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Eve is here. Physically, first and foremost, and that’s a surprise given how things have been going for her recently, Villanelle thinks. But mentally too.
That part is not surprising: find Eve— find Eve— has been the rhythm thump-thumping Villanelle’s heart along since she learned Eve’s name, stared at that photo and that face and that hair and that— Her.
The thought of Eve in her mind is usually subtle, in the background like a buzzing fly, but it’s stronger when she’s near her like some stupid homing beacon that—Villanelle reminds herself—she didn’t ask for.
She had proven she could move on, after all, and get rid of the image of Eve in her head. She had even married— uh. A woman, a beautiful one, a rich one.
(It’s funny, how Eve being here and so, so close, a door’s width away, makes Villanelle forget all of that.
Not funny in the haha way, of course. Funny in the “hide it away because it matters” way, in the “she was trained to not feel this way, and she can imagine Dasha’s scorn” way. The latter is what she’s used to, so it doesn’t even sting.)
It’s burning now, the thought of Eve, intense to the point of being heady since Eve is right here and she wants to be.
This is what they had planned: use the nighttime to prepare and, come morning, Eve would join her at the hotel. They’d pack lightly. Only the essentials.
And yet— when Villanelle opens the door, her lungs ache with surprise, and she brings a hand up to itch her temple unconsciously. She wills the feeling away: she knew Eve would come.
(She wouldn’t have been willing to walk away otherwise.)
Eve’s presence is so loud that it drowns out the pain a bit, or at least fades it around the edges, starts to fill something in her, but it scrapes on the way down too, reminding Villanelle of every person who didn’t make the choice to stay.
But Eve didn’t leave, and Villanelle knew she wouldn’t. That’s what makes Eve different, special. Worth it.
“Hi,” Villanelle says.
“Hi. Nice hotel.” A beat, and Eve chuckles: obviously.
“Isn’t it?”
It’s weird, the stillness. They have been moving, chasing for so long, and now—
Now Eve is looking at her, eyebrows raised, so Villanelle steps aside to let her in. The tiny knot of doubt that had been sitting right behind her stomach fades away. Good. Fear had always made Villanelle itchy.
Eve steps into the hotel room and walks straight over to the sofa, turning back to half-sit on the armrest as she sets her bag—that black purse she had nearly left on the bridge—on the carpet. Villanelle follows her, stopping with two shoes’ lengths between her toes and Eve’s. She’s still for a few seconds after, staring, and Eve stares back with that look that says I know you, and Villanelle believes it wholly.
She shifts on her feet, arm almost brushing the wall, and the motion—though small—seems to remind Eve where she is.
Eve stands back up from the sofa but doesn’t move a centimeter forward. Her face is nearer to Villanelle’s now, and they’re as close to even eyes as they get given their height difference, and it reminds Villanelle of the bus enough for her heart to skip a beat, and the next one pumps so hard it hurts.
Eve had caught her off-guard on the bus. And last night. And again this morning. She scratches her palm with her fingers, a loose fist. Eve has always been good at shocking her.
(That’s the crux of it all, isn’t it?)
Villanelle’s mind whirls, dancing from bus to the train station to that man’s—Paul’s?—house to Russia—should be home, but it isn’t—and she finds herself blurting, “I had plans to go to Cuba.”
Eve’s stoicism breaks, her brow furrowing. Villanelle didn’t mean to surprise her, but there’s a thrill in it anyway, like she’s one point closer to an even score. Only—
Eve waits for Villanelle to continue for a moment, and when she doesn’t willingly do so, she prompts her, monotone and slow. “Cuba.”
“With Konstantin. And Irina.”
Villanelle watches Eve swallow hard, clenching her jaw and raising her gaze in that way she does when she’s torn between saying what she wants to say and what she thinks she has to.
It’s Villanelle’s favorite face she’s ever seen, even though Eve used to always do the latter, win the battle. Watching that moment of indecision was worth it.
“You still can, if that’s what you want.”
Villanelle isn’t sure if this is Eve winning or losing, so it is her turn to briefly stop short. Eve steps one foot back, still not moving but shifting, as if taking the pause to mean yes.
“Why would I—?” Villanelle stops to tilt her head. Eve clearly took that the wrong way. “I don’t want to go to Cuba. That’s why I didn’t go with Konstantin.”
“Oh.” Eve looks unmoored.
(Why would Eve doubt her? She turned around. Turned after offering to separate in the first place, even—an action, Villanelle thinks, that was very kind.)
Villanelle steps forward and right into Eve’s space. Eve looks up.
“I was going to go to Cuba until I saw you again. So now I’m not going to do that, but I am going to suggest we find whatever stashes Konstantin left behind when he ran, because I know he had many, and we are going to need to think about running ourselves very soon. Is what I meant.”
Villanelle can see Eve’s brain processing, and she readies herself for any number of questions or demands for explanation. Instead, she gets: “Will you promise to talk to me? About whatever happened?”
And oh, so that’s what’s new. That’s what turning around got them: the right to ask, finally, the questions they have for each other.
(I want to know everything, Eve had said, lifetimes ago.)
“Yes.” Villanelle voices the word immediately. She’s not sure she’s telling the truth, but it fits, and it feels honest now, and she can figure the rest out later.
Eve eyes her, and this moment would feel like a decision if they both hadn’t already chosen each other time and time again. Because they have, it’s just silence.
“Where do we start looking?”
“I— There are several options,” Villanelle admits. Eve grins and sighs, the moment bittersweet: she is not at all surprised this won’t be easy. “There are a few good ones, though, where we should start. Including, I think, that office building.”
“Bitter Pill?”
“Yes. When I went looking for you there, I also went to see if Konstantin left anything, in particular anything about the Twelve, but your…” She hesitates. “—Friends… were there.”
“I still don't know why you went— Never mind. They’re nice people.”
Villanelle laughs, short and quiet but genuine, and Eve doesn’t even try to hide the way her gaze softens. “Sure, Eve.”
“I’m serious, and if you wanted to avoid them, you shouldn’t have gone in the middle of the day.”
“As I said, I was there for you, primarily.” Her tone is as playfully defensive as Eve’s prompt had been, and she expects Eve to continue in kind. After all, that is what they always did, isn’t it? One-up each other until they snap?
Yet Eve’s eyes shift, look toward the window. Her voice is quiet, nearly reverent, when she speaks. “Well, now you’ve got me.”
Villanelle shivers.
They walk into the Bitter Pill office at 8:16 AM— wait, no. 8:17 now. The elevator is slower than the train over had been.
It’s empty, like Eve had said it would be. “Your friends think that things worth investigating begin right at nine?”
Eve looks over just so Villanelle can see her roll her eyes. “They’re normal people. With lives.”
“That’s boring.”
Villanelle barely hears Eve’s answer. “I agree.”
Eve hasn’t made an effort to move much further than the entryway because she’s staring at Kenny’s desk, and it’s all real again, and Eve says, louder but cautious, “What are we doing?”
A loaded question.
Villanelle cops out. “We are… Looking for Konstantin’s documents. He has his money, and everything he will need to get to Cuba. But when he… came here…”
There’s no good way to phrase ‘when he came here to kill Kenny, your friend, remember?’ so she doesn’t try. And she doesn’t have to, because Eve nods, acknowledging the obviousness of Villanelle's answer, and says, “This would have been a good place to leave other things. It’s not connected to him, but he could get back. Yeah, I know.”
(Obviously she does. If Eve weren’t maybe the smartest person Villanelle knows, MI6 would still be searching for a man, probably.)
Eve walks then, one short, halting step and three more confident ones, and they’re close again. “What are we doing?” she repeats. She’s not grinning, but she’s not frowning either. She looks just barely at peace with something, enough to show Villanelle that she’s not angry. Seeking, rather.
The bridge felt inevitable, with the hazy grain of lamplight cutting through the darkness. The wind. The people around them, human in the most fragile way.
This is harder. The lights are bright, and Eve is looking right at Villanelle rather than down at a rushing river.
They’re equally untamable, so maybe it’s not all too different.
“You tell me. You’re the one who can’t get enough of me.” Cheeky words, except Villanelle flushes with nervous affection as she thinks about the times it’s been proven true, the times Eve has chased her, found her.
Eve’s eyes widen momentarily at the sight, and she steps forward again, softly. “You know what I want.”
“Do I?”
“You broke into my apartment and left a bear telling me, so—“ Admit it, Eve. You wish I was here.
Eve isn’t nervous at all, Villanelle realizes, and she is proud and something like guilty: I helped do that. I changed her.
“So you liked it.”
Eve bites back quickly, no pause: “I didn’t say that.” But she breaks just as fast, the words belied by a smile she hides, ducking her head.
Villanelle smiles back, all teeth and muscles that aren’t used to this kind of tug, and her face aches. It’s not that she doesn’t smile. It’s that she doesn’t do— This. Flushed cheeks, nerves.
They'll talk about it all eventually. They have to. But for now, they simply stand until Eve shuffles and clears her throat. She goes to turn, presumably to search. Villanelle’s hand shoots out to Eve’s arm, stopping her. Turning her, seconds later, with only the barest pressure needed for Eve to mold under her touch. Eve was waiting for this.
“We need to run soon,” Villanelle murmurs.
“I know.”
“I have money. So that will be fine. But I do not know where we'll be safe.”
“I know.” Eve is perplexed: how many times are they going to have this conversation?
“But to answer your question, that is not what we are doing. We are doing this.” Her hand moves: shoulder to neck to back of head, tangled below Eve’s ponytail. Scraping. She thinks this should count. As a move or whatnot. A point.
Eve, however, is the one to lean forward, and the score tilts in her favor again. That’s okay. Villanelle smiles into the kiss, and her cheeks don’t hurt.