You lovely lot continue to make my week. This is just the best fandom. Thank you so much for all the support so far for this bonkers little story. I hope you continue to enjoy x
Also I made it to tumblr! I'm over there as morethanwords229 if you feel like saying hi :)
Chapter Four
Henry had reared his arm back with the intention of throwing a swift, cruel punch at their attacker's throat, but his growing momentum jerked to a sudden stop when Elizabeth exclaimed, "Matt!"
He looked at the other man's face for the first time and took in the familiar features. Elizabeth was right. Not someone attacking them, then. Someone who could help them. Thank God. Henry let his arm drop, but the tension didn't leave him. Being reunited with the Diplomatic Security agent was good, but they weren't yet clear from danger. "It's good to see you," Henry said with relief. At least he would be spared from having to beat a man to a pulp.
"You too, Dr McCord," Matt said. "Madam Secretary. It's time to move."
"Way ahead of you, Matt," Elizabeth answered. Then she reached out to take the DS agent's elbow, pulling him closer to her and peering at him in concern. "Your shoulder."
Henry followed her gaze. There was blood coming from high up on the man's left shoulder, staining his white dress shirt with splotches of dark crimson. "You were hit?"
"By shattering glass not a bullet. I'm OK. Don't worry about it."
Elizabeth was reaching up and trying to pull back Matt's shirt to get a better look. "Too late," she told him.
"Ma'am, there's no time." The man's voice was stern and left no room for argument. "We have to go. Frank and Kev are waiting in the car."
Henry was all too aware that they had arrived that evening with more men than that.
"We're not leaving anyone behind," Elizabeth said, similarly authoritative.
"We won't. But our priority now is to get you in the car." He stepped forward like he wouldn't be against picking her up and slinging her over his shoulder to carry her down the stairs if that was what it took to make her move.
Henry understood the feeling, because he was experiencing it himself. "Zembrovko is dead, did you know that?" he asked the DS agent.
From the way that the man's face blanched, it was clear that it was news to him. "Christ," he muttered, and that was as close to an emotional outburst as Henry had ever seen from the man who usually kept his cool no matter what. "Move." He took Elizabeth's arm again with one hand while drawing his gun with the other and took a step towards the stairs.
A voice came from above. "Leaving so soon?"
Henry's heart slammed in his chest. He shot his arm out with the intention of pushing Elizabeth behind him but she caught his elbow and came to stand at his side instead. She shot him a look that suggested chivalry would not currently be appreciated. He got it. He did. She was the one paid to be the diplomat, to speak on behalf of the United States, not him. But how the hell was he supposed to stand down his protective instincts when the building was under siege and there was no way in the universe the timing was a coincidence? When it was highly likely someone viewed his wife as either a trophy kill or a prize to bag?
As soon as the voice had finished speaking, Matt put himself in front of Henry and Elizabeth, gun aimed in the direction it had come from. He turned his head briefly back to them. "Get down the stairs now," he ordered.
They didn't have time to comply or disobey because that was when Gleb Kodalov came into view, casually walking down the stairs towards them like he hadn't just himself murdered at least one person, probably two, and taken a presidency by force. He was followed by three guys dressed in black – just like the ones who had originally stormed the ballroom. From the look of them, what they wore and the way they held themselves, Henry would guess that they were Special Forces. Highly competent, highly trained. The elite of the military. Not good.
Elizabeth spoke up to answer Kodalov and her tone was impressively light when she said, "Well, you know, the evening started well, but in the end the hospitality has been a little disappointing."
Kodalov laughed, slicking his gelled hair back from his face.
Henry had heard a lot about the various members of the government of Petria that Elizabeth had been meeting with over the past few days, much of her assessment unfavourable, but she had reserved the greatest disdain for the man currently in front of them. How had she described him? Slimy, that was it. She had cast around for several seconds to find the right word and in the end the best one had been a simple one.
On only a few seconds' acquaintance, Henry thought that the description was apt. Kodalov was slimy. And a murderer. And guilty of treason. And he was staring at Elizabeth with something akin to glee in his expression. Henry flicked his gaze to Matt, watched the DS agent evaluating the situation, calculating the merits of making a break for it down the stairs and concluding that sudden movements were probably unwise given the three foreign security guys in front of them with guns much bigger than his own. Henry slid his hand into Elizabeth's, feeling the urgent need to hold onto her.
Her fingers flexed around his, squeezing tightly although her face looked completely calm as she watched Kodalov on the steps above them. "What are you doing, Gleb?" she asked.
Kodalov tutted like he might at an errant child. "That would be Mr President, Madam Secretary."
"You're not the president."
Grief – fake, but convincing – coloured his face. "Didn't you hear? Artur is dead."
Did he know that they had seen him pull the trigger? Henry thought that maybe he was unaware of the fact, and thought it might be best if it stayed that way.
Apparently Elizabeth assessed it differently. "I know he is. You killed him."
Henry held his breath. Elizabeth, dial it back. He thought he understood what she was doing. The man in front of them had no legitimacy. Making him feel credible by cowering before him was obviously not ideal, but Henry thought it might keep them alive. But antagonising him – outright accusing him as Elizabeth was – surely couldn't help. Surely there was no way he would let them leave alive knowing that he had been the one to kill Zembrovko.
"You look worried, professor," Kodalov said, flicking his gaze over to Henry briefly before looking back at Elizabeth.
Elizabeth tensed beside him. "You won't succeed, you know."
"Ah, but Madam Secretary. You haven't seen the streets."
What was happening on the streets? Fresh concern flooded through Henry. With so many hostile resources directed at the presidential palace, he hadn't even given thought to what might be happening outside on the streets. Suddenly the problem of getting out of the building and back to the car seemed relatively simply given the prospect of unrest – something worse? - on the streets.
"You have no legitimacy," Elizabeth said, apparently taking a gamble that Kodalov would choose not to shoot her, perhaps on the grounds that Conrad Dalton would be liable to invade the country with extreme and brutal urgency if he did.
There was also the fact that Henry would murder him without hesitation if he tried to lay so much as a hand on his wife.
What Kodalov said next made Henry's blood run cold.
"No, Madam Secretary, that would be you. I have to inform you of a change in the relationship between our two countries now that I am in power." He came down the last two steps to stand on the little landing with them, not at all intimidated by Matt pointing a gun at his chest and holding up one hand to push him back when he tried to step around the DS agent.
Henry took a step forward, putting himself just in front of Elizabeth. She'd just have to deal with his chivalry.
Elizabeth lifted her chin, defiant. "Oh?" She sounded like she cared hardly at all, although Henry knew better. He could feel the slight tremble in her hand as he held it tightly in his.
"Yes," Kodalov said. "As of now you are no longer welcome here. You are hereby persona non grata under Article 9 of the Vienna Convention. You and your delegation."
Henry got now why Kodalov hadn't bothered to shoot them. After all, why murder a foreign diplomat when you could just take away their protected status and leave them to take their chances in the middle of a violent coup in a country that was often sceptical of their aims at best and unashamedly hostile at worst? And now the hostile forces had a new champion, who had installed himself as their president victorious.
"You have no grounds," Elizabeth said and then, as though it was part of the same sentence, a natural follow-on, "You'll be dead within a week." She looked away from the man, finished with him. "Goodbye, Mr Kodalov."
She turned her back on him, taking Henry with her as she started down the stairs.
Elizabeth, ever the consummate professional, managed to look straight ahead during the descent, seemingly not even curious whether Kodalov and his guards might be about to unexpectedly shoot them in the back. Henry, his too-recent lively adventure in Pakistan still close to the surface, couldn't help but look back, needing to be aware of the whole terrain.
Kodalov's guards did indeed have their guns pointed at them as they left, and Matt had his own gun aimed at the guards as he descended the stairs sideways on to provide cover to Henry and Elizabeth in front of him. But it was the image of Kodalov himself that Henry would remember long after he had disappeared from view.
The self-anointed president was smiling as he watched them go, his face chillingly controlled and his gaze intently fixed to the back of Elizabeth's head until finally she left his sight.
