A/N: School is kicking my butt, y'all. I'm only in week 4 but ready to be DONE! However, teaching is going great, and I'm so proud of my students each time I leave my class.

Here's an update, and I already have chapter 31 in the works, so it hopefully won't be a long wait!

Hope you enjoy.

August 28, 1989 | Elizabeth

Her mind feels a bit foggy after signing up for classes this morning. She never imagined that as a junior she would be taking general courses to just fill electives that she'll need to graduate, but now that she's decided against financial analysis, she sees no reason to continue filling her math requirements for now.

The sounds of the grocery store around her seem as though they're being filtered through a cup to her ear—like everything is a bit morphed or something. But she pushes the cart anyway, taking a deep breath when she realizes she's already walked past the produce section and hadn't stopped to actually buy any of the vegetables she'd had on her list. Well, that Henry had on their list—she could do without those.

She's picking through the cucumbers to find one that's not too big since it goes to waste quickly with just the two of them there. Her finger pokes at one and it mushes, her skin touching the sliminess of the inside of a rotting cucumber. She holds back a gag as she quickly pushes her cart away, "No cucumber is worth digging through that," she thinks to herself, briefly apologizing to Henry in her head.

The heads of lettuce manage to call her back right before she was about to pass them, so she backs her cart up a few inches and finds a head that looks decent. "What's the point of buying the lettuce without the cucumbers?" She thinks to herself but throws the lettuce in anyway. Henry likes his salads. Hopefully he'll like them cucumber-less, too.

Pushing on through to the meat section, she stops at the chicken to pick out some wings—Henry said he would make them tonight, so she gladly volunteered to go pick them up. He was doing some things with the ROTC today after signing up for classes, and she was just happy he was home again and that he'd be home when she got there later. He's never made wings before, at least not for her, though, and she's not sure if she should expect much. But she decides since he's good at everything else he cooks, he'll probably be great at this, too.

She tosses a package of wings into her cart and starts to turn her cart to go down the aisle to her left, but a cart crashes into hers with a soft force. "Oh!" She says, picking her head up and trying to snap herself from her grogginess, "I'm so sorr—" she stops when she sees the person driving the cart, and she tilts her head to the side just slightly. "Director Dalton?" She asks.

He gives her a curt little nod but adds a smile to the end of it. "Good afternoon, Miss Adams," he says, gripping onto his cart a little tighter as he backs off of hers.

She squints her eyes and tilts her head up, "What—" she stops herself, trying to not sound rude would be a good idea. He has helped her a lot, after all, even if she hadn't known until recently. "What are you—" nothing quite sounds right, it all just sounds a little too harsh, and she's shifting on her feet now and straightening her back, lowering her shoulders an inch.

While she's trying to figure out what to say to him, he provides a conversation, "I was told I might find you here," he says, clearing his throat and lowering his chin, "That you shop here often."

Without thinking, her eyes drop to his cart and she sees that he has nothing in there. She takes that in for a moment, and then leans against her own cart as she feels like her legs are going to turn into noodles, "Are you—" she clears her throat again and furrows her brow, pursing her lips together before finally locking eyes with him. She does it with such ferocity that it makes her heart skip a beat from her own boldness. "Are you spying on me?" She asks.

A smile skips across Conrad's face just briefly before he furrows his own brows, shaking his head quickly, "Oh no," he says, but she picks up on the change in his tone. To anyone else, it might still sound like a normal conversation, but to her, she knows that he's playing coy. She can just simply tell, even if she's not quite sure how she can. "A little birdy told me." He says, and now she is undeniably sure of two things:

1. He's stalking her.

2. He's playing coy.

She spreads her arms out across the cart's handle, her hands gripping on the cool metal on each side, "Well, why was the little birdy in search of me?" She asks, immediately cringing for using that metaphor. "It wasn't good when he said it, why did you think it would be good when you said it, Elizabeth?" She thinks to herself, doing a mental eye roll.

He shrugs a shoulder, "I heard finances weren't really your thing." He says.

She tilts her chin up now, becoming less suspicious as she's catching on quickly. Her right foot comes up to the cart's bar between the wheels, resting there as she leans over slightly. Instead of the defensive language her body was speaking, she's now on offense, ready to attack. The thought crosses her mind that she shouldn't feel this way with him, that he's kind, that he's been helping her behind the scenes, that he told her about her parents when she asked. But something in the way he's looking at her, almost as if he's trying to prey on her, is making her feel a coldness toward him.

"No they weren't," she says finally, "I'm knocking my electives out of the way."

"I don't think that's a good idea." Conrad answers, his back stick-straight as his two hands are resting calmly on the handle.

She squints her eyes at him again, losing her confidence and replacing it with confusion, "Why not?" She asks, "Actually, why does it matter to you?"

He relaxes his shoulders a half-inch before looking down at his hand, almost as if his wedding ring suddenly caught his attention. His other fingers pinch around the band, sliding it up and down his finger as he stay silent a moment. "I think we should meet in my office." He says, and it catches her off guard. She'd been staring too long at his wedding ring, wondering what the hell he was thinking about. "Say tomorrow at noon?"

She thinks for a moment about her schedule, knowing she doesn't have to be at work this week since she took off one week before school began. She wanted some time with Henry before the chaos of classes started again. "Tomorrow at noon." She agrees.

She's about to speak again, opening her mouth to say something about Henry coming, but he just gives her that same curt nod before turning down the aisle. She watches him, standing right in her place, and he leaves the cart at the door and heads outside, never buying anything.

Her body shudders involuntarily before she hears a voice behind her, "Excuse me," she says. It's a little old lady in a floral dress, hunched over her cart, "Can you reach the milk on the top, dear?"

"Of course," Elizabeth answers, snapping herself out of the trance that Conrad had put her in and letting her mind wander every which way now. When she grabs the milk for the woman and sets it in her cart, she leaves the grocery store after paying, deciding she and Henry can eat out tonight.

August 28, 1989 | Henry

"He what?" Henry asks, putting his deodorant on as he stands at the bathroom counter.

She's been a whirlwind ever since he got out of the shower and found she had arrived at their home. He wasn't sure what she was so tightly wound about at first—she'd just been stuck in some weird silence as she was putting the few groceries she'd bought away. "We're going out to eat tonight," she'd said to him when he walked out in the complete nude, carrying his towel and dabbing at his back with it.

"Why's that?" He'd replied.

"I'll explain in a minute, but I only bought the lettuce and the wings." She admitted, so he just shrugged, kissed her cheek, and walked to the bathroom, deciding she would likely tell him on her own time.

Now she's whirling around their bedroom digging through the dresser in a way he's not sure he's ever seen her do. She's throwing clothes out of the drawers, and he's been thinking the entire time that she'll be regretting that when she gets back to her normal self, her less-edgy self.

"He stalked me to the grocery store, Henry," she says again, and he's sure he heard her right this time.

He puts the lid on the deodorant and leans against the door frame, his toes scraping against the bedroom carpet as he watches her change pants and turn around as she's zipping them. She has a worried look on her face, but he notices that she's not emotional, necessarily, just…worried. "Are you sure?" Henry asks, and he immediately regrets it. Of course she's sure.

"Yes," Elizabeth answers, almost in a snapping tone. She walks to the closet and throws a shirt on over her head, messing her hair all up, "He said a 'little birdy' told him I shopped there frequently." She says, "I don't like that I'm being followed."

"Well," Henry says, then pauses. He was going to say "they're the CIA, they can follow us whenever they want," but he decides against it. He just shifts and crosses his arms over his chest, thinking about what he'll say instead. "So are you going to go meet with him?" He asks.

She doesn't answer, but she's also struggling to fix her hair and finally she just is putting it up into a ponytail.

"What do you think he wants?" He asks.

"I have no idea." She says, "He told me it would be a bad idea to change my major. I know that much." She says, "And that's pretty much all I know." She adds, turning around and facing him before folding her arms across her chest, too, "Do you think this is about my parents? Somehow?"

"You said we wouldn't—"

"This is the one time I need to talk about them," she interrupts, throwing her hands down and shrugging her shoulders in a frustrated manner, "I don't know, Henry. I just…I don't know how I could be of any value to Dalton or the CIA or why he wants to meet with me."

Henry shifts and swallows hard, moving to the bed to put his pants on. He slowly steps into them as he watches her putting her shoes on at the end of the mattress, "Maybe he just wants to catch up?" He asks.

She gives him a look over her shoulder, and he smiles sheepishly immediately.

"Yeah, okay, good point." He says without her even having to say anything verbally. He shrugs as he slides his Marines tee over his head and straightens it out over his newly-muscular body. Thank God they had done so many push-ups over the summer. "Whatever it is, do you want me to go with you?"

"I think I should go alone." She says after a moment, still looking at him as he's putting his belt on. "He didn't mention you coming, at least, so I think he wanted me to come alone."

He nods a little and leans over the bed to the edge of the mattress, pressing a kiss to her cheek, "If you change your mind, you know I'll be there." He answers. "You ready?" He asks before they walk out the bedroom door, grabbing his keys on the way out of the living room, and heading to the diner in his Bronco to see their favorite waitress, Patty.

August 29, 1989 | Elizabeth

She glances down at her watch as she walks in, seeing the minute-hand between the eleven and the twelve, on its way to meet the hour-hand at the top. "I'm here to see Director Dalton," Elizabeth says to the woman at the front of the office.

"Oh yes," she says with a smile, one that almost makes Elizabeth's stomach turn from the sickeningly sweet way she did it, "I knew who you were as soon as you stepped out of your car."

Elizabeth looks over her shoulder and frowns, knowing she had to park in a parking garage and walk over here. "How did—"

The woman tilts a monitor and Elizabeth immediately sees herself talking in present time, then she sees another view of the parking garage and her car. There were cameras all over this place, apparently.

"Oh." Elizabeth says, taking a deep breath.

"He's on his way up."

"Okay," Elizabeth says, about to turn around and go sit down in one of the little chairs, but she hears the door open and she sees Conrad poking his head out.

"Miss Adams," he says, giving her a warmer smile than he had yesterday in the store, "Good to see you again."

She nods at him, clutching one hand around her purse strap that hangs from her shoulder, "Good to see you," she says, though she's finding it difficult to say that with any real meaning behind it. She kind of would just like this to be all behind her already.

As she follows him down the long hall, she stifles a yawn and rubs at her lower lid of her eye, wishing she'd been able to sleep better than she did last night.

"Sorry for all the…" he waves his hands around at his sides as he walks in front of her, "The espionage." He says with a lightness in his tone.

She raises one brow, "So you're admitting to spying on me?"

He heads into his office and gestures her to step in first, moving out of her way and shutting the door behind him. "Please, sit," he says, walking back behind his desk.

"You didn't answer my question," Elizabeth says, standing right beside the chair he'd told her to sit in.

He plops into his rolling desk chair and leans back in it, crossing one leg over the other and folding his hands over his stomach, "I would hate to remind you that the CIA has been keeping tabs on you for most of your adult life, Miss Adams." He says, his head lowered just slightly as he brings his eyes up to meet hers, giving a little grin. "But yes, we may have been trying to find out where you were so that I could have this meeting with you."

"You know where I live." Elizabeth says, finally walking around to the front of the chair and sitting down, slinging her leg over the other.

He nods, "I do," he says, "However, we wanted as little attention as possible on this meeting."

Her ears immediately perk up and she locks eyes with him, clearing her throat, "And why's that?" She asks.

"I'm wanting to recruit you to be an analyst for the CIA." He comes out and says.

Elizabeth feels like someone shoved a vacuum down her throat, and she has to blink a few times and wonders if she needs to pinch herself. Maybe this is all just a nightmare. Am I in a coma? "Excuse me?"

"The CIA." He says, "I would like to recruit you. First as a field agent—I think you could do great work there." He says, "I know you were onto me yesterday."

"I was." She babbles, trying to scrape her thoughts together. The only thing she can think of to say is: "Why do you want me to keep my financial analysis thing going?" She hates how it comes out of her mouth, but she's too baffled to say much else.

He smiles, "While we have been keeping tabs on you because of who your parents were," he says, swallowing hard for a moment and looking out the window beside him. When he pauses, she realizes that they really, truly, must have been friends, her parents and Conrad. "We also have kept an eye on you because of your academic achievement." He says, "Ever since your time at Houghton, we knew you had great potential, but it wasn't until you were at the top of each of your classes here at UVA that you really got our attention." He explains, rocking a bit in his desk chair and looking at her once more. "Your analytical skill transcends the world of finance, yes, but we are watching activity in the Middle East and seeing things starting to stir up there." He says, "That's all I can really say about it, but we're looking for agents with your financial knowledge and analytical skill to be able to trace and analyze the financial activities of these international criminals in potentially hostile nations."

She swallows thick and takes a deep breath through her nose, trying to take all this in. The CIA? The place that got her parents killed? She's just a finance gal, she's never imagined herself doing something like this. But again, the breath feels like it's being sucked from her, so she has to steady her lungs the best she can before just looking down and twiddling her fingers a bit. She feels his eyes watching her like a hawk, but she doesn't care as much. He's just dropped a lot on her.

"You have great potential as an analyst to track the flow of money and uncover hidden financial connections that would be vital in combatting threats to national security." He explains, and she still feels like she can't catch her breath. She just wants him to stop for a moment. "As a field agent," he continues, and her heart drops because he won't just shut up for a minute, "You'll be staying in the States. We have a few folks we want to keep an eye on here in DC." He admits, "And then you'll move into an analyst position when the time is right."

She looks up at him and tilts her head, "Does this have something to do with my parents being CIA?"

"Nothing at all," he says, "Like I said, you would have caught our attention with your stats in all your classes anyway." He says, "And don't think we don't have feelers in our nation's top schools." He adds with a smirk.

She swallows hard and takes a shaky breath, looking back down and thinking for a moment, "When do you need an answer by?"

He shrugs, "It's something to think about right now, as you're heading into your junior year. You have a little time." He says calmly, "But this is an official offer, and it will last until next summer, and I'll need your word that you'll be coming to us after you graduate." He states.

She nods and looks up at him, standing up, "Thank you, Director Dalton," she says, extending her hand for him to shake.

He stands as well and takes her hand, giving it a firm shake before cupping his other around theirs, "I mean it, Elizabeth, you have potential." He says in a softer tone, feeling as though he were looking right into her brain and seeing that she was so unsure about it all. I guess that's what the CIA does. "The CIA and I would be lucky to have you on our team."

She nods and manages to curl the corners of her lips up into a smile before shaking his hand one more time and turning to the door, wondering what the hell she's going to tell Henry. She stops, looking over her shoulder, "Is this confidential?"

"Do you mean can you tell that fiancé who's head over heels for you?" He teases with a little smile, "You can tell him everything I told you today, with the addition of telling him that if word gets out, I'll personally know it was one of you who spread it."

"Got it," Elizabeth says, quickly moving her feet and trying to focus on not tripping or falling on her face from the lack of stamina in her legs.

The CIA? She couldn't…

But she finds herself driving out of that parking garage and straight to UVA, to the registrar's office to ask for a change of schedule, that's she has had a change of heart and will continue her math degree. Without stopping to tell Henry, without really even thinking about it, she continues to be a math major for at least this semester.