Thank you once more for all the reviews. Once more my life has been hectic in the last week, and I've managed to injure myself once more, this time a broken nose and whiplash following crashing my car after a tyre blew out. When I wrote Ashleigh's accident in the first story, I had no idea how upsetting or frightening it was, believe me, now I do. However, despite my car being totally destroyed, I'm back on the road, albeit cautiously. I'll never write another trivial car crash again!
I had one of my readers ask recently if David Kain was actually Ashleigh's father. After several moments of barely concealed astonishment, verging on being seriously 'squicked', I found out this person didn't mean that Alec might be her father, no, rather more sensibly they were thinking along the lines that James might be! Well, he's definitely not, but its made me think. I'm going to make an offer. If anyone wants to email me, or leave a review asking one question they have about the story, I'll answer it. Anything at all. Be it about the plot, the ending, the characters, or whatever, I'll answer it if I can. I'll reply in an email to you, so I'll need you address, but let me know how much you want revealed. No saying you want to know what happens at the end, but don't give any spoilers – just not possible I'm afraid! After all, who knows, the way I drive, the end might never get written!
Onto the next chapter. I know things are moving slowly, but I'm trying to disguise it under all the tension! Honest.
It had been nearly twelve hours since Alec had vanished in a cloud of dust and a squeal of tires. It was the early hours of the morning, the sky was still dark outside, and the moon was about to creep below the horizon, her pale glow waning as she slipped lower. Armed agents hovered near the gate, cold and tired, but alert and on duty.
M stood shrouded in a doorway, peering at Ashleigh's sleeping form. The young woman was plainly exhausted by the events of the past two days, and slept soundly, her dark hair splayed across the pillow. She seemed so small, lost in the vast emptiness of the bed.
M thought of her own husband. Steadily dependable, virtually unflappable, and completely nonplussed by the strangeness of his wife's chosen career, he had been her rock, her security for the last almost four decades. He was her sanity, the one thing in the world that kept her feet on the ground. If she lost Robert… well, she shuddered to think what would happen to her.
She had known Ashleigh since the moment of the girl's birth. Had seen her grow up, and mature into a sensible woman. She had approached the twenty one year old Ashleigh Kain, and made the offer. Join MI6, and follow in your father's footsteps. Perhaps she had been had been too fond of the girl. She had made allowances for her, overlooked incidents in her career that perhaps shouldn't have been overlooked. She had made sure the girl had gotten the assignments that had gotten her noticed, and had made sure her career had progressed quickly.
She had done the same with Bond and look where that had got her.
She covered her small smile quickly.
Let the girl rest in peace. She needed her energy. As M did, if she were to ever find Trevelyan.
And his whereabouts troubled her greatly.
Bond crept through the silent, dark house, and mentally cursed Ashleigh Kain and the day that she had been born.
If he had one weakness, it was women, and Ashleigh knew it. She could play him easily, read his weaknesses, and hit upon the one thing he couldn't stand.
A crying woman.
When holding a gun to his head had almost failed, she had let her big brown eyes well up with unshed tears, and with the combined threat to his most precious part of his anatomy, it had worked. Worked far too well.
The keys were in the garage, neatly stored in a small, metal cupboard. They would all be labelled. He just had to get her the right ones.
No, that wasn't exactly true, he frowned to himself. He had to get the keys, and then figure out how the hell to distract the guards long enough to get her out.
Or to find another exit. One that wasn't immediately obvious.
His eyes fell on a pile of discarded boards lying in the corner of the garage. They looked as if they had once formed part of an old gate, yes, he could make out larger pieces below. It made sense, the darkened wood showed its age, it was thick, and more importantly, it was strong.
It would also be the right height.
Suddenly Bond knew how to get Ashleigh out.
She owed him this time. One day he would have his own debt to call in from Ashleigh. He would make sure of it.
Sweat trickled down his spine as he heaved the wood out of the garage, hoping the dark night would give him enough cover to finish the task unseen.
Ashleigh's eyes opened in the darkness, as she listened to M's footsteps fall away. Silently she pulled the covers from her body, slid from the bed, and crouched by it, reaching beneath to pull a leather jacket from its hiding place.
The thick leather fitted snugly on her slim frame, the trousers were padded to protect her knees, the heavy boots muffled by the deep pile of the carpets. In her hand she held a shiny black helmet.
She paused by the door, listening once more. There was a guard posted at the other end of the corridor, but Ashleigh had lived in the house for over six years, and knew every creaking floorboard that would give her away, every shadow that would conceal her.
She slipped easily across the hall way, and through the narrow dark door. A few steps brought her down to the kitchen via the old servant's passage. A few more steps and she was in the garage.
The keys were bright and silver lying in a patch of moonlight. As she reached for them eagerly a hand snapped out and caught her by the wrist.
'Where will you go?' Bond hissed, dragging her into the shadows, his face unreadable in the dim light.
'I don't know,' she admitted, feeling her godfather's solid bulk behind her. He held her tightly, and she knew not to fight him.
'After him?'
'Yes.'
'Forget him,' he whispered cruelly in her ear.
'Never,' she hissed back.
'He's left you, Ashleigh, why bother chasing after a man who no longer wants you?'
She jerked away then, anger roaring once more to the surface. She knew his anger was poisoning his words, but still she couldn't believe he would utter those things to her. And not for the first time, either.
'I have my reasons, James. As you did when you pursued him half way round the world. And my reasons are far more important than yours were.'
'I was trying to save the world,' Bond snarled.
'Were you?' Ashleigh's eyes were almost black in the dim light. 'Or were you searching for revenge? Revenge against the one man who outwitted you. You couldn't bear the fact that he had bettered you, and so you chased him under the façade of heroism until you could exact your own revenge. He told me your last words to him, James, the last words he thought he would ever hear.'
Bond's hand tightened on her wrist, all his anger seemed to be concentrated in his hand, he was hurting her, but she refused to show it.
'For England, James?' Alec asked, from his precarious position, suspended thousands of feet above the crater of the satellite dish, held aloft only by Bond's strength and Bond's hands wrapped around his ankle. Blood poured from various gashes on his face, his blood hair was dishevelled and streaked with mechanical oil, and yet, still, somehow, the bastard managed to be defiant. His green eyes blazed with something close to madness as he taunted his former friend, sneering at him, mocking him.
'No,' Bond replied, his voice dull and dead, realising what he had to do, realising that this was indeed the end, and that he was about to kill the person he had once called his closest friend. They had trained together, worked together, almost mirror images of success, both walking the fine line between loyalty and betrayal. Alec had crossed the line, while Bond had remained staunchly behind it. There were consequences to such actions, and now, finally they had caught up with the actions of the man now known as Janus.
'For me.'
He had let go.
Alec had fallen, fallen from grace, and now fallen to his death.
That had been the end of their rivalry, or so Bond had thought.
'You don't deny it then?' Ashleigh asked coldly.
'Why should I?' Bond answered, his mind still lost in Cuba on a warm Caribbean afternoon.
'You've learnt nothing, James, not in all your time with MI6. And you never will. The world is bigger than James Bond 007, and everyone realises it but you. You're almost past it; you're an ageing playboy with nothing to show for years of service. You're becoming a parody of yourself.'
She was almost spitting the words at him, her hands twisted into claws, trying to fight her way free from him, but still he held her.
'And what do you have, Ashleigh?'
Her eyes blazed with fire, and for a moment he thought she would strike him.
'Nothing,' he scoffed scornfully. 'Your husband has vanished, your daughter is missing. The two must be connected, and you're too blinded by his charms to realise it.'
'He wouldn't do that! He wouldn't hurt Natasha… or me…' she added quickly at the end.
'Wouldn't he?' Bond lifted an eyebrow, 'Perhaps you should open your eyes, Ashleigh, and see who your husband really is. Janus, a man with two faces.'
She turned so quickly she nearly dragged him off balance.
'At least you can see both of Alec's,' she growled, 'he doesn't have to disguise them beneath his ageing charms.'
Below the belt, he thought darkly, and he pulled her close once more so he could whisper cruelly in her ear. 'Don't think your marriage certificate will protect you, Ashleigh, if he decides to kill you, you're a dead woman.'
'Not if I…' she began, but immediately she shut up.
She knows, James thought with a tinge of alarm, she knows what he's capable of. He stared at her, and realised that the woman that stood before him was not the same girl he had known as a child, as a young woman on the brink of a promising MI6 career. She's changed, he thought, she's… darker.
He couldn't describe it any other way. Her eyes were black in this dim light, there were dark shadows underneath her eyes, her clothes created the impression of a sleek, strong black silhouette. James had faced women like this before, women they called black widows, women who used their attractive looks to lure, and then would kill.
Women like Xenia Onatopp. Women with no light in their eyes, no light in their souls. They were extinguished flames, dark and deadly.
There had always been a luminescence to Ashleigh, no matter what life had thrown at her, she had always fought and survived. James had walked the line between the light and the dark before, but Ashleigh had never come close before. Before she had met Alec.
'James…' she gasped, trying to pull away, 'James! You're hurting me!'
He blinked, and it was just Ashleigh once more, his frightened goddaughter, her brown eyes filled with pain and worry. Her warm brown eyes. He pulled her close, once more, but this time it was an embrace.
'Take care,' he whispered into her ear, brushing his lips against her temple, 'You know that M will kill you for this.'
'I've done worse,' she smiled weakly.
'I know you have.'
She nodded briefly, slipping the helmet over her dark hair, her fingers fumbling with the chin strap.
'Good luck,' he held his hand out formally.
He thought he saw another smile the instant before the visor snapped down. The voice was muffled, but the dry humour was there. 'The best of British, of course.'
She slipped into the shadows. Bond did the same, heading away from her.
He hoped it wouldn't be the last time they would speak.
M woke from a hazy sleep, at some point she had dozed off on one of the soft sofas. Lulled by the buttery feel of leather, and the sound of the gently lapping sea outside, she had let her defences down and slipped into a sleep where she floated somewhere between dreams and awareness.
Now she woke, and her senses were alert.
'Bond?' she asked.
'Sorry to wake you, sir.'
'No, you're not, so don't bother pretending.' M felt the fogginess of sleep cloud her mind. She hated waking after too little sleep; it made her feel slow, and her senses seemed dull. It also made her unbearably grumpy.
'Of course, sir.'
'You're very affable this morning, Bond.'
'Am I?'
'Yes. And it makes me damned suspicious.'
'Paranoid, sir?'
M eyed Bond beadily as she brushed her short hair back into place. 'While you work for me, Bond, paranoia is usually the safest option.'
Leaving her smirking 00 agent behind, M stepped outside for some fresh air. Dawn was just breaking and the agents that were posted outside snapped smartly to attention as M appeared. She resisted the urge to snap 'At ease, soldiers'.
'How's Ashleigh?' M asked, as Bond followed her out.
'Asleep, I presume,' Bond stared fixedly into the distance.
'I know this situation has been difficult for you, Bond,' M began, 'but you must understand why I decided not to inform you.'
Stiffly, Bond merely inclined his head.
'Sir!' An agent shouted in alarm.
M's head snapped up sharply. 'Yes?'
She didn't need the explanation. She felt a vague sense of déjà vu as she heard the roar of an engine, saw the motorbike rounded the side of the house.
'Going to open the gates?' Bond raised an eyebrow.
'Stop them!' M snapped, ignoring the snide comment.
But the bike wasn't heading for the main gate. The rider increased the speed, and then M saw it. The gate had been used as a make shift ramp, the bike powered up, and suddenly, the rider was airborne, the sleek black machine framed against the sky, and with a solid thump, landed on the other side.
It rode straight for a moment, then the bike swerved, tilted, and crashed to the ground. For a moment the rider lay stunned underneath the bike, but then they were on their feet, heaving the bike up, kick starting, and suddenly it was gone.
'Where the bloody hell did she learn to do that?' M fumed, her face flushed with angry colour.
Bond leant in close to her. There was a barely restrained urge to gloat dancing across his face as he spoke.
'Basic training, second year.'
