The woman once known as Julia Hunt twisted the engagement ring she wore on her left hand, its weight still unfamiliar though she'd worn it for a month. So different from the little plastic sunflower that had marked her first marriage - the one nobody else could ever know about, now; the one she only allowed herself to think about in the depths of a night shift, when the hospital was as quiet as it could get.
Now, she had to focus on her upcoming wedding that would be far more lavish than her first exchange of vows in a hospital chapel. The chaplain on duty had smiled at the toy rings - the sunflower for her, a panda for Ethan.
Ethan.
Julia closed her eyes against the flood of memories associated with the name she never spoke aloud. Dark hair, hazel eyes, cocky grin, and the gentlest touch she'd ever known. She'd been lucky, even for the short time as they'd had together.
"There you are, darling. You wanted to see me?"
Julia made herself smile and turn toward the man approaching her. Martin Bryce might not eclipse Ethan Hunt in her mind, but he shone with a light of his own. She could be, if not happy, then at least content with him.
"Just to ask if you have any preferences. The wedding planner should be here soon."
Martin wrapped his arms around her and dropped a kiss to her temple. "I prefer to be married. The rest is details."
Julia shook her head, smiling up at him. "That's not narrowing it down."
"Let's try this, then." Martin stood back and adopted a stern expression. "Absolutely no themes that will look dated next year, let alone ten years from now. Simple and classic."
"Much better," Julia teased. "I can work with that."
"Whatever you want," Martin told her. "It's your day."
"Our day," she corrected, and stretched up to kiss him lightly.
He returned it, then stepped back. "Sorry, I have to go. The auditors are coming today, and then I have a meeting with some of our suppliers. They keep wanting to raise prices, the greedy bastards."
Julia returned his smile. "I'll try to keep the wedding costs reasonable, then, just in case you don't out-negotiate them."
"The day I can't out-negotiate a supplier is the day I resign as President and Chairman. I'll see you at dinner."
"See you." Julia watched him leave, absently turning the engagement ring around her finger. In most respects, Martin couldn't be more different than Ethan, but there was one way in which they were eerily similar. She had the same feeling that Martin wasn't telling her everything about his work that she'd had with Ethan, before she'd been kidnapped and taken to China. Then she'd learned everything about Ethan and his work.
She only hoped it wouldn't take another kidnapping for her to learn everything about Martin and his work.
"The wedding planner has arrived, Miss. The sun room."
"Thanks," Julia told the housekeeper. I'm a nurse. When do nurses have housekeepers? But that was just one of the things she'd had to get used to since she'd started dating Martin.
Julia crossed to the library, surprised to find a man surveying the manicured lawn through the French doors.
"You don't look like a Laura," Julia said.
The man turned to face her, and she took in green eyes, brown hair, and a well-cut charcoal blazer and slacks. He smiled and offered his hand. "I'm Brandon Williams. Laura came down with flu. I'm filling in for her."
"I see." Julia shook his hand, hoping she didn't sound too skeptical.
"It's been my experience that women have a hard time encouraging other women to be beautiful, even on the most special day of their lives."
So she hadn't hidden her reaction well enough. "Well, that would be a fruitless endeavor on any day, in my case."
"Hardly." Williams smiled at her again, and Julia thought there was a warmth in his smile that hadn't been there the first time.
"Please." Julia sat on the chintz-covered sofa and gestured for him to sit next to her. He did, dropping the portfolio he carried onto the coffee table. "I'm afraid I have no idea where to start. I always thought I'd have a small wedding."
She had had a small wedding, when she married Ethan. The two of them, the chaplain, and a couple of witnesses. It hadn't been legally binding until they'd signed the marriage license weeks later, but she savored that memory, hoped it would get her through the spectacle that her wedding to Martin would be.
"Let's start with that," Williams said. "What you'd like most. "
Julia closed her eyes, thought back to the wedding fantasies she'd had when she was a girl. "Outdoors in the fall. Leaves turning color, maybe by a stream. And then come inside for a reception by the fire." She opened her eyes to find Williams staring at her, and she blushed. "Not what you usually hear, is it?"
"At least you haven't set me an impossible mission, like some of my clients."
"Impossible mission?" Julia repeated, unable to keep the surprise from her voice. The odd phrasing reminded her of Ethan - he'd worked with the Impossible Mission Force. This wedding planner couldn't have anything to do with that, could he?
Williams nodded. "One of them wanted an entire chapel built from ice. She'd stayed at the Ice Hotel in Quebec and wanted to recreate the experience. Except she was getting married in July."
"That does sound impossible." The disappointment was irrational, Julia knew that. Still, she'd hoped for some link, however tenuous, to Ethan, even if it meant her life might be endangered again.
"The good news is that a venue shouldn't be difficult. In fact -" Williams broke off and opened his portfolio, paging through it until he found what he wanted. "Would you consider this?"
Julia took the brochure he offered her, studied it. It was for a bed and breakfast about an hour's drive away. The picture showed it nestled among mature woods with an English-style garden behind it.
"It's beautiful," Julia said.
"The inside flap has pictures of the rooms." Williams' voice was neutral, and Julia gave him a puzzled frown, but opened the flap as he suggested.
Her breath caught when she saw the sticker pressed in the lower corner. It was a yellow sunflower. She yanked her gaze from it to Williams, opened her mouth.
Before she could speak, he said, "I can arrange a tour. Tomorrow, if you like."
"Yes." Julia heard the catch in her voice and cleared her throat. "I have a night shift tomorrow, so I need to be back by three."
"I can be here at nine, if that's convenient."
"That's fine." Julia barely paid attention to the rest of what Williams said, focusing past the rush of emotions just enough to provide responses when prompted. Williams was with Ethan's agency and, given the sunflower sticker, probably knew Ethan. At the least, he knew who she was.
A cautious voice that sounded a lot like Ethan's spoke in her mind. He may know who you are, but that doesn't mean he's on your side. Be careful.
=X=
The company headquarters of Bryce Pharmaceutical wasn't the most ostentatious office Ethan had ever visited. Its lobby reminded Ethan of a Holiday Inn - inoffensive décor, functionality reigning supreme. The money Bryce hadn't spent on interior designers had instead gone to security.
Thankfully, he and Jane weren't carrying anything that wasn't adequately explained by their pose as auditors, Ethan thought as the guard at the security desk checked their identification.
"Take your laptops out, please," the guard said. "And turn them on."
Ethan raised an eyebrow, but opened his briefcase to remove his laptop. Beside him, Jane did the same.
The guard gave the laptops a cursory glance as they booted, then said, "That's fine, thanks." He handed back their ID. "Wait here."
Ethan exchanged a glance with Jane, and saw that she shared his concern. If security was this tight just to get into the building, what would they face when they tried to insert a worm into Bryce's intranet?
Trust Benji, Ethan reminded himself. He's one of the best, and he's got backup at headquarters again.
"Mr. Davidson?"
Ethan turned to see a woman about his age dressed in a tailored business suit approaching. "And my colleague, Laura James."
"I'm Renee Ford, Director of Accounting." The woman shook hands with each of them. "If you'll come with me, I'll get you situated."
Ford took a pair of badges from the security guard and offered one to each of the IMF agents. "These will get you into your workspace and the common areas."
"I'm impressed with your security," Ethan said as he fell into step with her. Jane followed only a pace behind.
"It's necessary," Ford answered as she swiped her card to summon an elevator. "Some of the research we do here is very sensitive. Having someone walk in at the wrong time would be disastrous. I'm not allowed in many more places than you will be."
The elevator opened and Ethan gestured for the two women to precede him. Ford pushed the button for the twelfth floor.
"Accounting is on twelve," Ford said, "and the cafeteria's on three. The elevator won't let you make another selection." Just to prove her point, she pressed the button for the eighteenth floor.
"Please make another selection." The recorded voice echoed in the closed elevator.
"Very polite," Ethan observed.
"If you keep trying, the elevator will shut down until Security can respond," Ford said.
"I'll be sure to have coffee before I push the button," Jane murmured. Ford gave her a tight, polite smile just as the doors opened on the twelfth floor.
"This way." Ford led them down a corridor to a small conference room overlooking the front approach to the building. "You can work here."
"Thanks," Ethan said. "Anything we need to know about computer access?"
"I'll have IT bring you passwords and get you set up." Ford smiled at him. "My office is at the end of the corridor on the left, if you need anything else." She gave the briefest pause. "Lunch, perhaps."
"I will." Ethan smiled back, and then Ford was gone.
"Will's going to be upset," Jane observed quietly as she pulled her laptop from her tote. "He called dibs on the next seduction."
Ethan blinked at Jane's suggestion. Seduction?
"You can't tell me you didn't see she's interested."
"No, I saw." Ethan turned to his briefcase. "But you heard her - she's not likely to have any useful information."
For which he was grateful. Even though he and Julia weren't together anymore, could never be together again, and now she was marrying another man, Ethan found he had no interest in another woman. Sure, he flirted with Jane, but that was safe - agents never slept with other agents. Doing so made the missions personal, which was the one thing a mission was never supposed to be.
If he had to, Ethan would find a way to flirt with Renee Ford, even seduce her if that was necessary. But it would simply be duty, and not the pleasure it had been before Julia.
"Hey, y'all." Ethan looked up to see a man in his mid-twenties standing in the doorway. "I'm Jared. Ms. Ford said y'all need passwords. If you'll let me drive your keyboards for a minute, I'll get you all set up."
"Sure." Jane turned her laptop toward him. "Thanks for your help."
"No prob." Jared took over her keyboard. "Here's the intranet login site. And your passwords are auditor oh one and auditor oh two. Ladies first, of course."
"Of course," Ethan murmured, and Jared moved to his laptop.
"There you go," Jared said after another moment. "All set up. You'll see the auditor information link once you log in. You need anything else, I'm on extension six oh one six."
Then Jared was gone in a lingering echo of a Texas twang and Ethan closed the conference room door behind him. "Benji, you there?"
"Mercury reads you, Jupiter. I'm in the server room - conveniently also where the phone lines are."
"Logging in to their intranet now." Jane's words were punctuated by her tapping on the keys.
"Mercury?" Ethan repeated.
"Pluto's not a planet. I should at least be a planet. Inserting spyware and data miner program now," Benji reported. "And despite Saturn's suggestion, I'm not going for Uranus."
"Still leaves Neptune and Mars," Jane observed.
"Neither one of which suit me. All right, you should be good to go."
"Opening data miner," Jane said. Beside her, Ethan logged in to the intranet normally. Having the two programs operating side by side would further confuse anyone who might be watching - so Benji said, and Ethan trusted Benji's judgment in all things software related.
"We are good to go, Mercury," Jane reported after a few minutes. "You can fix the phone problem now."
"Roger that." Then Benji fell silent, and Ethan knew he was packing up to leave. His part of this phase of the mission was finished.
His and Jane's part was only beginning, though. They'd have to search through Bryce's most secure records to try to find the leak that led the Syndicate to the nano-drugs. Benji would help from the hotel room that was their base of operations, but Ethan knew this phase of the mission would make or break the rest of it.
"Is it hard for you?" Jane's question broke into his thoughts.
"Is what hard?"
"Being here, maybe running into a woman who resembles your wife."
The drawback with having a team that was as close as this one, Ethan mused, was that they knew too many of each other's secrets. Jane didn't know the biggest secret where Julia was concerned, but she knew enough to ask uncomfortable questions.
But maybe he could discourage her. "If you don't think I can handle it -"
Her eyes widened slightly. "No, that's not what I meant. I don't doubt you can handle it."
"Good. Has the data miner found anything yet?"
"Not yet." Jane focused on her screen again. Ethan hated being sharp with her when she was simply being friendly, but the wound of being thrust into Julia's orbit again was too new, too raw, for him to be completely rational.
He was just grateful that Will had offered to see to bugging Bryce's house. Even with a full-face mask, Ethan wasn't sure he could keep from revealing himself to her, and he would have to, in order to keep her safe. But Will had volunteered, and so all Ethan had to do was stay away. If he could.
=X=
"How'd it go?"
Will looked up at Ethan's question. For the moment, the two of them were alone in the sitting room of the hotel suite that was the team's base for this mission. "I made contact, as planned, but haven't got the bug planted yet. Which I said in the debrief earlier."
"Not what I meant."
Of course it wasn't, Will thought. Not with Julia involved. What Ethan meant was How is she? Is she happy? Will let out a breath.
"She looks good," he told Ethan.
"Happy?"
"I don't know her well enough to judge." Will kept his voice even. "I'm seeing her again tomorrow. I'll ask."
"Ask?" Ethan stared at him as if he didn't believe what he'd heard. "How can you just ask someone whether they're happy or not?"
Will couldn't help the grin that tugged at his lips. "I'm her wedding planner. I'll hear all the details, especially if she thinks I'm gay." Then he sobered. "Ethan - I've got your back. You know that, right?"
Ethan nodded once, acknowledging that their friendship that went beyond being IMF teammates. Will wasn't certain just when and how that had happened, but it had. He now counted Ethan Hunt among those precious few for whom he'd do anything - kill, die, or anything in between - if it were ever needed.
"Then back off."
Ethan blinked at the sudden sharpness Will put into his tone. Will might be Ethan's second in command now, but he'd led a team of his own, too, and he knew how to command when needed.
"Will -"
"No, Ethan. In Dubai, I accused you of fixating, obsessing, on Hendricks and the codes. I didn't know you then, and I was wrong. Now I know you, and I'm not wrong this time. You're fixating on Julia when you promised you'd let her go."
For once, his commander had no comeback, and Will pressed his advantage. "I promise you, I'll do everything I can to protect her. I won't fail her - you - like I did in Croatia. But you have to let me handle it."
Ethan sat quietly long enough that Will started to wonder if he'd pushed too hard, too fast. Then Ethan let out a breath. "Thank you."
Which response was as puzzling as an explosion would've been expected. "For?"
"Having my back."
Will couldn't joke, not in this moment. So he said simply, "It's a fair trade. You have mine."
And there it was, the cocky grin Will had come to recognize, and sometimes loathe, over the last year. "Yeah," Ethan said. "I do."
"God help us all, you crazy-ass son of a bitch," Will muttered, and Ethan laughed.