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The Sentinel

"The Demons Within Us"
by Rushlight

Blair slid one eye half-open and shivered lightly at the sensation of warm hands moving over the skin of his chest and arms. He smiled and buried his face deeper into the pillow under his head, stifling a soft sigh as his body relaxed into the delicious massage.

"Good morning," Jim's voice murmured in his ear, breath hot against the side of his young lover's neck. Blair shivered again, deeper this time, and half-turned inside the arms that enclosed him.

"Good morning yourself." He gave an appreciative grunt as Jim's fingers slid down over the edge of his hipbone, unconsciously rolling his hips forward into the touch. It always felt so *good* when Jim touched him, and waking up to the sensation was definitely his preferred way of starting the day. "What's the occasion?" he asked, voice thick with interrupted sleep but growing more alert with each second that passed.

"Like I need an excuse to want to touch you." There was a smile in the words. Jim's lips skimmed over the side of Blair's face, tongue dipping briefly into the concavity of his ear, as his hands started moving with more purpose over his lover's body.

Blair's breath was starting to shorten now, all vestiges of sleep forgotten. He gazed up into Jim's eyes and saw desire there, heat, a love that warmed him to the very heart of his being. Around them, morning sunlight streamed in through the clerestory windows, painting the room in a rich suffusion of color that seemed somehow ethereal, fantastical.

"I love you," he whispered, just before Jim swooped down to claim his mouth in a kiss.

Damn, Jim was hungry. Blair slid his arms up behind the other man's back, moaning his appreciation as Jim's tongue stroked deep into his mouth, tasting him, laying claim to him, and he had just enough mental capacity left to be grateful for the fact that morning breath didn't seem to be having any impact on his lover's libido at all. He could feel Jim's heart pounding inside his chest as their bodies pressed together, and he twined his legs around Jim's thighs, locking his ankles together as Jim's hard heat surged forward against him, making him throw his head back in an abrupt desire for air as a jolt of pure pleasure arced through his body.

"God, Jim," he panted, nuzzling into the other man's neck and dragging his tongue across the sweat-slickened skin there. The low growl that Jim made in response rumbled up through his tongue and into his head, making him dizzy with the force of his own heightened arousal. Blair sank his teeth into the hard knot of muscle at Jim's shoulder and keened softly, scrabbling at the other man's back as the pleasure burned through him. "Jim, I ...

I'm ... oh, god ... *Jim*..."

"Come on, baby," Jim encouraged, his voice dropping to a hoarse whisper, winding his fingers deep into the tangled curls of the younger man's hair. He pressed a kiss to Blair's shoulder, spreading one large hand across his ass and pulling their bodies more tightly together, grinding his hips forward against Blair's trembling body. His own body was shaking fiercely, adding to the friction between them, and Blair spent one breathless moment being amazed that he could incite his lover to this degree of primal want, primal *need*, before the crest of his pleasure slammed into him with near debilitating force and sent him over the precipice, screaming Jim's name in unconstrained joy.

A few moments later, he peeled open one groggy eye and saw Jim's head lying on the pillow beside him, his expression lax and sated, eyes soft and warm with satisfied contentment as they trailed over his face. Blair shifted slightly against the sticky sheets and trailed the backs of his fingers down the other man's spine, drawing out a subdued shiver.

"Good morning to you, too," he said with a smile, well aware of the self-satisfied purr that threaded through the words.

Jim leaned forward to kiss him lightly on the tip of the nose, grinning. "Happy first day of vacation, lover."

Blair chuckled, taking a moment to stretch luxuriously before replying, "How much time do we have?"

"About an hour. I want to be on the road by seven to beat the traffic heading up to the mountains."

"Fair enough." Blair glanced down at his chest and trailed a finger through the viscous white mess that had pooled over his abdomen. Absently, he raised the finger to his mouth and sucked the tip of it clean, inwardly grinning as Jim's arms tensed around him in response. "I do believe that a shower is in order then."

"Tease," Jim growled affectionately, tugging shortly with the fingers that were still twined in the younger man's hair. His eyes snapped with tolerant amusement as he leaned in to steal another kiss, probing lazily with his tongue to share the combined taste of themselves that Blair had just offered him.

A short time later, Blair found himself cleaned and dressed and standing in the front room of the loft, gazing around speculatively as he tried to decide if they'd forgotten to pack anything. It wasn't often that he and Jim had an entire weekend to get away from the trappings of civilization and lose themselves in the semi-rough wilderness of the Cascade Mountains.

It was something he had been looking forward to all week, and he was determined that nothing would get in the way of their well- earned vacation.

"I think that's it." Jim came into the room from the direction of the bathroom hallway, carrying a small travel bag slung over one shoulder. Everything else had already been loaded into the truck last night, which left them with little else to do but double check their inventory and then take off for parts unknown.

"From your mouth to God's ear, man." Finally satisfied that nothing of dire importance was being left behind, Blair allowed himself to be herded out of the apartment. "I seem to remember a minor debacle a couple of months back where *someone* forgot to bring the map and ended up getting us lost in the middle of a freaking *blizzard*..."

"And I seem to remember someone getting us lost in the middle of nowhere even *with* a map." Jim's tone was teasing. "I'd think you'd be more forgiving of my occasional shortcomings, Darwin."

"Cutesy nicknames will get you nowhere, my friend," Blair retorted, leaning in to steal a quick kiss before they pushed open the front doors of the apartment building to make their way out onto the street. He grinned wickedly. "You might as well accept the fact that you're never going to live that down."

Jim laughed, relaxing easily into the banter between them. "Easy for you to say. You're not the one who has such a sterling reputation to uphold..." He trailed off distractedly, frowning.

Blair glanced up at him curiously, wondering what had caught his eye. "What is it, man?" he prompted when Jim didn't say anything further.

Jim looked incredulous. "Do you see that woman over there? With the dog? I'd swear I know her."

Blair followed his gaze to see a young woman maybe a few years older than he was crouched by the edge of the sidewalk about twenty yards away, petting one of the neighborhood strays. It was hard to tell much of anything about her at this distance. "Former girlfriend?" he teased, and was caught off guard when Jim didn't reply.

He followed when Jim moved to approach her, his curiosity piqued.

Jim's reaction was hard to judge; part of him seemed guarded about the whole idea of meeting this mystery woman, even though he seemed honestly happy to see her. Thoughtfully, Blair narrowed his attention in on her.

If he said she was 5'2", that would be granting her an inch or so. She looked kind of nondescript, actually, in faded blue jeans and an oversized red flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up over her wrists. Her hair was long and brown and pulled back in a loose ponytail over the backs of her shoulders. There was a bit of a knocked-around air to her that seemed to belie her youth, which made Blair hesitate to classify her as one of the students from the nearby university, even though that was the first thought that flashed through his mind.

"My god," Jim breathed, in a voice that could almost be described as reverent. He slowed as they approached the edge of the parking lot, his brow furrowing in undisguised amazement. "What the hell are you doing here?"

The woman smiled up at him from where she crouched by the curb, shading her eyes from the sun with one hand. "It's nice to see you again, too, Ellison." There was a soft lilt of humor in her voice.

Jim seemed to shake himself out of the shock that had fallen over him and glanced at Blair, a self-conscious smile spreading across his face. "God, I'm sorry. Blair, this is Jeri Buchannan. We served together in Albania about twelve years ago. Jeri, this is my partner, Blair Sandburg. He's a civilian observer with the police department."

"Pleased to meet you," Jeri said, reaching out to shake Blair's hand and using the proffered limb to help pull her to her feet. She seemed even smaller up close than she had from a distance, if that was possible.

"You, too." Blair smiled in private amusement as she stood up beside him. Despite appearances, this woman seemed to be a very forceful individual. He wondered how much of that stemmed from overcompensation for her diminutive stature. It was something that he could readily identify with.

"I'm not interrupting anything, am I?" she asked, casting a curious glance at Jim. "I was just getting ready to go up and see if you were in this morning. I'd love it if we could sit and talk about old times for a while. I'm not going to be in town for that long, and it would be nice to catch up a bit, don't you think?"

"We were planning on heading up to the mountains for the weekend," Jim replied, casting an apologetic glance at Blair, "but I'm sure it wouldn't matter if we postponed for a little while."

"No, of course not." Blair smiled to show that he wasn't upset by the delay in their plans, surprised to find that he truly didn't mind; it wasn't every day that he got the chance to spend time with one of Jim's old Army acquaintances. He knew so little about Jim's past before they'd met, and he couldn't help feeling that Jim had been a completely different person back then. "You were in the Army with Jim, then?"

Jeri gave the brown dog at her feet a farewell pat before moving to follow him back toward 852 Prospect. "Yeah, for about two years." She shoved her hands into the pockets of her jeans and smiled up at him, the strands of hair that had fallen loose from her ponytail drifting idly around her face in the wind. "Jim was running recon for our support unit during the fallout at Elbasan.

What was supposed to be a routine sweep turned into a full-scale invasion. Took the better part of nineteen months to put out the flames."

"I remember." Jim's voice was grim. "Talk about your textbook case of too many cooks spoiling the broth. We never should have *been* at Elbasan."

"Ah, but think of the fun we had." The grin that she turned up at him was impish. "And I do believe that *someone* got a promotion out of the whole fiasco."

Jim laughed. "Well, if you don't take advantage of the opportunities that are presented to you..." He pushed open the door of the apartment building and gestured for her and Blair to precede him inside.

Blair was enthralled by this glimpse into Jim's past. Jim never talked about his time in the Army -- not really -- and Blair was surprised to learn how very hungry he was for knowledge about the man that Jim had once been. He listened avidly to the conversation as it wound its way from Elbasan to the Middle East crisis to the state of officer competence in the military, not wanting to miss a word of it.

"Anyone want iced tea?" he offered once they reached the apartment.

"Sure," Jeri said, smiling, and moved to take a seat at the kitchen table.

Blair moved toward the refrigerator to fetch the pitcher of tea, keeping a discreet eye on Jeri as he did so. Jeri's gaze swept cursorily over the apartment as she settled down into the chair at the far side of the table.

"So, you two are roommates as well as partners?" she commented. "You must get along really well for a partnership like that to work."

"Yeah," Jim answered, looking up from where he was rummaging around in the cupboard for glasses. "We do." He cast a subdued look at Blair and smiled slightly, and Blair couldn't help but grin in response.

A few moments later, he and Blair were joining Jeri at the table, iced teas in hand. "Are you still with military intelligence?" Jim asked, handing Jeri her glass.

Jeri snorted indelicately, accepting the glass with a nod of acknowledgment and running a finger lightly along the rim as she leaned back in her chair. "Hell, no. All the action's closer to home, these days."

Jim quirked an eyebrow in question. "FBI?" he guessed.

That earned him a full-scale laugh. "Can you honestly see me in law enforcement? Eating donuts and Chinese take-out all day long, hanging out at the gym pretending to get buff, bowing to the commissioner's political agenda and all that crap." She glanced apologetically at Blair. "Present company excluded, of course."

Blair smiled, knowing an affectionate tease when he heard one. "Of course." Nevertheless, he couldn't help being a little off- put by her casual slight against law enforcement personnel. Jim, however, didn't seem at all surprised by the comment.

"CIA," Jim said then, and Jeri smiled.

Blair stared at her. "You're a *spook*?"

"Special operative," she corrected archly, and Blair laughed. She grinned at him. "You seem surprised."

"Well, you just don't seem the type, I guess."

"And how many CIA agents have you met?" She seemed honestly interested.

Blair cast a sideways glance at Jim. "Only one. But it was a ... unique experience."

Jeri leaned back in her chair, drumming her fingers against the tabletop, but despite the casual posture, Blair had to wonder if she already knew about Brackett and the attempted theft of the AVCX. She *was* CIA, after all. "You have been a busy boy, haven't you, Jimmy?" she teased, sounding nonchalant.

"No more than you, I'll bet." Jim took a long sip of his iced tea and then abruptly dropped the casual air. "It's great to see you, Jeri, but really -- what are you doing here? Twelve years, and you just pop up out of the woodwork? And at my front door, no less. You've been keeping tabs on me."

Something in Jeri's eyes darkened at that. "Ah, yes. Well, that would take a bit of explaining." She chewed at her bottom lip, looking suddenly uncertain. Something in her expression made Blair shift in his chair uneasily as he realized that this wasn't just a social visit. "There is something that I was hoping to talk to you about."

Her gaze moved to Blair, and Blair frowned as he realized that she wanted to talk to Jim alone. He stiffened reflexively, but before he could say anything, Jim cut in with, "Whatever you have to say to me, you can say in front of Blair." The tone of his voice left no room for objection, and Blair glanced at him gratefully.

Jeri hesitated for a long moment, but Jim held her gaze evenly, refusing to back down. Finally, she gave in with a small sigh. "Have you ever heard of E-3T?" she asked, her eyes drifting back and forth between them.

Blair shook his head, glancing sideways at Jim. Jim's expression was similarly perplexed. "No," he said. "Should we have?"

Jeri sighed again. "It's an experimental retrovirus that was recently developed at the internal virology lab at Quantico. One of the deadliest neurotoxins on the face of the planet, and believe me, that's saying a lot these days. Makes Ebola look like a summer cold." The expression on her face was one of extreme distaste. "There's a bit of genetic programming encoded into the head of each viral capsule that alternates the type of protein coat each progressive generation of the retrovirus forms, making it absolutely impossible to immunize against. Once a human body is infected, there is an acute onset of symptoms that culminates in death. Average life expectancy after introduction of the toxin into a host is less than three minutes."

Blair raised the back of his hand to his mouth without thinking, utterly horrified by the dispassionate account. Jim frowned, staring at Jeri with narrowed eyes. "Cut to the chase, Buchannan."

Jeri paused before continuing. "Four days ago, the retrovirus was stolen from the high security compound where it was being held for transport to Iraq. An international terrorist organization calling themselves Solomon's Vengeance has claimed responsibility for the theft. They're threatening to unload the retrovirus onto an undisclosed location within the U.S. if we do not release several high-profile political prisoners that have recently been taken into U.S. custody. They've given our government exactly three days to comply with their demands." She hesitated. "One of those days is already over."

Blair stared at her in disbelief, feeling numb. His heartbeat seemed to have jumped immediately into triple digits at this unexpected revelation. "Well, aren't they *doing* anything?" he demanded, looking to Jim for reassurance. "Do we know where they're planning to release the toxin? Is the government going to release the prisoners?"

Beside him, Jim's expression was growing progressively darker as each moment passed. "I'd guess they aren't planning on releasing anyone," he said, his voice even.

Jeri smiled tightly. "You know the game, Jim. Uncle Sam doesn't bow well to blackmail."

"So why are you telling us this?" Blair's heart was still racing, but Jim's fingers touched his knee lightly under the table, soothing him slightly. He glanced from Jeri to Jim and then back again, feeling lost. "You can't just be sharing this information with everyone on the street. What do you want Jim to do about it?"

Jeri leaned back in her chair again, pausing a moment to take a sip from her glass of iced tea. "To be perfectly frank, I don't agree with the stance that my superiors have taken on this. They're just as frightened that word of the retrovirus will leak out into public awareness as they are that the damned thing will be used against us. They don't want to do *anything* that might implicate them in any way."

"Implicate them?" Blair latched onto the phrase, feeling an uncomfortable tightening in his stomach. "Implicate them in what?"

Jim's hand on his knee tightened, but his gaze did not move away from Jeri's. "I think she's talking about biological warfare, Chief."

"Don't be naive, Jim." Jeri's tone was sharp. "Of course I'm talking about biological warfare. You think that something like this gets developed by accident?"

"Oh, my god." Blair sank back in his chair, gripping the edge of the table as he tried to process everything she was telling them.

"Do you have any idea what you're saying?"

"Yeah." Jeri looked grim. "Our government's been playing in areas it shouldn't have, and now someone's gone ahead and dropped the ball. There are those who might say that this is a perfect example of poetic justice."

"So where does that leave us?" Jim's voice was calm, even though

Blair could feel the nervous tightening of the fingers on his thigh. "What do you expect me to do about this? It isn't exactly in our jurisdiction."

Jeri hesitated before answering. "What would you think if I told you that there is someone presently in U.S. custody who worked closely with the Solomon's Vengeance group, and knew about their plans for stealing the retrovirus?" she asked at last. Her gaze swept over them each in turn. "Someone who may very well know not only what the target city is going to be, but where the retrovirus is being kept?"

Jim frowned. "Being held where?"

Jeri gave a tight shrug of her shoulders, looking frustrated. "Presently he's being held by No Such Agency, but--"

"Wait, wait, wait. Wait a minute." Blair stared at her.

"You're talking about the NSA, aren't you?"

She nodded, a line of irritation appearing between her brows. "Pompous utilitarian assholes. The prisoner's name is Justin Denney. He's worked for our government for the past fifteen years, and it only came out recently that he's been playing both sides of the fence."

"Shit," Jim muttered, looking disgusted.

"What?" Blair turned to look at him, feeling lost again. "What does that mean? He's been selling information to someone else?"

"It means he's never going to see the inside of a jail cell, Chief." Jim rubbed a hand over his eyes, sighing heavily. "Right now he's going to be bartering every piece of information he's learned about our 'adversaries' in exchange for his freedom and protection, and probably for a nice little strip of beach down in the Cayman Islands besides."

Blair was unimpressed. "So what? Why the hell aren't they questioning this guy?"

"It's a 'jurisdictional' matter." Jeri said the word like it left a bad taste in her mouth. "My people don't want the NSA to know that they dropped the ball on the retrovirus, and the NSA isn't about to give up their new golden boy without a damned good reason. It's all *politics* where I come from." She glanced away sharply, clearly upset by this. "And meanwhile, there's a neurotoxin out there being prepped for release into some unsuspecting city of the United States, and our boys are sitting on their asses waiting for someone to start cooperating with them, or for hell to freeze over, whichever comes first. This entire situation is deteriorating rapidly, and the only outcome I can see is that the terrorists are going to end up releasing the toxin and killing about a quarter of a million people."

******

"So what do you expect us to do about it?" Blair tapped his fingers over the tabletop nervously, trying to contain the fear that surged through him. "I mean, we're not trained in counterterrorism. At least *I'm* not." He glanced at Jim. "I'll be the first to admit that this is the stuff that nightmares are made of, but why exactly did you come to Jim about it?"

For the first time since he had met her, Jeri looked apprehensive. She paused for the barest of moments before answering, her gaze sliding back to Jim. "With my contacts," she said slowly, as if gathering her thoughts, "I can get into the holding pen where they're keeping Denney and have him released into my custody." She raised a hand sharply to halt Jim when he leaned forward to protest. "It'll be tricky, but it can be done.

With all the interdepartmental red tape that these things have to go through, it'll be at least a few hours before they realize that the orders were faked. And by then, Denney and I'll be long gone."

"*Fuck*, Jeri." Jim smoothed a hand back over his hair, leaning back tensely. "You do know what you're saying, don't you?"

She nodded. "I'm not conceited enough to think that I can handle an operation like this on my own. And there's no one in my department that I know I can trust. I need your help, Jim. I *know* you feel the same way as I do; we can't just let things keep escalating. This is *serious shit* here, and those bastards in charge aren't doing anything about it."

"I think you're underestimating their stake in the matter," Jim retorted, unconvinced.

"Maybe, but think of it -- with this one act, we can ferret out the bad guys, find out where the toxin is being kept, and save the day. The CIA's hands are kept clean, and we return Denney to the NSA when we're finished with him. Everyone wins, Jim. And no one dies."

Jim looked troubled. "I appreciate what you're trying to do here, Buchannan. Really I do. But they call this *treason* in some parts of the world, you know?"

"I'm the only one who'll be at risk. I swear to you, Jim." She leaned forward across the table earnestly. "No one will ever know that you were involved. I'll be the one to go in and present the papers to release Denney. I just need you to be my back-up, in case something goes wrong. We'll snatch Denney, pull him back to a safe location, question him, and turn the information over to my boss. Then Denney goes back to the NSA, and I'll deal with whatever fallout there is. *No one* will know you were even involved."

"Except Denney," Blair remarked, not sure if he was horrified or fascinated by the idea she was proposing.

"No, he won't." She was adamant on this point. "We'll make sure of that. I'm the only one who will come into contact with him. Jim won't even have to *do* anything, if everything goes the way I've planned it. I just want someone to back me up in case something *does* go wrong."

"First rule of covert operations," Jim mused. "Never go into an inflammatory situation without sufficient back-up." He let out a heavy breath and turned to look out the windows over the balcony.

"Look, do you think you could take a walk, or something? I need to talk to Blair alone for a while."

Jeri nodded, pushing back away from the table. "Sure, Jim." She glanced at the clock on the wall. "There's a plane leaving for San Francisco in about two hours. That's where Denney's being held. I figure we can go and have him in our custody by nightfall. I have all the necessary paperwork set up; all we have to do is go down there and grab the bastard."

On this note, she left them alone, closing the door softly behind her. Blair sat staring down at the surface of the table for a long moment, feeling the anxiety being transmitted through the hand on his knee thrum through him.

"You're going to do it, aren't you?" he said at last.

Jim sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. "Jeri's always been a bit ... overzealous. But her heart's in the right place, Blair. And I've never worked with anyone who's better at covert ops. If she says that the situation is as bad as this, then it is."

"So what do we do, then? Go down to San Francisco and babysit her while she pulls this off? That's all she's asking us to do, right?"

Jim turned back to look at him then, his brow tightening. "She hasn't asked *us* to do anything, Blair. This is way beyond the call of duty for you. There's no way I'm letting you come anywhere near this."

Blair tensed, fighting back an irrational surge of anger as he reminded himself that this was only Jim behaving at his stubborn and overprotective best. "Forget it," he said evenly, curtailing the argument by simply refusing to acknowledge it. "I'm coming. If you decide to go, that is. And if you try to make me stay behind, I'll buy my own ticket and get on that plane right behind you. Unless, of course, you plan on leaving me chained to the bedpost or something."

Jim looked exasperated. "This isn't a *game*, Sandburg..."

"Don't you think I know that?" He was getting truly irritated now. "If you think I'm going to let you wander off and go up against the NSA and the CIA and god knows who else, without bringing me along to back *you* up, then you really are insane, Jim. Don't you think the whole idea of this scares the shit out of me? What if you zone out and I'm not there to help you? What

if something happens and you lose control of your senses? Do you think I'm going to be able to live with myself if something goes wrong and I wasn't there?"

Jim held his gaze for a long moment, and Blair counted off the seconds by the rapid pounding of his heart. Then Jim let out his breath in a long sigh, stroking deeply with his fingers into Blair's thigh. "Have I ever told you how much I love you?" he said with a wry smile.

Blair grinned. "I suppose you may have mentioned it, once or twice."

Jim sighed heavily. "So you're going to come whether I allow you to or not." He sounded less than pleased by this, but it seemed to ease some of the tension in him.

"Yes." Blair put his hand on top of Jim's and twined their fingers together. "So are we going to do this?"

"I think we have to." He frowned, obviously wishing there was another answer. "If you really think you're ready for it."

Blair nodded, smiling slightly to mask how utterly terrified he felt. "I'd say the camping trip is off, then," he said, with forced levity.

Without warning Jim leaned in and kissed him suddenly, forcefully, on the lips. Blair rocked forward into the contact, sliding one hand up to cup at the back of the other man's neck, overcome by the suddenness of the sensual onslaught.

"I love you," Jim said as he pulled away, and there was a depth of emotion in the words that seared into Blair's soul. The look in Jim's eyes was sweltering. "Promise me that you'll do exactly what I tell you to. *Everything* I tell you to. I mean it, Blair. I have a really bad feeling about this entire fucking situation."

Blair nodded shakily, disturbed by the portent of the words. "Sure, Jim," he said, feeling off-kilter and apprehensive and completely out of his element suddenly. He squeezed Jim's hand and met his gaze evenly, determined to show his support in spite of all of that. There was, after all, no question that he could remain behind.

"I promise."

********

Jeri was less than pleased about Jim's decision to bring Blair along, but said she would meet them at the airport in an hour when they tracked her downstairs to tell her their decision. After she left, Blair went up to the loft again with Jim to pack a light overnight bag for the trip. The packing was done with a minimum of conversation, although Blair did notice that Jim seemed to be touching him even more than usual. It was comforting, actually, and served to help keep his own rampaging nerves in line. By the time they were ready to leave, he still wasn't sure whether the touches were being bestowed for his benefit or for Jim's.

They met at the airport right on schedule, and Blair was surprised to see that Jeri had changed into a sharp navy pantsuit. She held a dark brown attaché case in one hand, and she looked every inch the polished professional. There was nothing that overtly screamed "CIA operative" about her, but still he found it mildly amusing to note how much easier she seemed to fit into the stereotype now that she had dressed the part.

The plane ride to San Francisco was blessedly short, and Blair spent the entirety of it wondering what the *hell* kind of past Jim had that could make him look so fucking calm about all of this. The plane landed without mishap, and while Blair was half- expecting the terminal to be swarming with men in black waiting to apprehend them, he saw nothing but the usual Saturday morning crowd of patrons waiting to catch their flights. He cast an uneasy glance at Jim as they made their way out into the bright, sunlit parking lot fronting the airport and was rewarded by a brief smile.

"Relax," Jim urged, reaching up behind Blair's neck and massaging heavily with his fingers. Blair immediately went limp under the soothing touch, his shoulders and arms drooping.

"I'm trying, Jim." It was an effort to string words together under the delicious kneading sensation of Jim's hand, as he fought the urge to close his eyes and burrow in against Jim's side. Shifting one shoulder slightly, he discreetly pleaded for a deeper stroke. "It's just that I've never actually done anything like this before, you know?"

"I know." Jim sounded sad. "I really wish you'd agreed to remain behind in Cascade."

"Uh-uh, man. Forget it." The indignation that flared up in him gave Blair the strength to lift his head and turn to glare at his stubbornly protective partner. "If you think I'm going to let you traipse off to do something like this without me to back you up, you *are* insane."

Jim chuckled dryly, although his eyes remained troubled. "Okay, I get it." A moment later, his expression sobered again. "Just remember to stay behind me and don't do anything unless I tell you to, okay?"

"I know, Jim. You're in charge here."

Any response that Jim might have made was cut off as Jeri appeared behind them, brandishing the keys of their newly procured rental car. "This way, gentlemen," she remarked brightly, and turned toward a distant corner of the lot where a fleet of cars bearing the Budget Rent-a-Car logo were tethered. "Our chariot awaits."

Jeri had no issues with turning over the keys to Jim, and she slid easily into the back seat of the relatively new Ford Taurus that the printed slip in her hands led them to while Jim and Blair clambered into the front. Blair couldn't help but wonder at the oddity of the moment as Jim started the car and slowly pulled out into the stream of traffic heading toward the entrance ramp of the freeway. This just seemed so *normal*, as if they weren't about to break about fifty billion federal laws, including such well-penalized crimes as treason and kidnapping, just to name a few.

The window beside him was halfway open, and even though Blair had his hair tied back in a severe ponytail, some recalcitrant strands had worked their way loose and were presently blowing about his face, disrupting his vision as he tried to focus on the road in front of them. He pushed them back with one hand absently, casting a brief glance at Jim where he sat beside him. Jim's eyes were focused unwaveringly on the road, his expression unreadable.

"It's not that far," Jeri remarked from the back seat, as if sensing Blair's unease. "Take the next exit into the Potrero Hill district."

Jim nodded without looking away from the street. Blair sighed and hunched in against the car door, trying to make himself comfortable. Jim had gone completely into "warrior-Jim" mode, which, while having its advantages in a combat situation, meant that Blair would be the odd man out until this entire ridiculous adventure was over. Not for the first time, it occurred to him how very oddly matched they were. He and Jim came from two entirely different worlds, and it never ceased to amaze him that they had managed to find such happiness together, that either one of them could put aside their differences long enough to actually admit that they loved the other. The thought made him smile slightly.

Not to mention that seeing Jim so intensely focused was doing interesting things to his libido. Blair shifted again, willing the growing warmth spreading underneath his skin and pooling in his groin to dissipate. It had to be a reaction to the adrenaline surging through his system, a classic response to a dangerous situation, and he'd be lying to himself if he said that it was the first time that it had happened to him. There was just something *primal* about Jim when he got this way, something raw, that made Blair's body completely disregard whatever danger it might currently be facing and beg for a friendly (or more than friendly) touch.

He supposed there could be a survival-based reason for such a response; everything in him felt ultra-sensitive right now, geared to react to the slightest stimulus. His vision was sharper, his hearing more acute, and he felt more in tune with the world around him. These would be definite advantages in a survival situation, and it was entirely possible that this reaction had developed after millennia of evolutionary advancement in the human species, meticulously cultivated through generation after generation as those with the prickliest libido survived, leaving their less horny brethren to die in the dust.

Or it could simply be that he'd grown accustomed to getting fucked senseless by Jim after engaging in life-threatening situations, and his body was just gearing up in anticipation of the event.

That actually seemed like the more likely explanation, come to think of it.

He was torn away from his thoughts when the car turned onto the exit ramp, moving smoothly out of traffic and onto the lesser- used streets that stretched into the residential districts of the city. Blair breathed in deeply, letting his gaze sweep over the hills that blurred by past his window, and thought about how very different the air tasted here than it did in Cascade. There was a metallic tang to it that he found innately distasteful, and he spent a frantic few moments longing for the sweet familiarity of home. An inexplicable feeling of dread moved over him as he watched the city move by around him; this was so far beyond anything that he and Jim had done before, and he couldn't help feeling that it could end in disaster for all of them.

"Stop when you come up onto the next ridge," Jeri instructed, leaning forward in her seat to peer over Jim's shoulder. She pointed at a tall, broad-based structure in the distance, whose walls were filled with a glittering array of windows that caught and reflected the sun. "That's the NSA building right there. It's unmarked -- I think it's being advertised as a Microsoft branch office. But that's where our boy is being held."

Blair stared at the far-off building, squinting against the afternoon sun. The building in question was nondescript, unremarkable, no different than the multitude of other office complexes that spread around it. But then, it wouldn't look any different, now would it? There were less than a dozen cars parked in the front lot, which didn't seem that unusual for a Saturday afternoon. He almost dared to hope that this might go off without a hitch, although he supposed he should know better. In his experience, nothing he and Jim did ever ended up going smoothly.

Just as the road reached the crest of the sharply inclined hill it was climbing, Jim pulled their car over to the side of the road. There was a dark, unmarked sedan with government plates parked in the lot of the grocery across the street, which had apparently been left here in wait for them. It made Blair feel somewhat better to know that everything had been meticulously planned before his and Jim's arrival -- as if that made them somehow less a part of everything that was going on.

From here, they had a clear view of the NSA building and its surrounding property, which was tucked into the far side of the shallow valley beneath them. Jeri opened the briefcase in her lap and pulled out a sheaf of papers, and Blair turned to see a plastic ID clip with a passport-sized snapshot of Jeri on it sitting on top of the pile. He just barely caught a glimpse of the letters "NSA" printed in bold red type before the badge was lost from view.

"It's not too late to back out of this," Jim said quietly, without taking his eyes from the building beneath them.

Jeri paused in her review of the forged authorizations to frown at him. "We don't have a choice, and you know it, Jim. All I need is for you to back me up if necessary; chances are, you won't even be called into play at all. This is too important to leave to chance."

Despite his misgivings, Blair had to admire the conviction in her voice. She truly believed that she was doing the right thing. He glanced at Jim and found the other man already looking at him.

The expression in his eyes was unreadable, and it bothered Blair that he didn't know what Jim was thinking right now.

Jeri spent a hurried few moments tying the long mass of her hair back into an efficient bun at the nape of her neck and then slid the papers on her lap back into the briefcase. "I'm going to take the sedan down and get Denney," she said, without a single indication that she was feeling at all stressed out by what she was about to do. Blair wondered if she *did* feel at all anxious, or if this was just old hat to her. The thought made him uneasy for reasons that he couldn't quite explain. "If everything goes well, you'll see me come out again with him, get in the car, and drive away. They should think I'm an NSA rep with orders to transport him to a more secure facility. If not, everything should go to hell fairly quickly. That's when I'll need you to step in, Jim."

"Got it," Jim said in a clipped tone that sent shivers racing down Blair's spine. God, didn't *either* of them realize that they were about to do something just a little bit dangerous?

"I've got a safehouse set up for us to take Denney to. 4951 Alameda Court, in Mission Terrace. If it turns out that I make it out of there with Denney, I'll come back this way and you can follow me there. Otherwise, we'll rendezvous at the safehouse if anything goes wrong. Blair should probably just play it safe and take the Taurus there at the first sign of trouble." She glanced at him. "There should be a map of the city in the glove compartment. I'd brush up on it while I'm driving down there, if I were you."

"Fuck that." Blair normally felt reticent about swearing in front of women, but there was something about Jeri that just made him want to start cussing out the universe at large. "I'm not going anywhere until I know Jim is safe. I'm staying with him."

Jeri frowned and glanced at Jim as if expecting him to object. Blair was relieved when Jim said nothing to refute his statement, although the older man's expression was admittedly far from happy with the situation.

"We'll play it by ear, then." Jeri sounded unconvinced, but was obviously unwilling to make an issue of it. "We'll just plan on meeting back at the safehouse with Denney, and then take it from there." She flashed Blair a tight smile that he supposed was meant to be encouraging. "Relax, Blair. Everything's going to be just fine."

With that, she opened the car door and slipped outside, carrying the briefcase with her. She waited for a few moments until there was an opening in the light afternoon traffic and then sprinted across the street toward the parked sedan.

"I have a very bad feeling about this," Blair remarked conversationally as she climbed into the car and proceeded to pull out into traffic, heading in the direction of the unmarked NSA building.

"You, too?" Jim sounded mildly amused. He flexed his fingers around the steering wheel in front of him, following after the sedan with his eyes long after it was lost from Blair's view. "Do you know how to get to Mission Terrace from here?"

"Yeah. One of my mom's old boyfriends used to live in that area."

"Well, I think it's a really good idea for you to make for the safehouse if it turns out that I have to go in there."

"Forget it, Jim." Blair blotted his damp palms against the tops of his thighs. He took a deep breath and counted backwards from ten in three different languages, reminding himself yet again that Jim was only acting this way because he loved him. "So," he said, changing the subject. "Tell me about Jeri. I keep getting mixed signals from you about her. I mean, sure, you seemed happy to see her and all, but there seems to be more going on here than you've seen fit to tell me about."

Jim sighed. "I'm not hiding anything from you, Chief. We served on a mission together in Albania; she was military intelligence and I was Special Forces." He stopped suddenly as the sedan came into view at the end of the road in the valley below them, coming toward the front gate of the NSA building. Blair leaned forward in his seat as he watched the guards move forward from the gatepost to intercept the car, and he held his breath for a frantic few minutes until it was allowed through.

Jim relaxed again and continued talking. "She's a good operative. A little obsessive, but she knows her stuff."

"So what's the problem?" Blair turned away from the drama unfolding below him long enough to cast a curious glance at his partner.

It was a moment before Jim answered. "She reminds me of a time in my life that I'm trying real hard to forget. Things were ... different back then, Blair. *I* was different. And I don't like being reminded of that."

Blair's attention was snagged then as Jeri parked the car and made her way on foot toward the front of the tall building, briefcase in hand. Beside him, Jim had gone unnaturally still, and Blair knew that he was tracking her with his senses.

"Nice and easy, man," he urged automatically, without even having to think about it. "Just focus in on her and start trying to filter out everything else, layer by layer." He knew that Jeri couldn't be aware of Jim's hyperactive senses, but it was an obvious benefit in their favor. It would serve as an early warning system if anything went wrong, instead of just waiting to see if she showed up with Denney or not.

Time passed slowly, or so it seemed to Blair. Every so often, he would reach out to touch Jim's arm and talk softly to him to make sure he stayed focused, but as far as he could tell, things seemed to be going smoothly. Still, it was an enormous relief when he saw Jeri come back outside with a dark-haired man that he assumed to be Denney in tow. He watched avidly as she led Denney to her car and ushered him inside, then moved around to the driver's side door and disappeared. The car began to move toward the exit and was waved past the checkpoint with what looked like a minimum of hassle.

"That's it, Chief." Jim reached for the keys and started their car again. The sudden roar of the engine seemed unnaturally loud, making Blair jump.

"That's it?" he echoed incredulously. It hardly seemed possible that the danger could be past so quickly. "You mean it's over?"

"Well, not over, exactly." Jim waited the few minutes it took for Jeri's car to come back around in their direction and pass them by, then took a slow U-turn to follow her at a discreet distance. "I mean, we still have to question him to find out if he knows anything. But the hard part's over, at least."

Blair still felt numb, and it took a little while for the words to register. "You mean after all this, he might not even *know* anything? Jesus, Jim."

"It's the nature of the beast," Jim said with a sigh. "Just because Denney had an association with Solomon's Vengeance, it doesn't mean that he actually knows about the theft of the E-3T, or where it's being kept now. But I'd say it's likely. A professional like Denney wouldn't be the type to let any kind of saleable information pass him by."

Blair digested that in silence as they made their way out of the Potrero Hill district and into the outlying suburbs, trying to force himself to relax. The hard part was over, he reminded himself. Jim had said so. Even so, he couldn't shake the feeling that he had a bright red target painted in the middle of his back. He couldn't stop glancing at the sideview mirror outside his door, expecting to see a fleet of dark, unmarked cars identical to Jeri's pulling up behind them, preparing to flag them down. In the far distance, the sun was just beginning to dip behind the edge of the horizon, lengthening the shadows around them.

He had a feeling it was going to be a long night.

********

Justin Denney was a lean, unremarkable-looking man with dark brown hair and a perpetually harried expression that completely failed to make Blair sympathize with the situation that he had found himself in. There were, he supposed, a number of wholly immoral people in the world, but it never ceased to amaze him when he stumbled across one of them.

It was apparent from the outset that Denney was scared. He was still in the process of negotiating his immunity with the NSA, and he was far from feeling secure in the status of his newly discovered duplicity. Apparently he'd pissed off quite a few people in his nefarious career, and now he was afraid that his foreign contacts were going to be coming after him, either to find out what he knew about the Americans he allegedly worked for, or to keep him from sharing what he knew about them. He wanted the protection of the U.S. government and was quite unwilling to share anything that he knew until he was certain that he had it.

"Fucking bastard," Jeri cursed as she came into the living room where Blair sat sipping slowly at a Diet Coke and munching on McDonald's French fries. He glanced up at her and flinched slightly at the burning anger that he saw in her eyes.

"He's not talking?" he guessed. Every moment that passed with Denney here in the house with them was grating on his nerves. He couldn't wait for this whole nightmare to be over so he and Jim could stop playing super-spy and get back to their semi-normal lives in Cascade.

"No." Jeri ran her fingers back through the light tangle of her hair and perched on the arm of the couch next to him, reaching absently for one of his French fries. "Not a fucking word."

"He's clammed up tighter than Fort Knox," Jim agreed, following her into the room and collapsing into the armchair in front of the window. "He's refusing to say anything without discussing *terms*. And of course we aren't authorized to offer him any, even if we were so inclined. That's not something we can just bluff our way out of, not in the day and a half we have left."

"So what are we going to do?" Blair glanced from one of them to the other and then back again, waiting for some pearl of wisdom to fall. It seemed impossible that they could have come this far and have nothing to show for it.

Jeri sighed, turning to gaze out the broad window next to the couch. The sun had set over an hour ago, and despite the watery light of the streetlamps by the sidewalk, the shadows outside the window were thick and dark. It gave Blair a slow chill as he looked at it, although he couldn't have said why. He was enormously grateful suddenly for the light of the reading lamp at his elbow.

"I think it may be time to try sterner measures," Jeri said.

Jim's expression did not change, but something in his eyes turned brittle at the words. He glanced up at her sharply but didn't say anything.

Blair stared. "Are you talking about *torture*?"

Jeri's expression was hard when she turned to look at him. "We're running out of time, Blair. You know what's at stake here. If that toxin gets released, it could wipe out an entire city the size of Cascade. Do you want to have that on your conscience, knowing that you could have prevented it?"

"*Fuck* the toxin." He stared at her in complete horror as he realized she was serious, that she really wanted to go ahead and do this. His heartbeat was pounding as if he'd just run a marathon, and he found himself pulling away from her slightly without meaning to. "There has to be another way."

"What? What other way, Blair?" Her voice was soft, deliberately cutting through his panic. Maddeningly, the expression on her face was sympathetic. "There are lives at stake here. Families.

Children. If this toxin gets out, they're all going to die, and it's not going to be a pretty death. This stuff is *bad news*. We have a responsibility to protect them."

"No!" He stood up abruptly, unable to keep still, and began to pace the length of the room, gesturing agitatedly with his hands.

"This is *bullshit*. We can't ... we can't just..."

"Think about it, Blair." Jeri's voice turned coaxing, fighting the blatant disbelief that flared within him. Her eyes were intent as she looked up at him, tracking his movement across the room. "We don't know where the bastards are planning on releasing the retrovirus. It could be anywhere. Maybe Cascade. Your students, your family, your friends. Jim..."

"No," he said again, turning on her. He was shaking now, and he clenched his fists at his sides to try and stop it. "No. This is *wrong*, Jeri. There has to be another way." And while he had no defenses to raise against her quiet arguments, he knew, deep inside of him, that it *was* wrong, that there could be no excuse dire enough to condone what she was proposing. They were the *good guys*, for crying out loud.

Now Jeri was starting to look irritated. Her voice rose sharply as she said, "Do you want to be responsible for all that death, all that suffering, because you could have done something to stop it, and *didn't*? We have a chance here, Blair, a real chance, to stop it before it even starts. This is it. And if you let something like your own petty code of morality get in the way of what needs to be done, then you're going to have to live with what follows."

Jim had stayed distressingly silent through the entire argument, and now Blair turned to him for help, hating the closed-off expression on the other man's face. "Jim?" he said, willing the other man to say something. *Anything*. "Tell her there has to be another way."

Jim winced as if he'd been struck. "Blair..." he said, and the anguish in his eyes was enough to freeze Blair's blood in his veins. He realized suddenly that Jim was actually considering going through with this.

"It's nothing we haven't done before," Jeri said quietly, obviously intending to soothe. "And with far less cause."

It took a moment for the words to sink in, but once they did, Blair felt as if he'd been hit by a freight train. The room faded to grey at the edges of his vision, and he swayed, clutching at the back of the chair in front of him. He was barely aware of Jim suddenly appearing at his side, grabbing hold of his arm to steady him, a formless shadow of deepening black flickering at the corner of his eye. Jim's fingers felt like hot iron against his skin.

For the first time, it occurred to Blair just how very dark Jim's past in covert ops must have been. Jeri's casual "we" sent a surfeit of images racing across his mind that blanked out even the fearsome pounding of his heart -- warrior-Jim, dressed in jungle fatigues, making his way through a night-cloaked landscape of trees and draping vines, intent in the pursuit of whatever mission he had been assigned to. There was something primal about the Jim in his mind's eye that Blair had never truly allowed himself to recognize before, something that conflicted harshly with the modern sterility of the jeans-clad urban detective that he had met two and a half years ago. *This* Jim would certainly be capable of torturing and even murdering a fellow human being, and there was something jarring and inescapably terrifying about that realization that sent his mind spinning into an immediate and total panic.

He forced himself to look up, to meet Jim's gaze, pleading silently for Jim to tell him he was wrong, that he was jumping to conclusions, that Jeri was lying. The subdued anguish in Jim's eyes was more answer than he could have ever wanted, and Blair tensed, feeling shock move like a cold wash of ice water through his veins. Jim's fingers felt hard on his arm, hard and filled with rushing warmth, the blood rushing underneath the surface of his skin, and Blair yanked his arm away without thinking, his heart shattering.

"Blair," Jim said, the agony in his eyes deepening, but Blair took a hasty step backwards, holding up his hands to forestall any further exposition. Suddenly, all he wanted was to get away, to run far away from this place, and the need thrummed through him with an almost audible hum, bubbling up inside of him until he could barely think, barely breathe, barely even consider that any of this might be real.

"I ... I have to get out of here," he said numbly, deliberately not looking in Jeri's direction because he didn't want to see the goddamned fucking *pity* in her eyes. When Jim moved to take a step towards him, he tensed again, sliding in the direction of the door. "Just let it go, Jim." Was that his voice? When had he ever sounded so cold? "I need to ... I need to think."

Jim reached out for him, looking stricken, but it was too much for Blair, far, far too much, and he snapped, turning towards the door with a furious shake of his head. He flung it open and stepped out into the night without even pausing to snatch up his coat, ignoring the sound of Jim's voice as it called after him. The cool air hit him like a blow to the chest, but he ignored it, hugging his arms around himself as he made his way forward down the driveway with sharp, anguished strides.

It was like watching a favorite picture suddenly snap into three dimensions, and finding out that those depths were darker than anything you could possibly have imagined. He had never been one to believe that ignorance is bliss, but he had to admit that there were some things you weren't supposed to find out about people, things that you just weren't supposed to *know*. Images of Jim laughing with him, joking with him, making love with him, crashed in a raging torrent through his mind, mingling insanely with the imagined images of what he had just learned until he felt that he had no recourse but to lose his mind. Overwhelmed by the conflicting impulses that raged within him, he did the only thing that it seemed possible for him to do.

He ran.

********

Jim stared at the open doorway where Blair had disappeared, his heart hammering in his chest. He could hear the rapid cadence of the younger man's panicked footsteps as they raced away down the street. For a moment, Jim couldn't wrap his brain around what had just happened, couldn't think about the undeniable significance of what had just been done.

He turned to Jeri and found her looking at him with an expression of pure misery in her eyes. He knew that it couldn't have escaped her notice that he and Blair were more than partners, that there was more than just work between them.

"I'll be back in a while," he said, shrugging into his coat and then reaching for Blair's. Very deliberately, he turned toward the door, not meeting her eyes.

Jeri nodded. "Take whatever time you need, Jim." Her voice was soft. "I've got things under control here."

He didn't pause as he stepped outside, closing the door behind him, but he stood there for a moment with his hand on the doorknob, breathing heavily. He knew that by leaving her alone with Denney, he was giving her his tacit permission to go ahead with the interrogation. Strangely enough, the thought didn't bother him as much as he felt it should, and all he could think of suddenly was how very disgusted Blair would be by that.

It took no time at all for him to locate Blair. Despite the fact that each shuddering second felt like an endless eternity, it had been less than a minute since the younger man had bolted from the house. Jim found him walking (not still running, thank god) a short distance away down the street, hands shoved in the pockets of his jeans. He was shivering.

"Here." Jim held out the younger man's coat, and Blair took it wordlessly, slipping his arms into the sleeves and then pulling it closed across his chest. He didn't look up from the ground in front of his feet, and Jim had to fight the sudden urge to grab him by the arm and swing him around, forcing him to meet his gaze. But the truth was, he truly didn't want to see what emotions were lurking in the other man's eyes.

They walked without talking for a while, and Jim took comfort from the fact that Blair didn't seem all that eager to get away from him; at least whatever wild impetus had driven him from the house seemed to have calmed somewhat. There was a strange acceptance to the silence between them, however brittle, and after several long, exhaustive minutes, Jim found the courage to speak.

"Look, Blair." He peered at the other man out of the corner of his eye, trying to gauge his reactions. "There are a lot of things in my past that I'm not proud of. I've ... done things that are pretty much guaranteed to damn me to hell if there is such a thing. We were at *war*," he emphasized, and even as he said it, he realized how pitiful an excuse it was. "There wasn't always time to ... to weigh the repercussions of things. We had to live in the moment, Blair." He hesitated, disconcerted by the other man's continued silence. He wanted so very much for Blair to understand.

Blair moved toward a bench at the deserted bus stop on the corner and sighed heavily as he sat down, raking his fingers back through his hair. Still, he refused to meet Jim's eyes. "I don't want to be responsible for this, man," he said, his voice shaking.

Jim couldn't tell if he was referring to the torture or to the release of the toxin. "You aren't responsible," he said, sitting down on the bench beside him. He felt a swift surge of anger at Jeri for even suggesting that Blair should feel accountable for this. "You didn't consent to it, either way."

Blair laughed shortly, without humor. "'Silence *is* consent,'" he quoted. "I didn't do anything about it either way, so whatever happens, I *am* responsible."

While this attitude troubled Jim, it was so perfectly in keeping with what he knew about this man that he had to stifle the urge to wrap his arms around him and bury his face in his hair. One of the things he loved best about Blair was his sense of personal responsibility -- the way he never backed down from a situation where he believed he could be of help, no matter what the potential cost to himself. There were times when this mind-set had serious personal repercussions, but it was so much a part of who and what Blair Sandburg was that it was pointless to argue whether or not he *should* feel that way.

Jim sighed, staring out across the empty street. "I'm sorry, Blair," he said quietly. "I'm so fucking sorry that you had to get involved in this."

"I love you, Jim." Blair's voice was calm. "I do, but I am just having a little trouble *dealing* with this, you know? It's like

I found out that you were a ... a *child molester* or something. The fact that you did it in the line of duty doesn't make it any better for me."

"I know." The words cut through Jim like a multitude of tiny blades, drawing blood. He bit into his lower lip savagely as he stared across the street.

"I mean, it's kind of surreal." Blair continued as if he hadn't spoken. "You're the same guy I sleep with, fuck with, work with, that I pretty much gave up my whole fucking *life* to be with, who buys me bagels and gives mind-blowing backrubs and always knows exactly what flavors of tea to get for me at the grocery store. I can't seem to reconcile these two images in my mind. Internal error, does not compute, you know what I'm saying?"

"Yeah. I know." Jim tried to keep the hurt from his voice but was only marginally successful. His reaction angered him; here Blair was having a major fucking *moment*, and all he could think about was how badly it pained him to hear these words turned against him.

Blair leaned forward and buried his face in his hands, letting out a keening sigh. "It's too much for me, man. Let's just ... just go back to the house and get some sleep, all right? Maybe things will be better in the morning."

Jim didn't believe that a night's sleep was going to make any impact on this issue at all, but there didn't seem to be a whole lot else to do. "Sure, Blair," he said, standing up from the bench. "Whatever you want."

When they arrived back at the house, it didn't surprise Jim to find that the government sedan was missing. While Blair couldn't have missed the significance of that, he made no comment as he stepped inside. Even without Sentinel senses, he had to know that the house was empty.

Blair ended up forsaking the inner bedrooms and lying on the living room couch under an afghan. Jim watched him get settled with a feeling of deep unease, not liking the way he kept refusing to meet his eyes. Where did it leave them if Blair couldn't even look at him anymore? The thought brought a sharp stab of panic arcing into his gut, and he sank into the tall armchair by the window, gripping the arms of the chair so tightly his knuckles ached. It was no secret how much Blair had come to mean to him over the past several years, how very much a part of his life he was. Hell, Blair *was* his life, and Jim didn't have the faintest clue what he would do if Blair decided to leave him.

The possibility was unthinkable. Jim immediately turned his thoughts away from that line of speculation and focused in on Blair's breathing, narrowing his senses to the steady rise and fall of the shoulders under the afghan, the hard line of the back that was turned to him as Blair curled in against the backside of

the couch. The sound of the other man's heartbeat was calming, soothing, even if it was still too fast for Jim's liking.

Tentatively, Jim loosened his death grip on the arms of the chair and sat back, trying to get as comfortable as he was able. He could go into one of the bedrooms and sleep in a nice, soft bed, but there was no way he was going to leave Blair alone here, even if his presence wasn't exactly desired. At least Blair wasn't asking him to leave. And until he did, Jim had no intention of giving up his silent vigil.

Wrapping himself inside the unpleasant murmuring of his thoughts, he settled back to watch. And wait.

********

They were disturbed just before daybreak by the ringing of his cell phone. Jim sat up abruptly, surprised to find that he'd drifted off, and glanced immediately over at the couch where Blair was just sitting up, rubbing at his eyes and pulling the afghan tighter around his shoulders. He met Jim's gaze briefly and then looked away.

Sighing, Jim stood and moved into the kitchen, snatching up the phone from the counter where it sat beside his keys and dragging a weary hand across his face. "Yeah?" he grunted, half wishing that it would be a wrong number.

"We got him, Jim." Jeri's voice was tight with triumph. She sounded obscenely cheerful for such an ungodly hour of the morning. "Denney knew exactly where the toxin is being held. I've already got our boys looking into it, and we should have the retrovirus back in our possession within a couple of hours." She paused a moment then, and when she spoke next, her voice was somewhat more subdued. "Did Blair ever come back?"

"Yeah." Jim glanced back into the living room. "Yeah, he's here." He knew he should say something else, something about how great it was that Denney had changed his mind about withholding information on his former association with the Solomon's Vengeance organization, but surprisingly, he found that he couldn't really bring himself to give a damn.

Another moment of silence passed before Jeri spoke again. "We did it, Jim," she said, and there was a solemnity to her tone that raised the hairs along the back of his neck. "We won. We beat the bastards at their own game, and we're reclaiming the toxin with a minimum of casualties. This is a *clean bust*, Jim.

We did the right thing."

*We*, Jim mused, appreciating her choice of words. It pleased him that she wasn't trying to pretend that he and Blair weren't equally responsible for everything that had happened here this weekend.

He heard her sigh. "Why don't you and Blair come meet me somewhere? I'll buy you both breakfast. Or lunch. Your choice.

I might as well have one last fling before I go back home to face the music."

Jim frowned, recognizing her need to make amends. "I think that Blair and I are going to be taking the first flight back to Cascade. If you want to meet us at the airport, we can always get something to eat there."

"You're on. I'll meet you in the food court before your flight leaves. Oh, and Jim..." She trailed off, suddenly uncertain. Taking a deep breath, she finished, "Tell Blair I'm sorry? I never meant--"

"I know. I'll talk to him." There didn't seem to be a whole lot else to say.

After he hung up the phone, he moved back into the living room. Blair was sitting on one corner of the couch, knees pulled up to his chest, wrapped up tightly in the afghan. The image he made was so completely vulnerable that it made the words Jim knew he had to say catch in his throat, and he stood there unmoving at the entrance of the room, staring. Sometimes he forgot how truly *innocent* Blair was, and every time another layer of that innocence was chipped away, he couldn't help but despise himself for it.

"Denney talked," he said, deciding not to avoid the issue at hand. "Jeri's spoken to her people, and the CIA is moving in on the terrorists as we speak. Chances are, they'll retrieve the retrovirus without serious casualties."

Blair nodded, his eyes huge in the newly risen sunlight that streamed in through the window. His hair was unkempt and standing out away from his head in a messy tangle, adding to his somewhat battered air. His fingers flexed uncertainly in the folds of the blanket that covered him. "That's ... that's great,

Jim."

Jim took a couple of steps into the room, aching to reach out and run his fingers over those tousled, dark curls. He hated that this man was hurting, hated that he had been the cause of it, and hated that there didn't seem to be a damned thing he could do about it. "Jeri wants to meet us at the airport for lunch before we go. I mean, if it's all right with you."

Blair nodded. "Sure, Jim. That's fine." He yawned hugely, huddling in deeper under the blankets that covered him. "I'll be honest with you, man. I really cannot wait to get out of here."

Jim heard the attempt at levity in the words and smiled in response, even as he cringed against their inherent meaning. Whatever else Blair might be feeling, he seemed to want to put this whole unfortunate incident behind them.

"Me, either," Jim said honestly, and reached again for the antenna on his cell phone. "I'm going to call in to see when the next flight leaves." He paused, not certain that anything further would be appreciated on his part, but finally he broke down and added, "We'll be home soon, Blair."

When Blair smiled slightly in response to the statement, Jim chose to feel heartened by it. It may not have been much, but at this stage of the venture, he'd take what he could get.

********

Jeri was waiting for them at the airport as promised, and she smiled at them as they approached, leading them toward a secluded corner of the small café at the far end of the food court. She had changed back into the jeans and red flannel shirt that she'd worn in Cascade, and her hair was hanging loose around her shoulders.

"I've already arranged for Denney to be processed for release back to the NSA," she said. "My branch office downtown is going to be handling everything from here on out. I think when everyone figures out just what happened, though, there're going to be some majorly pissed off people on both sides of the equation."

"So what's going to happen to you now?" Blair asked.

Jeri shrugged. "There'll be an investigation, I'm sure, but the fact is, we just averted an international incident. Not to mention that my superiors still don't want anyone knowing about the toxin. I honestly don't think that they'll be doing much of anything to me at all."

"It's the way of the black ops world, Chief," Jim said, leaning back in his chair with a sigh. "They encourage their operatives to work outside the box, every once in a while."

Blair glanced at Jim for a moment, then turned back to stare at Jeri, incredulous. "You mean you took a gamble, and you won."

She nodded. "That's about the size of it." She eyed him narrowly over the top of her Diet Pepsi. "It's the way the game is played, Blair."

"And if you hadn't been able to get any information out of Denney? Or if he didn't know anything?"

"Then we'd all be in a hell of a lot of trouble right now." She sounded exasperated. "But the point is, he *did* know, and he told us, and now everything's going to be fine. You can't keep worrying about what might have been."

Blair shook his head, barely able to believe what he was hearing.

"I'm not even going to pretend to understand it. I suppose you might even be getting a nice fat promotion out of this, won't you?"

Jeri met his gaze levelly. "You may not like me, Blair, or approve of me, but the truth is, you *need* people like me to help defend this country. We saved about a quarter of a million lives today, and no matter what ethical crises you may be having right now, you can't change that. We did good, Blair. *You* did good."

The P.A. system crackled to life just then, announcing the boarding of their flight. Jeri glanced up reflexively and then drained the last of her soda. "I guess that's my cue."

Jim and Blair both stood up to see her off, and they said their good-byes succinctly. Blair followed her thoughtfully with his eyes as she left, watching as she vanished neatly into the crowd.

"It's a different world," he remarked quietly, once they were alone.

Jim nodded, not looking at him. "That's one of the reasons I left that job behind. I don't *like* living in that kind of world."

Blair paused thoughtfully, considering. "It isn't you," he said at last.

"No," Jim agreed. "No, it's not." He bent down to pick up their overnight bag and hefted the strap up over his shoulder, turning to give Blair a long, searching look, his eyes turbulent with emotions that Blair couldn't put a name to. He looked like he was about to say something else, then seemed to change his mind.

"We're going to miss our flight," he said quietly, his eyes searching Blair's face. "Let's go home."

All their current problems aside, Blair thought that sounded like an excellent plan.

********

Jim eased open the door of the loft with a feeling of profound relief, as if simply stepping over the threshold would erase all the tension of the past couple of days. He refused to think about how very ridiculous that notion was as he moved into the living room and threw the bag he held down onto the couch.

Outside the broad windows, the sun was progressing well in its slow downward climb through the sky, and the light was brassy as it slid across the hardwood floor, coating the furniture in a dull golden sheen. It felt so incredibly *good* to be home, and he sank down onto the couch next to the travel bag with a heavy sigh, stretching the kinks from muscles that had grown tense from the long flight.

He deliberately didn't look up as Blair moved into the kitchen, rummaging around in the refrigerator with no apparent purpose in mind other than to avoid having to talk to him. They had spoken very little during the flight, and what had been said was trivial, spoken just to help pass the time. It was yet another mark of the strangeness that had fallen over their relationship this weekend that Blair would be the one avoiding conversation, while Jim was the one who desperately needed to have things brought out into the open between them.

Sighing, he stood up and went into the kitchen, reaching around Blair's shoulder to grab two beers from the bottom shelf. He handed one to Blair and watched the younger man take it tentatively while he nudged the refrigerator door shut with his knee. Blair stared up at him in apprehension, knowing full well what Jim was going to say before he said it.

"We have to talk, Blair."

He thought for a moment that Blair was actually going to refuse, and the thought terrified him -- what were they supposed to do if Blair refused to talk about this? Before even the vestiges of panic could set in, however, the tension seemed to drain out of Blair before his eyes.

"Yeah," Blair agreed, shifting his eyes away. "Yeah, I really think we do."

He followed Jim into the living room, and Jim sat first, allowing Blair to choose whatever seat he felt comfortable with after that. He was surprised and pleased when Blair chose to sit beside him on the couch, not too close, but closer than Jim had been anticipating.

Jim took a deep breath and decided to plunge right in. "When I was in the Army, I did what I did because I believed it was right, Blair. Because I was saving lives." He gazed at the other man intently, willing him to understand, or at least to accept. He sighed heavily and shifted his gaze away when Blair still refused to look at him. "It's not something I'm proud of. But the fact that you know about it now doesn't change who I *am*."

"No, but it changes what I know about who you are." Blair's expression was solemn.

Jim felt himself teetering between full-blown panic and abject despair at this declaration. He was beginning to feel that no matter how this situation ended up playing itself out, that he would be losing Blair. And that thought was just unacceptable.

Blair shook his head, sensing Jim's panic. After several moments, he gathered his thoughts enough to say, "It's a lot to process, Jim. I don't ... I don't understand this world that you and Jeri lived in. And honestly, I can't imagine you being a part of it. It ... scares me."

Jim flinched, feeling something deep inside of him withdraw reflexively. "You're afraid of me," he said, and it was an effort to keep his voice calm.

"No!" Blair's denial was vehement. He stood up abruptly and began to pace back and forth in front of the couch, punctuating the statement with a sharp gesture of his hands. "I'm afraid of *me*, Jim! Because I've become a part of it now, too. Because I *knew* what she was going to do to Denney and I didn't do a damned thing to stop it. Because I still think that it was somehow *right* not to stop it, and that scares the shit out of me. My entire worldview is completely fucked up right now, and I'm having a little trouble dealing with that." He was shaking now, and he stopped pacing suddenly, lifting one hand to rake his fingers roughly back through his hair. His voice dropped to a haunted whisper. "How did you do it, Jim? How did you go into this type of work and just ... do it? How did you do it and not go insane?"

It couldn't have been more painful if Blair had laid into him with fists and feet flailing. Nothing could ever be more horrible to Jim than the knowledge that this man was hurting, and seeing him now in the grips of this kind of emotional turmoil -- and knowing full well that he was the cause of it -- was excruciating.

Jim took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. "It's never easy, Blair," he said, choosing his words with care. "I'd have been scared if it ever got to *be* easy. That kind of work does make you a little crazy, and there's no getting around that." He paused, wishing there was something more he could do, something more he could say that would take this burden away from both of them.

For the first time in what felt like forever, Blair turned to look directly at him. "How did you deal with it?" he asked, sounding honestly interested.

Jim had to stop and think about that for a moment. Finally he said, "You just keep telling yourself that what you're doing is right, that what you're doing has *purpose*, and hope that you can still look yourself in the mirror in the morning." Part of him wanted to stop there, to let sleeping dogs lie, but he had never opened up to *anyone* about this before, and he was struck by a sudden, irresistible need to share everything with Blair, to open up about everything that he'd kept locked away inside of him all these years. He leaned his head back against the top of the couch and closed his eyes before continuing, not wanting to see the emotions that were building in his lover's -- his former lover's? -- eyes.

"Until one day you realize that you just *can't* anymore, and that you need to get out while you can," he said softly. "And if you're very, very lucky, you manage to break away from it, and start a new life, and find someone who loves you, someone who will let you love him in return. And you hope to god that you can close all that darkness away, bottle it up inside of you so deep that you can pretend it's not a part of you at all. And that it never was."

"But it *is* a part of you, Jim." Blair's voice was low. He spoke slowly, as if he were just now figuring this out for himself. "It's a part of who you are, and what you are -- it's part of what made you into the man you are today." Jim tensed at the light touch on his shoulder, and he opened his eyes to see Blair standing over him, his eyes bright and vividly blue in the fading sunlight that suffused the room. "The man that I love."

"God, I love you, Blair." Jim realized that he was shaking and couldn't even find the presence of mind to care. Because Blair was touching him -- *touching* him! -- which he hadn't done since they'd snatched Denney in San Francisco, and he was looking at him, and talking to him, and telling him he was loved.

It seemed like pure reflex to lean forward and wrap his arms around Blair's waist, burying his face in against his stomach. He half-expected Blair to push him away, but instead, those strong arms moved up around his shoulders, holding him, anchoring him, and he shivered at the feel of cool fingers sliding across the nape of his neck, holding him tightly against Blair's body. Jim keened softly, realizing just how close he was to bursting into tears (and if *that* wasn't enough to prove that he wasn't the same person he'd been in covert ops, he didn't know what was), but Blair's arms only tightened around him, refusing to let him go.

"I love you, Jim." Blair's voice was thick with what sounded like tears of his own. "I do. I'd be lying if I said that I was okay with all of this, but I *love* you, okay?"

There were so many things that Jim wanted to say -- *I'm sorry*, *Forgive me*, *Don't leave me*, *I love you* -- but instead he found himself just holding onto Blair, refusing to let go of Blair, and then Blair was sliding down to his knees in front of him, shifting his grip around Jim's shoulders to hold him even tighter.

"It's okay, Jim," Blair whispered, and Jim shivered, feeling the words move warmly past his ear. He buried his face in the crook of Blair's shoulder and breathed in the heady scent of him, getting drunk on the sheer, unadulterated *presence* of him, and finally, tentatively, allowed himself to believe that he might be forgiven for the things he had done. That he might be able to begin forgiving himself.

"I love you," he whispered back, not sure that Blair could hear him and not really caring. Because this was what he wanted right here, this warmth, this acceptance, and nothing in all the world had ever felt as wonderful as this. And that was love, wasn't it? Real love, and who was it who had said that if you can tell someone your deepest, darkest secret, and still be accepted, then it was real. *This* was real.

Much later, after they'd eaten and showered and put away the majority of the clothes they'd packed, they made their way together to their bed upstairs. Blair was dressed only in a pair of comfortable boxers and a nearly threadbare T-shirt, his hair soft and loose around his shoulders, and Jim thought that he had never looked more beautiful. Or more desirable. Jim kept his thoughts to himself, however, as he slid under the sheets beside him, not quite sure how much his advances would be welcomed.

Blair turned and gazed at him with half-lidded eyes that saw entirely too much, and smiled slightly. "C'mere, Jim," he murmured, holding out one arm, and Jim obeyed without hesitation, rolling up against that warm body and sighing contentedly as he leaned in for a kiss. Blair's mouth opened easily for him, and Jim spent a lazy few moments nearly zoning on the sweet, familiar taste of the man that he loved.

"I thought you were going to leave me," he said at last, trailing his fingers over the line of Blair's brow. Blair closed his eyes and hmmm'ed gently, arching his chin up into the caress.

"It still bothers me," Blair admitted after a moment, turning his head to press a light kiss against the inside of Jim's wrist. He kept his eyes closed as he continued, "But I love you, Jim. And when it comes right down to it, it doesn't matter what you *were*, or what you *did*, because it doesn't change anything about who you are *now*. Except that I know more about you now, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. I think ... it's helped me understand a lot. About you, I mean. And about myself."

"And you're okay about what happened this weekend?" Jim asked, wanting to be sure that everything was laid out in the open between them. He knew that Blair still blamed himself fairly heavily for what had happened to Denney, and that pained him more than anything else that had happened to them.

It was a long moment before Blair answered. Finally, he opened his eyes to blue-tinged slits and nodded slightly. "I will be," he said quietly.

Jim leaned in to kiss him again without really thinking, knowing only that he loved this man, that he admired this man, that everything inside of him wanted to be a part of him, forever. Blair's lips parted under his, encouraging him with a soft sigh, and Jim moved his hands down over that hard young body, feeling its familiar contours slide under his palms, and burrowed up underneath the thin T-shirt until he found the warmth of smooth skin. Blair arched against him with a small moan, the sound working its way deep into Jim's consciousness as their bodies slid closer together under the smooth coolness of the sheets.

It was all the invitation that Jim needed. Clothes were shed with slow efficiency, with soft smiles and even softer kisses, and Jim was both relieved and gratified that Blair would still allow him to touch him like this, knowing what he knew. Blair laid back against the sheets, his body hot and pliable underneath

Jim's, and stretched his arms out over his head, grabbing onto the pillow above his head. Jim shifted to lay his full length over him, growling low in his throat at the blatant display, and reached up to lock his hands around those narrow wrists, holding them down against the mattress.

"Jim," Blair whispered, holding Jim's gaze steadily. His breaths were hot and shallow, his chest heaving, but there was no fear in him that Jim could see, no fear at all. His heart was hammering wildly underneath Jim's chest, but it was lust-rhythm, jungle- rhythm, the familiar rhythm that told Jim he was wanted, he was needed, that no irreconcilable damage had been done to the love between them.

"Love me, Jim," Blair said, and in those words, Jim heard the final acceptance of everything he was, both good and bad, light and dark, hated and loved. If Blair could still trust him after everything he'd learned, still want him, then there could be no doubt at all that they were going to make it through this, that they would be stronger for it. That they would persevere.

"Always," Jim said, running a hand down the side of the shivering body beneath him. Blair's eyes were dark with lust and love, his limbs trembling, face flushed and hair disheveled, full mouth swollen with kisses. God, he looked good like this, so desperate, so wanton, so very, very beautiful. Jim turned him over with gentle hands, and Blair submitted easily, clutching the pillow under his head with both arms and moaning into it as Jim stroked heavily down his spine with the fingers of one hand. Jim watched in awe as that lean body undulated under him, silently pleading for more.

Blair's cries intensified when Jim moved to prepare him, using the lubricant that was kept in the sidetable drawer. Jim bit down hard on his lower lip as he slid his fingers in and out, in and out of the narrow channel that waited for him, and Blair lifted his hips up enthusiastically into his touch, knees sliding forward of their own accord until he was kneeling in front of Jim, head pillowed comfortably on his folded arms, thrusting himself back over and over again onto the fingers that penetrated him.

"Mmm," Blair said appreciatively when Jim slid his fingers out the final time, and Jim chuckled softly at the self-indulgent sound, smoothing his other hand over the curve of the ass in front of him while he wiped his fingers clean on the corner of the sheet. Sweat glistened in a shallow pool at the small of the younger man's back, and Jim leaned down to lap at it gently, feeling Blair's gasp of appreciation echo up through his tongue. The air was warm with the heavy scents of sweat and sex and anticipation, and Jim breathed it in hungrily, wanting more.

Unable to wait any longer, he slid his body up over Blair's and planted his hands to either side of the younger man's head. He bent to nuzzle briefly in the curls over one red-tinged ear, and Blair smiled up at him, his expression welcoming. Blair's eyes were soft and bright at the same time, and the sight of them made

Jim dizzy with want and need and unabashed joy. "Love you," he whispered, leaning in for another lingering kiss, and then he reached down to steady the base of his cock as he moved forward into the tight heat that awaited him.

They quickly found a rhythm that suited them, and Jim kept his chest pressed firmly to Blair's back as he moved, needing that depth of contact between them. Blair closed his eyes and moaned, muscles straining, and his fingers closed around Jim's when Jim moved to take hold of his hand, twining their fingers together over their heads. Jim held him tightly, tasting the sloping planes of neck and shoulders and spine, as he muttered over and over how good Blair was, how hot he was, how very, very much he loved what Blair was doing to him, for him, with him.

"Jiiiim," Blair said on a long, drawn-out moan, his breath catching. Loose strands of hair clung to the sides of his face, accenting the sheer abandon of his expression, and he made no objection when Jim pulled back onto his haunches, lifting Blair with him so that the younger man was kneeling over his lap, Jim's cock penetrated deep within him. Jim wrapped his hands around the hard heat of Blair's erection, stroking heavily, and thrust his hips in a demanding rhythm, biting sharply into the smooth skin of Blair's shoulder to stifle the cry of ecstasy that wanted to burst out of him. Blair felt so good, so very, very good, so soft and warm and hard and needy and there was nothing, nothing that Jim wanted more in this moment than this connection, right here, between them.

Blair responded by giving a sharp gasp and then drove his hips down *hard*, his expression freezing, heart pounding. Jim groaned low in his throat as the action caused his release to slam into him, stealing his breath away, whiting out everything but the pure liquid pleasure that exploded through him. A moment later Blair convulsed over him, tipping his head back over Jim's shoulder and crying out loud enough to wake the neighbors, fingers digging with near bruising strength into Jim's thighs.

Jim held onto him tightly through the shuddering shock of both their orgasms, burying his face deep in the sweat-scented curls of Blair's hair, and slowly lowered them both down onto their sides on the mattress. The sheets were tangled somewhere around his ankles, but for the moment he couldn't bring himself to care.

Slowly, the wild cadence of Blair's heartbeat settled down into a more natural rhythm, and he shivered. Jim reached for the edge of the blanket next to him and pulled it up over them both, snuggling down into its warm folds and wrapping his arms tighter around Blair, winding their legs together. Blair leaned back to give him a sleepy smile of thanks and a light peck on the nose, his breath warm against Jim's face.

"Love you," Blair whispered, and those two simple words were the most beautiful sound that Jim had ever heard.

Blair was already starting to fall asleep, his expression lax and trusting as he burrowed in against Jim's chest. Too little sleep the previous night combined with too much stress and the incredible release of tension they'd just shared was proving too overwhelming to fight, and Jim smiled as he brushed the hair back away from the other man's face. The fact that Blair would love him like this, trust him like this, was all the absolution he needed.

With a heavy sigh, Jim gave up fighting the fatigue that moved in waves over him. Feeling content with both the world and himself for the first time in far too long, he curled in against Blair's side, and slept.

*** end ***

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