Disclaimer: I do not own Leverage nor am I associated with Dean Devlin, Timothy Hutton or Gina Bellman.
A/N: I just loved Sophie's Annie character so I had to write this!
Fashionable Heartache
Nate used to watch her getting ready for cons, when they were working together on the team. He loved the way she brushed on mascara, the way she pulled up her hair, the way she slid into a breathtaking dress. He knew she knew he was there but it didn't seem to bother her, in fact she probably enjoyed Nate watching her walk around her office half-naked while she did her makeup.
But he didn't have those privileges now. They weren't in the same building; they just met at the warehouse. He didn't even get to see her before she came sauntering in to stop his demise, her voice high and accented with a Cockney lilt.
If his jaw didn't hit the ground, he would be surprised but his whole body was sort of numb so he couldn't be sure. He had certainly seen her with less on, a poolside meeting in the Mediterranean came to mind, but somehow the way that red dress clung to her without showing off much beneath a tailored coat drove him crazy. Heels that weren't terribly high on legs that weren't hardly tan at all. And yet he somehow found himself staring, a pleased smile on his face, hidden expertly, of course. He liked her new haircut, he suddenly found himself thinking. And of course that accent tumbling sharply over those darkly painted lips…
Nate tried to chime in, finish her sentences the way he always did but the gangsters were on him in a second, pushing him back down in his chair.
She leaned around O'Hara. "Oy! I wasn't talkin' to you." He was sure she enjoyed that, a small jab for his need to always be in control.
Sophie had the same problem. She liked to be in control. Two control hungry thieves in one dysfunctional relationship…
And yet with that hair and those lips and, good God, those legs, and the fact that later she put three bullets in Eliot without flinching, hence never ceasing to amaze him, Nate just couldn't bring himself to care.
Even if she didn't actually hurt Eliot and probably never could. Nate was the only one she could ever bring herself to hurt, no matter how much she loved him.
"Ahh… Boyfriend."