three nights before when he had invited her into his bed and she had refused, wishing to wait until they had married and then the evening before they had sailed, his words had made her skin crawl; I had hoped you would come to me last night. She had feigned exhaustion. As she always did.

''Did he?'' Jack couldn't help as the words flew out of his mouth. ''I'm sorry, it's just-''

''No, Jack. I wished to never go to bed with a man until I was a married woman,'' She told him quietly. Her hands fell upon his chest and she felt his deep breathing, ''until, perhaps…'' She didn't know how to finish the sentence, because it was unknown. That was the thing about Jack; it was all unwritten.

Jack tilted his head and leant forward to kiss her hair but he couldn't stop. He continued to trail kisses down her neck and she clung to him for her life. How could one want someone so badly after just two days. The intensity between them was magnificent. They clattered backwards, missing the bed and winding upon the wooden floor. Rose was straddling him; he was well and truly beneath her and all control seemed to be within her own hands. One didn't know what to do when faced like this and as she pulled back, slowly, preparing to see the eyes which pinned her to the spot so deeply and drowned within them; seduced by the lust and adoration. Sitting herself back slightly, Rose reached down, pulling at the hem of the dress which she wore, there was a slight hesitancy there, lingering for a second or two as she caught his gaze and the curve of his smile. It played on Jack's lips beautifully. She was looking at the dirt. At how everything about her had changed.

Through the blinding flash of lightning, Rose huddled against Jack. This was her safety; right here. Together, they would leave this place in search of a more satisfying journey.

Even if the rain subsided now, even if the sea turned into a tsunami, it wouldn't deter them from their own world. Jack's eyes, beneath the deeply blackened horizon which loomed outside of the window, was glimmering with sensuality and his lips moved across her cheek causing flares of fire to spiral throughout her entire nervous system as though she had been hurled upside down.

''I cannot believe that I have run away,'' Rose whispered against his ear, mainly to herself as she succumbed to the daze. ''I have run away with you.''

Jack tightened his grip upon her, holding her right at the waist with his damp face tucked into her shoulder where he breathed upon her. It tickled. Burnt. She was almost shivering and yet, completely on fire…

''At home, with Cal and my mother, it feels as though only the pictures in the shadows look at you.''

''You mean no-one understands a single word that you say?''

Rose nodded.

Jack pulled back, his hand slowly going towards her lips, before he penetrated her gaze. ''They should see it in your eyes, just what is going around your head. I see everything. I see you.''

''And?"

The question remained unanswered as he pressed his lips to hers again.