Harrison looked around the packed airport as he tried to figure out which direction to take. The board high above him in the terminal told him that he had plenty of time before the next flight to New Orleans left but he didn't want to take any chances and there was no telling whether Cassie had already arrived or not.


Tru looked around the convenience store and quickly located Diane Miller in the grocery section. She kept one eye on Diane as she scanned the store for anyone acting suspiciously.
"No sir," the woman at the desk said in response to Harrison's question. "Check in time for that flight is not for another hour at least."

"So the passengers aren't here yet?" Harrison confirmed.

"Some of them are probably already here, waiting," the woman replied. "Better early than late after all. But no one has checked in as yet."

"I'm looking for someone," Harrison said. "She about so high," he raised his hand to indicate Cassie's height, "long black hair…"

He halted as the woman shook her head, "I'm sorry, we get a lot of people through here, you've just described any one of a number of them."

Harrison looked back at the woman and wished that he was the type of person to carry a picture of his girlfriend in his wallet. The woman at the desk indicated for him to step aside so that she could deal with another person who had approached her and Harrison dutifully moved out of the way, taking a seat nearby.


"Looking for someone?" Jack asked in Tru's ear, smirking a little as she jumped, startled, at his approach.

"Don't you have somewhere else to be?" Tru hissed. "Isn't it a little late in the day for you to be only now turning up?"

"I thought you'd forgotten about Mrs Miller," Jack replied. "Too busy with other matters. Do you know who the robber is yet?"

Tru frowned as she looked around the store again. She could tell that Jack knew who it was that she needed to find, his particular brand of gloating always gave away when he was one up on her.

"How about him?" Jack said with a nod towards a young teenager in scruffy jeans, trainers, and a cap that was pulled low over his eyes. "He looks a little shifty if you ask me."

"If you're pointing him out it must be someone else," Tru replied and directed her gaze in the opposite direction.

"Hand over all the cash in the register," a young male voice demanded drawing Tru's attention back to the direction of the counter. She glanced at the young teenage boy for a second before looking back to Jack.

"I'm hurt that you wouldn't believe my word," Jack whispered. "So untrusting, so sure that I was lying, so…predictable."

Tru glared at Jack one last time before moving cautiously across the store to where Mrs Miller was standing, her attention also drawn to the counter.

"Don't move Tru, you'll draw his attention," Jack said in an unnecessarily loud voice, designed specifically to draw the attention of the robber directly to her.


Harrison was too restless to sit down for long and within ten minutes he was back on his feet searching the endless stream of people coming and going for the one face he wanted to see. He had again tried calling her cell phone but again it was switched off, he had left another message but his own phone had yet to ring.

He paced back and forth across the waiting area, glancing repeatedly at his watch and at the clock on the wall and wishing for the hundredth time that he had handled things better that morning.

As was his luck for the whole day, he was looking in the entirely wrong direction when Cassie herself arrived at the airport.


"Don't move," the teenager robber shouted, waving his gun in the direction of Tru and Mrs Miller. Tru came to halt in her tracks and raised her hands so that the youth could see that she was unarmed.

The teenager turned cautiously back to the cashier, directing him with a wave of the gun to carry on emptying the register.

Tru wondered whether it was worth edging slowly to Mrs Miller or not, she thought she could manage to avoid being spotted by the robber but unfortunately she knew that the second she inched forward Jack would be sure to say something again. She was already looking in the direction of Mrs Miller and tried, with her facial expression, to get her attention.

Mrs Miller looked at Tru curiously as Tru tried to indicate with her eyes for Mrs Miller to get down on the ground, and thus be safe from the future flying bullet. Unfortunately although she could tell that the woman had got her message, she could also tell that she had got a different one from Jack. Tru watched her eyes flicker from herself to Jack who was just behind her, she watched the indecision in the woman's face stop her from taking her silent advice and instead remain standing, just as Jack wanted her too.


"Harrison?" Cassie asked as she approached him while he was looking up at the departures' board.

"Cassie?" Harrison replied in a shocked tone. Despite the fact that he had come to the airport to find her, knowing that she had to come through the area where he was waiting, he still couldn't quite believe that she had finally appeared at his side, at the exact time he was looking in the other direction.

"You came to see me off?" Cassie asked with a small smile. "I'm so sorry we argued this morning."

"Me too," Harrison replied, pulling her to one side and out of the way of the crowd of passengers. "I shouldn't have stormed out like that."

"It's okay," Cassie assured him. "I guess I shouldn't have sprung it on you like that. I'm glad you're here though. I really didn't want to leave without saying goodbye."

"But you were still going to," Harrison pointed out, knowing even as he said the words that he was stalling for time.

"I didn't want to get in the way between you and Lindsay," Cassie said, looking away towards the other side of the room, unable to meet Harrison's eyes.

"Lindsay?" Harrison repeated. "What the hell is it with the women in my life that they all seem to think I want to get back together with Lindsay?"

"I saw you together," Cassie said, her tone slightly accusing but with the hint of a question in it.

"That would be Tru's crap attempt at matchmaking," Harrison replied with a scowl. "Me and Lindsay aren't getting back together, neither of us want that."

"You don't?" Cassie asked, still slightly unsure. "Jack said that…"

"Jack?" Harrison interrupted. "Since when is that ass known for telling the truth?"

"Um…"

"I think the word you're looking for is 'never'," Harrison said with a roll of his eyes.

"Now can we just go back to your place and talk about things sensibly?"

"But my flight…"

"…can wait. If they want to do business with you that badly they can wait a few more days, right?"

"I guess."

"So what are we standing here for?" Harrison asked, giving Cassie a quick kiss, before putting his arm around her shoulders and guiding her back out of the airport. He spared a quick glance over his shoulder for the woman at the desk and gave her a quick wink when she smiled across the room at him.


Tru tried over and over to silently persuade Mrs Miller to get down on the ground but Jack was just more convincing, and with the reaction of the robber to her previous attempt to move, it was only natural that the woman would not be eager to attract his attention. Unfortunately Tru couldn't think of a way to get the message across to the woman that if she remained on her feet, where she was standing, she was going to be dead in a very short space of time.

The cashier finally finished putting the money into the bag and nervously passed it across to the robber who kept the gun pointing across the counter as he shoved the bag inside his jacket and started edging towards the door.

Tru looked at the doorway and saw that a police officer was heading straight to the store. She realised that the officer had no idea what he was walking into, his gun was still holstered and his wave across the street to his partner standing at their vehicle, indicated he was merely coming into the store to buy something. The robber however was not as observant as she was and at the sight of the uniformed officer coming towards him he scuttled back from the door and moved further into the store.

Tru watched him looking wildly about the room and realising he was looking for a hostage stepped forward, placing herself in between him and Mrs Miller. The robber pulled her towards him and she felt the cold metal against her throat a second before the officer walked into the door.

She caught Jack looking at her cautiously and realised that he had not anticipated that move. She wondered if he would leave her to her fate or stop her from being killed in Mrs Miller's place. He said that he had to ensure each day ended the same as the previous one and she had lived the previous day, but that philosophy had not stopped him from killing Luc; would it stop him from letting her die?

"Drop the gun," the officer said calmly, his hands held outstretched and away from his own sidearm.

"Get back," the youth said in a voice that wavered with uncertainty. Tru inched backwards with him as he moved further into the store.

"You don't want to do this," Tru said in a quiet voice. "You don't want to kill me, you don't want to kill anyone. You know you don't."

"Shut up," the youth hissed as he continued to move backwards.

"Just drop the gun," Jack interrupted and Tru turned to see that he was standing with a gun of his own raised and pointing in their direction.

"You'll hit your girl if you shoot," the robber said, pushing his own gun that little bit harder into Tru's neck.

"That's a risk I'm prepared to take," Jack said. I'll bet he is, Tru thought to herself as she glared at Jack, calmly aiming a gun straight at her.

The officer stepped forward to stand at the side of Jack. "Just drop your gun, sir," he advised him. "Leave this to the professionals."

Tru watched Jack's face alter and the mask that told her he was lying and putting on an elaborate act for others slipped into place.

"He'll kill her," Jack said with a fake sob of frustration. "I can't let him just kill her without doing anything about it."

"Just lower the gun, sir," the officer repeated. "You aren't doing any good by taking the law into your own hands."

Tru watched Jack's hand shaking as he started to lower the gun; she was probably the only one who caught Jack's quick smile, right before he shouted "no!" and the sound of a gunshot rang out in the store.