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When it’s time for the parlor to close for the night, Elise and Chelsea rush Hannah upstairs to get ready. She quickly jumps in the shower while they set about choosing an outfit for her to wear. She steps out of the bathroom wrapped only in a towel with her hair dripping wet just as Sawyer walks through the door to the living room. Hannah stands frozen staring at him with wide eyes and red cheeks. His mouth is gaping open and is unable to move from his current position.
Chelsea comes down the hall and witnesses the awkward exchange. She laughs, “Come on Bambi, let’s get you glammed up.” She tugs Hannah’s arm and leads her to the bedroom. Sawyer calls out after them, “Don’t make her look trashy.” The girls laugh while closing the door.
They throw a red dress at Hannah that hugs her chest then flares out to her knees. They have also selected a pair of black heels for her to wear.
She hesitates, “Are you sure about this?”
Chelsea and Elise answer at the same time, “Yes, put it on!”
Hannah steps to the closet, pulls the dress over her head and slips the shoes on. When she comes out, they are smiling at her in approval.
“What should we do with her hair? I think we should straighten it. What do you think Chelsea?” asks Elise.
Chelsea looks up from the makeup she is setting out and agrees.
They force Hannah to sit in a chair they brought in from the kitchen table and begin primping her. Elise gently runs a brush through her hair while blow drying it as Chelsea begins applying makeup. Hannah becomes preoccupied with watching them work on her transformation. They move naturally in sync with each other as they take turns with Hannah’s hair and makeup. In no time, they announce that they have finished. Hannah snaps out of her daydream, gazing at her reflection. Her hair is straight and shiny. Her complexion is evened out, purple and brown eyeshadow has been applied to her lids along with eyeliner and mascara. They have swept a faint amount of blush to her cheeks. The final touch is the red lipstick on her full lips.
“Wow, I can’t believe that is me! You guys worked a miracle here,” Hannah laughs in awe.
“We didn’t have much to improve, we just amped up your beauty,” Elise grins.
“Let’s go show dad to see if he approves,” Chelsea laughs while rolling her eyes.
Hannah trails Elise and Chelsea out of the bedroom to find Sawyer, who is sitting at his desk glancing through his mail. He looks up, his eyes fix on her. His face is void of any emotion, the mail in his hand forgotten. His dark, brown eyes look her up and down, assessing every detail from Hannah’s hair to her heels. Her face turns crimson under his inspection. Elise breaks the silence, “Well, what do you think? Stunning, right?”
Sawyer coughs, “Yeah, you look great babe. Call me if you need me.” With that, he stands and walks away. Hannah is left awkwardly with the girls, feeling out of sorts. She wonders why he acted that way. Elise and Chelsea look at each other and shrug their shoulders.
“Okay, well come on. Shelley is waiting for us,” Chelsea declares. Hannah grabs her small handbag and notices a twenty-dollar bill hanging out of it. Sawyer must have slipped her the bill. Now she’s just confused. How can he act like he doesn’t care, while encouraging her to go at the same time? She tries to not let Sawyer’s attitude worry her tonight. It’s her first time out with friends, and she doesn’t want anything to ruin it.
The trio leave the apartment and walk down the driveway to Chelsea’s red, two door sedan. “Where are we going?” Hannah questions. Chelsea answers that they are going to meet up where Shelley’s boyfriend Dave works. The girls drive for a few minutes listening to the radio then arrive at Aces Wild, a popular pool hall. The building looks ancient, with disintegrating bricks along the outer walls. There is a line of people waiting to go in and a burly man outside the door. Hannah begins to walk over to get in line when Elise calls for her.
“Where are you going? We don’t wait in line, honey. We are VIPs here,” beckoning for Hannah to follow them. The man at the door nods his head at them, then opens it. The music tumbles out of the door as well as cigarette smoke. Hannah gasps, looking around at the large crowd. There is a vast room to the left that houses several pool tables. To the right, there is an extensive bar area where the rest of the crowd is.
“Come on, I see Shelley over there,” Chelsea hollers over the noise to the girls. Hannah looks to where Chelsea is pointing and sees purple hair bobbing up and down. They maneuver through the crowd to her and Shelley grabs Hannah in a tight embrace.
“Girl, you look great! I knew that dress was legit, what did I tell ya? You are turning a lot of heads in here,” she says as she turns her head toward a group of guys that look to be around Hannah’s age.
“No, they can’t be looking at me. They must be looking at somebody else,” Hannah tells her bashfully. “Hey doesn’t your boyfriend work here?”
“Oh yes! You haven’t met him yet. Come with me.” Hannah follows her to the bar, as Shelley begins yelling loudly at the man behind the counter.
“Dave. Dave Peterson get your cute self over here now!” The man turns toward her and begins to walk over swiftly.
“Yeah babe, what do you need? We are getting slammed tonight.” He looks over at Hannah and realization hits. “Oh, are you Sawyer’s girl, Hannah? I’ve heard good things. I really would like to talk, maybe we could another time though,” he says to her as he hurries back to the other side of the bar.
Hannah turns to look at Shelley, who is slyly grinning at her. “He’s handsome Shelley, but what is this Sawyer’s girl stuff? You know we are just friends.” She shrugs her shoulders then says, “for now,” and laughs. “Do you want a drink?” Elise asks as she turns toward the bar.
“I’ll have water, thanks.” She gives Hannah a puzzling look, “Hannah, I mean do you want a beer or something?”
“I don’t believe in drinking alcohol. I’ll just take a water please.” She nods her head without questioning further and walks to the bar with Shelley and Chelsea to place their order. Hannah is left standing beside one of the pool tables being used, where she is amazed at what some of these people are wearing. Suddenly, someone grabs her from behind.
“Hey, gorgeous. What are you doing here? Looking for me, perhaps?” a man whispers in her ear.
She is paralyzed with fear. The girls don’t realize what’s going on and it’s far too loud in here for them to hear her. Hannah slowly turns her head to see Beau smirking at her.
“Beau, please don’t do that to me. I don’t like being grabbed or snuck up on,” she furiously tells him.
“Now sugar pie, you know I didn’t mean anything by it. Did Sawyer finally let you out to have some fun? I think he is trying to keep you all to himself. I guess he wasn’t taught to share,” he says as he strokes her arm, leaning in closer to her face. She’s backed up to a wall, he has her caged in with his arms. He reaches over to the table beside them and grabs an orange drink.
“I ordered this for you baby. I noticed that you didn’t have anything to drink. Here try this,” he tells her as he hands her the drink. Hannah eyes it suspiciously. He grins at Hannah, which repulses her.
“Baby, it’s just orange juice. You can trust me, Sawyer does,” he croons in her ear. Hannah tentatively takes a drink. It’s much stronger than the orange juice that she’s used to and rather bitter. She chokes on it and hands it backs to him.
“Thanks anyways for the drink Beau. I think I’m going to stick with water. I need to find the girls,” she tells him as she turns to walk away.
He grabs her arm, pulling her back to him. Hannah is now struggling against him. “Sugar pie, don’t fight this. I know you can’t resist me forever. No one has to know. No one needs to know about us. It can be our little secret, doesn’t that sound like fun?” he breathes in her ear.
Hannah begins to fight him off as he begins to forcibly lead her toward the door. She pleads with him to let her go, that she won’t tell anyone if he will just stop. She is in tears as he grows angrier and rougher with her. He then turns around, frustrated with the trouble she is causing him and slaps her hard across the face with the back of his open hand. From out of nowhere, Beau gets slammed into the wall and releases his hold of her causing her to fall to the floor. Hannah scampers over to Shelley who is rushing to her. Chelsea and Elise are right behind her, as is Dave. Shelley helps her up from the floor as the others form a wall around her.
“Hannah, Hannah look at me. Are you okay? Did he hurt you? Did he make you drink anything?” they all ask her at once.
The room begins to spin and the last thing she remembers is Sawyer’s concerned face looking at her.
***
SAWYER IS PACING BACK and for in his living room. He is sure that he has made a rut in the carpet by now. How could I have let her go anywhere without me? What if something happens, will the girls be able to protect her? He pulls at his hair and curses. His phone begins to vibrate in his pocket. He pulls it out to see it is Shelley calling, which makes him anxious.
“Shelley, what’s wrong?”
“Sawyer, come to the pool hall now. Beau is here and he has Hannah pinned. I can’t get to Dave to help us since this place is so—“ Sawyer doesn’t allow her to finish the sentence before he hangs up as he rushes out the door. He jumps into his truck and peels out of the driveway. He is driving like a mad man through the streets to the pool hall. He is so worried that something has happened to her. Sawyer knows what kind of guy Beau is, and he knows what he has the potential to do. Sawyer should have known that Beau would show up where she was. Once Beau grasped that Sawyer was serious about him staying away from Hannah, it became a challenge. A game that Beau planned to win at all costs.
When Sawyer reaches the pool hall, he parks on the sidewalk, not caring about rules at this point. The bouncer sees him and lets him in. Sawyer scans the entire room for Hannah. His eyes land on Beau trying to drag her out on the opposite side of the room to where he is at. Hannah was fighting, kicking, and hitting him the whole way. Sawyer runs between the pool tables, crashing into everyone playing but not even noticing. After what feels like an eternity, he reaches them just as Beau slaps Hannah across the face. Sawyer sees red and forcefully heaves Beau off her, throwing him against the wall.
Sawyer is so infuriated that he forgets about Hannah and lunges onto Beau. The blonde is caught by surprise and doesn’t have time to defend himself. Sawyer rears his fist back and makes a connection with Beau’s face, repeatedly. They both fall over, Sawyer is now straddling Beau while continuing to issue blow after blow. Beau’s face is a bloody mess, both eyes swollen shut and he has missing teeth. Sawyer notices that the man beneath him has stopped trying to fight back. Sawyer halts his punches when he realizes that he has knocked him out. Quickly, Dave pulls Sawyer off Beau. Sawyer stands to stare at the body on the floor, assessing the damage he has caused him. Sawyer is panting from the exertion and trembling from the adrenaline.
It finally dawns on Sawyer to check on Hannah. He looks over to Shelley, Chelsea, and Elise and sees that they are surrounding Hannah as she lies on the floor. He begins to panic at the sight and rushes over to her.
“Is she ok? What did he do to her?” He asks hysterically.
Shelley answers, “He forced her to drink something, she took a sip, tried to get away from him and then he started—“. She stops, trying to not cry.
“How could you have let this happen? I trusted you guys and look what happened. I should have been here, better yet, I shouldn’t have let her come in the first place,” Sawyer says bitterly.
Dave steps in trying to comfort Shelley. He looks over at Sawyer, “Sawyer, it’s no one’s fault but Beau’s. As soon as Shelley saw him, she called you. She and the girls tried to get help, but the place is too crowded and they couldn’t get through.”
Sawyer looks at him, then back over to Shelley. “I’m sorry, Shelley. I know it’s not anyone’s fault but his,” he says as he looks disdainfully at Beau.
Hannah starts to stir and Sawyer rushes to her side, pushing past Chelsea and Elise. Her eyes flutter open, trying to focus. “Hey, you’re okay now. I’m here. He won’t touch you again. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here to protect you.”
“Sawyer, you’re here now, that’s all that matters. Can we leave now? My head really hurts.”
He laughs, shakes his head, and gently lifts her off the floor. He carries her bridal style out to his truck. The girls are next to him, desperately apologizing to Hannah and clearing up what happened. She quiets them down by saying that she will be okay and still wants to do stuff with them, but just not at the pool hall ever again.
Sawyer softly places her in the truck then buckles her in. When they are on the road she looks at him and then at his hands. “Sawyer, your hands! You’re hurt!”
He looks down at his hands on the steering wheel, seeing that they are bloody, but not with his blood. “Babe, I’m okay, it’s not my blood. Beau’s face had several run ins with my fist,” he tells her, satisfied with himself.
“My mom told me that violence is never the answer, but I’m glad you knocked him out,” she says sheepishly. He laughs as she joins in. They head back to the apartment where they promptly fall asleep, ready to put the day behind them.
***
THE NEXT MORNING, THEY wake up relatively early. Since Hannah still has a headache from the previous night, Sawyer suggests that they go out for breakfast. They walk to the little cafe across the street from his apartment. After entering and being seated, Sawyer leaves Hannah for a moment to wash his hands. When he returns, he finds her pouring over the menu.
“You can order anything you want. What sounds good to you?” he questions.
“Everything looks good, what are you going to order?”
“I always get the same thing here. Pancakes, bacon, and coffee. Can’t go wrong with that,” he tells her smiling.
“That sounds good, I’ll have the same.”
A new waitress comes over, one that Sawyer has never seen there before.
“What can I get for you? Me perhaps?” she giggles. Sawyer looks at her for a moment, realizing that she is attempting to flirt with him. He looks over at Hannah. She looks stunned, then dejected.
“I’ll have pancakes, bacon, and coffee, and so will my very lovely date,” he says to the waitress as he gazes across the table then grabs Hannah’s hand. The waitress looks over at Hannah and her smile disappears. Hannah innocently grins back at her.
“Yeah, well, I’ll have that out in a little while,” she retorts before she huffs off.
Hannah is still watching the waitress, then she turns to Sawyer. “Can you believe she said that to you? She is very brave, and kind of dumb. What if you were really on a date or something. That’s so rude!” she tells him, exasperated.
He laughs, “I can’t believe that she thinks she has a chance, I mean look at the beauty seated in front of me. Like I would ditch you for her!” he scoffs.
Hannah looks down and realizes that they were still holding hands. She hurriedly releases his then folds her hands in her lap while blushing fiercely. She looks so pretty when she does that. Wait, what am I thinking? Sawyer thinks as the waitress returns with their drinks.
The food finally arrives and the perturbed waitress slams both of their plates down in front of them. When she leaves, they burst out into laughter.
He finds himself gazing at Hannah throughout most of the meal. They talk and laugh like they have known each other for years. She tells him that she thinks she may have an addiction to the cooking channel, he tells her that he may have an addiction to her cooking. This revelation delights her, he enjoys the smile he gets from her. Sawyer also discovers that she enjoys singing, but has never sung in front of anyone. She only sings when he is gone to the parlor during the day. Sawyer mentions that he also enjoys singing, and has a guitar he can crudely play. He jokingly suggests that they can form their own band, to which she laughs.
“Maybe. Maybe in your dreams!” she tells Sawyer, which surprises him. Hannah is finally comfortable enough to joke around with him. Since she is in a joking mood, he decides to spread his wings and teach her the cleanest jokes he can think of. Knock knock jokes.
Sawyer starts, “Knock, Knock.”
“Oh, um, who’s there?” she giggles.
“Nunya,” he tells her as seriously as he can.
She looks puzzled, “Nunya who?”
Sawyer leans forward while glancing right and left as if he’s about to tell her something of the upmost importance. She leans toward him, waiting for his answer. “Nunya business,” he whispers as he leans back, waiting for her response.
She starts laughing while holding her stomach. It was a petty joke, but she loved it. The sound of her laughter is literally like music to his ears. The smile on her face is always on his mind and the way she blushes makes his stomach feel funny. Just the thought of her makes his heart beat faster. Oh, no, I think I may have feelings starting for her, but I am going to ignore them, for now. Besides, I have something to take my mind off my feelings for Hannah. I have to deal with Beau today. Sawyer thinks to himself as he finishes his breakfast while sitting across from the beauty that is quietly stealing his heart.
***
HE SITS YET AGAIN IN the café across from Lucifer’s apartment this morning, like all the other mornings since he has found her. He is sickened that the beast allowed his mistress to be paraded by his vile fallen angels in that heinous place the night before. She was dressed most sinfully. Wearing red? How dare she wear something so immodest! Just because the dress she had on didn’t show any of her unmentionables, the color itself was most inappropriate. Red? The color of sin, the color of the beast, of Lucifer. How could she agree to such a thing? Of course, how could he think otherwise? Lucifer made her wear it, then he didn’t even protect her from the repugnant humans that were in that place. His mistress wouldn’t willfully do such disgusting things. She was pure and good, it was the beast that was to blame.
He had watched as several men undressed her with their eyes. He knew they were thinking repulsive thoughts about his mistress. That alone almost drove him mad. Then when he couldn’t stand it any longer, another vile beast tried to violate her. Violate her right in front of him, on purpose. That blonde beast must be working with Lucifer. I wish I could have seen his face, I would take care of him for good. Lucifer is now having his secondary demons begin to try to destroy her also.
Savior Paul warned the sect about such situations. He taught them that Lucifer would send many demons to make sure that their god’s plan didn’t succeed. Savior Paul told the sect that they must do everything and anything they could to protect the plan. He knows he must now destroy all of the secondary demons that are coming after his mistress as well. This complicates his mission greatly.
As he is drinking his coffee, the door chimes and he turns his head toward the sound. There, right in front of him is his mistress with the beast. If only he was prepared for this moment. He could finally free her from his grasp. He carefully pulls his paper in front of his face to shield himself. They were seated a few tables behind him, and his mistress’s back was toward him. He has gone unnoticed by her and the beast. He feels very fortunate when he realizes that he can overhear their conversation easily from where he is sitting.
It drives him crazy with rage to hear the beast make her laugh. How can she sit there, across from him and entertain him? She is falling into his trap further. Not his precious mistress. It even appears that she may have feelings for Lucifer. How could he cleanse her completely if she loves the beast?
He continues to stay where he is without drawing attention to himself. Whenever the waitress walks over to offer a refill he quickly waves her off. He is too busy listening to the beast converse with his mistress. He learns that the beast is trying to buy her affections. That is how he is controlling her, with money. Did I not teach her anything? Money is the root of all evil, of course, Lucifer would use that on her. How could she fall for his tricks?
He is thoroughly disgusted by her blatantly disgraceful behavior. How can his mistress act so wantonly? Her laughter is making him ill, and obviously, those around her too. He takes note of how the waitress has been acting since Hannah arrived. Her mood went from cheerful to angry. This is the effect Lucifer has on people. He takes the light away and replaces it with darkness. This is why he must capture Hannah quickly. Just think of how greatly his god will reward him if he successfully carries out his god’s plan for salvation and also eradicates the world of Lucifer and his demons! He will surely be elevated to sit at his god’s right hand for eternity with his mistress by his side.
He smiles to himself as he ponders over what his reward will be. He soon forgets about the happy, young couple behind him. His head is full of the adoration and worship he will receive from the world, once he is declared Master of Salvation.