Chapter 8
|Behind the bar, Jake's|
The bar was silent; a rarity in it's own for the seedy place, especially when someone like Maxie Jones was a customer. There was the faint sound of pool balls clanging against one another on felt and the sounds of beer bottles being set on tables, but no high pitched giggle that melted Spinelli's heart.
This was bad.
Sighing, he cradled his laptop to his chest and tried to stretch out behind the bar, desperate to make a silent and safe exit without being caught by Coleman. The bartender liked him well enough, but there was no way to possibly explain why he was behind the counter, laptop in tow, hiding away.
Of course, Spinelli could use the overall atmosphere and his fear of it as an excuse. Booze, attractive women, and bar stools did nothing for the Jackal, and when you added in his beloved Maximista, he was destined to be a complete mess.
Craning his neck, he peeked out to see Coleman laughing with a customer on the opposite end of the bar and knew that now was his chance to escape. He slid his laptop across the floor and placed his palms face down as he tried to pull himself from the tight spot.
Unfortunately, despite his quiet demeanor and petite form, the Jackal did not fit well in tight places.
This was really bad.
Gritting his teeth, he thrust forward, hoping to will himself out of the tight spot, and found himself face to face first with the remnants of bar nuts. He didn't want to think about whose mouth they had come from or how long they'd been on the floor. Surely, Maxie was going to force him to bathe in bleach upon their return to the penthouse.
Shaking his head, he thrust forward again, well aware that he looked awkward to anyone who would have noticed him, but was thankful that Coleman was still laughing with the bar patron.
"Come on," he murmured, feeling defeated as he twisted his legs around and rocked back and forth on his hands. He really had no idea what he was doing at this point, but figured the more he moved, the looser he'd become, and…
Yes.
He tumbled forward, his face colliding with the bar nut coated floor as his legs flailed behind him. He cringed at the sound of something banging against the floor, followed by the sound of breaking glass.
"What the hell are you doing, Jackal?" Coleman called out, rushing over to help him to his feet. He frowned as he dusted Spinelli off, shaking his head at the pile of broken barware. "You were under the bar."
He nodded, tugging at the hem of his shirt as his knees started to buckle beneath him.
"What in the hell are you doing, Spinelli?"
He cringed at the all too familiar voice of his boss and roommate. He glanced over his shoulder to find him glaring in all his leather jacket clad glory and just knew that Jason had been the very patron that Coleman was talking to.
This was really, really bad.
**********
|Upstairs hallway, Jake's|
"Oh my Ggod, you have your own room above a bar!" Maxie exclaimed, slapping the dark haired, PCU student she'd met downstairs on the arm. She rocked back and forth on her feet as she glanced around at the room numbers. "This is the kind of stuff legends are made of."
"Something like that," he laughed, fumbling with the lock to room number one.
Maxie frowned when she realized his hands were trembling and he was entirely too over eager about getting her upstairs. He was definitely not the stuff that legends were made of. "Take your time, big boy. There's no reason to rush and fuss," she slurred, patting him on the shoulder. She leaned over and brushed her lips to his ear. "We've got all – whoa!"
She stumbled forward as the man grabbed her wrist and jerked her into the room. "What the hell is wrong with you?" she hissed, trying to push him away, but he was stronger and pulled her forward. "What are you doing?"
"Just what you wanted, baby," he murmured, pressing his lips to hers.
"I am not your baby, you stupid-" He cut her off by kissing her again, and she did the first thing that came to mind and sank her teeth into his lower lip so hard that he pushed her away.
"What the fuck is wrong with-"
"Maximista!"
She stumbled back on her feet as the door swung open, and Spinelli and Jason burst inside. Her best friend looked completely frazzled, and she suddenly felt really embarrassed about what had just happened. Leave it to her to use sex as a way to get what she wanted – even if she didn't have any intention of actually sleeping with this guy, it was typical Maxie fashion and she hated that Spinelli had to see that side of her.
"Don't ever come near her again," Jason spat, stepping towards Maxie and gathering her in his arms in one swoop.
"What the hell, Jason?" she cried, smacking him in the back as he tossed her over his shoulder and started out of the room. "Stop acting like some damn caveman and put me down!" When he didn't she twisted around as much as she could and grabbed him by back of his head.
He swore a string of curse words that almost made her blush, but promptly set her on her feet. "You met some strange guy in a bar, got plastered, and let him take you upstairs."
She tossed her bangs from her eyes and folded her arms over her chest. "What's wrong, Jason?" she asked, flashing him a wide grin. "Are you just jealous that it wasn't you?"
Jason's jaw tightened as he looked at Spinelli. "Can you take her home or do I need to haul her over my shoulder the whole way?"
"I think he likes me," she chuckled, wobbling as she elbowed Spinelli in the side. He looked completely horrified, and she almost stopped her shenanigans, but realized this was just too fun. "I just wanted to see an upstairs room." She reached out and squeezed Jason's arm. "You wanna show me yours?"
"Get her home now," he barked, turning to walk away, but Maxie started after him.
"Oh come on, maybe the reason you hate me is all this pent up sexual-" She laughed when he spun around and tossed her over his shoulder again, starting straight for the stairs. "Why travel by feet when you can travel by hitman?!"
"Stone Cold, the Jackal apologizes for the Fair Maximista's clear state of duress. It's the liquor that made her tongue so loose and-"
"Save it, Spinelli. The big man doesn't care about any of that," she slurred, smacking him on his behind as they stepped out into the parking lot behind the bar. "Oh! Spinelli, did you get my purse?" She grinned when he held it out to her and she snatched it from his hands. "Best friend ever. I can always count on – Jjesus! You can warn a girl!" She stumbled back onto her feet as he set her on the ground, hurrying to dig through her purse as Jason motioned for Spinelli to open the car door.
"Get in," Jason ordered, narrowing his eyes at her.
She stuck her tongue out as she snapped her purse closed, challenging him to grab her again.
God, men were so easy.
"In," he snapped, grabbing her by the arm and shoving her inside the car.
She gripped the leather on his jacket, pulling him over her as she tumbled into the backseat. Her hands skimmed over his jacket, his pockets, and she briefly felt his muscles through his t-shirt, and it was impossible not to think that he was completely wasted on Sonny Corinthos.
"Oh, this is a position I never thought we'd be in!" she snickered, poking him in the side. He gripped her wrists in one hand, holding her down in the back seat. "I always knew you'd be the dominating-"
"Cut the shit, Maxie," he warned, letting go of her as she finally gave in and collapsed against the seat.
Jason slammed the car door behind her, and she laughed as she listened to him telling Spinelli that after tonight, Maxie was forever banned from the penthouse, that he didn't want to be within five hundred feet of her. He even threatened to get Diane to make it legal.
Putz.
Sighing, she closed her eyes and listened as Spinelli defended her, relieved that someone was on her side.
**********
|Two blocks from Jake's|
Spinelli sighed heavily as he glanced at Maxie in the rearview mirror, wondering when his beloved and best friend had taken to his boss like so many other women in town. It was terrible enough to see her swooning over some stranger at a bar, let alone Jason Morgan. It wasn't fair that he would never be polished and suave and make girls fall to their knees without knocking them over first. Shaking his head, he flipped on the radio, desperate for some NPR to soothe his soul as he rolled to a stop at a red light.
"Oh my Ggod!" Maxie cried, sitting up in the back seat. She immediately started to smooth her hair and stretched forward to smack him on the arm. "Spinelli, you let me fall asleep!"
"Perhaps that is the liquor-"
"I'm not drunk," she interrupted, motioning up the street. "Pull into the next empty spot."
"The Jackal must take the Fair, Inebriated Maximista-"
"I am not drunk," she hissed, glaring at him in the rearview mirror. "I had one drink. Ordered another and slowly poured it onto the floor."
"But you-"
"I was pretending. We were watching, Jason, remember?" She frowned heavily at him and pursed her lips together. "Do you honestly think I would drink on the job, Spinelli? Isn't that in your forty-two rules or some-"
"You're not inebriated? High on the elixir of alcoholic gods? Three sheets to the-"
"No, I just pretended I was drunk," she stressed as if that were supposed to make some kind of sense.
"Why?" he asked, slowly pressing down on the gas when the light turned green.
"Pull over! We have work to do!" she ordered, gripping the driver and passenger seat as she barreled herself forward. "Oh, this is – crap…There." She sat up satisfied with a grin on her face when she was finally upright. "I pretended I was drunk because I needed some kind of excuse to get upstairs."
"Why didn't you just go-"
"Because then Jason would have seen me and been all what the hell are you doing, Maxie?" she imitated, clenching her jaw and speaking robotically. "And then I would have been all it's none of your business and he would have all but thrown me over his shoulder – well, it sounded like a good plan at the time, Spinelli."
She shrugged, pulling his laptop from his bag and turning it on. "I thought I'd get drunk, get upstairs, make some noise, and Jason and Sam-slash-Elizabeth would hurry out of his room to save me, and then bam! Case solved. We know who Jason is banging."
He nodded slowly, trying to keep up, but only one fact of this little scheme of hers mattered. Sighing, he pulled the car into an empty spot on the street and turned off the ignition. "So asking to see Stone Cold's room-"
"Oh, ew." She curled her lips up in disgust. "Yeah, Jason is hot and he has pretty eyes and a body that most men would kill for, but seriously – his room – ew. Never. I'd give up all the Jimmy Choos and Couture in the world before I would go there. He is so not my type. I thought you would have realized this by now."
"The Fair Maximista doesn't wish to have an attractive, blue eyed, muscular-"
"No, I want that, but I want someone who actually talks," she interrupted, making a face at the computer screen. She held it out to him and pointed at the screen. "Fix this. I mean, like I said, he's all that, but he's not the bag of chips – wait, that makes no sense. Gosh, pretending to be drunk really slows you down."
She rolled her eyes and looked over to make sure he was booting up the computer. "Why are we talking about this? You know that there is only one man in my life, my very best friend and soon to be the best damned private investigator around, Damien Spinelli."
His heart fluttered, and he tried to resist the urge to return such devotion, knowing that she didn't quite mirror his exact emotions. "What am I doing?" he asked quietly, trying to focus on the task at hand.
"Oh, well, I did something bad," she confessed, her eyes widening as she smiled, "but not that bad. If Jason ever finds out, I'm toast. This is worse than anything I've ever done, and he'll probably force me to swim with the fishes – do you think he'll tie cement blocks to my feet or just put a bullet between my eyes." She shivered, suddenly looking worried. "Oh, gosh. What was I thinking? I think pretending to be drunk really made me drunk, and I just cannot – I have no idea-"
"Maximista, relax and tell the Jackal what you did, and we will get through this together."
She nodded, looking unconvinced. "Well, technically you aided me by giving me my purse, so I'll just say you did it, that way Jason doesn't kill me, and you're practically everything to him – all the poor man has so-"
"What did you do?" he repeated, scrubbing a hand over his face.
"Spinelli, please don't hate me. I really did think it was a good idea. I figured why not – it will let us know what Jason is up to – unless – oh my Ggod. What if he kills someone? We'll be witnesses. Unless he changes his pants or shirt or jacket – no, he's always wearing that damned leather jacket."
"Maximista." He leaned forward, pressing his forehead to the steering wheel, knowing he didn't want to hear what she was going to say.
"Please don't hate me."
"The Jackal could never hate you."
"You can't even look at me."
"I need to know what you-"
"Okay, okay!" she cried, holding up her hands and taking a deep breath. "I – oh, God. I am so going to die tonight."
"Maximista!"
"I bugged Jason!" she shrieked, letting out a painful cry. "I – you had those stupid bugs – and I took one – and you gave me my purse – and I – oh, Ggod. There is a bug on Jason Morgan right now. What if someone intercepts it and they hear bad things and he goes to prison and Sonny makes me swim with the fishes." She chewed her lip as she looked at him. "Sonny doesn't like you and while I'm his fiance's assistant, I'm basically replaceable. We are both so dead."
"You planted a listening device on Stone Cold?" he asked, amazed that the night continued to get worse by the second.
She nodded.
"Where?"
"What?"
"Where is the listening device?"
"Oh, I put it…" She trailed off, resting her head against the back of her seat as she rubbed her hands over her face. "I have no idea, Spinelli. I mean, I touched him everywhere. My hands touched places I would have never touched – oh, not that place, that is seriously foul. I will never get close to Jason Morgan's Mini Morgan – ever. But everywhere else. Crap."
"How can you not remember, Maximista?" he moaned, shaking his head against the steering wheel.
"I told you," she pouted, folding her arms over her chest. "Pretending that you're drunk is really hard because you almost feel drunk, but you're not. Just give me some time to sober up and-"
"You're not inebriated."
She scowled and stared out the windshield. "Fake inebriation is by far worse than the real kind." Hanging her head, she slowly snuck a glance at him. "What are we going to do? I know I have no right-"
"There's only one thing we can do," he sighed, holding up his laptop. "We listen."
"We listen?" she asked, her eyes wide with fear.
"We listen," he repeated seriously, "so that we can find Stone Cold and debug him."