by Rowena Dawn
“You drink your coffee black, from what I observed,” he said, laying the cups on the coffee table.
“You have a good sense of observation,” Ellen replied flatly, leaving the plateau on the table as well. She took a seat on the sofa because Jay blocked the way to the armchairs.
Jay merely shrugged and sat next to her. Ellen’s eyebrows arched, and she looked pointedly toward the armchairs framing the coffee table.
“Nah, I’d feel better next to you,” Jay said with another grin and shifted his position to see her better. “Now, it’s time you talked,” he noted, picking up his coffee cup and waiting expectantly.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“About what?” Ellen pretended not to understand his meaning.
“You played this game before, Elle, and it didn’t work,” he admonished her playfully, a grin turning the corners of his mouth up.
Ellen just shook her head stubbornly. “I don’t recall,” she shrugged.
“I do,” Jay replied. “Allow me to enlighten you,” he said in a haughty tone of voice and placed the cup of coffee on the table. He needed to give his undivided attention to the woman. “First, you have to explain why you resigned your position. Second, why you put me under surveillance. Three, what smart plan you hacked to catch that guy into the act,” he counted on his fingers, and Ellen grimaced.
“You don’t want much,” she grumbled with annoyance.
“Nah, I don’t think it is much,” Jay chuckled. “We’ll get to more serious things later,” he warned her.
“Like what?” the woman looked at him sideways, with a frown on her face.
“Just things,” the man fluttered his hand. “You’ll see when we get there. So?”
“So what?” she arched an eyebrow.
“Come on, Elle, you’re not dense. So talk. I know when someone is just playing with me,” he warned her, bobbing his eyebrows and making her laugh.
“All right, don’t get your pants into a twist,” Ellen slapped his thigh, and then her eyes widened, surprised by her gesture.
“I like it so don’t fret about it,” Jay waved her embarrassment away. “Feel free to touch me in any way you want,” he invited her, and Ellen blushed.
“I don’t want to touch you,” she replied with a pout.
“Yes, you do,” the man countered her in a serious tone of voice. “But you can do it while you’re talking,” he reminded her, and took her hand in his, starting playing with her fingers.
“I can’t focus and talk when you do this,” she tried to draw her hand back.
“Huh, huh,” Jay shook his head, denying her wish. “It’s mine for the moment.”
Ellen stared at him nonplussed. His tone of voice showed that the man was serious, and she didn’t know what to think of his attitude.
“Talk, Elle,” Jay groused through his tightened teeth, intertwining his fingers with hers and giving a slight tug to her hand.
“Oh, for God’s sake, I’ve already told you why I resigned,” she practically shouted, sick of hearing the same thing all the time.
“Not really,” Jay pointed out. “There’s more to that story,” he shook his head. “You didn’t just decide that you couldn’t achieve your goals in the spur of the moment. Something must have happened,” the man said, observing Ellen attentively.
Ellen blushed and turned her eyes downward. She didn’t want to share with him the awkward scene that had taken place in the commander’s office. The woman still shuddered when she recalled how poorly she had managed that situation.
“It can’t be so bad, sweetie,” Jay tugged at her hand again. “Just spill it out, and you’ll see that it’s not the end of the world.”
“I haven’t said it was the end of the world,” she lifted her eyes at him peevishly.
“No, but your attitude tells me that,” Jay replied in a soft tone of voice, and his thumb stroked her palm.
Ellen felt a tingle and closed her eyes for a second. She breathed deeply, and then opened her eyes and looked directly into Jay’s dark pupils.
“All right. Here it goes. I went to the commander with the proposition to arrest the casino owner for what happened to you. He refused, and I insisted. Then, he said that I seemed too closely invested, and he couldn’t rely on my words. That pissed me off big time, so I resigned,” the woman said fast to get over with it sooner. “Are you satisfied now?” she thundered him with clouded eyes.
Ellen expected Jay to scoff at her, but the man just shook his head. He flexed his fingers over hers, and then, he leaned forward and touched her face gently with his other hand. The woman’s lips parted in surprise, and her eyes widened.
Jay leaned even further and touched her parted lips with his mouth. Ellen felt as if a bolt of light had crossed her body, and she sighed into his mouth.
The man deepened his kiss for a moment more, and then, he drew back just a little, leaving only one inch between their faces. Ellen’s agitated breath reached his mouth, and a tender smile curved his lips.
Jay’s eyes wandered over the woman’s flushed face as if he couldn’t have had enough of her. His hand was still curled on the woman’s jaw, and his thumb brushed over her lower lip.
Then, his slightly dilated pupils fixed on her hazel eyes. They stared at each other for a few more moments. Ellen’s fingers shook in Jay’s hand, and the man quieted their movement, clasping them in his hand tighter.
Jay’s head got closer to her again, and his lips brushed over hers once more. Then, he deepened his kiss and took her mouth the way he had thought about during the long days when he painfully missed her physical presence next to him.
Now, Ellen curled the fingers of her left hand around his wrist, while she slid the other one from Jay’s grasp and placed it on the man’s chest. The woman didn’t have any intention to stop him. She just wanted to feel more of him. When it became too much, she knotted her fingers in his t-shirt and held onto him to keep her balance.
Jay ended their kiss with soothing nibbles on her lips, and then he let go of her. He drew back and took her hand in his. The man brought their intertwined fingers to his mouth. His lips brushed over her knuckles, and he squeezed them briefly in his hand. With a last soothing stroke over her hand, he untangled their fingers and reached for his coffee cup.
The man felt that he had overwhelmed her and marveled that he was so attuned to her emotional state of mind. It wasn’t the first time he sensed what she needed, and what she felt.
Jay knew that his empathic skills were rudimentary at best, and he had never been able to sense more than a momentary flash of emotion in the people around him. But then, Ellen’s presence in his life seemed to have sharpened his senses because he had a clear picture of her emotional turmoil. The man didn’t need to guess what she felt, but what she thought.
He sipped his coffee pensively, watching Ellen from the corner of his eye. The woman clasped her hands together tightly, and she bit her lower lip, unsure of what she should have said or done.
“Don’t fret, Elle,” Jay said softly, shifting his eyes to her. “It was meant to be,” he explained. “The pull between the two of us is strong, and we’d have got to that sooner or later,” he shrugged.
Ellen didn’t reply but lifted her eyes at him. She measured him with hungry eyes. ‘Too bad he’s a gambler,’ she reflected with regret and changed her position on the sofa.
“You regret that you kissed me,” Jay noted dryly, disappointed with the emotional waves coming from her.
Ellen shook her head. “No, I don’t regret that we shared a kiss,” she pointed out. “But you’re a gambler, and nothing good would come out from a relationship with you,” the woman said with determination. Ellen regretted that she had to utter those words, but the woman knew that she would regret much more afterward if she got involved with him.
“I see,” Jay grumbled and stood off the couch.
Ellen's eyes widened. ‘Now, he’ll throw me out again,’ she thought with bitterness, unsure of how she f
elt about that.
Jay just chuckled and shook his head. “You’re fantastic, Elle. I’ve got no intention to send you packing, girl. I just need a drink right now. It’s over one in the afternoon,” he remarked, glancing at his watch. “We can have a drink,” he shrugged. “What’s your poison?” the man asked her.
“I don’t know. Maybe whiskey or vodka,” the woman answered undecided.
“Let’s have a whiskey. I’ve got a good Scottish one,” Jay boasted and rushed to prepare the drinks.
The man handed her one of the Glencairn glasses he held in his hands, and Ellen’s eyes widened. “These are original Scottish glasses,” she remarked.
“You know your glasses,” Jay noted dryly. “I learned from my uncle, Michael. He’s a whiskey connoisseur, and he taught me to hold my liqueur,” he confessed. “To my mother’s dismay, I should say,” he mumbled. “I had a field day with her when she discovered. And her brother didn’t fare better if you want to know,” he winked at her. “You’ll also notice that I have no ice. I didn’t bother to replace it after you used it on my face,” he shrugged.
Then, the man swirled the whiskey, holding the glass tightly in the scoop of his hand to warm the liquid. Then, he raised it toward her, “Cheers, Elle.”
Jay took a mouthful and let the alcohol warm his palate. ‘I’m not at a tasting after all,’ he shrugged inwardly. He hissed when the potent liquid hit his throat, and then turned to Ellen, feeling her eyes on him.
“It’s strong stuff, so be careful,” he warned her, and she shook her head with a smile. But then, she just sipped. She didn’t dare to follow his example, and Jay grinned.
“Would you tell me what you have against gamblers? Where does this aversion of yours come from?” he inquired pensively, and Ellen’s eyes lifted at him.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ellen seemed embarrassed to answer to his query. She merely stared at him, undecided about what she should do.
“Come on, Elle, you can tell me,” he cajoled her. “As a matter of fact, you have to tell me. I’m invested in this thing,” Jay waved his hand between the two of them. “I have the right to know against what I have to fight,” he said very matter-of-factly.
Ellen shook her head. “You don’t have to fight anything, Jay.”
“Oh, yeah, sweetie, I do,” he nodded emphatically. “You see, the point is that I’m interested in keeping you with me, so I need to know what I’m supposed to do to make that happen,” he explained candidly.
“You’re so... unbelievable,” Ellen observed with another shake of her head. She couldn’t believe the man’s insistence and didn’t understand his ulterior motives, because he must have had some.
“Believe it, Elle, and start talking,” Jay waved his hand to her impatiently. The suspense tensed him.
“I don’t really like to talk about that,” the woman tried to explain, glancing at him from under her lashes.
But then, Jay wouldn’t have any of that. He just shook his head and asked her again to tell him everything.
Ellen sipped from her glass, taking her eyes off the man. On the one hand, his attitude bothered her, but on the other, she admitted that maybe if he found out what had happened, he would leave her alone.
“My father was a gambler, Jay,” Ellen started to talk. “The worst type of gambler, as a matter of fact,” she explained, gesturing agitatedly. “He rarely won anything at the tables although he thought he only had a run of bad luck,” she shook her head as if she still couldn’t understand what was in that man’s head. “Anyways, soon enough, we were in so much debt that we didn’t even have a piece of bread in the house. For days in a row,” she blushed with embarrassment.
Jay took her hand in his, and Ellen’s eyes fell on their joined hands. The man’s gesture made it easier for her to speak about her childhood days, and she didn’t understand why.
She shook her head to clear it and continued, “Father didn’t work... No time for that, you see,” she said with derision. “He spent almost all his waking hours in a casino, or God knows where, playing cards or dice.”
Ellen turned her eyes toward the balcony. She refused to see the expression in Jay’s eyes. The woman knew she would have loathed noticing either his censure or his pity.
“Mother drank,” she continued in a tone of voice more appropriate to tell a story. It was as if she hadn’t spoken about her family at all. “That was how she coped with father’s gambling addiction. Anyway, by the time I was about ten, we were on welfare, and most of the money went on playing cards and buying rum... I can’t stand the smell of rum even today,” the woman shook her head and closed her eyes.
Jay didn’t intervene and waited for her to continue in her own rhythm. He just stroke her palm with his thumb and made a note in his mind not to ever keep rum in the house.
“Anyway, when I turned twelve, my father inherited a little house from an older aunt,” she turned her eyes toward Jay.
The man shivered at the ice in her eyes and her remoteness. He just knew that the worst part of her story was about to come.
“He sold the house and cashed the money immediately,” Ellen revealed in a flat tone of voice. “Then, he went to the same casino where you were, and lost every single penny,” she continued in the same impassive voice. “Father came back home at around two or three in the morning and explained everything to mother. He told her that the game had been arranged, and that was why he lost his money. I had never seen such a huge fight between the two of them before although they regularly fought,” Ellen shook her head, and Jay pressed his lips when he noticed the paleness of her face. “They practically broke every dish and piece of furniture in that dreary small studio where we lived... Anyway, that morning he left. For good. I have never seen him or heard from him again,” she shook her head. “Mother polished two bottles of rum, one after another. She utterly forgot about me. I waited for two days for her to come back to her senses,” Ellen recollected with bitterness now.
The woman still remembered how hungry she had been, and how she had rummaged through the house for a piece of bread. ‘Of course, there wasn’t any,’ Ellen recollected.
“Anyways, when she did wake up, she just glanced at me and told me that I had to go away too,” the woman shrugged as if it hadn’t been important.
‘Oh, but it was important, Elle. Downright heart-wrenching, sweetheart,’ Jay reflected, and his heart ached for her.
Her story had stirred his anger, but that last comment brought him on the verge of exploding with fury. He breathed deeply, trying to control his rage. The people he would have liked to break their necks weren’t in that room after all.
“What happened then, Elle?” he asked when the woman didn’t continue with her confession.
Ellen just shrugged, but Jay tugged at her hand, and she glanced at him.
“Actually, that’s the end, Jay. I ended up at the Sacred-Heart orphanage first. I lived there for a little over a year. Then, I was placed in foster care,” she recollected. “Until the age of eighteen, I met four foster families. It wasn’t a big deal,” the woman shrugged once more when she saw the flat light in Jay’s eyes.
‘Yeah, sweetie, I bet it wasn’t,’ the man reflected with sadness, and then he brought her hand to his lips again. ‘You have to think heard, Jay, to come up with a plan to make her stay,’ he sighed inwardly while watching the woman’s profile. He had his work cut out for him.
Ellen drew her hand from the man’s fingers and picked up her tumbler of whiskey. The woman busied herself with swirling the liquid in the glass because she didn’t want to see if he pitied her.
“All right, here’s the deal,” Jay said in a very matter-of-fact tone of voice.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“There’s a distinction between a man who gambles to make money and one that gambles for fun,” Jay pointed out, watching her expectantly.
When he noticed that her expression hadn’t softened at all, the man sighed and stood up, starting to pace t
he length of the floor. Jay covered the same distance a couple of times, and then, he locked his hands at the back of his head and stopped before the open balcony door.
For a few minutes, Jay just turned various variants in his mind, but he rejected every single one with a shake of his head. By now, Ellen watched his actions with bewilderment. The woman didn’t understand what happened to him.
Suddenly, Jay rubbed his hands and then returned to her. This time, he sat on an armchair, so that he could look straight into her eyes.
“All right, the truth,” the man sighed. “As a matter of fact, I’ve already told you the truth, and you didn’t believe me,” he pointed out. Ellen arched an eyebrow, and Jay hurried to say, “I did tell you the truth, only not everything. I’m afraid that you won’t believe what I am going to say now either,” he took care to mention, leaning forward and bracing his elbows on his knees. “You have to promise something to me though,” he asked piercing her with his eyes.
“I can’t promise anything without knowing what you’re asking,” Ellen retorted, looking at him askance.
Jay chuckled, but then, the woman realized that the man was somewhat anxious, and that confused her. He always seemed in control of everything.
“Of course, I won’t ask you to make a promise without telling you what’s about,” he shook his head. “I need your promise that what I’m going to say will stay just between the two of us. No one must know that you found out. Not my brother, not Nora or Becka, and not even Bryan,” he pointed out.
“Imagine that I won’t start shouting your words from the rooftops,” Ellen replied miffed. “I don’t have such a big mouth.”
“I haven’t said that you do, but maybe, inadvertently you might say something, and it is important that you don’t,” Jay warned her. “I’m breaking the rules here and big time, believe me,” he stressed out.
“All right, I got that. I promise. Are you satisfied now?” the woman asked in a cross tone of voice.
