Page 4 of Cassian
He said he’d get it done and decided to do it before he ate.There was no point in pissing off the police today; he had better things to do other than put up with their rules, too.Once he had the bed made as well as he knew how, he pulled his meal to him and opened the lids.He had to admit that the food here was good.Tonight he was having a hamburger with French fries and a large wedge of pie for dessert.He didn’t eat like this at his own home, much less at work, where he got a free meal every time he worked.
After eating, he laid down on his cot and thought about what he was going to do when he got out of here.He was going to have to suck up a little more, or he’d be taking the classes until he was an old man.He didn’t see himself as a fast food manager for long.He wanted to run his own district so that he could have more minions beneath him.Smiling to himself, he wondered if he could get thesame district as the one he was working in now.It would be a feather in his cap to have come up from the ranks and been the best district manager that there ever was.
That wasn’t something that he thought about too often.He had this anger management thing hanging over his head, and he wanted to make good on his promise to give it his best shot at getting out of the classes.He had plenty of things that he could work around, and one of them was to suck up to everyone that he could.There was no point in trying to be a good manager.He just wanted to be able to rule over the people who were beneath him.
~*~
Cassian didn’t know what to do with his free time.He’d been making sure that Raven was all right in getting around for the past three weeks, and she was doing so much better than before.Now he wanted to keep an eye on her, but she kept pushing him away.It was sort of hurtful to him how she didn’t seem to want him around.But he was in love with her, and he was going to try his best to make this work out.
She’d been beaten so badly about a month ago by her former boss.Raven had given her notice to the company, but her former boss wanted her to stay over, and she’d had plans.He didn’t know what her plans had been, but it didn’t matter; there was no reason for him to beat her up like he had.If not for his intervention, there is no telling how much worse it would have been for her.
“There’s a man at the door for you.”He watched as she limped her way out of his office and into the hall as she continued.“I don’t know who he is, but he said that it was important that he speak to you.”
“I’ll come to him.”He stood up and made his way around his desk to go to the front door when Raven turned and looked at him.“Is there something wrong?You know that I’d give you the world if I could.”
“Daniel Winters is going to anger management classes, and they let him keep his job.Why would anyone think that people would want to work for him after what he did to me?”He said that he’d been keeping an eye on him with a faerie and knew that he wasn’t doing so well in the classes.“I don’t doubt that.He’s a monster.”
When she went on her way towards the kitchen, he watched her.She really was getting around much better than before, and he was happy for her.Going to the front door, he opened it to find Ace standing on the steps with a huge smile on his face.
“You should have told her to let you in.Come on in and tell me how your job is going.Do you need my help on anything?”Ace Savage was his cousin from the same side of the family.He’d run for mayor a few months ago and had been voted in.The previous mayor, Morgan Trail, of all names, had been doing nothing in office, and Ace was getting so much done already.Even the sidewalks looked much better than they had before he’d taken office.“I was just in my office doing some trading on the stock market.Come in and tell me what you’ve been up to.”
“I came to ask you if there was maybe a way that you could help me find more money for the city.The football field is in good repair, but the housing that they use for the sale of food and drinks is in poor shape.I don’t know that it’ll go for another season.”They ended up at the desk in his office with Ace sitting across from him.“I don’t know what that would even be called, funding for the football vending.”
“We’ll try that first.”He put that in and had a few hits on it.“It says here that we can get funding for the building, but we’d have to show proof that it’s all it’s used for.I don’t think there will be a problem with that.I know they use it all seasons to keep the families that come there fed.”
“They want to expand, too.I’m not sure how much room there is to do that, but it would be nice if they didn’t have to put pans around when it rains.I guess it’s quite a flood even when it’s just a little bit of rain.”He brought up the specs on the grant and told Ace what he had to do.“Tank is the one who is going to be applying for the grant.He’s having so much fun finding money that I think that he’s having more fun than I am.And I can’t believe how much money is out there for small towns to use.A lot of things could have been finished and fixed had Morgan just looked on the internet for stuffto pay for it.”
He had a feeling that Ace was there for another reason and decided to wait him out.While the website was printing off the computer, he made small talk about how Raven was getting along.Ace seemed to be about half listening to him when he suddenly looked at him, concerned.
“Something has come to my attention.It’s not terrible, but it’s enough that I’m worried about the effects it’ll have on the area.Did you know that someone is buying up land around here?”He said that it was Tucker.Tucker had been buying up land for the last several years.“Do you think that he is going to do something with it that will cause trouble for the taxpayers?”
“He’s hoping that if he gets enough land purchased, he’ll be able to bring more businesses to town.I don’t know if you’re aware of this or not, but the big manufacturing business out on Route Sixty has finally filled up.He’s hoping that soon, he’ll have enough to get something else around in here.I heard, too, that the schools are coming along nicely.That’s his baby, too.”
“Kings said that I should ask Tucker, but he frightens me a bit.He’s such a big man, and he rarely smiles.I don’t think he likes me all that much.”He told Ace that he’s bored with his life outside of being with his little dragon, Kaida.“I heard that he called her that all the time.They’re a good couple.”
“They are.And I think he’d be hurt if he knew what you thought about him.He’s really a good guy and I love him.”He said that he’d go and talk to him when he was finished here.“You really should.He’s about the nicest person that I know, and other than my brother, someone that I depend on a great deal.”
“Good to know.I’ll work on getting to know him better.”Ace stood up.“I have a couple of meetings in the morning through lunch tomorrow.Why don’t you come by the office and help me figure out the mess that the other mayor left behind for me?He’s not one for filing something, is what I’ve come to realize.”
“I’d love to come out and help you.”The two of them hugged, and Ace left him to go back to his office.He had no doubt that they’d be breaking ground on a new shelter for the vending at the fields in no time.Ace was the perfect man for the job of mayor, and he loved that he’d been a part of him getting into office.He went to find Raven to tell her of his plans.
“Did you want to go and get dinner tonight with your grannie?I heard that she really likes pizza subs, and I know just the place to get them where they’re really good.”She said that she was trying to get around without the support of the cane.“I’ll be there for you.I can carry you, too, if you’d rather not walk all that far.”
“I don’t need you to carry me.I walk just fine by myself.I just tire quickly.I think that it’s because I’ve been down for so long.”She looked up at him.“Why are you so nice to me all the time?I’m trying my best to push you away, yet you do something like offering to carry me places, and I can’t stand that.You’re making it difficult for me to hold you at arm’s length.”
“I’m hoping that you no longer want to hold me away from you.That I might wear you down a bit more daily.”He wanted to kiss her, but had a feeling that she’d knock him out.She tended to be slightly violent when she was backed into a corner.“I’ve fallen in love with you, Raven, and would do anything in the world to make you happy with me and create an us.”
“I don’t know what to do if we were to become an us.”He told her that he understood that very well.It was a lot for her to take in.“See?You’re being nice to me again when I would have kicked my ass if I said anything like that to me.”He wasn’t quite sure if that was what she meant to say, but left it alone.
“Would you like to have dinner with me and your grannie?Right now, that’s all I’ll ask of you.”She turned away, but not before turning back, telling him that she’d love to have dinner with him and her grannie.“I think your grannie likes me.She sure is a wonderful person to have around, isn’t she?”
“I’ve always thought so.She took me in when my parents divorced.I had a choice to live with either one that I wanted, and I chose her.My parents were pissed off at me, so they didn’t visit when they had the time to do so.They were also mad that they had to pay her child support over the years, too.”He asked if she had anything to do with them now that she was older.“No.I haven’t seen eitherof them since I was ten.They’d messed up weekends on coming to get me.It was a court order that they visit me, and when they both showed up, it was a fight.After that, they just stopped coming around.I was fine by then.I figured out that I needed them less and less over the years than I needed my grannie.She’s been my lifeline all this time.”
“Another reason to love her.”He asked if she wanted to eat in the house or go out, and she said that if he drove her to the pizza place, she could walk in.“All right.I’ll make sure that everything is ready to go at about six.If you get too tired, please don’t hesitate to ask for help.I’m there for you.”
“I know you are.”She made her way down the hall again, and he was surprised to see a faerie following her.He knew that one of them was going to be her forever faerie, but he’d not heard that she’d found one.Choosing a faerie was a big deal to the little creatures, and they didn’t take their job lightly.
Kings and Skye had been chosen to be the king and queen of their kind.He’d not wanted the job any more than Skye did, and they went to the Lady Earth to tell her that they didn’t want the job.As one of the perks that they would get is a couple of pips—a group of faeries—to help around the house.When it got to be too many for them, they decided that all of them should have faeries in their homes to help out, too.It had been overwhelming at first, having so many of them needing to be put to work, but they soon found a job for one another, and he loved having them around to keep up with the daily chores around the house.The Lady Earth had decided that they could keep the faeries around so that they could help them when they needed.He loved that it had worked out so well.
