Eyal decided as he walked through the airport that although he would not be sleeping until he had gotten Avi back he had to at least change into a new set of clothes. As he headed across town to his apartment he debated how best to approach Annie. He knew he needed her help but calling her out of the blue seemed both rude and impersonal. He figured he would make his decision after he had had a shower to calm his nerves. Not one to ever get nervous on a mission this was a new sensation for him, but he figured it was probably just because of what was a stake.
He pulled into his parking space and then got in the elevator.
When the doors opened on his floor he didn't notice that the door was ajar to his apartment but stepping closer he realized that it was halfway open. He immediately drew his gun. The lights were off but he could hear someone moving around inside. He carefully set his bag down in the hallway and stepped into the apartment.
First they took Avi and then they had the nerve to go through his apartment! Well he was going to kill this son of a bitch thought Eyal. Sneaking into the bedroom he saw a person with a flashlight rummaging through the drawers clearly looking for something. Eyal came up behind the intruder and placed the muzzle of the gun right at the base of his skull.
"Down on your knees", ordered Eyal in his most cold-blooded voice. He would beat the shit out of this guy and get the information he needed before killing him and going to find Avi.
"Hands behind your back, I'm going to zip-tie them", Eyal lashed out. He was already thinking about the most painful ways of making this guy talk. He had tuned out all interruptions.
"Well this is quite the switch from the last time we used these", his intruder replied. Eyal was still focused on his vendetta and pulled the zip-ties as tight as he could meaning that they were probably going to cut off the blood flow; he didn't care.
"Eyal?" his intruder questioned. In that one word he realized what he hadn't the first time the intruder spoke. It was a woman and he knew that voice.
"Annie?" Eyal responded. He was shocked at what he was about to do. What he would have done if she hadn't spoken his name. "Oh, what am I going to do" Eyal whispered.
And with that Eyal dropped the gun and fell to his knees with his hands over his eyes. He couldn't comprehend what he had been about to do. His son was kidnapped and he was about to kill the one person that could help him. The one person that he trusted no matter what. The one woman that he loved.
Annie didn't understand what was going on. "Eyal what's wrong? What are you doing here?" She saw him crumple to the floor but couldn't understand his actions. She quickly sat down and slipped one, then the other leg, through her arms so that her still zip-tied hands were now in front of her.
"Eyal? Eyal, look at me. What's going on? I have never seen you like this. Tell me, what's wrong?" Annie tried to peal his hands away from his face but he wouldn't budge. He simply moved from his knees to a sitting position with his back to the bed.
Eyal still couldn't focus. He was still caught up in the fact that he almost killed Annie, that he had been ready to torture her to death.
Annie decided that with her hands still tied together, now in front of her, her options for getting close to Eyal were severely limited. She looked over at him and sighed. She knew what she was about to do would make some later conversations very interesting, but right now she didn't care. She straddled his lap and brought her hands up over his head simply hugging him. He had always comforted her. Now it was her turn to comfort him.
Eyal didn't realize what Annie was doing until she laid her head on his shoulder. He had been kneeling when she had tried, unsuccessfully, to pull his hands away from his face. He had simply moved to where his back was against the bed and his legs were stretched out in front of him. Now he realized that Annie was sitting on his lap with her hands behind his head. When talking hadn't worked she had resorted to hugging.
"Neshama give me your hand", Eyal spoke for the first time since he had realized who the intruder was and what he had almost done to her, to Annie.
"Ah…Eyal I can't", Annie replied looking slightly frustrated.
"What do you mean you can't?! You can't or you won't?! Annie I thought we were friends if you don't even trust me enough to give me your hand how can I…" Eyal was beyond grief that something as simple as holding hands was something Annie was not willing to do. If she couldn't trust him with that how could he ask her to help with Avi?
Annie had interrupted him as his mind raced, "Eyal". She still couldn't understand why he was acting this way.
"What!" he managed to spit out angrily at her. She drew back from the hostility.
"Eyal it's not that I don't want to, it's that I can't". She started to laugh, pulling her hands off of his neck and revealing the problem: her hands were still zip-tied together. Reeling from the notion of almost killing her he had forgotten that he had tied her hands together, and recalling now how infuriated he had been that they were really tightly tied. He quickly pulled his knife out of his pocket and cuts the bonds. He could see where the plastic had cut into her skin; it was already starting to bleed.
Annie knew Eyal hadn't known it was her when he had tied her hands together or she knew he wouldn't have done them so tight, but now she regretted the look of pain she saw flit across his face as he took in the damage of what he had done. She quickly drew her hands up to her mouth and licked the cuts to try and stop the bleeding.
Eyal looked at Annie's wrists and felt like someone had kicked him in the stomach. He had never wanted to hurt her, ever. Now he had failed. He had failed Avi, and now he had failed Annie, the two most important people in his life. He was appalled at what his life had become. He picked her up, very easily he noted as she was still straddling his lap. How had he missed that? And carried her into the bathroom, setting her on the sink. He took her hands, not asking for them now, and started to attend to her wounds, wounds he had inflicted. He thought back to when he had done it and noticed that she didn't flinch, didn't cry out. He realized she trusted him, she knew who it was the moment he spoke and let him do it. That cut him like the blade of a knife. He cleaned each cut and bandaged her wrists without speaking.
Annie let him carry to the bathroom. She knew protesting would only make it worse. If only she could figure out what was going on with him. She sat silently and let him clean the cuts left by the zip-ties. When he was done and putting the first aid supplies away she spoke.
"Eyal are you going to explain or am I going to have to pry it out of you?" she asked, semi-sarcastically as was their nature, but still serious enough that she knew he would know she wanted a real answer.
Eyal finished what he was doing and then whipped around and picked Annie up knocking the breath out of her as he carried her back to the bed so they could talk. He didn't want to let go. He needed something to hold on to.
Annie was shocked when Eyal picked her up but she could sense he needed this. She let him place her gently on the bed without complaint. She leaned away to turn on the light but he pulled her back.
"Eyal, I just want to see your face" Annie sighed. She felt around in the dark for his hand and picked it up, giving it a gentle squeeze as she leaned over for the light again. She flicked it on and turned to see Eyal. He looked worse than his voice let on. He was almost…was she imagining that…in tears?
Eyal had never cried in front of a woman. In fact he could count on one hand the number of times he had cried period. But today he had hit his limit. There was just too much going on for him to process. His son had been kidnapped. He had almost killed the only genuine friend he ever had. The woman that he loved. He was in pieces. A single tear betrayed him as it slid down his cheek.
Annie held onto Eyal's hand as she watched a tear roll down his face. She reached up to wipe it away and Eyal caught her other hand there, holding her palm to his face. She started to make gentle circles on his cheek. He pulled her into his lap and just held her. Annie knew something was very wrong for him to act this way. She knew he needed this, but at the same time she knew she needed to know what was going on.
Eyal just held Annie. He needed something pure, something good for a moment. Just to live, and hold onto this moment. He knew she wanted to know what was going on, but at the same time she was letting him get out what he needed. He broke the silence.
"Neshama, I am so sorry. I never would have hurt you had I known it was you. I feel terrible. You cannot fathom how it pains me to see what I have inflicted upon you. I hope you can forgive me." Eyal waited in pained silence for her response.
Annie was very solemn in her answer. "Eyal, I know you didn't do it on purpose. I shouldn't have been in here with the lights off and the door open. I can imagine how it looked. I know you have a short temper but I didn't think you would ever shoot me."
Hearing Annie's words Eyal knew he needed to explain. Needed her to trust him again and know that wasn't how he felt about her, that he would never hold a gun to her head like that.
"Neshama I came here, to the United States, to ask for your help. I wasn't sure how I was going to do it and in all honesty just came here for a shower and a change of clothes. But when I saw the door ajar and heard someone going through my apartment I assumed you were an intruder. Avi's been kidnapped and I figured they were searching the place. I had no idea that you were the one…" Eyal took a deep breath trying to calm himself. Trying to forget what he had almost done.
Annie chimed in, "Wait, what? Avi's been kidnapped?! When were you planning on telling me?"
"Well I wasn't sure how our relationship stood. I didn't know how to approach you about this. When I showed you my son, the most vulnerable aspect of my life, it was because I trusted you and I wanted you to trust me. Then we had that whole Ansari mess and I ruined your trust in me. Then you shot me, well sort of, in Zurich which I thought carried quite a lot of meaning and after that I didn't know where we stood." Eyal admitted.
Annie smiled up at Eyal. "I knew you were just taking the fall for them. I knew it! We worked so hard at keeping our friendship, despite the odds, that I knew you won't just through it all away. Yes, I shot you in Zurich, but it was to save your life you idiot."
"But I just figured you did it out of guilt for putting me in that mess" Eyal responded unsure of how he wanted this to turn out. Did he want her to admit she didn't care about him anymore?
Annie reached up and cupped his face with both hands letting his fall in his lap. "Eyal Lavin you look at me right now. I trust you. I have trusted you and I will trust you. As you know, trust does not come easily for a spy, but there are very few people in this world that I trust more than you. You care about me, and you would risk your life for me, and you always come through when it counts. Never doubt our friendship."
Eyal listened to what Annie said and with her words he started to cry again. He hugged her tight against her chest. After a minute or so he spoke.
"Annie you have no idea what that means to me. I was so worried that our relationship had changed too much and that you would not be able to forgive what I have done. When I came in I have to admit I almost killed you. I was so angry over Avi's kidnapping that I was ready to torture you to death. I'm sorry, Neshama. I'm sorry." Eyal waited for Annie's answer.
Annie looked up at Eyal. "The important thing is that you didn't. I'm here and you're here. We trust one another and we care about one another." She noticed Eyal was back to almost crying. "Or am I wrong?" she challenged.
"No, No!" Eyal burst out. "You just can't imagine what it's like to hear those things spoken aloud. Yes. I trust you. Yes. I care about you. And in case you just hadn't gotten that far yet, let me beat you to it, I love you Annie Walker." Eyal finally heaved a sigh of relief at having spoken those words.
Annie smiled up at Eyal. She was glad he felt the same way. But now they needed to deal with the issue at hand.
"Okay Eyal. That's great, and I love you too. But what is this about Avi? We need to focus on that now. This is a conversation we can complete at a later time." She raised her eyebrows to confirm that he would be around for that conversation. She was lucky enough to catch a familiar glint in his eye before he went back to his grief stricken state.
Eyal thought for a moment. Now that he had laid his cards out on the table about one of the two things bothering him it was time to deal with the second. "Right yes" Eyal switched into mission mode, something he could deal with. "Okay so my ex-wife called to tell me what happened…
Eyal filled her in on what little he knew. He waited for Annie to jump in.
Annie just listened to what had happened and started formulating. Avi had been taken almost 18 hours ago, that didn't leave them a lot of time. But they were Americans and in the US. That gave her some options. She reached for her phone, Eyal stopped her.
"Eyal, I need to call Langley", Annie explained.
"No you don't", Eyal managed to say both forcefully and with a hint of pleading at the same time.
"I can't have anyone finding out that I have a son, Annie. This has to be handled quietly and discretely that's why I came to you for help. If I wanted the whole world to know about Avi I would have simply called Mossad." Eyal spat the name out like it was poison.
"Okay, we can do that but I still need to call Langley" she held up a hand when she saw he was going to protest "to call off from work". She saw Eyal noticeably relax as her statement was both an agreement not to tell Langley what was going on and a promise to help.
"Hi Joan, this is Annie. You know how you have been telling me to take some vacation days well I've decided to use one today and one tomorrow. I figured I would squeeze a couple in while there's not an active op. Is that okay?" Annie smiled and listened as Joan agreed and quickly hung up. She then took the battery out of her cell phone.
Eyal liked this woman. No he felt much more strongly about her than that. But he liked her spycraft. He watched as she set the pieces of her cell phone on the nightstand and then went to get up. He wouldn't let go so she pulled him up with her.
"Okay here's the game plan" she said as she turned to him. They smiled at each other knowing that the next step in getting Avi back was right up their alley.
Never kidnap the son of a spy. Especially one of the very few that had managed to make friends.