*Author's Note* I had to put something up. I was pretty distracted when I wrote most of this so I'll probably revise it later on or something. I'll be editing the entire story when I've completed it. Enjoy, hopefully! X|
Chapter 14
“We’re here,” announces Gabriel as he slows the car down. He parks some distance away from a grand house and we both clamber out of the car simultaneously. He walks swiftly up to the gate that blocks the house and I follow more slowly behind him, gradually putting more weight on my ankle until I can walk a bit steadier.
“Damn,” I hear Gabriel mutter. He’s in front of a small keypad attached to a pillar next to the gate. I hear a few beeps and another curse word until I approach him.
“What are you doing?” I ask curiously as he punches in more numbers and swears when it isn’t the right combination.
“I’m trying to get in but I can’t remember the password!” He slaps the keypad and more numbers enter, all of them incorrect.
“You can’t remember the password to your own house?” I ask, very skeptical.
He grunts and mumbles, “I stay inside most of the time.”
I look thoughtfully at the keypad and ask, “Is the password someone’s birthday?”
To my surprise, Gabriel looks at me scornfully. “Of course it isn’t! Every hacker knows that the most obvious password is a birthday.” He punches in some more numbers and slams his fists against the stone pillar, saying every obscenity I’ve ever heard of.
“Now what?” I ask as he slouches down to the ground slowly.
“We’ve got to wait till someone comes to let us in,” he says grumpily. I don’t respond; instead I walk up to the gate and look through the wrought iron bars. Most of the house is obscured because of the gate, but from what I can see the house is huge, and unkempt. Bottles litter the ground, a stray shoe is floating in a fountain at the front of the house, and there’s a smashed window or two.
“Your house is a mess,” I say loudly.
“Yeah,” he says, his voice even grumpier, “That’s the price you pay for inviting four hundred people to your birthday party.”
“Didn’t I say I was sorry?”
He looks up for a moment and furrows his eyebrows, as if thinking. “No,” he says, “No, you didn’t actually.”
“Oh,” I say simply. He isn’t getting a sorry out of me now. He crouches on the ground, his mouth turned down into a frown while I stay standing, still looking through the gate. After a few minutes of looking at his trashed house something small and moving catches my eye. “Hey,” I say, still focusing on the figure. I nudge Gabriel with my foot and he stands up to look through the gate. “There’s a guy right there,” I point out.
“A guy where?” he asks. He’s having more difficulty looking through the gate than me.
“Right there!” I try again, and this time I get more specific. “Um, he’s trying to get a shoe out of the fountain…”
“Oh! That’s my butler,” says Gabriel. “Yeah, he should be able to get us in. Gerard!”
I look at him with a confused expression as the butler lifts his head up and looks around. “Why do you have a butler? Can’t you do things yourself?”
“It gets lonely in my house. I can’t throw parties every day. Gerard!”
“Lonely?” I persist. “Don’t you have a girlfriend or something? Or a family?”
He looks down at me with a dangerous glint in his eyes. “You irritate me.”
“I thought we were on the same side now!” I exclaim. He shakes his head then continues to call for his butler. The butler finally looks at the locked gate where the two of us are standing. He shuffles over in an excruciatingly slow manner until he finally reaches the gate.
“Hello Mr. Caen,” the butler says in a wispy sort of voice, as wispy as the small amount of white hair at the top of his head.
“Gerard,” Gabriel nods. Gerard squeezes a skinny hand through the bars of the gate and manages to type in the correct password into the keypad. He steps back as the gate opens smoothly. “Thanks,” Gabriel says and walks briskly toward his house. I smile at Gerard and quickly follow him.
“My ankle is still sore you know!” I call out pointedly as he practically runs up a large staircase leading to front doors that are open just a crack.
“So what?” he says in a disgruntled sort of voice. He opens up the front door and slips through then slams it behind him, disregarding me completely. I finally make it up the staircase and flex my ankle a bit. “What’s his problem,” I grumble under my breath.
A voice coming from right behind me interrupts my thoughts. “He doesn’t like to touch the subject of family,” a wispy voice says. I turn so sharply I have to wave my arms wildly to keep my balance and prevent my fall down the stairs. Gerard stands some distance away, his hands folded behind him and a ghost of a smile lingering on his face.
“Why?” I ask, once I’ve recovered enough to speak.
“I’m sure you’ll find it out, miss,” he replied.
“My name’s Ruby,” I tell him. I don’t want to be called miss. Gerard nods and walks back down the stairs to continue cleaning. I turn and walk towards the front doors. Luckily the door is unlocked when I give the handles a tug. When I step inside, my footsteps echo loudly, giving the house an even emptier impression. I look around Gabriel’s entrance hall, half impressed and half disgusted. It would’ve been impressive if trash and food scraps and various clothes weren’t scattered around. I walk forward and turn to my left, ending up in another hallway. Although this hallway is almost spotless. The first thing that catches my eye is the mosaic that decorates the hall’s floor. Black tiles make up a large circle and crimson tiles form an elegant rose in the middle with green tiles acting as a stem. It seems odd that Gabriel would be so into roses.
I look up from the mosaic and see short stone pillars that are lined up all along the walls. Vases are on most of the pillars, but some are shattered or absent. And in each vase that is there is a single crimson rose. I walk over to the closest vase and closely look at the rose that is inside.
And in the silence of the rose filled hall Gabriel’s voice echoes unnaturally loudly. “Snoop much?” he calls and causes me to jump up in shock. My arm jerks involuntarily and the vase with the rose I was just observing falls and smashes to the ground.
“Oh God, I’m sorry!” I apologize quickly as Gabriel walks towards me. “I didn’t mean to, I swear!” He doesn’t answer but instead gets a firm grip on my arm and drags me quickly away from the hallway.
We end up back in the entrance hall and he takes me up a flight of stairs I haven’t noticed before. At the top of the stairs he turns right and we pass multiple doors, most of which are ajar and filled with more debris. He keeps the firm grip on my arm until we reach the very last door. This one is shut with a keypad on the door instead of a door handle. Gabriel lets go of my arm so he can type in the password. The door opens up immediately (unlike the mishap at the gate) and he pushes it open all the way. “In,” he says curtly. I shuffle into the room and look around. The room, like the rose filled hallway, is virtually spotless. Except for the unmade bed at one corner of the room. I hear a thump behind me and turn to see Gabriel rummaging through his closet. As I watch him he pulls out a variety of boxes and pulls out some clothes and a pair of shoes from each one.
“Here,” he grumbles and shoves the piles of clothes into my arms. “Get dressed and we’re leaving. There’s a bathroom through that door over there.”
“Where did you get these clothes?” I ask suspiciously. I indicate the maroon v-neck clutched in my right hand and the pair of black boots tucked under my arm. “You didn’t steal them from some girl, did you?” I look at the dark denim, ripped jeans in my left hand as if it would give me an answer.
“No,” Gabriel says tersely, “No, I didn’t. Now just get dressed and I can get you off my hands quicker.”
“I’m not wearing those clothes or going anywhere until I get a straight answer,” I say stubbornly. And to strengthen my point I drop the clothes onto the ground and cross my arms.
He looks at me with an expression of stone and says quietly, “You’re not getting an answer out of me.
“Then I’m not going anywhere.” I sink down to the floor and cross my legs tightly. Gabriel doesn’t move or speak so I continue. “Your butler told me you don’t like to talk about family.” If anything, his expression becomes even stonier. “You can either tell me ‘bout it, or just keep the ugly attitude you got a half hour ago.” His expression slackens and he crouches down onto the floor. To my surprise he buries his face into his hands, breathes deeply, and begins to talk.