Disclaimer: I don't profit when I write these stories, nor do I own them… wish they were, but what will I do with them?

CHAPTER FIVE

Irina sat down on her bed. Paris sometimes shows an aloof exterior, like her father does. But Paris also has Jack's very comforting smile. 'But she referred to him as Agent Bristow. Jack must have repelled her with his anti-Irina Derevko spirit.' She thought and shook her head. Yes, they had collaborated to find Sydney. But they still have misgivings and distrust with each other. Yes, they slept together. But that was out of desire, out of lust. Not love.

'Are you sure?' an inner thought asked. 'Are you sure that what you felt was lust and not love?' it asked. Irina loves Jack. She still is madly and deeply in love with him. But he hates her. He hates her so much that whenever he speaks to her, he doesn't look at her.

Irina closed her eyes. He doesn't know, and he might never know what I've been through so that they wont be harmed.

Kashmir, 1981

The whole room seems to taunt her. It has been three week since she was extracted but instead of returning to Russia, she was sent to Kashmir to be interrogated. Here, she was beaten, electrocuted starved.

And she is pregnant.

She can hear someone approaching. She feigned sleep, curling herself into a ball, not caring if the cement floor is as cold as ice. She shivered, silent tears falling down her face.

The door to her prison opened. She tried hard to be still.

"Irina."

She recognized the voice. But she ignored him.

"Irina, I know you're awake." He said in Russian. Irina meekly sat up and came face to face with her twin brother. Danilov was three hours older than her, giving him the privilege of being the older brother. He is more ruthless, manipulative and violent. He is also one of the ranking officials in KGB. She looked at him, afraid that he would hit her.

Danilov, sensing and seeing the fear in his sister's eyes sighed and went closer. Irina instinctively cowered back.

"Iri, I'm not going to hurt you." He said as he took her hands. They were wounded and bruised.

"Why are you here?" Irina asked, her voice, barely audible.

"I've come to take you home."

"Why? Am I not a traitor to this country?" Irina sarcastically asked.

Danilov rolled his eyes. His sister was born with an acid tongue.

"They were doubtful. Why did you resist your extraction?" he asked as he sat down.

"I can't leave my child and…"

"And your husband." He finished. Irina didn't reply.

Danilov sighed. Irina, being the youngest of them, is more prone to emotional attachments. He doesn't need to torture her to know that Irina loves the CIA agent they made her seduce and marry.

"Just tell them that it was a misunderstanding. That you misunderstood the order."

"Just please don't hurt them. Please Danilov, don't hurt them." Irina pleaded.

"Who said they will be?" he asked.

"Khasinau, Cuvee. All of them." Irina answered.

Danilov hugged her. "No one will. They already ordered that. They won't touch a hair in their heads, okay? Can you now tell them what you've gotten so that you can get out of here?"

"Danilov, I'm pregnant."

Her brother stiffened. "Are you sure?" he asked.

"Yes."

He looked at her and then kissed the top of her forehead. "I'll deal with them." He stood up and went out. She watched him go.

Danilov made it look like the baby was Khasinau's. He knew that her baby would be treated as a second-class citizen because her father is an American.

An enemy.

But they tried to raise her well and Danilov acted as Paris's surrogate father since Khasinau didn't want to pretend he has a child. Her grandparents protected her until their deaths and she was raised not knowing her father. Paris, unfortunately, grew up too fast.

*********

Paris walked out of the cell. She has just finished wiping her tears away and just want to leave. She looked around. Sydney was nowhere to be seen and she feels so out of place because, in the sea of black suits and ties, she's the only one wearing jeans and t-shirt.

'I'm like a kid in an adult's world.' She thought as she smiled a bit to one of the employees.

She walked in the corridor looking for a familiar face when she heard someone talking with a British accent. She looked around and saw a blonde woman talking to Agent Vaughn. She looked familiar.

Paris tried to get a closer look. She doesn't know the woman but she was pretty sure that she has seen her before.

"I'm sorry, honey. I have a meeting. I promise I'll make it up to you." Lauren said to Vaughn as she touched his cheek. Vaughn smiled slightly and touched his wife's hands.

"Okay. Just be careful."

Lauren smiled widely. She then felt someone looking at her way. She looked around and spotted a teenage girl watching them.

"Love, is the CIA recruiting minors?" Lauren asked Vaughn. Vaughn turned to where she was looking and saw Paris.

"Her name's Paris and she's not a teenager. She just looks like one. She's a new employee. Do you want me to introduce you to her? She's also British." Vaughn said. He didn't give any specific information about Paris or what she's in the CIA for. Lauren doesn't even know that Irina Derevko was in CIA custody.

"Maybe some other time, I'm already late for a meeting. She looks a lot like Sydney, though." Lauren said and kissed Vaughn in the cheek. "I'll see you later." She added and hurried off.

Paris watched as Lauren rushed to the elevator. She looked around and saw Weiss, who was reading something, coming her way.

"Hi. Agent Weiss, right?" Paris asked. Weiss looked up from what he was reading and looked at her. He smiled and nodded his head.

"Uhm… I just saw this blonde lady talk to Agent Vaughn and I was wondering if I should know who she is." Paris said and looked at Weiss earnestly.

"Blonde? It must be Lauren, his wife. She's with NSC." Weiss answered and shrugged. "I don't think you should get to know her. She has this rift with your sister." Weiss continued. He doesn't really like Lauren that much.

"Rift?" Paris asked. Weiss nodded his head. "I'll keep that in mind. By the way, do you know where Agent Dixon's office is located?"

"Uh, yeah, go straight up, second door to the left. His name in on the door."

"Thanks."

*********

"Where have you been? I've been waiting for your call!"

"I'm sorry, love. But I'm still at home. Something came up in CIA's operations center. I'm just checking something out." Lauren said as she paced around their bedroom. She was talking in the cell phone.

"Why? What happened?" It was Sark.

"There's this girl. She was giving me this look. And she looks a bit familiar. Vaughn told me she's a new employee. But she looked like a kid."

"What are you doing then?" Sark asked as he opened a bottle of red wine.

"Checking her out. I mean aside from Michael, nobody really knows her name."

"Well then, describe her." Sark said, forgetting to ask the girl's name.

"Well, she's as tall as Sydney, brown hair, brown eyes, wide shoulders. Actually, she has an uncanny resemblance to Bristow and Michael told me she's British." Lauren replied. She heard Sark coughing violently in the background.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just choked on my drink." Sark answered in between coughs. "Did you say a British Sydney Bristow look alike?" he asked.

"Well, the more I think of it, she looks more like Irina Derevko."

Sark didn't answer.

"Are you still there?" Lauren asked.

"Yeah. Uh, I've sent you a photograph in your email." Sark said. "Is that the girl?" Sark asked as he heard a beep on the other line.

Lauren checked her inbox and scanned the picture. "Yeah that's her. Except she has a shorter hair." Lauren answered.

"Is her name by any chance, Paris?"

Lauren paused. "How did you know that?"

"Get out of there, now!" Sark said in an urgent tone.

"What? Why?"

"Just get out of there. Take everything; don't leave a trace. Meet me in Bern, I'll explain everything there." And with that, Sark ended the call.

He can't believe it, 'She's alive.' He thought and paced around the room. 'She's alive, and she's going to kill me.' He thought as he sat down his leather chair.

Acapulco, Mexico

June 3, 1998

Sark, wearing a blue polo and khaki pants, arrived in Irina's private beach house driving his red-hot sports car. He closed the door of his car and approached the front door.

He knocked. A few minutes later, a burly man appeared and let him in. He was led to the patio overlooking the beach.

"Hello, Julian. Its nice of you to join us." Irina said. Sark noticed that she was with her siblings, Katya, Dmitri, and her twin brother, Danilov. One was missing, though.

"Well, you convinced me to come." He answered and looked to the beach. He saw three figures running across the water, laughing. He recognized one of them and smiled.

"I thought she wasn't going to come if I didn't go." He said to Irina.

"Its her birthday. And besides, her cousins begged her to go. You do know her world will not stop for her best friend." Irina replied. Danilov laughed.

"Go to her and say sorry. But then again, She might shoot you. She has her mother's temper, you know." Dmitri said. This time, Katya and Irina laughed.

"Shoot me?" Sark asked.

"She's working against her mother. But she doesn't know that." Danilov said.

"You know?"

"Of course we know. Though a bit late, that's why I brought her here. To let her see that going inside the espionage world will prevent her from doing the things she likes. Even if it's a bit manipulative of me to do that, I'll do whatever it takes to protect her." Irina said. Sark looked at her.

"Go and say hi." Irina said.

"What if she shoots me?" Sark asked.

"Julian, she's not going to shoot you in front of Andre and Daniela." Katya said as she drank her vodka.

Sark shrugged, and then went outside. He moved towards the water to greet Paris a happy sixteenth birthday. She saw him and gave him a wide smile, exposing her dimples.

"I thought you weren't going to come." Paris said and went to him. She was wearing short denim shorts over her blue bathing suit. Her skin was already golden brown.

"Your mother convinced me. She said that you will classify all the rocks you will find in this beach out of boredom if I will not come."

"I might have done that and maybe make a presentation about it and bore everyone to death. But now we can go shopping." She answered teasingly. "Come in the water, its warm."

"Maybe later, in the afternoon." Sark answered.

"There will be jellyfishes in the afternoon, Julian. Anyway, you're the one who's going to be stung." Paris said and smiled. She then went back to her cousins and resumed playing with them.

Sark watched first before he went back to the house to get his towel, strip into his swimming shorts and take off his Rolex watch.

He was going to swim this morning because he doesn't want to be stung by jellyfishes in the afternoon. Besides, he's going to go shopping later.

He looked at one of his paperweights, one of the things they bought in Acapulco. It was still with him. 'She's going to kill me.' He thought as he took his cell phone and dialed a number.

"Sir? I think we have a problem."