Thank you for all the lovely comments :) I hope you enjoy this penultimate chapter...


Chapter Nineteen

"Maybe we could say it wasn't us." Russell Jackson took a healthy swallow of whisky and then stared down into his glass as though it might hold all the answers to his problems.

He damn well hoped that it did, because currently he was crapping out.

Sat on the opposite couch in the Oval Office, President Conrad Dalton looked up from the bottom of his own – much more measured – glass. "If we could stick to serious suggestions only, please."

"Who said that wasn't serious? Also it has the bonus of being true. Because it wasn't us. It was Elizabeth." He meant, of course, the giving of the insane order to shut down the power plant.

"Elizabeth is us, and be careful, Russell," Conrad warned. "You have to admit, it was a bold move. And effective."

"And running just slightly against the sentiments of your phone call with Gleb Kodalov." Yeah, telling the man in one breath that he could keep his presidency while in the next switching off his lights, that was just great.

When everything was over, Russell would remind himself of the fact that Elizabeth hadn't known they were in the middle of doing a deal with the devil while she was trying to find a way out of hell, and that she had just been in a literal full-on fight before negotiating with a bastard to try and save everyone in the embassy, but other things were more immediate. He could be nice later. Maybe.

Conrad swirled his whisky in the glass. "But it's also exactly what he wants. The US-owned power plant gone. He can't be mad about that."

"But he will be." Russell downed the rest of his drink in one go and then immediately poured himself another. That was the problem they had. It wasn't about what should happen, it was about what would happen, and he would bet everything good in his life that Kodalov would be pretty mad when he discovered Elizabeth turned out his lights. If only she'd had time to get out of the country first, it might have been entertaining to sit back and watch the show for a little while before flicking the switch back to 'on'. But as it was, she was still there and still in trouble, and the recently re-opened exit route seemed to be closing down again, unless they could do something to fix the mess.

Fix the mess, or distract Gleb Kodalov. Either would do in the short term. In the immediate term, Russell felt the need for something to calm his blood pressure, and reached over to where he'd left his phone on the end table.

"Maybe we can say the plant shut down due to security concerns because of the protests," Conrad mused. "The guy who runs it, what's his name?"

"Mark Strong." Russell had pulled up an app on his phone and was intently staring at Panda Cam in the hope that the livestream of the pandas at the National Zoo could calm his heart rate, and he was only half-listening to Conrad.

"Mark Strong," Conrad repeated. "Do you think we could get him to agree to that, to saying it was due to security concerns? Russell?"

Russell looked up, surreptitiously closing down the cell phone's browser window before his boss could catch him watching pandas. It had been a long day. He had needed those few moments. "I don't know, sir, maybe. Probably. We can see what the situation is over there at the moment." He looked back at his phone and opened up the Twitter app – he had given up going through the CIA and had started going straight to the source of rolling live updates. "Well, what do you know, Mark Strong has just tweeted his concern for the situation in Petria tonight."

No doubt the power plant boss was laying the social media groundwork for the pending shutdown. And his internet access was obviously still working, unlike across much of Petria. That was interesting – and useful.

"In the circumstances, that's encouraging. Can we call him?" Conrad asked.

"Let's go one better." Russell couldn't face any more calls with crackling phone lines about to drop out at any moment. Instead, he opened up Twitter's messaging facility and found his ego stroked a little when it transpired Mark Strong was already following the Chief of Staff's account. He typed a message.

Mark, tell me what's going on with the lights. Then fix it.

He thought that about covered it. He pressed send.


If not for the beefed up security presence on the gate outside and the muffled sounds of a large group of people not all that far away, it could have been business as usual at the British Embassy. The atmosphere was calm despite the events of the night, and while there was no sign of a brothel in the building, once the ambassador and his staff had got over the surprise of their American friends rocking up unexpectedly on the doorstep seeking refuge, Elizabeth had been offered a veritable cocktail of painkillers for her injuries and so her assessment of ending up in a drugs den was proving not entirely inaccurate.

And the ibuprofen had been very gratefully received.

She slid off the desk she had been sitting on while the embassy first aider – an ex-army doctor, no less – had tested her jarred wrist and poked her bruised ribs before proclaiming, without much in the way of fanfare, "You'll live." He had said the same thing to Henry after checking him out, and had then disappeared without a backward glance, leaving them alone.

"See," Elizabeth said to Henry, as she adjusted her blouse and straightened her hair. "All fine."

He raised a sceptical eyebrow that suggested he didn't entirely agree with her but said nothing, instead electing to slide his arms around her waist and hug her to him, breathing deeply and slumping against her like the stress was leeching out of him. Elizabeth got it. She recognised that they still had a way to go, but she felt somewhat secure for the first time since the first gunshot was fired hours ago – yesterday, now. It was almost three thirty in the morning.

No wonder she was half-asleep. What a night. Not even over yet.

The door opened abruptly and Matt half-fell into the room, breathing hard. "Ma'am, good news, I thought you'd want to know."

Elizabeth lifted her head from Henry's chest the better to speak with her agent, but kept her husband close. "What is it?"

The DS agent was grinning and that could only mean something really good, especially under the circumstances. "We just got a radio signal from our guys still in the palace. They're OK."

Relief and not a little wonder flooded through her and Elizabeth stepped away from Henry to go to Matt, feeling the need to peer closely into his face to make sure he was telling her the truth. "Really? All of them?"

"All of them, Ma'am."

"Daisy and Jay and the rest of the detail?"

"The very same. They're hiding in an outbuilding on the palace grounds, waiting for a ride home."

Elizabeth closed her eyes to take a moment to process it. "Oh, that's just the best news."

Henry stepped up next to her and reached over to clap Matt on the shoulder. "It is," he agreed. "That's great, really."

It was, really great. It also meant that soon – very soon – they'd be sending a team out to the palace to go and quietly retrieve their friends. That presented an opportunity, Elizabeth thought, her tired brain automatically kicking back into gear and an idea starting to percolate. An opportunity she could take advantage of.

"Elizabeth?" Apparently Henry had seen something change in her face, because he was already back to looking concerned.

She looked at Matt instead, knowing that looking at her husband wouldn't help with what she was currently thinking. She needed to keep her professional head on for a little while longer, and not the one that told her that she should just take Henry and hide away somewhere until it was time to leave. "We're sending a team in?"

"A small contingent, yes, Ma'am. We'll send Kev from our detail, plus Corporal Greenwood has volunteered. And a couple of the local guys and some of the team from the British Embassy who are familiar with the palace grounds. In and out as fast as possible, while we head for the airport. They'll meet us at the plane."

Elizabeth nodded. "OK. Except how about we change that plan so we can all head for the plane together."

"Ma'am, there's no time to –"

"I mean, what if I want to go to the palace?"

"No." That was Henry, immediate and sure. He stepped around in front of her, blocking her view of Matt as he took her shoulders in his hands and leaned down so his eyes were level with hers. "Are you crazy?" His voice was hard and shook with what Elizabeth knew to be stress and, she guessed, anger that would be bound to spill over if she pushed him the wrong way.

She knew what she was asking of him. She brought her hands up to hold onto his wrists as his own hands held her firmly. "I want to talk to Kodalov."

Maybe it was crazy. It probably was crazy. But she thought that if she talked to him, if she had the opportunity to see him face to face, maybe she could make the little problem of the lights being about to go out go away. They had only minutes left, after all. Maybe she could do some damage control. And maybe it would help her understand him.

"And just walk right up to him in an unsecure location, where he can do whatever the hell he wants with you?" Henry was not taking the idea well.

Elizabeth took in a slow breath, telling herself not to rise to Henry's – justifiable – protest. Getting into an argument wouldn't help anything. "If I can just get him to listen –"

"No."

"Henry…" She sighed in frustration, scrubbed her hands through her hair. "Leaving like this, it just… it feels like running away."

Henry's eyes softened then as he took in her words. He stroked his thumbs over her shoulders. "It's not running away, babe. It's surviving. It's logical. It's necessary. And it doesn't preclude anything that might happen tomorrow, or the next day, or the next. It doesn't stop you picking up the phone and calling him as soon as you get back to the office. But right now, tonight, there's nothing more that we can do, OK?"

It was in her mind to protest, to try another argument, but the we in Henry's last statement got to her. He was right. She wasn't the only one in this. He was, too. And so were her agents and everyone in the US embassy, and now everyone in the British embassy, too. She had to remember the picture was bigger than just one awful night. She looked down.

Sensing an advantage, Henry closed in. "It's going to take time to put together a case to take down Gleb Kodalov, especially after Conrad's phone call with him. Let's make sure we get that time, OK? Let's go home now and see our children."

Elizabeth nodded and gave in. "Yeah," she said quietly. "OK."

"Good," Henry said.

"Good," Matt said, obviously relieved he wouldn't have to take on Elizabeth McCord with her mind set on something. Then he said, "Helena Garfield has persuaded the British ambassador to loan us some vehicles, Ma'am."

"Of course she has." Elizabeth smiled at that. She was sure Helena Garfield could persuade just about anyone to give her whatever the hell she wanted. Maybe she should have a go at taking down Kodalov.

"The contingent going to the palace will be leaving in the next few minutes with your blessing, and then we'll have a car for you in the next ten minutes to go to the airport."

She ignored the second part of the statement and focused on the first. "I want to speak to the guys before they head to the palace."

"They're waiting next door. This way."

Elizabeth followed Matt out the door with Henry crowding in close behind her, his arm securely around her waist like he was ready to physically pull her back if he had to. She slid her hand onto his and held on tight.


Her Facebook and Twitter notifications were full of people sending her messages of support and concern, a lot of them from friends and people she knew, but not all of them. That was something Alison McCord was still getting her head around; that people would actively seek her out because of who her mom was, and send her tweets like they knew her.

At least tonight they were sending nice stuff.

She hadn't replied to any of them. She didn't know how to. Nor did she know how to respond to the stream of texts and missed calls on her phone from her friends, who had obviously been online and seen the posts about the Secretary of State's car being surrounded at the embassy in Rusapol, and Gleb Kodalov singling her out in his address for scorn and threats. What the hell was she supposed to say to them?

Replying with thanks just seemed pointless, but it was all Alison had been able to come up with, so she had settled instead on not replying at all, and hoping fervently that everything turned out OK so that in a couple of days she could regale her friends with the outlandish story about how she had called up the President of the United States and given him an earful and ordered him to give her information about her parents, and then everything could go back to normal.

If it didn't go back to normal, she didn't know what she'd do.

She shuffled closer to Stevie as they sat on the couch, staring in the direction of a movie that none of them were watching. Her older sister absently wrapped her arm around her shoulders and Alison leaned into her, looking over at where Blake sat slumped in an armchair to find him looking at them with concern, and something that might have been pity.

She looked away, looked at her phone, didn't want to deal with anyone else's concern. Instead she distracted herself with her new habit of opening up her draft messages and trying to resend the one to her mom and dad, asking if they were OK.

Alison pressed send. Watched the little icon whir around, steeled herself for it to fail again.

Message sent.

She sat up abruptly, startling Stevie and waking Jason who had fallen into a fitful sleep at the other end of the couch.

"What?" Stevie said.

Alison turned to her with a smile on her face. "It sent! The message sent."

"That's great, Ali," Stevie said, exchanging a look with Blake that suggested neither of them thought it meant that much.

Maybe it didn't. But it meant something, she was sure of it. It had to mean something better than before. She'd take it, for now.

It was something.


The party headed to the palace had just left out of a side entrance, and now their numbers were fewer.

Henry leant back against the wall of the wide ground floor foyer as he watched Elizabeth talking to Helena Garfield, trying to persuade the ambassador to leave with them when they departed any minute for the airport. The ambassador was refusing to budge, insisting that she could stay at the British embassy until it was safe to go back to her own – and the British ambassador seemed more than happy for that to happen; a fact that was, happily, massively pissing off Andreou Flack as he sat handcuffed to a chair in an office, waiting to join them on the ride to the airport.

Henry stood back out of the way as Elizabeth tried one last time to talk Helena round; he knew that his wife's attempts to get the ambassador to go with them were as much about Elizabeth's annoyance that she didn't have the option of staying to fix things as they were about their immediate safety.

He knew it was driving Elizabeth crazy not to be able to fix everything, not to stay until the job was completely finished. But they just couldn't take the risk, and he wasn't about to apologise any time soon at putting his foot down over her mad desire to go to the palace to talk to President Kodalov. She might be the Secretary of State, and she might still have work to do, but first she needed to be safe. And to sleep. She had done enough for one night.

"You're absolutely sure about this, Helena?" On the other side of the foyer, Elizabeth sounded like she had finally given up trying to convince the ambassador to leave with them.

Finally. Someone more stubborn than his wife. "I'm sure," said Helena. "It will be fine. Besides, this way I can call you in a couple of days with the latest gossip."

Elizabeth glanced over at where the British ambassador stood with a small huddle of his staff. "You sure you're not gonna be the gossip?" she murmured slyly.

"I couldn't possibly comment."

Elizabeth sighed. "It might get worse here before it gets better."

"I know that, Ma'am."

"You know, I told you, you don't have to call me Ma'am in the middle of a crisis."

Helena smiled and shook her head. "Yes, I do. I need a leader. And I hate to break it to you, Ma'am, but you're it." She reached over and hugged Elizabeth carefully, mindful of her ribs. Then she went over to join the British ambassador to discuss their security plans for once they were alone.

Henry managed to last precisely three seconds of watching Helena's comment sink in and Elizabeth looking slightly bereft and overwhelmed before he pushed away from the wall and held out his hand to his wife. She blinked at him for a moment, her eyes slightly wet, before she slid her hand into his and let him pull her the couple of steps towards him. "Talk to me," he said quietly.

He marvelled at the fact he could speak quietly; while he could still just about hear the protest and was conscious of the large group of people a couple of streets away, the noise levels were much more normal.

"About what?"

Henry was about to answer when he realised something. "I can't hear the helicopter anymore," he said, looking up at the ceiling as though he could see through it to the sky.

Elizabeth shrugged. "They probably don't need it now that Kodalov has secured his position. It was all for show until he consolidated power. Or maybe he's keeping up his end of the bargain to make it easier for us to leave."

Her tone was slightly bitter, and Henry guessed that she was thinking about the conversation that Kodalov had had with Conrad. He guessed that she was thinking that the conversation would have been very different if she had been the one having it with Kodalov, and no doubt that was part of her reason for wanting to go to talk to him at the palace.

Matt popped his head around the door into the foyer. "Ma'am, the car is ready. We need to leave now."

Two security guys appeared with a disgruntled Andreou Flack between them, having collected the man from where he'd been left in a small office.

Henry raised his eyebrows in disbelief, pointing at the back of the Regional Security Officer as the little group passed by. "He's coming in the car with us?"

The DS agent suppressed a small smile. "No, Dr McCord. We've got two cars. And we'll make him sit in the back of the plane."

"Good." Henry wasn't worried about Flack doing any more damage if they were shut into close quarters with him; it was more about what he might be inclined to do to Flack. Watching the other man push Elizabeth around before slamming his shoe into her ribs hadn't exactly endeared him to Henry, and he wasn't averse to a little retribution when presented with the opportunity. He still had just enough of his wits about him that he realised it probably wouldn't be wise in the long run to actively seek that opportunity.

"We're coming, Matt," Elizabeth said, but then she hesitated, looking in the direction of the street outside.

Henry dipped down to catch her gaze with his. "Babe, we have to go."

She nodded. "I know." But she was still hesitating.

"Matt and the guys have made as sure as they can do that we'll be safe driving to the airport." He couldn't deny that he was a little nervous about being out in the open himself, and he couldn't blame Elizabeth if she was apprehensive about it.

"No, that's not… That's not it." She gave him a tight, self-deprecating smile and then dropped her gaze to closely examine his collarbone. "I know we have to go. I just hate leaving things unfinished."

Damn, she was brilliant. His wife was amazing. A wave of love and protectiveness washed over him as he watched Elizabeth warring with herself. He knew that the messy, inconclusive nature of so much of her job was something she found challenging at times, that she liked to see things through to their conclusion, no matter what. Even when it required her to make sacrifices or things didn't go to plan. She was incredible. But sometimes she needed reminding that she could only do so much, especially in other countries' affairs. She had to let things shake out for themselves. Sometimes she had to let it go, at least for a little while. "I know, babe," Henry said, lifting one hand to stroke her hair back over her shoulder, tucking it gently behind her ear. "But Kodalov started this. He can finish it. You did what you had to do, and now we have to leave. OK?"

She breathed in and held it for a moment. Then she exhaled and said, "Yeah."

Henry thought that if he wasn't there with her, Elizabeth might have stayed. She might have been able to convince Matt to take her to the palace with the others to confront Kodalov. She might have stayed to try and unravel the crossed wires caused by Conrad's phone call and her call over the power plant. She might well have stayed, and who knew what would have come of it, what might have happened to her if she went storming back to Kodalov. He thanked his lucky stars he had come on the trip, and that she loved him enough to put him first.

Because that was what she was doing, he knew. She was leaving because of him –with him. She'd always choose him.

It worked both ways.

They followed Matt through the embassy to the back entrance, which was away from the road and would hopefully give them enough cover to get out and on their way without being seen. The car that was waiting for them was European, non-descript, small, just about space enough for five. On the face of it, entirely normal.

"Don't worry, it's bulletproof, and the windows are tinted," Matt said. "It's on loan from the British ambassador. I'm told we'll get a big bill to pay if it comes back damaged, so we're gonna be real careful to drive safe."

The driver, also on loan from the embassy, was already behind the wheel. Matt held the door open for Henry and Elizabeth and then he climbed in after them, the three of them squashing together on the back seat while Frank got in the passenger seat. Henry held Elizabeth's hands in his, feeling his heart rate pick up again as the doors were slammed shut and the engine revved. Elizabeth's palm was slightly clammy against his and he could feel the rapid beat of her pulse in her wrist.

A forty-five minute drive to the airport. That was all it was. All they had to get through.

There was a burst of radio static from the front of the car, and then they started driving, pulling away from the back door of the embassy and navigating a little warren of back streets until they reached one of the main boulevards. There were still people out protesting on the streets, but there wasn't the violence they had seen outside their own embassy. A few people glanced at the car as it passed, but hardly anyone gave it a second look. It blended in well with the few other cars that were out on the roads at such a time of day.

It was getting on for four in the morning.

Henry was just about to comment to Elizabeth that things seemed to be getting a little calmer when, without warning, all the surrounding city lights went out.