A/N I cannot tell you how difficult this chapter was to write, so thank you for your patience waiting for this new chapter. This feels like such a pivotal moment, I can only hope you guys appreciate it. I keep writing (of course other than to keep my sanity because USA cancelled CA. THE MOURNING CONTINUES) because of the words you leave on the review section. Thank you for keeping me going!

So enough of that, let's get into some Walkerson action- stuff that ain't mine, ya know, coz I'm still not rich enough to have Covert Affairs back on the screen and own the series.

Chapter 4

They stood there, hugging for quite a while. Auggie kept his one arm around Annie, his other on his cane as Annie sobbed quite heavily. He couldn't bring himself to ask just yet, but he knew too that they couldn't stay in the chilly November air too long. He found Annie's hand with his free one.

"Hey. Why don't we step inside." Auggie said gently, turning Annie around. She had somehow managed to mutter an affirmation, and Auggie found her elbow from there. Annie wiped away her tears furiously as she led him to the lounger.

"I'm going to mix up some tea. You want anything? Water? Patron?"

"Patron sounds good."

She didn't say another word but padded to the kitchen. Auggie heard her sniff a couple of times, but decided to wait until she came back with the Patron. She did pretty soon. She handed over the bottle and curled up beside him on the lounger. He tipped in some of the contents- liquid courage to ask his questions.

"I know you missed me, but that's an awful lot of tears." He joked in hopes to warm her up to the conversation. She only sniffled in response and took a sip from her tea. Auggie knew she wasn't spilling with something as light a jab as that. He scooted closer to Annie and took the hand that his had bumped in the process.

"You know I hate to hear you cry." He drew little circles the way he used to soothe her during moments of duress. He was surprised to have her lean over on her shoulder. They stayed that way for a while, and it was Annie who broke that silence.

"I broke it off with Ryan today," she whispered. It was all she could say. She didn't know if she had the courage to tell Auggie why she had done it- because he had told her to follow her instinct. Her instinct then told her two things: that Ryan McQuaid wasn't the man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with, and that she wasn't ready to go on with a life that didn't have Auggie in the picture. She couldn't tell Auggie the latter thought however. She could only take too much heartbreak in one day. Besides, she wasn't going to justify her actions with saying "because you told me too." She wasn't that daft.

Without warning, the waterworks began again, and she only dug her face deeper into Auggie's shoulder. He let her cry for a bit, but when she seemed to calm down a little more, he asked the question that had been left hanging in the air.

"You broke it off. Then why the tears?" he asked.

"I don't know. Relief. Guilt. Everything in the middle. Fear even, maybe."

"Annie Walker is afraid of something?" Auggie extracted Annie from his shoulder, taking Annie's slender ones into his hands. He scoffed, but it was to hide the surprise he felt.

"I'm afraid I might never share what future Ryan offered with anyone," Annie whispered. "You know, a life far beyond the agency. A family at some point, even. I don't know if I can give myself to anyone anymore, because the man I love has someone else in his arms."

The words poured out like a waterfall. Annie wanted to punish herself for saying them out loud. It was true though. She couldn't be happy with Ryan. But she knew she couldn't ever be happy with anyone other than this man that held her in his arms- someone who had someone else. Auggie didn't know how much it broke Annie as he rocked her back to a comfort. He didn't know she spoke of him. Or at least, he wouldn't allow himself to expect that this same man was him, only because he felt the same way for her. He'd only remained silent because there had been a small part of him that rejoiced in Annie's news- he didn't want it to come out that way. He loved Annie, he knew. But in all honesty, his return had been marred with thoughts of what ifs. What if Annie had decided to get married to McQuaid was one he didn't have answers to though. It was something he would never be able to live with, and it was something he would only have himself to blame for.

"Tash and I broke things off, too." Auggie's tried to keep his voice even. Like a light switch, Annie's sobbing came to a halt. He heard something he definitely had not expected: she laughed.

"What a pity party we've become," she chuckled. Auggie couldn't deny that they did sort of sound like a pathetic bunch of friends weeping over Patron and Tea because of their break-ups. He chuckled too. "What happened?" Annie asked the inevitable.

Auggie took his time to put together his answer. "You know, so many things have changed since Tikrit. The past few years for me have been acceptance of what I had lost that day, and I'm going to tell you that my eyesight may as well be the least of it. So many things are different now after Tikrit. I'm different, and I hadn't known that Tash wouldn't be able to deal with that. I'd just wanted things to be as they had been before between us, but I realized, too much has changed. There are many more factors that have come into the equation that I've blatantly disregarded only to have a fraction of my life then back. I realize now that it isn't possible."

Annie simply leaned back into his shoulder, at a loss for words beyond what she would blurt out.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"I'm not."

She pulled away, caught off-guard by Auggie's statement. He wasn't? Had he not been the happiest she had ever seen him when he had divulged his decision to go around the world with Natasha? She had been so sure then that she had lost the only chance she ever had to having the love of her life, only she had been so stubborn to admit it. Yet they were there, only a month or so later, lamenting each other's failures in the love department.

"You're not?" Annie asked.

"I'm not." Auggie repeated. "We wouldn't be here if I hadn't realized that."

"We wouldn't. Where exactly is here?"

"In your apartment. Sipping on tea and Patron. Mulling our lives apart as the disasters that they have been." Auggie pushed away to face Annie, his hand on her shoulder. He slid it up to her cheek. "Maybe together really is where we should be."

"Are we having that talk again?" Annie smiled. Auggie felt it as he cupped her cheek, a moment of jubilation because he had thought of every situation that could have gone awry and yet here, with her smile, she accepted him. And more than he had ever felt in months, he knew he was complete.

"I guess."

The kiss was as magical as the first time. In fact, it seemed sweeter this time around.