A/N: Not only are we getting into the deep $h!t, but we are also getting into the lovey $h!t.

Welcome to the little bit of Elizabeth POV romance, guys.

Enjoy!

Elizabeth | Post-Extraction – 179 Hours

It felt like she had a thousand locusts trapped inside her skull, buzzing and thumping against her brain as she thought about what Henry had just said. The crates, the men left behind, Grayson…all of it felt like some sort of cruel joke that was being played on her. The possibilities of just how big this could be felt like they were limitless.

She'd brought her hand up to her face and was rubbing her temple when Henry made a grunt and started getting up.

Henry got up from the floor and beelined over to the bedroom, and she tried to peer around the corner to see where he went after that.

"Henry?" she called out, not wanting to get up yet—putting all the effort into getting her leg underneath her was a lot, and her entire leg felt like it was on fire without her pain medicine.

A thud came from the other side of the wall and she felt the panic shoot up within her, but then she saw him coming back around the corner. When her eyes landed on the gun in his hand, she felt her throat constrict. "Where was that?" she asked.

He looked at her briefly as he was loading a magazine into the pistol, "Closet," he murmured, tucking it into the front of his sweatpants and grabbing another one out from underneath his arm, sliding a magazine into it. He handed her the butt of it and she looked at it, "You need to take it for your own protection," he reminded.

She was watching it, "I can't be on crutches and shoot a gun."

"I'm not sure there's many other options," he said, still holding the butt of the gun out for her. She moved her eyes up the barrel, up his arm, and then finally met his eyes. He nodded just barely, "If we're caught, we're going down shooting."

She swallowed hard and finally, in a swatting motion, grabbed the gun from his hand and tucked it into the back of her waistband. "Are you sure you're willing to—"

"Sh!" Henry hissed, his hand falling to the gun in his sweatpants as he looked out the window and crouched down. He was watching over her head, and she felt like she should look back or crawl up on the couch, get into position to help him fight. But she wasn't sure she could move her leg enough to even put up a fight or if she would just cause more of an issue.

She heard a car door and held her breath, closing her eyes as Henry crawled over on the floor next to her, propping himself up on the couch to get a good look out of the window. In that moment, she decided if she moved she would cause more of a problem, she was safer down here and so was Henry if she stayed down. She knew she couldn't maneuver enough to stay out of harm's way if gunfire broke out, so she just let the Marine do his thing.

"They found us," she breathed, barely even audible as her breath was shaking.

He put his finger to his lips and gently laid his hand on her shoulder, and she closed her eyes again as she felt her body freeze up completely. His hand was so warm through her tee, and she briefly remembered that she still had her Frampton shirt on. If I'm killed in this shirt…so be it. When she heard the door unlock, she stopped breathing entirely and waited for the gunfire to begin.

"Jesus, kid. You sure know how to stir up a mess."

She opened her eyes and looked at the new voice, frowning when she saw an older man standing there in the doorway. He was shutting the door as Henry was sliding onto the carpet next to her, catching his breath and rubbing his palm against his forehead.

She saw the glimmer of sweat rimming his hairline before she turned back to the other man.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Henry asked, causing Elizabeth to jump. She hadn't expected Henry to take up such a conversational, yet brusque tone.

The man crossed his arms and hid behind the door, checking to make sure he was out of the line of sight from the windows. "A Marine and a CIA agent go AWOL after a top-secret mission involving the Middle East, and you think people aren't gonna come lookin'?" He rolled his eyes and leaned against the door, crossing his arms over his chest defiantly as though he were a father disciplining his kids.

Elizabeth felt Henry relax next to her and she tore her eyes away from the man standing against the door, looking over to him instead, "Henry," she breathed, "Who is this?"

Henry looked at her and then defeatedly looked past her again at the man, "Elizabeth," he breathed, "This is Lieutenant Colonel Charles Rawlins."

Elizabeth stared at him for a moment, waiting for him to provide more, but instead the man started speaking and she whipped her head around to look at him. He was still standing with his arms crossed and his legs in a wide stance, eyeing the two of them, "And tell her how you know me, too, kid." He nodded toward Henry when he didn't answer immediately, and Elizabeth wondered why he hesitated. She still was unsure if they were in danger or not, but Henry didn't have his gun drawn anymore.

She felt Henry tense up again, "He's the one who told me where this safe house was."

She closed her eyes and blew out a breath.

The way he talked about the man who told him about this place made him sound like he was dead.

She clenched her fists and her toes curled up in her sock, trying to ignore the shooting pain in her foot.

Startled, she looked over at where the noise was coming from, not having heard Lieutenant Colonel Rawlins move from his spot by the door. He was fumbling around in the kitchen, and she thought she maybe heard a board slide out of the drawer before she heard a pill bottle.

When she saw him coming toward them again, he was shaking out a pill into the palm of his hand and holding it out for her. "This ought to help," he said, standing in front of her now.

She frowned, squinting to try to see the name of the medicine on the bottle. She couldn't see what it was, how much it was, or who it was prescribed to.

"You can trust him," she heard Henry say.

She looked over at him, "And how do you know who we can trust?" she snapped. She hadn't meant to make it sound so vicious, but between her confusion, her fear, and her pain, she didn't have much of a filter left.

"He didn't kill us or start shooting at us as soon as he walked in," he said, and she felt her chest deflate. "He also is retired military and had no access, or shouldn't have had, to our case files. So," Henry turned toward Lieutenant Colonel Rawlins and frowned, and Elizabeth turned toward him now too, "How the hell did you know we were missing? Especially her," he said, nodding toward Elizabeth.

Rawlins was still holding out the pill, and Elizabeth finally took it from his hand when it was clear he wasn't going to start talking until she did. But she didn't take it to swallow it down yet, she just took it to get him to continue with his story. "Conrad Dalton contacted me personally," he said, a look coming onto his face that almost seemed like amusement.

"Conrad?" Elizabeth asked, watching as Rawlins made an effort to get down on the floor, too, across from her and Henry. He was older, but not terribly old—probably in his fifties or so. He looked like he walked with a bit of a limp from what Elizabeth could tell, though, and he had a tattoo on his forearm. It was faded enough that Elizabeth couldn't tell what it was from her position on the floor. "How do you know Conrad?" she asked, meeting his eyes intensely.

Rawlins flicked his eyebrow up, "Conrad sure is worried about you," he said, shaking his head and making a disapproving noise by clicking his tongue against his teeth a couple times, "He and I go way back. I was his first lieutenant when he first joined up. Served in 'Nam together."

"The Marines…" she whispered, blinking as she remembered some of the little stories or comments he would say about the Marines. He never had much to say about it, though, and she could tell he always seemed like he was in pain whenever he said anything at all about it. She knew, too, that he wasn't anywhere near retirement age from the Marines, yet he had gotten out and started with the CIA. She wished more than ever she knew his backstory better.

He looked at Henry, "And this kid here," he said, "He apparently forgot I would know exactly where he was hiding."

"I didn't forget," Henry almost snapped. She hadn't heard him so riled up. "I just didn't know you'd know the director of the CIA."

"Hank," he said with a laugh, shaking his head and draping his arms over his knees. Elizabeth could see the way his knuckles were knotted up, and he looked like he had a nasty case of arthritis already, "You should know by now that us Devil Dogs all know each other one way or another."

She looked over at Henry briefly. He seemed like he was lost in thought, and she wondered if he even knew that Conrad was Marines at all. Admittedly, there was a lot between the both of them that they hadn't explained to each other, mostly just because they didn't know what the other needed to know.

He was tucking his gun back in the waistband of his pants, and it reminded her that hers was still in the back part of her waistband. She'd almost forgotten about it already, and she squeezed onto the pill a little tighter. She glanced down at it before Rawlins started talking again, darting her eyes back up to him.

"Back to you," he said, looking at Elizabeth. She eyed him again, wondering if he could be trusted, if Conrad could be trusted, either, "Conrad's worried sick about you, kid, and he called me up when he looked through McCord's file and realized I was his major back when Hank joined up." He paused, then shook his head, "I had both McCord and Dalton in my platoons at one point."

Elizabeth almost smiled, the name "Hank" sounded so foreign to her. That seemed like some kind of gruff, tough-guy name—not the Henry who held her last night when she had a nightmare. Not the one who held her and reminded her how to breathe more than once in the past week, either. Hank sounded like he should have a beer in his hands at all times and a handlebar mustache, complete with a motorcycle that is his only personality.

She wondered, briefly, if Henry had a motorcycle.

"He wouldn't tell me a lick of information over the phone, so when I met up with him outside D.C., and he told me everything that happened? I realized why he didn't tell me a lick of information," Rawlins said, shaking his head. She couldn't tell if it was disappointment or something else. "I told him I couldn't give it away where I thought Hank would be hiding, but I did tell him I'd find you and bring you back."

Elizabeth tucked her hands underneath her thighs, feeling like she was in the principal's office—a feeling she couldn't verify because she'd never been in the principal's office for any kind of reprimanding. But she assumed this is exactly how it would feel.

"And if I refuse to go back?" she asked.

Rawlins eyed her for a moment, "It's not a matter of yes or no," he said.

"Then you don't know me at all," Elizabeth answered. For just a moment, she felt her normal self come back, the one who hadn't been so damaged before she was Eleanor Morgan for a few months.

Rawlins huffed, an attempt at a laugh, but he didn't say anything else. He did, however, reach into the inside of his jacket, and Elizabeth immediately grabbed behind her back for her gun and pulled it out, aiming it at him.

He picked his eyes up, but no sudden movement other than that. He just smiled and grabbed the envelope out from his jacket pocket, "Glad to see you found the guns, Hank," Rawlins said, tossing the envelope over toward Henry's foot.

Henry moved to scoop it up and saw the envelope addressed to Eleanor. He handed it over to Elizabeth, but she still had the gun pointed at Rawlins even though her hand was shaking a little. She'd dropped the pill in this whole process, too, and it was laying between her and Henry's legs.

Henry gently reached over and touched her wrist, slowly pushing her arms down to settle the gun into her lap. He took a shaky breath as she continued to stare Rawlins down—she didn't trust him at all. How could she? How could she know he was telling the truth when there were obviously so many lies going on? How could she know Conrad didn't send him here to kill them both?

Elizabeth caught a glimpse of the envelope and saw that it said Eleanor, and she tried to relax as she took a breath when Henry laid the gun down beside her. She picked up the envelope and tried to get her fingers to open the flap, but they were shaking too much and she shoved it into Henry's hand instead. The muscles in her neck tightened and she looked away quickly, trying to not let her frustration show.

The pre-Eleanor Elizabeth appeared only briefly, and now she was gone again.

When he looked up at her, his eyebrows lifted slightly, and she just stared at him. Please just open it, she beckoned him silently, hoping he could somehow read her mind. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes, feeling them suddenly become so dry—the sign she was about to cry. She took a sharp breath and opened her eyes again, "Just open it," she whispered.

He looked at her carefully for a few more seconds before nodding once, fumbling with the envelope and pulling the letter out, finally opening it up to face them.

"He didn't give me all the details," Rawlins said, making her look up at him, "But he wanted me to make sure I gave you this. I don't know what it says."

She looked back down and thought of the seal on the envelope—it had been sealed. Rawlins hadn't looked at it since it had been sealed, but what if this was all some sort of setup?

How would he have known my spy name if he wasn't in contact with Conrad?

She swallowed hard and looked down at the message, taking it from Henry's hand and trying to focus on the handwriting. It was definitely Conrad's messy cursive, and she squinted trying to read it, but her hand was shaking too bad. Henry reached for her wrist and steadied her hand, and she felt herself breathe in—she wondered, too, how long she'd been holding her breath for prior.

"Elizabeth, Captain McCord,

You've got people looking out for you, both good and bad. Don't trust anyone who tries to turn you in or turn you around. Stay strong and keep your head down. You know who your allies are.

The river's flow never stops, even in the quiet. You know where the path narrows. The lanterns won't fail you, but the sunlight will."

Her breath caught in her throat again and she choked, and immediately Henry was handing her the bottle of water he'd gotten from the refrigerator when he brought over the MREs. She chugged some down and felt the panic rising in her chest, felt the heat spreading through her cheeks and over to her ears. She shut her eyes as she put the lid back on the water, trying to steady her breathing.

The message was coded—there was no doubt about that. But she knew immediately what Conrad meant, and that he was asking her to meet him at old cabin they'd once used as a rendezvous point during her training days. It's off a narrow, overgrown path by the river, and the reference to the sunlight meant that he wanted her to meet him at dusk. She swallowed hard and looked over at Henry who had nothing but concern on his face. She wondered, only briefly, if it was concern for her or himself.

"This is the message?" she choked out, looking up at Rawlins.

He nodded, shrugging one shoulder, "That's it," he said, twisting his lips to the side. Elizabeth watched his white mustache move along with his face.

She swallowed and then shut her eyes, taking a deep, steadying breath. She felt the pain shooting in her toes and she almost whimpered, but she was too busy trying to work all this out in her mind. Does this make sense? Yes. Conrad's message makes total sense. But what if he's trying to throw her off his trail, trying to make him seem like he's not involved in this?

But what if he's not actually involved in it?

She looked at Rawlins again, "Tell Conrad I'll be there," she said firmly.

Henry looked at her with his brow furrowed, "Elizabeth," he breathed. "Are you sure about this?"

She nodded without looking at him. She knew if she looked at him she would second guess herself, and she didn't have much room to fail here.

"You need to get us out of here though," she breathed to Rawlins, and Henry looked back at the Lieutenant Colonel expectantly. "And keep things quiet as you get us out."

Rawlins didn't hesitate, he was already standing up and nodding toward the pill on the ground. "Only once you take that pain pill—your toes are all cramped up," he noticed, nodding now toward her toes that were curled up outside her cast, and she hadn't even realized because the whole area was in a lot of pain. She reached for the pill, and she could tell Henry was about to stop her, but she swallowed it and chased it with water before he could put his hand up.

He watched her for a moment, and she wondered if he thought she might explode. She, too, wondered if she might explode. But at this point, it was better than feeling this excruciating pain shooting in her foot and leg and ankle. If she died now, she wouldn't have to figure out who to trust anymore.

When she'd gotten in the back of Rawlins' car with her duffle bag, Henry had helped her the whole way and climbed in the back with her. She looked over at him as Rawlins backed out of the grassy area in front of the house—not quite grassy enough to be a yard, but something that would've resembled a yard if it would've been tended to.

Henry was looking over at her as he was buckling his seatbelt, "Are you alright?" he whispered, looking down at her cast.

She looked, too, and nodded. Though the pain medicine hadn't set in yet, she did feel a little better knowing she hadn't, yet, exploded. If Rawlins was trustworthy enough to have a note from Conrad, then he probably wasn't here to kill either of them, even if she was still unsure about Conrad's trustworthiness, too.

"Where are you taking us?" Henry asked, turning his body toward the front now and looking at Rawlins through the rearview mirror.

Rawlins moved his eyes back to Henry briefly before turning out onto the main road, "The cabin," he said, but his tone said he wasn't going to be adding anything else, so Elizabeth and Henry didn't pry further. They figured, after all, it was probably better for them to not know exactly whose cabin this was or where, even.

She looked over at Henry, and she realized his hand was laying right next to hers on the middle seat. She looked down at it and grabbed it, her fingers resting on his briefly before wrapping around them instead, squeezing. She closed her eyes and he squeezed back, and she practically fell over onto his arm. If she would've opened her eyes, she would've seen Rawlins looking at them in the rearview, but she just breathed in through Henry's shirt.

He always had this specific smell, but she never could quite pick out what it was. She assumed it was something to do with the way he had rescued her, something psychological that triggered her brain to equate that smell to safety, but she didn't care. She just needed, desperately, to feel safe right now, and this was doing the trick.

Her eyes popped open when she felt his lips on her head, and she looked up at him. Her eyes were wide, her heart thumping in her neck, and she swallowed hard.

"Sorry," he whispered.

She shook her head and laid it back down on his arm, not saying anything at first. Once she found her voice again, she took a shaky breath, "Don't be sorry," she murmured, barely loud enough for herself to even hear.

Once they bumped along down the road for thirty-eight minutes—she'd been keeping an eye on the time—they arrived to a very similar place they'd just come from. It was all surrounded by woods, but instead of it being a small concrete house, it was a log cabin with steps leading up the front. She eyed the steps immediately and thought about how hard it'll be to get up and down them with her crutches, cringing at how she has to be helped so much.

Defiantly, she decided she was going to just walk up those stairs—she couldn't hold Henry back with her injuries any longer. Before he had the chance to get out and open her door, she did it first, stepping out and gasping in pain.

Her eyes clenched shut and she stood super still, listening to Henry yelling at her. "Elizabeth! Stop—you're going to hurt yourself."

"I'm fine," she muttered.

"You're so obviously not fine."

"I'm fine," she snapped, shooting her eyes open and looking at him. He just stared at her, though, and he wasn't budging. Before she could argue any further, he bent down and scooped her knees up into his arm, and she was in his arms once again, being carried to the front door.

The entire walk there, she felt bad for snapping. When he had reached the front porch, waiting for Rawlins to open the door for them, she looked at Henry as Rawlins was still getting her crutches and duffle from the car, "Keep carrying me over the threshold and I believe in some countries we'll be married," she teased, then immediately regretted it.

Her heart skipped a few beats whenever she said it, and she knew, then, that she was probably in too deep.

But then he smiled at her and she felt her heart completely stop, she's sure, and he just wagged his brows, "What a lucky guy that would make me," he said.

She pulled her ears back and looked at the door, unable to look at him anymore and let him see her red cheeks. "Right," she said, "Because I'm totally not hindering your entire life."

He looked at her as she heard Rawlins' footsteps coming up behind them, "You're not hindering anything," he whispered, and she looked away quickly at Rawlins as he opened the door for them.

Without another word, they were inside, and Rawlins was telling them where everything was—including a bottle of pain medicine. By the time he left, Rawlins had shown them where some food was stashed and where there were waters in the fridge, and she felt like she almost could be comfortable.

Until she remembered why they were here, and she got uncomfortable all over again.

"I'll be back to get you two to meet with Conrad," he said, "Be ready."

"We'll be out on the porch as soon as we hear you pull up, sir," Henry replied.

Rawlins nodded and left, and Elizabeth snorted as soon as the door closed. "Sir," she teased.

"What?"

She shrugged innocently and propped her foot up on the couch, "I just think it's funny, that's all."

"That I call him sir?" he asked, furrowing his brows as he walked over to the couch beside her. She sat up a little and patted the cushion, prompting him to sit down so she could lean against him.

"Yes," she said, "I think of you as this Marine captain, and even though I'm well aware of how military rankings work, you just seem like everyone else should be below you. You take charge," she said, then felt her face burning again. She looked away and ran her tongue along her teeth, trying to will her face to stop feeling hot and surely red, too.

He just laughed a little as he got settled into the couch, and as though it were perfectly natural, his arm wrapped around the front of her body and encompassed her shoulder and her collarbone. She leaned into him a little more, her foot stopping its throbbing now that it was elevated and had some pain medicine helping it.

"You should get some sleep," he said, "I'm not sure what tonight will entail."

She ran her tongue along her bottom lip again, still stuck on her thoughts about him taking charge.

Surely the pain medicine is to blame, she thought as she felt a warmth spreading through her body. And surely it's to blame about me thinking—stop, no. Don't think about that anymore.

But how could she realistically stop herself from thinking about the way he takes charge? About the way he picks her up in his arms as though she's featherlight? About how he's done everything for her that he possibly could, waiting on her hand and foot, literally, and helping her with her crutches and up the steps? How could she not think about what the night could entail, thinking about him holding her in his arms in a bed again?

"I desperately need a shower," she said, hoping to counter some of her romantic thoughts by thinking about how dirty she probably was. She couldn't say for sure, but she was almost positive she smelled by this point.

He sat up a little and looked down at her over her head, "Do you want to?" he asked, "I can draw a bath for you."

She swallowed thick, looking down over her body. "I haven't showered since—" she stopped, thinking about the last time she showered in her little London apartment the morning she was kidnapped. She twisted her lips to the side, "I mean, Jordan gave me a sponge bath," she added, feeling a short rush of embarrassment.

He huffed a laugh, "I haven't showered in, like, three days," he admitted, rubbing her shoulder. "Come on, I'll draw you a bath," he said, moving so that she was no longer wrapped up in his chest. She looked at him as he got up, watching him walk away from her, and her breath caught in her throat.

She bit down on her lip, wondering how much pain medicine she'd have to take to be bold enough to tell him she would rather him just hold her in the bathtub and take charge of her just as he has for the last few days.