CHAP FOUR
So I helped Ray. First, just as a player in his work and array of characters needed to accomplish his tasks. As time went on, I watched his back and took on a more active role in cases. We helped people who needed help, but for whatever reason could not go through proper channels or legal methods. There was still no money exchanged. You don t work for money? a client would ask.
Ray would smile. "It s a personal shortcoming."
Ray taught. I learned. A small business being pushed under by a shady corrupt community leader; a man who lost his savings in a land scam;a nurse being stalked by a former patient (not all those stalking laws were in effect then); a homeowner being forcedfrom his home and neighborhood by drug dealing neighbors, a psychologist who feared one of his patients was a formerKGB agent and had been killed the list went on and on. Ray and I worked systematically, when we wanted to, for whomwe wanted to.
Ray kept notes and files on each and every person he helped and a web of how they somehow intertwined.
We worked mostly out of California then. I did graduate with honors achieving my degree in Criminal Justice and
Psychology. Ray came to the graduation and looked on with pride. He gave me a pair of carat diamond stud earrings.
After I didn t have any class work tying me down, we became more mobile, staying gone for weeks at a time. I gave up
my apartment to save my money, moving my things into the large beach house Ray kept at that time (a favor , in
which was rent and utility free on lease for 2 years in someone else s name, leaving no ties to Ray or me.) He started my
transition into wiping myself off the grid. I paid off any bills or credit in my name, closed all my bank accounts,
moving my remaining inheritance and money from the house into a private Swiss account under my new alias, Bella
James.
Bella because, as Ray stated, it was Italian for Beautiful.
Ray operated using cash only when it was necessary, money occasionally was wired to him from a source I was yet to become aware of.
"Contrary to popular belief, the world doesn t run on money. There s more to life love, friendship and understanding," he said once.
But I finally learned of Benjamin, the mysterious benefactor/philanthropist who had been as much of a mentor to Ray as
he was to me. It was 3 years into our working relationship before we journeyed to Colorado.
It was a spring, I remember. As I said, we worked on a schedule and pace fitting to need. We meshed; he knew how I
thought (I was beginning to anticipate him as well by now) and sometimes it was almost as though he read my mind.
He continued to teach me new skills more weapons, security type things, kinesics or how to read people and patterns
in speech, things I would never have though of. Sometimes we philosophically debated, but rarely argued. That may
have been because there were no real emotional ties yet. We were not a couple. We were partners. When one of us neededa break, we took it.
When that meant being apart and alone, it was understood and we were better for it. But that spring,
we decided to vacation together. We took a trip to the Greece and the Greek Isles. It was a gift from Benjamin I found out
later and we took the opportunity to relax before embarking on a different sort of journey.
The lease on the beach house would be up when we returned and Ray talked about a more permanent and secured
location for base. That was when he told me about Benjamin, and the Colorado property where we might find that.
I was fine with it. We had been traveling for 3 years, what else would I do? Sometimes I longed for some security
and a sense of home . I ventured to think this might be the place I would find it.
I let myself enjoy Greece and our Villa, south of Thessaloniki in the beginning of Kassandra, the western peninsula
of Halkidiki in Greece, a quiet place - the realm of beautiful butterflies. It is situated in the reserve of
Mediterranean pines. The path to the beach held smells of pine and aloe, and looking south the hills of aton could
just be seen. On the beach there were almost always blooming sand lilies. The villa was surrounded by a beautiful
garden with flowers and the greenest of well manicured grass. The beach was of smooth white sands and rolling waves
of blue water carressed it with a gentle sernade. I had never seen water so blue and so clear. It was there I learned
to snorkel and scuba dive in the warm water.
I was chored with learning piano before we left and it was coming along well, and luckily (probably on purpose) our villa
had a baby grand piano in a lovely salon with green and white tiles and a wall of windows that opened and looked
out on the sea. I toiled a bit each afternoon, my latest accomplishment being Moonlight Sonata. I about had it, with
minor mis strokes of a key. Ray stood in one open door and listened, and as I glanced at him then, it was almost magical
capturing his absolute look of peace then. Funny how those moments become memories.
One evening, as we had dinner on the veranda of our villa overlooking the beach and ocean, three or four glasses of
wine in, I broached a subject that sometimes crossed my mind, but rarely my lips.
"Do you ever want more Ray?"
"More wine?" he replied coyly. He knew full well what I meant.
"More in life. The things some people have. Normalcy. A home. Family."
He raised an eyebrow. "I guess I m just different. Why? Do you want those things? Or did your biological clock start ticking?"
He was being smart.
I pursed my lips, letting him know I wasn t amused. "Funny."
I was 27 years old then. Most of my 20 s had been devoted to a man who I had never even kissed.
"I was just thinking about the place in Colorado. I do think it would be nice, a more permenant place. Although,
thanks to you, I ve learned to be comfortable anywhere."
I poured another glass and took it to stand near the wroght iron scrolled balcony railling. "I don t feel like children should be brought into a world where things are so uncertain and conditions are just not there for a bright future. Maybe 10 years ago I would t have felt that way, but I have seen so many things Ray. The world can be ugly. Maybe if more people thought that way, or even thought about the matter at all, maybe we would have less homless, abused, or abandoned and neglected kids out there."
Ray stood to join me. The warm evening breeze came off the ocean with a salty clean smell and blew through my loose hair.
"I ve told you Bella, family and home to me is where I am that moment, the people I m with, who I help."
"And me?" I asked tenatively.
"Of course you. Sometimes mostly you."
I smiled distantly. This satisfied me enough. We watched as the sun dipped into the water, the last of its pink and orange light streaming away.
Ray brushed a loose tendril of my then very long hair off my shoulder softly. Then, ever so gently, he kissed by bare shoulder.
I was a little shocked, very excited, and extremely aroused by the simple gesture.
"What is it you are missing Camilla Bella?" he asked softly, that voice so hypnotic, close then to my ear.
"Closeness. Touch," I said, my mind so trained to answer truthfully to him, it slipped out before a lie could even form.
"All you 'd ever have to do is ask."
I could feel his warm breath on my neck.
I turned now facing him, our bodies mere inches away, close enough to feel his warmth in the cooling breeze. I shivered.
"What if ...I m asking?"
He slowly put both hands up to my face and tilted it up towards his and kissed me.
The electricity and overwhelming need flooded through me with that kiss. It was as if a whole new door had been
opened and something wonderful beconed me to come throguh it. The kiss lasted long enough to thrill and excite me
but not long enough to satisfy me.
I knew Ray had had his share of lovers, one or two even since we d met. I on the other hand, had not since early
college days, felt I wanted that sort of relationship. So many things raced throguh my brain, but just then, I chose
to shut it off and instead follow the myraid of other feelings.
He finally broke his lips from mine.
"Are you?" The master of answering a question with a question.
"Yes," I said, slightly breathless and dizzy from all the feelings coursing through me.
So that is when Ray took my hand and led me to the bedroom and taught me, just like so many other things, the
art of making love. Not the tedium I d endured from a highschool sweetheart or a college date, which was all I had
known till then. This was a sweet concious melody of two people exploring and discovering desires. Ray was a man of many, many talents and I discovered in this area he was not lacking any skills either. We didn t sleep until after
3 am, finaly sated. And he held me, even in slumber, like he loved me. I knew then, like I do now he did.