The Big Ten: The First Ten Books of the Beginnings Series

by Jacqueline Druga

  “Dean.” Ellen sounded like a child. “Tell him the password thing is my project and he’s wasting time. I used the words he’s trying. I did all the ‘G’s’”

  “No, El.” Henry argued. “You didn’t mark them.”

  “Henry. I’m telling you I did. I must have been tired. You tried two, they didn’t work. Don’t try that . . .” She looked at Dean. “Hey, Dean. What are you doing to that helpless rabbit?”

  “I gave him tetanus so I can see if that vial actually does contain the tetanus vaccine. That is something that can be . . .” Dean and Ellen turned their heads to Henry’s loud exclamation of vulgarity.

  Ellen’s shoulders dropped when she heard the system shut down. “Damn it, Henry, I told you.” She marched up to him, grabbed the dictionary and proceeded to hit him with the paper back. “I told you.” She tossed the book at him. “I’m leaving. I refuse to stay here while you are here aggravating me and wasting my Friday.” She stormed to the door. “Dean, I’ll pick up the slides and bring them back down here. Jason said something about you finding them interesting?”

  Dean nodded as he injected a squealing rabbit. “Yeah, I know what he’s talking about. Thanks Ellen.”

  “I’ll be back.” She shrugged and opened the door.

  “Wait, El.” Henry jumped from the stool. “I’ll come with you.”

  “Oh you are just determined to work my last nerve today, aren’t you?”

  Henry laughed. Ellen didn’t. In the lab, Dean continued his work, grateful for every sound of the fading and arguing voices.

  ^^^^

  Really not in the mood for something trivial, and angry that it was George’s job to handle non-security problems at the field, Frank made his way to the field house. Cole seemed anxiously waiting for him. “Hey.” Frank lifted his chin in acknowledgment. “What’s up?”

  “Ready?” Cole asked, bracing Frank. “Follow me.” He walked to the right of the field house. “Saw one of those wild bores that always slip through.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Frank smiled. “You gonna cook it.”

  “No, I didn’t get it,” Cole stated as he stopped. “I wanted to use a scope rifle. I came to the armory hatch to get one. And . . .” He bent down and lifted the metal hatch.

  “Fuck.” Frank’s one world echoed in the empty hollow container. “Where are the weapons?”

  “George removed them. I called him and he stated since survivors are running around left and right, per Ellen’s instructions, he thought safety first.”

  “And he removed them?” Frank asked strong.

  “Yep.”

  “Let’s go. Grab a jeep and we’ll stock it back up.” Frank marched off toward his own jeep.

  “But George specifically said . . .”

  “George is wrong. It was a mistake.” Frank kept his stride steady. “Or at least if better be.”

  ^^^^

  “Are you listening to me, Dean?” Jenny badgered following Dean around the cryo-lab. “Are you? Dean?”

  “Jenny. No.” Dean said. “I’m not. I’m working. And why are you down here? This is off limits.”

  “But this is important.”

  Giving up, Dean set down the rack of blood. “Go on. Make it fast. I have plans for tonight.”

  “With Ellen?” Jenny questioned.

  “That’s none of your business.” Dean said with a chuckle.

  “I’m making it my business.”

  “What? Why are you making me and Ellen your business?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know.” Ellen, arms folded, stepped into the lab with Henry. She moved toward Jenny. “Why?”

  Taking a deep nostril breath, Jenny flung out her hand. “Fine. You want to know. I’ll tell you. Someone has to stop you from wreaking havoc around here.”

  Ellen laughed. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “What you did to Frank.”

  “What I did to Frank? Where is this coming from?” Ellen argued.

  “If you must know. Last night I went to him, to comfort him and. . .”

  “Hold it.” Ellen stepped to her. “Comfort him as in sex?”

  Snidely, Jenny tossed her head back. “Please don’t tell me, you of all people have a problem with that. The way you run around here, failing to do things right. Next thing you know, you’ll have a problem with me coming down to Dean.”

  Ellen raised one eyebrow. “I do. Are you? Is this some sort of revenge on Ellen for Frank by going after the men in my life?”

  Jenny laughed. “Please. Not even I could keep up with the amount of men you handle, Ellen.”

  Not much thought went into it. In fact there was no thought at all. Years of frustration went into her fist. Years of dealing with Jenny Matoose went into the hit. Ellen nailed Jenny with all of her weight, sending the heavier woman back and tumbling to the floor. Then Ellen dove on her, fist swinging violently, while Jenny screamed out. Both women began to roll about in a brawl, crashing about on the linoleum.

  Dean jumped up and pulled at Ellen who was giving him more of a struggle than he thought a woman of her size would. Grunting he turned to Henry. “Can you help?”

  “Sorry,” Henry snickered. He wiped the smile from his face then went over to help Dean..

  “Calm down!” Dean scolded at Ellen as he lifted her and Henry grabbed Jenny. “El, she just wants to get to you.”

  Breathing heavily, Ellen stepped back. “And she did.” She wiped her mouth. “She got me.” Ellen backed up. “She got me to see what I have to do.” Without saying anymore, Ellen bolted from the lab.

  Speechless and frazzled, Dean stood in the center of his lab. He looked at Jenny who pulled herself together. “What just happened here?”

  Henry shrugged. “Don’t know. But here . . .” He handed Dean a box. “We brought your slides.”

  ^^^^

  With a long shuddering breath, Ellen looked at her left hand one more time before knocking on Frank’s office door. She tapped lightly as her walk to his office had cooled her down. After his stock, ‘yeah’, Ellen opened the door, peeking her head inside. “Are you alone? Can I come in?”

  “El . . . yeah.” Frank stood up, trying to hide a smile.

  “Thanks.” As she stepped inside, her hands shook. For the first time ever, she couldn’t look at Frank. She really couldn’t look at him. “I have something that belongs to you.”

  “What is it?”

  Breathing in, Ellen walked to his desk, brought her hand down to its surface and dropped before him her wedding ring. “It belonged to your mother, so put that away.” She started to leave.

  “What is this?” Frank didn’t want to touch it. “I gave it to you.”

  “I don’t want it. I can’t keep it. That was your mother’s.”

  “El.” Frank picked up the ring. “I don’t want it back. I gave you my mother’s ring because . . .”

  “I don’t want it!” She shouted, throwing her hand his way. “Just . . . just keep it.”

  “This is wrong. Giving me back the ring I gave you. It’s wrong.”

  “What am I gonna do Frank? Keep it? Wear it? I’m not your wife. You made that perfectly clear before and you certainly made that perfectly clear last night.” She started to leave again but stopped. “You know, I thought you couldn’t possibly do anything that could hurt me anymore. If it were anyone else, anyone, I’d understand why you went to them. But you did it on purpose didn’t you?”

  “What are you talking about?” Frank held his hands out totally confused.

  “I know you’re dumb, but you aren’t that dumb. You racked that brain of yours trying to come up with a way. Saying to yourself, what else can I do to really kill Ellen? Well you did. You did it. You evened the score card . . . no wait. You’ve won.” She raced to the door.

  “El, I guess I am that dumb, ‘cause I haven’t a clue why you are . . .”

  “Two words.” Ellen stepped through the door. “Jenny Matoose.”

  Frank jumped with the sl
am of the door. “Jenny Matoose? Oh great, she has a fight with Jenny so she gives me back my ring.” Frank opened his hand and looked down at the ring and the indentation it caused. He picked it from his hand as he walked to his desk, placing it on his little finger and feeling the ring as he blindly sat in his chair. He felt the roundness and the semi-smoothness of the design. As his body sunk down, so did his heart. At his low point, mind playing what just happened . . . it hit him. “Shit!” He sprang up. “Shit.” He ran to the door, Ellen was gone. “Shit, she thinks I slept with Jenny.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  From Ellen’s point of view she really wasn’t doing any good at the social skills class anyway. She hung more so in the back, allowing Henry to explain to them the proper procedures when visiting any of the distribution areas. Ellen knew Henry was trying to make her smile when he diligently tried to do the class but he couldn’t. Nothing would. She just wanted to go home. Henry offering to stay and finish up, was her invitation to leave.

  It was surprisingly odd how dark Dean’s house looked when she approached. He and the twins couldn’t be in bed already. It wasn’t even nine. Ellen stopped, totally, as she opened the door to Dean’s house. At that particular moment she didn’t know to leave or stay. She could see from the small hallway that Dean heard her. He looked up at her, smiling a blushing smile as he bent over lighting a candle. “What’s going on?” She asked.

  “El. You’re a little early.”

  “Oh shit, I’m interrupting something. I’ll leave.”

  “No.” He shook the stick he used to light the candle. “You aren’t.” He walked up to her and shut the door she still held open. “Besides, interrupting what?”

  Ellen shrugged.

  “El.” Dean seemed nervous. “You’re probably going to kill me. Don’t. I wanted to do something nice for you.”

  “You do enough for me. You shouldn’t have done anything.”

  “Yeah, I should have.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “It dawned on me today. After all these years you and I never had an evening together. A couple’s evening.”

  “You mean like a date?” Ellen looked to the steps. “Where are the twins? Sleeping?”

  “Um . . .” Dean briefly closed his eyes, hoping she wouldn’t get upset. “Andrea has them tonight. It’s just us.”

  “Us?” Ellen peeked around to the living room.

  “So will you El? Will you have this evening with me?”

  Ellen felt his hand reach down to hers. “I’d love to have this evening with you.”

  Dean gripped her hand. “Great.” He led her through the living room to the dining area.

  Ellen took in the rooms as she walked through them, with the candles, the table and two glasses setting there. “So, since Andrea has the off spring, I take it she knows about this date.”

  Dean sat down at the same time as Ellen and grabbed a bottle of wine. “Andrea is the one who suggested taking the kids. She said . . .” Dean held the bottle over Ellen’s glass. “ . . . you and I needed it.” He poured for both of them.

  A hint of sneakiness hit Ellen. “Are you trying to seduce me tonight?”

  “Nope.” Dean moved his chair closer. “But, if you decide somewhere in the course of this night, that you want me too . . . just let me know.”

  “Dean. I’m really sorry. I am. You’re such a great guy, and I never saw that.”

  “Yeah, you did. In your own way.” He watched her sip the wine “A part of me believes that I hold a special place in your heart no matter what happened.”

  “You do.” Ellen took another drink then softened her voice. “Dean. Just know, all the times that I hurt you . . .”

  “El.” He lifted her chin. “Forget about everything that happened in the past. Tonight’s not about that..” He reached for his own glass and stood up. “Now I have a question to ask you. Will you dance with me? I have never danced with you. I would love to.”

  Ellen stood up. “As long as you’re not going to sing for us.”

  “No.” Holding his glass in one hand, he led Ellen to the living room. He set his glass on the coffee table and took Ellen’s , and placed it next to his. Bending over to the floor to their little lab cassette recorder, Dean pressed play and the slow music began. “May I?” His hand held out to her.

  Ellen placed her hand in his and stepped to him. His arm went slowly around her waist and Dean pulled her to him. His cheek pressed to hers and their bodies moved slowly, slower than the music played. There was something just a little awkward about the moment. The tension was there and it stayed as the first song slipped past them.

  As Ellen felt Dean start to release her, she shook her head, pulled him back, and waited for the next song to play. Slowly she pulled her head back to look at him. “Dean. I want you to know, I’m not letting you hold me like this, out of spite to Frank. I’m with you right now . . . I’m here because I want to be.”

  Dean pulled her back into him. “I’m glad.”

  “Dean.” She whispered in his ear. “I’m not afraid of where this could lead. Are you?”

  Her whispering words sent a shiver through him, making his eyes roll slightly. He let go of her hand, sliding his hand up her arm to her neck, bringing his lips to her ear. “Not anymore.” As if a lever was released, the tension, anxiousness, and fears left him. Dean moved his body more freely, holding Ellen against him as he did. He felt her breath. He pulled back some, looked at Ellen, brought his lips to hers and stopped. It wasn’t time. Not yet. The rush wasn’t going to consume him. Every reason was there to take in the moment. He wasn’t going to let something he waited for slip by him so fast that he hadn’t any time to realize it was happening.

  Faces so close. Eyes staring into eyes. Lips brushing in a teasing kissing manner to each other without ever touching. The emotion of the song began to build as did they. Dean brought his hands up to Ellen’s face, placing them against her, feeling the contours of her gently with his fingertips. He stared so intensely into her eyes it was if he were looking into her soul. Grazing down his thumbs to her lips, he parted them for her. The music stopped.

  “Dean . . .” Ellen moved her lips to his.

  “El, If it starts, I’m not gonna be able to stop. I’m not going to want to stop. Are you sure?”

  Her answer to him was simple and strong. Pressing her lips to Dean’s, she separated his mouth with hers, bringing her hands to his hair, letting her fingers slip through it, and holding him to her.

  Henry didn’t understand the meaning of filling out after social skills class reports. About half way through the paperwork, he decided he didn’t want to understand. Leaving containment, he headed to Dean’s. He would drop of the paperwork to Ellen. Hopefully she still would be up.

  Was Dean’s house on fire? Henry wondered as he approached almost in a panic. The glowing amber and orange color emanating from Dean’s homemade Henry think of flames. He ran to the house but stopped ten feet from it. He saw them. Through the window, the slightly opened blinds, he watched Dean kissing Ellen in tight embrace and hands that did not stay in one place. By the kisses, by the scene, Henry knew what was happening.

  He thought it too much of an irony that Ellen would be with Dean on the same day Jenny implied that she slept with Frank. Though it wasn’t his place, Henry felt it was a mistake. In this midst of his thoughts, Henry had stopped watching them. When he resumed his view, he saw them slip from the window’s scope. “Shit.” He took off running.

  Ellen lay on the couch watching Dean above her. Watching as he brought his knee to the cushion, his hand clung tightly to the back of the sofa as he leaned down. A look of apprehension to join her was on him.

  An invitation without words was given. She reached up to the belt loops of his jeans and pulled him down to her. They continued kissing, pausing only as Ellen lifted his shirt from his jeans and brought it over his head, laying it on the back of the couch.

  “Frank!” Henry burst through Frank’s front door.


  “Shut up, Henry. I just got my baby to sleep.” Frank stood up from the couch.

  Henry took a moment to catch his breath. “Get Josh to stay with the baby. You have to stop them.”

  “Stop who?”

  “Ellen, Dean. You have to stop Ellen.” Henry, whose breathing began to normalize, grabbed Frank’s arms. “I went to Dean’s house. I saw them through the window. They were kissing. They were . . .”

  “I don’t want to hear this.” Frank backed up.

  “No you have to hear it. You pushed her to this. You pushed her because of everything you’ve said but mostly because she thinks you slept with Jenny. Frank . . .” Henry walked up to him. “If that’s why she’s doing this you owe her the truth. You owe it to yourself. It’s a mistake Frank. She deserves to know the truth before she does this. You have to tell her.”

  “It’s too late.” Frank’s shoulders fell and he closed his eyes.

  “No, not yet. But it will be if you don’t get over there and talk to her. Talk to your wife.”

  Frank’s head sprung up. “Tell Josh to watch Brian.” Through the door that Henry left open, Frank ran. He ran with everything he had to Ellen.

  Dean closed the bedroom door slightly and turned to Ellen who stood before him. Her shirt was off, dropped somewhere in the journey upstairs. He moved to her, biting his bottom lip as he did. Waist first he pressed to her, immediately laying his mouth at the top of her neck. His fingers gripped the straps of her bra sliding them off her shoulders, then removing the garment and tossing it backwards out the door. His lips brushed downward to the center of her chest. She held his head tight to her as he pulled the belt from her loosely fitted tan pants and undid the button. Slipping his hand slightly into them, feeling the touch of her bare skin, sent Dean completely over the edge.

  Raising his head, kissing her on the lips, he backed her to the bed.