Chapter 15
Jack stared into the pink rose bushes in front of him, knees digging into the soft earth underneath him and staining his pants with mud and grass. His hands hovered over a rose, one curled around the petals, ready to catch the flower after he snipped its stem with the clippers in his other hand.
But he couldn’t close them, couldn’t tighten the blades around the flower’s stem.
A snort followed by a laugh came from behind him, shocking the CEO to his core and startling him so much that he snipped the stem crookedly and much too short. The rose landed in his palm with a soft thump, its small stem sticking up, taunting him almost. Jack glared down at the blossom before dropping it into the wicker basket by his legs, and then turned to look at his daughter who was covering her smile behind clasped hands.
“I was wondering when you would snap out of it. You’ve been staring at that rose for five minutes.” She giggled into her palms which were covered in dirt. Some of it got on her cheeks, mixing in with her freckles.
“I was not-”
“Dad, don’t lie. I was able to harvest two honeycombs while you were spaced, and pick carrots.”
Jack snapped his mouth shut, craning his neck to look behind Angel to find their picnic table laden with a few jars of honey and a half-filled basket of carrots. He narrowed his eyes as he looked back at Angel, and stood with a huff, dusting his hands off and rubbing the dirt off of his jeans. When he was at his full height, he stared down at Angel with an annoyed look on his face as he crossed his arms over his chest.
“I was just distracted. Care to tell me where your hat is?”
“Distracted my ass-” Angel started with a roll of her eyes, smile still hanging off her lips.
“Angel María Lawrence, what have I told you about that kind of language?”
Angel jolted, eyes widening in a way that was almost comical, but Jack merely stared down at her and tapped his foot in the grass, the muffled thumping unsatisfying instead of intimidating like how it would have been if he were doing this on their hard-wood floors. Still, Angel caught the action and her dipped her head down.
“Lo siento, papá.”
Sighing, Jack reached out to Angel, threading his fingers through her hair and pushing it out of her face so that he could kiss her forehead. He kissed her cheeks as well, wiping away the dirt from her skin with a swipe of his thumb.
“Te perdono, mija. Still didn’t tell me why you’re not wearing your hat, though.” Angel shot him an indignant look at that, huffing at Jack in annoyance.
“I’ve grown up with these bees. I know how they are, I really don’t think I need netting to protect myself from them.”
“And I’ve worked with them for longer than you’ve been alive and I still wear my hat when I tend to them. You’re lucky I only want you to wear the hat and not the whole suit. I just want to make sure you’re safe, sweetheart.” Jack smiled down at her sweetly which she returned with a roll of her eyes. His smile turned crooked then and he tangled his fingers in Angel’s hair again, messing with it until her curls were sticking up every which way, much to his daughter’s annoyance.
“Oh my god, dad-” She squawked when Jack pulled her into his arms, one of them hooking around Angel to keep her in place as he continued to mess with her hair, ignoring all her attempts to break free. Peals of laughter escaped them both, with high pitched squeaks coming from Angel every so often.
“Dad, please!” Finally, Jack released her, a grin plastered to his face which she mirrored, her blue eyes glaring at him but still betraying her amusement.
“I can’t believe you just noogied me. I thought you were supposed to an adult.”
Jack shrugged before he reached down to pick up the basket by the rose bushes, filled with many perfectly cut roses and just one with a crooked stem. Jack picked that one out of the basket and broke off the few thorns on its stem before putting it in Angel’s hair, the stem just long enough to rest behind her ear.
“Getting older is exhausting,” He said in response, placing the basket on the picnic table before grabbing his own net-covered hat that was sitting on the bench and putting it on. Pointedly, he tapped the brim of the hat and looked at Angel. “Too many friggin’ expectations and responsibilities.”
Angel hummed in response, grabbing her own hat and putting it on just to stop Jack from complaining more. With the net falling neatly around her face, Angel joined her father in the far corner of their backyard where Jack kept his beehives. Pollen-rich flowers crowded the fence near the hives, giving the bees easy access to their materials, and a bird bath sat not too far away, providing water for both visiting birds and their own buzzing insects. The area was shaded by the large oak in their yard, with sunlight filtering through the leaves and casting hypnotizing shadows along the ground. Around them, the honey bees whizzed by, minding their own business happily.
“Responsibilities like telling people you like them?” Angel asked, clasping her hands behind her back as she came to stand next to Jack. Absently, she noticed that she was eye-level with his shoulders now, and that he seemed to freeze at her comment. A moment passed before Jack relaxed again, leaning over to pull out one of the frames Angel had already cleared of its honeycomb to inspect it. Some raw honey was still stuck to the frame, but Jack put it back without worry.
“I tell plenty of people that I like them. You, Timmy, Nish, Wilhelm,” Jack grabbed the smoke canister he kept nearby and started to spray a previously untouched beehive, disrupting any attacks his disturbance would have incited from the hive. “Your mother when she isn’t screaming at me to agree to split-custody. Which, by the way, would cause hell to freeze over and thus never happen. You think she would get it after seventeen years.”
Angel dutifully ignored the comment about her mother, not wanting to incite one of Jack’s rants about a woman she barely knew, and nudged his arm gently.
“You haven’t told Rhys. You had the perfect opportunity last night.”
Jack’s shoulders bunched up, his back taut with new tension and his hands clenched tight around the smoke canister. Angel leaned forward slightly to peer at his face, the tightness of his expression only somewhat masked by the netting surrounding his face and blocking her sight.
“I tell Rhys that I like him. Just the other day, I called his office to tell him what a good job he was doing.” Jack said through gritted teeth, voice low and nearly a growl. Still, Angel pressed despite Jack’s tight-lipped response.
“Dad, you and I both know that you don’t go out of your way to give gifts like that to just anyone.”
“Angel-”
“The last time you spent that much on a gift was Gaige’s prosthetic, and before that those antique revolvers you gave to Nisha, and before that-”
“Stop.”
Angel snapped her mouth shut and blinked up at Jack, mindful of the way he was carrying himself now. He dropped the smoke canister to the grass below and pulled out a frame from the hive, inspecting it and its honey content. Bees swarmed on the frame, some of them taking flight to find more pollen, but none of them were prompted to attack the source of the disturbance. A few bees landed on the net of their hats, but neither father nor daughter paid them any mind. The honeycomb was too small to harvest, so Jack replaced it and took another from its nook, repeating the process until each frame was examined.
None of them were ready to harvest. Angel almost imagined it might be a metaphor for something in their lives, but she dismissed the thought. Too poetic, too akin to something in a trashy romance novel or a slice-of-life book with no real plot.
“Rhys is,” Jack scowled at the beehives, searching for something to do with his hands now that they were free of honeycomb. Failing in his search, he clenched them into fists. “Rhys is a friend, a valuable employee, and someone that you like for some reason.”
“And whom you spent nearly fifty-thousand on for that upgrade alone-”
“Angel.”
“Jack.”
They each squared their shoulders as Jack turned to face Angel, annoyance in every line of his body. Through the netting, Jack could see the fierce look in Angel’s eyes, her baby blues alight with fire that he knew his own eyes mirrored. Her jaw was set, an angry flush across her cheeks making her freckles stand out more than usual.
“Why are you so adamant about this?”
"Why are you being so stupid?” She shot back, tone biting and nearly making Jack flinch.
“What have I told you about-”
“I don’t care, Jack! You’re being stupid! You’re being stubborn! Rhys is the first good thing to happen to you in a long time and you’re letting him slip away! I see how you look at him! How your stupid face lights up when you talk about him!”
Jack growled in response, making a move to grab at his hair, but was hindered by his hat, making him even more frustrated. He tore the hat off of his head and threw it to the ground, stopping just short of stomping on it. Around them, bees swarmed, getting agitated with the commotion.
“So what if it does? So what if I like him! What do you expect me to do about it, Angel?!”
“Tell him!” Angel nearly shrieked, wanting to pull her own hair out.
“I did!” Jack shouted back. His chest heaved, his fists clenched at his sides, and he knew his own face was flushed with exertion. Angel looked at him, her eyes blinking owlishly as she breathed heavily as well. Her own hands relaxed at her sides and her shoulders fell, but her lips were pursed into a straight line, annoyance still clear.
“In a language he doesn’t understand. I heard you last night. I went down the hall to use the restroom and I heard what you said to him.” Her tone was purely accusatory, as if daring Jack to deny her allegations. Jack bit the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood.
“I can’t tell him any other way.” He said finally, bending over to pick up his forgotten hat. He wiped dirt from the net, refusing to meet Angel’s eyes. “It’s not that easy.”
“Yes it is! You just have to walk up to him and say-” Angel’s voice dropped an octave as she tried to emulate her father’s tone. “Oh Rhys, I see the stars in your eyes, and I-”
“Angel, you don’t understand-”
“-Would love to have the pleasure of your company tonight at dinner. What do you say, pumpkin?” She finished off with a wink, pursed lips stretching to form a smile instead.
“Angel, you are a child, and you don’t understand what you’re talking about! Nothing in life is that easy! Absolutely nothing!” Silence reigned between them, and Jack had only a moment to really register what he shouted at Angel before tears started welling up in her eyes. Her face became flushed for a different reason, the tip of her nose growing red as tears started to fall down her cheeks. Her eyes never lost their fire, not even as her face became stained with tears, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.
“Aw shit-” Jack grimaced and reached out for Angel. She flinched away from him, watching as he reacted as if slapped across the face. “Angel, sweetheart, I didn’t mean that-”
“Don’t,” Angel began, her voice hardened. “Don’t touch me. Don’t talk to me.”
Angel ripped off her hat and threw it to the ground as she stomped her way back into the house, slamming the back door hard enough to crack the wood. The rose Jack placed in her hair earlier fell as she went, landing at the steps to the back door. Jack stared at the rose, a sinking feeling in his gut before the sound of something else slamming shut caught his attention. He saw the flutter of curtains being hastily closed and turned his attention next door, where Rhys’ kitchen window was. They were still moving when he looked, evidence of being only recently closed.
Fuck.
Inside his own home, Rhys gripped the kitchen sink. His sleek prosthetic covered his mouth, preventing noise from escaping him. Which was stupid, Jack couldn’t hear him from that far away, but it helped to calm him down, helped to even his breathing.
What was that?
“Hey bro, are you okay?”
Nothing. Not even a twitch.
“Rhys?” Vaughn tried again, waving his hand in front of Rhys’ face.
“Rhys!” Finally, Rhys showed a reaction, jumping slightly at Vaughn’s voice and looking at his friend with a shocked expression.
“Dude, what’s wrong?” Vaughn threw his hands up in the air, and gestured to Rhys when he brought them back down.
“What’s wrong? What’s wrong? I don’t know, maybe the fact that you walked out of the kitchen like an hour ago and have just been sitting on the couch watching Judge Judy re-runs? You hate Judge Judy, bro!” Vaughn vaulted over the back of the couch with ease to flop down next to Rhys, hooking his arm around Rhys’ shoulders. The action was a little difficult due to their height difference even when sitting down, but Vaughn was determined. “Did Jack put some program in that fancy new arm to mess with your head? I can get someone over here to check it out if I have to-”
“No!” The accountant stared up at Rhys with confusion, just a little startled by his outburst. “I mean, no it’s not that. Jack didn’t do anything- Well, he did, but not like that! I just, heard something shocking and don’t know how to comprehend it yet.”
“Hm,” Vaughn rubbed at his jaw, fingers scratching at his growing facial hair. To be honest, Rhys was quite excited to see that Vaughn was growing out his beard fully. “Was the thing you heard meant for you?”
“Well, no but-”
“Was it about you?” Vaughn questioned, still stroking his goatee.
“In a way, yeah?” Rhys shrugged, not sure how he felt about the exact topic of the conversion he witnessed between Angel and Jack, or how it had ended. Dread filled his gut as he remembered the way Angel ran off and he bit his lip to stop himself from mentioning that.
“Was it bad?” Vaughn continued, looking up at Rhys from over the rim of his glasses.
“I don’t…” Rhys ran a hand through his hair and sighed. He looked at his hand in his lap, the soft glow from the prosthetic’s lights making him think of honey and Jack, which in turn made his belly twist uncomfortably. “I don’t think so?”
Rhys slumped against Vaughn, pulling his legs up and onto the couch and shifting until he was able to rest his head on Vaughn’s shoulder. In turn, Vaughn chuckled and started to comb his fingers through Rhys’ hair and grabbed the TV remote, switching the television off so that they could sit comfortably without hearing trashy daytime shows.
“Then don’t worry about it, bro. Just let it play out naturally, whatever it is.”
Rhys hummed and was content to not respond any further. They stayed like that on the couch for awhile, eventually sliding down to a laying position when Vaughn started griping about his shoulder. They fell asleep like that, with Rhys laying on Vaughn’s belly, his arms wrapped around the shorter man comfortably. Vaughn had one hand on the nape of Rhys’ neck, his other arm thrown over his eyes to block out any light while he slept.
Athena came home and found them like that, and didn’t waste a single second to take pictures.
The rest of the weekend was spent in relative silence. Rhys didn’t want to, but he couldn’t help sneaking peeks into Jack’s backyard, and keeping an ear open for any more arguments from the family next door. He saw Jack a few times in the yard, obsessively tending to his garden and his beehives, but there wasn’t the slightest sound of raised voices, which helped to relieve some tension in Rhys’ chest.
Still, he walked into Hyperion the following Monday with nervous energy running through his veins. Even the smallest nudge from Vaughn was enough to startle him, which in turn made his friend stare at him like he had grown a second head.
“You sure you’re okay, bro? You’ve been jumpy all weekend.” Vaughn hooked his hand around the crook of Rhys’ elbow to help steady him, looking up at Rhys with worry. “You can call in sick, you know.”
“No, no. I just-” Rhys stopped mid-sentence to take a deep breath, letting oxygen swirl in his lungs before he released it and tried to put a confident smile on his face. “Need to relax, let things take their course, like you said. Everything will work out in the end.”
Vaughn gave him a look, but shrugged his shoulders and moved his hand to gently pat Rhys on the back. “Whatever you say, man. ECHO me if you need anything, yeah?”
“For sure, bro.” Rhys pointed his fingers at Vaughn, initiating Their Bro-est Of Bros™ finger gun routine. Vaughn, being the bro that he is, pointed them right back at Rhys as he walked off to the elevators, shooting his taller companion a wink as he went.
The silly gesture wasn’t much, but it did help to soothe Rhys’ nerves.
Rhys walked into his office with his head in the clouds. There were three things he did not notice because of this.
- His door was already unlocked even though he was diligent about locking it at the end of each work day.
- There was a coat on the back of his chair that did not belong to him.
- His chair was facing the window, not the desk like it usually was.
Rhys turned to shrug off his jacket and hang it on the coat rack, and he slipped his bag off and hung it up as well, fishing out his ECHO device before turning back towards his desk. Still refusing to notice the changes in his room, Rhys unlocked his phone and checked his email, feet automatically carrying him to his desk when a voice called out and stopped him.
“Have a seat, pumpkin.”
“Wha-” Rhys jumped, hands losing their grip on his ECHO and fumbling with it until he was able to save it from falling to floor. He stood gripping his phone to his chest, heaving from the shock he just experience, as his chair was swiveled around to reveal Handsome Jack. His hands were steepled in front of his face, elbows resting on the arms of Rhys’ chair, and his eyes were trained on Rhys.
In turn, Rhys swallowed heavily, heart pounding in his chest. Already, Rhys’ mind was running a mile per second, remembering Friday night when he received his arm, that Saturday and the argument he witnessed between Jack and Angel.
The revelations that weren’t meant for his ears.
“I’ve been expecting you.”
Wait.
Was he serious right now?
Rhys squinted at Jack, lips tugging downwards. Did he really just- ? Did Handsome Jack really come all the way down from his cosy, classy, CEO office to the lower levels of Hyperion’s workforce, waltz into Rhys’ office, and wait until Rhys arrived just to-
“Ho-ly shit, kiddo, you cannot believe how long I’ve been wanting to do that! I mean, the only thing that could possibly make this better is like, if I had some fluffy monstrosity of a cat in my lap, you know? Named like, Mister Wiggleston or some shit.”
Of course he did. Why was that even a question.
“Now that would have been the bee’s knees.”
“Jack-”
“But enough about me, how’ve you been, buttercup? Liking upper management so far? How’s the arm treating you?”
“Jack-”
“I’m pushing R&D to roll out more from that prosthetic line later this Spring, gonna be a big hit with other amputees and people with your condition. Gonna do a lot of good with that, pumpkin.”
“Jack,” Rhys said finally, adding more of a bite to his words. The CEO snapped his eyes up to Rhys’ face, keeping his mouth shut. “You look like shit.”
After Rhys had gotten over his initial disbelief and fright, his eyes roamed over the CEO, taking in his appearance. There were dark circles under his eyes and white crust at the corners, like he had forgotten to wash his face that morning. His jaw was covered in stubble and his clothes were rumpled terribly, evidence of sleeping in them. Even his smile looked forced and out of place.
Shit was just the best adjective to describe him at the moment.
“Rough weekend,” Was all Jack said, standing up from the chair and walking around Rhys’ desk. He came to a stop when he got to Rhys and put his hands on the man’s shoulders, pushing him towards his own chair and making him sit. Rhys went without complaint, curiosity winning out against all else, and sat with a soft oomph as he fell back in the chair. Jack stood behind him, hands still on Rhys’ shoulders as he leaned down, face uncomfortably close to his.
“I have another proposition for you, Rhysie.”
Rhys cringed, moving away from Jack and his frankly horrible breath.
“Does it involve you brushing your teeth at some point? Because ah, you really need to. God.”
Jack scowled at him and pushed himself away from Rhys, using his leverage to spin Rhys’ chair around (steadfastly ignoring Rhys’ squawks of protest) as he walked to the other side of the desk and planted his hands on the surface of the wood, still leaning into Rhys’ space but far enough away that the manager didn’t have to smell his days-old stench.
“Anyway-” Jack began, ignoring the way Rhys glared up at him. “I’m offering you another promotion. You got a good head on your shoulders and I could use that higher up.”
Immediately, Rhys started protesting, eyes wide with surprise and mouth open, ready to ask questions Jack really did not want to hear at the moment.
“Be my PA, Rhys.”
Jack held his breath as he looked at Rhys, noticing the way his eyes got impossibly bigger at the announcement. Jack saw the way Rhys worried his bottom lip between his teeth as he contemplated his answer, and how Rhys’ hands (one flesh, the other beautifully chrome and made from Jack’s own design) clenched and unclenched on the arm rests. There was no way he was going to deny his offer.
On the other end of the spectrum, Rhys was actually doing all these things because was just nervous about how Jack would react when he told him:
“No.”
You don’t deny Handsome Jack anything, not when it comes to his company.
But Rhys was a leader, not a follower, and he made mental note to send Vaughn a simple text reading “I totally #rekt Jack today lmao text it.”
“Excuse me, princess?” Rhys noted the way Jack’s nails started to dig into the wood of his desk, and decided to choose his next words very carefully.
“I said no. Jack, you already have a secretary. While she’s- less than pleasant, she does her job well enough. You don’t need a PA.” Jack pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes, but it was much less intimidating with the scruff dusting his face.
“But I want one.”
“Then find someone else,” Rhys shot back, quickly getting agitated. “Because I want to stay here. I like this position, Jack, and I’m doing some real good with it. I have plans for this company, and I can’t accomplish them if I’m glued to your side, managing your meetings and fetching coffee for you.”
They squared off against each other, an unstoppable force against an unmovable one, for what seemed like minutes, but was actually only mere seconds. Rhys was the first to break, leaning back into his chair with a heavy sigh and running his hand through his hair.
“Jack, why do you even want me as your PA?”
“I just,” Jack swallowed around the lump in his throat, for once at a loss for words. He couldn’t tell him the truth, that having him around would make Jack happier, that it might make the tightness in his chest loosen. What he told Angel was true, none of this was ever easy, and it wasn’t like feelings came naturally to Jack, not anymore. Not after what had happened.
Jack settled for something much simpler.
“I want you close to me.”
“Jack-” Rhys could feel his face burning up, his heart hammering in his chest. But he couldn’t- He couldn’t just respond to that in the way that he wanted, in a way that would reveal his accidental eavesdropping. Coughing softly into his hand, Rhys tried to wave the comment away casually, hoping his voice was steady as he spoke. “We live next door to each other. How much closer could we be?”
Jack blinked at him, surprise blossoming on his face until it melted away as he grimaced. Whether it was at Rhys’ comment or his own show of emotion, Rhys couldn’t tell, but Jack shut down after that. His face was closed off now as he shoved his hands in his pockets and spun on his heel, making for the door.
“Yeah, you know what?” He called out. “It was stupid fuckin’ suggestion. Forget I ever said anything.”
Another second passed and Rhys was left with the image of Jack slamming his office door shut behind as he left, the sound reverberating throughout his room. With a shaky sigh and heart still pounding away, Rhys leaned back into his chair again and breathed deeply. An unfamiliar scent filled his nose. It wasn’t unpleasant, quite the opposite in fact, and it filled his senses until Rhys finally moved away and turned back.
Jack left his coat hanging off his chair.