"Stop that," Jazz whispered, miraculously looking none the worse for wear, despite everything that the two of them had been through in the past few days. "We'll get stopped by Customs if you don't let go of my hand."

"I don't care," Adam whispered back, a curious half-smile tracing his lips. He had no intention of letting go of his lover. Not now. Not ever. It might make things difficult, but that was a chance he was willing to take.

"Besides," Adam continued, "they've seen worse."

"Thanks," Jazz replied dryly. "I'm sure I've looked better, but then again, I've never been dead before."

He was kidding. Adam had to know that, but the stricken look on his face made Jazz wish he could take back every word.

"I'm sorry—"

Adam shook his head vehemently. "No, no, it's okay. It's just—"

"I know," Jazz said softly, cupping a slender hand under Adam's chin. He was trembling. Inside. It didn't show anywhere else. Except his eyes. His dark, dark eyes that now seemed almost black.

"We should talk about this," Jazz said, noting the way Adam unconsciously leaned against his hand.

Adam nodded, as if he didn't trust himself to speak. "Yeah," he finally said aloud, his voice inexplicably hoarse. "Not now, though." He glanced around almost nervously, his gaze finding what he was searching for a few seconds later. His father was standing a discreet distance away from them, ostensibly absorbed in studying their plane tickets. It was late, the middle of the night actually, and the cold glare of the fluorescent light stripped away his protective coloring, and Adam abruptly realized that he wasn't the only one so desperately affected by what happened.

"Dad," Adam called, his voice never rising above what passed for background noise in the airport.

The fact that Michael heard him told Adam what he had always suspected. His father wasn't cool and unfeeling. That was a persona he adopted in order to survive. It had served him well all those years ago…but at what cost?

"You okay?" Michael asked huskily.

Adam squeezed his lover's hand gently. "Yeah. You?"

"Yeah."

That was all they needed to say. What passed between them didn't require words.

"What do you mean we lost them?"

The comm op resisted the urge to flinch. Margaret could be so…unpredictable. "Just that, ma'am. We haven't been able to contact Carlos or Gabriel since—"

"Carlos went dark. I know that. But I gave Gabriel specific orders to relay Carlos' position when he found him," the head of Section One said frostily. "He wouldn't defy me. He wouldn't dare."

Waves of cold broke over his head and the comm op thought, not for the first time, that he was glad it wasn't aimed at *him*. Still, that didn't mean that he enjoyed being in the line of fire.

"What are you doing to re-establish contact?" she demanded.

"Um…" He thought fast. How could he possibly explain that he had no intention of looking for either of them? They'd only done what everyone else here dreamed of doing. Escape. He sympathized with them, but he knew he wasn't strong enough to withstand Margaret or the inevitable White Room. He wasn't the type to sacrifice himself. He wasn't brave. He was just a lowly comm op…

…who happened to know where Carlos and Gabriel were.

He sighed. Everyone had to die sometime. It would need to be soon, though. Because he was taking their secret with him.

The trip home was uneventful. Yet no one slept.

Jazz was curled around Adam as much as possible, given the confining nature of airplane seating. Adam's eyes were half-open, his fingers restlessly kneading the back of Jazz' neck.

"You gave up everything," Adam murmured.

"*That* wasn't everything," Jazz whispered.

"Your dreams then."

"Nope, not even."

"But—"

Jazz turned his face up and blinked sleepily at his lover. "As long as I've got you, I don't feel like I gave up a thing." A shy smile crept across Jazz' sensual mouth that made Adam want to kiss him senseless. "Anyway, I can always make *new* dreams."

"You sure?"

Jazz nodded without speaking, seemingly mesmerized by the slow descent of Adam's mouth.

"Someone'll see," Jazz hissed.

"I don't care," Adam declared, claiming what was rightfully his.

Across the aisle, Michael buried his nose a little deeper into his newspaper and smiled.

"Wake up!"

"Wake up?" Smoke rolled over onto his stomach and aimed his pillow at his mate. "I dunno if you noticed or not, but it's the middle of the night, Jamie!"

James traced a finger down the rigid outline that was Smoke's spine, hesitating only when he came to his well-muscled buttocks. Smoke glared at him for an angry second or two before pushing James' hand away. "And that won't work either! I'm…I'm immune…to your charms!"

James fell back onto his side of the bed, sputtering with laughter. "My what? Where on earth did you get that? In one of your romance novels?"

"I told you, I was only reading them for a paper! When are you going to forget about that?"

"Probably never, Pete." James folded his arms behind his head and smiled enigmatically. "Don't you want to know why I woke you up?"

"No," Smoke grumbled into his pillow. "I know why…and I'm too fucking tired."

"Not for this, you're not."

Smoke groaned dramatically and flipped onto his back, twisting the bed linens in a way that James would have found seductive under other circumstances. "Okay, get it over with. Then I'm going to kill you and hide the body so I can go back to sleep."

James chuckled. "You've been spending too much time with Declan again."

"Have not."

"Have too."

"All right. Do it. Please."

"Are you begging me, Pete?"

When Smoke sighed, James took pity on him. "I just had a phone call."

"I'm very happy for you."

"Which, I might add, you slept through."

"There's a real good reason for that, Jamie," Smoke said pointedly.

"Don't you want to know who it was?"

"A wrong number?" Smoke asked hopefully.

"No." James paused for effect. "It was Adam."

Now he had Smoke's undivided attention. "Adam? Why? Did something go wrong? Is Jazz okay?"

"He's okay, Pete. He's okay. They're all okay."

Smoke clenched his eyes shut, and James moved closer, his protective instincts automatically taking over the baser ones. "I mean it, Pete. He's okay."

Smoke opened one eye and peered cautiously at James. "You wouldn't lie to me? Cause you think I can't take it?"

James shook his head somberly. "I would never lie to you, Pete. Not about anything. But especially not this."

"Good." That seemed to satisfy Smoke, albeit temporarily, and James relaxed against him.

"He's coming home."

"But what about his internship?"

"He'll find something else, Pete. Hopefully something closer to—"

"Us?"

James rolled his eyes and playfully swatted Smoke's shoulder. "I was going to say his family—"

"That's us," Smoke insisted.

James lowered his head to Smoke's neck and buried his face in his long black hair. "You're right."

Smoke pressed a kiss to James' ear, yelping in surprise when James suddenly wrenched him into his arms. "And now I can have my evil way with you!"

"Not so much. Not when you tell me beautiful things like my son is coming home in one piece."

James stared at him for a long moment before kissing him, the unexpected tenderness catching both of them off-guard. "I do love you, you know."

"Now that…is something I never forget."

"You disobeyed a direct order."

Carlos' eyes flickered so minutely, it was nearly imperceptible. But Gabriel was standing close enough that he could feel the faint ripple of unease that passed through his lover's body. They should have run. They should have taken off and never looked back.

They meant to.

Gabriel tried not to look at the body of the dead op who had struggled valiantly to keep their secret. He hoped he died quickly, but he knew better. Margaret was relentless…and she would never give up once she scented blood.

Carlos gave Margaret a mild look that implied she was wasting her time. Margaret raised one eyebrow and studied Carlos. He was undeniably her best operative. She would hate to liquidate an asset like him. But she was uncomfortable with Carlos operating outside her control.

"You're not afraid of me."

It wasn't a question but a statement. Still there was a hint of disbelief in Margaret's voice as if she couldn't reconcile such foolishness with what she knew about Carlos. He wasn't a sentimental man. That was one of his strengths.

But lately…that had changed.

"You don't care if you die?" she challenged.

"We are always ready to die. Isn't that the nature of our work?"

Gabriel couldn't help but glance surreptitiously at his lover. What was he doing? Pushing Margaret wasn't wise. There was every chance that they wouldn't survive the encounter, but he refused to think beyond the moment to a time when they might not exist.

Margaret cocked her head and narrowed her gaze. At the same time, she brought up her gun hand. "Are you so eager to meet your death?"

Carlos forced himself not to blink in the face of her almost reptilian smile. "If you're going to shoot me, shoot me," he said matter-of-factly. He couldn't look at Gabriel. He didn't dare.

"Should I put my hands up?"

"You care too little about yourself," Margaret ventured. "But perhaps too much about…" She gestured at Gabriel with the gun, and it was all he could do not to flinch.

"Tell me where Michael Samuelle is," she demanded.

"Never heard of him."

"Tell me…or Gabriel dies," she said quietly. Somehow the softness of her tone made her blatant attempt at intimidation seem more obscene.

"Are those my only choices?"

"Yes."

Carlos looked lost in thought for several seconds, and Gabriel wondered if he had a plan. Then his dark eyes regained their focus and trained themselves on him. Without thinking, Gabriel took a step back, only to find the wall behind him.

"Forgive me, caro," Carlos whispered, drawing his own gun.

Gabriel closed his eyes. He couldn't help but think that he was going to a better place.

He had no memory of the actual escape. There was only the inexorable pull of the deepest grief he'd ever known. If it had been up to him, Carlos would have stayed where he was and pulled the trigger on himself as well.

But someone had to warn Michael.

Section was coming.

The last thing Michael expected to hear in the middle of the night was the sound of his cell phone.

His first thought was that one of the kids was in trouble. That made his heart race in a distinctly uncharacteristic manner. "Adam," he murmured to himself, all traces of sleep suddenly gone.

Nikita moved restlessly on her side of the bed, and Michael realized that she could sense his tension. Even deeply asleep. He flipped open the phone and said huskily, "Are you okay?"

But the voice that greeted him on the other end wasn't his son's. "No," the younger man replied. "I'm not okay." His voice broke, and that, more than anything else, scared Michael.

This wasn't a man who gave in to his fears. This was a rugged field-trained agent who could rival Michael when it came to being cool and detached.

"Carlos?"

"Meet me outside."

"Car—"

"No names," the other man hissed. "Outside. Now."

Michael didn't need to be told twice. Although he had been out of the field for several years, he felt his well-honed instincts kick into overdrive.

If it hadn't been for the glowing tip of his cigarette, Michael might have missed Carlos standing there in the dark. "What's wrong?" he queried tersely. Something had to be wrong. Carlos would never have come otherwise.

Suddenly Michael realized that the younger man was alone. He frowned into the darkness and asked, "Where's Gabriel?"

There was no answer save for a choked sound.

"Is he all—"

"He's dead," Carlos whispered, his eyes stinging with unaccustomed moisture.

"How?"

"I k-killed him." Michael heard the quaver in Carlos' voice and realized that he was dangerously close to falling apart. Which, for a field op, was completely unheard of.

"Why?"

Carlos struggled with words that seemed totally inadequate to explain what he'd done, and when he was finished, he broke out in a cold sweat. "She would have t-tortured him. I-I couldn't let her hurt him like that."

"So you killed him," Michael echoed.

"Yes."

It had been years since Michael left Section One, but he knew what it was like to have no choice. "Quick and painless," he said.

Carlos nodded, his cigarette dangling precariously from shaky fingers.

"You got out," Michael said, letting his implied question hang there for a few seconds before he continued. "You couldn't take him with you?"

"I never meant to leave," Carlos confessed. "I wanted to stay and finish the job…but she stopped me."

Michael nodded. "So you could take her to me?" Michael said in clipped tones that betrayed little of his escalating agitation.

"No! I came to warn you—"

"How do you know you weren't followed?"

"I didn't bring them here," Carlos snapped. "But they're not stupid. You've got to get out. Split up. Head in different directions. Right now, there's no safety in numbers. If you stay together, that's how you'll die."

"You're serious," Michael said.

"Yes."

"But I've got children—"

"Do you want them to live?" Carlos grabbed Michael by the shoulders, as if he wanted to shake him, and then, just as suddenly, his hands fell away.

Carlos laughed harshly and strained to light another cigarette. "Don't tell me where you're going. What I don't know, I can't tell anyone."

"What about you?"

"I'm going to take out as many as I can," Carlos said, slamming a fresh clip into his gun.

"You'll die—"

"I know."

Michael shook his head and started to walk away before abruptly turning back. "Thank you."

There was no reply. Carlos had already disappeared.