AN: First of all, thank you for all your lovely reviews, really, they warmed my heart and made me type faster so here we are, next chapter, hope you enjoy it but remember, after a fluffy chapter, it's time to a little bit of angst.
She had pressed the send button at the end, not entirely enthusiastic about her choice, though. She wasn't confused, that wasn't the problem, the problem was that , at the contrary, she was perfectly sure, for once in her life, about her deepest feelings inside her and that was totally destabilizing. She wasn't a coward, never been, she had always faced tragedies and sufferings with her head held high, never running away, collecting the pieces of her tormented heart, alone, in the security of her solitude. She had never dealt with happiness before though, that kind of happiness that made you feel almost empty, light, raised in the sky on a wicker basket between clouds made by whipped cream. The truth was, she had never dealt with love, it scared her, deeply, that's why she was trying to ignore it, to postpone it, to cover it with sand, trying to resist to its incredible push. Marcus had helped her to do that, to keep love away, having actually an excuse to hide herself behind that deceit. She knew now that, with that message, everything would have changed, she wished she could have been brave enough in happiness as she was in pain. She felt his car arriving in front of her condo, panic starting to rise further, then she took a breath, ready to face the unavoidable.
"Hi honey." He greeted her, just entered in her condo, then he kissed her softly on the lips and that kiss annoyed her, childishly, because she still wanted to feel the memory of Jane's lips on her mouth instead.
"Hey." She answered back.
"You look good, have you sunbathed or something?" Marcus asked, scanning her face.
"I went for a run, sunny day." She replied automatically. "We need to talk." She said eventually.
"Oh yes, we do, indeed, let me start, ok?" Marcus said, a strange electricity in his eyes that she couldn't understand.
"Actually, I think it's better if I—"
"Marry me." He said abruptly, cutting her off.
"What?" She asked, her weak voice a perfect mirror of her internal anxiety.
He smiled like a kid the day of Christmas, then he took her hands in his, "Look, I've never been the perfect boyfriend, I know .. these days, away from you, have been a living hell, literally, but they also helped me to realize that it's you, it's always been you and you will always be the only one and ..I want to spend the rest of my life with you." He knelt in front of her, taking something that she suspected was a ring from his pocket.
"Marcus, please." She tried to stop him.
"Teresa Lisbon, will you marry me?" He asked, glittering eyes, handing the ring to her.
She looked at the jewel, noting that she didn't like it, it had rubies that seemed small pools of blood; like that was the real problem anyway.
"Teresa?" Marcus called her, still on his knees.
Then she was stupid enough to find a new excuse to take time again, to postpone everything.
"I need to think about it, ok?" She replied, smiling forcedly at him.
"I knew it." He said, standing up, a genuine smile on his face, he wasn't even angry or disappointed, like he was expecting that answer. "Take your time honey, I know it's hard for you but I'm sure you'll make the right choice at the end." He said, winking at her.
"Are you in for a movie? Make some pop corns." He said to her from the living room, not realizing she was still motionless in front of the door.
"Ok." She replied, hiding herself in the kitchen while her breathes were becoming always more elaborated. She took a glass of water to calm herself, she could feel the noises from the TV and Marcus' laughter in the background and her eyes suddenly started to become heavy, glossy. Her phone buzzed and she was almost scared to open the incoming text.
Run away with me on that hot-air balloon, I miss you already.
She turned off her phone and started to cry.
Jane smiled, looking at the text he had just sent to her. He felt like a teenager facing his first crush, that woman was ruining him.
"Paddy, the ice-cream?" Charlotte called him from the couch.
"Coming." He hollered from the kitchen.
"Here you are, double chocolate and strawberry, as you like." He said, handing the bowl to her. Charlotte started to eat quickly and he just observed her, admiringly. "Charlie, do you remember Teresa?" He asked her, eventually.
"Of course, she played with my dolls." Charlotte explained to him and that comment made him chuckle.
"Do you like her?" He asked her then, almost shyly.
"Yes, I like her, she's your friend." She replied logically.
"Would you like her, even if she wasn't my friend?" He asked again.
"Yes, she has princess hair." She said.
"That's true." He said, dreamy.
"How much do you like her, from zero to twenty?" He continued his investigation.
"Thirty!" She said enthusiastically. "And you?" Charlotte asked him.
"What?"
"How much do you like her, from zero to one hundred thousand?" She asked, waving her spoon in the air.
"two hundred thousand." He replied, smiling.
"You like her a lot, then." She said satisfied.
"I do, indeed." He replied, staring hopefully at his phone.
She decided it was better to focus on her job, since she had made progress two days before, the hardest part was that one thing was to actually investigate the responsible of a crime, another thing was to have him there, in front of your eyes, without being able to do anything to put him behind bars. Minelli had patiently listened to her story that morning, once again, but he couldn't pretend that her sensations and some diary's pages of a dead reporter could be enough to condemn a man that seemed the epitome of a living hero. The only thing that she could gain was the promise for an official warrant to search the Volker corporation, hoping to find something meaningful, even if her hopes were really low, considering the smartness and the cunning of the man in question. She realized soon though, that that little but dangerous hunt for Tommy Volker was starting to thrill her in some unexpected way. She wanted to chase that man and make him pay in some brutal ways that she had never thought about before. Besides, that diversion kept her away from other different thoughts, a marriage proposal, plenty of ignored messages and calls from another man on her phone, a grapes' basket she had found on her desk on Monday morning and the fact that she had called Jane, anonymously, Tuesday at four in the morning only to hear his sleepy voice some seconds through the phone and then ended the call immediately. She also checked different tabloids and gossip sites once a day to see if he had been spotted with some new models or impossibly beautiful women but she had never found anything new. She had never met love before, but if those were the its effects , she was totally screwed.
She went to search in Volker corporation on Wednesday, gain the permission for the warrant had been a little feat, that man seemed really untouchable but maybe some days off had been good, to cool things down a little and to give him the impression that he wasn't at the center of their interest, not anymore. Once arrived in the building with Cho, she felt immediately that something was wrong; the place was too calm, immaculate, nothing out of the place. She fought for some precious moments with the secretary at the hall and in the end she took the situation in her hands, ignoring her protests and going herself in Volker's office. The man was there, waiting for her, a glass of red wine in his hand.
"Miss Lisbon, what a pleasure, I was starting to miss you." He said, staring at her from head to toes. "Want a glass of wine? It's delicious, from Napa Valley, if I remember correctly." He said mischievously, emphasizing the place of origin in a way that she hadn't liked. Was it a coincidence, right? She didn't know it and she also didn't know if she wanted to find out about it. The memories of that day were too precious to be corrupted in every possible way, she kept telling herself that ,in that day, she had probably met love, the real one, for the first time and the fact that they had been lost between colorful hills and dancing hot-air balloons in the sky, made everything even more magic, like it had been a living dream only in her mind.
"You seem distracted, Miss Lisbon, hard week?" He asked her again.
"I'm perfectly fine, Mr. Volker, now excuse me but I should search your office." She said coldly.
"Oh, I find it hard to believe." He challenged her.
"I have a warrant, now back off." She said, handing the warrant to him.
"So feisty, I love it, do you want to search me, too?" He said seductively.
"In your dreams." She replied, before managing to censure herself.
"Oh yes, you got me, I dream about you Teresa, quite often lately, I have to say.. do you want to know about these dreams?" He kept saying in the same seductive voice.
"No thanks." She replied, busied in emptying drawers in a not very delicate way.
"I dream about you seducing me, ordering me to pleasure you, to do whatever you want me to do with that Glock pointed on me and those fierce eyes that never leave me. It's so exciting, I'm excited now, thinking about it." He said, sprawled on his armchair.
"You're sick." She replied, approaching the last cabinet, hoping to find something.
"Have dinner with me." He said again.
She sighed frustrated, ignoring him, she hadn't found anything, neither the smallest clue and if she had been alone in that moment she would have probably destroyed his office and screamed until dawn, but she needed to stay calm and to play it cool, especially in front of him. She was trying to steady herself when she didn't realize that he had left his place on the chair and was now behind her, impossibly close. She felt him inhaling deeply her hair and that gesture made her push him away but he was faster, pinning her to the wall behind her. He trapped one of her leg between his two and he brushed against it, causing her to close her eyes in disgust, then he leaned toward her, finding her ear and biting her earlobe, not too lightly. "You need to stop this ridiculous hunt right now, Agent, or this will get out of hand soon." He whispered in her ear. When she tried to get rid of him again, he kept her pressed against the wall some seconds more. "I will make you suffer, you and people you care about or maybe, should I say the only one you care about?" And after this last statement, he bit roughly on the juncture between her neck and shoulder and then he let her go.
That night she just wanted to go home, overeat some junk food that she would have regretted an hour later and overdrink any kind of drink with some alcohol in it. Marcus had been sent in San Francisco that weekend for a conference and he had asked her if she wanted to go with him and visit the city a little; she had refused the invitation, blaming the job and this time it hadn't been a lie, not totally at least. She thought about Volker's words that she could still hear vivid in her ears, she couldn't pretend she hadn't caught that last reference "the only one you care about." Was he talking about Jane? It couldn't be, unless he was following her or something, thing that couldn't be hard to believe, considering his creepy tendencies. Or maybe, he was just talking about Marcus, she had never hung posters about her love story around the city, but their relationship wasn't exactly a secret. Coming back home, she decided to stop in a supermarket, not really near her apartment, but very assorted, especially in the Mexican cuisine and she would have killed for some Guacamole sauce and Tequila that night. She was walking through the compartments, lost in her thoughts, when she didn't realize he was in front of her, comparing two packs of bread for Hamburgers in his hands. Her heart started to beat in a way she didn't think it was possible while she tried to figure out what was the best thing to do. If she had followed her mind, she would have hidden herself, becoming one with the shelves and running away from the supermarket like a crazy person, taking the guacamole with her, though. If she had followed her heart instead, she would have walked toward him, grabbed the lapel of his grey sexy shirt and kissed him senseless, without saying a word; they would have made love near the pickles' jars too, without problems. She opted for a middle way in the end.
"Jane." She said, approaching him.
He looked at her, making fall one pack of bread from his hand. "Hey." He said, trying to hide how pleased he was to see her.
"Hamburger's night?" She asked, pointing at the bread.
"Yeah, Charlotte is coming over tonight." He replied, never leaving her eyes.
"She's lucky to have you." She said softly.
He shook his head in response, "why are you acting like this?" He asked her, approaching her.
"Jane, please." She said, lowering her voice.
"You keep ignoring me since Sunday, why? You're making me crazy here, Teresa." He said sweetly now, cupping her cheek and stroking it lightly. She abandoned herself to his touch, putting her own hand on top of his and caressing it.
"It's not easy, I need to think about it." She tried to justify herself.
"There's nothing to think about." He answered back, starting to become mad. "You think you're the only one to be scared here? I already lost the woman I loved once, I should be the one to be scared for God's sake." He said impatiently, removing the hand from her face.
"I'm sorry." She said, unable to say something else and upset by his words. He looked at her, exasperated, losing himself in her beauty for some seconds, noticing that her face was still a little bit rosy from the sun, her hair was straighter, less wild and more professional, not messed up by the wind at least. She wore a cream blouse that married her porcelain skin perfectly and he noticed how the first three buttons were loosened and he just wandered about how would have been irresistible unfasten the rest of them, a privilege that he had already experimented once. He was about to end his mental trip when he noticed something disturbing that ruined her pale complexion; it was a red mark between her neck and shoulder, it seemed a love bite, a ferocious one and he couldn't contain his jealousy.
"What's that?" He asked coldly, touching her skin in that point.
"Nothing." She replied too fast, trying to cover it and cursing herself in her mind because she had totally forgotten about it.
"Did Marcus do that to you?" He asked again, his fingers still pressed on it like he was trying to erase it.
"No." She said, breaking the eye contact.
"Who did it, Teresa?" He asked, not really convinced.
"No one." She replied.
"I'm not stupid." He said impatiently.
"Volker did it." She said abruptly, regretting her confession almost immediately.
"Are you kidding, right?" He asked, trying to calm himself.
"I met him this morning for an official search, things didn't go exactly like I had planned." She explained.
"I hope you've talked about it with someone , acting reasonable for once." He said, getting mad, minute after minute.
"No need, look I can defend myself." She replied a little bit annoyed.
"Oh I see, you allowed that son of a bitch to bite you but you can defend yourself, of course." He said sarcastically. "Maybe you're not as good as you think you are, after all." He added at the end, blinded by his madness.
"Screw you, Jane." She said, leaving him alone in the center of the compartments.
She arrived in front of the condo, still nervous for their encounter, she knew he was only worried for her, she knew his madness had spoken those words instead of him but she also knew that everything coming from his mouth had the power to affect her like it had never happened before, no matter what. She checked her letterbox, finding a yellow envelope, she extracted it while her phone started to ring. She saw his name on the display and she decided to stop ignoring him, for once.
"What do you want, Jane?" She asked, trying to open the envelope with one hand.
"I'm coming to your place." He said.
"Why?" She asked, almost succeeding in her feat.
"Because I can't stand the thought of you being mad at me." He said softly.
She smiled, stopping her actions, melted by his sweetness. "I'm not really mad at you."
"Well, I'll come anyway." He replied.
"You have the hamburger's night, remember?" She told him.
"Yes, that's why I'll pick you up and you'll come with me, you love hamburgers, Teresa and Charlie basically adores you." He said, trying to sound convincing. "You can take the guacamole sauce with you if you want." He added, making her chuckle in response.
"I'll wait for you, then." She said at the end.
When she ended the call, her mood had changed in less than five minutes, and she took time to focus on the mysterious envelope. She opened it, finding some pics. She looked at them and her smile turned quickly in a grimace of horror. There were Jane and Charlotte in those pics, her pretty face in a red circle. A warning that she didn't really expect. She needed to stay away from him, starting right in that moment. She took her phone and texted him immediately, I have to take a rain check, not feeling well, I'm sorry.
She just hoped his stubbornness wouldn't have won even this time.
Please don't hate me, I know this is a little bit of a roller coaster but I promise things will be good soon, I hope you like it, let me know, I need your reviews to keep going, thank you!