Title: Wish List
Author: Donna donna__rose@hotmail.com
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: They're not mine, if you think they are you are obviously either insane or a very dumb lawyer.
Summary: Syd wishes, Vaughn delivers, a happy ending. I dunno, read it and then you can write my summary for me.
Notes: Okay, on to Chapter Five, I am loving the reviews, and look how fast I'm going! Keep them coming and I'll keep writing, that's a promise. Also, go and check out my other fic True Lies, people seem to be liking that one so I hope you do go and take a look. Please everyone who reads this just leave a review, even if it's just two words, I'd be soooo happy.
Chapter Five
Francie nodded slightly as she backed away from him, her eyes narrowed into slits as she looked him over. "Sydney's never mentioned anyone called Michael. I'll be right back." She turned and left the room, Vaughn could only sit and bite his lip as he evaluated the situation. Francie was reacting with the predicted distrust but Vaughn hadn't planned on her running away so quickly.
Standing up, he made to follow her down the hall of the house. He didn't really know where he was going as he had only explored the front room, leaving the de-bugging to the experts. He made his way down the hall and was silently looking for Francie when he heard her voice from behind a closed door.
"Sydney, there's this man here."
Sydney was just walking out of the theatre, choosing her next film when her mobile rang. Taking it out she listened as Francie talked, "Sydney, there's this man here. He says he works with you, he was just sitting on the chair when I walked in."
Sydney's heart began to race, had SD-6 sent someone? "Francie, Francie, calm down, what's his name?"
"He says his name is Michael Vaughn." Sydney cut across her as she forgot about the movie and began to run for her car at full speed.
"Francie, he's a friend, do not let him leave that house." She hung up the phone and continued down the street at full pelt, her speed gaining estranged looks from many of the people lining the streets. She was at least an hour's drive from home and she silently hoped that nothing had gone wrong. She turned her phone off as she climbed into her car.
Francie continued to talk into the phone, "Sydney, Sydney..." but get no reply, she looked up to find Vaughn standing in her door way. "She said it's true, then she hung up on me."
Vaughn realised who she'd been talking to and motioned for her to join him back out in the living room. He was running short on time now; he had perhaps an hour to talk instead of three, to get this over with. Francie sat down, quite stiffly, in a chair across from the one Vaughn chose. "You work with Sydney at the bank?"
"No," Vaughn didn't have time to try to make this easy, he'd organised this entire thing and it was not going to stuff it self because of one stupid phone call. "Have you ever noticed that Syd seems to work very hard for that bank?"
Francie looked back at him, the beginning of curiosity sparkling in the corner of her eyes. "I had noticed that, yeah."
"Right, good, and what about overseas trips, she goes on a lot of them?" Francie could only nod in response, the man in front of her seeming to be able to read her mind. "Good, um, this is really hard. I want to tell you something but before I do, I do not want you rushing out. You have to promise that no matter what I say, you won't run." Vaughn gulped and stared at her, trying to pick up on her feelings.
Francie sat back in the chair, acting as though she was preparing herself for some very juicy gossip. She nodded and reinforced it with: "Yes, I promise, I'll stay right here."
Vaughn nodded. "Okay, I'm just going to come out and say this." He paused, aware that this wasn't how the script was supposed to be playing out. He was supposed to come in here, tell Francie and whisk Syd away on a white horse. The image raised an eyebrow and he summoned up the courage to say what he wanted to. "Sydney is CIA."
Francie didn't react for several seconds, just sitting there, her face frozen, her hands not moving and her eyes glued to Vaughn's face. "That doesn't make any sense."
"No, it does." Vaughn leaned over, just enough to appear friendly but not intrusive. "Think about it, she always rushes off to the bank, you don't know anyone she works with except Dixon, her boss works her like a slave and she is always out of town."
Francie nodded slightly to herself. "Okay, let's say I do believe you. Sydney is CIA. What is she, like a spy?" Francie was biting her finger nails, a bad sign, but still, she hadn't run out the door.
Vaughn nodded. "Okay, she isn't exactly a spy, she'd a double agent, I'm her handler, her connection with the CIA. She used to work for a group that claimed they were a covert branch of the CIA. Eventually she found out that they weren't and joined the CIA while pretending to stay with them. Since that time, I've been giving her counter missions and keeping her up to date." Vaughn looked back and realised how much he had left out.
Francie was blown away; she stood up and began to pace, back and forth, in front of Vaughn, a hand to her head. "Sydney's a double agent?" Vaughn nodded. "Does anyone else know?"
"She told Danny, her fiancée, that she worked for the CIA. This was before she realised that she was working for the enemy. Her boss had him killed."
"Hang on, you're saying that Will was right? Danny and that Kate Jones were murdered." Vaughn nodded. "By SD-6?"
"Yeah, that's who Sydney works for." Vaughn paused, "You wanted to know who else knows. Will knows a lot of it," Francie's eyes widened. "A few people at the CIA, me and her dad."
"Hang on, Will knew all this time and he didn't say anything?" Francie stopped waiting for a response
"He was looking into SD-6 too much and he was captured, tortured, it's a very long story. But he knows a lot of it." Vaughn glanced at his watch, still at least half an hour.
"Did you say her dad?" Francie looked doubtful but Vaughn nodded enthusiastically to confirm his point. "As in Jack Bristow?"
"Mmm, one of the best."
"One of the best whats? He sells aeroplane parts. Why the hell does he know?" Francie just stared at Vaughn, oblivious to the answer that was causing Vaughn to smile slightly.
"Jack's a double agent as well. He works at SD-6 with Sydney, they go on missions together." Vaughn laughed at Francie's outraged look of shock. "It's true, cross my heart. He's considered a brilliant agent."
"I thought he sold aeroplane parts." Francie looked up. "What else am I allowed to know?"
"Everything, I should probably fill you in on a few names first though cause thanks to your little phone call Syd'll be home very soon." Francie leaned back in the chair and raised an eyebrow, she was fully relaxed with this man, quite a shock considering the news he brought with him, but still, definitely a plus. He smiled at her and he began counting people off on his fingers. "Okay, well, I'm her handler, Michael Vaughn, my boss's name is Devlin, and my best friends name is Eric Weiss."
"Why do I have to know him?" Francie looked down sheepishly at her rude remark, "Sorry, I mean, what is his connection to Sydney?"
"He's helped out on a few missions." Vaughn waited for any other questions, there were none. "The head of SD-6 is Sloane, Arvin Sloane." Vaughn waited for a remark and got one.
"God, he sounds sinister."
"He is. Then there's Dixon, her partner, he's a good guy, Marshall, he's the tech guy, good as well, um, her Dad of course and the latest addition is her mother who may or may not be evil." Vaughn realised just how crude he sounded a few seconds after he registered the shocked look that immediately overtook Francie's facial features. "I think she might actually be okay, but it's a delicate subject."
Francie nodded. "This is a lot to take in," she muttered.
"I realise that but as I said you did sort of cut my time." Vaughn smiled at her. "Any more questions?"
"Yeah, why exactly are you telling me all of this now?" Francie shook her head and sat back down, the rumples in her jacket returning as she slumped in her chair.
"As I said I'm her handler and I believe that it would help her in the field if she had someone to talk to this about." Vaughn smiled lightly at the end and winked at Francie who just laughed back as she realised his words held little truth.
"Sydney really needs someone to talk about all this with, not just the bad stuff, but like just joke around with," Vaughn told her, somehow coming to the conclusion that being honest in this instance was the best thing to do. "I owe her my life; this is the best I could manage."
Francie shook her head, "Hang on...did you give her a silver antique picture frame?" Vaughn grinned awkwardly, proving Francie's first thoughts about how good he could look. "You did? Oh my god, she loves that thing."
"That's good, I thought she would. Now, we've got like twenty minutes until we should start expecting her so start asking questions, I can tell you what ever you want to know." Vaughn sat forward, completely prepared to answer any questions this very friendly woman could throw at him.
Francie opened her mouth, but quickly become conscious of the fact that she had far too many questions to ask and so closed her mouth again and waited until she came up with one she really wanted to know about. "What country does my 'normal little room mate' operate in mostly?"
Vaughn looked helpless for a second, before looking her in the eye and started to count off the countries as he remembered them, "Taiwan, Italy, France, Egypt, Morocco, Spain, Greece, Germany, Singapore, Russia, Brazil, England, Romania, India, should I keep going?" Vaughn grinned
"My God, she's been everywhere, huh. So every time she said Boston or Seattle she was actually on the other side of the world chasing bad guys?" Francie grinned at him as he smiled at her. This was much easier than Vaughn had expected it to be.
"Hmm mmm. In stilettos." Vaughn laughed at her questioning look. "Her boss, Sloane, has this thing about tight dresses and high heels; must be hell to run around in. When she rescued me in Taipei." He shook his head as she looked about to ask another question, "She was in a blond wig and this low neck black dress. Great to look at but hey, she was supposed to be trying to get some stuff from the bad guys."
"Great to look at huh?" Francie grinned at Vaughn as his face fell, "Well, Michael, I've discovered quite a few things this afternoon, but this is just as good."
"Hey, no, don't turn this on me." He waited but she just smiled at him playfully. He put a hand to his brow and wiped away the invisible sweat that had begun to seep out. "Any more questions..."
"Yeah, what do I do when she gets home?" Vaughn grinned, he could really just sit here with this woman forever, he understood why Sydney loved her so much.
"I have absolutely no idea." As Vaughn spoke he heard car tyres screech outside and along with Francie he was on his feet and out on the pavement before Francie could ask where he was off to. Outside the pair was faced with a car tearing down the street well over the speed limit with Sydney sitting, dark glasses perched on her nose, at the wheel.
Vaughn could do naught but laugh as she swung around hard, back tyres spinning as they looked for something to grab onto, and pulled into the drive, stepping on the brakes hard enough to stop her from driving head first into the house. Undoing her seat belt she began to clamber out of the car. Francie turned a little and muttered to Vaughn, "I didn't know she could drive like that."
"Trust me, wait until she gets me inside, if you're lucky I should last about ten seconds before she has both my legs broken in at least five places." He grinned before guiding Francie inside.
Sydney was right behind him and as they heard the door slam behind them, Vaughn winced as he was pushed further into the house, by what were apparently her sunglasses. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Sydney spat, out of breath and her voice apparently pumped with adrenaline.
Francie sat to the side, a huge grin stuck to her face as she watched. She had expected to feel weird around Sydney now that she knew about her, but she just felt eternally proud to know her. None the less, Francie was perfectly happy to watch the chemistry play out in front of her.
"You could have us all killed." Sydney said from behind Vaughn who was now up against the wall, still grinning from ear to ear, confident that she wouldn't kill him. A sharp shove in the back, straight between his ribs, with a finger, dimmed that confidence. "I mean, what on earth, how much does she know?"
"She knows as much as I could tell her in the forty five minutes we got, how the hell did you get home so quickly?" Vaughn tried to straighten his face as she loosened her grip and allowed him to turn around.
"I ran every red light, was over the speed limit by at least 30 and forgot about the rail road crossings." She glared at him while he just laughed it off, amused at the idea of her driving around LA like that.
"Look, just calm down, everything is completely under control, none of this is dangerous." Vaughn set her down in a chair and continued; "When you had both left earlier today, I had a team come in here. Before that, I had an undercover sweep of the place to make sure there wasn't going o be anyone watching and put the road cameras on loop. The team that came in here, came with me, we posed as thieves so even if someone was watching it just looked like a robbery." Francie raised an eyebrow but didn't speak.
"The entire house has been de-bugged and we have a tech team watching for transmissions anyway. The only way anyone is going to find out that I'm here, is if one of you tell someone you shouldn't." Vaughn checked off everything in his mind but when he saw Sydney opening her mouth, a look of caution still on her face, he knew he'd left one base unmentioned.
"What about running outside? Anyone watching would have seen you." Sydney's voice was slower now, her chest no longer heaving with the effort of driving so fast.
"We have agents everywhere and anyone with in two kilometres has background checks done on them the minute they enter the area. Anything and I leave straight away and you run, with Francie." Vaughn sat down and watched as Sydney reluctantly joined him.
She turned to Francie who was smiling slightly, "You know everything?"
"I think so," she looked at Vaughn before continuing, "Your handler told me about Danny, your dad, your mom, everything about you being a double agent."
"I've freaked you out haven't I?" Sydney dropped her head and Vaughn just looked at Francie, silently praying she had something nice to say.
Francie leaned over and took her room mate's hands in her own and said. "Actually it sound's sort of cool. It is a bit scary and it must be horrible, but it sounds cool. I'm sorry if that's insensitive, but it just, I don't know, it sounds like something I'd like to talk about." Francie looked at Vaughn who nodded encouragement.
Sydney looked up at Vaughn, her face softening as comprehension hit her in the stomach. "You did all of this because of what I said," he nodded weakly. "How did you organise all of this."
Vaughn's face quickly turned scarlet. "Oh, um, I sort of told Devlin that I would quit unless he let me do this."
"And that worked?" Sydney looked at him, doubt in her eyes, completely shocked that a claim such as that had worked.
"Well, he figured that if I left, you'd be pretty upset, so he let me do it." Vaughn shrugged it off and turned back to Francie. "Francie took it all very well."
Sydney just continued to stare at Vaughn. She couldn't believe that he'd threatened to quit just so she could have something that she wanted, what a sweet thing to do. Eventually she realised that Francie and Vaughn were both staring at her. "Yes, she did, very well." Her face fell a little and she frowned, "Francie, I am sorry I couldn't tell you, it's just that..."
Francie held up a hand and motioned for her to stop. "It's fine, I'm just awfully interested in what it is you do. I mean, when do you meet Michael?"
Sydney frowned, "Who's Michael?" Francie looked confused but Vaughn couldn't help but let out a small chuckle before waving a hand in front of Sydney's face and raising his eyebrows as if to say, 'Hello, remember me? Michael?'.
"Oh, Michael, um, he'd call and I'd just leave." Francie continued to look puzzled and so Sydney explained, "I call him Vaughn. Never call him Michael."
A playful murmur came from where Vaughn was now sitting watching the girls speak. "Don't know why she insists on calling me Vaughn. I mean I call her Syd all of the time."
"It's against protocol. And calling my 'Syd' put you straight into my dad's bad books, you should have learnt from that." Sydney turned back to Francie and continued to explain. "Every time that we got the wrong number call about Joey's Pizza; that was Vaughn signalling a meeting."
Revelation dawned on Francie's face. "Oh my God, you mean, every time?"
"Every time," Michael grinned, "I remember once you answered, went completely off at me. 'Yeah, this is Joey's Pizza, do you want to hear our specials?'" Vaughn's impersonation wasn't very good, but it still got a giggle out of both of them. Francie obviously remembered the occasion.
Much, much later that day, at around ten pm, Vaughn stood from where he'd been lounging on the floor. They'd discussed everything from Marshall to Sydney's dad and it had all gone fine. Sydney had had a great time, as far as Vaughn could tell, and by the end of three cups of coffee and Chinese take-out, everyone was low on voice and very sleepy. Francie stood with him, detecting the end of the day.
Vaughn held out a hand, but Francie pulled him into a hug. He felt uncomfortable for only a second before melting into the embrace as he spied Sydney watching, obviously quite content, from behind Francie. As Francie let go, she said, "It was really, really good to meet you Michael. You should come over again tomorrow. I had fun."
"Me, too," Vaughn replied. Francie began to make her way to her bedroom and paused only a second when she heard Vaughn call out, "Good night," behind her. She said good night back and disappeared into her room.
Vaughn collapsed into a chair, massaging his throat, and looked at Sydney who grinned back, her eyes lighter than usual and her cheeks full and perfect as her lips turned up. "Thank you," she whispered.
"It was fun," Vaughn said, "I will come over tomorrow, if that's okay." He looked at her questioningly, looking for any hint of hesitation, when she smiled and nodded with no indecision, he could do little more than grin back. "I had better get going; all of the agents take off at eleven." He stood up and headed for the door.
Sydney stood and followed him out onto the front step. "I really don't know how to thank you." Vaughn could think of a few things and by the weird look Sydney was giving him; the goofy grin was giving his thoughts away. "But, you do know how much this means to me?"
Vaughn nodded, "You deserve it."
Sydney took a deep breath and looked out over her street, it was very dark. She looked up at Vaughn and her stomach suddenly was full or what she would only call butterflies. "Sydney..." She hushed him with a finger to his lips before turning to him and raising herself up on tip toes.
"Thank you," she mumbled before leaning in, closer to him than she had ever been before...
Reviews will get you another chapter....so go and review!! And check out my other story as well!
Author: Donna donna__rose@hotmail.com
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: They're not mine, if you think they are you are obviously either insane or a very dumb lawyer.
Summary: Syd wishes, Vaughn delivers, a happy ending. I dunno, read it and then you can write my summary for me.
Notes: Okay, on to Chapter Five, I am loving the reviews, and look how fast I'm going! Keep them coming and I'll keep writing, that's a promise. Also, go and check out my other fic True Lies, people seem to be liking that one so I hope you do go and take a look. Please everyone who reads this just leave a review, even if it's just two words, I'd be soooo happy.
Chapter Five
Francie nodded slightly as she backed away from him, her eyes narrowed into slits as she looked him over. "Sydney's never mentioned anyone called Michael. I'll be right back." She turned and left the room, Vaughn could only sit and bite his lip as he evaluated the situation. Francie was reacting with the predicted distrust but Vaughn hadn't planned on her running away so quickly.
Standing up, he made to follow her down the hall of the house. He didn't really know where he was going as he had only explored the front room, leaving the de-bugging to the experts. He made his way down the hall and was silently looking for Francie when he heard her voice from behind a closed door.
"Sydney, there's this man here."
Sydney was just walking out of the theatre, choosing her next film when her mobile rang. Taking it out she listened as Francie talked, "Sydney, there's this man here. He says he works with you, he was just sitting on the chair when I walked in."
Sydney's heart began to race, had SD-6 sent someone? "Francie, Francie, calm down, what's his name?"
"He says his name is Michael Vaughn." Sydney cut across her as she forgot about the movie and began to run for her car at full speed.
"Francie, he's a friend, do not let him leave that house." She hung up the phone and continued down the street at full pelt, her speed gaining estranged looks from many of the people lining the streets. She was at least an hour's drive from home and she silently hoped that nothing had gone wrong. She turned her phone off as she climbed into her car.
Francie continued to talk into the phone, "Sydney, Sydney..." but get no reply, she looked up to find Vaughn standing in her door way. "She said it's true, then she hung up on me."
Vaughn realised who she'd been talking to and motioned for her to join him back out in the living room. He was running short on time now; he had perhaps an hour to talk instead of three, to get this over with. Francie sat down, quite stiffly, in a chair across from the one Vaughn chose. "You work with Sydney at the bank?"
"No," Vaughn didn't have time to try to make this easy, he'd organised this entire thing and it was not going to stuff it self because of one stupid phone call. "Have you ever noticed that Syd seems to work very hard for that bank?"
Francie looked back at him, the beginning of curiosity sparkling in the corner of her eyes. "I had noticed that, yeah."
"Right, good, and what about overseas trips, she goes on a lot of them?" Francie could only nod in response, the man in front of her seeming to be able to read her mind. "Good, um, this is really hard. I want to tell you something but before I do, I do not want you rushing out. You have to promise that no matter what I say, you won't run." Vaughn gulped and stared at her, trying to pick up on her feelings.
Francie sat back in the chair, acting as though she was preparing herself for some very juicy gossip. She nodded and reinforced it with: "Yes, I promise, I'll stay right here."
Vaughn nodded. "Okay, I'm just going to come out and say this." He paused, aware that this wasn't how the script was supposed to be playing out. He was supposed to come in here, tell Francie and whisk Syd away on a white horse. The image raised an eyebrow and he summoned up the courage to say what he wanted to. "Sydney is CIA."
Francie didn't react for several seconds, just sitting there, her face frozen, her hands not moving and her eyes glued to Vaughn's face. "That doesn't make any sense."
"No, it does." Vaughn leaned over, just enough to appear friendly but not intrusive. "Think about it, she always rushes off to the bank, you don't know anyone she works with except Dixon, her boss works her like a slave and she is always out of town."
Francie nodded slightly to herself. "Okay, let's say I do believe you. Sydney is CIA. What is she, like a spy?" Francie was biting her finger nails, a bad sign, but still, she hadn't run out the door.
Vaughn nodded. "Okay, she isn't exactly a spy, she'd a double agent, I'm her handler, her connection with the CIA. She used to work for a group that claimed they were a covert branch of the CIA. Eventually she found out that they weren't and joined the CIA while pretending to stay with them. Since that time, I've been giving her counter missions and keeping her up to date." Vaughn looked back and realised how much he had left out.
Francie was blown away; she stood up and began to pace, back and forth, in front of Vaughn, a hand to her head. "Sydney's a double agent?" Vaughn nodded. "Does anyone else know?"
"She told Danny, her fiancée, that she worked for the CIA. This was before she realised that she was working for the enemy. Her boss had him killed."
"Hang on, you're saying that Will was right? Danny and that Kate Jones were murdered." Vaughn nodded. "By SD-6?"
"Yeah, that's who Sydney works for." Vaughn paused, "You wanted to know who else knows. Will knows a lot of it," Francie's eyes widened. "A few people at the CIA, me and her dad."
"Hang on, Will knew all this time and he didn't say anything?" Francie stopped waiting for a response
"He was looking into SD-6 too much and he was captured, tortured, it's a very long story. But he knows a lot of it." Vaughn glanced at his watch, still at least half an hour.
"Did you say her dad?" Francie looked doubtful but Vaughn nodded enthusiastically to confirm his point. "As in Jack Bristow?"
"Mmm, one of the best."
"One of the best whats? He sells aeroplane parts. Why the hell does he know?" Francie just stared at Vaughn, oblivious to the answer that was causing Vaughn to smile slightly.
"Jack's a double agent as well. He works at SD-6 with Sydney, they go on missions together." Vaughn laughed at Francie's outraged look of shock. "It's true, cross my heart. He's considered a brilliant agent."
"I thought he sold aeroplane parts." Francie looked up. "What else am I allowed to know?"
"Everything, I should probably fill you in on a few names first though cause thanks to your little phone call Syd'll be home very soon." Francie leaned back in the chair and raised an eyebrow, she was fully relaxed with this man, quite a shock considering the news he brought with him, but still, definitely a plus. He smiled at her and he began counting people off on his fingers. "Okay, well, I'm her handler, Michael Vaughn, my boss's name is Devlin, and my best friends name is Eric Weiss."
"Why do I have to know him?" Francie looked down sheepishly at her rude remark, "Sorry, I mean, what is his connection to Sydney?"
"He's helped out on a few missions." Vaughn waited for any other questions, there were none. "The head of SD-6 is Sloane, Arvin Sloane." Vaughn waited for a remark and got one.
"God, he sounds sinister."
"He is. Then there's Dixon, her partner, he's a good guy, Marshall, he's the tech guy, good as well, um, her Dad of course and the latest addition is her mother who may or may not be evil." Vaughn realised just how crude he sounded a few seconds after he registered the shocked look that immediately overtook Francie's facial features. "I think she might actually be okay, but it's a delicate subject."
Francie nodded. "This is a lot to take in," she muttered.
"I realise that but as I said you did sort of cut my time." Vaughn smiled at her. "Any more questions?"
"Yeah, why exactly are you telling me all of this now?" Francie shook her head and sat back down, the rumples in her jacket returning as she slumped in her chair.
"As I said I'm her handler and I believe that it would help her in the field if she had someone to talk to this about." Vaughn smiled lightly at the end and winked at Francie who just laughed back as she realised his words held little truth.
"Sydney really needs someone to talk about all this with, not just the bad stuff, but like just joke around with," Vaughn told her, somehow coming to the conclusion that being honest in this instance was the best thing to do. "I owe her my life; this is the best I could manage."
Francie shook her head, "Hang on...did you give her a silver antique picture frame?" Vaughn grinned awkwardly, proving Francie's first thoughts about how good he could look. "You did? Oh my god, she loves that thing."
"That's good, I thought she would. Now, we've got like twenty minutes until we should start expecting her so start asking questions, I can tell you what ever you want to know." Vaughn sat forward, completely prepared to answer any questions this very friendly woman could throw at him.
Francie opened her mouth, but quickly become conscious of the fact that she had far too many questions to ask and so closed her mouth again and waited until she came up with one she really wanted to know about. "What country does my 'normal little room mate' operate in mostly?"
Vaughn looked helpless for a second, before looking her in the eye and started to count off the countries as he remembered them, "Taiwan, Italy, France, Egypt, Morocco, Spain, Greece, Germany, Singapore, Russia, Brazil, England, Romania, India, should I keep going?" Vaughn grinned
"My God, she's been everywhere, huh. So every time she said Boston or Seattle she was actually on the other side of the world chasing bad guys?" Francie grinned at him as he smiled at her. This was much easier than Vaughn had expected it to be.
"Hmm mmm. In stilettos." Vaughn laughed at her questioning look. "Her boss, Sloane, has this thing about tight dresses and high heels; must be hell to run around in. When she rescued me in Taipei." He shook his head as she looked about to ask another question, "She was in a blond wig and this low neck black dress. Great to look at but hey, she was supposed to be trying to get some stuff from the bad guys."
"Great to look at huh?" Francie grinned at Vaughn as his face fell, "Well, Michael, I've discovered quite a few things this afternoon, but this is just as good."
"Hey, no, don't turn this on me." He waited but she just smiled at him playfully. He put a hand to his brow and wiped away the invisible sweat that had begun to seep out. "Any more questions..."
"Yeah, what do I do when she gets home?" Vaughn grinned, he could really just sit here with this woman forever, he understood why Sydney loved her so much.
"I have absolutely no idea." As Vaughn spoke he heard car tyres screech outside and along with Francie he was on his feet and out on the pavement before Francie could ask where he was off to. Outside the pair was faced with a car tearing down the street well over the speed limit with Sydney sitting, dark glasses perched on her nose, at the wheel.
Vaughn could do naught but laugh as she swung around hard, back tyres spinning as they looked for something to grab onto, and pulled into the drive, stepping on the brakes hard enough to stop her from driving head first into the house. Undoing her seat belt she began to clamber out of the car. Francie turned a little and muttered to Vaughn, "I didn't know she could drive like that."
"Trust me, wait until she gets me inside, if you're lucky I should last about ten seconds before she has both my legs broken in at least five places." He grinned before guiding Francie inside.
Sydney was right behind him and as they heard the door slam behind them, Vaughn winced as he was pushed further into the house, by what were apparently her sunglasses. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Sydney spat, out of breath and her voice apparently pumped with adrenaline.
Francie sat to the side, a huge grin stuck to her face as she watched. She had expected to feel weird around Sydney now that she knew about her, but she just felt eternally proud to know her. None the less, Francie was perfectly happy to watch the chemistry play out in front of her.
"You could have us all killed." Sydney said from behind Vaughn who was now up against the wall, still grinning from ear to ear, confident that she wouldn't kill him. A sharp shove in the back, straight between his ribs, with a finger, dimmed that confidence. "I mean, what on earth, how much does she know?"
"She knows as much as I could tell her in the forty five minutes we got, how the hell did you get home so quickly?" Vaughn tried to straighten his face as she loosened her grip and allowed him to turn around.
"I ran every red light, was over the speed limit by at least 30 and forgot about the rail road crossings." She glared at him while he just laughed it off, amused at the idea of her driving around LA like that.
"Look, just calm down, everything is completely under control, none of this is dangerous." Vaughn set her down in a chair and continued; "When you had both left earlier today, I had a team come in here. Before that, I had an undercover sweep of the place to make sure there wasn't going o be anyone watching and put the road cameras on loop. The team that came in here, came with me, we posed as thieves so even if someone was watching it just looked like a robbery." Francie raised an eyebrow but didn't speak.
"The entire house has been de-bugged and we have a tech team watching for transmissions anyway. The only way anyone is going to find out that I'm here, is if one of you tell someone you shouldn't." Vaughn checked off everything in his mind but when he saw Sydney opening her mouth, a look of caution still on her face, he knew he'd left one base unmentioned.
"What about running outside? Anyone watching would have seen you." Sydney's voice was slower now, her chest no longer heaving with the effort of driving so fast.
"We have agents everywhere and anyone with in two kilometres has background checks done on them the minute they enter the area. Anything and I leave straight away and you run, with Francie." Vaughn sat down and watched as Sydney reluctantly joined him.
She turned to Francie who was smiling slightly, "You know everything?"
"I think so," she looked at Vaughn before continuing, "Your handler told me about Danny, your dad, your mom, everything about you being a double agent."
"I've freaked you out haven't I?" Sydney dropped her head and Vaughn just looked at Francie, silently praying she had something nice to say.
Francie leaned over and took her room mate's hands in her own and said. "Actually it sound's sort of cool. It is a bit scary and it must be horrible, but it sounds cool. I'm sorry if that's insensitive, but it just, I don't know, it sounds like something I'd like to talk about." Francie looked at Vaughn who nodded encouragement.
Sydney looked up at Vaughn, her face softening as comprehension hit her in the stomach. "You did all of this because of what I said," he nodded weakly. "How did you organise all of this."
Vaughn's face quickly turned scarlet. "Oh, um, I sort of told Devlin that I would quit unless he let me do this."
"And that worked?" Sydney looked at him, doubt in her eyes, completely shocked that a claim such as that had worked.
"Well, he figured that if I left, you'd be pretty upset, so he let me do it." Vaughn shrugged it off and turned back to Francie. "Francie took it all very well."
Sydney just continued to stare at Vaughn. She couldn't believe that he'd threatened to quit just so she could have something that she wanted, what a sweet thing to do. Eventually she realised that Francie and Vaughn were both staring at her. "Yes, she did, very well." Her face fell a little and she frowned, "Francie, I am sorry I couldn't tell you, it's just that..."
Francie held up a hand and motioned for her to stop. "It's fine, I'm just awfully interested in what it is you do. I mean, when do you meet Michael?"
Sydney frowned, "Who's Michael?" Francie looked confused but Vaughn couldn't help but let out a small chuckle before waving a hand in front of Sydney's face and raising his eyebrows as if to say, 'Hello, remember me? Michael?'.
"Oh, Michael, um, he'd call and I'd just leave." Francie continued to look puzzled and so Sydney explained, "I call him Vaughn. Never call him Michael."
A playful murmur came from where Vaughn was now sitting watching the girls speak. "Don't know why she insists on calling me Vaughn. I mean I call her Syd all of the time."
"It's against protocol. And calling my 'Syd' put you straight into my dad's bad books, you should have learnt from that." Sydney turned back to Francie and continued to explain. "Every time that we got the wrong number call about Joey's Pizza; that was Vaughn signalling a meeting."
Revelation dawned on Francie's face. "Oh my God, you mean, every time?"
"Every time," Michael grinned, "I remember once you answered, went completely off at me. 'Yeah, this is Joey's Pizza, do you want to hear our specials?'" Vaughn's impersonation wasn't very good, but it still got a giggle out of both of them. Francie obviously remembered the occasion.
Much, much later that day, at around ten pm, Vaughn stood from where he'd been lounging on the floor. They'd discussed everything from Marshall to Sydney's dad and it had all gone fine. Sydney had had a great time, as far as Vaughn could tell, and by the end of three cups of coffee and Chinese take-out, everyone was low on voice and very sleepy. Francie stood with him, detecting the end of the day.
Vaughn held out a hand, but Francie pulled him into a hug. He felt uncomfortable for only a second before melting into the embrace as he spied Sydney watching, obviously quite content, from behind Francie. As Francie let go, she said, "It was really, really good to meet you Michael. You should come over again tomorrow. I had fun."
"Me, too," Vaughn replied. Francie began to make her way to her bedroom and paused only a second when she heard Vaughn call out, "Good night," behind her. She said good night back and disappeared into her room.
Vaughn collapsed into a chair, massaging his throat, and looked at Sydney who grinned back, her eyes lighter than usual and her cheeks full and perfect as her lips turned up. "Thank you," she whispered.
"It was fun," Vaughn said, "I will come over tomorrow, if that's okay." He looked at her questioningly, looking for any hint of hesitation, when she smiled and nodded with no indecision, he could do little more than grin back. "I had better get going; all of the agents take off at eleven." He stood up and headed for the door.
Sydney stood and followed him out onto the front step. "I really don't know how to thank you." Vaughn could think of a few things and by the weird look Sydney was giving him; the goofy grin was giving his thoughts away. "But, you do know how much this means to me?"
Vaughn nodded, "You deserve it."
Sydney took a deep breath and looked out over her street, it was very dark. She looked up at Vaughn and her stomach suddenly was full or what she would only call butterflies. "Sydney..." She hushed him with a finger to his lips before turning to him and raising herself up on tip toes.
"Thank you," she mumbled before leaning in, closer to him than she had ever been before...
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