Long Island, New York, U.S.A.

Casey was trying to stuff some additional items in her backpack. She topped it with a small bag of treats for the dogs and an extra bottle of water for herself. She was almost to the kitchen door when Olympia's voice reached her. Damn, I almost made it!

"Casey, you're going to eat something before you leave, aren't you?" Olympia asked.

Eva Meridio came in from the patio and almost ran in to her daughter.

"Casey, you're not going out dressed like that are you?" her mother walked past, indicating the sweatpants and sports bra the small blonde wore.

"It's official," Casey whispered to the two Dobermans who sat obediently at her feet, "we're in hell."

The two older women began planning their day; they were off to go shopping for antiques. Being fostered by two mothers was almost more than the small blonde could handle some days, but she wasn't really complaining. Since Olympia came to America to live with them, she found her mother was actually getting a life. The two old friends became the life of the community, doing everything from playing bridge to gardening. Casey was happy that her mother was showing signs of forgetting about the past.

Tessa's fortune allowed her mother to realize some dreams of her own. Casey pleaded for Jack's help in eliminating the red tape of getting Olympia citizenship in this country and of course the man always seemed to come through for Casey. He did it so well that the small blonde hit him up a few months later to get Alex into the country.

The Greek cook opened her own restaurant on Long Island and initially spent long hours turning the business into a restaurant with an impeccable reputation for authentic Greek food. Alex managed the establishment and found that he had a natural aptitude for that kind of business. In the last few months Olympia started teaching cooking classes at the local community college and became a big hit. The older woman was a godsend for Casey's mother when the young girl went to Connecticut for her rehab. So, now all three women lived in the spacious Long Island home and even though Casey had to bite her tongue about once a day, she wouldn't have it any other way.

"I'll be home late...I'm taking the boat out." Casey called back to the seated women.

"Be careful." Both women responded in unison.

"Yes, mothers." Casey made sure to tease as she closed the door.

The small blonde set her pack down and bent down to unlock her bike. Raising herself up again she slipped the backpack over her shoulders and hopped on the narrow bicycle seat. Her time at the rehab center was rough, mentally as well as physically. They said they could work miracles, but the young woman soon realized they meant they could make her work the miracles. The program was intensive and she was still just getting over her losses. Sometimes she would cry herself to sleep at night, missing her mother and Olympia. Once when she was having a particularly rough day she looked up across the grounds and she thought she saw the outline of a tall dark figure. When she blinked her eyes and looked again, the vision was gone. It was enough, though, to remind her of her lover and gave her strength to go on for another day, which turned into two and soon six months had gone by.

He strong legs pedaled the bike up the steep hill, Cinnamon and Mahogany loping along beside her. She'd tried to keep the two animals at home when she went sailing, but her mother said they howled the whole time she was gone. They were well trained and the funny thing was, even though it had been Tessa who trained the Dobermans, they obeyed every word that came out of Casey's mouth. Soon, she simply took them everywhere she went. It was a satisfying feeling having the two animals as bodyguards, almost like the feeling of being safe within Tessa's strong embrace.

Casey shook her head and chided herself. She promised she wouldn't do that anymore. She caught herself the last time staring at Olympia. The older woman's hair had earned a few extra streaks of gray and so she had her hair colored. It made her look years younger, but it had a different effect on Casey. Sitting in the living room, enjoying a glass of wine, Casey noticed how much that Tessa had favored the older woman. Once the small blonde realized she'd been staring, she turned away, blushing in embarrassment.

They reached the private docks and Casey smiled as Mr. Peterson opened the gate for her so she didn't have to fish around for her own key.

"Mornin' Miss." The old man waved and Casey waved back. She left the gate to her slip open, knowing she would have a visitor today.

Casey hopped aboard the Apógevma Nóstimo and lifted her bike over the boat's rail, hoisting the mountain bike up into the air easily with her powerful shoulder muscles. She went about the task of preparing to set sail. The small blonde moved about the boat with the efficiency and skill of a seasoned sailor. She still had the slightest limp to her right leg. It was barely noticeable and the doctors told her she would more than likely have to live with it. It took about a half an hour to get everything set up just the way she liked it. She tugged on the side stays, as was her habit, to test the tightness of the wires supporting the mast from the side of each hull.

That's when she heard the low growls from each animal as they lay passively on the deck of the boat.

"I know, let him get a little closer." Casey muttered under her breath. "Okay, heads up!" Casey said louder.

The two animals leaped gracefully from the boat's deck onto the dock and bared their teeth menacingly at Jack Armstrong.

"Shit! I hate when you do that, Casey." He said, backing up along the dock.

Casey laughed out loud. "Down." She said quietly and the dogs immediately ran up to the man and licked his hand in apology. "Jack, what in heaven's name was so important you couldn't e-mail me?"

"Well, I have this application, now before you say no--"

"Jack, I'm saying no. I do not want to join the FBI. My answer was no yesterday, last week, even when you sent me an application in my Christmas card, which was really pathetic, I might add. My answer will be the same a week or a year from now...it will always be no, Jack." Casey finished softly.

"All you do is workout and sail this damn boat around, or you just come out here and sit in it while it's tied up. You live with your mother, you never see any one...you're young, Casey, don't you think it's time you took your life back?"

Casey could have been angry with the older man, but she understood how Jack felt about her. She was only five years older than his eldest daughter was and he felt a certain fatherly responsibility toward her. That and the guilt over having gotten her into this mess in the first place.

"Yea, well, just in case you change your mind," he held out the application.

"Goodbye, Jack," Casey smiled and turned her back, "have a nice weekend."

"You're not from around here, are ya?" Peterson asked the stranger.

"No," the low voice answered, trying to step back into the shadows of the Harbormaster's office.

"Look, ya come by here every day to watch her and if you're thinking about starting any stalking kind of trouble, then ya should know I never forget a face."

Peterson watched as the face broke into a small smile that seemed to be tinged with irony. He was getting on in years and he guessed there might be a few faces that he forgot, but this one wouldn't be one of them. She was as tall as he was with long dark hair that fell into her eyes. Those eyes were what he'd remember. Pools of blue like the sky, but they had a look, kind of like a wounded animal that doesn't know whether to run away or just lay down and die. She had a long thin scar that ran along one cheek and she hardly ever took her eyes off the small blonde on her sailboat.

"Like I said, if it's trouble--"

"No! It's nothing like that," she answered. "Do you--have you known Casey long?" She asked.

"Well, let me see...I was here the day she put her first Hobie Cat in the water. She was just thirteen that year I guess. Pretty long, why?"

"Does she...does she seem happy...when you talk to her?"

"I guess if you knew her well enough you'd know that she had a bit of trouble when she was down in Greece. Pretty bad accident, I heard her father was killed...big mess. I don't know what all happened, but I do know that she ain't the same girl she used to be."

The stranger stepped further into the shadows when she saw the man's car coming toward them to leave the gate. She held her breath waiting as he rolled past, but the car stopped suddenly with a jerk and the passenger side window was powered down.

"You're not supposed to be here...hell, you shouldn't even be in the country." Jack's voice called out from the car.

The stranger stepped forward into the sunlight and leaned her head down to the window.

"I had to see her...I couldn't--" Her voice broke and she thrust her hands into her jeans to try to calm herself. "I just couldn't do it anymore." She finished.

"Two years, Tessa. We agreed it would have to be for at least two years. If everyone thinks you're dead, then Casey is safe, but if the Turks ever get wind that she knows where you are--"

"I know...I know. It's been so long and I was afraid...afraid she forgot about me."

Jack watched as tears filled the dark-haired woman's eyes. He'd seen those eyes filled with a lot of emotions...anger, hate, and even pain, but this was a new look. He watched as she swallowed and looked back out to the boat where Casey sat on the deck. Her blue eyes filled with abject despair and he wondered if he could do what Tessa had done. Could he have let his wife believe that he was dead, watching as she tried to put her life together, only to hope that there would still be room in it for him when he came back?

Jack sighed. He always sighed like that when he was about to do something that could possibly get him fired.

"Aw, hell...two years, eighteen months...seems pretty damn close to me. Go on," He met Tessa's eyes and finally saw a spark of life in them.

"Are you serious, Jack?"

"Yea, yea. Hey, what are you gonna say to her?" Jack asked.

Tessa smiled and Jack felt better about his decision already. The tall woman knew just what she would say. She made a deal and there was nothing on earth that could keep her from saying the words now.

"It's okay, Mr. Peterson...she's one of us" Jack called out to the Harbormaster standing close by.

"Jack," Tessa reached a hand through the window and placed it gently on the agent's arm. "Thanks...for everything."

The large man placed a hand over the woman's and squeezed it briefly. He drove off as soon as Tessa stepped back from the car.

Casey leaned against the mast and closed her eyes, feeling the sun shining down on her and thinking of the time when Tessa held her in those strong arms as she slept, here in this very spot. She kept her eyes closed tight, but the tears squeezed from behind her lids to cover her cheeks in their wetness.

A strange sensation passed through her, almost like a tingling up her spine. She heard footsteps on the dock behind her and uttered the same words she always did in these situations. "Heads up!"

Cinnamon and Mahogany jumped on to the dock, but they were whining, as if they didn't know what to do with the command Casey just gave them. Then the small blonde had that feeling again. She turned around slowly and met the vision that consumed her sleeping as well as her waking dreams. The dream that it was all a horrible misunderstanding and Tessa never did die. Her therapist said it was a natural response and it would go away eventually, but it never did.

Tessa reached out a hand and gently scratched Cinnamon behind one ear, never releasing the small blonde's uncomprehending gaze. Casey felt if she was going to go crazy, then this is the way she wanted to go.

The small blonde didn't even realize she was still crying. "Are you real?" She asked the vision.

Tessa smiled at that. That sexy smile that revealed those perfectly white teeth and ended in an all knowing grin.

"Yes, baby...I am very real."

Casey didn't hesitate, dream or not, she didn't even care if people thought she was crazing. She jumped over the boat's railing and when she hit the dock in front of the tall woman, Tessa scooped the blonde into her arms and held her in a crushing embrace.

"Oh, Niko, you came back to me!" Casey sobbed against the woman's chest.

Tessa held the young woman that way, stroking her hair and wiping the tears from her cheeks. Finally the dark-haired woman pulled away to look down into the beautiful face. She cupped Casey's face within her hands.

"We made a deal, remember?" Tessa responded.

Casey looked up at her with a confused expression.

"I promised I'd come back to say the words. I love you, Cassandra," the dark-haired woman drawled. "I have always loved you."

The two women held one another tightly; tears of joy being shed as they kissed for the first time in so long. Tessa remembered her first impression of her lover's kiss and she still thought it was the sweetest taste she'd ever known.

Tessa came so far to find something worth living for other than revenge, now, standing there on a dock in the middle of summer, twenty years, and thousands of miles from where they started, they each found something worth living for.

The End

Date: 2015-12-24; view: 544