Elite 2: The Wrong Side of Revolution

by Joseph C. Anthony

  On this particular evening, Jordan noticed Daniel sitting on the roof from her bedroom window and decided to climb out and join him.

  “What are you doing out here?” She asked him.

  “Just enjoying the stars,” he replied. “You can see so many of them out here.”

  Jordan carefully made her way over and sat down next to him. “It’s beautiful.”

  Daniel laid down on his back to get a better perspective.

  “Do you come out here often?” Jordan inquired.

  “Almost every night.”

  Jordan joined with Daniel by laying down on her own back. “How come I’ve never noticed you out here before?”

  Daniel shrugged. “It’s usually a lot later, after everyone else has fallen asleep. I decided to come out a little earlier tonight to see the things I sometimes miss later on.”

  Jordan accepted Daniel’s response, knowing that he hadn’t slept well since leaving Chicago. “Can you believe we’ve been here six months already? It’s almost the Fourth of July.”

  Daniel let out an exalted breath. He could very easily believe it. As much as he had managed to enjoy his time in the hills and dunes of northwestern Michigan, there was still a big part of him that remained back home in Indiana, and without it he would never feel whole.

  “My mom loves to come up this way for the Fourth,” he spoke. “I keep imagining that I’m going to conveniently bump into them on the street in town somewhere, and that we’ll all hug and cry, then go get dinner together and I can explain to them why I’ve been gone so long.”

  Daniel wiped tears from his eyes. They had both written letters to their families during their stop in North Carolina, explaining the situation as best they could and hoping their families would understand why they couldn’t come home, but seeing them in person would provide an emotional release that Daniel sorely needed.

  Jordan rolled over on her side and rested her head on Daniel’s chest. “I thank God every day that you are here with me,” she said softly.

  Daniel smiled, and a second wave of emotion crashed over him. He tasted warm, salty water running down the sides of his face and onto his lips. He closed his eyes tightly and once again wiped the tears away.

  Jordan felt the breath in his chest shorten, and ran her hand up to his cheek, feeling the warm moisture on his skin. She looked up with her eyes of blue, and he looked back at her, trying to keep himself together. It was obvious that she was feeling similar emotions, but that she had a different idea of what to do with them.

  She lifted herself up and moved her face closer to his. Daniel began to lift himself up on his forearms but before he could react her soft lips were pressed against his. He instantly allowed himself to fall backwards as she threw one leg over his and pressed her body weight against his chest. The kiss became more and more intense with every half-second, and before he knew it Daniel was pouring every emotion—all the sadness, hatred, aggression, fear, and love—into that one kiss.

  Soon the passion overwhelmed him and he threw her off of him before getting to his feet and lifting her up onto hers. He grabbed her hand and pulled her over to his bedroom window, leading her inside. When they were both in the room he grabbed her by her hips and pulled her closer, continuing what they had begun out on the roof.

  The fact that this was the same woman he had for years longed to sleep with never played into it. Jordan was a warm, beautiful human being whom he trusted and knew he could use to transform all of his pent up emotions into fuel for an extreme act of passion.

  Jordan immediately began pulling up on his shirt and Daniel lifted his arms, allowing it to slide it over his head. Jordan didn’t look, rather just slid her hands over Daniel’s abs and chest, pressing against them as hard as she could as she did so. Her hands eventually made their way up and over his shoulders and around his neck. He reached down and gripped onto the bottom of her butt and lifted. Jordan popped up into the air and taking Daniel’s cue, wrapped her legs around his waist.

  The two continued to kiss passionately as Daniel began taking strides toward the bed, carrying Jordan every step of the way. She leaned back, maintaining her grip around his waist, and pulled her own shirt over her head and threw it somewhere off to the side before grabbing each side of Daniel’s face and pulling her mouth back onto his.

  Daniel threw her off of him and down onto the bed before climbing on top, and in an instant they had gone from friends to lovers, finally doing the one thing they had never done before.

  Daniel and Jordan both collapsed onto the bed, panting and trying to regain their breath. The sex had been the most intense that Daniel had ever had. He had used Jordan, taking all of his frustrations and aggressions out on her body, and she had seemed to respond well to it. As he threw her around the bed she cried out with sounds of pleasure, and those sounds had only motivated Daniel to push further.

  Although he had only made love one other time since developing his abilities, it seemed that they had learned to instinctively kick into gear during sex as well.

  “That was more than I’d ever expected,” Jordan told him when she had finally gathered her breath.

  Daniel laughed through his heavy breathing. “Well to be fair, if this had happened over a year ago it probably wouldn’t have been nearly as good.”

  “Well then I guess our timing was perfect,” she responded with a smile, leaning over and giving him one last sweet kiss before rolling over in the other direction. She grabbed Daniel’s arm and pulled it with her, encouraging him to spoon as she drifted off the sleep.

  Daniel adjusted himself into the most comfortable position possible—though there is never a truly comfortable position when you’re the big spoon. Fortunately he was able to increase the blood flow to his other arm to keep it from falling asleep.

  “Why is your heart still pounding?” Jordan asked, feeling as his heart pumped harder in order to get the blood circulated through to the arm being currently crushed by his own body weight. Daniel laughed and settled it back down, trying to find a different way to get sufficient blood threw. Hopefully she would fall asleep quickly and he could roll over.

  Jordan noticed the almost immediate drop in his heart rate. “It’s amazing how you can do that so quick.” She followed the statement with a yawn.

  Daniel moved in close and felt her long brown hair around his nose. He took a silent sniff. Even through the sweat her hair still smelled beautiful. He closed her eyes and within five minutes felt Jordan start twitching in a way that indicated she had fallen asleep.

  Chapter 17

  Once he was convinced that Jordan was indeed sound asleep, he gently and quietly got out of bed and slid his clothes on before climbing back out onto the roof. There was a chill to the air, so he reached back through his window and grabbed a sweatshirt. It was pitch black outside but for the light of the moon and stars.

  Daniel sat back down where he had been when Jordan had joined him a couple hours earlier, and began to rub his face, still absorbing the fact that he had just slept with Jordan. He had no idea what that even meant, if anything. Clearly it had been something that had been on her mind given the fact that she had made the first move, but up until the moment she kissed him he had considered their love life dead and over with.

  Yes, the sex was incredible. There was no doubt that the two still had a strong physical attraction to one another, but there seemed to be something missing—something that hadn’t been during his night with Norma. There was no emotional connection between the two of them. Daniel had used sleeping with Jordan as an emotional release, but it didn’t feel like something they were sharing. Perhaps circumstance played more into that than anything. Maybe next time…

  Next time?

  Daniel wasn’t even sure if there would be a next time. Maybe this would be a one-time thing. If it was, Daniel didn’t think he would have a problem with that. If it wasn’t, he didn’t feel he would have a problem with that either. He cared about Jordan deeply and enjoyed sharing
a physical relationship with her, but he had rather recently given up on her being the one. He no longer felt about her the way he had about Norma.

  In all fairness though, he hadn’t known Norma for nearly as long as he had Jordan. There had been no time for those initial butterflies to flutter away. Perhaps given more time he would have felt similarly about Norma as he did about Jordan. There was no way to know for sure.

  Daniel sighed as he laid back down on the roof and flailed his arms out to his sides. There was no sense trying to piece it all together tonight. There would be plenty of time for that in the days to come.

  In the days to follow Daniel and Jordan never bothered to have an official discussion on where they stood. Instead they just carried on their daily lives, sometimes acting like friends and other times acting like a couple.

  While Carlos and Marie were around they generally acted the same as they had since the day they moved in. When they were alone however, Jordan would move closer, laugh louder, and glance longer. When they went into town together they often held hands or wrapped arms around each other, and Jordan spent many more nights in Daniel’s bed, and they didn’t always sleep.

  Whatever it was that was happening between the two of them, Daniel welcomed the distraction. It was nice to have someone to feel close to when there was no one else around. Anymore there was no question who his best friend was, and if she wanted to occasionally act romantically, he was happy to oblige. He loved her and she loved him. It was comforting for them to be able to show that both emotionally and physically.

  As July wound to an end and August neared, Daniel found himself spending more and more time at the yacht club and less time worrying about research into his untapped abilities. There would be plenty of time for that when Eva and the FBI came calling. Now that he and Jordan were involved, he enjoyed coming home from working in Harbor Springs and stopping in downtown Petoskey—the town on the other side of Little Traverse Bay. Here Daniel would meet Jordan when her shift ended at the restaurant, and they would go for a walk along the waterfront and stop off for drinks before heading back home for the night.

  One day while Daniel and Jessie were in the marina getting a yacht fueled and prepped to head out on the long journey back to Key West, Carlos came over with an elderly gentleman who was dressed appropriately for a yacht club. He wore light khaki pants and a blue blazer with an anchor crest on the pocket overtop of a white polo. A white captain’s hat covered what was left of his white hair, topping off the ensemble.

  “Daniel, I want you to meet someone!” Carlos called to him from halfway up the dock.

  Daniel stopped what he was doing and hurried down the dock toward Carlos and his guest.

  “This is David Boone,” Carlos explained. “He owns the company that buys the bulk of our cherry crop.”

  Daniel raised his eyebrows to signal the significance of the man’s association with Carlos and reached out to shake his hand. “Pleasure to meet you Mister Boone.”

  Boone reached out with a shaky hand to grasp onto Daniel’s. “Likewise.”

  David Boone was the typical rich old white man with a boat. He had ragged and wrinkly skin with a dark orangish tan. It held on loosely to his bones and drooped down his face.

  “I hear you’re staying with Carlos and Marie,” Boone said in an almost too familiar tone once the handshake was over.

  Daniel nodded. “That’s right. We needed a place to stay and we’re friends with Carlos’s cousin.” He tried to be as honest as possible without giving too much away.

  “Oh,” Boone replied as if interested. “So where are you from originally?”

  Daniel gritted his teeth, debating on how to respond. “Indiana.”

  Luckily Boone seemed to have little knowledge of, or interest in the Midwestern farm state. “Well I imagine you’re enjoying the beautiful scenery now that you’re up here.”

  “Yes sir,” Daniel responded, trying to remain polite but desperately hoping that this conversation would end soon. “It certainly is gorgeous.”

  “Daniel,” Carlos interjected mercifully, “I invited David and his wife over to the house for dinner tonight. I was hoping you could let Jordan know and you two can join us.”

  Daniel nodded his head as if he had a choice in the matter. “Yeah, Jessie and I are just getting the Trust Fund ready to go and then I was going to head over to Petoskey to pick her up. We’ll skip the usual drink and come right home to meet you guys.”

  “Great,” Carlos said satisfactorily. “We’ll see you at home.”

  “We’ll see you soon,” Boone waved to Daniel as he and Carlos started back toward the club building.

  Daniel waved a hand and went back to help Jessie. He dreaded to think of what questions the Boones might have for he and Jordan at dinner.

  As he navigated his way along the streets of Petoskey, Daniel mentally prepared a backstory for he and Jordan to stick to when the Boones started asking too many questions. They had been fortunate that Carlos and Marie had never inquired too deeply into their past, but from the sense he got from his minute with the old man on the dock today, the Boones would not show the same level of discretion.

  As he rounded the corner of the street Jordan’s restaurant was on, he saw her out on the patio, talking and laughing with one of her managers. She threw her head back as she let out a loud cackle and patted his chest with her hand gently. Daniel knew the manager as Bachman. He believed his first name was Travis, but everyone just referred to him as Bachman.

  Jordan clearly had a crush on Bachman and though she denied it, it was quite obvious to Daniel. He wasn’t too surprised to find that she had a thing for one of her managers, and given that he was tall with curly brown hair and blue eyes, he did come off as somewhat attractive.

  She never acted on any of her feelings, partly because she was still denying their existence to herself. Daniel knew that he should have felt jealous about their little fling, but it surprisingly didn’t bother him. His lack of jealousy was in part due to the fact that Daniel no longer believed that Jordan was the one. Whatever their romantic relationship was, it was purely situational. With everything they had been through together, it was only natural that romantic feelings would eventually surface, but Daniel fully expected them to fade just as they had in the past.

  Once maybe Daniel had believed that Jordan was his soul mate and that he needed to spend the rest of his life with her to be happy, but he wasn’t that person anymore. He wasn’t the same clueless guy trying to get through life one day at a time with the simple goal of living in the locale of his choosing with the girl of his dreams. Life, unfortunately, was no longer that simple, and nor were his romantic interests.

  If Norma were to somehow rise from the dead and come back into his life, he would forget about his relationship with Jordan and go with her in an instant. For this reason he knew it would have been completely unfair for him to get mad at Jordan for having feelings for someone else. When the time came and Jordan was ready to give things a shot with Bachman, he would be more than willing to step aside. He cared deeply about Jordan, but not in the same way he had a year ago.

  Daniel started for the restaurant patio and it did not take long for Jordan to notice him. She waved and gave a big smile which he returned. She ended her conversation with Bachman and leaned against the rail to talk to Daniel.

  “I’ve just got one more table left and once they’re done I’ll be out of here,” she told him.

  “Okay,” he replied. “Carlos and Marie have the guy who buys their cherries and his wife coming over for dinner so I told him we’d head right back there after your shift.”

  Jordan’s expression changed in an instant as though she were very concerned by this change of plans. “When will they be there? Will I have time to shower and change?”

  Daniel smirked. The things women worried about. “I’m sure even if they’re already there they’ll understand if you go upstairs to clean off. They’ll probably prefer it.”

  J
ordan nodded, accepting of the answer but not entirely satisfied with it. “Let me get this table their bill and I’ll meet you out front.”

  When they walked through the front door of Carlos and Marie’s, the Boones were already in the common area enjoying hors d’oeuvres. “Shit,” Jordan whispered to no one in particular.

  “Hey guys,” Marie greeted the couple as though they weren’t expected. “Come on in.”

  Carlos stood up and began proper introductions. “Daniel, you’ve already met David, this is his wife Melinda. Jordan, this is David and Melinda Boone, they are the ones who buy our cherry crop from us every year.”

  “And I must say those cherry trees are looking absolutely beautiful,” Boone added, standing up to shake hands.

  Jordan, Daniel, and the Boones all exchanged proper handshakes and “how do you do do?”s before Jordan excused herself to take a shower.

  “I’m sorry, I’ve just gotten off work at the restaurant. I’ll only be a moment.”

  “Take your time dear, we understand,” Melinda assured her in the form of a dismissal.

  Fortunately it had been a rather cool day and Daniel hadn’t needed to do any particularly extraneous work at the club, so rather than make things slightly awkward by going upstairs and joining Jordan in the shower he decided to remain in the clothes he had on.

  Carlos and Marie went all out for their dinner with the Boones, serving bacon-wrapped scallops as an appetizer with a twelve year-old bottle of Michigan cherry wine.

  “So will you be helping Carlos with the harvest next week?” David Boone asked Daniel.

  Daniel hadn’t given it much thought, but he could see no reason not to. “Definitely.”

  Jordan sped through her shower and was presentable and back downstairs in only fifteen minutes, which as it turned out was just in time for dinner. Marie had made pork loin with a special homemade cherry glaze and it smelled delicious.