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Jada pushed her way up the stairs, leaving the ballroom behind. There was nothing fancy about her exit, as had been planned; instead she'd been shoved up the stairs by her mother, a whispered "go to bed" snapped in her ear with no small amount of ferocity. It was only half past midnight as she pushed open the door to her bedroom, blinking at the figure on her bed, she shadows in the corners of the quiet room.

The young debutante didn't bother to turn on the light; the figure in her bed was asleep, and in the dim light it looked like it was Fallon's mother. Instead, she reached behind her, undoing the zipper of her dress and pulling it down, dropping the fancy debutante gown in the middle of the floor and kicking off her heels, moving for her closet. White stockings were pulled off, tossed in the bathroom. Odd. Castor wasn't meowing his greetings to her, winding around her ankles as normal. when she pushed open her bathroom door. He must be asleep. She pushed open her closet door, back to eyes watching her in silence from the far corner of her room as she flicked on the light in her closet. As she pulled out a simple sundress, a rich amethyst, pulling it over her head.

She moved for the bathroom, turning on the water and rubbing away her heavy makeup, leaving herself natural. Wiping away her mother, leaving only herself. she turned off the bathroom light, moving for the balcony, eyes not yet adjusted to the darkness. She would sit out back for a while. It wasn't eagerness, she told herself, to see if Marlo would come. It wasn't that she particularly cared if he came up; after all.

She had thought that he liked Fallon.

Her own mixed feelings towards him were an imposition and a cruelty. It wasn't her fault though, she told herself. Step by step, closer to the door, pressing her hand to the handle. An arm slid around her waist from behind, tugged her up close to an unfamiliar body, and her heart caught in her chest, seizing. "Lets step outside." It was a familiar, masculine voice. She tried to turn; he held her to him as if bound by iron. "I've wanted this all night."

He had. Oh, he had. He'd been afraid, when Fallon had entered the room with her drunken mother, that Iva's presence would prevent this. He'd intended to take her out to the gardens- that was still his goal. He just had to do it a slightly different way. Jada's hand turned the handle, pushing open her door, and she was pushed out onto her balcony, the door being pushed shut behind the figure that clung to her.

"You smell lovely." his breath was hot on the back of her neck. Jada gave a strangled whimper, feeling a slender hand close around her throat, squeezing lightly on her windpipe. Her blood was chilled, and she felt the hand attached to the arm around her body spread, the palm splaying over her flat belly. "Don't try and talk." he urged her as she made soft little noises low in her throat. "Don't talk." The hand around her body hurt, gripping her too tightly for comfort. The sound of steps on the stair; thank god. Or so she thought until the hand tightened, moving up to grip her chin, pulling on her lightly to expose her neck as the man behind her bent his lips to her skin. The purple eyes that turned to Marlo as he came over the last step were terrified. For just a moment, she thought she felt a laugh, mingled frustration and annoyance, and then she was being shoved forward; Jada gripped to the railing for dear life as she almost went over the edge of the stairs, to go tumbling down; she felt a nail tear, break off against the metal railing and then her light body smashed into Marlo's.

It was deliberate. He'd had no other choice. He wasn't able to finish what he wanted- again. Briefly, gray eyes flickered at Marlo's, memorizing his face. This blue-eyed boy was getting to be one huge annoyance. All he'd wanted to do was spend some time alone with his girl, watching the stars with her and listening to her breathe. Was that so much to ask? He reached out, tried to grab her by the hair, jerk her back towards the bedroom. Tried to jerk open the french doors, taking advantage of the fact she was on the ground to drag her against her will. No luck. She was clinging to the rail, clinging to Marlo, she didn't know what the hell she was grabbing, but it was enough that her stalker cursed and let her go, slamming the French doors shut. He didn't bother to lock them behind himself. Jada caught her own breath, lungs seizing with the sudden influx of air. As he fled down the stairs, mixing in with other servers before slipping out the front of the home almost unnoticed, the gray-eyed man consoled himself with the fact that she would find his little present for her soon enough. Probably next time she tried to take a shower. (He didn't like cats, it infuriated him that she had gotten one. But then, she'd never let him tell her how badly he hated them.)

Jada shuddered, balancing herself against the railing. ******** hell, he'd broken in a second time. Jada remained where she was collapsed on the top stair, shaking, before looking down at her trembling hands. One of her nails had snapped, leaving her with four long nails and a single short on her left hand. Her right hand was lifted to her throat. For the moment, Jada found herself torn between logic and terror. Logic dictated that a man had been in her room, alone, with Fallon's mother. Iva! Jada shoved to her feet, stumbling over to the French doors and tugging them open, not waiting for Marlo behind her. She pulled open the door, hand going unerringly to the light switch. The older woman was breathing, thank goodness.

Terror was turning itself into fury. She'd had such a simple, well-meaning plan for the night. She just wanted a dance with a friend. But no. Stalker boy had felt the need to- gah! she wrapped her arms around herself, turning her attention back to the man who had, again, been there for her. "You have the best timing of any man I've ever known." her voice was hoarse.

Arms went around her again and Jada made a distressed little noise, just for a moment, before she buried her face in Marlo's chest, her own arms sliding around him. She could feel the nausea in her stomach, the blood pounding in her ears. She could feel his heart beating in his chest, and she found it soothing. She found him soothing. Her body shook, the same powerful, silent shudders from the day at the mall. Marlo thought they'd been close the night before, hah! Jada was clinging to him now, not just hanging on to him, her face burying itself against his flesh as she shook.

"Marlo." she mumbled his name against his chest. She'd started getting comfortable in her own skin. She'd started letting go, as the man had vanished from her sight for several weeks; she'd thought, maybe he found someone else. But now... "I want this finished. I'm tired of it." She shouldn't be thinking that he smelled good. She shouldn't be remembering how safe he made her feel.

Reluctantly, she unclenched her hands from where they had bunched in his shirt, pulling her face out of his chest.

He held her, and she felt herself calm down. Why? She could protect herself; she was Scylla. Worst come to worst, she could reveal herself for what she was, and strangle the life out of that crazy fu- she stopped that train of thought. She wouldn't be able to do it. And she was paralyzed by him, her self-defense lessons had been for nothing. She was weak as a kitten, physically. Exhausted from a stay in the hospital and the drugs in her system... Marlo's hands in her hair made her bite her lip, fighting back her first instinct to lean into his touch.

Had the stalker hurt her? He'd been choking her. She didn't answer that question as Marlo pulled away from her, moving around the room. Jada sat carefully on the end of her bed while he prowled. The purple dress, so carefully chosen, felt dirty. She just wanted to tear it off, screaming, fling it out the window or into her fireplace and burn away his nasty touch.

She stood, moving for her closet, stepping over the crumpled heap of her white dress on the floor. Marlo met her, pulling her back into his arms, and she went eagerly. She needed to be held right now, by someone to make the dirty touch go away. She shuddered in Marlo's arms, lifted her face to look up at him. "At least you came." On some level, she hadn't thought he would. "You saved me again." She owed him more than she could ever repay.

What was it with the Xanis brothers and finding her at just the right moment?

"I want to change again though." she said finally, and pulled out of his arms, moving for the closet; a moment of hesitation, and she locked the balcony doors, then the bedroom door. She didn't want anyone coming back, or what if he'd gone in her closet, or hidden in her bathroom? She reached out for her shut closet door, hand shaking. She couldn't- she had to. She pushed open her closet door, almost violently, and stepped into the other room. "Do you care if I wear a skirt or pants?" it was a redundant question. It was something to fill the silence, and to distract her from reality. "I don't want to stay in here. I was thinking we could go out to the garden."

If Marlo wanted to go inside her closet first, into her closet he could go. There were no people inside the square room; the door between closet and bathroom was wide open. Jada closed it as she followed the blonde man into the walk-in, a pale, slim hand clutching his dark jacket. She locked the door between bathroom and closet, following him back to the entrance and letting him take her into her arms. It was comfortable. "I don't want fighting. I just want-" she shook her head. "I just want him caught, and behind bars." her neck tingled, the brand of the gray-eyed man who followed her. In some ways, she was especially glad that Marlo had no idea that this wasn't the first time he'd broken into her home. Crystal. Here. She wasn't safe anywhere but in Scylla's skin, and there she was only safe from her stalker. There were greater monsters that sought Scylla's life.

God, Marlo smelled good.

He made her feel safe. What could she say? In so many ways, she was quintessentially female. Jada liked the feeling of being protected. She wanted to be held. She didn't want to be the strong one. Marlo was very good at being male. Oh, she'd met a few females who could do it too, but there was just something about the testosterone complex that made it particularly... ********.

She pulled back from him after a moment, face a bright red over the pallor that still lay under her skin. It was an odd contrast. "You are a sweet talker, Mr. Xanis." she looked up at him, eyes dark with some kind of amusement, or... even Jada wasn't willing to dig that deep into the swirl of how she was feeling right now. "It makes you dangerous." So dangerous. Her mother would pitch a fit that she was so close to him. Her mother would pitch a fit that she'd kissed him. Her mother would pitch a fit that Jada was so close to him, and looking at his mouth with no small amount of consideration through dark lashes. It wasn't that it was Marlo, if Jada were to be honest with herself. Not tonight. Anyone else could just have easily gained her affection for the evening with a timely rescue. It helped that she liked Marlo. He was a good boy.

It took her a few moments to realize that she'd been clinging to him, arms around his neck, stuck in her own thoughts. "I'll go get changed." her voice was husky. "Thank you, Marlo."

His own emotions were as jumbled as her own. At least that was what she gauged his clear confusion to mean. "Are you sucking up to me, Mr. Xanis?" she smiled up at him, eyes dark with amusement. "I mean, if you are I'm not complaining, but I am rather curious as to what you think I could offer you." She wasn't. Jada knew exactly what men (typically) wanted from her, and it had nothing to do with her physical beauty. No, it had, rather, everything to do with the beauty of her wallet. Or her father's wallet. However one cared to look at it. She'd learned that the hard way. But with Marlo, she oddly didn't think it was the money that brought him toward her. He hadn't known who she was when he had come to her rescue.

She liked the thought that she could have such an effect on a male. Most of the people she'd dealt with had been older, well-versed in the wiles of women, and quite immune to her little flirtations. Jada had needed to sell herself in ways she didn't like in order to gain approval from the older men. With Marlo, she'd never had to lie to get the reactions she wanted. She'd just had to open up, and give in to those naughty little voices in her gut. Was it the difference between young men and old? Younger men, so easily charmed by a pretty face and a wicked smile? Why was she even thinking these things? She blinked, breaking the pensive spell that had set itself over her thoughts, and took another step back into the closet. "I'll be right back." she told him, and started to close the door. 'Wait,' he said, and she paused, blinking up at him. His hands resting near her hips made her breath catch, heart giving an odd little thump.

Marlo's lips on hers stunned her.

More stunning was her own response. Slim arms wrapped around his neck, and she kissed him back. What he had meant to be quick was suddenly not going to be so. Those worming little tendrils of uncertainty in her gut solidified, becoming snakes, eating away at her. Long, slender fingers tangled around and with the ends of his blonde hair. His lips were soft.

It was with reluctance that Jada pulled away from him, letting his lips go. "I'll make it quick." she murmured to his chest, not meeting his eyes. And almost fled into the closet, shutting herself away from him.

For several minutes she rested her forehead against the closet door, eyes closed while her blood pounded in her ears, scalp tingling where he'd tangled his fingers in her hair. Her wantonness stunned her, the sheer absurdity of her own actions- given what her night had been like so far- making her cheeks burn. What did Marlo think of her?

Jada felt like she was going crazy. She tore off her amethyst gown, dragging another dress blindly off of a hanger and sliding it on. Sleeveless. White. Ugh, she hated that color right now. Sundress.

Her hair clips were tugging on the nerves of her scalp, and she tugged open the door. Marlo was gone. For a moment, she panicked, until she heard cursing and the sound of a weak cry coming from her bathroom. The door was open; she poked her head inside. Castor was crying at Marlo, shaking and clinging to him.

"What happened?" she moved over to the two, lifting the kitten out of Marlo's arms. The small toyger let go of him easily, clambering up her arms and mewing into her ear, dampening her shoulder with his dripping body. Small claw holes were left in her pale arm, and the kitten bawwed out his woes against her ear, huddling under her hair as she used her mirror to pull the pins out of the black curls, letting them fall down out of the updo. "Marlo, what happened to him?" she looked concerned; she'd be more so if she had a clue of how he'd found her cat trussed up like a turkey.

At least he hadn't killed the kitten or anything.

When her hairpins were gone, Jada tugged a complaining, squalling kitten out from the shelter of her hair, letting him rest in her arms, pressed against her chest.