A/N: Okay so, I've gotten several PMs asking what I'm planning to do with this over the hiatus and whether or not I'll continue it into the Fourth Season. First of all, let me say how incredibly stoked I am that there are people even interested in what may happen to this in the future. lol. Second, I have a few chapters that I want to do past this one (if you read to the end you'll understand why) and then I plan to just leave it alone until the last three episodes at the end of this season. At this time I'm not planning to continue into the Fourth season, mostly cuz I think that would require going way further into AU territory than I'm comfortable with, but really that can't be decided for sure until I see how they end this season.

As for this chapter, I really struggled with it (as you may have guessed with how freakin long it took me to post it) and I really really hope you guys enjoy and think it's at least reasonably IC. Let me know, okay? Also, there's two major echoes from previous chapters in this, one subtle, one not, I'd love to see if you catch 'em. Again, this chap is to help the fic live up to it's namesake...sorry. lol. Enjoy! -pj

We go round and round
Tryin' to work it out
And all we get's Hell bent and bound
Never far from right where we are

You'd think that we'd get enough
And be sick and tired of fuckin' up
Holdin' on and sinkin' down
Here we go round and round

(Select Verses) Making Circles – Christian Kane

oooOOOooo

The Morning After Job

Eliot sipped slowly on his beer, sidled into a booth beside Sophie in McRory's across from Hardison and Parker. Both he and Hardison still wore their costumes from earlier that day, minus most of the weapons and TAC gear, and Sophie had finally managed to help Parker remove the last remnants of her blue lipstick and makeup.

"God, will the ringing ever stop?" Sophie complained, clamping her hands over her ears and clenching her eyes shut.

Parker tilted her head at her, attempting to look sympathetic and awkwardly patted the grifter's arm.

"There there."

Sophie opened her eyes and gave her a look.

"My dog hasn't died, Parker. I just have a headache."

"You have a dog?"

Sophie made a disgusted noise and dropped her head back into her hands and Hardison chuckled quietly, sipping a coke.

"Eliot, man," he looked over at the hitter, who was looking surprisingly relaxed for someone who didn't have a Dominican beauty on his arm. "Where's Tali tonight?"

"Workin'," Eliot grunted, lifting his beer to his lips, "at the bar."

Parker wrinkled her nose, pulling her legs up under her so that she shifted minutely closer to Hardison and was leaning against him shoulder to shoulder.

"She still does that? Doesn't she know you're loaded?" She asked indelicately and momentarily got a dreamy look on her face remembering the checks they'd gotten after that first job.

"It's not like it's the kind of thing that just pops up into conversation Parker," Eliot defended gruffly.

The thief shrugged, unphased by his ire.

"Still," Sophie lifted her head and rested it on her hand to look over at the hitter, "it does seem like the sort of thing she ought to know. That bar where she works is completely awful." She finished with a disgusted face. Across the table Hardison 'hmm'd in agreement and hardly noticed when Parker swiped his coke and finished it off.

Eliot rolled his eyes but his phone started to vibrate before he could respond and fished it out of his pocket.

"Hello?"

Eliot frowned, catching eyes briefly with Hardison, whose brows furrowed in return.

"Who is this?"

"Um, my name's Dana. I'm looking for Eliot?"

"How did you get this number?" Eliot demanded. There were a half dozen people in the world that had the number for his mobile phone, and four of them were sitting in that bar. Across the table Hardison pulled out his own phone, pointed at it and mouthed 'trace?'.

"From Tali."

Eliot shook his head and got up from the table, his heart beating just a little bit faster as worry started to claw at the edges of his mind.

"What do you mean? Where is she?"

"Oh, she's here and um, it's just that…damn, she'd be pissed if she knew I called you."

"Dana," Eliot said sharply, not liking the nervous timbre of the young woman's voice, "what's going on?"

"Look, its nothing serious okay? I mean, not yet or…well…"

Eliot made a noise of frustration that must have sounded like a growl from the other end because she was suddenly pouring out all she knew.

"It's just that there's these big dumb guys that have been givin' us a hard time all evening and they're drunk and the boys aren't workin' tonight and Tali keeps trying to get them to leave but, you know Tali, she can't keep her mouth shut when she outta and they're all gettin' really upset and I'm afraid-"

"I'll be there in ten minutes."

Eliot snapped his phone shut and spun around to walk back to his table.

"Eliot is everything-" Sophie started, but he cut her off, all the relaxation and contentment of the post-job high gone from his persona.

"There's trouble down at the bar, I'm gonna go deal with it." He turned around to leave, the tense set to his shoulders telling all the regulars to keep clear of him. He was a bit surprised to feel a pressure on his shoulder as he reached the door.

Hardison raised his eyebrows at him.

"There's a reason we got partners man," he tapped one lanky finger against his forged badge.

Eliot hesitated only a moment before jerking his chin once.

"Alright, c'mon."

oooOOOooo

In the end, Eliot was glad Hardison came along. He wasn't sure he could have controlled himself if he hadn't had the hacker at his back.

The bar was nearly in shambles when they got there. Tali held a crowbar in one hand and had fisted the other with Dana pushed into a corner behind her. The younger woman was crying and Tali was shouting and cursing, in Spanish and English while the three men destroyed everything in their path as they stumbled around in a drunken rage.

Eliot enjoyed putting them down probably more than he should have.

Hardison stuck around when the cops arrived, helping give credence to the 'buddy cops' persona and then escorted Dana home, leaving a still wired Eliot and Tali to their own devices.

Tension and adrenalin were not a good mix under the best of circumstances and emotions ran high on the ride back to Eliot's place, with more than one frivolous argument erupting between them. Tali gave as good as she got on any night and Eliot's short fuse, made shorter by a full day on the con, had things coming to a dangerous boiling point by the time they reached his front door.

"Hell no Eliot," Tali practically shouted as they came through the door, tossing her purse across the room where it missed the couch by a mile. She whirled around to face him, hands on her hips. "I already quit one job for you, I'll be damned if you'll take this one too!"

"Hey! You ain't puttin' that on me," Eliot retorted, slamming the front door shut behind him, "you don't do a damn thing unless you want to. You quit that job for you."

"Oh please," she scoffed, her smile venomous and sharp, "I'm not the one who almost got himself killed in a mine shaft because he just could stand the thought of somebody else seeing me naked. Believe me, mandamás, I have nothing to hide."

Eliot rolled his eyes, stalking away from her toward the bedroom. "Don't give me that, Tali. You've got nothing but secrets."

Tali made an affronted noise and followed, watching him rip off his blue uniform shirt and throw it at the laundry basket with much more force than necessary.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means," he paused, spinning back toward her, his lips curled in a snarl, "I know less about you than I do Parker. And believe me, darlin', that's sayin' somethin'."

He yanked open his dresser drawer and pulled out a new shirt. He was surprised when a pair of hands much smaller than his grabbed at it and jerked it away.

He barely had time to react before those same small hands reached up and shoved him backward onto the bed. Immediately Tali was on top of him, straddling his hips and slamming her mouth down over his, hot and aggressive. They both tasted blood from where their lips were caught between each other's teeth.

No sooner had his back hit the mattress than Eliot was flipping them over so that Tali was the one on her back and she let out a small cry of surprise at his force. Still kissing her with bruising force, he reached for her arms and jerked them up over her head, holding onto her wrists while she struggled against him.

Her hips bucked at him and ground against his and he grinned darkly, opening his eyes and knowing they mirrored the lust in hers.

"It means everything I know about you I learned because Hardison hacked a police report."

Tali went rigid beneath him and her eyes widened, all the desire draining from them, leaving only the anger smoldering underneath.

"You bastard," she hissed, and with that she yanked her hands loose and sat up, forcing him to move off of her. She bent over, giving him a show in her jean mini-skirt, and snatched the clean, discarded shirt from the floor and threw it at him before stalking out of the room.

Eliot tugged the garment on roughly and jumped to his feet, following her down the hall.

"You wanted to know my life story, right? Well guess what, that highway goes both ways sweetheart."

"Oh it does, does it?" Tali snapped, breathing shallow and harsh. She pointed at the fresh bruise on her arm from when she got in the way of a flying chair that night. "How about these, huh? These go both ways too? 'Cause I don't recall ever pitchin' a fit like this when you come home covered from head to toe in bruises a hell of a lot worse than this."

She shook her head, practically vibrating with anger. "You're not the only one that knows how to take care of themselves, you do realize that don't you?"

"Oh I know. Problem is you don't know. You have no idea what the world's like, Tali. You don't understand what people are capable of." He shouted back. He was too caught up in the moment to see the hurt that flickered across her face at his words. And she was too caught up to keep herself from lashing out in return.

"Yeah, well guess what? The whole world isn't like you Eliot!" She cried, slamming her hand down on a nearby table.

The words drew Eliot up short and brought his movements to a screeching halt.

He nodded, his voice suddenly quiet and rough.

"You're right. They're not." He turned to walk away.

Desperate and furious, Tali followed him across the living room toward the kitchen and foyer.

"No, uh-uh, you don't get to walk away. You don't get to make me the bad guy-"

The loud, solid sound of flesh hitting drywall stopped her and she gaped at Eliot's fist now planted in the wall.

"That's because I'm the bad guy. Right Tal?" he bellowed, pulling his hand out and shaking off the white dust that clung to his broken skin. His eyes locked with hers, cold and blue. "I'm a bad guy and you'd be better off without me."

He turned and snatched his jacket off a hook on the wall and was gone through the front door before she could think of anything to say. The door slamming behind him pulled her out of her shock and instantly tears sprang to her eyes.

"Eliot!"

She ran to the door, flinging it open and hardly noticing when it banged against the wall.

"Eliot wait!"

But it was too late, he was gone.

She stared out into the empty hall for several minutes, willing him to come back into view. When he didn't, she slowly closed the door again and turned to lean against it.

The first sob broke loose and her knees buckled and she slid down to the floor, wrapping her arms around herself. She leaned her head on her knees and, crying quietly, feeling hopelessly alone, she was left to wonder how it all went to hell so fast.

TBC

mandamás - boss man, macho man