Title: a single man, in possession

Author: Jedi Buttercup

Disclaimer: The words are mine; the worlds are not. I claim nothing but the plot.

Rating: PG.

Summary: Leverage, B:tVS. Eliot had never been so relieved to escape the custody of a pair of beautiful women in his life. 1000 words.

Spoilers: Post-series for Buffy; no particular spoilers for Leverage.

Notes: Written out of sequence, to fill some of the gap between "acquit me henceforth of cruelty" and "so immovable a dislike". This episode mostly plotty gen. :)

Eliot had never been so relieved to escape the custody of a pair of beautiful women in his life.

After a prickly détente in which Nate had negotiated the trade of Eliot for the files Parker had stolen-- an exchange that had prompted his attackers to call Nate 'the thief girl's Giles' for some reason, in distinctively approving tones -- he'd been firmly escorted out of the girl's school's administration building, dripping minty suds and stinging with fresh bruises. It hadn't taken the quietly angry expression on Nate's face when he reached the car to tell Eliot that the job they'd been hired for wasn't quite what they'd been told, after all.

It wasn't the first time any of them had been fooled. It wasn't the first time Eliot had come out the worse for a fight, or Parker had been forced to return what she'd stolen, or Nate had jumped to the wrong conclusions from the available evidence. Might be rare; but it did, however they liked to pretend otherwise, occasionally happen. But there was something about this one that seemed to have got under all of their skin.

"So it ain't actually a con," Eliot grumbled, as he gingerly tested the range of motion in the arm he'd used to block the blonde's strike. The woman had a fist like the hammer of Thor; it wasn't quite broken, but it felt bruised clear down to the bone. What did a girl like that see in an old British librarian, anyway? "The school, I mean."

"No," Nate sighed, swirling the whiskey in his glass thoughtfully. "Parker was right about the strange security on the safe; but it turns out if you open the door and tilt it on end, gravity still works, and the files aren't affected once they leave its shelter. I checked them; it wasn't actually financial information."

"What was it, then?" Parker frowned.

"Personal information about the school's students. Active young women, mostly from vulnerable situations, mostly minors, with quite a bit of unorthodox training...." Nate glanced around at all of them, eyes lingering longest on the young thief. "I think you see where I'm going with this."

Sophie's expression was eloquent. "I can't believe I bought into his story. This was never about the money; though he probably does quite want it returned. Nor about the death of his son; though that undoubtedly stung his pride as well. It was ultimately about those young women. The supposedly disgraced ex-colleague, Mr. Giles-- he was actually helping the girls take charge of their own destinies, wasn't he? Rather than let men like Roger Wyndam-Pryce exploit them."

"That's certainly a more likely story than the one he fed us, I'm afraid," Nate tipped his glass to her.

"So what are we going to do about it?" Hardison asked, grimly.

"What do you mean?" Parker scowled. "Of course we tell him we aren't doing the job."

Hardison shook his head. "See, the thing is-- whether or not the keys to the financial assets were ever in that safe, that money still exists. Y'all saw my research; none of that was faked. Mr. Giles did take the funds from the original WC Holdings and funnel 'em into the school. An argument could be made that he didn't know there were any survivors at the time to contest him, but now? If Mr. Wyndam-Pryce hires a good lawyer, he probably will be able to get whatever's left of it back, no matter what we do or don't do."

"Hence the vengeance story; so we wouldn't ask ourselves why he didn't just take that option to begin with," Eliot concluded, cataloguing the rest of his injuries. "And now I got splinters in my ass, a scalded ankle, a footprint in the middle of my back, and more bruises than a squirrel's got nuts."

Parker gave him a curious, evaluating look. "Because of the 'unorthodox training'? I'd wondered how they got the better of you."

"Thanks for the reminder," Eliot rolled his eyes. Though training or no training, their sheer striking power, never mind their speed, was still difficult to believe. Even Mikel Dayan had never given him that much trouble.

Parker rolled her eyes right back, then turned to Nate. "So what are we doing, then?"

"Simple," Nate replied wryly, taking another sip from his glass. "We'll steal ourselves an apology."

"To whom? Or should I say, from whom?" Sophie stared suspiciously across the table at him.

"Yes," Nate shrugged. "Or-- whichever works to encourage them to tell their side of the story, and enlist us to help them in making matters right. Obviously, they have all the security they need on the physical front, but if they had sufficient social and political measures in place, we wouldn't even be here."

"'Cause that Wyndam-Pryce guy wouldn't have had enough proof to get us to take the job," Hardison nodded. "You're thinking... what? Turn it around, take him down instead?"

Nate pursed his lips. "Mmm, that's not a decision I'm comfortable making without additional information. Your research found other survivors of the original WC Holdings. If one or more of them are working in concert with Wyndam-Pryce, focusing our attentions on him might not be enough. We might have to pretend to follow through with the original plan instead, only with Ms. Summers' and Mr. Giles' support to make the assets disappear."

Eliot blinked at the group's mastermind in dismayed comprehension. "You're sayin' I gotta walk back in there and make nice with those women? After what they just put me through?"

"I'm afraid so," Nate answered, wryly.

Eliot might have a certain weakness for strong, vicious ladies, but his pride had its limits. "I'll want a rematch."

"I'm sure that could be arranged."

What the hell. If he was going to walk right back into their custody? Then he was going to do it with a swagger and a smile.

"Then let's go steal that apology," Eliot said, getting up from his chair.

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