OK - So this is turning very 'wordy' - But that's how I see it at the moment, I am in one of those 'wordy' type of moods...But it's funny wordy! (Well at least I hope it is) and there will be more in the way of action in later chapters... AND CALLIAN Promise...

Many thanks to my reveiwers and alerters...

Disclaimer as norm….

COMPLICATED DEALS

Ben's sudden entrance into her office made Gillian jump.

"Foster – How is he? Have you seen him, spoken to him? Does he still have her with him?"

"Cal is the only one that gets away with not knocking Agent Reynolds, let's get that straight first please. Now….He is in an exceptionally bad mood, so yes – you can take it from that that I have seen him, and spoken to him – He does still have Samantha Fowles, who I assume is 'Her' with him, and you are going to sit down and answer some of my questions now before you go anywhere else"

"Arhh cum on Foster, he's gotta be screamin mad for this key by now and I'm sorry, but he scares me more than you do"

"Key, what key? Ben please just …"

His exit breeze moved her hair slightly.

He tried really hard to make it straight through to Lightman's office but…

"Reynolds! Wait up"

Ria grabbed him by the arm and pulled him into the lab.

"You're going in there right?"

"Torres I…"

"Let me come with you, I can…follow you in with a tray yer know cups and coffee and biscuits. I've had Heidi make one up so I just have to pick it up and.."

"Uh arh..No way, I mean NO WAY Ria – you find another plan to do your snooping, one that doesn't involve me! I am in enough trouble already, now I gotta go"

"But Ben….DAMN!"

xXx

"For fucks sake! Why couldn't you do that 8 hours ago, or 6, or 2 or maybe even before we got on the bloody plane at Heathrow!"

Sammie was still admiring her handiwork on the table. The opened handcuffs and the small, bent pin by the side of it.

"Well you would have run away from me and I didn't want you to"

"WOT?"

"Oh come on Cal – If it had been at Heathrow you would have lost me in the crowds, if I had done it during the flight you probably would have made a makeshift parachute and jumped, and god knows where you would have dumped me if I'd released you once we had landed on this side of the pond"

"I don't believe you.."

"Hey Lightman! I'm here and I've got the key…."

"Oh Triffic Reynolds. Perfect fuckin FBI timing as usual! Here, cum and get yer 'oh so highly specialalised' wrist jewellery!"

"How the hell?"

"Childs play agent Reynolds, nice to see you again by the way, Cal – is there any chance of getting some coffee?…"

"Oh – Did someone mention wanting coffee? I have some right here, I kinda thought you all might be…well, after such a long flight. Hi, my name is Ria…Ria Torres..I work here with Dr. Lightman"

Ria pushed past Ben with the tray and ignored Cal's scathing glare as she placed it on the table and extended her hand to the blonde.

"Oh wonderful thank you Ria I'm gasping. Mr Happy here wouldn't let me have a single drink the whole flight because supposedly I would then be running off to the loo every 5 minutes, which is quite funny really considering he's the one who…"

"Samantha!"

"Ooops" She raised a finger and placed it against her pursed lips faking an apologetic grimace to Cal's angry eyes.

For a brief moment they all stood there, just looking.

Cal was looking at Sammie, Ben was sill looking at the opened cuffs on the table and Torres was switching between looking at all of it.

Cal abruptly walked to his desk and picked up a large pile of paperwork.

"Torres, Heidi could easily have seen to that tray so I am assuming the only reason there is for you doing it is because you have nuffin better to do – so here, take this lot and get it sorted and filed"

Seeing her hesitation he opened the door "Well go on then…sling yer hook…hop it"

Helped by his hand on her back Ria stumbled out of the office with her paper mountain.

"Right! Well here she is, and she's all yours now Reynolds – have fun – Sammie it's bin….interesting catching up bye"

Ben dropped his head, his adams apple began rapid movement and he clasped his hands together in front of his groin.

"Yeah…well…about that Lightman…"

"No! Absolutely no. If you think I am taking responsibility for her for one more second?…"

Call started his unique, menacing walk towards the anxious agent.

"Look Lightman – This is not me ok, I'm just relaying – don't go shooting the messenger here"

"And WOT exactly are you supposed to be relaying? An I wanna know the name of the moron that came up with the notion, and THEN I want his home address and details of all his family"

Samantha had made herself comfortable with a mug of coffee and had started munching the biscuits whilst seemingly enjoying every moment of the discomfort and anger of the two men in front of her.

"Cal – You know the problems here…She needs to be kept safe AND confined! There is no law enforcement agency in this country that can handle her and not a single place we can guarantee she won't escape from"

"SO?"

"So ..The general consensus seems to be that staying with you – at your place – is our best bet….WAIT, wait, let me finish. We will provide 24/7 security back up outside and she will be electronic tagged – we will give you ANY security and surveillance equipment you want"

Sammie nearly chocked on her biscuit as she tried to stifle a roar of contemptuous laughter at the mention of the electronic tag – yeah, like that would stay on more than an hour!

Reynolds was steeled for the onslaught:

The eyes.

The total invasion of private space.

The silence followed by a barrage of abuse using words that were either basic slum level or contained so many syllables that even he had no idea what they meant. Sometimes he wondered if the words only existed in some pocket of space entitled 'The Lightman Dictionary'

He waited, held his breath even.

Cal just gave him a lopsided grin, looked at Samantha momentarily, then started to back away from the expectant agent, a somewhat sinister grin creeping over the whole of his face.

Three Days Earlier….

"So let me get this straight – Samantha has ..somehow managed to sleep with strategic members of …what was it again? Oh yeah – FBI, British Intelligence, CIA…"

"Yeah, yeah. Let's not go through the whole list again shall we, suffice to say all the major players"

"Oh I was gonna say all the usual suspects but never mind. In every case the man concerned was in procession of HUGE amounts of really, really top secret squirrel type info – which – they now believe they passed on to Sammie in sum sort of 'pillow talk' marathon. Am I right – so far?"

"Yeah"

Reynolds crossed his arms and dropped his head looking for all the world like he had been one of the accused parties.

"Ok, right – moving on. We now have a woman, of rather dubious reputation, who may..or may not have a shed load of British and American secrets that she may – or may not pass on to persons of other nationalities that really have no right to be knowing that sort of thing"

"Look – It's up in the air I know, but at least two guys have admitted telling her things they shouldn't have…oh, and one woman"

Cal let out a throaty laugh.

"Lightman, the Brits have been trying to keep her under wraps for the last week but 7 times in the 5 days that they have had her she has ' slipped out' past a full quota of security personnel"

"Yeah but they caught her again didn't they?"

"More by luck than judgement" Ben snorted.

"And they have tried to find out wot she knows and have got Nuffin right?"

"Yeah. Anyway they want her out of Britain for the time being and they want you to act as an escort and then take a run at her back here"

"Really! – that's nice…NO"

xXx

Three Days Later – Back at the Office….

"So lets just say – just for the hell of it – I agreed to take this, ..fundamentally character flawed woman …. into my home, let her mix with my 16 year old daughter, watch over her 24/7 AND interrogate her to boot! How much are the combined agencies involved prepared to pay me?"