A/N: Let's continue, shall we?

Disclaimer: I do not own Leverage - except on DVD!

Reviews are appreciated, and always read.

Warning: some creative swearing.

Previously:

"An old contact got in touch with me." Eliot whispered. "It might be nothing. But there might come a time when I have to take care of some business.

Now:

Five months. It had been five months, almost to the very second, and Parker was done. Five months of silence, of waiting for a sign or a clue, or, hell, the fucking Bat signal, and she was done.

They were all standing around the kitchen, watching Hardison frantically try to put out a fire that was sparking on the stove. Parker watched with detached indifference, his yelps of shock and panic barely registering. Normally, she would be laughing her ass off while Eliot swore and yelled about how he was ruining his kitchen and how he was going to kill Alec and Nate sighed at the noise and Sophie fussed over Hardison and yelled at Nate to help her. That's what she wanted back. Because now, while Hardison still yelped and Nate still sighed and Sophie still fussed, Parker wasn't laughing. She wasn't laughing because Eliot wasn't swearing. And Eliot wasn't swearing because he wasn't here.

He hadn't been here for five months.

Parker reached up and touched the locket hung around her neck. She hadn't taken it off since the day Eliot left, the day he and Nate had argued about safe-houses. He had left almost immediately, gone home to set things in order, he had told them. And then the next morning, he had called Nate from a burner cell, saying he was sorry, saying that he thought he'd have more time but he had to take care of whatever business he had right now and he'd be back as soon as it was done.

Parker clutched the locket in her hand. What kind of job takes five months to finish? And how come he hadn't contacted them at all?

"Parker?"

Sophie's voice broke her from her anxious thoughts, and she noticed that the fire was out, and Hardison had finished screaming and now all three of the rest of her team were looking at her with sad, concerned eyes. The same looks they always gave her these last months.

"Parker, are you okay?" Sophie asked again. Parker was suddenly filled with a surge of irrational anger and she dropped the locket back against her chest, the heavy metal making a comforting thump against her collarbone.

"Am I okay?" She spoke softly, but there was no mistaking the anger and the stress in her voice. "I haven't been okay for five months, Sophie. Five months! Why would today be different? Is Eliot back? Have we heard anything from him? Do we know if he's okay? Or if he's alive?"

"Parker -" Nate started, but Parker cut him off as she whipped her head to face him, her trademark ponytail lashing out behind her like a deadly blonde whip.

"No. No more "Parker". I'm not a child, and I'm not the one you need to worry about! Okay?" Parker demanded. "It's Eliot."

"He told us he would take care of it." Hardison said. "He doesn't want us involved in whatever he's got going on, and we all agreed that we'd respect that."

"Oh please. Since when have we ever respected each other's privacy?" Parker snorted. "Yeah, we all got secrets, but that means shit when one of our own goes AWOL for months on end without a word. I mean, are you kidding me? I thought we were family!"

"We are." Nate said firmly. Parker looked at him again, but her anger abated at what she saw. His face was tired, drawn, and there were circles under his eyes like he hadn't been sleeping. And if that's what he looked like, then Parker knew he really hadn't been sleeping. Once upon a time, she might have thought he had been drinking and he was hungover, but those days were long gone. Sure, he still drank, but it wasn't like before. It was like he was back in control. So seeing him like this really hit her that he actually was taking Eliot's disappearance harder than she had thought. Parker looked around at Sophie and Hardison and saw similar signs of fatigue and stress and Sophie's eyes were rimmed with red and the mascara smudged, as if she had been crying and tried to hide it. Hardison was more quiet than he used to be. He no longer rambled on and on about pointless World of Warcraft facts, or talked Doctor Who or hollered about "The Age of the Geek". Parker wondered how much of that had been purely to annoy Eliot, the way a younger brother annoyed his big brother. The thought hit her in the heart.

"I'm sorry." Parker whispered. "I didn't mean -"

"We know." Sophie said. "Parker, we know. And it's killing us that we don't know anything about Eliot. But there isn't much we can do."

It was strange to hear that, and altogether horrible. The thing that Parker had come to count on about Leverage and their team and everything about them was that there were no limits to what they could accomplish. They had conned in fifteen minutes, on an airplane, on boats, in Europe and during a blackout. They had conned masters in the trade, Interpol and state police and the FBI. They could find anyone and find everything and it never ceased to amaze Parker what they were capable of together. So when Eliot left, while it made her feel a little unsteady, she knew that if he was gone for too long, they'd be able to find him in no time and swoop in to the rescue.

But that was before she learned that he had used an untraceable burner cell to call them, that he had erased the aliases they knew of, completely cleaned out the safe house and his apartment in the area, canceled the credit cards they knew of, sold his truck, and all but erased himself off the earth. So when almost two months had gone by and Nate had decided to look into it, there was nothing for them to trace. Nothing. It was like Eliot had never existed.

By the third month, Parker had gotten anxious. She was freaking out without Eliot. She started having nightmares. There were weeks on end where she would wake up screaming, dark dreams about fire and blood and Eliot always just out of reach but needing them, needing her, and it slowly drained her. The locket was the only thing that gave her any comfort.

It had been a gift. A gift from Eliot, though no one else knew that. Inside were two tiny pictures, and Parker would never admit it, but when she had first gotten the present, she had sat and stared for hours at both of them, fascinated with the tiny faces, the capture of the memories.

The first photo was a picture of all of them - Parker had a hunch it was a surveillance photo from one of them many bad guys who were always hunting them down. Maybe it had been Sterling - but nevertheless, it had been a picture of all of them, together, sitting at that restaurant Sophie had dragged them too - where Eliot had later been poisoned, but they hadn't know that yet, and there they were, smiling and actually having a good time all together, like a family.

The second picture was just Parker and Eliot. It was when they had been dancing in the living room, unaware that the rest of the team was watching them. Their heads were bent close together, eyes closed and arms wrapped loosely around each other. It was a surprisingly good picture and it had quickly become one of Parker's favorites. So during that hard third month, she would open the locket when she was alone and stare at that picture and try to recall how his arms felt around her.

By the fourth month, Parker started looking again. She rappelled around the city at high speed, checking his old favorite haunts just in case he stopped in, and when she wasn't back in her hangar or at HQ, she was flying around the city, hunting for her hitter. She even went so far as to call his family, his sister Tessa and all of them, and see if he had checked in. But she hung up as soon as Tessa had said hello. She couldn't bring them into this…and what would she even say? She couldn't lie to them and she couldn't tell them the truth. It was easier to step away, like Eliot did so long ago, and that was when she had finally grasped his decision, and why, when they had forced him to visit so long ago, it had been so hard.

Five months in, and now Parker was terrified - and angry. When she finally got her hands on Eliot Spencer, she was going to beat him senseless - or fall into his arms crying, depending. She would probably do both - beat him in front of everyone else, and then collapse once they were alone. She had pictured it so many times, it was like a vision for the future - but not yet. Not until they've found Eliot.

"We can start again." Parker said. "We haven't tried in two months. What if something's changed? What if he sent out a signal and we didn't see it because all of a sudden we decided to be decent people? We're thieves, dammit!"

The four of them looked at each other for a split second, and then it was as if a shot went off. They leapt into action like the backwards superheroes they were and Parker all but vaulted over the couch so she could be right up and personal with the screen.

"Alright, alright, ladies and gents. Give me some criteria. Where's Waldo?" Hardison cracked as he waggled his fingers over his tablet.

"Why don't we start from the beginning?" Nate said. "We know the burner cell is a dead end. What about surveillance cameras? Can we go over that footage again?"

"We already checked the cameras around Eliot's apartment." Sophie mentioned. "He had already tampered with the feeds and it was all useless until hours after we knew he was gone."

"Damn cowboy is more tech savvy than I gave him credit for." Hardison griped, though Parker knew he was secretly proud and impressed with Eliot's hidden skill.

"Right, right, right." Nate mused. "But this is Eliot. So he knew we'd check around his apartment. He knew we'd check around the spots that he frequents, knew we'd check every obvious…" He trailed off, and Parker felt a tremor of excitement trickle down her spine. She knew that look. That was Nate's "I-had-an-idea" face, the one that was usually followed by a clever twist in their con right at the point when things were about to go south.

"Nate, what is it?" Sophie said eagerly. Parker wasn't the only one who knew what that face meant.

"We checked the cameras around Eliot's apartment and safe house in the area." Nate confirmed. "But did we ever check the cameras around this building?"

There was stunned silence. Then -

"Are you shitting me?!"

"I swear to fuck, if that - that dick douche literally left us a clue in front of our own fucking building -"

"That bloody cockwaffle!"

"Are we all dumbasses?"

The chorus of swearing went on for a while, which Parker briefly enjoyed as things got more and more creative, before watching with intent seriousness as Hardison quickly tapped into their security camera feed and logged into five months previous.

"Thank the Lord I had the brains to install a backup server to hold at least a year's footage." he remarked. "If I had gone the regular route of monthly, we'd be up shit creek without a paddle if you know what I mean."

"Huh?" Parker gawked.

"Nevermind, Parker." Sophie waved her hand. "All he means is we have the reel from five months ago up until today."

Hardison tapped more buttons on his tablet and Parker watched as the video on the screen began to scrub through itself, little green check marks popping over every head on any person that walked through the frame. Beside the video, some kind of image processor was whirring full speed.

"I'm analyzing facial recognition so we don't have to sit and watch five months worth of recording. Instead, I've programmed it to specifically teach out Eliot's facial features and body structure, so if he's been anywhere near here while he's been AWOL, we'll see it. It's only a matter of time."

Turns out a matter of time was a nice way of saying forever. Parker glanced at the clock again. Four and a half hours.

"You know the guys on CSI have their machines beeping and whirring and answers spewing out in, like, five minutes." Parker griped.

"Parker, CSI is a television show and everything is condensed to fit an hour time slot." Nate called out from where he was making another pot of coffee. "In real life, these things take a lot long-"

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

"Hardison!" Parker screeched. There was a crash, a door slam and the hacker came running, hiking up the waistband of his jeans.

"Jesus, woman, I was in the bathroom! I could hear the beeping! You couldn't let me find my business?"

'It's Eliot." Parker said simply, as if that answered everything. And in a way, it did.

"Okay. Let's see." Hardison hit a few more buttons, sorting through the data his program had complied. Sophie and Nate came in behind him, and they waited anxiously to see if there would be a sign of their hitter.

"There!" Parker yelped suddenly, pointing at the screen. "That's him."

There was a figure on the video, and the size and shape of the shoulders and body made it easy to conclude that it was a well built man. He was dressed in all black, and Parker thought it might have been leather, and a tinted motorcycle helmet was covering his head. Overall, there was no way to actually identify the person. But Parker knew. She knew.

"Parker, you can't even see who that is. It could be anyone." Sophie said.

"Hold on." Hardison said, typing away. "The body structure does fit Eliot's. There's a good chance Parker's right. I mean, I can't be one hundred percent sure, but come on. What are the odds that there are two people out there with the exact same shoulder-hip width ratio? I'll tell you - slim to none. I think we got him."

"YES!' Parker shrieked. "Where is he?"

"Hardison, when was this recorded? And see if he appears in any other frames besides this one." Nate ordered and the hacker was off at full speed.

"Okay. Looks like the first time this Maybe-Eliot was recorded was about three months ago. And he shows up every couple of days - and here he is. Yesterday afternoon. 3:45. It kooks like he always comes to stand in this spot, like he's waiting for someone. Then after fifteen minutes, he just rides off again." Hardison brought up still images of the videos and lay the images of the mysterious figure clad in black in a line. The motorcycle helmet was always down, the tinted visor blocking all sight of his face. Parker eyes the pictures hungrily.

"He's here. He's been here." she whispered. "But he's not coming forward. Why?"

"Something's happened." Sophie said. "Something must have happened. Maybe the danger is here now, and he's trying to protect us."

"Maybe." Nate mused. "The only person who can answer that is Eliot, I'm afraid."

"So let's ask him." Parker said, turning to her team, eyes glinting.

Parker pulled the brim of her hat down and turned the collar of her jacket just a little bit higher up on her neck. Across the street she could see where Nate and Sophie had set themselves up in the bakery, and Hardison was looking down from the apartment above, in the command center. Parker was stationed to where they estimated the motorcyclist would ride up, where he had been the last dozen or so times he had come.

"Parker, you're the only one he might let close enough to him to actually figure out what's going on." Nate told her. "We can't risk something happening if we all swarm him. If something really happening here, if one of his enemies is here and he's trying to protect us - we need to know anything we can so we can help him and let him come home to us. To you."

He knew about the locket. Nate always knew, which meant he knew about them. Officially, that is. Sure, the others could guess. They had seen them dancing and everything after all. But they had never announced it officially, never really done anything else in front of the team. They were a secret, sort of. But Parker vowed that if Eliot came back to her today, she would scream and yell all through the city that she was in love with Eliot Spencer, and that he better get used to it.

The revving of an engine startled her out of her thoughts and Parker tucked herself further into her jacket, and pressed herself up as m=nonchalantly as she could against the brick wall of the building. Out of the corner of her eye, Parker watched as a motorcycle roared up to the curb, the cyclist the same figure in black from the pictures. As the engine came to a purring halt, Parker stared at the bike - and it wasn't just any motorcycle. It was a Ducati.

"If you could buy only one more thing, just one more thing and nothing else for the rest fo your life, what would it be?"

Parker was lying on top of Eliot's chest, their bare skin glistening with the after glow of making love, their chests heaving as their heart rates slowed down. They had been quiet for a while when this silly little question popped into her head. She liked silly little questions, and even more asking Eliot them at random times. It amused her to be able to surprise him, and his answers always gave her more insight into the man she was slowly falling in love with.

She felt the rumble of laughter in his chest, and felt his arm encircle her.

"I suppose I would buy a Ducati."

"A motorcycle?" Parker scoffed. "Why?"

"It's not just a motorcycle, Park." Eliot laughed. "I've wanted one of those for years. Trouble is, it's not something expendable like the rest of my stuff. I mean, I can get a Ford truck anywhere in the state and I wouldn't give two shits. But a Ducati….what I wouldn't give to have one of those. For me to buy one, though, means I'd have to settled down somewhere, and that just isn't in our line of work."

Parker just lay there, listening to his heartbeat while she thought that over, letting fingers trail over her arms.

"What about you darlin'? What would you buy?"

Parker thought about it for a minute before looking up at her boyfriend (even thinking that word gave her chills) and smiling softly.

"A Ducati sounds pretty awesome, if you ask me."

Parker watched as the figure in black cut the engine and pushed out the kickstand with the heel of his foot. The helmet swiveled to face her, and Parker wished she could see crystal blue eyes beneath the tinted glass, but there was nothing. Slowly, the figure got off the bike, boots hitting the concrete noiselessly. He walked around the Ducati, and made his way to where Parker was standing.

"Okay, Parker. Do your thing." Nate's voice in her ear helped her steady herself and she straightened up as this Maybe-Eliot approached. She took off her hat, slipped her ponytail out from the back and let her blond curls hang around her face, the way he always liked it, and unzipped her jacket partway, showing that she was wearing a cut up of one of his T-shirts. The figure paused, only slightly, but kept walking towards her.

"Eliot?" Parker said. "Eliot, is that you?"

This time, the figure stopped walking completely. There they stood, facing each other, neither one of them moving or making a single sound, instead letting the world rush by around them.

"Eliot, if it is you…" Parker swallowed. If this wasn't Eliot, this was going to be super embarrassing on different levels, but she had to chance it. "For whatever reason, you've been gone for five months. For whatever reason, you haven't reached out to us, even though you've been here and we've been right up there. For whatever reason, you've left me wondering whether or not you were alive, whether or not you've left me for good. All that, believe it or not, I can understand because I know that for whatever reason, you were doing this to protect me. To protect us. And I can't fault you for that."

He didn't move.

"Eliot, please. Whatever is going on, whatever you're trying to protect us from, we can help." Parker pleaded. "You're not alone anymore. And I am not letting you walk away from me today. Not after almost half a year of missing you. I love you, Eliot Spencer, so like it or not, you're stuck with me."

Slowly, painfully slowly, the figure reached up the the helmet and lifted it away from his face - and for the first time in forever, Parker sighed in relief. As the helmet came away, familiar silky black hair shook out, and Parker took in the fading bruises on porcelain skin, the split lip, the black eye, the gash along his cheekbone, and those beautiful blue eyes.

"Eliot…" Parker sighed and she ran forward the remaining four feet that separated them and flung her arms around him. "Eliot, Eliot, Eliot…"

"Parker," Eliot groaned in response, most likely due to more bruises and injuries he had hidden, but his arms still gripped her to his body. "Parker, I'm so sorry."

"I know. I know."

"I'm trying to protect you, all of you. But it's almost over, I promise."

"I kno- wait, what do you mean 'almost'?" Parker pulled back slightly. "Nate, Sophie, back off a second." She spoke the last part into her comm and saw Eliot's eyes clear in understanding before glancing upwards to where the apartment was.

"Tell Hardison to back away from the window while your at it. I'm not completely sure where they might be hiding."

"They?"

"They?" Hardison yelped in her ear. "Sure, leave it to Eliot to have a fucking militia after him. Oh, Nana, I should have just gone to music school like ya wanted. None of this would be happenin' I'd just be playing the violin and being fancy and drinking sparkling Fanta -"

"Shhh!" Parker hissed. "Eliot, tell me. Tell me what's going on."

"I -" Eliot started but then something changed. He glanced over her head and Parker watched his eyes dilate the way they did when he was in "Hitter Mode". "Parker, do you trust me still?"

"Yes." Parker didn't even hesitate. No matter the past, she would always and forever trust the man before her. Eliot glanced back down at her and smiled. Briefly, he leaned in and kissed her softly, and Parker felt he stomach light up in such a way she hadn't felt in ages.

"I love you." he whispered and then in a split second, he shoved her hard away from him and to the ground just as a gunshot echoed through the air.

TBC