We get in my house and I invite him up.
When we enter my apartment he looks around and I can see it in his eyes, he sees to like it. I don't think much about the fact that he is in my apartment bit of what happened.
I feel sad that the bottle of wine I bought is no longer, it could really help with calming down right about now.
"I will sit here and make plans for your safety." He says once I get out of my bedroom from the shower.
"No need for that, this place has security it shouldn't be an issue." I tell him as I sit.
"It's best if you did what I am telling you, it's what is best for you."
"I don't know you. And I don't follow orders." I tell him. Why is he acting all commanding?
"You just opened a can of warms, what do you think is going to happen when you continue with this?"
"Are you suggesting that I should stop?! Because you can forget about it!" I say this as I stand in defence.
"Your life is in danger. They wanted the papers and any type of information you have gathered tonight. It has only been two weeks and already they are doing this, are you that blind?"
He is making sense on that. "but I can't just abandon my work simply because I almost got robbed tonight!"
"Hannah, I will assign you someone to be escorting you everywhere and that is final. You are so stubborn on not stopping the case, so you will get that."
"No! I-" he stands and covers my mouth with his palm, gently but firm. He looks in my eyes and there is finality in there.
"Do you understand me?" I nod at him yes.
"Good girl."
His hand is still covering my mouth as we look at each other, and I start feeling the tingles. I lick my lips and in doing so, the tip of my tongue touches his palm.
His eyes flare and slowly, he uncovers my mouth but holds my chin. His thumb runs over my lower lip and I can't help but close my eyes for a moment. His hand slides down my throat slowly, all this time staring right in my eyes, and then he withdraws his hands and takes a step back.
I feel like the room is suddenly cold, and I come back into reality. I clear my throat and run my fingers through my hair as I make my way into the kitchen for some water.
When I look back, I see the front door closing. He is gone, but has left my phone at the table.
I exhale sharply and sit down. Tonight is very strange and a lot has happened.
I think about calling gig and telling her all about it but if my life is in danger I shouldn't include my friend in it. So I decide to just sit there and I can't help think about him. He was right here, in my apartment.
Without thinking my fingertips touch my lower lip, remembering how he ran his thumb and trace down to my throat.
His touch alone is stirring something deep inside me that I had no idea was still alive. Something I don't want to wake up, but it is a very part of me. Something I never thought would ever be satisfied let alone explored.
I decide to stop my mind from going any further into that road and take my bag instead. I take the files of my work and look through them. It has dirt on powerful people no one would ever suspect and i will make sure it all comes out.
It must come out. This is personal to me, reason why I agreed to do all this in the first place. I go through the papers and come across a company name. The name I saw on the list and decided to take on the case.
When I was in high school my dad died. He had health issues and required lot of homecare and medication. The insurance tried to cover for it and it did. For a while. Then all of a sudden it couldn't. We were introduced to this particular company that told us they could put my father into a test program, with the medication. For a period of time my father stated getting better, he even started to walk again, and get outside the house all on himself.
The program was working for him, and we didn't have to worry about money because they covered all that. Until one day, I remember I was coming home from school. My father was not feeling so good.
He started by feeling nausea and dizziness, all the side effects they told us would happen. What they didn't say is that within the next day, he would be vomiting blood. We had no time to even take him to the hospital. Blood was coming from every opening in his body. There was nothing we could do. He died.
My mother tried to get them to tell us what kind of medication he was on that made him so but they couldn't. for months she tried to know what went wrong, I too tried but no one could find anything g. until one day , news were on and the company was said to be under investigations for using humans as test subjects for a project they had been doing for months. We researched and we saw my father was in the project.
Of course the lawsuit that was being filed by them didn't stick because after a couple of weeks, it all went down, no one was asking questions. Money was being sent to families who were affected and that is how it all got lost.
That is how I decided to be a journalist. To uncover truths and shed light and bring justice to the helpless. When I came across this case and saw that people were still asking questions even after fifteen years, I took it. So yes, this is personal and no one is going to stop until the bastards are behind the bars every single one of them.