AN:

Hey guys! Sorry I'm late. Been a big couple of days. This one is long again. I need to get better at breaking things up more evenly into chapters but I knew exactly where I wanted this one to go, and I just couldn't compromise. Sorry if it gives you tired eyes! I promise the reason for the M rating is coming, but this story is plot-driven. Mike and El's relationship will be rehashed in flashbacks and then further developed as the story progresses, but it's all got to fit and be believable. But don't worry, it'll happen. I know I'm taking ages to reunite them, but they'll be spending A LOT of time together soon. Whether they like it or not. :P

Four Gimme Shelter

"I want you to imagine you're lost in a blizzard, Jane. I want you to imagine you're lost in a blizzard, and that you need to find a house."

"My house?"

He hushed her softly. "Shhh. Don't speak. Just imagine."

His voice was so soothing, she felt she might fall asleep.

"Imagine you come upon a house you've never seen before, at the end of a long, lonely road. It's honey-coloured brick, with tangling vines framing a green front door. Open the door, Jane."

Jane's breathing was slow and deep. She could feel her hair fluttering in the breeze created by the ceiling fan, tickling her neck lightly. She was cold. Freezing, in fact. It was the middle of winter but Dr Ford still had the air-conditioning and the fan on high in his small office, and having not expected to need it indoors, Jane had left her sweater in Hopper's Blazer. She supposed it helped, though, for imagining the blizzard.

"Inside, there's a small entryway, then a room. There's a couch and a bookcase and an unlit fireplace. Do you feel lonely, Jane?"

She did feel lonely. Here she was, imagining herself in somebody else's house in the middle of a snowstorm. She was cold. She had no food. She saw no phone on the wall, so there was no way of calling anyone for help. Even if there had been, she had no idea where she was. Stranger's house or not, she was all alone. Nobody else was here. The black hole of the fireplace seemed to make that abundantly clear.

"Do you feel lonely, Jane?" Dr Ford repeated, and Jane realised that this time he expected an answer.

"Yes," she breathed, not wanting to drag herself out of her reverie by making too much noise. "Yes, I feel lonely."

"No one is there for you," he prompted.

"No," she agreed. No one.

"You're completely alone."

"Yes."

Another brief pause, and when he next spoke, Dr Ford sounded closer.

"I want you to stay in that room, Jane, and I'm going to put my hand on yours. When I do that, I want you to picture very clearly your answer to my next question. Do you understand?"

Jane felt as if she were lost in a dream. Inside this room, even in the cold, even with the snowstorm whipping and shrieking outside the still-open door, it all felt so far away.

"I understand," she whispered.

She was sitting in a giant armchair in Dr Ford's office. It was the most comfortable chair she'd ever sat in. The soft leather was cool against the backs of her arms and her neck as her head rested back, nestling her as she focused her mind.

"You're alone and scared," he murmured. "You don't know what to do."

Her palms rested flat on her thighs, as previously instructed, and a moment later, she felt Dr Ford's much larger, warm hand cover hers.

"Who would make you feel safe?"

The warmth emanating from his hand filled Jane, and suddenly, there he was, standing right beside her, holding her hand.

Hopper.

He smiled.

She smiled back.

Dr Ford squeezed her hand, indicating it was all right to open her eyes, and they smiled at each other.

Jane's eyes snapped open and she took a deep breath. She was lying under a blanket on Steve and Dustin's couch, staring up at the ceiling. This morning, after the boys had quit bickering like children, Dustin had fetched her a proper pillow and some actual pyjamas and told her they'd figure out a more permanent sleeping situation in the next few days. Jane had told him thank you but truthfully, she was more than happy to crash on the couch. She'd been sleeping on a foam cot for four years—she could handle a couch.

It had to be close to midday by now, and Jane was hot under the blanket but she knew that wasn't the only reason she felt over-warm.

Lecherous bastard. Lecherous, lecherous bastard. She couldn't believe she'd never questioned it before—she hadn't even remembered it until now! There had to be a law somewhere about touching patients—especially underage patients.

How had she not remembered it?

Jane thought back. Had it seemed like such a non-event to her sixteen-year-old self that she hadn't even properly registered it when it happened?

But that was ridiculous. She'd spent her entire childhood being poked and prodded and dragged around by people she never gave permission to touch her. Had she really trusted Ford that much?

She clearly never told Hopper about it because he would've gone in there and thrown the doctor through his second-floor window.

She couldn't believe she hadn't remembered it.

Pushing herself up, she saw Dustin had left her a scribbled note on top of the stack of transcripts on the coffee table.

Hey psycho. Gone to work (got to keep up the façade). What you need is in the fridge.

Jane grimaced. Yeah, she was going to make sure that didn't catch on.

Forcing herself to her feet, she padded over to the refrigerator and swung it open. Just below eye-level was a doggy bag from Maggie's and she saw Dustin had labelled this one, too. Thankfully, all this one said was 'Eat.'

A giant caramel, white chocolate, blueberry and walnut muffin and a slab of bacon and spinach quiche awaited her inside the bag and Jane was so disgracefully hungry that she didn't even bother heating the quiche up. The actual meal took her about two minutes to wolf down but she spent the next thirty clutching her aching stomach back on the couch. God, she really hadn't had a decent meal at CSH for as long as she could remember.

Clearly, though, her memory wasn't at its most reliable these days.

On that note…

She sat forward and found the 'candidate' booklet again. If her whole Periphax theory was correct—whatever that theory actually pointed to—then at the time this transcript was recorded, she would have been on the Periphax for three months, and the anti-depressants for a bit over eight. If that's what they even were—anti-depressants. But they would have to have been. They did make her feel better. A lot better. She'd been able to relax again around everyone she loved; she'd been easy-going and trusting for the first time in her life. Could one drug do that and give her psychotic symptoms at the same time?

It was the same question with the Periphax: could it correct symptoms while still having a secondary purpose? She'd heard of anti-psychotics being prescribed as sleep medication, but beyond that?

Did dosage matter?

And, the million-dollar question: what possible reason could Dr Ford have had for prescribing two inter-reliant drugs to a sixteen-year-old girl whose only initial issue was feeling unworthy to belong?

As Jane tried to sort the timeline of events with the inclusion of drug intakes in her head, her gaze returned to Ford's first mention of the blizzard and stopped short.

Lecherous lying bastard.

She reread the dialogue to make sure she wasn't mistaken.

Nope.

There was no mention of the physical contact. None at all. It went straight from "Do you feel lonely, Jane?" to "Who would make you feel safe?"

She shoved herself to her feet, ignoring her protesting stomach, and marched toward the front door. She didn't have a key yet but she wasn't going to forget where the boys lived. If this were the city, she'd feel bad about leaving the apartment unlocked but this was Hawkins. Nothing ever happened in Hawkins.

Except, well, that whole thing with the monsters and the secret government lab… And now apparently a conspiracy.

Was it too soon to call it that?

She shook it off. Priorities, Jane. She'd been seeing a psychologist every day for the past four years and twice a week for the two years before that. It was about time she had another session.

The giant laundry bag that Dustin had pulled from the trunk last night blocked her path, sagging like a half-melted snowman in the middle of the entryway.

Not like that, you don't! I can't stop you from going out but I can save your ass. Again.

Jane rolled her eyes as she read Dustin's third note of the day, taped to the front of the bag. She could just imagine his obnoxious tone.

It's all in the bag, Janie.

She huffed and dragged the bag back into the better lit kitchen, loosening the drawstrings and emptying its contents onto the floor.

Huh.

A substantially oversized fleece-lined khaki jacket, a plain black T-shirt, some jeans, a hairbrush, a toothbrush, a wallet, a watch, a pair of white Converse, hair dye, and about forty dollars' worth of makeup. Inside the wallet, thirty dollars in actual cash and—she reddened—a gift card to Mary Sue's Lingerie and Hosiery Boutique. She didn't know whether to feel touched or extremely uncomfortable that Dustin had even thought to consider her underwear situation.

Still squatting over her spoils, she picked up the box of hair dye. Ugh. Bombshell blonde. Complete with bleaching solution.

Joy. Because she'd been so great at girly things before.

She wished Nancy were here.

Her desire to confront Ford drove Jane as she muddled her way through bleaching and toning her incredibly long tresses. Having gone four years without a haircut, the finished product looked even more bedraggled as she stared at herself in the bathroom mirror than when she'd first started out. So, after conditioning her freshly-bombshelled locks—which honestly looked a lot more cool-toned and dirty than the peroxide tone displayed on the box—she did what any incredibly stable, clear-thinking, law-abiding civilian would do: she fished a pair of all-purpose scissors out of the kitchen drawer and cut nearly a foot off. Now, instead of hanging almost to her waist, it stopped bluntly at the knobbly wings of her shoulder blades.

Next was clothing and makeup. She realised too late that it probably would've been much easier to shower while rinsing her hair than awkwardly sticking her head in the bathroom sink and making the shower an entirely separate experience, but what was done was done.

After she dried off, she realised she definitely was thankful for Dustin's gift card as she pulled on her jeans sans underwear, and vowed to make that the second item on the agenda after Ford's office.

Going braless was fine for the time being since she'd lost so much weight off her breasts at the hospital. If she kept eating the way she had at breakfast though, that wasn't going to last long.

By the time she finally finished getting ready, she vaguely reminded herself of how she'd looked post-makeover in Chicago with Kali. Although maybe that had more to do with the fact that she'd never worn dark makeup before then, so it had seemed like such a dramatic change when really it had mostly just been the wonders of eyeshadow. But she could recall the feeling almost exactly in this moment.

All the makeup Dustin had bought was quite dark and vampy—not Jane's usual style at all. Then again, she'd been locked away for four years… It was probably as good a time as any to admit she didn't really have a style anymore.

It wasn't that she hadn't been into makeup at eighteen. She knew how to apply it and everything. After her dad and Joyce had gotten together and she'd become a constant presence in Jonathan's life, learning how had been her big bonding experience with Nancy. Joyce too, actually.

Joyce.

Oh, God. That was another reunion she couldn't even contemplate.

She stared at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were thick with black liner, smudged out into her smoky charcoal shadow. She'd tidied her eyebrows up with tweezers and given them a bit more shape. Her lips were the colour of rich red wine; she'd only filled them in with lip liner, wanting to avoid accidental mess later on if she ate. In the end, she'd opted to avoid applying base of any kind—a very light dusting of a brownish-rose blush to her cheeks and she already felt over-done.

The rest of her look was extremely simple. She'd tucked her T-shirt into her waistband and stolen one of Steve's belts to hold up her jeans. Unlike Dustin, he had extremely narrow hips, so even though she'd still had to punch an extra hole in the leather to make the belt tight enough for her waist, she'd made it work.

The jacket had a hood, she noticed, so as she left the apartment and slunk out onto the downtown street, it served a dual purpose: keeping her warm and keeping her face hidden.

The apartment was actually prime real estate for her purposes. It was only a short walk to Dr Ford's old office, just around the corner from The Hawk, and she was just about to cross the road when she was jerked back by her hood.

She spun around, ready for a fight.

"Thought so." Steve pulled her hood back up to cover her face, unimpressed yet evidently unsurprised.

"Steve," she groaned, taking a moment to calm her racing heart, then pushed him off her. "What are you doing here?"

"No, what are you doing here?" he hissed. "You cannot just waltz into Ford's office and demand answers! You think there's any other option besides me rolling you out in cuffs if he actually discovers you're here?"

Jane weighed her head side to side, knowing she was being stupid but not wanting to admit it. "You rolling him out in a body bag?"

Steve took her by the wrist and ushered her under a nearby street tree, positioning her so her back was to any shop windows.

"I understand you want to know what's going on, Brown Eyes, but you can't take risks like this. It's stupid!"

She ripped her wrist out of his grip. "What would you have me do?"

"I would have you stay put and let me look into Ford's connections like I said I would!" he snapped, and the very common image of his younger self shaking a dish towel at her sprang to her mind. Getting disciplined at age fourteen; why would anything be different at twenty-two?

She fumed at being spoken to like a child but used her silence to concede to him that he was right.

Suddenly his expression changed. "What's happened to your hair?" He looked her up and down properly, apparently for the first time today, and followed up with, "And your face? And—and everything?"

"Your grimace is doing wonders for my ego," she deadpanned. She figured it would probably hit too close to home to make fun of his poor detective skills.

His expression didn't change, reaching out to rub a lock of her hair between his fingers, as if checking he couldn't change the colour back that way.

She batted his hand away. "We don't want people recognising me, Steve. What of it?"

"You think a new 'do and swollen lips are going to throw off the Wanted poster?" He shook his head. "Yeah, no. I made you from a block away."

"Swollen—" She cut herself off. Not important. "Then what do you suggest? I can't stay locked up in that apartment forever. I'll go crazy!"

He shot her a look that made her want to punch him.

Exercising restraint, however, she still tried to grab him by the shirtfront. "Oh, you little—"

"I'm kidding! I'm kidding!" He trapped her hands in one of his and straightened his collar. "Seriously, just a little patience." Seeing her poorly-concealed dejection—she really wanted to accomplish something today—he sighed. "I tell you what, we'll break in tonight. I went into the station early this morning so they won't be expecting me to stay back late. We'll go about nine. Happy?"

'Happy' wasn't exactly the word, but she nodded. "Satisfied."

He nodded once, as if to punctuate the deal. "Good. Now run along home."

She pulled a regretful face and sucked air in through her clenched teeth. "Oh, would that I could. But I need to buy a couple of things."

"I'll get 'em. What things?" His fists were planted on his hips, his stance as imposing and resolute as he could make it. He really wanted her to go home.

Which is why his willingness to fold so quickly after she answered him so deeply amused her.

She cocked her head to the side. "Steve, do you really want to go into a lingerie shop and buy panties for me?" She could have said 'underwear.' She could have. But somehow 'panties' was so much worse, and it showed on his face as he looked like a deer caught in headlights.

"...No." He looked like he had junior year when he'd picked her up in the school parking lot and admitted much more loudly than intended that he'd been waiting all day to watch Princess Bride with her: frozen in a moment of horror, hoping no one had noticed, wishing he could erase himself from the scene then and there.

Jane didn't know why he'd been so embarrassed about that. Princess Bride had swords and giant man-eating eels and shit. She guessed it just had something to do with the title.

She nodded. "Didn't think so." Taking pity on him, she changed the subject. "You'll keep digging?"

"What do you think I'm doing here?" he questioned. "Town Hall is down the street. Nothing on public record, not that that's surprising but I've got to start somewhere."

Jane nodded and zipped up her jacket tighter, starting to back up down the street, back towards The Hawk. She vaguely remembered where to find Mary Sue's. "Keep looking."

"I live to serve." He tipped the hat he wasn't wearing and they parted ways.

Heading back down the high street, Jane felt a flutter of panic as she saw Mrs Sinclair crossing the road toward her, her arms loaded with groceries.

Jane's breathing came in fast and she kept her head down, suppressing the compulsion to bolt. That would most certainly draw attention.

But the older woman didn't even notice her, continuing on with her very ordinary day along her very ordinary walk back to her car.

Reaching the street corner near RadioShack, Jane glanced back. She knew it was only Day One, but she didn't know if she was ever going to get used to being back in Hawkins. Even if there was something going on off-the-books, outside in the open everything just seemed so…normal. And yet, here she was, feeling that total disconnect again. Granted, this time, her reason for it was a bit different, but it still felt awfully familiar. Lucas' mom was the warmest of women. She'd used to welcome Jane into her house and given her a seat at her table without a moment's hesitation. The boys' mothers had all, in their own way, played mother to Jane at some point in time.

And now Jane was hiding.

And, she realised a moment later, being totally pathetic.

Solve the problem, get her life back. That was the plan. That was the incredibly over-simplified and, she realised, possibly impossible plan.

But she couldn't think like that.

She turned on her heel, making a beeline down the street for Mary Sue's.

And that's when she saw him.

She froze, mid-stride. It was as if every muscle in her body locked up and she absolutely, completely froze. It had been at the back of her mind since she'd followed Dustin through the darkness of the hospital corridors last night; if she got out, if she got to Hawkins—if, if, if… What if she just saw him, in so mundane a situation such as walking down the street? She'd imagined her heart would beat so fast it would burst out of her chest.

But it didn't.

It downright stopped.

Mike.

And just like that, all she could think about was the last time she saw him.

He was already sitting on the other side of the Perspex when she sat down. He picked up the phone and, slowly, she did too. Neither of them said anything.

Her trial started tomorrow. She'd been in this temporary prison for weeks now. The Park, the inmates called it, since it was basically smack bang in the middle of nowhere and all that surrounded them was forest. Since she'd realised there was no way out, she hadn't wanted to see him—hadn't wanted to face him. She needed to stay strong but he made her weak.

But that wasn't right. The thought of losing him made her very, very strong. And that's why she had to lose him in an entirely different way. That's why seeing him was so hard… Breaking his heart for real, even more than she had already done recently, was going to be so much worse than anything she could imagine.

"Big day tomorrow," he said quietly.

The way he was still able to be so gentle toward her—after everything she had done—made her feel like her heart was ripping apart in her chest.

"We're all going to be there," he continued when she said nothing. "Best seats in the house."

"Don't try to be funny right now, Mike," she chided, her voice almost cracking so she spoke even more quietly. "We need to talk."

The look of relief on his face almost floored her.

"El, I'm so glad you said that. I hated how we left things—"

"So did I," she interrupted him, her tone as purposely vacant as her eyes.

He was still babbling on. "I was just upset. I wasn't listening—maybe I made you feel like you couldn't tell me—but I'm listening now, I promise. I know it wasn't what it looked like, just like this isn't what it looks like—"

"It was," she said. "It was what it looked like." Taking advantage of his sudden wordlessness, she added, "And this is…exactly what it looks like."

"El…" he started, but she cut him off again.

"You just don't know when to give up, do you?" She did her best to sound scathing. "We're not kids anymore, Mike! Fucking hell, look at where we are! You're heading off to college next year and I'm—"

"What, a murderer, are you?" He'd found his voice. "You really expect me to believe that?"

"What could I really expect from the boy who doesn't even believe what he sees?" she shot back, and she saw a tiny crack appear in the faith in his eyes, fractured by hurt.

"Oh, I see," he said, nonetheless hurt but refusing to be beaten down so easily. "A lot more than you think."

And he pulled an orange canister out of his inside jacket pocket and banged it down hard on the metal bench in front of him. Jane didn't even have to look to know what it was.

"Periphax?" Mike demanded, seeming mostly angry now, although he was smiling in disbelief. "It's Austrian, you know. Not widely circulated so all the information I could dredge up was in German, but I'm not such an idiot that I don't understand 'antipsychotikum' when I see it!"

"How did you even get that in here?" she demanded in response, knowing there was no way the guards would let him into a prison facility with drugs on his person.

He sat forward, his fingers tightening their grip on the handset. He held up the canister. It was empty. "I found this under your bed last year. I was waiting for you to feel like you could trust me enough to tell me about it. But, since we're here a year later…" He trailed off.

She stared at him blankly. "What do you want me to say?"

"What do I want you to say?" he repeated incredulously, and then incredulity gave way to outrage. "I want you to tell me what the fuck is going on!" His eyes were wild and a guard barked over to pipe down.

Jane inhaled deeply and let the breath go. In a bored voice, she said, "Isn't where we are pretty self-evident of that for you?"

"You didn't kill Hopper," he dismissed. "I don't know why you're saying you did now, but I know you didn't."

"What is so fucking shocking about it, Mike?" she demanded. "You've got the label right there in your hand—'anti-psychotic'!"

He shot forward, his face barely an inch from the glass as his eyes bore into hers. "And I still don't believe it!" he snarled.

"Just because you tell me every pathetic little detail of your life doesn't mean you know everything about mine," she murmured, not breaking her calm. Calm was cruel. He needed cruel. Even if it made them both feel like dying. Her gaze was frigid. "You're being an idiot."

"And you're being a bitch!" He spat the word with more ferocity than Jane had ever heard from him. But then he sat back on his stool properly, pushing a fingertip against the glass between them, clearly making a real effort to calm down. "But I'm on your side." He exhaled a long breath and his shoulders sagged. When he looked back up into her eyes, his were pleading.

"What happened, El?" he murmured. "Whatever happened, you can tell me. I know we haven't been us lately. There's still a lot we need to talk about." He shook his head, his voice suddenly so earnest and gentle. "But I love you. Everything else, I can forgive—just give me time. Just tell me this isn't…" He took a shaking breath. "Tell me this isn't true."

There was too much in that. Too much love, too much everything. Even if she wasn't in the current mess she was in, Jane wouldn't deserve that. Even if she wasn't trying to be callous, she knew she couldn't come close to formulating an appropriate response to that. Sometimes Mike was just beyond her.

As things were, she kept it simple. "Screw you, Mike."

"What is going on with you?" he demanded.

She glanced down, steeling herself. Then she looked back up, dead-eyed. "I just don't want to settle for less anymore."

The response was immediate. Mike stared at her, completely frozen. She'd chilled his blood to ice.

Even Jane couldn't believe her cruelty.

It had been about a year ago. She'd been on the anti-depressants for a few months then and it was the night after their first time, almost to the hour. They'd been working on homework together all evening—with the door open, like his mother always insisted—and he'd finally told her why he'd been so upset the night before—so upset that even after she'd kissed him and told him everything was all right, he'd still all but run out the door.

He was in love with her—so in love with her that he couldn't even think of what he'd do if she left him. He lived in fear of that day, always feeling inferior, always in awe of her. He said he always thought it was just a matter of time before she realised she could have anybody, and that he just didn't measure up.

Now, in the visitation room, Mike's Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, his eyes faintly glossy. "And that's what I am, is it? Less?"

Jane set her jaw. "You?" She sighed, halfway to a scoff. "At this point, you're just noise."

His lips pursed as he clearly tried not to cry, but his eyes properly welled up at that. He tried to rationalise it. "Okay, I know this has been a really emotional time for you—"

"Don't patronise me!" she snapped. "I know what I'm saying! Just like I knew what I was doing in that house."

He looked at her for the first time like she was a stranger. His voice was hollow, cracking on the last word. "What are you saying?"

Jane kept her charade in check. "I'm not a victim here, Mike."

He stared at her for another moment before he glanced down at the Periphax and then into his lap. Jane couldn't tell whether he was hanging his head or making sure he wouldn't forget to take anything to go.

"Clearly." He pocketed the canister and stood up, still holding the receiver. He went to hang up, but then pulled it back to his ear and said quietly, "Wouldn't want you to settle."

And he hung up. Although torn, Jane eventually decided she was glad he didn't wait for a response. She had no idea what she would have said to him. Slowly, he dragged his beautiful, sad eyes from her face and walked out.

Jane sat there, unmoving and ice-cold, still holding the receiver, until eventually the guard yelled at her to get up.

She couldn't even wait until she was back in her cell. She cried as soon as she was on her feet. Walking, crying, allowing herself to be ushered wherever. She didn't care anymore. She cried all night until her eyes felt like they'd been drowned in chlorine and her body felt devoid of liquid.

By her trial in the morning, she had cried herself numb.

Now, he was coming out of a sandwich place she didn't recognise. Must have been new.

Jane didn't know what came over her. She just followed him. Mindlessly, stupidly followed him.

She followed him to the Fause building—the only building in Hawkins to stand higher than two storeys. She followed him through the Merchandise Pavilion, as it was so pretentiously signed, and through a perfectly white door that led down a perfectly white corridor to a pair of pristine stainless-steel elevator doors. Mike got in and Jane all but threw herself into the emergency stairwell that was so providentially positioned as he turned around to press for his floor.

She realised she had no way of knowing which floor he was heading to without seeing the numbers light up on the wall, so she sprinted up the stairs to the first level from ground. A few people glanced up with weird looks on their faces when she stuck her head through the access door, but she didn't loiter long enough to be asked any questions. Mike had already passed Level Three.

Sprinting up another three flights to Level Four, Jane stuck her head out. Cubicles. Lots of them. With worker-bees in headsets and sunny yellow polos. But no Mike.

She dashed up to Level Five only to reel backwards, redirecting her momentum against the wall just inside the access door and trying to swallow down her gasps for air. She didn't think he'd seen anything. He'd only just started to look up, catching her movement out of the corner of his eye as he tried to unbutton the top button on his navy sweater with one hand, clutching a doggy bag in the other. Jane waited a minute, trying desperately to control her breathing. Then she turned and practically pressed her eye up against the tiny window that barely served as a peephole.

The corridor was empty.

Slipping through the doorway and edging in the only direction he could have gone, still casting very little thought as to what the hell she was doing, Jane peered around the corner and saw three doors at the end of this new corridor. With so few doors around the place, she figured this must either be a level for large offices or conference rooms. Maybe storage, but considering how easily she'd slipped in, she figured security was a little lax for that. Dustin had filled her in a bit on Fause last night as he was brushing his teeth; their technology wasn't exactly cheap.

Only one of the doors was open, and peeking around the doorframe, Jane saw it most certainly was a large office but that Mike was just as certainly not in it.

Maybe it was for the best.

Screw that, she thought. It was definitely for the best. She stepped out of the corridor to gather her thoughts.

What had she thought was going to happen? What would have happened if she hadn't run into him and what in the name of God would have happened if she had?

No. It was better this way. It was—

The door clicked behind her and she whirled around.

Her lips parted and she felt her blood run cold.

He wasn't so far away this time; she could actually see his face. Every detail.

She opened her mouth to say something but no words came out. Not a sound. She couldn't even articulate his name.

Mike.