TENSION

Alexia didn't speak but to give directions, her mind whirling like a hurricane as she stared out of the window at the cars that passed, racing in the opposite direction along the streets of Miami. She wasn't really focused on those cars though, on all the various makes and models. She was watching Michael in the reflection of the window and the side mirror, angled just enough for her to see his hands firmly gripping the steering wheel, his jaw set in a relaxed position as he concentrated on the road. Well, she assumed that he was concentrating on the road, but with the cognac lenses of the sunglasses that sat so very perfectly on him, it was difficult to tell.

He hadn't spoken to her since they'd left the loft except to offer quick sounds to assure her that he was listening to the directions that she gave. It was strange. He had been so chatty, well, at least he seemed to be, but she did have to admit that she must have stunned him. After all, she had stunned herself even more.

She still didn't understand why she'd kissed him, even if just on the cheek in a brief gesture of thanks. It was so against her nature, her careful, calculative and quite frankly cunning nature for her to get so close without taking even a moment to assess the dangers of such an action. She'd still done it though, and on a whim that she could for just a moment trust a man that she barely knew, a man that she had believed was the only one that she would ever fear.

She thought that he must have believed her to be insane, switching so quickly after keeping her distance and avoiding contact, only accepting her offer to try and fix her shoulder when it became the difference between her accompanying him to her apartment and being most likely tied down somewhere so she couldn't escape in the loft.

Not that ropes could stop her.

'Turn left,' she said, still facing the window. 'Then a quick right and pull into the car park of the first building that you see on the right.'

He did as she told without a word or even a moment of recognition, the Charger purring into the darkness of the lot beneath the concrete block of the six story rise, the boring façade drawing no attention. It could, after all, house anything, and it was surrounded by a couple of flashier hotels, locking it into the back of the block out of view.

He pulled up in a park between some of the lights that offered only the slightest illumination, the Charger blending with the darkness. It was an apartment building, though one going slowly out of business with no advertising scheme to boost its popularity and the surrounding buildings appearing far more attractive. It was cheap though, and far more comfortable than many of the places that she had stayed in. Considering how little time she spent in the apartment, it didn't really matter how comfortable it was when it was merely a place to sleep.

She hopped out of the car, closing the door behind her, instantly moving to the door to the stairs. She wasn't going to wait for Michael in fear that he would ask her about her actions, because there was no explanation that she could offer to account for them.

She made it to her floor and to her room, closing the door behind her before Michael had even reached the top of the stairs. She leant against the solid wood, hearing him grumbling with displeasure at her actions from the other side.

'Alexia,' he called, leaning against the door. 'Why won't you let me in?'

'Because you don't need to be in here,' she said, moving away from the door even as he tried to argue. She passed the couch, heading straight for her room and the closet. The dust hat that had collected still remained, reassuring her that no one had been searching her apartment.

She collected her netbook and the other papers within the hidden section of the closet, placing them into a bag. She secured the panels once she had everything that she needed, pausing for a moment before she headed for the door, taking a breath before she opened it. She stepped to the side just in time, watching as Michael fell forward, eyes wide as he lost his leaning place. He landed hard with an 'oompf,' losing his breath, but somehow he managed to pick himself up gracefully, quickly straightening his shirt and sunglasses as if he'd just come in from a windy day rather than having fallen on his face.

'Okay?' she asked.

'Ahmm,' he cleared his throat. 'Yeah, fine. Aren't you bringing any clothes?' he asked, changing the topic before he reached up to scratch the tip of his nose, eventually giving up and rubbing it, realising that she knew that it must have hurt.

'Why?' she said. 'I'm not going to stay at your loft when I have this perfectly good apartment.'

'But you've suffered a–'

'Concussion, yes, I know. Nothing I can't handle.'

'There's also the fact that we need to deal with this and deal with it quickly. I'm not letting you disappear tonight to try and make a stand on your own. It's too dangerous, whether you think you know this guy or not.'

'I do know him.'

'Judging by the trick he pulled last night, you don't. Not as well as you think.'

She stared at him for a moment. 'Surely you realise I'm not good at this working together thing. I don't trust you Michael and it would take a number of years before even the most basic trust could start to build between us, so give up. I can handle this and I will handle this because I should have done so a very long time ago. I have all the information I need from the envelope stored up here anyway,' she said, tapping her head. 'If you can't deal with it, I suggest you leave.'

She held the door further open, directing him out with her hand. He moved her aside, slamming the door to step in front of her, blocking off the exit. He reached up, taking his sunglasses off to meet her gaze, the pale blue as hard set as his jaw.

He put his sunglasses on the table beside the entrance, crossing his arms over his chest. 'No.'

She stared straight back at him. 'No to what?'

'To everything. To your trust issues and to your lone ranger crap. This is not something you should deal with on your own, physically or mentally, because it's too big for anyone to deal with, especially if something goes wrong.'

'I'm not going to let–'

'Just listen to me,' he said, stepping forward, toe to toe with her. He grabbed her shoulders, still gentle with her, knowing that she was injured. 'I don't know how you grew up or what's happened to make you like you are, but you're not the only one who has been through hell and back a hundred times in your life.'

'And what am I like Michael?' she asked. 'Who do you think I am?'

He let out a breath, hands moving down her arms. He took a step back, turning away for a moment. He ran his hands down his face, meeting her gaze again. 'After I saw you at my mum's house I spent days looking for anything that I could find on you, running on my memory and three flimsy sheets of paper in an attempt to work out something, anything, about you.'

'And?'

'One of your aliases is Mia Landlaw. You spent some time in London infiltrating the four's trust and then neutralising them. Recently, you befriended my mum. You own a red 1969 Corvette, you have green eyes, brown hair and you were nearly killed whilst getting an envelope for your handler which contains information on a modified strand of Ebola,' he said, the pale blue holding her, 'and, you may or may not be the Shadow Viper, the only person in the spy community that I shouldn't trust because you simply can't exist, but can't seem to allow myself to leave for fear that something will happen to you.'

She held her façade even as she felt the stab of his words, each more painful than the last. Yet there was nothing else that she could do but stand and stare at him, hearing everything in his words. He knew who she was and was willing to help her even though he knew all of the danger that surrounded her, all of the secrets and seeming impossibility of the lack of existence of Alexia Salazar, the woman behind the Shadow Viper alias.

'You're right,' she said, holding back her emotions. 'I don't trust. I don't work well with people because I've never had to. All of my interaction with people is false because I never learned anything different. It's only been in recent months that I've finally managed to have a conversation that didn't involve weaponry or tactics, that I've realised that the pains and turns and twists inside me are what real emotions feel like and that I can feel at all without faking it. You think you've got it bad with your burn notice? With your deadbeat father and your mother and brother who love you? At least you had them. At least you didn't grow up in the dark, learning exactly what it was like to live like a spy before you were old enough to be one, to wait in the shadows and hope that you would make it through another night just to live through another day of nothing, because that's all I am; nothing. Nothing except for what I do and who I become, and right now I need to take down Thompson and to do so, I must become the thing that he fears most.'

'And what is that? He knows you already, knows how you work and other details that he can use to take you down, so what more can he fear that you can become?'

She allowed a small, empty smile to pick up her lips as she brought her arm up, pulling the sleeve down enough to reveal the bracelet that held that tiny vial. She looked at it, a certain fondness in her gaze. 'I can become the very poison that he fears will take his last heartbeat every second of every day. He has no idea just how frightening I can be,' she said, lingering on it for a moment before she looked to him again. 'Neither do you.'

He came forward, turning her, backing her into the wall beside the door. He rested his hands beside each side of her head, boxing her in as he leant close, invading the personal space that he knew that she valued. He locked onto the bright green of her eyes, his nose barely a breath away from hers, her heartbeat racing as she felt the warmth of his skin radiating so close. 'Show me,' he whispered, the heat of his breath tickling her lips. 'Show me how dangerous you are.'

She could have made him back down, landed a solid crack on his ribs, but she was frozen, her mind whirling with the sudden turn of the situation. He was so close, invading the space that he had been so careful to avoid entering before. He knew how to affect her even though he admitted that he knew so little about her. He was becoming just as dangerous as he believed her to be.

'Come on, Alexia,' he whispered, a little more forceful as he pushed forward, lips grazing her ear, 'show me.'

Next update: Wednesday 16th of June

From now on, How It Burns will be updated every Wednesday and Saturday unless a change is noted in the most recent chapter due to travel or other events that may stop me from writing, though a change is very unlikely before the completion of this fan fiction.

I hope you're still enjoying How It Burns.

~ Ryuk In Person ~