Hey guys, wanted to try my hand on some emotion in this chapt. Hope you like it! Reviews are always welcome! Once again, sorry for the wait!
4. Paper cuts
The ability for people to go by unnoticed in life is uncanny. People who don't want to be seen are masters of slipping through crowds without getting as much as a glance from those around them. A sandy-haired young man, barely out of his teens, was doing just that, walking past politicians, businessmen, and attorneys completely oblivious to anyone around them. Worn jeans and a faded sweatshirt might as well be a force field of invisibility in Washington D.C.
The cell in the young man's back pocket vibrated against the bench only minutes after he wandered around the Reflection pool and sat down.
"Schmidt," he said sharply after his thumb slid across the screen.
"Where are you?" the voice on the other end was soft, but low, curious with a sliver of lethality settled darkly underneath.
"Reflection pool," Schmidt answered, looking around through the tinted shades of his cheap sunglasses. He didn't see anyone around him that was also on their phone, so he allowed himself to relax a little. "What do you need?"
"There's a shipment coming in thirty-six hours. I need you to have a place for them."
Schmidt sniffed and leaned forward on the bench, his elbows on his knees. He thought briefly of his cramped apartment that sat above a pharmacy in Georgetown. He was paid well so the apartment was by no means cheap…just built for one. "How many?"
"Five."
The young man bit his tongue, the curse still bitter on his tongue.
"I wired $95,000 to your account this morning," the voice drawled with its lazy confidence, "buy or rent a loft. Say you're an artist renting for a gallery. Lie."
"But-"
"I didn't hire you for your honesty, Schmidt, nor did I hire you for you to argue," the voice barked, the soft lowness cracking. "I hired you to do exactly what I say. Is that understood?"
"Yes sir." The stubbornness of youth had not yet aged out of Schmidt. The stubbornness was tempting, but then again so was the idea of keeping his life.
"Good. Sebastian's coming tomorrow morning at 9:00. You are expected to call him with the new address before then."
And with that, Alexander Knapp hung up.
The two chopsticks hovered over the carton of chicken lo mein, their tips stained from the soy sauce Liz had drizzled over it. She was sitting cross-legged on the dusty floor of the storage locker, the pressed clothes of work traded for grey sweatpants and a sweater that slipped lazily from one shoulder. Liz's blue eyes squinted up at the spider's web of pictures and notes, her lips pursed in thought. Running her tongue along the inside of her lip, she set down the noodle box and picked up the one full of dumplings.
"I don't get it," she muttered, sighing as she stabbed a dumpling with her chopsticks, not even bothering to use them correctly.
There was the rustling of paper as Red folded it and glanced at her from his seat in the corner. It was the first thing she had said all that night. Ressler and a few other members of the team were getting prepped for Baltimore, so Liz had a light day at work, only using her profiler training to try and write up a file on Knapp, but she had come up empty handed. Cooper instructed her to go home and try and get more information from Red, but instead she had opted to spend some time in the storage locker.
"You should get a rug in here," Red mused, flipping the paper back up and scanning over the new scandal of some mayor. "I'm sure that cement must get uncomfortable."
Elizabeth ignored him.
She got up, and idly chewed on the tip of her chopstick as she studied the four passports that were pinned to the board. Tom's face was captured flawlessly on Russian, French, British, and American documents.
As she stood there, Reddington stole a glance over the paper and he couldn't help but follow the smooth line of her exposed shoulder as it gracefully arched up into her neck. For a moment, he let himself slip back and picture her in her own kitchen, sipping wine and sautéing onions, before he blinked and returned to the newspaper.
The silence around the two was comfortable.
"I want to know how she found us," Lizzie said after a while, pointing to the picture of the cherry headed Jolene. "I know she was working with Tom. How else could she have found us?"
Reddington glanced at the board…seeing the woman and feeling a pang of bitterness. He had made a mistake letting the cowboy follow her. She was more lethal than he had originally thought and his obsession with the Tom Keen had blinded him, preventing him from moving in the calculated way he usually did. Raymond made a mental pact to never act brashly again.
"I found her dead in Tom's hideout with her real travel papers. She was going somewhere," Liz said. "After he killed her, I'm assuming he had taken or burned all the photos of me, there were ashes found at the scene. Cooper and the FBI don't know she's connected to Tom yet."
"They don't know anything about Tom yet, Lizzie," Reddington quietly corrected, "No one knows about Tom yet." He cocked his head and gave her a small smile. "Except us."
Lizzie bit her lip, still studying the picture.
"She looks so familiar to me…."
Red sighed and stood, folding the paper and laying it down on the seat of his chair, his suit jacket draped across the back. "She's watched you before and you said she had contacted you before you found out about your husband."
The word stung.
"No, I mean she looks familiar from a long time ago," Liz said, glancing to him as she crossed her arms.
Red rocked on his heels and clasped his hands behind his back. He pursed his lips for a couple seconds before sighing and speaking. "I wish I could tell you how long they've been watching you, Lizzie"
She shook her head and Reddington watched as she brought her hand to her face and lightly held her knuckle between her teeth. Her nails were painted the dark maroon of wine and were glossy in the splotched light of the storage garage.
"I know you don't know," she said, sighing irritably and sitting back down on the concrete, her intensity deflated.
The dark brown of her hair shone and Red traced the plait of the lazy braid as it curved along the side of her head and met with a messy bun. His eyes caught the way the stray strands wisped like ghosts. The arch of her neck was graceful as she leaned forward and pressed her palms to her forehead.
"I don't even know where to start."
Reddington grudgingly looked at the dusty floor and thought for a moment about how expensive his trousers had been. However, the look of a frustrated Lizzie made him forget about the dust and his clothes.
"What are you good at, Lizzie?" Reddington murmured, settling down next to her and leaning backwards and supporting himself up with his hands. The argyle of his dress socks flashed into view when he crossed his lets at the ankle.
"What?" the woman asked, momentarily surprised by the question.
Raymond blinked his blue eyes behind his lightly tinted lenses, casting a sidelong glance. He felt the steadiness of her gaze. "Lizzie, you're a profiler. Profile him."
"Tom?"
"Yes."
"Jesus, Reddington…don't you think I've tried that? I know nothing about him!" Lizzie threw up her arms and shook her head. She was beyond frustrated, brought to the point of almost being numb because the hopelessness was so tempting.
"You know he's a liar."
Elizabeth Keen was quiet. Her eyes were dark and she couldn't help but think back to Tom. Her heart panged as she remembered all the little things. She remembered waking up next to him, his eyes bleary and tired like a child's, before he smiled at her and wrapped her up in a hug. The way his glasses made his eyes look half a size bigger. The way his voice dropped in pitch when his hands traveled up and down her body….
For a moment she'd forgotten how to breathe.
"He's narcissistic," Lizzie blurted without really realizing she had come to a conclusion. "He knows what he wants and believes there's nothing that could possibly stop him from getting it. He believed he was two steps ahead of me, had no idea that I could possibly believe he wasn't my husband."
Reddington listened quietly, not ignoring the way her bitterness sharpened her voice.
"Tom thought he was so much smarter than anyone else…that's why he was so vicious when I confronted him. The fury that he'd been beat was beyond comprehension. His confidence was his downfall."
Lizzie was quiet for a moment and she allowed the wheels in her head to turn. As she thought, she mindlessly leaned back and copied Red's pose, her arm brushing against the pressed fabric of his sleeve, their fingers inches apart. Elizabeth felt comfort in the brush of his shirt, realizing that so far in this mess, Reddington was still there, still a constant.
He could smell the coconut and vanilla of her shampoo.
"He didn't like that you were better than him," Elizabeth said. "When I had him tied up, he was talking about you, insulting you in front of me to try and build himself up. As calculated and careful as he his…his attitude is a weakness."
"I suppose that makes sense for the little brat," Red said, smiling at his own wit as he looked back at the board.
The soft sound of her chuckle warmed him. When it died away, Lizzie softly bit her lower lip, the arch of her eyebrows furrowing together.
"I don't think he'll go far. The fact that he failed is a draw in itself. He feels like he needs to redeem himself. Pick up where he left off, fix his reputation, build his ego."
Elizabeth felt oddly at peace after her profile. Even if it was way off, the fact that she had at least something to go off of gave her some hope. Just a sliver, but it was enough for her to dig her nails into and hold on. She wasn't about to let it go, not after all this.
"But I still don't know what it has to do with you."
"If you've been around as long as I have, Lizzie, you tend to make three enemies for every friend."
"No, it's more than that," she returned, not looking at him. "You're more than just an enemy…he needs you for something. Some kind of information or something you have. Or maybe for revenge, but much more than a business transaction gone bad."
Small little tendrils of panic started to build up in Reddington's stomach, reaching out through his arms and making his fingertips prickle. Her brilliance amazed him, her ability to read people as easily as one reads a book.
His silence made her stand up and Reddington couldn't help but look at the way her shoulder was bared. His mouth went dry and he imagined resting his chin there, the smell of her shampoo filling his nose. These little thoughts had started plaguing him more and more in the recent days. At first he had shook them from his head, but now he was finally giving in.
When he spoke, his voice was much lower than normal, the octaves dipping to a low register that clung to Elizabeth's ears.
"What are you doing?"
"Just looking through some papers."
She was standing in front of the desk, flipping through this and glancing over that. Red contented himself with sitting on the floor and watching her work, watching her think.
There was a curse and Elizabeth snatched her hand away. "Shit."
"What is it?"
"Damn paper cut," Lizzie said, grabbing at her index finger.
Reddington stood and walked over to the chair, taking the handkerchief from the front pocket. Walking back over to her, he reached out to her.
"Let me see."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes, "It's just a paper cut."
He worked his jaw and raised his eyebrows, his hand still outreached.
Lizzie huffed and held out her bleeding finger. Red's hands were soft and warm when he wrapped her finger up in the handkerchief, squeezing it gently to keep some pressure on it. The sleeve of her sweater was pushed up to her elbow and Elizabeth wasn't meeting Red's eyes. He followed her gaze and couldn't help but clench his jaw when he realized she was staring at the mottled scar of her burn. She wasn't blinking and her eyes shone. Red knew it wasn't from the sting of the paper cut.
"Lizzie…"
She didn't respond, she'd shut down.
"Lizzie, you haven't allowed yourself to react since Tom left," Red murmured. "You can't hold it in forever."
His thumb on her wrist moved gently along her skin, trying to give her some kind of comfort.
"I should've listened to you, Red," she murmured. "You knew and I didn't listen…and then afterwards…you gave me a bed, you gave me a place to stay…and this place, you gave me this."
The quietness of her voice stung and, throwing caution to the wind, red pulled her to him and wrapped his arms around her. His hand rested on the back of her head and gently brought her head to his shoulder, allowing her to silently cry into the fabric of his shirt. Her body shook, but Lizzie made no noise.
She was lost. Tom was a lie, her father was dead, there was a terrorist threat brewing in the United States, and the only thing that stayed the same in her life was a master criminal. But right now, Reddington's arms were warm and safe and the steadiness of his breathing calmed her as she cried.
"Lizzie, you're strong," was all he said, murmuring the words lowly in her ear and making her tighten her arms around his middle, clinging to him as the waves crashed over her, threatening to rip her away. He smelled like cigars and scotch, of leather and warmth and she couldn't help but shudder violently against him.
Reddington pressed his lips to her temple and ran his hand up and down her back, trying to coax the tears from her. As much as he wished it was a romantic gesture, he didn't allow his mind to think of the way her slight frame felt pressed against him, the soft push of her breasts against his chest and the way her smooth skin burned his lips.
But now he had to comfort her. Stuff those feelings away.
After a while her shaking subsided and Lizzie allowed herself to slightly loosen her arms from his middle, resting her hands on the side of his body, the wool of the front of his dress vest meeting the satin of the back underneath her palms. She sniffed once, then twice before she pulled away, wiping her eyes, embarrassed. Her cheeks grew rosy and she felt the heat of Red's concerned stare.
As much as she felt the need to mutter a quiet apology, Elizabeth knew she wasn't sorry for initiating the contact.
The silence hung between them and it was Red who spoke first.
"You're welcome to stay at the apartment as long as you want," his voice was low in her ears and she calmed.
Lizzie looked behind her, her eyes trailing along the massive spider web of photos and documents. "I'm pretty beat," she said, biting her lip and heading towards the side table and reaching for the lamp switch. "Could we maybe turn in for the night?"
Reddington gave her a small smile and headed to the chair, scooping up his jacket and putting it on with a flourish. "Of course."
