Garrison and Adrienne (Backdated to May 16)

[x-adrienne.livejournal.com]

Garrison gets Adrienne to slow down enough for dinner and she tries to play a prank on him.

Some cities had greasy spoons. Others had chip wagons or all night diners. But in New York, if you were drinking into the evening and were beset with a craving, it was the pizza place to angled for. Specifically, one tucked away in the back of a bakery down on 22nd, close to Adrienne's apartment. For one in the morning, it was busy, packed with a mix of college kids and professionals having a night out.

"So hows the business?" Kane said, around a mouthful of the deluxe slice he'd ordered.

Adrienne looked up from the sheaf of papers she'd brought along with her from the office. "Huh?" She blinked a couple times to catch up to the conversation. "Oh. Great! 'Just making some amendments to this contract with a certain international ladies magazine to provide their models for the next three months." Feeling guilty, she put the papers back into her briefcase to give him her full attention. "How are things in the crime-fighting business?"

"Quiet. SHIELD's taken up most of the available oxygen regarding mutant related issues, with the help of local law enforcement. We're working on not being bypassed but... every local cop who needs to call in an incident thinks he's got a shot at Captain America showing up personally to conduct the investigation." His eyes found the clock. "And you should not be putting in eighteen hour days all the time, babe."

Shrugging, Adrienne snagged a slice of cheese pizza off a plate. "Gotta put in the work if you wanna stay on the top of the food chain," she philosophized. "Coming to this... universe, plane, whatever you want to call it," she explained quietly, "has made me realize how much I'd been slacking off. The...version of me from this timeline has accomplished far more than the... old me. I've got to put in the time to maintain it all, or I'm going to lose everything... again."

"Hey, you're not going to lose everything. Especially if I have something to say about it." Garrison was oddly protective of Adrienne's career. Just because he saw close up how much time and effort she poured into it, and how important it was for her to show her ability to be valued. "But even super-hot executives get the odd night off."

"And there's no one I'd rather spend an odd night with than you," she teased. With mischievousness still in her eyes she continued. "I'm glad you're speaking to me again. Does that mean you're over your blaming me for the Sox getting Price?"

"Not even close. I plan to make you pay for Price with a series of tearaway outfits."

"Oh yeah?" Adrienne asked playfully, eyebrow raised. "Are they going to be anything like the ones I'm going to make you wear when I beat your cute ass in fantasy this year?"

"Last year was a fluke. You got lucky. This year, there will be... a reckoning." He said ominously before chomping off a bite of pizza. "Besides, Sox will be out of it by August."

"Pfft. You wish." Adrienne poked him in the arm with a finger playfully. It felt good to put business out of her mind and focus on baseball for a while. "We have Price. We have Rodriguez. Not to mention at least six guys pitching in triple A who could be starters on any major league team. And our relief crew runs circles around yours. Sure your bats are better, but anyone can score runs off bad pitching, and it's a lot harder to score runs off good pitching."

"Really? Is this about scoring?" Kane grinned and set down his slice. "So, what is the barter? Oral sex every time my team hits a home run off your bullpen?"

"Sure," she agreed gamely. "But what about me? Do I get oral sex every time we turn a double play on the first five in your batting order?"

"That sounds fair... even if you only get to enjoy it a couple of times." He teased. "And, as much as I hate to leave the baseball and sex talk, you still planning on taking a step back from the agency? You mentioned you had something in the works."

Eyes brightening, Adrienne nodded as she swallowed another bite of pizza. "Oh! Yeah. It's running pretty smoothly now. Worthington's really stepped up, leadership-wise, which has been a pretty pleasant surprise. So I think I could probably take a step back and buy a baseball team." She was joking, but she wanted to see if she could string him along at all and make him think it was true.

"You're rich, babe, but you're not that rich. Unless you were targeting A ball somewhere, and I can't see you doing that. Seriously though, plans for the new spare time?"

"Oh, come on, I'm richer than A ball. Double A," she told him matter-of-factly. "I bought the Portland Sea Dogs. I'm going to buy property in Oregon, start being bi-coastal." Except the Sea Dogs were in Portland, Maine, not Oregon. But Garrison was Canadian, so she wasn't sure he'd know that. The attempt at stringing continued.

Kane looked puzzled. "I thought they were the Hops now... why would you buy a short-A team for the Diamondbacks... oh shit. Hon, I think you might have gotten scammed. The Sea Dogs are in... Maine? Yeah, they've got the Maine Monster in their park, I think. Who negotiated the deal? We can still get your money back." Kane dug out his phone, ready to call the Bureau's fraud division.

"Oh man." Adrienne tried to look as concerned as possible. "The broker's name was James Collins." She picked the name of the first Boston Red Sox player inducted in the Baseball Hall of Fame. "You really think you can get the money back? I mean, I know you can," she amended quickly, "because you're the best cop, but it was a lot of money."

"Someone scammed you in my town? Fucking right I can." Kane turned back to his phone. "Kasey, I'm glad you're on. I've got word of a broker running a baseball team scheme. Ah, yeah, using Collins. James Collins." He put his hand over the receiver. "Do you have any of the paperwork? Or a phone number?"

"Not on me," Adrienne answered apologetically. She wondered if she was about to get a very large sum of someone named James Collins' money. That would be awesome. She also wondered how long Garrison was going to keep buying this. She hadn't enjoyed herself this much in weeks. "I stopped keeping business emails and numbers on this phone. Because... the screen's too small for me to read." Okay, she had to commit to this whole thing. It was worth a little self-deprecation.

"You can't..." Kane paused. She'd never mentioned trouble reading her phone with her glasses before. He was sure he'd recently seen her use it without issue recently. "Hey Kasey, can I call you back." Staring at Adrienne, he opened up his search engine and plugged in the name and the key word 'baseball'.

"You bitch."

Adrienne cackled gleefully around a piece of pizza. "I'm sorry! I am a bitch. But it was too good to pass up. You are the sweetest, though," she assured him in a simpering tone. "I'm so touched you jumped to my defense soooo fast. Really, you're the best boyfriend a bitch could have!"

"You are the worst. I'm going to have to shout Kasey a dozen doughnuts for that." Kane said, chuckling as he shook his head. "So this is your new hobby? Making me insane?"

"You know it," she answered smugly. "Besides, you seem to like the fact that I always feel guilty afterwards and make it up to you at home," she pointed out with a waggle of her eyebrows.

"Point. But some day, you're not going to be able to make it up to me by getting naked. I mean, some day isn't today, of course, but some day."