They didn't usually fool around during a Job, especially one that took them out of town. Too many questions like 'Why did you come out of Eliot's room this morning?' Sophie had asked that one the first job they did after the two had gotten together. Of course Alec thinking on his feet quickly told her that they had been up late playing drinking games and he'd crashed on the couch. Thankfully the Grifter didn't put too much thought into the fact that none of the other rooms had a couch. Yesterday though had called for Alec stripping Eliot down and checking over his entire body after the older man had been jumped by the marks hired guns. One thing lead to another and neither man was a Saint and once all those clothes fell off... Alec got carried away. So carried away that Eliot was covered in love-bites.

"Wake the fuck up right now Hardison." Alec snapped to attention and sat up quickly in bed.

"What, where's the fire?" He turned his head groggily from side to side. Eliot growled and was suddenly right in Alec's face which was completely distracting what with the no shirt and pants. "You could have waited til morning," Alec reached out to pull Eliot on top of him.

"Look what you did," He bit out and started jabbing a bit violently at his neck and chest. On his neck, torso and well lower and lower were dark splashes of color on Eliot's skin. "What the hell am I going to do about this?" He poked a particularly high hickey that wouldn't be covered up by anything that Eliot had.

"Uh," Alec was starting to wake up and other parts of him were going very dormant, man Eliot was never going to fool around again. "Wear a turtleneck?"

"Get the fuck up then," Eliot yanked the blanket and left Alec laying there naked and shivering, the room was damn cold. "You're buying it."

That was how they ended up in the local twenty-four hour Wal-Mart. "Man when I was in high school this was all the rage. Go out to the Wal-Mart and fuck with people."

"Wasted youth," was all Eliot grumbled. "Here we go," He yanked off the first turtleneck that was on the rack and started for the registers.

"No way man," Alec put it back quickly, earning him Eliot's death-glare. "That is fugly." He put the diamond patterned thing in the back of the rack in hopes of sparing some poor schmuck the same mistake Eliot was going to make.

"I'm going to wear it once Alec." Eliot growled.

Alec clicked his tongue and started looking through the rack. "Yes, I know but don't you want to draw the least amount of attention that you can. That is like blond, blue eyed girl in Mexico; it's going to cause an accident." Like Sophie or god forbid Parker started asking a whole lot of questions about an ugly turtleneck.

"Whatever," Eliot mumbled and crossed his arms over his chest. Aww, Alec's baby didn't like having someone pick him out clothes.. Huh, if Alec wanted to remain doing one of his favorite things, breathing; he should never repeat that sentiment to Eliot.

"Here," He pushed a dark blue sweater into his hands. "That will look good on you promise." Eliot didn't even look at it and it stung a little bit.

When they got back to the hotel room they went to their own rooms and Alec felt a little better when Eliot gave him a quick kiss before disappearing into his room. It was already five-thirty and Alec didn't see the point in going back to sleep so instead he checked out WoW; it'd been weeks, or more like a few days but it felt like weeks since he'd been to his little virtual world. Eliot teased him relentlessly and didn't even allow him to play it at his apartment. Three hours later or it could have been ten minutes to Alec he got a rude call from Nate asking him if he was ever going to show up.

"Eliot," Sophie was purring when Alec got there and from the scowl on his face he wasn't the only one to get a call from an annoyed Nate. "You look quite nice today." She smirked. "Who are you looking so nice for?"

"No one," Eliot grunted and when Sophie turned her attention to Nate Eliot shot him a glare. One that Alec barely noticed since Eliot was just.. smokin' hot.

Alec had misjudged on the size just a smidgen because the torso of the sweater hugged him in all the right places and the deep blue, that in the harsh fluorescent lights of Wal-Mart had not looked like that, made Eliot's own eyes stand out. Alec had to swallow, hard, and took a seat as far from Eliot that he could mange. It brought him right next to Parker who was giving him an odd look.

"Alright now that we're all here," Nate began but Alec stopped listening since his brain was telling his eyes one thing, 'don't look at Eliot.' While his eyes were doing their own thing, drinking Eliot in. "You think you can do that Hardison?"

Huh, what? "Yeah Nate, you got it." He gave him a salute, that earned a little smirk from Nate.

"Good, take Parker with you." Nate waved his hand and Alec really hoped that Parker knew what he was supposed to be doing.

The hotel door wasn't even shut behind them when Parker turned to him, "Oooh someones got a secret crush!" She exclaimed and Alec had to worry if the remaining team had heard her. "Alec and Eliot sittin' in a tree.." She sing-song down the hallway. Alec shook his head, he'd crushed on Parker for a month before turning his attentions to the less oblivious Eliot. Ten minutes of ogling and she was singing songs. At least she only thought it was a crush; Eliot might kill him if she found out the whole truth.

"Shut up Parker. I don't have a crush." It left a bit of a sour taste in his mouth. Alec had never been the kind of guy who hid his relationships, no matter what their gender was. But he knew that Eliot had a problem with it. He wasn't exactly sure if it was a problem with Alec being male or if it was a problem with people knowing his business. Whatever it was Eliot had made it pretty clear in the beginning that this was something to remain between them.

"Yes you do. You were giving Eliot the same googly eyes that you used to give me." Alec's mouth fell open while Parker just smirked triumphantly.

"If-if.. Why did.. What?" Alec was truly at a loss for words. He'd never been so stumped. Ever.

Parker grinned and freaking tweaked his nose, "Because Eliot gives them to you too!" She said happily. "You should go for it." She nodded her head in agreement with what she said and then elbowed him. "You two would be so cute together. Like an oreo cookie with half of the cookie ripped off." She imitated taking a cookie apart and crumbling the discarded half.

Alec had to tell Eliot now, if only so the older man could do something about his googly eyes. He was going to flip. "You're crazy. Even if I did have a crush, which I don't; Eliot would not be crushing on me." That sour taste came back, because of course Eliot had a thing for him and Alec wanted to shout it from the nearest, tallest building and stamp a 'Property of Alec Hardison - touch and Die!' on the man's chest.

They were in the lobby now and Alec really hoped that Parker would just drop the subject but of course Parker always did the opposite of what you hoped she would do. "Who would top?" She asked it mostly to herself, tapping her chin thoughtfully. "Do you think Eliot is an equal opportunity lover?" Alec wanted to say, 'Why yes, yes he is,' but Parker didn't let him get a word in. "Probably not." He was ten seconds away from strangling the girl so he decided to give in a little bit.

"Okay since I was so busy fucking Eliot with my eyes," The dirty language earned them a double take but the bug-eyed man kept on walking with one look from Parker. "What the hell are we doing?"

"How would I know, I was too busy eye fucking him too." Parker said with a straight face and Alec knew his eyes went possessive since she didn't keep up the charade very long. "Nate wants you to bug the guys car. Don't worry I don't have a thing for Eliot. I doubt I'm his type." She wiggled her brows a bit and smirked manically. Alec groaned, Eliot was going to kill him.


When they got back Parker still hadn't let up but Eliot wasn't glaring anymore so Alec was going to call it a win and leave it at that. Of course Parker had other plans.

"Hardison got a girl's number." She said sweetly. "She was a very pretty girl."

"Good for you," Nate glanced up from the papers he was reading through. "You got the bug on the car?"

"Yeah on all his cars, guys got like six." Eliot hadn't looked up from the book he'd been reading but Alec could see that he was a bit tense.

"Are you going to call her?" Sophie looked between Alec and Parker and he knew what she was trying to say. 'What about Parker?' He wanted to laugh, Parker wasn't his concern. The deadly-force of Eliot was his concern; he'd tensed just a bit more.

"Oh yeah," Parker spoke up before Alec could get a word in. "He already did."

"What? No I didn't!" Eliot had already stood up and was heading for the door when Alec had bursted out his protests. "I'm not calling her Parker."

"Why not?" Nate glanced up again before going back to his file.

"Because.." Alec trailed off, what the hell could he say? He couldn't say he was taken because they wouldn't believe it. Alec spent way too many nights with the team for them to believe that. "I'm not interested in her." He stressed the 'her' for both Parker as a hint to back off and for Eliot. Though he wasn't sure why for Eliot. He shouldn't have to reassure Eliot-freaking-Spencer that Alec was his.

Eliot returned to his seat and his book but he kept giving Alec little glances, little glances that the hacker was sure Parker was noticing. "Told you so." She breathed in his ear as she walked by to get to Eliot.

His stomach tightened as she leaned down and said something to Eliot who's gaze flicked to him before settling back on his book. She said something else and his eyes got a little wide but still didn't reveal much. "Oh come on." Parker huffed and walked away clearly annoyed by Eliot's non-response. She flopped down next to Alec again, "He's stubborn," She mumbled, "But definitely interested."

Alec chose to ignore her and just opened his labtop to fiddle with some programming he'd been working on. The silence stretched on from there for awhile. Sophie and Nate talking quietly about the best way to reapproach their mark was the only thing to break it now and then.

"I thought guys only wore turtlenecks to cover up hickeys." Parker said out of left feild about a half an hour later. Alec should have known she was just sitting there getting bored.

Sophie's interest was immediately piqued at this simple musing. "You know it is a common occurence." She said her lips twitching with the makings of a smile.

Eliot grunted, "Whatever."

Alec saw it happening and he was pretty sure he could have stopped it, but Parker moved so damn fast and by the time he'd reached out to grab her arm his fingers didn't even catch the material of her shirt. Eliot, who's damn head was still planted in his book, didn't even see her coming. She hooked a finger in the top of the turtleneck and gave it a good pull before Eliot sent her stumbling back across the room; she landed on her butt on the floor. Eliot's eyes flashed and he stood up, Alec did too.

"Oh my God it looks like someone attacked you!" She crackled and didn't even bother to try and get up from the floor where she laid. "What did she do, attack you with a vacuum?"

"Don't touch me again." Eliot growled taking a step towards Parker and Alec found himself without even thinking putting himself between them.

"Guys," Nate admonished and it was such a.. fatherly way of trying to break up what looked like a fight beginning. "Knock it off."

Parker was looking between Alec and Eliot and her grin was growing and growing. Without even trying they'd outted themselves to her. Well, damn. "C'mon," Alec yanked on Eliot's arm and he came willingly. "Why don't you just cool off somewhere else." The last thing they heard was Parker laughing gleefully and Sophie and Nate questioning her why.

"Oh.. nothing." Alec could hear her grin. "I just like being right."


Disclaimer: I do not own Leverage for if I did this season would be much different. *snicker*

Oh this was so much fun to write! I heart Parker, I thinking of just doing a Parker fic.. As soon as the inspiration hits!