Ninety Miles to Cuba (Part 2 of 3)

[fleurlb]

A/N: Written to try to satisfy lovesrogue36‘s prompt at leveragekink: ‘Nate/Sophie, fugitives on the run.’  Part two of three. Read part one here.

 

Disclaimer: I own nothing here and am just doing this for fun and to pass the time until Season 3. 

Spoilers: Entire series.

 

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Nate watches as Sophie drops her book and covers the space between them in three long strides. She settles herself gently on the edge of the bed. The look on her face reminds him of the time he ran away from home when he was seven. When he returned hours later, sheepish and hungry, his mother had looked like she didn’t know whether to smother him with hugs or slap him silly.

 

 

He’s momentarily distracted as Sophie runs her hands over his face, her fingers cool and soft. Then he remembers that they need a plan.

 

“How did they get you too?” asks Nate, his voice rough with disuse. He struggles to sit up. Sophie presses on his chest, stronger than he ever gave her credit for. Maybe all that finding herself involved some time in a weight room.

 

“It’s okay, Nate. Relax,” she says, letting her eyes do most of the talking. But Nate knows that her eyes lie, so he listens to her tone, finally satisfied that everything is as she says, even if he can’t figure out the how and the why of it just yet.

 

He lets out a breath and nods. Sophie smiles and takes her hands away, but he catches one and holds on tight. It’s been far, far too long since he’s been able to touch her, and he’s going to try to make up for lost time, even if she’s still looking at him like she might haul off and deck him.

 

“Can I get a drink, Sophie. Please?”

 

“Really Nate? Four months of drying out in federal prison and the first thing you ask for is a drink?” asks Sophie, disappointed, as she looks away. 

 

“I was actually thinking about water,” he says with a wry grin that causes her to blush.

 

“Right,” she replies, suddenly all efficient and businesslike as she stands up, smooths her skirt, and then leaves the room through a door that’s outside of his field of view. 

 

Nate listens as the water runs and he looks around the room, finally taking it in. It’s small, with slanted ceilings, probably an attic. The windows are large though, and covered with gauzy curtains, a mixture of light and shade filtering in from the sun shining through the trees. It’s like being inside a treehouse and Nate thinks of Robinson Crusoe. 

 

Sophie returns and sets a glass on the doily-covered bedside table and then helps ease Nate up, settling him against the headboard. She hands him the glass and then sits down, putting noticeably more space between them this time. He drains the glass, grateful as the cool liquid slides down his dry throat. 

 

He has so many things he wants to say, so many things that he wants to ask her and tell her. It’s been months since that heady moment where he finally gave himself permission to kiss her, his head dizzy with blood loss and excitement and the feeling of finally, finally coming home. It had been even longer since he’d stood in her apartment, asking in his bumbling way, for her to come back.  

 

But he can tell, by the way her hands are knotted in her lap and the way she looks at him, not quite in the eye, that she’s not ready to hear any of it. And if he’s honest with himself, which is all he’s had the time and space to do for the last four months, he’s probably not ready to say any of it yet.

 

Which leaves two questions: where and how.

 

“So, how did you guys do it then?” Nate asks, his voice nearly back to normal. 

 

“It was Eliot’s plan. And by the sounds and looks of things, it went pretty well, except that the goons he hired went a little crazy with the sedatives.”

 

“Eliot hired goons?” asks Nate, a trace of amusement in his voice.

 

“Well, we all hired them, technically speaking, but Eliot knew the one guy, said we could trust them.” 

 

“And making it look like the triads?”

 

“Eliot’s idea.”

 

“It was a good one. And they certainly sold the bit. I was convinced. How long was I out?”

 

“It’s Wednesday afternoon. They grabbed you Monday morning.”

 

“Where’s the rest of the team?”

 

“The rest of the team...” said Sophie, her voice trailing off and then returning with a tone that made him wince. “They’re, well, you know. Busy.”

 

“Sophie, I don’t want to hear that voice,” warned Nate. 

 

“Sorry, Nate, bad habit. It’s just that...well... Eliot felt that the plan will work best if there’s only one guy running the show.”

 

“I’m not that much of a control freak.”

 

“Well, Nate, you sometime can be. All I can tell you is that freeing you was phase one. Phase two involves trapping Sterling and then making a deal with him to make sure that you remain a free man.”

 

“No. Deals with Sterling are not a viable option. That man would trade away his own mother if he thought it would further his career. Sterling’s an angles guy and he knows how to play them all.” His fingers twitch as he thinks, tries to see the angles laid out in front of him, tries to picture it all like a giant three-dimensional puzzle.

 

“Nate!” Sophie’s voice is sharp and it cuts across his thoughts, stopping him cold. “This is exactly what Eliot was afraid of. Just trust him. He’s figured out a way to make the deal completely ironclad.”

 

“And how did he do that? Is the devil involved?”

 

“Nate. Just trust him. Trust us. We’ve put a lot of time and money into this plan.”

 

He nods slowly, wondering where the money came from.

 

“We had a bit of a whip-around, you know, chipped in to pay for the kidnapping... and other various expenses,” says Sophie, answering the question even though Nate’s 90% sure that he didn’t ask it out loud.

 

“All of you?” asks Nate. “Even Parker?”

 

Sophie laughs. “Even Parker. And we didn’t even have to drag it out of her, kicking and screaming. Although she did insist that if teeth were so important to Eliot, he should pay the dental work bonus.”

 

“The dental work bonus?”

 

“A quarter of a million for each tooth.”

 

Nate smiles and lets out a low, impressed whistle. “So one particular thug is at least half-a-million dollars richer.”

 

“Hardison pulled the hospital records. Sterling actually lost three more. I think there might have been a little... piling on, after they pulled you out but before they all escaped,” says Sophie, eyes twinkling.

 

“So my only other question is where the hell are we?”

 

Sophie smiles and looks around the cramped room. “Sorry, the quarters are a little tight, I know. This is a bed-and-breakfast, owned by an old acquaintance of mine, Gerard.”

 

“In which country? State? City?” asks Nate, unable to hide his irritation. It’s so like Sophie to give an answer that’s technically true, but not useful information.

 

“Oh, right. Key West.”

 

“Of course,” replies Nate. “Key West. And the rest of the team is in?”

 

Sophie presses her lips together and shakes her head. Her hair curtains her face and Nate resists the urge to reach out and brush it back. “Can’t tell you that.”

 

Nate groans and leans back against the headboard, letting a hand cover his eyes. He hasn’t even been awake an hour and he’s already itchy and impatient, wanting to know everything and be involved. 

 

“You need to rest. Hardison’s developed an elaborate system for using disposable pre-paid mobile chips and will be calling later this evening. You can talk to everyone then.”

 

Nate felt like he should say something to Sophie, thank her and try to talk about what happened on the ship that day. But as he struggles to find the words, he drifts off to sleep.

 

---//---

 

Nate sleeps on and off for the better part of three days. He remembers a hazy conference call with the team, which mostly consisted of Hardison and Parker talking over each other while Eliot growled and grumbled in the background. He remembers catching glimpses of Sophie fussing over him, soothing him after a bad dream and bringing him water when he has a coughing fit.

 

He thinks he even remembers her sitting on the edge of the bed, holding his hand and murmuring about things being different and better this time. But he suspects that last one is a dream, because the way she’s treating him when he’s fully conscious is different, but not exactly better.

 

There’s a stiffness to Sophie that he doesn’t recognize. A whisper-thin barrier of formality and hesitation that never existed before, not even when he was married. He catches her nearly touching him, then smoothing the bedspread or tidying the room instead. 

 

When he’s finally able to get up and walk around without wincing or feeling dizzy, Sophie announces that it’s time for him to dye his hair.

 

“No. I like my hair the way it is.”

 

“Fugitive 101, Nate, you have to change your appearance. You’ll have a shave, that’ll help. And I’ll trim some of this scruffiness, but you’re going to need something more than that.”

 

Nate shakes his head and folds his arms, all the while knowing that he’s fighting a losing battle. 

 

“Red or blonde?” she asks, picking up her purse.

 

“I’ll go with you,” he replies, standing up, eager to get some fresh air and see something other than a television screen or the four walls of his room. 

 

“No, you won’t. You can’t go out, certainly not in the daylight.”

 

He sighs and flops back down on the bed. “Fine. Surprise me then.”

 

Sophie returns an hour later with a couple of mystery novels and two packages of blonde hair dye. At first Nate thinks that she’s going to dye her hair too, which he thinks would be an awful idea, but they turn out to both be for him. 

 

He follows her reluctantly into her bathroom, where she has an elegant claw-foot bathtub with a detachable shower head.

 

“I see who Gerard prefers. You definitely got the nicer room.”

 

“Hush,” says Sophie, distracted as she reads the directions on the box. Nate sits down on the floor, with his back to the tub, and waits until she’s ready.  When she turns on the water, he leans his neck back over the edge of the tub, surprised at how comfortable it turns out to be.

 

Without fuss or explanation, she washes his hair first. The way her nails rub small circles on his scalp makes him want to purr. She’s perched on the edge of the tub, her long legs tucked up underneath her. It wouldn’t take much, though, for him to just turn his head and land right in her lap, a thought that he struggles in vain to ignore as she rinses his hair, the water the perfect temperature.

 

The dye smells funny and Nate makes Sophie promise that she’ll stop with just the one box. He doesn’t think he can go through this all over again, even if he does relish the excuse it gives her to touch him. 

 

After the dye is done setting, Sophie washes his hair again and then takes out the scissors. He sits still, a towel wrapped around his shoulders, as she works. The hair that falls around him looks foreign, too brash and bright. When she’s done, she hands him a small mirror and he tries to hide his dismay. He looks like an investment banker whose midlife crisis has driven him to become a surfer boy.

 

“Looks... wow. Really  nice work. Thanks, Sophie,” he manages, his praise sincere in spirit since he does appreciate her effort and time, even if he dreads the results.

 

---//---

 

A week passes and they’re still holed up in Gerard’s attic. But at least it’s summer in Key West, the off-season. When the place is empty, he can sit in the parlor or on the screened-in back porch. There’s a big family reunion going on this weekend, though, so Gerard has guests and Nate grows resentful and tetchy at the ‘room arrest’ that Sophie is insisting on.

 

He’s read every book she’s brought for him and is sick of watching television. With the sloped ceilings and low clearances, he can barely get four paces in before he’s forced to turn around. When Sophie brings him his lunch, he’s about ready to snap.

 

“This has to stop, Sophie. I’m going crazy here,” says Nate, ignoring the sandwich that she places on the table. He paces toward the window and pauses there, looking out at the small lizards running through the tree branches.

 

“Nate, just be patient. They’ll all be gone on Monday afternoon and then we’ll have the place to ourselves again.”

 

“No, Sophie, it’s not just that. Look, I got more exercise in prison, for God’s sake,” he says, turning around swiftly, surprised to find Sophie just inches from him. Her hand goes up to her necklace and she shuffles back a few steps. You don’t have to be a grifter to read the body language there.

 

She looks down and Nate can see that she’s weighing options, considering doing something that she was explicitly told not to do. He slips his hands in his pockets and rocks back on his heels as he waits. 

 

“All right, Nate. You can go out, after midnight. I won’t be able to go with you though, Eliot was very clear that we’re not to be seen together. He was also very clear that you were to stay in the room.”

 

“What Eliot doesn’t know can’t hurt him,” says Nate with a grin.

 

“It’s not Eliot getting hurt that I’m worried about.”

 

---//---

 

It’s after midnight when Nate finally manages to get outside. His preference would have been to go for a jog, but Sophie vetoed that idea, saying it would draw attention. He’s supposed to blend in, which, from the looks of the folks on Duvall Street, means that he should be lurching around barely sober.

 

He can smell the alcohol, can pick out different varieties the same way Maggie could identify flowers. He stands outside Smokey Joe’s and inhales: a cheap domestic beer, a hoppy microbrew, a good old-fashioned stout, and a mid-shelf Scotch. 

 

He’s tempted. God is he tempted, but right now, he still has enough sense and self-control to resist that temptation. The scars from last time are just barely healed and the memory of how everything went spinning out of control is all too fresh. He’s tempted, but he’s still able to put one foot in front of the other and keep walking.

 

Nate ends up on a beach and he kicks off his shoes so he can walk in the surf, the moonless night leaving the water nearly opaque. It’s as warm as bathwater and the sounds the waves make are reassuring, but Nate soon feels just as bored as he has in his room. Only here, on the beach, he feels lonely too. 

 

If he’s going to take these midnight walks, he’d rather they be with Sophie. If he’s honest with himself, he’d rather be doing other things with her as well, but he can feel the distance  between them, the reservation on her part.

 

He remembers a conversation they once had, how she’d tactfully told him he had to figure out how he felt about her. How she’d teasingly added not to take too long. Only he had. And then that whole fuckup with the Davids had happened. By the time he righted the ship, she was seeing someone else. And then she just disappeared, walked out the door on the pretense of finding herself.

 

Life. Maybe it was what happened when you were busy making other plans. Or maybe it was just something that would always get in the way, if you let it. Nate sighs and runs his hand through his hair before deciding that it’s time to head back.

 

He finds Sophie waiting for him in his room, anxious and concerned. She throws her arms around him in a relieved hug, but he can tell by the way she pauses on her way in that she’s actually sniffing for alcohol.

 

He pushes her away, annoyed. “You can trust me, Sophie.”

 

Her eyes suggest that would be a mistake, and he wants to argue with her, to explain how he’s changed, but he doesn’t have the energy to deal with it right now.

 

“Leave,” he says, his voice flat and eyes empty. It’s not a request, and she walks out the door, hurt on her face.

 

---//---

 

Part Three

 

Comments

[lovesrogue36.livejournal.com]

*sniffle* Poor Nate, poor Sophie, It's just never easy for them.

I love the scene where she's dyeing/cutting his hair. It's just so intimate and romantic. The fact that they don't have to talk to be comfortable with each other (even when their relationship is strained, the way it is here) is one of the things I love about them.

Great job!

[fleurlb.livejournal.com]

No, it's never easy for them, which is part of what makes them so much fun to write. :)

I'm glad you liked that scene - that popped into my head, nearly fully formed, and it was definitely my favorite. Always happy to hear when a favored scene works for someone else.

[whimoffate.livejournal.com]

Wow. I think I would be hard-pressed to say that I enjoyed this chapter, primarily because the tension and the strain between the two characters is so palpable, but I found it compelling and necessary. I look forward to the last chapter.

There is something about this pairing that is devastating to me. They are very much connected to one another, but particularly ill-equipped to handle what they are feeling. Watching them, or reading them when they are in character, sort of breaks my heart. I hurt for them.

You are rapidly becoming my favorite writer for Nate/Sophie. I hope that encourages a speedy delivery of more fiction. Ha.

[fleurlb.livejournal.com]

Thanks for your kind words. *blush* And yeah, flattery will get you many places with me. :) I'm not too proud to admit that.

There is something about this pairing that is devastating to me. They are very much connected to one another, but particularly ill-equipped to handle what they are feeling.

This is such a perfect and beautiful encapsulation of them. I think it's what draws me to them. I've always been a moth to the bittersweet flame.

[whimoffate.livejournal.com]

I find the bittersweet flame rather tempting myself. It is hard to look away from that kind of pain. I am not sure why.

So, what should I do to bribe you for more? Pretty words? Begging? lol

[fleurlb.livejournal.com]

Thanks - glad you liked it. Writing tension is fun, but difficult sometimes. Part Three is up now. :)