Rachel's feet made muddy footprints in the soil outside of the stone entrance. She turned her head as His arms wrapped around her waist and she smiled as He nuzzled her bare neck in the summer sun.
"What do you think?" he murmured into her ear.
"I think it's a cave," she giggled. "What's so special about it, o' great one?"
He took her hand and playfully tugged her inside. "Come on!"
Rachel grinned wryly at his devout mischievousness and followed him into the darkened space.
"How far back are we from the cabin, anyway?" she yawned. "I'm getting tired. And your parents wanted us back so we could have dinner and then the bonfire."
"Relax, Rach," He laughed at her. "We're only about a half-mile in. And it's not even five yet. Stop ruining the fun."
She hugged him. "Then show me what's so great! It's cold in here."
He led her farther back, just enough so that the sunlight was barely visible at all now. She shivered in the musty cave and clung to His t-shirt, afraid that at any moment a bat or goblin even may come attacking at her back.
They walked a bit farther in, and Rachel began hearing noises. "What's that?"
"You'll see. A little farther now."
Rachel sighed and began to see dim light ahead, so she quickened her pace. As they got closer, her claustrophobia grew so she raced ahead of Him and found the source.
There was a huge opening in the stone ceiling above, where a small waterfall trickled water into a large natural lagoon. Rachel gasped in awe.
"How did you find this place?" she murmured admiringly as He caught her shoulders.
"My little sister showed it to me the summer before she…" He trailed off. He always got upset when he talked about the death of his sister Lily. "Anyway, I've been coming back here since I was ten, the year she died was the year she found it. When she was five. It's always been my place with her, the only place I can be alone."
"But you brought me," Rachel frowned. He smiled at her and kissed her head.
"Yeah, I did," he agreed. "Because I needed to tell you something."
"Ok," Rachel sat on a large rock next to the lagoon and dangled her feet in the crystal foam. "Go ahead." He sat next to her, wrapping His arm around her shoulders.
He paused and she looked at Him. For a moment they sat there in silence until he finally spoke. "I'm not quite sure how to say this, but…well…here I go. Bear with me, Rach, please."
She smiled. "You got it."
"This past year has been the most incredible of my life," he admitted with a sigh. "This is so clichéd, and I know you hate that, but…"
"Go on," she laughed. "It's fine."
"I've never felt this way about anyone before. My dad won't listen to me. He says we're too young to have a relationship that's anything deeper than puppy love, but believe me, Rach, I beg to differ. This is what the songs talk about."
Rachel felt a tear glistening in her eye. "What is it?"
"It's love, Rach. I love you."
"I love you-"
BANG. The gunshot resonated throughout the cave as He fell to the ground, bleeding from his stomach. Rachel screamed and lept to her feet as They came towards her. Screamed. Scream.
Xx
Rachel awoke with a start and realized that she was sweating profusely. She was breathing heavily as she glanced wildly around. I'm not in a cave. It was That Dream again. She wiped back tendrils of dark hair from her forehead and realized that she was on a plane. What the fuck am I doing on a- Then it came to her. Forest. Snow. Knife. Chris. Alec Rocher. Uncle Freddie.
She looked at the seat next to her and saw a vacant spot. Maybe Alec had jumped off the plane. Wouldn't that be a nice surprise. She wondered vaguely where he was but her thoughts were disrupted as an older man leaned across the aisle to speak to her.
"Ma'am, if I may be frank with you for a brief moment, I was wondering if you're all right." Rachel smiled at him. He reminded her of her grandfather from Missouri. They looked a bit alike, with their thin wisps of white hair that curled delicately around their slightly pointed ears, giving them both elfish appearances.
"I'm fine," she lied. "Just having a bit of a nightmare."
"I understand," he nodded. "Dreadful little buggers, ain't they?"
She laughed a fake little giggle and nodded before looking out her window. She wondered how long she'd been out. Three, maybe four hours? She saw lights beneath them but didn't think that meant anything. A sudden wave of nausea overcame her already uncomfortable stomach and she craned her neck, searching the seats for Alec. In a way, she wanted him back next to her in the hope that he'd probably have Tums or some other blessed medicine to help her ailing body. But then, it was Alec. The sadist would probably just let her suffer and then tape it for her uncle to see. I've suffered enough. I'm going to look for help.
Rachel rose to wobbly feet as the seatbelt sign clicked on. For now, she ignored it. First priority was the bathroom.
Shit. A flight attendant gripped her shoulder. "Miss, I need to ask you to return to your sea-"
"No, I can't," Rachel forced out the words, not sure how her brain was managing to form words right now. She clamped a hand over her twisting stomach. "I-I'm sick, I'm going to be sick, I need the bathr-"
"There are bags in your seat, ma'am, please, for your own safety, I'm going to need to ask you to-"
"No, you don't understand!" Rachel finally cried. "I can't go back to my seat, I'm being held host-"
"Chloe," a voice rasped behind her.
Oh, shit. I'm screwed. Rachel gritted her teeth and didn't turn as the firm hand grasped her wrist.
"You heard the lady," he repeated calmly behind her. "Now calm down and come sit. I got you water and some Tums."
Rachel choked on a tear and she slowly turned to Alec as the plane rocked. The flight attendant, now extremely flustered by her crazed passenger, clung to the back of a chair.
Rachel's eyes held sorrow. Please don't make me do this, Alec, she mentally transmitted.
His face hardened and he held her firmly. "Chloe, come on now…dear." Rachel swallowed hard the building bile. Her head felt heavy.
She nodded limply and let Alec cart her back to her seat. She buckled in and Alec rattled the plastic cup of Tums before her face. She reached for them as another wave of queasiness rattled her esophagus. He cruelly jerked them away.
"Please!"
"I leave you alone for five minutes and you run off," he snarled, making sure to keep his voice low. "This isn't work if you don't stop abusing my trust."
"I was sick," she pleaded, then added as an afterthought, "I don't want it to work!"
He dug his nails into her hand. She whimpered as a red sticky liquid dotted his palm. Her blood. "Chris does, Rach. So does your uncle. He cares about you, you care about Chris. Nice chain. This needs to work. We're all depending on it, and face it, you're the crux. Everything depends upon Rachel Redford, middle-class snob from Hicksville."
She fell silent and Alec must have grown bored because he tossed the cup at her. She eagerly swallowed them and waited for her sickness to subside.
"This isn't fair," she murmured as the plane began its descent. After a glance at Alex's Rolex, she realized it was near five in the morning. Has that much time really passed? "None of this is fair."
"It's life, Rach," Alec snapped harshly. "Get used to it."
She turned angrily to look at him. "What the hell do you think you know about me? You may have stalked me but you don't know shit, Rocher."
"So its Rocher now?" he smirked. "I do know. I know you won't talk to anybody. You curl up into your little shell." He paused. "No one will miss you." Thanks a lot, asshole.
"You say it as if I'm already dead," she snapped. "And I'm not afraid to talk to them, if that's what you're implying. I just don't feel like it."
"Okay, Holden Caulfield," Alec rolled his eyes. "Snap out of it."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
He sighed and stretched as the plane bumped down the runway. "The Catcher In The Rye. Holden Caulfield is the main character? Always says he doesn't feel like doing something?"
Rachel turned from him in disgust, slightly confused that he read classic literature. "Whatever."
"Why don't you 'feel like' talking to people?"
"None of your goddamned business." There goes my Holden again.
"You brought this upon yourself, Rachel. Tell me or a certain someone with the initials CR will get a beautiful surprise. Somebody break your heart? Dump you? Cheat on you? You get mugged? Shot? Raped?" He listed off the causes with no difficulty or emphasis, though he placed a little bounce on the last word. You disgusting pig.
"No. Now shut up."
"Get it out, Rach, it'll make you feel better." The seatbelt sign clicked off again as the plane finally rested.
Change the subject, Rachel, or you'll have to go through this again. "Well, Alec, whatever happened to me is probably the same reason why you went into the assassination business. Correct?"
His eyes grew fuzzy for a moment, then turned blank. "No-well-I don't know. Come on."
Well, that worked, Rachel frowned. But now I'm confused. He doesn't know? There must be something that causes a person to willingly enter that line of work. It's not like if you become a teacher because the registration lines for the college classes are the shortest.
Alec grabbed his bag from the overhead and smirked at Rachel as he led her forcibly from the plane. "I never check baggage. Want to know why?"
"Not particularly, no."
He ignored her as they strolled through the terminal. "My friend gave me a tip a few years ago. See, if you're on a working flight and you happen to do something that might get you into a little legal trouble, for example, if you decapitate someone in the lavs, then you want to make a quick getaway."
Rachel felt sick. "So have your baggage sent to you."
"Ah, ah," he corrected. "Easily traced by security, your baggage will lead them to you and you'll get caught. Smart thinking?"
"Thanks, it'll be useful if I ever decide to kill people," Rachel rolled her eyes as he led her to a Dunkin Donuts kiosk.
"Hungry?"
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"Really?"
Rachel shot him a scathing look that could have frozen hell. "Listen, are you trying to get on my nerves or does it just come naturally?"
He shrugged happily. "I've a gift, what can I say? Now pick something to eat because you haven't eaten in a while and I can't afford to have you collapse in the middle of the job."
She quickly scanned the menu with pursed lips. "A plain bagel with a chocolate raspberry coffee."
"Now, was that so hard?" Rachel crossed her arms as he ordered and handed her a bag.
"I think that would be a 'thank you' that we're looking for, Vanna," Alec informed her as they sat at a dirty table.
"Buy a vowel, Alec, you're not getting one."
He laughed and ripped open his bag, pulling out two chocolate glazed donuts and a decaf coffee.
He had his first donut down before Rachel had taken three bites of her bagel.
"Don't be shy, Rach, the bagel isn't going to asphyxiate you."
She glared at him. "I'm not hungry when I'm upset."
Alec didn't get the hint. "I'm very sorry. Now eat, we have to stop somewhere before we go home."
Rachel reflected on how odd this was. I'm sitting in an airport terminal eating a bagel with a man who kidnapped me and plans to kill me if my uncle doesn't ransom. Sure. Makes sense. "Home? You're not locking me in a cell until my uncle ransoms?"
He snorted. "No. What good would that do?"
"I don't know. But it seems like-"
"-What they do in movies. You watch too many movies, Ms. Redford. That's not the way it works for my company. We take the hostages home. Get to know them a little. Unless they're really annoying, in which case we just kill them." He finished his second donut.
"Charming."
"I know. Aren't you excited?"
"I'm pegged." Hold on a minute, is this…banter? No. It simply can't be.
"Yeah, so, we all live in the one building. It's not bad. There's stuff to do, you know. Pretty nice place, and I live next to my boss, so-"
"That must be fun," Rachel rolled her eyes.
"Well, it is, because he's my best friend," Alec admitted honestly. "And he-um-kind of…has…a girlfriend, so you'll…"
"I'm so excited to buddy-buddy with an assassin's whore," Rachel spat truthfully. Who in their right mind would fall in love with a killer?
Alec glared at her. "If you have to know, she's in the same predicament you are."
Rachel frowned. "She's a hostage?"
"No. Well, kind of. You might have heard of her. The one who was involved in the Lux explosion and is now being blamed for the whole thing because she disappeared. God, what's her name?"
"Lisa Reisert," Rachel answered numbly. I don't believe this. I almost feel starstruck. Lisa Reisert? Wow. "Why would she go with you guys?"
"Well, Jackson kind of-well-took…her…along, so he'd have…er…company, you know, and-"
Rachel threw her half-eaten bagel back down onto its foil covering. "You people are disgusting. Every last one of you. You're like…slave traders. Women are people, you know. You can't just kidnap one and expect her to be yours."
"You know, I'm not asking that of you."
Rachel blushed. Boy, did that come out wrong. "That's not what I said. Jackson is asking that of Lisa, though, isn't he?"
"Well, kind of, yeah, but…"
"Shut up, Alec." Rachel felt her face redden even more and she shoved her food away, trembling as she sipped at her coffee.
After a few minutes he spoke. "Are you ready?"
"Whatever." She stood and threw away her trash but held on to her coffee. I need the caffeine.
"Where's my coat?" Alec stood and glanced around her chair.
"I don't have it."
He sighed irritably. "You lost it?"
"It's your coat."
"But I gave it to you for the plane ride."
"I'm not your property, I'm not going to wear your clothes."
Alec groaned angrily and just grabbed his bag and roughly her arm, leading them out of the airport into the bright sunshine.
"Where are we, anyway?" Rachel grumbled.
"Well, Rachel," he hissed into her face. This man has more mood swings than Lindsay Lohan. "Welcome to Orlando."