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Eliot stared open-mouthed at Hardison’s display, trying desperately to kick his brain off dead center. It wasn’t possible – nothing about what he was looking at was possible. And yet… “Parker, you’re sure she said her name was Susan Waters?”
“You know what I know,” the thief countered, clearly losing patience with him. “I’m not going to waste Hardison’s time chasing down somebody who doesn’t exist. I saw her ID, she’s got a history –it’s all right there!” She blew out a harsh breath. “If she’s not Susan Waters, who is she?”
You’re supposed to be dead, Eliot thought, still unable to take his eyes off the DMV photo. Before he could answer Parker though, he felt Hardison’s shock like a ripple in the air. “You serious, man? Am I looking at what I think I’m looking at?”
Eliot met the hacker’s gaze, not bothering to hide what he was thinking, and how thoroughly it had shaken him. “Witness Protection?” he asked.
Hardison nodded – a quick, sharp gesture of assent. “Looks like. It’s a good job, but once you clued me in that there was something to find, it fell apart pretty quickly.” He paused, looking decidedly nervous. “Is she really Moreau’s sister?”
“Katerina Moreau,” Eliot said, turning towards Parker. “Damien Moreau’s younger sister. She was a classic wild-child, black-sheep type; word was she died in 2008 in some kind of explosion.”
Parker’s momentary surge of anger at being left out of the loop bled away in the face of a new puzzle to solve. “She went into Witness Protection?” she asked gesturing at the image in the center of the array. Off Hardison’s nod, she looked thoughtful. Eliot could see in that moment why Nate had left her the job of Mastermind for their work. “Hardison, can you make sure that Damien Moreau is still in Interpol custody?”
Eliot was never letting either of them handle the face to face screenings ever again.
“At least she didn’t lie to us,” was all Parker could manage when they’d finally sifted through everything that Hardison had managed to dig up on Katerina Moreau, aka “Kate”, aka “Susan Waters”.
Hardison gave a low whistle of appreciation. “Seriously. If I was her, I’d be looking to hide from my psycho arms dealer brother too. Wouldn’t trust the government to do the job either.”
Eliot’s head was spinning, shifting all the pieces of the problem in front of them into different configurations, and not liking anything he saw. “Break it down,” Parker said gently, catching his gaze. “You’re trying to swallow the whole thing all at once. It’s too big.”
Drawing strength from her steadiness, Eliot forced his mind clear. Blowing out a slow, soft breath, he nodded at the thief and took his seat. When did you start being able to ground me? It was a largely idle thought, nothing he would voice aloud now – if ever – but somewhere Parker had decided that Nate’s skill at bringing him to heel was something she needed to have in her arsenal in order to be an effective mastermind for them.
“Hardison, you’re going to need to create a new identity for Miss Whoever-She-Is,” Parker said, once she was certain she had the attention of both her boys. “Better than Witness Protection. Getting her hidden has to be our first priority.” She glanced at Eliot. “Unless she’s evil. She didn’t seem evil, but she also didn’t seem like Damien Moreau’s sister to me.”
A sharp burst of vibration static cut off Eliot’s intended reply. Brow furrowing, Parker pulled out her phone and answered it. “How did you get this number?” After a few moments, her entire expression lit with delight. “Really? Of course I’ve heard about it, but I’ve never had a chance to actually try it out!”
It was like flipping a switch, Eliot thought, marveling at how cleanly Parker shifted from the steady, cool, mastermind into the hyper-active super-thief they’d always known. After a few moments chattering with whoever was on the other end, she got up and left the table – still talking. Eliot glanced back at Hardison, and was marginally relieved to see that the hacker had no more idea who had called than he did.
“You’re not thinking in terms of us taking on Damien Moreau again, are you?” Hardison asked, his fear at the prospect writ large in his expression.
Luckily this was one area Eliot knew he could put his friend’s worries at ease. “The only thing I’m thinking about for Moreau is a bullet,” he said grimly. “Preferably fired from as far away as I can set up and still guarantee a clean shot.”
Parker returned to the table then, disturbingly subdued. Pushing a button on her phone, she set it on the desk between them. “You’re on speaker, Mozzie. Tell Eliot and Hardison what you just told me.”
Eliot felt a knot of cold dread tighten his gut as he realized things had likely already gotten away from them. Mozzie had been friends with Kate once upon a time, but more importantly he was best friends with one Neal Caffrey – art thief, forger, con man, and formerly the love of Katerina Moreau’s life. Not to mention a serious bone of contention between her and her brother, Eliot thought, memories of a past he would have rather forgotten beginning to overwhelm him.
”…and whoever took him left a card addressed to Eliot Spencer,” Mozzie was saying, when Eliot was finally able to tune in on the conversation. ”It says, ‘You were willing to argue for his life once upon a time – are you willing to deal for it now?’ There’s no signature.”
There wouldn’t be. “He’s calling me out,” Eliot said, locking eyes with Parker and letting her know without words that he’d understood the message perfectly. “I agree to meet him at a time and place of his choosing, or Caffrey dies.”
There was a moment of silence as they all digested this new information, broken ultimately by Mozzie. ”Spencer, I don’t pretend to know what sort of history is between you and Neal, but…”
“It’s fine,” Eliot said, cutting the other man off. “Caffrey never signed up to be a part of this. Whatever it takes, I’ll get him back.”
“We’ll get him back,” Parker interjected in her “not to be argued with” voice. Glaring at Eliot to underscore her point she asked, “How are you supposed to find out where to meet him?”
“I have some ideas,” Eliot admitted, deciding not to have that argument with his teammates right now in front of an outsider. “Do you have a secure dead drop we can use for his reply? I don’t want this blowing back on us, and I don’t want you in the line of fire longer than you have to be.”
”Don’t worry about me,” Mozzie retorted, and even over the phone Eliot could read a lot more determination in the man’s tone than he suspected was usually present for anyone. ”I know just the place.”
They spent a few minutes more discussing details and running possible scenarios that Eliot – at least – had no plan of sticking to. Parker was already getting ready to end the call when the three of them heard a commotion heading for the office through the corridor that lead to the brew pub proper.
“What fresh hell..?” Hardison muttered, getting to his feet and moving to intercept as Parker finished up with Mozzie and disconnected the call.
Eliot was moving to back Hardison’s play, when they heard Amy – their manager – say, “If you’ll just wait out front, I’m sure…”
“I need to see him.”
That voice – he hadn’t heard that voice in over a decade, but Eliot Spencer never forgot such things. “It’s her,” he said, pulling up short. “Susan. Kate. It’s her,” he said, waving a hand dismissively.
Neither Parker nor Hardison seemed comforted by his news. “Vicki Vale,” Hardison said, his expression earnest. “Bat Cave.”
“Just let her in,” Eliot grumbled, half-collapsing back on the stool he’d been using. The effort of trying to plug himself back in to a psychotic soap opera he’d never asked to be a part of in the first place was beginning to overwhelm him. It was all so overwrought and predictable, and…Of course he sent her a rose. “Hello, Kate.”
Time had fulfilled the promise of beauty Damien’s sister had held as a young woman in her early twenties, trying to break free from her family’s legacy. “Eliot,” Kate said, her eyes brimming with tears as she raised the half-bloomed white rose between them. “He knows I’m alive.”
Eliot could have kissed Parker as she snorted softly, hands on hips. “That’s why you came to us in the first place, right?” Ordinarily he or Hardison would have lectured the thief for her lack of empathy for the client, but this was one case where Eliot was sure her blunt way of cutting through the bullshit was exactly what was called for. “You want us to make sure he can’t find you?”
“It’s too late for that,” Kate snapped, showing Parker the rose. “He knows where I am – he’s coming for me.”
Or he wanted Kate to come to him, Eliot thought. He’d never really understood Damien’s fascination with roses and the lore they’d collected over the years, but everybody who’d spent more than a year around the man learned that receiving a white rose meant nothing good was going to follow. “He has Caffrey,” Eliot said into the sudden silence, trying to distract Kate before Parker really got going.
Clearly it was the last thing Kate had expected him to say. “Neal? What – why?” Her still-smooth brow furrowed in confusion.
“It’s the only thing he knows that potentially ties the two of us together,” Eliot countered. “Don’t waste my time playing stupid, Katerina – even now, you know him better than anyone. You know what he’s likely to do and you know why.”
Silence fell between them, Kate chewing thoughtfully on her lower lip. “I don’t know him better than you do, Eliot,” she said finally. “Nobody knows him better than you.”
*************************************
“She’s worried you’re going to do something stupid.” Hardison came up beside him and leaned on the balcony railing. Below them, Portland was alive with lights and movement in the darkness. “So am I.”
Eliot bowed his head, pressing the heels of his hands against his closed eyelids. He’d retreated upstairs after barely touching his dinner, too overwhelmed by Kate and Caffrey and the prospect of facing Damien Moreau once more to think straight. Too many ghosts… “This isn’t your fight, man,” he said finally, raising his head again to look at Hardison. “Neither of you. You didn’t sign up for this kind of madness.”
The hacker smiled wistfully. “Eliot man, I’m not gonna insult you by reminding you how things work around here. Your fight, our fight – that kind of talk stopped before Victor Dubenich first reached out to Nate. Whatever this turns into, you know Parker’s not gonna let you face it alone.”
“You could convince her,” Eliot said, seizing onto the mad thought as it wafted through his brain. He gripped Hardison’s arm, willing the younger man to buy into his plan. “Back me up, man. Convince her to let me get in and out on my own – just let me make it go away.”
He was grateful that Hardison didn’t actually say “You’re adorable,” even though he could read the words in the hacker’s pitying gaze. “I’m on her side, Eliot,” he said finally. “The idea of even putting eyes on Damien Moreau again scares me to death, but he’s not just your problem anymore.” He shrugged. “Besides – I like Caffrey, and you’re right; he didn’t ask to get caught up in y’all’s drama.”
Eliot stayed on the balcony with Hardison for a while – not so much to talk anything else through, but more to digest what the hacker had said. When he felt steady enough to risk running into Parker again, he clapped Hardison on the shoulder and said his good nights.
The thief was in the offices – sitting cross-legged on the countertop and looking disturbingly peaceful. “I’ve decided,” she announced as he entered the room at the edge of her vision, “that your knightly martyr self-sacrificing thing is really annoying.”
“Knightly martyr self…” In spite of himself, Eliot grinned at Parker’s very “parker-esque” assessment of his drive to keep her and Hardison safe at all costs. “Parker, Moreau is not your problem. Moreau and Kate are definitely not your problem. It’s not martyrdom; it’s sound tactics and deep down I think you know that.”
He heard a small whisper of fabric as she spun to fully face him. “Don’t try to be Nate at me Eliot – that’s my job.” Before he could react to that, she sprang off the counter, landing lightly on the balls of her bare feet. “What I know is that this man scares you like nothing else I’ve ever seen. And it’s not because he’s more powerful or scary or dangerous than the other bad guys you beat up without even thinking about it.”
Eliot hadn’t realized she was moving closer to him, until she pressed a hand against his chest. “He scares you because of how he makes you feel. He reminds you of that man you don’t want to be anymore, and that makes you panic. You panic, you get sloppy, and that’s not sound tactics.”
You’re not that man anymore. He’d shrank from Sophie’s assessment at the time, but that wasn’t what Parker was saying. That man you don’t want to be anymore, was a significant difference, and if he was operating from a place of panic as Parker had said… “You picked a hell of a time to lay this on me,” he said finally, his voice unexpectedly shaky.
“Not my fault this is the only time you would hear me.” Leaning in she kissed him…long and slow, making his head spin even further. “Think about it,” she added, once she let him up for air. “Without me and Hardison, you’ve got nothing to remind you about who you want to be. You face Moreau without us, you will lose – and Neal and Susan or whoever she is lose too.”
“I’m more worried about losing you,” Eliot admitted, feeling more raw and vulnerable than he could ever remember. “You’re right about what being near Moreau does to me, but Parker I swear…”
She kissed him again, cutting off whatever he was about to say. Eliot put his arms around the thief, clinging to her for all he was worth. “Trust us,” Parker said, her voice low and uncharacteristically soft. “Whatever happens, we’re not about to let you go.”