Best Enemies | Part Three

"Don't you remember how she was when she first got here?"

Allison shuddered. "She wasn't herself. It was scary."

"Well, that's what Sark is worried about. He doesn't want her to fall back into that--and doesn't want her going back to that life. It's going to kill her if she does and they both know it."

"I'm worried for both of them. God, Simon, if you had just seen the look in her eyes when she saw me--I thought that degree of hatred was reserved specifically for Arvin Sloane." She brushed her hair aside. "It was so different. I know--when I was *her*, I was treated differently, there was love in her eyes. But even that night, when we were firing off shots at each other--it was like she couldn't believe it--she didn't look at me like that. It was so cold--"

"--like him." He once again finished her thoughts.

Allison nodded. "Yeah. Just like him."

Simon leaned back against the bed they were resting on and pulled her with him, careful of her bandaged arm. "*That's* what I'm scared of. Because he can go down that road and come back--that's what she does for him. But if *she* went down that path--I'm no so sure they would recover."

"It would kill them," she was starting to understand his fear.

"Exactly."

She shifted to look at him. "You don't think--"

"Not sure. But you remember what she was like. Time can change a lot, but darkness like that. it's not just something that you wash out, like a stain. It has a way of embedding itself into your soul."

* * *

| SIX MONTHS EARLIER. . . |

He was on the usual reconnaissance job. The employer wanted a scope of the area before they decided to move on the unique gem collection. There was another group scheduled to make an appearance tonight, but he'd yet to see them. The standard cautionary measures were taken; his point man was at the door, ready at his signal, they'd planned three alternate escape routes, his gun was hidden and there was a knife hidden in his left boot.

Everything was going according to plan when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned and was met with the startling brown eyes of a rather striking woman. She was dressed in a simple black dress, her neck and wrists nearly dripping with diamonds. He'd be buggered if she was the contact.

"How do they look?" Her voice was appropriately deep, and sent chills down his back. If he had been single.

"Marvelous."

"Good. Come with me," she smiled coyly and laced their fingers together.

They cut a path through the small crowd and he had no choice but to follow as she led them to a small back room.

"Don't suppose I can get your name?"

She stopped in front of an unassuming door and kicked it wide open. Locking eyes with him and giving a seductive smile, she reached for his concealed gun. She ignored the shocked stares of the couple making great use of the round bed and fired two shots directly into their heads.

"The name," she tucked the gun familiarly back into his waistband, "is Julia."

"Simon. Pleasure to work with you."

He had no time to prepare, for suddenly, her lips were nearly fused to his and they'd shoved the other two aside, while grabbing at clothes and mirroring the previous occupants' moves.

Julia tore at his shirt and hungrily drank in the sight of his body while he worked on getting her dress unzipped. He'd had enough of the tricky clasps--and she'd lost patience with it--for the next thing he knew, she was kissing him again and kicking the dress off her hips.

Simon kissed a line down her skin, starting from her neck and was working his way towards her stomach when his hands ran over a slight bump. There, almost even with her hip, was a small scar. Something triggered in his brain and he immediately froze.

Julia looked up at him with lust clear in her eyes. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he reassured her, "It's just that--how did you get this scar?" He worshipped it with his lips and she looked down.

"Oh that?" Simon nodded encouragingly. She shrugged. "I don't--" her eyelids suddenly fluttered almost comically, "--remember."

Simon stared down at her in astonishment, chuckling to himself. "Bloody hell. Been years since my foreplay put someone to sleep."

* * *

He ran all the stop signs and red lights, nearly side-swiped a tourist family, and outran several cops while heading for the warehouse. Located near the bay, there were several large container ships and waiting boats that would hide their location well. While a red Ferrari wouldn't be the easiest thing to hide in eastern Spain, the amount of steel and titanium that covered the yard would easily block out signals of helpful police and keep away unwanted visitors.

Allison met him before he got to the door and her jaw dropped. "But she--I thought she was--"

Simon shook his head once, curtly. "She's obviously not. Set up the GPS locator and make sure the SAT phone's working. I'll need to set her down in the spare room, but I'm going to need a mild sedative to make sure she doesn't hurt anyone, least of all herself. Whoever was leading the team will worry soon enough, and we'll move as soon as she's stable."

With the communication being well under way, Simon carried Julia--or Sydney, as she was really known--up a flight of stairs to a small room. He laid her on the bed and filled a syringe with a light blue liquid. Her eyes opened once, when the needle was stuck in, but closed before he'd finished administering the dosage.

He breathed a sigh of relief and closed the door behind him.

In a room with no windows, and one lead door, even the most capable spy would have trouble escaping. He'd heard stories of Sydney Bristow and knew that she wasn't quite up to par with her usual skills. Either that, or something had gone seriously wrong. Because none of his reports showed a woman with any blatant scarring. Nor did she go by the alias of Julia.

Allison was on the phone with their contact in LA when he reached her. "Yes. This is Mr. Walker. Tell him. . . we've found her."

* * *

"We were lucky we saved all your meds from the recovery. One thing I never want on my hands is a pissed off Bristow. Could get messy fast."

Allison closed her eyes and leaned her head on his shoulder. "He got there pretty quickly, though. I mean, considering that he was in CIA custody and all. Did he ever mention how he escaped?"

"Not once. And I haven't brought it up."

"She didn't know, then."

"Now that's something you'd have to ask her yourself."

She snorted. "Yeah, because she's going to be so open to talking to me right now."

* * *

Sark sat on the edge of the bed and brushed back Sydney's hair. For a woman who donned wigs as frequently as she did, it was no wonder she left her hair natural and free when she could. He found he had an obsession with it. That he could think of nothing smoother and softer to run his fingers through at that at the end of the day, there was nothing else he'd rather do than this mindless movement of being close to her. Probably annoyed the hell out of her, but he liked it.

And she would allow him his indulgences, no matter how strange she thought they were.

"How long are we staying?"

He wasn't surprised that she was still awake. "Until your friends from the CIA decide they can work better in the "Search for Sydney" if they're all home, depending on one computer tech and out of Europe. Where would you like to go?"

"Home." The plaintive note to her voice was enough to make even the strongest heart crumble. And it left a few cracks in his when he thought that she'd rather be living her life of lies than with him. But if it made her happy.

Sark dragged her upwards until she was forced to rest against him. "If you want--quite so badly--to go home tomorrow--I'll make the arrangements. But we can't keep doing this. It's too dangerous for everyone involved." He didn't tell her that the constant seeing her and having to let her go was pretty much destroying him.

"When I said home, Sark," Sydney sighed, "I meant anywhere but here, someplace with you. There's so much chaos in that world now, I don't know if I'll ever want to go back. I don't know if I should. But my father will never stop looking for me. And--as much as we both hate to admit it-- neither will Vaughn. He was on the team when I left with you and he's going to take my disappearance personally."

"Don't know why. It's none of his business. You don't belong to him anymore."

She elbowed him sharply. "I don't belong to *anyone*."

"Not true." He waited until she was looking at him to answer, "You belong to me."

"Possessive jerk."

"Yeah, but you love me."

"For reasons unexplainable to man, you're right. I do."

"Wait a second now. I wasn't proposing. Give it a few more months, Sydney, we've not even been together for half a year."

Sydney laughed. "That wasn't what I was talking about and you know it."

"I do. --Know it, I mean." He scrubbed a hand over his face. "Now you've even got me talking like you. This is bad."

She giggled and ran a hand through his curls. "I'm glad you grew your hair back."

Glad for the change in subject, and mood, he teased, "What--didn't you like the prison cut they gave me?"

"Nope." Sydney punctuated this with a kiss on each side of his temple. He closed his eyes, at peace.

"I suppose I could always cut it again." He trailed off, wincing as the fingers in his hair tightened painfully. "Or not," he concluded, breathing easier when her grip receded.

There was a mischievous smile on her face as she continued to comb her fingers in his hair. Apparently, the habit went both ways. "Nice to see. . . I have you at my mercy."

Her fingers, however, weren't the only ones that could move.

Sark reached out and turned off the light. "Pleasure to be here."

* * *

End part three!!!