This chapter is probably a little rushed but that's because it's the set up for the next chapter which will include some Faberry interactions. Also thank you, thank you, thank you, for the encouragement and following me and this story. It means a lot. Fill free to review and tell me what you think so far and what might happen… and without further a due, here is Chapter 2 of Hold My Hand
Bzzzz "Ugh!' Quinn groaned as she reached her hand out onto her side table in search for her phone. She brought the phone to her face and debated about answering the text when she saw it was Bonnie. It took a few seconds to dawn on Quinn as to why Bonnie would be texting her at seven in the morning, but once the realization set in she quickly sat up and unlocked her phone.
Quinn read the text a goofy smile appearing on her face in the process:
Rachel Barbra Berry:
21 Main Brooklyn from 7 to 10,
1 to 5 NYADA then
94 St Cloud Brooklyn 7 to 2.
"Damn, this girl works three jobs and goes to school. How does that even work?" Quinn wandered aloud.
"Crap!" Rachel tripped over her feet as she hurried out the door. She was trying to be quiet for her roommate's sake, but that wasn't going too well this morning, and she knew she'd be getting hell for it later. She ran out of the apartment and quickly hurried down a few blocks to her first job of the day.
"Two seconds to spare Rach!" A girl called to the brunette as she walked into the diner.
"Ha, ha," Rachel mocked laugh the girl as she rounded into the back to put her stuff up and put on her apron. "It's a skill."
"I'm sure it is. You've got booth 3 over there."
"Mkay," Rachel grabbed a coffee pot and headed over to the table. "Hi," Rachel's smile managed to lighten up the diner which was nice because it was a gloomy day there in New. "Would you like a cup of coffee?"
The young woman, who looked to be around Rachel's age, looked up from the file she was currently engrossed in and returned Rachel's smile, "Please. I hear you guys have some the best coffee."
"I'd say so," Rachel poured the coffee in the woman's cup. "And I'm not just saying that because I work here." Both young women chuckled. "Do you know what you'd like to order?"
"Do you recommend anything in particular?"
"The French Toast is my personal favorite."
"Well then, I suppose I'll have the French Toast."
"Good choice," Rachel picked up her notepad hanging on her apron's pocket and jot down the order. "Could I get you something else? Water, orange juice, maybe tea?"
"No thank you Miss Berry." Rachel's eyes widened at the sound of her last name. Her name tag only read her first name, so how this woman knew her last name was a mystery.
"Have we met before?" Rachel asked clearly confused.
"No, but you have recently met my boss. Quinn Fabray. I am more than willing to explain everything to you, but could you maybe place the order first, as to-go if possible. I'm actually quite hungry."
"Um, yeah, sure." Rachel placed the order then returned to the woman at table booth three. "Um…"
"Please Miss Berry, take a seat," she motioned to the seat across from her.
Rachel hesitated, eyeing the woman with the gray eyes and soft light brown skin. She could see Rachel's hesitance and in hopes of easing her discomfort she pulled out the small clutch, one that in less than twelve hours had made its way into four different people's hands, only one of whom Rachel knew would be holding it, and that one person was herself.
"My clutch," Rachel's words came out mixed in a gasp.
"You left it yesterday after your performance. Quinn said one of the workers came running out with it, but you were already gone. She asked me to return it to you. She figured you would need your license, credit card, debit card, and everything else."
"Um, thank you," Rachel shyly took the outstretched clutch.
"You can have a seat Miss Berry, I promise I don't bite," Rachel could see the woman's smile was genuine, and after looking around at the nearly empty dinner she slid into the seat opposite of her.
"Your name," Rachel spoke quietly. "You know mine, but I don't know yours."
"Yes of curse. I'm sorry for being so rude my name is Bonnie, Bonnie Bennett." Rachel didn't say anything further. She just stared at Bonnie, wandering what her angle was, apparently Bonnie caught on to this, "I assure Miss Berry I have no alternative motives. Quinn simply asked me to return your clutch to you as soon as possible which was your first job."
Rachel's eyes once again widened. How does she know I have more than one job… how does she know where I even work.
"You're probably wandering how I knew where to find you." And how the hell did you know what I was thinking, Rachel thought while nodding. "I work for lawyers. Lawyers often need things found out about people which is my job. I'm the firm's private investigator. Therefore finding you wasn't too difficult."
"Should I be worried?"
"No, not at all. I'm just a messenger."
"Rachel! French Toast!" The cook called from out behind the counter.
"Excuse me," Rachel stood, taking the clutch with her, to retrieve the French toast. She returned to Bonnie's table and placed the to-go box in front of Bonnie, but remained standing.
"Thank you." She stood with the box and file in hand then smiled at Rachel. "I should get going. Work to do." She gave Rachel a small smile and continued out the door.
Rachel stood where she was for another minute watching the woman leave before deciding to take precautions and check to make sure everything was in her clutch. She thought the items in her head while she pulled them out: licenses, debit card, credit card, lip gloss, cash, paper… wait what? Paper? Rachel looked over the paper and smiled as she read what was on it.
My apologies for what I imagine might have been a little off setting (sending Bonnie).
I would have preferred to come myself, but things got a little hectic here at the office.
Anyway, I was wondering… dinner, tomorrow, 7?
My number 1234567892
PS: If I you don't call I'll be forced to assume something bad happened
And to go see you at work ;)
-Quinn Fabray
"How'd it go?" Quinn asked Bonnie as she walked into the blonde's office.
"Quinn, I don't think she knows who you are." Bonnie sat on Quinn's desk, looking at the blonde as she stared out of her the window.
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Well, you might have freaked her out. Just think it about it from her perspective. Young twenty-two year old living in New York City. I show up, a woman she has never met, with her clutch, and having to tell her that I pretty much stalked her to find out where she worked-"
"You didn't stalk her. Your job is to find things out about people. Which is exactly what you did," Bonnie was about to object when Quinn continued. "But I suppose you have a point." Quinn turned her head away from the window and to Bonnie who was sitting with her legs crossed on her desk. "I can't help it though… there's something about her."
Bonnie had a smart ass comment to make towards Quinn, but before she could say it Quinn's personal cell phone began to ring. Quinn jumped at the sound hoping that it was the small brunette that had managed to occupy her thought since she left Harmony's the night before. "Uh, Quinn," Bonnie picked up the phone. "Why is Harmony calling you?"
"Finally," Rachel walked into her shared apartment to see her favorite Latina watching T.V on the couch in booty shorts and tank with a sprite in hand.
"Hey Rach," the tall Latina smile allowing her perfect white teeth to show.
"Hi Santana," Rachel gave the girl a quick kiss on her temple before plopping down beside her on the couch.
Santana was Rachel's friend from high school. The two hadn't planned on rooming together at first, much less being in the same city, but after both ended up in New York and spent two months with roommates they couldn't stand they easily came to the conclusion that getting a simple two room apartment equal distance from their schools would fix their problems. Things were a little dicey the first few months, but once they got their groove things went smoothly for the two of them.
"What's wrong short stuff?" Santana lowered the volume of the TV and turned to her friend.
"Nothing is wrong per se, I'm just contemplating some things is all."
"Such as?"
"Okay," Rachel took a deep breath knowing the Latina would have a rather large reaction to what she was about to say. "Well I didn't tell you this yesterday because we were busy at the bar, but I met a girl."
"You did what?!"
"I met girl. Or rather she met me or whatever. Okay so," both girls sat up straighter, to face each other. Rachel taking off her shows before crossing her legs underneath her.
"Rach, spill." Santana wanted details pronto. She couldn't believe Rachel hadn't said anything to her all day.
"Okay, well I had just gotten done with the last song in the set and so I make my way off stage to head to the back and grab my stuff when some guy steps in front of me trying to flirt with me. I nicely told him I wasn't interested, but he didn't take that too well and grabbed me by my arm-"
"What! Rach why didn't you tell me, or call me? I would have come and got you. Did he hurt you Rachel?" Without giving the smaller brunette a chance to answer Santana grabbed Rachel's arms and lifted up her sleeves, examining her arms to make sure there were no marks. "What's his name? I'll take care of it."
"No, Santana," Rachel swatted away her friend's hands. "You didn't let me finish. He didn't do anything because as soon as he grabbed me this woman, Quinn Fabray, showed up and got him to let go." Santana focused on the name for a brief second feeling like she had heard before on multiple occasions, but let it go when nothing came to her. "I'm not exactly sure how, it looked like it was something personal between the two of them, but he let me go and she took me with her."
"So what? You have a knight in shining armor now?" Santana teased.
"No, it's nothing like that. She was just being nice."
Santana didn't buy it, especially not with the light blush grazing Rachel's cheeks. "Whatever, so what happened after that?"
"Well after that I had to go so I could make it to my shift, so I left."
"Just like that. You left. She saves you and you leave. Did you even say anything to her hmph-"
Rachel covered her roommate's mouth before she continued with the questioning. "Goodness Santana, are you just going to keep interrupting or can I finish now," Santana smirked then bit Rachel's palm causing her to pull away with a slight yelp. "That was mean."
She laughed and pulled Rachel's hand back to her and began rubbing light circles over where she bit. "You can continue."
Rachel beamed her best smile and continued, "Okay, so I ended up leaving without my clutch because I was in such a hurry to get to the bar on time. Anyway I planned on getting it after my shift at the diner today since I had a few hours to spare, but while I was there I met a woman who apparently worked for Quinn Fabray, and she had my clutch," Rachel saw as Santana's face changed to confused, and went into further detail. "She said that a man had come running out after me with my clutch but I was already gone and Miss Fabray had also followed me. So she took the clutch from the man and promised to return it which is why she sent the woman with my clutch, Bonnie, her name was." Rachel smiled, satisfied that she had managed to explain all of that to Santana, but her smile faded when she saw Santana wasn't as happy or even surprised. "What? What's wrong?"
"Rachel, how did this woman even find where you work or knew you would be there at the time you were?" Santana couldn't help but worry about the situation. It just didn't seem right to her.
"She's lawyer, and the woman who returned the clutch is a private investigator for their firm. That's why she was able to find me, but that's not even the part I'm contemplating."
"Then what is?"
"Well when she left I checked inside to make sure everything was still there, and everything was, but there was also something extra." Rachel paused for dramatic effect. "A paper," she took the paper out of her pocket (she had kept it there all day while trying to figure out if she should call the blonde).
Santana took it from Rachel and quickly read over it. She didn't like this at all. For multiple reasons, "Don't call her." Santana stated firmly.
"Why not?"
"Because, I think we should see if she'll actually show up. If she's a woman of her word. Now come on, we've gotta get ready for work." Santana kissed Rachel's palm quickly before bouncing up off the couch and heading towards her room.
Rachel watched the tall brunette leave. She knew that Santana didn't want her to call Quinn because she was worried, and didn't trust the blonde, but Rachel didn't think there was a need for her to worry so much. She was always trying to protect the small brunette, but sooner or later she felt Santana would have to learn she couldn't protect her all of the time. But since today was neither sooner nor later she proceeded to her own room to get dress for the long night she had ahead of her.