FlakJacket

by Nichols, A

  “And what was it?” Now she positively glared at him.

  “None of your business.”

  He paused. “Everything you do is my business.”

  “Not until I sign that damned contract, and I haven’t done that yet, have I?” There was some anger in her voice. He watched her like a hawk, as the color fluctuated over her cheekbones.

  “Ah, I think I see. He made a pass at you, didn’t he? He wanted you, and you didn’t want him.” Anger flared in her blue eyes.

  “How about he tried to rape me-–how would that work for you!” She jumped off the stool and stalked towards the steps.

  “Come back here.” She hesitated for only a second at the command in his voice but then continued on her way. It took him only seconds to get off his stool and grab for her; she turned but seemed to slip through his hands like a shadow. “We’re not done talking.”

  She was in his face then, her hands clenched at her sides, her voice like ice. “We are if I say we are.”

  His voice continued, cutting into her. “So the relationship was unacceptable, was it?”

  “Yes, you bastard. You probably wouldn’t mind a woman pawing all over you, forcing you, her hands on you, hurting you? You’d welcome that. You’d give her everything she wanted—and more.”

  Jordan watched her uneven breathing, pondering her words. “It’s always going to be a battle with you, isn’t it?”

  Her eyes flashed at him, and in an attempt to wipe that knowing smile from his face, her hand flew, striking him—catching him by surprise. “That’s how I respond; I fight. You should remember that from the first time we met.” He reacted even though the slap hadn’t hurt, putting his hands on her small wrists and holding them tightly. She was stunned as they slowly loosened on her and moved down her body to her hips, where they rested. She didn’t breathe, and she didn’t move an inch. She watched the rage play over his face as he harnessed his anger.

  So she hadn’t wanted Hull’s hands on her. He stepped back out of her reach; sometimes, retreat was the better move. He looked surprised as she said, “Well. Are we done talking now?” Her eyes dared him to continue the interrogation.

  Damned if she didn’t knock him off balance. He turned her and pushed her towards the stairs, moving towards his office. “Stay out of my way,” but her image was seared in his mind.

  CHAPTER 6

  Jordan sat in his office looking over the reports he had garnered on Thomas Hull as well as the pictures. The man was very good-looking, and he had wanted Madison, had he? The financial reports he was waiting for were now flooding his inbox—all the information he could gather on the conglomerate of buyers for the Jordanian properties. They would soon be aware he was moving in on them capturing a snapshot of their operations. He couldn’t believe the amount of money the group had raised to buy the properties in his native country.

  He had put in for the police report from Chicago, hoping it would give him the information he needed about her arrest in that city. The witch was upstairs asleep, or at least he hoped she was. He glanced at his watch. There were only a few minutes before he would have to wake her for her news conference. She hadn’t brought many clothes with her, so Jordan had sent out for some outfits that he liked. Another battle lay on the horizon; he could sense it coming. The only question was why was he doing this? He chalked it up to his being a man who liked a challenge. Then he laughed at himself. He was such a liar; she reinforced everything he thought about women. He had never known if his daughter was really his; his wife had been unfaithful to him many times, but she didn’t deserve to die in childbirth. He could have had the paternity tests run, but he chose not to. The little one was his in his heart even if she wasn’t his flesh and blood. He wiped the memory from his mind. He lived in the present, now—and away from all women except those he used to slake his need with no emotional attachment.

  Madison was curled in the middle of the king sized bed, her hair spread out around her, her camisole pulled up letting her stomach show. He found her a delectable piece, and so NOT HIS. He called to her from the doorway of the room. “Madison. It’s time to get up.” She turned, but her eyes didn’t open. “Madison.” This time there was more of a bite to his voice. Her one eye opened, as she watched him cross the room to stand at the foot of the bed. “You need to get up.”

  She curled back into herself. “Later. I can’t. I’m too tired.”

  He frowned. “Now. Get out of that bed.” She rolled onto the other side just out of his reach, and she stoked his anger once again. Witch. “Get up, or I’ll let the press come up, and we’ll have the press conference right here.” Her brow wrinkled, but she sat up, pushing her red hair from her face and straightening out her top and sleep pants. Compliance, he thought. How refreshing. “How do you feel?”

  “Fine. I’m fine.

  “Your outfit is in the closet.” Her eyebrows went up as he walked to the door and opened it. A beautiful blue suit hung there.

  “That isn’t mine. You are not purchasing clothes for me.” He had her back up again. He was getting quite good at pushing her buttons.

  “That’s what you will wear. You have five minutes to change, and then we’ll go over the statement you are going to make. If you are not ready when I come in, I will dress you myself.” He turned and left the room.

  “You arrogant son of a bitch!” she yelled after him. He shut the door firmly on her tirade as she thought—the nerve of that man. She muttered to herself: “There is no way in hell I will do what YOU say.” She got up and held the vibrant blue suit that matched her eyes to her body. Damn the man had taste. She stripped off her clothes and dressed hurriedly. He was mean enough to do exactly what he said he would. The soft light blue color of her sheer blouse peeked out between the lapels of the fitted top. The pants flared a bit at her ankles. She swirled around to see a stranger in the mirror. It was perfect, maximizing her slenderness and her coloring; she felt glamorous. Who had picked it for him? There was note attached to the hanger.

  Jordan,

  I did the best I could to match your very specific requirements. This is the closest I could come. You have such an eye of colors and fabrics—Jessica.

  Who in the hell was Jessica? The door behind her pushed open without a knock, and Jordan’s eyes ran up and down her body as he surveyed his handiwork. She was a vision. He crossed the room and held out a paper to her; she took it gingerly like it would bite her and scanned its contents. “You will answer five questions. Here they are. What you choose to say to answer them is up to you.”

  “Well, thank you for nothing, Jordan. Or maybe we should call this what it is—running roughshod over me?”

  “You’ll know when I run roughshod over you.” Witch. “I can promise you that, and take my word for it—that time is not far away.” She had taken his calm and stirred him up all over again. Jordan didn’t often move in an emotional realm.

  He waited for her and followed her to the front veranda. The press corps was camped on his lawn drinking punch of all things. She gave him a look, and he had the grace to blush a bit. She stepped up to the microphone and took over smiling sweetly at the crowd. She read the statement and asked for questions; most concerned the attempt on her life that morning.

  “My message about the refugees is controversial with many voices on each side. I have to expect that some will not appreciate my point of view and will try to silence my voice. But the need is clear to me, and it will take more than what happened this morning to stop me from speaking out about these people’s needs.”

  “Are you now using Lassiter Enterprises as your protection service?” Jordan frowned. That wasn’t one of the questions on the list he had approved.

  “We are negotiating that at the present time. Mr. Lassiter was kind enough to bring me to his house to recuperate; I fainted, gentlemen. Remember to eat breakfast.” There was general laughter. “As you can see, there has been no harm done.” She was minimizing the threat to her life. The question was: Why? D
idn’t she realize the danger she was in?

  “We’ve discovered that the man arrested worked for Mr. Thomas Hull. You two used to be an item at one time, correct?”

  There was a slight hesitation and stiffness in her manner before she answered. “My father introduced us at a gala, and we did date for a short amount of time. I have moved on in my life, and I’m sure Mr. Hull has as well.” Jordan wondered about that.

  “The Senate is proposing standards to help the refugee crisis. Are you on board with what they are proposing.”

  “I am for anything that will help these people find new homes or be able to return to their old ones in peace.”

  “Are you going to continue your speaking schedule?”

  Her eyes found Jordan’s. “I am.”

  He stepped into the fray. “Thank you. If you have further questions, I suggest you pose them in writing to Ms. Kelly.” He moved her off the porch and back into the house. He had declared the interview over.

  A message chimed into her phone; she picked it up, and Jordan watched as anguish covered her face as she read it. He didn’t ask; he just took the phone from her hand and read the message: “So, Mr. Hull would like to meet with you.”

  Her angry eyes looked at him. “No!”

  “That bad?” She walked away from him moving slowly up the stairs to her room.

  Jordan waited until dinner was ready, and then he walked up to get her. He knocked gently on her door, but there was no answer. A sudden feeling of dread went through him, and he pushed it open. He found her sound asleep, dressed in her camisole and sleep pants once more, dark circles under eyes. He touched her neck at her pulse point, and it was steady. What had happened to her in the past with Mr. Hull? Had it been a friendly groping that she overplayed or a full-fledged attack on her person? He made up his mind to find out.

  He had already glanced at her schedule for the next day, and it was brutal. He planned on telling her she would have to cut two events, or he’d do it for her. “Madison? It’s time to eat.”

  She thrashed around violently and cried out in her sleep, “No. Please, no.” Her voice rose to a shriek. Damn. She was in the midst of a nightmare fighting her demons, her arms striking out. He quickly sat down beside her and held her arms, pulling her tightly against his body to still her, as she struggled violently against him.

  “Madison. Wake up,” he whispered in her ear. He made his voice as unthreatening as he could. Her body stiffened as she heard him. “Madison.” She slowly opened her fear-filled eyes.

  Her eyes cleared as she saw who was with her, and her body softened. “I’m sorry. I must have fallen asleep.” She made a move to get out of his arms, but he held her. Her heart still beat at a rapid pace; she was obviously terrified of something—Thomas Hull came into his mind. What had he done to make her fear him so much?

  He strove to keep his voice casual. “There are too many events on your schedule tomorrow. We cut two of them.”

  A mutinous look came over her face. “No. I promised. I have to get to all of them.”

  “No, you don’t. You’re still not up to par from your faint, so the answer is No.” His voice was sharp. “It’s just until you feel a little better. You’re tired and run down, and you need some rest.”

  Her eyes pinned him like a bug. “Do you practice being controlling everyday, or is it just for me? What do you do, look into the mirror and decide who is going to be your victim?” It was an awful thing to say to him.

  His look became agonized. “No. When I look into the mirror, I see a man who can’t do critical things right, and innocent people suffer for it. That’s what I see, and I am the tormented one.” He eased out from underneath her and moved stridently to the door, closing it loudly behind him. He was in pain, and she had pulled the hurt out of his all over again.

  CHAPTER 7

  She ate alone. Jordan was nowhere to be found. She wandered aimlessly around his house and then knocked on his study. There was no reply, so she tried the door, and when it opened, she walked slowly into his domain, inhaling the slight fragrance that was uniquely his. She moved to his desk and looked over the items on it. There was the picture of the dark-haired woman and then a separate one of a little girl. She looked just like her mother. Madison’s fingertips touched the 10” x 10” wooden box engraved with his initials that sat on the desktop. She knew she shouldn’t, but she pushed open its hinged lid.

  Inside were papers—a death certificate for Katelyn Lassiter. It read death by drowning; the dates indicated that the child would have been three at the time. The second paper was also a death certificate for Aisha Lassiter; it was probably Jordan’s wife—death in childbirth. Oh God. His citizenship papers for the U.S. were there. A wedding ring, a torn piece of a pink blanket, and a thank you note completed the treasure trove; the feelings imbued in each of them began invading her body each one screaming its story to her. She sat down in his chair and pondered them, trying to ward off the visions that came. When she had gathered the salient facts, she mentally pulled herself away from the pieces of his life, closing her eyes to encapsulate them in her memory. She sensed his presence sifting through the exploding memories of her brain, and her eyes rose to meet his; they were not happy ones. He stood looking at her, and he was angry.

  She put the papers back into the wooden box and closed the lid. “I’m sorry.” Her hand lingered on the initials, a hot sensation jolting her system. “I shouldn’t be here.” And she meant that she shouldn’t have allowed the visions and feelings that she had to come.

  “No. You shouldn’t.” He saw only the invasion of his privacy; his voice was clipped, and he had every right to be pissed. She got up and moved to pass him, but he caught her upper arm as she did so. “I need to talk to you.” She nodded. “But not in here.”

  “I’ll wait for you in the great room.” She pulled her arm from his and walked from the room, her heart rate accelerated, her feelings in flux. The visions that she saw flashed through her—a party with many guests, Jordan talking to several men at the side of the pool. The children were running and screaming, and a little girl wandered near the edge of the pool, no adult nearby. She toppled into the water making barely a ripple. She sank, her pink outfit standing out sharply from the blue of the pool lining. She saw Jordan as he saw her floating body, his anguished cries and his body hitting the water to pull her from it. She looked down at the scene as he tried again and again to revive her until men pulled him from her. He had been too late. That scrap of blanket had been hers, a piece of the one she held in her arms as she died.

  Then she saw the face of another child, a boy, so like Jordan that she caught her breath. This would be her child and his; oh God, he was the one. The future was clearly delineated now before her; he would claim her body, and she just wasn’t sure if he would choose to claim her heart. She closed her eyes and willed the child away, but in her heart, she held him close as he smiled at her, his arms reaching for her, waiting. The image dissipated as she drew in a deep breath and came back to the present.

  When she glanced up, Jordan was sitting in front of her, watching her carefully. Her head had been somewhere else when he came in, but where? Her face reminded him of a picture he had once seen of a Madonna in a church, her arms reaching out to her child. But this witch was no Madonna. She spoke: “I’m sorry again. Have you been here long?”

  He shook his head no. “I want to go over your schedule for the rest of the week. I have to make sure I have every angle covered. The threat yesterday makes that painfully clear.” She nodded. “This is the new schedule for the week. You can use me as the reason for your cancellations and time constraints.” She glanced down at it. Crap. He had decimated it.

  “I can’t make these changes today.”

  “You don’t have to. I already did.”

  She was on her feet, hands fisted and anger ripping through her; no one told her what to do. “You work for me, and I say what speeches and events I attend.”

  His voice was f
irm. “I. Cancelled. Them. Deal with it. You have an activity tonight. It is covered by my men, but you’d best get ready. The car will be here in fifteen minutes.”

  “This discussion is not finished, Mr. Lassiter. I still haven’t officially hired you to be my close protection.”

  “The damned contract is in your room. Sign it. I’m already charging you for my time.”

  He turned and walked from the Great Room, his shoulders set, his manner stoic. She couldn’t help but remember the anguished look on his face when they told him his little girl was gone. He was locking out his emotions and raising his fist at the world every single day. But he couldn’t get back what he had lost. She wondered if he had the heart to reach for something new. Would it be only his sperm he gave to her, or would it be more?

  Madison ran upstairs to get dressed for her event. She grabbed the first outfit her hands reached, another one that Jordan had purchased for her. She turned to the mirror to find its flattering lines on her body. It was knee-length, flowered, its colors flattering to her fair skin and hair. She pushed on her pumps and grabbed her carryall. A quick brush through her hair, and she was running down the steps and out onto the porch. A car was pulled up, and the back door was open. She hadn’t remembered to look at the contract. A man stepped up to help her in. “I’m Matt. I’ll be your close protection for tonight.” She nodded and almost asked where Jordan was, but she needed distance from him and from her pervading thoughts. She sat back in the car and concentrated on the event ahead.

  Jordan sat in his car outside Thomas Hull’s palatial estate. His searches had found only mentions of a young Madison and the man eight years older than she. They had been seen in public at a number of events for six months or so, and then they were no longer a couple. Speculation ran rife as to what had happened. They had been seen arguing for the last four months at several events that they attended as a couple.