Someone told me that I 'give good fic'. If that's not a good reason to write, I don't know what is.

/

Each one is different.

A certain scent, a certain viscosity. And the way it burns - that's different for each one, too. Some of them flare up in oranges and blues. Some of them rush like a current of red. Some of them pop and hiss the minute a spark touches down. And others are a roar, taking over a room and then tearing up everything in sight.

Mother Nature does it.

Ashley does it, too.

"While I'm here, Dennison, let's discuss some other details in this new partnership of ours."

Spencer's voice is cool and congenial. But Ashley has a duffel bag and a lighter and those words don't seem as final as they could.
The gears are still turning. Her mind is still working to put the pieces in the right places.
And if this is to buy Ashley time, then Ashley is going to make the most of the seconds given.

And she doesn't like this game, but she's in it now.
No way out. No way to turn back the clock. No way to stop the urge to burn, it's been there too long, flames in her blood.

"Of course." And the man smiles, but it is not as pleased as before. Aiden had plans and Ashley knows she's at the heart of them. Plans like fingers broken. Plans like taunts in front of her busted face. Plans like punishment for a perceived betrayal, his hands around Ashley's neck.

But there are other factors at work, things that Aiden Dennison is either too cocky or too stupid to notice.
And Spencer smiles. And Ashley swallows down her nervousness. And Aiden waves a man over, instructing him to take Ashley away.

As if it were perfect, like she had written it and was now watching it play out, they don't take the bag away from her. They just toss her in a room, far down one hallway, with a table and a window high above - and nothing more.

And once the door shuts, Ashley starts looking for whatever tricks Spencer Carlin has slipped up her sleeve.

/ / / /

He'd shove her out, if that were possible and if that were wise.
But there is the business - the streets and the money and the power and the deals.
And there is the personal - the sex and the suits and the fear and the anger.

He'd rush her along, if that were smart and if that were in his best interest.
But there is the business - the contracts and the palm-greasing and the talks.
And there is the personal - the cars and the late nights and the smirks and the cold laughter.

Spencer Carlin is picking over parts of this collaboration with a fine-tooth comb and Aiden fights the urge to rolls his eyes.
But he answers patiently. And always with a grin, bourbon at their fingertips.
The trappings of their respective fame - the faces they have wiped out and the kingdoms they will topple... Oh, it can be grand and he knows it and so he'll indulge her questions.

The personal can wait a bit longer.
The personal can sit on ice for a moment or two more.

Ashley, charcoal hands and underground ways, is back in the fold.
And as much as he likes her, because he does like her... It'll be good to let her go.

For good.

/ / /

Smells like butterscotch in that hair-spray bottle, weirdly sweet. But there is sharpness there, too. Like the stripping of finger-nails, color removed.

And this is the shit that kids use to get high, the ones too poor to score pills or powder.

But it'll catch fire as well, if not better, than gasoline.

And it's not enough to render this place to nothing... Then again, that doesn't seem to be Spencer's ultimate plan.

A magazine for tinder. A lighter. A bottle full of flammable liquid.

And in that toothbrush holder, rolled up tight, is the only advice given.
The only solution to Spencer's problems. The only rule that Ashley cannot bend nor break.

"take him out and you'll be free"

The perks are pretty high, right?
The man who wants her dead, wants to make her life just a footnote, would be eliminated - for good. The woman who controls this, who has set up this dilemma, promising freedom with just a few syllables.

And it's tempting, a chance to rewrite history by killing the present.
A chance at walking away and starting over.
But what is the future if you cannot forget the past? The racing of heat and the father carted away and the man she killed - these are things she has not released from her memory.

Adding another murder won't solve it.
And dying would solve it, either.

Ashley stares at the door, running her fingers over the lighter again and again, knowing that soon that door will open and all her decisions will made for her.

Fight.
Flight.
Live.
Die.
Play.
Lose.
Him. Her.

Or me...?

/ /

Finally, the woman leaves and takes her boys with her. And the locks are thrown down. And the main lights turned off. And Aiden waves away his bodyguards, because this is personal.

They've been around for many of his blood-lettings. They've been the fists and they've been the barrels pointed to foreheads. They've been the long knives in the night.

But not this time.
This is personal.
And they know they would get the same if they ever left, if they ever dared to take off and hide away. So, they step aside and watch the doors and play card games.
They don't watch him walk down the hallway, blazer slowly taken off. They don't see him roll up the sleeves and loosen the tie.

They don't need to see any of those things to know that leaving Aiden Dennison is bad for your health.

Because underneath the polish and the boyish good looks, there is a cruelty that would probably even shock Spencer Carlin.
And Aiden demands absolute loyalty.
And he'll get it - even its with a person's last breath.

/

"Did you pay attention?"
"Yes, ma'am"
"Where?"
"End of the hallway, last door on the left."
"And you've got the layout?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Find the room and get near it, see if there is a way in or out of there besides the door."
"Yes, ma'am."

She nods her head and off he goes, no need to hear the words.
And she snaps her fingers, a soft click in an otherwise silent alleyway, as another man appears from the darkness.

"We know he has some surveilliance. Talk to Harris. And then get rid of it, quick."
"Yes, ma'am."

But that potential flaw weighs heavily, pushing like a hand to the back of her head and she must slap it back, tell it to shut the hell up.

Because you have choices in this lifetime - do you save your body or do you save your soul?
Do you lose what makes you human in order to stay alive? Do you sacrifice your morals and your standards just so you can walk away, unscathed?

Spencer has made these choices so many times.
A blink of the eyes and another sliver of morality falls down, drowning in a man's blood pooling at her shoes and the blank stare of the dead.
This is the world she lives in. This is the business she deals in.

It's nothing personal.

Of course, though, there is that flaw. And that flaw looks like Ashley Davies.
Looks like her too deep gaze of brown. Looks like her fearful snarl and wicked touches.

And Spencer isn't sure if the woman can do what needs to be done, isn't sure if Ashley will make her own life more important than the life of the man who wants her dead.

Spencer finds her hand gripping the gun strapped to her hip, stiff and unrelenting hold upon the handle. This tension is not new, but it is stronger. It is slightly different, in ways that can be mistaken and be lied about later.

Spencer wonders what she'll be asked to sacrifice tonight.

And she wonders, for a second, if she'll be able to do so.

TBC