Running Away by InSilva
Summary: Rusty on the run from Isabel. Part of the period between Rome and O11.
Disclaimer: Ocean's characters, not mine at all. Now, there's a surprise
Rusty called me.
"Can you make it out to Nice? I've got a two-hander lined up."
"Now?"
"Not now." There was a pause. "Tomorrow?"
Rusty goes way back, him and Danny. They used to run together all the time and they're mighty exciting to be around, long as you can get over that private world thing they got going.
Course, they stopped sudden about five years ago. I couldn't believe it when I heard Rusty was working solo because all these years, they always come as a package. Then I found out the reason had a name. Shortly after, there was an even bigger reason in the form of Danny being detained for a solid stretch.
I wondered then whether that would have happened if Rusty had been there to look out for him. Always struck me that Rusty's strength lay in blowing all the mines up before Danny ever set foot in the field.
Didn't surprise me that Rusty carried on working. Con's got to eat, after all and Rusty sure can eat.
The call to ask me over to Europe came at an apposite time. We had one little adventure on the Cote d'Azur then a detour through Monte Carlo, where we both did very nicely, merci beaucoup then headed to Rome to scope out the next job.
Rusty came back smiling to himself one day and I called him on it.
"Had a little exercise with the carbineri," he said, his smile growing.
"And this is tickling you because…?"
He shifted a little and then said, "There was this girl."
"A girl."
"Yeah." And that damn smile was back on Rusty's face like it was never going to leave it.
"You care to elaborate on that?"
"No," he grinned and that was all he'd say.
The following day, we met up and Rusty looked like he'd been caught with his fingers in the deck.
"You going to spit it out or am I just going to have to guess?"
"I went back to see the girl."
"The girl you saw while you were being chased by the cops."
"Her name's Isabel."
"Uh-huh."
"I'm going to see her again."
"Is that right? What do you want from me? Permission?"
Actually, I thought that if I'd been Danny standing there, that might be just what he'd want. As it was, he just grinned in a way that told me he was going to go ahead, permission or not.
Isabel gained a surname the next evening and an occupation the evening after. I figured Rusty knew who and what she was from the start but had to be sure where he thought he was headed with her before he bothered me with all that information. Actually bothered is a good word, because I was. Exceedingly.
Rusty was, as my Auntie Vi would say, like a cat and a cream churn. He'd pitch up at mine with a smile nailed on his face and a faraway look in his eyes that told me he was anywhere but where he was. The job, he was his usual self: logic and planning and coolness and we walked away with what we came for.
After that, I headed back home but Rusty stayed on. That did not surprise me at all; just worried me plenty.
Half-past four one afternoon, my phone rang.
"You home, Frank?"
"Yeah…Rusty?" It didn't sound like him.
"I'm at the airport."
"You want to swing by?"
"Yeah."
It was close to three in the morning when he fell through the door. I worked out later that the airport in question was in Rome.
Rusty was a mess. He looked like he hadn't slept in weeks and for a man usually so comfortable in his own skin, he looked like he had jumped out of it and back again. His eyes were red-rimmed and his breathing was shallow and for once, he did not look attractive in any way, shape or form.
I got him into an easy chair.
"You sick?"
He gave a slight shake of his head.
I tried again. "When did you last sleep?"
He shrugged.
"When did you last eat?"
"I don't remember," he whispered and I stared at him disbelievingly then poured him a whisky and pressed it into his hand. He stared at the glass unseeing for a moment and then threw it down in one gulp, coughing hard afterwards.
"'Nother," he said and held out the glass for a refill. I obliged and he downed that one too.
I sat down opposite him.
"I know I'm not…" I began gently, "but you can still talk to me, Rus. If it'll help."
He looked at me then, all wide-eyed and I found myself wishing I was Danny, who would have read him like a kindergarten story and got it out of him in seconds. But I wasn't and he was going to have to spell it out for me.
Eventually, he said, "I don't know whether I've just nearly avoided the biggest mistake of my life or whether I've made it."
And that was all I got out of him that night.
I went to work as "Ramon" a few hours later and left him scrunched up in the chair with a supply of whisky. He was still sitting there when I got off shift eight hours later and I pulled the glass from his hand.
"Have you eaten?"
Rusty looked up at me through dull eyes, a couple of days' growth decorating his face.
"Right. I'm going to run you a bath and dig out a change of clothes. Then you are going to sit at this table with me and get some food inside you."
I went to the bathroom and started running the water. Then I took the nail scissors and the razors and hid them.
At first, he played with the food in front of him but I looked at him sternly and he managed half a plateful. I made him a strong coffee and he flopped back down in the easy chair. I sat back down opposite him and I wondered whether I was going to get any answers this time.
"When Danny met Tess, I was so angry," he said out of nowhere. "I was angry at him and angry at her and angry at myself for being angry. And that passed but I didn't understand, you see, Frank. I'd never found someone that I thought I wanted more than the life I lead."
He looked at me with a sad little half-smile. "Isabel," he began and choked on her name. He paused for a moment and swallowed. "Isabel," he mouthed, "was...she made me feel like all my senses were singing…I only feel like that with a con…"
I felt there was some unsaid things going on here and again I wished I were Danny to pick all these up. Mind you, something told me the things were about Danny in the first place.
His eyes dropped down to the coffee cup. "They-she- found evidence to lead back to me."
"You sure?" Rusty was nothing if not thorough.
He smiled that sad little smile again. "Sure enough to climb out of a bathroom window and run all the way here."
He yawned suddenly.
"Want to hit the bed?" I asked but he shook his head.
"Thing is, I couldn't see a way through for us any more than I could see a way through for Danny and Tess. But that didn't stop me wanting to try. I had all these marshmallow ideas...you know, she's so good she's up for promotion? Up for a move to Amsterdam? She's telling me this and I'm so damn proud of her. And at the same time, I know it's her work on this job of ours that's going to make or break the deal and if she succeeds, it's the end of me. The end of us."
And I knew "us" did not mean Rusty and ol' Frank C and I wasn't entirely convinced it was completely Rusty and Isabel either.
He rested his head on the back of the chair and looked up at the ceiling. "You know what, it was touch and go for a moment whether I stayed there or ran."
He yawned again and I thought about all the things Danny would be saying, or not saying, and about what little comfort I could offer him. When I looked up, he was gone. I prised the cup gently from his fingers and found a blanket to tuck round him. Rusty was sleeping like a baby.
Each day I went out to work, each day I came back. Each day, Rusty was healing. When I came home after a couple of weeks to find a trail of candy wrappers leading to the bathroom, I knew that he must be feeling better.
He emerged, clean-shaven and in a suit, looking about a hundred percent better and about seventy-five percent closer to being recognisable as Rusty.
"You look…"
"Believe me, I feel." He even sounded like Rusty. Near enough, anyway.
"Thank you," he said sincerely and shook my hand and I knew this was goodbye.
"Where you headed?"
"Thought I'd go West. See the bright lights of California."
In other words, as far away from Rome as he could get on mainland USA. I nodded.
He hesitated for a moment. "Frank, what happened there-" And here, I heard.
I interrupted him. "Won't say a word, Rusty."
"Thanks," he looked relieved. "Again."
"Be seeing you."
"I'll call."
And he left. And I was sure he thought he was over it all. Thing is, as my Auntie Vi would say, once a cat's tasted cream, he ain't gonna settle for no skinny milk. I figured this was coming back to bite him. Just a question of when.