Stunned, JC allowed himself to be pulled as Kate kicked the lower part of the door then hit it just under the drivers door window before jiggling the handle exactly twice then yanking it open.  She ducked in and rummaged around in the console as JC stared at the mess in the car. 

He never noticed that she pulled out a pair of scissors and cut open the restraints that held them together.  “Well JC, it’s been…interesting.  Hopefully, we will never cross paths again.”  Kate got in the drivers seat, unrolled the window, pumped the gas pedal, and turned the key.  The car clicked once then she repeated the maneuver. 

JC realized that she was going to leave and he still knew next to nothing about her.  This living out of her car…this he could fix.  So he dove in the open window, pressing her back against the head rest and twisted the key, pulling it out and pocketing it quickly.   

“Kate – there is no way I can let you leave like this.  Are you really living in your car?”  He shouted on a tangent.  Footsteps behind him made him pause and decide to take this conversation elsewhere.  “Come on, grab some clothes and we are going upstairs.”

Kate grabbed a backpack out of the pile before JC pulled her back.  He slammed the door lock and shut the door before placing his hand under her elbow and practically running to the elevator. 

In silence, they rose to the floor where JC’s room was.  Immediately upon the opening of the doors, Tom leapt toward them.  “Where have you been, JC?  We’ve been looking everywhere.  We need to leave for an interview in five minutes.”

JC simply held up a hand and kept tugging Kate down the hall.  “Cancel it; right now I’m not even sure there will be a show tonight.  But I can’t deal with that right now.”  As he was digging his room key out of his pocket, he touched Kate’s car key.  Slightly twisting as he walked he tossed the car key to Tom.  “Can you get someone to empty the car and put the clothes and stuff in some suitcases and then find a safe place,” he said wryly, “for the car.”

“What?”  Kate shrieked.  “No, you can’t do that!”  JC opened the door with a quick turn of his wrist and lightly pushed Kate in, letting the door slam behind him.

Not expecting the shove, Kate stumbled before she caught her balance with the doorframe of the bathroom.  Her first thought was to grab the phone and call for help.  She didn’t want to be locked up with JC any longer.  Who knew what he had in mind for her?

JC thought of the phone the same instant she sprang into motion and raced to place his hand on top of hers.  He gentled his touch when she flinched away from him.  “Kate – let me – let me help you…please?”

Her hands came up to hide her face as loud sobs broke free from her throat.  He gently enfolded her into his arms, eventually maneuvering her so that she was cradled on his lap in the nearby chair.  “I’m sorry, Kate, I’m going to do everything in my power to help you and trust me you will never have to live in your car again,” he whispered into the soft hair at her temple. 

JC wasn’t sure how much time had passed; he had ignored the several insistent knocks at the door.  Kate finally calmed down enough and moved from his arms to grab her backpack off the bed where she had placed it and had been in the bathroom with the shower running for twenty minutes. 

He paced the small room until he was sure his footprints would forever be imprinted in the cheap hotel carpet.  He had come to a decision while holding Kate – he wasn’t leaving this room until Kate talked to him. 

Without warning, the bathroom door opened; he hadn’t even noticed the shower turn off. 

“Kate – ” 

“JC – ”

He motioned for Kate to go ahead.  Her hair was wrapped in a towel and the clothes she now had on were wrinkled, but they appeared to be clean. 

Kate took a deep breath as she prepared to speak.  “JC, if I tell you what you want to know, you have to give me your word that you will let me go and forget all about me.”

He was so distracted by the way she removed the towel from her hair and shook her head to let the hair fall around her face that it took him a moment to process her words.  “Kate, I don’t make promises that I can’t keep, but I will however give you my word right here that I will never forget you.”

Kate was taken aback at his words, his serious tone, and the genuine look in his eyes that she didn’t realize that he hadn’t given his word to let her go.  She became to comb her fingers through her wet hair and JC grimaced at the tangles.  He grabbed his own brush from the open suitcase on the table behind him and with a hand on Kate’s back, he led her over to the chair and footstool. 

Sitting in the chair, he patted the footstool and she cautiously sat down in front of him.  JC was thinking that if she wasn’t facing him, perhaps she would be more open and he hadn’t met a woman yet that didn’t like to have her hair brushed. 

“I don’t know where to start.”

He lifted the brush and tenderly began working through the tangles as she gathered her thoughts.  “Start at the poem you wrote.”

Her shoulders rose with the deep breath that she took.  “The poem, okay…”