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“Moreau would like to speak with you,” Eliot says to Vector in the courthouse. The words are bitter in his mouth, a reminder of the life he used to lead. It’s right there, buzzing underneath his skin - the memory of being that man , of all of the things he did.
It makes him want to be sick. It makes him want to punch somebody.
Instead, he walks out of the courthouse with Parker and Hardison. Parker drapes her arm around his shoulder and laughs in his ear and he feels himself relax ever so slightly.
“Hardison and I will hit Moreau,” Eliot says to Nate in the bar. Eliot knows what he’s doing, knows what he’s getting himself into, what he’s getting Hardison into. But he doesn’t have it in himself to feel bad about it. He has to be there in order for the con to work, and the only person it makes sense to take is Hardison - the only person he wants to take is Hardison.
Later, Eliot will feel bad about blindsiding Hardison like that. Later, Eliot will let Hardison yell at him, and will take whatever Hardison throws his way without flinching. Later, Eliot will understand if Hardison refuses to work with him, if any of the team do. He is a hypocrite, after all. His big speech to Nate about not conning your own team means jack shit now. He wouldn’t blame them, any of them, if they can’t trust him anymore.
Or maybe by the time later comes around they’ll all be dead and it won’t be their problem anymore.
“You’re not that man anymore,” Sophie says to him in the park. She sounds so certain, so convinced that she’s right. But Eliot knows better. He knows that no matter how deep he’s buried his past, it’s still lurking there, right beneath the surface. Waiting for the time that he needs to call upon those skills again.
He’s proved right in the warehouse. He still is that man, and he shows it when he leaves a trail of bodies in his wake and feels nothing more than pity.
“I like the hair,” Moreau says over the phone, a smile on his face that Eliot can see clear as day. There’s a sudden, overwhelming urge to grab the nearest knife and chop it all off, but he forces it to the back of his mind. Right now, his only job is to get Nate and the Italian out safely. If he can do that - if he survives doing that - then he can worry about his stupid hair.
It’s only when they get home to Boston - and when did Boston become home? - that Eliot faces his reflection in the mirror, a pair of scissors clenched in his fist. He first grew out his hair after he left Moreau - in part as a way to avoid being easily recognized, but also to distance himself from what he used to be. It let him look in the mirror and not immediately see the monster he’d become. But if today showed him anything, it’s that he still is the monster - or that he can be when needed. He can’t distance himself from that anymore.
In the end, Eliot takes a deep breath and puts down the scissors. He’s done letting Moreau dictate what he does.
“The rest of the team, they don’t need to know what I did,” Eliot says to Nate, even though he knows it’s useless. He reeks of gunpowder and there’s blood on his pants mixed with oil and the explosion at the warehouse must’ve been reported by now and he knows the police will find so many bodies and-
Nate agrees anyway, because he knows what it’s like to want to forget your past.
“Help me get rid of this Moreau guy for good,” Nate says to them in the bar. He presents it like a choice, even though they all know it’s not. They may have pushed Moreau around a little, but he still has plenty of resources at his disposal. Once everything blows over, he will come for them. That much Eliot is sure of. And he can’t let that happen.
It doesn’t matter how much Eliot hates the idea of going back to San Lorenzo, how it makes his skin crawl to imagine being in the same room as Moreau again. He’ll do it for his team. He’ll do anything for them, and that thought doesn’t scare him nearly as much anymore.
“These people you are with now, would you leave any of them behind?” Flores says to him over the phone. The words hit Eliot like a knife - and not just because they’re true, but because it’s so obvious how much he cares for these people. They’re his weak spot, but he’ll be damned if that stops him.
Parker looks at him, a satisfied smile on her face, and he knows exactly what Moreau would do to break her, how it would break him in turn. If Moreau really wanted to hurt Eliot, he would only have to hurt one of his team, any of them.
He turns away before he can think too hard about it.
“Moreau’s gone, you’re a free man,” Eliot says to Nate, says to himself . He’s unable to help the laugh that bubbles up in his chest. It’s been too long since he’s been able to laugh like that, since he’s been able to walk down the street without looking over his shoulder every five seconds.
Moreau has been a weight hanging over him for years now, and now that it’s gone he barely knows what to do with himself.