Hi, y'all. I'm sorry this took so long, I've been having a a rough time to be honest. But I didn't intend for it to be such a long wait, so I apologize for that.

Before the update, I do have some bad news, but then some good news!

Bad News: This chapter ends on a cliffhanger. The proper kind. Sometimes y'all like to call my chapter endings cliffhangers when it's really just that the characters aren't happy at the end of the chapter. But this one is an actual cliffhanger.

Good News: This time you really won't have to wait long after the cliffhanger, because part of the reason this chapter took so long is that I wrote chapters 46 and 47 at the same time. So both are totally finished and 47 will be up next week. And I know I've estimated that time period in the past and not met it! But that was for chapters that were partially finished, and this one is 100% done and ready to go. All I'll have to do is hit post, which even I can manage.

Also, some people have asked about chapter count. I know I originally said this story would end at 40 chapters, and obviously that didn't happen because I can't count and I refuse to learn. But if I had to estimate the new total I would say it will end around…50-ish. I will definitely tell you guys when the last chapter is coming up so you aren't caught off guard by it.

And lastly, I've gotten so many worried messages from readers that I feel like I need to address this: this story will have a happy ending. I've mentioned this before, but just to reiterate: this has always been written with a happy ending in mind! That's why I don't feel too bad putting the characters through so much misery. It seems like a lot of you have gotten concerned I'm going to go rogue and end it with them breaking up forever or one of them dying, and that's just never been the plan! Please, breathe easy and enjoy the sadness secure in the knowledge that it's only temporary. And if you're someone who reposts on Tumblr or WattPad please let the readers there know, too.

Okay, this is the longest chapter I've ever written so get settled in and happy reading!


When Sarah got back to her apartment, the bone deep exhaustion that had lived inside her for the last few days had somehow managed to multiply. Her eyes were bloodshot from crying, and her aching head was ringing with echoes of her fights with both Lauren and Matt.

So understandably, the last thing she wanted to deal with as she slowly walked up the sidewalk from the bus stop to her apartment was a chatty Mrs. Benedict, who had spotted her from down the block and decided to walk and talk with her. Sarah just gave small 'hmms' in response and hoped they came across as somewhat polite.

"—but I told him, you can't go vegan, you need meat," Mrs. Benedict was complaining. "I knew a girl who turned vegan and she died! Not even a year later! It was in a car accident, but still—"

"Mhm." Sarah nodded along dully as she pulled opened the lobby door. It felt like it weighed a thousand pounds, and she felt the her bruised stomach muscles screaming in protest with every move she made.

"—and then he…" Mrs. Benedict's chattering trailed off as she got a better look at Sarah under the fluorescent lobby lights. "Are you feeling okay, dear?"

"Just tired," she said quietly.

"You look awful. I thought you were staying at Matthew's while your apartment was being fixed," she said with a playful raise of her drawn-on eyebrows. "Thought you'd both come back looking bright-eyed and bushy-tailed!"

Sarah's chest twisted. "I was…just sick recently."

They got on the elevator. Sarah counted down the seconds until the ride was over while Mrs. Benedict tutted in disapproval.

"Oh, no. Does he have mold? Black mold will catch you every time."

"No."

"Well, if you're sick, maybe you shouldn't be all alone, honey. Why don't you call him, tell him to bring you some soup?" Mrs. Benedict suggested. "Being sick is the perfect opportunity to get spoiled."

Sarah swallowed hard, trying to keep herself from falling apart again. After all the fighting and pleading and crying she'd gone through today, she didn't think she had another word left in her. All she wanted was to lock herself in her room and hide under the covers for a week.

When she didn't respond, Mrs. Benedict seemed to finally catch on that something was off besides Sarah's worn-out appearance. She frowned at her sympathetically, but before she could say anything, the elevator door opened and Sarah hurried off as fast as she could without passing out.

"Bye, Mrs. B," she muttered as she brushed past her.

But her mad dash to her apartment was stopped rather suddenly when she reached her door and realized with a sinking sensation that she didn't have a key.

Somehow her exhausted brain hadn't registered that her keys were in the bag she'd brought to the fundraiser, which she no longer had. The only two people with extra copies were both currently not speaking to her. And even if they were, without her bag she didn't have her phone to call them. All she had was a bit of cash that she'd had in the sweats Matt had brought her.

No phone, no keys, barely any money.

Great.

Sarah leaned her forehead against the door with a heavy sigh. What was she supposed to do now?

"Are you alright, Sarah?"

She slowly turned around to see Mrs. Benedict standing in her doorway, watching her with a worried expression.

"I, um…I'm locked out. I…lost my purse," she said.

"Well, what are you doing standing there? Come on in. Come on," the older woman said, beckoning towards her open door.

Which was how Sarah ended up curled up on Mrs. Benedict's couch underneath a heavy crocheted blanket that had been mostly forced on her, declining for the third time the large quantities of food being offered to her.

"No, thanks. I'm really not hungry," Sarah said.

Mrs. Benedict eyeballed her disapprovingly, but set down the mystery casserole she'd been trying to give her.

"Oh, I almost forgot. Someone was knocking on your door looking for you yesterday."

Sarah's stomach dropped. It was almost never good when people showed up at her door unannounced. Was Jason looking for her already? Had Tracksuit decided to come collect on his IOU? There were any number of possibilities, none of which were pleasant.

"Did you get their name?" she asked, trying to sound casual.

"No, sorry. She was nice looking. Blonde, slender," Mrs. Benedict said.

"Lauren?" Sarah asked automatically, before shaking her head. Obviously not Lauren, who had known perfectly well she was in the hospital, and who also wasn't speaking to her.

Mrs. B shot her a dirty look. "Now, I'm old but I'm not senile. I would recognize Lauren."

"Right. Sorry."

The only other option she could think of was Karen. Sarah wasn't sure why Karen would be knocking on her door, but it wasn't something she had the capacity to think about right now.

"Whoever it was, she said she would try calling you again. Do you want a sherry?" Mrs. Benedict asked as she poured one for herself.

For all her nosiness, it seemed Sarah's neighbor hadn't heard she was trying not to drink. And despite the somewhat old lady-ish drink being offered, that stressed out part of Sarah's brain was tempted to say yes just to dull her own thoughts.

"No, I'm fine," she said, then changed the subject before Mrs. B could offer again, because she didn't know if she would be able turn it down twice. "Thanks again for letting me sleep here. I'll go get my keys in the morning."

A trip she very much wasn't looking forward to. She figured she'd try Lauren before she tried Matt. Lauren was possibly less likely to slam the door in her face, and besides—if she wouldn't give Sarah the bag back, she needed to at least give her back her own belongings, the ones that weren't Daredevil evidence.

"Stay as long as you like! Usually I have no one to talk to but Harold," Mrs. Benedict said. She nodded towards the shelf above her TV, where Sarah spotted an ornate glass urn she assumed contained the ashes of Mrs. Benedict's late husband. "Do you mind if I watch Wheel of Fortune? I never miss an episode."

Sarah shook her head. She was too numb to care about much of anything right now.

So she curled further into the couch, rested her head on her hand, and slowly drifted off as Pat Sajak's overexcited voice filled the living room.


Due to the nature of his alter ego, Matt Murdock was very familiar with the feeling of having the wind knocked out of him. A hard kick to the stomach, a rough landing of spine against solid pavement—every time, it sucked the air out of his lungs and left his head spinning.

So when Sarah's confession hit him like an unexpected blow to the chest, it was certainly a sensation he'd felt before. But it didn't mean he was any more prepared for it.

Because despite the number of times Sarah had come close to accidentally revealing something about him, the times she'd nearly let something slip that might tip Lauren off…the possibility that she would willingly choose to give his secret away hadn't even occurred to him. Even in the seconds leading up to her confession, it hadn't crossed his mind that she would tell him what she had. He'd trusted her completely, without question. A mistake he hadn't made with someone in a long time, and now it had come back to bite him.

Thankfully, he'd been able to get in touch with everyone he needed to warn: Foggy and Karen had been together, and Claire had picked up despite being at work. All three were on standby, waiting for him to tell them if their lives were about to be upended.

That left just one more person to talk to: Lauren.

Finding out his secret had stopped her from going to the police in that moment, but there was no guarantee it would stay that way. Lauren still very much posed a threat, and he needed to find out what she was planning to do with the information she now possessed.

But not tonight.

He'd intended to do it tonight, had traveled across Hell's Kitchen until he landed on Lauren's roof. But as he paced back and forth, he begrudgingly had to acknowledge that any confrontation with her tonight would only lead to disaster. Tonight Matt's veins were flooded with hurt and anger and betrayal and even he knew that wouldn't lead to anything helpful.

Plus, the added complication of Lauren's family didn't help. Listening in on Lauren's apartment, he heard three heartbeats inside: one in the main bedroom, two in the nursery. He heard Lauren's voice quietly talking to the baby, who was held close to her chest. She was whispering nonsensical baby-speak phrases to him as the rocking chair she was in creaked faintly. Down the hall, Greg's heartbeat and breathing was slow as he slept.

Not exactly the ideal setting for a confrontation. It seemed like Lauren was in for the night, at least, and not on her way back to the police station. Matt listened for a few minutes longer before he left. A few more hours. He'd come back in the morning when he was thinking straight and when he had a better chance of the entire family not being there.

As he made his way back across town, his fight with Sarah yet again consumed his thoughts.

Maybe he should have expected this, should have been more wary of the unpredictable streak she had. The fact that she could understand the danger in a certain choice, but she would do it anyway. It was the first thing he'd ever learned about her, the night she'd refused to leave town when he'd told her to. It made her brave in the most surprising of situations, but it also made her reckless. She had to understand what she'd just risked: not just Matt's life, but his friends' lives—and her own. God, in a screwed up way that almost made him angrier than any of it. Because she knew full well what would happen to her if Jason found out, knew how that would destroy Matt on a level different from anything else. And she did it anyway.

But the worst part was, the betrayal went both ways. Sarah didn't seem to realize it, but Matt had let her down, too. For days, he hadn't been able to stop his mind from replaying the moment she got hit by that dart. When her heartbeat had sunk dangerously low, so low he'd thought...

They hadn't made many promises to each other. But they had promised to keep each other safe, and both of them had failed.

Despite all these thoughts tumbling around in his head, despite the heavy, twisted knot in his stomach…he still found himself making one last stop before heading home.

As his boots landed on the roof of the building next to Sarah's, her familiar heartbeat floated up to greet him. It was slow and steady; she was sleeping. She'd made it back to her place, at least. And she could stay there until Matt sorted out this entire situation with Lauren.

Then Matt tilted his head as he realized her heartbeat wasn't coming from exactly where he'd thought she would be. She wasn't in her own apartment, but across the hall in Mrs. Benedict's. After a beat, he realized that if her keys were in her bag, they were currently in Lauren's possession. At least until tomorrow morning.

The sound of Sarah's heartbeat was making his chest feel tight, and after another moment he left. But even when he was blocks away, it was still ringing in his ears.


The next morning, Matt was sitting on a windowsill in the living room of Lauren's apartment, listening to her approaching footsteps on the sidewalk as she turned the corner to her block. She had a large leather tote slung over one shoulder, and she was carrying two paper bags full of groceries while cradling her phone between her ear and shoulder.

Lauren and Greg's apartment was spacious, filled with plush rugs and furniture made of expensive wood. It smelled like cleaning products and air fresheners. Pleasant, but lacking the warmth of the citrus scented, slightly cluttered apartment he was so used to visiting—

Matt shook his head as he felt a twinge in his chest. He couldn't think about Sarah right now.

But how could he not think about her when he was sitting in her best friend's home? It was because of her that he was going about this the way he was.

He'd learned lessons from the way he'd met Sarah. He'd been so afraid of what she knew and what she would do with it that he had gone straight to level ten, and he had regretted it ever since. He couldn't afford to make a mistake like that with Lauren, who already very much believed him to be dangerous.

But he also didn't need her to think he wasn't serious about her keeping quiet. So, she got somewhere in the middle: he'd come during daylight hours, and left the mask and black suit at home, choosing to wear a regular clothes instead. But he was also fully aware she wouldn't particularly enjoy finding him waiting for her in her home, and that was fine with him.

Once inside, he had immediately located the bag containing his mask and phone; Lauren had hidden it in a locked drawer in the antique wooden desk that sat against the far wall of her living room. It would have been easy to break it open, but he refrained. Whether or not he could talk her into giving it to him would serve as a good barometer for how likely she was to turn him in. And if she wouldn't give it to him, then he would break open the drawer. But he hoped it wouldn't come to that.

Lauren's footsteps came up the front steps, and Matt tuned back into her phone conversation.

"I just dropped Noah off at my mom's hotel; she's going to watch him while I go to my appointment with Dr. Peters," she was saying.

Through the phone, Matt heard Greg reply: "That's at eleven, right? Are you headed home first?"

"Yeah. I stopped by the grocery store so I want to put those away and maybe try to get some laundry done."

"I can do the laundry later, love."

"I know, but I have to keep busy just to keep my mind off everything," she said. "I'm getting home right now so I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"Alright. Text me after your appointment."

"I will. Bye."

Lauren shifted the grocery bags, juggling them both in the crook of one arm as she dumped her phone in her tote bag with the other and fished around for her keys.

She got the door open and kicked it closed behind her. With the blinds closed, Matt estimated the living room was fairly dark even in the late morning, and Lauren didn't see him in the shadows as she dropped her keys into a dish on the side table and cut through the room on her way to the kitchen. It wasn't until she flipped the light switch next to the kitchen door that she spotted him.

Lauren jumped and let out a surprised swear, nearly dropping the grocery bags.

"How did you get in here?" she asked, taking a step back. Her muscles were tense as her heart rate skyrocketed.

"I'm not here to hurt you, Lauren," he said calmly.

"Right. This is one of those friendly kind of break-ins," she said. "Why are you here?"

Matt tilted his head. "Why do you think?"

For a moment, the only sound was her uneven breathing as she watched him.

"Can I go put my bags down first?" she asked, the forced calm in her voice nearly masking how fast her heart was pounding. "They're heavy."

Matt thought he knew why she actually wanted to put the groceries down. In her kitchen, way up high in a dusty, rarely-used cupboard, was a handgun—never fired, still clean and polished. Recently purchased, if he had to guess. Sarah had mentioned before that Lauren kept telling her to get a gun for self-defense, so it was no surprise she'd gotten one for herself.

Of course, Matt had unloaded it long before Lauren got home, but he was curious to see if she would actually try to shoot him.

He jerked his head in assent. Lauren backed up, then pushed her shoulder against the swinging door that led to the kitchen and disappeared through it.

In the kitchen, he could hear the rustle of paper bags as she set them on the counter. Then, sure enough, she turned towards the cupboard with the gun. Her fingers touched the cool brass handle of the cupboard door, but she didn't open it. She hesitated for a long moment, then swore softly under her breath and withdrew her hand.

When she came back in the room, Matt lifted his head from where he'd had it bowed to listen.

"I already unloaded the gun," he said calmly, and Lauren's footsteps froze. "But I appreciate you not trying to use it."

There was a long beat during which she seemed to process what he'd said, and then she swallowed hard.

"Well, I just had the carpets cleaned," she said stiffly.

Matt's mouth twitched, just barely.

"Sit down," he said, nodding towards the arm chair nearby.

He'd half expected another snappy retort, but after a beat she did as he said, sitting at the very edge of the chair and watching him with what he was sure was a great amount of wariness.

"I'm guessing you want to know where your things are," she surmised.

"No. The bag is in the top drawer of your desk. The one with the lock."

Lauren paused. "If you already know where it is, why are you still here? You broke into my home easily enough, it's not like you can't break into a locked drawer."

"Because I wanted to talk to you. I need to know what you're planning to do with the information Sarah gave you," he said.

The silence that followed was long enough for Matt's frown to deepen.

"I wasn't sure if she would tell you," Lauren said finally.

"What?"

"I mean, I figured she'd probably tell you I had the bag. But I didn't know if she would tell you…that she told me who you are."

Matt raised his eyebrows. For all of Sarah's secretive tendencies, she would never have tried to keep it from him that his identity was blown, no matter how upset she knew he would be.

"It's kind of important information for me to know," he said dryly.

"Yeah. And isn't it also the thing you like, tracked her down and threatened her over to begin with?" Lauren pointed out. "If I were her, I probably would never have told you the truth."

"Good thing you aren't her, then."

"Right. And you just…took it fine? No big deal?"

This time it was Matt who took too long to answer, his mind going back again to the night before, the way his entire sense of trust had shattered. It still made his stomach lurch.

"I guess that's a no," Lauren said after a short silence.

Matt wasn't sure why she'd think he was the type to to tell her all the details of his painful argument with Sarah, but he had zero plans to do that.

"That's between me and her," he said shortly.

"Did you hurt her?"

The question shouldn't have surprised him, but he still found himself caught off guard by it. Sarah wasn't afraid of him anymore—even in the heat of their worst argument last night, she'd jumped when he hit the window, but she didn't back away. But just because she wasn't afraid of him didn't mean her best friend wouldn't be on her behalf. Lauren hadn't been there for everything they'd been through together.

"I wouldn't hurt Sarah."

"Right…that's what you both keep saying," she said, doubt coloring her tone, but the tension in her muscles lessened just fractionally.

"I didn't hurt your cousin, either," Matt said.

Lauren paused, then let out a long, shaky exhale. "...yeah. I've realized that."

Matt tilted his head.

"Have you?" he asked. "Because less than twenty-four hours ago you were pretty certain I did."

"Well, twenty-four hours ago I also thought you were just Cecilia's date," Lauren retorted. "Do you know how screwed up that is, by the way? You know she despises Daredevil more than anyone, and you went as her date anyway and let her, like, flirt with you and slow dance and—and drink champagne."

Matt gave a sharp, humorless laugh.

"Yeah, well I'm sorry to ruin Cecilia's innocent attempts to seem like a good person by bringing along 'do-gooder blind lawyer' as her date, but I needed to be inside the building if something happened."

Lauren leaned back in her chair and shook her head slowly.

"How do you do that?" she demanded shakily. "You…you know things you shouldn't know. Cecilia used those exact words when she talked about bringing you as her date. But that was way after we left Sarah's apartment that night you were there. We were blocks away And—just now. You knew I almost reached for the gun. And that your bag is in a random locked drawer. What, do you have everything bugged or something?"

So it seemed as if Sarah hadn't gone into detail about the things he could do. That was something, at least.

"Why would I explain that to you when you might just walk away from this conversation and straight to the police station?"

Lauren's shifted uncomfortably in her chair.

"I—you can't blame me for wanting to protect my family," she said, and if he didn't know better he'd say there was a shadow of guilt in her voice.

"No. I can't. But that's not what you'd be doing," he said. "You know you're one of the numbers in that phone, right? If you want to protect your family, putting a target on your own back isn't the best way to do that. Unless you deleted yourself already."

"I didn't."

"You understand that the person who attacked Cecilia is still out there walking free?" he continued. "And that if you give my name to the police, that person will continue walking free, and will never face any consequences for what he did? The police won't give a damn about whether or not it was really me. They want an arrest that will look good to the public, and me going to jail would look very good right now."

"I know that."

"And innocent people will get caught in the crossfire. I have people I care about—one of them is someone you care about, too," Matt pressed. "They haven't done anything wrong, but they'll be targeted. If they don't get killed, they could get arrested. You've met Claire at least twice now, right? At the hospital?"

"Yeah. The nurse," Lauren said hesitantly.

Matt nodded, relieved she remembered. His hope was that if she could put a name and face to enough people in that phone, along with what would happen to them, it would make a difference.

"She's one of the numbers in that phone, with a lot of calls back and forth. She'd be put under investigation and probably lose her job. And Foggy. You've talked to him, too. He'd be disbarred at the least."

"But that stuff's your fault!" Lauren exclaimed. "You decided to go dress up in a costume and put everyone in danger. Not me. And not Sarah."

"I know. It's not your fault, but it is your decision now. And Sarah would be in the most danger of anyone, she—" Matt cut himself off, taking a deep breath to keep calm. "Exposing my identity and the people connected to me would be signing her death warrant, because her boss will kill her in a heartbeat if he puts the dots together—"

"Okay, I get it," Lauren said abruptly, clearly not wanting to hear more. "You don't have to convince me. I already decided last night not to go through with it."

Her heart pounded, but steadily. She wasn't lying. Which didn't mean she couldn't change her mind later on, but for now...it was something.

"And I wasn't going to let anything happen to Sarah. I wanted her to come with me, to tell her side to the police so that they could offer her protection—" Lauren tried desperately, but Matt cut her off.

"If you don't think half the police force works for Wilson Fisk—and by extension for Jason—then you're out of your mind," he snapped. "There would be no protecting her."

"It doesn't matter because I'm not going to do it! The only reason I was even going to do it was because I thought you were the one who attacked Cecilia. Sarah had sworn so many times that you weren't dangerous, that you wouldn't hurt any of us…and then you did," Lauren said, suddenly sounding as stressed and exhausted as Sarah. "Or, I thought you did."

Matt started to respond, but—unsurprisingly—Lauren had more to say.

"And you have to understand that everything Sarah was saying sounded crazy, okay? Like, tranquilizer-brain type crazy. That—that her blind lawyer was secretly Daredevil? And that the one we all saw was some mysterious imposter? Even for Hell's Kitchen that's something from a soap opera. But…then I thought about it yesterday, after I talked to Sarah. Fought with Sarah. You pulled me out of the way of those darts. I was so drunk, I thought I must have remembered it wrong," she said with a rueful laugh. "Because how could a blind guy know I was about to get hit? And then when everyone was running and screaming, and I finally saw Sarah there on the floor...you were next to her. Already. And I couldn't understand how you got to her so fast, how you even knew where she was. I still don't really understand how."

From the way she was speaking, Lauren was clearly still processing all this information, and they both fell into a short silence. Several times, Matt could hear her breathing change as she started to ask something, then stopped herself.

The last thing he felt like doing right now was explaining his abilities to Lauren, but this was going well. He could afford to give her a little more information if it meant pulling her further away from the panicked decision she'd nearly made, that she could still make.

"You have questions," he said.

"A lot," she said immediately.

Matt held back an irritated sigh. "Narrow it down to a few."

She opened and closed her mouth a few times as she changed her mind about what she wanted to ask first.

"You're a lawyer," she said finally.

"That's not a question."

"You're Sarah's lawyer. So, what, you just run around breaking the law with her and then defend her when she gets caught?"

"…basically," Matt said. It wasn't the way he would have phrased it, but it wasn't inaccurate.

"The Devil of Hell's Kitchen is...a defense lawyer. That's...crazy."

"Well, I don't wear the costume in court."

"You're not wearing it now, either," Lauren pointed out, her tone questioning. "I figured you might show up looking for your stuff. But I thought it would be more of a…dead of night, scary black mask type situation."

Matt let out a deep exhale. "I've gone that route before. With Sarah. It wasn't the right call. I thought I'd try less of an asshole approach this time."

That seemed to catch her off guard, and she took a minute to collect her thoughts before continuing with her questions.

"Why do you do it?"

He wasn't sure if she was actually expecting him to give an honest answer to that. Then again, if her tendency to spill out everything she was thinking was any indication, she might not have the same idea of personal boundaries that he did.

"Because it needs to be done," he said shortly. "Last question."

Matt had an inkling of what her final question would be, and sure enough she shifted forward in her seat a little, barely contained curiosity in her voice.

"How does it work? The whole…blind thing?" she asked.

"Generally it means you can't see."

"You know what I mean. How are you out there doing the things you do if you're blind?"

When Matt had first started as Daredevil, he'd never anticipated he would have to give this explanation so many times. To Claire, Foggy, Sarah, Karen…now Lauren, too.

"There are a lot of other ways to experience the world besides sight. And even if I can't see, my other senses are enhanced," he explained.

"Enhanced…how? Like, you're just a great listener?" she asked.

"Among other things. Before you came here, you went grocery shopping. You bought…tomatoes, basil, parmesan," Matt said. He tilted his head, picking up on the faint residue of wax on her fingertips, the chemical floral scent it had. "You thought about buying a hibiscus scented candle, and you picked it up probably three or four times to smell it, but you didn't buy it. You did buy a chocolate bar, and you ate it on the way home. You were listening to pop music until you were about a block away, when your husband called. The speaker in your left headphone is going to blow soon, by the way. And your left leg from your hip to your knee is bruised up pretty good. Hurts to walk on, so you've been favoring your right foot. My guess is you got knocked into something when everyone was running at the party."

He could have gone on, but from her rapid breathing and heartbeat, that was enough.

"Jesus," she breathed out.

Matt gave her a moment to let everything sink in, and then he spoke.

"I've answered your questions," he said slowly. "Now I need that bag back, Lauren. And I'd prefer it if you just gave it to me. It will save you replacing that lock."

Lauren watched him for a long moment, then gave a nod and stood up.

"Okay," she said. "Okay, yeah. It, um...it has Sarah's things in it, too. Her keys and phone and stuff."

"I know. I'm going to give it to her after I leave here," he said. Something he very much wasn't looking forward to. Even thinking about her caused a flash of pain.

Lauren walked over to the bowl she'd dropped her keys into and grabbed them, several keychains and charms jangling as she fished through the ring until she found the smallest key.

And maybe if the situation had ended there, if she had just handed him the bag and he'd gone on his way, they could have left on somewhat civil terms. Neutral, at least.

"Just so we're on the same page…you're certain you aren't going to tell anyone?" he clarified, needing to hear her say it truthfully one more time for his own peace of mind. "The police or anyone else?"

"I'm sure," Lauren said evenly. The steadiness of her heartbeat matched her tone. "I won't tell anyone."

"And you haven't told anyone already?"

"No one," she said. Her tone stayed the same. There was no hesitation, no stammer or shake.

But her heartbeat skipped and quickened.

Shit.

Matt went very still as he suddenly felt like he'd been dunked in cold water. He inhaled slowly, trying to stay calm. Who would she have told if not the police?

"After everything I just told you…" he said slowly. "You really think I can't tell when someone is lying to me?"

Lauren gave a nervous laugh, like she wasn't sure if she believed him or not.

"Th-that sounds very spooky and all, but I'm not lying," she said, stammering for the first time since their encounter began.

"Lauren," he warned lowly.

She was nervous now, as much as she had been when she'd first come in. He felt her shift slightly, her head turning just a fraction towards the front door, like she was calculating if she should run.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Look, I think I left the key for the desk upstairs" she said, speaking very quickly and with excessive nonchalance as she started towards the hallway. "So I'll just grab it for you and you can leave."

But Matt was up from the windowsill in an instant, blocking the doorway before she could leave. He didn't touch her, but was close enough that he could. Lauren took a quick step back.

"The key is in your hand. Don't bullshit me," he said harshly, trying very hard not to let his panic seep into his voice even as it coursed through his entire body. "Who did you tell, Lauren?"

The sound of her panicked heart pounding filled the room, reminding him unbearably of Sarah.

"My husband," she said finally.

Matt's jaw tightened. Another person he barely knew who held his life's biggest secret in their hands. Another person who could tell whoever they wanted. This entire situation was spinning rapidly out of control.

His displeasure must have shown on his face, because Lauren took another step back.

"That's great," he bit out. "And who has he told?"

"No one!" she said. "And he's not going to tell anyone."

Matt gave a bitter laugh. "You can see why that doesn't mean much coming from you."

"I'm serious. He's the…levelheaded one, okay? He's the reason I didn't go to the police," Lauren insisted. "I couldn't wrap my head around the whole situation, and I just…needed someone to tell me if I was losing my mind or not. Someone who isn't Sarah, because I love her but she doesn't seem to think straight when it comes to you. So I told him. He talked through it with me, and…he didn't think I should turn you in."

Matt breathed in deeply, then out, trying to keep control over the anger and panic trying to claw its way out of his chest as for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, the rug was completely pulled out from underneath him.

Seemingly unnerved by his silence, Lauren kept talking.

"I couldn't not tell him; he's my husband. And I'll go out on a crazy limb and guess you aren't married," Lauren said. "So maybe you don't understand the kind of strain keeping so many secrets can put on a marriage, but it can."

"Give me the keys," Matt said, ignoring what she was saying. He needed to get out of there. To his aggravation, she didn't move. "You have about ten seconds. I'm really not in the mood to play games."

Lauren reluctantly held out the keys in her hand, and Matt took them.

"Are you still going to Sarah's right now?"

"Yes," he said shortly as he strode past her to get to the desk. His hands were unsteady as he jammed the key in the lock and yanked the drawer open.

"It's not her fault," Lauren said. "She doesn't even know that I told Greg."

Matt raised his eyebrows as he turned around, the bag in his hand. What, was she expecting he would keep it to himself so she could tell her?

"She's about to."

Again he started to leave, but Lauren stepped quickly in front of him.

"Look, I understand that you're pissed off—"

Matt tilted his head back in frustration, casting his blank eyes towards the ceiling. "Yeah, I am. And if you really understood that then you might not be blocking me from leaving."

"—but I don't think you should go over there right now. Maybe…maybe you could just take your things. And I can give Sarah hers," Lauren suggested hesitantly.

Matt could tell that Lauren thought he was going to Sarah's to take out his anger on her, and maybe ten minutes ago he would have taken the time to tell her he wasn't, that he'd already said everything he needed to say to Sarah. But at the moment he honestly didn't give a damn what Lauren thought.

"Why? Because you still think I'm going to hurt her?" Matt demanded. "As far as I'm concerned, you forfeited your right to care about that yesterday. When you threatened to go to the police, you were considering putting her in more danger than you can imagine. And now you want to act like you're worried about her safety?"

"I am. If you hurt her—"

"—no, I think you've made all of your 'if's very clear," Matt interrupted. He'd lost all patience for hearing Lauren act like he was the one who had hurt Sarah this time, and not the other way around. "So let me tell you one of mine. If Sarah's insane decision to trust you with this comes back to bite her—to bite me, and the rest of the people I care about? You'll be the person I come looking for. And your husband, too."

For a moment, all he heard was Lauren's racing heart, her ragged breathing.

Then she shook her head. "This is you being less of an asshole?"

Matt's mouth thinned into a tight line. "Significantly."

Lauren didn't say anything else as he brushed past her and out the front door, slamming it closed behind him.


Sarah woke up that morning feeling nauseous. Claire had warned her about the aftereffects of the tranquilizer leaving her system, and she had been right. Not only was her headache still there, but a wave of dizziness hit her as she got up from the couch.

She knew she needed to go to Lauren's before she could do anything else, and she slumped her way to the shower in an attempt to look halfway human before going out in public. Mrs. Benedict had gotten a railing installed in her shower after taking a nasty fall a couple years ago, and Sarah found herself leaning heavily on it as she stood under the hot water.

After thanking Mrs. Benedict again, she slowly made her way out of the apartment and to the elevator. She leaned against the elevator wall and closed her eyes as it descended, running through what she would say to Lauren. She was so bad at confrontation, but sometimes trying to plan out what she would say ahead of time helped a little—with Lauren, at least. With Matt, she tended to get so flustered that even practiced arguments left her head.

When the elevator doors opened in the lobby, she was met by the sight of the very man she'd just been thinking of: Matt Murdock, standing in front of her wearing a dark grey hoodie and his even darker glasses.

"Matt?" she said in surprise, so caught off guard that she didn't even move.

She stood still for such a long beat that the elevator doors began to close again, until Matt shot his hand out and blocked them, then stepped back to let her off. Sarah shook herself out of her surprise and followed him, a small amount of hope rising in her chest. He wouldn't have come all the way over just to get mad at her even more, right? Maybe he wanted to talk, at least, to hear her out even if he wasn't ready to forgive her.

"I…didn't know you were coming," she said for lack of anything better to say. And like a lovesick teenager she couldn't keep the hope out of her voice.

Matt nodded wordlessly, then held something out to her. It was the red clutch.

Sarah paused, then slowly reached out to take it from him. "You got the bag back."

"Yeah. Your keys and everything are in there."

"How did it…I mean…was Lauren there? Did you…talk to her?" she asked hesitantly.

Matt's short, humorless laugh at her question dispelled any notion she had that he was here to reconcile.

"I talked to her. She says she's not going to go to the police."

"You're sure?" Sarah asked as relief flooded through her.

"Her heartbeat was steady. She meant it," he said. "Which doesn't mean she can't change her mind later on."

"She won't. Really. She just needed some time to calm down. She won't tell anyone, I swear," Sarah said adamantly. She knew it, she knew if Lauren just had some time to get her head around things she would see the mistake she was making. And she had…so why did Matt still look so grim?

Matt gave a half-shrug, the casual gesture incongruous with the tight set of his mouth.

"She already did, Sarah."

There was a long silence as Sarah's pounding head caught up with what he'd just said.

"What?" she asked, giving him a startled look.

"She told her husband."

"I—what are you talking about?"

"Your friend Greg. He knows everything she knows," Matt elaborated. "And she swears he won't tell anyone. But that's what you just said about her. And up until yesterday I'd have said the same about you."

Sarah was so caught off guard she didn't know what to say. In the few hours that Lauren had known, she'd already told someone. And yes, Greg was a better option than the police. But it was still another name to add to the list because of her, another person who both posed more danger and was in more danger.

"Matt, I'm…I'm sorry, I didn't think she would—"

"I did," he cut her off steadily. "Which is why if I'd been included in the decision, I wouldn't have told her."

Sarah bit her lip. What was she supposed to say to that?

She wished he didn't have his glasses on, that she didn't have to look at her own guilt-stricken expression in their reflection as they stood wordlessly facing each other.

"I have to go," he said abruptly. "I just came to give you your things so you can get back into your apartment."

Sarah winced as he turned to leave. She hated how impassive he sounded. Not even angry, even though she knew he was pissed. It weirdly reminded her of the way he spoke to Stick; like she'd hurt him so deeply he wouldn't even let her see it.

"Wait, will you just…will you just talk to me?" she pleaded as she took a few quick steps to get in front of him. The sudden movement made her head spin a little.

Matt stopped, his shoulders rising and falling with carefully controlled breathing as he tilted his head down face her. And now that she was right in front of him, close enough that she would normally reach up to touch his face, she found every word she'd practiced had left her mind.

"Look, I—I know you think I told Lauren because I wanted to save my friendship with her, but I didn't. I told her to save you."

"I never asked you to save me. The only thing I asked was that you not tell anyone about me—especially her, with her connection to Cecilia," he said. "And that was before she got the idea of turning me in."

"I know. And I'm sorry, I'm really sorry. But I…I did what I thought I had to do. Can't you understand that? I—she was going into the police station, and I just…panicked, and—"

"You can't blame every decision you make on panic, Sarah," he retorted.

"I know that. But—but what would have you have done? If I had come to get you first and she'd gone in and given them that bag? With your DNA and your fingerprints inside?"

"I would have figured it out from there!" he said, and for the first time the careful neutrality in his voice gave way to anger. "It's one thing to steal something from the cops before they can send it to a testing lab, it's another thing entirely to try to make them forget a name that's been given to them. A name that's now been spread to at least one other person—who knows how many more? Don't you get how much more dangerous that is? Not just for me?"

"Yes, I get it," Sarah said in frustration. How could she got get it? He'd only told her a thousand times how much danger he and his friends would be in if she let his secret out. "I know I screwed up, I—I put you and…and Foggy and Karen in danger. I know. I'm sorry."

"Jesus, Sarah," Matt said, his own frustration matching hers. "You put you in danger. Foggy and Karen would be targets as my friends and coworkers. But I might have time to get them out. But you? You work in the lion's den, and Jason would put things together in two seconds. I could never get to you in time. Do you have any idea how I—"

Matt cut himself off abruptly. With a deep inhale and a shake of his head, he stepped around her to leave.

And part of her wanted to call after him again, if only to see if he would turn around. But there was nothing for her to say that wouldn't make things worse. So she just bit her lip and watched him through the glass front doors as he made his way down the sidewalk and disappeared into the crowd.


Now that she had her keys, Sarah returned to her empty apartment.

The cleaners who had been tasked with getting all traces of gasoline out of the apartment had done their job well, and she was relieved not to smell any of it when she opened her front door. All she really wanted to do was curl up in her bed and go to sleep, both to ease her exhaustion and to make her mind stop replaying her conversation with Matt. But before she could rest she had things to do, and the first was gathering enough energy to go down to the corner store across the street.

She knew her fridge was empty—or, if anything was in there it had turned into a science project after so many days of being gone—and she needed tea and comfort food and maybe some more trashy magazines just to keep her mind occupied.

She made it through the corner store on autopilot, focusing on the oldies songs that were playing over the crackling speakers to keep her mind off her own thoughts. It didn't work very well. She couldn't stop herself from thinking about Lauren, about Matt, about how everything had gotten messed up so quickly. Yes, Lauren had decided not to go to the police, but what did that mean for her and Sarah?

Her thoughts spiraled farther downward until finally, she found herself standing in an aisle she hadn't gone down in a long time, staring at the sale sticker on a bottle of wine. It was the brand she'd always favored, the one that had greeted her after many rough days at Orion. And she couldn't help thinking about how good it would feel to sink into the numb relief of that first glass.

Slowly, she reached out and took the bottle off the shelf.

The kid who worked behind the counter began to ring up her things. He reeked of weed, and he seemed to be moving just as slowly as Sarah was—although he seemed to be in a much better mood about it.

"You got your ID?" he asked as he reached for the bottle of wine.

Sarah bit her lip and fidgeted with the clasp on her wallet as she eyed the bottle. She didn't really need to do this. It would make her feel better for a little bit, drown out the miserable monologue in her head. But what came after that? The same awful situation, just with a hangover? But god, she wanted to so badly. But she also didn't want to be the girl who downed a bottle of wine whenever things got rough.

"Um…no," she lied, quickly making her decision before she could change her mind. "No, I forgot it. Sorry."

"Oh. Well, uh…I can't sell it to you then," the cashier said awkwardly, giving her an apologetic look as he set the wine on the shelf behind him. "I just got in trouble with my manager for not checking someone, so…"

"It's fine. Just the other items, thanks," Sarah said.

As she left the store, she wasn't sure if she felt relieved or disappointed not to feel the heavy weight of the wine bottle in her grocery bag.

The first thing Sarah did when she returned to her apartment was take out the giant bag of rice she'd bought at the corner store. She dumped it into a large kitchen bowl, then buried the three waterlogged phones in it. She didn't have high hopes that any of them would be salvageable, but it was worth a try. After that she slowly put the rest of her groceries away, and put a pot of water on the stove for tea.

Then, with those tasks done, she mostly…gave up.

She didn't go into work that day. Or the next.

Not having a working cell phone was almost a relief, because she didn't have to answer any phone calls from anyone at Orion asking when she would be back. If Jason was calling at all. With all of his sources around town, he must have heard that she was one of the people who had been injured in the attack—his attack. And while she wasn't exactly expecting a Get Well Soon card, she figured if he was busy dealing with the aftermath of the attack and thought she was still in the hospital, she could get away with a couple of days at home.

And she did. For a couple of days. She used them to sleep, mostly, interrupted by Mrs. Benedict occasionally knocking on the door to check on her and ask if she needed more food.

Early Friday morning, she was reluctantly about to get dressed in order to go try a second time to give her statement at the police station. Mahoney had let her know in no unclear terms that he was already bending the rules by letting her wait so long to come back in, and she was out of time.

So she was standing in her kitchen, her hair washed for the first time in days, making coffee that smelled like melted plastic as her Spanish soap opera played in the background. The last two days she had barely managed a few hours at a time of being out of bed, and while she finally had a little more energy today, she still felt drained from something as simple as taking a shower.

A knock came at her front door, and her heart leapt. Despite knowing it was unlikely, she knew the two options she wanted it to be.

And neither of those two options involved Tracksuit looking back at her from the other side of her front door peephole.

"Dammit," she murmured under her breath, taking a step back from the door. She'd figured she'd hear from Orion soon if she didn't go back into the office, but she'd hoped it would be an angry email, not someone showing up at her place.

But between the thin walls of her apartment and the television playing in the living room, she couldn't pretend to not be home. Even if she did, she was only delaying the inevitable. Biting back a groan, she opened the door.

"Took you long enough," Tracksuit said by way of greeting as he barged past her and into the apartment.

"What are you doing here?" she asked him suspiciously.

He was craning his neck to look around her small apartment. "This is your place? They really do just give you half a paycheck, huh?"

Sarah suddenly remembered the phone-filled bowl of rice on her counter, and she quickly angled herself in the way of Tracksuit's line of sight.

"What do you want?"

"Jason says you got an appointment to go give a statement at the police station later this morning," he said.

Sarah bit back a grimace. It wasn't any big secret that she would have to give a statement like every other attendee at the charity ball had, but she didn't like that the news had immediately found its way to Jason through one of his many NYPD connections.

When she just stared at him, Tracksuit rolled his eyes and kept talking.

"So he wants me to go with you. Make sure you, uh…get to the police station alright and all."

Bullshit. Jason just sent him as a reminder to her that he had so many sources in the NYPD he might as well be sitting in the station next to her as she gave her statement. And there was nothing she could do about it.

"Fine," she ground out.

"And then you're going into the office. Vacation time's up," he told her. "And I don't have all day, so hurry up. Put some shoes and let's go."

"I'm not dressed for work," she said incredulously. "I can't just leave this second. I have to get ready."

Tracksuit gave her an impatient look up and down. "What's wrong with that?"

Dumbfounded by the question, Sarah looked down at the ratty red sweatpants and threadbare red sweatshirt she'd been sleeping in for the last three days. With a frown, she noted the similarity to the much brighter red tracksuit the man in front of her was wearing.

"Just—I need ten minutes to change," she said tiredly. It wasn't like there was a point to anything like makeup; there was only so much exhaustion you could cover up, and she was past that point.

"Fine. I'll wait," he said, dropping onto the couch and squinting at the TV, where her soap opera had just come back from a commercial. He picked up the remote "The hell is this? Do you know this isn't in English? Don't you have ESPN?"

"You're not waiting in here," she told him, looking at him like he was crazy.

"Jason said to stick to you until I've brought you to work," he said with a shrug, still trying to flip through her TV channels.

She gestured around. "Where do you think I'm going to go? The fire escape that's falling apart? You can wait outside."

Tracksuit finally seemed to realize the only channels she had were a handful of free ones with blurry picture and no sports, and with a disappointed roll of his eyes he tossed the remote aside and stood up.

"Whatever," he said as he headed towards the front door. "Ten minutes."

She locked the door behind him and then went to her kitchen, grabbed the bowl of rice-covered phones, and shoved it out of sight in the cupboard before making her way back to her bedroom to get ready for work.


Tracksuit did in fact stay with her until she got to Orion. To her relief, he wasn't allowed in the actual room while she gave her statement at the station—although, to her disappointment she wasn't able to give it directly to Mahoney, who had been called away on a case. Instead, she gave it to a generic-looking cop by the title of Officer Davis, who was bland enough that she honestly couldn't tell if he was on Jason's payroll or not.

Either way, she gave him the carefully prepared statement that she'd been planning out for the last few days. Almost the entire truth, with a few blurred spots: she downplayed how well she really knew Cecilia, and made sure to mention it had been too dark for her to see who had saved them at the fountain. And of course, she left out the fact that the Daredevil who had attacked the event had been an imposter.

It was quiet when Sarah first got back to work. Jason's door was open, but he was nowhere to be found. Employees milled around, but for once no one bothered her. Normally Sarah would consider that to be an ideal day, but the total lack of any work for her to do just reinforced the fact that she'd only been made to come in as a punishment.

It wasn't until just after 4:00 that she saw Jason at all. She'd stepped away to use the restroom, and when she came back she could hear Jason in his office, speaking to someone on on the phone.

"…yes, I got the email. Both of them. What about the cell phone?" he was asking. After a brief pause where the person on the other line responded, she heard him let out a frustrated sigh. "What do you mean it was already picked up by the owner? The owner is in a coma." Sarah frowned, listening closer as she waited for the other person to finish replying. "If it wasn't hers, then why would I care about it? I don't need to know about random phones you found at the goddamn place, I need to know about hers. Figure it out."

Sarah heard his chair move as he stood up, and she hurriedly made a show of opening one of her desk drawers loudly so he wouldn't think she was standing out here eavesdropping.

Jason appeared in the doorway a moment later, a wide, calm smile on his face. No trace of the frustration from his phone call seconds before.

"Sarah. Welcome back to work. Step into my office."

Taking a deep breath, Sarah followed him into the office.

"Have a seat," he said, gesturing at one of the chairs without looking at her. He sat back down at his desk and turned his attention to his computer screen.

Sarah waited a beat for him to begin, but he seemed absorbed in whatever he was looking at. After a while, he spoke.

"So first of all, tell me…did you have a good time at your party?" he asked pleasantly.

Sarah stared at him.

"No," she said finally. "Not really."

He made a sympathetic tutting noise, his eyes still on the screen. "Party crashers? A shame. But I heard your musical performance was just heavenly."

She dug her fingernails into her palms. "Thank you."

"Your police statement certainly doesn't make it sound like a fun time. It does seem to match Vanessa's very closely," he said finally.

She blinked. She hadn't realized he'd have gotten a transcript of it so quickly. As cloudy as her mind had been the last few days, the spark of adrenaline now running through her veins was helping clear it a bit. She needed to keep her thoughts straight, because this part—the part she knew was coming, where Jason would question what had happened—was hard enough when she was at full strength.

"Right," she said. "Well, that makes sense. I think most of the people who were there will say the same thing."

"Then let's skip straight to the important part. I am curious to know how the situation played out like it did. How Vanessa managed to escape an assassination for the second time in just a few years. Poor woman," he said, fake sympathy still in his tone. Then his gaze snapped to hers, and unsurprisingly there wasn't a shred of empathy to be found there. "Did you assist her with that impressive feat?"

"No."

"She got away on her own?"

"No, she had a bodyguard. But he was…" Sarah bit the inside of her cheek, forcing herself not to picture the bodyguard's head snapping back as the bullet went through his skull. "He was shot."

"Yes, I see that in her statement and yours," he said. "And...the journalist. Cecilia Gladstone. You were with her when the attack began."

"We were both coming out of the same restroom when it started," she said with a nod.

"Do you two know each other?"

This was the hard part. Having to balance what she knew versus what she was supposed to know, versus what Jason already might now.

"We've met," she said. "We're not friends, but...we end up at some of the same parties sometimes."

"I see. I ask because I was surprised to learn that Miss Gladstone was aware of the truth of what happened that night, and I am very curious to know if you were the one who informed her."

"I…what?" Sarah said, caught off guard.

"Obviously you know that wasn't the real Daredevil. Let's not pretend otherwise. And I assume by now you've put together that it was I who hired the imposter," Jason said calmly, seemingly unbothered. Sarah tried not to show her surprise that he was admitting to it all so easily. "But I have little interest in discussing that. What I want to discuss is how Cecilia Gladstone knew that the man who attacked her wasn't the real Devil of Hell's Kitchen. Did you tell her while you two were escaping together?"

Sarah stared at him. How did Jason know that Cecilia had figured out the fake Daredevil? "No. It…it was the other way around. Cecilia figured it out and told me."

His eyes lit up.

"She told you? Fascinating. I guess she was smarter than her reporting let on," he said. Sarah internally bristled at his use of the past tense. "I am a little disappointed you didn't figure it out on your own. After all, it was your suggestion."

"What do you mean?" she asked slowly.

"You were the one the point out that I was wasting my energy on too many enemies. Elliott Bradshaw…Daredevil…Vanessa. So I started thinking, why not take out all three at once? And your fundraiser was the perfect opportunity."

Great. The one time she tried to use logic to pull Jason back from one of his manic plans, and it had just made him go fully nuclear.

"Then why didn't you bring me in on the plan?" she asked, trying to keep her voice calm. It felt like every sentence that came out of his mouth was throwing her off balance.

"Primarily because you've been acting…erratically lately. Perhaps it's just who you are at your core. Or perhaps it's something else. I don't know for sure right now, but I will find out," he told her in a cool tone. "As it happens, the plan didn't pan out as I had hoped, so I am bringing you back into the loop to assist me with damage control."

"What do you want me to do?"

"The man who attacked the ball is someone I picked from a carefully curated pool of candidates. And he did the job, for the most part. He didn't manage to take out Vanessa, but he did make sure everyone—including Vanessa—heard that it was Elliott Bradshaw's doing. And his theatrics on the balcony with that journalist were perfect," Jason said, his eyes lighting up once more as he presumably remembered the entire horrifying scene. "Just the kind of news bite I was looking for."

Sarah just nodded, biting down hard on the inside of her cheek again to keep herself from saying anything. That Daredevil imposter had cost her everything: her relationship with Matt, her friendship with Lauren, probably her friendship with Greg, too.

"However, our devilish friend did make a significant mistake. When he managed to corner the journalist, she kept telling him she knew he wasn't the real thing. Threatening that she was going to do a big expose on the whole thing," he said with a wide, amused smile. "Can you imagine? The gall to threaten someone in that situation. But what concerns me is that he mentioned while she was saying these things, she was recording him."

"Recording him?" Sarah repeated faintly.

Cecilia had been filming people just before her attack, interviewing them about what they'd witnessed.

"Yes. She was taking a video on her phone, and in the chaos of escaping from the police, he failed to collect said phone as he should have done," Jason said. His expression darkened alarmingly. "This wouldn't be too much of an issue normally, as getting evidence from the NYPD is as simple as a phone call. But my sources at the station are telling me they can't find Miss Gladstone's phone. There was only one phone up on the balcony, and it didn't belong to her. Dropped by some other fleeing partygoer, I assume. Which leaves the question…where is the phone with the video on it? Who took it from the balcony?"

Sarah tried to keep her expression neutral as her heart began to pound. She had Cecilia's phone. She had pulled it out of the fountain. That's why Cecilia had been filming on…Greg's phone.

Greg. Oh, god.

By some kind of miracle, it seemed that Greg hadn't crossed Jason's radar yet. He was still under the impression that the phone on the balcony was randomly dropped, and that it was Cecilia's phone he should be looking for. Meaning for now, at least, Greg was still safe.

A loud knock came at the office door.

"Speak of the devil," Jason said as the door opened.

Sarah turned in her seat to see who it was, and even without the mask she recognized him. A tall, broad-shouldered man with a square jaw and cold eyes. The man she and Lauren had knocked into on the dance floor, the one who had been watching Cecilia so intently. The man who had appeared later on dressed as Daredevil.

"I assume you called me here to give me my money?" he asked Jason by way of greeting. Sarah's eyes widened as she looked back at Jason.

Jason gave a cold chuckle. "Not quite. Have a seat."

The man's jaw tightened, but he dropped down heavily into the chair. "I did the job you assigned me. I don't like when people try to screw me out of payment."

"No one's screwing you out of anything. I gave you a part of the payment, and you'll receive the rest when the job is finished properly," Jason told him. He turned his attention back to the screen in front of him. "Which means tracking down that phone you carelessly let get lost."

The Fake Daredevil glared at him, then turned to glare at Sarah as well. She saw his eyes widen in recognition.

"You. You were there with the girl. What, did Jason send you to spy on me? Make sure I was doing the job correctly?" he demanded.

Sarah looked from him to Jason in alarm. "Uh, no. I was just…there as a guest."

"Right. I find that hard to believe," he said.

"I assure you, Sarah wasn't involved," Jason interjected distractedly, still intently reading something on his computer screen. "In fact, it would…"

Jason's words trailed off as something on the computer caught his attention. His gaze flicked from the left side of the screen to the right, then back again.

"Of course," he murmured, his eyes glinting.

"What?" Imposter Daredevil demanded.

"Sarah, there's something you seem to have to forgotten to mention in your statement," Jason said slowly.

His voice was gleeful underneath the usual calm, and it sent Sarah's heart rate spiking.

"Like what?"

"According to Vanessa's statement, the man who held the three of you hostage at the fountain threw all of your phones into the water," Jason said.

She had left that out, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that the phones were no longer there. It had seemed like a small enough detail she could just claim forgetfulness.

"Oh. That's right, I…I guess I forgot. It wasn't as big of a deal as some of other stuff going on," she said with a shrug.

"But it is a big deal. It is. Because if Miss Gladstone's phone was thrown into the fountain, then she was using someone else's phone to film later that night."

Sarah's entire body froze, her heart dropping into her stomach.

Jason grabbed the phone off his desk and dialed, putting it on speaker phone. It only rang once.

"Sorry, we still haven't found it," answered a nervous voice. He sounded young. "We're trying, I swear."

"The phone you found on the balcony. The one that was already picked up. Who did you say it belonged to?" Jason demanded.

"Uh, just some guy. A guest at the party," he replied. "Gregory something...hang on, I have it somewhere."

Sarah struggled to keep her breathing steady as her mind raced, trying to figure out how to stop this, how to stop the danger of her Orion life from crashing into her loved ones yet again.

"Check the statement he gave," Jason ordered. "See if it mentions him knowing Cecilia Gladstone."

"Yeah, hang on. Let me just…search the document by keyword…" the cop mumbled to himself for a few seconds, then made a sound of surprise. "Oh. Yeah, he does mention her. Says that she's his wife's cousin. So they do know each other."

The triumphant glint in Jason's eye made Sarah's stomach turn.

"That's it. He lent her his phone. That's why it was the only one on the balcony. Do you have his home address?"

No, Sarah screamed internally. No, no, no. She didn't have her phone, no way to warn Greg or Lauren. She didn't even know their numbers by heart.

"Yeah. I'll send it to you now," the voice on the phone responded.

"Where does he work?" Jason inquired.

"Uh…for an advertising agency."

"An advertising agency. That's nice and public, isn't it? And it's just before the end of day, so there should be plenty of witnesses. Send me that address, too."

"Sending it now."

"And put our usual protocol in place. Any emergency calls you receive from either of these addresses, make sure there's a…significant delay in response. And arrange for the right team to be the first ones on the scene. Understood?"

"Understood."

"So, what's the plan?" the Daredevil imposter asked Jason as he hung up the phone.

"I want that footage. I didn't go to all that work to hire you only to have the entire thing exposed to the public and ruined," Jason said sharply. "So as long as we're tracking this man down, what better place to stage the next phase of our Daredevil saga? Picture it: He's so hellbent on getting revenge on the journalist that now he's attacking her poor family members in public. It's perfect."

"You want me to kill him?" Fake Daredevil asked indifferently, and Sarah's heart leapt into her throat.

"I don't care," Jason said with equal indifference. "The fact that that footage hasn't shown up on the news means he probably doesn't even know what he has. Kill him, don't kill him—just make it a spectacle, got it?"

From the smirk on the imposter's face, it was clear which option he would pick.

Jason's phone dinged with an incoming message, and he read the text gleefully before tapping on his screen to forward the information.

"This is the office address," Jason informed him. "Try there first. It shouldn't take you too long to get over there."

Sarah felt like she was going to be sick. Apparently it showed on her face, because Jason suddenly eyed her with the distaste.

"What's the matter with you?" he asked in annoyance.

"I just, um…the tranquilizer I got hit with. It makes me feel queasy sometimes," she said unsteadily.

"Do not get sick in this office," he snapped, his eyes darting from her to the expensive white rug beneath her. "Besides, you have a job to do. I assume this…Gregory person will be at work right now, but there's a chance he'll be home. You need to go to his home address, and if he's there you will contact me immediately so we can adjust the plan. Understood?"

Sarah nodded tightly.

"That costume's been shoved in the back of my trunk for days," Fake Daredevil protested. "It probably reeks, and I'll have to find a place to change. You didn't tell me I'd have to wear it today."

Jason slowly turned to look at the man, and even amidst all of her panicked thoughts, Sarah realized with perfect clarity in that moment that Jason would kill this man when he was done being useful.

"But you do have to wear it, don't you? So get over it," he said icily. "I was generous enough to guarantee that you'll have plenty of time to complete your task before the police show up, to avoid another botched escape. The least you can do is refrain from whining. Both of you get to work now. I want that footage by the end of the day."

Despite her weakened muscles, Sarah bolted up from her chair and out of his office. Luckily the threat of vomiting was a good cover for her hurried exit, and as much as the quick movement made her head spin, she didn't slow down as she grabbed her bag and rushed down the stairwell and out the front door to the sidewalk.

Once outside, she took a second to catch her breath and figure out what she was going to do. She took in deep breaths as she started towards the subway station down the block, which she knew still had an old payphone in it. She'd seen people using it before, so it must still work.

Calling the police was out of the question. Jason had all but guaranteed they wouldn't show up, anyway. And even if she managed to contact someone who wasn't on Jason or Fisk's payrolls—which seemed unlikely—Jason would catch on when he found out an anonymous tip had been called in from a payphone near Orion. She needed to reach Greg, needed to warn him…but she didn't have her phone, and she didn't know his number. She didn't know anyone's number—except for Matt's.

After he'd made her change the devil emoji she'd had his burner phone number saved under, Sarah had put it back to only his number, just to be safe. His burner had popped up on her screen so many times that she easily had it memorized by now. But would he have his burner on him during the day, at work? She had to hope.

Sarah gripped the phone tightly as it rang through to Matt's phone. Once, twice, three times.

But Matt didn't answer.

Sarah didn't know if he was in court or if he was just ignoring her, but the phone rang through to its generic voicemail.

"It's—it's me," she stammered after the message beep. "Listen, I know you're pissed at me but you have to help. Jason is sending that—that fake Daredevil to attack Greg at his office, in front of everyone. He wants the footage that Cecilia took on his phone, a-and he's going to hurt him. The office is on 42nd and, um…" Sarah squeezed her eyes shut and tried to remember the cross street. "…and 12th. J-just before the water. Please, I know I screwed up but Greg didn't and…and I'm going there now to help him. Please come."

She hung up and started to turn to take the stairs, then stopped as she remembered the Nelson & Murdock card she'd had floating around her purse—did she still have it? That had been a larger purse, and all she had today was a small crossbody. She couldn't remember if she'd switched everything over. Desperately, she yanked the bag open and began digging around inside for the card, knowing she couldn't waste too much time searching.

When her fingers closed around a small white business card she felt like she could nearly cry from relief. It wasn't a guarantee; Matt could be in court, or out with a client, or he might just hate her so much he wouldn't come at all. But it was at least worth a try.

Like Matt's burner phone, the Nelson and Murdock phone rang once, twice, three times. Sarah was about to hang up when someone picked up.

"Nelson and Murdock, this is Karen speaking."

"Karen," Sarah blurted out in relief. "This is Sarah Corrigan. I need to talk to Matt, it's an emergency."

"Sarah?" Karen repeated, her confusion mixing with alarm. "Matt's not here. He had a client meeting, he should be on his way home now. Did you try his cell?"

"No, I—I'm on a payphone. I need you to call him for me. Tell him the man who's impersonating him is going to make another attack at an advertising agency on 42nd and 12th. He's on his way there right now. Tell him he's going to try to kill Greg. He'll know who that is. I know it's daylight and I know he's mad at me but he has to come. He has to."

"Wh—hang on," Karen said, and Sarah could hear paper rustling in the background as she hurriedly scratched some notes down. "42nd and 12th. Greg. Jesus, did you call the police?"

"I can't."

"Okay," Karen said, and despite not knowing her very well, Sarah assumed that was something she understood. "Okay, I'll get him for you."

"Thank you," Sarah breathed out.

She slammed the chipped phone handle back down on the payphone's receiver and started down the steps to the platform as quickly as she could. Her body protested every move, but she ignored it. She knew it was only three stops to get to Greg's office from Orion; she'd gone straight there before to meet up with him and Lauren for drinks after work, way at the beginning of Orion before she started cutting them out. It wasn't a long ride. She could get there before the fake Daredevil did. He still had to change into the suit, and that bought her a little extra time. As for the plan after she got there…

Greg's office was in one of the newer buildings in Hell's Kitchen, all sparkling glass and stainless steel. The advertising agency he did copywriting for took up the top two floors of the tall building, with various other successful businesses filling the other floors, and the result was a busy building full of people coming in and out. Hundreds of witnesses for the fake Daredevil's show, Sarah thought.

She pulled open the glass doors to the building and was immediately met with an obstacle: the path to the elevators was blocked by turnstiles, flanked on either side by a long counter of security guards checking people in. Two more guards stood on either side of the turnstiles to prevent people from jumping them. Sarah tried to catch her breath as she walked up to one of the counters.

"I need to get up to the offices for Langford Advertising. I—I have a meeting there," she said, trying to sound calm.

"What's your name?" the security guard asked, her eyes on her computer screen. "I'll see if they have your meeting logged."

Sarah froze. There would be no meeting in the log, obviously, but more importantly she couldn't have her name put down in their log, a record that she had been here. But what other way did she have to get up there? There was no way she could hurtle herself over those turnstiles without one of these security guards catching her.

"Name?" the guard repeated, eyeing her.

"She's with me," came a friendly voice from behind her.

Sarah turned, then blinked in surprise to see Todd standing there, smiling at her and holding up his employee I.D. for the security guard to see.

Of course. She'd almost forgotten Todd worked with Greg; that was how Lauren had met him to begin with, back when she'd picked him as both her baby photographer and a disastrously mismatched date for Sarah. And he was just about the last person she wanted to deal with right now, but if that was her only way upstairs then she would have to take it.

"Y-yes," Sarah said, turning back to the guard. "This is…who I was going up to meet."

The guard squinted at Todd's employee badge, then nodded her head towards the turnstiles. "Go ahead."

Sarah had to wait for Todd to swipe his I.D. at the turnstile before they could go through, then again at the elevator, and every second that ticked by felt like an hour. As Sarah stepped into the elevator with Todd, she wondered how much longer she had before the man in black got to the building. She had a feeling he wouldn't be entering through the front lobby like she had, and those guards wouldn't have much luck slowing him down.

"So...is this surprise visit because you saw me at the charity ball the other night?" Todd asked.

Sarah tore her eyes away from the floor numbers slowly ticking up on the small elevator screen.

"I'm looking for Greg," she told him.

"Oh. Well, you'll have to wait. He's about to have a meeting with the rest of the creative team to go over some pitches. And if they end up going the direction I think they will then I'll be the best choice to do the photography for it. And I need that account," Todd said.

The elevator stopped at a floor midway up, and three people got on. They quietly conversed as the elevator rose, and Sarah felt like she would explode into a million pieces. This had to be the slowest elevator on the planet.

Three floors later the three employees got off, and Sarah hit the 'door close' button repeatedly, trying to speed up the process.

"You know, Greg hasn't asked me to be on any accounts with him since you and I had that whole…street sign fiasco on our date. When you freaked out on me?" he reminded her. "I think he got all weird about it. Or, probably his wife did, and you know how that goes. So, you really need to tell him that we're cool now."

"Yeah. Cool," Sarah mumbled, her gaze turning back to the floor numbers. God, how tall was this building?

"And since you'll have to wait for him to finish his presentation anyway, maybe...come have a drink with me," Todd suggested. "I have a great bar setup in my office. It looks just like Don Draper's."

Sarah had no intention of waiting for Greg to finish his meeting, and she definitely didn't have any intention of going anywhere near Todd's office.

"I can't. Thanks," she said.

The elevator finally dinged, announcing their arrival on the top floor. The doors slid open, but before Sarah could step out, Todd casually stepped in front of her. He leaned against the elevator wall with his arm outstretched, blocking her way.

"Move," Sarah told him, giving him a confused look.

"Alright, alright. You don't want to drink in a boring office, I get that," he said with a shrug. "Come out with me later, then. After work."

"No," she said flatly. "I'm in a hurry. Move."

She tried to duck around him, but he just moved his arm lower to block her.

"Okay, how about this…I'll move, and you go out with me again," he said with a teasing grin.

"Are you kidding me?" she said incredulously. She didn't have time for this; every second he blocked her way was another second that Jason's Fake Daredevil was getting closer. "This isn't a joke! I need to find Greg right now, it's an emergency. Let me off this elevator."

"Oh, come on. I'm not serious, I'm just having some fun with you," he said with an eye roll, but he still didn't move. "You remember what fun is? Just come out with me for a drink later."

"Todd, get out of my way right now. I mean it."

"Listen, we'll go to this great place that has aged bourbon with flavored—"

But what was flavored would remain a mystery, because Sarah lost all patience at that point. With all of the energy she had left, she cocked her arm back and aimed her fist at Todd's face, where it connected hard with Todd's left eye.

He shrieked in an oddly high pitched voice and stumbled backwards, finally making some space for Sarah to get by.

"What the hell? Have you lost your mind?" he yelled, clutching at his face.

But she ignored him as she ran down the hallway in search of Greg's office. Todd's shouted expletives echoed behind her.

She lost more time as she searched the floor for Greg. She didn't want to draw attention to herself by asking around, but as she passed room after room and saw how many different hallways stretched out ahead of her, she knew was running out of time.

Then she turned a corner, and through the glass of a large conference room, she saw Greg. He was standing in front of a large trifold board with various colorful print ads displayed on it, and was pulling up a slide show on a projector screen. It looked like he was preparing for a big presentation—one he definitely wouldn't be able to give.

"Greg!" Sarah panted as she burst into the room. "Oh, my god. Finally."

He looked up from his slides in surprise, gaping at her sudden and disheveled appearance.

"Sarah? What are you doing here?"

"Looking for you. We have to leave," she said quickly.

"What? What are you on about?" he asked, looking at her like she was crazy.

"Look, I—I know Lauren told you some of what's been going on. That man who attacked the charity ball, the one pretending to be Daredevil. He's on his way here, and he's looking for you."

"For me?" Greg repeated in alarm. "Why?"

"Because he thinks you have footage of him on your phone. Footage Cecilia took at the ball," Sarah said. "It might be evidence that the man who attacked her wasn't the real Daredevil, and they don't want that getting out."

"They? They who?"

"Uh—my boss, mostly."

As she answered him, she scanned the conference room for anything they could use as a weapon. A letter opener, a water pitcher, a hefty stapler, anything—but the room was bare except for the folders Greg was holding.

Greg still wasn't moving, probably due to the shock of the situation. Sarah glanced over her shoulder as though expecting to see the fake Daredevil standing in the doorway.

"Greg, I'm sorry. I know this is a lot to throw at you when you only just got involved in this, but we need to go now," she pleaded. "I didn't get a big head start on him."

Her desperate tone seemed to snap him out of whatever shocked state he was in, and he nodded.

"I—yeah," Greg said quickly.

He reached for his crutches, and Sarah's heart dropped as she looked down at his cast covered foot. She'd forgotten about his injuries. That was sure to slow them down.

"You need to call Lauren and tell her to take Noah and get out of the house. He's coming here first because he can make a big scene, but he has your home address too and he'll go there next if he doesn't find you here," she said.

Greg's face went pale as he felt in his jacket pocket for his phone.

"My phone is in my office. On my desk."

"Can you call her on that one?" she asked, nodding towards the conference phone on the table.

"I—I don't know the number," he said, going pale. "We both just had to change them, remember? She got pissed at AT&T and dropped their service and we got new numbers, and—oh, god. I don't know it. We have to warn her."

Sarah closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. Her head was spinning from all the movement of getting here so fast, and it was starting to catch up with her. They needed that cell phone. Not just to get in touch with Lauren to warn her, but to keep anyone else from finding it.

"Shit. Okay, we need your phone."

"Why can't we call her on yours?"

"I don't have mine, I—" We're wasting time. "Where's your office?"

Greg pinched his nose. "All the way on the other side of the building."

Of course it was. At the rate he was moving, it would be faster for her to go get the phone on her own.

"Alright, take—take this," she said, shoving her pepper spray into his hand. She kept her stun gun in her pocket. "You start heading towards the elevators to get out of the building. I'll go grab your phone. Is your office numbered? Does it have your name on it? How do I find it?"

"Yeah. It's 1109. It has my name on the door," Greg said as they started down the hallway together, towards the point where they would split up. Between her still weakened muscles and his crutches, it was slow moving for both of them.

"Where are we going? After we get out of here?" he asked. "We need to tell Lauren where to go."

"I…I don't know," Sarah said. It hadn't occurred to her yet.

"Is he coming? Your—your friend?" Greg asked, giving her a significant look. "The real one?"

Sarah was silent for a moment. Was Matt coming? She had no way of knowing if Karen got in touch with him, or if he'd gotten her voicemail. And if he had…he would come, right?

"I don't know," she admitted, wishing she had more answers for him. "I sent a message, but… I don't know. For now we need to assume…no. He's not."

Greg was about to reply when Sarah spotted something in one of the empty offices they passed by.

"Wait, hang on," she said, ducking into the office. High up on a shelf sat a pointy, heavy-looking glass award that appeared to be in the shape of the Empire State Building. Sarah hurriedly grabbed a rolling chair from behind the desk and pushed it over to the shelf.

"What are you doing?" Greg asked as she climbed up on the chair. "Are you going to hit someone with that?"

"I hope not, if we hurry."

"He really might not come? Daredevil? So it's just you and me if this bloke shows up?" Greg asked. Glancing over her shoulder, Sarah saw that he was looking quite pale.

"We'll be fine, Greg," she told him firmly, turning her attention back to the shelf.

"Yeah? Have—have you been in a lot of situations like this one, then?" he asked hopefully.

"Uh…yeah, kind of," she said breathlessly, reaching the limits of her exertion as she stretched up on her tip toes to reach the award on the shelf. "Sometimes worse. This one time, I was up on my roof and I didn't have any shoes on and these guys wanted to pull all my teeth out and all I had was this kitchen knife—"

"What?" Greg said in alarm.

"Got it," she said as she grabbed the heavy award and jumped down off the chair. Her head spun viciously at the movement, and she was surprised her knees didn't buckle altogether. "Let's go."

She glanced over at Greg as they resumed walking down the hallway as quickly as they could, and she saw him giving her an odd look.

"What?"

"Nothing, I just…I'm connecting some dots as to why your right hook suddenly got so strong."

Sarah got to the split and rounded the corner, and suddenly came face to face with Todd and a uniformed security guard from downstairs. She skidded to a halt, and Greg did the same beside her.

"Miss," the guard said, holding out his arm to stop her. "I need to speak with you."

Behind him, Todd was holding an ice pack up to what looked like a nicely blooming black eye.

Jesus Christ. Did this really have to be happening right now?

"Sorry, I—I can't talk right now," she said, trying to side step around them, but between the two of them they were taking up the entire corridor.

"Did you assault an employee earlier in the elevator, miss?" the guard asked.

"What?" Greg exclaimed. "No, of course she didn't."

"She absolutely did!" Todd piped up indignantly from behind the guard.

The guard's hand was lingering on his hip, and Sarah wondered if he was armed. There was no point in her trying to get by them and potentially slowing things down even more by getting in some kind of confrontation. Greg would have to go get the phone, no matter how slowly he was moving.

She turned to Greg and gave him a meaningful look. "You'll have to go get that thing you needed."

Greg hesitated, then gave a jerky nod. The guard gave him and his crutches a quick appraising look before moving aside to let him by. He sent one concerned look back at Sarah as he slowly hobbled down the hallway towards his office and out of sight.

"I was just leaving," Sarah said. "So you don't need to, like, escort me off the premises. I'll just go."

"Look, she's stealing things!" Todd exclaimed, pointing to the glass award in her hand. "That's Calvin's, she took it from his office!"

With a disapproving look, the guard held his hand out for the award. Sarah didn't particularly want to give up one of the only two weapons she had, but she also couldn't afford to waste time arguing about it.

She shoved heavy glass statue towards the guard. "Here—you can have that, and I'll get out of your way."

The guard shook his head. "If an altercation took place between you and an employee, I'm going to need you to stick around so we can have the police fill out a report."

"The police?" Sarah repeated. She took a step back. She didn't have time to be waiting around for the police when the man in black was on his way right now.

"Miss—" the guard said warningly, holding his hand up as Sarah took another step back.

But before he could say anything else, the sound of people screaming echoed towards them from the direction of the main foyer near the elevators. Sarah whipped around to look behind her and saw a few people at the end of the hall, running away from someone that hadn't come into view yet. But Sarah knew exactly who it was.

"What the…" the guard's brow furrowed as he reached for his radio and started off down the hall, forgetting about Todd and Sarah.

"Hey!" Todd called after him. "What about her?"

"You're such an asshole," she snapped at him as she darted past him and down the hall as fast as her dizzy head and whining muscles allowed.

Sarah turned a corner and squinted at the number plaques next to the doors there. 1047. 1049. What had Greg said? 1100 something? This was the wrong way. She spun around and went down the opposite hallway. These numbers were higher. 1081. 1083. She sped up down the hallway until she took another corner and saw Greg come limping out of an open doorway.

"Greg!" she called. He had his phone up to his ear; he must be talking to Lauren, warning her.

He turned in her direction, and as he did a dark figure appeared in the hallway behind him. The Daredevil impersonator had found them.

"Behind you!" she yelled out, and Greg turned just in time to catch a blow directly to his jaw. He stumbled backwards against the hallway wall, then swung out wildly with one of his crutches. His phone dropped from his hand and went skidding across the floor.

As Sarah ran towards them, she saw Greg's right crutch connect with the fake Daredevil's face, but it barely seemed to have any effect.

"You're coming with me," she heard fake Daredevil say to Greg. "So we can have a few more witnesses for this."

He raised his fist to strike Greg again just as Sarah reached them. Lurching forward, Sarah jammed her stun gun against his lower back and hit the power switch.

The loud crackle of electricity filled the air, and the man went rigid as thousands of volts of electricity coursed through his body. She held it for the full cycle, which lasted less than ten seconds. As the electricity stopped, the Daredevil impersonator stumbled to the side, his hand shooting out to brace himself against the wall.

"Come on," Sarah panted, reaching for Greg. There was a stairwell just a few doors away, and even with Greg's broken foot they might still have a chance if they could just get to it—

But the man in black lunged at her, grabbing her wrist and wrenching it painfully so that she let the stun gun clatter to the floor with a loud cry. She twisted her wrist just like Matt had taught her, her body remembering the move. But she was still too weak from the tranquilizer, and she couldn't break the hold.

"Did Jason send you?" he demanded. Up close and in the daylight, she could again see the differences that weren't as clear in the darkness of the fundraiser. This man's lips were more downturned, his jaw cut square, and his mask was much, much thinner: as opposed to Matt, this one actually needed to be able to see through the material. "What, he thought I couldn't be trusted?"

Desperately wishing for the dizziness in her head to clear, Sarah aimed a hard knee at his crotch, but didn't quite manage to hit home, landing instead somewhere on his inner thigh. She saw him grit his teeth in pain, but he didn't release her.

Then Greg appeared behind him and swung a punch directly against the man's right temple. It was a surprisingly strong blow, and looked like it hurt. The man in black apparently agreed, because he let go of Sarah. With a strangled growl he turned and swung his elbow hard, hitting Greg directly in the windpipe with a frightening amount of force. The impact sent Greg flying hard against the wall, where he crumpled to the ground and didn't move.

"No!" Sarah shouted as she tried to dart around him and towards Greg. But she couldn't reach him. The Daredevil imposter grabbed her arm again and flung her to the side, where she landed hard on her knees several feet away.

With a groan, she looked up to see the man had turned his back to her, his focus back on Greg, who was stirring slightly. Her stomach dropped as he leaned over him and grabbed him by the collar. She couldn't let this happen. This man was going to kill one of her only friends in the world, because she had let him get mixed up in all this.

Her eyes landed on Greg's phone, which had she hadn't landed far from. Struggling to her feet, she staggered over to grab it.

"Hey," she said, forcing her cracked voice as loud as it could go. No reaction. "What do you want to bet if I give this to Jason, he'll give your money to me, instead?"

Slowly, the man in black turned to her, Greg's collar slipping out of his gloved hand.

"So, that's why you're here?" he growled. "I think I mentioned I don't like people screwing me out of my money."

Sarah didn't have much of a plan for what to do once his attention was on her, but at the very least it was off of Greg. As the man strode towards her, she summoned every last ounce of strength she had to make a run for the stairwell a few doors down, hoping he would follow her.

And he did.

She might have made it to the stairwell, too. But just as she reached for the handle, something hit her elbow hard, making it explode in pain—one of the batons he'd had strapped to his leg.

She stumbled, and he caught up with her. In one clean move, he struck her hard across the face. The blow sent her to the floor again, landing hard on her knees as she threw her hands out to brace herself. The phone went spinning across the sleek tile floor, out of her reach. Her cheekbone throbbed with pain, and she brought a trembling hand up to wipe the blood away from the broken skin.

It was almost funny in a screwed up way. The one time the real Daredevil had—however unintentionally—hit her full on, it had knocked stars into her eyes and left half her entire face a giant bruise. This guy's punch hurt, but nothing like that.

"You don't hit half as hard as the real one," she said with a shaky laugh.

The man stilled. She felt a small rush of spiteful satisfaction at the way his mouth twisted in displeasure at that.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. You'll find out someday."

That pissed him off, and for as much as he clearly wasn't Matt, he certainly had one of Matt's signature moves down. With a snarl, he seized Sarah by the throat and jerked her to her feet, then slammed her back against the wall, knocking the breath out of her. The sudden lack of oxygen sent her head spinning even more, and he tightened his hold on her throat until she couldn't inhale. She instinctively clawed at his forearm, but it was useless; his grip was too strong.

She kicked out hard, making contact with nothing as the edges of her vision started to darken, tiny black dots crowding the corners like a picture frame. Her vision blurred and began to double, until it looked like there were two Daredevil standing in front of her—

But then his hand was gone from her throat, and as her legs gave out and sent her slumping onto the ground, she realized: there were two Daredevils in front of her.

She didn't catch much of what was happening as the two men fought. The room was still spinning slightly, and she could only tell which Daredevil was Matt by the way he wrenched the other one down the hallway, away from her.

Back down the hall, Greg was sluggishly attempting to his feet, leaning heavily on the wall. His crutches were lying a few feet away, and he reached out to grab them.

Sarah wheezed, trying to get her breath back as she, too, clambered to her feet and unsteadily made her way back towards Greg. She skirted as widely around the fight as the space would allow. Another baton went flying towards the wall, then ricocheted off it. She ducked as it nearly struck her.

She was dizzy and out of breath, and there were now two men fighting between her and the only exit, so with a yank at Greg's jacket they both stumbled through the closest doorway: into his office, where at least they had some cover. She shut the door partway, leaving it open just a few inches to watch what was going on.

The fake Daredevil was, to Sarah's surprise, actually a fairly good fighter. He wasn't as skilled as Matt, but he was fast, and his blows were accurate. They moved so fast when they fought that she had trouble keeping track of which was which; it felt like when she was a kid, watching her dad play three card monte and never guessing correctly where her card was.

Then without warning, several gunshots rang out, and Sarah had to clap a hand to her mouth to keep from crying out in surprise.

The window behind Matt and the fake Daredevil shattered; the shots had come from down the hall, in a direction Sarah couldn't see unless she stuck her head out of the room and around the doorway—which she certainly wasn't going to do.

The two masked men had stopped fighting and were both crouched low to avoid further gunfire.

"NYPD! Turn slowly towards me, and put your hands in the air," an authoritative voice rang out from down the hall.

Sarah's heart jolted as she realized it was a police officer. Shit. She didn't need them finding her here and the news getting back to Jason. Although, the cat would be out of the bag anyway, wouldn't it? The fake vigilante had already seen her.

Slowly, she inched the door closed a bit more and flattened herself against the wall so that she wasn't immediately visible to anyone in the hallway. Greg did the same next to her as he held his crutches in a death grip.

"I said, put your hands in the air!" the cop repeated loudly.

One of the masked men slowly did so, putting his hands up and turning to face the voice.

But the other, moving so fast that the cop had no time to even react, turned and flipped straight out of the shattered window, breaking off parts of the jagged glass that still clung to the frame as he went.

Sarah bit her lip, hard. That answered the question of which one was which. Only the real one would do something that insane. And even though Sarah knew Matt had to have a place to land if he had jumped, her heart still raced at the sight of him disappearing into what looked like a straight drop down.

"Was that him? He just jumped out the window and left us here?" Greg whispered to her.

She shook her head.

"No," she whispered back. "He's still here. Just...wait."

She heard the cop swear, then footsteps as he moved closer to the remaining vigilante. She held her breath as he slowly passed by the office they were hiding in.

Then the cop spoke again, just five surprising words.

"Did you get the phone?"

Sarah blinked.

From the tone of his voice, the man in black seemed just as surprised as she was.

"What?" he asked suspiciously.

"Jason said if there was two of you here, I'd be able to tell which of you was the real one. 'Cause the real one will do crazy shit like jump out the window, and you won't," the cop said. "He said you were supposed to get a cell phone from someone. Did you get it, or what?"

Sarah heard Greg's ragged breathing grow faster next to her, and she turned her head just a fraction to meet his alarmed gaze. She brought one finger to her lips.

After a pause, the man answered.

"Yeah. I got it," he retorted defiantly. He pointed to the cell phone lying on the ground nearby. "It's right there. So you can tell Jason to stop riding me. The phone is taken care of, and if you get out of my way I can take care of the guy, too."

Sarah's grip tightened on her stun gun, the only weapon she had. Had he seen her and Greg scramble into this office to hide, or had he been too distracted by the fight?

"Jason didn't say nothing about a guy. Just a phone. And you're saying that's the phone?" the cop clarified again.

"I told you, yeah. I got the phone," the masked man answered in annoyance.

"Alright," the cop said. Then without warning, he pulled the trigger one time.

The shot was quiet, muffled by a silencer that Sarah was sure wasn't police-issue. She snapped her eyes shut as she heard the heavy thud of a body hitting the floor.

Her heart was pounding so hard she felt like the cop must be able to hear it through the wall, echoing through the silent hallway.

"It's done," the cop said quietly.

Sarah nearly jumped, thinking he'd figured out they were there and was addressing them. Then she heard the faint crackle of a voice on the other end of a phone line, and realized he was on his cell phone.

"Yeah. He got the phone," the cop said. She heard a few footsteps as she assumed he walked towards the phone and bent to pick it up. There was a pause as he listened. "Yeah, I'll have the usual guys help me clean up the scene. No one'll know anything went down." Another pause. "Oh, yeah. The real one was here when I got here. Jumped straight out the window. Psycho. He's probably long gone by now, but I can send the rest of the guys on a chase anyway so no one gets curious and comes up here."

Then it seemed his conversation came to an end, and the next thing she heard was a static noise as the cop spoke into his radio.

"Suspect is on foot, moving south towards 48th Street. All units should be in pursuit. Send Donovan, Lowell, Chancey and Bradford up to help me secure the scene; otherwise keep everyone out of the building until I give the say so."

A few seconds later, a staticky voice replied: "Copy that."

She heard more footsteps as the cop walked towards the masked man's body and crouched down next to it. A few seconds later, more footsteps echoed in the stairwell as the backup he'd requested arrived.

Shit. Sarah quietly crept over to the window to see what their options were: no fire escape, because it was a new building. There was a rooftop garden that didn't look too far down, but it was hard to estimate. But she quickly realized it didn't matter either way: the windows were welded closed anyway.

"Search the floor to make sure no one's left up here, then get this cleaned up," the cop instructed Donovan and the others. "I have to go make a delivery."

Sarah swore internally as the cop left with Greg's phone in hand. There was no chance the cops wouldn't check all these offices, and she was pretty sure Donovan would shoot her on sight.

As she returned to her spot next to Greg, who was looking pale as a ghost, she grabbed a pair of scissors out from on top of the desk in the room. It was the only useful item she could spot. Greg nodded towards the window with a hopeful look, and she shook her head.

Then she turned her attention to the ceiling.

"The windows don't open; we can't get out that way," she whispered as low as she could. "I need you to clear a path for Greg and I to get to the stairwell."

Greg looked at her like she'd lost her mind.

"What are you doing? Are you praying?" he whispered.

Sarah shook her head. "Not exactly."

The footsteps in the hallway stopped right outside the door to Greg's office, and Sarah gripped her scissors tightly.

Then there was a loud commotion on the other end of the floor, a crashing noise like something large had been thrown through a window. It was so immediate that she knew Matt must have already been planning out a distraction.

"What the hell?" she heard Donovan mutter from the other side of the door.

The sound of the cops' footsteps faded as they rushed towards the sound, down the hall and around the corner. Eventually Sarah couldn't hear them at all.

"Okay. Let's go," she told Greg.

She stuck her head out of the doorway and saw no one in the hallway—no one, that is, except for the dead man in the mask sprawled out on the floor. She looked away. It wasn't Matt, of course, but the sight of someone in his black suit and mask lying dead on the ground still made her feel sick.

Once in the stairwell, she could hear the sounds of a panicked, confused crowd people on the floor below. The perfect place for Greg to blend back in and pretend like he never saw anything. Hopefully everyone would be too busy to notice his fresh injuries mixed in with his preexisting ones from the charity ball.

"You just need to go down one flight," she told Greg, eyeing the cast on his foot. "Just blend in with the crowd and get out of the building with them. If anyone asks you anything, you were hiding on that floor the whole time. You didn't see anything, same as all those people down there. I'll…I'll find you after, okay?"

"Wait, you're not coming down too?" he asked in confusion.

Sarah glanced up at the roof access door at the top of the stairs. Matt was still here; she could feel it. And she knew exactly where she would find him.

"No. I'm going up."


Up on the roof, Matt was catching his breath as he listened in closely to what was going on in the building below. His distraction had worked: the cops were still on the other side of the floor, looking for the source of the disturbance, and Sarah had dragged Greg out of their hiding place and to safety. Had he realized that cop was one of Jason's lackeys and not the first wave of a rescue mission, he might have gone with a different plan to begin with.

The fire escape door eased open, and Matt turned as Sarah's footsteps came closer. He'd heard her and Greg in the stairwell, known she was going to come up here looking for him. Part of him had wanted to leave before she got up here, but for his own sanity he had to know she was okay first.

Then she was standing in front of him, and the instinct to reach for her was so strong: to run his fingertips over her skin like he always did, reassuring himself she was in one piece. But he didn't. He flexed his hands by his sides, tilting his head as he scanned her injuries: the broken skin at her cheekbone, the bruised skin of her throat.

"Are you alright?" he asked instead.

"Me?" she said in faint confusion, as though she hadn't just been attacked downstairs. Then she lifted her fingers to touch the inflamed skin at her cheekbone. "Oh. Yeah, I'm—I'm fine. Nothing crazy."

Matt's jaw ticked; he wouldn't consider nearly getting strangled to be nothing crazy. But he nodded.

"Are…are you okay?" she asked hesitantly, taking a step closer. "You're…bleeding a lot. From the window."

"I'll be fine," he said shortly.

"You don't look fine, Matt," she pointed out softly. "You look like you need stitches. Or at least to get all the glass out. You can come to my place. I can help."

And he wanted to. Despite the anger and the hurt, part of him wanted more than anything to be in her apartment right now, listening to the sound of her voice as she stitched him up, and keeping one ear on her heartbeat to reassure himself that she was safe.

But…that was the pattern they kept falling into, wasn't it? Dangerous situations tore them apart, and then dangerous situations brought them back together again. Maybe the mistake they kept making was coming back to each other; maybe all the adrenaline and risk made it easier to ignore the red flags, the signs that they were hurting each other more than helping.

"I don't think that's a good idea," he said.

His chest twisted at the way she deflated, and he knew she'd been thinking the same thing he had. Danger, fight, danger, reconcile.

"Um…okay," she said thickly, then swallowed hard.

Matt couldn't have this conversation; couldn't handle hearing the hurt in her voice.

"Why was Greg being targeted tonight?" he asked abruptly. "Why was that cop talking about a phone?"

There was a stumbling pause as Sarah caught up with the rapid shift in tone and topic.

"You didn't get my voicemail?"

He frowned. "No. Karen called me right when I got home, said you called her and said someone was going to plan an attack at this address, that they were going after Greg—what's going on, Sarah?"

"Um, Cecilia. Cecilia was filming on Greg's phone after the attack," she explained. "Jason thought maybe there was footage on there that proved it wasn't really you who attacked her."

That caught his attention. "Is there?"

"I don't know. Maybe. But…now Jason will have it," she said hopelessly.

Matt cocked his head, trying in vain to locate the cop that had left with the phone. He'd been so focused on getting Sarah out of there safely that he hadn't paid any attention to the phone they were talking about. He listened in on the chaos below them: sirens, people shouting, officers directing the crowds away. The cop with the phone was long gone.

He blew out a long sigh. Of course. The one potential way to clear his name—and that was extremely hypothetical, considering the video might not even exist—and there was no telling where it had just gone. Jason wasn't about to have a uniformed police officer walk into his office and hand it to him.

"Come on," he said finally, turning and walking towards the edge of the building. "The next building over has a rooftop with an access door. I already checked; it's unlocked. You can get in through there and take the elevator down to the street without being seen."

"I'll try to find the phone," Sarah said as she followed him. "If there's something on there that could clear your name—"

"No. I'll worry about clearing my name. You focus on staying careful around Jason. I'm guessing you still don't have a working phone form me to reach you on?" he asked.

"I'm trying to fix the one you gave me. But…if it doesn't work I'll pick up a burner."

Matt nodded shortly, trying to keep the conversation as business-like conversation as he could. "Jason got the phone he wanted, so your friends should be safe for now. At least until he finds another person to put on the mask. Call me to let me know when you have a working phone. And check in with me if anything changes."

The footsteps following him stopped. "And then what?"

Matt swallowed and turned back towards her; the oasis of safe topics was quickly drying up. "And then we figure out the steps to take from there."

"So we just won't see each other until something bad happens, and then…what, I just call and hope you come help?" she asked.

"What do you mean, hope I'll come help? Come on, Sarah. You know I'll come. I'm not going to let something happen to you just because we're—"

Matt broke off, and Sarah went still. She swallowed hard as she wrapped her arms around herself, the wind blowing her hair around her face.

"Because we're what?" she whispered.

Matt didn't know. He just knew he couldn't be around her right now.

"I don't know," he said quietly.

"We're what, Matt?" Sarah repeated. "Broken up? Enemies again? What—back to how we were at the start?"

That wasn't true, and they both knew it. Neither of them could go back to how they used to be.

"No, it's not like it was at the start, is it?" Matt shot back. "Back then we both had something to use against each other. You knew I could hurt you, and I knew you could expose me. And you still can expose me, blow my life to pieces—you did, and it's already spreading. But you still could do more damage if you felt like it. And I can't. You know full well you could go on the news tomorrow morning and tell the whole world who I am and I still wouldn't hurt you. You know that, I've worked hard to make sure you know that. But it still means you're the only one left holding a weapon."

"It's not a weapon." Sarah's voice cracked as she argued. "I wasn't trying to hurt you."

"You weren't trying to be careful, either."

"Matt—"

She stepped closer to him. He wished she wouldn't. The heat radiated off her skin, and the slight breeze in the air caught the scent of her hair and carried it towards him. Then beneath that, the scent of blood from the wound on her face. Another injury to add to her collection, another moment of pain he should have stopped from happening.

"Look, I…I need to get my thoughts straight," Matt said. He took a step back. "And that's not…something that I can do around you."

Sarah didn't say anything. He didn't know if he was relieved or not.

"I'll be in touch," he said. "If you…if you need anything for your injuries…Claire is working the night shift. She'll help you."

He could taste salt in the air and knew she was crying, knew he had to go. So he did.


Sarah reached the street without being noticed by any of the crowd outside Greg's work. From a safe distance away, she searched for Greg's lanky form in the crowd of people anxiously milling around, interspersed with police officers and a few news reporters. There was no sign of him, and she assumed he had already gone to meet Lauren.

She turned and began tiredly making her way down the block towards the subway, every muscle in her body screaming at her for pushing past her limits.

Then she heard a loud whistle. Turning her head, she saw Greg standing next to the open door of a yellow cab, beckoning at her. Relief rushed through her tired bones as she made her way over to him.

Inside the cab, Sarah was surprised when Greg gave the cab driver her address. Upon her questioning look, he shrugged.

"When I called Lauren, I had to tell her to go somewhere. Your place was the first spot I thought of. I know she has a key."

Sarah gave a slow nod, and neither of them spoke again for several minutes .

The cab driver seemed unconcerned by the two disheveled and injured people sitting in silence in his backseat, and simply tapped his fingers along the steering wheel to the beat of his music as he drove. Sarah looked over at Greg, who was staring distantly at the back of the seat in front of him. Between his broken foot and the fresh new cuts and bruises on his skin, he was littered with signs of what being friends with her could do to a person. What all of her secret-keeping had brought on her friends.

He turned to look at her when he felt her gaze on him.

"Do you hate me?" she asked quietly.

His eyes moved from her to the window behind her, watching the streets go by as he appeared to consider it.

"You did just save my life, so I don't know if hatred is strictly allowed," he said finally. "But I do have a lot of questions. A lot. And I would love if you could manage to give me some honest answers."

Sarah nodded quickly, relieved not to hear resentment and suspicion coloring his tone.

When they got to her apartment, Sarah had barely touched her key to the lock on her door when it flew open, and Lauren's pale, anxious face greeted her. Lauren's eyes flicked from Sarah over to Greg and then back again, taking in the various cuts and bruises on their skin. Her gaze lingered on Sarah's throat as she took two unsteady steps back to let them inside.

Sarah made her way to the bathroom for the first aid kit, leaving Lauren and Greg in the living room, where they conversed in hushed tones. Her head spun as she bent down to retrieve the kit from under her sink, and when she straightened up she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Underneath her injuries, her skin had taken on a sickly pallid tone that clearly told her the tranquilizer still lingering in her system did not agree with today's choice of running and jumping. God, she just wanted to sleep for days.

Back in the living room, she found Lauren and Greg sitting on the couch. Noah was propped up on the cushion between them, looking up at his bruised father with that wide-eyed curiosity that babies always seemed to have. Sarah set the first aid kit on the coffee table in front of them.

"This should have everything to help with all of the, um…" she trailed off, gesturing at Greg's swollen face.

Greg and Lauren exchanged a short, significant glance that Sarah couldn't entirely read, and then Greg gave a short nod, clapped his hands on his knees, and got unsteadily to his feet.

"Actually, I think I'll step in the kitchen to prepare Noah's bottle," he said. He situated his crutch under one arm, then grabbed the baby bag Lauren had brought. "You can use the bandages and whatnot first. You look worse anyway."

Sarah grimaced at that, but he wasn't wrong. She took Greg's spot on the couch, feeling Lauren's eyes on her as she reached for the first aid kit and rummaged inside until she found the disinfecting wipes she was looking for. Her hands shook in exhaustion as she tried to rip the packet open, her fingers fumbling to grasp the thin plastic.

Then a hand settled over hers and Lauren gently took the packet from her.

She watched as Lauren quickly opened the packet, then looked up at her. She met Lauren's gaze and found a conflicted whirl of emotions on her face. Was she still angry at her for putting them all in this situation? For asking her to keep hiding dangerous secrets for months? She wondering what her own expression was saying. She was still angry at Lauren for all she had done too, for making her choose between her and Matt, for not trusting her to make the right call. But at this point it was dulled by fatigue and guilt, and she mostly just wanted to let it go.

Lauren reached out and gently dabbed at the broken skin on Sarah's cheekbone. Sarah closed her eyes, and neither of them said anything for a minute.

"Matt told me you guys spoke," Sarah said finally, opening her eyes. It felt strange to talk about it so openly, to not have to watch herself for a slip up with names. After so long, everyone in the room knew who he was.

"Yeah. He dropped by my place for a…surprise visit," Lauren said with an unhappy twist of her lips.

"He said you aren't going to go to the police."

Lauren inhaled deeply, then shook her head. "No. I'm not. I…thought about everything you told me. And it started to make sense, as crazy as it sounded. And…" Lauren hesitated, meeting Sarah's eyes for a second then looked away again. "I talked things through with Greg."

In the kitchen, Greg was suddenly clattering around in the cupboards, apparently having moved on to the task of making tea.

"You told him everything?" Sarah asked quietly.

"Everything I know," she confirmed. She looked down at her lap, fidgeting with the alcohol wipe wrapper as she hesitantly continued. "I've been going to therapy…since Noah was born. I just haven't been—been feeling like myself. And…I didn't go because of anything with Greg, but some of the things I've been talking about with my therapist…it made me realize how many secrets I've been keeping from him. How that's been affecting us."

Sarah glanced over at the kitchen, where Greg was very clearly listening and also doing his best to appear as though he wasn't.

"Ever since all of this started, I've been so scared that I would make the wrong call," Lauren admitted, her voice shaky. "That something horrible would happen to you, and I would be left wondering why I didn't do something with what I knew, why I just stood by and didn't try to tell someone, to find help. And—and then what happened to Cecilia…it just made it worse. I freaked out, and then…then I did make the wrong call." She swallowed hard, and when she met Sarah's gaze and spoke again her voice was firmer. "I should have believed you."

Sarah shook her head. "It's not like I have a great track record of honesty."

"Yeah, but…your lies are usually you trying to keep other people out of danger. You wouldn't have told one that would put us in more danger. I should've realized that. I'm really sorry."

"I'm sorry too. I—"

"Sarah, stop," Lauren said with a shaky laugh. "I know you, like, love apologizing, but this is kind of one of those one-sided apologies. I'm the wrong one."

Sarah nodded, lifting the corner of her mouth in a tired approximation of a smile. Lauren bit her lip as she resumed dabbing at the wound on Sarah's cheek.

"Look, I know you said that the police around here aren't going to help you with this," she said carefully. "I understand that. But…isn't there someone the two of you can involve to help you? Like the…the FBI? The CIA? The Avengers? I don't know. Someone."

"How would we convince anyone? Jason covers his tracks perfectly. Not only that, he—he sets up other people to take the fall," Sarah said, her mind flashing to the security footage Jason still had tucked away somewhere, footage that showed her wheeling McDermott's bloodied corpse out of Orion, and which almost certainly didn't show what had led up to that moment

"People like you," Lauren surmised.

"Yeah. People like me. And anyway, between him and Fisk they have connections everywhere, so I can't go accusing him of anything unless I have solid evidence," Sarah said. "And it has to get into the right hands, where it won't mysteriously disappear. It's not like I can walk into a station and say, 'Hey, I saw this guy kill someone with a hammer one time.'"

"What?" Greg's alarmed voice interjected from the kitchen.

Lauren shushed him, then turned back to Sarah.

"It just seems overwhelming for two people to handle all this on their own, even if one of those people does have some kind of freaky super powers. I mean, I don't know how you do all this," Lauren said. "I was there for like, one single traumatic event and I lost it and started thinking I was putting my entire family in danger. You've gone through months and months of things like this. And you're still pretty much as sane as when you started."

"Which was never entirely sane," Sarah said with a shrug. "I've lost count of how many panic attacks I've had."

"But for the most part you've handled it all with a lot of grace. I don't know how."

"Because I have…" Sarah trailed off, her throat tightening as she corrected herself. "I had someone to go through it with."

Lauren nodded, sad understanding flickering across her face. "I know he's...saved you from a lot of dangerous situations."

"That's not what I mean."

Like a movie reel, Sarah's mind went to Matt kneeling in front of her, keeping her hands from shaking after seeing Ronan in that diner. Waking up in Matt's bed to see he'd fallen asleep on top of his sheets with his work papers all over his lap so she wouldn't have to be alone. Sitting in her windowsill with her while the sun rose. Bringing her to his church, to his piano. Dancing with her on the balcony. And then, most clearly: the raw hurt on his face as she'd told him she'd broken the only promise he'd really ever held her to.

Such a strong wave of hopelessness washed over her that she put her head in her hands just to stop it from spinning.

"I don't know if I really got the extent that you two are, like…close," Lauren's hesitant voice brought her back. Sarah lifted her head back up. On the other side of the kitchen counter, Greg had stopped messing with the tea and was watching her with the same concern Lauren was. "Until all this. I mean, you guys had that one kiss and then you pretty much stopped talking about him as anything more than a…scary-sounding coworker, so I thought…"

Sarah couldn't help it; her gaze met Greg's, and she saw the quiet realization dawn in his eyes. Lauren frowned as she followed Sarah's gaze over to Greg, then looked back to her in confusion. Sarah hadn't realized how close she was to crying until just then, when she felt her cheeks getting wet. The same realization dawned in Lauren's eyes as well.

"Oh. Oh, god. I'm stupid," she said softly. "Of course it wasn't just the one kiss."

Sarah's shoulder tipped in a weak half shrug. "But that's what I told you, isn't it? A few times. No wonder you don't know when to believe me."

"So it was…serious? Not just hot spy stuff, but…as in, real feelings territory?" Lauren asked uncertainly.

"As in…I fell in love with him," Sarah whispered, admitting it out loud for the first time. She roughly wiped away the tears tracking down her cheeks, barely wincing as she grazed over the freshly broken skin. "And now I screwed it all up."

"I screwed it up," Lauren countered. "I didn't realize…"

Sarah shook her head. "No. I made the choice. I knew when I did it that it wasn't something he'd forgive me for."

"I was scared he might hurt you. When he found out you told me, and that I told Greg," Lauren said. "I asked Mrs. Benedict to come check and see that you were okay."

"Matt wouldn't hurt me," Sarah said, shaking her head. Not physically, at least. But what was happening now hurt like hell.

"Yeah, he seemed pretty pissed that I thought he would. I guess...that makes more sense now," Lauren said softly.

Sarah desperately needed to change the subject if she didn't want to spend the rest of the night crying.

"We don't need to talk about this," she said abruptly. She fiercely wiped away the last of the tears that were spilling over, and took a deep breath to stop any more from coming. She looked up at Greg, who had just come back into the living room. "There's more important things going on. We should talk about…what happened today."

Greg glanced at Lauren, then lowered himself into the chair across from them with a sigh. "Right. Then I do need to know…are we safe? Your boss—Jason, is it? Is he going to send more people after us, like he did today?"

They were both watching her expectantly, waiting for her input as the resident expert on Jason's psychotic mindset.

"He's unpredictable," she said carefully. "But...I don't think so. He already got what he wanted. He has the phone. I don't think he'll waste extra time and effort to keep coming after you. He'll be too focused on trying to find someone else to put on the mask."

"Wait, you mean he's going to turn around and hire another fake Daredevil?" Greg asked.

"If I had to guess, yeah. There's a reason he wanted to hide that the first guy is dead. So he can replace him. And without the footage showing that he was an imposter, people are going to keep believing that Daredevil is behind these attacks, and Jason is just going to keep making them happen."

"Jesus," Lauren murmured.

"Did either of you watch the videos Cecilia took?" Sarah asked them. "To see if anything was on there?"

Greg shook his head. "No. Everything's been so hectic, I never even thought about the videos. But I assume your boss will have destroyed the whole phone by now, so we'll never know."

"Maybe," Sarah said slowly. "But he might want to see what's on the video. He might try to figure out a way to get into it. Your phone has as passcode, right?"

"Yeah," Greg reassured her. "Although…it's not very hard to crack. It's Noah's birthday."

Lauren shook her head. "I keep telling you to change that."

Greg shot her an offended look. "Every new parent uses their kid's birthday when they have to set up a new passcode. At least for the first few years."

"Exactly. That's why you need to change it, anyone could guess that."

"Up until very recently, I haven't had anything top secret on my phone to worry about!" he protested.

"Well, I can think of more than a few photos on there I wouldn't want any rando who has your phone to see!" Lauren argued.

"I want to get the phone back," Sarah said quietly, interrupting their bickering. "And release the footage."

The two of them looked at her in surprise.

"I—" Greg faltered as he looked at Lauren, then down at Noah. "Your boss would make the connection that it came from me, wouldn't he? I don't want him coming after Lauren or Noah as payback."

"I don't think he will. He's a psycho, but he's a practical one. He's not going to rack up collateral damage if he doesn't have to. Once the news is out there, it won't benefit him to come after you. He'll know that going after members of Cecilia's family will only draw more attention to him."

Lauren and Greg exchanged a significant glance.

"I don't know," Lauren said. "It's risky."

"I know. And I won't do anything with the footage if you guys ask me not to, but…it's the only way to keep Jason from using Matt's name to keep hurting innocent people. And I don't even know if I can get the phone or not, but either way…" Sarah took a deep breath. "Either way, I think you guys should leave town."

There was a startled pause, with only Noah's quiet, sleep-laden breathing to fill the silence.

"What are you talking about?" Lauren demanded.

"Look, the footage isn't what will make him try to hurt you guys. It's me. Jason…he's getting suspicious of me. He already knows I know Cecilia, and now with Greg on his radar…if he realizes that I know you and kept it from him? He's getting too close to you both. I've…I've tried so hard to keep you separate from this. But I'm failing," Sarah said, her voice wavering. "I can't do it. I can't keep what's going on in my life from spilling over into yours and—and poisoning it."

"Sarah, no. That's not what's happening," Greg protested.

Sarah disagreed with that, but didn't bother arguing. "It doesn't matter. The point is…you should go. I know Greg is allowed to work from home, and Lauren, you can do your art anywhere. Go upstate, rent a place somewhere out of the city."

"Are you nuts? We can't just leave you here to deal with all this alone!" Lauren said.

"Yes, you can," Sarah insisted forcefully. "Because if you stay here, you guys are…liabilities. And it will get you hurt."

She hated hearing Stick's phrasing echo off of her own tongue, but it was the truth. Greg and Lauren could offer no concrete help to her, but they could be used against her. She finally understood why Stick's lone wolf mantra managed to get under Matt's skin so much. All it took was a few close calls with her own loved ones and she was starting to think the same way.

Greg and Lauren exchanged another long glance. As crazy as the request sounded, she knew they were both shaken by their recent encounters with the darker side of her life, and they had a baby to worry about.

"For how long?" Greg asked finally.

"I don't know exactly, but…I don't think it will be much longer now," she said haltingly. And it wouldn't. She knew it deep inside somewhere.

"I don't like the way you're talking about this," Lauren said. "Like something's about to…I don't know, explode."

"I'll be fine," she lied. "Besides, like you said, I'll still be able to call Matt if I really need help."

Greg looked slightly reassured by that, but Lauren still looked wary.

When they both finally left her apartment, they hadn't made a decision on the phone or leaving town. Sarah hadn't really expected them to, not that night at least. But god, she hoped they would go. Because Lauren was right: it did feel like something was about to explode. Something was going to give soon, one way or another. And while she hoped it would be in her favor, she had a sneaking suspicion it might not be, and she didn't want her friends to be around when it happened.


On the other side of town, Matt hadn't bothered to go home after the scene at Greg's office. He stuck around to hear Sarah leave in the cab, and then turned his attention towards his patrol for the night. It was early, sure. He could tell from the heat against his back that the sun was only just starting to fully go down, but he was sure he could find something to distract himself, to keep his mind focused on landing the next punch and nothing beyond that.

And he did.

It had started to pour by the time he got home many hours later. Heavy sheets of rain that fell sideways, leaving Matt so soaked through that he was numb. Which was nice, in a way, because it dulled the pain of the various cuts and bruises he'd sustained from the fight at the office, and then from his hours long mission to keep his thoughts off Sarah.

That goal backfired, of course. Because as he stood in his bedroom, wincing as he yanked his torn shirt over his head, her absence was more glaring than ever.

Matt had been so insistent on Sarah staying with him, in his apartment where he could protect her, and now she was everywhere. She still had some of her clothing in his closet, her taste was on the rims of his coffee cups and his shower smelled like her citrus shampoo. Everything about her had filled his apartment, overflowed into every inch of it and now her absence had left a painful vacuum, because for all the glaring signs that she had been here, she wasn't here now.

His exhausted fingers fumbled as he cleaned and bandaged the worst of his injuries—probably with significantly less care than he should have taken, but the awkward angle was hell on his aching muscles, and made very clear how much he'd come to rely on Sarah's gentle patching up. The realization didn't help his mood, and he just wanted to sleep. He dragged himself into the bed that now smelled like her no matter how many times he washed his sheets, and tried to catch at least a couple hours before his alarm went off in the morning.


That weekend, Sarah worked on getting the three cell phones in her possession to work, to varying degrees of success.

Cecilia's phone hadn't fared well. It looked fine, no cracks or discoloration, but no matter how many times she tried, Sarah couldn't get it to turn on. She supposed it didn't matter too much anyway, if the videos she needed were on Greg's phone. But she'd been hoping she might be able to access something, anything to help her.

Vanessa's phone was in much better condition. It powered on and seemed to be working mostly fine, if a little slow. Sarah was dying to know what kind of secrets that woman was keeping on her phone, but there was no way to find out without her passcode or fingerprint. So she powered it back off and stowed it away in her nightstand.

Lastly, her own phone was somewhere in between. It seemed to be working at least 70%, which was better than she had hoped. The screen was discolored from water damage, and she had to aggressively tap to get it to respond sometimes, but she could text and make phone calls without sounding like she was underwater.

And so despite her reluctance, she did make a phone call—to Matt. In an arguably cowardly move, she waited until late to call his regular phone, when she knew he'd be out on patrol with only his burner on him. She left him a short voicemail saying that her phone was working again, and she also needed her laptop and other belongings back from his apartment. It reminded her of every stilted breakup conversation she'd had to have with ex-boyfriends, and she hated it.

He called her back the next morning, and in what was possibly the shortest exchange they'd had since the first days of knowing each other, he let her know that he'd be in her neighborhood for a client meeting that afternoon, and he'd bring her duffel bag of stuff back to her then.

As she hung up the phone, she couldn't stop her mind from flashing back to the conversation they'd had at Matt's dinner table when she was first staying with him—("To be clear," he'd told her as he'd hooked her hair behind her ear. "Every part of my life you've taken up space in is...greatly improved by your presence there. So please keep doing it.")—and she tried it ignore the way it now sounded like he already had all of her things packed up, just waiting to get rid of every shred of evidence that she'd ever managed to worm her way into his life.

Sarah went to visit her dad that morning, and by the time she was finally almost back to her apartment, she sort of regretted it. She was still moving so much slower than usual, and she hadn't taken into account how rough just the short few blocks walk from the bus stop to her apartment would be on her tired muscles. She'd just reached the intersection a block away from her apartment when she took a moment to lean heavily against the street light there, taking in a steadying breath to try to even out the dizziness rushing through her head as people streamed around her to cross the street.

"Sarah," said a voice close to her.

She opened her eyes to find Matt standing there, dark glasses on and cane in hand, with her duffel bag slung over his shoulder.

"Matt," she said, her voice sounding more exhausted than she liked. She cleared her throat and stood up a little straighter. "Hi. I was…just coming to meet you."

"Yeah. I brought your things."

Short. To the point. The carefully crafted Matt Murdock shield up in full force to keep her away.

"Thanks," she mumbled, and held her hand out to take the bag from him.

His glasses glinted as he tilted his head, and she could feel him scanning her, taking in her slumped posture and uneven breathing. His mouth thinned, the only sign of anything other than careful neutrality on his face, and he let out a low sigh before jerking his head in the direction of her apartment. "I'll bring it to your building for you."

Part of her wanted to tell him no, to deny the small act of kindness that she knew was only offered out of an autopilot sense of protectiveness. She didn't want any part of her irrational brain to latch onto it as a sign of anything else. But the other part of her knew that a bag full of everything she'd brought to Matt's would be heavy even on a normal day, and it would feel like two hundred pounds to her right now. She already felt like she was close enough to passing out as it was.

"Okay. Um, thanks," she said quietly.

Matt just nodded.

They didn't say anything to each other as they walked down the last block to Sarah's apartment. The tense silence between them was only broken when they were greeted by the loud voice of Mrs. Benedict, who had just come out of the apartment entrance several yards down the sidewalk and was walking towards them.

"Sarah!" she called out, much to Sarah's chagrin. Then the older woman's gaze shifted to Matt, and her face lit up in surprised delight. "And Matthew! It's Mrs. Benedict, dear," she added in a slightly louder voice.

"Hello, Mrs. Benedict," Matt said with a nod.

Another glance between Sarah and Matt seemed to alert Mrs. B to the fact that this was not the heartfelt reunion she'd initially assumed, and for once she had the grace to not say anything about it.

"Sarah, I'm about to go catch a bus but I just wanted to let you know that your visitor is back again at your door," she said. Sarah saw Matt's head tilt slightly out of the corner of her eye. "I didn't get a chance to talk to her but it looked like maybe she was leaving you a note. She should be coming downstairs in a minute."

"Oh," Sarah said, blinking in confusion. She'd forgotten that Mrs. B had said someone had been at her door looking for her, but now her curiosity was piqued again. "Okay, thank you for letting me know."

"Of course. I have to run now, but I'll catch up with both of you soon I hope," Mrs. B said with one last meaningful glance in Sarah's direction.

As Mrs. B hurried down the sidewalk—moving, Sarah realized with chagrin, at a faster pace than Sarah could currently manage herself—Sarah's initial suspicion about who the blonde woman might be returned to her.

"You don't know of any reason why Karen would stop by my place, do you?" she asked Matt hesitantly.

Matt frowned. "No. Why?"

Sarah shook her head. "Nothing."

They reached the front entrance of her apartment building and stood for a moment in tense silence. Sarah shifted her weight uncomfortably, opened her mouth to say something, then closed it again. What was there to say she hadn't already tried?

"I can take it from here," she said finally.

Matt gave a short nod, then started the slip the duffel bag off his shoulder. Sarah glanced through the glass doors into her apartment lobby, where she saw the elevator doors open and a tall blonde woman get off. Her head was down as she texted on her phone, and through the slight distortion of the glass, Sarah thought maybe it was Lauren.

Then the woman pushed open the door to the building and looked up as she stepped out into the sunshine, and Sarah got a look at her face for the first time: at the features that weren't Lauren's at all, but an older version of her own.

All of the breath left her body, and Matt cocked his head at her with a bewildered frown. He was still holding the duffel bag out between them, but it was forgotten as Sarah stared at the woman for a long beat before speaking.

"Mom?"


See y'all next week!