Cold metal dings lightly under Liz's fingernails as she taps repeatedly on the bars of Red's cell, the irritating pinging the only sound in the holding room aside from the rumble of Red's voice and the tiresome sound of her own breathing, standing here in front of Red's cell.

Red's cell.

Those two words are making her stomach churn, guilt and uneasiness and fear all roiling around together, trying their best to make her sick.

Red's telling her all about his trial, seated on the uncomfortable excuse for a bench they've given him in there, with his head propped up on his hand, talking slowly to her, his eyes heavy.

(He's so tired.)

She's trying to listen to him, she really is, because she does care about how the trial went and, although she already heard the most important facts from Cooper, Liz knows that any other day she would love to hear Red's rendition.

(Because for some reason the image of Red striding confidently around a courtroom, waxing poetic about his sins, weaving a tapestry of innocence with his hands and his voice, no doubt entrancing the female judge despite her attempts to resist him?

Well, Liz wishes she was there to see that.)

And he's still talking, telling her everything that happened, and – in another life and a different universe – this would feel for all the world like they were a domestic couple sharing stories about their day and the thought of him placing that kind of trust in her is scratching at her insides once again.

(Because she wants more and more to be that person for him.)

And this could all be very normal – well, as normal as people like them can be – if not for the bars in between them.

(And there's definitely more than one meaning in there somewhere.)

Liz hates them, she really does. She doesn't relish the sight of him trapped behind them like Jennifer assured her she would. Instead, Liz somehow feels like the trapped one, itching out of her skin at the sight of him caged and captured, not calm and confident like she knows him to be. He seems like a smaller version of himself, deflated and sad. He's still him, still Red, still cute and always handsome and looking fantastic just like she's been telling him – but he's putting on a show, like he does, and Liz has a feeling that she's the only one who can see right through it to the toll this is really taking on him.

And she hates it.

But Liz can do nothing right now except gaze at him and tap her fingers restlessly, feeling hot and cold and slow and fast and impatient and angry because she did this and it's eating her up inside. She wishes more than anything that she could take it all back or, better yet, just open the cell door and lead him out into the sunlight where he belongs –

And then Red is pausing in his retelling and taking a moment to scrub a hand over his face, closing his eyes as she's only ever seen him do in her presence alone and the sight of him, exhausted and vulnerable in front of her, the one who betrayed him, feels like a knife to her gut and all at once she really just can't stand it anymore.

"Get up," she commands without preamble, vaguely aware that he was opening his mouth to speak again when she plowed right over him, but she can't bring herself to care because there's something she has to do. There's something she has to do right now because if she doesn't do it now then she never will and if it never happens – well, she stopped thinking that far ahead a long time ago.

(But she knows she would regret it for the rest of her life.)

"Pardon?" Red asks, blinking at her, ever polite in the face of her rudeness.

"Get up," Liz repeats impatiently, glancing down the hallway and up the stairs to where the kindly guard disappeared at her request for some privacy. They should still have a few minutes left. "Get up and come here."

Red frowns but follows her brusque instructions anyway, standing with a heavy sigh and shuffling closer to face her at the bars.

"What –"

But Liz doesn't give him a chance to say anything because his lips are close enough now, so she simply shoves her hands as far through the bars as she can to grab two fistfuls of his suit jacket and tug him forward. She barely notices when his forehead clunks painfully against the bars and the shock of cold metal against her own face because she's captured his lips with hers and he makes a surprised sound that's somewhere between a whimper and a sigh before he can stop himself and –

(Ah.)

But Liz barely gets a taste of him before he's wrenching himself away from her and her eyes fly open to find him looking at her, stricken and scared and cautious and hopeful all at once, any trace of fatigue gone from his face.

"Lizzie, what are you –"

"I know," she gasps, breathless and quiet, still close to him, staring into his eyes, desperate for him to understand and just kiss her already. "I know you're not my fa–"

"Oh, thank god –" he doesn't let her finish the word, the six dirty letters that have created an ugly, deep trench between them, before he's lunging back towards her, scaling that trench with the ease of blowing away a line in the sand – and it's always been that simple, hasn't it? – and he reclaims her lips with a desperation that now matches her own.

Liz is disarmed for a short second by the sheer force of his emotion, now evident and unhidden, no longer smothered by layers of subterfuge and foolishness but then her bottom lip is slipping in between his and the sharp nip he gives it has her gasping and before she knows it her tongue is tracing his back teeth and oh, he's good at this.

Absorbed as she is by his lips, it takes a moment before she becomes aware of a faint tickling sensation at her waist and another second after that before her sluggish brain realizes that Red is struggling to fit his hands, larger than hers, through the bars to hold her waist, only managing to brush his fingers tantalizingly against her.

(And Liz has a sudden vision, the most disarming image, of no barriers between them, no cold steel in the way, and Red would be hauling her against his body and she would be throwing her arms around his shoulders to eliminate any space between them and oh, if only.)

At the intoxicating thought, she hurriedly steps forward to press herself to the chilled bars, so unlike the warm body she's craving, and only barely manages to feel the heat of him. But Red gets a palm around one of her hips and that seems to satisfy him for the moment, as he turns his attention back to her mouth, his tongue doing truly dirty things inside her mouth.

(Oh, my.)

And her legs are starting to tremble, and she can't hold in a small groan at the feeling and with a shock she suddenly feels his warm fingers on her bare skin, where he's apparently managed to untuck her shirt from her jeans and just stroke and if she could just get a leg through these bars –

Thud.

There's a noise at the top of the stairs and suddenly Liz is crashing back to reality as she and Red jump away from each other, Red hurriedly turning to face the wall and put his back to the entrance while Liz is whipping around to face the stairs, bringing a hand up to hide her kiss-swollen lips, just in time to see the guard's head clear the top of the stairway and peer down at them, frowning slightly.

"Everything okay down here, Agent Keen?"

Liz has to stop herself from swaying in relief. He didn't see anything. Oh, thank god.

"Just fine, thank you, Sergeant Simms," she answers, trying to sound professional, something like she wasn't just sucking Raymond Reddington's tongue down her throat – Oh, Jesus Christ –

"If you say so, Agent," Simms says easily, not looking suspicious in the least. She's lucky that he seems to have a thing for her. "Time's almost up though," he says regretfully, giving her a sympathetic look.

"Um, could we have one more minute?" she asks, trying not to sound as broken as she feels at the thought of leaving Red right now.

"Sure," he says easily, glancing once more at Red, who, for his part, is putting on a good show of being overcome by emotion from something they were talking about, facing the wall with his head down, a perfect complement to Liz's shaky hand over her mouth and arm wrapped around her waist to hide her partially untucked shirt and well, they do make a good team, don't they?

Simms nods once more before heading back up the stairs to the ground level and Liz waits until she hears the scrape of his chair legs before she's back at the bars, stretching through to grab Red's hands that are already there and reaching for her.

"Lizzie –" he's breathing to her and he sounds just as wrecked as she feels and he leans forward, not to kiss her again as she expected, but to rest his forehead ever so gently against hers and the sheer sweetness of the gesture makes tears well up in her eyes and she shoves a hand painfully through the bars to cup his cheek and guide his lips back to hers for one last searing kiss.

(But please don't let it be the last, she thinks deliriously.)

Liz can feel Red smother a groan, mindful of the sergeant this time, and tilt his head into her hand instead, desperate for even the most basic of touches. The motion pulls at her heartstrings and makes her take his lip firmly in between her teeth and he lets out a low growl that she can feel in her toes, before he pulls back to look at her, his pupils large and black in the sunlight illuminating the cell.

"Lizzie," he murmurs, his voice so deep and raw that her jaw actually goes slack in shock. "If it weren't for these damn bars –"

"I know," Liz is gasping, unable to listen to any more, not if she's going to successfully walk out of this jail on her own two feet. "I know."

She presses her forehead to his once more, trying to take strength from the contact, before inhaling a deep breath and pushing away from him, leaving him there without warning in an effort to make a clean break, but really just hating the sight of him pressed against the bars, still reaching for her.

"Hang in there, okay?" she says, her voice cracking, trying not to let her tears fall. "I'll see you as soon as I can."

Red just nods, never looking away from her even as she begins to back up towards the stairs.

"I will see you soon," she repeats, because she knows she has to say something to reassure him that this wasn't a last-ditch, spontaneous, meaningless moment shared between them.

Because it wasn't.

(It was everything.)

With a final teary nod and a longing glance, Liz turns away and hurries up the stairs, walking right past Simms without a word and out into the daylight, one thought resounding strongly in her head.

Yes, she's the one who put Red in that godforsaken place.

And, by god, she's going to get him out.