24 YOU SEEM TO BE UNBLOCKABLE! (1)

Next couple of days did not bring any extraordinary events; Mary continued her routine of running, working and cooking. She did not leave the house alone anymore and blocked a couple more numbers from which Jim tried to reach out for her.

Saying that she disappeared from his radar would be most correct, she was offline for him, unreachable.

From the news of Gabriella she found out that her parents decided that their company reputation was worth more than the educational value of Gabriella's fraud scheme being known to public. How it influenced their relationship was not clear though. Also Mary wondered whether Daniel's mother was now as fond of Gabriella Wilson as she used to be before the incident.

The weekend came too quick, Daniel was busy again, he had to attend several meetings on Saturday and then leave to his parents' house, so he would be absent till Sunday evening. He did not invite her to come with him and she was not eager, she still remembered his mother saying that she would do anything possible to cause their break up. Somehow Mary felt that as long as she managed to avoid meeting this woman she could be more or less safe from her judgy vibes.

On Saturday morning she waited until Daniel would leave and then went out for a run. She felt that her weekend would be most boring and it spoiled her mood a little. She was running in the front and Marcus was following behind her as usual.

Mary was deep in thought trying to imagine what kind of activity could make her day any better without violating her not-leaving-the house-alone treaty with Daniel when she unexpectedly stumbled onto a man who was crouching right on her way, his back turned to her. She did not notice him and almost fell over him head first. He caught her in her flight and helped her steady herself. When she was standing steadily on her feet she raised her head to look at her savior and saw Jim's face right in front of her.

She pulled back trying to avoid any further contact and turned around to explain this coincidence to Marcus, but what she saw was not anything she expected to see: two men grabbed Marcus and were not letting him go. He started fighting them but they seemed even bulkier than he was and his struggles were almost useless.

"Let him go!" Mary shouted at Jim.

"I'm not holding him…" He said with a smile on his lips.

Mary gave him a look, "You, yes, you three, stop fighting! No one is getting hurt here."

"But Mr. Melrose…" Marcus tried to explain that Mr. Melrose asked him to never let Jim close to Mary. But Mary knew it too well even without his explanation.

"Mr. Melrose isn't here, is he? And we're outnumbered." She turned around and saw a couple more bodyguards standing close to them.

Marcus stopped fighting and two bulky-looking guys let go of him.

"Now, let's chat a little, shall we?" Jim said calmly and invited Mary to join him in a promenade. When Marcus tried to come closer to them two men by his side stopped him. Mary gave him a nod saying that it was alright and there was no need to come any closer.

"What are you doing here anyway?" She asked Jim matter-of-factly.

"Running of course, can't you see?" He pointed at his outfit; he was dressed in a sports suit and wore snikers just like Mary did. But he was not as sweaty as she was, it seemed that he put on these clothes just to mingle with other runners.

"You don't even live in this area."

"Have you been to my apartment while I was out?" He raised his eyebrows as if he discovered something unexpected.

Mary clucked her disapproval of this stupid joke. Of course she had nothing to do in his apartment no matter whether he was in or out of it.

"Alright, I came here to parley." He acquired a serious tone of voice.

"About what?!" Mary was losing her nerve already. Why couldn't he just leave her alone? Was it too much to ask?

"Unblock my number." He whispered to her.