Archive of Our Own

The first text message came in 2005.

And 2005 had been a very strange year for Leon. A year had passed since he rescued the president’s daughter from an evil bioterrorist cult, released his report on Las Plagas, got a new apartment in D.C, and sank deep into the bottom of every whiskey bottle he could find. Work had died down and after years of endless training and fighting, Leon didn't quite know what to do when he wasn’t chased by some kind of monster with a tentacle for a head. He’d tried to reach out to Sherry a couple times, but each attempt had been met with rejection and excuses by the department that took her in. Claire said not to worry, that she was handling it and that Sherry was fine, but something in her voice told him she was lying.

Still, trouble always caught up to him, in the end.

Velvet Grove.
Tomorrow, 3:30 PM.
Come alone.

Leon stared at the screen for nearly ten minutes, mind spiraling. Images of Spain and Lord Saddler and all the enemies he’d collected over the years flashed through his mind, which was insane, because they were all dead now. But if there was something Leon had learned, it was that even dead people could come back to life, in more ways than one.

Who’s this? he dared text back, but there was no reply. He was almost tempted to report it to Hunnigan, ask if maybe they could track down the number, or send backup in case of a trap. But Leon was kind of adventurous and reckless, and the lack of adrenaline as of late made him yearn for both action and peace and quiet, which was quite the contradiction. His life was kind of contradictory, in a way; so he woke up early the next day, took his gun, knife and copied the address. It was an old hotel, he’d seen it a couple of times, not far away from the White House. He decided to go on foot just so that he could have an escape route. Bringing his car would mean trouble. It could be followed; the patent could be tracked. It was too risky.

Leon arrived at the place after walking for nearly thirty minutes. He stood on the sidewalk, looking up at the building, and held the gun tight against the holder underneath his jacket. The lobby was teeming with people and Leon wondered if this could be someone’s playground for a bioterrorist attack. Why send him the address of such a crowded place? Why not meet up somewhere private, if he was the target? Leon stared at the people gathered; families, kids, couples, going off about their day and making plans for the evening. Every face became a potential victim, someone he needed to protect.

He approached the receptionist, growing restless by the second.

“I have a reservation,” he said, trying to sound casual and at ease. “Leon Kennedy.”

The woman checked her computer and smiled at him, handing him the keycard.

“Your room is 601.”

Leon hesitated, licking his lips.

“Sorry, but do you know who made the reservation? I was—” he stopped, realizing he was oversharing. He shook his head, eyes moving in all directions in absolute pursuit. “Never mind, thanks.”

He hurried towards the elevators, the doors sliding shut when he pressed the 6th floor button and waited for ten seconds until he arrived, hands shaking in anticipation. His eyes roamed through the extension of the hallway, empty and silent. Leon made sure to remember where the exit staircase was, and walked restlessly towards room 601, one of the first in the corridor. He paused, took a deep breath, and inserted the keycard. The door beeped, and Leon hurried inside before taking out his gun, just so that the security cameras wouldn’t see he was armed.

Aiming at nothing in particular, Leon gave a few steps, eyes studying every inch of the room. It was small, definitely not the fanciest one in the hotel. Just a king-sized bed, a bathroom, a desk and a couch near the window. He checked every room, every nook and cranny in search of a note, a clue, something that would explain why the fuck he had been summoned to this place. Was it some kind of joke? Leon lowered his gun, sighing in frustration. Should he stay for a while? Leave before it was too late? He spent nearly ten minutes considering his very limited range of options when the door beeped behind him. As if fueled with fire, Leon turned to the entrance, hands strong and steady around his pistol’s handle, ready to shoot the whole damn magazine if it was necessary.

“Easy there, Rambo. It’s just me.”

For an instant, Leon couldn’t believe his eyes. He staggered, as if crushed by an invisible force or a violent torrent, drenching him from head to toe. Ada closed the door behind her, unarmed, and left her black gloves on the entryway table along with her keycard. Without lowering his gun, Leon felt hot all over. Hot with rage and confusion and madness, a buzzing sound encapsulated all his thoughts until he couldn’t even hear his own heart beating.

“You have to be fucking kidding me,” he said under his breath, trying to regulate himself.

She walked over to the windows and lowered the blinds, engulfing the room in dim darkness.

“We need to talk.”

Leon gasped, flabbergasted.

“Talk?” he shook his head, his gun still aiming at her. “You wanna talk?”

“So I said.”

“I have nothing to say to you,” Leon replied, hands shaking. “I thought I was clear when I said we are going our separate—”

“Our separate ways, yes, I remember,” she said coolly. Ada walked over to the door and leaned her back against it, as if blocking his way out. “But there are some things I left unsaid. Stop being difficult and put that gun down. I know you won’t shoot me.”

Leon turned his gaze away, jaw tightening as if he’d been slapped across the face. Ada had a way of doing that, slipping past his defenses without even touching him, hurting him without leaving a single bruise. It didn’t make any sense. For years, Leon had tried to rationalize this feeling, this pain, the grief he’d endured for a woman he’d only known for one night. One single night, that’s all they had. It should have been forgettable, like that girlfriend of three years he’d broken up with hours before arriving at Raccoon City. She hadn’t even been in his thoughts during the breakout, yet the fleeting hours he’d spent with a woman he barely knew had haunted him for six fucking years.

Six years, and somehow she still knew exactly where to press. Like she’d memorized him in that short span of time and kept it with her. Like it mattered to her, even when deep down he knew it didn’t. It was nothing, it should have meant nothing, but his thoughts always circled back to the same, infuriating truth:

It hadn’t felt like nothing.

It never took long for Leon S. Kennedy to fall in love with a girl. A little exchange, a little display of affection, and he’d fall in love. What a fucking fool.

Feeling cornered, Leon offered a frantic nod, wishing nothing more than to get this over with. He took a seat at the edge of the bed, elbows pressed to his knees, gun still in hand.

“Alright,” he ran his tongue over his teeth, blood bumping and burning. His knee bounced with the weight of his anxiety. “Talk.”

He heard her sigh, saw her hesitate when she pressed the back of her head against the door. Leon assumed she was trying to come up with a good lie, a sweet tale that would leave him satisfied and fat as a pig for the slaughter before she decided to press the knife to his chest.

“It was one of my first jobs, believe it or not,” she began, eyes staring at everything but him. “I wasn’t nearly as experienced as you might think. I was young and thought myself smarter than everybody else. In some ways, I was a rookie, just like you.”

Leon huffed a laugh.

“Was using me part of your inexperience, too?”

“You want to know how inexperienced I was?” she snapped, the first spark of emotion she displayed since entering the room. “In my line of work, you would’ve been considered an obstacle. Anyone else would’ve pulled the trigger. I didn’t. I let you live. What do you think that means?”

“That you’re a coward.”

It felt good, Leon thought. It felt good to be harsh and bitter, to be the one throwing out the blows and the knives and see the expression on her eyes twitching, her lips parting, to give her a taste of all the pain she’d caused him for six years.

He felt like a wounded animal lashing out.

But Ada recovered quickly, as she always did, and laughed. A rose-cheeked, eye-glowing laughter that twisted his insides and burned his chest with feelings he didn’t want to expose right now. He stared, knuckles turning white around the handle of his pistol, all of it blurring at the edges, undone by something as simple as the way she laughed. None of this had ever touched her; she hadn’t spent years trying to stitch a wound that refused to heal, unlike him.

She was above it.

“You’re one to talk,” Ada tilted her face, shaking her head in denial. “Go on, grab your phone and call your superior. Turn me in. Or you can shoot me yourself and be done with all this bother.”

Leon stared down at his hands, the gun slipping from his grasp with each passing second. He saw them drenched in the blood of all the innocents that had died because of her involvement in bioterrorism and his inability to cast aside his feelings and do his duty. Turn her in, put her in jail, end this cycle of death and scheming once and for all. He didn’t think himself a coward, though.

He was just a hypocrite.

Ada continued, granting him no mercy.

“You can’t, can you?” there was no mockery in her voice. “Maybe now you’ll understand how I felt six years ago.”

Leon lowered his head in resignation, chuckling.

“Are you telling me you spared me out of the goodness of your heart?”

“You’re a good man, Leon,” she said, softer now. He almost scoffed at that. “I can’t say I’ve met many good men in my life. I guess you stood out. Made quite the impression on me.”

He rubbed his forehead, a headache creeping in.

“Is that what you’re here for, then? To tell me I’m a good man?”

“To tell you that I’m sorry,” her words came out unevenly, unfamiliar to her tongue, like it was the first time she’d ever spoken those words to someone. “I never meant—it was never my intention to… I know you’re angry. Maybe you have every right to be. But I didn’t foresee any of this. I wish things had turned out differently for you. I’m the one to blame, I see that now. I should have been more professional and—”

“Angry?” Leon let out a breath that sounded closer to a laugh, but there was no amusement in it. His head snapped back up, something akin to madness flickering behind his eyes. He stood up from the bed, walking towards her. “You think—you think I’m angry because you lied about being FBI? Or because you kissed me? Or because you were there for the G-Virus?”

His voice broke, panting.

“I thought you were dead!”

Ada lowered her gaze, taking a deep breath that didn’t go unnoticed by Leon. His words felt like shattered glass all around them.

“For six—” he swallowed, shaking his head like he couldn’t quite get through it. “For six years, I thought… I saw you fall. I… I mourned you. And now you show up like nothing ever happened, like you didn’t—”

“You knew I was alive,” Ada cut in, pressed against the door with Leon standing in front of her. He had her cornered. “You had intel.”

“That’s bullshit!” his voice rose. “It doesn’t change a damn thing. You played me for a fool, you laughed at me. You expect me to thank you for not shooting me when you had the chance? Fine. Thanks. But I wish you had.”

The words came out harsher than he meant them to, but he didn’t take them back.

“If you’d done your damn job,” he spat, pointing at her chest with his finger, “I wouldn’t be so fucking miserable.”

“Do you think I was going to jeopardize an entire mission for someone I’d just met?” she gasped, frowning. “Don’t make me laugh. You’re smarter than that.”

“I did.”

The realization hit him; it pushed down his chest until the air departed from his lungs and all that was left was the empty shell of a broken man. He would carry that scar for the rest of his life, forced to stare at it in the mirror every morning. He could cover it up, wear the fanciest jackets to feign dementia but the truth was that the wound never recovered fully, not quite. On rainy days, in moments where his body was tired and aching, he’d feel the pain in his shoulder like a bitter reminder that he’d been ready to die for her, a woman he didn’t even know.

He didn’t know her still, and Leon knew he’d make the same mistake over and over again. She didn’t even have to ask.

“I took a bullet for you…” he let out a broken breath, lips quivering. “And I’ve been bleeding out ever since.”

Ada avoided his gaze. Her jaw tightened, a faint pulse jumped beneath the skin of her cheek, betraying the effort it took to keep herself composed. But Leon did not want her composed; he wanted her out of her mind, open and bruised. Her silence overwhelmed him, realizing that if he didn’t act now, she’d walk away again and he’d have to swallow this poison until it killed him. Leon didn’t know if he could survive it this time.

He gasped, realizing his hands were shaking when he cupped her cheeks, forcing her eyes to meet him against her will. Ada’s eyes fell shut for a second, giving in, and her own fingers found the skin of his jaw, perhaps the only comfort she could allow herself to give him.

“Look, I don’t care anymore. I don’t fucking care what you do, what you are, it doesn’t matter,” he panted, desperate, brushing her cheekbones and pushing aside her fringe with a familiarity that shouldn’t have survived six years of distance. “It doesn’t change the way I feel.”

Ada grimaced.

“Leon,” she heaved, body shivering when his eyes stared down at her lips. Her hand gave his cheek a gentle caress, and he felt the touch right into his soul. “You did fine without me. You don’t need—”

“You kissed me,” his voice cracked, his grip tightened. “I know it meant something to you, because it sure as hell meant something to me. Tell me I wasn’t wrong, that it was real. Tell me I wasn’t imagining it.”

She stayed silent as the ghost she’d always been. Her gaze slipped away, just for a second, but it was enough for Leon to witness something fragile and uncertain waver. It gave him the courage to push a little further.

“Ada, tell me—”

“Leon.”

He shook his head, desperate.

“I loved—”

Her fingers pressed against his lips before he could finish.

It was quick, too quick to be gentle. For a second, her touch lingered there, the warmth of her skin at odds with the sudden stillness that settled over her. It was as if something inside her had recoiled at the sound of it, a red alarm that would kill her if she didn’t run away in time.

Leon looked into her eyes, blinking tears that wouldn’t come out as his breath shivered. The darkness was coming for him. Every spark of hope and courage he’d felt minutes ago had been swallowed entirely. Leon felt only coldness. And whatever had been there before, whatever softness had slipped through her cracks, whatever unguarded thing she’d almost allowed him to see, it vanished.

“Don’t,” she hissed. “Don’t ever say those words to me, do you understand? Because I will never say them back.”

Ada lifted her hands, pushing his away from her face. He let them drop down at his sides, felt the weight on his back and the rain soaking him from head to toe. He wasn’t even looking at her face, anymore. Leon stared at nothing at all.

“I saved your life, you saved mine. Now we're even. Perhaps it’d be best if we go our separate ways, like you wanted, before your ‘feelings’ turn into more of a burden for both of us to handle.”

Leon held his breath when Ada picked up her gloves, her keycard, and left the room without even sparing him a single glance, like he was something she needed to dispose of, a mission accomplished, an unwanted cargo. The door slammed shut and Leon was back on square one, with the silence and the darkness and this hole that couldn’t be satiated with anything. He dragged a hand over his face, breath hitching. He took one step back, and then another, until the back of his knees hit the bed and he sank without even thinking. The silence overwhelmed him; it swallowed him whole.

And even with no one there to see, he hid his face in his hands and wept like a child, his body wracked with wave on wave of heavy, silent sobs.

Leon walked through the door of his apartment, the air was cold. He hadn’t meant to get off work so late in the night, but his job had become—against his own irrational will—an escape from the silence that lingered in the walls of his isolated home. He had a TV, sure, some noise he could rely on when his thoughts wandered to dangerous places, but work kept his head busy, his hands occupied, and his feelings numbed. Alcohol did that, too. Which was good and comforting and the thing he planned on doing tonight, considering Hunnigan called off work tomorrow, something about a storm and low work volume and a bunch of stuff Leon didn’t pay attention to. He was going to open up a bottle of whiskey, drown his entire existence and watch a boring cooking TV show until he crashed on his couch. It was the perfect evening, truly.

He was almost excited about it. But Ada Wong had other plans, which often included ruining his.

Perceptive as he’d always been, Leon closed the door behind him and asked himself, again, why was the room so damn cold. Shrugging off his jacket, he walked towards his living room where he found the windows wide open and the silhouette of a woman balancing on his chair, legs crossed over his cheap dining table. She mingled with the shadows, dressed in black. The bottle of whiskey he’d reserved for tonight was open and halfway empty over the table along with two glasses, one in her hand. He huffed, irritated. This time, Leon didn’t pull out his gun. He was tired, and angry, and all he wanted was a night of peace and solitude. So he leaned against the nearest wall, arms crossed.

“For all that shit you gave me last time about going our separate ways,” he began, sighing, “you have a habit of changing your mind when it suits you.”

Ada wasn’t looking at him. She kept her gaze on her glass, swirling the whiskey over and over again. She looked like a grim reaper, waiting for him in the dark, the same way he supposed Death waits for everyone, eventually.

“You have a lot of bottles over there,” she slurred her words, as if it’d taken a considerable amount of effort to sound cohesive. Her finger pointed at a cabinet near the farthest wall. “Are you an alcoholic?”

Leon shook his head in denial. “How do you even know where I live?” he looked around, as if realizing. “This building has a shit ton of security, how did you get past—”

“I’m not scared of your security boys, rookie,” she sighed, as if the conversation bored her. "If anything, they should be afraid of me."

He saw her gun on the table. He thought about reaching out to the wall and turning on the lights, but something in her demeanor sent shivers down his spine, like being in front of a wild animal that could charge at any sudden movement. Leon stood still, assessing the situation.

“Alright,” he spoke softly. The room reeked of whiskey. “Wanna tell me what you’re here for?”

Ada remained silent; she took her time. Drowned the glass in one go, setting it over the table, and licked her lips with the patience he lacked for these kinds of heavy, unwanted silences. Ada always seemed to take slower steps compared to him, yet she constantly gloated about reaching the finish line first. Everything was a competition, everything was a game.

“I had an interesting client, you see,” she began, tilting her head to the side. And it’s not that Leon was an alcoholic, only an enthusiast, but he noticed her lack of sobriety right away. “He seems to have taken quite an interest in you. You’ve made a lot of enemies over the years, Mr. Kennedy. He thinks you’re a problem, and he wants you out. I’ll let you guess who he hired to do his dirty job.”

Leon blinked, not impressed by her nonsense. He laughed, terribly amused.

“Oh, I see,” he nodded, still chuckling. “You’re here to kill me? Fuck. Thought this day would never come.”

She ignored his words completely.

“I’ve been here a while. Considered a few options,” she said, absently tracing the rim of the glass. Her red lipstick stood out in the darkness, velvet and smooth. “Poison, at first. They say it’s a woman’s weapon. I even had it ready, thought I’d make it painless for you. Poured the drinks, but I ended up finishing both myself. I just couldn’t do it. Why is that, do you think?”

The confession should appall him. Should twist his insides and crawl at his skin and make his teeth grind but the years have made him perceptive, as much the professional as she claimed herself to be. Leon could see through her facade the same way she could see through his.

Leon delivered a soft, amused, fond smile. He was done with her bullshit.

“Oh, I know why.”

“I’ve never failed a single job,” she ignored him, her tone growing restless. “Not even once. And yet… I can’t seem to finish this one. Why?”

“Because you’re scared,” he said it plainly, just the way it was. “You’re too scared to admit what we both know very well.”

Ada lifted her chin, defiant.

“And what’s that?”

And since Leon considered himself to be quite the suicidal bastard, he offered himself for the slaughter.

“That you’re in love with me.”

It was so unlike her, the way Ada rose from the chair in an instant, almost kicking the bottle in the process. She walked towards him in a hurry, fire and anger unleashing in her gaze, almost stumbling with her heels. Leon felt the impulse to make fun of her, of her composed demeanor slowly breaking at the seams, of the way she so expertly carried herself with excessive overconfidence until the word love was brought up, as if loving her was the worst thing he could ever do to her.

“You don’t know a damn thing,” she hissed, looking at him straight in the eye.

“I know you love me,” he pressed, fighting back the smirk.

He was an asshole, wasn’t he?

“Love you?” her voice cracked, her anger a perfume he could taste. He’d never seen her like this, so out of her element. “You're pathetic.”

This time, he couldn’t hold it. He laughed.

“Is that where you draw the line?” he mocked without intention. It just came out of him. “You’re still a rookie if the word love is what makes you lose your shit like that. Very professional, Ada, really.”

Slow down, a voice whispered in his ear. You’re pushing it too far.

She was panting.

“I should kill you, should’ve done it years ago. I—”

Leon pushed himself away from the wall, towering over her.

“You’ve already killed me,” he attacked, the weight of their anger pulling their bodies closer each time. “Time and time again, it makes no difference anymore. So finish your job, if you want, but I know you can’t, because you—”

Leon didn’t see it coming. Ada slapped him across the face.

He snapped his head to the side, jaw shifting by the impact. It wasn’t painful; he knew she could truly hurt him if she wanted to. She could break his neck in the blink of an eye if she meant to. The silence that followed was only filled with her pants, her little sounds of frustration that he ate up with sick satisfaction. He turned to her again, unaffected, and that only drove her madder.

She slapped him again, almost as if expecting he’d fight back. He didn’t. Ada panicked and shoved him in the chest, hard enough to make him step backwards but she never got the reaction she hoped for, so she shoved him again. And again. And again. The whiskey dulled her senses and her judgment.

“You’ve ruined everything,” she choked, the mask completely off her face. She shoved him one more time, frowning and shuddering and Leon almost swore he saw something like tears in her eyes. “You—you ruined… you…”

Her hands hit his chest again, but this time he caught them. His fingers closed around her wrists, stilling her before the next push could land. Ada tried to fight back, but in one quick motion Leon shifted his weight forward, pinning her against the nearest wall. She tried to break free but he wasn’t the rookie she so proudly thought him to be. He was strong and tall, and a force to be reckoned with.

Leon restrained her hands behind her back, noses almost touching. Her frantic breath hit his lips, clouding his senses.

“Are you done?” he gasped.

She parted her lips, readying her poison, sharpening her knives. Her eyes ran all over his face, overwhelmed, her anger and frustration morphing into something he knew quite well. Lust. Ada didn’t think twice before she caught his lips in a searing, painful kiss. And Leon would have liked to pretend he didn’t see it coming, like the first time she kissed him on their way to the NEST. He’d been young back then, and stupid, and easily surprised.

But nothing surprised him anymore.

Leon kissed her just as fervently. His tongue broke way into her mouth, letting go of her hands. He cupped her jaw, tilting her face just enough to make her see that his restraint had been snapped too, that he was also done with this constant pulling and pushing. Her fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt, whimpering against his parted lips. She tasted like everything he wanted her to taste like: of whiskey, of cherries and gooseberries, of lust and gunpowder and chaos.

He had her up against the wall in one quick motion. His hands slipped underneath the fabric of her dress, grasping the extension of her thighs. She felt hot to the touch, burning up with a fever that he felt right to the core. Ada trailed her lips down his jaw, tongue slick and moist, gripping his hair at the nape with an agony that sent endless waves of pleasure down his back.

“I want you,” she growled against his skin, consuming his lips in another open-mouthed kiss.

I know, he wanted to say. I’ve always known. But it was hard doing that with her tongue nearly reaching down his throat. He heard the sound of her heels meet the ground with a loud clack. She pushed her hips and rolled them against his erection, and his hands moved to her ass to encourage the motion, to feel her on him as deeply as he felt her in his veins, throbbing and intoxicating. Her fingers unbuttoned his shirt, tracing down his chest, and of all the times he imagined this scenario playing in his head—he was a man, after all—he never quite thought it would be like this, hurried and in the midst of an argument. He imagined a bed, sometimes, and some words of honesty. Leon knew he could easily carry her to his bed if he wished to, but six years of agony turned him into a monster of longing.

His palm slipped under her thong and his lips curved when he felt her wetness overshadow her endless web of lies. I don’t need you, I want to kill you, I don’t love you, I’m just using you. What a load of bullshit. He dragged lazy circles on her clit just to infuriate her, to drag her over this pit she’d built where she expected him to be the one to fall, but he wasn’t going to give up that easily. If Ada intended for him to fall, he was going to drag her along with him. Whatever shit she started in 1998, he was going to finish it tonight.

Ada moaned against his tongue and their eyes found each other in the stillness of the moment, in the way his fingers quickened their pace and in the way he saw the molten heat pour out from her eyes, burning him alive. She gripped his shoulders, a strained whine escaping her gorgeous lips, chasing his touch with a roll of her hips. His pace never faltered, lips grazing but not kissing, a single string of saliva connecting their parted mouths. He would make her come, just like this, and remind her how much she needed him, how guarded she pretended to be and how compliant she would become with just a touch of his fingers.

He wanted to eat her out, leave her hanging and then break her apart with his tongue, but he didn’t have it in him to push away just yet. Her features contorted in pleasure, so unlike her stoic expression. He swirled his fingers faster on her clit and felt her body go slack in his arms.

Never breaking eye contact, he whispered against her mouth:

“I want to see you come.”

The sound of his voice did it for her.

“L-Leon…” she sobbed, desperate. Her hands clutched at his face, digging her nails into his skin, promising to leave marks the next morning. He didn’t mind. She’d marked him for life, already. “Leon.. Le…”

That’s all she said as she came. His name.

The next couple of minutes followed a similar path. She fumbled with his belt buckle, trapped him inside of her, and he fucked her against the wall like it was the last time he ever would.

Perhaps it was.

Hunnigan was right.

The storm filled his bedroom with the aroma of rain and cold metal. Thunder flashed through his open windows and the cold made Ada’s body even warmer in his arms. The bed was a mess, his life was a mess, his night had turned quite messy, too. He never took Ada for the clingy type, but something about whiskey, with the help of one orgasm or two, made her impossibly attached to his body. He ran his fingers through her hair, her back, noticing she was dozing off.

He was about to do the same, but he heard her whisper mingling with the rain.

“I didn’t take the job, you know,” she said. He felt her lips mouth the words against his skin. “Took care of the guy before I even accepted the offer.”

Leon stayed silent for a while.

“Why?” he finally asked.

Ada shifted slightly against him, just enough for Leon to feel it.

“Because no one gets to kill you but me. If you’re going to die someday, it’ll be my call. No one else’s."

That was probably the closest thing to a love confession he was going to get from her.

“Yeah,” Leon hummed, eyes falling shut. The arms of slumber slowly took over him. “Wouldn’t want anyone else getting that honor.”

Ada waited for him for nearly two hours.

She had intel that he was in New York City, accompanying the president on some routine government affair, nothing of great importance. It had been a while since they’d seen each other, so Ada thought it appropriate to catch up, as only old friends do. She had texted him the hotel address days ago, but the message was never delivered. At first, Ada thought nothing of it. Phones changed just as numbers did. In his line of work, it was expected, and the world in 2007 was changing faster than most people could keep up with, technology included. She couldn’t blame him for wanting to stay trendy or spend his salary on a fancier device. It meant nothing at all.

Until she realized the number was no longer his.

It took a few hours, a handful of contacts and just enough pressure in the right places to get what she needed. His number appeared on her screen again as if it’d never left, so she sent the message one more time and this time it was delivered. Ada was aware of the risks she was taking. If anyone traced it, it could compromise him. Drag him into something he had no business being part of, but Ada wasn’t worried. If anything came for him, she would deal with it, like she always did.

But as Ada paced around the suite, she wondered what the fuck she was doing. Wearing her pretty red dress, calling room service and even having the audacity—the audacity!—to check herself out in the mirror, like she was some lame ordinary woman on a date. This wasn’t a date, this was nothing more than simple body needs that needed to be taken care of, and what better than doing it with a man she knew wouldn’t backstab her during her sleep? He was a familiar face and she didn’t have many of those in her life. They’d fucked a few times since she showed up at his apartment that one night that became her biggest nightmare, never to repeat again. Ada enjoyed his company, for better or worse.

That was all, truly.

And yet, when Ada heard the door beep and open, her heart did this thing she wasn’t quite used to, where it rattled and burned till one time made her wonder if she was about to have a heart attack. It was different from the agitation of a good run in the morning or the adrenaline in a hand-to-hand combat. It spread to her skin, the very tips of her toes; it made her breath irregular and her cheeks quite flushed, which was pathetic.

Leon came in through the door and Ada noticed that something was off. She pushed the thought away, pretending she hadn’t spent two hours pacing around the suite waiting for him and decided to occupy her hands with something else to play the part, feigning surprise at seeing him arrive like she hadn’t been counting every fucking minute ever since.

It was embarrassing.

“You’re early,” she lied, walking towards him. “I just got in; traffic was awful.”

Ada reached out to him, ignoring how desperate she was to kiss him and feel his hands all over her, but when she held his face and motioned towards his mouth, Leon pulled away slightly. Ada froze. He’d never done that before, not even once. There was tenderness in the way he held her wrists when he stopped her from reaching closer, a soft gaze that told her he wasn’t angry.

She loathed it.

Ada didn’t want his softness. She wanted him to rip her dress and pull her in and make her come and kiss her until she could no longer breathe. She wanted to feel his need and the way he acted like he couldn’t function properly if he didn’t have her naked on a bed.

“We need to talk,” was all he said. He gave her cheek a fleeting caress and walked past her, leaving her standing there like a fool.

She would never be a fool. Especially not for him.

Ada refused to show disappointment, so she moved over to the room service cart and poured herself a glass of champagne, gulping it down in one go before pouring another.

“You want some?” she asked, casually, her back facing him. “This champagne is atrocious, but it’s the only one they h—”

“I’m seeing someone.”

Ah, there it was. The reason for his cold and honorable demeanor, his desperate attempt to do the right thing because he was just that kind of guy. Ada turned slightly, no emotion in her eyes.

She nodded.

“And?”

Leon stared for a second, then gasped.

“Are you serious?”

Ada sighed, walking over to the bed. She got herself comfortable on the mattress, taking a sip of her flute.

“I’m not your girlfriend, Leon,” she explained the basics, as if arguing with a toddler. “You can do as you please.”

For the next couple of seconds, Leon didn’t move, didn’t even blink. It looked as if her words hadn’t quite registered yet. Like he was still catching up. He was quite slow, after all. She didn’t blame him, in fact, she found it cute, so she laughed. She laughed, and that’s when he snapped out of it. His expression shifted all at once, brows pulled together.

“I can’t believe it,” he hissed, shaking his head as he paced around the room.

Ada shrugged, arching a brow.

“Why? You think you’re my only lover?” Ada felt a knot in her chest but she pushed past the feeling, desperately needing to control the situation to the best of her abilities. He wasn’t going to fucking ruin things for her, not again. “I don’t mind. Look, I ordered Pad Thai. Let’s eat, aren’t you hungry?”

“I don’t want—” his voice rose an octave and stopped himself before losing it. Leon rubbed his eyes, taking a deep breath. He approached until he was kneeling in front of her, holding her face in the palm of his hands. “Ada, please, please listen to me. I—”

“Stop that,” she hissed, pushing his hands away and rising from the bed, needing a way out, an escape route.

“Stop what?”

“Treat me like I’m some fragile thing you need to protect. Say what you came here to say. You want to stop, is that it?”

Ada saw the light depart from his eyes, the softness he’d displayed. She was doing that to him, she realized. Sucking the life out of him, the joy, the tenderness, all the qualities that made him who he was. She was a fucking parasite.

“You know what? Maybe I do. Maybe I’m tired of sneaking off to some shitty hotel just to—” he exhaled sharply, dragging a hand through his face. “Just to be with you, not knowing when I’ll see you again. Or if I ever will. You call me when you need to, but it seems you don’t give a fuck when it’s been four, five, six months and I haven’t heard a single word from you. You didn't even say goodbye last time. I woke up and you were gone. That was six months ago.”

Ada held his gaze, refusing to look away. If he wanted to deliver his pathetic little speech, he would have to do it to her face. But with every word he said, her grip tightened around the stem of her flute.

He continued, panting.

“I can’t keep doing this shit with you and pretend I can have something real with someone else. I can’t have both, and maybe I don’t want to anymore. Maybe I want something real, for once in my fucking life. Is that so bad?”

She bit the inside of her cheek so hard that it would hurt tomorrow. It would bleed. Ada blinked, once, twice, and nodded.

“Okay.”

Leon frowned, caught off guard. “Okay? That’s it?”

Ada nodded again, taking a sip of her champagne.

“Yes, that’s it.”

“You’re not going to—”

“What? Beg?” she mocked, amused. “Don't make me laugh.”

She turned around, pretending to arrange the food on the cart, but the reality was she needed something to keep her hands busy, a convenient reason not to look at him. If she did, even for a second, he’d see it all. So Ada adjusted things that didn’t need adjusting, straightened utensils already in place, lifted the lid of a dish only to set it back down again. Her vision blurred for a fraction of a second. She blinked quickly, once, then again, forcing it back, screaming at herself not here, not now. Stop, you dumb fucking bitch, stop—

Leon’s voice felt like a punch in the face.

“Alright, then,” was all he said.

Nine years, reduced to two simple words. She heard his footsteps first and then the door, the sharp finality of it echoing through the room. Ada flinched, and the sensation felt so foreign in her own body that she stilled immediately after, as if she could erase it by sheer will alone.

Her gaze dropped back to the room service cart, the food untouched.

She didn’t even like Pad Thai; it was too sour and greasy. She had always preferred simpler flavours, but Leon loved Pad Thai, and she was willing to make an effort for the chance of seeing him smile and say “you ordered Pad Thai?” like he always did. As if surprised that she knew what he liked. Now he would have it with someone else. Someone who would actually enjoy it and wouldn’t lie about it. Someone who would give him the kind of life he deserved, free of danger and scheming and plotting. Someone with a real name, a real family, an honest job, a selfless heart.

Someone who wasn’t her.

Gasping, Ada threw the flute to the side, the glass shattering against the wall. She braced her hands on the cart, panting, fighting back the tears and the burning and the ache, her mind conjuring an infinite amount of insults to herself. Idiot, imbecile, you pathetic piece of shit, he’s the only real pure thing you have in your miserable life and you managed to ruin it all over again, you fucking—

The room felt too small all of a sudden. The echo of the glass still rang in her ears, swallowed by the silence he’d left behind. He was gone, and the thought hadn’t settled until now. He was gone. For years, she’d been the one to leave. The one to decide when it ended, when it paused, when it continued. She’d built her control around that certainty because Ada knew she wouldn't be able to fathom a blow that didn’t come from her hand first. He was too nice, too kind to do such a thing, but she’d given him the butchering knife and what? Pretended to be shocked that he finally used it?

Her head lifted abruptly, eyes darting towards the door as if expecting it to open again, see him walk back inside and go back to the useless game they’ve been playing for more than nine years.

He'll come back, she thought. He always does.

Only this time he didn't.

Ada pushed herself off the cart completely. Her heels caught slightly against the carpet floor but she didn’t stop. She ran out of the suite and into the hallway, didn’t even take the elevator and headed straight down the stairs, expertly skipping steps until she reached the reception and pushed the glass doors open to breathe the nasty air of New York. She stopped on the sidewalk, people walking past her like she wasn’t even there, and her eyes roamed around for traces of him. Of his black leather jacket and his blonde hair and his ocean eyes and his pathetic one-liners she hated so much and—

He was nowhere to be found.

She felt the tears run down her cheeks, unwanted and foreign, for the very first time in years.

The smell of sex filled the air.

The room had gone quiet in that heavy, lingering way it always did after, when the sheets were still warm and the air hadn't quite settled yet. Distant sirens, the low hum of traffic, the life of the city infiltrating through his closed windows and into his ears… it was a reminder that people had normal lives out there, normal things to do.

Leon lay on his back, one arm behind his head and the other resting loosely around Angela's body, curled up against him. She was a beautiful woman, and Leon quite enjoyed looking at beautiful things. She had a gorgeous body, a gentle voice, and the kind of lifestyle that he could keep up with. Dating outside the job was hard these days, and his few (and very short-lived) relationships never lasted long. He had to travel a lot and spend entire nights in the office doing boring paperwork. He would sometimes show up with wounds and bruises that would scare off any kind of ordinary woman whose only concern in life was to pick between two movies on a Saturday night.

That was a life he couldn't have, and he'd made peace with that.

Angela was easy and she'd taken quite an interest in him. Claire told him he should give it a shot because he was becoming a "boring bastard who didn't know how to have fun", those were her words. And since he took Claire's opinion in high esteem, he decided to try it out. For good, this time.

Emphasis on the word trying, needless to say.

"You do that a lot," her voice was merely a whisper, but Leon felt her eyes all over him.

A quick remark swirled on the tip of his tongue. He wanted to say something like "what, make you come?" or "I can do a lot more, if you wanna" which he knew would infuriate her because Angela wasn't the biggest fan of his lame sense of humor. She took it personally, trying to overanalyze him because she believed it was one of his many unhealthy coping mechanisms to avoid confrontation.

It pissed him off, sometimes.

"What's that?"

"Space out."

Leon dragged a hand over his face, exhaling slowly.

"It's been a long week, Angela."

She paused for a moment, stroking his arm.

"You can talk to me, you know?" Angela said softly, shifting closer against the sheets. "If you tell me what's wrong, maybe I—"

"I have nothing to say because nothing is wrong."

The words came out sharper than he intended, and Leon winced almost immediately, a flicker of regret crossed his face before he could hide it. He dragged a hand through his hair, gasping. He wasn't trying to snap at her, but there was something about the way she looked at him sometimes, like there was something fundamentally wrong with him, something that needed to be fixed.

It made his skin crawl.

"Everything's great," he added in a whisper. "You want a drink?"

He didn't wait for an answer. Leon swung his legs over the side of the bed, the mattress dipping as he stood, and reached for his joggers to pull them on in one quick motion. The floor felt cold under his feet as he crossed the room towards the cabinet that had been calling him since the moment Angela entered his apartment.

"Things are clearly not great if every time you feel cornered you end up in a bottle."

Ah.

Right.

Leon's hands hovered over the cabinet door for a second before he pulled it open again, grabbing the first bottle on sight. He didn't even care which brand it was. He didn't care about many things, lately.

"I'm not—"

"If you'd just admit that you have a problem, then—"

"A problem?" Leon cut in, turning around abruptly. His grip tightened around the bottle. "Over a glass of wine? Don't make me laugh."

Leon almost winced at his words, realizing they sounded pretty much like something Ada would say to him. The thought pierced his chest like the cut of a thousand knives. Fuck. Angela pushed herself up on the bed, the sheets pooling at her waist as she faced him fully now. She stared at him the same way you'd look at a soaked puppy in the rain. He hated being looked at like that.

"You've been drinking every day for a month," Leon gazed away for a second, scoffing under his breath. Angela continued, "I'm not trying to be judgmental, I'm really not. But I care about you, and I want to help—"

"Help?" he let out a short, incredulous laugh. "What the hell does that even mean? Do I have a sign on my back that says 'save me', or something?"

Angela flinched, clearly hurt by his words. It was a habit lately, to lash out at everyone and everything.

"You barely talk to me," she said, firmly this time. "I know nothing about you, Leon. I've told you everything about me, but you just… when you have a bad day, you disappear. You don't answer my calls. And when I'm right here you don't even look at me."

His gaze dropped to the floor. What kind of excuse would he deliver this time? There was no excuse. Or maybe there was, maybe his excuse had long legs and high heels, red lips and a sardonic stare. A gun pointed at his head, always, and words that cut him deeper than any sword ever could.

Don't ever say those words to me, because I will never say them back.

Leon felt like a hypocrite, like a thing that every day morphed into a monster rather than a real person. Angela had said those words to him, too. In the heat of the moment, gasping against his lips and hoping he'd say them back. He never did. Perhaps he wasn't that much different from Ada, after all. Perhaps all the things he went through broke him to the point of no return, unable to love anything at all in a pure, honest way. And the one thing he loved, he couldn't have. Such was the paradox of his sad, tragic life.

He was trying, with all his might, to be present. To smile when supposed to, crack a joke or two. Focus on a movie, hang out with his team after work, eat healthy and be grateful for a roof on a rainy night. But the truth was that cars driving by didn't sound the same and love songs felt like torture on the radio; he wasn't even getting that much sleep. Leon knew what a broken heart felt like, he was familiar with that sentiment, but Ada's absence felt like more than a simple ache that could be erased in the arms of another woman.

Angela—or any other, for that matter, couldn't fill the empty shape Ada left behind. He'd tried, time and time again, to find something that could fit into that hole and numb the pain, but nothing ever worked. He'd stare at his phone, sometimes, heart fluttering when the screen flashed and his wishful thinking muttered maybe it's her, maybe she'll say that she's sorry for being a bitch and ask to meet up and say that she misses me—

But that moment never came, which was hilarious, because it had been Leon the one to break things off with her in the first place.

"I'm not stupid," Angela said in a whisper, taking him out of his trance. "I can tell when a man's thinking about someone else."

His eyes fell shut. He wanted her to shut up, to stop summoning the ghost of a woman he was trying to forget every damn second of every fucking day. For years.

Leon stayed silent, not knowing what to say.

She licked her lips, shrugging in sad resignation.

"Will you tell me who she is, at least?"

Ada was a secret he'd take to the grave. As bitter and resentful as he felt, as many curses as he'd thrown back at her in his sleep, as much as he wished that sometimes he'd never met her, he would never speak Ada's name out loud. He would die before doing so.

So Leon shook his head, unashamed, and met her eyes at last.

"No," he said. "I won't."

Angela got out of bed in a hurry, putting on her underwear and her floral dress and combing her fingers through her hair to look presentable. She grabbed her purse, looping the strap around her shoulders, and he didn't stop her.

He did nothing at all.

"I wish you well, Leon," was all she said before exiting his apartment, slamming the door shut.

Leon stood there, by the cabinet, one hand resting against its edge like he needed something solid to hold on to. He realized, then, that he was done. Done with the dating, the women, his poor attempts to build a normal life that did not fit into his small, undecorated apartment.

He was going to spend the rest of his days working himself to an early grave, drinking until he passed out, content with his spite and his tears, his beers and his candles.

They found each other again a year later, by mere accident.

Leon was drinking at the hotel bar, which didn’t come off as a surprise, but Ada hadn’t foreseen a reunion in such a short span of time. She thought that the next time she’d hear from him would be under a different picture: a wife, kids, a new car, a new house, the kind of boring life he claimed to pursue. Instead, she saw the silhouette of a lonely man with tired eyes and a glass filled to the rim.

She was in D.C for work, to be honest. She’d taken a good number of jobs over the last few months, most of them out of the country, but this one required a formal meeting with an informant at a fancy hotel near the National Building Museum. And since the job was over, she decided to spend her remaining hours drinking something at the bar before leaving for whatever place she needed to be, which was nowhere at all.

She had nowhere to go, truly, when she wasn’t working.

That’s when she saw him. She wasn’t going to approach, despite her selfishness and lack of judgment, but their eyes met across the room and neither had the willpower to look away. Ada hesitated, uncomfortable for the very first time in her life, until Leon raised his glass and motioned at her to come over with a tilt of his head.

Ada let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding for nearly five months. Putting on a smirk, never willing to let him see how relieved she was that he wasn’t being a rude son of a bitch, Ada walked over to the bar, elegant and mighty.

She sat next to him, composed and at ease.

“You look miserable,” was her greeting.

It made him smile. It made her smile that he smiled. Leon shrugged, already used to her peculiar introductions. Ada ordered herself a martini, resting her cheek in the palm of her hand.

“Yeah, it’s part of the charm,” he joked. “Keeps them coming back, you know?”

Ada raised her brows, eyes swiftly inspecting her surroundings.

“I see no one around,” her gaze returned to him, and the way he was looking at her made her catch her lower lip for the briefest second. Ada spent most of her life seeking control, yet it took one glance from Leon to crush all her defenses. “Where’s that girlfriend of yours?”

“Yeah, about that,” he mused. “That… didn’t end well, actually.”

Of course it didn’t.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she wasn’t sorry at all. “You were quite enthusiastic about it.”

The bartender brought her the martini. Ada chewed on the olive, studying Leon like he was the most fascinating painting in a museum.

“You’re the worst,” he shook his head, drinking from his glass, and breathed out a laugh.

Ada shrugged, drinking her martini in silence.

“What about you?” he continued, elbows on the counter. “Has life smiled down on you, too?”

I cried myself to sleep the other night because of you, you fucking shit, she thought.

“Very much,” she agreed. “Added a great number of zeros to my bank account. I’m in high demand, you see.”

“Oh, I’m sure you are.”

Ada went back to her martini, her grin slowly fading away. They stayed in silence for a while, and perhaps it was the alcohol and her low tolerance to it, or perhaps it was Leon, but Ada vomited the words before she could push them down her throat.

“I missed you.”

She thought herself brave enough to stare at his face as she said that. It was a whisper, a soft little thing meant only for Leon to hear, even if the bar was quite empty, so late in the night. He didn’t meet her eyes, kept his gaze on his glass, but knew he heard her.

Leon nodded a few times, slowly, as if taking it all in. Tasting her brief moment of honesty like it was a first.

“I missed you, too.”

His eyes found hers, finally, and Ada answered with a faint nod. They held each other’s gaze for a few seconds before she reached out, her fingers brushing through his hair, gentle in a way that felt almost misplaced on her. Leon’s eyes slipped shut, leaning into the touch without thinking.

Just like that, the tension in his face softened. Suddenly, he didn’t look as miserable anymore.

“Are you hungry?” she asked, her voice like soft velvet. She wondered if Leon knew she’d only ever used that tone with him. “They had Pad Thai on the menu, last time I checked.”

Her blatant lie made him grin.

“You don’t even like Pad Thai.”

Ada bit the inside of her cheek, a smile tugging at her lips. He really was something, wasn’t he?

“Ah,” she murmured. “You got me.”

He grabbed her hand before she could pull away, guiding it down from his hair. His fingers wrapped loosely around hers as he brought her knuckles to his lips, pressing a slow, lingering kiss there. It wasn’t wise for either of them to display this much affection in public. For all Ada knew, the bartender could be a double agent. The waitress wiping the tables could make a single call and have them both killed. That’s the way Ada lived her life. Everyone is your friend, everyone is your enemy. Expect the worst, always, and trust no one.

But Leon had managed to crush her professionalism and turn it into meaningless dust. He had the power to ruin her life as much as she could ruin his.

The world was already in flames, either way.

“Yeah,” his breath caressed her fingers. “I’d like that.”

They ate Pad Thai, had two more drinks, and then had sex.

But sex wasn’t quite the word she was looking for, this time. There was no rush to it, no urgency driven by habit or the unspoken understanding that it would be over too soon. Ada kept her eyes open when he cupped her face and gave her a kiss that she felt down to her skull. They undressed slowly, held each other closely, and for a moment Ada was frightened. This was the very thing she’d been trying to avoid, the same thing she’d tried to explain to him numerous times, without words.

Leon was her weakness, the only weakness she’d ever had. She was impeccable at her craft, could take down a life and never lose sleep because of it. She could do her job diligently and gain the respect of the most dangerous people on earth. But Leon was a problem, one that she’d obtained by her inability to think straight when he was near. She needed to keep him safe and away from her, but almost eleven years had passed and nothing had changed. Ada was still in orbit, pulled by his unyielding magnetism. She couldn’t have it both ways, and the thought tortured her mind during numerous sleepless nights.

They lay in bed, facing each other, talking for hours late into the night. Leon was dozing off, doing his best to keep up, but Ada hadn’t heard his voice in nearly six months and now she was feeling greedy.

“Do you regret it? Becoming an agent?” she asked, wide eyes staring at his face.

He thought about it for a second.

“It’s hard to regret something you didn’t choose, but… I never thought my life would turn out this way."

“Hmm,” she hesitated, biting her lip. “In what way? What did you dream about?”

Leon snorted, finding her question rather amusing.

“I just wanted to be a cop,” he sighed, like it was that simple. It used to be, in a way. “Help an old lady cross the street, stop the robbers… get married, have a kid or two, that kind of stuff. But that life feels too far away now.”

Ada blinked, slowly.

“You could still have those things, you know,” she said. After a moment of consideration, she added. "You’re not that old.”

Leon hummed, eyes falling shut for a second.

“I don't mind anymore,” he paused, then opened his eyes again. “Did you dream of doing… well, whatever the hell it is that you’re doing now?”

“I didn’t have much of a choice either.”

“What is it that you wanted, then?”

For a moment, Ada paused. She looked down, choosing her words carefully.

“I wanted…” she swallowed, licking her lips. “I guess I wanted to become important to someone. One day."

She regretted her words as soon as she opened her mouth, which was becoming a normality every time she spoke to Leon. But when she looked up at his face, his eyes were closed. His chest rose with the slow cadence of his breathing, exhaling one last time.

“You’re important to me,” he slurred the words, letting himself be carried away by slumber.

The words lingered in the air between them. Ada blinked, almost as if she hadn't heard them properly, as if they might dissolve if she acknowledged them too quickly. What did he mean by that? Important could mean lots of different things. Her job was important to her, the one thing she'd devoted her whole life to for the past twenty years. Her grapple gun was important, too. She felt naked and exposed without it, like an autumn tree. But Ada realized she was naming material possessions, station, ideologies.

She wanted to ask, desperately, what he meant by that. Important in which way? Important enough to turn a blind eye whenever she accepted the job of a client he wanted to kill? Important enough to protect her even if it costs him his own life? Important enough to turn this whole deal into an illicit affair if he ever found himself a wife in the near future?

Important how?

Ada stared at him. His faint stubble that spoke greatly of his growing maturity, the marks on his shoulders, the nuances of his breathing, the rise and fall of his chest…

Without even thinking, her fingers brushed along his cheek, careful not to startle him. He looked at peace, like a version of him untouched by all the horrors he'd endured, all the things she'd put him through. He was beautiful, she thought. But so were lots of other men. The difference was, and this seemed to blow Ada's mind away sometimes, that Leon carried his beauty like it was something burrowed. Carefully yet casually, not making a fuss about it. He wouldn't stand out for anyone, anywhere. He'd stand out, glowing with quiet pride.

She wondered what it must've been like to grow up that beautiful, with his hair kissing his eyelashes and the spark that shimmered in his gaze when he laughed about something he found hilarious. He'd told her about his childhood, his parents' criminal records and how he'd been rescued by a cop, wishing nothing but to follow in his footsteps. He was all alone in the world, just like her. Empty rooms with no one to talk to, no one to trust entirely. Did she trust him? Did he trust her?

Ada shifted closer, just enough to shorten the space between them. She curled into his side with measured restraint, his face only a few inches away from hers; she could feel his breathing caressing her lips. She didn't understand him, sometimes. The only puzzle she hadn't yet been able to solve, smart as she thought herself to be.

She wanted to, though. For better or worse.

Ada licked her lips, filling her lungs with words she'd never said to anyone ever before.

"I…" she hesitated, staring at his mouth. "You're important to me, too."

Suddenly, Leon chuckled, rough with sleep. Or the illusion of it, that filthy bastard. It startled her enough that her entire body tensed, muscles spasming in something akin to horror. His eyes opened, lazily, shimmering with affection and adoration and love and—

Ada wanted to throw up.

"What—"

"You always talk this much when I'm asleep?" he mused, his chuckle made the mattress jolt underneath them.

She wanted to beat his ass.

"You misheard," was her lame reply. Ada tried to put some distance between them, her ridiculous attempt at self-preservation betraying her once again.

Leon closed his eyes, smirking.

"Now you're shy?" his arm wrapped around her waist before she could pull away entirely. "Come back here."

Ada was thankful for his closed eyes. Her cheeks were burning red and if he ever saw that, she'd have to murder him. For real, this time.

"And you wonder why I leave," Ada allowed the physical contact, but didn't touch him back. She didn't mean to be harsh, but it was a habit at this point to say something hurtful when he was being an asshole.

This time, Leon didn't feel the pain.

"You come back each time, though," he must have found that amusing, because he laughed again. "I must be very important, huh."

"An important inconvenience."

Leon hummed and the heaviness took over his eyelids. Ada felt prompted to kiss him there. Perhaps later, when he was actually asleep.

"Glad we cleared that out, then."

As time went by, as the years dragged slowly and the weeks turned into months, Leon began to wonder what it was about Ada Wong that drove him to absolute insanity.

She was hot, first and foremost. The most beautiful woman he'd ever come across. Her voice did things to his body that he couldn't quite explain. She smelled of cherries and gooseberries and her hair was the softest thing he'd ever touched. She was strong and extremely capable, and he didn't have to worry about her safety as much as he pretended to, which was a comfort in disguise.

But that was only a small part of it, a nice detail that he was grateful for, but wasn't exactly a necessity. Leon was certain that she could turn herself into a slimy, fetid monster and he'd still beg for scraps of her attention, so appearances were out of the question.

In truth, Leon liked the way she rolled her eyes at his jokes, pretending to find them annoying, but kept her smirk intact when he wasn't looking. He liked that as much as she tried to fight this feeling, this chemistry, she was always the first one to reach out to him—which was hilarious. Of course she would, he had no way of contacting her, as much as he'd tried—and send an address or show up at his apartment with the recklessness that someone in her position couldn't afford. He liked the way her fringe sometimes kissed her eyelashes and he'd have to push it away from her face to get a better view of her gorgeous eyes. He liked the coldness with which she'd treat him when they were out in public, as if he hadn't fucked the brains out of her months ago, as if he didn't know the way she tasted.

He hated lots of things, too. Like her elusiveness and lack of honesty and obnoxious personality, but what could he say? He had his flaws, too, and the years made him wise enough to understand that they were both more alike than he ever cared to admit. Mirrors of each other, truly. In a sick, almost disgusting way.

He'd come to terms with that as well, amongst other things.

Leon stopped his endless pursuit of happiness when he realized that the only moments when he actually experienced that feeling were when they argued, or shared a meal, or stole each other's breath in an obscene kiss. When he managed to disarm her and make her say words like "I missed you" or "you're important to me", which meant more now than a thousand unspoken I love you's. At thirty-two years old, Leon realized there were other ways to say those words. He hadn't seen that then, but he did see it now.

So, he wasn't nearly as heartbroken anymore when she sneaked out of his bed at night, leaving an empty spot on the mattress. At least, she'd be kind enough to leave her lipstick all over his cheek for him to see in the mirror and realize it hadn't been a dream. He didn't feel as bitter when he thought about the years he spent mourning her and the dirty jobs she'd take behind his back.

She had him absolutely enamoured. She could kick him in the balls and he would still say "thank you."

Pathetic.

And here they stood, thirteen years later. Old lovers with thousands of unspoken words and not a single tag that could describe their strange, peculiar entanglement. A couple? Hell no. An affair? Not quite. Enemies? On special occasions. Friends? Sometimes. Leon was tired of trying to put a name to this thing.

He just loved her to the bones. That was his truth, and that was enough. For now.

They were in his apartment again, which Leon advised against numerous times in the past. It was dangerous. She could be seen, she could be followed, and he didn't mind taking a one-hour drive to whatever hotel she booked for the night. Wherever she wanted him to be, he would be. She didn't even have to ask. But Ada said she liked his apartment. It's tasteless and dull, just like you, she said, which Leon knew actually meant the following: it's warm, and your bed smells like you, and I quite like that steak you sometimes make with the rosemary and the garlic.

He'd learned to read between her lines, lately.

And that, too, was enough.

They lay on his couch, watching the storm rage through his open windows. He was eating a bag of chips, keeping Ada's legs across his lap. He reached to his side to grab the beer bottle, taking a generous sip. Ada had already finished her own, he knew it because her tolerance to alcohol was almost comical. One single drink and her cheeks turned red as cherries.

He felt her eyes on him.

"If you keep drinking like that, you're not making it to forty."

Leon paused for a second, turning his head to look at her. He couldn't help himself, so he blurted out a bitter laugh.

"I'm lucky if I ever make it to thirty-nine," he snorted, chewing on a chip. "And you're one to talk. Last time I saw you, you chugged down three martinis. Three. You're mad."

Ada made that face she usually did whenever he said something she considered to be very stupid. Which was all the time, really.

"I only drink when I'm with you," she explained. "But I don't spend the rest of my week drowning in alcohol as you do. You should be more careful. Right now, you're quite the easy target. I could take you down in the blink of an eye and you won't even feel it."

Leon chewed slowly. She wasn't making any sense and she was rambling, saying too much as she usually did whenever she got herself a drink. It was hilarious. To be honest, Leon hadn't been drinking much these days, just the occasional beer once a week or a glass of champagne during presidential meetings. He wasn't pouring whiskey in his morning coffee anymore—not every day, at least—and he'd been going to the gym more often, which was good.

"You sound like my wife," his words were light, but they felt heavy on his tongue.

For a second, he almost regretted saying that.

"Hardly. More like your mother, considering all the times I've saved your life."

Leon gasped, laughing. Time had turned their once offensive remarks into careless banter. He didn't take her words to heart anymore, and she didn't look so scared every time he showed something as normal as affection. This is what they'd become, and it was the most real thing Leon ever had.

"Uh, excuse me?" he choked, mouth full of chips. He coughed slightly, caught off guard. "I didn't realize we were keeping score."

"Do you want to?"

He frowned, a bit lost.

"What? Keep score?"

"Sure," Ada gave a small, indifferent shrug, like it meant nothing. "Go on."

He blinked, thinking it through. He set the bag of chips aside, the crinkling plastic mingling with the sound of the rain. Leon leaned back slightly, running his tongue through his teeth in contemplation.

"Well," he said finally, a hint of pride slipping into his tone, "I took a bullet for you."

Ada huffed a quiet laugh.

"That was in 1998. Any recent achievements?"

"I—" He stopped himself, growing restless. He adjusted his position on the couch, palms flat over the skin of her thighs, and a rush of adrenaline washed over him, like he suddenly had something to prove. "I saved your life more than once, too. This doesn't make any sen—"

"When?" she pressed, brows arching. "Remind me, please."

Leon clicked his tongue, feeling quite irritated. He did not mention her name in his report; did that count? He kinda saved her ass there, but Leon had the impression that she was talking about life-threatening situations rather than calculated decisions that took at least two bottles of whiskey to be made.

"How many times have you saved me, then?" he shot back, a little too quickly.

He was deflecting now, but it was easier than admitting the blank space his mind had just run into. He searched anyway, but nothing worth mentioning came out. Damn.

"Raccoon City. Spain. Slav Republic—"

Leon's expression wrinkled.

"Slav Republic? When did you—"

"The elevator."

He stilled, suddenly remembering.

"That was you?"

Ada laughed; his obliviousness sparkled a shimmer of affection in her eyes. It kind of took his breath away, to be honest.

"You'd be dead by now if it weren't for me, rookie," she sighed contentedly, getting herself comfortable on the couch. "But that's okay. We're even, either way."

Leon snorted, mindlessly caressing the skin of her knee.

"I'll save your life again, you'll see," he promised, accepting the challenge. "I'll wipe that smirk off your face."

Ada hummed in response.

"I'll be waiting," her eyes roamed around the room, and something that draped carelessly over the back of a nearby chair got her attention. "New jacket?"

He followed her eyes. The Fine Creek Leathers piece hung half in shadow, the dim light catching just enough of its shape to give it away.

"I don't like it that much," he breathed, disappointed. "It's too thin. I tried to find something like the one I wore in Spain, but it was a limited edition. Shame I lost it."

He'd loved that jacket as much as he loved Ada, which was not an exaggeration. It'd been expensive, rare and impossibly warm. Thick enough to act as a barrier and, well, he thought he looked quite good in it. But he'd lost it somewhere in the village. What an idiot.

Leon felt Ada's legs shift over his lap.

"About that," she hesitated, and the change of tone was enough for Leon to look at her. "You didn't lose it."

He blinked. "Huh?"

"I sold it."

His expression shifted instantly, shock and disbelief and then something that looked a lot like absolute betrayal. Ada couldn't help it; she laughed.

"Leon—"

"What do you mean you sold it?" he cut in, sitting up straight. "To whom?"

"Who do you think? The merchant," she explained, wondering if he knew what she was talking about. "You know, the Stranger guy? I found it lying around, and I was running out of ammo, so…"

For a second, all Leon did was stare at her, not a single thought crossing through his mind. He gasped, flabbergasted.

"You sold my jacket," he repeated, and somehow that made it worse.

"It was a fair trade."

"That jacket was—" Leon arched his brows. "You sold my jacket."

Ada snickered, rosy-cheeked, until his hands moved before she could react and a louder chuckle escaped her lips. Leon grabbed her by the ankle and dragged her down in one quick motion. She squeaked, so unlike her, so out of character that Leon thought, for a brief second, that he would die. Could a person die by love alone? He had no idea.

"You sold my jacket?" he echoed, voice low, and his fingers sank on her knee pit, where he knew the skin was sensitive.

"It was—" Ada breathed out a shaky laugh when he squeezed, hard, and moved until he was on top of her. "That was a strategic deci—"

"You are a thief," he accused. You stole my heart and my peace of mind and everything else, he wanted to say, but instead tickled her thighs and felt her body twist along with her poor attempts to push him away. "You stole my favorite jacket and sold it."

"I didn't steal—"

"Say you're sorry."

"Leon—"

He squeezed harder, casting aside his fraudulent anger to laugh with her.

"Say it."

"I'm sorry," she yielded, breathing out the words against his mouth before she kissed him softly, chuckling. "I'm sorry, handsome."

Leon groaned, letting his forehead drop against her chest, stopping his assault and blurting out a heavy sigh. This, exactly, was the thing that he couldn't find with anyone else. History. Leon longed for familiarity because it was the thing he lacked most in his whole life. He loathed introductions, to retell his sad story over and over again only to gain pitiful eyes in response. Ada didn't pity him, she was able to read him in a way that scared him sometimes. Was it trauma bonding, perhaps? Leon couldn't answer that, but he wanted it all the same.

He wanted it so badly that it killed him knowing he could never fully have it.

Not with her, at least.

"Losing your temper like that over a jacket," Ada mused, fondly stroking his hair. "What am I going to do with you, hmm?"

Leon didn't even think before speaking.

"Love me."

Her body tensed underneath him and Leon knew immediately that he'd fucked up. Again. He stood still in her arms, feeling her heart skip a beat. Was it so hard, truly, for her to say that she loved him? Ada pulled him a little closer, for a while, and then cupped his face to kiss him. They kissed until she gasped against his mouth and Leon pulled her shirt over her head and they made love on his couch. Sometimes he wondered how his life would be if he hadn't met her, if he'd escaped Raccoon City with only blood instead of ghosts. Her scent had been forever imprinted on his mind, and the moments he feared the most every time she left were when it faded. Before her, his days were calm and his nights were soothing.

Ada had carved a knife inside his chest that he couldn't pull out. In fact, he twisted it even more deeply, time and time again. She was his rival and his companion, so close to him yet so far away. And he knew he had to prepare himself for an inevitable goodbye, that someday perhaps she'd leave for good and never come back, die by someone else's hands or be forced to do it himself.

Leon whispered, then, against her lips, with no remorse or shame or fear.

"You love me," he was fooling himself. "I know you love me. You don't have to say it. I know you love me."

Ada kept her eyes closed the whole time, as if scared he'd see it in her eyes if she stared back, but Leon knew it all too well. And when they were finished, when the coldness and the emptiness embraced him stronger than her arms ever could, when he went to pull away, Ada held him tighter against her chest.

"Just a bit longer," she whispered into his hair.

Leon was at the office when his phone buzzed in his pocket.

We need to talk.
Old Town Alexandria.
Tonight.

Unknown number, an address, straight to the point. He didn't even need to guess who it was before he gathered his jacket and offered no explanations to Sherry, who was sitting next to him on a desk. Leon didn't even say goodbye. He grabbed his keys, got into his car and drove like a madman for nearly an hour towards the city of Alexandria.

Truth be told, Leon didn't know exactly how to feel. Last time he'd seen Ada, she was lying in his arms, unconscious, while that crazy son of a bitch Simmons shouted from a distance, nearly killing them both. I was just resting my eyes, she'd said, but it hadn't looked like that to Leon. He remembered the weight of her body, heavy and silent, and it scared the shit out of him because he'd seen that picture once before. Fifteen years ago, in Raccoon City.

Not again, was all Leon thought as he'd touched her face and hoped against hope that she'd open her eyes. Please, please not again.

He knew he would not survive it a second time. And when she finally woke up, when she demonstrated how resilient and strong and wonderful she was, she vanished. Again. Leaving him in the darkness for two months with news of her death by members of the BSAA. And the funniest part was that he didn't even bother to contradict them, of turning her in to Chris and putting an end to all of this after she massacred his entire team. Leon was done being kept in the dark, done with her bullshit and her lies and the sea of ignorance he'd been drowning in for nearly fifteen years.

He was done.

Leon parked his car, slammed the door a little too loudly, and entered the hotel with his hands shaking. Grabbed his keycard and headed towards room 205 with shivering hands and a thousand words hanging at the tip of his tongue.

They all vanished the moment he saw her.

She'd arrived early, already waiting for him inside the room. She wore a short, satin red dress, informal enough to avoid unwanted attention but captivating him all the same. She turned around the moment she heard him enter, hesitation lingering in her eyes. He never thought he'd seen that kind of expression on her face, something like dismay and fear of rejection. They stood in silence for a moment, and the tension stretched just enough to become unbearable. It was absurd, considering all they'd been through. Ada shifted imperceptibly, like she wanted to step forward but was too frightened to scare him off.

Leon let out a slow breath, surrendering for the thousandth time and walking towards her. Her breath hitched, attempting to close the distance, but Leon was already there before she could step forward. He caught her face in the palm of his hands, eyes falling shut when their foreheads kissed and he inhaled her perfume. Cherries and gooseberries, warm and with a heart still beating.

Ada ran her hands through his hair.

"You've got a ton shit of explaining to do, Ada," he sighed, and despite his dryness, he bumped her nose with his own.

"I will, I swear I will," her voice quivered in assurance. "I—"

"I thought you were dead," he hissed, tightening his grip on her face, forcing their eyes to meet. "Dead. When Chris told me that you—do you have any idea of how I felt when—"

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

"Chris said you wiped off his entire team, that you orchestrated the Neo-Umbrella attack in China, but the intel you gave me said otherwise, I don't—" he gasped, out of words.

Ada shook her head, all of her walls crumbling to pieces. Her hands ran frantically all over his face.

"It wasn't me," she responded quickly, unable to hold herself back when she kissed him swiftly. One, two, three times. "It wasn't me. I'll explain everything, I promise."

Against his better judgment, Leon believed her. She could tell him that the sun was green and the moon a gigantic ball of cheese and he'd believe her. She got rid of his jacket, throwing it to the carpet, and pushed down his shoulders to make him sit on the mattress. Then, she walked over to the nearest table to pour herself a glass of wine.

She turned, leaning back on the edge of the table.

"I…" she paused, licking her lips, "… used to work for Simmons before I was sent to Raccoon City to retrieve the G-Virus. Did a couple of jobs for him and The Family, but broke ties when I heard he'd been involved with the bombing. He didn't like that, of course, and developed quite the obsession with me. You probably noticed, but I have that effect on men."

She held his gaze at her last words, without flinching. But Leon snorted, unamused.

"I bet you like that."

"Only when it's you," was her reply, and Leon nearly hated himself at the way his heart stumbled for a second. "We lost contact after that, until I found out he'd been conducting experiments to clone me."

"Clone—?" he stuttered, taken by surprise, the conversation taking a turn he wasn't expecting. "What do you mean—"

"What do you think, Leon?" she cut in, and sighed before lifting the glass to her lips. "He took one of his researchers as a test subject, Carla Radames. That's how the C-Virus was used. She looked just like me and that's exactly what Simmons wanted. I suppose she felt somewhat betrayed, so she used my identity to establish Neo-Umbrella and kill Redfield's team. He had other experiments going on, too, but I burned the lab down."

Leon went silent. The footage he'd seen, the accusations made by the BSAA, Chris's call when he said Ada had died…

"When Chris said you were dead—"

"It was Carla," Ada said. "I killed her myself, after she turned into a B.O.W."

He frowned, trying to piece the information together.

"So you're innocent," he thought about the International Warrant she had under her name, thought about what Chris would say if Leon could just explain, although he didn't know how, that it wasn't Ada the woman responsible behind Simmon's attacks. Would Chris believe him? Would he trust his judgment and protection over the most wanted woman in the country?

The thought made his skin crawl.

Ada let out a sardonic chuckle, her gaze dropping to the wine in her hands.

"I'm hardly innocent, Leon," she admitted. "I should've known working for Simmons would come back to bite me eventually. I'm just as guilty as he was."

He licked his lips in contemplation. He felt just as guilty, then. Guilty that he was unable to realize, at first glance, that the woman they'd been chasing wasn't Ada, but a replica.

"Then I guess I am, too," he said quietly, voice lowering as their eyes found each other across the room. "I fought Chris right before this… Carla, or whatever the hell her name was, ran away. He wanted to kill her, and I didn't let him. I've known Chris my whole life and never in a million years thought I'd end up pointing a gun at him."

Ada remained still.

Not the poised stillness she wore so well, one that Leon sometimes loathed to pieces. Her eyes flickered, and her lips parted for a second, swallowing back whatever thought crossed through her complicated mind. He wanted to repeat himself. I fought an old friend for you and I would've let him kill me if it meant saving your life, again. Even if it meant I'd become an enemy of the state, just like you.

Ada finally gasped, smiling in a way that almost made him blush.

"You went up against the Captain of Special Operations Unit… for me?" she mused, eyes sparkling. "I'm flattered, rookie."

Leon breathed out a laugh, dragging his hand along the back of his neck.

"Well, I did say I'd save you again, didn't I?"

Ada held his eyes longer than she should've. Silently, she placed the glass on the table and approached him, climbing over his lap. She secured her arms around his neck, firmly, and pressed their foreheads together. Leon's eyes fell shut, running his hands up and down her back.

"Ada," he breathed, and opened her eyes to stare at her face. "The intel… you—"

"Saved your life again?" she joked, brushing the hair at his nape.

Leon sighed, holding her cheek.

"You cleared out my name but what about yours? They'll find out you're alive, eventually."

"You don't have to worry about me," she explained. "I can handle the BSAA just fine."

He felt greedy to ask more questions. Who did she work for, really? For how many years would this game endure, playing on opposite sides unless they locked themselves in some crappy hotel for only a couple of hours? Was it so wrong, so foolish of him to want more? To want all of her?

"What now, then?" he wondered, and she must have noticed the resignation in his voice because she grimaced, as if it pained her.

"I think it will be best if I go low for a while," she whispered, studying his expression as if she was expecting him to snap. "I've only taken one job since I left China, but I could use some time off. Let things cool off, and handle this on my own as I always have."

"Ada—"

"You probably won't hear from me for a while, but I promise I'll—"

"No, no," he shook his head, frantic. "You can't do that again, you can't just disappear—"

"Just for a month or two, I'll stay in touch. I'll—"

"Ada."

"No, Leon, listen to me," her grip tightened on his face, forcing eye contact. She looked restless. "This isn't another one of your little adventures. What happened in China was serious and now that I've gotten involved, it's worse. This is bigger than Umbrella, or The Family, or—"

She stopped abruptly, hesitating.

Leon frowned, pulling away just slightly.

"Simmons is dead," he reassured, thinking that perhaps Ada felt threatened. "The Family is gone. I'll talk to Chris and convince him that you had nothing to do with it. He'll listen."

Ada kept on shaking her head with a stubbornness that reminded him of his own.

"Bigger forces are pulling the strings. I know you quite like the Redfield guy, everyone does, but the BSAA is not what you think. The DSO, the government, even your beloved president—"

Leon's jaw tightened.

"You don't know him," he said quietly. "He wasn't… he never meant—"

"He was the one who coerced you to work for them, the one who put the Birkin girl under Simmon's care, and he was the National Security Advisor. If you think this ends with Simmons then you are more short-sighted than I thought."

Leon found himself at a loss for words.

For years, Adam had turned into the shape of his resentment. The man who dragged him into a life he hadn't chosen, burying Raccoon City under layers of classified silence and placing a weapon in his hand, as if that could ever come close to the justice Leon thirsted for. And he wore that anger like an armor.

Adam hadn't been president back then, didn't have the power Leon once imagined, and somewhere along the way he understood that Adam hadn't had any choices, either. He did what he had to, and that anger morphed into respect. Friendship, even.

Leon exhaled slowly, already looking for excuses before he could stop himself.

"He was a good man," he explained. Ada huffed, sharp and unimpressed, prompting his defensiveness to fire up. "I know he kept things from me, I'm not that naive to believe he made it to the presidency without dirtying his hands, but—"

"You respected him, I get it," she finished for him. "You can't help but see the best in people, and that's something I've always loved about you, but you need to understand that there are others in the government who don't share your same sense of justice, and if they find out you're involved with me, your very life could be at stake."

Love.

That's something I've always loved about you.

The word almost knocked the breath out of him.

Leon tried to hold onto the weight of the conversation, the severity of it, but his thoughts scattered all at once, his mind a blank canvas. He blinked, completely off guard, and used all of his very limited willpower to stop himself from smiling at something he'd been dreaming of hearing from her since the night they met.

"They could torture you," Ada continued, oblivious to the frantic beating of his heart and the goosebumps running all over his skin. "Force you to give out information about—"

"And you think I would?" he chuckled, gently squeezing the skin of her waist. "If they want intel about you, they'll have to dig somewhere else because I won't say a damn thing. Never."

Ada threw her head back in quiet exasperation. Leon took the opportunity to lean forward to press a kiss against her neck. He stood there for a while, breathing her in.

"I've loved you since I was twenty-one. I tried to fight it, for years, until I realized it didn't lead me anywhere. I'm not scared of them, Ada. But if you are, then let me help you. Whoever it is you're scared of, I'll take care of it."

"I just want you to be safe," she whispered, so low he almost didn't hear it. "Live a normal life, the one you always dreamed of. Have kids, a house, a dog. I can't give you that, Leon. I can't give you peace."

The landscape she pictured was pretty. Sunlight through kitchen windows, quiet mornings, something steady to hold onto. A house that didn't feel like an office, no guns under the pillows, laughter in a hallway that didn't lead to classified files and a world free of decay. They could run away, and Leon would be lying if he said that thought didn't cross his mind from time to time. That he wouldn't spend minutes of his day absentmindedly staring at his luggage, wondering what it would feel like to pack his things, change his name, start anew in some nameless hidden corner of the world.

But then he'd remember, as he always did. Emma and his father, who chose to take his own life before moving on without her. Lieutenant Branagh, bitten and bruised, wasting the remains of his strength to save the life of a rookie who didn't know any better. Luis, who paid the price of redemption with his blood. Shen May, murdered for the sake of her own brother.

Leon could run away, but their ghosts would haunt him forever. And although he loved Ada with a force that threatened to shake the very foundations of the world, he couldn't leave their memories to rot.

He wouldn't be able to live with himself, if he did.

"I'll never have peace," he breathed, coming to terms with it. "And I don't want it if it means losing you."

He thought she'd laugh. He thought she'd pull away, and scoff, roll her eyes and walk away through that door like she did so many times before, when she felt cornered by the force of his devotion. But the world was changing, more dangerous now than it'd ever been before, and they were changing along with it.

So, Ada sighed, and buried her face in his hair.

"Alright, then."

"Leon," Sherry whined at the end of the line. He could hear the clattering of dishes through the phone. "It's my day off, just because you are a workaholic doesn't mean—"

He snickered, reclining on the outdoor armchair, eyes gazing up at the moon shining bright behind a building.

"I didn't say I wanted the file today, I said 'make sure you have it ready for tomorrow'," he clarified. Feeling a little mischievous, he added: "And kids your age don't spend their days off at home reading novels till 4:00 AM. Go out, have some fun."

"This kid is thirty-seven years old," the annoyance in her tone made him smile. "And I'm quite content with my novels, thank you very much."

Leon nodded in agreement, even if she couldn't see him.

"A kid through and through."

Sherry blurted out a deep, loud sigh.

"Don't you have anyone else to bother?" after a pause and the sound of a soda can popped open, she continued. "In any case, when are you coming back?"

Leon's heart swelled with affection. Despite their daily banter and the tedious obsession he sometimes had with exhausting her patience, Sherry always asked the same question whenever he was out of the country. When are you coming back? The years had narrowed down the number of people they could trust, and now that Sherry was safely back underneath his wing, he noticed she never fully felt at ease when he was away for too long. And although he knew she was more than capable of handling herself—she was thirty-seven, after all—he still felt somewhat responsible for her. As much as he'd been enjoying his days off in Italy, Leon was feeling a little homesick.

Perhaps that's why he'd called with the excuse of discussing boring paperwork.

"I'll be there on Thursday."

"Do you want me to pick you up at the airport?" she asked, the sudden warmth in her voice felt suspicious. "Wouldn't want your knees to wear out from all the walking."

He should have seen that coming.

"Ha-ha, very funny."

"I can ask for a wheelchair, if you want."

"Yeah, yeah. Respect your elders, Sherry," the sound of the door made him turn his head around all the way from the balcony, where the breeze was warm and humid. Ada walked into the hotel room, shrugging off her coat and throwing her purse over the bed. "Gotta go, don't stay up late, kiddo."

Sherry gasped.

"Go take your vitamins, old man," she hurried the words very close to the speaker before hanging up, saving herself from another comeback.

Leon chuckled, setting the phone aside. He watched Ada step through the balcony doors, with her silky dress and the smell of cherries clouding his senses. She was trying to get rid of her earrings.

"Hello there, gorgeous," he greeted.

"Hi, handsome," she bent down to press a quick kiss on his head, leaving her earrings on the table. "Have you eaten already?"

"Yep," he stretched his arm, hearing the bones crack. Well, fuck. "But they ran out of Risotto."

"It's alright," Ada breathed, slipping off her heels with a comfortable sigh. She took a seat on his lap, wrapping her arm around his shoulders, and reached out to take a bite of the garlic bread he didn't finish. "How's your headache?"

Truth be told, and although it was true that he was enjoying some days off, he'd been called to join a team in Italy to investigate a facility run by an ex-FBI member, rumored to have ties to The Connections. It hadn't been nearly as bad as Leon expected, but since Ada told him she had some info he could use, they agreed to team up and finish the job quickly. The team had gone back to D.C, but Leon decided to stay for a few more days since Ada was done with her contract. Nothing illegal, don't worry, she reassured him when he asked. Now, their meetings were orchestrated by a modified encrypted phone she'd given him years ago, connected only to her device. Hard to track and easy to hide, which was a comfort. At least for now.

He'd grown quite enthusiastic with the prospect of texting, so he told her about his headache.

"Maybe I should start taking vitamins," he said under his breath. "It's alright, I think I just needed something in my stomach."

Ada hummed, chewing on her bread.

"It gets worse with age, they say."

Leon huffed a laugh, absently kneading the back of her neck.

"Women," he mumbled.

She swallowed and took a sip of lemonade.

"Yeah, about that," Ada got comfortable in his arms, and he was thankful for the gesture. He ran his hand up and down her thigh, looking up at her. "I've heard an interesting rumor about you the other day, Mr. Kennedy. From one of your D.S.O boys."

"D.S.O?" he asked, but felt rather curious. "You've never spoken to them before. How did you—"

"I overheard."

"Right," he chuckled. "Spionague stuff, I assume."

"You assume well," she grabbed a small cube of cheese, eating slowly. "They believe you are secretly married."

His brows rose, quite surprised by the confession. He knew people talked, sometimes, about his personal life. His relationship with his coworkers, his attachment to Sherry and, once, Helena told him about this absurd—and quite hilarious, really—rumour about him "not enjoying the company of women anymore" since he hadn't been seen with a woman in years. And now, he was supposed to be married?

Leon couldn't help but laugh at that.

"Hope I didn't miss the honeymoon," he snorted. Alright, that was funny.

Ada arched a brow, not very amused, and caught his jaw between her fingers, pressing her nails a little too roughly onto his skin. He winced.

"Is there anything I need to know?" she almost threatened, which made him want to laugh and that was hard enough already with her fingers squeezing his lips shut. "I wasn't planning on committing a felony tonight… but don't push it, rookie."

She let him go, but kept her eyes on him. Leon sneered, stroking his jaw. Ada was not particularly the jealous type, but he'd be lying to himself if he said he didn't enjoy the brief moments in which she was.

"There's this woman, though," he rambled. "Gorgeous as fuck, with the temper of a hyena, a bit obnoxious sometimes. Treats me like shit, to be honest. I don't think she likes me very much."

Ada smirked, nodding.

"I think she likes you a great deal, considering she's been putting up with your pitiful, lame jokes for thirteen years."

He grinned, leaning back on the headrest.

"Fair enough."

She paused for a moment, chewing on another piece of cheese before she took another sip of her drink, her silence making Leon's eyes squint in mistrust. He was hoping for another bitter remark, but she fixed her eyes on his hand, carelessly resting over her thigh. He gazed down at it, finding nothing of peculiar interest.

"I think…" she hesitated, licking her lips in contemplation. "I think she likes you so much that she wouldn't mind, you know, if you wanted to give her a ring."

He almost laughed, waiting for the inevitable punchline, but it never came. Ada stayed in silence, and it dragged for endless seconds until he realized she wasn't joking. And Sherry was right, after all. He was getting old, and nothing surprised him anymore. He walked through this life alongside Ada with an ease he didn't possess before, when he was younger and starry-eyed. They already argued like an old married couple, anyway. And kissed with the gentleness of those who don't need to rush, or be explicit with their choice of words because they no longer needed conversations to understand one another. One look, and Leon knew all there was to know.

So he hummed, calmly, and grabbed her hand to kiss her knuckles.

"As you wish."

We need to talk. It's urgent.
Same place, right now.

Leon had been dreading the moment he'd have to send that message for an entire week. He told himself, over and over again, that it was not necessary, that he would fix this mess by himself. There was no need to bring meaningless anxiety to her if there was something he could do about it, always playing the hero. But as more bodies kept being reported and Sherry mentioned her disturbing theory about the victims being survivors of Raccoon City, he knew he could not keep it hidden for long.

When Leon opened the door, he found Ada sitting at the edge of the bed, staring at the window. He swallowed, and the sound made Ada's eyes lift towards him in an instant. She rose, the flicker of worry painted all over her face. Did his cryptic message scare her? Perhaps he employed too much dryness, but Leon's fingers shivered when he pressed the words, deleting and rewriting them over and over again.

"Ada—" he intended to smile, fondly, to let her know that he wasn't angry, that there was nothing to be worried about, until he noticed her outfit. A black, long-sleeved dress with a tight turtle neck. And gloves. And high leather boots. Not a single glimpse of skin on sight. She, who wore the most revealing pieces of clothing, suddenly looked like a fucking nun. Leon panicked, heart rattling, and didn't even notice the harshness in his voice when he said, "Take off your dress."

Ada arched a brow, amused.

"Stimulate me with a bit of conversation first," she said, quickly noticing the gloved hands, too. "I thought—"

Leon didn't let her finish. He walked towards her, fast, and gripped the edge of her collar, yanking it down. Ada staggered and her eyes fell shut for a fraction of a second, all playfulness erased from her features. She tried to stop him, weakly, never meeting his gaze. Leon felt his vision grow dizzy when he saw the dark, marred flesh on her neck, the same black blotch he'd seen in the bodies they'd found.

The same blotch he carried in his left hand.

His breath hitched.

Ada looked up at him, eyes flickering as if she didn't know what to say, and Leon didn't blame her. He didn't know what to say, either.

"Leon—"

"It'll be okay," he panted, nodding frantically. Dilusion took possession of his body, and he nodded again. "It's going to be okay."

She grabbed his hands, pulling out his gloves. He allowed her to inspect, to stare at the marks for a moment until she stepped away and gave him her back, clearly affected.

"Fuck," she gasped. He saw her run her hands through her face. "Fuck."

"Ada—"

"I have some contacts," she stuttered, her stumbling words made him feel more restless than the infected skin on her neck. "I can give them a call, ask them to—"

"Hey, listen to me."

She turned to him, desperate.

"Leon," she hissed, panting. "This is—"

"I know what this is, alright?" Leon gripped her face in his hands, stroking her cheekbones. He was trembling, too. "I know. I've seen it my whole damn life, you don't need to tell me. Sherry has it, too. But I need you to keep calm. I'll fix this, I'll—"

"Fix?" she cut him, appalled. "Leon, we might not make it till tomorrow."

He dropped his gaze, licking his lips.

"We're looking into it, Sherry and I. We might have something, but…" he paused, lost in a maze. They didn't have shit. Only dead bodies and morning symptoms. "I just need you to trust me on this one, alright?"

Ada sighed, pulling away to sit on the bed.

"How did Sherry even get it? With the G-Virus…"

"I don't…" Leon faltered, shaking his head. He sat next to her. "I don't know. She talked to Wesker's kid, but his antibodies only respond to the C type. This is different."

The silence that followed became unbearable. They stared out the window, the sun slowly hiding behind the buildings, darkening the room.

"Do you have any symptoms?" she asked, quietly.

"Just some coughing," he lied, tiredly.

He omitted the blood, and the headaches, and the dizziness that sometimes washed over him if he moved his head too rapidly. He'd never felt so cornered in his life, like being attached to a bomb that could blow up at any given moment.

"I'll do some digging of my own, too," she said. "Perhaps I'll beat you to it, find a cure before you do."

His lips curved, but the glee never reached his eyes.

"You won't steal my shot at glory," he rubbed at the skin of his hand, the spot where his ring was missing, safely tucked in the pocket of his trousers. "Let me be the hero, this time."

Suddenly, his phone beeped. He quickly took it out of his jacket, a message from Sherry on the screen:

The police found another body in Elbridge.
They want you at the scene.
I'll call you in ten.

"Fuck."

"What is it?"

"Gotta go," Leon stood up, tucking his phone away and putting back his gloves. "They found another body."

Ada stood up, too. Silently, she brushed his hair. Ran her fingers through his leather jacket, as if trying to fix him up. With a sigh, both held each other's faces, pressing their foreheads together.

"Don't die, Leon," she whispered close to his lips, so close he felt the words reach his lungs. "Only I get to kill you. I meant what I said back then."

He couldn't think of a better way to go.