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Every time Harry inadvertently reveals another secret about his unsavory past, he first freezes, then glances involuntarily toward Eliot. This time is no exception, even if he's tied to a metal chair, wrists chafing against the coarse rope holding them behind the sharp edges of its back, shoulders pulled taut and straining. Even if there are five, count them, five dangerous criminals between him and Eliot, who has just strolled in through the door.
There had been guards at that door, Harry's pretty sure. Armed guards.
"Eliot Spencer!" Salvatore lights up like an old friend's come to visit. He's always had a big voice, but in the empty warehouse the sound booms against every wall. "Can't talk new business right now. Wrapping up the old. Tying up loose ends, you know how it is."
"No need to delay on my account," Harry quips weakly from the chair. "I'm in no rush."
Immediately, one of Salvatore's goons slugs him in the mouth, not for the first time. Pain blooms, and he spits blood like red petals.
Eliot's eyes had been a bit wide, which meant he hadn't expected to run into Harry here. Which meant the team hadn't known Harry had gone missing. Which meant Eliot was just meeting with Salvatore for unrelated reasons. Hitter reasons.
Now his eyes narrow.
Salvatore is still talking casually like they're chums, but if he really knew Eliot as well as he thinks, he'd be able to read Eliot's expressions as easily as Harry can.
He'd know it's time to run.
Harry's only been working with the team for a few months, and that's been long enough to learn those tells. It's a matter of self-preservation, really.
A few short, violent moments follow.
Harry doesn't take his eyes off Eliot for a second, even when he does that move that effortlessly twists a man's arm to an unnatural angle and drops him to the floor.
Shortly, the two of them are the only ones left conscious in the warehouse.
"Why do you do that?" Eliot says, emptying the magazines from each of the guns he's wrested from Salvatore's men. They clatter to the floor and the sound echoes.
"Do what?" Playing innocent, that's basically Harry's thing.
Eliot exhales forcefully. Thankfully he doesn't have the patience to pursue it, and moves on. "What were you even doing with these guys? They're bad news. Even against our usual. The things they're involved with—"
"Oh I'm aware." Harry coughs. "I may have, ah, represented them in a few cases. Successfully."
Eliot stops what he's doing and gives Harry a dark look. The team knows, in rough sketches, the sins of Harry's past. But even then, the specifics tend to shock them.
When it comes down to good guys like the Leverage crew, and the bad guys they fight, Harry's well aware he's closer to the latter. He also knows that there will come a breaking point, a certain number of bodies unearthed, skeletons tipped from his closets, when the rest of the team figure that out too.
In that event, he can see two possible exits.
Either they'll figure he's harmless, and cut him loose. No more jobs. No more "let's go steal a". No more being part of something extraordinary.
Or they'll figure he knows too much, and send someone to take care of him—
"You're doing it again." Eliot's a bit closer now. A pocket knife has materialized, out of nowhere, into his hand. "You're giving me that look."
"How do you think you'd do it? If I were a loose end you had to tie up?" Harry goes for casual, but doesn't think he succeeds. He's caught, and Eliot's looming over him with a sharp blade. Realistically, this is how he's always imagined it ending, when the team finally decides he's too much of a liability, too tainted by his past. Who else are they going to send, if not their hitter?
"You look pretty tied up already to me." Eliot's voice is neutral, so it's hard to tell if he's making a joke, or if he's just shutting down the conversation, saying don't go there, not now.
"I mean it," Harry insists. "Salvatore isn't the worst criminal I've helped to walk free, not by a long shot. If it comes to that…"
Eliot circles behind Harry, and every cell in him is screaming that there's danger behind him, where he can't see or defend himself, staring him down right between the shoulder blades.
Eliot just took out five men larger than him without breaking a sweat.
Harry has carpal tunnel. He never stood a chance.
From behind, Eliot's hand lands on Harry's shoulder, and he jumps, as much as the ropes and the hand allow him.
"It won't come to that," Eliot says into Harry's ear, in a tone that makes the hairs on the back of his neck rise. "You're not beyond redemption. You're not me."
Then the rope snaps on Eliot's knife, and Harry's wrists come free.