ultra_fic | HAPPY BIRTHDAY, poestheblackcat!!! - Fic: Lawyered Up (One-shot, Leverage/Angel, E/P, PG-13) (Reply)

A/N: For my wonderful friend, poestheblackcat, who writes the greatest Leverage crossovers in the world! As requested, here is a Leverage/Angel crossover, especially for you. I really hope it doesn't suck! lol More than that, I hope you have a fabulous Birthday, my friend, you certainly deserve it after all the work you've put in on your own fics lately! :)

Title: Lawyered Up
Author: Ultra
Summary: When Parker first met Eliot he looked so very familiar. Had she met him before or was that somebody else? Eventually she found out the truth, and now she's going to use it!
Timeline: post-Season 5 Leverage, with flashbacks to Season 1 Leverage, and Season 2 Angel
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: All recognisable characters belong to the creators of Leverage and/or Angel - basically, they don't belong to me!

Parker learnt a lot of things as part of the Leverage team. Looking back, she was always amazed by how much she still needed to know. She had been pretty sure she already had all the skills she would ever need before she met Nate, Sophie, Hardison, and Eliot. She was the world’s best thief, she figured that was all she needed. Now she could grift, she had self-defence skills, and best of all, she understood family.

A great many things that she had picked up along the way came from Eliot, and in the beginning it wasn’t even deliberate on his part. They always had secrets, the two of them, and a relationship that was set in motion before they ever actually met. Parker never really believed in destiny and fate. When she talked to Eliot about it he laughed and reminded her how crazy she was, but in a nice way these days. Still, it was strange, that they had an unknown connection before they ever laid eyes on each other.

The place was Chicago, the year 2008. There was a major heist to be pulled, a con like no other. The best and brightest in the world of crime were brought together in some kind of Ocean’s 11 stunt, and Parker was proud to have received the call that brought her here. She had heard of her counterparts - Alec Hardison and Eliot Spencer - but had never laid eyes on either of them before. The only one she knew was Nathan Ford, the ex-insurance investigator who had chased her across the country, across the globe, more than once.

She expected a stereotypical bespectacled geek and a muscle-bound action figure type. Hardison was a real surprise, but not half so shocking as Eliot. Parker made herself not react when she saw him, told him it was nothing when he caught her staring and asked why. He probably thought she was attracted to him, after all, he did have a reputation with women. The truth of the matter was that Parker was sure she had met the guy before, but Eliot Spencer had not been his name then.

Parker didn’t like running with a partner, never mind a whole crew. This job was different, special. She had signed on only because the leader was a contact from her foster-child days, one of the few kids she had actually got along with back then.

They were in a jam, they needed a safe cracker, and Parker had gotten herself a reputation as the best. She hadn’t failed on this job, it was rare that she ever got into trouble, but someone else had screwed up.

The break in was easy, the escape was tougher. Somebody set off an alarm somewhere, and that coupled with the screaming down the hall had Parker running like her life depended on it, mostly because she was pretty sure it did. She headed for the roof and found her stashed gear right where she left it. Down the side of the building, quick as a cat and quiet as a mouse, with the unidentified object she had stolen strapped to her back.

Half way down, a little further, Parker was completely confident about her descent until suddenly the line seemed to snag. She looked up with panicked eyes to see a monster of a man gripping onto the thin rope, a blade flashing as if it just grew out of his finger tip.

“No!” she yelled, scrambling and swinging wildly.

Parker flew in through the nearest window in a shower of broken glass, her cut line following her. She was in an empty office, safe for now, but the alarms still blared and trouble was still sure to find her yet.

The door opened suddenly and a man appeared. She didn’t recognise him as being on her crew and yet he knew her name.

“This way, Parker,” he urged her, and trap or not she had little choice but the leave though the exit he was giving her.

“Who are you?” she wondered aloud as he led her expertly through the building to some hidden stairs that she knew damn well hadn’t been on the blueprints she studied with Caleb and Joey.

“A friend, I hope,” he smiled, all blue sparkly eyes and Southern boy charm in a moment.

Despite the serious situation, Parker smiled too. Her instincts with people, especially men, tended to be stab first and ask questions later. This guy seemed okay somehow, though she would never know why she trusted him so easily on sight.

They were down on the ground and out the back door into the cool night air before long. Parker put her back against the wall and let out a breath. This was all running a little too close now.

“I have to get the package to Joey,” she said, looking back and forth down the street. “If he made it out.”

The cops were around front of the building. She and her new ‘friend’ could see the coloured lights flashing crazily from all sides.

“I’ll make sure he is” the guy beside her promised. “You just take your goods and go.”

“I don’t even know who you are,” Parker shook her head, conflicted between the need to run before she was caught and also to ensure things hadn’t gone as south as they seemed. “Do you work with the guys, or...?”

“On this job, I do,” the stranger admitted. “Actually, they work for me. Y’all do, but things didn’t go exactly according to the plan,” he explained, reaching behind the dumpster and pulling out a jacket that he shoved his arms into.

It was only now that Parker got a good look at him and realised how well dressed he was. All she saw in the dim light of the back stairs were his bright blue eyes and floppy hair. Now she realised he was wearing smart pants and a button down shirt. He looked like a business man or an official of some kind, certainly not a criminal like herself.

“Huh,” she reacted with surprise as he pressed a card into her hand. “Lindsey McDonald,” she read aloud. “Wolfram & Hart, Attorneys at Law. You’re a lawyer?” she checked with evident surprise in her looks and tone.

“Amongst other things, yeah,” he admitted with a grin, before peering around the corner once again. “Now you go, make sure those goods get where I want ‘em,” he advised Parker. “And if you’re ever in a jam, you call me,” he pointed to the card he had put into her hand.

With a wink and a smile he was gone, and Parker waited just a beat too long before remembering what she was doing. Stolen goods, cops, danger. She set off at a run, shoving Lindsey’s card into her pocket as she went. Tonight had been a very weird night.

The card still burned a hole in her pocket, transferred from wallet to wallet for years now. Parker didn’t know why she kept it. The deal on that particular job went down without her ever seeing him again, with Joey and Caleb handling the transfer as they had agreed. She only ever called Lindsey twice when she was in serious trouble, and then there was the one time he contacted her about a deal she never did go for. Sometimes she wondered about the guy, who he really was and all. These days she could ask Hardison to run a search but there was no need. Between their first meeting in Chicago and now, six years down the line in Portland, Parker knew the truth of Lindsey McDonald, or as much as anyone could know.

It was after the first job was done, the whole job, including the double-cross on Dubenich. The team decided to actually be a team and parted ways only long enough for things to settle. When the call came in and they reconvened in LA, Parker knew she had to ask Eliot what the deal was with him looking exactly like a guy she used to know. She couldn’t work with him never knowing the truth, it would drive her crazy, much crazier than the hitter already seemed to think she was.

Lindsey was a separate person, of that much Parker was certain. She couldn’t ever have explained how she knew it, because it was perfectly plausible that a guy like Eliot had a hundred aliases, including one that was a lawyer. The other simple explanation was that he had started out in the law and later learnt to break it. After all Lindsey had offered to get her out of trouble before now and had stuck to his word both times she asked. He even offered her in on a crime on a different occasion. For a lawyer he wasn’t exactly a straight arrow, but then these days, for thieves, the Leverage team were not exactly criminal.

They were mid-way through the job to take down a corrupt congressman and some smugglers. Parker and Eliot were waiting for Hardison to finish whatever he was doing on his computer before they could all leave together and go do a little recon at the docks. She walked into the hitter’s office and sat down on the edge of his desk, swinging her legs back and forth like a kid. It took all of three seconds for her heels banging on the wood to annoy him.

“Parker!” he snapped at her. “What the hell’re you doin’?” he asked, all angry flashing eyes and a snarl.

Parker didn’t flinch.

“I have to ask you a question,” she told him simply. “A serious question,” she emphasised with a look to impress her point upon him.

Eliot considered her for a moment, then pushed away the plans he’d been studying, tossing his glasses on top. He leaned back in his chair and gestured for her to go on. Sure, her question might be nutty as she was, but he didn’t have to answer if he didn’t want to.

Parker twisted around, pulling her legs up under her lotus-style. She stared at the man with the face she recognised, but hair too long and muscles too large for it to be true.

“Who’s Lindsey McDonald?”

The second the name left her lips she saw him flinch. Eliot Spencer wasn’t supposed to have any tells. Impervious to pain and capable of standing up to any torture, that was what she heard and she believed it to, but Parker had hit upon the one thing that could shake the unshakeable man.

He was up from his seat so fast, even Parker almost missed him. The door was quickly closed and locked before he returned to his seat, no longer relaxed. He sat up with his elbows on the desk, leaning in to the thief and speaking in a low voice.

“Where’d you hear that name?” he asked her, a no nonsense tone to his question.

Parker still didn’t flinch.

“I didn’t hear it. I know it,” she countered. “He’s a guy I know, and you have his face”, she explained, pointing a digit too close to his nose for the hitter’s liking. “I wondered if you knew him is all, and apparently you do.”

Eliot hated that he had to tell her the truth. It wasn’t that he thought a bunch a lies was a good thing amongst a team, but this was personal and private. This was his twin brother for crying out loud! He had hoped to never have to talk about that guy ever again.

On the other hand, it was kinda nice to realise Parker was talking about knowing Lindsey without spitting out his name or speaking ill of the dead. She had to be one of just a handful of people his brother hadn’t screwed over at some point or other. Eliot was another in that small bunch, and equal parts proud and sickened to be so.

“You knew him,” said Eliot then, a statement not a question since the fact had already been established. “How? When?”

“He helped me out a couple of times,” Parker shrugged he shoulders, hands braced on her knees. “Y’know, thief, lawyer,” she gestured around with her hand, and made a face like her point ought to be obvious. “I haven’t talked to him in a while, but...”

“He’s dead,” the words from Eliot’s lips were harsh and brutal.

It wasn’t right or fair to break it to her that way. As tough as Parker was in the sense of leaping off high-rises and standing up to armed guards, something behind her eyes told Eliot she had fragile layers hidden in there. Telling her a guy she knew was gone like that, it was mean and nasty. He hadn’t needed to do it, but it was done now, too late to take back.

“No he’s not,” she chuckled, when he actually expected her to cry.

“Parker, he was my twin brother,” Eliot told her a little too loudly, catching himself when he realised they might yet be overheard. “My brother,” he repeated, pressing his pointer finger firmly into his own chest. “You don’t think I oughta know when he died? May 19th 2004, right here in LA,” he recounted, on automatic.

The laughter died on Parker’s tongue, but she still didn’t look sad or hurt. She looked confused, almost like she didn’t know what he meant when he said Lindsey was dead. There was no way in hell she could be so out of whack she didn’t understand that people didn’t live forever, no frickin’ way!

“That’s not possible,” she shook her head, digging a hand into the back pocket of her pants.

She produced a wallet and from it the card she had on her these past eight years or so. Handing it to Eliot, she watched him read the text.

“This is old, Parker. Completely out of... date,” the hitter’s words became disjointed, a frown creasing his brow as he held the card up to the light and tilted it left and right.

It wasn’t a regular card, he realised that now. Though it bore the Wolfram and Hart logo, and Lindsey’s name with profession as lawyer, it wasn’t any LA number that showed up.

“I called him, on that number, a couple of months before Chicago,” she explained. “If he died five years ago, I really don’t think he would’ve picked up,” she scoffed.

Back when Lindsey gave Parker this card, it would have had his office telephone number printed on it, maybe even his current cell. Over the years, he moved around a lot, and yet the number on the card always got Parker connected to the man himself. It was a mystic card, somehow tied to its original owner, that much was clear to Eliot now, because there was no way in hell good old W&H knew where their former recruit was these days. Even his own brother didn’t know.

Eliot couldn’t breathe. All the things he’d been through in his life, all the pain and torture, remembering to breathe, calmly and evenly, that never left him. Right now, the rule of always remembering to inhale and exhale at a reasonable rate abandoned the hitter, and all because of the card he held here in his hand.

Parker didn’t know what to say or do next. She had asked her question of Eliot and got her answer. He and Lindsey were twins, which was much less freaky than her own theories about them being clones or robots or something. Twins were just brothers, and that was pretty normal, except now it was getting freaky again, because Eliot thought Lindsey was dead when he clearly was not.

“I shoulda known,” he smirked a little as he handed the card back to Parker. “Shoulda known he was smarter than that, he always was before,” he almost laughed as he ran his hands over his face and back though his hair.

“So it’s good, that I told you he’s still alive, right?” the little thief checked.

“Yeah, darlin’, it’s a good thing,” Eliot assured her with an absent nod of his head, clearly still a little stunned at the news about Lindsey.

Parker decided maybe now was a good time for her to leave and hopped down off the desk, simultaneously shoving Lindsey’s card back where it belonged. She got all the way to the office door and reached for the knob, but her hand stilled before she ever made contact. Parker turned back.

“Eliot? Don’t you wanna call him?” she asked curiously, almost wondering if he heard her at all when he didn’t look over right away.

“No,” he answered eventually. “If he needs me he let’s me know,” he assured her. “But Parker?” he called when she looked as if she would really leave this time.

“What?” she asked, peering back over her own shoulder.

“This, er... Can we keep this a secret?” he asked her seriously. “Nobody knows about my brother. We keep our lives separate and I could use the team not finding out.”

Parker thought about it a moment and then slowly nodded, a smile creeping across her lips.

“We can have a secret,” she agreed, practically bouncing up and down as she let herself out at last. “I never had a real secret with another person that wasn’t Bunny before.”

Eliot hadn’t been sure how to take that, not knowing who Bunny was or how Parker had come to be a thief with no secrets that anyone else knew. It didn’t matter. He had to take her word on this and hope for the best. Mostly he had just been reeling about Lindsey still being alive, his mind in a whirl with possibilities of how his twin had survived and where he had been since. Why had he not been in touch and when he might do so. It helped knowing that if worst came to worst, there was a way to get a hold of him, just so long as he kept a track on Parker.

Little had Eliot known then how easy keeping hold of the little blonde thief would be. As elusive as she was, he always knew where to find her, because ninety-nine times out of a hundred she was on his tail or he was on hers. They never lost contact, even the few times they were supposed to. The team would split after a major con, promising to keep their distance and lie low until everything settled. Eliot and Parker always managed to come across each other at some point or other.

It was a friendship neither had expected that begun that day in his office with one shared secret. Later, there were more tales told that nobody else knew, swapped over a drink, after a hard day at the ‘office’.

From Los Angeles to Boston and then onto Portland, the city changed but the team remained the same. Eliot and Parker changed from team-mates to friends, and eventually to lovers with the shifting of time. They thought nothing of the closeness that developed between them. Though they had both been loners so long, to be together became the most natural thing in the world.

Lindsey never did call, and since joining the team, Parker never needed a lawyer like him. The card still moved from wallet to wallet these six years, and she never ever asked Eliot if he wanted to call his brother up again. Of course, she had called him, just three days ago. She made that call, telling the mysterious Mr McDonald she had a situation and they needed to meet.

There was a safe house in Wyoming that they would use. Parker was a lousy liar and so was forced to tell Eliot at least a half-truth to get him to their destination. She said it had to do with them getting engaged, and she had somebody she needed him to meet. Four or five years ago, Eliot wouldn’t have been so eager to go, concerned he was about to meet a mob of assassins or similar. He didn’t trust anybody then, now he trusted four people, and none so much as Parker. She hoped that wouldn’t change when they arrived and he saw who she wanted him to meet.

The thief held her breath when they got out of the car and dare not let out a drop of air until the potential worst was over.

“Hey there, little brother,” said a voice from the next room the moment they cleared the front door.

Parker watched every single emotion cross her lovers face, and then just when she thought she had ruined everything, a smile appeared.

“Linds!” the hitter practically ran to his twin, grabbing him up in a bear hug the like of which Parker had never seen.

There were tears in her eyes she couldn’t explain at all, as she let out that breath she’d been holding and thanked a God most of her kind didn’t even believe in.

Here was her closest family now, two brothers she had met at vastly different points in her life but that had changed it for the better, as far as she could tell. Without a thought in her head, she threw herself at the pair, an arm around each of their necks, and a grin on her face bright enough to light up the world. The place was Cheyenne, the year 2014, and she was finally home.

The End