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elementof_riskJust so we’re clear – you approached me. You were the one that was stupid enough to let me into your room. And afterwards, you were the one that wanted to cuddle. - Rachel Gibson
2006
He can't get her out of his mind. It's maddening to realize that, now that he knows who she is, what she is. Bad enough that the thought of her lingered in the morning when he could turn his head and smell her lingering on his pillow, and he wanted to cross the hall and invite her to breakfast, to see her one more time. He even went so far as to knock on her door, only to have the maid tell him she had checked out early that morning. But now? Weeks after? Knowing she was with APO, and friend to people who very much wanted him dead?
He shouldn't be thinking of her. He should be planning for this mission with Anna, not getting distracted by her transformation into Sydney. His work isn't suffering, but he can feel the split focus. Just his luck the first woman he'd been truly interested in since Lauren's death had to be one of them. Though, he had to admit, that pillow snuggling or not, it was likely that her revelation as an agent had as much to do with the lingering obsession as the sex itself.
Anna was not going to help get her off of his mind. As furious as she had to be about his double cross the year before, there would be no repeat of their one night, and he wonders if that would have helped. A lover he'd had before, now identical to the woman he'd obsessed over for years...surely that would be enough to get Rachel Gibson out of his head? But even if Anna was willing, he cannot see how there would be time. Perhaps after, when the mission is complete and they are riding high on the sense of a job well done...perhaps if he lets her vent her ire over his betrayal...as he recalls, she has much the same reaction to such violence as he.
Perhaps that will do it, erase beautiful eyes and a teasing smile, and soft laughter and softer touches from his memory, or relegate them to their proper place, at least, and he can stop looking for her on each mission and wondering what she would do if he showed up on her doorstep. It can't happen, anymore than Sydney would ever truly have stepped off of her goody-two-shoe line and crossed to play in the shadows. He knows that.
But nothing he tells himself erases the memory of the feel of her against him or the faint wistfulness that wants to know what it would be like to wake up with her in his arms.
2006
He can't get her out of his mind. It's maddening to realize that, now that he knows who she is, what she is. Bad enough that the thought of her lingered in the morning when he could turn his head and smell her lingering on his pillow, and he wanted to cross the hall and invite her to breakfast, to see her one more time. He even went so far as to knock on her door, only to have the maid tell him she had checked out early that morning. But now? Weeks after? Knowing she was with APO, and friend to people who very much wanted him dead?
He shouldn't be thinking of her. He should be planning for this mission with Anna, not getting distracted by her transformation into Sydney. His work isn't suffering, but he can feel the split focus. Just his luck the first woman he'd been truly interested in since Lauren's death had to be one of them. Though, he had to admit, that pillow snuggling or not, it was likely that her revelation as an agent had as much to do with the lingering obsession as the sex itself.
Anna was not going to help get her off of his mind. As furious as she had to be about his double cross the year before, there would be no repeat of their one night, and he wonders if that would have helped. A lover he'd had before, now identical to the woman he'd obsessed over for years...surely that would be enough to get Rachel Gibson out of his head? But even if Anna was willing, he cannot see how there would be time. Perhaps after, when the mission is complete and they are riding high on the sense of a job well done...perhaps if he lets her vent her ire over his betrayal...as he recalls, she has much the same reaction to such violence as he.
Perhaps that will do it, erase beautiful eyes and a teasing smile, and soft laughter and softer touches from his memory, or relegate them to their proper place, at least, and he can stop looking for her on each mission and wondering what she would do if he showed up on her doorstep. It can't happen, anymore than Sydney would ever truly have stepped off of her goody-two-shoe line and crossed to play in the shadows. He knows that.
But nothing he tells himself erases the memory of the feel of her against him or the faint wistfulness that wants to know what it would be like to wake up with her in his arms.
