'How's Mary doing? Are you all caught up on the gossip from school?' Joe teased her gently as he approached the sofa, his calls made and meetings over.
Jill turned and smiled. 'Joseph, we don't gossip as you well know', she jibed back, stretching her hand out towards him.
He enveloped it in his as leaned down and kissed her. 'How ya doin, babe?' he asked quietly, noting that her smile didn't quite reach her eyes.
She sighed.
'Ok. I just can't stop thinking about Louis though. I spoke with Shawn again, he said the doctors are struggling to figure out what's happening with him. It's really serious, Joe', she said, her eyes holding his.
He came round and took his seat beside her on the sofa.
'Would you like to see him?' he asked.
'Louis?'
'Yeah.'
She bit her lip and nodded. 'Yes, of course, but how can we do that without the whole world finding out what's going on?' she wondered.
He looked at the floor. He knew it would be important to Jill to have seen Louis if the worst came to pass. Equally he'd like to see him with his own eyes. But he had to be honest. He really wanted to discuss all of this with the medical team and with Shawn, because he wasn't willing to take anything at face value right now and right now a lot of things weren't making sense to him.
He let his eyes follow the pattern of the carpet as he thought. It was an intricate design, it made him think of the web they were trying to unknot at the moment too.
The Russians were willing to take him out because of what Jill was working on. Louis had helped her in the past, and again currently. Prior to recent events they already suspected that he was in danger and probably being followed. The health situation seemed complicated; the medical team were struggling to figure out exactly what was going on.
He turned his gaze to her. 'I asked Glen to see if we can figure something out. He's working on it right now. But if it's an option you'd like to, right?' he asked again, just to be sure.
'Yes, I would', she replied, her voice strong. 'Hopefully something can be done but if not then ... I'd like to ...', she paused, her eyes filling with tears.
Joe held her hand. 'One step at a time babe, we'll do everything we can for him', Joe promised just as his phone pinged.
He ran his thumb across the screen and smiled a tight smile.
He looked back up at her, 'time to pack our bags, honey, there's an event at the Embassy in Paris we're going to. We need to be there early in the morning', he told her, checking the details again on his phone.
Jill sat up a little. 'Really? We can go that soon?' she asked, her voice eager.
'Yeah, Glen and the Ambassador have concocted it between them', he explained, reading the message from Glen.
'He's working on an itinerary but, basically they've orchestrated our attendance at an event to give us enough cover to get to Paris and then get some private time where we can slip to the hospital. Glen, Sam, Dave, Tony, Annie and Anthony are all in cahoots on this one', he said, a small grin brightening his face. He felt incredibly grateful to them all at this moment.
'Well, I'll start to pack then', Jill said, glad to have something concrete to do.
He nodded absently, then checked his watch.
'You ok?' she asked, noting his expression.
'Yeah, I'm just wondering if there's a Mass anywhere nearby I could attend', he said.
