A/N: In response to a couple inquiries, no, the last chapter was NOT the end of the story. Hence, the chapter I have for you today. This one is the second last, but I might add an epilogue depending on whether or not I can squeeze a satisfying ending into the last chapter... my guess is that there will be one.

Just an aside, the reference to 'handlers' is a term I shamelessly stole from the show Chuck (think more à la Casey than Sara, only because none of these guys would look as good in a skirt). Enjoy!

*=*=*

Chapter 13

*=*=*

"What?! But... how?!"

"How what?"

"How did you survive? I don't understand."

"Neither did I. And for a while afterwards, I wished I hadn't lived all..."

"..."

"..."

"Augh! You aggravating whelp! You're not going to tell me how, are you!"

"And ruin the suspense? Surely you know me better than that."

"You must get some sadistic pleasure out of torturing a dying woman like this."

"Not nearly as much as you get complaining about it... I woke to the sun streaming in through the dusty blinds of a small, unfurnished bedroom. The weathered hardwood floors and gently-domed ceiling that stared back at me were of no help to my poor memory. Blinking in confusion, I tried desperately to figure out where I was and recall what had happened, because I was positive that I'd never seen this place in my life. How had I gotten here? What happened to me? Where was Amy? The more I thought, the more my brain hurt with the strain and I forced myself to lie back and take deep breaths. But there was one problem with that."

"Oh. Your side?"

"I didn't feel it at first. It was more like an irritating scrape that stung more than crippled me. Not until I lifted my hand to feel along my side did the pain really hit me. Someone had bandaged the wound for me and I could feel the cotton padding held in place by surgical tape, but that didn't help one whit. I've never felt anything so agonizing in my life and really don't recommend it; getting shot, even when the bullet misses all your vital organs, is a horrible experience."

"Oh what a baby! It hit your ribs! Do you know what it's like to take one to the gut? Or the side of the neck? Now that's frightening. "

"No one cares about how many bullets you've taken. This is my story, remember?"

"And if you weren't such a whiner, it'd be a better one."

"I was pretty heroic, I'll have you know! Even with my chest slit open six inches beneath my armpit, I still hauled myself out of bed like a man! I had to. Because the memories were flooding back and I started to realize the gravity of the situation I'd left behind. Amy's anguished face begging me stay with her as gunfire erupted around us flashed in my mind, seeming to both squeeze my heart with an icy hold and send my mind into a fiery, obsessive panic. I had to find her. I had to know she wasn't dead. I had to know she was still out there waiting for me like I would for her. Because the thought that she might be gone made me not want to live anymore. "

"..."

"What? Are you...cr—?"

"No! Don't be stupid!... Go on."

"I found that I was in a small, two-story house that, despite having no furniture, was extremely cramped for space. At least I knew I was still in Paris. Frantically, I searched every last room to find it completely abandoned. Not only was there no trace of Amy, but there was no trace of anyone else either. As I hobbled down the last of the stairs, I felt blood beginning to seep through the bandage at my side. Cursing to myself, I pressed my fingers against it to keep pressure and reasoned that there'd be time to see a doctor once I was with Amy and Dan. Maybe I wasn't too late. I might still make the rendez-vous point if I hurried. Amy could have managed to get away like I had. Perhaps she was just fine and I was worrying over nothing."

"...Ian, we were long gone by—"

"I know, but at the time, it didn't occur to me that more than a few hours had passed. It especially didn't occur to me that I'd been asleep for three whole days. And in my blind optimism, I wandered outdoors, surprised but relieved to find the front door unlocked. I didn't recognize the quartier where I was immediately, but after limping a few blocks and drawing the attention of many curious pedestrians, I realized that I wasn't actually too far from where we were supposed to meet."

"We waited as long as we could, you know that. But Lucians were crawling all over the city looking for you. Any one of them could have spotted—"

"Again, I know. I'm agreeing with you; keeping the clues safe should have been your priority."

"Just understand that that decision to leave wasn't easy... for any of us."

Yes. The rendez-vous location was a secluded alley behind a run-down pub. At my back, the sun was beginning to set by the time I reached the spot, casting long shadows across the walls and darkening the narrow street. I could feel a wet trickle of blood dripping through my fingers where I clutched my chest as I stumbled up, panting and groaning from the exertion. The entire way, my one driving belief had been that Amy would be there waiting for me. She'd never leave me behind; she'd never abandon me. And it literally brought me to my knees when I found it deserted and empty; just a few rubbish bins piled next to an over-flowing dumpster. I just collapsed against the wall, leaned my head back and let the pain and despair overtake me. You and Dan were gone, and Amy..."

"When did you find out about her?"

"As I rested there catching my breath, I noticed something resting on the pavement beside me—a rumpled orange flower. Reaching out, I grasped it with fumbling fingers, recognizing it as the tiger lily I'd given Amy. In spite of the pain, I couldn't help the grin that spread over my face or the tears that burned my weary eyes as I stared at that little lily. Amy was sending me a message. She was okay."

"At least you knew that much. For the longest time, we assumed you were dead. Well, most of us that is... you really should have seen her."

"Is that right?"

"Amy was a woman possessed when we found her, determined to scour the entire country to find you. She never believed you were dead."

"I wish I'd had a way to reach her, but you were in hiding and I was busy bleeding out in the dark with my last memento of her clutched in my hand. I don't recall passing out, but apparently I did because that was how Vincent found me."

"Vincent?"

"My handler. He was this great big Frenchman--shaved head, dark skinned and powerfully built with the most severe expression you'd ever see. His family was originally from somewhere in West Africa and they had immigrated when he was just a baby— although frankly, it was a little hard to imagine that man ever having been small. Yet, his was the first face I saw when I woke and I just about had a panic attack right then."

"Why?"

"Because I recognized him; he was one of the men who'd chased us after the trial, cornered us in the service road and opened fire. Once more, I was lying on the bed in the same small room where I'd woken up before, only now he was seated in a chair against the far wall watching me. Jerkily, I sat up, keeping my back against the headboard and snarled at him, demanding to know who he worked for and why he'd taken me here."

"Well, I certainly didn't hire him."

"No, and I was quick to dismiss that idea. Not only did you prefer the company of Russians rather than the French, but if you had really wanted us dead, I wouldn't still be breathing. But then, foolishly, I was assuming that the reason I was alive was because someone was looking for information."

"Ah! So you thought your father had sent him?"

"Naturally, although even that was off because he too prefers Russians. It was a mystery. Vincent, though, was a man of few words. He ignored my questions and, in annoyed-sounding French, told me to lie down before I passed out again. I staunchly refused, scowling at him as I defiantly swung my legs over the side of the bed. I had things to do. It wasn't the wisest idea because immediately my chest and head screamed in overwhelming pain at the movement. Gritting my teeth and digging my nails into my palms, I managed to stand on shaky legs for one victorious moment before they promptly gave out and I collapsed backwards onto the bed. Vincent eyed me from his chair with what I suspected was an amused look as I sat there, gasping for breath and glaring resentfully at him."

"What did he want from you?"

"He wanted to hand me a package, as per his instructions to do so. He informed me in his brusque manner that he and his men had been contracted as my personal protection for one week. After which, if I could no longer afford to pay them, they were free to go."

"Your protection?"

"Bodyguards, handlers, security personnel—whichever you prefer. I spat at him that I didn't need his protection and he could piss off right now if he wanted to. Something in his eyes hardened, but he said nothing and didn't move from his spot as we lapsed into an angry silence. A while later, a physician arrived to check on how my bullet wound was healing. He removed the bandage, cleaned around the stitches and re-applied a fresh one. I'd also suffered a concussion— which was the reason I'd blacked out—but I would be able to walk in a couple of days."

"Well, I should hope your protection stuck around longer than a week. They were the reason you got shot in the first place!"

"Technically, none of them had pulled the trigger. Back in the alley, they had only chased me to capture me, never to kill me. They hadn't even been aiming at me when they started firing; those bullets were meant to take out the Russian threat to my life. When I asked what had happened to him, Vincent shrugged and said vaguely that the situation had resolved itself. I took that as code to mean he was dead and rotting somewhere."

"Yes, Amy told us they shot him before kidnapping you. Not that she let them take you so easily..."

"I know. She gave Jean—another member of my protection squad—a split lip fighting to defend me. I wish I'd been conscious to see that, because I really can't imagine what it was like for her; watching them load me into a van and drive off. Anyone would have thought they were abducting me for questioning and torture. Not even I would have guessed that they were trying to save my life..."

"It's a mercy they didn't kill her!"

"Not really. She wasn't a threat to me or them; they had no reason to. See, they're not bad people—I may not have liked everyone, but I honestly couldn't see them shooting an unarmed teenage girl."

"I suppose you did get to know them."

"Hard to avoid it, really. There were three in the rotation: Vincent, Jean and Mathieu-Félix. Jean was another big, disagreeable chap, but unlike Vincent, he was always grimy-looking with a perpetual five o'clock shadow no matter how many times a day he shaved. Mathieu-Félix was all right, although he was pale, blond and overly pretty, in my opinion, for a hired thug. I was never without at least one of them hovering over me during the two days it took to recover. All the while, no one would tell me who it was they were working for and the mystery began to plague me. It could have been anyone from any branch of our back-stabbing family. But who? Another Lucian? A Janus? The Tomas were too hot-headed to have resisted torturing me by now... But the Ekats? The more I thought, the more I yearned to know what was in that package for me."

"Did you run out of time?"

"Pretty damn nearly. I supposed whoever had hired the tossers hadn't counted on me almost getting my nipples blown off and needing time to heal. But, two days and a number of pulled stitches later, Vincent finally handed over a brown parcel wrapped in twine."

"What was in it?"

"Ten thousand euro in cash, a typed note with an address on it and a Boston Bruins baseball cap."

"... huh?"

"My thoughts exactly. I failed to recognize the logo on the cap. I think I mistook it for a stupid American baseball team (Amy informed me it's not, but truly I've never seen the appeal of ice hockey either) and, having no patience for such insipid sports, I instead turned my attention to the unsigned note:

32 rue Cambon

Bonne Chance!

"I frowned and eyed the hat in my hand dubiously. Maybe I was supposed to wear it as an identifier when I went to meet whoever this anonymous benefactor was. But what about that 'Bonne Chance!' remark? It somehow seemed a bit uppity to wish me 'good luck' in light of everything that had happened. In the end, I resolved that I might as well take the bait and go pay whoever it was a visit. They didn't seem to want to kill me and they'd just given me ten thousand euro; it struck me as strangely impolite to refuse."

"Where was it?"

"Euronext: the Parisian Stock Exchange. I stood before it, staring in trepidation at the sign above before I reluctantly-- and with more than a little humiliation-- donned my new hat and made my way inside. Greeting me was a hive of activity similar enough to the London Stock Exchange, with which I'd already had ample experience. Men in suits chatted on blackberries, some scribbling furiously on notepads while brokers took down stock points for clients and shouted into headsets. No one paid any attention to my entrance and it didn't appear as though anyone was waiting for me. Unconsciously, my fingers touched the money I kept wrapped in its original brown package beneath my arm as I stared up at the numbers and stock symbols rolling by. What now? They wanted me to invest in something, did they?"

"Why would they want that?"

"I wondered about that at first, but then I recalled what Vincent had told me earlier: if I could no longer afford to pay them, they would be free to go. I eyed Jean, my handler for the day, as he sniffed obnoxiously, rubbing a hand under his nose and ogling the millionaires around us with a pickpocket's eye. Yeah, that would be a loss all right. Still, I couldn't help feeling like someone out there was trying to challenge me. It left me torn between refusing to play their sick little game and beating the hell out of it just to rub it in their face... You can probably guess which one I chose."

"The fool-hardy one?"

"Naturally. I did my best to observe, watching the stock ticker unblinkingly through the swarm of businessmen until little green and red arrows were burned into my retinas. Eventually, I requested a stock list and began going through an electronic copy of every company listed one by one, looking for anything that was remotely related to Boston. Nothing popped up immediately and there were simply tons of stocks to sift through. Funnily enough, I came across Sysco Developers, the company my mother had mentioned was about to go bankrupt because of my father. I snorted and moved on; that certainly wouldn't be one I'd invest in. It wasn't until I also saw the name Cortex Engineering that everything suddenly fell together. Madly, I ripped the hat off my head and groaned."

"Wait! Hold on. I'm confused..."

"There was a bloody bear on the front. See, when a stock is expected to do well, people invest money in it and call it a 'bull market.' If the stock goes up, they make money."

"Yes, I know that. What does this have to do with bears?"

"But, if you believe a stock is about to drop in value, like I knew for certain Sysco and Cortex were about to do, you can bet against it. If it goes down, you profit. That's called shorting a stock and it happens in 'bear markets.' The hat was telling me that I had to short those two stocks."

"Then you mean... the person who sent those men to abduct and protect you was..."

"Isabel."

"But... she disowned you! Why would she help you at all?"

"She had to disown me; Father and I both forced her hand. But she'd anticipated that and had devised her own scheme to keep me safe. I'm amazed at just how calculated her strategy was and it shamed me to think that while I was busy yelling at her back in London, she was handing me the keys to my own survival. Of course, Mother couldn't risk paying Vincent and his men openly without Father catching on, but she could give me the means to do so myself. And I hadn't disappointed her..."

"How much did shorting the stocks get you?"

"Enough to keep all three men around for a while. I'd decided to try it; if nothing else, they were a reminder that my mother was still watching over me. And that considerably lessened the loneliness I felt those first few months. Now, I'm not naïve enough to believe that my handlers alone were what kept me safe. Given his resources, my father could have easily sent a small battalion of thugs with Uzis to my front door and those three wouldn't have mattered a tick, but the fact that he'd refrained was a testament to my mother's influence. I could guess it was what she'd requested from Vikram in return for disowning me; that I be left in peace. Still, I had little doubt that he was monitoring my activities to see if I came in contact with the Cahills. Irritating though it was to know I was being watched, at least I could see his plan and that was a very bittersweet relief."

"She came through for us, even if she never knew it."

"She does now. But at the time, she might have picked a different set of thugs. The four of us got on all right eventually, but in the beginning there were a few rather nasty squabbles about what exactly constituted personal hygiene and how much work I expected them to do for me. Jean especially got on my nerves. He began calling me le petit prince over my so-called 'snobisme' until the nickname stuck. I thought it was a reference to the title character of de Saint Exupéry's novel or had to do with how much more civilized I was in comparison to them."

"It wasn't?"

"No, but I'll come to that later. My priority by then was to get word to Amy that I was safe and to keep her from looking for me. Our positions were extremely precarious, but for the time being, we seemed to have found safe ground. I didn't want to upset that by meeting while I was being so carefully watched. But how was I supposed to contact her without raising any red flags? My email was hacked and your private one was shut down, making any digital communication risky. I had to come up with something."

"It was moronic!"

"Really? You think so?"

"You don't?!"

"It got the job done, what more could I ask? I wasn't sure if he was monitoring all Lucian e-mails for anything from me, so I decided to go with a bold approach. After copying the addresses of every single high-ranking Lucian from my mother's account—you included, of course—I sent a nice big forward from my own declaring my survival and wishing Father a cheeky 'better luck next time.' I didn't really care to taunt them, but it let you and my mother both know that I was alive, which was more to the point."

"No. You deliberately provoked him! Do you know what he might have done to you?"

"Calm down! There was a bit of a backlash, but to tell the truth, I wasn't really aware of many of his assassination efforts. And for the longest while, that disappointed me. Not that I had any particular inclination to watch violent bloodshed on my behalf, but I somehow felt that I no longer mattered to my father; that I wasn't a threat anymore. And that hurt my pride. I had undermined his espionage activities, run away from home, nearly blinded him and blown a hole in the Lucian stronghold, and he was just going to let me go?!"

"You idiot! You got away! Don't you dare complain!"

"Oh, I didn't get away with anything. Vincent, Jean and Mathieu-Félix were just very skilled at hiding it. It had been three months without any communiqué with Amy and I was going a bit stir crazy. Even knowing she'd escaped didn't lessen the worry that ate at me—and I had plenty of time to stress over it, having nothing to do all day but read books and obsess over my stocks. It occurred to me that even if something had happened to her, I'd never know and that thought kept me up at night. It was possibly why I was awake one evening in October when I heard a scuffle outside my window."

"Ian, do you really need to tell me about—"

"What? How I stumbled upon my handler beating the stupid out of one of Father's henchmen? Fine, maybe not, but I never again felt that childish disappointment over not receiving any attention from Vikram. How could I? Vincent killed that man because of everything I'd done and I had paid him to do it. It was... sobering, to say the least."

"Well, at least you smartened up."

"That, I assure you, will never happen... After that night, I insisted that we stay on the move, rotating residences every few weeks—sometimes returning to old ones but often only finding new locations to live. It was ghastly expensive and I had to keep cashing in my investments to do so, but I hated the idea of more bodies piling up; my conscience weighed heavily enough. After a few months, our followers turned from assassins to harmless spies once more and it seemed that my father's wrath had been squelched at least temporarily. In that quiet lull, I decided that I wanted to attend school—even if it had to be a French school. I hadn't been in over six months and while I hadn't exactly missed it, I was bored out of my skull acting as a shut-in. It turned into a stormy, epic argument between me and Vincent who warned me it was a foolish risk. "

"Dear God! I can't imagine being on your security detail. I think I might have just let you get yourself killed and be done with it!"

"Now there's a comfort. I won, suffice to say, and enrolled in December at Lycée Jeanne d'Arc but the experience really doesn't bear mentioning except to say; firstly, just how sadistic the French school system is (having been intentionally designed to make anyone feel like a failure in life) and secondly, that it was the only way I could communicate with you."

"But even that was dangerous. Your Father was still watching you closely."

"Which was why we needed to be discreet. A few days before Christmas, I was summoned from class--ironically still bored at the time--and handed an envelope at the administrative desk. Some young lady had just dropped it off for me with the request that it be delivered immediately. I tore into it the second I was out of sight of anyone besides Mathieu-Félix—my shadow for the day—knowing it must be from Amy. But I was a more than a little dismayed at both how little the message contained and its signatory:

I'm sorry things are progressing slowly.

It still looks like it is going to be a while before we see one another again, but hang in there and keep your ear to the ground.

Love, Ida

"You knew it was from us."

"Yes, I knew Amy's tidy penmanship anywhere, but the name she used threw me. I'd seen her sign her e-mails to you with 'Ida'—an acronym for 'Ian, Dan and Amy'. Now, I supposed that 'I' stood for Irina and the thought both annoyed and frustrated me. Not only had you taken that active, in-control position that was rightfully mine, but it felt like I'd now become a liability in this arrangement."

"Yes, well... you were."

"Thanks, old Mum. You always know just what to say."

"No, not that. You were a liability because of what you meant to Amy."

"I was?"

"She refused to leave Paris once we found you; probably felt that we would be abandoning you. And it was impossible to convince her that you were going to be safe where you were."

"But you did eventually?--convince her, that is."

"Through great pains, but yes. We helped her realize that contacting you again might very well result in your death, which was what ultimately pushed her to leave."

"And that's why I never got another note?"

"It simply wasn't worth the risk."

"My, that's almost touching... in a cold, completely inhuman way, I mean. But in any event, life went on and, miserably enough, so did school. All three of my bodyguards, who were well into their thirties, disliked attending classes with me; Vincent found it degrading, Jean was as bored as I was and Mathieu-Félix was forever crabby because they didn't allow him to smoke on the premises. Christmas and the New Year were uneventful, which left me with plenty of time by myself to brood. When I wasn't wondering about Amy and her message, I'd sometimes envision what my family must be doing without me. Mother loved to spend the holidays in Fiji, although Natalie would always complain about the sun drying out her skin and refuse to go outside, and inevitably Father would get called away on business. I wondered if they'd gone after everything that had happened this year."

"A little homesick, hmm?"

"Not really. I missed Mother and Fiji; not so much Natalie's whining or Vikram. Especially not Vikram... January and February were long, wet months, but by the end of March, there was a palpable lightness in the air with the long-anticipated signs of spring. At the time, we had a nice, expensive flat with a sunset view of the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs Elysées, which was quite lovely in the evenings. But with the changing of the seasons, I could feel the tireless march of time. Over the past seven months, I'd grown taller, leaner, my bullet wound had healed over with a long scar and I'd even started to shave. Now, April was upon us and, with it, a dark shadow was looming over my life."

"A shadow?"

"My birthday. Early that month, I turned seventeen. In celebration, Jean bought a cupcake from a bakery down the street and, since we didn't have any candles, Mathieu-Félix lit one of his cigarettes and stuck it in the icing. It was the sorriest, most disgusting-looking birthday cake I'd ever seen and even sorrier to think about what it stood for. In another life I might have been rejoicing with family and friends, but instead I was busy contemplating my fate and wishing I was sixteen once again. Because, all the while, time was running out for me."

"Ah..."

"In one year, I would turn eighteen and become a legal adult. If you hadn't taken over the council by then, I could never be adopted as a Lucian. I could never become your successor. And the future of Orion would be forever left in the Council's bloodthirsty hands..."

*=*=*