Fractured Mirth
part 18
"You actually want to do this?"
Rachel Burke let herself into the Halliwell manor rather reluctantly, as she calmly dumped her suitcase in the foyer, wrapping her arms securely over her chest. Squinting briefly at her surroundings, she offered her opponent a frown, shifting her weight roughly from one foot to the other. Fatigue showed deeply in her gaze now, and her lids were inches away from drooping due to the sudden exhaustion she'd encountered. "Look. I'm on board with you and Bailey wanting to get a fresh start to Sunnyspring Lodge, but we-"
"Sunnyspot."
"What?"
Cole Turner couldn't manage to surpress throwing a gorgeous smile her way, as he shut the door behind them, a soft laugh escaping his lips. "Sunnyspot Lodge, Miss Burke. As a renown member of the VCTF, I really thought it would be your highest priority to have all of your facts straight."
"Yeah, well, when the facts tend to mesh, it really doesn't seem to matter anymore, does it?"
"On the contrary," he objected.
"Okay, what's your problem, now?"
"You do realize that name depends upon how many children we save and the well being of Phoebe's sisters, right? If we find any of them in demonic pieces because you screwed up, I guess it's safe to say you're no longer cut out for the job, isn't it?"
"This isn't funny."
"Oh, I'm hardly making it out to be."
"Do you ever think before you speak, Cole?"
"What would be the point?"
She only stared at him, his expression now clearly unreadable. The corners of her mouth twitched, fighting a fleeting grin. "Heh. Nevermind."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing. I didn't say anything."
"Either way, I don't think checking out this museum is going to be of any help to us," he added, ignoring her, as he sidestepped her into the kitchen. "Furthermore, whatever we find there, if we even find anything, can't possibly prove to be that much different from what we already have in our hands. We'd be wasting countless minutes."
"And what if we get something concrete. What then? You couldn't say it was a total bust, and you know it. We'd have something else to hold against him."
"What are we going to do? Hold a portrait in his face, and expect him to be damned to hell?"
"Ha ha."
"Do you want something to drink?"
She considered him a moment. "Wow. And is that an actual attempt at being nice to me again?"
He paused, thought about it. "No. Because you're still wrong about trying this new lead out. We're losing precious hours of valuable-"
"John doesn't seem to think so."
"No, he wouldn't, would he?"
"What the hell does that-"
"Why don't you ask him?"
"We're going," she stated plainly. "Maybe you somehow forgot you're not exactly in the position to judge here- but it's the only link we have to those photos, and we going to pursue it."
"I am not taking a tour of some stupid museum, when everything in those places always looks the same, alright? Anybody can attempt art and call it a specific kind of art."
"Afraid you might actually learn a little bit about your own history?" she challenged roughly.
"Hate to break it to you, but my history isn't exactly printed for all to see and witness amongst the written word, least of all in a public vacinity. You're more likely to find my fate damned to the depths of hell, if anything- but I digress."
"Do you think greed took those innocent lives?"
He smiled. "You know, it's funny, isn't it? I mean, it just shows you, you can go either way with what you're given. Given his disposition, I really don't think he's off in character. Satan believed he was superior, and therefore he was."
"But Satan was also a fallen angel," she rehashed.
"True, but the face of an angel can take on any evil it likes if it's prodded....pushed enough to the brink. It's almost like driving yourself to madness, and forgetting there's a switch."
"But he can't turn it off. He's gone on this way for far too long."
He nodded. "In a matter of speaking....yeah- I'd say that's pretty accurate. But also pretty obvious," he then pointed out. "The pictures tell their own story."
"But what are they telling us?" she reasoned.
"The pattern of the victims, for one. Each one showcases a new breed of horror, doesn't it? They may all relatively be in the same position, but I think it's more than that."
"Yeah. Which is why this place would be great for us to check out tomorrow," she countered.
"I repeat. Would you like something to drink?"
She shrugged, as she flopped herself absentmindedly down upon the nearby sofa, her face a blank hue, as she picked up a photo settled neatly upon the coffee table, briefly eyeing up its contents. "Is water okay?"
He smiled. "Well, it's something I won't have cause to screw up- so water, it is."
"Great. Thanks."
"You know, don't look too happy. I hear it could prove fatal to your health."
She merely rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah..."
He hesitated, a hand reaching to the back of his neck, as he calmly stretched his muscles. Wincing, he leaned his tall frame against the wall, quietly taking a deep breath. "He wants to, you know."
She snapped back to reality, blinking, as she focused her gaze lightly upon his face. "Huh? What? What are you talking about?"
"He wants to believe. And when the time is right, he will. You just have to keep telling yourself that."
"You don't even know him," she added, raising her eyebrows, as she calmly set the family photo of the three sisters aside. "At least, not well enough to deduce your own conclusions."
"I know him well enough to know there isn't a sorry bone in his body where you're concerned." He nearly laughed. "And be that what it could or will, have you ever considered the fact that he might be hanging on by a thread, because you put him in that place?"
"I didn't put him anywhere. Okay? Just because I was willing to tell you everything to your face, doesn't mean it's ever going to happen. So just drop it."
"This is really eating away at you, isn't it?"
"I'm not going to concern myself with it."
"Concern yourself with what?" Phoebe Halliwell questioned, her eyes glued to the brochure she'd managed to print out from George's laptop. "Oooo, get this. They open up bright and early at seven am, and they serve a free breakfast, if you're one of the first fifty people inside. I don't know about you guys, but that is a great way to start us off, before we head to Sunnyspot."
Cole smiled at her entrance, snagging a hand around her waist, as he placed a soft kiss to her cheek. "Something tells me we're going to be over forty short of that fifty."
"Oh, c'mon, it's a great deal," she countered, her face brightening.
"Yeah. If we're looking for a needle in a haystack," he quipped.
"Technically, we are," Rachel pointed out. "So what aren't you saying?"
"Nothing. We just don't-"
"We've taken risks already. It's not going to hurt to take a few more."
"Then go. It'll only give me more cause to get a head start."
"I see part two is well on its way," Bailey Malone commented with a touch of sarcasm, as he entered with a suitcase in his hand, John Grant following closely behind him with luggage of his own. "Can someone please explain to me why we need to bunk here for the night?"
"To get an earlier start," Phoebe emphasized. "Anyhow, it seems to have won over the most votes."
"Fair enough," he sided. "I'll gladly take the sofa, if no one has any objections?"
"See, he's usually a lot more fun than this," John quipped. "But all things considered, I think he's just cranky because he doesn't have his favorite pillow with him for the trip."
"John, you'd be wise to be quiet now, if you don't want to mistakenly get left behind in the morning confusion," he noted, his tone registering as only slightly humorous.
Cole fought back a smirk, as he lightly cleared his throat.
"George and Grace?" Rachel prompted, throwing the half demon a knowing look.
"Hotel," Bailey answered. "George thinks he may be able to target a lot more with a few extra hours we can't spare."
"Anyone up for a game of cards?" John volunteered.
"Only if it doesn't include you making anymore smartass remarks," Rachel offered, her eyes briefly touching up his, her expression masked, as she retrieved her suitcase once again. "Is there a bathroom I can change in?"
"I'll show you," Phoebe spoke up, throwing her a small smile. "Better use it now, because I'll bet the guys will be fighting over it later."
"So does that mean you'll join me?" he prodded. "I...I mean, both of you....would be great too-"
"And I happen to think it says a lot when you insult a man and he makes absolutely no note of it," she sided, nodding.
"You'll have to forgive him. He's one of little words."
"So I noticed," she murmured.
Bailey carefully settled himself into a chair, tapping his hands listlessly upon the fabric, as he shot a thoughtful glance up at Cole. "Alcoholic beverages?"
"Long night?"
"If it keeps up like this," he countered.
Cole held back a laugh, the corners of his mouth fairly amused. "You kidding me? I put up with this on a regular basis whenever I come over here. Believe me, it never gets any better. I just keep trying to tell myself I should be grateful I'm still alive, and none of them have kindly opted to grind my bones done to nothingness, and turn me into a great big pile of dust. It works ninety-nine percent of the time."
"Does it?" Bailey returned, raising a perplexed eyebrow.
"Be brave. It'll all be over soon, trust me."
"Not soon enough."
___________
"When's the last time you played?"
Rachel Burke smiled halfheartedly, "Well, it's not exactly something I've given a lot thought since I met you."
John Grant slyly arched an eyebrow, his blues falling on her face rather lightly. He stll couldn't deny the fact that he enjoyed looking at her. That he enjoyed the way her eyes always sparkled, and the way her voice could hold its own, no matter what tone it possessed. He loved the way she always seemed annoyed to be working by his side, but chose to endure it, if only for the sake of arguing. But what he hated, was seeing her so forlorn, and so entirely blank, that it actually scared him half to death. Lately, she'd strayed just a bit from herself. "Yeah, but since you've met me, you've strangely been looking a lot deeper into these cases. I mean...so I've heard."
Now there was a faded snicker to accompany her pretty complexion, followed by an abrupt laugh, as she calmly tucked her legs up beside her in the kitchen chair, slanting herself a bit sideways in the dim room. "This is one case, John. One case. And believe me, you already heard wrong by a long shot. But maybe it's actually endearing to know you haven't been paying a whole lot of attention to me since I stepped in to consume the VCTF, heart and soul."
"How can you say that?" He turned over his card in the well executed game of war they'd begun, noticing with a spectrum of gloom that her ten of diamonds, outweighed his two of spades by a value all too obvious, groaning slightly at her victory.
"Hmmm...well....maybe it's kind of like the fact that you just happened to have a deck handy this late at night, when we should probably all be fast asleep- and surprise, surprise, I just happened to be the only one who was also brave enough to take you on."
"Feels like old times."
"Right."
"But that's what I love most about you. Your sense of-"
"Adventure. Yeah, yeah. I mean, why me, you know?"
"Why you, what?"
She laid a five of clubs down upon the table, frowning discreetly, as he rose to the challenge, yanking an ace of spades from his pile. Neither of them took well to losing, she thought silently to herself. But maybe the battle she would lose, wouldn't necessarily be so bad in the end, when held in comparison to the struggle she was feeling right at that very moment. A small part of her wanted to be impulsive. A small part of her wanted to grab the white dress shirt he wore, the black tie somewhat undone, with the sleeves casually perched up to his elbows, and reel him in for a long and passionate kiss. Maybe it wouldn't have been so hard, had she originally gotten off to the best start with him in the first place. "Forget it," she whispered.
"What don't you want to say?"
"It isn't what I don't want to say, it's what I want to say. But I just can't see giving you another problem to deal with when we've gotta go pack our bags and fight Satan tomorrow, so-"
"And I'm really impressed."
"Come again?" she inquired, gently placing her cards down to the right of her.
"I could hate you for believing in the impossible, but I don't. See, there's nothing at all bad about it, if you want to put Cole and what he is into perspective. But because you're so willing to sacrifice yourself for what you stand for now, I....came to the conclusion that it just isn't about me anymore. I mean, yeah. It started out that way. I was bloody, beaten to hell, and you- of all people, worried about me. You worried, Rachel, and you made me forget who I am. There were times before that, sure, but not like this. Not when you try so hard to cover it all up."
She met him, eye to eye, her expression unwavering. "I'm not covering anything up."
"No, not in regards to this case, but....elsewhere."
"You know, John, if you spent less time worrying about me, maybe you could already accept the supernatural consequences by now."
"Actually, there's that something else that could have even bigger consequences."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Interesting case of foreplay we've got going on here, isn't it?"
"Yeah, and that's not the kind of case I was referring to, John."
"Look-"
"Are you crazy?" she demanded, moving the chair back an inch, as she let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. "Moreover, you're way off. Couldn't be further from the truth. So whatever you're doing-"
"I might be. But I'm tired of playing, Rachel. I really am. I mean, we're adults, we don't need to do this. I just can't- I might be wrong, and that thought is killing me right now, but if I'm not..."
"John, don't."
"I don't want to lose you in this."
"You won't," she promised, her eyes close to tears, as she fought the emotion with all she had.
"Then what's bothering you, if it isn't-"
"And I told you I don't want to discuss it. It's...it's not the right time, alright?"
"Right time," he mulled over, shrugging. "I'm not sure if that makes any sense to me. At least not any that's entirely logical to the fullest extent."
"We don't know who's going to make it out of this alive. I've got my faith in everybody here, but you've already been in one accident in the time we've been here. Whoever they were, they took you down. That doesn't sit well."
"Yeah, and does it really matter anymore? I'm not some hell bent Hamlet on the road to revenge. I'm a man who does my job, Rachel, and I take pride in it. You're no different. I'd like to see them suffer, without a doubt, but I want this guy at the head of the operation to suffer a lot more. He took children and he made them victims in their own quest for trust. That's never okay, and you can reason with it until you drop. You won't get the answer you were searching for."
"And you never got the answers you were searching for, either," she remarked, finding herself coming closer to him without warning.
"What do you mean?"
"Your mother," she stated plainly.
"Yeah, and Robbie already covered that. You think you can do a better job, be my guest."
"I'm not trying to make it a better anything. But if you think about it, if you think about all those feelings you've tied up inside yourself, you could almost say you made your life what you wanted it to be. You worked hard, and you got far, John."
"But I still have even farther to go to get to where I'd like to be yet," he initiated. "I want to send this guy back where he belongs."
"And we'll do it together. Make no mistake."
"Look, I just- I only want.....damn it, you're making this difficult."
"Making what diffic-"
But he had already pulled her to him, his hand going behind her neck in a gesture he never thought about, drawing her forward. Her lips touched his rather gingerly, a part of her strangely delighted at finding them warm and oddly comforting when they landed on her. She was lost. Completely and devastatingly lost in him right then and there. And God help her, she didn't want to do a damn thing to stop him. Hesitantly, she reached up to lay her hand upon the right side of his face, immediately noting the amount of stubble that had since accumulated itself upon her request, as she lightly fingered it. He'd probably had more women than she could count- probably never saw anything in half of them, and yet she'd remembered she'd witnessed his grieving over Kate like someone who had honestly and literally felt someone they'd cared for slip away, finding themselves torn between their own reality, as they nearly slipped just as far away from it. She'd always liked to think she had some influence in bringing him back to that reality, no matter how stupid it may have sounded. The time she'd spent helping him deal with it couldn't have proved as useless as she'd first believed. They'd been at odds, they'd been friends, and now here she was, kissing the one man she never thought she could have fallen for if the world ended, and Satan had in fact consumed it for his so called better judgment.