-1The Grinich Document
Angel burst into Lilah Morgan's office, catching her in mid-conference with a number of sharply dressed lawyers.
"Well," Lilah observed, "just barely past sundown and here you are. Can I assume you're hot after the same document we are?"
"Don't play games, Lilah; I'm not in the mood tonight. I know your people have the Grinich document."
"Correction. You know we'd like to have it, for the same reason you would; the Senior Partners consider it useful for their plans. Sadly, it's not in our hands and our research," Lilah paused to slap another folder onto the pile held by a non-descript file clerk, "has turned up almost nothing. You probably have more leads than we do."
Angel stalked around Lilah's desk, closing in on the soulless lawyer.
"If you're lying to me Lilah . . ."
"You want to go through our records, help yourself. You can start there." Lilah jerked her head towards the files heaped in the clerk's arms. Angel decided to pass. Lilah dismissed the woman, who staggered off back to the records office.
"You know," Lilah said, "we could work together on this. I could lend you Curtis and Willoughby here; they're very good at ferreting."
"No thanks, Lilah," Angel told her, "I prefer the company I usually keep." With that, he swept from her office.
"Curtis, Willoughby, stick around for a minute," Lilah said. "I have a special assignment for you. The rest of you go back to your usual projects."
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Angel entered the Hyperion's lobby and tossed the file he'd stolen off Lilah's desk onto the big ottoman. He was surprised to see Cordelia still working.
"Cordy? Aren't you going to be late for your audition?" he asked.
"Yes, I'm going to miss is altogether, in fact," Cordelia told him. "Angel, with everyone running in six different directions looking for this Grinich document, I just couldn't go off to pursue fame and fortune tonight. This is too important."
"I've read through Lilah's file, this lead will put us up against a master wizard with a zombie army. I can't afford to pull any of the others off their leads, so it'll be just us. I won't refuse your help, but are you sure you're up to it?"
"No, I'm not sure," Cordelia said honestly, "but I should help you, and I'm going to. I'm past just doing what I want. I'm in this fight, Angel."
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It was minutes to sunrise when Angel and Cordelia returned to the Hyperion, Grinich document in hand. Once out of the coming sun's rays, they paused to recover from the night's horrors.
"Oh god, Angel, we nearly got killed. Seventeen times!"
The human began trembling uncontrollably from the aftershock and Angel took her in his arms for comfort. In all honestly, it was a comfort to him as well, close as this call had been.
"Angel, I've been such a fool," Cordelia whispered. "I've wasted so much of my life on superficial, meaningless things. Run after cheap bits of fame, spent my free time on shallow people who don't care about anything but where their next shiny, expensive car is coming from. I don't want that anymore, and I don't want to go home now. Angel, I want to stay with you, just for a few hours." Cordy went on tiptoe to kiss the vampire tenderly on the mouth.
After a few moments, Angel pulled reluctantly away. "Cordelia. I . . . I can't . . . you know . . ."
"Shhhh. Angel, what happened before, with Buffy, was caused by something special, a unique love. We don't have that, we never will, but we're good friends, and we might be more. Even if we can't, we both need more comfort now than just a hug."
Cordy kissed Angel again, and this time he let her break it off. "Besides," she said, with a glimmer of the old Cordelia in her eyes, "if you do change I promise to stake you."
They resumed kissing.
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Many hours of imperfect happiness later, Angel awoke Cordy-less. Hastily dressing, he ran down to the lobby and was nearly out the door on his way to her apartment when he noticed Cordelia back at her desk, finishing up a phone call.
"Cordy! I, uh, didn't expect you right back at work after we, uh . . ." Angel broke off with a significant look upstairs.
"Well, somebody has to hold down the fort Mr. Sleeps-for-hours-and-can't-be-bothered-to-tell-me-he's-taking-a-personal-day." Cordy told him. "We do have some clients. Not that any came by today, but they might have. And you should do something about those nightmares, Angel. The way you were moaning and carrying on I'd have thought you'd been transported to Hell again, if you had another girlfriend with a sword."
A horn honked outside. "Oh, my date's here! Last night's audition was a complete waste of time, but I met a producer! We're doing the clubs tonight." With that Cordelia bounced out of the Hyperion and into a new Mercedes.
"What?" Angel asked, baffled, as the car rolled away.
"Don't let it bother you, big guy," came Cordelia's voice from the shadows outside. A moment later Cordy stepped into sight, a wicked grin on her face.
"Look at it as a lesson in, I don't know -- getting screwed over gracefully. Speaking of which," Cordelia's skin rippled slightly and she changed into the non-descript file clerk he'd seen in Lilah's office. "Thanks for the good time."
Still grinning, the woman stepped back into the shadows and disappeared. Angel ran out into the street but there was no sight, sound or scent of the changeling. He had no doubt the Grinich document was well on its way to Lilah.
"Damn it!" Angel thought, "If I ever get my hands on that changeling again . . . I probably won't even know it."
Shoulders slumped, he went inside. This was a night for the special reserve bottle of otter.