19. The Irresistible Force
Someone should have taught her that most coercive techniques worked best when used subtly. Even if he didn't already know from that fracas the evening before last, that Lucia had as much experience with sex and seduction as a Luddite, Neo-Green Lifer had with computers and cell phones, her blatantly revealing attire, decorously contradicted by the way she kept putting her hand at her hip to hold it together, was possibly the most obvious ruse he had ever had attempted on him. Plainly her position as the daughter of the most powerful political figure in the country, coupled with her striking if angular good looks, and the fact that she was younger by at least two decades than most of the men with and for whom she worked, meant she had not needed to hone her skills much in this area. He had barely suppressed a laugh when he had seen her in the Minister's study after he had completed that night's outdoor survey.
Apparently the only useful information she had gleaned from their previous meeting was that he found her physically attractive, and she was determined to use this fact to pry more information from him. This was not a good tactic to use on him, even if it had not been so clumsily executed. If the most important thing before a job was research and preparation, the most crucial element during it was focus. And what she was proposing was something anathema to maintaining proper focus. It was a distraction--something to be avoided at all costs, now that she was his client and her safety was his responsibility, and certainly not something to be sought after, and obtained through the exchange of information.
Not that he had much on that account in any case. The Ministry's office memos had been strangely quiet regarding the Groesbeck campaign, although he had found plenty of correspondence regarding the other, losing Opposition candidates from that same election. Lucia's name was glaringly conspicuous by its absence, appearing only on one crumpled post-it note (retrieved from under a desk), which looked as if it had been pulled off a large diagram showing the locations of districts up for the next round of elections.
He had steadfastly stonewalled her for more than an hour, until she had given up her ill-suited role as femme fatale and reverted to the clearly more accustomed one of spoiled brat. At least she had become quieter, even though it was now apparent that she had deliberately concealed items pertinent to the case in order to trade with him. If this continued he was going to have to impress upon her the danger she was in, as well as how seriously he took his jobs, and the consequences of baiting him.
Now she was kneeling beside his chair, reiterating the same questions she had peppered him with before, but adding the new, and much more effective distraction of her fingers, lightly brushing against the top of his thigh. It was becoming difficult to continue comparing names and dates on the correspondence with those he had jotted down in his notebook at the Ministry Office the previous day. He was going to have to make her stop.
And then she did. And she asked the question he had been expecting her to ask, but not in the way he had expected her to ask it. It was still the dreaded question, and she knew it was too. But it was phrased in such a manner that he thought he might be able to answer her, almost like a regular question a client might ask before securing his services. She wasn't happy with his answer.
"You can't guard someone and kill them at the same time," a tiny whisper, her face suddenly bloodless, she fell backwards onto her hands and crawled away from him, never taking her eyes from his face. "You can't guard someone and kill them at the same time," louder, with the beginnings of a panicked edge to her voice. "You can't…at the same time…" She had reached the door of the room and pulled herself upright with her hands on the doorframe. Eyes wide, they bored into his, searching for something. Not finding it, she turned and bolted down the hall.
Out of the chair, he was ahead of her before she reached the end of the hall. She crashed into him at her full speed and he grabbed her shoulders with his hands to prevent her from falling. An excoriating, terrified scream tore from her throat. Illumi was usually spared such screams. Preferring to strike from a distance, he had usually dispatched his targets before they were even aware of a threat. He had, however, occasionally employed other methods, and as a child had been trained in all forms of killing, and so he recognized the unmistakable scream of someone in fear of her life. She thought he was going to kill her. Ironic, considering that it had been his own wish to avoid that very thing that had driven him to seek her employ. He needed to calm her down, to reassure her.
"Lucia, Lucia, stop. Stop now," he cooed softly, holding her tightly to himself with his right arm around her waist, while he stroked and smoothed her hair with his left hand. She stiffened against him and struggled to pull away, but he held her fast, softly shushing. He had had a hand in training all his younger brothers and he knew he was good at this part, the comforting after the pain. The servants had been roused and were coming, and soon after the guards would follow, so Illumi kept his left arm around her shoulders and lowered his right arm, reaching around to slide it under her knees and pick her up. He ran down the hall and out the back of the house through the solarium. He jumped to scale her garden wall and didn't stop running until he had reached a small Zaoldyeck safe house just outside the capital.
He didn't enter the house proper, but went around to the back, to a small garden with a large two-person swing. The autumn moon was bright overhead but provided no warmth, and it was chilly outside as he sat down holding her in his lap. He thought she would be warm enough as long as he held her. She had stopped struggling when he picked her up and now she was just softly crying against him.
"When?" she said weakly, not bothering to lift her face from his chest.
"When what, Lucia?"
Testily now, "When can you kill me? A week from now? A month?"
He sighed. "I'm not here to kill you. I'm here to protect you. You have to trust me."
At that she did look up, with a little anger in her eyes, Illumi thought it suited her better than the fear. "That's not very easy when you won't trust me."
