by Jessie M
“Here is a booklet for you to read, it explains it all. It depends on the treatment, but once a week minimum, twice a week is better. The contact numbers are in there if you wish to pursue that line of therapy” He handed Ella a booklet and she put it in her bag to read later.
“Also, Mr Ford… I need some help. I’m only 21 and I have a job and a brother to look after too. I need 24 hour nursing a few days a week. Where do I find someone who could provide my dad with the proper care?”
“I have three companies I recommend. I am not involved with them at all personally, but I have heard good reports from other people in similar situations to you.” He looked in his drawer and produced three business cards. “They all do round the clock care” He fumbled around in his drawer again. “… and there is a support group and a friends group. Your father could get out and meet people a few times a month.” He handed Ella another two cards.
Ella was starting to feel a lot more positive as they left the consultants office. There were things her dad could try and she could get help for him. She had been already been looking for a housekeeper. Someone to do laundry, cleaning, yard tidying. It was all too much for her to fit in on a regular basis and things were slipping. That was before her new boyfriend was added to the mix as well. Now that she had money, she could afford all this. Her dad would have the stimulation of other people being around and she could have a little life herself. Yes, things were looking much better. Money made the world a better place.
She needed to read the booklet and make a few calls this afternoon and get the best arrangements in place for them all.
She also had a pile of stuff to do around the house, plus some groceries to buy. She had to call in and tell Benny and Gill that she didn’t need her job at the diner any more. Then she was going to burn her accountancy text books in a ceremonial pyre in the yard… Actually, that was just a little fantasy. In reality she was going to lock them in a cupboard somewhere, just in case her Archangel job went up in holy smoke sometime soon.
Then finally she was going to the gym for a workout and to tell Rob all about her amazing good fortune. It was all down to him, pushing her to go along to that audition. She just couldn’t thank him enough.
Chapter 24
It was 5 pm Tuesday evening and Devlin was on his long drive back from LA where he had been at a martial arts exhibition. As he drove home he was almost too desperate to see her, to take her back to his place and love her like crazy. She was all he thought about, he was up in the clouds ecstatic, and this worried him deeply.
He felt so vulnerable. He was obsessed. But maybe that was what love was like. He had nothing to compare his experience to. He’d never loved anyone before. It wasn’t like he could discuss it with any one. Men didn’t talk about things like this. If they discussed women it was in quite a different way.
It was so all consuming and almost painful. He couldn’t get over the way his stomach was constantly churning and his head felt light.
She had only to cross his mind for a few seconds and he had a hard on. The last two days had been so difficult for him.
His mind turned to the nightmare dreams he’d been having. They’d started just a few weeks before he’d met her. He thought about why the girl had left him. Perhaps it could be a warning. His subconscious mind telling him not to get too involved with anyone. Too late for that though, he was in way too deep to stop now.
Funny though, he hadn’t had his dream since he’d been seeing Ella. Not once.
Maybe that was the end of it.
Perhaps he shouldn’t read too much into it anyway.
Dreams can just be dreams, can’t they?
They don’t have to mean anything much at all…
Chapter 25
Ella dropped off her signed contract to Lucy and Tony and made her way down to dressing. She was a little late for her first official day on the job as the Arena Archangel. Her dad had needed some attention just before she came out and it made her twenty minutes late. She felt a little trepidation as she knocked on the door to be let inside the dressing room. The door was opened by Coral, she’d only spoken to her once before.
“Hey look, the Archangel has finally flown in…” quipped Sonia, “…maybe we can all start getting ready now?”
She looked around the room. Everyone was in here tonight and all eyes were upon her. Sara was sitting up the far end, texting on her cell as usual.
“Hi Ella” She called out, beaming at her.
“Hi Sara” She replied beaming back. She was so glad she had at least one girl friend in here. “So everyone, how’s things?” She thought she should try and be a little leader like, even if that wasn’t exactly her role. She wasn’t their superior, but it didn’t hurt to create some team spirit.
“Completely fine with me” Tori smiled widely at her. “Couldn’t be better.” They had all been given a generous pay increase and some beautiful clothes to wear. Things were A-OK with her. Dev and Ella news aside anyway… She couldn’t quite get her head round or past that shocking new development.
Lucy had given them all a pep talk on Saturday about working the crowd more and being social like Ella, blah, blah, blah. But in truth, they should have been doing that anyway, so it was no big deal. She was quite happy with what was going on. Much happier now that Marcia the bitch was gone too.
Kim guided Ella to the chair for her make up session. “So how’s our hot ‘n sexy couple getting on? All lovey dovey are we?” He asked with a grin.
“Well you know… kind of” She replied in surprise. Well, news obviously travels fast round here… how did he know? She looked around. All eyes were on her. There were some very obvious hostile ones too. Sally-Ann was looking positively hateful. She had thought she was quite a nice girl before, now she looked quite Marcia’ish. There was obviously a big undercurrent here about Dev.
“Ella bella love, you be careful with that man. Don’t go getting in too deep. Just have some fun, eh” Kim continued as he worked on her hair putting it up in a messy looped up-do and sticking a big decorative black pin through it and another silver one at right angles to it.
“I’ll try Kim,” she lied. It was way too late for any of that. She couldn’t get any deeper. She was in so deep she was already at the bottom of the bottomless pit of deepness. But one thing was for sure, she was definitely having a lot of fun with Dev. She’d never had so much scorching hot bedroom fun in her entire life!
Kim quickly plastered on a layer of make up. This was much stronger than usual. She looked so different. Huge black and white made up eyes stared back at her. Long eyelashes with twinkly bits on the ends and deep red lipstick. She never wore this type of thing but it looked so good. She looked at herself in amazement. He held out a black outfit and high rise cutout black and diamante sandals for her. She got up and quickly changed into the stretchy clothes and did up her shoes. She looked in the mirror at his black two piece creation. It was brief and very sexy indeed. What a shame Dev wasn’t here to see her sensational dark archangel look, she was pretty sure he’d love it.
“Kim, you have completely surpassed yourself. I thought the blue dresses were fantastic. This dark angel look is something else!” It seemed everyone liked it based on all the ‘ooh’ and ‘wow’ comments she was hearing.
“Kim, do me next, that is just so hot!” Sonia was positively hyper and jumping up and down next to him with excitement to get herself dark angeled up.
“I know… I have a hot artistic soul… you are all dark angels tonight and on Thursday, we’re going all white and virginal girls…” Kim was grinning from ear to ear with pride, his little diamond tooth flashing like a heavenly star.
The master of ring style worked through them all quickly and less than an hour later nine beautiful black dressed angels made their way out to the three arenas in hot and sexy style.
“Don’t mind if I tag along, do you?” asked Kim falling in step behind them. He wanted to see at first hand what kind of a reaction his artisti
c soul produced in the outside world. Besides, he was trying to go cold turkey with his dope. He couldn’t stay in that room on his own or he’d get fidgety and probably end up getting himself all high on his dress success.
Chapter 26
Marcia was waiting inside her car for Ginger to come out of the Arena back door. After what seemed like forever she finally spotted her leaving the building and walking across the lot, making her way through the remaining parked vehicles. She quickly got out of her car and followed her, bending down low so as not to be seen. Ginger got into her black truck and Marcia ran around the back and hopped in the passenger seat next to her quickly. As she got in she dropped the drugs and a roll of cash, which she was holding behind her back with a tissue, so that her fingerprints weren’t on any of it, into the door storage compartment just as she closed the door
Ella’s eyes opened wide as she took in the identity of her uninvited passenger.
“Hi Ginger… How are you?” Asked Marcia brightly with a beautiful white smile.
“What do you want?” Ella asked in a wary voice feeling more than a little anxious and worried about this sudden surprise visit.
“Just saying hello” Marcia replied super sweetly.
“Look, you made no secret of the fact that you disliked me intensely before. Why bother making an effort to be friendly now. You don’t need to.”
Marcia turned her body sideways on the seat looking straight at Ella.
“Ginger I was jealous of you. All because of Dev, you know… he does that to you – gets into your head. You’ll see one day. It makes you act all nasty and stuff. Look, I’m sorry, I really shouldn’t have behaved like that, okay? So… New start?” She held her hand out.
Ella took it warily and they had a quick, new start shake. “Okay…” She really wasn’t getting good vibes about this at all.
“Hopefully one day I’ll grow on you” Marcia continued on with a sweet smile “Maybe we can go out sometime, huh? Me, you, Tori, Sonia… Get together properly and have some fun somewhere, a club or something?”
“Perhaps. I’ll think about it.” Ella wasn’t buying all this somehow. It didn’t make sense.
“Anyway, Ginger…. I mean Ella, I must stop calling you Ginger, sorry… I must dash, got a hot date tonight… meeting my new boyfriend. I just picked up something from the Arena and saw you leave so I thought I’d catch up with you. I kinda felt bad about things.” She opened the door to go “See you sometime then Ella, bye”
“’Bye then” Thank God for that, she was going. Ella sighed in relief.
Well that was easy! It looked like she’d bought it….thought Marcia smugly. She quickly shut the door waving at Ella through the window and making her way back to her car smiling to herself.
Marcia got in her car and drove off to the car lot opposite the Arena. She parked up in a semi hidden position behind some garbage containers and sat waiting for Ella’s truck to leave.
Ella sat quietly in her truck for a few moments. Did she really mean any of that? She was confused, concerned and unsettled by this sudden run in with Marcia. Tori had warned her about her evil streak. Leopards don’t change their spots for no reason, do they? But then again, it seemed like she was moving on, dating a new boyfriend… perhaps it did make sense that she wanted a clean slate.
She started up the truck and turned on the air con full blast. It was stuffy and too warm tonight. A flurry of dust shot out and she suddenly sneezed, and again… her eyes were watering. She leaned across to the passenger side into the door pocket digging her hand inside it for her pack of tissues. He hand brushed against a plastic bag and she pulled it out curiously. She froze with horror. She was holding a bag of what looked like drugs. It contained quite a lot of small wraps of white powder. She peered into the door pocket again to make sure there were no more. She saw a roll of cash wound up with a rubber band and picked it out.
“My God…! “ She said out loud to herself… Marcia really was evil, a conniving venomous treacherous snake. She’d actually planted cocaine… class A drugs… on her? And a lot of it too. She sat in confused terror thinking about what this all meant. She was setting her up. She quickly opened the window and threw it all out and drove across the other side of the lot to calm down, taking a few deep breaths.
She got out her cell and called Dev. He should be home by now. She hoped he was because she had few people she trusted enough to call about this. Maybe Rob or at a stretch Paul… He answered straight away.
“Hey baby, I just got in. Miss me?”
“Thank God you’re home… and yes I missed you like crazy… but Dev I’m so scared. Marcia has put a bag of drugs in my truck and a roll of cash, I just found it…” The relief at hearing his voice was beyond description.
“Fuck!… Throw it and leave right now!”
“I’ve already thrown it” She was starting to cry now. The harsh tone of his voice had burst through her shock.
“Go home Ells, I’m coming over. Wait outside for me. Hopefully the cops won’t turn up before I do”
She drove home sobbing and sick with what Marcia had planned for her. She had nearly succeeded too.
***
Marcia sat in her car watching her leave. She picked up the brand new disposable cellphone she had bought the day before and dialled 911.
“I want to report a drug offence.”
She was put through to narcotics and started talking fast.
“I just saw someone selling drugs in a layby near the Arena Hilton. It was a girl, she got out of her black truck… I saw her giving someone what looked like cocaine and taking loads of cash”
She gave a quick description of Ella and the number plate of the truck. Then she rang off without giving her name, got out and threw the cell in the trash can in front of the car. She wasn’t leaving anything to chance.
She smiled wickedly to herself as she got back in her car and drove home. Job done. That would be the end of her short Angel career for sure. The fucking bitch can rot in jail. Lucy and Tony would soon be begging her to take her old job back.
***
Dev drew up outside Ella’s house before her and he stood outside his car waiting anxiously. She parked and got out and rushed up to him in tears and they leant against the side of his car hugging tightly. He brushed her hair away from her tearstained face with both of his hands and kissed her long and hard. He was so completely in love with her and the thought of something bad happening to her cut him up inside like a thousand knives.
“Tell me what happened Ells… exactly as it happened”
She explained about Marcia getting in the truck and their conversation.
“Yeah, I thought as much… I expect she’s called you in for dealing. The cops will be here soon, I’m sure of it. Look Ella, when they do act natural and innocent obviously.”
Right on cue a police car turned into the road ahead of them.
“Okay Ella, start kissing me baby… we’ve got to be real natural”
The car stopped in front of his and two police officers got out and walked up to them.
“Evening… Ma’am are you the owner of the black truck parked just there?” One of them asked as he gestured at her truck.
“No, my dad owns it, but he’s disabled, so I drive it. Why?”
“Can I see your license please ma’am?”
She took it out of her purse and passed it to him. He looked at it and handed it back.
“Can we take a look inside the vehicle please?”
“Why?”
“We have reason to believe you are carrying illegal substances”
“That’s ridiculous, why would you think that?”
“We are not obliged to say. Unlock the truck please ma’am”
“It’s already unlocked”
The two police officers spent some time going over the truck, pulling everything out and poking about. They shut the doors and came back to her, standing next to Dev and his car.
“Can I check you over
and your purse please ma’am”
He patted her down and looked through her small bag.
“And now you sir… license please…”
Dev and his car got the same treatment.
“Have you been inside the house tonight?”
“No, I just got home and my boyfriend was waiting here. We were just saying hello when you arrived. You are welcome to go inside if you like?”
“No, that won’t be necessary ma’am. Well, thank you both for your co-operation. It appears we may have been misinformed. Our apologies for interrupting your evening.”
They both got back in the police car and left.
Ella was shaking and exhaled loudly with relief. Dev held her tightly stroking her hair and kissing her head.
“Is that the end of it Dev? She must hate me so much. I’m really scared now. That must have cost her a lot of money. What’s she going to do next, when she finds out her plan went wrong?”
“I’m going to make sure she leaves you alone. Don’t worry Ells.”
“Oh my God… I’ve just remembered… what about the drugs in the lot Dev?”
“They’ll be gone, don’t you worry about that.”
Dev picked his cell out of his jeans pocket. He sent Marcia a quick text. He was way beyond angry.
‘good try bitch’ This should get her nicely annoyed, then he’ll hit her with it.
“C’mon Ells, let’s go see your dad for a while. Then I’m going to take you out for some late dinner and then to mine for a couple of hours. I have some nice bad things I want to do to you.”
She shot him a curious “I so like the sound of that idea” look.
***
Marcia lay on her bed reading the text message from Dev with a wild fury. Her head was ready to explode. How could her plan have gone wrong? All she had to do was fucking drive home! Fuck no… all that money gone to waste! And why was he involved anyway? She couldn’t even breathe properly she was so mad.
She text him back. ‘what do you mean’