The first time he sees her after San Juan, they're in a warehouse.
A week before that, he had been sitting in a diner with Kara, trying to find an old photo or any information on who she had been. They had found a photo two hours later, but were still lacking in information.
They were situated in yet another motel room, pages and documents laid out around them. There had been a knock on the door. He looked out the window to see Coulson standing with a man he recognized as a tail from the time he escaped custody.
He eyed the gun on the table. He reached for it. Kara, being the sensible one, smacked his hand away and went to open the door.
"How did you find us?" He asks once Coulson and the man are sitting on their couch. Coulson hands him a tablet
"Your poetics," he says. "When I saw the pattern of gunshots, I knew it had to be you."
He looks down to see the picture of Ian Quinn in the cellar of his Italian Villa, propped up on the wall with two gunshots through the stomach.
He passes the tablet back to Coulson and smiles.
Coulson, as it turns out had wanted their help in getting back S.H.I.E.L.D. and finding Skye. He finishes his spiel and Kara just starts laughing. He turns to look at her, for one because it is the first time he's actually heard her laugh. Coulson and the man now known as Hunter just look confused.
Kara looks only slightly embarrassed.
"I'm sorry," she says, hand over her mouth," But you lock him in a basement, send him to his worst nightmare, and now you want him to help you?"
Coulson smiles sardonically.
"Of course," he says, "I know I sound absurd."
"We'll help," he says right after, though he's not exactly sure why.
The week hadn't been too strenuous. They had searched for ways to get back into S.H.I.E.L.D, met up with Mike Peterson, which had been slightly awkward for Ward, and the day before, May had called to say that Skye had contacted her saying she was safe.
He's standing in a warehouse, searching it, when he rounds the corner and sees her.
She's not in her regular agent gear; rather she's dressed in jeans and a button down with a leather jacket. He tries not to focus on how pretty her hair looks, or the way the light catches her eyes. They lock eyes and she freezes too, gun hanging loosely in her hand. His is still clutched in his fist.
Kara and Hunter are right behind him, almost smack into him as he's frozen to the floor. Instead, they move to the side. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Hunter put his arm around Kara, effectively holding her back from getting in the middle of them.
Slowly, he lowers his gun to floor. She does the same. They don't move more than that, only stare at each other.
"I didn't want to shoot you," her voice is so quiet, he wouldn't even know she was speaking if he hadn't seen her mouth move.
"I think- The obelisk, it wanted me to kill you, wanted me to shoot you in the heart, but I couldn't."
She stares at him, tears filling her eyes. Coulson had briefed him about her gift. But the room doesn't shake. He is proud.
"I'm sorry," she adds.
He believes her.
Because he knows her. He trained her. He knows that she could convince any man in this world that she loved him. She could string men along for all it was worth. But when she was sorry, her emotions were always plastered across her face like a sign. When she was truly upset, he could see the emotions under her skin as clear as day.
"I know," he whispers, "I believe you."
She runs at him.
Kara lurches forward, as if to stop an attack, but Hunter pulls her back.
Skye leaps into his arms. Her arms wrap around his neck and her legs around his waist. He wraps his arms around her back to hold her there.
He hears a small "what" from a very confused Kara and Hunter.
It takes him a minute to realize she's sobbing. But she is, crying into his shoulder and shaking and gasping, clutching him tighter and tighter. She's murmuring unintelligible words, breathing hard, clenching her fists and trying to regain control of her emotions. But the tears keep flowing. He can feel the shoulder of his shirt getting wet where the bulletproof vest ends, and he can feel tears of his own building up behind his eyes.
Slowly, her strength wanes and she slides her legs out from around his waist. But she keeps her arms around him, now wrapping them around his waist as she lowers to the floor. He moves his arms so they're wrapped protectively around her shoulders. At first, he rests his chin lightly on her head, whispering words that he hopes will help or comfort her. When the tears start slipping down his face, he buries his face in her hair. She still smells like lavender, and like summer rain.
He chokes his own apologies into her hair. She holds him tighter in response. She's stopped sobbing, but he can still hear quiet crying. He's still sobbing earnestly into her hair. He hasn't cried in a long time. Even when she's stopped crying all together, when her breath go from shaky to deep and steady, he is still shaking with tears.
When he finally stops crying, when he stops shaking, he can feel her deep and steady breath into his chest. He head is still resting on the Kevlar vest. He lays a kiss to her hair, and breathes in the scent of lavender.
An hour later Coulson and both S.H.I.E.L.D teams search the warehouse to find them standing in this position, arms wrapped around each other.
Behind them, Kara and Hunter are sitting on the floor playing go fish.