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It was a cold autumn day, brown and orange the leaves fell, covering the floor in the forest. A car stopped a few feet from the cabin. When the engine was turned off, it turned all quiet. Patterson stared at the cabin from the car for a moment, checking her map and some notes she had in the passenger seat. She had found these traces of puzzles that had led her to this place. It all started with the message hidden in the magazine's crossword puzzle where David used to work. For some reason, she decided to follow that way alone and without telling anyone from the team. She even was using her first free weekend after long months of hard and nonstop work.She got out of the car and the autumn leaves crunched under her boots. She went to the cabin somewhat hesitantly. She knocked on the door without expecting anyone to come and open the door. After a little wait, she opened the door with her service weapon in her hands. As much as she tried to enter silently, the wooden planks creaked under her weight. She inspected the room and moved towards the kitchen, making sure that no one else was there when she heard the door closing behind her. She turned around hastily just to meet the person she had least expected to see there.“Tasha?” Patterson exclaimed surprised and raised her gun to point at her.“Easy! Patterson, easy…” she said and put her hands in the air, “I’m not here to hurt you.”“Why should I believe you? I know what you did to Reade.”“I’m not armed. You can search me if you want, but my gun is in my bag in the room in the back.” She pointed one hand down the short hall and raised it to the side of her head again. “Patterson, if I wanted to hurt you, I wouldn’t have left you a puzzling path for you to find me, I would get you when you went for coffee late at night.”Patterson hesitated. They already had had too many betrayals in too little time and she couldn’t handle one more, she wanted to believe in Zapata, but she wouldn’t let anyone fool her again. She needed to be sure, and confidence was a quality that was becoming increasingly difficult for her to maintain. “You left a message on my answering machine, you just disappeared. I didn’t know anything about you for weeks and then I found out that you were working for Blake Crawford, then for Madeline Burke and when I thought you can’t surprise me anymore, you kidnapped Reade in his own apartment, to steal some files from the FBI!” Podía notar lo molesta e indignada que estaba, pero también dolida. “Please, give me a reason, a good one, so I should put down my gun, why I should not handcuff you and take you to the FBI.”Tasha stared at her in silence. She kept her hands in the air and Patterson could tell she was having an internal debate about how much she could confess. She already had hidden crucial information from her before and it turned out in an awful way, now she had the opportunity to make a different choice, but she wasn’t sure.“Tasha!” Patterson rushed her.“Ok, ok. Look,” she said with a resigned sigh “you shouldn’t know anything I’m about to tell you, it’s all classified and it could risk everything, okay? If I’m telling you it’s just because I want you to know that you can trust me.” She looked Patterson straight in her eyes “I’m working undercover for the CIA. My only contact is Keaton and no one else can know.” She put her hands down, beside her body, keeping them visible to Patterson.“You have to be kidding me.”“What? You wanted the truth and that’s it.”“Keaton. Keaton is the only one who knows?” Tasha just nodded without understanding what was happening. “Keaton is in a coma. Are you saying that the only person capable of confirming your alibi, conveniently can not?”“What? Keaton is–! What happened?”Patterson stared at her in silence, she was trying to decide whether she should believe her or not. “He got shot… protecting Jane in the field.”Tasha ran her hands over her head as a bunch of thoughts appeared in her mind, full of uncertainty. “I swear to you that I didn’t know. What you… what you all saw when we had that fight… it was just acting, he was very specific, no one could know.”“And if nobody could know about it, why are we here? Why did you bring me here?”She remained silent, looking at the gun in Patterson’s hand. “I found out about the lockdown.” It almost looked like she had to convince herself to say those words. “I needed to be sure that you were safe.”The blond seemed to hesitate, her hands wavered for a moment putting the gun lower but still pointing to the brunette. “You wanted to…?”“Look, I know I screwed up. I didn’t tell you about Borden and we barely were getting back when I disappeared, but I do care about you. I care enough about you to risk my mission with this clandestine meeting. I don’t expect you to forgive me, just trust–”Midsentence, Patterson lowered her gun, walked the few steps that kept each other away, held her by the edge of her coat, and kissed her. It wasn’t a passionate movie kiss, but a kiss loaded with too many mixed feelings: rage, frustration, relief, love and more.“You have no idea how worry I was. You can’t do this to me again!” Patterson exclaimed with tears in her eyes. “When I knew that you should have been on that plane– when I knew you were working for– I was terrified to think that–”“No. I’m still on the same side. There are things I have to do to gain the trust of the people I am investigating, things that make me sick, but I’m still on the same side.”Tasha held Patterson’s face in her hands. She cleaned a tear from her cheek with her thumb, exchanging glances and feeling relief that she had listened. She had been devastated by the idea that Patterson would never forgive her due to everything she had done, and all the secrets she had kept. She was glad to find out that she was wrong. Adam Booth’s words had really affected her, she had always been a lone wolf but had never felt that lonely until that moment, in London, when this unknown man had told her that, while she was doing horrible things for a heinous woman and unable to talk to those who she loved more. It was nice to know that she wasn’t that lonely.“Patterson… Nobody can know about this.”“Tash… ”“I mean it. After what I did to Reade, technically I am a fugitive. If they found out that you saw me and let me go, not only could you risk my position, but it could risk your career or even worse. If something happens just act like this encounter hadn’t taken place.”Patterson pursed her lips ruefully. Her career was the last thing she was thinking of, she had a millionaire app and so many contacts in Silicon Valley, not to mention her extraordinary skills with technology. In the end, she nodded. “When do you have to go back?”“We’re flying to México tomorrow. I have to be in early in the morning in Madeline’s penthouse.”“Great, then we have all night,” Patterson said and went to the entrance door, with the intention of looking for her things in the car.“All night for what?”“To find a way to prove your innocence before you go. To make a plan to clean your name just in case Keaton–”“No, Patterson. Let me think about it at another time. I got into this by myself, I chose to accept this mission.”“But you are not alone, let me help you.”“You already are helping me. I just needed to see you. I don’t want to expend this little time we have, making plans.”“Then, what do you want to do?”Tasha walked over to Patterson. With hesitant hands, she held her by her shoulders. Her gaze went to her lips, then to her eyes and her lips again, as she shortened the distance between them, and then she kissed her. This time it was a soft kiss, almost shy, stripped of resentments, and honest. Their gazes met and Patterson hugged her. Without another word, Tasha walked holding the blonde’s hand and led her to the bedroom.Neither of them slept much that night, but they certainly didn’t waste their time together. The night witnessed their passion expressed in caresses and moans, the early morning sun found them cuddling, resting, Patterson’s head resting over Tasha’s naked chest. The brunette stroked Patterson’s arm as she looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully. She liked her job, she knew she was good at it and she really thought she was making a difference, but sometimes she wondered if it was worth it, especially when she got moments like that when everything was peaceful. She just knew she could stay all day in bed with Patterson.“Honey… ” she said softly after checking the time. Patterson barely moved, with an intelligible groan. “Come on, wake up. I have to leave now, I’ll be late at Madeline’s.” Patterson raised her head and looked at Tasha with barely open eyes. “You can stay if you want, I rented the cabin for the whole week, just in case.”“Promise me that you’ll be careful” she almost whispered in a plea, “Promise me that you’ll come back home safe.”“I promise to do everything I can to come back alive,” Tasha said, with a melancholy smile, and kissed her forehead.Later, Patterson waved to her in a goodbye, standing at the cabin entrance. She saw her leaving and felt like a piece of her soul left with Zapata. “Fairfarren, Tash.”