I, Thomas Vincent Keen, do take thee Elizabeth Laura Scott, to be my lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part.

Tom's wedding vows echoed in his memory as he sat in the bar holding his drink and considering the metal band he wore on his left hand. How could something so small feel so heavy? He examined the gold circle that symbolized his commitment to his wife...although technically Liz wasn't really his wife. She was Thomas Vincent Keen's wife, and Thomas Vincent Keen did not exist, except perhaps as a dead newborn buried thirty years ago in some distant cemetery. He downed his scotch in a single swallow.

Tom Keen didn't drink scotch. Tom Keen drank beer. Then again Tom Keen had never before been in a situation that called for hard liquor. Tom Keen needed the hard stuff tonight. His marriage was teetering on the brink and he was about to give it that final nudge over the edge and into the abyss. It was strange to think of "Tom Keen" as someone else, yet tonight it felt appropriate. Tonight he wanted to be a completely separate entity from the person he'd been playing for over two years. The trouble was he wasn't sure if that was possible any more. If "Tom Keen" didn't exist, if he wasn't "Tom Keen", then why was he in such despair?

Jolene's words returned to the forefront of his mind, "I think people cheat because they are miserable in their marriages." She seemed to aim those words directly at him, and they had hit their mark. He WAS miserable in his marriage, though perhaps not for the reasons Jolene suspected.

Berlin hadn't made contact in two years, ever since Angel Station. At first he was grateful, it made his job easier, not having to manufacture covers and alibis, and he could focus all his energy on being Tom Keen. He'd known the challenges he would face when he accepted the assignment, the complete emersion into a character. He knew the scrutiny he would undergo and the necessity of never breaking cover. The one thing he'd never anticipated how much he'd like it. He liked walking the dog. He liked having friends made him soup when he was sick. He liked slow Sundays doing crossword puzzles and lounging around in his pajamas until noon. He liked smelling Liz's lavender scented hair as he held her in his arms every night. He'd liked so many things about Tom Keen's life, which was the problem. Being Tom Keen had stopped feeling like a duty. It had stopped feeling like a job. He'd enjoyed it, he'd LET himself enjoy it and that was his terrible mistake.

Months passed without a word from his employer and soon his life before Liz felt like a bad dream. At times he could almost convince himself that there was no Berlin, that he'd always been Tom Keen, and that Liz was just one of a hundred FBI agents, no different from the rest. That illusion had been shattered the helicopters arrived outside their brownstone. The war was starting and he'd been caught completely unprepared. How unprepared he was became abundantly clear that night when a terrorist surprised him inside his own home.

One minute he'd been tying balloons to chairs and arranging champagne glasses and the next he was being held at gunpoint by an ailing bald psychopath. The next few hours were a fog of pain and fear. He remembered seeing Liz's face as he'd drifted in and out of focus, knowing she was in danger and not being able to do a thing to protect her. Even after he'd recovered from his stab wound, he couldn't shake that feeling of utter helplessness.

He'd felt a change in his marriage when he'd first returned from the hospital. Liz had pulled ever so slightly away from him. At first he thought it was guilt, then he suspected it was the stress of her new job. Even after he'd caught her scribbling the date of their Boston trip in her notepad it didn't connect that she had begun to suspect him. It wasn't until he was checking their credit card statements that he'd realized Liz had put down new carpeting while he was in the hospital. She'd found the box. Fortunately he had been prepared. The possibly of Liz finding his box had always concerned him so he'd been through. He made a deal with Gina before the Angel Station hit that he'd fulfill the contract and let her keep the lion's share of fee if she provided him with money that could be traced back to Reddington. The other condition of their agreement had been that if she was ever caught and questioned about the hit, she would take the fall for him. Gina had apparently held up her end of the deal and Tom had avoided being locked away from the rest of his life.

The worst of it hadn't been the interrogations, it had been during the week after, when he'd caught Liz looking at paint swabs in the dining room. She'd playfully jumped on his back and apologized again for doubting him. "They made me believe you were a monster," she had confessed and it had felt like a kick to the gut. A monster. Of course that was how she'd see him, if she knew the truth. She would never forgive him. He may have been granted a reprieve, but it was just a matter of time before the walls closed in. He'd been further reminded of that fact when he'd gone to Nebraska and come face to face with one of the most dangerous criminals in the world.

He hadn't been able to stop himself from double taking when he'd glanced up at the man who'd politely asked to sit beside him and found himself looking at the "concierge of crime". He'd only ever seen the surveillance photos, and read the dossiers. To encounter him in person, in Nebraska of all places was disorienting to say the least. Fortunately habit kicked in and he managed to make small talk with the man who for all he knew had a sniper rifle trained on him from the hospital roof.

As Reddington spoke of a friend that he'd lost that morning, Tom had known the international criminal was talking about Sam. Reddington had gone to visit Liz's adoptive father. Why? Tom's investigations had uncovered that Red and Sam had know each other for at least twenty years, and that Reddington had been helping pay for Liz's upkeep. Was Reddington's visit truly motived by a desire to see a sick friend? Tom found it a little too coincidental that Sam had apparently died within hours of his visit.

Tom had decided to probe a little, talking about how devastated Liz was going to be by the loss of her father. To his surprised he'd gotten a reaction, some combination of anger and guilt. Reddington had spoken of Liz's father always watching over her, and though the words could easily have been spiritual platitudes, it quickly became apparent that Tom was being threatened with a grisly fate if any harm should befall Liz. Reddington had then departed leaving Tom's mind swarming with unanswered questions. The coffee cup Reddington had left behind gave him had answered one of them. Raymond Reddington was Liz's biological father.

According to to official records Reddington had only one daughter, a ten year old, who no one had seen since 1990, the same year Liz had been adopted by Sam. Liz had been four years old at time. Was Liz illegitimate or the records of her existence been buried like so much of Reddington's history. The burn on Liz's arm added to the mystery. Liz had once confessed that when she was fourteen Sam had held her down and burn her wrist, crying the whole time, insisting he was protecting her. Tom had recognized the symbol from the moment he'd laid eyes on it. It was the symbol of Berlin. Liz life was intertwined with two of the most dangerous men in the world.

The danger of her position in this war became clear the day Tom had called Liz at work and her phone was answered by a man who claimed he was about to shoot her in the head. It had been over an hour of sitting frozen before Liz had miraculously come through their front door, mostly unharmed. He'd pulled her to him, so glad she was alive, so glad that it was over. But it hadn't been over, not really. "I got caught up in something…" Liz had told him helplessly.

Tom was losing Liz, little by little. Reddington was stealing their evenings, their tranquility, and worst of all Liz's faith in their life together. Reddington had taken his domestic bliss and turned it into a nightmare. Six months ago Tom Keen was a happily married man with a baby on the way. Now he was ignoring Liz's calls and lamenting the absence of a child he'd never even held. It killed that he had been so close. He'd had the passports and the money ready. If Reddington had just waited six more months, he, Liz and their baby could have been long gone, a world away from this mess. Now that dream was never going to happen. Liz was right, he had doubts. A year ago, he'd been so certain, so sure of his choice, dangerous though it was. Now...

If he had just done his job and maintained his distance none of this would be happening. He wouldn't feel this unbearable ache when he thought of all of things he'd lost. He wouldn't have lost anything at all, because he would have remembered that it was never his to begin with. Now he just wanted to forget, to disappear into the bottom of a glass, or better still into the arms of the woman waiting for him upstairs.

Why shouldn't he take Jolene up on her offer? She was beautiful and she wanted him and there would be no strings attached. Maybe it was just the reminder that he needed. The wake-up call that at the end of the day, he wasn't Tom Keen. He had never promised Liz his fidelity. She had never sworn him hers. What difference would it make if he escaped Tom Keen's hell for a few hours? He could make a choice, here and now, not as Tom Keen, but as himself. What did he want? He closed his eyes and waited for an answer to come. Come it did.

Liz. Despite everything that had happened, despite the pain, the danger,and the knowledge that one way or another he would lose her, he still wanted Liz. It wasn't a happy realization, but it did make things simple. He would go apologize to Jolene and then he would return to his room and call Tom Keen's wife. He would find a way fix what was broken and continue to protect Liz, because although he wasn't Tom Keen, they did love the same woman.