Falling In Love In a Coffee Shop - Part 11

"Audrey!"

"Oh, Jennifer.... I'm so sorry!"

The two sister hugged and held onto each other as Audrey rushed to sit next to Jennifer.




Duke quietly closed the door to give them their privacy and went to make sure the breakfast foods stayed warm.

"It's not your fault, Audrey. It's not...."

"I didn't send you my diary. It was the Guard. They took it from me..."

Audrey was aware that they were both babbling through their tears. She took a steadying breath and just buried her face in Jennifer's neck, hugging her hard until Jennifer winced away with a gasp.

"Oh, God, I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry, Jennifer."

"No, no. Hush Audrey. It's not your fault." At Audrey's grimace she insisted, "it's not. It's THEIR fault. They laid a trap. And, it's my fault for walking right into it..." She held her hand up for silence when Audrey started to protest. "And I'm glad I did. I'm even more glad that Duke was there and that somehow he was in the right place at the right time. You're here, with me now. You're safe, and away from them." Jennifer's excitement increased as a hopeful plan came to mind. "Duke can take us home, or anywhere..."

"Jennifer. Jennifer, no. I'm not going to just abandon these people. I can't. And... And I can't abandon Nathan either. HE won't abandon Haven. Look, we can stop them now. You and I. You can help us build a case against them and put them away." Audrey took a deep breath and prepared to explain to Jennifer her own plan.

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Duke wrapped the pancakes and waffles separately in foil and put them into a warm oven.  He could hear them in there, more or less. Indistinct, muffled sounds that were mostly happy if mixed with tears. Audrey would tell Jennifer she was sorry, Jennifer would tell her it wasn't her fault and they would talk about the Guard. Audrey might tell Jennifer some more of what had been happening. Jennifer might tell Audrey that the journal the Guard had taken was locked, presumably safe, in Jennifer's hotel room. They would plan what to do and where to go next and no doubt Audrey was counting on him to deliver them. He sighed as he filled the sink with hot water and soap. He had actually been looking forward to taking Jennifer away. Showing her the world. She's been to Disney World, but he was willing to bet she'd never been to Rio De Janeiro for carnival. Or that she had ever seen the sunset from Porto Moniz in Madeira. She had probably never been in the middle of the ocean at night and seen how bright the stars were, how many there were. He frowned as he set the mixing bowl and pan to dry on the rack. All of that was going to be considerably less romantic with her big sister on board. Especially if that big sister's boyfriend was also along for the ride.

A sudden suspicion caused him to fling the towel onto the countertop as he gritted his teeth and headed to his bedroom.

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"You sure, Jen? I wouldn't blame you for saying no. No one would. And if Duke will take you somewhere safe instead...."

"Are you trying to talk me into or out of this?"

"I don't know."

"You think it will work?"

"I think it's the best shot we have. And that once a few start to fall, the rest will go down. Turning on each other all along the way."

"And that Viking guy..."

"Dwight."

"Yeah.... He put evidence in that..." Her fingers brushed her lips, recalling how he had forced her mouth open and stuffed in that rough bit of cloth. "Oh, God."

"You okay?"

"Not really." Jennifer pushed back the covers and worked to swing her legs over the side of the bed. Audrey moved to help her. "I need to use the bathroom. Can you help me get there?"

"Of course."

Jennifer sagged against the bathroom door for a moment to regain her strength and steady her nerves. She practiced a moment at making her legs support her before taking the few tentative steps to the toilet, carefully keeping her gaze averted from the mirror over the sink. That didn't work so well when she washed her hands though. Even looking down she could catch glimpses of herself in the mirror until she finally took in a deep breath and looked.

Her cheeks were swollen and discolored by bruises that were purple and black. She had a black eye too. Her mouth was swollen and there was a cut on her lip.

It wasn't that she hadn't already been hurting. But seeing the bruising, seeing the dried blood on her lip, made it impossible to shove the discomfort to the corner of her mind, made it impossible to push down the memories of what had happened to her last night. She stared into the mirror but all she could see were sneering, hateful faces and their hands.

"Duke! DUKE!"

Audrey had been leaning against the bureau near the bathroom door when she heard Jennifer's panicked cry. She jumped, startled out of her brief reverie, and moved to the door, only to be startled again when the bedroom door opened as Duke burst in.

"Jennifer?!"

"She's in -"

He was already moving to the bathroom door and Audrey cleared the way, feeling awkward, out of place and sharply aware that it was premature to feel happy for her sister.

Duke opened the bathroom door and only just pulled it back in time to keep from knocking Jennifer over where she stood at the lavatory. She turned toward him and he saw the fear in her expression and realized that seeing the reflection of her bruised face had triggered her panic. He instinctively reached a hand to her face, but dropped it to her neck when he recalled that the motion could frighten her.

"Duke. I -"

He pulled her into an embrace and she stepped into him, wrapping her arms around him.

"I know. I've got you, Duchess. I've got you."

He supported her in his arms again while she cried. Audrey moved quietly into his line of vision, concerned for Jennifer and gesturing that she was going to exit the room. Duke just nodded at her before bending to place a kiss on the top of Jennifer's head.

After a few moments Jennifer's shaking subsided and Duke brushed his hand down over the back of her head and wrapped her curls around his fingers.

"Hey." He spoke softly, and even the simple word felt like a reassuring caress over her with his voice. "You wanna go back to bed?"

"Yeah."

She took an unsteady step backward but before she could turn and take another step, he lifted her into his arms and carried her back to the bed. He sat on the edge of the bed, settling her onto his lap.

"I should have listened to you."

"No. Don't go down that road, Sweetheart. These guys were determined to get to you, okay? They were the ones that sent you Audrey's journal. Did she tell you that?"

Jennifer nodded her head against his shoulder.

"And they were trying to use you for bait, right?"

Another nod.

"They had a picture of you in Boston too. They were going to come after you." He took a steadying breath and his arms clenched around her. Saying the words made the horror feel more real. She whimpered with the pressure on her ribs and he forced himself to ease his grasp.

"I can stop them."

She raised her head to look at him.

"Is that Audrey's plan?"

She rested her head in his palm.

"We have evidence, Duke..."

"Testimony isn't really evidence, Sweetheart."

"Besides me, I mean. What did you do with that thing that was in my mouth?"

Audrey returned, tapping on the open door before Duke could answer.

"Jennifer, I brought you some clothes... I thought you might at least want a change." She held up a small bundle.

"Yeah. Thanks, Audrey." Jennifer stood with Duke's help, leaning back against him for a moment.

"Audrey and I made breakfast, I'll go make sure it's warm."

He made sure she was steady on her feet before he left and closed the door behind him.

With Audrey's help, Jennifer got dressed and then collapsed onto the bed, exhausted.

"I can't believe that I'm sore and winded after getting dressed. You'd think I'd just completed a Zumba class."

Audrey smiled and sat down next to her. "Well, you went through a lot last night. More than I think anyone else has lived through."

Jennifer looked down at the weave of the dark grey leggings that Audrey had brought her and plucked at the hem of the red tunic.

"Seriously, Jennifer. I don't think I've seen anything that brave before."

"Audrey..."

"You came here looking for me based on a few clues from my journal. You followed leads... You did all that on your own - "

"I wasn't on my own."

"You didn't exactly plan on getting help or asking for it."

"I sort of forced Duke to help me when I ended up with something that was his." She wasn't going to tell her FBI agent sister that Duke was smuggling emeralds for someone. "In order to get it back he tried to help me break into your place yesterday afternoon. We were caught by that barista at the Gull. I guess the rest you know."

"The point is, Jennifer, you took on the job of two investigators and you did it pretty much on your own. Don't sell yourself short, okay?"

Before Jennifer could think of a response, Duke knocked on the door and peeked in.

"Ladies, we're being hailed by another ship. I'm guessing Detective Wuornos is done shitting kittens and wants to see his - ah... 'partner.'" Duke used finger quotations and winked at Jennifer when he noted her puzzled expression.

Audrey stood and smiled with laughter and delight at knowing that Nathan was near. She took a step toward the door before she turned back toward Jennifer, hesitant to leave her.

"Go on, Audrey. We'll be right behind you." It was Jennifer's turn to smile at her sister.

Audrey blushed as she turned away and passed Duke, averting her glance from him. When she was gone, Jennifer felt Duke's gaze on her and lifted her eyes from the space where Audrey had been.

"Young love, huh?" There was a touch of a sneer in his smile and voice and his eyes seemed a little cooler than Jennifer was used to from him.

She frowned, puzzled at him.

"This," he held up the small bundle of cloth that had been forced in her mouth last night as a gag, the bundle that had the evidence folded in there by Dwight.

"This was what was in your mouth last night, when they put tape on you."

She went pale at the sight of it.

"The Guard was going to use you for bait, and Audrey was using you to trap them?"

She didn't like what he was saying. She didn't like that cold hearted view of what happened. That he would see things that way. Audrey hadn't planned it that way, she hadn't planned on the Guard taking that journal and sending it to her. Once Audrey realized what was happening she had to find the best way to get the both of them out.

"Don't forget that she used you to make sure that I lived through it all." He hated that instead of her fire, she froze and closed down in front of him.

"Pretty damn lucky for her she had a back up plan to her sister getting maybe tortured to death."

"Well, since I'm so useful to people, what about you? What were you going to use me for?"

"Ha!" Duke turned away from her, took two steps and turned back.

"I?" He pointed to himself.

"I wasn't going to use you, at all."

He raised both hands in the air and put the air of someone befuddled and surprised. She hated that he could do this, morph into someone unrecognizable. That he could do it so fast.

"Not at ALL," he continued. "I was going to conduct business as usual, go about my life and maybe - just maybe - beat off to the image of the pretty woman I met at the coffee shop who would have steered a wide path from me if she hadn't decided that I  was useful."

There, in the middle of a sentence he morphed from sneering flirtation and wanting to shock her, to sneering condemnation to cut her low. She snapped.

"It wasn't like that! I didn't even want to tell you what I was doing here but you seemed to have a right to know since you saved me in the woods.  And what do you mean, steered a wide path from you? I only left when you refused to let me hire you to help me - I made you an honest offer! And you were the one who asked me to meet you for breakfast the next day!"

"Good thing I did, or I would have run afoul of a really serious business deal." He had gone to cold, quiet and hard and she hated that more.

"I thought is was my candy bag! You should have put them up! I can't believe you, of all people, wouldn't understand taking an opportunity when you see it! You certainly took the opportunity of looking down my blouse and then having an excuse to kiss me when you had it. You groped me too!"

"Oh, don't flatter yourself, Sweetheart..."

"Oh, don't be so full of crap!"

And there it was, every bit of royal, pain in the ass fire he knew she had from the moment he met her. She crossed halfway to him.

"You LIKE kissing me! If your phone hadn't rang yesterday in my hotel room, your 'I leave tonight' bullshit line would have been shown for the bullshit it was, then!"

She had actually mimicked his voice and expression before crossing the rest of the way to him.

"Me of all people, huh?" His voice was quiet, still, but not so cold or hard. "Of all what people? What do you think I am, Jennifer? Hm?"

She didn't back down, she leaned in, her voice still raised.

"I think you're the guy I met in the coffee shop who turned out to be a smuggler who saved me. A lot. And did more than he had to, to take care of me. I like you... I-"

She wasn't so sure what to say next.

"What do you think this is? This isn't some romance novel. We're not 'the smuggler and his lady.'" He closed the space between them and tamped down on the relief that she took a step back. "We're not going to sail off into the sunset together, are we? You're going back with your sister to finish helping her."

"You don't know that. I don't even know that I'm going to do that. I don't want to see them again or that town!"

She backed down even as she said it.

His laugh was a short huff as his lips pressed into a tiny smile and he shook his head. She felt his hand cup softly at her neck and his thumb caress lightly along her jaw.

"No, no, Duchess. Don't try to lie to yourself. You'll go back because you will want to save the world from them and because you want them to pay."

"You said you'd make them pay."

He lifted an eyebrow in surprise.

"Is that what you want me to do?"

"No."

It wasn't. She was telling the truth about that.

"What do you want me to do?"

"I don't know. I don't want you to think I was using you. I wasn't."

Her own hand wrapped around his forearm. She was telling the truth about that, too. He raised his other hand to brush her hair back and cupped the other side of her face.

"Okay." He nodded his head in agreement.

She grew bolder, her grip on his arm firmer. "And I want you to stop blaming Audrey, too. She didn't send me that journal, the Guard did. They took it from her. Just like they would have taken it again from me if I hadn't been more careful."

That reminded him of her misplaced sense of caution and he drew in a breath to tell her just what he thought of that when he heard Audrey's voice calling from the open door up to the deck.

"Are you two coming or what? They're almost here!"

He bit into his lower lip and shook his head.

"Don't let them push you into anything, Duchess. You hear me?" He wanted her safe.

"Yeah."

She blinked up at him and he wanted to slam the bedroom door, kiss her and  make the both of them forget about Audrey, the Guard and everyone and everything else. Instead he dropped his hands to her shoulders and gave her an assessing look over. Audrey had brought her a pair of thick leggings, but the red tunic wasn't very heavy and Jennifer's feet were still bare.

"Come on then. Bet we get to see the softer side of that detective."

He turned to a coat hook on the wall and pulled down a heavy sweater cardigan.

"But first... It's chilly outside and you need to stay warm."

He went to the bureau, pulled out a pair of heavy socks and held them out to her.

She raised her eyebrows, tilted her head and showed her puzzled disdain.

"You wanna try to borrow my shoes?"

She smiled and shook her head as she held out her hand to receive them.

"They're thick enough for you to wear on deck for a while."

They were ridiculously too big for her and he didn't want to find the effect adorable.

Duke followed her up on deck to make sure she got up the steps alright and took a moment to secure the door closed. Jennifer ignored the returning exhaustion and pain and forced herself to hurry to join Audrey on the deck. She could hear the boarding plank being set between the two ships and voices.

"I don't know if this is a good idea."

"I know. I'm sorry. I just need to see for myself that she's okay and tell her how sorry I am."

Jennifer rounded the corner and stopped short when she saw the familiar face that went along with the voice she had thought was familiar. She opened her mouth to scream but nothing came out. She felt him then. She felt Duke's arms around her again as he lifted her and pulled her behind himself.

"Son of a BITCH!"

Duke yanked Jennifer behind himself and crossed to the two men boarding his boat. One was Detective Nathan Wuornos. The other was one of the men who had hurt Jennifer; the one who had forced open her mouth and then gagged her. He drew his gun from his waistband. Wuornos moved to intercept him and Duke indulged himself in an urge from earlier in the morning. He dropped the detective to the deck of the Rouge with a quick punch to the throat, then leveled the gun at Jennifer's assailant.

"Duke!" Audrey shouted. "No!"