"Are those gardens," Rachael asked seeing a hedge wall around and behind the building. The driver came out and got in his taxi, pulling out into traffic as they stood looking at the inn.
"I'm glad that you like it," Cerulean said taking her hand and walking up to the door.
Inside they walked to the desk and the clerk standing behind it.
"Do you have a reservation," the clerk asked.
"Here you are. Your room is being prepared right now. While you are waiting, feel free to have a meal in the lounge or take a tour of the garden in the back."
"Alright, thank you," Cerulean accepted their room keys and turned to Rachael. "So what will it be."
"Gardens sound nice. Let's take a look around," she said walking back outside and around to the garden entrance.
"This is great. Oh look, they have a fountain here," Rachael said going ahead to look in the water.
Cerulean laughed as he hung back at the entrance to watch her. Rachael looked over her shoulder at him.
He looked so relaxed now. She knew some of it was their formally declaring their relationship to their families and some was that he was somewhere new with Ochre and beginning to let go of his worry that something would happen to his son.
She smiled as she walked back to him.
"I love seeing you happy," she said taking his hand and kissing him.
Cerulean smiled and kissed her again before pulling her along the path around the fountain.
When they returned inside the desk clerk informed them their room was ready so they headed upstairs to put their bags away.
Rachael laughed looking around, "this room is definitely not your color."
"What, you think I can't sleep in a room that's not blue?"
"I don't know, can you? I've seen your room at your house."
Rachael was startled when he turned her around to face him. "Well, I guess it's a good thing we won't be doing much sleeping here."
Rachael laughed placing her arms around his shoulders and kissing him.
The next day they went out to explore the neighborhood around the inn. After coming across the small lake they decided to give fishing a try.
"This is supposed to be fun," Rachael asked after a half hour of the activity.
"I guess," Cerulean said. "Where are you going?" he asked when she started to put her fishing pole away.
"To that bench," Rachael said pointing to it, "I'm going to read the book I brought while you fish for dinner."
Rachael looked up when Cerulean joined her shortly after that.
"Where's my fish dinner," she asked.
"My worthy foe eluded the lure," he said, "I'll buy you fish dinner at the lounge to make it up to you."
"Sounds good," she said kissing his cheek.
After their meal, Rachael pulled Cerulean out to the dance floor where they danced until late then retired back to their rooms.
A ringing phone pulled Rachael out of sleep. The bed shifted as Cerulean got up to answer it. Rachael watched as he picked up the phone and silenced it before going to the bathroom and closing the door.
Rachael pulled the covers up and tried going back to sleep as Cerulean's voice drifted through the door.
When she next stirred he wasn't in bed. Rachael sat up looking around the room until she saw the door to the balcony was open. She got out of bed and went over to find Cerulean sitting outside. He didn't seem to notice her at first so she stepped through the doorway.
"Who was that call from?" she asked.
He jumped at her voice, confirming her suspicion that he hadn't noticed her.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."
"You didn't. When you didn't come back to bed I went searching for you."
Cerulean nodded as she sat in the chair next to him.
Rachael looked at him and waited. "Well," she prompted when he didn't answer her question, "who did you talk to?"
"Mags called."
"What? Are the kids okay? What happened?" she asked alarmed that her friend would be calling in the middle of the night.
"No, no," he said realizing he had alarmed her, "the kids are fine."
"They're okay," he repeated taking her hand in his, "she was calling about work."
"Okay," Rachael nodded as her heart rate steadied. "What happened at work?"
"She found a possible lead on someone I've been trying to track down for months now."
Rachael felt her eyebrows drop into a confused frown, "why are you trying to track someone down?"
"It's part of my job. The part I haven't told you about yet," he said blowing out a breath and leaning back in his chair.
Rachael stayed silent waiting for him to continue.
"The Palette Agency isn't just a jack of all trades organization. It's a group of mercenaries and rogues that does legal and sometimes not so legal work. Mags does the computer work at the company like she said, but it's not just payroll and accounting. She also handles tech support and computer investigations for active agents. Viridian's shipping is really borderline legal smuggling. He acts as an ear into the underworld for when we need those kinds of connections. I did undercover work before my leave.
"A few years ago I was undercover as low ranking muscle to an influential crime family. I played a pivotal part in gathering the evidence needed to put them behind bars. One of their members escaped from prison not too long ago and we've been trying to track them ever since."
Cerulean turned to look at her from his seat. Rachael was shocked by his revelation having never expected his 'work' to be anything like this.
Cerulean sat forward in his seat worry on his face. "Are you okay?" he asked.
"I don't know," Rachael answered. "This is a lot more unexpected than I expected it to be. I kind of feel lied to. You and Mags both have kept this from me."
"We never meant to lie to you or anything like that," he said taking her hand, "it's just that we don't talk about the family business outside the family. It's part of how we are raised, to be part of the family business and to keep it's full activities a secret."
"It's complicated Ray." Cerulean said standing too.
"So un-complicate it Lean. This is our future children we're talking about right now," Rachael said turning on him. "I won't let our children be forced into something they don't want and your family can go to hell if they think I won't stop them from hurting Ochre, too."
"Whoa, Ray, stop," Cerulean said grabbing her shoulders, "It's not forced, okay. Our children won't be forced. Ochre, won't be forced to do anything he doesn't want to. Like you, I want him to do whatever makes him happy too, but there are certain expectations."
"I chose this life. I chose to work for my family and do what needs to be done because my father was getting ready to retire and someone needed to take over his responsibilities. And while it's not expected that everyone join it is expected that everyone keeps the business secret."
"Why," Rachael asked, "why keep it secret? Is it illegal?"
"Sometimes it can be nearly illegal but it's always done with the support of the legal authorities. There are just some things they can't do that we can. But we keep it secret so that those in the family that are not also in the business, the wives, husbands, and children, won't be hurt to get to the agents that are."
Rachael looked up at him a new worry taking root in her heart, "it's dangerous isn't it? The work that you do."
Cerulean looked at her trying to read her response before nodding his head, "It can be but I've been doing it long enough that I've learned to minimize the danger I put myself in."
Closing her eyes and shaking her head Rachael stepped up to him and embraced him.
His job was a worry she hadn't expected to have but she loved him too much to let it make her run away now. "Don't you dare ever let yourself get hurt," she threatened him, "or I will be very upset with you."
"I do my best." Cerulean answered wrapping his arms around her and pulling her close.
Random Ramblings
So wow :O This was so not what I originally thought I would write out. It was scripted but not to this level of detail. The details come in as I write it in the blog so again, wow.
But I think I like it better. So can anyone guess what Cerulean does in game? Rachael is in the writer career (I already mentioned that) and Cerulean is a "secret agent" or something (can't remember the actual in game title and too tired to check now).
I just had to come up with a plausible reason for him to be a secret agent and this is what I came up with.
Nice! But scary. If I were Rachael, I don't know how accepting I would be of this...especially to find out AFTER the wedding!
ReplyDeleteYeah. If someone tried to pull this on me in real life I would be very angry with them at this point. But since I'm writing in the spirit of a romance novel Rachael is just a little more accepting than would be wise in real life.
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