Hello everyone- it'll be a little bit before the next update, although I'm hoping to squeeze one more in before Thursday... at any rate, here's a long one. Have a wonderful weekend and a great Thanksgiving, just in case!
:) leanmean
Rachel clicks to the next screen, her face frozen in shock.
This is not good.
The muffled ring of a cell phone tucked in the corner cabinet agrees. Swallowing, Rachel opens the drawer slowly, pulling out the phone and grimacing as she sets it against her ear.
"Hello?"
"What was the deal, Rachel."
Sighing, Rachel scrolls to the bottom of the screen, studying the Q. Fabray written under the screen shot of her smiling behind a microphone.
"I didn't know press would be there."
"Doesn't matter," the man says. Rachel can practically see him, sitting at his desk surrounded by paperwork, his fingers pressing into his temples. "You signed a contract and you broke it. You have to be removed. We're coming to get you tonight so pack a bag."
Rachel huffs, crossing her arms at the table. Her dads, the mob, now the witness protection program... she's so tired of everyone else getting a say except for her. No. They're saving her life blah, blah, blah, but if she's not living, what's the point?
"Look, I've done a fine job of keeping myself perfectly safe. I'm not living in a box for the next four weeks. I'm just not. So you can come to terms with that in your own time."
His frustrated sigh echoes over the phone line for a solid minute. This guy must have taken lessons from her parents, Rachel thinks, cringing as she clicks to the next screen and more pictures of her pop up.
"Rachel you realize as the trial gets closer, Maroney is going to put a lot more effort into finding you. You're the only person left to testify against him. That means, you're all he has to do in the next month. That's it. One wrong turn and you're as good as dead."
Closing her laptop, Rachel sips her tea. Touche, good sir.
"What if, if anything appears even remotely out of the ordinary, I use this handy emergency cell you got me and call you immediately. You're the government. I have faith you'll get there in a timely manner."
"And if I disagree?"
"Good luck finding me. I took the tracker out of this phone six months ago. It's probably washed all the way to England by now."
Rachel bites back a laugh as she hears papers crumple together on the other end.
"Fine. But word to the wise, they've got a connection on you now, Rachel. They may not know exactly where you are, but they have a start. Don't go back to that club and for God's sake stay away from that reporter. The last thing I need is your face in magazines."
With that, the line goes dead and Rachel sets the phone down on the table. That went well. The cell beeps, one new text message. Opening it, Rachel sighs tiredly.
Disappear for one more month. It's all I ask.
One month without Quinn? It's...possible, she supposes, though it certainly wouldn't be easy. Plus she did promise Brittany she would do this Friday's show with her... she'd just have to call her and get out of it. Finishing off her tea, she opens her laptop again and pulls up solitaire.
One more month of being a hermit. Fantastic.
"Quinn Fabray?"
"Good morning," Quinn says, shaking the hand of the approaching woman. Her dark brown hair had started to gray, but the way that she flowed across the room to her, even in an empty bar, echoed of a life spent on stage. Must be one of the owners, Quinn thought, tucking a loose hair behind her ear.
"And to you." She gestures towards a table. "I'm Patti and this..." she says, spreading her arms towards the flowing fabrics and mirrors, the low lit bar and puttering musicians in the corner, "...is my kingdom. Well half mine." She winks. "It sounds like you're going to get to know it very well in the next week."
"I hope so," Quinn says, setting the video gear down on the table as she adjusts the strap of the camera around her neck. "I don't want to put anyone out or be in the way. I'm really just hoping to get a... well, a real taste of what this place has to offer."
Patti nods, raising a mug to her lip and sipping. "I read your editorial online and I've got to say, if anyone is going to look in all our dark corners, I'm glad it's you. I like your style. It could go a long way around here, if that's something you're ever interested in."
Flushing, Quinn grins and ducks her head.
"Thank you, Patti, that means a lot. You know it's kind of rare for me to find something that really gets my juices flowing, so I'm hoping to really make something you'll be proud of in the end."
"Oh I have no doubt," she says, patting the top of Quinn's hand. "You are free to do whatever you need to do here, Quinn. You come and go as you please, and if you have any questions or have trouble with anyone, just let me know. Sound good?"
"Sound perfect, Patti. Thanks for being so generous."
"Hey, you just do what you do, and we'll both win." She adds with a wink, picking up her mug and standing. "If you want to start today, you're more than welcome to. Everyone in house knows why you're here and is super excited... and considering these are mostly performers, consider this your warning: they're not camera shy."
Chucking, she reaches to shake Patti's hand.
"I'll keep that in mind." Grabbing her equipment, she follows her towards the stage, where morning practice is already underway.
Quinn smiles at Brittany, who waves at her while sinking into a split. Setting her video camera to record rehearsal from a tripod, she moves to the front of the stage, letting her photographer's eye get inspired.
"Alright let's run the first act with changes, ladies. Where's Rachel?"
"Here!"
A rush of brown hair speeds onto the stage, tossing a bag and a coat on its way. Rachel swipes the hair off her face and, slightly out of breath, her rosy cheeks break into a grin at center stage.
"Sorry, Patti. Traffic."
Patti taps a clipboard on a table and clears her throat, moving glasses from the top of her head onto her nose.
"This time only. Take five to stretch."
Rachel nods and sets her mike down, falling into a stretch next to Brittany. As she leans down to wrap her hands around her ankle her eyes catch Quinn's and avert quickly back to Brittany. Quinn shakes her head, snapping a picture of the two huddled together.
Rachel wouldn't ignore her on purpose. Would she?
As the girls line up for the new opener she settles onto a table top to get better lighting, but the song starts, hips gyrate, and she forgets the camera anyway, her mouth hanging open instead.
"Stop, stop!" Patti calls, waving off the music. "Brittany when you get to Lhana I want you to grope her, got it?" Quinn chuckles at Brittany's face, clearly thinking about how Santana is going to react to that on Friday.
"This isn't flashlight tag girls. We get to touch. Again from the top."
The music restarts, the girls begin again, and all thoughts of Santana slip from her mind. As the lights shift to red and Rachel belts out the opening lyrics, Quinn captures it in her lens, bobbing her head to the beat. Before she knows it rehearsal is over and Rachel's a blur again, shooting out the back door like her shoes are on fire. Slipping her camera off her neck, Quinn motions towards the door when a dancer comes down to sit on the stage edge.
"Where's she going?"
The dancer shrugs, sipping her water bottle.
"I don't think she's supposed to even be here anymore, but Brittany talked her into doing one more show. So, she maybe she's got other commitments."
That could be, Quinn thinks, but she finds it interesting that Rachel's new behavior showed up the same day as her. Quinn chats with the girl while she finishes her water, slipping the finished roll out of her camera and resetting a new one. What Rachel Berry does with her days may be a mystery, but she does know one thing for sure. She's totally gonna need more film.
Rachel huffs as she attempts to get her hair just right for the third time. For goodness sake Berry it's a ponytail, just do it! Checking the clock she sighs, resigning to the sloppy mess on top her head rather than being late to practice for a second time. Patti is forgiving, but not that forgiving. Throwing her oversized handbag on her shoulder, Rachel locks her front door and heads for the steps. If she took the subway she could get there just a minute before rehearsal began, whereby avoiding all possible moments to be confronted by one Quinn Fabray. Sure, she would get no warm up, again. But sacrifices for the sake of...sanity... had to be made.
Who's she joking? The last few days had been pure hell. Flipping up her hood, she takes the steps down to the subway. Is hiding behind curtains and slipping through back alley doors a little creepy? Sure. Does it do anything to help with the way the other dancers are already weird around her, curious as to where she's been the last few months? Not one bit. But if it means she fulfills her duties to Brittany AND avoids getting anymore features from the blonde she'd rather be...fulfilling... well then so be it.
Rachel smiles at the thought of Quinn, her finger poised over the snap button of her camera, eyebrows knitted in concentration, studying the girls in the light. Her passion for her work inspired Rachel almost as much as the calm confidence that came over the blonde as she fluttered about the bar, capturing her ideas on film. Sitting on the cold hard bench of the subway, Rachel's insides tickle at what it feels like, being on the opposite end of that calculating look, the subject of the hazel eyes behind that lens. There is so much to Quinn, so much more than the attraction she feels to her physically.
Of course if she chases those feelings, if she lets them bloom like she knows they will, she's really only hurting Quinn in the long run. She's not even supposed to leave her apartment, how is she supposed to court ideas of a relationship. The best thing she can do for her is walk away. Run away even.
Stepping off the subway at her stop, Rachel shoulders her bag again and starts towards the stairs up to the street, the quick look over her shoulder to check for followers a well trained habit.
Now she finally had a chance with Quinn, and she would have to let it slip through her fingers again.
Pulling open the door to the Black Cat, the blonde in question stands on the other side, apparently on her way out. Rachel chuckles quietly and steps aside, holding the door open for the girl.
"Afternoon, Quinn."
"Hey, Rach." She smiles, squeezing the girl's arm as she turns back towards the parking lot. Rachel's skin burns where her fingers brushed. Pulling the door shut behind her, she walks through the dark to the stage and sets her stuff down, turning to take in the empty house.
Slipping into a chair, she sighs. When it comes right down to it, could she live with letting go? Maybe she was putting herself at risk... but maybe it's worth it. The steady thump against her ribs when Quinn enters through the front carrying an armful of equipment seems to her, an answer enough.
For Quinn to say she was a little disappointed would be an understatement. Three days at the Black Cat and she had yet to catch more than a glimpse of Rachel outside of her time on stage. It was to the point where Quinn was pretty convinced she'd have to actually join the cast in order to talk to the girl, even if it was just about choreography. Sighing to herself, she follows Brittany and a few other girls through the wardrobe racks backstage, videotaping the dancers as they gave her the "official" tour.
"So is there a certain order to this or..?" Quinn says, flipping through a few outfits. The girls nod as Brittany holds a satin vest up against her.
"Ear bling, ring, glittery thing, boa, boots, fishnet stocking."
Quinn laughs, nodding her head, and snapping a quick picture of Brittany posing with a crown. Between her camera and the video, she was going to have enough footage to do ten documentaries and five magazine spreads.
As the dancers finish introducing her to their costume methods, Quinn continues through the back stage, filming the crew as they build props to be used in new songs for the weekend. A couple wink at her and she smiles shamelessly, waving them away from behind the lens. One morning session together and she'd been shooting their requests for drinks and dinner down ever since. As she spins the camera slowly to catch all the action, the gold star of the cast room catches her eye and she blushes at the thought of her last visit there.
Well why not. If she couldn't see Rachel, at least she could relive the memory.
She enters the room, running her fingers along the silky fabrics, the bright colors blending and overlapping on the screen. Panning out, she pushes through the final red sheer and turns a sweeping circle in the room, commentating under her breath.
"And this is where the magic happens... Here we have the make-up mirrors, where Rachel curls her pretty hair. And here we have the accessories, which never shine quite as bright as Rachel does. And here we have the cushion corner, where Rachel lays her pretty head."
"And where does Quinn lay her pretty head?"
Quinn closes her eyes, gasping at the unexpected husk of Rachel's voice so close and the sudden flood of warmth between her thighs. This room is definitely starting to be her favorite. She sighs as the heat of Rachel's body moves in behind hers, pressing her front to Quinn's back, and all feelings of confusion from the last few days are suddenly forgotten.
"Rach—"
"Shh.." Rachel starts, running her fingers down Quinn's forearms, wrapping her hand around the camera, and tossing it softly towards a chair of boas.
"I'm starting to think you come with the room, Quinn." Trailing her hands up Quinn's arms and down her spine, she wraps her fingers around her hip bones and pulls her back flush against her chest. Quinn whimpers weakly, the sound producing a quick gust of breath against her shoulder blade as Rachel laughs, then presses a kiss there.
"I'm also starting to think you wouldn't mind that either." Quinn squeezes her eyes shut, willing herself not to combust with the pressure of Rachel's fingers digging into her hips. She's not sure what she had expected all these years, but the Rachel she's met in private is exactly as confident and driven as the public Rachel, and it's unbelievably sexy. Quinn's always prided herself in being the girl who doesn't get pushed around, but as Rachel's fingertips trace the skin along the waist of her jeans, she thinks... change can be good.
"I've been thinking about you," Quinn says quietly, over her shoulder. She catches a glimpse of Rachel's dark hair before it disappears out of view, punctuated with the quick nip of teeth at the bottom of her shoulder blade. "I was looking for you all morning."
She also kind of thought Rachel would be a talker, which is apparently not the case.
Quinn reaches for Rachel's wandering hands, pulling them softly together in her own in front of her belly button to appraise them. She runs her thumbs along the smooth olive skin as she feels Rachel rest her forehead against her spine. The brunette's whisper breaks the silence.
"I've thought of you forever."
Her thumbs still. Rachel hums a low easy note as Quinn pulls her around her torso, stopping her when they're face to face.
"Why didn't you tell me?" She says, cupping her hand against Rachel's cheek. She shrugs, turning her head to press a kiss to her open palm, her brown eyes meeting Quinn's without hesitation.
"I'd rather show you."
Tipping up on her toes, Rachel reaches to meet Quinn, and when she does, the kiss is slow and seeking, steady and sure in a way that makes Quinn's stomach flutter with expectation. Smiling into the kiss, her knees weaken as she feels Rachel do the same, the thought of her being as happy as she is right now almost too good to be true.
"Sweet God my retinas. Brittany! BRITTANY! I'm blind!"
Quinn tears her lips from Rachel's, turning to find Santana standing stock still with a look of horror on her face.
"Isn't there a sign you could put on the door?! Don't enter on fear of death?" Santana is almost as pale as Quinn when Brittany barges through the hanging sheers, wrapping Santana in a bear hug.
"It's okay Santana, I've got you! It's Brittany, no punch!"
Quinn's lip quirks at Rachel's low chuckle behind her.
"Sorry Santana. I thought everyone was out of here for the day. I was just doing some filming."
Santana holds a hand up, her eyes closing as she pinches the bridge of her nose.
"Please God, woman, do not tell me about you and Berry's home movies."
Brittany beams as she tilts her head against Santana's shoulder.
"Ohhhh I like home movies! Remember that one we watched of you when you were little San? You were so cute!"
"That was Paranormal Activity, B, not a home movie."
Quinn snickers as Rachel's silent laughter vibrates against her back. Santana sighs, defeated, and slips an arm around Brittany's waist.
"Can we please just go home so I can wash my eyes with bleach?"
Brittany kisses her cheek and tugs her arm, leading the two out of the room.
"Let's stop and get ice cream on the way. Bye Quinn, Bye Rachel!"
The two wave back as they leave, the draping fabric slipping softly back into place.
"Well," Quinn starts, turning to wrap Rachel in a hug. "That could have gone... less dramatically."
Rachel presses a kiss to her neck and leans into her embrace, still chuckling.
"I hope Brittany doesn't actually get her bleach when they get home. Santana checks that stuff, right?"
Quinn smiles, breaking away from Rachel to pick up her camera, then holds out an arm for her to hold.
"She does," she says, holding back the first sheer for Rachel to walk through. "She'll find it adorable if Brittany does get her bleach actually. I've learned to just casually sniff everything before I put it in my mouth at their place... for several reasons."
Rachel's eyebrows furrow as they exit the cast room side by side, the crew and dancers following the pair with their eyes as they walk towards the exit.
"I don't want to know, do I..."
Quinn pulls her closer as she pushes open the back door, chuckling as the last dreads of sunset filter brilliantly across the sky.
"You definitely don't want to know."
Rachel waves fondly to Quinn as she closes her door, flipping on the radio as she starts the car and waits for it to warm up. She knows she should have just stayed away from "that reporter," but a girl can only do so much, especially when they happen upon their favorite blonde being particularly adorable. The way Quinn moved between her and Santana was enough evidence. Quinn did like her and she almost seemed nervous that Rachel didn't feel the same way. Rachel laughs at the thought, putting her car into reverse and backing out of her space.
How could anyone not like Quinn?
She would just have to come to terms. If she can't stay away from Quinn, she sure as hell better protect her. Maybe she should avoid her when everyone else is around… tactical meetings?
Yes, that could be the answer. If the mob came for her that's one thing, but if they went after Quinn, she'd never forgive herself.
Pulling into traffic, she never notices the black SUV accelerating along behind her in the rear view mirror.
Quinn purses her lips, swiping a loose blonde hair off her forehead as she leans over the processing tray. Poking the photo with a pair of tweezers, the light outline of Brittany, her leg propped up on a chair, smiles back at her. Chuckling, she pulls the photo and hangs it next to the others in the lab, glancing at the clock. She always does her best work in the studio at night, so she's forever grateful that Boss gave her the security code a few years ago. Of course, a few more hours and she may as well have packed a bag for work tomorrow… well, today. She hadn't realized exactly how much media she has on the Black Cat, let alone how in the world she's going to edit her video, pick out the magazine layout, and finish the actual article by Friday. Thirty hours. Sure that's enough time. Sigh.
Sipping thoughtfully at her coffee, Quinn walks the length of the room, considering her finished photographs. There's some good stuff here, she thinks, tilting her head to the side at a particularly cute one of Rachel and Brittany together on stage. Enough stuff for her to put together a great layout for the magazine, and have a few leftover for other projects as well. Lifting a black and white of Rachel looking thoughtfully at her, reflected in a makeup mirror, Quinn smiles and stacks it off to the side.
Maybe there's a few she'll have to keep for herself as well.
Pulling her laptop up onto the work desk, Quinn powers it on and cracks her knuckles. 3:48 AM. If she can get the first few minutes of footage together on the video while her pictures finish developing, she may just make that Friday deadline yet.
Morning sun slants through the vertical blinds, the only light dispersing in the hazy room. The ceiling fan circles lazily, its chain clinking with each revolution. He clears his throat, lifting the cigar from an ashtray to his lips, blowing the spicy smoke through the untrimmed whiskers of his mustache. Clicking the mouse, the screen tabbing to a picture of Rachel, hair shining under blue neon lights.
He sighs, sets the cigar down, and turns in his chair to face the men in suits in front of his desk.
"Is there a reason why every person in this city has found this girl and yet all of you have not? Because I'm very interested to hear it, if that's the case. Donny? Leo? Anyone?"
A clean cut man in a navy blue suit steps forward, running an anxious hand down the back of his neck.
"We almost had her last night, boss. She got away in the traffic."
Standing, the man nods, his fingertips pursed on the desktop as he leans towards him.
"You almost had her?"
The young man nods, gulping.
"The traffic, you say?" The tap of his finger against the dark wood echoes through the silent room. Chuckling quietly, his finger pauses. Grabbing the computer screen, he rears back and hurls it against the wall, screaming as it crumples to the floor.
"I see her face everywhere, EVERYWHERE I TURN!"
Pressing his lips together, he slips his hands into his pockets and turns back to the men, tightly drawn together in the center of the room. "Except for right here in front of me... Where she needs to be by the end of next week."
Staring each of them in the eyes in turn, he gestures towards the monitor, shattered on the floor.
"Do we understand boys?"
"You got it, boss."
Satisfied, he dismisses them, settling back into his chair with his cigar, puffing thoughtfully. Blowing a smoke circle into the air, he studies the red of the burning tip and smiles.
By the end of next week, Vincent Maroney would make Rachel Berry do more than just sing.
Thoughts, comments, suggestions? Inspire me, my friends!