A/N: This little vignette starts right after the end of 2.01 Breaking and Entering,where Fiona has informed Michael that they can't be together, and covers events from 2.02 Turn and Burn and 2.03 Trust Me. Honestly, it was kind of tough writing the 'Theirs' portion of this, since they aren't together in this scenario, but here it is nonetheless. As usual, all reviews welcome and much appreciated. A belated birthday shout out to the amazing DKougar, hope it was awesome, and much love to the #Burners of Twitter and FB.

()()()

His

When you work as a spy, it's easy to think of people as assets- resources to accomplish a goal- because you don't have a personal relationship with an asset. You don't care about an asset. You don't miss the scent of an asset when she leaves the room.

He had stared after Fiona as she had swept out the door, pausing to look back at him before she'd eventually moved past the heavy metal barrier without bothering to close it behind her. She had been waiting… for him to say something… to do something possibly…

But he'd had no idea what that should be… and then she was gone. The burned spy paused before moving to secure the doorway again.

But the staccato beat of her platform shoes against the rusty metal stairs and the sound of the Saab protesting Fiona's heavy foot let him know she was truly gone. Michael sighed. At least he'd been able to put the convertible his grateful client had given him to good use. It had temporarily placated the Irishwoman that morning. But he had known there was no way to avoid permanently the topic of the current status of their romantic relationship

"Time to talk…"

On the one hand, he really would have rather set himself on fire. But there was a part of Michael that had wanted to tell her the truth. Dealing with the people who burned him was dangerous for anyone he cared about. Yes, he needed and valued her tactical support and even her friendship, but being in a relationship with him was a death sentence for her right now.

"Don't look at me, I don't get it. I don't get why you're so dead set on getting back it. Why go back to work for the people who've put you through all this?"

He'd known she wasn't going to understand. The former PIRA operative would be equally dismissive of the danger as his reasoning for engaging in it. But then something odd and completely unanticipated had happened.

"What are you saying, Fi?"

The burned spy looked down at the tablet, loaded with five hundred files detailing every nasty op Ryder Stahl's mercenaries had been involved with. He knew he should be studying the intelligence Jimmy had helped retrieve and conveniently provided copies for him to peruse as well; however, Michael kept replaying the conversation he'd just had with her instead.

"That I'll always care about you... Michael... and I'll still help you with your thing and you'll still help me with mine, but we can't be together."

In the push-pull dynamic that had defined their interaction for the last decade, that was literally the last thing he had expected to hear from her.

The slender redhead generally pursued any opening on his part that indicated an interest in deepening their connection and his perceived rejections of her were usually met with a certain degree of violence.

When he'd seen her for the first time after Ireland, she'd pistol whipped him… , The last time he'd seen the fiery Irishwoman before being kicked awake by her well placed boot, she'd cut him free, scoring his bicep in the process, before burying the knife next to his face, slapping him nearly senseless and then deserting him in Berlin.

"Think of all the fun we could have, Michael…"

"I'd like that… when all this is over one day…"

He really couldn't blame her for being furious then either… although Fiona did tend to interpret things the way she wanted to hear them, even if it hadn't been exactly what he'd been saying in the context and he had meant what he'd said… He'd just clearly been too awash in post coital dopamine to consider how his words might have been taken in those circumstances.

Even now, in the relative silence of the enormous industrial space he'd been using as a base for these last six months and an ocean away from the places they'd been together, Michael still felt the energy that Fiona brought by her mere presence. Of course he wanted her around. But at the end of the day, he knew he couldn't meet her expectations for their mutual future.

"I know. I said that for a long time."

"Yes, you have."

Her quiet assent stood in complete contrast to the roundhouse punch she'd thrown when this whole thing with Jimmy and Security Associates had started. He shivered involuntarily at the memory of their all too brief embrace before his mother's phone call had interrupted their close contact.

His former lover had agreed to provide the tactical support he desperately needed, the added pleasure of her company and friendship, all without any of the complications that their previous connection inherently included.

He knew at some point in the not too distant future there would be a new man in her life to contend with. Women like Fiona didn't stay unattached for long and she'd already given her a foretaste of that with Tom McKee.

"I didn't think we were in a relationship, Michael…"

The dark haired man sighed again and ran his hand over his face. The fiery redhead had literally given him everything he'd thought he had wanted and without grievous bodily injury this time. So, why did it feel so wrong?

Michael dismissed the sense of foreboding with a forceful shake of his head.

He needed to meet Sam down at Carlito's and see if he'd had any follow-up contact with Jimmy and then get prepared for his promised meeting with the mysterious Carla. If the organization that had burned him truly had the resources it seemed, this was going to be a major challenge…

"I remember the old days. Once you go to work, someone always starts shooting at you."

Hopefully there would be less gunfire this time, but he wasn't counting on it.

Time to go to work…

()()()

Hers

As usual, Michael's timing had been amazing and infuriating all at once.

She knew she'd have to ditch her stolen Honda CRV after Carla's goons had put some very hot assault rifles in the rear of the white vehicle while she'd been at the beach. With the ATF busy arresting Ryder Stahl and his crew for possessing them, it seemed highly prudent to leave the SUV that had transported the guns somewhere that it would not linger on the streets long after she'd abandoned it in one of Miami's less savory neighborhoods.

After that, once Sam had dropped her back at her Intracoastal apartment, she'd alternated between contemplating what to do about her apparent crossroads in her relationship with the burned spy and whether she should expend some of her hard earned cash on a car instead of going shopping for yet another five finger discount in the nearest commuter lot the next day.

So when Michael had called to tell her that he was on his way to pick her up because he had something for her to drive, that had nicely resolved her transportation issues. But it had firmly put her problems with her on-again off-again here-again gone-again lover to the forefront of her mind.

Studying his profile while they made the short drive to Jimmy's workplace in the early morning hours to retrieve the black Saab, having the keys for once was a nice change, had as usual softened her resolve to tell him the truth.

But as he went on about his acquisition of the vehicle and the final happy disposition of its owner and his family and his latest problems resolving his burn notice, Fiona knew full well that Michael Westen only talked this much when he was actively avoiding the discussion of more uncomfortable topics.

Then going through the data on the misdeeds of Security Associates, she'd already known what was coming. She had moved to Miami to see where their partnership could go once Michael wasn't tied down to a government agency and for a very brief time she'd been hopeful… but not anymore…

"You had a choice to make and you made it. I always thought, maybe, when it came down to it… that… but you didn't…

Leaving the loft, Fiona had found she hadn't been furious; she'd just been reconciled to her new reality. Pausing at the door, she'd waited to see if her declaration would be met with any sort of contradiction. But the dark haired man had merely stood there at the bar, looking as resigned as she'd felt.

Time to talk had become time to go, to continue on with her life… albeit with Michael still in it this time… How odd that had felt… not to be enraged…

When he'd abandoned her in Ireland, she'd destroyed their apartment, wanting her surroundings to mirror the turmoil in her heart. When she'd seen him again in Tripoli, the former freedom fighter turned gun runner had wanted him to feel the pain he'd caused her. Over the intervening years, Fiona told herself she could continue with her life just fine with him dropping in and out of it at random. Those two weeks in Milan had been heaven…

But after Berlin, the Irishwoman knew that was a lie. The sense of betrayal she'd felt when she'd realized that he'd meant he wanted to be with her when his self-imposed obligation to the government was over and she was decidedly not at the top of his priority list had overwhelmed her. Then her subsequent rage had helped clarify for her and for the spy as well that Fiona Glenanne was not content to take a backseat to the CIA any longer.

Now as she sat in the corner of her third club of the night along South Beach, feeling the pounding bass in her bones as deeply as her sense of finality, the petite redhead in the skimpy pink print party dress decided she still wasn't angry about what had happened. When Michael had blown her off after she'd first arrived in Miami, she'd gone to Benny's Place out for blood.

She chuckled internally at the memory of breaking Matt Delaney's leg for the affront of trying to put his hand up her skirt and she'd nearly had to repeat that performance over the course of this evening a couple of times, hence this being her third stop of the evening and all, and a very tiny part of her that was getting smaller as the night wore on had hoped perhaps to see Michael step out of the shadows as he had that night at the smuggler's bar.

But he didn't…

And she knew she'd made the right decision.

And she wasn't looking for a fight tonight to assuage her fury. Fiona wasn't fuming…she was… hoping that without a job to occupy him, they could have been them again… She liked Miami, she'd made friends in the gun runner community, she had her secret stash house out in the Everglades and she enjoyed the work they did helping the little people for the most part.

But apparently they couldn't be them again... Lovers with a mutual goal to pursue and a shared destiny… Mr Westen had a new crusade to chase.

So, if they couldn't be more than friends, then it was nice to know she had some solid tactical support and pissing off Michael's new bosses would keep her from getting too bored in between gun deals and while making new acquaintances in the carnival of legitimate and illicit enterprises South Florida had to offer. There was no need for her to leave Miami right now.

The Irishwoman had been a paramilitary for the Cause, an arms dealer, a black marketer as well as a freelance crusader against injustice wherever she went. She had made so many changes in her life, what was one more?

Fiona had held out the hope that Michael would be at her side one day, like they had been in Eire. But obviously she would just have to see what their life was like side by side instead. And the fiery redhead wanted to shake off the past instead of trying to pummel it into submission as she had done before.

She spotted what she'd been subconsciously searching for at the far end of the dark room in between flashes from the lasers and the strobes. His white blonde hair and his pale skin were still distinguishable in the dim colored lighting and he was the only man in the nearly empty nightclub who hadn't tried to hit on her as of yet.

Fiona licked her lips and ran a hand through her wild mane before making her way over to the man looking out of place in his button down and jeans amongst the glittery overdressed assembly. She smiled at him brightly.

"What's a nice girl like me doing in a place like this you ask?" Her sing-song accent sounded even sillier since she had to nearly shout it over of the thundering techno sound crashing through the speakers.

He paused for a beat before answering, looking her over carefully but not ogling her. "No, I didn't actually. I don't even know what I'm doing here."

She leaned in closer, laughing and batting her eyes as she took in his cologne. It was something not typical for this area. "New in town? Lost?"

"No and no… Guess I'm just being stood up. You…?"

"Well, I am new in town, trying to figure out where I fit in. Been waiting long?"

"Too long…" He looked around as though he expected to suddenly find what he apparently had not previously seen. "Would you care to dance?"

And irony of that phrase was not lost on her as she took the blonde to the dance floor. He was almost her height and she smiled again as she noticed the heavy boots he was wearing. They chatted about nothing while they moved from side to side, their bodies entwined in the darkened room.

…She has even secret mischievous moments in which she wishes she could get him alone, on a desert island, away from all ties and with nobody else in the world to consider, and just drag him off his pedestal and see him making love like any common man…

That bit of G.B. Shaw, remembered from her college days, drifted through her brain as the Irishwoman sat down at a table with her new companion for the evening. She'd had those same hopes and dreams for a life with her elusive ex-spy lover, to get him away from it all and just be them in Miami.

And those fantasies had come to naught, like dust in the wind…

So, she wasn't looking for a fight and neither was her new friend. He'd been left hanging by his drunken date who'd seemingly decided that going home with his buddy was a better option than coming back from the bathroom.

When he confessed several slow dances and Stolis later that he was tired of letting the woman he loved stomp all over his heart, Fiona smiled sweetly and then leaned over slowly to kiss him softly across the sticky glass table.

He didn't look like Michael, he didn't smell like Michael. He didn't have Mr Westen's cocky self-assurance or his stoic demeanor. He didn't walk like him as they left the bar, he didn't talk like him as he'd held the door open to the hotel room she'd gotten for the night. She already knew he didn't taste like Michael. But more importantly, he didn't feel like Michael or fuck like Michael.

And somehow, in the morning, she'd felt a little more like herself as she left the pale blonde sleeping in her rented bed to slip home to take a shower.

"If you can't appreciate what you've got, you'd better get what you can appreciate." More words of Shaw's wisdom came to mind as she put the convertible top down and her hair fly in the wind as she had back then.

If Mr Westen didn't appreciate what he was missing by now, so be it…

()()()

Theirs

The sound of the Saab announced her presence long before her shoes on the stairs or the squeak of the heavy metal door had. Michael couldn't help but be a bit relieved that she'd stopped by after all. After he'd tried to bribe her into helping him with his Barry problem for all the yogurt she could eat, he had managed to miss her call with everything else that had been going on.

Between scouting Sofia's little problem with Sam, which involved more than Mac-10's, coffee cans and lidocaine, a lot more than the burned spy had wanted to deal with, and his subsequent confrontation with an alleged restaurant hostess plagued with an abusive stalker who'd turned out to be a DEA agent trying to take down the Campos' cocaine distribution operation for the last two years, Michael had had little success in actually speaking to Fiona. She'd left a message providing him the details on the mysterious Tunisian counterfeiter operating out of a TV repair shop in South Miami.

His calls back to her had all gone straight to voicemail.

It wasn't like he actually needed to speak to her. She'd already given him all the intel to make contact with Nefzi and whatever she'd said, Barry had then called him back, offering to deliver everything he'd require for his cover ID.

It wasn't like he actually needed her help washing all these checks either, but it would make the job go faster… and it was always good tactics to keep tabs on one's allies when one's enemies had greater resources at their disposal.

"Sam told me about your latest client. She sounds like a handful," the Irishwoman observed as she came sashaying into the sparsely lit loft, moving fluidly to the table in the kitchen area where Michael stood working with a tape dispenser amidst a plethora of papers, bottles and metal trays.

Ms Glenanne had made sure to get the skinny from Sam before she decided whether or not to show up tonight in response to Michael's vaguely worded request for additional assistance. She'd had enough of Barry for one day and a meeting with several of her gun running associates to attend to as well.

"Just helping her with the job…"

"Where'd all these checks come from?"

"Barry. Whatever you said to him must have been convincing. These are leftovers from a defunct shell company."

Leaning against the wooden table with her elbows, Fiona smiled at the remembrance of successfully intimidating the money launderer in the middle of his facial session. The spiky haired little weasel was lucky she'd been in a good mood or he might have needed more than a day at the spa to recover.

"And what are you doing with them?"

"Becoming a forger…. Approach the Tunisian with a few phony checks…"

"And you're not just a client, you're a colleague."

Michael waved an X-ACTO knife at her; an unspoken invitation to join in all the check washing that was going to be required over the next few hours. Fiona snatched it from him, waving it him and licking her lips, clearly telegraphing that there was going to be a price to pay for her support.

She worked quietly at first, pouring all the acetone into the thin metal trays while the former CIA agent continued laying tape over the signatures on the first stack of checks. The redhead made a few remarks about his being lucky she'd already removed her polish in anticipation of tomorrow's appointment at the nail salon. She might have had to shoot him if her expensive manicure had been ruined by his little counterfeiting operation.

"Special occasion?" he asked, dipping the first check into the acidic bath.

"Maayybeee…" she sing-songed. "I like to make a good first impression. We'll see if it pans out. Besides, either way it goes," she concluded with a shrug while starting to soak her own paper rectangle. "I'm worth it."

Michael declined to swallow the bait any further by asking exactly upon whom she was planning on making said impression. Her activities, either for fun or for profit, were something he didn't want to delve into too deeply.

A few more moments passed while they applied brushes to the parchment, dissolving the payees and the amounts and then fished them out with plastic tongs, hanging them from IDL clips on the rack Michael had constructed for the specific purpose of drying them. The Irishwoman smiled slyly as they found an operational rhythm. Working together had never been their issue.

"So, Sam said Sofia's a brunette. Must not have been your type after all."

Michael's mind froze for a second. Wondering where the redhead was going with this crashed together in his brain with a very brief flash of the chocolate curls of the woman he'd been engaged to prior to being deployed to Dublin.

Fiona continued to work on the next check while the ex-spy chose patently ignoring her comments as his best strategy.

"I mean, it could have gone really badly if she'd been another busty blonde. Good thing you were able to see through her ploy this time."

They were both looking at each other surreptitiously while they continued to work. The former urban guerrilla was enjoying her ex-lover's discomfort far too much to let him off the hook without a few more well deserved jabs.

"Apparently you can teach an old spy a new trick or two."

He didn't want to do it, but in the end Michael couldn't help himself.

"What are you talking about, Fiona?"

Carla was the only blonde he'd been matching wits with lately and he was fairly certain, though not one hundred percent positive, that his alleged new handler was not the 'she' in question. Buxom did not describe Carla at all.

"Sam told me Sofia approached him through a cooking class Veronica set up. Darned clever way to get next to an ex-spy, don't you think? She certainly wasn't going to get Sam to solve her problem, now was she?"

"Your point, Fi?" he asked dryly, fishing another check out of the acetone.

"That you're lucky she turned out to be DEA agent with a problem instead of some hired killer using you as a stalking horse to get close to her target."

Evelyn…. This was about him missing all the obvious clues that Evelyn had been playing him… Michael tried his best not to clench his jaw but he knew she could see his frustration. Why was she bringing any of this up now?

After narrowly rescuing Doug from the Amazonian assassin only because Fiona's hairpin had been clipped in his wallet, they had already had this conversation as they'd prepared to get him into federal custody the next day.

Deducing that she just liked to torture him as payment for his numerous sins both real and imagined was the obvious conclusion, but that was too easy.

It was because Evelyn had played him so badly that he had been able to see through Sofia's ruse so easily. A restaurant hostess couldn't have afforded that cooking class just like a desperate single mom looking for her kid with no resources couldn't have afforded that swank hotel on beachfront property.

Never mind spending money she allegedly didn't have on Securicorp instead of a good family law firm with a private detective on payroll… Fiona had been right. He'd gotten too emotionally wrapped up in her cover story to see it.

And in fact the Irishwoman herself wasn't entirely clear now on what her own motivation was behind reminding him again of the previous incident, besides the obvious parallels between the situation with Sofia and Evelyn, the only difference being that Michael had completely missed the fact he was being manipulated and he had rejected her tactical analysis of the situation with the blonde, dismissing her instincts as jealousy of all things… as if…

"So, either she wasn't your type since you weren't blind to her true intentions, or you finally learned your lesson about getting distracted by a pretty face."

She said it with a certain level of snark in order to cover her divided feelings on the matter. Mr Westen, whom she'd observed in the last six months involved very few people into his inner circle, was as unlikely to be distracted by a femme fatale on the whole as Sam was entirely likely to lose track of everything over a well-endowed woman.

"If I need a beautiful woman to mess up my life," he'd told her once early on in their time in Miami with a soft smile. "I can do a lot better than Debbie."

She had been, with the apparent exception of Evelyn, the only woman capable of distracting him. It seemed doubtful that the burned spy would pay attention to anything that didn't directly relate to getting his old job back.

"I guess I finally did," he conceded. "Good thing you'll be here to provide tactical support for when I have my next lapse of judgement."

Whatever response the redhead was anticipating, that wasn't it. Her blue green eyes locked on his cobalt blue ones, momentarily attempting to read his mind, before dropping back down to her handiwork, trying to decide if her former lover meant the obvious implications of his statement or if he was just being sarcastic, oblivious or some combination of the two.

"We made a good team…" she said at length, her tone somewhere between a statement and a request for affirmation before she looked back at the man she'd once thought to be her soulmate.

"We make a good team," Michael corrected, still avoiding the scrutiny of her gaze before finally meeting her intense stare. "I'm glad you're here, Fi."

Fiona smiled softly. "You'd be at this all night without me."

"Probably so…" Then it was his turn to focus intently on his task at hand.

"Well, then, you'll owe me breakfast… and not just a cup of yogurt."

Michael wasn't sure if there was a catch in her voice or not, but he wasn't going to risk looking to make sure. If his time in Ireland had taught him anything, it was that peace was fragile and needed to be handled carefully.

"I might know a place."

But in the end, he hadn't kept that promise. As their labors drew towards a close and the night was not nearly over, Fiona found herself questioning her decisions, both past and recent. Before the incident with Evelyn, even before coming to Miami, it would have been way too easy and desirable to spend their time before breakfast deliciously skin to skin and entangled on the solitary mattress, driving each other insane in the best possible way.

But she'd told him they couldn't be together and meant it. So as much as she was sad, longing for what had been, she'd made a decision and reinforced it astride another man's bare body prone between her naked needy thighs.

Feeling the weight of that had left her unwilling to remain any longer than it took to complete the task at hand. So they had parted awkwardly well before the dawn. Michael's face was a neutral mask of banal gratitude for her assistance, so she was uncertain if he were remorseful or relieved by her departure. In the end, she concluded, it didn't even matter how he felt.

Because it felt strange not to be with Michael and yet still be around Michael.

In the past, after their two ships passing temporarily in the night encounters had ended, they had parted company quickly for various reasons, usually leaving for other continents. When she'd first come to Miami, he'd rejected her advances initially, that first night and during those first several months, only to succumb later. For the first time in their relationship, she would have to figure out how he fit in her life long term without them having that kind of a future together because, Fiona reminded herself as she drove towards her apartment on the Intracoastal, she had chosen not to be the second best.

()()()

"I don't understand why you refuse to mix business with pleasure."

"Can we focus? Our ticket to the backroom just showed up."

"You're no fun, Michael… Now Zeke on the other hand looks like he knows how to have a good time… Breaking into the safe shouldn't be too hard." She had pulled the pin from her hair and shaken it free. "Getting invited into the back shouldn't be too difficult either…" She'd begun to move with the music again. "Why don't you go meet your Pakistani spy and I'll take care of this."

"Ah… just don't… just don't work too hard!"

Fiona smiled at the memory. The only time she ever worked too hard was trying to get Michael's attention and she was done with that. Watching him work a cover, especially one she'd roped him into, was definitely not work.

"Damn, girl, how do y'all stand the humidity here? I'd rather drink Crown than this air… Whud ya mean how do I like it? Straight up, darling, straight up!"

Now she was back sitting at the far end of the bar sipping free champagne with Zeke, con man and club owner, at her elbow for the second night in a row. Definitely mixing business with pleasure tonight, watching Davis Cullen, an alleged Texas oil baron's entitled offspring make his entrance at Velvet.

For someone who'd wanted no part in helping their clients, he was certainly throwing himself into the role. But then Mr Westen always was professional.

A little too damned professional sometimes… Life was boring if you played the rules all the time… She highly doubted he would have approved of her choice of vehicle for the evening after she'd lent him hers for his cover ID.

They'd arrived separately again tonight, Michael using the valet with her Saab while the vivacious redhead had parked on a side street in a Mercedes coupe she'd conned from an over-eager salesman trying to land a score with an extended test drive, although she'd left him a borrowed car in exchange for the silver e350. The former urban guerilla had settled on the high performance vehicle when it had caught her eye on her way by the showroom, looking exactly like the one she'd blown up ten days ago.

"If we can't make Raul look like a traitor one way, we're gonna have to do it another way. Fi, get me a sniper rifle and some C4."

"Oooh I like where this is going…"

And while Fiona had enjoyed demonstrating her skills with her Hectate and who didn't love blowing up a car or two, Ms Glenanne had been very much of the opinion that she had been on the giving end of I'll still help you with your thing and you'll still help me with mine recently between planting trackers on trucks and making sure Raul went running straight to the DEA for protection.

"So am I forgiven?" Zeke asked as her fifth glass of a very nice vintage of Dom was poured into the flute she had just emptied, interrupting her reverie.

"Maybe I should let you pour a martini on me more often," she purred. "Just not all over a designer dress in a semi-public place next time..."

"We'll have to see if I can arrange that."

The blonde leaned over to kiss her, but the Irishwoman skillfully timed her next generous sip of bubbly such that the man's lips landed on her cheek.

It hadn't been difficult to engineer him spilling a drink on her in order to get to the private restroom back by the office where the safe holding all her client's money was; but it was pretty damned hard to pick a magnetic card reader with a hairpin. On the other hand, it had allowed her the opportunity to force Michael into the more active role of playing the mark since she'd arouse suspicions if she tried to duck into the back again, making it a two-man job.

"Yeah, trouble is Zeke only lets girls and marks past security."

"Yeah, so one of us has to play the fool," Sam had groused.

"I know who I'd vote for… See you tonight. You're perfect for it, Michael.

She giggled aloud, remembering the smug grin on the older man's face and the barely disguised annoyance on her ex-lover's visage, and then covered it by batting her eyes at the con artist before quickly nipping at his earlobe.

Then the tipsy redhead laughed internally as Michael increased the volume of the dirty joke he was telling in order catch Zeke's attention over the din.

"So he goes up the hill and he says, which one of you am I taking home?"

The ex-spy laughed uproariously at his bovine humor and saluted Fiona with his tumbler full of fine whiskey. She wondered if he was feeling the glow quite as much as she was, though the Irishwoman very much doubted that.

"Who's your friend?" the blonde inquired, sizing up his next target.

"You don't know Davis? He's wild. He's some oil baron's kid."

"Oh, yeah…? You wanna introduce me?"

Introductions made and Zeke's cell phone taking a bath in a cup of Crown later, the private party in the VIP section was in full swing with Fiona over playing her role as a flirty boozy party girl in the covert operative's personal opinion. While being pitched on the merits of full partnership in a Cuban club, Michael was reflecting on why he was there trying to recover the $200K Andy had been swindled out of while attempting to cover Diane's medical bills.

"What is this about, Fi? You really care that much about some lady you never met who's living out in Boca Raton with a bunch of cats?"

The only thing he'd wanted to do even less than sit next to Fi playing poker with his mom's gang of geriatric card sharks, while the spiky haired blonde at the end of table glared at him for breaking up with his not-girlfriend, was to be volunteered to work a case helping some poor sap with a loan shark. He'd made it plain he didn't believe they needed to be involved in their business.

"You owe me."

"I gave you the car."

Then she had made it equally plain she didn't agree they were even at all.

"You owe me more than that."

He was vaguely aware of the inequity in the amount of assistance she provided him, and not just recently, than the reverse before Fiona had fixed him with a hard stare, a disturbing light in her blue green eyes.

"I want to do this because this guy, Andy, chose to put someone he loved before himself… That's why."

The object of his musings then blocked his view of Zeke, distracting the con man while she was fishing in his jacket for the key card, before Michael could get too deep into analyzing his behavior. He'd already had a forty five minute ride with Fiona from his mom's house to Andy's mom's house to do that.

"Why don't you boys stop playing with each other and play with me instead?"

The burned spy rolled his eyes while slipping the stolen swipe card in his own pocket. Fiona was really overdoing it… but if it got the job done…

"This whiskey is running right through me. Where's the head?"

There are two schools of safe cracking. Some people like to beat the lock; some people like to break the lock. But it doesn't matter when the safe is sitting wide open.

Realizing the safe was nothing more than a prop to impress marks, the former CIA agent decided they needed to get ears on their target since they were not having the staff carry trash bags of cash out of the club tonight as previously planned. He was in the midst of wiring his cell phone into an unused USB port when the Irishwoman called to let him know that the club owner had partners who'd showed up and they needed to wrap things up.

"Michael, it's really time to go. Your cover's about to be blown."

Heavy footsteps, a swish beep, the sound of a heavy door closing and the covert operative was certain he was clear to head back into the VIP room. Watching the redhead from behind as he wove his way through the gyrating bodies left Michael feeling vaguely bad for the amount time she'd had to spent feigning interest and fending off the hustler among other things.

"Hey, hey, you wanna talk some business…?" Zeke never noticed Fiona slipping the magnetized plastic rectangle back into his not-so-secret jacket pocket as her hands had been all over him all night as it was.

"Maybe a little later, I think it's time for me and this little lady to get to know each other better." Michael flipped the petite woman over his shoulder in one quick move and headed for the exit. "You don't mind, do you, partner?"

Waving and blowing kisses to everyone on her way out of the nightclub, Fiona felt the momentary shock of the humid night air on her legs and backside as they left the air conditioned space that was Velvet and hurried towards the outdoor valet stand in the evening's sticky heat.

Michael had yet to set her back on her feet as he handed the man at the stand his ticket and told him to hustle it up as he had business to tend to.

"Da-vis, dar-ling, I'm getting dizzy up here," she slurred on purpose in that cut glass English accent Armand had taught her to wield all those years ago.

Fighting the temptation to smack her ex-lover on that taut ass she knew was concealed under Davis Cullen's jacket, the spry redhead raised her upper body as Michael applied the appropriate pressure to her lithe legs.

That all too familiar electricity crackled between them as she slowly slid down the front of his body. He didn't release her immediately, holding her close to his side. The Irishwoman's arms slipped under his coat of their own accord she stared into those intense blue eyes, trying to ignore that cupid's bow on the apex of his very kissable lips.

"Fi…" he breathed out that one syllable, the air ghosting over her face hotter on her skin than the suddenly scorching Miami night.

The petite spitfire started to rise up on her toes and he did nothing to move his mouth away from hers, but then Fiona caught herself with a start. Quickly, she pressed her cheek to his shirt. Michael did his best to keep his heart beat or breathing from giving him away. Using his distraction, she pulled his wallet out of the black Spandex hidden under the button down.

"Leave the man a nice tip," she whispered low. "Davis Cullen can afford it."

She bit her lip to keep from laughing aloud at the perfect expression of annoyance that flashed over his visage before the lusty Texan returned.

"Open the door up for the little lady here, partner. We got places to be."

Stuffing the cash into the monogramed pocket of the young man's polo shirt, Michael was behind the wheel of her Saab and hoping to share some of his irritation by burning a bit of rubber before sending the auto squealing out of the driveway of the South Beach hot spot in a cloud of blue-white smoke.

"Where are you parked?"

"Two blocks over, take the next right. Were you able to get any of the cash out of the safe? Did you get a look at Zeke's partners?"

"There was no money back there." His exasperation over that was quite plain. "A few hundreds wrapped around stacks of newspaper." This charity case is getting longer by the minute. But Mr Westen had the good sense not to state his impatience with the situation out loud. "I've got ears on them. We do some listening tonight…" There seemed to be a subtle invitation there. "Maybe we can figure out where they're actually holding the cash."

But Fiona wasn't interested in continuing the uncomfortable scenario from the other night. She had been drinking, dancing, flirting… The fiery redhead had a very definitive idea about how the rest of the evening was going to go, which would not be including Michael, who had established his priorities.

"But you got out clean?" So, if the business part of their activities was over…

"Yeah, we're good." He was saved from asking which vehicle was hers as soon as he spotted the high performance silver car parked inconspicuously ready to make a quick exit "Do I want to know where you got that from?"

"Probably not… Take care of my car," Ms Glenanne admonished as the burned spy pulled alongside the Mercedes. "You gonna stash Diane and Andy at your place for now?"

"I'm hoping it doesn't come to that. We have one more day to get the cash."

"Let me know if you and Sam can't handle it. Otherwise…" The Irishwoman gave him a saucy smile as she slid out the passenger door. "Don't call too early. It's going to be a very very very late night."

And Michael couldn't help but smell her perfume on Davis Cullen's shirt as he watched the woman who wasn't his girlfriend strut to her borrowed ride. As the Celtic firecracker disappeared down the street to the roar of the V6, he dismissed the urge to follow her albeit from a distance for safety.

It was none of his business what she did on her own time and he had his hands full trying to find out who Carla was and who she worked for.

That's what he told himself anyway…