Vaughn looked at Sydney in disbelief as her words echoed in his mind. *We need to tell her, because I don't think we can have a real future together until we do.*
"What do you mean we can't have a future until we tell my mother?"
Sydney tore her eyes away from his and looked down at the bathroom floor. "Vaughn, neither of us has been shy about admitting that we want to spend the rest of our lives together. We're both in this for the long haul, right?" she asked looking back up at him.
"Of course." At least he had thought so until a minute ago. Now he wasn't so sure.
"Well, the first few times I let myself think about being with you *forever,* it was just a nice fantasy, something that I didn't think would be possible until years from now. But now, it doesn't seem so far away anymore; in three months, SD-6 won't exist and we won't have to hide our relationship, and we can actually start building a life together."
"Those are good things, right?" Vaughn asked, wondering where she was taking this conversation.
"Yes, of course they are." She shook her head, frustrated that she wasn't expressing herself clearly. Vaughn was looking at her with an uncertain expression that was tearing her heart out. "It's just that for the last two years, and especially in the last few months, I've been telling myself that my life would be perfect once SD-6 was gone. But now that its demise looks like a certainty rather than a possibility, I'm already thinking ahead, trying to brace myself for the next horrible event that might take place in my life, and losing you is at the top of that list. *That's* why I'm afraid of waiting to tell your mom about me. I'm afraid of letting myself get my hopes up with you only to have them come crashing back down to earth if your mother can't handle the thought of you being with me."
"Why would you be afraid of that?" Vaughn asked, taking Sydney's hand in his and holding it up to his chest. "Do you really think that I would leave you if my mom didn't want us to be together?"
"Are you saying that you wouldn't?" Sydney asked with a raised eyebrow. "Vaughn, admittedly I haven't spent that much time with you and your mom, but all it took was five minutes of watching you together to see how close the two of you are. You have the kind of relationship with her that I always dreamed of having with my parents. It's so obvious that you're the most important person in her life and that she loves you more than anything, and it's equally obvious that you would never want to make her unhappy. So I don't think it's crazy of me to think that if you had to choose between her or me, you would choose her."
"That *is* crazy, Syd," Vaughn corrected her. "You're right, my mom and I are incredibly close, but if I ever had to make a choice . . ." he sighed and ran his free hand through his hair. "That would never happen. My mom would never force me to make a choice like that," he said softly.
"She might," Sydney said in an equally quiet voice. "Vaughn, I wouldn't blame her at all if she couldn't get past who my mother is and what she did to your family. It would be asking a lot of her to look past all of that and welcome me into your family with open arms. If she gave you an ultimatum, can you honestly say that you would choose me?"
"Yeah, I could," he nodded. "Why are you so shocked by that? Syd, it would hurt like hell not to have the same kind of relationship with my mother, but if she ever gave me an ultimatum like that, there would be no other choice. I would choose you in a heartbeat. I love my mother, and I've spent most of my life trying to make her proud, but I can't live my life for her. I tried that once when I went to law school instead of joining the CIA and I was miserable. And what she and I both learned from that experience was that I had to be my own person and make my own decisions. I couldn't just take the path that she wanted me to, and as it turned out, the path that I eventually chose was the one that led me to you, so I trust my instincts," he smiled.
Sydney looked at her hand intertwined with his and wondered how he always managed to say the perfect thing to her no matter what she was afraid of or upset about. It was just another of the many reasons she knew that she would die inside if she ever lost him. Still, she would almost rather live without him than force him to sacrifice everything in his life to be with her, even though she knew she would gladly sacrifice everything for him.
"Vaughn, I wouldn't be able to live with myself knowing that I came between you and your mother. I couldn't live with the guilt of that."
"You'll never have to." Vaughn sighed and brushed a kiss across her palm. "Syd, you could never come between me and my mom. Remember tonight when she was telling you the story of how she and my dad met?" She nodded. "Well my grandfather made my mom choose between him and my dad, and she chose my father because she loved him so much. But my dad didn't come between them; my *grandfather* did, because he was the one who cut her off from his life simply because she followed her heart. Eventually, he realized that he was wrong to have forced her to make that choice, but having gone through that herself, my mother would *never* do that to me."
"Vaughn, that was different," she said as she stepped closer to him. "Your grandfather didn't have a good reason for not wanting your mother to be with your father, but your mother has every reason in the world not to want you to be with me."
"No, she has every reason in the world to *want* me to be with you, Sydney. She sees how happy you make me, and ever since my father died, that's all she's ever cared about. She would never ask me to deny myself the one thing that makes me happier than anything else."
Sydney desperately wanted to believe that he was right. She prayed that Elise had seen how much in love she was with Vaughn and that she wouldn't hate her once she learned the truth about the history between their families. The pessimist in her, however, couldn't help but fear that Elise wouldn't want anything to do with her.
Her thoughts were broken when she heard Vaughn laugh. "Why are we having this conversation in the bathroom?"
She also laughed at the realization that they were having one of the most important conversations they'd ever had standing next to the toilet. She followed him as he led her back into the bedroom. He sat at the foot of the bed, but instead of sitting next to him, she climbed on the bed and knelt behind him. She moved her hands to his shoulders and let her fingers gently knead his flesh. She stopped for a second to place a soft kiss on his collarbone.
"You seem tense," she explained. "I think that's my fault." He started to protest that it wasn't but he moaned instead as her fingers expertly loosened the tightness in his neck and shoulders.
"What would your father think about this?" Sydney asked after a few minutes.
"About you giving me a massage? He'd be all for it," Vaughn cracked. "No, seriously, he would love you."
"I don't mean how would he feel about *me,*" she shook her head. "I mean, how would he feel about you being in love with the daughter of the woman who killed him? Do you ever feel like you're betraying him by being with me?"
"Sydney, no," he said firmly. "I'm not betraying him by loving you. *You* weren't the one who killed him."
"I know," she sighed. She concentrated on massaging him before speaking again. "How come you never talk to me about him?"
"I've told you things about him," Vaughn said weakly. She bent her head forward and shot him a look and he sighed, realizing that she was right. "I guess I don't talk to you about him for the same reason that you don't really talk to me about your mother."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Sydney, I know that you hold back from me where she's concerned. You think that you can't talk to me about her because it'll upset me, or because it will dredge up all kinds of emotions that I try to keep hidden from you, and I never talk to you about my father because I'm afraid that it will make you feel guilty, even though you shouldn't."
"So basically, neither of us will be open or honest with each other because we're to busy trying to protect each other's feelings?" she asked with wry amusement.
"Basically."
"We have issues, Vaughn," she laughed. "I think our issues have issues." He turned his head and smiled at her.
"I think that goes without saying."
"The thing is, we're gonna have to learn how to deal with those issues together, or at least figure out a way to make sure that we don't end up resenting each other because of them."
"I know," he sighed. "It's just that I've never been the kind of person to talk about my feelings or share them with other people. I've always just dealt with them on my own."
"I understand. I'm not trying to force you to tell me how you feel all the time; I know by now that that's not who you are," she smiled. "I just want you to know that when you do want to talk about your feelings -- *if* you ever want to talk about them -- you can. You don't have to protect me from the truth."
"You don't have to protect me either," he said pointedly.
"I know," she sighed. "Easier said than done, right?"
"Yeah. Especially since I don't even know how I feel about your mother. It's not something I've let myself think about a lot. I've perfected the art of avoidance," he admitted. "Mostly because if I let myself really think about her, I'd have to admit that part of me hates her for what she did to my family, and the other part of me is actually grateful to her for making one half of the most incredible person I've ever met."
"Vaughn -- "
"No, it's true, Sydney. You wouldn't be the person that you are if it weren't for her. You're *not* her, but it's obvious that the two of you are similar in some ways. You're both smart and complex . . . and beautiful," he said quietly. "Sometimes I'm not sure whether to hate her or admire her, and it was a lot easier to hate her when she was a faceless villain. That's why I almost wish that she hadn't turned herself in." He took a deep breath before he pushed on with his thoughts.
"You probably don't realize it, but I understand why you want to get to know her, why you need to. If my father walked through the door tomorrow, even if I found out that he'd been alive all this time but never came back because he started a new life and had a new family, even if he had killed *twenty* other agents, I would still want the chance to get to know him. As much as I loved him, I know that I never really knew him. I mean, I knew him as much as an eight year-old can know his father, but when you're eight, you think your parents are perfect and infallible. I guess that's why he's always been this idealized, god-like figure to me. I never got the chance to see him as a person, an actual, human, flawed individual. That's why I'd want to get to know him even if he had spent the last twenty-six years doing awful, unimaginable things. I *do* understand, Syd," he repeated.
"But you don't like it," she said as she ran a soothing hand through his hair. She knew that it wasn't easy for him to open up to her like this and she was touched that he was making the effort.
"It's not that I don't like it," he said quietly, "it just scares me, that's all."
"Why?"
"Because . . . you and I have been through so much -- learning to trust each other, fearing for each others' lives, coming to terms with our feelings -- and through all of that, we forged this bond that's unlike any connection I've ever felt with another person. It's so strong that I don't think anything could ever come between us, except maybe your mother."
"What makes you think that? She's encouraged our relationship every step of the way, for reasons that I admittedly don't understand. But she sent us to Fiji together and she tried to get you to be honest about your feelings for me, and she told me not to let anyone stand in the way of being with you. After all of that I don't think she would ever try to come between us." she said reassuringly.
"I didn't necessarily mean that she'd *try* to, although that's not out of the question. I know you want to believe that her intentions are good; I want to believe that too, Syd," he said when he noticed her small frown. "But, we can't ignore the possibility that maybe she pushed us together for some ulterior motive, for some grand scheme that she has. And even if she didn't, even if she only encouraged us because she genuinely wants you to be happy . . ." his voice trailed off and he took a deep breath.
"You spent twenty years idolizing her, the same way I did with my father, and now that she's back in your life, now that you're connecting with her . . . I guess I have the same fears that you do, that if it came down to a choice between me or your mother, you might pick her."
His words were soft, but they hit Sydney with the force of a Mack truck. She couldn't believe that Vaughn was insecure about her love for him, though she'd had the same insecurities a short while earlier. She suddenly realized that for once in their relationship, he needed to be reassured as much as she did.
"Vaughn, how could you ever think that I would choose her over you?" she asked disbelievingly. "That I would ever choose *anyone* over you?"
"She's your mother, Sydney," he said, looking down at his hands in his lap.
"Yeah, but you're . . . you're *everything,* Vaughn," she said when she realized that she couldn't put into words all the things that he was to her. "You're the only person in my entire life that I've ever trusted completely and you're the only person who knows everything about me, who sees every flaw, and loves me anyway. I can't even tell you what you mean to me.
"And as for my mother," she sighed. "I may have idolized her once, but I know now that she's not the person that I thought she was. She never will be, even if she spends the rest of her life making up for all the things she's done. She could never be all the things to me that you are, and I'm never going to need her the way that I need you, no matter how close I get to her."
When Vaughn turned to look at her, he was struck by the sincere expression her face. He knew that she meant every word she'd said, and even though it wasn't enough to completely quell his fears, it strengthened his resolve not to let anyone or anything come between them, not even their parents. For the first time, he truly realized that he would sacrifice everything in his life to be with her, and the depth of his love for her overwhelmed him. He shifted his body and placed his hands on her face.
"You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, do you know that?" he asked, his voice choked with emotion.
Sydney looked back at him in awe, feeling herself getting lost in his beautiful eyes. She couldn't believe he was saying those words to her when she should be saying them to him. She often felt guilty for making Vaughn's life so much more complicated than it was before he met her, and she knew that she'd never understand how he could feel the way he did about her, but she believed him. She believed him with every fiber of her being, because every action, every word, every look from him revealed the truth of his love for her.
"You stole my line," she smiled as she moved to straddle his lap. She placed his hands on her hips, and ran her own hand through his hair. "I love you so much, Vaughn. That's why I'm willing to risk your mother's scorn when I tell her the truth," she laughed, trying to hide her fear that she was doing exactly that.
"Syd, are you sure that you want to be the one to tell her?" he asked with concern as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer to him. "It's incredibly brave of you, but you don't have to."
"I want to," she said firmly. "I *need* to. And it's no more brave than when you went to see my mother that first time."
"I was scared as hell when I did that," he admitted. "I'm sure you must be feeling the same way."
"Well, I can't say that I'm looking forward it, but it's something I have to do."
"I understand," he said, reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. "Just know that when it's over, I'm still going to be here, no matter what happens. Don't even think about trying to push me away out of guilt, because I won't let you," he said firmly.
"Then I won't try," she agreed, before she captured his lips with hers and kissed him with all the emotion she felt inside of her.
Shortly afterwards, they fell asleep wrapped in each other's arms, feeling closer than they ever had, secure in the knowledge that nothing, not even their shared tragic past, could come between them.
*****
"Mrs. Vaughn will be right with you, Ms. Bristow. She said to tell you to make yourself comfortable."
"Thank you," Sydney smiled at Elise's assistant before she left the room. She glanced around her office, taking in the tastefully elegant French furniture and muted blue, white, and red color scheme. She had a feeling that most of the offices in the embassy were similarly decorated, but Elise's office was filled with personal mementos and artwork that gave it a warm, inviting feeling. She was immediately drawn to the bookshelves on the near wall of the room, which were lined with books and picture frames. There were a few pictures of Elise with friends, with two women who looked just like her and appeared to be her sisters, and with an older couple that Sydney assumed were her parents. The rest of the pictures were of Vaughn -- one of him as a chubby baby, grasping Elise's blouse with a tiny fist as she grinned back at him; one of a young, snaggletoothed Vaughn in a hockey uniform, clutching a trophy with a proud smile on his face; a triple frame with pictures of Vaughn and Elise at his high school, college, and law school graduations. Yet another picture showed Elise, Vaughn, and William sitting on a hillside with a vineyard spread out behind them, Vaughn sitting between his parents as they all smiled for the camera. Sydney picked up the picture next to that one and smiled instantly. Vaughn wore an intense look of concentration on his face as he tried to balance on ice skates and William stood behind him, holding his young son's hands above his head.
"Michael was four when that picture was taken," Elise said as she walked into her office with a smile. "That was the first time William taught him how to skate. He had no idea then that he was creating a monster. If I had a dime for every time I had to drag Michael off the ice as he got older, I'd be a very wealthy woman right now," she laughed. "How are you, Sydney?" she asked as she gave her a hug.
"I'm well, thank you," she said as she turned and placed the frame back on the bookshelf. When she turned back, she noticed for the first time that there was a more recent picture of Elise and Vaughn sitting on her desk. Next to that picture was a beautiful antique silver frame holding a picture of Elise and William on their wedding day. She felt a stab of pain as she looked at their smiling faces and wiped her sweaty palms on her pants. She could almost feel the courage draining from her body as she found herself surrounded by the evidence of how happy the Vaughns had been before William's death.
"I was so surprised when you said you wanted to come by today. The embassy is not terribly exciting, as I'm sure you've seen by now," she said with a light chuckle. Sydney opened her mouth to speak, but before she could, they were interrupted by Elise's assistant, who entered the office with a tray loaded with a teapot and various pastries. "Thank you, Celine," Elise called out as the young woman exited the office once again.
"Oh, Elise, you didn't have to go to this kind of trouble," Sydney protested.
"Oh, it was nothing. I'm just being a good hostess," she smiled. "Come, sit," she said as she gestured to the couch and chairs on the opposite side of the room. She perched gracefully on one of the chairs and Sydney took a seat opposite her on the couch. Elise reached down to the coffee table between them and poured two cups of tea, handing one to Sydney, who nervously twirled her spoon inside her cup, grateful for an excuse to stop fidgeting.
"What did you and Michael do yesterday?"
"We went ice skating, actually," Sydney said with a small laugh.
"I should have known," Elise said with a wry laugh. "So what brings you here? Michael hasn't done anything idiotic, has he?"
Sydney shook her head. "No, nothing like that. I just, um, I needed to talk to you. Ever since I got here, you've been so nice to me, and I can't tell you how much I've appreciated that, especially considering that Michael and I kept our relationship a secret from you."
"Well, you're keeping it a secret from everyone, aren't you?" Elise asked with a smile and a raised eyebrow. "It's okay, I understand."
"Yeah, we are," Sydney said, looking down into her teacup, as if the directions for how to proceed with this conversation would magically appear in the steaming liquid. "That's not the only secret we've been keeping, though. There are . . . things that you don't know about me," she said in a hesitant, shaky voice. "Things that may affect how you feel about me, how you feel about my relationship with your son, and I think it's only fair that you should know, so you can make an honest assessment of me."
Elise looked at Sydney with concern, unable to imagine what kind of secret she was keeping or why she looked so terrified at the prospect of sharing it with her. She set her teacup and saucer on the coffee table and folded her hands in her lap, watching as Sydney nervously did the same.
"Sydney, what is it that you have to tell me?" she asked in an encouraging voice, hoping to make her feel more at ease.
"I'm not sure where to begin," Sydney said as she subconsciously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Saturday night at dinner, you were telling me all kinds of stories about your family and your husband's family, and I'm sure you must have noticed that I was uncomfortable when you asked me about my own family."
Elise nodded. "I did, but I didn't want to pry into your personal life."
"It's okay," Sydney said, taking a deep breath. "I guess the first thing I should tell you is that I'm not the only spy in my family. My father works for the CIA too; in fact, he's a double agent like I am, although I never knew it until my fiance was killed. Until then, I thought he worked for an airline parts manufacturer. He and I weren't very close when I was growing up," she explained.
"Were your parents divorced?" Elise asked. Sydney shook her head.
"No. My mother died in a car accident when I was six, and after that my father was so emotionally distant that he and I never really had much of a relationship. We've gotten closer since he told me the truth about who I was working for, but I'm still learning a lot of things about him -- about both of my parents, actually. I've reached a place where I finally trust him, but last year, I didn't trust him at all. I had a lot of questions about him, which I told Michael, so he did some checking around and pulled my father's file, and we learned that he had once been investigated by the FBI."
"He was accused of selling secrets?" Elise asked with surprise. She knew from her years with William that the FBI rarely investigated CIA agents unless they were suspected of being traitors.
"Yes. The FBI suspected him of collaborating with the KGB, but he was eventually cleared. That wasn't enough to alleviate my doubts, though. I knew that he was still hiding things from me, and when I found KGB codes in some of my mother's old books, I was convinced that he actually *did* have ties to the KGB. So, Michael had the codes translated and we discovered that they were order to kill CIA agents, twelve of them, actually. Michael wanted me to turn my father in, but we were just starting to get to know each other, to have an actual relationship, so I was reluctant to report him."
"Well, that's certainly understandable. I can't imagine being in such a position. That couldn't have been an easy decision for you to make."
"It wasn't, and I didn't actually agree to report him until Michael showed me the profile of the twelfth agent. Elise, I don't know how to tell you this," Sydney said as she leaned forward, "but that agent was your husband."
Sydney expected Elise to gasp or scream or kick her out of her office, but she simply leaned back into her chair and let out a slow breath. "That was in December, wasn't it?"
"Yes, it was," Sydney said quietly.
"When Michael came home for Christmas that year, he told me what he had learned about his father's death. When William died, we were never told why or how -- the agency never tells you that -- but I always assumed that he died a violent death. It's a safe bet that when an agent dies in the line of duty, it wasn't from natural causes," she said with a wry smile. "This may sound strange, but when Michael told me that William was murdered, it almost gave me a sense of peace, because at least I didn't have to wonder anymore." She looked at Sydney with questioning eyes. "Did you ever report your father?"
Sydney blinked, surprised by Elise's calm, matter-of-fact demeanor. "I did. Michael and I did together, actually. But when we met with the deputy director, we learned that my father wasn't responsible for those agents' deaths . . . my mother was."
"Your mother? She was the one who killed those agents?" Elise asked with honest shock.
"Yes. As it turned out, she was a KGB agent sent to spy on my father. *She* was the one who received those orders and *she* was the one who carried them out. She killed your husband, and I don't even know how to apologize to you for that."
Elise looked down at her folded hands and Sydney unwittingly held her breath waiting for her to speak again.
"When Michael told me that William was murdered, he was so matter-of-fact about it. If learning the truth was hard on him, he certainly didn't let me see it. If you don't mind my asking, how did he react to the news when you found out?" she asked with concern.
"He was understandably shocked, but he's so selfless that I think he was actually more concerned about my feelings, about how I felt having learned that everything I thought I knew about my mother was a lie. Sometimes he's *too* selfless," she said with a small frown as she remembered the way he'd comforted her, when she probably should have been the one comforting him. Their relationship had been a lot different then, but she wished that she had paid more attention to the pain that he must have been feeling, instead of focusing on her own pain.
"He *can* be far too selfless sometimes," Elise agreed, "but he probably realized, like I do, that what's done is done. By the time he learned the truth, William had been dead for twenty-five years, and nothing would have brought him back. Your mother was dead, too, so it wouldn't have done much good for him to be angry or vengeful."
"No, I suppose not, if her death had put an end to her deception -- but it didn't. We learned a few months later that she faked her death and was still alive. I know this must sound like a ridiculous soap opera," Sydney said with a frustrated shake of her head.
"A bit," Elise said, too stunned to say much else. Her mind couldn't even begin to process the unbelievable story that Sydney was telling her.
"Would you believe me if I said it gets worse?"
"Probably not," Elise said, even as she braced herself for what was coming next.
"It does," Sydney said softly. "When my mother faked her death, she went back to Russia and eventually formed her own crime syndicate."
"You're serious?" Elise asked with a weary, disbelieving smile. Sydney nodded and Elise took a deep breath. "Is she . . . is she on the run? Is she still a threat?"
"I'm not sure if she's still a threat to anyone, but she's in federal custody at the joint operations center in L.A."
"I see. Is there anything else?" Elise asked when Sydney paused. She was almost afraid to know the answer. "Please tell me that there's nothing else," she said with a nervous smile.
"No, that's all," Sydney said. She couldn't bring herself to tell Elise about finding Irina in Taipei and the virus that almost claimed Vaughn's life. She had already overwhelmed her enough for one day. "I can't even imagine what you must be thinking or feeling right now, other than the urge to tell Michael to run as fast as he can."
"Why would you think that I would tell him that?" Elise asked with genuine surprise.
"Because my family is so profoundly screwed up. Sometimes I think he would have been better off if he'd never met any of us. But, Elise, you should know that I love your son more than anyone in this world, and I would sooner die before I'd let my mother hurt him or your family again."
"I believe you, but *you* should know that there will be hell to pay if you have any plans of following in your mother's footsteps and deceiving my son the way that she deceived your father." The steely tone in her voice sent chills down Sydney's spine, and she had no doubt that Elise would carry through on her threat, if necessary.
"That being said," she said in a much warmer tone, "I don't honestly believe that you would ever do that to him, and I like to think that I'm a good judge of character," she smiled. "I have to tell you that I greatly admire your honesty, Sydney. I know it couldn't have been easy for you to come here and tell me what you just did."
"No, it wasn't, but it was something that I needed to do."
"Well, that's at least one difference between you and Michael," Elise said with a thoughtful smile. "He probably never would have told me about your mother."
"Oh, I think he would have, eventually. He was just concerned about how it would affect you."
"That's so like him," she rolled her eyes. "He's always trying to protect the people he loves, even when he doesn't need to. He's spent his whole life doing that, and even though his intentions are good, sometimes it can be infuriating."
"I guess he's used that as a coping mechanism ever since his father died," Sydney said softly. "Just another example of the damage my mother caused."
"Actually, he comes by that honestly. William was exactly the same way," Elise smiled. "He and I didn't argue very often, but when we did, it was usually because I found out that he was keeping some secret in a misguided effort to protect me. It took me years to realize that he wasn't patronizing me, but that he just couldn't bear to see me upset or unhappy. It's amazing how a trait can be someone's best and worst quality at the same time, but I suspect you're learning that with Michael."
Sydney smiled softly. "I think he's spent every minute of the last two years trying to protect me, but even though he doesn't have to, I'd be lying if I said that it wasn't one of my favorite things about him. His capacity to love is amazing."
"So is his capacity for forgiveness," Elise said meaningfully. Sydney looked back at her with surprise.
"Maybe, but I'm not sure he's ever going to be able to forgive my mother. I can't honestly say that she deserves his forgiveness. I don't think she's even expressed remorse for what she did."
Elise swallowed hard at the realization that the woman who killed her husband might not even care about the impact she'd had on twelve families, including her own. She simply couldn't understand how anyone could be so heartless and callous, but it was obvious that those traits hadn't been passed along to her daughter, who sat across from her with tears in her eyes. She was touched by Sydney's obvious guilt and reached across the coffee table to place a comforting hand over Sydney's own shaking hands.
"Forgiveness isn't always earned, Sydney. Sometimes it's just given, even when we don't deserve it. Have *you* been able to forgive your mother?"
"No, not yet. I'm still trying to figure her out, but I want to be able to forgive her so I can move on with my life. But even if I forgive her for what she's done to me, I'm not sure that I can ever forgive her for what she's done to my father and Michael. They're the two most important men in my life, and she ripped both of them apart. I don't know how to feel about that."
"I understand. There aren't any easy answers for that. Now that I know the truth about your mother, I think I'm going to have to work through some forgiveness issues of my own. But Sydney, I won't be forgiving *you* because there's nothing to forgive you for. I don't want to oversimplify things, and I realize that this situation is complicated, but I don't hold you responsible for what your mother did. She's done horrible, despicable things, but it wouldn't be fair to ask you to shoulder the burden of her sins. So maybe you should stop trying to," she said with a sincere smile.
"Elise," Sydney said as a tear ran down her face, "the last thing I expected when I came here was for you to be so understanding. I . . . I don't know what to say or how to repay your kindness."
"Just love my son, and take care of him. That's all you have to do, and as long as you do that, you and I will get along just fine. All I want is for him to be happy. I want that for you too," she said as she stood up and drew Sydney into a hug.
"So do I, and I will, I promise," Sydney said, smiling through watery eyes. It was one of the easiest promises she'd ever had to make.
TBC . . .
"What do you mean we can't have a future until we tell my mother?"
Sydney tore her eyes away from his and looked down at the bathroom floor. "Vaughn, neither of us has been shy about admitting that we want to spend the rest of our lives together. We're both in this for the long haul, right?" she asked looking back up at him.
"Of course." At least he had thought so until a minute ago. Now he wasn't so sure.
"Well, the first few times I let myself think about being with you *forever,* it was just a nice fantasy, something that I didn't think would be possible until years from now. But now, it doesn't seem so far away anymore; in three months, SD-6 won't exist and we won't have to hide our relationship, and we can actually start building a life together."
"Those are good things, right?" Vaughn asked, wondering where she was taking this conversation.
"Yes, of course they are." She shook her head, frustrated that she wasn't expressing herself clearly. Vaughn was looking at her with an uncertain expression that was tearing her heart out. "It's just that for the last two years, and especially in the last few months, I've been telling myself that my life would be perfect once SD-6 was gone. But now that its demise looks like a certainty rather than a possibility, I'm already thinking ahead, trying to brace myself for the next horrible event that might take place in my life, and losing you is at the top of that list. *That's* why I'm afraid of waiting to tell your mom about me. I'm afraid of letting myself get my hopes up with you only to have them come crashing back down to earth if your mother can't handle the thought of you being with me."
"Why would you be afraid of that?" Vaughn asked, taking Sydney's hand in his and holding it up to his chest. "Do you really think that I would leave you if my mom didn't want us to be together?"
"Are you saying that you wouldn't?" Sydney asked with a raised eyebrow. "Vaughn, admittedly I haven't spent that much time with you and your mom, but all it took was five minutes of watching you together to see how close the two of you are. You have the kind of relationship with her that I always dreamed of having with my parents. It's so obvious that you're the most important person in her life and that she loves you more than anything, and it's equally obvious that you would never want to make her unhappy. So I don't think it's crazy of me to think that if you had to choose between her or me, you would choose her."
"That *is* crazy, Syd," Vaughn corrected her. "You're right, my mom and I are incredibly close, but if I ever had to make a choice . . ." he sighed and ran his free hand through his hair. "That would never happen. My mom would never force me to make a choice like that," he said softly.
"She might," Sydney said in an equally quiet voice. "Vaughn, I wouldn't blame her at all if she couldn't get past who my mother is and what she did to your family. It would be asking a lot of her to look past all of that and welcome me into your family with open arms. If she gave you an ultimatum, can you honestly say that you would choose me?"
"Yeah, I could," he nodded. "Why are you so shocked by that? Syd, it would hurt like hell not to have the same kind of relationship with my mother, but if she ever gave me an ultimatum like that, there would be no other choice. I would choose you in a heartbeat. I love my mother, and I've spent most of my life trying to make her proud, but I can't live my life for her. I tried that once when I went to law school instead of joining the CIA and I was miserable. And what she and I both learned from that experience was that I had to be my own person and make my own decisions. I couldn't just take the path that she wanted me to, and as it turned out, the path that I eventually chose was the one that led me to you, so I trust my instincts," he smiled.
Sydney looked at her hand intertwined with his and wondered how he always managed to say the perfect thing to her no matter what she was afraid of or upset about. It was just another of the many reasons she knew that she would die inside if she ever lost him. Still, she would almost rather live without him than force him to sacrifice everything in his life to be with her, even though she knew she would gladly sacrifice everything for him.
"Vaughn, I wouldn't be able to live with myself knowing that I came between you and your mother. I couldn't live with the guilt of that."
"You'll never have to." Vaughn sighed and brushed a kiss across her palm. "Syd, you could never come between me and my mom. Remember tonight when she was telling you the story of how she and my dad met?" She nodded. "Well my grandfather made my mom choose between him and my dad, and she chose my father because she loved him so much. But my dad didn't come between them; my *grandfather* did, because he was the one who cut her off from his life simply because she followed her heart. Eventually, he realized that he was wrong to have forced her to make that choice, but having gone through that herself, my mother would *never* do that to me."
"Vaughn, that was different," she said as she stepped closer to him. "Your grandfather didn't have a good reason for not wanting your mother to be with your father, but your mother has every reason in the world not to want you to be with me."
"No, she has every reason in the world to *want* me to be with you, Sydney. She sees how happy you make me, and ever since my father died, that's all she's ever cared about. She would never ask me to deny myself the one thing that makes me happier than anything else."
Sydney desperately wanted to believe that he was right. She prayed that Elise had seen how much in love she was with Vaughn and that she wouldn't hate her once she learned the truth about the history between their families. The pessimist in her, however, couldn't help but fear that Elise wouldn't want anything to do with her.
Her thoughts were broken when she heard Vaughn laugh. "Why are we having this conversation in the bathroom?"
She also laughed at the realization that they were having one of the most important conversations they'd ever had standing next to the toilet. She followed him as he led her back into the bedroom. He sat at the foot of the bed, but instead of sitting next to him, she climbed on the bed and knelt behind him. She moved her hands to his shoulders and let her fingers gently knead his flesh. She stopped for a second to place a soft kiss on his collarbone.
"You seem tense," she explained. "I think that's my fault." He started to protest that it wasn't but he moaned instead as her fingers expertly loosened the tightness in his neck and shoulders.
"What would your father think about this?" Sydney asked after a few minutes.
"About you giving me a massage? He'd be all for it," Vaughn cracked. "No, seriously, he would love you."
"I don't mean how would he feel about *me,*" she shook her head. "I mean, how would he feel about you being in love with the daughter of the woman who killed him? Do you ever feel like you're betraying him by being with me?"
"Sydney, no," he said firmly. "I'm not betraying him by loving you. *You* weren't the one who killed him."
"I know," she sighed. She concentrated on massaging him before speaking again. "How come you never talk to me about him?"
"I've told you things about him," Vaughn said weakly. She bent her head forward and shot him a look and he sighed, realizing that she was right. "I guess I don't talk to you about him for the same reason that you don't really talk to me about your mother."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Sydney, I know that you hold back from me where she's concerned. You think that you can't talk to me about her because it'll upset me, or because it will dredge up all kinds of emotions that I try to keep hidden from you, and I never talk to you about my father because I'm afraid that it will make you feel guilty, even though you shouldn't."
"So basically, neither of us will be open or honest with each other because we're to busy trying to protect each other's feelings?" she asked with wry amusement.
"Basically."
"We have issues, Vaughn," she laughed. "I think our issues have issues." He turned his head and smiled at her.
"I think that goes without saying."
"The thing is, we're gonna have to learn how to deal with those issues together, or at least figure out a way to make sure that we don't end up resenting each other because of them."
"I know," he sighed. "It's just that I've never been the kind of person to talk about my feelings or share them with other people. I've always just dealt with them on my own."
"I understand. I'm not trying to force you to tell me how you feel all the time; I know by now that that's not who you are," she smiled. "I just want you to know that when you do want to talk about your feelings -- *if* you ever want to talk about them -- you can. You don't have to protect me from the truth."
"You don't have to protect me either," he said pointedly.
"I know," she sighed. "Easier said than done, right?"
"Yeah. Especially since I don't even know how I feel about your mother. It's not something I've let myself think about a lot. I've perfected the art of avoidance," he admitted. "Mostly because if I let myself really think about her, I'd have to admit that part of me hates her for what she did to my family, and the other part of me is actually grateful to her for making one half of the most incredible person I've ever met."
"Vaughn -- "
"No, it's true, Sydney. You wouldn't be the person that you are if it weren't for her. You're *not* her, but it's obvious that the two of you are similar in some ways. You're both smart and complex . . . and beautiful," he said quietly. "Sometimes I'm not sure whether to hate her or admire her, and it was a lot easier to hate her when she was a faceless villain. That's why I almost wish that she hadn't turned herself in." He took a deep breath before he pushed on with his thoughts.
"You probably don't realize it, but I understand why you want to get to know her, why you need to. If my father walked through the door tomorrow, even if I found out that he'd been alive all this time but never came back because he started a new life and had a new family, even if he had killed *twenty* other agents, I would still want the chance to get to know him. As much as I loved him, I know that I never really knew him. I mean, I knew him as much as an eight year-old can know his father, but when you're eight, you think your parents are perfect and infallible. I guess that's why he's always been this idealized, god-like figure to me. I never got the chance to see him as a person, an actual, human, flawed individual. That's why I'd want to get to know him even if he had spent the last twenty-six years doing awful, unimaginable things. I *do* understand, Syd," he repeated.
"But you don't like it," she said as she ran a soothing hand through his hair. She knew that it wasn't easy for him to open up to her like this and she was touched that he was making the effort.
"It's not that I don't like it," he said quietly, "it just scares me, that's all."
"Why?"
"Because . . . you and I have been through so much -- learning to trust each other, fearing for each others' lives, coming to terms with our feelings -- and through all of that, we forged this bond that's unlike any connection I've ever felt with another person. It's so strong that I don't think anything could ever come between us, except maybe your mother."
"What makes you think that? She's encouraged our relationship every step of the way, for reasons that I admittedly don't understand. But she sent us to Fiji together and she tried to get you to be honest about your feelings for me, and she told me not to let anyone stand in the way of being with you. After all of that I don't think she would ever try to come between us." she said reassuringly.
"I didn't necessarily mean that she'd *try* to, although that's not out of the question. I know you want to believe that her intentions are good; I want to believe that too, Syd," he said when he noticed her small frown. "But, we can't ignore the possibility that maybe she pushed us together for some ulterior motive, for some grand scheme that she has. And even if she didn't, even if she only encouraged us because she genuinely wants you to be happy . . ." his voice trailed off and he took a deep breath.
"You spent twenty years idolizing her, the same way I did with my father, and now that she's back in your life, now that you're connecting with her . . . I guess I have the same fears that you do, that if it came down to a choice between me or your mother, you might pick her."
His words were soft, but they hit Sydney with the force of a Mack truck. She couldn't believe that Vaughn was insecure about her love for him, though she'd had the same insecurities a short while earlier. She suddenly realized that for once in their relationship, he needed to be reassured as much as she did.
"Vaughn, how could you ever think that I would choose her over you?" she asked disbelievingly. "That I would ever choose *anyone* over you?"
"She's your mother, Sydney," he said, looking down at his hands in his lap.
"Yeah, but you're . . . you're *everything,* Vaughn," she said when she realized that she couldn't put into words all the things that he was to her. "You're the only person in my entire life that I've ever trusted completely and you're the only person who knows everything about me, who sees every flaw, and loves me anyway. I can't even tell you what you mean to me.
"And as for my mother," she sighed. "I may have idolized her once, but I know now that she's not the person that I thought she was. She never will be, even if she spends the rest of her life making up for all the things she's done. She could never be all the things to me that you are, and I'm never going to need her the way that I need you, no matter how close I get to her."
When Vaughn turned to look at her, he was struck by the sincere expression her face. He knew that she meant every word she'd said, and even though it wasn't enough to completely quell his fears, it strengthened his resolve not to let anyone or anything come between them, not even their parents. For the first time, he truly realized that he would sacrifice everything in his life to be with her, and the depth of his love for her overwhelmed him. He shifted his body and placed his hands on her face.
"You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, do you know that?" he asked, his voice choked with emotion.
Sydney looked back at him in awe, feeling herself getting lost in his beautiful eyes. She couldn't believe he was saying those words to her when she should be saying them to him. She often felt guilty for making Vaughn's life so much more complicated than it was before he met her, and she knew that she'd never understand how he could feel the way he did about her, but she believed him. She believed him with every fiber of her being, because every action, every word, every look from him revealed the truth of his love for her.
"You stole my line," she smiled as she moved to straddle his lap. She placed his hands on her hips, and ran her own hand through his hair. "I love you so much, Vaughn. That's why I'm willing to risk your mother's scorn when I tell her the truth," she laughed, trying to hide her fear that she was doing exactly that.
"Syd, are you sure that you want to be the one to tell her?" he asked with concern as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer to him. "It's incredibly brave of you, but you don't have to."
"I want to," she said firmly. "I *need* to. And it's no more brave than when you went to see my mother that first time."
"I was scared as hell when I did that," he admitted. "I'm sure you must be feeling the same way."
"Well, I can't say that I'm looking forward it, but it's something I have to do."
"I understand," he said, reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. "Just know that when it's over, I'm still going to be here, no matter what happens. Don't even think about trying to push me away out of guilt, because I won't let you," he said firmly.
"Then I won't try," she agreed, before she captured his lips with hers and kissed him with all the emotion she felt inside of her.
Shortly afterwards, they fell asleep wrapped in each other's arms, feeling closer than they ever had, secure in the knowledge that nothing, not even their shared tragic past, could come between them.
*****
"Mrs. Vaughn will be right with you, Ms. Bristow. She said to tell you to make yourself comfortable."
"Thank you," Sydney smiled at Elise's assistant before she left the room. She glanced around her office, taking in the tastefully elegant French furniture and muted blue, white, and red color scheme. She had a feeling that most of the offices in the embassy were similarly decorated, but Elise's office was filled with personal mementos and artwork that gave it a warm, inviting feeling. She was immediately drawn to the bookshelves on the near wall of the room, which were lined with books and picture frames. There were a few pictures of Elise with friends, with two women who looked just like her and appeared to be her sisters, and with an older couple that Sydney assumed were her parents. The rest of the pictures were of Vaughn -- one of him as a chubby baby, grasping Elise's blouse with a tiny fist as she grinned back at him; one of a young, snaggletoothed Vaughn in a hockey uniform, clutching a trophy with a proud smile on his face; a triple frame with pictures of Vaughn and Elise at his high school, college, and law school graduations. Yet another picture showed Elise, Vaughn, and William sitting on a hillside with a vineyard spread out behind them, Vaughn sitting between his parents as they all smiled for the camera. Sydney picked up the picture next to that one and smiled instantly. Vaughn wore an intense look of concentration on his face as he tried to balance on ice skates and William stood behind him, holding his young son's hands above his head.
"Michael was four when that picture was taken," Elise said as she walked into her office with a smile. "That was the first time William taught him how to skate. He had no idea then that he was creating a monster. If I had a dime for every time I had to drag Michael off the ice as he got older, I'd be a very wealthy woman right now," she laughed. "How are you, Sydney?" she asked as she gave her a hug.
"I'm well, thank you," she said as she turned and placed the frame back on the bookshelf. When she turned back, she noticed for the first time that there was a more recent picture of Elise and Vaughn sitting on her desk. Next to that picture was a beautiful antique silver frame holding a picture of Elise and William on their wedding day. She felt a stab of pain as she looked at their smiling faces and wiped her sweaty palms on her pants. She could almost feel the courage draining from her body as she found herself surrounded by the evidence of how happy the Vaughns had been before William's death.
"I was so surprised when you said you wanted to come by today. The embassy is not terribly exciting, as I'm sure you've seen by now," she said with a light chuckle. Sydney opened her mouth to speak, but before she could, they were interrupted by Elise's assistant, who entered the office with a tray loaded with a teapot and various pastries. "Thank you, Celine," Elise called out as the young woman exited the office once again.
"Oh, Elise, you didn't have to go to this kind of trouble," Sydney protested.
"Oh, it was nothing. I'm just being a good hostess," she smiled. "Come, sit," she said as she gestured to the couch and chairs on the opposite side of the room. She perched gracefully on one of the chairs and Sydney took a seat opposite her on the couch. Elise reached down to the coffee table between them and poured two cups of tea, handing one to Sydney, who nervously twirled her spoon inside her cup, grateful for an excuse to stop fidgeting.
"What did you and Michael do yesterday?"
"We went ice skating, actually," Sydney said with a small laugh.
"I should have known," Elise said with a wry laugh. "So what brings you here? Michael hasn't done anything idiotic, has he?"
Sydney shook her head. "No, nothing like that. I just, um, I needed to talk to you. Ever since I got here, you've been so nice to me, and I can't tell you how much I've appreciated that, especially considering that Michael and I kept our relationship a secret from you."
"Well, you're keeping it a secret from everyone, aren't you?" Elise asked with a smile and a raised eyebrow. "It's okay, I understand."
"Yeah, we are," Sydney said, looking down into her teacup, as if the directions for how to proceed with this conversation would magically appear in the steaming liquid. "That's not the only secret we've been keeping, though. There are . . . things that you don't know about me," she said in a hesitant, shaky voice. "Things that may affect how you feel about me, how you feel about my relationship with your son, and I think it's only fair that you should know, so you can make an honest assessment of me."
Elise looked at Sydney with concern, unable to imagine what kind of secret she was keeping or why she looked so terrified at the prospect of sharing it with her. She set her teacup and saucer on the coffee table and folded her hands in her lap, watching as Sydney nervously did the same.
"Sydney, what is it that you have to tell me?" she asked in an encouraging voice, hoping to make her feel more at ease.
"I'm not sure where to begin," Sydney said as she subconsciously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Saturday night at dinner, you were telling me all kinds of stories about your family and your husband's family, and I'm sure you must have noticed that I was uncomfortable when you asked me about my own family."
Elise nodded. "I did, but I didn't want to pry into your personal life."
"It's okay," Sydney said, taking a deep breath. "I guess the first thing I should tell you is that I'm not the only spy in my family. My father works for the CIA too; in fact, he's a double agent like I am, although I never knew it until my fiance was killed. Until then, I thought he worked for an airline parts manufacturer. He and I weren't very close when I was growing up," she explained.
"Were your parents divorced?" Elise asked. Sydney shook her head.
"No. My mother died in a car accident when I was six, and after that my father was so emotionally distant that he and I never really had much of a relationship. We've gotten closer since he told me the truth about who I was working for, but I'm still learning a lot of things about him -- about both of my parents, actually. I've reached a place where I finally trust him, but last year, I didn't trust him at all. I had a lot of questions about him, which I told Michael, so he did some checking around and pulled my father's file, and we learned that he had once been investigated by the FBI."
"He was accused of selling secrets?" Elise asked with surprise. She knew from her years with William that the FBI rarely investigated CIA agents unless they were suspected of being traitors.
"Yes. The FBI suspected him of collaborating with the KGB, but he was eventually cleared. That wasn't enough to alleviate my doubts, though. I knew that he was still hiding things from me, and when I found KGB codes in some of my mother's old books, I was convinced that he actually *did* have ties to the KGB. So, Michael had the codes translated and we discovered that they were order to kill CIA agents, twelve of them, actually. Michael wanted me to turn my father in, but we were just starting to get to know each other, to have an actual relationship, so I was reluctant to report him."
"Well, that's certainly understandable. I can't imagine being in such a position. That couldn't have been an easy decision for you to make."
"It wasn't, and I didn't actually agree to report him until Michael showed me the profile of the twelfth agent. Elise, I don't know how to tell you this," Sydney said as she leaned forward, "but that agent was your husband."
Sydney expected Elise to gasp or scream or kick her out of her office, but she simply leaned back into her chair and let out a slow breath. "That was in December, wasn't it?"
"Yes, it was," Sydney said quietly.
"When Michael came home for Christmas that year, he told me what he had learned about his father's death. When William died, we were never told why or how -- the agency never tells you that -- but I always assumed that he died a violent death. It's a safe bet that when an agent dies in the line of duty, it wasn't from natural causes," she said with a wry smile. "This may sound strange, but when Michael told me that William was murdered, it almost gave me a sense of peace, because at least I didn't have to wonder anymore." She looked at Sydney with questioning eyes. "Did you ever report your father?"
Sydney blinked, surprised by Elise's calm, matter-of-fact demeanor. "I did. Michael and I did together, actually. But when we met with the deputy director, we learned that my father wasn't responsible for those agents' deaths . . . my mother was."
"Your mother? She was the one who killed those agents?" Elise asked with honest shock.
"Yes. As it turned out, she was a KGB agent sent to spy on my father. *She* was the one who received those orders and *she* was the one who carried them out. She killed your husband, and I don't even know how to apologize to you for that."
Elise looked down at her folded hands and Sydney unwittingly held her breath waiting for her to speak again.
"When Michael told me that William was murdered, he was so matter-of-fact about it. If learning the truth was hard on him, he certainly didn't let me see it. If you don't mind my asking, how did he react to the news when you found out?" she asked with concern.
"He was understandably shocked, but he's so selfless that I think he was actually more concerned about my feelings, about how I felt having learned that everything I thought I knew about my mother was a lie. Sometimes he's *too* selfless," she said with a small frown as she remembered the way he'd comforted her, when she probably should have been the one comforting him. Their relationship had been a lot different then, but she wished that she had paid more attention to the pain that he must have been feeling, instead of focusing on her own pain.
"He *can* be far too selfless sometimes," Elise agreed, "but he probably realized, like I do, that what's done is done. By the time he learned the truth, William had been dead for twenty-five years, and nothing would have brought him back. Your mother was dead, too, so it wouldn't have done much good for him to be angry or vengeful."
"No, I suppose not, if her death had put an end to her deception -- but it didn't. We learned a few months later that she faked her death and was still alive. I know this must sound like a ridiculous soap opera," Sydney said with a frustrated shake of her head.
"A bit," Elise said, too stunned to say much else. Her mind couldn't even begin to process the unbelievable story that Sydney was telling her.
"Would you believe me if I said it gets worse?"
"Probably not," Elise said, even as she braced herself for what was coming next.
"It does," Sydney said softly. "When my mother faked her death, she went back to Russia and eventually formed her own crime syndicate."
"You're serious?" Elise asked with a weary, disbelieving smile. Sydney nodded and Elise took a deep breath. "Is she . . . is she on the run? Is she still a threat?"
"I'm not sure if she's still a threat to anyone, but she's in federal custody at the joint operations center in L.A."
"I see. Is there anything else?" Elise asked when Sydney paused. She was almost afraid to know the answer. "Please tell me that there's nothing else," she said with a nervous smile.
"No, that's all," Sydney said. She couldn't bring herself to tell Elise about finding Irina in Taipei and the virus that almost claimed Vaughn's life. She had already overwhelmed her enough for one day. "I can't even imagine what you must be thinking or feeling right now, other than the urge to tell Michael to run as fast as he can."
"Why would you think that I would tell him that?" Elise asked with genuine surprise.
"Because my family is so profoundly screwed up. Sometimes I think he would have been better off if he'd never met any of us. But, Elise, you should know that I love your son more than anyone in this world, and I would sooner die before I'd let my mother hurt him or your family again."
"I believe you, but *you* should know that there will be hell to pay if you have any plans of following in your mother's footsteps and deceiving my son the way that she deceived your father." The steely tone in her voice sent chills down Sydney's spine, and she had no doubt that Elise would carry through on her threat, if necessary.
"That being said," she said in a much warmer tone, "I don't honestly believe that you would ever do that to him, and I like to think that I'm a good judge of character," she smiled. "I have to tell you that I greatly admire your honesty, Sydney. I know it couldn't have been easy for you to come here and tell me what you just did."
"No, it wasn't, but it was something that I needed to do."
"Well, that's at least one difference between you and Michael," Elise said with a thoughtful smile. "He probably never would have told me about your mother."
"Oh, I think he would have, eventually. He was just concerned about how it would affect you."
"That's so like him," she rolled her eyes. "He's always trying to protect the people he loves, even when he doesn't need to. He's spent his whole life doing that, and even though his intentions are good, sometimes it can be infuriating."
"I guess he's used that as a coping mechanism ever since his father died," Sydney said softly. "Just another example of the damage my mother caused."
"Actually, he comes by that honestly. William was exactly the same way," Elise smiled. "He and I didn't argue very often, but when we did, it was usually because I found out that he was keeping some secret in a misguided effort to protect me. It took me years to realize that he wasn't patronizing me, but that he just couldn't bear to see me upset or unhappy. It's amazing how a trait can be someone's best and worst quality at the same time, but I suspect you're learning that with Michael."
Sydney smiled softly. "I think he's spent every minute of the last two years trying to protect me, but even though he doesn't have to, I'd be lying if I said that it wasn't one of my favorite things about him. His capacity to love is amazing."
"So is his capacity for forgiveness," Elise said meaningfully. Sydney looked back at her with surprise.
"Maybe, but I'm not sure he's ever going to be able to forgive my mother. I can't honestly say that she deserves his forgiveness. I don't think she's even expressed remorse for what she did."
Elise swallowed hard at the realization that the woman who killed her husband might not even care about the impact she'd had on twelve families, including her own. She simply couldn't understand how anyone could be so heartless and callous, but it was obvious that those traits hadn't been passed along to her daughter, who sat across from her with tears in her eyes. She was touched by Sydney's obvious guilt and reached across the coffee table to place a comforting hand over Sydney's own shaking hands.
"Forgiveness isn't always earned, Sydney. Sometimes it's just given, even when we don't deserve it. Have *you* been able to forgive your mother?"
"No, not yet. I'm still trying to figure her out, but I want to be able to forgive her so I can move on with my life. But even if I forgive her for what she's done to me, I'm not sure that I can ever forgive her for what she's done to my father and Michael. They're the two most important men in my life, and she ripped both of them apart. I don't know how to feel about that."
"I understand. There aren't any easy answers for that. Now that I know the truth about your mother, I think I'm going to have to work through some forgiveness issues of my own. But Sydney, I won't be forgiving *you* because there's nothing to forgive you for. I don't want to oversimplify things, and I realize that this situation is complicated, but I don't hold you responsible for what your mother did. She's done horrible, despicable things, but it wouldn't be fair to ask you to shoulder the burden of her sins. So maybe you should stop trying to," she said with a sincere smile.
"Elise," Sydney said as a tear ran down her face, "the last thing I expected when I came here was for you to be so understanding. I . . . I don't know what to say or how to repay your kindness."
"Just love my son, and take care of him. That's all you have to do, and as long as you do that, you and I will get along just fine. All I want is for him to be happy. I want that for you too," she said as she stood up and drew Sydney into a hug.
"So do I, and I will, I promise," Sydney said, smiling through watery eyes. It was one of the easiest promises she'd ever had to make.
TBC . . .