NOTE: Wow...I am so sorry about the long wait! I got sick, and I had a lot of work to do, and blah, blah, blah...life gets in the way. I hope you guys can forgive a poor busy (unpaid) author!

Chapter Thirty-five

Peter sat at the small table in his apartment staring at the laptop that Neal had given him or rather that Mozzie had brought for him. He had gone through the operating system several times looking for spyware but he hadn't found anything suspicious. Peter had come to trust Neal to respect his privacy, but he wouldn't put it past Mozzie to pry. He had known from the start that Cheng monitored his every key stroke on his computer so he had never dared stray from his work, having been terrified of the consequences. Still unsure that he wouldn't get caught now Peter hesitated to open the internet.

The longer he sat contemplating the closed laptop the more Peter realized that it wasn't a fear of being caught that was keeping him from acting, it was the consequences of what he might find if he did. With Cheng he'd never even had the chance to learn anything about Elizabeth's side of the story once they'd been separated. Now that he had the opportunity sitting in front of him he wasn't sure he had the courage to take it. As much as he wanted her to move past him he wasn't sure his heart could take learning that she had, on the other hand it certainly wasn't going to make him happy to know she was miserable and stuck in the past.

However his real greatest fear was that she had sought revenge against Renner. Even if she hadn't already been facing embezzlement charges of her own there would have been no way for her to win against him in any kind of lawsuit. In the eyes of the law Renner hadn't done anything wrong, since Peter was working under a lease contract with the company he had to wear a collar in the building and Renner had the right to set the passcode to whatever he wanted. There would have been no real consequences for him having nearly torturing him to death with the powerful collar.

At the most Elizabeth could have tried to file for destruction of property, but even that would be a pointless suit and would have done more harm than good for her. Renner's lawyers wouldn't hesitate to drag her through the mud. Any legal proceedings against Renner on property damage would have only ended up focusing on Elizabeth's personal relationship with said property. No one would rule in favor of someone insane enough to fall in love an Animula. As it was Peter just hoped that the company had kept the embezzling as quiet as possible to keep her from becoming tabloid news. Luckily that would have reflected badly on them as well so he fairly confident that at least she hadn't become a household name for her infamous affair.

When Peter had first starting going home with Elizabeth on the weekends he was terrified that the rest of the office was going to quickly start to at least gossip if not outright accuse her of having an inappropriate relationship with one of the 'corporate resources'. However it never happened, no one at the office even batted an eye when she stepped forward to purchase him outright. It was just assumed that she was making a career move considering how well Peter had done to help her accounts. The idea that she had a deep emotional connection with him was so out of the realm of social reality that it had even taken Renner years to figure out.

Becoming increasingly anxious thinking about Elizabeth Peter got to his feet and started pacing around. Feeling closed in he went over to the door and opened it slightly. It helped somewhat to reassure himself that the door wasn't locked, but it didn't real solve the greater issue and his stomach still twisted in a painful knot. The Market had done such a thorough job of instilling the fear of forced isolation and had used it against him so many times in his life that his reaction to anything even similar had become automatic. He didn't know if all Animula were effected by it as much as he was, but he doubted that any of them made it out of the Market without at least a strong distaste for being alone in closed in spaces.

There had been several occasions when Elizabeth had been forced by travel to leave him behind for several days at a time, but it had been different somehow. He wasn't sure if it had been having the whole house to roam, or even just the simple fact that Satchmo had been there to keep him company that made her absence tolerable. Of course Elizabeth had never used the isolation as a punishment, but then again neither was Neal. Even the fact that he mentally wanted some time alone at the moment wasn't changing the fact that it was making him physically uncomfortable right now.

"What is wrong with me?" Peter snarled at himself. "It has never been this bad, not under conditions like this anyway."

In any company he'd ever been owned by and with the few private owners he'd had Peter had always had his own room and a single evening alone had never been an issue. He'd spent most of his time alone in Cheng's house, although in that case he had quickly learned that it was far less pleasant to be in Cheng's company since at any moment any encounter could turn violent. His basic desire to be around others conflicting with his growing fear of Cheng had been a difficult paradox for him at first, but eventually he had learned to prefer to be alone as Cheng's abusive treatment reconditioned him. Just a few weeks with Neal seemed to have reversed that conditioning to the point where now he struggled to be alone for even a few hours.

Continuing to pace around his apartment Peter was sharply reminded of one time when Elizabeth had to leave him that he'd been highly anxious. Unlike before when she had to leave the house that particular time he'd been the one forced to leave. Having been snuck into a hotel room Peter had spent the entire day trying not to panic. He wasn't any more welcome in the hotel than he was in a restaurant and if he'd been discovered the Market would have instantly been called. He wasn't even sure if he'd be returned to Elizabeth considering she had illegally left him in the room alone.

Nightfall hadn't helped his mood as people started returning to the hotel to bed down for the night. Every time someone laughed in the hallway or even walked by quietly Peter's heart would race. The door was locked from the inside and there was a do not disturb card on the outside of the door handle but that felt like poor defense against an intruder. When someone slipped a key card into the lock Peter instinctively looked for a place to hide even though he knew it was most likely Elizabeth.

Peter released the breath he hadn't even realized he'd been holding when Elizabeth stepped through the door, quickly closing it behind her. She looked stressed but when she looked up at Peter her expression brightened as she smiled at him. Peter came forward to meet her half way to greet her. Elizabeth threw her arms around his waist and hugged him tightly. It had only been about fourteen hours since he'd seen her last but he returned the embrace as though it had been years.

"Sorry I'm late." Elizabeth said with her head still resting against his chest.

"Don't worry about it, I wasn't even expecting to see you. You didn't have to come here tonight."

"I hate sleeping alone."

"Me too." Peter hugged her tighter.

Unwilling to pull away Elizabeth kept her arms around Peter and leaned against him. Having her back had removed his own anxiety, but it didn't take long for him to feel that Elizabeth was tense. He sighed quietly as he reached up and smoothed out her hair before he took a step back so that they could look at one another. Elizabeth didn't look up at him at first and when she finally did he could see the rims of her eyes were red.

"I take it your parents' visit isn't going well?" Peter asked gently.

"I don't even know how to talk to them anymore," Elizabeth admitted sadly. "They haven't confronted me, but I feel like they know I'm keeping a huge secret from them."

"I'm sorry."

"You have nothing to apologize for. I wish you could meet them. My mother worries that I'm lonely and it's so hard not being able to tell her that I've never been more loved. I hate having to hide you away like this."

"It's okay, I don't blame you."

"I want to believe that they'd accept us, but my father…" Elizabeth trailed off, her father had never referred to an Animula as anything other than an abomination. "Maybe I should just tell them, take the consequences."

"Elizabeth, no." Peter said firmly. "I know it's hard to keep us a secret from them, but I don't want you to lose your family over me. I have isolated you enough as it is."

"I don't feel isolated because of you Peter."

"You've had to push away all your friends in fear of being reported to the Market. No one comes the house, and you've put off having your parents visit for over a year. You don't get any social interaction other than me. I even can't take you out to the park without risking everything we have. You are practically a prisoner in your own house."

"That's not your fault." Elizabeth assured. "I knew exactly what I was getting into with you, and I wouldn't give you up for the world."

"I just wish I could provide you with a normal life."

"I don't want a normal life, Peter, I want you."

Peter had appreciated her words, mostly because he knew she meant them. He had often felt selfish for loving her, knowing the risk for it ending badly, as it eventually had. Despite the guilt he could never find it in himself to push her away. With his thoughts back in the present Peter suddenly realized why his anxiety of being alone had gotten so much worse with Neal. Life with Cheng had never presented him with even the slightest chance of seeing Elizabeth again. Neal on the other hand had already shown himself to be a hopeless romantic.

"Unless he's just conning me…using a carrot instead of stick is still a means of control." Peter muttered bitterly.

Peter thought about his words and had to admit that he was being unfair to Neal. If Neal had been acting strictly selfishly and was just playing him then he was not only doing an extraordinary good job of it but he was also going to an obscene amount of trouble to trick him. If money was all Neal cared about he could have just sold him, if obedience was what he was after he would have tried to force a collar around his throat. It was far more likely that Neal truly meant what he said about not wanting to be his Master, and Peter doubted that he would keep him from Elizabeth if he knew about her.

"Stop it," Peter shook head to clear it "don't even think about it. You still can't offer her a real life…not that she ever cared about that before."

Becoming increasingly agitated Peter found his heart pounding painfully. He was torn between his overwhelming desire to be with Elizabeth and his instinctive drive to protect her from becoming a pariah again, not to mention the additional heartbreak if they were separated again. However now that he'd had the thought of seeing her again he couldn't let it go. He wouldn't even think of going near her again for his own sake, if she could live without him then he felt that would be best. Peter didn't really know what the human capacity was to recover from emotional pain, he hadn't proved to be very good at himself. For all he knew there was a chance that Elizabeth had grown to hate him for everything he put her through, or worse yet had simply forgotten him.

"There's only one way to find out…"

Peter turned and looked to the laptop that was innocently sitting on the table. Swallowing hard against a dry throat Peter walked back over to it and sat down. Opening the computer it still took him several minutes to actually open a browser. Finding himself a little dizzy Peter reached out with shaky hands and typed in a url. He and Elizabeth always knew that there was a very real danger that one day they'd be forcibly separated and Elizabeth had insisted that they have a backup plan to contact one another again. Peter had suggested opening free e-mail accounts for them both. It wasn't a perfect solution but it was low risk. He hadn't been able to connect to it with the software on the computer Cheng which had tight controls on both monitoring and what sites he could even access. At first it had driven him towards madness to not be able to at least let her know he was alive, but over time he had convinced himself that it was best if she didn't know.

Peter still wasn't a hundred percent sure that Neal didn't have a way of looking at his screen, but even if he did Elizabeth's real name wasn't on the account. Peter entered his user name and password before needing a moment to settle the storm in his stomach. He wasn't sure what he would find, he wasn't even sure what he wanted to find. Before he could talk himself out of it Peter struck the enter key.

The screen that came up seconds later literally stole Peter's breath. There were close to eight hundred messages sitting unread in his inbox from Elizabeth. It only took a quick glance to see that for the past two years she had faithfully written to him at least once a day. It broke his heart to see her daily calls out to him unanswered, but at the same time the fact that she never gave up him reminded him of exactly why he loved her so much in the first place. Overwhelmed by the sudden flood of emotions tears traced down his face even though a warm smile touched his lips. The last message had been sent to him earlier that evening. Whereas most of the message subject lines simply held the date this one held a message that Peter read aloud since it mimicked his own feelings so well.

"'I miss you'."