Chuck Versus the Christmas Caper
By Steampunk . Chuckster
Summary: New Christmas traditions bring Chuck, Ellie, and Devon to the small beach resort of Capitola, California for a three week vacation. But his holiday plans for fun under the Northern California sun don't play out the way Chuck expects them to when other vacationers staying in the beachfront hotel start raising his suspicions. Can he maintain a new friendship with a fascinating and beautiful neighbor while getting to the bottom of this Christmas caper?
A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing that first chapter. I'm still trying to get ahead of this thing as I'm posting because I want this to actually be a Christmas/New Year fic and not a May/June Christmas fic. I'm not gonna be updating any other fics 'til this one is done. I need some prayer circles this starts to pick up and I blast through it. Thanks ahead of time. Enjoy chapter 2!
Disclaimer: I do not own Chuck and I'm not making any money by writing and posting this fic.
Chuck Bartowski wasn't stupid.
And wasn't chock-full of high expectations for himself, either. The man knew his limitations, which was why he tried so hard to get his sister to join him and Captain Awesome on a jog. But the brat stayed all snuggled up in the bed, even going so far as to make a crackling moan sound and throw the duvet over her head in protest.
Which meant he was stuck with the drill sergeant himself.
"Ellie," he whispered at the lump in the bed as Awesome pulled a shirt on. At least that much was happening. He wouldn't have to run next to his own glaring inadequacies in the perfectly sculpted torso of his sister's boyfriend, so there was that.
"Nope. Vacation."
"Babe. You can still run on vacation. It's good for your energy," Awesome chirped.
"Great, cool. Know what else is good for my energy? Sleeeeeeeeeeeep," she drawled happily.
"She's got a point," Chuck said. "In fact, maybe I'm just gonna go back t—"
"Nope! No, you aren't. I ate enough to feed a T-Rex last night at that barbecue place and so did you. We need this." He thumped Chuck on the shoulder. "C'mon. You'll feel so much better afterwards. Trust me."
Within minutes, they were off, with the blonde rushing out a, "Last one to the bridge has to pay for breakfast!"
"I already said I'm paying for breakfast!"
"Great! Then I guess be a slow poke!" Devon called over his shoulder.
Butthole.
A total butthole.
Because he knew how much Chuck hated being labeled a slow poke during their runs. So of course he picked up the pace. God, those ribs he demolished last night sat in his gut like a couple of dumbbells.
He made it to the bridge not too far behind Devon, and the cool breeze felt so good on his skin, the morning fog still settled out on the water, and hovered over the streets as they crossed the bridge and made their way onto the sidewalk, moving away from the ocean.
Devon took point because…well, he ran faster.
But as he ran, Chuck tried to take in the shops, putting a few of them in his mind for later visitation purposes, even getting a little distracted by the pastries he saw in one of the windows.
Distracted enough that he nearly didn't see her.
He did see her though. Decked out in an exercise sweatshirt and stretchy pants, her hair pulled up in a bun, he still recognized her from the beach. Miss You're Blocking My Sun herself. Apparently also out for a jog. But she hadn't just been a little distracted by the pastries in the window, she'd slowed to a stop and was staring at them through the window.
Chuck slid to a halt in a way he hadn't when he saw the delicious pastries. What in the hell was he even going to say? What did he say to her? Hi, I blocked your sun on the beach earlier. Don't those pastries look good? Freak.
But right as he opened his mouth, she turned and continued her run, having not seen him at all as he paused behind her. Chuck followed her with his gaze, his finger still up in the air. He looked down at his finger then and shook his hand out. What was he, a cartoon character? Jesus.
"Hey. Bro. Pastries later. Run now," Devon laughed, a few paces ahead of him, facing him and running in place.
Shaking himself, he chuckled and nodded. "Sorry. They look amazing."
They took off again and Chuck brushed off the non-event that that had just been.
}o{
She knew there was a town behind the hotel, apparently a sweet, quaint little town that also had a nightlife, restaurants and bars, clubs, gift shops, creameries, cafés, a taco place that had great reviews.
But she felt a brittleness in her that kept her in her hotel room that night, ordering dinner from the kitchen and having it brought to her by room service. She'd spent a while out on the beach, and when the sun finally slipped behind the horizon, she'd put her wrap back on to protect herself from the cold breeze and she'd stayed sitting there, finally calling it a night and locking herself back in her room.
And again, she ordered room service for breakfast, before she changed into running clothes, strapping her knives to her thigh, rolling her pants back down, and heading across the bridge to run through town. She took it in as she went, eyeing people, rejoicing in the way it boosted her energy even as it made her lungs burn by the time she got back to her room.
She'd even found a good pastry shop as she made her way through the cute shops along the main street in the town, one she intended to hit up in the morning tomorrow for breakfast.
Wallowing in a lump wasn't going to make any of this any clearer, and it wasn't going to make her mom and that baby any safer. And frankly, her dad was on his own now. He was out of the prison system, which meant the rest of what happened to him was in his hands. If he fucked up again, that was on him.
Now she had to take care of herself, be the driver of her own fate.
Something like that.
Her shower lasted longer than it should have, but the air had felt colder than she'd expected, probably because it was so much wetter than the air she'd left behind in D.C., and not all beaches in California felt like paradise all the time. The California coastline had a way of feeling like a couple of different countries, depending upon where you were, how far north you went, versus south.
Sarah grabbed her laptop again and left her interesting little stucco one room one bathroom place behind, going to the lobby and wandering around to look for a place to just sit and be around people, but…not be around people at the same time.
She found a bar with a nice, airy, open room that had tables and chairs, a nice spot with comfortable plush chairs and a couch by the fireplace, and a door out onto a patio that looked like it was covered with that refreshing morning beach dew, sea and salt glinting on the table tops, on the chairs and the puffed up seat cushions.
Opting not to sit on wet things with her electronic laptop, Sarah chose a table inside near the large window, sitting down and pulling her laptop out. She was totally alone in the room save for the middle-aged woman tending the bar area, so she decided more coffee was necessary while she did a little mid-morning life research. Climbing to her feet, she left her laptop behind and approached the other woman.
"Hi, love. What can I get ya?" she asked in a mid-London accent.
"Do you know where in this lobby I can get a regular cup of coffee? Nothing fancy, just a cup of black coffee."
The woman smiled. "Just so happens I can do that. You staying in the hotel? Want it on your tab?"
"Perfect, yes please."
"Right, just write your room number here, sign, and I'll bring it over to you, love." She slid a receipt over, Sarah did as she was asked, and went back to her laptop.
Where did she even start?
She stared at the Google homepage for a long time, unsure, her fingers not working, even as the woman brought her coffee, even as she started drinking the hot, black coffee, the warmth sneaking down her torso, spreading into her limbs pleasantly.
Where did she want to live?
No, what were her skillsets and what place would suit them best?
She was good at fighting, she was good with knives, she could lead a special-ops team like no one else. She was an expert liar, a fantastic playactor. She was relatively fluent, fluent enough, in fourteen languages. There were plenty of ways to kill a person using just her thumb and forefinger and she knew them all.
None of that would help her in an office setting.
Maybe the languages? There was nothing violent about that.
Who knew how long she sat there as her laptop slowly drained of power, the sun coming out again as the fog drifted away? She had her coffee refilled a handful of times, and she was almost a little jittery from it, but she ignored the buzzing in her fingers, clicking around job sites, looking for the different types of jobs that were even out there. Making faces at jobs that meant sitting at a desk all day, making even worse faces at jobs that would force her to work on teams with other people.
He'd killed any desire she might have to work with other people on a team. Team jobs were crap. Partners were crap. You were supposed to be able to trust your partner more than anyone. Even more than your handler. They were supposed to tell you things before they disappeared with stolen intel. They were supposed to ask for help before they went off the grid completely. Especially if you were sleeping with them.
She shoved that part out of her head, trying to focus on the task at hand instead. That was a big freaking mistake. And she'd known it the first time, and all the times after that. Still, she did it. Selfishly, she'd wanted to do it so she had.
Oh, look. A job cleaning fish tanks at an aquarium in Monterrey. She could do that. And she liked fish. She'd kept a fish for a short time when she'd been in D.C., but it hadn't lasted very long. He'd won it for her at a local festival they'd gone to for a little recon. She'd given him one of her looks when he sidled up next to her with the goldfish in the bag. You realize how terrible these conditions are for a fish, don't you? He'd smirked. Good, you can give it a better home then.
Asshole. And his smirk.
Maybe she could get promoted from cleaning the fish tanks to swimming with sharks in the big tank. That'd be awesome. Getting paid to hang out with sharks. She was a vicious killer, too. She'd fit in with the shiver of sharks at the aquarium.
And that wasn't fair to the sharks, she knew. They killed to eat. She killed because someone in a suit told her to.
"Um."
Sarah furrowed her brow at the sound, blinking once, realizing someone was speaking to her. It wasn't just a voice in her head.
"E-Excuse me. Sorry."
She lifted her eyebrows and turned to find a tall, young man standing a polite distance away but looking right at her. He shuffled his feet, holding a tall glass with what looked like an iced coffee beverage in it. "Yeah?"
"Sorry," he muttered again. And he lifted his free hand up to scratch the back of his head that was covered in dark curls, barely controlled curls. Was she sitting at his favorite table or something? Was he really gonna ask her to move right now? She would, she didn't really care all that much, but it was weird. "Sorry, I just… Nobody else is in here and I noticed that you're in here and by yourself. And I'm in here and by myself, too. And we both like…coffee. Obviously." He looked slightly miserable for a moment, and then he pulled back his slumped shoulders and gestured to her laptop. "You're probably doing some important work on there and I don't want to interrupt it, but I thought maybe we could sit and enjoy our coffees in the same…general area and maybe…just…chat."
What?
It must've shown on her face, because he thrusted his free hand out, palm down.
"Totally understand if you don't want to. Thought I'd just ask. Feel free to enjoy that, what you're doing, alone if that's what you'd prefer. I get it. Totally. Just say the word if you don't want company right now and I'll go back to my table over there and leave you alone."
She didn't know what to say.
It was a surprisingly un-intrusive, polite request. And she found it hadn't annoyed her in the slightest. He was asking if she wanted company, but didn't seem to feel entitled to it.
Shock churned in her over the fact that he'd given her such an easy out without making it feel like she'd be totally rude if she rejected the offer. In fact, it didn't feel like she'd be rejecting him at all. So she took the opening he gave her.
"Oh. Sorry, I'm, um, working on something." He nodded quickly, his brow furrowed. "But thank you for the offer."
"No, of course. Of course. Anytime. Good luck with what you're working on and I hope you enjoy your…um…coffee." His eyes narrowed in self-deprecation and he shook his head. "Uh, have a good one."
His smile was warm and kind as he gave an awkward wave, spinning on his heel and hightailing it away from her. She lifted her hand to wave back, even though he didn't see it, his back to her as he fast-walked to a table that was more in the middle of the room. What in the hell was that?
She couldn't help watching him as put his iced coffee down first and plopped into a seat with his profile to her. He hopped up to his feet a little, eyes wide, and he reached back to pull a rolled up thin magazine looking thing out of his jeans' back pocket before sitting again.
He painstakingly flattened it against the table, then lifted it up to start looking at it. It wasn't a magazine after all. It looked like a comic book.
She turned back to look at her computer screen. She looked at the profile she'd put together for a job searching site, the blank résumé, because what could she really put on a fucking résumé when everything she'd done was so top secret? Did she lie? Could she get away with that? She typically did get away with lies.
And then she turned to look at the guy who'd had the guts to ask if she wanted to drink coffee and "chat", some random pretty woman he saw at the edge of the room on her laptop, only to get shot down out of the sky when he'd dared to lift his feet off the ground.
He was just sitting there, sipping his coffee, enthralled with his comic book. No badgering her. No hovering even though she'd said no. Not a single bit of him made her feel like he didn't know how to take "no" from a woman. It felt silly, being so enthralled with, and frankly shocked by his behavior. It was just that she'd never had someone ask and take polite declining so civilly.
Smiling a little, she went back to her laptop. But it only took five minutes before she realized something. It suddenly clicked in her head and she spun to look at him again.
That same furrowed brow in thought, the pursed lips, the hair. He was wearing jeans and a hoodie this time instead of the swim trunks and T-shirt he wore that day. She smiled, deciding she liked him better when he wasn't casting a cold shadow over her while she was attempting to get some sun on a cool, breezy day.
"Hey."
He blinked, then looked up but not at her. He was confused, glancing around.
"Hey!" she tried again. He finally turned to look at her, his eyes wide, and then he took a glance over his shoulder, and pointed to himself, mouthing Me? "Yeah," she said loud enough for him to hear. They weren't the only ones in here anymore, folks starting to trickle in to order food. But nobody else was paying any attention. "You were blocking my sun the other day. That was you, wasn't it?"
Pursing his lips, he narrowed his eyes in a wince. "Um, yeah. Heh. Yeah, that was me. Sorry about that."
"No harm, no foul," she said with a shrug. Then she took one last look at her laptop screen and flattened one hand on the lid, snapping it shut, then slipping it into her bag again.
"At least I found a thing I'm good at…" he said back to her across the handful of tables between them. She gave him a curious look. "Um." He cleared his throat. "Blocking the sun." She just stared at him and he stared back. "Er, that was better in my head."
She snorted and shook her head. "How?"
"A fair question," he chuckled, and he took a sip of his coffee.
Fuck it.
She was a little bored, tired of reading words on a computer screen, tired of not knowing how to make the blank document that was her résumé into something that would sell her without it being full to the brim with utter lies.
She grabbed her bag with her laptop, her cup of coffee, and she stood up, slithering around the other tables to stop at the chair across from his at his table. He looked up at her, obviously surprised.
"I know what I said earlier, but I'm…done with the thing I had to do." A lie. But an easy one. "Would you be okay with me…sitting here?"
"Right there?" He pointed at the chair.
"Yes. Here."
He smiled, his eyes still wide. "Yeah. Have a seat. Please."
She did, giving him a small smile and going right back to her mask she usually used on marks. Without even realizing she was doing it.
Then she looked down and stared at the comic book he still held, open as if he was in the process of reading it at that very moment. He followed her gaze to look down at it and she saw a small bit of self-deprecation in his face.
"Uh…"
"That's a comic book, huh?"
"It, uh, it is. Yes." He lifted it and shook it a little.
"Wow. You are pretty freaking tall for a fifteen year old."
He seemed confused at first, and then what she said looked to sink in. He laughed. "I know you're teasing me about this, like because I'm reading comics, I'm a wee teen," he said, holding up the comic book, "but that was the year I hit my growth spurt so…"
She twisted her pursed lips to the side to keep from laughing outright. The way he so easily slipped into self-effacing humor. Apparently he didn't take himself too seriously, which might be why he'd taken her rejection with so much grace and kindness earlier.
"Fifteen, huh?"
"Mm." He nodded. "Tenth grade was a good year for me."
She made a face and he shrugged, wincing. Ducking her head, she went for her coffee and took a sip, reaching over to put her bag onto the seat of the next chair over. It felt a little bit like she was settling down here in this spot, across from him. Instead of keeping it on her lap where she could get up and leave him alone again, go up to her room and sit on her little balcony alone, watch the waves roll in, the birds floating overhead.
That wasn't to be, it seemed. She'd set her bag down, and she made eye contact with a server who'd since joined the lone woman who'd been at the bar when she first arrived a few hours ago. She watched as he refilled her coffee for her, thanked him, and turned to look at this man still clutching his comic book.
"I hope I'm not interrupting your…comic book."
He gave her an amused look as he set it down and scooted it to the side. "You definitely did, and it was just getting good, too."
Not expecting that at all, she chuckled, pulling her chin back. "Wow, okay."
"Kidding. I mean, I was reading it, but it's just something I found at a little gift shop down the road this morning. Looked interesting."
"Is it?"
"Eh. S'all right so far. They're really leaning into the hero complex, and it's a bit much. Like, we get it, okay? Being a superhero means the people you love could be in danger at any moment. Blah blah. But these are choices we make to be happy, right? And taking that choice from somebody else, just because you think some maniac supervillain will target them to get to you? Kinda over that whole thing."
The CIA agent blinked. And he blushed.
"Uh, sorry. Gotta a little too, um…"
"No, it's okay. Freedom of choice. It's important." She found herself thinking about what he'd just said, the implications of it all as it pertained to her own situation. But she wasn't a superhero, she was a CIA agent who was trying to break away from the agency, and she wasn't a fictional character, and her actions had real consequences. Like putting her mom and that child in serious danger because of the people she'd killed, the criminals whose long-laid plans she'd ruined, in her time with the CIA.
She had to make this choice for them. She had to stay away to keep them safe. She would spend her Christmas hiding under the sheets of a bed in a hotel room hundreds of miles away.
"Black coffee, huh? Hardcore," the guy was saying. She blinked and brought herself back, raising her eyebrows at him. "What you're drinking, I mean. Black coffee. Pretty cool. I only do that if I've had a really intense sleepless night, or if I have a really intense sleepless night coming up. That bitter taste though, man. Nah ah."
She eyed his iced coffee and smirked. "So then what's all in there?"
"Oh, this?" He lifted it, amusement in his open features. She nodded. "Ice." She gave him a flat look and he giggled, smiling toothily. "I love me some fresh, cold half 'n half. And I had them add a bit of cinnamon too because 'tis the season and I'm basic."
"Basic what?"
He stared at her for a moment. "B…" He tilted his head, his brow furrowed. "Oh. Basic at…drinking coffee."
"You stick to the basics? I'd say I'm the basic one. Nothing's in this." She pointed at her cup.
"No, basic in this case means…" He looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully and wrinkled his nose. "Basic is like when someone gets pumpkin spice latté because it's Fall. Pumpkin spice is basic. Cinnamon around Christmastime? Basic. Um, it's like…" He snapped his fingers. "Someone who's following trends, the popular thing. Just because it's popular. They're super mainstream, incapable of coming up with their own idea of what to drink, they just get what the chains put right in front of their faces. I saw that 'Now with cinnamon' sign with the little Christmas tree and went, 'Oooooo!' because I'm basic."
Sarah propped her chin in her palm and tilted her head, just staring at him. She understood what he was saying, and some part of her somewhere knew the way he was using the word even if she had been closed off from pop culture and society while traveling all over the world for missions, hiding out in hotel rooms, crouching on rooftops, ducking into safe houses until she got the all clear from top brass. It was kind of fun watching him try to explain, though.
And he must've seen the intelligent sparkle in her eye, the slight hint of amusement in the way the corner of her lips turned up. Because his face fell into a flat look and he chuckled, shaking his head and rolling his eyes. "That was kinda mean. You know that? But you have done one thing."
"Have I?"
"Yes. You have put into perspective for me just how stupid these weird phrases and pop culture terms we use are, because it's freaking impossible to try to explain it to someone who doesn't already know. I had a really hard time trying to tell you what 'basic' means in this context."
"I noticed."
He gave her a faux glare and she chuckled. She was surprised to find that it was a real chuckle, not something she manufactured somewhere in her brain, a certain type of chuckle for a certain type of mark, a way to get what she needed, a way to persuade them she wasn't a threat, or that she was way dumber than she actually was, a way to fit herself into a box she knew meant they would dismiss her. And they'd never see the double cross coming.
No, this was real. And it came from her chest instead of from her head.
Biting her lip, she glanced off to the side. "No harm in wanting cinnamon in your coffee."
"Thank you. I appreciate the support."
"The half 'n half, though? Yikes." She widened her eyes and pulled a corner of her mouth back in a grimace.
He threw his head back with a laugh. "Wooooooooow. Are you some kind of lactose intolerant individual?"
She snorted at the way he phrased that. "No, I'm just pulling your leg. I don't care what people put in their coffee. To each their own."
"Oh. I like that. I agree. And hey, feel free to pull my leg. It's right here, ready for the pullin'." He stuck his right leg out to the side, all long and spindly, and he shook it a little. Then he pulled it back in as she chuckled again and he made an embarrassed face, shaking his head. "Sorry. That was weird."
"Weird is okay as long as it never slips into creepy. Creepy is less okay."
"Noted." He laughed lightly. "I will do my best to stay away from creepy. I can't make any promises about weird, though. I'm kind of a weirdo."
She reached across the table and tapped a finger on a comic book. "Like this?"
"Hey. Comics are mainstream now, okay? Sort of. Well, more than they were when I was a kid, that's for sure."
"Yeah I guess you're right about that. Don't they have big ol' movies Disney keeps shoving down people's throats?" She wasn't totally out of the loop. She'd seen billboards and she watched TV sometimes if her hotel room had one.
"I love the way you put that," he said with a laugh. "It does feel a little bit shove-down-the-throat-ish sometimes, doesn't it?"
"I dunno. I guess."
He nodded and a bit of an awkward silence settled between them, and then he cleared his throat suddenly and shifted in his chair. "I'm about to be weird again and if it veers into creepy, help a guy out and give me a signal or something so I can reel it back, huh?"
"A signal?"
"Yeah, maybe a hand signal or something?"
"This work?" She stuck her middle finger up and he choked a little, chuckling.
"That's pretty effective. We'll go with that."
She smirked and settled her chin on her palm again, her elbow on the table. She sipped her coffee with her other hand as he continued, a certain spark in his eyes—which were brown, she realized. Or more of a golden brown, maybe. Like the color of amber.
But she also sensed some shyness in him too.
"Um, besides me blocking your sun the other day, which—again—so sorry." She shrugged and dismissed it with a shake of her head. It wasn't the end of the world, really. "I was on a jog with my…friend. And, um, I happened to spot you running in the other direction." She raised her eyebrows. This was an interesting development. "I-I mean, we crossed paths. Actually, it was right in front of a, um, a place with danishes and other pastries. I almost stopped too because they looked—"
"So amazing," she input when he stopped. "Like, melt in your mouth insides with the flaky crust on the outside that just…glistened in the light."
He groaned. "Yes. Exactly. But-But then I did stop. Because I saw that you'd stopped. And I-I recognized you, I guess. From the beach. And I was thinking about maybe saying something, but it'd be so random and awkward if I did, and then you ran off again before I could embarrass myself." He cleared his throat as she just stared at him, completely unsure of what to say to all of this. And his cheeks pinked. "Which is totally okay because while I missed my opportunity to embarrass myself earlier, I'm doing it now to make up for it. Ta daaa."
She giggled. Again, a real giggle. That wasn't normal.
Should he have said something then? What would he even say? What could she say back? It would've definitely been awkward. And she'd had no idea anyone she'd passed on the sidewalk had noticed her at all. She'd been slinking through the early morning pedestrians.
And here this guy had seen her, recognized her, and was close to saying something to her. It would've shocked her if he had said something. And maybe she would've been uncomfortable. She was a little uncomfortable now, she realized. But it wasn't his fault. And he wasn't being creepy at all.
"That's why you came over to me to talk earlier?" She threw her thumb over her shoulder towards the table by the window where she'd sat for a few hours before he approached her.
"Yeah." He shrugged. "I think so. I mean, I don't normally approach super pretty women like that. It's, um, not in my playbook."
"A playbook, huh?" She raised her eyebrows, finding herself extra amused suddenly.
His eyes widened. "W-Wait. Not…that was a bad word I used there. Not that kind of playbook. Um…it isn't like…those kinds of plays. I meant, my nature. It isn't in my nature to approach people randomly like that. That's what I was trying to say."
"Playbook," she kept going, liking the pink in his cheeks. "What's the title of this book?"
"Um. Something like, How to Embarrass Yourself or Die Trying." She burst into laughter, rocking forward. "New York Times bestseller."
"You've really got something there," she said, chuckling.
This had taken an unexpected turn, and while nine times out of ten, she would spin on her heel and hightail it out of here, check out of her hotel room, and find someplace else to hide where there was nobody to strike up a conversation with, this was going to end up being that one time when she stayed put instead.
Unexpected turns weren't in her playbook. Not at all. She dealt with them, then did the work to make sure she wasn't blindsided again.
Still, she sat there, sipping her coffee, even getting another refill, jittery as all get-out, but needing a reason to stay at that table for longer, and longer still. Talking about nothing at all, and enjoying every bit of it.
}o{
Chuck eyed her hands, the way she clasped them on the table in front of her. They were shivering, shaking even, no matter how tightly she squeezed her fingers around one another.
He'd watched her get those coffee refills. And he hadn't made a peep about it. Who was he to dictate what somebody put in their own bodies when he'd spent way too many nights in college glugging away at Red Bulls and eating Cheetos to get through midterms and finals week.
"So are you staying here?" he asked. "Probably kind of a stupid question, I know. You're here right now. You were out on the beach the other day."
"Not so stupid. It's a public beach," she said with a shrug. But then she didn't answer his question.
"Sorry. It's none of my business."
"No, no. It's o—I mean, yes. I am. Staying here. You staying at the Venetian too?"
"Definitely, yeah."
She looked down at his hands for a moment, giving them a slow, observant sort of look, before she raised them back up to his face again. They were very blue, but then there was a grey in them too. Like when the morning had just crested, sleepy but awake, an overcast almost grey tint to the gentle blue of the sky.
"Definitely," she said. "Interesting word to use."
"Well, how do you look at this place, right on the beach, this beach in particular, and go, 'Naaaaah I'll stay at this place instead that's not right on the beach and doesn't have cute little stucco buildings with rooms that are surprisingly large on the inside'? How do you do that? I ask you."
She snorted. "Touché. Apparently I wasn't able to resist, either."
"Not sure anybody can. Her pull is too powerful." He gestured around them. Then: "You here alone?" He cursed himself at the surprised look on her face, and then it became almost guarded just as quickly. "Sorry. Yet again, I'm…asking questions that are none of my business. Sorry sorry." He winced.
"Oh, it isn't…"
She didn't seem to know how to respond, so he wrinkled his nose and leaned in. "It isn't any of my business. It's okay. You don't have to say it. I appreciate you trying to be gentle about it, though. That's nice of you." There was surprise in her face again as she gave him a long look. "Don't answer. It's okay. Instead, I'll ask you a completely non-intrusive question. Are you a PC person?" She blinked. "Just asking because I noticed your laptop is a PC instead of an Apple. Me? I fuck with both."
A bright smile broke on her mouth and she shook her head. "You're pretty weird."
"Sorry, should I not curse?"
"Curse all you want. I'm a grown woman, I can handle curse words." He liked the way she'd said that, her brow furrowed, nose a little wrinkled up, almost as if she was offended he'd even apologized for it in the first place. And then she cut in, "And stop apologizing a million times. You're fine."
"Sor—" He stopped himself and winced. "I mean…I'm not sorry. At all." He cleared his throat, smirking when she laughed at that. "It's a compulsion. See? Right there? I just had to stop myself again because I almost apologized again. Literally twice in the span of three seconds. Jesus."
She smiled harder. "It's difficult to unlearn things like that. I get it." She cast her gaze to the side at her bag. "I'm neither a PC person nor am I an Apple person. I don't fuck with either. I use whatever I have in front of me."
"So…technically…you fuck with everything." He grinned. "Me, too."
She laughed and his grin became toothy. He liked the sound of her laughter. It was almost like a surprised burst of sound that came from deep inside of her. But then the mirth dropped from her face as she looked down, pulling a phone out of her pocket. She looked at it quietly, frowning, and then she put it away quickly.
"If you have to take that…"
"Um, I should call them back…"
"You can answer…"
She shook her head and gave him a small smile. "That's okay. Thanks, uh, thanks for the chat."
No, no, no. He stood up with her as she did and he thought he might live to regret having as much coffee as he'd had. He felt it coursing through his veins especially now that he was standing on both legs. "Sure. Yeah. Anytime. Thanks…for coming over to join me."
"Glad I did," she said with a smile, shouldering her bag. "See you around maybe, huh?"
"I really, really hope so," he said candidly, feeling a little breathless. She was leaving and it was all happening so fast.
But that earned him a pleased smile, and she picked up her coffee cup with one more nod to him, heading over to the bar and setting her empty cup on the bar, waving to the woman behind it, before she turned and waved to him on her way out of the dining area.
Chuck waved back, merely lifting his hand up by his shoulder and holding it there. She disappeared from his sight and he plopped back into his chair, suddenly in a state of shock.
Glancing at his watch, he realized she'd been sitting at his table for almost two hours, and they'd just…talked. Exchanging words, drinking coffee—too much coffee—engrossed.
He looked down at his empty glass, his jaw slack, and he shook his head gently, blinking. And he heard himself mutter, "What in the hell just happened?"
}o{
She waited until she heard his voice to confirm it was him before she spoke.
"You're clear. Hello, Agent Walker."
"Director Graham, I thought we had this conversation—"
"You on a clear line, Agent?"
"Yes," she said impatiently. She didn't care about protocol right now. "You told me to take some R&R, but you're still calling me two days later? If it's a mission, I'm not doing it."
"It isn't a mission."
The way he said that, she felt a chill go through her. "Oh God. It's Ryker. He escaped."
"No," he said quickly. "He's still heavily guarded in an undisclosed location, behind bars, underground, and he's going to stay there. It isn't about Ryker. But it is about the child. We need to know where she is."
"I don't know where she is," she lied.
"What?"
"I gave her to someone I knew would be safe, they took her, and her location is now unknown."
He sighed heavily. "You did that by design, didn't you?"
"Yes."
"Because you knew we would want to find her."
"Yes. I can't trust that she'll be safe with the CIA."
The director of the CIA paused for a long time, before he spoke quietly. It was his hurt voice that he used sometimes when she accused him or his agency of malpractice, or even when she asked valid questions about the CIA's motivations for some of her directives. She didn't believe it for a second, the way she might have when she was in her late teens, before her Red Test had stolen the wide-eyedness from her.
"Now just what makes you think the child wouldn't be safe in the care of the U.S. Intelligence community, Agent Walker?"
"I wasn't safe in your care. And I was a child when you found me, Director Graham. I wasn't safe in your care. I was regularly sent into the belly of the beast before I'd even hit twenty."
"It was how you learned."
"It was how I nearly died countless times before I was even of legal drinking age!" she snapped. "I'm not risking my life for you anymore. And even if I knew where that baby was now, I wouldn't say."
"I figured you wouldn't. You do understand that you could face consequences for this decision, hiding away this child from us, from where she might be safe? If something happens to her…"
"I've ensured nothing happens to her. She'll grow up loved and taken care of. Not in a lab like some rat running mazes before getting tossed back into its cage. She'll have a normal childhood. I can't see that happening under the 'care of the U.S. Intelligence community'," she threw back at him. "You'll make her into your next Wildcard Enforcer, no doubt. A vengeance machine aimed at the crime rings in Europe, avenging the death of her family." She took in a rough breath and let it out. "Instead, she's gonna be the star goal scorer on her soccer team when she's seven. Get straight A's when she's eleven, even if she might not like math as much as she likes science."
"And if they find her again? Instead of us?"
"They won't. If you can't find her, neither can they." She straightened her spine. "And don't threaten me with consequences. What will they do, kick me out of the CIA? I'm already out, I told you."
He chuckled and she could almost see the piqued look on his face under the mirth. "They told me picking you up out of the gutter your father left you in would come back to bite me. I did it anyway." She clenched her jaw and blinked rapidly. She hadn't expected the dagger in her side. "You are the best agent we have. In any agency. Your future is bright."
"It isn't. It's short."
And she decided she would rather slip into a life that meant she survived longer, even if she didn't get the adrenaline highs from a successful mission that she was so used to getting anymore. Even if she did end up missing parts of this job.
She could… Oh, she didn't know, attend a coworker's kid's Bat Mitzvah. Something freaking normal like that.
"This is your destiny."
"You don't get to tell me what my destiny looks like. I decide my own destiny. I pick my own fate. I won't die alone in some warehouse because some drug kingpin's gunman got in a lucky shot. I'm building a life far away from all of this. The way I should've been able to when I was a kid, no matter who my father was, or what he did."
And that was something that had started to become much clearer to her now. The CIA, Langston Graham, had snatched her up and made her atone for someone else's sins. They'd made her sacrifice her own freedom and toss her ability to choose her own life's path in the garbage. Just because her father had committed crimes.
She was angry now. And she was hanging up.
"If this number doesn't work after this call, I think you'll be very aware of why that is, Director Graham. Rest assured, I'll show up at Langley again after a few weeks' break from all of this, but my mind won't be changed. Go ahead and wiggle my father in front of my face as bait again. After the trouble he caused me? It's not gonna work the way it did when I was sixteen. I'm done."
She didn't give him a chance to respond. She hung up the phone. And then she put it down. When it rang again, she turned it off, and then she meticulously pulled it apart and threw it in the trash.
Grabbing her laptop, she looked for the nearest store where she could buy a new phone. One the CIA couldn't reach her on.
And when she found one, she decided she would go tomorrow. Today, she would be without a phone. She sent a quick, encrypted email to a secondary email she set up for her mom, one she only intended to use for a situation like this, telling her she was switching phones and to email if there was an emergency. She would email her the number when she got the new phone.
For now, she shook out her hands and pushed herself to her feet again, hopping a few times in the middle of the room and rolling her head on her shoulders. That coffee had made her really antsy now, and she had too much energy she needed to get out. And because her brain was going a mile a minute, she tried to settle it down, to focus on just one thing.
Pick something, she commanded it.
And when it did, she winced.
Because it focused on the stranger whose table she'd wandered over to, sitting down and talking for nearly two hours. What in the hell had that even been? She'd melted into the conversation and hadn't pulled herself out of it for that long. It had felt good, just talking. Neither of them had pushed for personal information, and the few times he had, he'd observed her reluctance, apologized, and changed the subject. It hadn't gotten deep or anything, either. It was just a chat, a long chat, one that had settled some of the bad feelings she'd been having about everything.
And it was nuts, too, because she'd really had no intention of talking to anyone for any reason while she was here. That was why she'd picked such a small place away from the cities, away from masses of people, away from the "holiday spirit" that everywhere else seemed to be freaking exuding.
Especially when he'd approached her, his voice intruding her privacy, standing there like a tall shadow hovering nearby again, a large part of her had scoffed. Could men just not leave her alone? Why couldn't anyone just leave her alone?
Then he'd done exactly the opposite of what she'd expected. And he'd sat there reading a comic, minding his own business. And she'd been the one to raise her voice just enough to speak to him, and then she'd freaking gotten up from her table and she'd gone over to him. Him. Some guy sitting there reading a comic book. What in the hell?
She chalked it up to spending over a decade relying on her spy craft. This innate need to check out her surroundings, to get the lay of the land, and study the mark. Study everyone around her. So that she could piece together a story, so that she didn't have to worry about being blindsided or surprised by anything. It was just what a spy did; the way she subtly lowered her gaze to his hands to take each of his long fingers in, focusing for a moment too long on the ring finger of his left hand in particular. No ring, no ring-like pattern of a ring as if he took it off when he was away from his partner. She'd learned to spot those, too.
And even if he had been wearing a ring, what of it? It had been such an innocent chat, no ulterior motives, no end game that involved getting into her pants. She hadn't felt even a modicum of guile, not a bit of sliminess, no put-upon charm.
Shaking her head, she plopped facedown onto her bed and just stayed there, blindly reaching for the television remote she knew she'd left somewhere near the pillows, snagging it, and pointing it over her shoulder to turn the TV on. There was a news report, something about a surfer saving a dolphin, and the dolphin returning to thank her before swimming off to rejoin its family.
The ex-agent, the woman now splayed out on the hotel bed, let the sounds of the voices drone on and on and on, in one ear and out the other, as she stayed in that spot, face buried in the duvet, unmoving. And she meditated. For who even knew how long, she let herself experience some peace, a sorely needed peace.
}o{
It was on the next day of this impromptu holiday vacation, as Chuck laughed at something Morgan texted about his Tío Mario's penchant for pissing off his mom, that he first saw the girl.
He'd stepped out of the suite, giving Ellie and Awesome space to cuddle on the couch in the living area without him horning in on their alone time, and he'd found a nice little area on the hotel grounds with a pristine, lush garden. Plopping down on the bench, he responded to Morgan's texts he'd ignored earlier.
When he looked up to take in his surroundings again, breathing in the cool air, the lovely flowery scent, he noticed a girl who looked like she could be in her late teens maybe, step out from behind a corner, clicking away on her phone. Texting somebody no doubt.
She smacked on a piece of gum, pushing some of her long dyed purplish pink hair away from her face, and she smiled down at the phone. Then she pressed something and lifted the phone up in front of her face as if she was taking a selfie. She began to talk to it, as if recording a video, though Chuck couldn't hear a bit of what she had to say. And suddenly, a tall, gangly man who looked to be in his late thirties, and tattoo sleeves running up both arms, came around the corner and charged right at her.
"Don't do that shit!" he barked. He snatched the phone away from her, held the power button, and stuck the phone in his back pocket. "We already told you…"
And then he must've felt Chuck's eyes on them or something, because he froze. That momentary freeze was enough for Chuck to face forward again and lift his phone to his ear, watching in his peripheral as Mr. Tattoo Sleeves looked at him. "Oh yeah, I know. It's dumb. All they have to do is expand our paid leave a little bit longer and that's what we said but they don't listen to the little guy, am I right? Ha ha ha."
Chuck kept watching in his peripheral as the girl was taken by her arm back to where they'd both come from, and he peeked after them. She didn't seem to be struggling, as disgruntled as the look was on her face. And then she was gone.
What in the hell was that? Who cared if she took a video of herself? Did she need to get her phone taken away? She looked nineteen, maybe twenty. She couldn't have her own phone? What was going on there?
Frowning, Chuck got up and slowly followed in their footsteps, moving between the rows of buildings, shivering a little in the shadows of the overhang above him, and then he pressed his back against the cold stucco wall behind him and carefully peeked around the corner.
They were gone. He didn't know where.
That was so freaking weird.
Bizarre.
He shoved his hands in his hoodie pocket and went back to the suite, knocking before he let himself in.
Ellie looked up from where she'd moved to sit at the table by the balcony, checking something on her laptop. "It's cute that you are knocking before coming in here. We're not going to make out in the shared living area, Chuck, I promise."
"I know. I know you both said that, but I really can't afford to see something I don't want to see."
"You're such a freak."
Awesome strolled in from their bedroom. "Oh nooo," he said in a voice that was both dramatic and sarcastic at once. "Chuck's back and we were just about to get nasty on the coooouch."
Ellie cracked up made her hands into a heart in the direction of her boyfriend as Chuck just watched them both with a flat look on his face.
"This is the thanks I get for being polite? Okay, fine. Fine, I'm going to go find radical Capitola woman and we're gonna click like crazy and I'm gonna bring her back here and make both of your lives a living hell. Watch me do it."
"I haven't seen any knitting clubs in the Capitola guide book the concierge gave us, babe, have you?" Ellie teased, looking at her boyfriend again over her computer screen.
He laughed, barely able to stifle it when Chuck glared. "Ellie, that's mean."
"What? Old ladies love Chuck. They're obsessed with his hair."
"He does have fantastic hair. You have fantastic hair, bro."
"Okay, all of this aside," he said with a chuckle. He couldn't help it. That had been kind of funny. "I just saw something really weird out there."
"Ooooo okay. Elephant balancing on a sphere weird, or UFO weird?" Awesome asked, leaning against the back of the couch with no small amount of intrigue in his face.
"Um, neither."
"Okay, I'm super interested. What'd you see?"
Chuck almost told them but then he noticed Ellie was paying rapt attention to…her computer screen. "El? Care to join the class today, or…?"
She looked up at him and made a face. "Do you want me to book those whale watching tickets for this week or not? You're the one who made loud whale noises in the car because you want to see a whale while we're here, like…the whole freaking way up."
Chuck mocked her by twisting his face up and moving his lips, making "meemeemerrr merrr meeemeee" sounds, earning a snort and an eye roll. "This is important, Ellie. What if I witnessed something I wasn't supposed to see? Like, what if I should call the cops?"
That got her. She sat up straighter and turned in her chair to face him. "The cops? What the hell? What'd you see? Is someone hurt?"
He watched as both his sister and her boyfriend stood up and went into full medical professional mode. It was crazy impressive how they both did that, and so simultaneously too.
"No, no. I didn't see anyone being hurt. But it was…weird. Like I said. Like, it didn't sit right. I went out to this nice garden area and was chillin' on the bench in there, texting Morgs, when I looked up and saw this girl walk around the corner. I dunno, she was maybe eighteen to twenty. But she took her phone out and was tapping away on it. I don't think she knew I was there. Then she grabbed it…" He took his own phone out and held it up in front of him in the same way she had. "And it looked like she was, I dunno, making a video? This dude who looked like Iggy Pop comes barreling around the corner, grabs the phone, turns it off, sticks it in his pocket, and takes her away."
"Why does Iggy Pop care if that kid's taking a video of herself?" Awesome asked.
"It-It wasn't actually Iggy Pop." The blonde gave him a flat look, which was fair. "I don't know what was up with that, but it felt…weird. That's the only word I can use for it."
Ellie crossed her arms. "I mean, that does sound a little weird. They left then?"
"Yeah. He had her arm and they walked away."
"He grabbed her arm? Like…forcefully?"
"No, not really. She didn't struggle. She just went with him. But she looked annoyed. Like he'd foiled her plot or something."
"Her plot? What's her plot? FaceTiming her boyfriend?" Awesome snapped his fingers. "That's it! He's probably like…her uncle. And she's in a relationship with a boy the family doesn't approve of. So they're mad 'cause she snuck off to try to FaceTime said boyfriend."
Chuck furrowed his brow. "It didn't feel like that."
"I bet Devon's right, Chuck. Some silly family bullshit. It just looked weird out of context."
He sighed and shrugged, realizing they could both very well be right. But it hadn't felt normal. Nothing about it had sat well with him. And how quickly they'd disappeared once he tried to follow them.
Something just felt off.
But he didn't continue the conversation, instead plopping onto the couch to watch some television.
And in spite of finding a Bruce Lee movie on TV, he wasn't able to get the purple-haired girl or Mr. Tattoo Sleeves out of his head.
A/N: And so... mystery sparks! And a man called Mr. Tattoo Sleeves joins team Christmas Caper! Also, I hate the feeling of having had too much coffee. I feel like my heart is going to explode so these two having a conversation all hyped up like that? Impressive.
Please review! Thanks!
-SC