Turn of the Tide

Fandom: Once A Thief/Taking The Falls

Category/Rated: PG13. Some adult situations and language.

Year/Length: ~29,660 words

Pairing: Vic/Mac

Disclaimer: Characters from OaT belong to Alliance. Mack Stringer was featured in 'Taking the Falls' and doesn't belong to us either.

Author's Notes: Mac Stringer was played by Nick Lea, and was the boyfriend of the main protagonist in Taking the Falls, Terry was played by Cynthia Dale, who is actually the sister of Jennifer Dale who plays OaT's Director. This gave Pic ideas that she ought to be spanked for. This is the result.

Beta: Grateful thanks to Speedo for very careful beta. We've tried hard to make it worthy. If we failed it wasn't hir fault.

The sound of the high heels echoed and Victor Mansfield's heart sank. Today was supposed to have been a day off. Mac and LiAnn had gone to Las Vegas for the three-day break the team had been granted out of the blue, and he had been looking forward to sleeping late, vegging out and just plain relaxing.

When the summons had come at a beastly early hour, he'd shot the telephone, blowing it into satisfyingly small fragments. When Dobrinsky had arrived at 7:23 am Vic had had half a mind to shoot him too - had actually drawn his gun and waved it about wildly.

As usual, Dobrinsky had ignored his gesture, folding his arms and standing, massive, unmoving and all too calm. "Come on, Ace."

Vic had moaned, grumbled, and then finally dressed, glaring at Dobrinsky in his most menacing manner as they left the apartment. He'd maintained a steady stream of moans and grumbles all the way in to the office. Dobrinsky hadn't left his side for a moment - as if Vic were coherent enough to think of a detour other than to Starbuck's for a shot of the triple something-or-other that Mac always swore by.

Safely ensconced - according to Dobrinsky - in the boardroom and hearing the Director's approach, Vic wished that he hadn't drunk quite so much retsina with last night's moussaka. Becoming a gourmet was not all joy.

Head down, listening hard, Vic deduced that the Director had stalked around the table to perch beside him on its shiny surface. He continued to avert his eyes, knowing that this was a power game she played. Why should he look? He knew what he would see. The Director would be too close, and her clothes would be too tight, her voice too intimate. He swallowed. It was far too early in the day for her bullshit. He wanted to go back to bed.

"Victor, I'm so glad that you could join me this morning."

"Like I had a choice," he muttered, remaining slumped in his seat. If the wretched woman was going to chew him out, he was damned if he was going to make it easy for her. He waited for the axe to fall, but she made no further comment. When he finally hazarded a tiny peep at her, he frowned.

Something was wrong. By no means an expert on women's fashions - much less the bizarre interpretations the Director's wardrobe represented - Vic did notice that she was less than her usual immaculate self. She seemed to have dressed the way his mother always claimed he did - by guess - and her hair was not its usual glossy mane. She looked … bedraggled. If Vic knew one thing for sure, he knew this - the Director was never, ever bedraggled. No longer as adamant about delaying whatever happened to be inevitable today, he sighed and faced her.

"What's so important? What is it that can't wait until Tuesday? You just gave us this time off yesterday and I need it," he complained, but her appearance caused his voice to become kinder of its own accord. There was definitely something wrong, and he always responded to damsels in distress - although calling the Director a damsel was a stretch, and openly mentioning her distress could well prove fatal.

"I need your help on a most important matter," was her reply.

It stunned Vic. Straightforward, forthright and seemingly directly to the point - could it be that, for once, she wasn't playing games?

"I need your help. It's something of a personal matter."

This was bad. In fact, this was potentially more than bad, maybe even approaching catastrophic. His boss was far more in the habit of demanding rather than asking. Something dreadful must have happened to produce this kind of - well, plea - from her. He attempted a stony glare, but felt it slip from his face before it fully formed. Thawing by the second, he leaned forward in his chair and instinctively reached for her, his hand hovering while he debated patting hers. Unsettled by his own impulse, he opted for trying to appear sympathetic from a distance. "Suppose you tell me what's wrong and I'll see if I can help."

For a moment, she didn't move. With a small sigh, she finally stood, stalking over to pull down the screen on which she usually showed the team pictorial information.

"I want you to look at this, Victor. Look carefully, and tell me what you see." She took hold of the remote and returned to sit beside him, dimming the lights en route. There was a moment of static on the screen, and then silent video of a young man could be seen. The camera was behind him and to his right, as he sat and spoke with a laughing, dark haired girl.

The camera zeroed in on the girl, and it seemed to Vic that she looked familiar. He racked his brain in an attempt to determine who she was, and where he might have seen her before. When the camera panned and focused on the man, he sat upright, forehead creased in bafflement.

"Okay, what is this? Who the hell is that?"

The man he was looking at was himself. Correction, thought Victor, the face on the screen was almost his double. The hair was a little longer, and darker. The face was sharper, and somewhat thinner, but they were so alike that they could have been twins.

The Director paused the video and said, "His name, Victor, is Mac Stringer. He was an officer in the RCMP until about six months ago, and the woman with him is my sister, Terri."

Her voice was dispassionate as usual, but when he turned to her, she looked away. That was far from the norm.

"Watch the screen, Victor. I'll turn up the volume for you."

This wasn't normal either. Vic was used to stills, and a lot of reading material. Suddenly, inexplicably nervous, he asked, "Where did you get this footage?"

"A colleague of mine is fond of videotape," she replied, her voice a little edgy. "Watch the screen, Victor. Watch it closely."

"Why?" When she didn't respond, he gave voice to his frustration, "Look, I get it. You've found a double for me, and you've started to pull him into your clutches by using your sister. What I don't see is why you need me. Can't she handle things from here?" His voice was sarcastic, but he felt as though he'd been had. Again. For a minute he'd almost thought that she was vulnerable! Hell, she'd sounded sad, just like a regular person. He should have known better than to waste his sympathy.

Her voice cut through his self-recrimination. "My sister is dead. She was murdered by the people who are responsible for abducting both her and her lover. We have many reasons for wanting to recover Mr. Stringer from them. Not the least of which is the fact that he loved my sister, and she died because of that."

She prowled the room, eventually coming to stand behind him, her hands resting on his shoulders. He flinched, disliking the contact, and knowing that she would enjoy his revulsion. Try as he might, Vic couldn't sit still. His skin began to crawl as her lips brushed his ear when she repeated, "Watch the screen, Victor."

The Director re-started the videotape, and a series of still shots of his spitting image flickered over the screen -- those of the man looking proud in his red serge and yelling angrily while dressed in a button-down shirt and jeans were chased by others in which he was unshaven and gaunt, housed in what looked to be some kind of holding cell.

While Vic wondered about the rapid-fire and dramatic changes in Stringer, the still shots were replaced once more by video.

"Stop evading the issue," Stringer said, eyes focused seriously on the young woman on the couch next to him.

"I'm not," Terri asserted before kissing him lightly and reaching for his belt buckle. "I just have other items on my agenda."

"Terri," Stringer muttered, halfheartedly slapping her hands away. "Aren't you tired of this being just a weekend here and there?"

In response, Terri laughed and kissed Stringer harder, slipping his belt from around his waist with practiced ease. Hands busy unbuttoning and unzipping his fly, she whispered, "What this is that, Mac?" against his lips.

"Us," he groaned, as her hand slipped beneath the waistband of his boxers.

"Lift," she instructed.

Stringer complied but continued to talk while his lover slid his jeans and underwear over his hips. "Why don't you stay for a while - a week or two? You know, just see how it goes."

Spreading his legs to make room for her to kneel between them, Terri countered, "I already know I like how it comes."

Stringer was neither deterred nor diverted by her words. "C'mon, Terri. What do you say?" Terri's actions, on the other hand, appeared to be more effective, as he struggled to continue. "We could … you could … have the closet in … in the bedroom, and … and I … Christ, I …"

Vic shifted uncomfortably in his chair. The camera was focused on Stringer, but it didn't take a whole lot of imagination to figure out what Terri was doing to him. As Vic watched Stringer's breathing get more rapid, the Director slowly stroked a fingernail along Vic's throat. She did it again as Stringer's eyes closed, and Vic considered running for the door.

When the video setting shifted, the Director sighed, and her hands went back to Vic's shoulders. Relieved, Victor focused on the screen rather than on assessing his reactions to the unwelcome contact.

The two on the screen were in bed, asleep, both naked, smiling and tousled. Terri's head was on Stringer's chest and when she shifted restlessly, he moved to accommodate her, arms tightening around her body.

Vic sighed. This looked like what he'd always wanted - a relationship that worked. He was well on his way to envying Mac Stringer by the time the two stealthy figures dressed in black entered the room and shot what Vic assumed were tranquilizer darts into the lovers.

He hadn't even realized that he'd tensed until he felt the Director's hands seeking pressure points in his shoulders. Assuming she was simply bored didn't diminish Victor's unease, but another shift in video scene captured his attention.

The screen was black and a man's voice said, "What did you expect, Mac? I told you this would happen if you didn't comply."

Vic anticipated that he'd see the angry Stringer of the still shots, but he was wrong. Stringer stood stock still in the middle of a stark, dark-toned room. "But …" was all he managed.

"It is done. Your lover is dead and your colleagues at the RCMP are shocked and dismayed that one of their own could have done all those unspeakable things to such a lively and vital young woman. They're whispering the word ‘obsession' in quiet tones - those that aren't denouncing you long and loud to anyone who will listen, that is. Face it, Mac; you have nothing. You have less than nothing and will pay the price if your attitude does not undergo an immediate and profound improvement. Is that clear?"

The pain and horror in Stringer's eyes lanced straight past any hope Vic had of remaining unsympathetic. This man had had something very special and had seen it ripped away. Furthermore, Vic knew all too well what it was like to have a career and a reputation in tatters.

As she clicked off the VCR, the Director squeezed his shoulders to remind him she was there. "Mr. Stringer was a good officer - a gifted detective with a promising career ahead of him." She tapped one finger on Victor's shoulder and walked around the table to retrieve a folder that was full of papers. "He was noticed by an associate of mine - one that has long envied me my team and wanted to infiltrate it. Mr. Stringer was a key to his schemes. Using Mr. Stringer, the man - let's call him Caddell - hoped to achieve his goal. His grand plan involved Mr. Stringer assuming your identity after some careful changes in his attitude had been effected. He was expected to undermine the team's functioning and my reputation for success." Voice softening ever so slightly, she continued, "Even though Caddell has been running agents for the organization for almost as long as I have, he was careless in this case. He didn't know that Mac was my sister's lover."

Vic couldn't believe what he was hearing. Holding up a peremptory hand, he demanded, "Hey, wait a second! Your sister is dead, and this guy's life's all screwed up over some feud between you and Caddell over Mac, Li Ann and me. How do you live with yourself?"

She paced as she replied, "On the contrary, Victor, dear. The misfortunes that have befallen Mr. Stringer can be laid directly at your door. If you and he weren't virtual carbon copies, none of this would have been possible. You owe it to Mr. Stringer to lend him some assistance in getting his life back on track. The poor man is heartbroken. Not only has he lost the love of his life, he was framed for her murder, so his career is gone as well. He's most unhappy, Victor, most unhappy."

Vic spluttered in outrage. Damn the woman! Even when he was obviously blameless, she managed to twist things around so much that somehow the problems she created became his!

Unmoved by the distemper of her operative, she forged ahead. "Mr. Stringer has been forced through a number of most unpleasant procedures, and now he's become an unfortunate liability through no fault of his own. You can get him over that hump, Victor." She wheeled abruptly, stabbing one blood-red fingernail in Vic's direction.

"Hold on. Just hold on. What makes you think that I can do anything? I don't know him. And after what he's been through, he's not gonna take kindly to me popping in and saying 'Hi, I'm from the government; I'm here to help,' is he? Keep me out of this."

Vic had tried for finality in his last statement, but she stood there staring at him as though he'd only amused her. Defensively, he said, "He's more likely to want to kill me than befriend me. Let the poor guy go, why don't you? Do the right thing for a change." Hearing himself getting shrill, Victor scowled. He was touched by the story that the Director seemed determined to relate, and he was furious, both at himself for knowing that she was manipulating him, but possessing no defense against it, and at the situation that she described.

"I need Mac Stringer functional, Victor. We need him. You're the only one that can do the job. Get used to it."

Victor sighed. He knew that there was no point in arguing. She'd win in the end; she always did. "Suppose you tell me what you think I can do for this guy that hasn't already been done?"

"That's better, Victor." She smiled at him in the manner of a pleased master to an obedient pet. "You'll identify with him and, more to the point, he'll identify with you. The two of you have much in common."

Harboring a faint hope for a different outcome, Vic asked, "Why can't you do it? Terri was your sister."

"I rescued him from the less than palatial environment where they were holding him, but he doesn't trust me, no doubt wondering how I came to know where he was too late to help matters. Thus, enter Victor, stage left," she concluded. Slight bitterness had crept into her tone when Vic snorted in derision as the word ‘trust' was spoken. Assuming that all had been decided, she clarified, "I want you to befriend him: to encourage him to trust you-"

"You don't want much!" Vic snarled at her retreating form.

As the last in a series of unprecedented events, she actually deigned to dignify his outburst with a response. She paused and turned back to him, an annoying smile on her face. "Oh and, Victor… I want him working for the department - for me."

Before he could gather breath to howl in anguish, she was gone, leaving him to grind his teeth and read the file detailing precisely what had been done to his double.

"Are you ready to begin?"

Victor Mansfield jumped at the sound of the Director's voice. He'd been lost in thought, but was troubled by the fact that he hadn't heard her approach. Then he realized that he actually had, but that he'd dismissed the sound as familiar and non-threatening. He chided himself for his slip. As if the Director's approach had ever been non-threatening to anyone or anything.

"I hope you are, Victor, because Mr. Stringer is no doubt expecting his dinner. We've consistently served it at 7:30 pm; I'd hate to throw off his schedule on your whim."

"What do I have to do with Stringer's dinner?"

Looking at him as though he was being purposefully obtuse, she chided, "Someone has to bring it to him. Who better than a kindred spirit who understands more of what's driving him than he does at the moment? Don't you agree?"

"No, I don't." Gesturing at the papers that were strewn across the table in front of him, Victor asserted, "After all the shit your pal Caddell put him through, he needs professional help. Not me."

"You want me to send Mr. Stringer to a psychiatrist, is that your assessment?"

Uncertain at how to interpret her sharp tone, Vic ventured, "Yeah." When she said nothing, he continued, "I mean, look at this stuff. They shot him full of drugs and tortured him for over five months. What the hell am I supposed to say to him? ‘Don't worry, Stringer, the Director can make it all better. She can give you some really good happy pills and you'll forget that your life is fucked.'" Vic was breathing hard when he paused, waiting for her to say something, anything.

"I won't give him drugs."

Her flat statement enraged Vic. "Oh no, that's right, you couldn't do that, could you? That might actually make him feel better. If you want him to work for you, he's got to learn to manage his misery better." Standing and shoving the documents back into the file folder haphazardly, Vic growled, "Hell, maybe you should show him the video you have of me so he can have a role model. Maybe that's the strategy for you. Bore the man nearly to death and he'll beg to do whatever it is you want him to."

"Victor."

"What?"

"What would you have said to a psychiatrist when I plucked you from prison?"

"That's not-."

Brooking no argument, the Director demanded, "Answer me."

She had him and she knew it. Sullenly, Vic admitted, "Not a word."

Nodding, she glanced at her watch and noted, "It's nearly 7:00 pm. We have to get moving."

Throwing his hands up in exasperation, Vic tried again. "You aren't hearing me. His situation is different. I'm not the man for this job. He needs a doctor."

Leaning against the table just to Vic's right, the Director fixed him with an intense glare and softly said, "He's seen doctors, Victor. Quite a number of them. But he doesn't trust them either, because some of the people who did all those things to him were doctors."

"But -."

"It has to be you," she stated. "Get your jacket."

With that, she turned and walked away. Vic's urge to rebel died when he looked down and saw the picture that had spilled out of the hastily reconstructed file. Stringer was huddled in the corner of a room, staring over his shoulder with eyes wide with fear, facing a soldering iron deployed less than an inch from his bare back. The knowledge that here was only a mild example of the atrocities that had been perpetrated on Mac Stringer made Vic's stomach ache.

Grabbing his coat from its crumpled heap in the chair next to the one in which he'd been sitting, he threw it on and followed the Director.

The tray contained a steak, baked potato and salad, and a large portion of apple pie. There was mustard and horseradish, and a bread roll wrapped in a napkin alongside a pat of butter. They weren't starving the man at least, thought Victor, as he reluctantly entered the corridor that led to where Mac Stringer was incarcerated.

Ok - so maybe incarcerated was a strong word. It wasn't like Stringer was in prison. In fact, the Director had sprung him from a situation that had been far worse than the prison cell in which he would've spent the rest of his life if they'd arrested him for Terri's murder. Vic had thought that the time he'd spent in a jail cell was the worst experience in his life. He couldn't even imagine what Stringer had gone through - held as he had been by those who wanted to break his spirit but leave his mind intact. A functional automaton was what they'd wanted to create, according to the Director, and nothing that Vic had seen in any of the files argued for a different conclusion.

What can I really do here? That question haunted Vic as he pushed open the door to Mac Stringer's place of … what? Residence certainly wasn't it. More like a holding tank. Maybe purgatory. That was it. Mac Stringer was in purgatory.

That thought didn't prepare Vic in any way for coming face to face with his double. The man was lying on the bed in the corner of his room and didn't look up as Victor entered. One knee was raised and he had flung a hand over his face. The clothes that he wore puddled around him as though they didn't belong.

Vic moved over to the table and set down the tray.

"Okay, bud. Soup's on," he declared inelegantly, settling himself into a chair and taking a minute to look around. As purgatory went it didn't seem so bad. There were no windows, but otherwise it looked like a normal, run of the mill hotel room, perhaps even a bit bigger than most. Beside the bed and the small dining room set, there was a dresser and a desk with a computer on it, and Vic could see a blue bathroom through the semi-opened door.

The occupant hadn't moved. Vic sighed and regarded Stringer where he lay, no doubt brooding. Mansfield himself had plenty of experience at that activity and recognized it on sight.

"If you let yourself go to hell, you'll have lost, and they'll have won. You know that, don't you?"

Silence followed. For a moment, Victor thought that he was going to be ignored, and then a hoarse, bitter voice issued from beneath the arm that curved over the unseen face. "Whatever it is that you're selling, I've already got two."

Vic eyed the steak, cooling on the plate beside him. His belly rumbled, reminding him that he hadn't eaten anything that day. Shrugging philosophically, he picked up the knife and fork and dug into the meal. "Waste not, want not," he said through his first, delectable mouthful.

The only sounds were those of the cutlery clattering on the plate, and the munching as Victor tore into Stringer's dinner. He'd finished the main course, and was reaching for dessert when the man on the bed finally sat up.

"What the hell are you doing?"

After a moment to pay the man back for his prolonged silence, Vic glanced over at him, mouth full of the delicious pie.

"You didn't want it, and I'm starving. Damn, it was good, too." He returned his attention to the pie as he attempted to conceal the shock he felt at the appearance of his double. Unshaven and ravaged, the man seemed to be made from paper, so thin he was. His hair was matted and unkempt, and only the stain of several days' growth of beard broke the pallor of his face, until he raised glowing eyes that seemed to burn into Vic.

"Okay. I've changed my mind. I'll buy. Who the fuck are you?" The voice assailed Victor, as familiar as his own, and he winced inwardly. That was the $1,000,000 question, wasn't it? Who the hell was he to interfere in this poor bastard's life? He sighed and put down his fork.

"I'm the person you should blame for your current situation, I guess. If you didn't look like me, you probably wouldn't be here." Vic toyed moodily with the napkin. "I'm told that they took you and turned your life into hell purely and simply because you and I look alike."

Mac Stringer stood, revealing a physique that appeared more appropriate to an elderly man. He stooped, and his body seemed twisted somehow as he shambled over to the table, and to Vic.

Standing over Vic, Stringer peered at him for an inordinately long time. Then, he pulled out another chair and sat down to face him. "What are you telling me?" he asked.

Vic felt awful as he got a closer look at the sorry state of the man he'd been sent to … to claim for the Director. His eyes shifted at the empty tray in front of him, and smiled weakly.

"Look, I'm sorry I ate your steak. You want me to go find you something to eat?" Mac Stringer made a gesture of dismissal that indicated Vic, the tray, and everything that was no longer on it.

"Talk, dammit. I want to know what you meant."

Vic gazed into the tormented eyes for another moment, and then nodded, swallowed, and began to get his thoughts together. Victor twirled the knife back and forth between his fingers absently, and his eyes darkened as he gazed into a past that was gone forever. "I was a cop. When my colleagues framed me, I was recruited out of jail to work for the Agency. I'm part of a team. Apparently we're successful, though I'm never sure whether what we do is for good or for gain. Because you look like me, someone thought that you would be useful. There's apparently a rivalry between the different departments in the Agency. God only knows what they were intending to do with you, but it probably involved either killing me or doing something equally permanent and unpleasant."

"You've gotta be kidding. This isn't James Bond. This is Canada, dammit. Things like that don't happen in Canada." For the first time since Victor had entered the room there was a little of the animation he'd seen on the video in Stringer's voice.

Vic shook his head. Then he started to laugh. "You're not serious. You can't be. But if you are, I'll introduce you to the Cleaners. That would change your outlook on life in a big way. Things like that and worse happen here. Look what happened to you. You think that denying it will make it all into a dream or something?" Vic shook the knife at Stringer for emphasis, and then realized that he was brandishing it and put it down sheepishly. "I'm telling you from bitter experience that the only way you can beat this kind of shit is to take what control of it you can. Come on, man. Don't let them grind you down to nothing."

Stringer sneered at Vic, shifting in his chair. "You think I want control? You think I'd give them the satisfaction of fighting so they can smack me down again? I mean - what's the point?" He drooped listlessly. "They've taken everything I had. Why should I bother to fight? There's nothing left to fight for."

"You know, you're right." Vic stood abruptly, scraping his chair along the thin carpet as he rose. "Don't let me stop you from wallowing in self pity. I've taken up enough of your time already. And for a minute there, it sounded like you actually had some life left in you. Guess you aren't that much like me after all." Giving the room one last look, Vic moved to depart, not deigning to give it or Stringer a backwards glance. He had reached the door when the plate that had held the steak smacked the wall beside his head, and burst into pieces. Slowly, Victor turned to face Stringer. His temper flared dramatically.

"What the hell was that for?" he thundered, picking splinters of Pyrex from his jacket as he stomped back over to Stringer. The other man did nothing, other than smirk at him in a snide fashion. As Vic grabbed the front of the man's shirt and hauled him up so that they were standing nose to nose, Stringer's expression didn't alter; he snorted at his assailant, and stood, perfectly limp beneath Vic's clutching hands.

The standoff lasted for over a full minute. When Stringer finally did speak, it was in a hoarse, tight voice that reflected not only pain, but also barely leashed fury. "You really think I can get them back; have some kind of revenge on them for what they did?"

Vic's hands relaxed on Stringer's shirt as he processed the angry plea. What redress could there possibly be for someone who had been wronged so terribly? He shook his head in pity, but he knew what he had to say.

"I don't know, bud. I really don't, but if there is, I'll help you find it. You can count on that."

Vic meant it. He was angry for this man who had been so dreadfully treated, and even as he realized that the Director had successfully manipulated him into feeling that way, he knew that he would do what it took to help Mack Stringer. His conscience wouldn't allow him to do otherwise.

Stringer slumped and Vic reached out to steady him. "Come on, bud. You're not going to do it like this. Go and shower. I'll find you another dinner." Stringer nodded, and slowly, very slowly, he moved off into the bathroom. Vic watched him go, and when he heard the water begin to flow from the shower, he nodded to himself and went in search of another steak.

Showered, shaved, fed and watered, Mack Stringer looked a bit more like a human being, albeit an undernourished, sun-deprived one. Sipping an after-dinner cup of coffee, he eyed Victor warily.

Vic waited, seeing the spark of life in Stringer's eyes and trusting that the younger man would talk when he was ready. Truth be told, Vic wasn't sure he wanted to go through with implementing the course of action he'd decided upon just as Mac had started in on his dinner.

"So what happens now?"

Smiling a trifle sheepishly, Victor tried to correct what he perceived to be an earlier error. Holding out his hand, he said, "Vic Mansfield." Thinking he'd seen the barest hint of a smile, Vic counted that as progress along with the slight softening he saw in the other man's gaze.

"Mack Stringer. But you knew that, I guess."

"Yeah, I did," Vic admitted, fearing that even that small acknowledgement of Stringer's situation might cause trouble. Rapidly moving to something practical, he added, "Do you mind if I call you Stringer? My partner's name is Mac, too. Mac Ramsey."

"Wouldn't want to confuse you, Mansfield."

Noting the edge in Stringer's voice, he said, "I prefer Vic, actually."

Stringer looked at Victor as though he was trying to find some hidden meaning in the simple statement. A few moments of intense scrutiny later, Mac leaned back in his chair and muttered, "Ok, Vic, now that the social niceties are attended to, what happens?"

Looking him directly in the eye, Vic dropped his bomb. "We get you out of here."

"Out of here?" Stringer repeated, unable to keep his hope in check. "No shit?"

"No shit, Stringer."

"Where?"

"My place until I can convince the Director that it's ok to make other arrangements."

Eyes narrowing, Stringer growled, "Your boss is letting you take me home like some stray puppy? You must have been a very good operative this month."

"Oh for-," Victor began before cutting himself off. How could he blame Stringer for being skeptical after all he'd been through? The sarcasm is only a front, Vic reasoned. He'd seen the other man's hope before Stringer had buried it under bitterness. "Look, she's only doing this grudgingly. She hated the idea because of how fragile she thinks you are."

Stringer frowned expressively. "Fragile?"

"Yeah, isn't that a crock of shit? You're not. Brittle maybe, but not fragile."

"Why the fuck does some bitch who dresses like she's ten years younger than she is and doesn't know me from Adam think I'm fragile?"

Forcibly keeping his expression impassive in the face of righteous indignation, Vic decided to go for broke. "Terri was her sister."

Mouth dropped open in shock, Stringer had to try three times to form words. "Terri's sister? I mean, Terri mentioned a sister who worked for the government, but she made it sound like bureaucrat stuff, you know?" Vic nodded and more words followed. "An … an older sister. Shit! This is impossible. My girlfriend's sister working with a guy that looks like me. No way!"

Shrugging, Victor asked, "You wanna get out of here or what?"

"You sure you used to be a cop, Vic?"

Taken aback, Victor muttered, "What kind of question is that?"

"You've got some shrink moves, cowboy. Keep changing the subject."

"What do you know about shrinks, anyway?"

"More than I ever wanted to," Stringer replied with a tired smile. "Lived with one for almost two years." Leaning forward, he focused on Victor and demanded, "Are you playing me, Vic?"

"No."

The two men stared at each other once again, that single word hanging in the air between them.

When Stringer nodded his acceptance of Vic's assertion, Mansfield softly inquired, "You want to hear the conditions?"

Sighing, Stringer said, "There would have to be conditions, wouldn't there?"

"Yeah. You interested?"

"Why not? Let ‘em rip."

After taking a deep breath to collect his thoughts, Victor held up his forefinger and began, "One. You don't run. We go to my apartment and you stay there. You can go out, but only if I go with you. Got it?"

"Prisoners under the age of thirty must be accompanied by an adult on furlough. Yeah."

Mack's voice had been flat and emotionless, but Vic was encouraged by the attitude shining through in his response. "Two. You rest, eat and work out until you get your strength back."

Looking thoughtful, Stringer nodded. "Prisoner must improve health to work on chain gang."

"Three. You consider the Director's proposal about what to do with the rest of your life, because she will make you one."

"You happy, Vic?"

"Huh?"

"You heard me," Stringer said, eyes boring into Victor's once again. "She made you a proposal and you accepted. You happy?"

"Happier than I'd have been doing time."

Stringer grunted in what sounded like disapproval. "Why bother just to exist, Vic? If I get out of this mess, I want to live!"

"Your life will be whatever you can make of it within the parameters set by the Director. I … I'm just … not very good without structure, so …" Vic trailed off uneasily, suddenly wondering why he was discussing himself when Stringer was the issue.

"How stringent are they - these parameters of hers?"

Vic had no urge to lie to this man. "Your every move will be documented and filmed. She'll find out everything about you and what makes you tick, and she'll use it to get what she wants."

Surprising Victor, Stringer smiled. "Only if you let her, Vic. Someone can't take that kind of power; you have to give it to them."

"You don't understand."

"Maybe not," Stringer allowed with a self-deprecating tilt of his head. "Are there any more catches to this deal of yours?"

With a grin, Vic asserted, "You clean up after yourself and me, occasionally. Ok?"

"I don't know about that one. How much of a slob are you?"

Pleased that Stringer was loosening up a little, Vic admitted, "I'm kind of a neat freak, actually, so that one will be easy."

Stringer looked around the rooms in which he'd been sequestered, before his eyes tracked back to Mansfield. "Ok, Vic. You got yourself a roommate."

Mac Stringer gazed around the apartment, not ready to give up the monosyllabic tack he'd taken on the drive over here. He'd always wanted a pickup truck, so he'd spent the time looking over Vic's vehicle. That his reluctance to engage in conversation frustrated the other man almost amused Mack. If he'd been capable of amusement, it would've done the trick. Hadn't Victor told him that the only way to win was to take control of the situation? He wondered what his expression had showed when he caught Victor looking at him quizzically. Curious, he raised an eyebrow.

"What's with you?" Victor demanded.

Stringer shrugged and moved aimlessly about the living room.

Vic's second question demanded a response, however. "You want a beer, Stringer?"

"Yeah."

When the other man disappeared into what Mack presumed was the kitchen, he decided to see what there was to see about Victor Mansfield. Pictures, as they say, are worth a thousand words, so Stringer walked over to the wall where several of them were displayed. One caught his eye - Vic with a pretty Asian woman. The smile on the man's face told Mack all he needed to know about Victor's view of the relationship. He had the look of a man in love. The woman, however, was a different story. She had a reserve to her that made Stringer wonder whether she actually reciprocated or whether she'd merely convinced herself that she did or had even bothered with the self-deception for Vic's sake.

The sound of a throat being cleared spun Stringer around. Victor stood not far from him with a bottle of beer in each hand, eyeing Mack warily.

"Who's she?" Stringer asked, gesturing at the picture he'd been studying.

"My partner."

Laughing, Stringer wondered, "That's Mac?"

"No!" Victor nearly shouted. "That's LiAnn, my … ah … other partner."

"Your other partner? I see. How many partners you got, Vic?"

Clearly irritated, Victor stepped toward his guest, shoved a beer bottle at him and growled, "Two. Mac and LiAnn."

Taking the beverage, Stringer met Vic's eyes. "She's not your girlfriend?"

"No."

Turning back to the wall, Stringer mused, "So where's Mac?"

"I don't have a picture of Mac on my wall!"

"So why one of LiAnn?"

Without speaking, Victor retreated to the couch and flopped down onto it. "I'm supposed to be helping you adjust," he muttered. "Not satisfying your morbid curiosity about my personal life."

"What do you think this is, Vic? I'm a trained observer. I see things and I ask questions. That's what I do. You should be pleased."

Sullenly taking a long swallow of beer, Victor commanded, "Interrogate someone else."

"Who would you suggest?"

Fixing Stringer with a hard look, Victor stood up and began to pace. Finally, he asked, "Why are you being such a pain in the ass?"

"Why am I here, Victor?"

"Because I thought it would be nicer than a holding cell."

Nicer? Who was this guy really? "What's the difference? I'm not free to come and go. I'm just as much of a prisoner here as I was there."

Holding up his beer bottle, Vic asserted, "This for one thing."

"I'm supposed to be swayed by look-alikes bearing beer, is that it? C'mon, Vic. What do you take me for? This is just another game. I'm tired of playing."

"Game?"

Mansfield looked genuinely confused and that took Stringer aback. He'd expected more of a professional, glib denial. This one hadn't gotten his story straight.

"Yeah, a game. He isn't responding to the violence. Sex didn't work. Neither did drugs. Don't see much merit in rock and roll for this, so let's go out on a limb and try something completely different. Let's rescue him. Yeah, send in a red haired, female quasi-authority figure to do it. He won't be expecting that. And then … then what can we do? Wait, I know. Let's present him with someone he might identify with, someone he'll trust and expose him to more benign living conditions." Stringer noted that Mansfield reacted to the concepts of identifying and trust and grinned in satisfaction.

"That'll shake him out of his funk. Well, congratulations, Vic. It did. But, you know what? I don't think you'll like me this way very much. Pretty damn soon, you're gonna wish you'd left the morose, pathetic bastard whose dinner you ate the hell alone!"

His outburst tired him, reminding Stringer of how far he'd let himself deteriorate; hoping that those that held him would lose interest. Shakily, he reached for the back of the couch to steady himself.

Victor took a step toward him, prompting Mack to say, "Don't."

Bristling with anger, Vic rapidly closed the distance between them, grabbed Stringer by the arm, hauled him in front of the couch and shoved him down onto it. "Stubborn son of a bitch," he growled.

"You got that right," Stringer muttered, hating the weakness that fatigue put in his voice.

"You think I'm going to deny it?" Vic snarled. "I'm not. The Director is playing both of us right now, but I don't care. I brought you here because I don't want to see someone else go through the same shit I did when she offered me this damn job by himself. I needed help back then and I didn't get it. You will, if you aren't too stubborn to take it."

The older man's vehemence impressed Stringer. This was either on the level, or one seriously good performance. Wanting to know which, he queried, "Why?"

"Because the Agency fucked with you like my buddies fucked with me."

Nodding slowly, Stringer sipped his beer. His mind was whirling and he couldn't order his thoughts. He was simply too damn tired and way too rundown for this garbage.

"You still with me, Stringer?" Vic asked softly.

Stringer's eyes snapped opened and he slowly lifted his head up from where he'd rested it on the back of the couch. "I … I guess."

"Right," Vic muttered. "For tonight, you take the bed. C'mon. Let's go."

The will to fight left him, and Stringer allowed Victor to help him up and into a comfortable bedroom. For form's sake, he protested, "You could've left me on the couch."

"Well, I didn't. Get some sleep, Stringer."

Stringer watched Vic retreat, hoping that he'd be able to figure a way out of this mess once he got some rest.

Vic spent a very restless night on the couch. There were no sounds from Stringer, but Vic expected them any minute. The very absence of noise seemed shocking to him as the night dragged. He lay awake trying to make plans for Stringer and by extension, for himself.

When morning finally came, he was bleary eyed and resentful; his back ached, and he felt like death warmed up. He rolled stiffly from his couch and stumped into the kitchen to brew coffee while he pulled his fuzzy ideas together.

First things first, he thought. Before I can do anything else, I have to get Stringer half way able to cope with the Director. That is easier said than done.

As coffee dripped through the filter, Victor inventoried his cupboards. He would have to do a major shop to buy things that would build his protégé's strength. Vic made a show of cooking, but had to admit that most of the time he ate out. There just hadn't been much excitement in the thought of cooking for one. Mentally he made lists of protein to buy and meals to cook. By the time Stringer emerged, looking well rested, Victor had started on his second cup of coffee and was beginning to feel as though he could manage the day.

"Morning, Stringer." Vic waved him towards the coffee, and returned to his list.

Stringer grunted, poured himself coffee, and sank down into a chair, inhaling the steam with evident pleasure. He didn't say anything directly to Vic, but his mouth quirked in the vestiges of a smile at the picture Vic presented, sitting at the kitchen counter, clad only in his boxers, and yawning repeatedly.

"What?" Vic saw the small smirk as it rippled over Stringer's features.

"Oh, nothing." Stringer buried his face in the fragrant steam that rose from his mug, "I slept really well last night. First time in months that I didn't feel as though I was being ringed by vultures waiting for me to stop moving."

"That's good. I was just working out a list of stuff I need to buy. Is there anything you can't do without?" Vic ran a hand through his hair. "You think you might wanna get a haircut and re-join the human race?"

Stringer met his eyes with a look that was part appraisal and part challenge. "Just because I spent the night in your bed, doesn't mean that you get to start picking out my clothes this morning."

"Oh, come on, Stringer. Don't be such a jerk. Have you seen yourself in the mirror lately? You look like the fucking wild man of Borneo. It would be a good first step to give up on your impression of a bear backing out of a hole. I can loan you a razor if you don't have one.

The stubble on Mack Stringer's chin wasn't half so bad as Vic suggested, but he could by no means be considered clean cut. Victor ran his eyes over the other man, whose hair was hanging into his eyes and down onto his shoulders, and shook his head. "Your problem - if you want to go on peering through a hedge, carry on. I'm going for a shower. You want one, you can get one after me."

He stood up, placing his mug down on the counter, heading for the bathroom and welcome solitude.

The day broke into a series of strange confrontations, as Vic and Stringer negotiated a set of living arrangements that would permit them to exist under one small roof for an unspecified period of time.

They shopped, and Stringer did consent to a haircut. When they returned to Vic's condo, they were laden with items of food, toiletries and clothing. Mack Stringer seemed quiet, and the skin around his mouth appeared pinched. Vic wondered if he'd overdone Stringer's first day exertions. Five minutes later, as Stringer lay snoring on his couch, Vic knew that he had.

Vic unpacked the purchases and started to prepare dinner, his plans for getting Stringer into the gym temporarily on hold as he contemplated the sleeping man.

Stringer was younger than Victor, and his face in sleep seemed impossibly innocent. The dark smudges beneath his eyes were translucent, the cheekbones painfully taut beneath the fine skin, and the thick lashes curled onto his cheeks as though they were fronds of some rare fern. The mouth, pinched closed while he was awake, had relaxed, and his lips curved sensually. Stringer had laugh lines at the corners of his eyes, and in the grip of some pleasant dream he had lost his sour expression.

As Vic chopped tomatoes for sauce, he bent his mind to the question of how he could best restore his guest to health. He was just adding red wine to the mix when the doorbell sounded, dragging him back to the present. Wiping his hands on his apron, he crossed to the door and opened it, leaving the security chain in place as he peered through the gap.

Sighing, he pushed the door closed again and unlatched the chain, opening it to Jackie Janczyk, who was leaning up against the wall outside, swinging her car keys idly in one hand.

"Like, hi, Victor. The Director thought that I should swing by and say hello, you know?"

"No, I don't. What do you want, Jackie? What does she want?"

Jackie smiled her non-stick smile and sashayed in past the scowling Victor. As she drew level with the couch, she glanced at the slumbering occupant, but betrayed no surprise. Victor hoped that was because Stringer's face wasn't visible. Sauntering over to the pots bubbling on the stove, she touched the wooden spoon, tasting her finger delicately.

"Hey, y'know, I kinda like have to watch my figure, but this is good, Victor. I love Stroganoff." She perched on one of the stools beside the counter, grinning unrepentantly. Vic growled at her half-heartedly, as her failure to answer his questions filled him with a sense of foreboding.

"What did she want you to come see me about?" he asked, his voice husky with annoyance. "It's supposed to be my weekend off. Just because I didn't go away doesn't mean that I'm still on duty."

"Awww," she said, patting his cheek with a giggle, her hand trailing over Vic's rough jaw. "Lighten up. I just love to eat Italian. Reminds me of my days with the mob, only, I have to be careful not to eat too much because it would be so uncool to have like a huge roll of fat." Babbling happily, Jackie waved her arms expansively as she posed, impossibly slim and toned in her micro-mini skirt and belly-button revealing midriff sweater.

"That's nice, Jackie, really, but I'm…um busy. Why don't you come back some time when I'm free, and we can have a cosy…" Vic's voice tailed off, Jackie's attention was on Stringer, who had chosen that moment to awaken and sit, stretching luxuriously.

"Victor!" twittered the blonde. "You have a brother! That is so awesome. I think that family is just the greatest thing, don't you?" She uncrossed her long legs.

Vic winced inwardly. This was all he needed. He was sure that the ditzy blonde would be an unwelcome intrusion to Stringer. Damn the Director for foisting her off on him just when he was beginning to make progress with the prickly ex-mountie.

"He's not well, Jackie, leave…" the next words were never uttered. To his astonishment, Stringer rallied, smiling affably and extending a hand for Jackie to shake. As he watched, Stringer patted the couch for Jackie to sit beside him. He was about to say something about the danger of cultivating the ex-mob queen and current airhead, when his sauce boiled over.

Uttering mental imprecations, Victor returned to the stove, adding more wine and mushrooms, stirring the result, and measuring out water and pasta into the steamer. By the time he was done, Stringer and Jackie were chatting with the ease of long time comrades.

"Victor, this is too amazing. Mack told me how out of shape he is, so I'm going to put him on a fitness regime." She grinned, patting Stringer's face. "Why don't the three of us do it together? Like, it totally wouldn't hurt you to shape up a little, would it?" With a malicious roll of her eyes, she dug a finger into Victor's middle. "I can pinch a teeny bit more than an inch right here."

Drawing breath to snarl at her, Victor suddenly saw the slight sparkle in the eyes of his protégé, and swallowed the scathing words. Jackie the Jinx was snapping Stringer out of his current despond, and he couldn't in all conscience get in the way of that. Vic drew a deep breath, smacked Jackie's hand down again, and then nodded. "Yeah? You think you can turn that sorry wreck of a man into Schwartzenegger? Okay. Count me in; this I gotta see." Mentally making a note that Jackie seemed almost normal today, he began setting the table - for three.

"Dinner's ready," Vic called to the two younger people.

Stringer followed Jackie into the dining area, nodding at her ideas about his workout regimen as he gallantly held her chair out for her. She smiled sweetly and tossed her hair and allowed Stringer to slide the chair beneath her.

Victor concentrated on not rolling his eyes, busying himself with pouring wine, Jackie's first, then Stringer's. When he moved the bottle toward his own glass, Jackie snaked out a hand and snatched it from him.

"Hey!" Vic protested. "I said I'd work out with the two of you; I didn't agree to any dietary restrictions."

Jackie winked at Stringer and placed the wine back on the table out of Victor's reach. "Not my idea, Vic. Pasta without wine is like sacrilege or something."

"Well, what do you know, Jackie? We actually agree on something." It took all of Vic's waning self-control to ignore the smile Stringer was hiding behind a hand. "So why don't you just give me the bottle back, and we can try to have a pleasant meal?"

"Can't," she murmured in a regretful tone that didn't match her bright, mischievous eyes. She resolved that conflict when she spoke with incurable irreverence in her voice. "The boss lady wants to have you … for dinner. All to herself, she said."

The mere thought of the Director uttering those words froze the blood in Victor's veins. "She didn't say that!"

"Well, ok. Not, like, exactly." Jackie was smiling widely at Vic now, enjoying his discomfort too much for his taste. "She did say for you to wear black, though. She made me repeat that part, as if I'd forget." Glancing at Stringer, she explained, "Black is his best color."

"I've heard it's slimming," Stringer offered with a grin.

"Right!" Jackie enthused. Turning to Victor, she sighed to call attention to her chest, and Vic noted that Stringer's eyes drifted in that direction. "She said she'd meet you at this address." With a flourish, she removed a small, folded piece of paper from her cleavage and held it out to Victor. "If you wear something decent, you'll look good together. Maybe she's going to show you off at her club."

Victor paled at the thought and Stringer saw it, asking, "Club?"

"Jackie," Vic interrupted, a clear warning in his voice.

"Don't be shy," she chastised, leaning over toward Stringer. Victor was gratified to see Mac's eyes stay focused on her face and Jackie's resulting moue of disappointment.

"This has nothing to do with being shy, it -."

Jackie was off on her tangent, full steam ahead, gesturing for Stringer to help himself to dinner as she talked. "The Director's a founding member of a very exclusive sex club. I'm dying to go, but it's invitation only."

Not having moved as she'd directed, Stringer's eyes widened and he looked to Victor. "You and Terri's sister …?"

"No," Victor muttered. "No. We … No. There's no we about us. Or," Vic continued, stammering. "Or any us for that matter."

Laughing, Jackie piled pasta on Stringer's plate. "You better get changed, Vic. She said 8:30 and she's all obsessive about punctuality."

Victor looked dubiously at the piece of paper in his hand. After serving herself, Jackie evidently couldn't stand the suspense. "It's a suite at the Ambassador. You should - how did she put it - try not to stick out like a sore thumb. Said that meant decent cotton at least. Preferably wool or silk. No leather." Jackie frowned at the last. "I guess you aren't going to the club, then." Brightening just as quickly as she'd clouded over, she added, "Unless she's selected something especially for you to wear as a surprise. It isn't your birthday, is it, Vic?"

He was getting nowhere standing here, Vic decided, as he growled, "No."

Jackie was her usual relentless self. "Anniversary with the Agency?"

Catching himself actually thinking about it, he snarled, turned on his heel and left the room.

Nervous, Victor stepped out of the elevator on the top floor of the five star hotel. Based on Jackie's specifications, he'd selected a black cotton shirt that he'd actually sent out to be washed and pressed when he'd been feeling optimistic about his social life. When he'd sunk back into his normal mode of work and a quiet beer or glass of wine at home while making complicated meals for one or eating out at local dives, he'd shoved it into the back of his closet. Matching wool slacks and a very dark gray herringbone sport coat completed the hastily assembled ensemble.

Jackie had wolf whistled and even Stringer had nodded in approval when he'd left. The blonde had followed him to the door, kissed him on the cheek and asked whether he really needed his gun. Unconsciously shrugging to check the position of his shoulder holster, Vic had glared at her as menacingly as he could manage. Unfortunately, her giggles had followed him down the hall, ruining the image he'd wanted to project.

Mustering his courage and telling himself that the adrenaline rush and rapidly beating heart were stupid, Vic raised a fist and knocked on the door.

A sharply dressed young man opened it immediately and inquired, "Mr. Mansfield?"

Surprised, Vic managed, "Uh … yeah," while trying to see beyond the guy without craning his neck.

"Please, come in. She's expecting you."

Vic warily stepped around the young man, demanding, "Who are you?"

"My name is Daniel. If you don't find everything to be to your complete satisfaction, call down to the front desk and ask for me."

Nodding, Vic watched the young man begin his retreat before he realized the Director was nowhere in sight. "Where?" Vic gulped. The question was out of his mouth before the logical answer leapt into his brain. He did not want to set foot beyond the living room portion of this suite.

"The balcony," Daniel supplied helpfully, gesturing in the direction of the sliding door at the far end of the room.

Vic couldn't suppress a sigh of relief. He saw that Daniel noticed but didn't comment, choosing instead to slip out with a quiet, "Have a good evening, Mr. Mansfield."

Squaring his shoulders, he strode across the room, knocked once on the door just in case he might be interrupting anything and opened it.

The Director was sitting alone, staring pensively at the skyline. Given the fuss over his wardrobe, Victor couldn't help but note hers. A simple, elegant black dress told him nothing about why he was here.

"Sit down, Victor. Have a drink."

The small table between the two chairs held three liquor bottles, two of which were opened. She still hadn't looked at him when Vic had poured himself a healthy slug of single barrel bourbon and settled into the other chair.

"How is Mack?"

Victor wasn't accustomed to the Director sounding either tired or subdued. Off balance, he muttered, "Stringer's coming along. Slowly."

"Did Jackie help?"

"Yeah," Vic admitted. "Pretty women have a tendency to perk guys his age up."

She lifted her glass to her lips, still focused elsewhere. At that moment, Victor realized that her focus might be inward.

"Do you think Jackie is pretty, Victor?"

Where the fuck did that question come from?

"In an obvious sort of way, yeah. Her body is … ah …"

A harsh bark of laughter silenced him and for a few moments all that could be heard was the faint sound of ice impacting crystal as they both drank. "I think perfect is the word you're reaching for."

Unable to interpret her tone, Victor once again took refuge in his bourbon. To his dismay, his stomach rumbled. He had no wish to call attention to himself.

"Would you like something to eat?"

Finally, her eyes came to rest upon him and Victor felt like she was seeing right through his chest, the chair back and the wall and into her suite. There was no life in her eyes, only … resignation. "Are you all right?" he inquired quietly.

"I'll be fine," she countered with a sigh. "Order us some food and a bottle of wine. The menu is inside." When he rose to his feet, she added, "And don't worry about the prices, Victor. It's on me."

The hotel served their meal like a restaurant would. Appetizers first. Salad next. The main course followed by a fruit and cheese plate to share.

Munching aged Swiss cheese resting on an imported cracker, Victor suddenly realized that they were well into their second bottle of Pinot Noir. So far, the conversation had been general and, he had to admit, pleasant, and the food was nothing less than outstanding. A little buzzed, Victor could appreciate the fact that a year ago the excellence of this meal would've been lost on him, so much had his palate been refined since then by his conscious choice of a hobby.

He smiled at the thought, as he murmured, "Thanks."

The Director leaned toward him, her intense eyes boring into his. "For what?"

Gesturing to the elegantly simple table setting and the remains of the fourth course, he softly stated the obvious. "Dinner."

"You haven't asked why you're here," she noted, lifting her wine glass to her lips while watching him avidly. "Why not?"

Victor shrugged. "I figured you'd tell me if you wanted to and if you didn't, no amount of asking was going to make any difference."

"That would be like me, wouldn't it?"

Surprised yet wary, Victor nodded.

"Do you want to know, Victor?"

Something in her eyes pulled the truth out of him. "I always want to know why."

"Do you now?"

For the first time that evening, there was a hint of a purr in her voice and a smile with a touch of sexuality on her face. Tensing, Vic admitted, "Yeah."

"There's a dinner in the Excelsior Room. All of the Directors of the various units are there. I was planning on taking you to make it clear that I knew precisely what had been done to Mack Stringer and why."

Information imparted, she fell silent. Victor frowned at the obvious omission. "So … why aren't we at that dinner?"

She stared at her wine. "Because I started thinking about Terri and realized that what I know or how much control I have over the situation is irrelevant. He may have failed in his effort to disrupt my team, but he hurt me in a way that I can't fix or repay in kind." Victor wasn't sure that he was supposed to have heard her mutter, "The little bastard has no siblings."

Stunned by the revelation, Victor found himself asking, "Why didn't you just send me back home?"

"What?" she asked, chuckling throatily. "After I'd forced you to abandon the safety of your blue jeans and leather jacket? Even I am not that cruel, Victor."

Before this moment, Victor wouldn't have been so sure she was being honest, but he was now, probably because of the undercurrent of sadness that he finally perceived to everything she'd said and done that evening.

His attention refocused on her as she dialed Daniel once again. "We'll forego dessert in favor of a bottle of Martell XO."

"Cognac?" Victor choked. "After all this?"

"Why not? You're not driving tonight and neither am I."

Eyes widening as the beginning pangs of panic set in, Victor stood, feeling more comfortable towering over her, yet somehow he couldn't form his words into a statement. "I'm not?"

The Director looked at him as though he were a very slow learner and waved a hand dismissively. "I didn't save you from being replaced by our morose ex-Mountie only to let you drive under the influence."

"I'll just take a walk," Victor muttered. "Always sobers me up."

"It's pouring rain, Victor and we can't afford for you to come down with an upper respiratory infection. Not while you're responsible for Mack."

"I'm not responsible for Mac!"

Smiling, she clarified, "Stringer, Victor. Stringer." When he calmed a little, she added, "Go on. Have a look in the other room. The bed is more than big enough for the two of us and your virtue."

To hide the blush he could feel forming on his face, Victor did as she suggested. It looked bigger than king size, but he wasn't sure any bed was large enough for him to share with her.

If Ramsey gets wind of this, he'll never let it go. Never.

Vic stayed in the bedroom until he heard Daniel's voice. Feeling safer with a neutral third party present, he ventured back out to living room. When he appeared, the Director winked at Daniel who winked back and retreated as Victor's face reddened again.

"Have some cognac, Victor. Daniel was kind enough to pour for us."

After taking a deep breath, Victor moved as she directed. "Just one."

"Oh, Victor, don't ever settle for just one. Of anything." Her mildly predatory expression transformed into wry amusement as she added, "For goodness' sake, I won't bite. Unless you ask me nicely."

Fuzzily certain that he should object to her saying that kind of thing to him, Victor sank onto the couch, and realized his mistake when she swooped in to sit down beside him. The smile that curled her lip was a scary thing, and Victor felt trapped as he sat, body rigid, pressed back against the cushions, awaiting his fate.

When she leaned forward to pick up her glass, Victor jumped and permitted a shaky breath to escape him as he realized that the attack wasn't coming quite yet. Slowly, he reached forward and took his own glass, sipping the liquor and appreciating the fiery warmth of it as it seeped into his system, relaxing him.

They sat in silence for a while before the Director turned to face him, although her eyes didn't meet his. She seemed lost in the contemplation of her drink, both hands cupping the goblet to warm it as she sipped.

"My sister was very precious to me. She was a reminder of the way things used to be."

She hesitated, her face closed and bleak as memories flickered behind her eyes. All too soon, she became aware of Victor's scrutiny and leaned forward so that her long red hair veiled her face.

"Pain fades after a while," he remarked, thoughtfully. "It seems to hurt forever, but you know what? One day, you wake up and suddenly realize that it's not agony any more, and you can bear it." He nodded in agreement with his sentiments. "Some day, it will just be a part of you, and you won't even notice it any more. You'll have been assimilated."

For a moment that stretched forever, she seemed not to hear his husky voice, but as he subsided, sinking into the couch to await what came, she raised her brows at him.

"How very depressing of you, Victor. I don't have the time to wait for things to happen." A faintly mocking smile on her face, she asked, "Have you never wanted to take the bull by the horns? Are you always content to be a victim?"

Victor stared at her in speechless fury, and a gleam of satisfaction showed in the Director's eyes. "Content isn't the word I'd use. I'd be happy if people would stop trying to manipulate me once in a while." Her malicious chuckle made him color painfully, and he took another drink of liqueur to cover his discomfort.

"Victor, Victor, Victor," she said sweetly. "You should fight for the things that you want. You'll never be happy until you stop letting people push you around." His snort of anger induced a sly smile, swiftly hidden behind her hand.

"So if I refuse to do the things that you order, you'll cheer me on in my bid for independence?" His voice was tight, furious. Again, he drank, stunned that he'd emptied his glass. Wordlessly she refilled it, her co-ordination slipping as she slopped the tawny liquor into his glass. He barely noticed, raising it to his lips once more.

"Perhaps," she murmured.

Victor's head swam, so he couldn't be sure that he heard right, and late arriving prudence forced him to place his goblet down on the coffee table. Damn, he was drunk. That wasn't a good thing to be around the enigmatic - and normally malicious - presence of his boss. Frowning with effort, he placed his tongue with great exactitude around the words that threatened to slur.

"'M tired now. Need to sleep." That did it. Succinct, to the point, no double entendre for her to seize, nothing but a statement of intent. He waited, smiling in satisfaction at his own grasp of expressive language under trying circumstance.

The Director lowered her glass and turned towards him, apparently far less affected by the quantities of alcohol she had consumed. That annoyed Victor until he noticed how very carefully she spoke. "The bed awaits you, Victor."

No! That would not do. He gulped. "I'll shleep… sleep out here, on the couch."

"My very dear Victor, I assure you that your honor is perfectly safe with me. You run along and get ready for bed. I promise to curb my baser nature." His head whipped around at that, and the room tilted alarmingly.

"What will you do if I refuse?" he croaked, sure that his eyes were showing the whites all the way around, like a panic stricken bunny.

"Oh, I'm sure that Dobrinsky would be pleased to assist me in ensuring that you comply." Her lips pursed judiciously, and he couldn't be sure whether she was considering the act of coercion with pleasure, or merely attempting to speak without betraying her own intoxication. He growled, for just a moment angered by the sheer inevitability of her getting her own way. Lacking the energy to sustain it, he sighed, stood, and attempted to orient himself, before lurching for the bathroom.

Once in solitude, he used the facilities, washed his face with cold water in a vain hope that he might sober up, and contemplated inducing himself to vomit. Quite apart from the fact of the Director's presence, he was going to have such a bad head in the morning that he shuddered in advance. Sighing, he turned on the tap and ran a glass of water, then another, drinking them down in noisy gulps as he attempted to stave off the worst of the dehydration. Damn. He hadn't had a skinful like this since the day that LiAnn had told him that she just wanted to be his friend. Vic never wanted to crawl inside a bottle and never emerge, primarily because he knew how easy that would be for him.

He used one of the hotel's toothbrushes, and then straightened his shoulders, facing the bathroom door with the fatalistic air of a person facing execution. Here we go, he thought. A stumble spoiled his planned exit and he used the wall to support himself as he made his way toward the bedroom. As he made his move, the Director rose up from the couch as if to follow, and promptly sat back down again with a hiccup.

Victor shuddered, averted his gaze and entered the bedroom. Falling onto the bed, he lay, fully clothed, waiting for the room to stop spinning.

He hadn't turned on the light, and although there were somewhat worrisome sounds now emanating from the sitting room, he didn't acknowledge them, instead closing his eyes and attained the never more blissful state of unconsciousness.

It didn't last. He became aware of something - someone tugging at his feet, and kicked out sluggishly in an attempt to rediscover his nirvana. Inner peace eluded him. The Director, now clad in an expensive and very chic satin nightdress, was messing about with his shoes. When he kicked a second time, Victor felt one part company with his foot. She crowed triumphantly, staggered and fell backward, landing in a heap on the floor to sit blinking owlishly, clutching his shoe to her chest.

"What d'ye want to go ‘n do that for?" Vic mumbled, attempting to divine her intentions - convinced that they were malevolent - the woman was always fucking malevolent. He'd learned that lesson way back.

"You can't sleep with your shoes on." The Director got to her knees and attacked his other foot with the single-minded ferocity that was her trademark. He quivered, and attempted to shake her off, but only succeeded in losing the battle for his other shoe.

"Get off me," he said, horrifically embarrassed, as she hooted and raised the footwear aloft like a demented trophy. She wavered and lost her balance again, falling forward to sprawl onto him. Victor howled in panic and struggled to wrest his shoe from her and hold it between them as though it were a talisman that would protect him from the menace that was her. Glaring at her through eyes that wouldn't quite focus, Victor shrank back against the pillow as he awaited what he was certain would be a fate worse than death.

"Come now, Victor. Let's see less of this foolishness. Take off your jacket and trousers, they'll be ruined if you sleep in them." The Director moved around to the other side of the bed, pulled back the covers and slipped beneath them with a dignity that was marred only by a faint hiccup. "You're perfectly safe."

Oddly and irrationally indignant that he had been deemed unworthy of sexual harassment, Victor started to rise and the room lurched alarmingly. He subsided and took a few deep breaths to settle himself. Finally, with an ill grace, he stood, shucked off his jacket, shirt and pants, and climbed into the bed clad only in his shorts. Shortly thereafter, he slept.

Jackie Janczyk baffled Mack Stringer. He'd listened to her prattle artlessly about everything - and nothing - and was absolutely no wiser now than he'd been when she'd started. That art of conversation was conspicuously missing only made matters worse. Her monologue covered places and people he didn't know, all interspersed with comments on Victor, his lifestyle and his lack of aspirations to be trendy.

"He's, like, so out of it," she explained. "He's a gorgeous man, but those clothes…" She wrinkled her nose as she made a dismissive gesture. "He'd look so cool in, like, Hugo Boss or something, but all you get is Levis." Jackie shrugged, and the ripple that went through her torso was both eloquent and sensual.

In another way entirely, Stringer was fascinated. The woman was extremely fit and well built. Her clothing would have shown any spare ounce of fat, had there been one clinging to her person. It revealed only sleek, toned lines. Mesmerized, he watched as she put away a huge plate of Victor's culinary effort, and washed it down with the wine. Terri had eaten heartily, and hadn't cared a fig for her figure either, although the thought of Terri ever dressing like Jackie was one that made him smile. She'd been far more at home when dressed like Victor in jeans and a man's shirt. He thought back to the one time that he'd seen her dressed to kill in red satin. What a night that had been. She'd been gorgeous and somehow defenseless in her skimpy dress. He'd pushed her up against the wall, without caring who might be near, tasting her exposed flesh and feeling his excitement grow as she'd permitted it.

Of course, she'd turned the tables on him. Terri had never been a submissive woman. He wouldn't love her if she were. Wouldn't have loved her, he corrected himself, feeling a lump rise in his throat as he remembered how that evening had ended. She'd caught the bad guy for him, and all he'd managed to do was get himself shot. Wound be damned, the two of them had made love fiercely. He'd tried again to get her to go back to Ottawa with him, and her response had been to cuff him to her and then to her bed. He'd missed his plane, but he hadn't cared.

Enough. He could feel the tears welling, filling his sinuses, and pinched the bridge of his nose in an attempt to stop himself from showing Jackie just how maudlin he'd become. Jackie gabbed gaily on as he got himself back under control and Stringer had to interrupt.

"You don't seem to worry about your calorie intake," Stringer said. "I like women who take life in big bites."

The tinkle of Jackie's laughter was a pleasant sound. "You are so right," she burbled, happily, and then she was off into the second encore of her description of her workout regime and how she could help him if he wanted. Strangely, on this topic, the more he listened, the better it sounded.

Dinner over, the two of them set about cleaning up, and soon the dishes were washed and dried, and the room was tidy. Stringer smiled at Jackie and began to hint about her leaving. Running out of tactful approaches, he said, "I'm tired, Jackie. Sorry I'm not better company. Maybe we should continue this conversation tomorrow."

Again, she uttered the little laugh that sounded like bells. "I am so clueless. Like, what was I thinking? You need your rest." She collected her things and followed Stringer to the door, turning once it was open to slip her arms around his neck. Before he could react, she plastered herself to his body and kissed him. While he stood, goggling, she disentangled herself, winked at him and left.

Victor Mansfield was afraid to open his eyes. His head was already pounding and he expected the situation to go from bad to worse when he allowed himself to accept visual input.

What in the hell did I do last night?

Other than his head, he felt reasonably good, rested, warm and content. All was quiet and his nose was being treated to the pleasant scents of clean sheets and perfume.

Perfume?

His question was resolved in the way of sluggish, half asleep, still slightly drunk minds - fitting the stimuli with known parameters. Victor smiled; he'd always liked the way LiAnn smelled, fresh and sophisticated. This new scent was different, more subtle somehow, but nice. Arms tightening around her, Victor buried his face in her hair.

She sighed and leaned her head back on his shoulder, clearing the path for him to nuzzle her neck. LiAnn hated snuggling but, for once, didn't protest. Encouraged, he did as he willed, finally giving in to the more primitive urge to mark the skin of her throat.

"Be careful, Victor. I might get the idea that you're enjoying yourself. And be tempted to act on it."

He froze. Heart pounding, Vic steeled himself to open his eyes before realizing that he didn't have to in order to confirm the identity of the speaker. Her hair was too long to be LiAnn's and Victor knew that it would be red rather than dark brown. No combination of run-of-the-mill swear words was adequate to the task of expressing Victor's dismay. Amusing the Director was not high on his list of activities under the best of circumstances, which these were definitely not.

Shifting so that his chin rested on her shoulder, he muttered, "Morning."

"Indeed. How's your head?"

With a small sigh, Victor rolled onto his back and stretched, not incidentally creating distance between them. "Pounding."

The Director chuckled and murmured something that sounded appreciative before trailing a fingertip along his breastbone. "Throbbing would've made for a better double entendre."

Painfully aware of his typical morning erection, he grunted, "Sorry," gruffly.

"Don't be."

Her lips on an eyelid dynamited both eyes open, and Victor winced in the late morning light. Hovering over him was his boss, her attention seemingly focused on the headboard. Inattention would've pleased him if it wasn't for the absent, yet possessive way that her hand meandered over his body.

Slow, languid strokes of his abdomen demanded action of a diversionary nature. Catching her hand as casually as he could, Victor asked, "What are you thinking?"

Smiling wickedly, she taunted, "Are you sure you want me to answer that question, Victor? I know you said last night that you always want to know why, but I wonder if that's wise in all cases."

Jaw clenched, he accepted the burst of anger her challenge inspired and defiantly asserted, "I wouldn't have asked if I didn't want to know."

The sharp tug of the hand that he held was eloquent. When he relinquished possession, she rested it on his hip, leaning on her other elbow and staring down into his eyes.

This isn't happening. This can't be happening.

She was smiling and Victor had the sinking feeling that she knew exactly how he felt - that a hand print was being burned through his boxers and into his skin where she touched him. Burning in a very positive way.

Only one possible explanation came to his mind and he needed to put it into words. "I … I'm still drunk."

"Are you?"

"Yeah." Somehow she gave the impression that she was about to say something that would make him uncomfortable, so Victor preempted her. "And I need a shower."

"That's not all you need." Her purr sent a shiver down Victor's spine that, in turn, brought a knowing grin to her face.

Fighting the blush he could feel wanting to form, he grumbled, "Maybe not, but it's a start."

Hand slowly sliding from his clothed hip to his bare thigh and back again, she regarded him closely. Finally, she chuckled, sat up and gestured toward the bathroom. "By all means, Victor. Don't ever let it be said that I failed to meet your needs."

Only now did he recognize the trap he'd set for himself. Walking from his side of the bed to the bathroom would give her an excellent view of how hard he was. Morosely, he accepted that he had no choice. Making a snap decision, Victor stood quickly, intending to pick up his clothes and head for the bathroom at decent speed. Unfortunately, his balance was off and he stood next to the bed, swaying slightly, for a few damning moments. Muttering under his breath, he risked a glance the Director's way, hoping against hope that she'd been lost in her own thoughts again.

She licked her lips.

Victor's mouth dropped open and his body reacted without his brain's permission.

Eyes twinkling, the Director stood and made her way around the bed, maintaining eye contact with him even as she bent to retrieve his jacket and pants. Holding the clothing between them as an offering of some sort of another, she brushed her lips against his, whispering, "Take your shower."

He nodded, grabbed the clothes and stepped around her, drowning out her chuckle with a solemn vow never to drink Cognac again.

Mack Stringer looked up from the old issue of Sports Illustrated that he'd found when he heard the sound of the key in the lock. Habitually, he glanced at his watch and couldn't help raising an eyebrow. Apparently, dinner with the boss had extended to breakfast and quite possibly lunch as well.

Curious, he cheerfully said, "Hey, Victor."

"Hey."

"What's up? World weary voice and hand to the head are dead hangover giveaways."

Halting his beeline to his bedroom, Victor speared Stringer with a glare that needed work. Serious work. "Let it go, Stringer."

"Can't, tough guy," Stringer said, intrigued. "I was planning on primal scream therapy today and your binging has thrown my whole treatment program into the dumper."

Victor's eyes widened, but his tone was menacing. "There will be no screaming. Not here. Not today. Not ever. My neighbors have been good to me."

Shrugging noncommittally, Stringer asked, "So how's Terri's sister?"

"Fine."

"I see. You have anything to do with that?"

"No."

Victor had taken another step toward what must have seemed to him to be freedom when Stringer decided to prod. "Monosyllables, huh? She must've worn you out."

"Nope. She pissed me off. Just like you do."

Realizing that he was having fun, Stringer stuck with the conversational pattern, imbuing his tone with skepticism while emphasizing the first word of his next question. "Just like I do?"

Growling, Victor took a step toward his guest and stopped abruptly.

Stringer watched him clench and unclench his fists, wondering if he'd win his battle for control. When Victor turned on his heel and stalked away, he ventured, "Is that a yes?"

"Fuck you, Stringer."

"Ok. Is that a yes?"

Spinning around, Victor made a decision. "You asked for it."

He wondered if he'd really gone too far but stubbornly refused to back down. "Define it."

"We're going into the office today. I … ah … need to do some research." Smiling nastily, Victor added, "I think you'll enjoy the library." Pronouncement made, Victor left the room.

Unconcerned, Stringer pitched his voice louder and retorted, "You trying to bore me to death, Vic?"

"Not at all," came the response.

Undecided whether the hint of humor he'd heard was a good thing, Stringer tossed the magazine onto the couch and wondered what his host had in mind.

The corridors of the shadowy government agency were, as usual, apparently deserted, as Victor Mansfield led Mack Stringer toward the library. Stringer wore a borrowed jean jacket and blue jeans, and Vic was in his faithful leather jacket and a more faded pair of jeans. Stringer seemed subdued, darting covert glances from side to side as they walked. When they arrived at the library, Victor grinned and held the door for Stringer to enter the hallowed sanctuary wherein lay the collected knowledge of the Agency.

Victor walked a search pattern in the gloom of the stacks and Stringer dogged his tracks. A mild voice sounded from somewhere overhead and behind them and both men jumped.

"There's too much confusion about the Queen of England's promotion of global warming. I have to get the message out before her slug men land in comfort. Once the world is warm enough, they'll invade, and then where will we be, hmmm?" Nathan Muckle unfolded himself from his perch atop a ladder and descended, stork-like, to stand beside Victor. As Nathan took in the duplicates, he began to sweat. "Victor?" Uttering the name as a plea, Nathan stepped back, wild eyes seeking an escape route or a bolthole.

"It's okay, Nathan. This is Mack." Vic's voice held more than a touch of laughter as he took in Stringer's pole axed expression.

"Mac went to Vegas," Nathan insisted, under obviously mounting stress. Still sweating, he raised an inhaler to his mouth, watching both men with nerves that had to be raw.

Victor grinned, assuming that Nathan had concluded that there was a plot to populate the earth with clones of Victor Mansfield, and that it was only a matter of time before he himself was transformed similarly by the Illuminati.

"Different Mac, Nathan. This Mack isn't nearly as tall." Vic spoke soothingly, refusing to meet the hapless Stringer's eyes for fear that he once he started laughing that he wouldn't be able to stop. Members of the Illuminati Elite just didn't giggle uncontrollably. Nathan, having no such rigid rules of conduct to follow, turned to Stringer, scrutinizing him intently. Unsure, Stringer started backward when Nathan brought his inhaler into use for a further, fraught second or two.

"Global warming is only the beginning. Take my word for it, once the slugs invade, the price of vegetables will skyrocket. Eventually, *she'll* own everything." Nathan jabbed a finger at Stringer's chest, and followed him as he took another step back. "Is this disguise a new advance?" Nathan turned to look at the door as if expecting to see an army of Victors march through in ranks.

"Nathan, did the Director talk with you? She said that you'd have information ready for me." Nathan responded to Victor's quiet authority, doing everything save for snapping off a salute. The gaunt man plunged into the recesses of the library, mumbling to himself, and returned a few moments later with a stack of fat folders, from which papers hung like panting tongues.

"I got some stuff together for you, Victor. That guy has all kinds of affiliations." He clutched his offering as he stood before Vic, and Victor took a deep breath.

"You did good, Nathan." Victor took a deep breath. "I'll… uh… I'll tell the council." Nathan beamed with utter joy and he backed away, nervously ducking his head, until the two men stood alone, the proud possessors of whatever largesse Nathan and the Director had seen fit to bestow upon them. Shaking his head, Victor turned to leave, and Nathan rematerialized without warning.

"Watch out for the traffic cones." Two heads whipped around, two sets of green eyes fixed on Nathan, and two voices made similar astonished sounds. Vic nodded in acceptance-what else was there to do-and made for the door with Stringer at his side. Nathan's voice followed them. "They watch. Nobody suspects them, and they're everywhere."

Almost before the door to the library swung closed, Stringer stopped. "Who the heck was that guy?" he asked, between gusts of laughter.

"That," said Vic, without so much as a twitch of his lips, "was our librarian, Nathan. He keeps an eye on world affairs. Interplanetary ones, too. If it weren't for Nathan, I wouldn't know, for instance, that LiAnn is an advance spy sent by the bug people that live beneath Saskatchewan. She buzzes." Vic's serious tone was matched by his expression for a further microsecond, and then he dissolved into laughter. "He's a little nutty, but he knows his job," he said after the two of them had calmed.

They made their way without incident through the silent corridors to the boardroom. Vic dumped the pile of files on the table, and scraps of paper flew like confetti from one particularly disreputable and tattered item.

"What are we looking for, precisely?" Stringer murmured, as he dove for an errant page that had skimmed across the polished surface of the table onto the floor.

"Anything that you think will help catch the man who arranged to have my sister killed, boys." Her voice, usually so well modulated, had a shrillness about it that Vic hadn't heard before and the Director looked pale and drawn. "That ought to please you at the very least." She reached Stringer's side, and her fingers trailed negligently over his face, finally turning his chin up to her. He flicked his head, an angry gesture, a horse brushing away an annoying fly. She smiled. "So like Victor. So very like."

Turning to her own, cringing agent, she perched beside him on the table, her short skirt riding high as she crossed her legs.

"So good to see you… fully functional again, Victor. I pay homage to your recuperative powers." Her hand moved toward him, and Victor flinched, more in fear than in irritation. As though she had suddenly tired of baiting unworthy opponents, the Director rose smoothly to her feet and assumed her usual place at the head of the table.

"Pay attention, boys. James Arthur Caddell." A face appeared on the screen. "Recruited into the agency in 1975, and expelled from its ranks for consistently failing to play nicely with others. He became a Director in the late ‘80s and went through far more teams of operatives than was thought seemly by those that monitor such things. Murphy and Camier were detailed to finalize his dismissal two years ago when his attempt to set up a competing organization came fully to light." She paused, drew breath, and her voice lowered to a sultry growl. "They failed."

"Failed?" Victor's tone was incredulous. "How? Those guys just don't fail."

"Caddell vanished. He went underground and our best efforts have so far failed to locate him. Recently, he set out to ensure that the Agency - myself in particular - became aware of his existence as a thorn in my side. His murder of my sister wasn't an isolated act, nor was it related only to his treatment of Mr. Stringer. The man is dangerous, and it's time to stop him. You two are motivated to do that for the best of reasons."

"Oh yeah?" Victor's challenge rang unnaturally loud in the hushed boardroom. "And what would that be?"

"Why, revenge, Victor, what else?" Standing, she fixed them both with an impassive stare that surprisingly held no trace of mockery. "Find this man and stop him. Don't do it for me, or the Agency, or even for the teams he destroyed. Do it for yourselves. He wants you, Mr. Stringer, and if he acquires you again there will be no way to save yourself or Victor."

Turning, she made her way back to the stairs. As her willowy frame melted into the gloom that surrounded the mysterious portal, there was a commotion at the main door.

"So, like, am I late or what? Sorry guys. You won't believe the weirdness. I mean, like, someone broke into my house and tried to kidnap me."

Jackie Janczyk, clad in tight, black Lycra and high heels, wore a grin that was at total variance with the news she had brought. Vic frowned, missing entirely the goofy grin that marked his double's appreciation of her entrance. Jackie, always pantherish, looked particularly predatory today, and Stringer's eyes were drawn to the sleekly undulating figure as she hitched her butt onto the corner of the table.

"Can you believe that? I mean, where do they get off? And, like, the cops, well, they were no help. Just because I smacked him around a little they wanted me to, like, go to the police station. Well, I mean, would you? I mean, that is sooooo ridiculous. He was trying to kidnap me." She trailed off as she realized that Victor was still frowning at her. "What?"

"What happened, Jackie?" Vic asked. "You'd better tell me… us all about it." Stringer's face had settled into a somewhat more somber expression, by the time Victor noticed him. "There are people trying to take us. Don't you read any of the reports? You're in fucking danger, Jackie. You need to be on your guard." Vic's voice grew husky with rage, and Stringer nodded in agreement. "The Director is going to want to know about this. The guy you beat up. Where is he? She'll want to talk to him."

"Chill, guys." Gazing at them with disgust, she added, "Like any one dude is going to take me somewhere I don't want to go. I can look after myself, you know? Just because I'm cool and cute doesn't mean that I'm not smart or capable of kicking ass." She giggled, and her catsuit rippled in all the right places. The fatuous look had returned to Stringer's face, and Vic groaned in despair at it.

"Fucking hell, Stringer. Get a grip, you don't know where she's been," he muttered, and tossed Jackie a file to read, pointing wordlessly to the chair beside him. Flouncing for effect, Jackie sat where directed and began to read.

Hours passed as Vic, Jackie and Stringer waded through the mountain of information Nathan had supplied. Even Jackie had run out of chatter after they'd eaten the late lunch Dobrinsky had ordered for them. Victor hadn't even managed to muster the energy to protest when she sat next to Stringer upon on of her returns from the ladies room. The silence was broken only by the sounds of turning pages and the click of keys on their laptops.

Finally, Victor sighed, stretched and pushed away a file folder, muttering, "Caddell is big trouble."

"Master of the understatement," Stringer said, inclining his head to Vic.

Jackie giggled and smiled widely, as her hand came to rest on Stringer's thigh.

When Mack rested his hand on top of hers and winked, Vic sighed. Lovesick children he didn't need. "Look, you two. We need to come up with a way to bring this guy down."

"Don't sweat it, Vic." Jackie beamed at both men, imagining herself sandwiched between them in a most compromising position. "Boss woman will lay out her plan when she's good and ready."

"And not a moment before?"

Stringer looked to Jackie for an answer and approval. Victor graduated to full blown worry for Stringer's sanity - and his balls - when he grinned in delight at Jackie's affirmative nod. Trying to derail the younger man's hormones, Victor mused, "What do we know? Caddell was one of the good guys once."

Looking at his surroundings pointedly, Stringer asked, "Are you sure?"

Victor didn't want to think of all the things he'd done in the name of the Agency. Some of them were … shaded darker than he'd like to admit. "Let's make that assumption, Stringer," he muttered tiredly; the debauchery of the previous evening was catching up with him. "We've got to start somewhere."

Smiling, Stringer compromised, "He worked for the Agency and wanted to be top dog. But …"

Jackie smirked and finished, "The queen bitch was already there."

"Settled in comfortably."

Victor watched in growing horror as Stringer extended the tentative theory and kissed Jackie on the nose. By focusing on them, he could ignore the twinge of anger that shot through him at Jackie's use of the term "bitch." Trying to keep the kids on whatever track they'd chosen with regard to Caddell, he added, "But he didn't stop trying."

Nodding, Jackie looked to Mac and then to Victor, asking, "Why do men do that? No means, like, no. You know?"

Stringer's mouth was open when Victor interjected, "Caddell was driven."

"Yeah," Stringer agreed, pulling out a file from the pile to his right. "His psyche profiles are consistent on that point. What I can't figure out is why the Agency would tolerate someone in his position who had issues with women."

"He got results," Jackie noted. "His teams never opened a case they didn't close."

"Too bad that nothing got closed without bodies on the ground," Vic added, disgust evident in his tone. "Too many of them civilians."

Stringer's, "Frontier justice," earned him a glare from the ex-cop. Holding up his hands, Stringer temporized, "Ok, ok. Our man is a sexist with violent tendencies who," Stringer shot a grin at Jackie, "won't take no for an answer. That doesn't tell us where he is or what he's up to."

"Allow me." Dobrinsky stalked across the room, a videotape in hand.

"Allow you to what?" Vic queried, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

"Just watch the damn video, Victor."

Vic shared a look with Jackie. Dobrinsky wasn't the surly type. Most of the time, he was inordinately cheerful as he carried out the Director's orders. In the face of the nastier, harsher Dobrinsky, Victor and Jackie fell silent. Stringer, after a careful look at each of them, followed suit.

Dobrinsky shoved the tape into the machine, lowered the screen and growled, "This just arrived by courier. It explains a lot of things." Without more, Dobrinsky dimmed the lights and pressed the play button.

A smiling James Caddell appeared. He was seated at a glass-topped table in a pleasant bluish-gray room that received quite a bit of natural light. Folding his hands before him, Caddell leaned forward.

"To whom it may concern, or should I say Ladies and Gentlemen of the Agency?" Pausing, Caddell rolled his eyes and laughed, a rich, throaty sound. "Let's just cut to the chase and address this to my friend and colleague, Mack Stringer."

Stunned, Vic and Jackie turned to Stringer who was a bundle of barely contained anger. "Friend and colleague, my ass," Stringer growled.

Stabbing the pause button, Dobrinsky snarled, "Save it for when your friend's done."

Eyes darting to Dobrinsky, Victor wondered what was wrong. He couldn't recall ever seeing the other man so agitated. Before he could devise a theory, Stringer was on his feet, trembling with suppressed rage, fatigue or both.

"What's your problem?"

The challenge in Stringer's question was met by Dobrinsky's extremely thin veneer of calm. "Watch and learn."

Vic caught Stringer's eyes and held them. Reluctantly, the younger man sank back down into his chair. Nodding to himself, satisfied by something, Dobrinsky restarted the video.

"Mack, my boy, I owe you an apology." Caddell smiled sadly, his expression softening as if he were speaking mentor to pupil or even father to son. He then looked down - truly ashamed of his actions or unable to maintain the illusion that he wasn't - Victor couldn't say. His gut, however, was adamant that Caddell's attitude was an act, a show for their benefit. Even though he didn't know Stringer well, Victor believed in the younger man.

Stringer held onto the edge of the conference table so tightly that his knuckles were white. Expression unusually serious, Jackie reached over and placed a hand on the forearm nearest to her. When Stringer glanced at her, she squeezed gently and gestured toward the screen with her chin. Eyes blazing, Stringer turned back in time for Caddell to pick up his monologue

"I was very disappointed that you refused my hospitality, Mack. Very. Disappointed."

The coldness of Caddell's eyes somehow leapt from the video and permeated the room.

"And you already know how deeply I regret that you declined my offer of employment." Smiling ever so slightly, Caddell leaned even closer to the camera as though about to impart a confidence. "Terri had a beautiful voice for screaming."

Victor winced at the anguished noise that the man seated across from him couldn't keep inside. Meeting Jackie's eyes over Stringer's bent head, he was relieved to see what looked like sympathy. She'd also released Mack's arm to allow Stringer to hug himself as he fought to maintain control.

Caddell's voice relentlessly boomed, sounding like a canon in the large enclosed space. "But I'm a generous man. A forgiving man. So I'm going to give you another opportunity."

There were tears on Stringer's cheeks when he finally lifted his head.

"If you fail this time, well, let's just say that Terri's mother will most certainly leave you off her Christmas card list."

Victor didn't think he was supposed to hear the whispered, "Terri's mom thinks I killed her, thanks to you, you asshole."

"Losing her daughter was very traumatic," Caddell noted, features composed in mock sadness. "I understand that she's responding well to therapy, though, and that her psychiatrist is very hopeful. The loss," Caddell sighed, "of her only other child, her eldest, well, I'm afraid that that might prove to be too much."

Dobrinsky growled inarticulately.

Victor was on his feet without having consciously decided to stand. Fists clenched, he shook with a helpless anger. "Fuck," was all he could think of to say.

Jackie pushed her chair back from the conference table. "Like, who's Terri?"

Caddell spoke before anyone else could. "Think about it, Mack. I'll be in touch."

The video faded to black.

"I'll go."

Thinking about the engraved invitation that had been delivered, addressed to him, Mack Stringer acknowledged Victor's words with a shaken head and a frown.

"Yes," Victor insisted, his entire body tensed for action.

"Look, Vic --" Stringer began.

Jackie picked up his train of thought in her usual ebullient, tactless manner. "You're way too well fed to pass for Mack."

"I'll wear bigger clothes. I'm going. This isn't Stringer's problem." Victor's expression shifted from flat out stubborn to something more interesting and back again before he added, "She isn't his responsibility."

Tabling that intriguing morsel and tuning out the argument Victor was having with Jackie, Stringer looked at the piece of heavy, silver-laminated paper that had caused the current round of trouble.

Mr. Stringer,
You are cordially invited to the corner of 15th and Madison.
Your chariot will be waiting at 8:14 pm this very evening.
Latecomers will not be admitted.
Attire is business casual.
Weapons will be checked at the door.

Most sincerely,
Her sister's keeper

"Arrogant bastard," Stringer whispered.

"Right, Mack?"

Jackie's shrill request for verification of something or another cut through Stringer's musings. "Huh?"

"Jackie thinks we should hold out for proof that Caddell actually has the Director," Vic aimed a long, morose glance at Jackie, "before either one of us boys, like, goes after her."

"That's a direct quote, I take it?"

Dobrinsky rained on the small effort at humor by purposefully striding into the room, tossing a plastic bag on the table. "Here's your proof."

Victor reached for the item, but Stringer got there first. "That's some knife." Fingering the wicked-looking stiletto blade through the plastic, he asked, "Hers?"

"It was a gift," Dobrinsky offered. "I don't know from whom. She never left the office without it."

Handing the bag to Victor in response to the older man's imperious gesture, Stringer muttered, "There's blood on it."

He didn't have to look at Victor to feel his tension. The pale face surprised Stringer a little. Vic was taking this one very personally.

Ignoring the atmosphere or perhaps in an effort to add to it, Dobrinsky growled, "That's hers, too."

Victor was out of his chair and halfway toward the door before anyone could react.

"Vic--," Jackie called.

"I'm going home to change."

Both Jackie and Stringer rose to follow.

"Let him go," Dobrinsky ordered. "You two are going to back him up. We need to plan or we're going to lose both of them."

Victor was angry and confused a bit as to why. He was furious with Caddell for capturing the Director. She was an icon - a sacred cow, he thought to himself with a wry grin - and as such she should have been sacrosanct, inviolate. That she'd been taken as easily as if she'd been himself, or Stringer, was an insult that made him fume.

Yet his anger went further. He was livid that the Agency had been blindsided by the Caddell asshole for years. More than anything else, he was utterly consumed with rage at himself, because for some reason utterly beyond his ken, he cared that the maniac had the Director under his control.

Caught you, Mansfield, he thought. You're worrying about the bitch. Why the hell are you doing that? She's a man-eater, a black widow, a sleazy, manipulative, ball-breaking harridan….

And I care that he's got her. Fuck!

He was going to rescue her, and then he'd see what happened. There would be some changes made.

The drive to the place where Caddell had said the car would be waiting took forever. Traffic was snarled in a fashion that taxed everyone's nerves, and road rage hung like a pall over the streets as horns blared and tempers grew frayed.

Vic was beside himself with furious frustration by the time he found a parking spot. He was a couple of minutes late. It was 8:16, and he could only hope that the same traffic that had delayed him had treated Caddell's heavies no better.

At the sight of the stretch limo at the curbside, Vic breathed a sigh of relief and broke into a run. The engine of the huge vehicle was running when he jogged up beside it, and the rear door opened for him. He was in business. The jerks that had turned his life on its heels would pay and…

…And what? He'd get brownie points with Dobrinsky? He didn't think so. Would the Director ease up on him? Forget that. She'd never ease up on anyone. She was incapable of it, in the way that a snake was incapable of rising up to walk. It was her nature to coerce, and she would never change. In some strange way, that felt both comforting and devastating to Victor.

As he peered into the limo, he was seized from behind and tossed in onto the soft leather upholstery. The car door slammed behind him, and the steady press backward into the seat indicated that they had commenced their journey under acceleration.

The limo was divided by thick, bullet-proof glass, and Vic was alone in the rear. Shrugging philosophically, he examined the area. There were a couple of decanters holding spirits, a vase of flowers, and a selection of snack foods laid out behind fiddles. Vic chose a heavy crystal glass and poured himself a generous tot of whisky, then settled back to commit their route to memory.

Once outside of the downtown area, the traffic eased, and Vic relaxed as he would've if he'd been the one driving. The miles passed him by and, little by little, the city was left behind.

It was past midnight when Vic's stomach began rumbling and refused to stop. He'd long since forgotten when he'd last eaten a square meal, and would have confessed to nameless crimes to get one. The change of direction as the car pulled off the main road and onto a rutted trail gave him hope for an imminent arrival. When at last the car halted, he was ready.

The door lock mechanism clicked as the driver freed it, and Vic hastily stepped out and looked around with interest. He was somewhere in the Okanagan, he knew that. Vestiges a summer now well and truly over-a few leaves clinging grimly to the apple trees that edged one side of the driveway-also made Vic aware of the passage of time. The wind whipped at his jacket and ruffled his hair as he walked in the direction of the house, whose open door beckoned, enticing him with its pool of light.

Before stepping over the threshold, Victor took a deep breath and tried to assume Mack Stringer's personality. He would need to be careful, he knew, but he had a gun - more than one if the truth be told, and the will to shoot his way out.

Inside, Caddell sat in a tall-backed chair, sipping a brandy and studying the flames that roared in the large fireplace. As Victor was pushed forward by a very large man in a staid black suit, Caddell looked up, but didn't stand.

"Mr. Stringer, we meet again." Caddell smiled, nodded to his majordomo and Victor was propelled into the purple-black velvet of unconsciousness.

Victor's mouth was dry; his stomach was empty; he felt nauseous and his head ached fit to burst. The situation wasn't helped by the fact that someone was shaking him, none too gently either. He lashed out against the annoyance, and felt sourly gratified by the exclamation of pain. Take that, asshole, he thought.

Suddenly, Victor recalled where he was, more or less, and much of the fuzziness departed in the wake of a douche of cold reality. He sat up cursing, and almost tried to throw up the lining of his stomach when his head pounded in a harder, faster rhythm. Groaning, he opened his eyes and stared into the Director's.

"Well, well, well. If it isn't my knight in shining armor. You shouldn't have, Victor." The heavily loaded sarcasm stung him like a whip. "Really."

"Then I guess I'll go home and leave you here to rot, you ungrateful bitch," he said, freezing as he processed his own words. "I… I beg your pardon."

She sat against the wall in a room that was completely devoid of furniture. It was daylight, and the high, dirty window admitted only a little light - enough for him to see that she had been beaten. There was a purple swelling on her jaw, and a graze over her eyebrow. Despite the bruises, the matted hair and the smeared make-up, she still looked as though she was in control. The word ‘regal' floated unbidden to Victor's mind. She looked like a queen.

"Apology accepted. Now, would you mind telling me why you're here? I seem to be a little slow on the uptake today."

"I came," he growled, "To rescue you, but as you are apparently not in need of saving, being in the lap of luxury and all, I see that I wasted my time. Like I said, I'll shove off and leave you to it." He propped himself up against the opposite wall, stiffly offended that she could regard him so coolly. After a moment or two, she stunned him by offering a slightly warmer smile.

"You've managed to surprise me, Victor, and I thought that I was beyond surprises after all these years. Well done. Of course, you do realize that we're now both in the same boat? Caddell will be … pleased." She spoke without her usual drawl, and she seemed less remote than ever. "I despise satisfying men I don't respect."

Not wanting to dwell on those words, Victor checked the places about his person where he had stashed weapons; feeling his heart sink lower as he came up empty time and again. When finished, the only thing he had was a length of cheese wire that had been stowed along the outseam of his jeans. Triumphantly, he held it up for inspection.

"Now if we can only convince James to come within an arm's length."

Reaching for her cheek, Victor whispered, "Looks like he already did."

Her eyes widened, making Victor think that he'd surprised her again. Recovering her cool distance with an astounding rapidity, the Director patted Victor's hand. "I meant, without a number of his overeager minions holding us immobile."

Victor spun at the sound of the door opening and immediately saw the Director's point. Six young, steroid-fed men entered ahead of the slighter, smirking Caddell.

"How touching," he commented, just as the Director's nails bit into flesh.

Snatching his hand away from her bruised face, Victor looked from the Director to Caddell, pointless, posturing words dying in his throat at the hatred in the man's not-quite-sane eyes.

"I should warn you, Mack, the elder sister is not as … sincere," Caddell noted, moving on an oblique path toward them, "or as direct as our dear Terri was."

"Don't," Victor warned, stepping between the Director and her enemy.

"But of course not," Caddell agreed. "William, if you please."

One of the younger men pulled out a weapon and fired it at Victor's chest.

"They seem to have settled in, finally." For many hours, Dobrinsky had tracked Victor with an impressive singlemindedness. He'd traced Vic all the way to the Okanagan for a five hour meeting of some sort before he headed out again.

Mack Stringer watched Dobrinsky work with grudging admiration, but he didn't have enough facts to fully appreciate the technique. "How are you tracking Victor?"

Jackie stepped to Stringer's side, sliding her hand into his. "And, like, why is the signal so lame?"

Dobrinsky's fingers flew on the keyboard and the background cleared noticeably. "Ingestible tracer." Before either of the others could comment, he added, "That's the answer to both of your questions."

Leaning into Stringer so that her breast rested against his upper arm, Jackie turned up her nose. "What's Vic been eating?"

Dobrinsky laughed and ignored the latest question in favor of triangulating as best as he could. Victor drank less coffee than a lot of agents did, so his "signature" was weak.

"That's the coast," Stringer noted, tracing the jagged representation of water meeting land on Dobrinsky's computer screen. The land near the water was depicted in blue of a lighter shade than the water. Blue became green, then yellow, orange and red in succession and at varying distances from the coastline. "The colors must mean distance above sea level."

"Yes," Dobrinsky allowed, otherwise concentrating on his task.

The image on screen showed a progressively smaller area that was predominantly orange and red.

"They're up on the cliffs," Stringer interpreted. "Probably one of those max security estates. Damn."

"Don't worry, Macky," Jackie cooed. "I used to live in one of them and the Agency broke into it." Furrowing her brow, she lost herself in the memory, murmuring, "Of course, I did catch the other Mac in my bedroom, totally pawing at my things."

"Jackie," Stringer interjected, sensing that she was working herself into a huff. "Don't call me Macky."

"Why not?"

Seeing that she was diverted by his intensity, he grumpily muttered, "It makes me sound like the really stupid sidekick of an inept but well meaning hero. That's not exactly how I like to see myself."

Grinning, she suggested, "How about Stringeroo?"

"Christ!" Stringer's face remained in his hands only for a moment.

Dobrinsky's, "Got it!" forced it back up, blush and all. "So," Stringer said, shaking Jackie off. "How do we do this?"

Victor opened one eye and hissed at the brightness of the room. It was then that he realized that he'd intended to open both eyes and that that hadn't happened.

"Be still, Victor." The Director's voice was disembodied as far as Victor was concerned and the discomfort of being unable to see her was oddly reassuring. He was used to being uncomfortable around the Director.

"You've been stunned, and Caddell allowed his men to have at you in celebration of our arrival at our new and presumably final destination. There might be internal injuries."

"Is …?" he croaked out of a dry mouth. "Is it bright in here?"

"No," she replied, and Victor felt her fingers stroking his hair, soothing his increased tension. "It's natural for you to think so, though. You've been out for hours. I was becoming concerned."

Her voice sounded odd and it took Victor a moment to place what he'd heard in it that was unusual. Sincerity. That revelation was followed by another - his head was in her lap. An effort to lift it was a dismal failure. The moment he tightened his muscles to try, the room began to spin. Fighting to keep his breathing even, he asked, "What's the plan?"

"We wait for Dobrinsky to fetch us."

"What?" Victor winced. The sound of his own raised voice began a severe pounding in his head.

"Sshhh."

Gentle fingers on his forehead, massaging his temples, eased the pounding. Victor relaxed, drifting in and out of consciousness.

"Sleep, Victor," the Director urged, bending down to lift the eyelid of his less swollen eye and peer into a slowly reacting pupil.

He thought he said, "No," but Victor couldn't be sure. The feeling of firm lips on his was so startling that Victor decided to open his eyes. Synapses crossing, he opened his mouth instead.

A soft chuckle sounded in his ear. "You're just full of surprises, Mr. Mansfield."

Victor tried to retort, but his body knew better. He was unconscious before the Director slipped the wire he'd brought from his pocket and into her bodice with the skill of a life-long thief.

"You're joking?"

Mack Stringer was going mad with waiting. Dobrinsky had no plan. The Agency had no plan. No one had a plan and Victor was doing a masterful impersonation of a bloody pulp because of him.

"He's still, like, freaked over the Victor video," Jackie offered.

"That's perfectly understandable," Dobrinsky allowed.

"Am I the only one who's thinking here?" Stringer growled irritably. "Why would Caddell throw a fucking society party when he's got high level hostages on the premises?"

Nathan Muckle had been trying to melt into the wall at his back. He stiffened visibly when Dobrinsky took him by the arm and pulled him forward.

"Nathan's got the details," Dobrinsky said, pushing Nathan in front of him.

Watched by intense, uncannily familiar green eyes, Nathan lowered his own and referenced his notes. "Mr. Caddell sits on the boards of a number of prominent charities in order to maintain a façade of legitimacy. The function in question is a fundraiser for a shelter for troubled youth that was scheduled over six months ago. Rescheduling the celebrity comedy hour alone would have been impossible."

"So the show must go on," Stringer muttered.

"Cheer up, Macky," Jackie brightly ordered. "We get to crash the party." Batting her eyelashes at Dobrinsky, she verified, "Right?"

"That's the idea," Dobrinsky confirmed at the same time as Stringer said, "I told you not to call me that!"

Jackie chose to focus on Nathan. "We'll have to be rich to get in."

"Very," the librarian admitted. "The guest list is exclusive and legitimate." Lowering his eyes, he said, "You couldn't go as yourself."

Jackie regarded Dobrinsky expectantly. Taking her cue, Stringer did the same. Finally having their attention, Dobrinsky explained, "We have to assume that Caddell's information is current and that he's already found out that Vic isn't you, so we're going to have to change some things." Smiling at Jackie, he observed, "I've always thought you'd make a lovely brunette."

"I'm, like, dyeing my hair? Get out."

"A very tasteful shade, I'm told," Dobrinsky muttered. "Mr. Stringer will be the blonde in this particular power couple."

"I'll have to run right out and find the perfect little cocktail dress."

Stringer couldn't help it, he laughed. The term "cocktease dress" echoed in his mind and he was inwardly pleased at the glare that his innocent expression dragged out of Jackie.

"We've already selected your wardrobe," Dobrinsky rained on her parade. Her pout garnered her an, "I think you'll be pleased."

"So who are we?" Stringer asked, hoping that Jackie would forget her minor annoyance with him.

Dobrinsky handed each of them a file. "Know these people inside and out by tomorrow noon."

Victor felt like he imagined a professional hockey player did after a game. He was sore and a little tired, but it sure seemed as though the small, emaciated doctor in Caddell's employ had been right. The Director hadn't batted an eyelash when he'd pronounced, "The patient has suffered no internal damages," as though Victor hadn't been on the bed right in front of him. "Healing of the patient will proceed without intervention by myself."

Glancing at the remnants of the food that had been brought an hour or so ago, Victor wondered how long it would be before Caddell's goons brought the Director back. She shared most meals with her nemesis and the cost of remaining civil was high. It always took a while for her jaw to unclench over the fake smile after she returned to their cell. Victor sympathized. He couldn't have done half as well if someone killed his little sister.

"You're looking well, Mr. Mansfield." Startled but not enough to rise from the small bed, Victor rapidly scanned the room. Caddell was nowhere to be seen.

"I think you mean somebody else."

Caddell's voice resumed. "I assure you that there is no need to perpetrate the charade, Mr. Mansfield. Hmm, that's entirely too cumbersome. May I call you Victor?"

Keeping his expression neutral, Vic tried to decide whether to brazen it out or admit who he was.

A dramatic sigh emanated from an impressive sound system. "I have had the most enlightening conversation with my esteemed colleague. She was, of course, not pleased that I had discovered the truth behind your masquerade."

"She spins a story better than the best of them, Caddell."

"Indeed, but this time it was I who was telling the tale, as it were. On the one hand, it was a simple story of fingerprints. The personal touch is what complicated the matter. So," the snide voice continued at slightly higher volume, "may I call you Victor?"

Victor considered. His fingerprints were on file in several places, and Caddell knew he looked like Mack Stringer because that was essential to his original plot to disrupt the team by inserting Stringer in his place. "Call me whatever you want. You will anyway."

"How did you arrive at that … dispirited conclusion?"

"Directors are all alike."

While Caddell's laughter echoed, the door opened and the Director strolled through it. "I see you two boys are getting along."

"Just as you requested, my dear."

She arched an eyebrow at the northwest corner of the room. "I am not your dear."

"Of course not. How inappropriate of me even to jest in such a manner."

Victor consoled himself with the thought that an amused, borderline psychotic megalomaniac had to be better than an angry one.

"My apologies, Victor," Caddell said with all the sincerity of an unusually disreputable used car salesman. "I didn't mean to imply any measure, however small, of endearment for … your Director."

She replied, "He knows better, Caddell," in a tone far less sharp than Vic expected.

This roundabout conversation was a headache in the making. Hoping to start a refreshing new trend of directness, Victor asked, "Either of you want to clue me in?"

Caddell seemed eager to speak. "I told … oh, let's call her Amanda, for ease of conversation. As you intuited, Victor, I'm still enough of a Director to honor the precept of supervisor anonymity. Although why I should under these happy circumstances baffles even me."

"The rest of us aren't as enamored of the sound of your voice as you are, Caddell. Get on with it."

Out of habit, Victor winced at the tone of command but Caddell appeared to be unfazed.

"When I described to Amanda how fortunate I believed myself to be that you presented yourself at my doorstep, she did everything in her power to convince me that I was mistaken. I wonder why she should take such a stance, Victor. Perhaps you would be so kind as to enlighten me."

A glance at the Director gleaned Victor nothing, so he remained silent.

She smiled. "Victor doesn't talk out of turn. It's one of the things I love about him."

Hardly able to take in another breath, Victor gasped, "What do you mean, love?"

The Director sat next to him on the bed and took his hand. "I told him about us."

Realizing that he had to look a bit like a fish out of water with his mouth hanging open in shock, Victor cleared his throat and asked, "So what happens now?"

"I decide whether two hostages are indeed better than one."

Victor stared at the Director, hoping for some sort of cue as to how to act. Smiling tremulously, she brought his hand up to her lips and pressed a gentle kiss on his palm. It was such a convincing performance that Victor placed his other hand atop hers and mumbled, "Everything's going to be ok."

"Is it true that Mr. Stringer has been co-opted, Victor?"

Caddell's casual question was answered by the Director's tight squeeze of Victor's hand. "I'm not sure what you mean," he hedged.

"Has Amanda managed to replace his beloved Terri with someone named … what was it, now?"

There was an element of malice to Victor's helpful, "Jackie? Yeah. She's young, firm and cute. He didn't have much of a chance."

"Hmmmm. Perhaps this Jackie might be interested in assisting Mr. Stringer and I."

Jackie was a lot of things, but disloyal wasn't one of them. Chuckling at the visual image, Victor muttered, "Jackie would kick your ass without breaking a sweat or a nail."

"I should like to meet her, then."

Shifting back to lean against the headboard, the Director, appearing too bored for words, asked, "Don't you have some party preparations that require your attention? You need to make a good impression on that money you invited to finance further progress."

"My majordomo is due any moment."

"We'll say good night, then." The Director tugged lightly on his hand. "Victor?"

"Good night," Vic dutifully said.

"Sweet dreams."

Victor growled before demanding, "What did you tell that guy?"

"Whatever I had to, in order to keep him from having his pet physician stick you with something lethal."

Leaning closer, he pressed, "Which was?" Suddenly, she backhanded the arm Victor was using to support himself and he went down on his back, unable to suppress an, "Ouch."

Smiling with her mouth but not her eyes, the Director draped herself over him. She told her story in a low, urgent voice. "We're lovers. Have been for over a year. I'm planning on taking you off of the active duty roster if we get out of this alive, but you don't know that yet. I haven't told you, because you'll make a macho fuss and pout because you'll think that I think that you're too old to cut it anymore. It won't occur to you for a long while that I'm doing it because I can't bear to lose you. And it will take even longer for you to believe it."

"Why?"

"He won't kill you if he thinks he can use you to hurt me." Kissing him on the nose, she added, "I hope."

Vic couldn't process this information. There was something that didn't wash. "Wasn't he disappointed that you didn't break down when his men used me for a punching bag?"

"Who says I didn't?"

"Huh?"

"Victor, my love," she began, staring into his eyes, bending down to brush his lips with hers. "You." She gave him a harder, firmer kiss. "Were." She traced his lower lip with her tongue. "Unconscious." Taking his lower lip between her teeth, she gently bit down.

"I …" His simple declarative statement died an early death when the Director rocked her body against his, gently enough not to cause him pain from his injuries but firmly enough to mean business of a type that scared him.

"You?" she prompted, smiling more widely, unbuttoning his shirt to while away the time.

The Director's hands were on his t-shirt but Victor felt oddly detached - as though he were watching her touch someone else. "You … you …" It sure as hell felt like she was touching him, though. "You broke down?"

"I wept openly." The Director untucked his t-shirt and slipped a warm hand beneath. "After I beat two of them off of you and cursed Caddell and the horse he rode in on in three languages." She kissed him, slipping her tongue in his mouth when he opened it in surprise after she pinched a nipple.

Dazed and more than a little confused, Victor tried to catch his breath and organize his thoughts. It was one of the most difficult things he'd ever done. The Director straddled him, unfastening her own clothing with an unhurried ease that made it impossible for Victor to look away. Forcing his mouth to form the words, he asked, "You cried in front of him?"

She shrugged out of her silk blouse. "It made him feel powerful."

"You must … must …" The bra had gone the way of the blouse. Her hands were on the waistband of her leather skirt before he managed to swallow and finish. "Have hated that."

"I've done worse." Standing swiftly, she smirked. "And far, far better."

"I'll bet," Victor mumbled, telling himself not to look but unable to deny himself a peek a few moments later when the Director returned to kneel on the bed beside him. She was naked, unrepentant and looking like she really wanted to do this. "Um … do you think he … ah … oh … ah … is watching us?" Blushing furiously, Victor had finished in a rush.

"I like it that you're tongue-tied when I'm not even touching you."

A spark of anger flared. "Is that so surprising? You're … well-."

"I'm aware that I'm naked, Victor."

Vic squirmed uneasily. "Don't laugh at me!"

"I'm most certainly not laughing." The Director trailed a hand along his cheek, down one side of his chest and along the top of a well-muscled thigh. "But I am looking, Victor. I'm definitely looking." Sliding that hand around to the inside of his thigh, she noted, "And I think you like the attention."

Victor didn't know exactly when he'd gotten hard, but he was, and the protest on his lips didn't pass them. Honesty was a bitch sometimes.

"That's all I want to do, Victor," she whispered, stroking his thigh through his jeans with just the tips of her fingers. "Pay you some attention."

The longing for someone in his life that he tried to bury surged to the fore. Frightened by this sudden intimacy from this woman of all women, Victor fought it back down. His belt was unfastened by those nimble fingers. The buttons on his jeans were next.

"I want to touch you, Victor."

Her hot, low, phone-sex voice crawled in and took up residence in Victor's cock. He couldn't catch his breath to talk, but he didn't need lung capacity to listen.

"I want to take you in my hand and learn how you feel before I treat myself to the pleasure of discovering how you taste." She watched him pant and squirm, seeming to enjoy the moan that watching her lick her lips dragged out of his throat. "Then I want to take you inside me and lose myself in those lovely green eyes when you come."

"Jesus," he groaned. Focusing with a supreme effort, he whispered, "What's your name?"

The smile was slow and sensuous. "Diana. Remember it for later."

He whimpered and reached for her. Victor was stunned that she let him pull her on top of him and take her mouth with his, but that surprise was quickly overwhelmed by the wonder of her lips softening, surrendering to his demands. As soon as he could, he promised, "I will."

Mack Stringer had been barbered, tinted, highlighted, shaved, moisturized, and finally dressed resplendently in a tuxedo made from wild silk. By the time they had finished, he didn't recognize himself in the mirror. Blond hair made him look unreal somehow. He stared for what seemed forever, but could get no feel of who or what he was. Sighing, he turned away, a very different man. Dobrinsky, clad in the black uniform and peaked cap that was the mark of a chauffeur, joined him, taking a seat and twirling his cap around and around a long, brown finger.

Together they awaited Jackie, Dobrinsky smiling and Stringer twitching with impatience. When Jackie finally entered, stage right, both men gave spontaneous gasps, and stood, reverent, as she floated into the room. Luscious of body, she lent her form to a white, floaty, diaphanous fabric that covered without concealing. She trailed fluttering silk voile, and within the cocoon of cobweb and moonbeam her sturdy, toned body glowed. Stringer was speechless.

Her hair was elaborately styled, and colored blue-black; her maquillage was utterly perfect, but nobody would notice. All Stringer saw was that killer body and his thoughts ran to ripping the designer gown from her ivory shoulders and…

Perhaps there is life after Terri, he thought.

"Hi, guys. What do you think?" She twirled, inviting compliments with her ingenuous smile. "Like, I said that this was too extreme, but I'm supposed to make a stir." Smirking, she plucked at the material and added, "It's like a whole fashion paragraph, don't you think?"

Stringer's mouth was dry, but Dobrinsky appeared to be no better off, so it was up to him to respond to her invitation. He tried to overcome the acute inability to speak, and found that he was gaping like a haddock, opening and closing his mouth in stunned silence. It took three attempts before he found his voice, and when he did, he almost wished he hadn't.

"Wow."

"Why, thank you, kind sir," Jackie twinkled, and then took the arm that Stringer offered to her, gliding gracefully at his side as they followed Dobrinsky to where their chariot for the evening awaited them.

The limo seemed to be a block and a half in length, and Stringer, incapable of anything else, followed Jackie into the rear of it. There was a cocktail cabinet, a television, and a selection of CDs, but Stringer barely noticed them. He was far too busy gazing at Jackie.

It was not that long after they'd left that Stringer realized the limo was moving. That's what he tried to tell himself, anyway. Embarrassed by his obvious and very favorable reaction, he tried to focus on their task. Failing that, he turned his eyes out the window, grateful that Jackie was occupied with her own thoughts, sparing him the further ignominy of monosyllable conversation. The city flew by as they were driven out over the Lion's Gate Bridge and up the Sea to Sky Highway. The scenery was spectacular, illuminated by the throbbing sunset - gold and purple, bruised clouds with shining stains of rose and lemon bathed the world in liquid color over a sea that seemed made from hematite.

When Stringer returned his gaze to his companion, she seemed to be sleeping.

I wonder, he thought, whether I can trust myself with her. Aloud, he said, "Jackie? Where do you conceal a weapon in that?"

Her eyes remained closed, her pose serene, but a gurgle of laughter greeted his words. "Don't you worry. I'm gonna, like, protect you, even though you're wearing an uncool cummerbund."

"Hey," he retorted, stung. "What do you mean, uncool? What's wrong with it?"

"It's, like, so passé," she murmured. "Nobody wears that stuff any more. You should be wearing some, like, totally bitchin' threads like Mac Ramsey. He always looks cool."

"Fine," growled Stringer. "I'll make sure that I study his wardrobe carefully if I ever meet him. I'm sure he can teach me a whole lot about looking good enough for you."

Jackie chuckled richly. "That Mac's a total clothes horse, for sure, but he, like, doesn't have much of a brain," she confided. "Vic gets really annoyed at him."

"What's that prove?" grinned Stringer. "Seems to me that Vic gets really annoyed at everyone."

The ball was a glittering affair. Jackie, of course, had drawn eyes wherever she went, but Stringer had garnered his fair share of attention as well. After dinner had been served, the patrons had been herded to the ballroom to dance. Having gone with the flow, Jackie and Stringer had attacked each musical selection with gusto. Their energetic gyrations on the dance floor had given Jackie the excuse to demand, somewhat faintly, that she be squired her off on a quest for fresh air, and Stringer had made a great show of taking her outside to cool down.

Once out of the ballroom, it was the work of a few seconds to ‘lose their way' in the maze of corridors and to duck into a cavernous room that seemed to be a storage area for furniture - piled as it was with chairs and strangely shaped lumps draped in green baize cloth. Stringer followed Jackie into the gloom, and closed the door.

"Kewl," she whispered, and with a rapid twist and wriggle, she was out of her dress, leaving the filmy folds like discarded petals on the floor as she stepped clear.

"What the…" Stringer was stunned until he realized that what he'd taken for skin beneath the stunning creation she'd been wearing was in fact a flesh-colored catsuit, from which she was now drawing an impressive arsenal of weapons.

"Come on, Macky, let's go and find Victor," she said as she ghosted toward the door, a slender wand of a woman, pale and straight, but for the black mass of hair that seemed so un-Jackie. As before, all Stringer could do was follow her.

Victor was oddly ambivalent. He and the Director were being held captive by a guy who wouldn't get the "most sane" nod in a room full of James Bond villains. They had also had amazing sex. The Director-no, Diana-had let him take the lead for only a couple of moments, but the rewards for giving up the upper hand had been more bountiful than he could have possibly imagined. Li Ann had liked to draw out their lovemaking, but she was a rank amateur in comparison to Diana. He knew that it wasn't strictly in good form to compare women but Victor couldn't help it.

Li Ann was cool, a trifle detached. Diana was hot, completely enmeshed, immersed-whatever the right word was-in what she was doing to him. Li Ann liked to slowly build up the intensity. Diana seemed to make up new levels of pleasure as she went; speed wasn't an issue, sensation ruled. Li Ann wanted tit for tat. Diana got something real out of driving him out of his mind. Victor knew he'd been spinning his wheels lately; he recognized the bottom line-Li Ann didn't want him anymore and, for the moment, it appeared that Diana might.

What did she do to me, anyway? I came so damn hard I thought my head was going to explode. And I remembered her name at the moment of truth. The moment? Hell, it was at least a moment. What truth? Forget truth for a minute. What the hell am I doing? She's the Director. Right? Maybe, sometimes, she's just Diana.

"What are you thinking, Victor?"

Blushing at what the Director had interrupted, he mumbled, "I was wondering where Dobrinsky was."

"En route, I'm sure." The Director fixed him with one of her very best skeptical looks. "He's had more than enough time to come up with a suitable plan. Now tell me what you were really thinking about."

Wanting to break out of his typical pattern, he grunted, "Sex."

"I see. What about it?"

"Aren't you ever fazed by anything?"

Sitting down next to him on the small, lumpy sofa, she laughed. "Rarely."

"What was the last thing you were fazed by?"

She leaned over and stared into his eyes. "Are you sure you want to know?" Barely daring to breathe, he nodded. "Your hands on me when you came." Seeing his puzzlement, she smirked. "You should see the bruises. I'll carry your hands with me for a few days."

"I … I'm sorry."

"Don't be. It's intoxicating to make that much of an impression. So to speak." Embarrassed, Victor looked away. The Director grasped his chin and turned it toward her. "Are you interested in a rematch?"

"Very." Victor wondered where his pride had gone, but he didn't really miss it.

The next thing Victor knew, they were kissing as though they were trying to devour each other. He warmed to the competition and thought he had a strategy that might prevail. Unfortunately, he hadn't yet implemented it when a discreet but jarring alarm sounded. Victor managed, "What the-?" before his lips were reclaimed by the voracious woman in his arms.

"We've got at least ten minutes, Victor," she whispered. "Let's not waste precious time."

After having taken the limo around to the parking area, Dobrinsky had made his way to where the other drivers and staff members were assembled. They had their own refreshments, and there was a festive atmosphere below stairs as well. The addition of the contents of a small phial of liquid to the punch bowl was simple. All that remained was to sit back to watch the results of his intervention.

Before long, most of the waiting chauffeurs, and many of the serving staff were sleeping comfortably. Feigning sleep himself so that nobody would identify him as the cause of the mass lapse into unconsciousness, he awaited his opportunity to go in search of his boss and her would-be rescuer.

Stringer collided with Jackie but didn't step away from the contact while they both listened to what sounded like a muted air raid siren. Mentally measuring decibel level and assessing distance, he whispered, "The other guests won't even hear that."

Looking back over her shoulder and seeing two men approaching, one of them carrying the outer shell of her gown, Jackie countered, "We're, like, screwed."

"Good idea," Stringer said, pushing open the door next to them slightly. "Throw your weapons in there."

He was gratified that she didn't hesitate. The moment she finished, he shut the door and pinned her body between it and his body.

"What-?"

Heart pounding, Stringer interrupted her question with his tongue. A moment later, Jackie had molded her body to his and was giving as good as she got. Groaning softly, he reluctantly pulled back. "No," he panted. "Play shy."

Jackie pouted beautifully to his eyes. "I forget your name."

"Geoff." Telling himself it was all an act, Stringer applied his lips to the base of Jackie's throat and grabbed two handfuls of her ass.

She twisted in his arms. "Geoff, don't-."

"I need you." Stringer's voice wasn't steady and he responded aggressively to Jackie's closing eyes and small whimper.

The soft, "Not here," didn't sound like Jackie.

"Where, then?" Her lower body moving sensuously against his deepened his voice. "You're making me crazy, Elaine."

"The car," she murmured, never stopping the gyrations of her hips. "Home."

Stringer tried to create some distance, but Jackie had a firm grip on his hips and the sharp nip she gave his earlobe surprised him into blurting, "Can't wait."

She froze. "Oh, thank you!" Jackie deftly reached around Stringer and grabbed the portion of the dress that they'd abandoned from a young man who was doing his best not to stare at her chest. "I, like … um … well, we … he …"

"We get the picture, precious," the older of the two obvious security men drawled. Jackie favored him with a smile that Stringer desperately wanted her to aim his way. "You two better get back to the party."

Stringer had caught his breath and was gazing around in apparent puzzlement. "Is there a problem? That sounds like a fire alarm."

"Everything's under control, sir," the man replied as all three of them watched Jackie wiggle into her dress.

Grunting softly, Stringer muttered, "Speak for yourself."

"C'mon, Geoff," Jackie urged, grabbing Stringer's hand. "I want to see the ice sculptures again." Winking at the security men, she added, "I think they'll do you some good."

"Not funny," he growled.

"No sense of humor," Jackie countered with an irreverent smirk and a jaunty wave over her shoulder.

Nerves jangling, as much from the recollection of Jackie's warm and curvy body pressed against him as from the close encounter with Caddell's men, Stringer towed Jackie back to the party, fully aware that they were being watched intently by two men armed with submachine guns.

"Okay, so now what?" he asked.

Jackie caught her heel in her dress and tumbled to the ground with all the grace and style of a charging rhino. "Ow, fuck," she said, sotto voce. "I didn't mean to kick my own ass." Aloud, she bemoaned her fate prettily, clasping a slender ankle and sobbing gently as Stringer knelt to see if she was okay.

The guards rushed forward, talking urgently about the need for ice and a quiet room in which she would be able to rest until her driver could be summoned to take her home.

"Come on, Elaine," Stringer, playing the thwarted Lothario to his fullest, tugged her hand. Moaning pitifully, she turned to one of the guards - the younger one, thought Stringer to himself, sourly.

"Help me," she whined, eyes full of tears as she put weight on the apparently damaged ankle.

"I'll help you, Elaine," said Stringer, anger in his voice as he jerked her towards him by her captive wrist.

"Please?" she moaned, huge eyes fixed on the younger guard. "He'll hurt me. He always does."

The targeted guard reared up indignantly. "Come with me, little lady," he said, reaching for her and scooping her up in his arms. "I'll take you to get some ice for that ankle of yours and he," a sharp gesture indicated what he thought of Stringer, "can go on home. You're much too pretty and delicate to put up with his abuse." He strode off with Jackie in his arms.

"You bastard. You hit that little girl?" Stringer whirled in time to see the other guard raise the butt of his rifle. Smoothly, he ducked under the blow and brought both hands down on the back of the guard's neck, felling him neatly. Without losing a moment, he dragged the fallen man over to the room where Jackie's weapons had been hidden, looking to trade him in for them. As he did, Jackie sauntered around the corner, dusting her hands.

"Like, hurry up and get him out of the way," she said, and tossed him a bunch of keys. After locking the door behind the fallen guard, they ran down the corridor toward where they assumed Caddell's private quarters would be.

The Director calmly watched the door of their prison and Victor Mansfield's pacing. Contrary to her expectations-Victor was making a habit of being so lately-orgasm didn't relax him. Thinking that restlessness might be his normal reaction to frenetic, time-limited sex, she allowed herself a moment to contemplate a more leisurely and far more thorough seduction of Mr. Mansfield. Smiling, she stepped into Victor's path and stared into widening green eyes.

"He'll be here, Victor. Dobrinsky is very reliable." When Victor only grunted and stepped to one side, she matched his movement and added, "Particularly when there's a big carrot in it for him."

Eyes narrowing, Victor asked, "Carrot?"

Her body tightened most pleasantly in response to the low rumble of his voice. "We have been discussing what it would take for him to move up in the Agency."

"If you agreed that rescuing you was on his list, I'd check to see if he and Caddell are in this together."

Stepping in close, she whispered, "Do you have any idea what that tone makes me want to do?"

"I …" He was staring at her lips, so she licked them, moving her tongue in a slow, sensuous arc. "I don't have … ah … No."

"Why, Victor, I'm surprised at you." She was completely within his personal space and comfortable there, although it was plain that poor Victor wasn't at ease with her proximity. His breathing was no longer steady, and the predator in her enjoyed that small loss of control, pondering how best to further advance her interests. "It's simple cause and effect."

"Since when is anything that involves you simple?"

Inclining her head to look him in the eye, she said, "Some things are basic by nature."

"You aren't one of them."

When he took a deep breath in an effort to calm down, Victor's chest brushed against hers. Her nipples hardened instantly, and she whispered, "You're half right, Victor. A Director isn't, but a woman occasionally is."

Looking away, Victor wearily suggested, "Why don't you just tell me already?"

"When you growl, I very much want to reward you."

He blinked several times before he shook himself and asked, "And how would you go about that?"

Another surprise. His tone was lightly challenging and there was a hint of a smile in his eyes. "There are many, many things I can do for you, Victor."

"Such as?"

Victor was playing her game by her rules and it excited her beyond belief. The Director couldn't keep from running her fingertips along his arm and was shaken by how she ached for more of this man. "We don't have time for a third demonstration."

"Jesus," he muttered, shivering when her disobedient fingers shifted from his forearm to his chest. "I don't think I'd survive one."

"Oh, you will, my Victor. You'll survive and prosper."

The silence was full of possibilities and probabilities, of pleasure taken and the suggestion of what might yet be. Victor had his mouth open to speak when something large crashed into the door. Moments later, the door opened and a tall, rail-thin man with a submachine gun slung over his shoulder fell in, face first. His hands did not reach to break his fall.

"Ready to go?" Dobrinsky called cheerfully from the threshold.

"Quite," the Director confirmed, stepping around the fallen guard and taking the small Uzi Dobrinsky offered. Her eyes smiled at Victor as she added, "The facilities here aren't adequate for my needs."

Tossing Victor two handguns, Dobrinsky grinned. "Damned inconsiderate. I thought the members of the Director club had to be … sensitive to those things."

"And now you know why we threw Caddell out on his ass."

"He didn't play nice," Dobrinsky guessed, ducking his head back out into the corridor. "Unlike you."

"I don't play nice," the Director confided as she moved into position between the two men. "I play well."

"You agree with that, Ace?"

Not having any interest in wading into the vast sea of double entendre, Victor shrugged. "I don't want to know what games Directors play."

"You're smarter than you look," Dobrinsky muttered. The three moved down the corridor at a rapid pace with him in the lead, and the Director fell back to walk alongside Victor.

"I wasn't speaking of those games, Victor," she murmured, smiling at the expected flush in Victor's cheeks. When Dobrinsky had turned a corner and was out of sight momentarily, she added, "Of course, I play Director games to win as well, but my heart isn't in them."

"Pick up the pace," Dobrinsky hissed. "We've got to be in position in," he glanced at his watch without slowing, "ten minutes."

Not looking at the Director, Victor muttered, "Aye, aye, sir."

"He's auditioning for his new position." With a wink at Victor's look of surprise, she sped up to close up formation with Dobrinsky.

Victor watched her back and wondered what the rules might be in an alternate dimension where Directors seduced their most straight-laced agents.

"The guards with the biggest guns were loitering here," Stringer said, skidding to a halt at the junction of two corridors. "So they must be down there."

Jackie looked where Stringer pointed, nodding in agreement. "Let's, like, get this over with. I'm so ready to ditch this dress."

Vividly recalling what was beneath, he muttered, "I'm not stopping you."

Smiling happily, Jackie batted her eyelashes at Stringer and giggled.

"But I am." James Caddell moved in from behind, flanked by four of his men, all conspicuously armed. "This portion of my home is not for public viewing."

Jackie and Stringer exchanged a look. She winked; he sighed and said, "I don't suppose you'd make an exception in the interest of … um …"

"Cardiovascular fitness," Jackie supplied, full of mischief.

Caddell's smile was as cold as any that Stringer had ever seen. "While I can appreciate the temptation that Ms. Janczyk presents to a young man who has lost the love of his life-you do remember dear Terri, don't you, Mr. Stringer? I have to hold firm in this regard."

So, the jig, as they say, is up, Stringer thought.

Before he could speak, Jackie smiled in apparent unconcern and said, "I like my men more mature."

"How interesting," Caddell observed, looking at Jackie a bit more closely. "My information strongly suggested that youth and vigor were your only requirements."

She batted a hand in the air like a playful cat. "Nah. I like to be able to count to twenty before things get all sticky."

Holding on to his self-control for dear life and planning slow, painful torturous revenge on Jackie, Stringer stood perfectly still under the looks ranging from sympathy to amusement that he got from Caddell's guards. Caddell laughed with Jackie, and the way that her eyes darted, appraising the older man and the situation, reminded Stringer of Terri.

Overwhelmed by the memories, he whispered, "I remember, Terri. I'll never forget."

Jackie's voice dragged Stringer back into the present.

"… So I'm thinking that we're, like, at a standoff. Kind of old-fashioned, I know, but some of that stuff works, you know?"

"You don't look as though you agree, Mr. Stringer."

Liking the merger between Caddell and tension, Stringer shrugged. "I've found out that it's best not to argue with Jackie."

"Too cool!" Beaming, Jackie strutted to Stringer and kissed him on the cheek. "You learn so much faster than the other Mac."

"And what exactly have you been trying to teach the other Mac?"

"Children," Caddell interrupted. "While your performance is engaging and almost believable, I have other, far more urgent matters that require my attention."

Jackie mimed opening an appointment book. "Eleven thirty pm, global domination."

"Nothing quite so melodramatic, my dear," Caddell muttered. Stringer was thrilled that he and Victor weren't the only ones that Jackie annoyed. "It's time for a loyalty check for one of my colleagues." Examining the fingernails of his left hand, he added, "Past time."

"Can I watch?" Jackie now had the attention of every male present, but the interest was of a type far removed from that which she generally aroused. Gazing an apology at Stringer, shrugging so that her breasts rose and fell, she said, "I might learn something."

Caddell recovered first. "Unfortunately, my dear, it is also past time for you and the intrepid Mr. Stringer to be on your way." His eyes shifted to Stringer. "It's truly a pity. We could have done this in a much more civilized manner if you had cooperated."

Anger and frustration asserted themselves. "Killing a man and substituting another is civilized? That's a fascinating world view you've got there, Caddell."

Eyes boring into Stringer's, Caddell smirked. "It would have been quick, virtually painless for Victor and the scenario offered you a chance to do something useful with what remains of your life."

"I was mourning the woman you killed!" He had no chance against four automatic weapons, but the thought of rushing the arrogant bastard was almost too compelling.

"Grief doesn't last forever, Mr. Stringer." Without turning his head, he said, "Boyle."

The most hardened looking guard handed his weapon to Caddell, stepped forward and ripped Jackie's dress with one hand before slamming her into the wall with a well-aimed kick of a booted foot. The barrel of Caddell's gun was at Stringer's throat, but his eyes split time between Stringer's face and Jackie's cat suit. Stringer was inordinately proud when Jackie regained her feet and posed, aggressively sexy with her head held high.

"Does it?" Caddell prompted. He laughed when Stringer looked to him in confusion. "A woman like that," he stage whispered, gesturing toward Jackie with a small, sharp movement of his chin, "reminds a man of what it is to be one. Doesn't she?"

"She's hot. How obvious is that?"

"Too obvious for my tastes, but I expect that mine are a bit more refined than yours."

"Yeah, you're the man, all right," Stringer muttered. "And since you're holding all the guns and are about to throw us out of this fancy house of yours, maybe you'd lower yourself for a minute to satisfy my curiosity." When Caddell said nothing, he asked, "What did you hope to gain by substituting me for Victor?"

Moving a few paces away from Stringer, Caddell began, "When I left the Agency's fold, I had certain interests of which my colleagues didn't approve. They tried to eliminate me, but I was able to call in some of the favors that I had earned while gainfully employed to get their barely trained dogs off of my scent. With my newfound freedom, I was able to expand some of my more prurient interests into very profitable enterprises. But it was only a matter of time before those endeavors attracted the wrong kind of attention-that of my former colleagues." Caddell sighed. "Since I knew that only one of them was creative enough and intelligent enough to give me trouble, I decided that a distraction was in order. Disrupting her most ambitious project-her team of malcontents and misfits-seemed as good a strategy as any. If I'd only known the truth of the matter, I could have saved myself the complication of involving you, my poor fellow."

"Saved yourself …? You son of a-."

"Goes without saying, baby," Jackie murmured as she caught Stringer around the waist, keeping him from making a futile gesture of defiance. Looking at Caddell over Stringer's shoulder, she said, "Your intel isn't so good, huh? Ever think about a new network?"

"You intrigue me, Ms. Janczyk. We must talk again."

"Call me," Jackie suggested, "if your people can, like, get my number."

"I'll accept that condition." Handing the gun back to his minion, Caddell paused for a moment, as if lost in thought. Stringer was considering increasingly nasty and dramatic gestures when the older man spoke. "I can't afford to kill you with my house full of guests, but you would do well to be aware that I don't often entertain this extravagantly. Now, if you both would be so kind as to accompany Boyle and Cardigan to the door, we can part without any unpleasantness."

Angry, nearly sick with failure and the knowledge that he couldn't yet trust himself not to act on those emotions, Stringer allowed Jackie to babble assurances of their full cooperation and lead him by the hand along the path blazed by Boyle.

The party was still going strong. Strains of Glenn Miller's ‘Serenade in Blue' filtered out from the open balcony, underpinned by trills of laughter and a more general hubbub. Jackie gazed up at the dancing figures that were visible through the brightly lit windows and sighed.

"Like, we didn't do any slow dancing, Stringer. That so sucks."

"Easy, girl. If we get out of this, I'll dance with you as slow as you want, I promise." Stringer was nervous. He could see Boyle and Cardigan , but not the others behind. He was sure that he and Jackie were not going to be permitted to leave this place alive, no matter what Caddell had said. His little speech had given Caddell-what was the American political phrase-plausible deniability as to their fate.

They'd relieved Stringer of his gun, but he could still fight. Sometime in the past few days he'd realized that he didn't want to die and was determined to see to it that Jackie didn't either. The heat from Jackie's arm radiated through the jacket of his tux and grounded him in the immediacy of the here and now, demanding that they somehow make it through to see the sunrise.

Feeling somewhat better for his epiphany, he murmured to Jackie, "Someone's following us, kiddo."

"Yeah. Two, one behind and one to the left." She grinned at him. "I'll take the one on the left. You do what you can with the one behind."

Without seeming to break stride, Jackie sidestepped and delivered several jarring jabs to the poor boy at their flank. That brought the other, not so bright rearguard forward into Stringer's waiting fists. Stringer couldn't tell whether Boyle or Cardigan noticed the diminution of their numbers, but he didn't want to think about what it meant if they had. As it was, the coast looked clear for a retreat and Stringer was about to suggest it when Jackie grabbed his arm and pointed.

Ahead was their car with the engine running, but they couldn't see whether anyone was inside. Boyle sauntered over and leaned on the hood, idly twirling a pistol. Cardigan turned as they reached the vehicle, grabbing Jackie's hand as she reached for the door handle and pulling her to him with a snicker.

"Oh, no, little lady. You don't got no ‘get out of jail free' card. You got to pay like everyone else."

"Like, you have to be joking. Two words - personal hygiene," snapped Jackie as he tried clumsily to kiss her.

"Leave her alone," yelled Stringer, rushing forward, despite the fact that Boyle had a clear shot at him.

With a suddenness that kicked Stringer in the gut, Jackie went limp in Cardigan's arms. As he shifted his grip, she got her feet underneath her and kneed Cardigan in the groin. Boyle cursed and swing around, ready to pistol whip her.

A gunshot startled Stringer into momentary immobility.

Boyle slowly pitched forward, a dark blossom appearing between his eyes. Cardigan turned, gasping from Jackie's attack, and she brought both hands down on the back of his neck with a crunch that was audible even above the sounds of the party.

Seconds later, Murphy and Camier stepped out of the darkness.

"Miss Janczyk? Are you well?" Murphy's cultured tones inquired.

"Yeah, like, some guys just don't know how to behave, you know?" replied Jackie as she flicked at the spatters of blood staining her gown. "This dress is, like, seriously trashed."

"Mr. Camier and I have an appointment we can't afford to miss," Murphy said, cocking his shotgun, meaningfully.

"Failure is so… messy and unsatisfying." Camier, gaunt and genteel, gestured vaguely with his automatic weapon, and met Murphy's eyes with a look that spoke of calm urbane urgency.

"If Mr. Caddell escapes again, they'll revoke our membership in the assassin's guild." Without further discussion, the enforcers vanished into the house, main guns in hand and other weapons bristling about their persons.

Stringer jumped again when Dobrinsky materialized from the shadows.

"Get in the car, Ace. We don't want to be here any longer."

Wordlessly, Stringer and Jackie accepted Dobrinsky's instruction.

"I thought that you two would never join us," came a familiar throaty voice. "I assume that you stopped to have that one last dance that you saved for each other."

The Director sat primly in the back of the limo, and Victor, bruised and battered, lay with his head in her lap, unconscious.

"Is he all right?" was all that Stringer could think to say.

"He's just a little dented, but I want him to see a doctor as a precaution," the Director said, stroking Vic's hair with a strange tenderness. Automatic weapons were fired to the accompaniment of loud voices and hysterical screaming. "Get us out of here, Dobrinsky," the Director ordered.

The journey back into town was accomplished in silence. Vic had remained out of it, and the Director had tended to his injuries. In what was becoming a habit of her limo travel, Jackie had grinned, put her feet up on the back seat, and fallen into what appeared to be a deep and dreamless sleep, leaving Mac Stringer to try and figure out just how he'd been played this time.

"You meant us to be decoys, didn't you?" he asked as they climbed out of the limo.

The Director watched the paramedics load Victor onto a gurney and trundle him away to the Agency infirmary. Once he was out of sight, she turned to Stringer, who was now watching Jackie as she stretched and yawned histrionically.

"Yes," the Director said. "Don't feel too badly. They also serve, who only stand and wait."

"Why didn't you tell us we were going to create a diversion? We might've done a better job." Stringer was furious, fists balled and face mutinous.

"Do you know how much like Victor you sound, my dear Mack?" The Director patted his cheek, then turned and followed Victor's stretcher, leaving Stringer standing on the pavement with his righteous indignation.

"Hey," Jackie's soft touch on his arm startled him. "Hanging here all night won't change anything."

"I…" He turned to her, face clouded with confusion. "We ought to go in and find out how Vic is."

"It'll be hours before they tell us anything, and I want to get my hair back to normal. Black is so not the look for me." She grinned and affectionately punched him in the shoulder. "C'mon, I'll give you a ride back to Vic's place. We'll find out more in the morning."

"You drugged me."

The Director looked up from the files arrayed before her on the long, austere table in the Agency boardroom. "Hello, Victor."

"Don't act like this is a social call; it isn't." Glaring with the intensity of the wronged, Victor stalked over to her. "You drugged me and then you had your lackeys in the infirmary keep me that way. Why?"

"Why ever not?"

"What kind of stupid question is that?"

Calm and collected, the Director stood and faced her angry agent. "One. You were injured. I'm sure that Dr. Borden would be willing to describe each of your physical ailments to you in glorious detail."

"He already did," Victor mumbled. "A concussion and bruised ribs aren't so bad."

Shaking her head, the Director scolded, "I understood the bruised kidney to be of greater concern."

"Well, yeah, maybe, but-."

"Two," she interrupted, quiet yet forceful. "You do not convalesce well. Rest is a four letter word in the Victor Mansfield lexicon." When Victor opened his mouth to speak, she arched an eyebrow and smiled. "Was I wrong in my thinking that you're much too intelligent to go to the futile trouble of disputing that point?"

"No, but, you can't just drug anyone you want to and get away with it."

"Yes, Victor, I can."

Clenching his jaw and his fists, Victor attempted to order his thoughts and select an appropriate retort.

The Director didn't wait. "Three. There was no one I could trust to watch over you and protect you from over-exerting yourself."

"I don't need-."

As if she hadn't paused, as though he hadn't spoken, she continued, "LiAnn would have smothered you in endless recitations of what you should have done to avoid getting injured at all. Mac would have decided to conduct pharmacokinetic experiments of the effects of mixing the drugs you absolutely had to take with substantial recreational alcohol consumption. Jackie would have let you do anything that looked like exercise, so your muscle tone didn't suffer from inactivity. Stringer had to work through his pointless anger at being used yet again. I shudder to think what you might have suggested to Nathan would be necessary to preserve the Earth from invasion. Murphy and Camier had several more important tasks to occupy their time. I had to make my report, attend far too many tedious meetings about how we dealt with Caddell and push Dobrinsky's promotion through. Dobrinsky himself had to update all of his current files and take over his Directorship. So, you see, Victor, I had no choice other than to keep you properly medicated."

With growing dismay, Victor listened to the litany and recognized the truth in much of what she said. "You could have asked me to take it easy, you know."

"You wouldn't have."

"Maybe not, but you could have asked."

Her smile a bit warmer, the Director nodded. "I could have."

"Well, ok, then." Anger defused, Victor noticed that she was wearing an almost conservative business suit.

"I'm pleased that that's settled, Victor, because we really must talk about your future."

"What about my future?" he muttered, leaning a hand on the back of one of the chairs he usually sat in to receive his assignments or recriminations of one sort or another. "Aren't I just going to continue on as the third, sometimes fourth wheel in your unhappy, unhealthy team of borderline sociopaths?"

"No."

The simple reply was lost in the horror of a sudden thought. More nervous than he cared to admit, he whispered, "But I guess it's five now, isn't it? You won't let Stringer go."

"Mr. Stringer has no where else to go, Victor." Her voice was gentle. "Not unless he wants to turn his back on his life's work."

Anger flared again, this time in the name of protectiveness. "That's exactly what you said to me."

"Wasn't it true?"

Wary and sensing that he was being skillfully led, Victor nodded once and asked, "What about my future?"

"Come now, Victor," she chided. Stepping closer, the Director smiled up at him with what looked like true warmth. "Where's your sense of the ironic?"

"I must've left it at home." Victor dug his fingernails into his palm to dispel the thought that she looked beautiful when her laughter was genuine.

"Think of it," she whispered, watching him with mischievous eyes, stroking his chest through his wrinkled cotton shirt. "Mr. Stringer will change everything."

"Mac will hate him."

"I agree completely but I'm curious as to your reasoning."

Victor shrugged. "He's a guy, closer to Mac's age. He'll see Stringer as more competition than he ever gave me credit for."

"Competition for what?"

"Everything."

She had both hands on him now, but it felt more as though she were committing him to tactile memory than trying to distract or tease him. "And the fair LiAnn?"

"She'll want to hate him." After placing a brief kiss on the corner of Victor's mouth, the Director nodded in pleased agreement and arched an inquiring eyebrow. Taking a deep breath, Victor ventured, "Because he'll prefer Jackie's company."

"And our intrepid Ms. Janczyk?"

"They'll be friends, she and Stringer. Just friends, even if they do have sex on occasion, but she'll use him to egg LiAnn on and he'll let her."

"Very good, Victor," the Director said, smiling at his startled look at the praise before issuing her challenge. "Where do you fit in?"

Thinking hard, Victor tried to craft a niche for himself. He knew he could still be useful, but it was tough to see just how that might be. When the Director chanced across that place along his side that was ticklish, he instinctively grabbed her wrist and moved her hand away.

Unresisting, she prompted, "Well?"

Finally and with great reluctance, he admitted, "I don't."

"Precisely," she agreed. "And that, my dear Victor, is why I have decided to promote you to Dobrinsky's former position."

Shock kept him quiet for a full minute. "But what about LiAnn? I mean, I thought she …"

The Director rolled her eyes expressively. "Banish the thought from your mind, Victor. LiAnn is, as Jackie might say, so not Director material."

"Neither am I."

"You may have no aspirations in that direction and that's perfectly fine." Smirking at him, mischievous once more, she added. "But in the interest of full disclosure, I must point out that the most rigorous requirement for my job is a profound understanding of people and what motivates them. An ability, I might add, that you have just amply demonstrated."

"Only because I know them."

"Perhaps." Unerringly, her fingers returned to the ticklish spot, forcing Victor to recapture them.

"Stop that."

Ignoring him again, she said, "In any event, I am in need of a right hand man and I've selected you. Do you have any objection to that?"

Unable to simply accept what might well be inevitable, Victor muttered, "I'm not washed up."

"I never said you were and, what's more, I wouldn't have a close associate who was." Pulling her hands from his grasp, she rested them gently, one on each side of his face, as she kissed him, taking her time to ensure that she was thorough. "Work with me," she whispered against his lips.

"What-?" Victor's voice broke when she shifted her hungry lips to the base of his throat. "What do I have to do?"

Stepping back, she smiled wickedly. "Your first official act in your new position is to punish me for drugging one of my agents without his knowledge."

Victor's eyes widened to what felt to be a dangerous extent if he wanted his eyeballs to stay in their sockets. "Dob … Dobrinsky … did things like … like that?"

"That's another one of those thoughts to banish from your mind," she purred, bending over the huge conference table, pushing her skirt up to reveal garters and underwear that didn't match the conservative outer garments. "I should be spanked at the very least. Don't you agree?"

His mouth suddenly dry, Victor stared at the ass wiggling up at him. The wave of heat that passed through him made coherent speech impossible. He couldn't even make himself nod.

"Please, Victor. I need discipline."

Stunned, aroused, flushed and panting, he looked around for something to use to satisfy her craving.

"Your hand," the Director pleaded, looking over her shoulder at him with smoldering eyes. "I want to feel your hand on my ass. After that," she murmured, licking her lips and blowing him a kiss, "you can do whatever you want with me."

Held at bay for as long as humanly possible, the fantasy surged forward in Victor's mind, overwhelming logic and pride. Punctuating each word with a slap, Victor said, "I. Always. Wanted. To. Fuck. You. On. This. Table."

Stepping away from her, Victor tore at his button fly jeans, growling in impatience at his own clumsiness. When he'd extricated himself and looked up, Victor almost came. Files were strewn everywhere and the Director had climbed up onto the table, awaiting him on all fours, red ass in the air. "And I've dreamt about you fucking me wearing that jacket, Victor."

Her purr of his name broke down every barrier Victor had ever possessed. He pulled a muscle in his haste to climb up and position himself behind her, but her pleas to be taken made him forget the pain and the insanity of what he was about to do both personally and professionally. The only thoughts that mattered were of pleasure, given and taken.

Victor Mansfield had entered a brave new world and he strongly suspected that he might like it.

End

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