A/N: Hey guys! Sorry about the wait, I've had a lot of life changes in the past few months so I didn't have much time to write. Thanks so much for the reviews ShanRB and ReetSLP! It inspires me to keep going when I hear from readers! Don't worry, this story is going to definitely keep going ;)

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"It's time to encourage the good Commissioner to stop butting in to my affairs."

The house was large and empty, but it struck Jacques that Faison's voice never echoed. He looked up from the papers warily at Faison's too-calm pronouncement, sensing a storm brewing deeply. "He could be dangerous."

"I'm the one who can be dangerous," Faison responded flatly. "I made a deal with Scorpio and he's not keeping it."

As Jacques moved to exit the room, Faison called back to him. "Did you deliver the letter I asked you to?"

His man confirmed it. "I dropped it in the letterbox at her house."

Faison only gave the ghost of a smirk, the kind that would normally put Jacques at ease. But it didn't, this time. Jacques didn't know why...but something about this whole thing was off. And there was a small but persistent feeling that sometime in the future, it would be up to him to protect his boss, and he wasn't sure if he was ready for that. He watched Faison, who wasn't worried at all. "Good. I expect an answer soon."

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Fresh off a plane from Thailand, Robert did not stop back at the cottage before heading back to Sean's hospital room. He would see his fiancée soon. He knew Anna would eventually make her way there and somehow when he recalled Kate's face that morning he left, he didn't think going to the Lavery house now was the best idea.

Even so, after what had transpired between the three of them at GH already, he dreaded the sight of Sean's hospital room door. At this point in time, Robert was to be forced into this accord with Sean to take down an enemy, regardless of what would happen after Faison was finally out of their hair. So he wasn't sorry when a beaming Tiffany gave him the news that Sean was being released from the hospital that day.

He met eyes with his former boss over the blonde's shoulder, trying to dull the reflexive anger that arose in him. Now wasn't the time. He was an investigator, an agent, a patriot. He wasn't going to get personal with any of this...

"Best news I've heard all day," Robert smiled at Tiff obligingly as she bustled impatiently around them. Anna was along shortly after, greeting Sean like nothing ever happened. Robert had to wonder if she was that good an actress or if he honestly just cared more than she did about the depth of betrayal. Either option prickled at him unpleasantly, since Anna truly felt like his only ally. And sometimes, she didn't completely at that. Which was not something he wished to examine at the present moment.

She leaned into him after greeting the other two and he caught the pleasant scent of her hair. "How was your trip?"

He leaned in too and muttered "lots to tell" out of the corner of his mouth with exaggerated secrecy. Sean was watching them while Tiffany buzzed happily around her husband. Robert dared him to say anything about it.

"Honey, I…" Sean began, but then he looked around at all three of them and started again. "Actually, I have something to say to all three of you, now that you're all…here."

He proceeded to thank them for getting him through his latest close call, his wife and his two "very close friends". The silence that fell after Sean's plainly heartfelt words was awkward and Robert felt Anna glance at him from his periphery, and he knew she was mildly uncomfortable.

"Well," Robert said with a soft cough to dispel his irritation, "we wouldn't have wanted to lose you."

After another short beat, Sean took a cue to send Tiffany out to bother the doctors and get her out of the room. When she left, he changed modes, all practiced and alert. "Alright, come on, what's the story?"

Robert was all too happy to talk shop. "Desiree's induced suicide was confirmed by the local coroner. It was indeed a poison, a rather nasty variety. I had an independent study done and came up with the same thing. Effective... but nasty."

"And supposedly self-inflicted, I presume, right?" Sean scoffed with his own dry manner.

"Right," he reached into his lapel. "She left a note. My darling," at this Robert couldn't help but glance at a frowning Anna. "I could not bear to face the rest of my life on the run or locked up in prison. Either way would mean enduring—"

Anna looked a little sick as she said, "Boy, I can't believe this…"

"It gets better," Robert assured her. "—a lifetime without you. Please don't be angry, this is the only way out for me. Understand I am thinking only of you. All my love, Desiree."

"You check the handwriting?" Anna asked needlessly. Robert had been doing this for years. Nevertheless, he humored her and nodded.

"Its hers."

"And no link to Faison at all, right?" Sean said, frustration primed.

"What would you expect from an old pro?"

"So I take it none of us believe it was a suicide." Anna said.

"Of course not," Sean responds, shaking his head. "That's not what really worries me though."

"Right. Point is that Faison has simply uh…eliminated the obstacle, that now allows him to go after the thing that he really wants." Again, his eyes found Anna with significance, but she didn't react. He wasn't sure if he wanted her to or not, but it bothered him that she looked more speculative than uneasy.

He had seen that look before…long ago, and more sparingly in recent times. She was reverting, back to an agent.

Back to a double-agent. A voice whispered cruelly in the back of his mind.

He shook it off, warding away the angry voices. And Anna Devane continued her thousand-yard stare, none-the-wiser.

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"This bit about the village, the peninsula—is that true?" Robert had Anna and Sean's file of memories in his hand, browsing through it. He had to admit that some of it was nasty beyond anything he might have assigned to one human being.

Anna had a hand stressing methodically between her eyes. "Yeah, he bragged about it."

"And what about the chemical warfare experiments on his own men?" Robert chuckled incredulously.

"One of them was a double agent—"

Anna stood with a groan, fully agitated. "Do we have to keep talking about this? It's just sickening!"

Robert closed the file and stood as well, back to business. "Look, as far as I'm concerned, we have enough here to take to the Bureau. I tell them Faison's alive. They do our work for us."

Anna swung around to scowl at him. "Oh, Robert, it's not gonna stop there!"

"Robert, everything in that file…" Sean sliced his hand over to the manila folder. "Those are secrets that Anna and I kept for thirteen years, now the WSB's gonna wanna know your source!"

"It's our death certificate, right there in here." Anna tapped the papers in Robert's hand with one finger.

Robert look between their anxious faces and his mouth twisted into a dismissive line. "Never happened. I'll keep you out of it."

Sean groaned and Anna leaned in. "As soon as Faison knows that we betrayed him, he's not gonna take the fall alone!"

"Yeah, he starts pointing fingers, they go right at us."

"Oh, come on! You supposed the Bureau's gonna take the word of a sleazeball over two of their own?"

"Will you come off of it?! Loyalty is not one of the WSB's strong suits!"

Well, you would know, wouldn't you, Sean? Robert bit back the reply that jumped through his head and settled instead for a cold look.

"I think this whole thing is too risky," Anna said.

"It's too risky for all of us," Sean agreed. He gave Robert a no-nonsense glare. "Do you realize the kind of heat you're gonna get to reveal your source?"

Anna looked shaky and sick with fear. She muttered more about not wanting to go ahead with this as Sean spoke and Robert felt a brief sympathy; he had rarely seen her so off-balance, not since the end of their marriage, when she was unmasked as the double agent. "It's not working…" she breathed, her eyes on the ground.

"What else would you like to do?" he asked her calmly. When she turned back to him, her eyes were wide and pleading.

"You don't have anything to do with these problems, right? Why don't you just let Sean and I clean it up."

"And how're you gonna do that?" Robert followed-up, seeing where this was going. He already knew her answer. Damnit, how he knew this woman and those imploring dark eyes. When she got scared, she got reckless, and it scared the hell out of him. But if he showed her that, then she would never cave to his line of thinking, so he remained as calm as possible, knowing the words that would come out of her mouth before she said them.

She took a deep breath. "We're gonna go after Faison."

Robert laughed mirthlessly. "Look. The object of the exercise it to keep Robin and the both of you out of this."

"Right, but you can't keep us out of it, we're already into it!" Sean growled. He jerked his head toward Anna. "I agree with Anna, we go after him."

"Alright," Robert said. He ignored the possible distress he felt at his two best friends ranged against him, threatening to take a dark leap where Robert wouldn't. They had done that before and look where it had gotten them all. Right to this moment. "We're professionals… rule #6 in the book, as I recall, we take the least risky approach, right?" He looked at their utterly unconvinced faces and steadfastly ignored them. "Right. So," he picked up the papers with more force than necessary, pretending to study them. "I go to the Bureau first…well, of course I'm the only one that can go to the Bureau, can I?"

Anna was watching him intently, seeing right beyond his joking façade to that thinly-veiled fury. "It might be too late."

"Meaning what?"

"He already had Desiree killed in Thailand. He may know that you took a trip out there." She raised her voice. "That means that he has carte blanche to do whatever it is that he has—"

"Enough!" Robert cut across her, revealing the anger that Anna had meant to reveal, but not much caring that he had walked right into it. "We've wasted enough time with this conversation. We DEAL with this man before—" The possibilities raced through his mind and again, he tried to shut it down. Visions of Anna, visions of his daughter. "…before he does something else to us."

And with that, he left Anna and Sean standing there and slammed the room of the door, ignoring the medical personnel milling about, the ones that couldn't mind their own damn business from the look of them. Only moments later came Anna's voice.

"Robert!"

Oh, how he wanted to ignore her. He did. But he couldn't find it in himself, as ever, and he was soon turning around to face her.

"What now?"

"Look, I'm letting you do this your way because you've been hurt by all of this too." Robert almost stepped back as she pushed her soft, firm hands into his and squeezed, trying to put him under that influence she so naturally exuded. "And I know you don't want us to go off and do something on our own, so I need you to promise me that when the Bureau doesn't listen and this doesn't work that you'll let me do what I need to do."

"If the Bureau doesn't listen," Robert insisted, trying to draw his hands away from her, but she held fast. "We, and I do mean we… will figure something else out."

"I already know what to do!" Anna pulled at his fingers, forcefully pushing him towards her. "I know how to handle him."

"I don't want you handling him, Anna!" Robert said at a near-shouting level that had several doctors, nurses, and patients turning towards them, perturbed and Robert immediately regretting his volume.

"Hush," Anna glared, finally releasing him, to Robert's immense relief, not to be examined for the cause. "Unless you want the whole hospital to be privy to our investigation!"

"Of course, dear," Robert sneered more quietly. "Wouldn't want the denizens of Port Chuck knowing the dark truth, would we? Although, it's probably too much to be believed of you."

He hit home on that one and Anna flinched visibly. Robert blinked and then quickly reeled her back in, as if the faster he could salve the unintentional wound, the faster it would heal. No one had ever told him emotions didn't work that way. "I didn't mean that."

"You did," Anna said, blinking away the hurt from her eyes. "And that's alright. As long as you listen to me. As long as you let me do what I need to do."

She didn't understand that he could not let her. After everything that had happened thirteen years ago, the last place he wanted her was anywhere near Faison. Anna nearly jumped out of her skin when they were interrupted.

"Is everything alright over here?" Dr. Tom Hardy looked concerned, but his voice was kind as he inquired and Robert could see that many eyes behind him were still drawn over here. Robert dropped his arms from Anna's and smiled.

"Sure, Doc…just a private conversation. We apologize for any disturbances, we'll take it elsewhere."

Anna nodded when Tom glanced at her for confirmation and Robert felt a prickle of irritation that anyone could believe him capable of bullying his ex-wife, especially someone who knew them as well as Tom did. Without saying much else, Robert grabbed Anna's hand and pulled her away and into the elevator.

"Oh, Anna…" Once the doors closed them in, Robert rubbed a hand over his face and tried his best not to be cruel. "I don't know how many ways I can tell you that I really, really don't want you near this person."

"Right. Well you know what I want, Robert?" Anna asked him tiredly. "I want him out of our lives! I'm fine with you doing what you need to do the right way. But Faison isn't going to wait much longer before he makes a move. And if it comes to it, you have to let me do this!"

"And you can do it?" Robert challenged her. "You can be some objective operative after all that he has done?"

Anna frowned at her ex's skepticism. "It's you that can't be objective, Robert. Faison…he doesn't work like you. I know you 'know' this, but I don't think you really believe what he's capable of." Anna looked away from him. "He's evil." When her eyes met his again, they were confident, but irritated. "I can get the job done, you know. I always have."

Robert sighed. "That you do, luv." The elevator pinged and he briskly kissed her cheek. "I'll see you when I get back. We'll talk about this then."

As Robert went his separate way, headed to talk to WSB Director Ross, he shook his head.

Like hell they would ever talk about it again.

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"So what do you think that was all about?" Nurse Amy Vining murmured breathlessly to the orderly beside her. She had, by a fortunate turn of events, been on the floor for Robert and Anna's heated conversation and hurried exit. And she was very intrigued by it, needless to say. "Did you know that they were married before? They have this cute little daughter named Robin and they've always been best friends, but you wouldn't think that from looking at them today. Today, they looked liked a pair of quarreling lov—"

"You know, Nurse Vining," came a male voice from behind that sent the orderly scurrying away with some lame excuse. "I'd bet you don't get paid to spread gossip about prominent citizens. Isn't there a phone you could answer or a patient to check on?"

Amy was rolling her eyes before she ever turned around. She recognized the voice. It was an arrogant young doctor who had just begun his residency. The nurses either loved him or hated him, depending on how much they went in for a chiseled jaw and charming smile. "Dr. Fitzpatrick. You only moved here a month ago. What would you know?" Amy might not mind a young guy around the hospital who was easy on the eyes, but she did mind him ruining her fun.

"I know enough." The young doctor had already heard about the police commissioner and his ex-wife, the very beautiful former police chief who ran a private investigator office with their mutual best friend, the wealthy Sean Donely. All three had been big-time WSB spies, according to the grapevine. As he had said before, Robert and Anna were prominent citizens in Port Charles. But that didn't mean he had to give Amy the satisfaction of telling tales about other people's private lives. "I know you don't need to start spreading gossip when you didn't hear a word of their conversation!"

Amy crossed her arms and pouted. "I did too. Robert said she didn't want Anna 'handling' some man! Which is already something. I've always thought Robert had quite the jealousy problem where Anna was concerned. He and her last husband, Duke, didn't get along at all. Why, I remember when she got kidnapped by Grant Putnam, and the two of them were just snarling at each other right over Anna's hospital bed, blaming each other for what happened to her." She sighed, like imagining herself being fought over by a dashing Scotsman and rugged Australian. "And anyway, you didn't need to hear what he and Anna were saying, you just had to look at their body language…I mean, I've seen Robert and Anna flirt, everybody has. But that was just—"

"You know what?" Dr. Fitzpatrick said, grabbing his clipboard. "I'll catch you later. I have actual work to do. And why don't you go see if those blood samples I asked about an hour ago are ready, okay?"

Amy huffed, but headed downstairs all the same. On the way, she was ecstatic to run into Tiffany, who had just gone out to answer a call from the station. "Tiffany! How are you? I heard Sean is going to be released."

Tiffany smiled, her mind somewhat elsewhere. "Yes, he is. Actually, I was going to get the papers when there was some issue at the station. I'm taking him home right now. Robert and Anna are with him."

Amy smiled. "Robert and Anna just left, actually…" she paused for dramatic effect. "They were in the hall having some conversation and Tom went to break it up and they took off for the elevators."

"The elevators?" Tiffany frowned, looking toward the doors. "Huh. You said they had a fight?"

"Well, I don't know for sure. It looked very…intense. They were kind of grabbing at each other and Robert lost his cool for a minute there, but nobody could really hear what exactly they were saying. And then they left together." Amy took a step closer to Tiffany, unable to wipe the speculative look off her face. "And I also heard that earlier this week, Anna and Katherine were arguing right outside Sean's room and Katherine was very upset about it and Anna looked upset. Did Robert and Katherine break up?"

"Break up?" Tiffany gasped. "Of course not! Why would you even think…" she trailed off, realizing who she was talking to and what Amy was inferring. "Oh, come on! I'm sure that was nothing. Just Robert and Anna being…" she searched for the word she was looking for, but came up with nothing. "…themselves. It doesn't mean anything. Don't you go telling anybody that Robert and Katherine broke up, because it just isn't true." Her eyes narrowed. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to get my husband's paperwork so that he can go!"

Without another word, Tiffany swept off to do exactly that. It didn't take her long to return, armed with a wheelchair and worked-up into a slight temper.

"Sean! I have your release papers and we can get out of here now. Which is good, because you will not believe what Amy Vining just asked me!"

A/N: Yo! Reviews are love :)