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Tweak says, "It's Football NOT Soccer!!!"

Hope O'Shea (hope_lingers) wrote in haunted_roads,
@ 2008-06-27 21:56:00

Entry tags:

hope, nox

Week Ten: Saturday
Who: Hope and Nox
When: Saturday Night
Where: The lobby of the King's Inn

Ever since being witness to a murder, Hope was having a very difficult time sleeping. When she closed her eyes, she heard screaming, she saw that.. that.. glove? The more she thought about it the less she thought that it was really a glove. It was like.. nails, or claws rather, and she couldn't get the image out of her head. She had remembered something, two things actually, though whether or not they were actually real or just figments of her overactive imagination, she couldn't be sure. But that was why she had asked the Detective to meet her. Maybe he would think she was crazy, but then again, maybe what she remembered now would help. Maybe it would be similar to someone, or something, that they were looking for.

Hope didn't think that 7pm was ever going to arrive. She had been ready and waiting since 5pm, dressed in a nice, retro-inspired, black dress that looked like something one would wear out rather than something they would wear for a formal meeting. She was supposed to have gone out, to dinner, with Ginger and her father, but they had canceled at the last minute and Hope had been too tired to bother searching through her wardrobe for something a little more casual to wear. She had spent the two hours of free time sitting on the edge of her bed instead, listening to her I-Pod, to music that helped relax her. She had very old-school taste in music. She enjoyed things like Argent and Crosby, Stills, and Nash. She was also a huge Eric Clapton fan. She adored the Moody Blues and Bob Seger. It helped. She felt far less stressed when the clock finally struck five minutes till seven.

Slipping shoes into feet and grabbing her purse and jacket in case they decided to leave the lobby, or in case she decided to go somewhere for dinner after their meeting, she glanced once into the mirror to make sure she looked okay. Skin was pale but cheeks were flushed. Her dark brown eyes seemed troubled, as they always did, her thick, brown hair framing her face with soft curls. Good enough. She took the elevator just because the stairwell scared her a little. It was almost exactly seven when she stepped off into the lobby, eyes scanning for a face that was familiar enough even if she'd seen him only once.

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in_his_shadow
2008-07-02 09:40 am UTC (link)

It had been a few days since Nox first met Hope, under very grizzly circumstances. That was how he met a great deal of people. Though, at least she was still alive. Many of the people he'd met over the years, didn't live long after introductions. If he had let it get to him, he'd probably be one of the most depressed people on the planet. As it was, Nox tried not to think about how horrible the world was, and instead tried to focus on what he could do to make it better. That meant catching killers and preventing them from murdering again. Nox was hopeful that Miss Smith had remembered something that might prove useful in the case in which she was involved.

Nox had come directly from work to meet Miss Smith, so he was still dressed in a casual suit. It had been perfectly pressed that morning when he'd slipped it on, now there were wrinkles behind the knees, at his lap, and in the elbows. In his job, he spent a great deal of time crouched down over evidence and bodies. It was a good thing he aged so slowly, otherwise he'd likely go home complaining of aches in his knees and back... the typical pains of a man in his 40's. But Nox was stronger and in better shape than any of the humans fresh out of the academy, and he'd stay that way for years to come. It was beneficial now, but it would force him to vanish several years from now.

He walked into the lobby of the hotel about one after seven and scanned the room, not just for Miss Smith, but to do a quick assessment of his surroundings. He was frighteningly observant, taking in all aspects of the world around him. It wasn't just a safety measure, but a nervous tick of sorts. Probably considered a personality flaw, but it had made him very good at his job.

He spotted his witness and offered a smile when her eyes caught his. Crossing the room, Nox pushed all his other cases into a lock box in his mind and focused solely on the one that concerned Miss Smith. "Good evening. Sorry I'm a minute late. There was a bit of traffic on the way." With the brief pleasantry and apology out of the way, he motioned to one of several sitting areas in the lobby, asking, "Would you care to speak here, or would you feel more comfortable somewhere else?"

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hope_lingers
2008-07-02 08:17 pm UTC (link)

Hope spotted him walk in before she had even finished completely scanning the lobby for his face. A smile formed upon her lips, in spite of the reasons that she had for being here, that he had for being here. It would be nice, even given present circumstances, to be around someone who was an adult. The only person she had really spoken to since being here was Ginger, a nice girl, but definitely not very grown up.

She shook her head. "It's fine. I understand." She was surprised that he was so prompt with the particular job that he had. She noticed the creases in his suit, the locations where they were, and she had to imagine that he had had a rough day. The lines were familiar enough. She too spent a lot of time crouched down when she worked, and very little of it off of her feet. She missed it. She felt absolutely lazy being here, doing nothing.

A glance was given in the direction where she had come from, towards the elevator that she had stepped off of. "We could go upstairs. It would be private but.. I'm not sure if that's against the rules or not." She was incredibly sincere as she said it, not wanting to cause him to violate any policies that he needed to adhere to for his job. She took her own rather seriously and would never want to jeopardize anyone else's career.

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in_his_shadow
2008-07-03 11:06 am UTC (link)

It was nice to see Miss Smith smiling. Nox hoped she'd be able to bounce back from her horrible experience, but that wasn't an easy task for most. She'd seen something terrible, and he wouldn't doubt if she'd been having nightmares since. It was likely made even harder knowing the man responsible was still on the loose. The best way he could help her was to continue to listen and then find the guy and lock him up.

Nox was rarely late for anything. It could be difficult to schedule meetings with his job, which was why he often gave people a rough estimate of when he'd arrive, and then let them know when he was actually on his way. It had worked well over the years, and he saw no reason to change his methods.

When she looked toward the elevator and asked him if they might speak in her room, he nodded, "Wherever you feel most comfortable. The station allows me to act at my own discretion." He might have even been given more leeway when it came to such things, because everyone knew Nox was an exceptionally honorable man. He would never dream of abusing the authority granted to him.

Walking in the direction from which she'd just come, Nox called for the elevator, then put his arm at the door to allow her to enter first. Once it had closed and they were headed upstairs, Hope having pressed the button for her floor, he addressed her again. "Have you been able to recall more information about the night of the attack?" It wasn't the most subtle way of starting a conversation, but he was here on business. She either knew something more, or she simply wanted to talk about her experience as a way of healing. Either way, he was willing to listen.

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hope_lingers
2008-07-03 06:57 pm UTC (link)

The case was on her mind, of course. And she wanted to do everything she could to help, but admittedly, the case was not the only reason she had asked him here. She had remembered things, a few things, or she thought she had, though whether or not she really had remembered anything at all pertinent, she couldn't be sure. But some of the things she wanted to discuss were rather personal, so certainly her room would be the most comfortable place to discuss it.

"Thank you." He was such a gentleman. It was nice for a change. She hadn't met many men of that breed, not even professionals. It seemed that most men just weren't bred with manners. The doors closed, and she was expecting it, the question. He was the type to get to the point of things, she knew already from the first meeting. "I think I have. Well, I know I have, part of it." There were some things that she thought might have just been in her head, part of the ongoing nightmare that she had been having ever since the murder had occurred.

The elevator doors opened onto her floor before she could get into any detail about it. She led the way out, down the hall a few doors. Swiping the key card, she entered first, leaving him to close the door behind. Her jacket and her purse were placed on the foot of the bed. There was a small table with two chairs in one corner of the room. "You can have a seat." She gestured towards it. "Would you like something to drink?"

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in_his_shadow
2008-07-22 09:08 pm UTC (link)

Nox was in work mode pretty much all the time. It was hard to get him out of it. Hesper and Hale saw the other side of him more often than most, saw the part of him that actually knew how to relax and laugh a little. He knew he could be a bit uptight, but Nox preferred to label it as being 'professional'. Nothing wrong with that.

Nothing wrong with manners either, and Nox had them in abundance. He was the ultimate gentleman. It had actually frustrated one woman he'd dated, and things didn't last long between them because of it. At work it could be equally frustrating to his associates, who felt he needed to embrace the 'bad cop' attitude once in a while to force a suspect into cooperating. Nox would only resort to something like that if lives were in danger.

Nox followed Miss Smith to her hotel room, and when he entered, he walked toward the sitting area she referenced. "Water would be wonderful, thank you." Nox unbuttoned his jacket as he sat down. "I've checked into a few leads in the case, but they've all been false so far. As soon as something more concrete presents itself, I'll let you know. Do you feel safe staying here?" He knew that some witnesses to crimes often felt as though the killer was just waiting to come after them next.

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hope_lingers
2008-07-22 09:47 pm UTC (link)

Hope nodded her head and moved over to the small fridge in her room to grab a bottle of water, getting a diet 7-up for herself. She walked over to the small sitting area and had a seat, sliding the bottle over to him once she was comfortably in her chair. "I appreciate that." The question caught her off guard though, and an eyebrow arched thinly over a dark brown eye. "Uhm.. safe enough?" She said, though she didn't sound entirely certain. "I've been having nightmares." She admitted as she took the lid off of her drink and had a sip of it.

Setting the drink down on the table, she folded her hands in front of her. "I just want to put out there in advance that.. some of what I'm going to say that I remember now might sound a bit.." She paused. "Crazy." She was almost certain he would laugh at her. "And clearly some of it may be a part of the nightmares more than a part of reality but.. Either way, I feel that it's all worth mentioning." With that said, she cleared her throat and prepared to make a further statement as to what she had witnessed.

"I don't think it was a glove. I believe it was his hand. How that's possible, I'm not really sure, but that's what I think." She eyed him for a moment before she continued. "And his departure, it was so quick. Too quick. And I remember that I could still hear him laughing and it sounded like he was right there, just in the shadows, but I didn't see him any longer at that point." That part wasn't all that crazy really, not like the first. "And now the only part that doesn't make me sound like a loon.." She laughed softly. "He took something from her jacket. A piece of paper or something. At least that's what it looked like."

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