A.N. Thank you for your continued encouragement! To Bella(guest), I apologize that I was not able to post this prior to my usual update time. I really wanted to update last weekend, but if I'd done that, you probably would have to wait even longer for Ch 7! At this point, to the best of my ability, my updates will remain every other Sunday, but I hope that I'll be able to pick up the pace soon!
And here's the last breath of fresh air before the plunge!
.
.
.
.
Arms laden with bags filled to the brim with various house essentials—towels, bedding and more—Sam and Libby made their way out of the latest store that they'd vanquished.
"Goodness, who knew shopping could be so exhausting?" Libby puffed as they set foot outside in the blazing sun. Considering her words, she glanced sideways at Sam. "Don't answer that, seeing as the last time you went shopping with me, you ended up in the hospital. I'm surprised neither of us has PTSD from that experience and I'm surprised we can even set foot inside a store without turning around and running away screaming."
Sam smiled. Until Libby had just pointed it out, he hadn't drawn the parallel between their first encounter and this one. "Well, I for one have no intention of going to the hospital today, unless it's due to heat stroke, dehydration, or muscle fatigue from carrying too many items. I swear we just bought a bowling ball."
Libby looked him up and down and nodded sagely. "You're right, you don't look too good. I think we deserve a break. Food?"
Sam frowned. "Wait, no, I was only kidding. And besides, we just ate breakfast a few hours ago. It's not even eleven yet!"
"That's irrelevant," Libby stated, flapping her hand at him. "I am a growing person and therefore require copious amounts of food. Plus it's hot and that place over there," she pointed across the large courtyard and played her trump card, "has iced lemonade." She looked at him seriously. "I'd kill for something cold right now."
Sam raised an eyebrow at her. "We just stepped out of a department store that probably kept its internal temperature at a frosty sixty-five, and you want something cold?" Yes, Sam knew it was hot—the pavement reflecting the heat back at them only added to the scorching—but they'd only been outside for a minute.
Libby glared at him. "It's hot, Sam. Forgive me for not having your super-soldier thermostat and never-get-tired stamina."
He held up his hands in surrender—or tried to, but the various shopping bags hindered him significantly. "All right, all right, but I'm blaming you when we're late for the rendezvous with your parents and when they find out you've already eaten lunch."
They'd split up an hour earlier, Alex and David taking Tulio to shop half of the stores, Sam and Libby taking the other half, with plans to meet around twelve for lunch in this outdoor plaza.
"Food does not mean lunch. I'm definitely thinking this will be a second-breakfast." She glanced at her watch and her face brightened. "Actually, it'll be more like "elevensies!'" she cried happily. "I've always wanted to use that quote! Besides, this way we can scout out that restaurant and see if it's any good, and then we'll be in a better position to help Mom and Dad make a decision as to where to eat."
"You're going to admit that you ate an hour before lunch?" Sam asks skeptically.
Libby paused. "Hmm. On second thought, no. We'll just keep this to ourselves, shall we?"
Sam recognized that resistance was futile at this point—and an iced lemonade did sound heavenly. "All right, how about this. No food, but we'll spring for lemonades. Deal?"
She paused with a finger on her chin, pondering, then nodded. "Deal."
They made their way across the plaza—which was huge, surrounded on all sides by tall buildings full of department stores, restaurants and miscellaneous offices—and found a table outside in the shade, despite Libby's complaints about the heat.
Just as they were settling down with iced lemonades, Sam's phone buzzed. He pulled it out, thinking it was probably Ed again, and grimaced when he saw who it was: Spike. He couldn't face the Italian yet. He'd already called the hospital earlier that morning to make sure Spike was okay, and the staff had assured him that his friend would be fine and had already checked out. Worry alleviated, Sam still felt guilty as hell and couldn't stomach the idea of the bomb-expert tearing into him. They'd see each other come Tuesday when they started their next shift. Sam could apologize—again—then and Spike could just wait until then to yell at him.
Declining the call, Sam stuck his phone back in his pocket and looked up to see Libby watching him with a frown on her face. "Is he still bothering you?"
"No, it's fine," Sam replied automatically, before doing a mental double-take. "Wait… what do you mean?"
Libby stared at him, wide-eyed, realizing her mistake. "Oh, uh, nothing."
Sam narrowed his eyes. "Uh, huh," he drew out the words in a tone that clearly indicated he was not satisfied with her answer.
She started looking everywhere but at him, and even tried to distract him by pointing out a sign that amused her, but Sam just sat there in silence, arms crossed, waiting.
And Libby caved. "Uh, Ed," she explained guiltily. "I may have noticed that he called you quite a bit last night, and I may have, um, taken the liberty of answering one of his calls and, uh, telling him to leave you alone."
Sam stared at her, unblinking, processing her words, before he broke into a grin. "You did what?"
Libby looked at him uncertainly. "Told him to leave you alone? And that he's a terrible friend?"
Sam burst out laughing and quickly put a hand over his mouth in an effort to smother it.
She stared at him in confusion. "Honestly this was not the reaction I was expecting from you. Outrage? Yes. Exasperation? Maybe. Amusement? Not really."
"Oh I can almost picture his face," Sam smiled, still chuckling. "He probably started to get all growly and then didn't know what to do when you weren't me and started telling him off. Yeah, that might come around to bite me, but it was worth it to shake Ed up. And," he continued more seriously, "It means a lot to know that I have someone like you to stick up for me, someone who's in my corner. I thought my team was in my corner, and maybe they are, they're just… temporarily on leave after what happened yesterday."
"Well, Ed was pretty growly and a bit of a jerk, but he was also concerned about you," she admitted reluctantly, "so I can't be totally mad at him. Only ninety-eight percent mad at him."
Sam was surprised and tucked that piece of information away. Maybe there was hope.
She looked at him and asked hesitantly, "May I ask what happened yesterday?"
Sam sighed. He'd known that would come up in conversation eventually, and really, he was surprised Libby hadn't asked sooner—her self-restraint was impressive—but he still wanted to put it off until later. Sam rubbed his face and groaned. "Ugh, in a nutshell, a hot call went to hell."
"Well, yeah," Libby commented in a "well-duh" tone. "I knew that. Anyone with half a brain could see that. But what happened?"
Reluctantly, Sam explained, "I was in the Sierra position and a couple of my teammates—" he purposefully didn't name names "—got a little emotionally involved in negotiations and I had to make a call no one else was willing to make, and it didn't go so well."
She sat in silence for a moment, eyes searching his, clearly waiting for more.
He sighed. "How about this, I promise I'll tell you more about yesterday, just not right now. Maybe later today, okay?"
She nodded. "But I'm going to hold you to that," she warned.
"Fair enough. Now if you don't mind my asking, how did everything with Witsec end?"
She sat back and let out a breath. "Yeesh, long story." She sipped her lemonade. "Well, the short story is that Evans suffered a massive heart attack about a year ago and died not long after. His network of rats, crooks and toadies—which limped along during his imprisonment—broke down without their boss to lead them. They made some pretty major mistakes, and the police were able to mount a massive operation against the remnants of the gang, obtaining evidence significant enough to raid and imprison pretty much everyone.
"After that, my family had some pretty long talks about what we wanted our future to look like. None of us had really been thriving in the identities Witsec put us in, and Mom and Dad didn't want Tulio and I to grow up in such a," she searched for the right word before shrugging and settling on, "tense environment. They spoke extensively with officers and decided to end it. My involvement in Evans' trial was kept pretty secret, with my testimony only given in a closed door trial so that the public was kept unaware. As such, the police were certain that only a handful of people knew of my involvement, and of those people, all of those who might have intended me harm were now dead. Of course, the police did not recommend we leave witness protection, and my parents and I know we can't be one hundred percent certain, but we decided the benefits of leading a normal life outweigh the small amount of risk," she finished simply.
They sat in silence for a moment, before Libby grinned and slurped up the rest of her lemonade. Loudly. "Ahhh," she sighed in content, "that was delicious. Ready to get back out there? We still have a few things left," she told him, checking their list, "and I think I know just the place to get them."
Sam downed the rest of his drink as well, inhaling sharply as brain freeze pierced his skull, then nodded. "Lead the way."
They walked side by side across the plaza, chatting the whole way. Libby got onto the topic of school, and Sam asked her about what subjects—if any—she truly enjoyed. She hedged for a bit, clearly unwilling to divulge the information, but Sam finally wheedled out of her that—while she hadn't had a class on it yet—she'd picked up a camera about a year ago and absolutely fallen in love. Additionally, the school she would be going to in the fall offered both a photography class, as well as a collaborative club, and she was both ecstatic and incredibly nervous. She felt unsure as to how photography could be graded fairly, when it was such a subjective experience, but she loved it enough she wanted to give it a try.
Sam walked alongside her, content to listen and ask questions every once in a while, and as they moseyed along, he couldn't help but take in their surroundings. He wasn't scanning for anything in particular, but the habit of always being aware of what was around him had formed in the military and never truly left him. It was both a blessing and a curse. It helped him immensely while on the job with SRU, but the fact that he couldn't turn it off even when enjoying a relaxed, late morning shopping run with a friend… well, he'd learned to live with it, but once in a blue moon his senses would go hyperaware for some unknown reason, and now was one of those times.
So even as Libby told him about the photograph she was most proud of—one that he made her promise to show him—he noticed the flags hung limp on their poles; the wind offered no reprieve from the heat. A fountain splashed sluggishly in the center of the courtyard. A man pushed an empty baby stroller along the pavement, its wheels rattling and twisting with no weight to hold them down; Sam wondered absently where the child was, before he saw a girl run up to the man, shrieking gleefully. She was half soaked and Sam suspected she'd spent a few minutes playing in the fountain.
Two women sat side by side on a bench beneath an umbrella, laughing and talking. Another young couple walked hand in hand. A group of five people that could only be tourists traipsed along slowly, shoving each other and teasing. A few other clusters of people caught Sam's attention, as well as the occasional person clearly traveling solo. All in all, the atmosphere in the plaza was calm and pleasant, despite the raging heat.
As they wandered slowly back across the courtyard and passed the fountain, it was at that precise moment that Sam heard a noise that was totally incongruous with the lovely day he was having, the relaxed atmosphere and the public setting: a gunshot.
.
.
.
.
A.N.2. And so the saga begins! I realize this chapter ending is very similar to the end of Ch 1 in Timing... ah well! And now we are back to the true cliffhangers! Sorry... Not sorry.
And like I said in Ch 1, you'll probably have to suspend disbelief as to how/why Libby is no longer in Witsec. I needed her to be out of Witsec, because the other possibilities for a sequel didn't really sit right with me. One was a time jump of many many many years (but where's the fun in that? Libby would be an adult, then, and I like her as she is. And I'm not a huge fan of time jumps). Another possibility was to have Libby visit Sam (or vice versa) even while in witness protection, but that didn't sit well with me either, because given the types of stories I like to write (action with a healthy dose of heroics, hurt and comfort) that would mean they encounter danger which would partially be their own fault since they would be visiting each other when they shouldn't be. So poof! This is my explanation.
And no, the peril Sam and Libby are about to face is not caused by nor linked to the fact that she's no longer in Witsec. This is not people coming after her because now she's not hidden anymore. That would be wayyyy too much like Timing (though yes, I admit there are definitely similarities in the two stories... what can I say... there are certain things I like to write!).