chapter 28 | new players

"I'm glad I met you hope you know that"

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Aria POV

I track Charlotte as she nears the bedroom door now somehow with a gun in her hand. And somehow between Charlotte breaking a part of my soul and her reaching the bedroom door I made my decision. I slowly creep to the duffle bags, grab a gun from one of them and approach Charlotte. She doesn't look back, maybe not considering me a threat, maybe just considering whatever mission she has more important.

Go ahead and underestimate me.

She disappears throguh the bedroom floor and I follow, entering the room a few steps behind her and finding it empty. She still didn't notice me and was making her way around the room, searching. The sheets are filled with Blakes blood and there are feathers everywhere from my fight with the mouse, in which I clearly won.

"Drop the gun."

Blake steps out from the closet, grabbing his side but with a steady hand aiming a gun at Charlotte.

Shit.

"Drop the gun Charlotte before anyone gets hurt." Blake presses.

No one has noticed me yet but Charlotte has a calculated look an her face, something so similar to what I was used to and that meant she was about to do something incredibly stupid and reckless in my opinion. I decide to just stomp on my own heart one more time and aim that gun at Charlotte, press off the safety and while two pairs of eyes snap towards me I say with a steady voice I can't believe I have right now.

"Listen to him Charlotte."

The look of betrayal on her face is something I will probably never forget but I wasn't the one who came in here guns blazing and was a secret agent.

Apparently with two guns aimed at her she slowly lowers her putting it on the bed.

"On the floor Char and push it away"

This is not happening right now, I can't believe what I'm doing. I can see Blake looking at me from the corner of my eyes but all my attention is focused on Charlotte. I have no idea how good she is and if she wants to underestimate me that doesn't mean that I'm going to do that to her. I feel a tear rolling down my cheek and wipe it away while Charlotte kicks the gun in a far corner of the bedroom.

"Take the rest of her guns Blake"

"Ria" Charlotte tries.

"Don't."

I need time to think and I can't do it while she's threatening to kill Blake, I don't even want to think about what I'm doing right now. Me protecting Blake? Charlotte being a spy? Me threatening my best friend? I didn't even have breakfast yet.

But Blake obliges and in a few minutes Charlotte is on the couch with her hands restrained with duct tape in front of her and with a pile of weapons on the coffee table. Blake sat down in an opposite armchair clutching his abdomen and Charlotte eyed him again with that calculated look, avoiding eye contact with me since she sat on the couch.

I move in front of Blake and crouch down being at eye level with her.

"Ria please we don't have time, they're coming and I have to get you out of, your parents sent me and-"

"I'm going to stop you right there"

My parents? What the fuck? I can't even-

"Blake?" He must know something right?

"Yes cupcake?"

I throw him a look over my shoulder but considering he is shot and someone just tried to kill him, Blake wears a crooked grin and looks like Christmas came early.

"Don't call me that. What do you know about her?"

"Ria seriously? Do you believe him? Come one just-" Charlotte tries to interrupt but Blake starts talking over her.

"Not much. We had our suspicions, I mean I had Monique give me a file on her but besides a murky history with no actual school records and a lot of missing family members, we couldn't link any suspicious activity to Charlotte and you were very good friends with her so we couldn't just come in and remove her. Her grandfather was a known KGB agent but her parents cut ties with him and moved to Spain way before she was born so we-"

"Wait a second, you knew her grandfather was a spy and still let her live with me? Weren't you there to keep me safe"

Before Blake could respond Charlotte snorted.

"Like he was the one who kept you safe."

I shot Blake a look but he looked as confused as I was. When no one said anything Charlotte continued.

"Don't tell me you never figured it out. Fuck me sideways am I that good? Not even great Agent Cooper could figure out what I did right under his nose."

When neither me or Blake said anything she continued. This is actually something I learned from movies, that silence is the best way to get information. And apparently Blake had the same idea. Even though he looked slightly annoyed by the fact that Charlotte apparently did something he didn't know about. I on the other hand was still trying to grasp the whole situation, still trying to find my roommate in the person sitting in front of me and apparently whatever conflicting emotions I had on my face spurred Charlotte to keep going.

"Ria you have to believe me, Blake didn't keep you safe, only kidnapped you with very bad timing" she shot Blake a look "I never went to school but my parents did train me to protect myself by any means necessary because they had enemies everywhere. My grandfather wasn't the only spy in the family but I'm glad to know that the rest stayed off of MI6 records. My parents owed your parents a favor so when you went to college my parents sent me to protect you because if I had only a few enemies, whole organizations were looking for you and your sister. I don't even know how your parents kept you hidden until then or how you convinced them to go to college. I guess they got too soft, thinking that after so much time there would be less people trying to hurt them, but of course they were wrong and got us all in this fucked up situation. Anyway, I was so excited to finally go to a normal school away from my parents and even though I was there on assignment it was still freedom. And then I met you and you were the perfect best friend someone could ask for. It was extremely easy to befriend you and move in the same apartment. The thing I was most afraid about was that I couldn't be your friend and my parents would have to send someone else. But freedom didn't last long, six months into our first year I noticed men following us, following you. I wanted to contact my parents and call everything off but then I would return to a godforsaken village in the middle of nowhere with temperatures that could boil the blood in your veins so I- "

She looked down, took a deep breath and a few tears streamed down her cheeks, even though I had suspicions where this was going I kept silent, just sat on the floor and leaned my back against Blake's armchair.

"-dealt with the threat. I thought once it was a fluke, they must have spotted you and connected the points to your parents. But then it happened again after two months and I- did what I had to do again." She then looked and me, tears now streaming down her face "Ria you have to understand I had no choice they were going to kill you, I- I- I followed them listened on their conversations, the things they were going to do to you, I-"

Fuck this. I got up and quickly made my way to her and hugged Charlotte, cutting off the duct tape.

She started sobbing uncontrollably in my chest and I looked over at Blake. And he gave a slight nod.

"I also spotted a few of the men Charlotte is talking about but before I could further investigate they would be gone, most of them overnight and i thought that I was just paranoid." Blake explained.

Shit. So Charlotte did kill people for me. And from how she is still crying I guess a lot of people. And every time I would come home from uni I would complain about an assignment or a professor, while she was killing people that wanted to hurt me.

Double shit. And I pointed a gun at her just because she wanted to protect me.

Triple shit. I fucked up.

"Char, hey, I'm sorry for everything I-"

"Don't, don't apologize I should be the one apologizing. You have nothing to-" she was interrupted by an electronic 'bing' that came from one of her gadgets from the coffee table. She quickly grabbed it. It wasn't a phone, it looked more like an ancient GPS.

"Shit, they're here." she gasped while whipping her tears and getting off the couch starting to put on all her weapons.

"What? What do you mean? 'Here'? Like this cabin 'here'? Who's here?" I try asking, starting to panic. Blake also got up.

"Where?"

Of course Charlotte answers his question first.

"The turned left from the highway, they should be here in about 15 minutes, 20 if we're lucky"

They both start moving around at the same time, Blake stuffing things into duffle bags and Charlotte pouring gasoline on the floor.

"Charlotte? Blake?" Now they're suddenly getting along in a time of crisis? Seriously? I can't believe this.

Blake POV

I push a bag into Aria's hands and try to get her out of the living room, even though Charlotte acted fast, came prepared with the tracker and had an exceptional sob story I still don't trust her completely.

"Aria we have to move, get all the supplies from the bedroom, put them in this duffle bag and get the car."

Once Aria disappears in the bedroom I stalk over to Charlotte grab her hair and twist her around to immobilize her and ask

"How did you find us and who are you working for?"

She lets out a huff "Cooper we don't have time for this I will-"

I tightened my arm around her neck. "And how do you know me?"

"I put a tracker in Aria's neck after the first man came to hurt her. I work for the team that's keeping Aria safe, so as long as you don't harm her we're on the same team. And come on man who doesn't know you? You're basically a celebrity. Now let me go and let's go before you receive another bullet in your abdomen."

Somewhat satisfied by her answer I let her go, turn around and I see Aria staying in the bedroom door, mouth open duffle bag in hand and a betrayed expression on her face.

"You put a tracker on me?" the pain in her voice. Fuck.

"Shit, Ria I-"

"Save it. I'm tired we're getting my sister and if the next words coming out of your mouth are not her exact location down to the coordinate than shut the fuck up and let's go. I'm driving. Blake put everything in the trunk and start the fire."

She turned around and stalked towards the garage. Now I'm semi hard again, how the fuck does she do it. It's insane. She's insane. I'm insane. Two sentences said in a bossy voice and I would follow her to the end of the world.

I grab the duct tape and put it around Charlotte's wrists again. Drag her to the car shoving her in the back seat. I pull out a match, light it up and throw it in the already soaked gasoline living room, the house catches fire and I get in the car, Aria speeding off.



A/N

Here goes another chapterrr, hope you enjoy!!! Thanks again for reading.