Two nights she'd been denied the pleasures of her bed, and it wasn't getting any easier. At least last time, she'd been surrounded by the nuances of an old married couple and had some pictures to look at, as a nice waking up present. This time? She had an awful crick in her neck, from lying in the same position for too long. Which, was coincidentally with her head pressed against the desk.

This was getting ridiculous.

Some of the other staff had refused to the spend the night here, and had forged out into the paparazzi, batting them away with bags and umbrellas. Charles and Darcy? They, along with another two, had remained behind, like they were waiting for the storm to pass.

Elizabeth dropped to her knees and crawled to the window.

Never would she have considered this undignified position in normality, but aching all over can addle one's mind. Mercifully, the crowd outside had now thinned out. Probably, wanting to chase other bigger and better stories, instead of obeying an old man who'd called in a favour for his daughter being slighted. The more hardcore people still lingered, tapping their cigarettes outside the window, from their parked cars.

She would have to risk it.

Darcy was asleep in the transparent meeting room, like her, with his head pressed against the desk. There was a biro mark on his cheek, and he looked unexpectedly relaxed and youthful. A complete opposite to the night before, when he'd been ranting and raving, and pacing and telephoning. She stared a tick longer, before realising she was the subject of scrutiny herself.

Charles was already awake, and he was staring directly at her, with a phone pressed to his ear.

She hadn't seen him standing close by to Will.

His eyes probed her, cold.

She'd never seen him look so much his sister, at that moment, that it brought a nervous rack of shivers down her spine. He mouthed, "Where are you going?" Flummoxed, Elizabeth pointed out the window, as she picked up her bag with the hope he'll grant her that small mercy. Charles broke off, to agree with whatever the person he was speaking to was saying, and then found Elizabeth again with his eyes. "You can have the rest of the day off," he mouthed at her.

Thrilled, Elizabeth scuttled towards the lifts.

She made it all the way to the foyer, and the doors leading to her escape, before she came to a startling realisation as she tugged at the handles. They were still electronically locked, and there was no receptionist behind the desk. Bugger. She closed her eyes, and tried to remember where Sarah was standing, when the lift doors were closing yesterday, as she was running away from Darcy. In her imagination, the ghost of Sarah stood close to the computer, with a hand disappearing under the...

Bingo!

Elizabeth's eyes popped open with a smile and she casually strolled over, crouching down to find the correct button. As she heard a short buzzing noise, she knew she'd hit the jackpot. Hopefully no-one outside would bother her, and she could jog away in peace...

Halfway back, and the buzzing noise stopped.

Elizabeth froze mid-step.

No.

Don't tell me I'm locked in again!

She'd been too slow. She would have to inject more pace next time.

Seriously hoping no- one outside was looking in, Elizabeth repeated her trip to the button and didn't hesitate this time. The second she heard the buzzer go, she was off, sprinting like her life depended on it, and she got to the door in record time! Flinging it open in relief, she barreled right into someone's arms, a person who'd horridly put his hands up as a gesture to thwart her, but they went down in a barrel of arms and legs, with a bit of screaming along the way.

Mainly from Elizabeth.

"Ow!" Elizabeth yelled, feeling her hair catch in something. Like a demon, she clawed at the thing entangled in her hair, not listening to the string of curses and cries urging her to be still.

"Chrissake - stay still! This is expensive gear -"

"Gerioff!" Elizabeth said, not wanting to wear a camera strap in her hair like an accessory.

"Quit thrashing, and maybe I will!"

"Do it quicker!"

She felt like she was being scalped, as she lurched to her knees, before the pressure released abruptly. Clambering up and dusting her knees, she noticed the man next to her doing the same, as he tucked his camera hanging around his neck, protectively into his jacket. The other hand swept back his free-hanging hair from his eyes, which was a marked contrast from the ponytail he was sporting, when she'd seen him last.

"You!" Elizabeth spat, incensed, in no mood for games. "Wickham." She remembered his name.

She distastefully looked him up and down, before spinning on her heel.

"Wait." He hurried up to grab her arm, but thinking better of it, just followed her half a pace behind. "What's changed?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't know we'd struck up enough of a bond for you to ask that question."

"Snarky too."

Elizabeth buttoned her lips, and continued on her path.

"I know you remember me." He dogged her footsteps, almost to the point he nearly tripped her up.

"Well duh, didn't I greet you by name?"

"So, what's changed?" He insisted. "Our first introduction certainly had no antagonism involved, and the only critique you could give it, was that it was cut too short. Is that why you're mad? That once we got inside the venue, I left without saying goodbye? And you were still prattling into the darkness, thinking I was by your side?"

That wasn't even the start of it.

"No," Elizabeth said, thinking he was a great, big berk. "It's more like I'm disappointed. Because our company is close to ruins, and you're one of the vultures circling around, waiting for us to go bust. I mean, I'm not claiming to know you," she shot a sideways evil stare. "But my first impression of you, although brief, was much more pleasant."

George stopped so suddenly, Elizabeth sensed it straightaway.

She turned around, despite herself and saw he was holding her bag with the tips of his fingers, close to scraping the floor. He had a pained look on his face, and he appeared to wilt before her very eyes. Feeling guilty, but brushing the feeling aside, she strode back to him and tugged her bag out of his grip, where she'd probably dropped it earlier when both of them crashed into each other. He let it go without further ceremony.

"Thank you." She nodded at him. "For retrieving my bag."

"S-so..." he sounded, strangled. "I suppose Darcy's told you, has he?"

Don't ask...don't pry...

"About what?" She frowned.

"All the lies he's concocted about me."

"He's lying about you to people?" She asked, concerned. Darcy would never sink that low...would he?

George laughed bitterly. "It's all he ever does. Here's a word of advice, Liz - I can call you Liz, right? - Don't listen to a word he says. He's conniving, two faced and a complete bastard."

"He's - He's not that bad when you get to know him," Elizabeth replied, miffed.

"Oh? Says who?"

"Well, his sister for one."

At the mention of Georgiana, Wickham clamped his lips shut, and he turned a deathly white. Interesting. As she watched, he shot her a wounded look and scurried back the way he came, like she was a plague-carrier, and he was frightened of catching it. At least, she'd gotten her bag back before he fled.

"Whatever," Elizabeth said to herself. "Who needs this drama?"

.

.

"You haven't told anyone, right?" Darcy urged her down the line. She wondered how he'd react, if he knew she'd stripped down to her a bra, and was about to jump into the shower, before he called. Unzipping her skirt, she wriggled out of it and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Womanly curves contained in black, modest underwear. In fact, the condensation in the room, was making it cling to her skin, so her nipples were pebbling through. Blushing, she broke her gaze, and blinked up at the ceiling, at the light fixture.

Remind her again, why she'd brought her bag into the bathroom, to rest on top of the towel hanger?

Oh yeah. Force of habit.

She sighed, waiting for him to elaborate. In the meantime, she turned on the shower, and stuck her hand out, waiting for the temperature to adjust. Charlotte better have not used up all the hot water...

"About the big secret we don't want to get out," he hissed, probably thinking she was stuck in a torrential downpour. Not that he sounded like he cared. Bastard.

"About the whole hacking thing?" Elizabeth said absent-mindedly. "Yeah, I won't tell a soul."

"Not, even that brown-nosed flatmate of yours?"

"Especially not her." She tried to allay his fears. The bathroom was steaming up.

"Good," he sighed down the phone. "Then we might just ride through this. We can handle this Moira Banks or whatever, but if anyone outside the agency, catches wind of Jonah's little excursion shall we say, then we're screwed for. I'm thinking of getting everyone to sign a confidentiality agreement. Well, one more to the ones they've already signed up to anyway."

"That's a good idea."

"You think?" He sounded flattered.

Elizabeth wrinkled up her nose and didn't respond.

"Anyway..." he appeared to be pouting. "Where were you this morning? I woke up, and you were...gone."

His reliance on her was beginning to get worrying. She'd worked for him, not even four or five days, and she'd eaten breakfast, lunch and dinner with him yesterday. Not to mention, she ate sushi with him the day before yesterday, so yes, that technically counted as dinner. Why had he taken to her so fiercely? Why did he appear reluctant of letting her go?

One of her fingers accidentally brushed the tip of her nipple, and she was so primed, so ready, it took a great deal working of muscles not to cry out. Why was she viewing his attachment to her, with something akin to...satisfaction?

She was glad the distance was between them now. It was good she'd walked out on him, without waking him this morning. This reliance needed to stop within the walls of the office.

"Didn't you talk to Charles?" She asked, brusquely. "He gave me a day off."

"Oh, did he now?" He said testily. "Despite working for yours truly? Shouldn't it be me calling the shots?"

".What do you want me to do? To drop everything and come running over?"

"That doesn't sound bad," his voice became silky. "Tell me, Elizabeth...are you in the shower right now?"

Her eyes widened to twice their size, and she spluttered. The next thing she knew, she was frantically pressing the disconnect button and throwing her phone somewhere behind the toilet cistern. Oh, that didn't sound good. Clunk. She winced at the noise.

But still...what the hell was that?

Where did he learn to lower his voice attractively like that?

Elizabeth stripped the last remainder of her undergarments, and jumped into the shower, hoping the pounding water would drill the conversation out of her head. She really needed to teach him a lesson. For the rest of the day, it would be in their best interests if he couldn't get hold of her. So that meant switching off her phone, and taking a long rambling walk around the city, so they could both forget each other for a while.

After several minutes, her shower finished and she stepped out, toweling her hair.

Inside her bag, she didn't notice a little red light flashing.

Recording everything.

.

.

Darcy staggered down the steps, and fell to his knees. Charles was crouching beside him, shaking his shoulder, lips moving...but his words rushed past in a blur, and it sounded like a gale, a hurricane threatening to tear apart his organs and bury him, kill him...

Besides his knees was a newspaper.

It wasn't the front page, or the next few pages after that, but on page seven, in a little box, was a story relating to their agency. The tagline read: Hacking scandal on the verge of destroying small, family business. Except it wasn't family was it? After his dad died, he'd started this company in his dad's honour, but it was Charles who he became shareholders with. They were in this together. Brothers, even though they weren't related by blood.

"How - How did they find out?" Darcy croaked.

"It's mere speculation." Charles was looking desperate. Close to fainting. "They don't know anything. Look at this flimsy article, barely five lines..."

"But they know. Someone must've told them."

"Nobody could've told them!"

"How do you know?" Darcy was shaking all over. "They couldn't have pulled this out from nowhere...someone's squealed..." Suddenly, fists formed. "I bet it's Jonah, that sniveling dick! I bet he sang like a fucking canary."

"Jonah wouldn't do that...he wouldn't risk prison..."

"Then how can they guess and be so fucking close?"

It was the following morning, and the press had got their story. Well, most of them had reported on Lambton & Co's bad customer relation skills, but this one...this one seemed to have sniffed out a meatier story, though it was nowhere near good enough for a bump-up. Charles was right. The person who'd written it, didn't have much to go on...just that there was a hacking scandal possibly involved...but who? Where? None of these crucial details were mentioned.

Darcy straightened his shoulders, hearing himself speak, and marveling at how composed he sounded.

"This article was written by George Wickham. Somebody's been talking to him. Get everybody round, and start interrogating to who actually spoke with him in the past few days. Then we'll fire that person on the spot..."

His mind was racing ahead.

"After, we need to close this company. Just for a week or so, whilst I get to the bottom of this and for the media frenzy to die down. It's not big yet, and I don't want to get to the stage where it gets any bigger. Several independent auditors have to come in, to go through everything meticulously, so every quarrel we've had in the past can be settled. We're going to be whiter than white. They'll have nothing to pin us on."

Charles quit rubbing Darcy's shoulders up and down.

"And what are you doing to do?"

Darcy had his answer ready, he'd been searching for tickets all night.

"Well, I'm not going to be sitting around here, waiting for auditors to come in and clear off. No. Do you remember that week long trip I had planned at the end of April? To St. John's Island? It's a place I went to as a kid, nice place. Well, I'm going there tomorrow. Might as well scope out the place, if we're going to include it on our website later on next year."

Charles gaped at him.

"B-But," he wheezed. "Who are you going with -?"

"I have a person in mind," Darcy said darkly.

.

.

AN: OMG. I'm sooo excited. IrishJessy, that little prediction I told you about, is coming true huh? About some island fun? Omg...this is so fun to write, I don't know why I love it so much...

Thanks to the anonymous reviews too! Guest, JRB and Tanya. Tanya...I have firsthand experience living in England (still do), so it's so cool embracing including all the British-isms :P

Please reviewwww.