103 - Whole Lotta Trouble

He gingerly touched his nose, wincing when finding the pain still excruciating.  The emergency room had been out of the question, so he’d found a pharmacy for bandages and cleaned it up the best he could in a hotel room of dubious quality.  Eighteen hours later and it still hurt like the dickens, and Daniel had no better plan for getting what he needed.

Patience had led him on a merry chase these last three years.  Of course, it had taken nearly two of that to find out she’d left him the wrong information on the electrodes.  After painstakingly rebuilding the whole process and each individual component, it had taken that long to discover where the problem was. 

Damn both her and her social rebellion.

She didn’t understand that he had very powerful, impatient and short-tempered men waiting on this breakthrough.  It wasn’t even about the money any longer, it was about staying alive.  He’d made a commitment to these men and they bloody well expected him to keep it.  All she had to do was give him the chemical composition for the electrodes and he would disappear for good. 

Daniel knew she had the information stored in that biomechanical brain of hers, but he also knew it wasn’t the only place it would be.  There hadn’t been ample enough time to search every place in her apartment.  Not even enough time to find her laptop, where he was sure the information would be housed. 

Unfortunately, she would be more prepared for him now, and likely drag that damn Bon Jovi man into this mess.  The pictures weren’t doing the trick, but it wasn’t going to stop him from leaking them at the most opportune moment.  For his own personal amusement.

In the meantime, he was going to have to find a way to coerce her into giving him what he wanted.  A way that involved an unsuspecting, yet integral part of her life.  A way that wouldn’t allow her to refuse him.

And he had to do it soon.  Very soon.

Time was of the essence.

☠ ☢ ☠

[10:07 PM]JON:  I’m getting married on Sat.  Can you come?

Ten seconds later, Jon’s phone rang.  The only reason he looked at the screen was to find the Answer button.  He knew who the caller was.

“You’re getting fucking married, and you send me a text message?  A phone call was too much to squeeze into your busy goddamn schedule?”

“Hey Rich,” Jon greeted through his smile, winking at Petey, who was seated next to him.   Half-empty Chinese food cartons were littered across the coffee table, there was a muted football game on the TV and she was nestled into the corner of his penthouse sofa, her own phone resting on her thigh. 

They had done nothing but talk about logistics, schematics and details the last few hours.  The end result was a monumental list of things that needed done in order to make a Saturday wedding happen, but Jon didn’t mind.  He was very good at making things happen, and it was providing something for them both to focus on besides Daniel.

In the meantime, he was employing the best in the business to track down their problem.  These guys weren’t the ones you pretended not to know, but they knew plenty of those guys.  Jon was confident the problem would find a solution before he and Petey ever said I do.  It would help his honeymoon plans along considerably, seeing as he wasn’t comfortable leaving the country under the current circumstances.

There was a list of phone calls to be made that was as long as your arm, and they would divide those between ‘his’ and ‘hers’.  This first phone call – to Richie – was the exception.  They both wanted to talk to him.  Jon to get his best friend and brother-by-choice’s blessing, Petey because  she wanted to tell Richie everything.

“Don’t ‘Hey Rich’ me, mothafucker.  Text message wedding invitations?  For Saturday?  What the hell is going on?  Is she pregnant?”

Jon’s stomach rolled, wondering how many times that question was going to come up this week.  He glanced at Petey, answering, “No, she’s not pregnant.  It was a spontaneous decision.”

“Yeah,” Richie snorted.  “You and your ‘Let’s get married right now’ proposals.  I guess Petey should be grateful she gets almost a week’s notice.  Dot sure as hell didn’t.”

Don’t argue with him.  He wasn’t happy about you and Petey to start with, so why would he be jumping for joy over this?

“Why, Jon?  Why the fuck is it so important to do this now?  You can’t give her a chance to really get to know you?  To figure what an asshole you are so that she knows what she’s getting herself into?”

Jon forced a little laugh.  “I’m pretty sure she knows what an asshole I am.”  Her palm was warm against his shoulder blade when she slid her feet to the floor so she could lay it there in silent support.  “Things are a little complicated.  We would’ve ended up here anyway.  It just happened a little sooner than we planned.”

The warm little hand moved from his shoulder to his spine and down into his lower back, where she dug in lightly with the heel of it, encouraging the tense muscles into a state of relaxation. 

Under her tender attention, Jon told Richie the whole story – including the blackmail pictures and Daniel’s visit from the night before.  He and Petey had agreed that not everyone needed to know, but they wanted Richie in the loop.

“Kinky pictures.”  Richie sounded pained, and Jon couldn’t tell what was going through his friend’s mind.  He smiled absently at Petey as she continued her one-handed massage of his back.  The muscles were tighter now than they’d been at the beginning of the call.

“If they hit the media outlets, our marriage will minimize the impact.”

“So this is all about damage control.  Putting a positive spin on negative.”  Richie laughed humorlessly.  “Damn if that doesn’t sound familiar.  I thought we were past that point in our lives Jon.”

“Yeah, well I guess the more things change, the more they stay the same.  We’re handling it the best way we can.”

“Handling it.”  The guitarist’s voice was flat and disapproving.  “Do you even fucking love her?  Did you give her a nice proposal with flowers and candlelight?  Or was it a JB special? ‘Marry me and I’ll live up to my obligations?’”

He shouldn’t be surprised that his friend could make that kind of prediction after all their years together, but hearing it verbalized made him a little uncomfortable.  Even Jon’s single concentrated effort at the flowery words had been short and to the point. 

Petey’s fingers moved up to his neck, kneading the knots that were forming there.

“She said yes.”

“Yeah,” the usually affable man sneered.  “That’s about what I thought.  Where’s Petey?  I want to talk to her.”

“Richie, don’t stir shit up that doesn’t need to be stirred.”

“You mean don’t stir up your shit so that she smells it.  I told you once and I’m telling you again, you don’t deserve her.”

Jon’s jaw clenched in anger.  It was one thing to say it to himself, but for Richie to spit it out with such conviction pissed him off.  He childishly and deliberately refused to turn the call over to Petey.

“Maybe I don’t, but she wants me anyway.  Are you coming on Saturday?  Because if you are, I was going to ask you to be my best man.”

“She wants you because she doesn’t know you.  She’s had such a lousy love life up to this point that you actually look good in comparison.  I can’t endorse this.  I’m sorry, but no.”

“Is this what it is Rich?  All those years of blood on blood friendship and now it’s gonna be a woman to come between us?”

“Not a woman, the way you treat the woman.  I can’t let you do to Petey what you did to Dot.”

Jon emitted a huff of frustration.  “It’s different now.”

“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?  I assume Petey is there.  Give her the phone.”

The set of Petey’s own shoulders was stiff as she tried to keep Jon relaxed.  She couldn’t hear Richie’s side of the conversation, but judging by Jon’s physical reaction, it wasn’t going well.  He was coiled tighter than a spring, ready to bound off of the sofa with the tightly reined energy that was building within.

There was a strangled growl and Jon was pushing the phone in her face, with a snarled, “Talk to him.  See if you can get through his thick skull, because he ain’t listenin’ to me.”  The Jersey accent thickened as she’d noticed it did when he got overly agitated.

She carefully accepted the phone with a nod and Jon bounded off the couch, heading for the bar and a bottle of Pinot. 

“Hi, Richie.  What’s wrong?”

“Hi there, my Pretty Dark Angel.”  He sounded just like the Richie she’d known from the beginning.  Thoughtful, tender, caring.  “I hear you’ve got a mess going on out there.”

“Things are a little sticky right now,” she admitted cautiously.

“How are your injuries from last night?  Do they hurt like hell?”

Petey touched her cheek, assessing the damage.  Her lip was sore, and so was her cheek, but it was a deep soreness prompted by touch.  On its own, it didn’t feel much different than it normally did.

“They’re not so bad.”

“Darlin’, you don’t have to get married for a rebuttal to those photos.  I’ll help you figure something else out.  Don’t be pressured into marrying him because he thinks it’s the best solution to a problem.”

His words pricked at her insecurities, and she turned to look back over her shoulder.  A glowering Jon was leaning against the bar, wineglass nearly empty already.

Stop.  Jon loves you, and he wants to be with you. That’s why he wants to get married.

“I’m not,” she said with more confidence than she felt, offering her scowling fiancé a tentative smile before turning back to the array of colored uniforms on the silent television screen.  “It’s more than that.”

“Has he said he loves you?  Did he at least give you a decent proposal?”

“He loves me, Richie.  He does.  It doesn’t mean he’s suddenly become a sweet, starry-eyed romantic, but that’s okay.  I’m wearing a very thoughtfully chosen pink diamond on my left hand, and that says a lot.  Jon just does things his own way.”

“I know exactly how Jon does things,” he muttered grimly before softening his tone once again.  “Sweetheart, I only want the best things for you.  Really.  I just don’t happen to think this is for the best.  Don’t settle for less than you –“

The phone was rudely snatched away.  She hadn’t heard Jon slip across the room in his bare feet, but  he was now standing by the couch and had reclaimed possession of his telephone.

“Dammit, Rich.  The why  is between me and Petey.  I didn’t call for your permission or your lectures.  Will you come to the wedding and be my best man, or not?” 

The corners on his flat mouth turned downward and the lines in his face grew more pronounced.  “I’m sorry you feel that way.  We’ll miss you.”

With that, he disconnected the call and threw back the last gulp of his wine.  “Well,” he drawled, bending to brush her temple with a kiss.  “This is gonna be fun.  You sure City Hall is out of the question?”

Petey hunched her shoulders forward, resting her elbows on her knees and blinking the dampness from her eyes.  If this was indicative of the reception they would receive from everyone else, maybe City Hall wasn’t such a bad idea.

Or maybe he’s not the man you should be marrying.