Disclaimer: I don't own anything affiliated with Covert Affairs except for some DVDs and a passion for writing fanfiction! Story title is from the Florence + The Machine song of the same name (however this is NOT a songfic.)

Rating: T for now.

Characters / Pairings: Auggie/Annie (eventual, or at least that's the plan), some Auggie/Parker, and others can be expected to appear as well.

Author's Note: Wow! I am amazed by the positive response to the prologue! Thanks to all of you who read and reviewed. Reviews are writer fuel, so feel free to leave more! No flames though! =)

Heartlines

Chapter 1 - Missing

The wind whipped through Annie's hair as she drove down the eastern seaboard. After Auggie had left, she had talked to Joan, not about Auggie of course, but after her first kill in the field Joan seemed inclined to give her time to process. Which really meant time to drive until she ended up somewhere, which had turned out to be a small bed and breakfast in Maine, and both try and fail to sort out everything she was feeling.

It was a cold day to be driving with the top down, but she didn't care. After all, what were convertibles for? And after two weeks of trying to sort out her feelings and coming up with nothing that made sense, she might as well feel something she could understand, even if it was numbing cold.

Numbness was a fitting sensation, in the wake of Auggie leaving. Leaving her, if she was honest about her feelings, even if that wasn't exactly accurate. He could hardly leave her if they had never been, well, a thing, but… he had left her hanging. She knew it was true as much as she felt she didn't have a right to expect anything from him. Forget about feelings and relationships for a minute; she had killed a man, and the one person she could talk to, as a friend, who knew what she did for a living but who also knew what it was like to do what she'd done, had listened to her tell him he was the only person she wanted to talk to, and half a breath later, it seemed like, he was telling her he was going to Africa to be with someone. Annie couldn't quite bring herself to think of it as someone else; that felt too much like being abandoned, even though that was exactly what he had done when he left.

After he gave her a car.

What did that even mean? Congratulations on your first kill, here's a new set of wheels? Of course not, it was absurd, but what was she supposed to do with it? The car was great, and she understood giving it to her had meant something more to Auggie even if she didn't know what. But when what she had wanted to tell him was that there is something between us and I want to figure out what it is, a car felt a lot like a consolation prize. And somewhere, half a world away, that other woman had won Auggie.

And Annie didn't even know her name, because Auggie hadn't told her. She now wondered if he ever really told her anything, which was completely unfair because she told him everything. Well, almost. There were some things about Ben that she didn't think he knew. But of course, how could she even tell when he kept so much of himself a secret?

That was the heart of the problem, aside from the fact that he was in Africa: that dating within the Agency, or even trying to date, would always be like this. These were people for whom secrecy was their bread and butter. If Auggie, who she had supposed was her best friend aside from her sister, could have a girlfriend he was serious enough about to run off to Africa, then she didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting truth from anyone. No truth, no trust, but trust without truth was relationship currency at the CIA, and its value, she was learning, could depreciate completely at a moment's notice.

She herself was worth a very nice car, at least. If it hadn't seemed more like he was handing his old life to her for safekeeping while he ran away in the name of moving on. And what was that about, anyway? He'd been blind for years, and while she hoped never to know what that was like, it seemed so sudden, so artificial, for him to turn on a dime and bolt.

So maybe it wasn't what he was running toward. Maybe there was something he was running away from. That felt better, more right somehow, given what she knew about him, but he clearly played things so close to the vest that she had no hope of guessing what that something might have been, if it had anything to do with her, and whether there might have been anything she could have done about it. Or maybe that feeling of rightness was just her wishful thinking, and he really did run away to be with a girl.

Annie shifted, opening the car up on a long stretch of highway. Two weeks away may have done nothing to clear her head, but it had staved off that inevitable moment when she would have to go back to the DPD without Auggie.

xxxxx

There are some moments when the phone rings, and you just know it's something bad. Joan was a highly rational being, but she understood the truth of that. She would never verbalize the fact that when her phone rang that morning, her heart had caught in her throat, and she would never be able to quantify why it was so. The feeling didn't lessen when Stu in Tech Ops told her Auggie had missed a scheduled check-in, a request she had made of him while he was abroad. He'd had little choice after what had happened during his trip to Turkey… at least until such time as he was no longer attached to the CIA, a decision he had not yet made but that Joan suspected might not be long off.

She didn't bother replacing the handset in its cradle, only pressed down on the switch to terminate the call. She hesitated only an instant as she processed what she'd been told, that Stu had tried alternate contacts and had found that the Peace Corps housing where the Parker girl had been living had come under an attack of unknown motivation, that some people were missing… and that some were dead.

She dialed her husband first, updating him in clipped tones that brooked no refusals. Arthur understood Auggie was an issue on which Joan wouldn't budge, and he gave her what he could. He gave her Jai Wilcox. His was the next number she called.

"Jai, it's Joan. As of now, your office is assigned to the DPD. Report to my office in five minutes. Bring Barber with you."

Joan knew Jai was after her job, but she didn't care. She would still use him when it suited her, and this time, it did. She was more preoccupied with what she would say when she recalled Annie Walker.

xxxxx

"So, how was Maine?" Danielle asked as Annie settled at the kitchen table, tired from the road and thoughts that were more circuitous than helpful.

"It was fine," Annie muttered noncommittally.

Danielle pursed her lips. Annie had been unusually reticent to discuss certain things before she'd left, and that was taking into consideration the fact that she had a job she couldn't talk about. All Danielle knew is that Annie had gone off to see Auggie, and had returned with a car and a complete lack of a smile. That girl smiled even when she hurt, so it had to be bad. Danielle hadn't seen her like that since Sri Lanka.

And what was up with the car? It was a damn nice car. No one should frown when they had a car like that.

"Were there any… guys… I should know about?" Danielle asked, laying her bait casually.

"No. No guys. No guys ever again," Annie murmured disconsolately. Danielle had heard that line before, after her sister's absence overseas, after she'd been dumped by her high school boyfriend. It was Annie-code for abject misery.

"So this is about Auggie," she guessed.

Her sister looked up, lips pressed in a flat line and eyes soulfully deep with emotion. That look alone answered any more questions Danielle had. Except for the car, but that could wait.

"Oh honey," she said, heaving a sigh as her features shifted to match her sister's expression. She reached for the freezer.

"Isn't it a little early for Cherry Garcia?" Annie asked, smiling slightly.

"It's a little early for vodka, but I've got that in here, too," Danielle replied with an arched eyebrow.

There. The full-on Annie smile, at last. It was a little strained, but Danielle would take what she could get.

"The ice cream will be fine," Annie replied as she took the spoon Danielle offered.

They were just digging into the frozen treat when Annie's phone rang. Rolling her eyes, she pulled it out to look. Work. Her brow furrowed as she picked up; they knew she was on leave…

"Annie," Joan said crisply. "Are you home?"

"Yeah, I just got back today," she replied. "Joan, what's this about?"

"You're being recalled. We have a situation. Pack your bags. Travel light; supplies will be waiting for you on the ground. Jai's en route to pick you up."

"You're sending Jai? I can drive in…" Annie's heart froze as the pieces began to fall into place and the strain in Joan's voice registered. "Joan, what aren't you telling me?"

Joan took a deep breath, a steadying breath, it seemed to Annie, and that only deepened her sudden terror.

"It's Auggie. We've lost contact. He's missing."

xxxxx

Everything became a blur to Annie as she flew into motion automatically. She practically ran to the guest house for her go bag, rifling through her safe for the appropriate travel documents. Her sister had followed her out of concern but she didn't care. It wasn't like Danielle didn't know what she did for a living.

Danielle caught her arm in a gentle grip that snapped her back to reality with the force of an oncoming truck.

"Annie, what's wrong? I know you can't talk about it but… how long?"

"I don't know," Annie answered honestly, hesitating only a moment before she said the next thing, even though revealing it could technically cost her job… but Danielle knew who Auggie worked for, too. To hell with it. "Auggie's missing. They don't know what happened to him."

"Oh god," Danielle breathed.

A black sedan pulled up at the curb.

"That's my ride, I have to go…" Annie murmured, pawing over her bag one last time in a scattered effort to make sure she had everything.

"Annie," Danielle's voice stopped her. "You'll find him. You'll bring him home. And I'll be thinking of you every minute."

"Thank you," Annie whispered, choking back a sudden rush of emotion.

Jai stepped out of the car and approached Annie, reaching for her bag. Danielle looked him up and down, recognizing him from the time he'd come to dinner at her house.

"Wow. You too, huh?" she asked bluntly.

Jai froze, looking at her with wide eyes, then gave barely a half-nod as he recovered.

"Walker." Annie looked up at his voice. He gestured toward the car.

"It's time to go."

With a backward glance at her sister, Annie was gone, Danielle's small but encouraging wave goodbye frozen in her mind.