He didn't reply and she immediately thought: they've got him and now they're coming for me.

"Talia, what's wrong?" Alex asked her when he noticed how she stared intently at her phone.

"Jake didn't reply," she said and received a weird look from Alex.

"So? He's on a mission Tal, your brother is a big boy, he can take care of himself," Alex tried to calm her nerves but she shook her head as she started pacing.

"You don't understand, Alex. For this particular mission we have a code named Tag. He was supposed to text me the word 'tag' at the part where the mission was getting tricky. I would text him the same word and if I didn't get a response within five minutes he told me to run," she explained to him.

"Why do you have to run? What mission is he on then?" Alex asked while packing another bag with some more weapons and gadgets. Talia dropped the bag on the ground and stared at him with a frown.

"Do you remember that they sent you here because of the several attacks on important senators?" she asked him and he nodded, remembering the attacks very vividly, "When the attacks stopped and the agency took us of the case, Jake couldn't let it rest and went undercover. He found out that the organization that led the attacks was from our agency, which means our employers are corrupt."

"Why didn't you guys tell me? I could've helped and now Jake put himself in danger!"

Talia sighed and pushed his hands away. "How were we to know if we could trust you? You work for the agency, for all we know you could work for them." He gave her a smirk and walked up to her.

He looked her straight in the eye and in his eyes she saw something she couldn't quite place. "But now you trust me, because you know I care for you, don't you?" He whispered and a shiver ran up her spine as his warm breath tickled her ear. "I do," she whispered.

They stayed like that for a couple of seconds before she wanted to turn and get the hell out of the apartment, but he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her close against his firm body.

She looked up at his face as he put his other hand under her chin. "Everything will be fine," he muttered before kissing her passionately. The kiss startled Talia, but soon she gave in and forgot about the problems at hand.

His hands explored her body as she played with his hair until they both heard the sound of cars coming to a halt at their flat.

Talia jumped away and cursed. "We'll have to use the fire exit at the back of the building. Stay here, I'll get us a bulletproof vest before we go," she said and hurried off to get the vests.

When she returned Alex was typing something on his phone as she threw a vest at him. "Come on big boy, let's make a run for it before they get to us."

"What happened with 'running is never an option'?" Alex asked with a smirk as he put his phone away and put on the vest.

"That idea flew out the window the moment I knew they had my brother and I am the only one to save him," she snapped before grabbing a bag and storming through the door.

Alex soon followed her towards the fire exit. It wasn't long before armed men showed up at Talia's apartment, but they were greeted by an open door and no one inside.

By that time Talia and Alex ran down the stairs towards the exit, but just before Talia ran through the exit, Alex grabbed her arm and put a finger against his lips.

The sound of cars coming to a halt echoed through the alley behind the building. Talia looked at Alex with wide eyes.

"How did they get her so fast? Did they know we knew they were coming?" she whispered and Alex shrugged.

"I don't know Talia, but we'll have to make a run for it. If we're fast we might make it out of the ally alive."

"They're probably armed, but we might have the element of surprise at our side if we run before they've come too close."

Talia looked him in the eyes before kissing him on the cheek. "If we get out of here alive, there's more where that came from," she whispered. She thought she saw a flash of regret in his eyes, but they had to move. There was no time to waste.

She turned around pushed the door open and took off in a full sprint. Behind her she heard men shouting and soon footsteps followed.

She trusted that Alex was just behind her until she hear him yell her name. She kept running but looked over her shoulder.

As soon as she did that she knew she had made a mistake as she saw the men catching up to her. The end of the ally was in sight, but one shot made an end to that.

Talia screamed as the bullet hit her side. She lost her balance and tumbled to the ground. She rolled over the ground and tried to get up again, but the pain in her side made her dizzy.

How did they know exactly where to shoot? She was wearing a jacket over her bulletproof vest. But as she had slightly turned her body to look for Alex they had managed to shoot her in the side.

The men who had chased her had now surrounded her and one of them gave her a smack on the head with his gun.

Once again she fell on the ground slowly losing conscious as an all too familiar voice whispered something to her "Oh Talia, I'm sorry."

And that was the last thing she heard before giving in to the darkness.

-(*-*)-

When she woke up, she looked at her surroundings in confusion and concluded she was in a hospital. She wore the same clothes as last time, but without a bulletproof vest and her wound was treated as well.

She pulled the needle out of her hand and tried to stand up from her bed as the door opened. It was Alex and he looked baffled at her.

"You're awake," he said. She narrowed her eyes at him as he walked closer until he stood closer to her.

"I'm so sorry for what happened, Talia," he said and ruffled his hair. She still thought it was sexy, but she knew she would never do it again.

"It was you, all the time. And you wondered why we didn't trust you," she spat as she thought about all the signs she was too blind to see through immediately.

His sudden appearance with their mission. The fact that he always asked questions about everything Talia and Jake did. His sudden interest in her. He didn't actually care about her, he just used her.

"You kept asking questions just to give them more time to get here. You kissed me, to give them more time!" She accused him.

"And when I went to get bulletproof vests you texted them we were going through the fire exit. Even before we went outside you tried to give them time to catch up on us." Alex said nothing but just kept looking at the ground.

"You yelled my name so I would turn, so they could SHOOT me!" She yelled and the sudden yelling made Alex jump.

"I never wanted them to shoot you, Talia, but you were so goddamn fast!" Alex sighed.

"I never did something I didn't mean," he said staring at her intently and she knew he was referring to their night together a few days ago.

She saw he was being genuine and with that she saw a weakness.

"Is Jake here? Is he alive?" she asked pretending to be scared and Alex nodded. Within mere seconds she made him tell her the exact location of her brother with only a few pleading looks.

"Thank you for making sure they patched me up," Talia said as she sat back on the bed pulling Alex closer as she did. He smiled at her and captured her lips with his own.

And with that he sealed his faith. Talia roamed her hands over his body until she found the pocket knife she knew he always carried with her.

With a quick motion she stabbed the knife deep in Alex' throat. His eyes widened in disbelief as he gurgled blood.

"Oh Alex, I'm so sorry," she quoted him with no emotion in her voice.

She pulled the knife out of his neck and pushed him off of her. She put the knife in her pocket and walked out the door. It was time to find her brother.

She remembered their rule number one: "Trust nobody."