She keeps her muscles loose and holds her breath until she hears his footsteps fade. She hadn't been sure he would be fooled if he felt her neck for a pulse, even if hers is hard to find, but he had only checked her breathing. Faking death had been the only way to make him leave without her. And now he is gone, hopefully on his way to the train out, and she is free to collect her sample and go her own way.
Sitting up hurts, but it will not kill her. And nearby, there is the corpse of some G-virus-infected creature that someone has been considerate enough to kill for her.
It is when she is on—or, rather, under—the helicopter to safety, enjoying a moment of rest after a job well done, that she sees the missile headed for Raccoon and feels a surprising sting of regret. There is hardly a person left alive, and there is negative value if any in the creatures that are left, but it seems somehow...wasteful.
The twinge of doubt she feels when she hands over the G-virus sample is easily banished when she sees the seven-figure sum that has been deposited in her bank account. She takes a hot shower, puts on a green silk dress, and orders room service, and she begins to feel as she should again. It's not her concern what they do with their mariner's albatross. Tomorrow, she will transfer the money into other accounts she has hidden away just in case her employers decide to double-cross her. It's how the world works.
She sleeps in soft sheets and dreams of strong, trembling arms holding her close and phantom lips on hers.
Her first order of business is to take a short vacation. She takes a train first-class to New York and spends a few days admiring museums, art galleries, and fine restaurants, hiding her bandages under long clothes and her bruises under makeup and a hat. While admiring a particularly fine twelfth century royal portrait, she catches herself wondering what her life would be like if she had chosen a different profession, perhaps art thief, and she smiles at the thought of herself in a black catsuit like the woman in the movie that's supposed to come out in April.
Her smile turns wistful when she realizes that she is picturing Leon as the male lead. It doesn't fit; he's far too much a boy scout to be a thief.
When the bandages come off, she stands naked in front of the mirror and looks herself over with a critical eye. Only a few of her wounds, the deepest, ever leave scars, and those are easily covered by makeup. She is young, successful, strong, and beautiful. It is everything she wanted.
She sleeps with a man three months after escaping Raccoon. He's in his thirties, well-dressed, fit, and handsome enough to believe she wants him for his looks. When he is finally asleep, she takes images of everything in his briefcase and then puts it back exactly as it was before slipping out.
Two weeks later, she hears that he died in what is ruled an accidental fall, and she feels nothing at all.
Leon's name comes up in the middle of the next year, when she is researching government investigations into Umbrella. It surprises her so much that she forgets for a while what she was originally looking for. He has been recruited as a specialist, with no other designation, and she infers that his job has to do with fighting bioterrorism. The Birkin girl has been taken into protective custody, and there is no mention of a young woman, but a little digging turns up Claire Redfield, sister of former S.T.A.R.S. member Chris Redfield.
It is strange that Leon, who had attached himself to her so quickly, would let himself be separated from them, so she digs further and discovers the Faustian truth behind the pretty fiction. Leon always was quick to loyalty, she thinks, and the familiarity surprises her.
She could still choose him. And for a moment, she considers it.
She has information the government would sell Florida for: names, locations of laboratories, projects, and where and how to find the incriminating evidence. She could even find samples of the viruses if she wanted. It's more than enough to buy herself a full pardon, Leon's freedom, and even Sherry's safety if it's so important to him. She could wake up in Leon's arms tomorrow.
But it's not who she is. She'd be giving up her seven-figures-a-year, the freedom of anonymity, and probably years off her life once her employers realize what she's done. She'd never be paid enough to live as she pleases, not when bargaining for her continued freedom too, and any job the government would offer a turncoat would be low six figures at most. And if they knew Leon mattered to her, they would try to use him to control her.
She doesn't choose him, not then and not now, but she never does forget him either.
Once he's in her head, it's impossible to get rid of him.
One kiss, clumsy and desperate, and suddenly she can't stop thinking about him, but it's not just that. The kiss was from the man who had taken a bullet for her, and he gave it knowing she had given him only lies in return.
She's no blushing virgin; she sleeps with nearly a dozen men in the year after that kiss, most for business and some for pleasure, and she kisses all of them and more. They call her a dozen names, and it becomes easy to play along; none of them call her "Ada."
There's a little girl.
Her employers want pressure applied to a witness, so they threaten his family: his wife, an infant son, and a ten-year-old girl. But with the family under constant police surveillance, it isn't a simple matter of taking them hostage, and that is where she comes in. Her job is to watch the man and make sure he plays by the rules. If he steps out of line, well, they have two more hostages than they need. Accidents happen.
The girl bears a very passing resemblance to Sherry Birkin, or maybe all terrified pre-teen girls start to look alike. Leon would be horrified at the thought of even threatening her, but she isn't him.
When the man starts looking a little too speculatively at the nice detective who keeps dropping by, the only one of the three on the case not on their payroll, she decides to give him a warning of her own. The next day, the detective is in the hospital with food poisoning from undercooked shrimp, and the witness is mistakenly given a copy of his medical record.
He's smart. The case never makes it to trial.
Leon is her conscience.
It shouldn't be a surprise, considering she didn't know she had one before a foolish, idealistic young cop took a bullet for her and she realized that it hurt her to have caused him pain. She used him anyways, but she couldn't bring herself to truly betray him, and that stays with her.
She doesn't hear his voice in her head, scolding her for her sins, or anything so trite. Instead, she remembers him and, unbidden, thinks of the hurt she'd see in his eyes if he saw her now; he always did believe her to be better than she is, as intelligent as he was in other ways. His opinion of her is probably even less accurate now that he thinks she sacrificed herself for him.
Really, the world is what it is, and it's Leon who should know better. Bad things are always going to happen, and a girl's got to eat. She has a talent for what she does, and she isn't ashamed of it. But as long as she completes jobs with her usual efficiency, there's nothing wrong with trying to minimize casualties so she can sleep easier.
It started with Leon, but that isn't where it ends.
He changed her. The woman she was wasn't capable of love, yet he gave it to her, and it changed her. She still isn't capable of love in the way he is, but her feelings for him have only grown. He can't be hers, but she doesn't want to lose him, not for any price.
But more than that, she begins to see the cost of doing business differently. It's hard to care about bankruptcies and broken families, but collateral damage changes from something to minimize for the sake of common decency to simply something to be avoided, without need for justification. A job is a job, but she finds there are lines she is reluctant to cross. It's inconvenient, and sometimes she's even angry with Leon for doing this to her.
He wasn't supposed to make her care.
Sometimes, she thinks that if she just got a few hours alone with him in a hotel room, she'd be able to work this obsession with his damnable feelings out of her system.
Most of the time, she suspects her ulterior motives for that idea, but it would be much more convenient that way, except for the part where he would find out that she's alive. Smart as he is, he's probably already heard rumours, but he's focused on the if, not the why and how. Questions he will ask if she comes back into his life.
She settles for cold facts and second-hand reports. His closest living family is a distant cousin. He keeps sporadic contact with Claire Redfield through e-mail, short missives of friendly life updates and occasional tips their organizations are too chary to officially share. He pays all his bills automatically with his credit card after the second time his power was cut off. News of his latest successes is her guilty pleasure, since he's personally annoying half her client pool and working his way around to the rest. He's even taken a few off the list, which is dangerous; he's making enemies.
It's not entirely healthy, her fixation, but she needs to know that he's still alive.
There are very few constants in her life. She likes the colour red, fine things, and being good at her job. Wesker stays longer than she'd expected, but the Organization has lasting power, so she ties her loyalties to them. Without telling Wesker, of course, so their partnership continues.
The fall of Umbrella doesn't take her as hard as it does many in her profession, in fact pushing her up the unofficial ranks as the others struggle to stay afloat. Her position is no less precarious, but she reaps greater benefits. If it weren't for her history with the company and the slight stir of the rumours about her its fall causes, she'd say nothing changed for her.
She has her youth, her beauty, her skill, and lots of money, the only things she can put her trust in. And she has the slowly-fading memory of him, the only man she almost loved.
It's almost everything she ever wanted.
When she sees him again, he has changed. His hair is lighter, he's built up muscle on his slim frame, and there are fine lines on his face where there were none before. His eyes are sharper—six years of hard experience will do that to you—his body language and expressions are more controlled, and his voice has gained a note of cool determination. Where he was once so earnest, he now jests dryly with the ease of a man who has seen enough that even surprises no longer surprise him. Where he once hesitated, he doesn't anymore.
Yet he is unmistakeable to her. As she watches him, she can still see the heart on his sleeve, where he worries for strangers with the same fierceness most reserve for immediate family; the same strength he carried in Raccoon, only now pushed to the fore; and his new sense of humour is still recognizable as that of the young man who dubbed a pursuing nine-foot-tall B.O.W. "Trenchy." He is her Leon, only older and wiser.
Life may not have been kind to him, but he has aged well. It's hard for her to look away.
But he's in the village, and he won't leave until he's found Ashley Graham, which will be neither quick nor easy. His investigation will turn up her presence even if she avoids him; and even if it somehow doesn't, the odds of Luis, Krauser, Saddler and that idiot Salazar all keeping their mouths shut is so small it is insignificant. And, knowing Leon, he will be looking for her.
She might as well save him the trouble.