"I have to call my father." Lisa picked at her cuticles as she ran hurriedly through her options.

"Inadvisable. If they haven't targeted him already, they'll be watching him because of you." She turned around to face him.

"So I don't tell him where we're going, I don't even know myself yet."

"All right but don't do it yet." He strode over to her wardrobe and pulled open the doors. She briefly allowed herself to be disconcerted by the fact that he knew where she stored her suitcase. He dragged out the smallest he could find and dumped it on her bed. "Pack only what you need, its better if we travel light. We can buy anything else on the way." He slid a wallet out of a jacket pocket and brandished a credit card. "Untraceable without our names."

"You mean you stole it."

"No; its a false identity."

"Won't they know it from before?"
"Do you honestly think that I would keep the same identity after my cover had been blown. My job was to plan these things, that's why I'm so dangerous to them." His mouth formed into a grim smile. "And if they don't back off, I'll use what I know against them." Lisa threw the usual weekend away kit together, minus the heels as Rippner watched outside through a gap in the curtain.

Twenty minutes later, after retrieving the bullets from under the bed, they were leaving the flat. She pulled out her mobile phone and rapidly typed in the digits. She tensed as the dialling tone changed into the calling ring; moving alongside Rippner down the length of the hall and toward the staircase. Her watch made it about three fifty in the morning. She muttered under her breath, hoping her father hd fallen asleep on the sofa while watching TV, that way the phone would be in the same room as him.

"Lisa, what's wrong, has something happened? Are you OK?" He would have continued had she not silenced him by the frantic tone of her voice.

"Listen dad, you have to get out of there. The men responsible for what happened in February are still active. I'm leaving and I can't tell you where I'm going. But I'm worried that they'll get to you if I disappear."

"Lisa, you're not making any sense."

"Just trust me." Rippner took the phone from her.

"You do not know me; my name is not important, what you need to know is that you and your daughter are in danger. It concerns the trouble that you encountered several months ago."

"Are they back? Are they trying to hurt Lisa? Who are you?"

"Yes, I am taking your daughter into hiding, I suggest you do the same. Do not call this number again. She will contact you when she needs to through another source." He called off, Before Lisa's eyes, he pulled out the battery and the sim card. "They can and will track this number, it needs to be destroyed. He dropped the battery down the stairwell and slipped the now empty phone into the bag he was carrying.

"You should have let me talk to him, say goodbye."

"There was no time, we have to get out of here."

"We didn't bring my car keys." She had had just about enough of his tone.

"We can't take your car." They reached the ground floor. "The licence plate is most likely on their radar. You would do well to hide your face."

"No, I am not getting on any form of public transport with you." Lisa watched as the bus pulled into the station as she held the paper ticket in her hand.

"Well by all means stay and get caught. Look, I promised that I would not get you killed and I'll keep that promise whether you want me to or not. You are getting on that bus. I have no intention of leaving you behind." He grasped her upper arm and pulled her toward the station. They received strange looks from other people at the station. "Try not to look as if I'm kidnapping you."

"Well if it looks like that is what your doing perhaps you should modify your behaviour towards me. You look like a predator. I thought somebody like you would know about body language." They boarded the bus and showed their tickets. Rippner led her to the very back. "Are you going to tell me about these men that are after me?" She stowed her bags under the seats.

"There's not much to tell, European, thugs, even I was not subject to the knowledge of who exactly was running the operation. But they are not the only people that we have to worry about. My employers may have got wind of their little revenge scheme. In an effort to disassociate themselves with the entire mess, they may send their own people after us as well."

"Is there anyone who isn't after us?"

"As far as I know the FBI were looking into my case during my spell in the hospital. If you go missing shortly after my disappearance. It is very likely that they may assume kidnap and be hunting for me. Though that needn't concern you."

"Three?" She became aware that she had raised her voice.

"Keep your voice down." She glanced down at his hand on her arm. He removed it at her look. The few passengers in the bus returned their eyes to the front of the enclosed space. "It is imerative that we not draw any form of undesired attention. The bus drew away from the station. Silence fell between them.

The bus pulled in at a motel for several minutes to allow the passengers to stretch their legs and this was where Rippner directed her to get off. Bags in hand they stepped down on the gravel. They had spoken not one word since their conversation had drifted to a rather abrupt halt. Lisa looked over to him as the bus pulled away.

"What about the tickets? We bought the full journey."

"We need somewhere to hide out and think. Besides, our greatest advantage is in being unpredictable." He glanced around. "We would do well to get a room where we would not be overheard." He took her suitcase. "I will make a call. The check in desk is through that door. He handed her a roll of banknotes. She took it not wanting to think about what she was doing. She approached the front desk.

"Can I help you?" The young man behind the counter smiled pleasantly and hovered with his hands over the keyboard.

"Yes, I would like ..." She glanced back at Rippner. He seemed to have dissapeared. "Two rooms, please."

"Oh, honey, don't be like that, I told you I was sorry." She tried not to show the ice creeping up her spine as Rippner seemed to appear from nowhere and slipped his arm around her waist. He turned to the clerk. "It's our anniversary but I say one little thing about my sister in law and ..." The clerk nodded sympathetically. She tried to play along.

"Well, I thought it was rude and uncalled for."

"But she did ..."

"Honey, let's not discuss it here. Why don't you take care of things here? I need some air after that long journey. " He stared at her pointedly as she shrugged out of his embrace.

"The one room please. She'll change her mind in a minute." He smiled at the clerk. Lisa stepped out into the warm desert. The air conditioning gone, she might as well have said, she stepped out for some heat. After a few minutes had gone by in which she was trying not to look like she was attempting to escape. After a few minutes Rippner joined her, his hand on the small of her back. It still creeped her out how easily he could slip into his fake friendly persona. She had been taken for a ride when she first met him. "We need to maintain the appearance of anything other than what we are. If two strangers arrive together and check into different rooms, that's suspicious. But a young couple on an anniversary, that's normal."

"Fine. Well if we're playing at being a couple, could you not sound so much like the misogynist ass that you really are because no girl in her right mind would have marry that kind of guy after the fifties." His lips tightened.

"All right." She took her suitcase from him and strode down the passageway, the number key that he had given her in her hand. The room was a nice double with a TV. She thanked whoever was responsible for its presence there. She went straight for the bathroom . She would like to have showered but knowing that Rippner was in the next room prevented her from daring that. Instead she did her best to freshen up with out one before emerging. Rippner sat patiently on the bed with his hands on his knees.

"Are you going to tell me where we're going?"

"Chicago." He didn't skip a beat.

"Why?"

"You don't need to know that."

"If I'm to be a part of this, I think I should at least know what the plan I."

"You will, when I trust you not to go to the police."

"I'm not going to the police."

"Nevertheless, you're on a need to know basis."

"I don't like it."

"I don't require you to like it, only to understand it." She frowned and crossed her arms.

"I'm going out to get some food." She hadn't eaten on the bus and she didn't fancy staying another moment with him.

She threw down the food on the bed and ripped open the nearest carton, realising just how hungry she was. She did not look at Rippner who quietly sat in the chair across from her and took one of the offerings gingerly. They ate in silence. After some minutes she worked up the courage to seize the remote and turn on the TV. She turned on a crime drama that neither of them particularly wanted to watch. it was more for the silence than anything. She had figured out something while she had got the sandwiches. It was very likely that he would turn her over and was just keeping her until he was in a position to gain the most from the deal. Well, she had decided. Two could play that game and if what he said was correct, then he was just as much an asset as she was when it came to leverage.

"So what now? Is there anything we should be doing?"

"Sleeping. There is nothing we can do right now."

He sank further into the chair and crossed his arms. The discussion was clearly over.