Ellis was curled up in a ball on the bed, the blankets heaped over her. She was hugging a pillow tightly to her chest, even in her sleep. Adam could still see the tear tracks on her face.
He stroked her cheek gently before he silently slipped out of the bed. He was not wearing any weapons, having taken them all off when he had been trying to calm her down, and he did not put any on now. He knew that he would be hard pressed to not kill anyone as it was. If he had any weapons on him... somebody was certain to die.
He glanced back at Ellis. His Ell. He could not leave her here, bu neither could he wait anymore. With a nod to himself he did what he had to do.
...
"I was waiting for you." Ash said quietly. He was sitting cross legged on the floor in the ceter of the sparring room they had set up in their base, but now he stood up.
Adam walked up to him, and punched him straight in the face. Ash did not even try to stop him.
Then the next hit came, then another, then another, and still Ash would not fight back.
"Fight, damn you!" Adam yelled in frustration.
Ash glared at him, his mouth set in sullen lines.
"My fault. I should have been there, and I freaking wasn't!" Ash snarled.
Adam suddenly stopped. "It wasn't you." he breathed, some of his anger evaporating.
"How stupid do you think I am?" Ash said angrily.
"How the hell should I know?" Adam shouted, his anger back in full force.
"It was me." James said quietly from the doorway. Adam whirled around to look at him.
"You son of a bitch. I told you to stay away from her." Adam was not shouting, but his voice had a cold hair raising fury now.
"I know! GODAMNIT! I know! I thought she was just faking everything. I thought..." James stopped. He was about to say that he had thought that Ellis was having an affair with Ash, but he realized that telling Adam that right now might be tantamount to suicide.
"So you what? Just grabbed her in the dark?" Adam asked menacingly, coming closer.
"It was supposed to be a hug. Maybe from Ash. But she freaked, and then I just held on, not knowing what to do." James replied, but his tone made it clear that he was not defending his actions.
"Just held on my foot; she has bruises on her wrists." Adam said icily as he walked even closer to him. "Faking it? Do you know what it took for her to be able to trust me? How long it was before I could touch her and not have her flinch?" Adam snarled, before hitting him. Every hit, every punch was punctuated with more curses, but James would not fight back.
Adam was having none of it.
"Fight me or I swear to God, Chan I'll find a way to get to Mikki the way you..." Adam had not even finished the sentence when James punched him. Then it was really on.
...
"What are they fighting about? And what happened to you?" Vince asked Ash as he observed the fight. He had just entered the room and was completely out of the loop.
"Adam used me for practice." Ash answered.
"And?" Vince prompted.
Ash sighed. "Chan played a prank on Ellis."
"How bad?"
"Thank you for putting bullet proof glass in Ellis's cabin. I'd be dead otherwise." Ash answered.
"That bad huh? I hope Adam beats him to a pulp." Vince said calmly. Anyone watching might think that he was not angry. They'd be dead wrong.
They both watched and waited until Adam had indeed beaten James to a pulp.
Adam grabbed James and threw him over his shoulder. James crashed into the floor, and then rolled over, staring up at Adam, but making no move to get up.
Adam stared back, his breathing hard, blood dripping from him, but his anger still far from spent.
"If it wasn't for Mikki, I would have killed you for this." Adam said, his matter of fact tone making his words all the more chilling.
"I know." James answered, but not like he was scared. "Why is she like this?"
Adam closed his eyes, counting to ten in his head for patience, and he was a bit calm when he opened them.
"Do you remember those criminals we wiped out in a warehouse district once? As a personal agenda of mine?" Adam asked.
"The creeps with all those torture instruments in the basement? Five years or so ago, right?" James replied.
"I killed them because of Ellis." Adam told him, and James blanched.
"I need to apologize to her." He said, sitting up.
"Come near her and I'll shoot your kneecaps out." Adam snarled.
"Or she'll shoot you herself. God knows she's as good as me with a gun." Ash snapped from the side.
"Yeah I am." Ellis said quietly, and all of them whirled around to see her leaning against the door. She was still wrapped in a blanket, and looked like she had just rolled out of bed, but Adam could see the tension humming through her body.
"You look like you went through a shredder, love." Ellis told Adam, walking towards him.
Adam glanced down and shrugged. "I guess I do."
Ellis reached out and took his hand, wrapping it around her waist. Adam smiled slightly, letting her lean into him, as she stood with her back pressed to his chest.
"Ellis I... " James started, and Ellis looked at him. Her gaze was cold, empty.
"Drop dead." she said without inflection, before turning to look at Ash.
"Come over tomorrow morning, will you? We still have to train." Ellis told him.
"Take a day off Ellis." Ash answered.
Ellis raised an eyebrow, and Ash sighed. "I'll be there at noon, not before that."
Ellis nodded, before half turning to look at Adam.
"Home?" she asked.
"Yeah." Adam answered. He kept his arm tightly around her all the way to the car. It was Ellis who drove, because she needed to be in control now. Adam just watched her, wondering when she had gotten so strong.
...
"I need to bandage your wounds." she told him once they entered the house.
"Okay." he said quietly.
Ellis nodded, and led him to the washroom in their bedroom. She cleaned all the blood away, and then bandaged everything.
"Idiot." she told him softly, even as a few tears slipped down her cheeks.
Adam leaned his head back, not saying anything.
Ellis slowly dropped to her knees in front of him, letting her head fall on his knee. Adam lightly cupped the back of her head, but he said nothing as she stayed there, her arms loosely hooked around his leg, and her silent tears soaking into his jeans.
Ellis hiccupped and Adam finally straightened. He took her by her shoulders and pulled her to her feet as he stood up. Ellis looked at him with bloodshot eyes, feeling lost, and more than a little desperate.
Adam tugged her close, and wrapped his arms around her. "Mine." he whispered in her ear, before leading her out of the washroom and into their bedroom. Adam pulled off his bloody and ripped shirt and threw it in a corner, before he got into bed. Ellis stared at him for a moment, before she slipped in next to him, and wrapped her arms around him tightly.
Adam's breath hissed out of him. Ellis loosened her grip slightly.
"Bruised ribs?" she asked.
"Yeah." he answered, pulling her close, and stroking her back.
"You really are an idiot." She whispered.
"Is that so?" Adam murmured.
"Yes, but I love you more than anything else in the world." Ellis answered, looking up at him.
Adam smiled slightly, even though his jaw was badly bruised.
"Why did you get out of the car?" he asked.
"I woke up in the car, and it was outside the base. I figured you must've come there and not wanted to leave me sleeping alone at home. But I did not want to sit there, alone, either. So I came in, and then I just followed the sounds of fighting." Ellis answered.
Adam nodded.
"I was scared." Ellis whispered, as if saying it louder would make it more real. "I am scared. I don't want to be scared like this... I thought it would never happen again." She whispered, her eyes pleading with him to make it all go away.
"I'm here, baby. We'll fight it together, and before you know it, you won't be scared anymore." Adam answered, stroking her hair.
"I was even scared of you, Adam." Ellis confessed, expecting him to blow up at her. He stilled for a moment, but then he just resumed stroking her back and hair.
"When?" he asked softly.
"When you were fighting." She answered, not meeting his eyes.
"That's okay. I'll win your trust again." Adam said confidently.
Ellis let out a small choked sob.
"No more crying, love. Please." Adam begged, making her look at him.
Ellis wiped her tears away, and snuggled into his arms.
"We're one fucked up pair." She whispered.
"As long as we are one, I don't care how messed up we are." Adam answered, and she smiled.
"Yeah. Me too." Ellis said, and finally all the tension left her body, and she closed her eyes to sleep, relaxing into his arms.
...
"I am going back to South America." James told Ash.
Ash stared at him. "I should give a damn about this why?"
"I looked at the profile of the man Adam wanted me to find. I do know him, and he was involved with a terrorist group that you guys went after sometime ago. It's something personal to Adam, and this is my way of apologizing." James answered.
Ash sighed. "Before you go away half cocked, let me tell you what's going on." Ash then proceeded to tell James the entire story of Adam and Ellis's kidnapping.
"That son of a..." James snarled.
"Yeah. He escaped when we attacked the terrorists in South America. That is the main reason we're all so paranoid about Ellis's security." Ash answered.
"I understand. I'll take care of him." James said coldly.
"Take this." Ash said, handing him a USB key.
James raised an eyebrow.
"It's all the information we have on that group and on that man. Even if you kill him, Adam won't forgive you. As for Ellis, her forgiveness is earned, but I am not sure that you will be able to do that ever, after the stunt you pulled." Ash told him.
James nodded, and walked out of the room. He was still trailing blood after the pounding Adam had given him. Ash could not even make himself care. If he could, he would also beat the hell out of James, for what he had done, but that was Adam's right, not his.
Ash clenched his fists, trying to push all his anger inside again, but it was not working. All he could see was the haunted look in Ellis's eyes. The way she had looked at him, as if she was seeing through him, as if he was the enemy, as if he was some stranger; Ash slammed his fist on the table.
He remembered her standing in the sparring room, all sleep tousled. Adam was not the only one who had noticed how tense she was. Ash had seen it as well. She was shaking, and yet she had been brave. She bloody well wanted to train tomorrow.
Ash swore.
What was he going to do with that woman? How could he train with her when his every single instinct was screaming at him to protect her with everything he had. To hide her from anything that might ever harm her.
"GODDAMNIT!" Ash snapped, slamming his fist into the table again, so hard that the table cracked. He didn't care.
He was falling in love with Ellis. What in hell was he supposed to do about that?