Chapter 7

The next day Nate rose early and made his way into the kitchen putting the kettle on to make his coffee. He thought he had put this all behind him, he had taken Sophie away from it, from harm's way and now, now he had been the cause of not only David's death but his daughters' death too. His team was in danger and more importantly Sophie was in danger. His past, their pasts were coming back to haunt him, and he realised that with the people they had taken down over the years, this was always going to be a possibility. Some ex-mark coming to look for vengeance for what they had done, what he had done to them. They were never truly going to be safe, not him, not Sophie and not the other three. He had no idea what he was going to do, all he knew was he had to draw Moreau away, he was under no illusions that once Moreau had taken care of him he would go after the rest of the team.

"Nate." Eliot said stepping into the kitchen startling the Mastermind out of his thoughts.

"Eliot." Nate said pouring his coffee and adding a liberal dash of whiskey too it. "Coffee?"

"Yeah." Eliot said and Nate took out a cup for him before sitting at the table.

"What are you thinking Nate?"

"Right now Moreau is focused on me and that is the way it is going to stay. But you know as well as I do Eliot he will come after the rest of you if this does not work." Nate said taking a sip of his Irish. "I need your word Eliot that no matter what happens you will keep Sophie safe. You will kill Moreau to keep her safe if I fail."

Eliot just stared at the man This was the first time Nate had openly asked him to kill somebody for him. He knew the man was scared for his wife's life as well he should be. Nate was right, if he failed then he would be dead, and Moreau would come after all of them and Eliot was prepared to do whatever it took to keep them safe even if Nate had not asked. The thought of killing Moreau did not bother him but hearing Nate of all people asking him to do such a thing, that bothered him. It bothered him because it told him exactly where Nate was and that scared the living hell out of the Hitter.

"Nate I worked for this man and he…he will have studied you and he will know how you work. Remember Nate he has seen your work up close."

"I am not forgetting that Eliot, in fact I am counting on it." Nate said brining a frown to the Hitters face. "Now I am going to get cleaned up." Nate said downing the last of his Irish and then standing and walking away before Eliot could ask what Nate meant.

Eliot watched him go and shook his head, he had never been able to follow Nate's planning fully especially in times like these when he could see no way out of the predicament, but over the years he had realised that Nate could pull the most impossible jobs off and they only saw how it worked at the end, and sometimes not even then. When Nate did not want to share he didn't and they had almost blind faith in his abilities, with good reason. Nate had never let them down, never failed them and never got any of them in situations where they could loose their lives, he always managed to pull of the impossible, even if the job went bad he found a way and Eliot hoped that this would be no exception.

By the time the others started to emerge from their rooms Eliot was halfway through preparing breakfast. Sophie and Nate were the last to arrive at the table just as the meal was ready to be served. They ate in silence all of them wondering what Nate had planned for the day, how he was going to pull this one off, but none asked, Nate would tell them when he was good and ready, even Sterling ate in silence. Once the meal was over coffee was served and they all sat around the table when Sterling was the one to bring up the plans for the day.

"So Nate, what's the plan?" Sterling asked sipping his coffee as he watched his friend closely.

"Well Jim we are going to the funeral. There we will have a slight disagreement and then I will leave. You will all come back here, and I will go to my apartment."

"Disagreement?"

"Yes Parker, I am going to tell you that I am going to kill Moreau and you are all going to object." He looked at all of them and smiled into his Irish. "Should not be too hard to fake considering."

"So you kill two birds with one stone." Sterling said nodding slightly.

"Sorry?" Parker said not understanding what the man was saying.

"Well Parker Nate here is going to make it clear to Moreau he intends to come after him and kill him, just like he did on the phone, that way Moreau will be forced to go after Nate first, even if he was not planning to, even if he was going to come for you lot first."

"So he forces Moreau's hand." Hardison said not liking this scenario at all.

Nate said nothing he just watched the reactions from his team. Trust Sterling to cotton on to what he was planning and thinking.

"Nate he will come after you hard." Eliot said softly not liking this plan at all. Even if they covered the place there was no guarantee that they could get to Nate in time if Moreau came for him. Of course he thought looking at the man, that is what he wanted, he wanted Moreau to come at him hard, he wanted to kill the man and Moreau wanted to kill him, that was an unbelievably bad combination.

"Nate I don't like this." Sophie said softly putting her hand on his. She knew Sterling was right, Nate was not only drawing Moreau away from the team and focusing the man on him, but Moreau would go after Nate hard and fast. "You are making him angry and afraid."

"Afraid?" Eliot said looking at Sophie quizzically, why did she think he would be afraid.

"Yes Eliot, you were right Moreau knows Nate, he knows what Nate can do, but he does not know it all and that will scare him, he has been beaten by him twice and he will do anything to avoid that, in other words he is not going to give Nate time to put a plan together, he will take him out first."

"Right." Nate said bringing all their eyes to him and silence fell as they waited for him to continue. "That is exactly right. He will come for me and he will come for me as quickly as possible. That means he may make a mistake."

"He will have help Nate."

"So do I." Nate said smiling at his Hitter. "Well I am going to get ready the funeral is in two hours."

"Can we get to him before Moreau does, I mean if Moreau comes after him hard?" Sophie asked turning to Eliot after watching Nate leave. "Will he go himself or send somebody. I mean I know he wants to kill Nate himself, but will he go after him himself or get somebody to bring him to him? There are too many variables here Eliot and Nate is going to get himself killed."

"That is not your worst worry." Sterling said and seeing them all look at him he sighed. "Nate is doing this to draw Moreau away from you all as much as anything else. He wants Moreau to come at him before you can get to him, he wants that."

They all looked at him and knew he was right. Nate was doing this to make sure they remained safe as much as anything else.

"He also does not want us around when he…when he kills him." Sophie told them. "He won't do it if we are there."

"Like at the Dam?" Parker said understanding what Sophie was saying. "Because we don't want him to, because it would hurt us if he did."

"Just like that Parker." Sophie agreed.

"Dammit." Eliot said frustrated at the whole situation. "How do we stop this and how do we stop him and how do we stop Moreau?"

"You can't." Sterling stated. "I know Nate as well if not better than you all do." He smiled as they all looked at him dubiously. "I was there, I lived through it and this is another child that has died. Nate is not only doing this to keep you all safe he is doing it because of Elysia. Because a ten-year-old child died, and she died because of something he did or did not do. There is nothing you can do to stop this. All you can do is hope to stop him from getting himself killed at the same time."

Silence settled over the group after that. They all knew Sterling was right and none of them knew how they were going to help Nate or save Nate. They were in an impossible situation and none of them knew what to do.

"Well I am going to go and get ready." Sophie said standing and looking at her family and Sterling. "There is nothing else we can do now we just have to hope we can…well we will follow Nate's plan and make sure that we are there when we need to be."

Parker and Hardison nodded and Eliot just looked at her dubiously. Sterling finished his coffee and rose to get ready as well, how he had allowed himself to get involved in this he was not sure, he should have just left after taking care of their cover as they requested, but for some reason he could not. Maybe because he was not there for Nate when Sam died, and he was trying to make up for it with the death of the girl. Him and Nate had rekindled their friendship after the last job and besides he owed the man for his daughters safety and that was a debt he would never be able to repay, especially considering Nate had done what he did despite how he had behaved when Nate had lost his son. He signed heavily as he walked into his room to prepare for the day ahead.