SCATTERED AMONG THE STARS
They're 26 and 25 years old when their paths cross again. Ian dropped below the radar and became an M16 agent while Amy became the Madrigal Branch Leader. When he discovers a rogue Madrigal stealing files from the M16, he seeks Amy out for her help. "So, Amy Cahill, will you marry me?"
Rated T for swearing and potentially hinted adult content later on.
CHAPTER 2
"And in her smile, I see something more beautiful than the stars."
- Beth Revis, Across the Universe
/
"So, Amy Cahill, will you marry me?"
"Oh, that's hilarious, Ian," the Madrigal leader hissed. "Really? What the hell does that have to do with being your office assistant?"
Ian laughed. "I bought a new house."
"Good for you. Explain. Now," Amy seethed, her annoyance threatening to overflow and spill onto the floor. She could kill him, Amy decided, and she wouldn't feel the least bit of remorse.
Ian laughed. "We need to get into his house to steal the files back, correct? So how are we going to do that if the spy doesn't recognize you as familiar to the neighbourhood? We need to be subtle. And if you're going to move in with me, then you can either be my fiancée or my wife. Do I seem like the type of person to move in with my girlfriend before an absolute promise?"
"Yes."
The former Lucian drew back, placing a hand over his heart mockingly. "Oh, I feel so hurt, Amy," he shot back, watching her reaction closely.
The girl – no, woman – in question was burning with anger. "Go on, Ian. Go on. See where that lands you. How do you feel about a floor for a bed tonight?"
"You know what would make a better bed? Yours."
"I haven't got time for this," groaned Amy angrily. "Just tell me. Please. This game is exhausting."
They both pretended she wasn't talking just about the matter at hand.
Ian cleared his throat. "Right. Back to business. As I was saying, it is much more convincing if you were to appear as a steady figure in the household. Then, if we're walking around the area together at unconventional times, it won't seem as unnatural."
Amy frowned. "But it'd seem unnatural if anybody was seen walking around at unnatural times."
"Still."
"Still what?" she snapped, hackles rising on end. "Do grace us with an answer."
"Still, it would seem more logical – if I were to introduce you as my girlfriend, there might be a bit of disbelief. I have not, contrary to your apparent beliefs," he challenged, "been entertaining multiple mistresses at all times of the night. I told my co-workers and people around the neighbourhood that I have a long distance girlfriend who I'm planning to propose to. When I return to work, I can just say that I couldn't wait anymore and travelled to America, so in love that I just proposed."
"Oh, really? And people just believed that you were in love?"
"A long time ago, I think I might have been." He swallowed painfully and kept his eyes above her head. He tried not to think about how good it would feel to run his hands through her messy red hair, how much of a luxury it would be to -
No, Ian.
"And you're not, now?"
Ian frowned. "What?"
"In love, I mean," she clarified.
The game, she thought, is on.
"Ah, but you never know. I might be. I might not." He leaned in closer. "What do you think?"
He tried his best not to think of afterwards, and their lives after this mission. In a month or two, where would they be? Even if the mission dragged on longer, they'd still be stuck at this horrible, horrible impasse that separated the two of them.
Ian pretended not to see the way her pupils expanded, the slight hitch in her breathing and how that made him feel. The light, heady feeling that came over him – no, that fiery feeling stirring up low. The painful waiting. Now. Tomorrow. The rest of his life. The absolute uncertainty of their future.
What future?
More than ten years of knowing each other, and both of them knowing that they liked each other. That they might have been happier a long time ago.
But a long time ago was a long time ago, and this was now.
Ian pushed everything he felt for her away. She doesn't need to know, he told himself fiercely. She doesn't need to know. She doesn't need to know.
The Madrigal Leader and a defected Lucian M16 agent?
No, she shouldn't have to know. It would only make her sad. How pathetic you are, Ian, he thought.
They didn't have a bloody shot in the world anyway. What use was it telling her?
All of a sudden, the situation at hand came rushing back to the front of his mind, and he pummelled; packaged; boxed away what he felt. Later.
Silence.
And then she replied, "I accept."
Ian pushed his feelings down and didn't know whether to feel relieved or cry.
/
December 23rd 2015, 2200
"I can't believe we're leaving so close to Christmas," Amy hissed, throwing a glare at the British male next to her. Who, by the way, was towering over her with that self-satisfied little smirk hung on his (very pretty, in Amy's opinion) face.
They were at the airport, awaiting their flight to England as an engaged couple living together.
This was going to be so easy. Too easy.
Amy resisted the urge to scream. The ugly seriously good-looking, was he getting hotter by the second? M16 agent next to her was still smirking, and still silent.
The Madrigal Leader crossed her arms. "I still don't understand why we're not going to start the mission in early January. We're literally so close to Christmas! Why?"
"Because it'll look odd if I'm away for too long at work," came the reply.
"I was going to spend Christmas with Dan! And Nellie! I can't believe you."
"Believe it because you're spending Christmas with me."
"Yeah, but that wouldn't be as bad as spending Christmas with you as Amy almost-Kabra! Which we're going to do!"
"I see you've already begun calling me your husband. Don't worry, this works perfectly for me," he told her over his shoulder while moving forward in the line, dragging his suitcase in tow.
Yes, the line.
Amy did her very best not to laugh, smothering any hazardous giggles with her hand.
He'd matured. At least, Ian wanted to think he'd matured. Two years on your own doesn't allow much time for whining or complaining about the finer things in life.
He felt absurdly proud, so he said so. Obnoxiously.
Amy gritted her teeth and did her very best not to roll her suitcase over his toes when she caught up with him. Come on, Amy, she thought, you're the Madrigal Leader now! You're above this! You. Are. Above. This.
Well, she tried.
/
The plane took off with a roar, and it didn't take long before Amy's surroundings faded into the background, ear-piercing screams becoming muted sounds, the engine's grumbling softening to a much more tolerable, gentle rumble.
Thank God she had remembered to bring a book.
Settling down further into her seat, Amy adjusted the recline of her chair, and then pulled a blanket up around her. It was scratchy and uncomfortable, but still oddly soothing – the economy class flying, reading a book on the plane instead of working on her computer in business class – it was like the Clue Hunt all over again.
This time, with one of her worst enemies next to her, and not on the immediate flight afterwards, trying to catch up with them.
She paused. All this reminiscing was good and nice, but there was one problem to be addressed: economy class? Really, Amy? she scolded herself. There's nothing wrong with flying economy class! Oh my God, you're turning into the Lucian over there. And that'snot a good thing. It'snot.
Sighing, she pulled the blanket up around her again, snuggling even further into the airplane seat, nose buried in the book again. She sat back up and dove for her bag, digging through it to look for her earplugs. Upon finding the desired equipment, she wriggled back down into the seat and flipped her book back to the page she had been at after sticking her earplugs in.
Amy read until she fell asleep.
/
"Hello, sir, what would you like for a drink?"
Ian took off his headphones and leaned towards the air hostess speaking. "I didn't hear you, could you repeat?"
The lady smiled. "What would you like for a drink?"
He glanced at the push cart's offerings. Apple juice, water, red wine…
"I'll take the red wine."
She poured it for him carefully, Ian waiting slightly impatiently. He'd been watching a good movie.
"Thank you," he said curtly. He paused, turning his head to look at the Madrigal Leader next to him. Amy hadn't gotten anything – she was fast asleep. She was bound to be thirsty when she woke up.
He hesitated for a moment before tapping the air hostess lightly on her arm. "Excuse me, but can I have a glass of water? For the lady next to me," he explained.
"Of course," she replied, giving him the requested beverage. "You care very much for her, I see," the lady remarked.
He dared to reply. "Maybe."
So he was too much of a coward to actually do anything. It had served him well, this subtle caring for people.
He set the water down on his own table precariously. He'd give it to her when she woke up, he decided.
/
December 24th 2015, 0200
Ian looked over at the sleeping redhead next to him.
Her hair looked like it'd been through a washing machine, there was a little drool drying on the corner of her mouth, and quiet snores drifted through the air until the sound reached him. She was so beautiful it hurt. It hurt to know that this was something he could never have.
He cut off his imagination at its knees. He was here to complete his mission. That was it. Nothing else. No ulterior motive. Nothing the Ian before the Clue Hunt probably would have done at his age.
It didn't matter.
How he so desperately wanted to explain to her what she meant to him; what she had meant to him during those two lonely years of solitude. How he had watched her blossom into the clever, confident woman everyone saw now. How he had questioned himself a thousand times over, buried his tears under a grave of loneliness.
His heart clenched fiercely in his chest when he thought about it, so he put his headphones back on and picked another movie, any movie; anything to distract him from the woman sleeping peacefully next to him.
The flashy action scenes took his mind off the subject of Amy Cahill.
He didn't get any sleep that night.
/
December 24th 2015, 0816
"Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We have just landed at Heathrow Airport, London. The time is now 8:16 am. The weather here is considerably cold, and the city is around 7°Celsius now, but is expected to rise…"
"God, I didn't pay for a bloody weather forecast."
The gravelly sound of Ian's voice woke Amy up, and blinking owlishly, she sat up very slowly, wrapping the thick blanket even tighter around her. Through sleep-crusty eyelids, she could see out of the plane window next to her. Her breath fogged on the cool surface, and as she blinked rapidly, trying to get the sleep out of her eyes, she saw…
Grey. And white. But mostly grey.
The runway was grey tarmac, but because it was so foggy, she couldn't see past a few hundred metres. The fog in question gave the atmosphere a gloomy touch, swooping over them in a ghostly fashion. Not to mention that it was cold. Amy shivered and pulled the woolly blanket up and around her shoulders.
A loud noise came from her right, and she whipped her head around to see what it was.
Ian.
She'd forgotten that she was travelling with someone. Sleep did that to her. She'd wake up completely disorientated, with no idea where she was or what she was supposed to do.
Amy continued staring at him. He hadn't noticed that she'd woken up. Swearing furiously under his breath, the Lucian fidgeted around – Ian Kabra was fidgeting– in his seat, tugging relentlessly on the metal and cloth contraption also known as a plane seatbelt.
He groaned in frustration and flung his head back against the headrest, frowning in irritation. Dark smudges lined underneath his eyes completed the look, with a nice touch of huge eye bags that made Amy want to lean forward and smooth her thumb over them. The dark eyes weren't just from the flight. She knew.
Instead, she fought the urge and turned her head to the side, away from the tired Lucian who shouldn't have warranted her attention, but somehow did – every second; every minute; every hour.
Amy closed her eyes for a minute and a bit more, then yawned in fake-sleep, stretching up and above, exposing a small strip of skin when her shirt lifted. She'd be lying if she said she didn't want him to notice. The old Amy would have been so embarrassed. But she was a grown woman now and had been for quite some time.
"So," she said rather brightly to cover up her melancholy, "we're in London!"
He didn't say anything for a long time. Then, quiet and low, so quiet she almost missed it, "Yeah. We're in London."
He hesitated, and then didn't say anything else.
She didn't ask.
/
They passed immigration easily. The second they were out, Amy whipped out her phone, speed-dialing to Dan. Tapping her foot impatiently on the smooth ground, she waited for him to pick up.
"Hello?"
"Dan! I just touched down in London."
"London?"
She bit her lip when Ian turned a glare on her. Right after agreeing to the mission and explaining all the conditions and other nooks and crannies of the agreement, Ian had insisted on one thing: she wasn't allowed to tell anybody. Not Dan, not Nellie, not Natalie. Nobody. Her temper had flared up instantly – who was he to tell her to lie? – but she'd understood the logic. The fewer people who knew of the plan, the smaller the chance of exposure.
The Madrigal agent had to be high up in the hierarchy (how she hated that there was a hierarchy in the first place, but as Dan had pointed out, it helped to keep order) to have been able to steal M16 files without detection.
If anyone heard of what she and Ian were doing… well.
This would all have been for naught.
"Amy? Hello? Are you there?"
"What – oh yeah, right! I'm in London to sort out some Cahill business. You know that business Marie set up as a cover for the Cahill transactions?"
Marie, one of her most trusted confidantes, had proposed that idea. All four branches were in relatively good standing with one another, leading, of course, to the idea of mutual benefit. "Like trading between countries" was how Marie had explained it. The trading business connected other cover businesses that represented the other branches. So far, it was working perfectly.
Their headquarters were in London, which was superbly convenient for Amy and Ian. They'd agreed beforehand on this cover.
"What? Is there something wrong with the business?"
"No, no – I just need to check on one of the databases there. Apparently some information was muddled up, but in case it was really sensitive, I wanted to go check it myself."
"Why couldn't you have just sent someone else to do it?"
Oh, Dan. "Like I said, the information might be highly classified."
"But then you can't spend Christmas with us!"
She sighed heavily. "Yeah, I know, Dan. I'm so sorry, but this was really urgent."
She could hear his dejected tone. Thank God he hadn't suspected anything. "Fine."
"Send my love to Nellie and Natalie. And pictures! Don't forget to send lots." She'd be damned if she couldn't, at least, see how they were spending Christmas. Ian flinched next to her at the mention of his little sister.
"Ugh. I hate you."
"I hate you too," replied Amy, a hint of fondness seeping through her words. Glancing at Ian and his hopeful face, she quickly added, "Tell Natalie I love her very much too."
"Sure."
"Bye, Dan, I'll talk to you later!"
Amy put her phone back in her pocket, heading for the luggage terminal. Ian didn't say anything, just lingering behind for a little while longer.
She felt his eyes burning on her back as he took a few quick, long strides to catch up with her. He swallowed twice, cleared his throat, and finally turned to speak to Amy.
"Thank you. For taking care of Natalie."
"It was my pleasure."
She meant it sincerely.
/
A/N Massive thanks toRivalArgenticafor helping me look this over.
So sorry this took so long! One question: would you guys like a little more banter (as in the middle of this chapter) or more angst, like the last one?