It had all started as a fluke. His cousin, Hanna, worked at the Cultural Arts Museum downtown and he had been dropping her off because her car had broken down. Vaughn had spotted the exotic-looking Anna walking up the steps to the museum and an alarm went off in his head. They hadn't received any intel that she was even in the country, much less Los Angeles. If she was here, something was going down and the CIA needed to know why.

So he followed her. As she wandered from room to room, Vaughn took the time to study her. She was a striking-looking woman, with her long straight dark hair pulled into a sleek ponytail and held in place at the nape of her neck with a simple tortoiseshell hair ornament. Her makeup was minimal and understated, playing up neither her big brown eyes nor her full sensuous lips. Her red turtleneck and black slacks were classic without drawing attention to herself.

When Anna paused to peruse a poster regarding an upcoming exhibit, he knew this was the real reason why she was here. It certainly wasn't because she was interested in the cooking implements of the ancient Incas. Vaughn waited until she moved on and then he checked out the poster for himself.

It appeared that the museum was having a jewelry exhibition in a few days. Some of the pieces being shown had been fashioned by a man with the name of Milo Rambaldi. No doubt Anna was here to relieve the museum of one of those items.

Vaughn was in a quandary as to what to do next. If they could find out which piece Anna was after, the CIA techs could come up with a reasonable facsimile. Sydney would probably become involved, especially when SD-6 found out Anna was in town, if they didn't already know. If Sydney could somehow obtain the real item while handing off the fakes to Anna and Sloane…but first someone would have to infiltrate Anna's defenses.

Vaughn looked around to make sure no one was paying any attention to him and then placed a call on his cell phone to Headquarters.

"Weiss."

"It's me." Vaughn spoke in a low tone, deliberately not mentioning any names.

"Hello, Me." Weiss drawled. "Shouldn't you be in the office by now? You know Haladki is just itching to get something on you even if it is something lame like excessive tardiness."

"I have a very good reason why I'm not there yet." Vaughn replied. "It concerns Anna Espinosa."

"From K-Directorate?" Weiss was instantly alert. "Where are you?"

"At the Cultural Arts Museum downtown. I was dropping my cousin off at work and I saw Anna going into the museum."

"No one even knew she was in town." Weiss informed him.

"I know." Vaughn said. "That's why I followed her into the museum."

"Have you made contact with her?"

"No, but I think I know why she's here." He told Weiss about the jewelry exhibition.

"We need to find out which piece she's after."

"I know that, but how do you propose we go about it?"

"Let me go tell Devlin what's up." Weiss suggested. "I'll call you right back, but in the meantime, don't lose sight of Anna." He clicked off.

With phone in hand, Vaughn took off after Anna again. He made sure to stay at least one room away from her at all times, but still kept her within his range of sight.

Weiss called back ten minutes later. Vaughn answered immediately. "What's the plan?"

"Devlin says to go introduce yourself. We're in the process of putting an alias together, but he said to go for it since it's not as if she's going to be able to do a background check on you right away." He could hear Weiss shuffling some papers. "Your name is Russell Phillips."

"Russell?" Vaughn repeated, a bit disappointed with the moniker for his new persona. "Russell" wasn't one of his favorite names. It sounded a bit too bland. Why couldn't he have a cool spy name like Reese or Spencer or Pierce?

"Hey, the name works for Mr. Crowe, doesn't it?" Weiss quipped. "Your occupation is a stockbroker. What do you know about stocks?"

"Uh, beyond the fact that you buy and sell them?" Vaughn could picture Weiss rolling his eyes at him. Next would come…

Weiss sighed right on cue. "Well, you'll just have to do some cramming. Devlin wants you to set up an assignation between you and Anna."

"You mean a date."

"Well, if you want to get all technical on me, yeah." Weiss deadpanned. "So get in there and turn on the famous 'Balls of Steel' charm."

"Now that's a pleasant picture." Vaughn kidded him. "I'll talk to you later."

Now what? He thought to himself. This wasn't his forté. He wasn't used to being in the middle of the action; he was more an on-the-sidelines kind of guy. What kind of cover story could he come up with that wouldn't arouse Anna's suspicions?

Keep it simple. That was always the best line of attack. An idea hit him like a ton of bricks and he shook his head sheepishly. The most obvious approach was to pretend he was hitting on her. He only hoped he still remembered what to do. His first encounter with Alice had been such a long time ago and since then…well, Sydney didn't count, did she?

Anna was inspecting a glass case full of precious and semi-precious gemstones. Vaughn gave a silent prayer and then slowly sidled up next to her.

"Excuse me, would you mind telling me what that stone is?" He pointed to a pendant with a blue-green stone. "I don't have my glasses with me." He gave her what he hoped was a helpless-man look

Anna gave him a sideways glance. "It's a tourmaline." She replied in her slightly accented English.

Vaughn nodded. "My mother was here earlier in the week and she fell in love with that piece. Now she's insisting that I get her something with a tourmaline for her birthday."

"Lucky woman." Anna commented.

"She's actually a bit of an eccentric, but she is my mother and I love her." Vaughn smiled. Anna looked back at him with a noncommittal expression on her face. "I hope you don't mind my asking, but I heard your accent. Where are you from?"

"I was born in Cuba."

"And you live there now?"

"No." She shook her head. "I work for a museum in Brazil. My home is there."

"Oh, you work for a museum." Vaughn nodded contemplatively. "Is that why you're here?"

"I am interested in an exhibition that will be opening here in a few days." Anna informed him. "I wanted to see if it would be something I should book for my museum in Brazil."

"So you'll be in town for a few days." He mused.

"Why should that interest you?" She raised a perfectly arched eyebrow.

"Because I would like to see you again." Vaughn said boldly. He normally wasn't this forward. Maybe it was "Russell's" influence.

Anna felt a modicum of pleasure. She normally did not like American men, but this man was quite attractive. There was something about the way he smiled at her.

"Do you have a job?" She asked bluntly.

Vaughn's face showed a look of surprise. "Yes. I work as a stockbroker for a local firm here in town."

"So you don't normally frequent museums in the middle of a workday?"

"No, I don't." It finally dawned on him why she had asked such an odd question. "Please don't get the wrong impression about me."

Anna raised an eyebrow again. "And why should I care if I have the right impression about you?"

"Because I think it would greatly help my cause if you know I really can pay for the lunch we're going to have tomorrow." Vaughn smiled at her again and he could have sworn Anna's face softened at the corners of her mouth.

Anna's skeptical look turned to one of amusement. "You are too overly confident." She observed, a bit coy.

"No, I think I'm just the right amount of confident." He said smoothly. "My name is Russell Phillips." He held out his hand.

"Mariana Ortega." Anna slipped her hand into his. "I am staying at the Mondrian on Sunset. You may call for me tomorrow at 12:15."

"I look forward to it." Vaughn gave her an engaging smile.

Anna rewarded him with a parting smile of her own and then moved on. Only when she was out of his sight did he realize he had been holding his breath. He slowly let it out.

Vaughn wondered if Anna had really fallen for his somewhat clumsy flirting or if she was just playing him. Either way, it didn't really matter as long as he got what he wanted, but it would make him feel a little bit better about his spy skills.

Vaughn left the museum and headed straight for Headquarters. A message was waiting for him that Devlin wanted to see him as soon as he arrived.

"Hey, you're here." Weiss stood in the doorway of his office. He was holding a manila folder in his hand.

"Yeah, I just got in."

"Well, then I can give this to you. It's the dossier we've compiled on Russell Phillips." Weiss handed the folder to his partner. Vaughn glanced inside. A plastic bag held a new driver's license, credit cards, a gym club membership card complete with photo. There was also a detailed bio he would have to memorize with such facts as to where "Russell" was born, what his parents did for a living and where he went to college. The powers that be certainly hadn't wasted any time in compiling his new identity.

"Did you get the message from Devlin?"

Vaughn nodded. "I was just headed to his office now."

"Me too. Let's go."

Devlin was in his office, signing off on some paperwork. He looked up when Vaughn and Weiss appeared.

"Come in and close the door." He ordered in a matter-of-fact voice. "Vaughn, I want you to tell me everything that happened this morning."

Vaughn went through the story again of how he had seen Anna going into the museum. "So after I called here and received my orders, I made contact with Ms. Espinosa and we have a lunch date for tomorrow."

"What'd I tell you? Balls of steel." Weiss muttered under his breath, too low for Devlin to hear. Vaughn shot him a look.

"Good, good." Devlin nodded approvingly. "Our objective is to find out what Espinosa wants at that museum by any means possible, Agent Vaughn."

Vaughn looked slightly startled. "Any means, Sir?"

"Yes." Devlin affirmed. "Most likely it will require a search of her hotel room."

"You want me to get into her hotel room." Vaughn murmured to himself, somewhat perturbed. There were only a couple of reasons why a woman would invite a man she hardly knew to her hotel room and he knew what he would have to do in order to elicit such an invitation. The thought of faux-romancing Anna Espinosa was a little off-putting, but oddly enough, it wasn't because he was nervous about what she would do to him if she found out who he really was.

No, he was more disturbed of what Sydney would think when she heard what he was up to. He didn't think she would be happy to learn that he would have to wine and dine and charm one of her worst enemies. His head hoped she would understand he was just doing his job, but his heart wanted to believe she would be just the tiniest bit jealous that he was going to be spending time in the company of a beautiful woman she happened to dislike immensely.

"Sir, what about Agent Bristow?" Vaughn blurted out. Weiss gave him a disapproving glance, which he ignored.

"Jack?" Devlin frowned in confusion.

"No, sir, Sydney." He corrected. "Shouldn't she be involved in this?"

Devlin gave him a blank look. "I fail to see your point, Vaughn."

"Well, Sydney is very familiar with Anna." Vaughn stated. "If we want whatever Anna's after, Sydney's the one who will get it for us."

Devlin wasn't overly impressed with his reasoning. "Once SD-6 finds out about Espinosa being in town, they'll send Bristow in, don't worry about that." He said dismissively. "We'll get to her counter once we find out what they want her to do."

"Well, sir, I would like to tell her what I'm doing." Vaughn said in a respectful voice.

"No, Agent Vaughn, absolutely not." Devlin shook his head decisively.

"Why not?"

"Your mission does not concern her."

"But, sir, when Sydney sees me with her, she'll think--" He stopped in mid-sentence as alarm bells went off in his brain, telling him not to say anything more

"She'll think what?" Devlin interrupted.

She'll think I'm with Anna because I want to be, he thought grimly. If Sydney didn't know what he was doing, she might misconstrue everything.

"She won't understand why I'm with Anna." He said feebly.

"And she doesn't need to, Vaughn. If we play this right, she won't see you until the exhibition opening, anyway." Devlin pointed out. "As of now, you'll be temporarily replaced as Bristow's handler. Weiss will fill in for you."

Vaughn cut a glance at Weiss, who shrugged, and then looked back at Devlin. "Replaced? Why?"

"We don't need either of your covers blown should Anna decide you need tailing."

"We would be careful." Vaughn said stubbornly, barely managing to keep the impertinence out of his voice. He could feel Weiss giving him that look again, but he ignored it once again.

"I don't want to take that risk, Agent Vaughn." Devlin said firmly, his tone suggesting that there was no room for discussion on this point.

Vaughn's shoulders slumped in reluctant defeat. "Can I at least tell her I'm being temporarily taken off her case?"

"No, because then you would have to tell her why and we don't want that now, do we?" Devlin said in an overly patient voice, tired of the fact that his subordinate was constantly challenging his authority. "Don't make me regret putting you back into field duty, Vaughn."

"Sir, with all due respect, it's not as if I asked for this." He protested. "It fell into my lap--"

"I realize that, Agent Vaughn, which is why I'm cutting you some slack." Devlin cut him off. "Now go study the dossier we've put together on your alias, Russell Phillips. If Ms. Espinosa is as good as she's reputed to be, she'll have researched your background, so you better know your stuff."

"Yes, sir." Vaughn said resignedly.

"Weiss will fill you in on the details of where you'll be staying while you're undercover." Devlin told him. "We've decided to put you in a safehouse, so that Ms. Espinosa won't discover where you really live."

"Fine, fine." Vaughn stood up and left the office, Weiss on his heels. "Did you know about this?" He asked Weiss as they rounded the corner.

"About the reassignment, yeah." His friend admitted. "It's for your own safety, you know."

"I know."

"Look, Devlin was right. There's no reason for Sydney to know and besides, it might do more harm than good." Weiss said rationally.

"Explain to me how it would be bad for her to know?" Vaughn raised an eyebrow.

"Well, if she knew what you were doing, I think she would try to interfere."

"Sydney is not a rogue operative, Weiss." Vaughn said, feeling a bit defensive of his agent. "She would follow protocol."

"Really?" Weiss challenged him. "If she were to find out what you were up to with Anna Espinosa, I think she would fear for your life."

"And you say that as if it's a bad thing." Vaughn said, a bit sarcastically.

"What I mean is that she might try to insert herself into the situation in order to keep you from getting hurt and that might royally screw things up." Weiss said pointedly.

In spite of the fact that Sydney's interference might cause him problems, Vaughn was feeling a bit torn. "Do you really think she'd put herself in jeopardy over me?" He asked Weiss, completely oblivious to the hopeful tone in his voice.

"After everything you've done for her, don't you think she'd extend the same courtesy to you?" Weiss raised an eyebrow.

"I honestly don't know." Vaughn said truthfully and a bit sadly.

Weiss' face softened. "Mike, I know Sydney's not exactly the open book you are, but she does care about you. She trusts you with her life and I think she would expect you to do the same with her." Weiss gave him a look. "That is why you can't tell her what you're doing."

Vaughn gave him a grudging look. "Okay, I see what you're saying and I'm not going to tell her." He promised, looking put-out. "Even though I would kind of like to know how she'd react if she thought I was dating Anna Espinosa." Vaughn gave him a faintly evil grin.

Weiss rolled his eyes at him. "Yeah, I know you would want her to turn green with jealousy." He gave Vaughn a shake of his head.

"Well, maybe not green." Vaughn said thoughtfully.

"Puce, maybe?" Weiss supplied helpfully, as they started down the hall together.

"Puce?" Vaughn frowned. "Is that a color?"

"I think it's in the green family."

With a sigh and a heavy heart, Vaughn closed the warehouse door firmly behind him and left the premises.

To be continued…

Author's Note: Thanks to all who reviewed and please keep them coming!