"So," said Murphy, offering Connor a sorely needed beer. "How did it go?"
"I can't honestly say that she took it that well."
"Well she didn't shoot at ye."
"She couldn't shoot at me. I took her gun away." Connor sat down heavily in a chair across from his brother.
"Always a wise precaution where women are concerned," said Da seriously, emerging from the bathroom.
"She did," Connor continued, feeling too depressed to find Da's philosophies on life amusing, "throw a sword at me." There was a silence after this statement. Da grabbed a bottle of the hard stuff and Murphy just sat still, trying to absorb this information.
"Well," he said after a minute. "That's creative."
"You put them where?" Diana hissed, outraged. Whoever it was on the line had just informed her that after they had apprehended the Saints that morning, the agents had placed them in a jail cell in the Boston police station. "Do you have any idea how big of a screw up that was?" Diana was almost yelling now. "No… no… I don't think you do…. You know what. Nevermind. Don't ever do that again," she concluded pathetically, hanging up the phone with a snap.
She ran a hand through her hair, feeling frazzled. She had almost packed up the case. She would have never had to see Connor or Murphy again… ever. And then the job had been botched.
Surprisingly enough, they were still in the neighboring apartment. But though Diana was half tempted to just call back and have them taken now, after all that had transpired, to have them arrested in their apartment just seemed entirely unethical at this point. In fact, she refused to even think of it as an option… instead going back to the phone taps.
It was easier now. She'd put phone taps on their apartment, and had agents watching the phone booths within a ten block radius. Even so, she was nervous. She thought she'd be lucky now to ever get another opportunity to do her job.
But we are continually surprised.
Two days later she got another lead. An agent tailing them had overheard part of a phone booth conversation and suggested that their next target would be on the ninth floor of a hotel on the other side of the city the following evening.
Perhaps against her better judgement, Diana decided that this job would be one she'd do alone. She'd call when she needed it, but the less visible agents on the premises, the more likely they'd get it right this time. The crucial question, the Diana was trying not to think about was… could she shoot Connor if she had to? Could she shoot Murph and Da if she had to?
Roughly 26 hours later, she found out. She'd gone to the hotel in the afternoon, and decided that staying there would be the best way to avoid being seen. She stayed in the least expensive room, courtesy of the FBI, and sat around trying to distract herself with the Tempest, or anything else but the job at hand.
Two hours before the predetermined time, she went into job mode. It took her a short twenty minutes to get into position, which seemed lucky, but made Diana wary. Jobs that began easy had a habit of becoming ugly quickly, or unexpectedly.
"So we know they're coming," said a gruff voice.
"That's what our contact at the station said." Said another. "They're supposed to be here any minute."
Oh my God, Diana thought to herself. It's been staged..
