When they pulled up to the hide out the car stopped and Jackson was the first to get out. He walked around the car and opened Lisa's door and offered his hand. She looked at it with disgust and walked out of the car unassisted.

The hide out was nothing more then a house in what looked like a simple suburban neighbor hood. The lawns were perfectly manicured, the outside of the houses were all nicely painted with calm pastel colors. Even a bike or two was parked in front of the garage doors.

"It may look like your normal neighbor hood," Jackson said, reading the look on Lisa's face. "But these houses were especially put in by my boss to make nothing look suspicious. This is the prepaid housing for me and my coworkers. And remember, all these people in the surrounding houses have incredible aim, so don't try to run."

"Why would I?" Lisa asked sarcastically. "You just kidnapped me and dragged me to god knows where, no big deal right?"

"I told you we are going to help you get Natalie back," Jackson said, growing more impatient with every word out of Lisa's mouth.

"But you are a hit man! How am I supposed to trust you when you kill people for a living?"

"I have always been a man of my word though." They were at the door and Jackson was fumbling with the keys. "Here we go." Jackson opened the door to reveal what seemed a simple suburban home, the only thing wrong with the picture was the AK-47 on the vintage coffee table. A man poked his head out of the kitchen and said,

"Jackson! What are you doing back so soon?" He walked out and Lisa saw he was a tall man with dark black hair, dark brown eyes, and very tan skin. All in all, he was a very handsome and Lisa would have been far more interested if the circumstances were different.

"I had the men break me out of jail and I am helping Lisa get her kid back."

The man looked Lisa up and down and said, "Oh yeah, you're the woman who's kid got kidnapped a week ago, right? You're Lisa and the kid is Natalie?"

"Yes," Lisa said timidly.

"Well, I'm Tom." He stuck his hand out and Lisa took it and instead of him shaking her hand, he kissed it. "You have such soft hands, did you know that?"

"Now Tom," Jackson said, more serious in tone. "You, Lisa, and I are the only one's who are to know we are looking for the kid, understand?"

'Why?" Tom asked.

"Because I have a feeling I know who took the kid and some of the people here are in on it."

"Okay. Confidential it is." Then Tom turned to Lisa and said, "Well, it looks like you are going to need some clothes." He tried to grab Lisa's hand and lead her into the bedroom, but Lisa resisted.

Jackson took a hold of Lisa's other hand and said, "I will help her get ready. You just work on finding all of the proper equipment for the journey."

"Okay, but I did some rearranging and you might not know where all of the extra women's clothes are."

"I am sure I will mange." And Lisa was pulled into one of the back rooms by Jackson. "You are going to want to watch out for him, he will do and say anything to get into a woman's..."

"Alright! I get the drift, you don't have to finish that sentence. Just show me where the clothes are and tell me when we are going to leave."

"Well, like I said I think I might know who it is, but first of all, it is just a hunch and second of all I have no idea where he would be."

"Who do you think it is?"

"I will tell you when I know for sure."

"No god damnit! Tell me NOW!" She was about to scream in frustration when he put his hand over her mouth and looked her in the eye. She was once again, mesmerized by his eyes. He slowly let his hand down and just as she was about to say something. He kissed her passionately. He snaked his arms around her middle and she wrapped her arms around his neck and ran her fingers through his hair. Without even pulling out of the kiss, he picked her up and carried her out of the room and into another, but it was all dark. He shut the door with his foot and set her down on a chair, or what she thought was a chair for Jackson hadn't turned any of the lights on.

Sitting there in the dark, waiting for Jackson to come and find her to continue, the man in black's words ran through her head; "You are lucky that Rippner wants his revenge." Lisa let out a small whimper as her blood ran cold. She just realized that him kissing her was a ploy to get her in here so he could rape her and then kill her. And she didn't even have a pen to protect herself.

Jackson flicked the light switch on. The hum of the fluorescent lights and Lisa's quite whimpering filled the room. Lisa looked around to see that the room was a bathroom, hardly big enough to fit three people.

"Lisa the reason I brought you in here was because every single room in this house is bugged with audio and visual except this one."

"So you brought me in here so no one would see you kill me?" Lisa asked quietly.

"What? Where did you get that idea?"

"You did kidnap me after all. Was that kiss a real kiss or was it just a ploy to get me in here so no one would have to see you kill me?" Why Lisa never told him about the man in black, she never could understand.

Part of Jackson wanted to say yes, it was a real kiss, but his conscience took over and wormed his way out of the question. "Lisa I have told you already, we are trying to get Natalie back, I gave you my word!"

"But I told you that I don't trust you!"

Jackson sighed and said, "Look, I will make you a promise with the honor code."

"What's that?"

"It is something my boss made to make sure that everyone was a man of their word." Jackson pulled out a switch blade from his back pocket.

"W-what is that?" Lisa asked in fear.

"What does it look like? The honor code is where we make a cut in our palms," he sliced the middle of his right palm and said, "Give me your hand Lisa." She stepped back from him and clutched her hand. "Lisa this won't work if you don't trust me. Just give me your palm and I will make it a smaller cut, I promise." Against her better judgment, Lisa gave Jackson her hand. He took the knife and made a cut on her hand. "Now grasp my hand," Lisa was still a little bit unsure about this, so Jackson took her hand and gave the first squeeze and then Lisa caught on and squeezed back. "I, Jackson Rippner promise to Lisa Resiert that I will do everything within my power to help her get her daughter, Natalie Resiert, back and into her arms. I also promise to Lisa that no matter what the circumstances are, she will not be harmed by me in any way and I will do everything within my power to make sure that she doesn't get hurt, knowing full well if I break any of my promises to her she has every right to hunt me down and do what ever she wants to me; be it death or torture, if I break my promises she has the right. Now I am bounded by blood to these promises and I have every intention to keep them."

Jackson took his hand away to get Band-Aids and to wash the residual blood off his hands, Lisa did the same. "Now, the real reason I brought you in here was every room in this house is bugged with audio and visual cameras, so this is the only place where I can tell you who I think the kidnapper is."

"Who is it?"

"I am almost positive…" Jackson stopped mid-sentence and put his ear to the door.

"Jackson? Who…" and he rushed over to her and kissed her again, but this time he whispered in her ear,

"Lisa, Tom is at the door. I think he is in on the kidnapping so we can't let him know we have been talking about it. Just kiss me until he goes away so he doesn't get suspicious."

"Okay." And they started up again. Just as she started to kiss him again, the door was wrenched wide open.

"Oh, I'm sorry, did I interrupt something?" Tom asked.

Without even turning his head Jackson said, "Yes and we would appreciate it if you left us alone."

"Okay, but I just came to tell you that you are going to be stuck here for a couple of days. None of the equipment is working and all of our supplies are gone."


Hello my cheeky wee monkeys! (If any of you watch the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, you know where that came from.) I hope you enjoyed this chapter! This was actually supposed to be part of chapter five, but all together it was six pages; so I broke it down into two chapters so you don't have to slug all the way through one really long chapter. My best regards to all and for those of you who read and review a special edition Red Eye DVD!

Love,

Ceila