He wasn't alone.

Stepping into his home, Jack Bristow froze instantly and looked about him with sharp eyes, looking for any sign. Nothing was out of place but nevertheless...

The shower.

The sound of the shower reached his ears and he immediately relaxed his grip on his gun. There weren't many people who could get into his home, past his countermeasures, without any sign of entrance. And about only one of those would have the unmitigated gall to help themselves to his shower.

"Hello Jane." He said blithely as she emerged wrapped in a towel, a drink in hand.

"Jack, darling," the English super spy smiled silkily at him, "that shower of yours is absolutely to die for." She sniffed in disdain. "I wish I could say the same for your liquor supply. It's dreadful. How is a woman expected to make herself a proper martini when the ingredients are substandard?"

"My apologies." Putting down his briefcase, he shrugged out of his coat and hung it up. "You're taking quite a risk being here."

"Oh do relax." She scolded lightly, appropriating his couch and draping herself across it in a most appealing picture. It was only too easy to see how scores of men around the world had been utterly charmed into complacency. Not a problem he suffered from, of course, but he could see how they had fallen victim. England had cultivated quite the weapon in their infamous 007. "Really Jack, do you think me so inexperienced as to set off any of Sloane's security? I am many things but inexperienced and sloppy are not among them."

"What you are, Jane," he argued simply, loosening his tie, "is famous in our circles. More accurately, infamous, I doubt there's anyone in the Alliance who doesn't know who the designation 007 belongs to."

"Sydney." Jane finished her martini and placed the glass on the coffee table, the motion drawing the eye her very long, tanned legs. "But, of course, that is by design. You don't seem all that surprised to see me, Jack. Not that you ever are."

"Our assets in Cuba mentioned your sighting." Jack's lips twitched into a hint of a smile despite himself. "You made quite a mess."

"I usually do." She looked somewhat amused. "They do pay me to do so I'm afraid, and I always did take great pride in my work. I do clean up after myself nicely though, I must admit, this time the credit for clean up goes to your countrymen." She paused and inclined her head. "Rather, it would, if your government had any knowledge or involvement in my insertion into Cuba."

That brought an almost inaudible chuckle from him. "Wade?"

"Hmmm...Yes." Jane's expression darkened slightly and she looked over at him. "How much do you know?"

He knew enough to know the question she was really asking. He took a moment before he answered, considering all the best possible ways that he could answer and rejecting all non-optimal ones. "I know Janus is - was - Alec Trevelyan." He finally put forward with true regret in every word. Jane's history with Trevelyan was as known to him as his with Irina was known to her. "The identification was made quite some time ago but we had no way of informing your government. By then..."

"By then it was entirely too late. I'm sure Alec took great pains to avoid any discovery by the Americans." She agreed with a light shrug, a very minimal motion, conveying a multitude of emotions with the simplistic gesture. "He is aware of my affiliations with your organization and you are well aware of my...involvements with Alec. I would have been the first one called."

"Precisely." Jack didn't ask if she'd killed him. He knew Jane Bond better than that. Alec had betrayed far more than just a lover. He'd betrayed a fellow agent, his country, and everything both had stood for in a pathetic attempt at vengeance. In Jane's view of the world such things were unforgivable. She had, on occasion, engaged in a little vengeance seeking herself but there were limits to such. "I'm sorry."

She didn't ask him why he'd said it either. As well as he knew her, she knew him. They shared a certain understanding of how the world worked. Both sometimes felt like dinosaurs with the new age upon them. Both wondered in the rarest of moments if the day had arrived when they had finally outlived their usefulness. Both of them refused to accept that outcome. They'd long ago realized they were cut from the same cloth. It was almost refreshing.

"Nothing to be sorry about," she said finally, "had to be done and by my count he'd already been dead a decade. The realization just had yet to catch up with him." She offered a faintly unpleasant smile. "I merely helped it along, my patriotic duty, of course."

"Of course." He echoed.

A glimmer of mischief entered Jane's eyes. It would have been quite unexpected if he didn't know her so very well. He watched with a speculative gaze as she stretched a bit and one foot slipped out to poke at his leg. “So...now that Goldeneye has been neutralized, I'm sure your government will be dismantling their own equivalent?'

"Equivalent?" Jack parroted back, enjoying the game. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"No, of course you don't." She agreed mirthfully, warming to the game herself. "And Arvin Sloane wasn't trying to negotiate with General Ourumov for access to Goldeneye. It certainly couldn't have been his name the Russians turned up in it's little clean up of the good General's activities."

He knew she caught the flicker of reaction that crossed his face before he could stop it as he saw the change in hers. Mollified, she sat back and settled down. "Hmm...Consider it a freebie. M would be understandably scandalized if she learned I'd tipped you to that." She looked quite smug at the thought. "I'm afraid she doesn't quite yet understand how things work out here."

"The upper echelons rarely do." He demurred, capturing her foot the next time it snuck by for a quick poke and working the surprisingly soft skin. Jane rewarded him with a faint moan of enjoyment. The woman did have a fairly well entrenched hedonistic streak. "She'll learn. Either she'll learn or there'll be a new M." He let a faint hint of amusement work its way into his face. "Your section has come to depend on you for its best results."

"True. And Q would be positively heartbroken if he didn't have me to torture." She sighed and let her head loll back as he worked on her feet. "And you're right, she'll settle in. It's about time they let a woman at the helm. Not myself, of course, but M...perhaps Moneypenny. Anyone who can put up with me..."

"Should be made Prime Minister," Jack nodded, finishing her sentence before asking, "When do you have to be back?"

The innocent look Jane unleashed on him was telling.

Some day, he suspected someone, somewhere would finally dare to try impressing upon 007 the importance of communication.

Too bad Jane wouldn't be listening. She never did.

Finis

 

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