Argylle - The last chance

Chapter III

Trigger-warning: I mention sexual assault and rape ⚠️
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"Okay. Go on. Explain yourself," Tamara ordered.
Aidan was sitting on a sofa in Tamara's bedroom, while she was standing next to her desk, her arms crossed, looking at him in a harsh way.
After he had thanked her for helping him in the brawl, they hadn't said another word and she had only led him through the streets of Rome. Once they had arrived at her parent's house, she had brought him directly into her bedroom and now they were here.
"Great, that's so definitely a situation I always wanted to be in..." he groused, "well, I promised you I would explain so here we go. Do you know about the 'Division'?"
She nodded, "Alfie has told me about it, yes."
"Well, forget it again. This organization doesn't exist any longer. My partner... girlfriend. Yes, my girlfriend and I smashed the organisation from the outside some time ago in order to save her life and make mine worth living again..."
"Congratulations," she muttered, "Why are you here then? If you've already done everything about this case, you could've just let me live my life."
"Because we destroyed the main part, the head, and the control centre of the 'Division' but still there are agents out there. And they seek revenge," he explained and for a moment continued with a little sarcastic smile on his lips, "It's not very original, I know, but they sent a death threat to Alfie."
"For Alfie?" she asked.
"No, Tam, for you. They want to kill you," he admitted, and his eyes actually were looking quite worried, and the smile was whipped off his face.
"Why would they want to kill me? I had nothing to do with them. Neither with them, nor with you or anything connected to the case."
"Nothing except for... Alfie."
She shook her head in disbelief, "Nah, you don't... it's not... do you want to say that because I had contact to Alfie the offsprings of a criminal syndicate want to kill me?"
"That's pretty much it, yes."
She chuckled, "Yes, of course. Because they have nothing better to do. Come on, Aidan. Why are you wasting our time? I think it would be for the best if you would leave now."
"No, Tamara, you have to believe me!"
"Aidan!" she exclaimed, "Leave. Now."
With a sight of disappointment he rose from the sofa, not looking at her, just staring at the floor.
"I guess I told you, you could hate me after I explained everything... but if you really don't want to believe me..."
"Just leave," she said quietly.
"But I didn't explain everything, so you will have to listen to me for another couple of minutes."
He looked up, their eyes met, and it was as if a feather had been thrown onto a hard surface – his eyes, filled with hope and apologies, met her gaze, filled with hatred and anger and she didn't flinch at all.
"Go on," she sighed.
He led out a breath and before she could change her mind again, he started to explain why she was in danger.
"It must have been about six years ago. I was a normal spy for the CIA, working with my wonderful partner and soon-to-be girlfriend Rachel. But one time, I remember, we were in Greece, all of a sudden everything changed. Everything just went shit. We had been spying on the 'Division' for a long time but now Rachel, Alfie and I were in immense danger. We did everything we could. We tried to fight but Rachel lost her memory and the head of the 'Division' proved Alfie a conspiracy theorist and made him lose his job. Everything was dangerous for all of us so I could do nothing but watch and let things happen.  But now, with the 'Division' being destroyed a lot of people are mad. They seek revenge, as I said. And because someone found out that I have a half sister who has contact to Alfie, you are the most popular target right now."
"There are other people who wanted to kill me before. It's not the first time. Because, you know, being born into a family of agents comes along with some risks," she snapped.
"I know. And yet, no one was as dangerous as the people from the 'Division' are. Please, let me help you. These three men in the subway station, they were for sure not coming after me."
"And I could've handled the situation perfectly fine without you," she stared at him, and it was as if he was getting smaller with every second that passed. "I don't need, and most importantly I don't want you in my life. You decided to abandon me, so go and leave me for real."
"But you need help! I will not stand by and watch the 'Division' kill the last bit of family I have!"
"Then don't watch! Do it the way you did it ten years ago. Just disappear and don't care."
"I had to leave you in order to save your goddamn life!" he shouted.
"I didn't need to be saved, Aidan! I was a child; I needed a family!"
"You had families! And with me a life would've been far too dangerous!"
"I was eight!" she screamed in anger, "I was eight when my foster father in the US tried to rape me! So, Alfie moved me to the UK. It took one year, and I started to be bullied in school. I was ten when I was raped for the first time, by a junky in the streets. I was eleven when I moved to Germany, had to learn a new language that is hard to normal people and almost impossible to learn for an eleven-year-old that is suffering from PTSD. But I managed. I am fluent in German by now. But I was twelve, when radical men tried to kill me, thirteen, when the same men broke both my legs and one arm and fourteen when Alfie moved me to Italy. Here, some Mafia men tried to kill me again, which didn't work out, but instead I was kidnapped and raped again. Don't you dare telling me that you need to save me!"
Her eyes were filled with tears of anger and as she screamed at him, reminding herself of everything that had happened to her in her life, it was hard to control her tears.
"You don't need to save my goddamn life, because you never did that in the past," she ended her monologue quietly.
He looked at her in shock. "I- I didn't know..." he stammered.
"Of course you didn't. Because you weren't there."
"If I had known-"
She interrupted him, "Then what? You would have come to save me? Well, you didn't."
"I didn't know that your situation was so miserable! Alfie didn't tell me a thing! I asked for you so many times, but he just always said that you were save and he was looking out for you."
"In difference to you, he actually did look out for me."
"If he had done so you wouldn't have been raped, Tamara. I could've done it better. I-"
"Sì, but you didn't. That is the damn point, Aidan. Not that the things happened. Alfie did his best, but he had other things to do. And he always tried to get me somewhere safe as soon as possible. But where were you?"
"Now you are being unfair! I did what I thought would be the right thing. If Alfie had told me that you were in danger, I would've calculated the risks and decided whether to come and take you with me or leave you in that life."
She shook her head. "Leave. I don't want you in my life. I am doing perfectly fine without you – I finally am in a loving foster family that cares for me more than you ever could."
"But-"
"No! You said everything you could say, and I still hate you. So, leave. I don't want to say it again."
He opened his mouth to contradict again, but then he just sighed and got up.
"Alright," he mumbled quietly, "I wish you the best of luck for your future. You deserved much better, and I can only apologize for everything that happened to you. I know I don't have the right to return and want to be part of your life again. You're absolutely right. It's my fault."
Her gaze was cold as ice but behind this mask of callousness she felt like crying.
Over the past ten years she had grown to hate her half-brother, but she remembered the times when she had loved him more than anyone else in her life. She remembered the happiest days of her life with him, the best birthdays, and memories. He had always been the hero in her life and after their father's and Tamara's mother's death he had been the only person she trusted and the only person she wanted around.
But then he left.
And with him going to the CIA and leaving her alone all her misery started. And so, over the years, all the love had turned into hate because she made him responsible for everything that happened. He had broken her heart before anybody else could have done so.
"However, you are wrong in one point..." he continued, "your foster family could never care more about you than I do. I left you, yes. But not because I stopped loving you, little one. I was desperate and scared for your life. I didn't want to leave, I had to."