Alias: Sydney and Vaughn- No Matter How Many Miles
Title: No Matter How Many Miles (1/1)
Author: Cristofle (Liz)
Characters: Sydney and Vaughn, SVR
Summary: Set during and after 4.10 “The Index”- Sydney and Vaughn keep checking in with each other.
Spoilers: Spoilers through “The Index”; mentions of S2 and S3.
Disclaimer: I own Michael Vartan, naked and tied to my bed;) Seriously, everything belongs to JJ Abrams and ABC, I own nothing, don’t sue.
Author’s Note: As most everyone who posts with me knows, my ultimate OTP is Alias’s Sydney and Vaughn. However, whatever I write about them tends to be weird and abstract and not nearly complete enough to share. However, as I was watching my S4 DVDs, this one came to me and it’s fairly straightforward- I thought Sydney and Vaughn both had a lot going on in the episode, but were pretty isolated from each other, even with a mention of their warehouse. So I wrote a couple phone calls and a post-ep reunion. Side note: I killed off Vaughn’s uncle, even though I’m not sure it was ever made clear what happened to him. I didn’t hear it if they did.
“Hi.” Vaughn closed his eyes and smiled faintly, pressing the phone a little tighter against his ear as her comforting voice flowed across the phone lines. “Are you in Arizona?” Sydney asked softly.
“Yeah,” he sighed. “I’m with my uncle now- he’s still unconscious.”
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Something just threw me for a minute,” he admitted. “The nurse called me Bill- apparently, he refers to his nephew as Bill.” He got up restlessly to pace.
“I’m sorry,” Sydney said sympathetically. “I know it’s hard for you sometimes when people talk about how much you look like your father- it must be even harder to be mistaken for him.”
“It’s not only that.” Vaughn leaned against the wall near the window. “This probably sounds ridiculously childish, but if he talks about his nephew and/or his brother so much, if he cared so much, where the hell was he when my mom and I needed him?”
“It doesn’t sound childish, it sounds human,” Sydney gently corrected him. “Something you ARE allowed to be, by the way.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Vaughn leaned his head back.
“You sound so unhappy,” Sydney said in concern. “I have an op that’s going to take all of us, but why don’t I fly out afterwards?”
It was too tempting; Vaughn wanted her there and he wanted her now. Something about Sydney calmed and eased everything inside of him like nothing else. But she was busy and this wasn’t really an emergency. “No, it’s okay,” he shrugged. “This isn’t very interesting, anyway. He’s not awake.”
“Well, I reserve the right to change my mind no matter what you say if I feel it calls for it,” she said firmly.
Vaughn’s lips twitched. “What are you wearing?”
She let out a surprised giggle. “What?”
“I’m sorry, you just sound so sexy when you’re bossy,” he teased.
He could almost hear her roll her eyes. “Drawstring pants, one of your hockey shirts, and my glasses. Can’t resist it, can you?”
“Are you kidding me? One of MY shirts? That turns me on more lingerie,” he grinned. “You just look so much better in them than I do.”
“I beg to differ,” she shot back. “I don’t know. I like your shirts. They smell like you.”
Vaughn was surprised by how touched he was by that. Something about that one small statement said volumes. Things had gotten better since Liberty Village; he stayed over more often than not, especially since the operation with Sark and Anna. She’d given him a key after they got home from that. Still, sometimes he was scared he’d hurt her so badly she’d never really feel fully open with him again. When she said things like that, it gave him more hope that he was wrong. “I miss you,” he said honestly, dropping the game.
“I miss you too,” she said quietly.
“Come home safe from your op, and call me afterwards, okay?” he asked.
“Of course. I’ll talk to you later. Hey, wait,” she said suddenly right before he hung up. “I put a couple things in your carry-on bag, hopefully to help you pass the time.”
“Really?” he said in surprise, looking over at his bag resting on the floor. “I’ll check it out. Thank you.”
“Anytime. Bye,” she said softly.
“Bye,” he echoed. Clicking his phone shut, he went over to his bag. Sure enough, zipped in the side pouch was a new novel he’d meant to pick up and a movie he’d mentioned wanting to see. Smiling to himself, he opened the book and a picture fell out. He bent down to pick it up and his smile grew; it was one of him and Sydney that Nadia had impulsively taken days ago when she came home to find them curled up together on the couch.
Nadia had this developed, Sydney’s handwriting read on the back. Thought you might like a copy.
Still looking at the picture, still smiling, Vaughn went back over to the chair by his uncle’s bed and sat down. Nothing had exactly changed. But he felt much lighter than he had before.
“You were hanging. From the side. Of a plane.”
At Vaughn’s disbelieving voice as he answered her call, Sydney winced. Weiss must have called him. “From a helicopter, in point of fact,” she clarified in a small voice.
She could hear the muffled noise in the background that was distinct as him leaning back in his chair and rubbing his forehead. “Oh, I feel better now,” he groaned.
“We got the disc, no one was hurt, no harm done,” she said hastily.
“I’m going to be dead of stress by the time I’m 40,” he muttered, seemingly to himself. He sighed heavily. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. My arms may never work the same way again, but other than that, fine,” she tried to joke.
“What happened?” he asked. “Why was it such a close call?”
She winced; she knew he’d pick up on that. She wanted to tell him, but phone lines were tricky- it was hard to know who could be listening. “Oh, this and that. Long story,” she said evasively.
“I’m sitting here with my comatose uncle,” he said dryly. “I’ve got time.”
“How about I tell you when you get home?” she suggested, putting just enough stress on the words that she hoped he’d know she wasn’t dodging him, but just didn’t want to say it over the phone.
He paused for a minute. “Okay,” he agreed at length, and from the shift in his tone, she knew with relief that he’d gotten the message.
“So no change with your uncle?” she asked, curling up in her bed.
This time, his sigh was sad. “The doctor came in- his kidneys are failing. They’re not sure how much longer he’s going to hang on.”
“Oh sweetie, I’m sorry,” Sydney apologized, sitting up straighter. “You let me talk about the op this whole time? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It’s not exactly a change,” Vaughn pointed out. “I knew he didn’t have much time left when I came here.”
“Still, it must be hard to hear like that.” Sydney tucked her hair behind her ear. “Are you SURE you don’t want me to come?” She had no idea how she would manage that, but she’d figure something out- Sloane’s actions would never again hinder her relationship with Vaughn if she had anything to say about it.
“No, it’s really okay,” he assured. “I just want to…talk for awhile. Just to hear your voice.” His tone lightened. “Thank you for the picture.”
“I thought that was a good one of us; I have another copy. I’m thinking of finding a frame,” she smiled, once again curling into her pillows. Her mind wandered back to the previous day with Dixon. Standing in the old warehouse had brought back floods of memories of the earlier days of their relationship. “I went to that Vietnamese place you used to pick up take-out from when we’d have long sessions in the warehouse,” she fibbed. “It got me to thinking about those days.”
He chuckled. “I don’t miss not being able to look at you in public, but sometimes I do miss that old place- I used to live for the time I spent in that dusty old building.”
“I know. Me, too.” She rolled over and picked up her copy of the picture from her bedside table. “I went there with Dixon, and I was telling him about the warehouse- he thought it was funny. He said it must have been romantic. And you know, I didn’t know how to describe to him that sometimes it was.”
“And sometimes you’d bitch me out there,” he teased.
She groaned and put her face in her free hand. “Do you know, do you KNOW, how embarrassed I was after I blurted out that stupid thing about Alice not long before we took down SD-6? I spent hours- maybe the next two days- thinking that you must have decided I was the biggest loser.”
“Trust me, that wasn’t what I was thinking,” he assured her. “I was overanalyzing it in my head. I was probably embarrassingly insecure myself- sometimes I would be so sure what you felt for me was more than friendship, but then I would wonder why the hell you would see me of all people that way.”
“I wasn’t blatantly obvious?” she protested.
He laughed. “If you were, then what was I?”
“Okay, point taken,” she cracked, and he laughingly groaned. “I don’t know, our past has never exactly been innocent, but sometimes it really seems like we were so much…YOUNGER then. Like, even more than we were in actual years.”
“I know,” he said quietly. “Some things that have happened hit us hard, I guess.”
She picked up on the sadness in his voice and winced; he was having a lousy enough few days as it is. “At least we came through it all together, right?”
“Right,” he agreed, his tone lightening somewhat again. “That’s what counts.”
“I miss you,” she murmured, automatically looking over to his empty half of the bed. “I wish you were right beside me now.”
“I miss you, too. And believe me, I wish I was home,” he sighed.
She idly glanced at the clock, and as she took in the glowing numbers it hit her that it was an hour later for him. “Have I been keeping you up? I’m sorry,” she apologized.
“No, you just clearly keep hitting the early bird special back there,” he teased. She playfully huffed. “Don’t worry about it. I was staring at the walls of my hotel room having no luck sleeping; I was glad that you called.”
Sydney smiled a little. “I’m glad that I called, too. Talk to you soon, okay?”
“Okay. Night, Syd.”
Sydney clicked her phone off and turned off her lamp, but found she was no closer to sleep than she’d been before. Questions and suspicions still rumbled through her mind about Sloane, now combined with guilt because of her sister, and a vague kind of fear that she was abusing her job. Vaughn’s warm and comforting arms, which she was just starting to get used to having again, were nowhere to be found. The more miserable he sounded on the phone, the more guilty she felt about not being in Arizona- she couldn’t help but feel that if the roles were reversed, it wouldn’t have even been a question for him to be there.
Sometimes she really hated the complications of her job.
Vaughn quietly set his bag down and for a moment, just stared at Sydney, drinking in the sight of her. After the emotional upheaval of the past few days, after finding that journal written in what was unmistakably his father’s handwriting referencing dates years after his death, only to have his uncle die without ever waking up, he’d been about fifty miles beyond his breaking point. He had all too willingly allowed an old friend of his uncle’s to oversee the cremation and booked the next flight home.
He needed to be with Sydney.
He didn’t think he could tell her about the journal, not yet. This was a difficult subject for her too, and he didn’t know enough to risk upsetting or hurting her. He just wanted to be close to her, holding her, feeling her. Quickly, he stripped down to his boxers and a tank top, kicked off his shoes, and crawled into bed.
Sydney at first thought she was dreaming when familiar arms pulled her against a warm chest and a kiss was pressed against the back of her neck. Slowly, she came to awareness and realized she was awake. “You’re back,” she grinned, turning around in his arms.
“I’m back,” Vaughn concurred softly, capturing her mouth in a lingering kiss.
“How’s your uncle?” she asked, taking his hand and playing with his fingers.
Vaughn sighed. “He died. About eight hours ago. He never woke up.”
“Vaughn! Why didn’t you call me?” Sydney protested, reaching over to turn on the light and sitting up to face him.
Vaughn followed her up and it hit her how exhausted he looked. “I just…wanted to come home,” he admitted, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose the way he did when he was agitated. “I’m tired, I missed you, and I was sick of Arizona.”
“I’m so sorry,” Sydney whispered, wrapping her arms around his neck.
Vaughn buried his face in her hair. “Thanks,” he murmured back.
She rubbed her hands up and down his back in an attempt to comfort. “How are you holding up? Do you want to talk about it?”
“Actually, I’d rather talk about something else,” he admitted wearily. “I need to get my mind off this. Just…nothing good came from going to Arizona.” He started playing with her hair, wrapping strands of it around his fingers. “So what was going on the other day, anyway? What couldn’t you tell me over the phone?”
Sydney studied his face for a moment, trying to judge if she should take him seriously, if he really wanted to focus on something else or if she’d be selfish in listening to him. Ultimately, he looked so beaten down at the thought of his uncle that she decided to take him at face value. “Well, Dixon and I had a…misunderstanding with Sloane,” she hedged.
Vaughn drew back a little and raised his brows. “A misunderstanding,” he repeated dryly.
Sydney flushed a little. “Well, you know we were looking to retrieve the Blackwell Index.” Vaughn nodded. “It turns out Dixon had actually….well, tapped his phone.”
“Tapped Sloane’s phone?” Vaughn interjected incredulously. “Without permission from Director Chase?”
Sydney nodded, her blush going a little deeper. “Well, he noticed that Sloane had been having contact with an old Alliance partner, and…long story short, he thought Sloane was making us do his dirty work again, and I was late getting out of that op because I was burning a copy of the disc and I had to do it out of sight, and it turned out to be…not exactly the case with Sloane.” Vaughn just looked at her in resignation. “And by not exactly the case, I mean not at all,” she finished in her small voice.
Vaughn sighed. “Are you in any trouble? Did anyone find out?”
“Well, we had gone to Director Chase with our suspicions, and she’s not pursuing any disciplinary action and neither is Sloane,” Sydney answered, and Vaughn nodded in relief. “But Dixon definitely had to take that tap off,” she added ruefully.
Vaughn played with her earlobes. “I don’t trust Sloane as far as my mom can throw him,” he admitted, making Sydney laugh at the mental image. “And I know I can’t imagine how difficult it is for you and Dixon to have to take orders from him. So as far as I’m concerned, his integrity and honesty can never be questioned enough. I just don’t want you to get hurt or get in trouble with the agency because of him.”
“I know, I know. He’s not worth it.” Sydney loosely looped her arms around his neck and rested her forehead against his. “I really did miss you.”
Vaughn lowered his head to kiss her neck. “I missed you, too,” he murmured.
“Mmmm.” Sydney angled her head to allow him easier access. “I fibbed a little on the phone, by the way.”
“Really?” Vaughn murmured, flicking his tongue against a particularly sensitive spot behind her ear; he grinned as he felt her breathing pick up a little. “About what?”
“Ummm…” What was I talking about? “The Vietnamese place,” she managed. “Dixon and I actually met in the warehouse, sort of a safe hide-out.”
“Hmmm.” He flipped her back so she was lying against the pillows. “The things I wanted to do to you in that warehouse…”
“Do tell,” she encouraged huskily.
“I think I’d rather show you.” He slid down her body and pushed her shirt up so he could kiss her bare skin. “Just imagine we’re pressed up against that chain-link fence.”
She giggled, but cut herself off with a husky sigh as his tongue dipped into her belly button. “If I’d known…you were coming home….mmmm, I’d have worn one of your shirts.”
Vaughn chuckled but his breath was knocked out of him when she abruptly reversed their positions again, slamming him back against the bed and straddling him. “How ironic. In all my fantasies, you at some point got me pressed up against that fence,” he managed.
“Shut up.” She peeled off her shirt and yanked him up enough to get his tank top off.
Vaughn melted back into the pillows as she bit down lightly on his neck. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Am I an awful girlfriend?”
Vaughn opened one eye in surprise as they lay sprawled out on her bed. “Actually, right now I’m feeling like you’re a pretty fantastic girlfriend.” She giggled reluctantly. “Of course not.” He ran a hand up and down her arm. “Why do you ask, Syd?”
“Because your uncle just died and we’ve spent most of the evening either talking about my problems or having sex? I mean, don’t get me wrong. I like the sex,” she admitted, blushing a little. He laughed softly. “But still. I feel like tonight should be about you.”
Vaughn sighed and shifted on his side so he was facing her. “Even now, I don’t know how I feel about my uncle.” It was the truth, but it was evasive and it was one big reason he wasn’t thrilled about talking about the past week. “He hasn’t been in my life for so long.”
“But he was a connection to your father,” she whispered. “And now he’s gone.”
The truth of her statement hit harder than she knew; he shifted once again so he was staring at the ceiling. “Very perceptive, Ms. Bristow,” he murmured, trying not to wince.
“Hey, if you really don’t want to talk about it, we don’t have to,” she clarified hastily, tracing the tattoo on his shoulder. “I just…I wanted to be clear, that I’m always here if you wanted to talk to me.”
Vaughn smiled faintly and captured her hand. “Thanks,” he said softly, kissing her fingertips. “I know that. I’m not trying to push you away. I just really don’t know what to say. My uncle cut that link long before he died, and even if he’d woken up it probably never would have come back. Besides, the whole time I was there, I wanted to be here. I wanted to listen to Weiss talk about how he finally has a girlfriend.” Sydney giggled a little. “I wanted to listen to Marshall’s latest crazy gadget explanation. I wanted to know what was going on that you couldn’t tell me over the phone. I wanted to be with you.” He kissed her palm. “I wanted to come home.”
Sydney’s lips flickered up slightly as she snuggled closer. “In that case, welcome home,” she whispered.
She couldn’t know. She couldn’t know how, not even so much the statement but the complete natural ease with which she said it, went straight to his heart and eased every tense and emotionally bruised inch of him. She couldn’t have known how scared he was that she would never refer to a common space as their home, his and hers together. She couldn’t have known how convinced he’d become that he’d ruined any chance of that. He wasn’t sure he knew how to tell her. Instead, he just wrapped his arms around her and as she moved even closer, for at least the time being all his confusion and all his fear drained away. For that night, just being home was enough.
Author: Cristofle (Liz)
Characters: Sydney and Vaughn, SVR
Summary: Set during and after 4.10 “The Index”- Sydney and Vaughn keep checking in with each other.
Spoilers: Spoilers through “The Index”; mentions of S2 and S3.
Disclaimer: I own Michael Vartan, naked and tied to my bed;) Seriously, everything belongs to JJ Abrams and ABC, I own nothing, don’t sue.
Author’s Note: As most everyone who posts with me knows, my ultimate OTP is Alias’s Sydney and Vaughn. However, whatever I write about them tends to be weird and abstract and not nearly complete enough to share. However, as I was watching my S4 DVDs, this one came to me and it’s fairly straightforward- I thought Sydney and Vaughn both had a lot going on in the episode, but were pretty isolated from each other, even with a mention of their warehouse. So I wrote a couple phone calls and a post-ep reunion. Side note: I killed off Vaughn’s uncle, even though I’m not sure it was ever made clear what happened to him. I didn’t hear it if they did.
“Hi.” Vaughn closed his eyes and smiled faintly, pressing the phone a little tighter against his ear as her comforting voice flowed across the phone lines. “Are you in Arizona?” Sydney asked softly.
“Yeah,” he sighed. “I’m with my uncle now- he’s still unconscious.”
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Something just threw me for a minute,” he admitted. “The nurse called me Bill- apparently, he refers to his nephew as Bill.” He got up restlessly to pace.
“I’m sorry,” Sydney said sympathetically. “I know it’s hard for you sometimes when people talk about how much you look like your father- it must be even harder to be mistaken for him.”
“It’s not only that.” Vaughn leaned against the wall near the window. “This probably sounds ridiculously childish, but if he talks about his nephew and/or his brother so much, if he cared so much, where the hell was he when my mom and I needed him?”
“It doesn’t sound childish, it sounds human,” Sydney gently corrected him. “Something you ARE allowed to be, by the way.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Vaughn leaned his head back.
“You sound so unhappy,” Sydney said in concern. “I have an op that’s going to take all of us, but why don’t I fly out afterwards?”
It was too tempting; Vaughn wanted her there and he wanted her now. Something about Sydney calmed and eased everything inside of him like nothing else. But she was busy and this wasn’t really an emergency. “No, it’s okay,” he shrugged. “This isn’t very interesting, anyway. He’s not awake.”
“Well, I reserve the right to change my mind no matter what you say if I feel it calls for it,” she said firmly.
Vaughn’s lips twitched. “What are you wearing?”
She let out a surprised giggle. “What?”
“I’m sorry, you just sound so sexy when you’re bossy,” he teased.
He could almost hear her roll her eyes. “Drawstring pants, one of your hockey shirts, and my glasses. Can’t resist it, can you?”
“Are you kidding me? One of MY shirts? That turns me on more lingerie,” he grinned. “You just look so much better in them than I do.”
“I beg to differ,” she shot back. “I don’t know. I like your shirts. They smell like you.”
Vaughn was surprised by how touched he was by that. Something about that one small statement said volumes. Things had gotten better since Liberty Village; he stayed over more often than not, especially since the operation with Sark and Anna. She’d given him a key after they got home from that. Still, sometimes he was scared he’d hurt her so badly she’d never really feel fully open with him again. When she said things like that, it gave him more hope that he was wrong. “I miss you,” he said honestly, dropping the game.
“I miss you too,” she said quietly.
“Come home safe from your op, and call me afterwards, okay?” he asked.
“Of course. I’ll talk to you later. Hey, wait,” she said suddenly right before he hung up. “I put a couple things in your carry-on bag, hopefully to help you pass the time.”
“Really?” he said in surprise, looking over at his bag resting on the floor. “I’ll check it out. Thank you.”
“Anytime. Bye,” she said softly.
“Bye,” he echoed. Clicking his phone shut, he went over to his bag. Sure enough, zipped in the side pouch was a new novel he’d meant to pick up and a movie he’d mentioned wanting to see. Smiling to himself, he opened the book and a picture fell out. He bent down to pick it up and his smile grew; it was one of him and Sydney that Nadia had impulsively taken days ago when she came home to find them curled up together on the couch.
Nadia had this developed, Sydney’s handwriting read on the back. Thought you might like a copy.
Still looking at the picture, still smiling, Vaughn went back over to the chair by his uncle’s bed and sat down. Nothing had exactly changed. But he felt much lighter than he had before.
“You were hanging. From the side. Of a plane.”
At Vaughn’s disbelieving voice as he answered her call, Sydney winced. Weiss must have called him. “From a helicopter, in point of fact,” she clarified in a small voice.
She could hear the muffled noise in the background that was distinct as him leaning back in his chair and rubbing his forehead. “Oh, I feel better now,” he groaned.
“We got the disc, no one was hurt, no harm done,” she said hastily.
“I’m going to be dead of stress by the time I’m 40,” he muttered, seemingly to himself. He sighed heavily. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. My arms may never work the same way again, but other than that, fine,” she tried to joke.
“What happened?” he asked. “Why was it such a close call?”
She winced; she knew he’d pick up on that. She wanted to tell him, but phone lines were tricky- it was hard to know who could be listening. “Oh, this and that. Long story,” she said evasively.
“I’m sitting here with my comatose uncle,” he said dryly. “I’ve got time.”
“How about I tell you when you get home?” she suggested, putting just enough stress on the words that she hoped he’d know she wasn’t dodging him, but just didn’t want to say it over the phone.
He paused for a minute. “Okay,” he agreed at length, and from the shift in his tone, she knew with relief that he’d gotten the message.
“So no change with your uncle?” she asked, curling up in her bed.
This time, his sigh was sad. “The doctor came in- his kidneys are failing. They’re not sure how much longer he’s going to hang on.”
“Oh sweetie, I’m sorry,” Sydney apologized, sitting up straighter. “You let me talk about the op this whole time? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It’s not exactly a change,” Vaughn pointed out. “I knew he didn’t have much time left when I came here.”
“Still, it must be hard to hear like that.” Sydney tucked her hair behind her ear. “Are you SURE you don’t want me to come?” She had no idea how she would manage that, but she’d figure something out- Sloane’s actions would never again hinder her relationship with Vaughn if she had anything to say about it.
“No, it’s really okay,” he assured. “I just want to…talk for awhile. Just to hear your voice.” His tone lightened. “Thank you for the picture.”
“I thought that was a good one of us; I have another copy. I’m thinking of finding a frame,” she smiled, once again curling into her pillows. Her mind wandered back to the previous day with Dixon. Standing in the old warehouse had brought back floods of memories of the earlier days of their relationship. “I went to that Vietnamese place you used to pick up take-out from when we’d have long sessions in the warehouse,” she fibbed. “It got me to thinking about those days.”
He chuckled. “I don’t miss not being able to look at you in public, but sometimes I do miss that old place- I used to live for the time I spent in that dusty old building.”
“I know. Me, too.” She rolled over and picked up her copy of the picture from her bedside table. “I went there with Dixon, and I was telling him about the warehouse- he thought it was funny. He said it must have been romantic. And you know, I didn’t know how to describe to him that sometimes it was.”
“And sometimes you’d bitch me out there,” he teased.
She groaned and put her face in her free hand. “Do you know, do you KNOW, how embarrassed I was after I blurted out that stupid thing about Alice not long before we took down SD-6? I spent hours- maybe the next two days- thinking that you must have decided I was the biggest loser.”
“Trust me, that wasn’t what I was thinking,” he assured her. “I was overanalyzing it in my head. I was probably embarrassingly insecure myself- sometimes I would be so sure what you felt for me was more than friendship, but then I would wonder why the hell you would see me of all people that way.”
“I wasn’t blatantly obvious?” she protested.
He laughed. “If you were, then what was I?”
“Okay, point taken,” she cracked, and he laughingly groaned. “I don’t know, our past has never exactly been innocent, but sometimes it really seems like we were so much…YOUNGER then. Like, even more than we were in actual years.”
“I know,” he said quietly. “Some things that have happened hit us hard, I guess.”
She picked up on the sadness in his voice and winced; he was having a lousy enough few days as it is. “At least we came through it all together, right?”
“Right,” he agreed, his tone lightening somewhat again. “That’s what counts.”
“I miss you,” she murmured, automatically looking over to his empty half of the bed. “I wish you were right beside me now.”
“I miss you, too. And believe me, I wish I was home,” he sighed.
She idly glanced at the clock, and as she took in the glowing numbers it hit her that it was an hour later for him. “Have I been keeping you up? I’m sorry,” she apologized.
“No, you just clearly keep hitting the early bird special back there,” he teased. She playfully huffed. “Don’t worry about it. I was staring at the walls of my hotel room having no luck sleeping; I was glad that you called.”
Sydney smiled a little. “I’m glad that I called, too. Talk to you soon, okay?”
“Okay. Night, Syd.”
Sydney clicked her phone off and turned off her lamp, but found she was no closer to sleep than she’d been before. Questions and suspicions still rumbled through her mind about Sloane, now combined with guilt because of her sister, and a vague kind of fear that she was abusing her job. Vaughn’s warm and comforting arms, which she was just starting to get used to having again, were nowhere to be found. The more miserable he sounded on the phone, the more guilty she felt about not being in Arizona- she couldn’t help but feel that if the roles were reversed, it wouldn’t have even been a question for him to be there.
Sometimes she really hated the complications of her job.
Vaughn quietly set his bag down and for a moment, just stared at Sydney, drinking in the sight of her. After the emotional upheaval of the past few days, after finding that journal written in what was unmistakably his father’s handwriting referencing dates years after his death, only to have his uncle die without ever waking up, he’d been about fifty miles beyond his breaking point. He had all too willingly allowed an old friend of his uncle’s to oversee the cremation and booked the next flight home.
He needed to be with Sydney.
He didn’t think he could tell her about the journal, not yet. This was a difficult subject for her too, and he didn’t know enough to risk upsetting or hurting her. He just wanted to be close to her, holding her, feeling her. Quickly, he stripped down to his boxers and a tank top, kicked off his shoes, and crawled into bed.
Sydney at first thought she was dreaming when familiar arms pulled her against a warm chest and a kiss was pressed against the back of her neck. Slowly, she came to awareness and realized she was awake. “You’re back,” she grinned, turning around in his arms.
“I’m back,” Vaughn concurred softly, capturing her mouth in a lingering kiss.
“How’s your uncle?” she asked, taking his hand and playing with his fingers.
Vaughn sighed. “He died. About eight hours ago. He never woke up.”
“Vaughn! Why didn’t you call me?” Sydney protested, reaching over to turn on the light and sitting up to face him.
Vaughn followed her up and it hit her how exhausted he looked. “I just…wanted to come home,” he admitted, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose the way he did when he was agitated. “I’m tired, I missed you, and I was sick of Arizona.”
“I’m so sorry,” Sydney whispered, wrapping her arms around his neck.
Vaughn buried his face in her hair. “Thanks,” he murmured back.
She rubbed her hands up and down his back in an attempt to comfort. “How are you holding up? Do you want to talk about it?”
“Actually, I’d rather talk about something else,” he admitted wearily. “I need to get my mind off this. Just…nothing good came from going to Arizona.” He started playing with her hair, wrapping strands of it around his fingers. “So what was going on the other day, anyway? What couldn’t you tell me over the phone?”
Sydney studied his face for a moment, trying to judge if she should take him seriously, if he really wanted to focus on something else or if she’d be selfish in listening to him. Ultimately, he looked so beaten down at the thought of his uncle that she decided to take him at face value. “Well, Dixon and I had a…misunderstanding with Sloane,” she hedged.
Vaughn drew back a little and raised his brows. “A misunderstanding,” he repeated dryly.
Sydney flushed a little. “Well, you know we were looking to retrieve the Blackwell Index.” Vaughn nodded. “It turns out Dixon had actually….well, tapped his phone.”
“Tapped Sloane’s phone?” Vaughn interjected incredulously. “Without permission from Director Chase?”
Sydney nodded, her blush going a little deeper. “Well, he noticed that Sloane had been having contact with an old Alliance partner, and…long story short, he thought Sloane was making us do his dirty work again, and I was late getting out of that op because I was burning a copy of the disc and I had to do it out of sight, and it turned out to be…not exactly the case with Sloane.” Vaughn just looked at her in resignation. “And by not exactly the case, I mean not at all,” she finished in her small voice.
Vaughn sighed. “Are you in any trouble? Did anyone find out?”
“Well, we had gone to Director Chase with our suspicions, and she’s not pursuing any disciplinary action and neither is Sloane,” Sydney answered, and Vaughn nodded in relief. “But Dixon definitely had to take that tap off,” she added ruefully.
Vaughn played with her earlobes. “I don’t trust Sloane as far as my mom can throw him,” he admitted, making Sydney laugh at the mental image. “And I know I can’t imagine how difficult it is for you and Dixon to have to take orders from him. So as far as I’m concerned, his integrity and honesty can never be questioned enough. I just don’t want you to get hurt or get in trouble with the agency because of him.”
“I know, I know. He’s not worth it.” Sydney loosely looped her arms around his neck and rested her forehead against his. “I really did miss you.”
Vaughn lowered his head to kiss her neck. “I missed you, too,” he murmured.
“Mmmm.” Sydney angled her head to allow him easier access. “I fibbed a little on the phone, by the way.”
“Really?” Vaughn murmured, flicking his tongue against a particularly sensitive spot behind her ear; he grinned as he felt her breathing pick up a little. “About what?”
“Ummm…” What was I talking about? “The Vietnamese place,” she managed. “Dixon and I actually met in the warehouse, sort of a safe hide-out.”
“Hmmm.” He flipped her back so she was lying against the pillows. “The things I wanted to do to you in that warehouse…”
“Do tell,” she encouraged huskily.
“I think I’d rather show you.” He slid down her body and pushed her shirt up so he could kiss her bare skin. “Just imagine we’re pressed up against that chain-link fence.”
She giggled, but cut herself off with a husky sigh as his tongue dipped into her belly button. “If I’d known…you were coming home….mmmm, I’d have worn one of your shirts.”
Vaughn chuckled but his breath was knocked out of him when she abruptly reversed their positions again, slamming him back against the bed and straddling him. “How ironic. In all my fantasies, you at some point got me pressed up against that fence,” he managed.
“Shut up.” She peeled off her shirt and yanked him up enough to get his tank top off.
Vaughn melted back into the pillows as she bit down lightly on his neck. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Am I an awful girlfriend?”
Vaughn opened one eye in surprise as they lay sprawled out on her bed. “Actually, right now I’m feeling like you’re a pretty fantastic girlfriend.” She giggled reluctantly. “Of course not.” He ran a hand up and down her arm. “Why do you ask, Syd?”
“Because your uncle just died and we’ve spent most of the evening either talking about my problems or having sex? I mean, don’t get me wrong. I like the sex,” she admitted, blushing a little. He laughed softly. “But still. I feel like tonight should be about you.”
Vaughn sighed and shifted on his side so he was facing her. “Even now, I don’t know how I feel about my uncle.” It was the truth, but it was evasive and it was one big reason he wasn’t thrilled about talking about the past week. “He hasn’t been in my life for so long.”
“But he was a connection to your father,” she whispered. “And now he’s gone.”
The truth of her statement hit harder than she knew; he shifted once again so he was staring at the ceiling. “Very perceptive, Ms. Bristow,” he murmured, trying not to wince.
“Hey, if you really don’t want to talk about it, we don’t have to,” she clarified hastily, tracing the tattoo on his shoulder. “I just…I wanted to be clear, that I’m always here if you wanted to talk to me.”
Vaughn smiled faintly and captured her hand. “Thanks,” he said softly, kissing her fingertips. “I know that. I’m not trying to push you away. I just really don’t know what to say. My uncle cut that link long before he died, and even if he’d woken up it probably never would have come back. Besides, the whole time I was there, I wanted to be here. I wanted to listen to Weiss talk about how he finally has a girlfriend.” Sydney giggled a little. “I wanted to listen to Marshall’s latest crazy gadget explanation. I wanted to know what was going on that you couldn’t tell me over the phone. I wanted to be with you.” He kissed her palm. “I wanted to come home.”
Sydney’s lips flickered up slightly as she snuggled closer. “In that case, welcome home,” she whispered.
She couldn’t know. She couldn’t know how, not even so much the statement but the complete natural ease with which she said it, went straight to his heart and eased every tense and emotionally bruised inch of him. She couldn’t have known how scared he was that she would never refer to a common space as their home, his and hers together. She couldn’t have known how convinced he’d become that he’d ruined any chance of that. He wasn’t sure he knew how to tell her. Instead, he just wrapped his arms around her and as she moved even closer, for at least the time being all his confusion and all his fear drained away. For that night, just being home was enough.