Back again with the next chapter! Thank you so much for your reviews! That's always so motivtating! I'll post the next chapter at Sunday again and hope to hear something from you until then. Best wishes, Jenna

Translated by: Cleo28

Beta read by: Sg6169


Motives


"Nothing happens at random, but everything from reason and by necessity."

Leucippus


New York, April 11th 2009

Matthew Perrington felt pretty good by the time he returned to one of the top balconies of the Metropolitan Opera and settled into one of red velvet covered seats. During the break he had met, as he had hoped, with Frederic Samps, a wealthy businessman, who was normally very difficult to contact, but was at the moment, one of the few people, however, who could extricate him from his business plight. Due to his love of opera, Frederic had been in a very good mood and had even invited him for a drink, so Matthew had high hopes in getting down to business with him right away.

It had been a risk to appear this particular Saturday night at the opera, for there were also some better-known persons that had also arrived that were on bad terms with Matthew. But in the end it had been worth the risk. He had escaped most of the ungracious eyes through his skillful choice of seating - one of the rear seats isolated in the dark. Only the break had been tantamount to a small steeplechase but it had allowed him the contact he needed with Frederic. The cost and effort in getting a reservation for the balcony seat would be quite worthwhile in the end - of this Matthew was sure.

The many lights of the precious chandeliers around him began to darken. Matthew stretched his legs with a deeply satisfied sigh and was able to watch the heavy curtain rise slowly when the music resumed. The third act of Twilight of the Gods began. Matthew raised his opera glasses to his eyes, full of anticipation. Now it would become dramatic and he loved it dramatic.

The scenery was spectacular just the way Matthew liked it. Only now, after business had finally been settled, could he really relax and enjoy the sights and harmony of the classical music. But this state did not last long. At first he couldn't figure out what had caused this little shiver coming over him suddenly. Maybe it was the slight breeze that he felt at the back of his neck or the wonderful voices of the Rhine Maidens that floated across the stage. But then it should have been of a more pleasant nature. The tingling did not stop and soon began the unmistakable feeling that someone was staring at him, piercing him with their eyes. He lowered the opera glasses, bent forward a little over the next seat and looked over to the rows of balconies opposite him. But the people there seemed to be totally engrossed in the action on stage and Matthew started to turn away, shaking his head, as his eyes spotted a person whose face, in fact, seemed to be directed at him. He wrinkled his brow a bit annoyed and narrowed his eyes. It was a young man, as far as he could tell from this distance, blond and tall. He could not recall having seen him before on that balcony. Strange. Matthew's unease began to grow and again raised his opera glasses to his eyes. This time he addressed them directly to this impertinent person... and would have almost let them fall again - that great was the horror that grabbed him when he recognized the man who nodded to him with a very friendly smile: Josef Kostan.

Matthew's Opera glasses sank to his lap as he pressed, full of fright, a hand to his now fiercely beating heart. He knew Kostan not only through his business connections and various media reports... no, they had actually warned him about Kostan, had advised him to get bodyguards and to call them as soon as Kostan or any of the other people in the photos they had shown to him, appeared in his vicinity. He had thought this scare mongering to be totally overblown. He had thought that it would be almost impossible to figure out that he was supporting the work of the Legion with a part of his money. He now regretted his naivety, regretted giving his only security man permission to take a break during the play and to pick him up again at the end.

Matthew took a few deep breaths, his eyes still glued to Kostan. If he was fast enough he could reach his security guard in time. Even if Kostan was one of these... demons, he certainly couldn't fly and the way down the isle to his balcony was long. He had to remain calm and not panic, that was all that mattered now.

Matthew took another deep breath and prepared to jump up and race off. But he only managed to bend forward a bit because in the next second a strong hand grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back, pushing him against the back of the seat. His heart stopped for a moment and then hammered in his chest while he uttered a horrified gasp. He wanted to scream but all at once his throat was choked so much that he could not utter a sound.

"If you scream you're dead!" a deep voice hissed in his ear and the warm breath that brushed his cheek felt like the breath of death. He couldn't help it; he began to tremble all over. Never before had one of these beasts been so close to him... and yet or maybe because of that, he didn't dare turn around to look into the face of this monster that would surely tear him apart at any moment. He only ventured a glance from the corner of his eye at the large hand that exerted this painful pressure on his shoulder. A wide silver ring adorned the index finger of his executioner, a ring whose motif bore a resemblance to that of a decorated cross - perhaps some kind of insignia of an order, a recognition feature for this terrible clan of bloodsuckers.

"Who... Who are you?" Matthew finally managed to croak lowly. To speak in this situation was even more difficult than it was to breathe.

"I'm your worst nightmare," the cold voice growled.

The lump in Matthew's throat was so big and hard that he could barely swallow. "Please... I... I've done nothing," he breathed. "This is all a mistake..."

"Then these are probably not your bank statements," the menacing male voice whispered to him and a small stack of printed papers landed in his lap. Matthew only needed a brief look at the papers to know what this was all about. "This... this is from my son's account...," he stammered painfully.

"Then your son is living the high life and receives a pretty good amount of pocket change," the cold voice replied in a whisper. "Three million spent last summer alone... that must have been a very exquisite summer trip... two in the winter and about two months ago the same amount... How old is he again? Six, if I'm not mistaken... "

Matthew's heart stopped again and he felt sick. Where did this monster get this information? God, they were even after his family!

"Perhaps it's he I need to be appealing to," the vampire continued behind him. "Since you know nothing about this, he must be the one who's conducting all these transactions and should be called to account - and not his poor, innocent father..."

"Please!" Matthew whispered now in tears. "Please don't hurt my family! They know nothing about this. I... I'm the one who made these transfers. These were only a few profitable businesses. I have no idea what the money was used for... aah ... "

The pressure on his collarbone became so intense with his last words, the pain became too much to bear and Matthew had to grit his teeth in order to hide his cries of pain and not disturb the opera.

"What do you take me for, a fool?" the dangerous man growled behind him. "I know a lot about you... Matty..."

Oh, God, his wife always called him that! What had they done to her?

"Among other things, your money has not gone without reason into the research of your friends. By the way, how is your brother? According to the last entries in the medical records, his condition has deteriorated again. Did you know that?"

Matthew did not answer. He had the feeling by now that the hand of the stranger not only closed around his shoulder, but also around his guts and pressed them painfully together.

"Is this the reason you asked these people in an angry e-mail to obtain even more experimental subjects and act faster and more radically?" The voice became colder and more hateful and Matthew's fear increased immeasurably.

"Have you any idea what it's like to be locked up day and night in a windowless cell, to have limited movement and to endure painful experiments every few hours?" The man's lips were now so close to his ear that they now and then touched his skin and sent shivers of the most unpleasant kind down his back. Matthew hardly dared to breath. He just stared at the hand, this ring and inwardly prayed to God that death would come quickly.

"Has it ever occurred to you what tortures these 'test subjects' had to go through before they were finally released from their suffering?" He felt a heavy breathing on his cheek, felt the deadly strain of the stranger and closed his eyes. Now... now, it would be over...

"There's pain, you first need to create words for, to describe it..." Matthew felt that the sentence was not really finished, but the demon could not go on, only breathed deeply and hard, as if he had to wrestle with himself to not show him physically what he was talking about.

"Give... Give me a reason to let you live," he whispered, controlling himself only with great difficulty, "... NOW!"

Matthew tore his eyes open again. His thoughts tumbled. He had a chance... a chance!

"Names...," he croaked. "I know a name!"

"This is not enough..."

"And a location... an address I should turn to when difficulties like this arise..."

A moment of silence followed his words, a dreadful silence he could hardly bear, silence which gave him no other choice than to listen to the barely audible sounds of breathing behind him, with his eyes wide-open in fear and his heart pounding painfully in his chest.

"This is a start," the stranger's voice released him at last from his anguish and the iron grip around his shoulder lost its strength. "What's the address?"

"It's a bar in Manhattan," it burst immediately out of Matthew. "The Crazy Fools. It's a relatively new bar and I'm supposed to ask for a certain Robert Ducan who will help me then. I don't know the exact address but they told me it shouldn't be hard to find..."

"We'll see." The hand now let go of him completely and Matthew dared to exhale shakily.

"Out there someone is waiting for you," said the stranger, now much softer. "You should go voluntary with him. Nothing will happen to you as long as you cooperate with us. You and your family..."

Matthew closed his eyes and nodded his understanding.

"Give me your cell phone," the man ordered. Matthew swallowed hard, reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and did exactly what he was told to do. He felt terribly delivered and helpless as he put the device into the stranger's open hand and thus deprived himself of any chance to get help. His fate was now in the hands of these dangerous superior species and he was still not sure whether he would get out of this situation alive. But one thing was clear to him by now: the bloodsuckers were on a deadly campaign of revenge against any person connected with the Legion. And they were more organized and informed than his allies had previously thought.


The reading in the Renaissance Washington, DC Hotel was scheduled to start at six pm sharp. Guests who were late were not admitted, at least that was what was written on the table Amber Patricia Rudwell had just passed with vehement steps, pushing past the accumulation of people with an apologetic smile on her face in search of her seat. She knew exactly where she had to go. Aisle ten, seat five. And there wasn't much time left before the reading would start on the topic of Legal loopholes and their consequences for the social system. She glanced at her watch. Two more minutes. Her green eyes roamed over the rows of chairs and finally settled on a dark head of hair. Of course, he was already there. He was always punctual.

Her heart began to beat faster and she looked herself over, straightened the skirt of her disguise and the plastic shield, which she had only recently attached to the collar of her blazer. Amber P. Rudwell was written on it in thick black letters and beneath it a bit narrower: DA Washington, DC .

She took a deep breath, brushed a lock of dark red hair that had fallen away from her elegantly pinned up hair behind her ear and walked swiftly toward the aisle in which he was sitting. Her seat was located right next to his, as they had prearranged.

The rows of seats were far enough apart to get past the people already seated there without a problem, but nevertheless some stood up giving her a friendly smile and she smiled back politely, knowing exactly that this was attributed more to her short skirt than to the propriety of these men. Benjamin Talbot was much too absorbed in his notes to recognize that she had approached him. How convenient...

Amber sat down beside him quietly, directed her gaze deliberately to the lectern that was not yet occupied and waited. It lasted a second or two until he raised his eyes and looked at her. She could almost feel the wheels turning in his head, looked at him and raised an eyebrow questioningly, fully enjoying the confusion in his brown eyes. For a second she thought she might have to drop her masquerade for a moment to ensure that he didn't betray her with his behavior but then his eyes flashed slightly amused and he proved once again what an alert mind he had when he simply looked at his notes again.

"DA Washington DC, I see," he murmured with a smile and so quietly that only she could hear it. "Nice contact lenses, Beth... I mean Amber…"

"But of course," she replied in a very elegant way and hid a grin.

Talbot glanced around a bit. "And what is St. John dressed up as? A security guard?"

"He's not here," Beth whispered to him, like him, pretending to watch the people around her.

"Then your friend probably misunderstood me the last time we discussed this nice matter," Ben said softly, scratching his temple with his pen to then set it down on the paper once again. "I wanted a conversation with Mick - not with you. As much as I appreciate and enjoy your company..."

"That's exactly the point here," Beth replied quietly. "He'll be back in the States soon and then wants to meet with you..."

Talbot surprised her with a little laugh and she looked at him again. "But...?" he said raising his eyebrows amused.

Beth let her eyes wander again and found that an elderly man in a dark suit had now stepped up behind the lectern and was preparing to begin his reading.

"We need some small proof of your willingness to really work together with us," she whispered to him, reached quietly into the little side pocket of her costume's top and pulled out a USB stick that she quickly tried to conceal in her hand from the prying eyes of others. She knew that Talbot had noticed it.

"On this stick there are pictures and files of men who supposedly work for the Legion, whom the network is not willing to provide any real information about," she went on quickly. "Our wish would be that you'd try to find out whether the state is currently investigating these people and perhaps even some information is stored in archives that could be of immense value to us."

She felt Talbot's reluctance, his battle with himself. On the one hand he struggled strongly against being fooled into spy work, on the other hand, he was most likely aware, what value this information could also have for him and his work. Conscience against curiosity ...

Talbot let his hand slip from his lap so it was now dangling directly next to her, and only a few seconds later; he reached out for her hand and took the little device quickly from her fingers.

Beth made three crosses inside, but held back, however, exhaling relieved, even though it would have been lost in the loud echo of the speaker's voice, who had long since started his lecture.

"And what about St. John?" Talbot whispered. "You said he wasn't in the States. When can I expect a private conversation with him?"

"Maybe in a week," she breathed, and the excitement that had overcome her during Josef's last call and in which she had had great difficulty getting rid of, struggled up inside her again. Not to think of Mick's return, when she was asked directly about him was impossible... and four weeks of separation was just too long a period of time...

"At the least," Talbot murmured softly. "How will I learn about this appointment?"

"I cannot tell you," she answered truthfully. "To approach you is not usually as easy as it's been today..."

"Yeah," Ben smiled. "There are too many security guards here. The Legion wouldn't dare send someone after me here. They know I would instantly blow their cover. That was a smart move on your part, Beth."

"I have a clever team around me," Beth gave back modestly, but didn't tell him that the monitoring by the Legion concerning him had fallen sharply in the last week, and that the risk of being caught by them during an exchange of information with him had decreased significantly. For this reason only, they had dared to re-establish contact with him.

"The only draw back to this mission now is that you'll have to sit here and listen to this entire, quite boring reading if you wish to avoid attracting attention," Talbot said softly and she actually thought she heard something like naked spite in his voice. However, she bit back a further comment, for it was clear to her how right he was in his statement. It would be a pain for her to just sit for an hour and to be delivered to her own thoughts and feelings. All that was left now was time - and this she now had in abundance, for Ben Talbot did not give the impression he was interested in entertaining her during the speech. He made it quite clear with his posture and by facing the speaker now that he was though with their conversation. She had no other choice but to hope that the speaker kept to the announced break on the information sheet...


An hour and a half of suffering and Beth was finally freed by a long overdue break. The flow of people anxious for drinks and refreshments carried her out of the doors and into a wide corridor outside the conference room. Ben had indeed managed to ignore her completely during this painfully slow passage of time and when she saw him now in the crowd of other people, he in fact ventured a wink at her briefly and immediately walked with a beaming smile towards an older, already slightly grayed man with a neat mustache and goatee.

Beth's face remained immobile. She looked around briefly, to determine if she was being watched by anyone and looked for an exit. She just wanted to get out of this hotel, to leave the stuffy air and all these people behind. Since her time in Mexico, life in a big city now seemed so uncomfortably hectic and stressful that it made her break out in a sweat and want to just run away. Perhaps this was also because after the terrible battle on the farm, her wild chase in LA and the whole terrible story about Mick she simply no longer felt safe unless her blood-drinking friends were in her immediate vicinity. She was constantly afraid of being followed or even attacked, and if she was honest, these fears were not unfounded. The Legion was looking for them, like they were trying to corner them to cause the members to betray one another. Of course, because of this, both sides of the Legion were extremely cautious and actions such as this were particularly dangerous - in spite of the declining interest of the Legion in Ben Talbot. She had to be careful now when she left the hotel and the security zone of this event. But she was not completely alone...

The first week outside of Mexico had been quite hard for Beth. Gabriel and Mick had disappeared along with August just one day after the great battle and she had been flown with Josef, Logan and Seth to Toronto. After a few days Alejandro and his family had also arrived and they had all come together to make new plans. There had been a pretty big fight, when Josef had, in all seriousness, taken a stand to keep Beth out of all possible actions and to hide her, together with Simone, somewhere away from the Legion... The poor guy had had to endure a screaming tantrum on her part that had no equal. Of course he had only been concerned with her safety and had taken over the, in this case, quite unwelcome role of her protector that Mick usually filled so wonderfully, but at the time, her nerves had been so raw that she had had no eye and no understanding for it. To her it had only looked like removing, expelling and separating her from the people she needed the most at this time, besides Mick, and that she simply could not stand for.

After Isabella had walked with her into another room where she had enfolded her into her arms and just let her cry for a while, Beth had finally agreed to spend a week in the care of this good-hearted, motherly woman and to just rest. The separation from her vampires had still been terribly hard for her. But it had actually been much harder for her to rest and relax. After sleeping through a night and a day, her thoughts had once again started to circle around three main themes, which occupied her mind the most at the moment: the effects of the last events in Mexico, her participation in the hunt for the Legion and of course Mick. Since the latter was the topic on which she based her concerns and the forced separation emotionally drained her so much, she had tried to rid her thoughts of him so she could deal with the other two issues – which hadn't been much easier. Especially when she was asking questions that she couldn't answer, like: Why didn't Hendrik's blood turn her into a vampire? Or: What was the Legion going to do with poor Frank? To what extent would Josef allow her to participate in the pursuit of the Legion?

So many questions and until today, three weeks later, she had not been able to get any satisfying answers. Well, Josef had involved her again in the planning and execution of some actions but he still tried, despite her continuing anger, to preferably keep her out of outdoor activities. So Logan and Seth had become her best friends and had in fact been able to distract her again and again when she began to dwell on frightening thoughts or had sunken too deeply into her painful longing for Mick. Logan's hobbies, which he pursued in secret when there was nothing else to do and Josef wasn't around, had also started to be great fun for Beth as well. To play World of Warcraft was quite suitable for getting rid of aggression and to train the mind for strategic thinking, while learning guitar chords and playing along with old familiar rock songs was just plain fun and a wonderful way to forget your problems for the moment. Additionally Logan had a fairly large Media Center, as he liked to call it, on his laptop and Beth together with the two boys had held, from time to time, a small video evening while eating unhealthy snacks. Well, actually it had been Beth who had devoured the munchies but Logan had nibbled on at least one or two of the hot tortilla chips with a comment that even vampires could taste such sharpness.

As for their research work and the preparation of certain actions, they had developed, over time, such a good team that Josef along with the others - including Elizabeth, Tony and Thomas who now came more frequently to their meetings - had also started to hand them small jobs. This meant that they were allowed to plan and organize the smaller actions by themselves, and possibly even realize them alone – for this they definitely needed a more detailed agreement with Josef. It had been hard work getting their way with the mission regarding Talbot. The stubborn vampire had flat out refused that Beth would be the one to meet with this man. He had preferred to kidnap him again, which would have been much more noticeable and dangerous and would have drawn the attention of the Legion to the young lawyer again. It had been their luck that on that day Elizabeth and Thomas had been present and had supported them. Elizabeth had agreed to supervise the whole operation together with Max and that had been the only reason why Josef had finally yielded to their united prompting. He himself had had to fly to New York to meet with one of the many financiers of the Legion and in doing so finally move forward within the project 'Freeing Frank Peterson from the hands of the Legion'.

Yesterday he had called her once more to give her some advice to take along... and to tell her that Mick and Gabriel were on their way to New York. After that, the calmness she had worked so hard for in these four bygone weeks had been gone. The rest of the evening her thoughts had revolved around him and all the questions she had pushed back so wonderfully had immediately surfaced in her mind again. She didn't really like admitting to it but in addition to all the joy and longing she felt, a significant proportion of fear had also crept into her emotions, for she had not been idle in relation to Mick.

The Internet had given her fairly good access to information regarding trauma and its management and many of the things she had read there had reinforced her concerns so far. Mick had behaved, in the desert of Mexico, like a textbook case, with his moods swings, panic attacks, aggression and strategies of repression, what it implied was, that even his future behavior could be partially predictable and she was not sure whether she had the power to catch him if he really went out of control emotionally. It wasn't the irritability and temper tantrums she was afraid of but rather the tendency of traumatized people to refuse the bonds to the people they loved the most, to feel alienated and in the same way to behave even alien. She knew that this behavior would hurt her the most, especially because they had become so close to each other in the desert. It would be hard for her to condone such behavior because she needed Mick so much herself in order get through all of this better.

Beth shuddered inwardly, trying to rid herself of all these thoughts quickly as she emerged from the ornate entrance of the hotel. She was still not safe and she had to focus on what was going on around her. She pulled her sunglasses from her breast pocket and put them on quickly. That way she could look more inconspicuous for alleged persecutors. She was very aware that at least one required observation team of the Legion had to be out there somewhere. Her heart gave a little jump when she discovered diagonally opposite the hotel entrance, a dark car and she was greatly relieved when at the very same moment the taxi she had been waiting for turned into the driveway of the hotel and approached her. She got in without a word, nodded briefly to the driver using the rear view mirror, and the car slowly proceeded again. Her pulse quickened as they drove past the darkened BMW and she felt a tingling that caused the hairs on her neck to rise a little. A few seconds passed in perfect silence, in which Beth stared, tense, in the rearview mirror. Though she herself could not observe the traffic behind her, she was able to watch the driver's brown eyes and his reactions to what happening behind them.

"They didn't follow us," she finally heard his deep voice and she closed her eyes briefly, finally allowed herself to breathe in deeply. She could mostly rely on Max's statements, she had learned by now, and with him at her side she felt extremely safe, much like with Malik who, at Gabriel's request, had been her personal bodyguard the entire time. That Malik was not here today was only because Max had taken the lead into his hands in this action and the two didn't seem to be best friends.

"Were you able to get everything done?" Max asked now in this typical official tone.

"Yeah, he has taken the stick and will carry it around for a while, I think," she answered truthfully.

"Do you think he'll find out that this is not just a mass storage device?" was the next question.

She shrugged her shoulders. "He's an intelligent man, so it's very likely. The only question is whether it's going to indeed upset him that we have been able to track him at all times. He's eager to meet with Mick and he will know that the whole thing would be much easier if we know where he is."

She saw Max nodding. "That means, that as long as he's still interested in Mick, he'll cooperate with us without any problems..."

Beth frowned. "I wouldn't say without any problems. There will be certainly amount of trouble from time to time, but he will cooperate in most things, yes... " She became a little distracted at that very moment because something started to vibrate at her thighs. She quickly opened her purse and took out her cell phone. 'Josef is calling,' said the display and she quickly answered the call.

"Yes," she said briefly, preparing instantly for a whole catalog of questions to rain down on her, but it was just a gentle "Hey," that resounded from the phone. However, it threw her completely off course. The warm, deep sound of the voice at the other end of the line caused her to forget to breathe for a moment. It was so unexpected, so taken aback and just so wonderful that she was speechless.

"Beth?"

She cleared her throat, once, twice, then took a breath – God, did it well!

"Hey," was her 'imaginative', breathless reply, and her heart was now beating so quickly in her chest, as it had not done for a long time.

Mick! She had her Mick on the phone, after four agonizing weeks with no contact! Her worries and fears about their future together disintegrated, even though she knew exactly how ridiculous that was. She grabbed the phone now also with the other hand as if she could pull him somehow closer to her that way.

"Where... where are you?" She stammered like a lovesick teenager and her cheeks felt all of a sudden much warmer.

"In Manhattan, with Josef," Mick gave back after a brief cough and Beth was seized with the urgent feeling to immediately pack her bags and board the next plane. Just to hear his voice, was enough to make her emotional world go haywire. She felt close to tears while at the same time would loved nothing better than to cheer and laugh with joy. Mick was back ... Her Mick was back again!

And she wasn't sure exactly what to talk to him about, how she should talk to him. That was totally crazy! Why was she so strangely smitten when she had someone she loved so much finally back after all this time? But it was comforting that she wasn't the only one who felt like this because Mick as well hadn't added anything else to his short sentence - and he could draw on a far greater life experience than her.

'How are you? Did you miss me as terribly as I missed you? When will we see each other?' Those were the questions she actually wanted to get out and what did she say?

"How was the flight?"

How was the flight? Why didn't she just ask how the weather was over there in New York?

"Exhausting, but we survived it." She could hear him smile and also the corners of her mouth immediately rose into a lovesick, moronic grin. "I was a little worried when Josef told me what you were planning to do with Talbot in Washington."

"That's all been done and there were no problems," she gave back with pride. Typical Mick. He wasn't even really back yet and was already worried about her... A warm feeling spread in her chest and her longing began to grow. It wasn't enough by now to just hear him...

"Oh... that... this is good..." Mick stammered. Silence.

'When can I see you... hold you in my arms... feel you? Say it, Beth! Say it!'

"Yeah..." Beth grabbed her forehead and rolled her eyes about herself.

"My goodness!" A loud, annoyed voice resounded in the background. Josef. "You two are just unbearable! Tell her she'll be taking the next plane to New York. Simone will pick her up there and will take her to the meeting point. I think we need a team change! Come on! Tell her!"

"I don't need to anymore, Josef," she could hear Mick growl. "I think even our neighbors know it by now!"

Beth let out a little laugh. Josef had never been a particularly patient person and under stress he had even less nerves.

"Tell him I'm on my way," she replied to Mick and she knew he nodded, although she couldn't see him.

"Then ... I'll see you?"

"Yes," she replied with such a beam, that he just had to feel it. "You'll see me..."

Only seconds later she hung up. Her eyes remained for some time on the phone. Finally! Finally, they would be together again. New York was not that far away.