Hunted

She slapped his hand off of her shoulder, standing up to face him, ignoring the slight tears on her face. She knew he was trying to be nice. She saw the slight bruise on his knuckles, and so she forced herself to be civil.

"Armand. In the time that you have met me, you have witnessed a great deal of emotion. But that does not mean you know me. You are not my friend. I don't want your comfort." she said dully. Her eyes looked directly into his. She drew a shaking breath.

"I don't feel safe without you in the room, but I would appreciate it if you pretended that I was fine." she sniffed again. And then she brushed by him. She sat on her bed then, and covered her face with her pillow, crying silently, and without any movement.

She realized that part of her tears were because of the kindness that he gave her. She was so mean to him, but he was nice. He took care of her. And that scared her. Sure, her brother was nice to her, sweet, but he was related to her by blood. They grew up together. She sniffed again, forcing herself to stay still.

She pretended not to notice that he was sitting on her bed, since he was obviously in pain, and instead focused on the movie. As the movie progressed, her breathing slowed to a calm rate, 3/4 of the way through the movie, she drifted off to sleep, slumping into a deep slumber with her head on his shoulder.

When her head connected, she made a soft sound, and shifted slightly so that his shoulder made a better pillow.

A dull thud on the door jerked Frankie into awareness. That awareness was followed closely by the realization that Armand was very close to her, and that she was leaning against him. Which completely freaked her out.

She scrambled out from her position, and in the process managed to dump Armand rather unceremoniously onto the floor. She was speachless. She tried to say something a few times, and then turned towards the door to hide the tinge of pink that had risen in her cheeks.

All thoughts of embarrassment vanished from her face, however, when she saw who was at the door. A wide, almost childish grin came onto her face as she threw open the door. "You freaking scared the living daylights out of me!" she hollered at him, the grin on her face making it obvious that she was teasing him.

Freddie grinned back. "Sorry Cesca! I-" he paused, cocking his head for a minute. "You got shot." he stated in a low voice, surprised slightly, at how much the shoulder wound disrupted the flow of her electricity. Or was that something else? He grinned again, and scooped his younger sister into a gentle hug, the two short Ramirez siblings happy to see eachother.

Freddie released her from the gentle hug and glanced around the room. He started to make a comment about her living well, when he noticed a random person sitting in a chair, with a gun. He looked at Frankie, and when she didn't immediately offer an explaination, he raised an eyebrow. "Body guard?" he asked simply, and covered a grin when her face flushed slightly pink. (Considering that he's an actor, he's very good at covering grins and such)

Frankie nodded, trying to ignore the heat in her own cheeks. "Yeah." she replied simply, suddenly uncomfortable, since it was a reminder of how she'd just spent the night. She turned to Armand, and tried to pretend she was fine. "Armand, this is my big brother Freddie. He's not involved with Benito at all. He got disowned at 14 for not wanting to be in the Business." she said rather susinctly, her attitude far from the emotional one that Armand had witnessed the night before.

Freddie dipped his head in acknowledgement to Armand. "Cheers. Glad to know the saftey of my Cesca's in capable hands." he said seriously, flashing a Freddie grin at his sister's bodyguard.

And then that simple comment started the sibling banter. "Freddie. I don't call you Rick. Why must you call me Cesca?" she asked, and the look of cheer on Freddie's face said that they did this conversation a lot.

"Why, it's a pretty nickname for a pretty girl. It'd be a far better stage name than Frankie." he said cheerfully, taking Frankie by her good hand and spinning her expertly.

Frankie thumped him playfully on the arm. "But I don't want a stage name." she pulled her hand out of Freddie's and gave him a mock glare. And then it dawned on her that Armand was watching all this. She blushed again and pushed past Freddie into the bathroom, saying, "I need a shower," over her shoulder.

Freddie didn't need to ask. He knew his sister was having trouble dealing with having a man living in close proximity with her. Instead, he crossed over to the bed and sat down, removing his bright blue coat. "So. Armand, huh?" he asked conversationally, discarding the coat on a chair on the other side of Frankie's bed. He tried to ignore the fact that even with the height difference of the bed, Armand was still an inch taller than him.

Freddie grinned at Armand. Inwardly he thought this fellow was slightly socially awkward, and felt sorry that he had to be forced to put up with Frankie. But he didn't look it. At all. "Yup. Good observing, though I'm sure somebody with my level of weirdness couldn't really do anything else." He ran a hand through his hair to keep it out of his eyes before continuing, "But yeah, I did Broadway until the heat from the mob got too bad. So now I'm out of a job, Singer, Dancer, Actor." he shrugged.

"So you look like you know a lot about the military. I'm gonna venture a guess that you've been doing it for most of your life?" he asked, the Brooklyn accent playing up his dramatic pizzazz for speach even more.

After Frankie had had a shower, she left the water running so that it sounded like she was still washing, and dried off, got dressed, etc. And then she just stared at herself in the mirror. She was bored. She was going to have to convince Armand to take her out somewhere rather than keep her cooped up for much longer. She didn't know how much longer she could handle being in close quarters with him for a long period of time.