After he’d caught his breath, Tarin watched the two sisters go back and forth for a minute talking about him…while he stood there…in the room.

Of course Lee hadn’t brought anyone home. Interesting that she was so emphatic about the fact, but absolutely none of Tarin’s business.

Rachel spoke again, definitely loud enough for him to hear and Tarin cocked his head to one side slightly. He didn’t look like Tarin? Interesting, Lee hadn’t mentioned anything to him but was openly acknowledging the fact to Rachel.

Lee made a more…formal introduction and Tarin couldn’t help but smile at the two who were so obviously siblings.

“Nice to meet you.” He said, “Thanks for helping Lee so Lee could help me.” He offered…helpfully.

”You guys probably want to catch up, I can totally go hang out in my room…”

“Of course,” Rachel replied with a smile at Tarin. “Anything so that Lee can ‘help’ you out.”

Lee audibly sighed, letting her forehead fall into her hand with her eyes closed. “Rachel, ‘this’ is not helping,” Lee said, her voice sounding almost exacerbated. As if the set up attempts over the years weren’t bad enough, now she thought that there was something going on between her and this Tarin?

”You guys probably want to catch up, I can totally go hang out in my room…”

“You might as well just stay out here, Tarin,” Lee said, turning her head to look over at him as she kept it resting in her hand. “Because she’ll just stay here until you come back out. Even if you’re in there for hours.”

“I just want to get to know the man my sister is suddenly helping,” Rachel said, her voice chipper as she moved to sit on the coffee table facing the center of the couch. Then she looked over at Tarin again. “She’s barely told me anything. Other than she’s helping you. At night.”

Oh, this just got worse by the second. Rachel was clearly in her element and Lee seemed equal parts frustrated and exasperated.

Rachel also didn’t know the whole story. There were a lot of reasons why Lee hadn’t and they couldn’t tell her sister everything, but it did make the situation seem a lot more contrived when it was approached from this angle.

Tarin was absolutely planning to leave, but when Lee said he might as well stay, he revised his plan. Lee clearly didn’t think that his leaving would help matters…and Tarin had to admit a bit of morbid curiosity as to where this conversation was going.

Rachel moved to sit on the coffee table of all places and Tarin simply looked at Lee and shrugged before he moved over to sit on the couch.

Lee had apparently not shared much at all, other than she was helping Tarin…at night. He couldn’t help but smile and shake his head at just how forward Rachel was and the assumptions Lee’s sister was making. If he hadn’t been the subject of the assumptions…it might have been funny. As it was…it was just uncomfortable.

“Ask away then. I’m an open book…” As long as the conversation stayed within the parameters Lee had set, he didn’t have a problem talking to Lee’s sister. Tarin had a feeling that beneath the slightly silly veneer Rachel was just trying to make sure everything was safe for her sister and Nephew. “It’s always better to get info directly from the source anyway.”

Lee saw the mischievous twinkle in her sister’s eyes when Tarin gave her permission to ask. It had always been bad enough when it was just her and her sister when Rachel was digging for information, what would have been gossip if she actually told anyone else.

“Ok, let's say she is actually helping you with your powers,” Rachel started, but she didn’t leave a single break in her questioning to let someone else say anything. “Why does that mean you have to be here? She can help you during the day when Kevin’s at school, right? And these merges. Are they actually as dangerous as she says? She hasn’t told me much about them, but last time, she didn’t let me come check on her and Tarin for days, and then she stayed in New York and they got back together. Now this time, Lee wouldn’t even tell me what the big ‘emergency’ was until the next day.

“Really, Lee,” Rachel continued as she looked over at her instead of Tarin now, not even missing a beat. Lee wasn’t even sure how her sister was still talking, it didn’t seem like she was pausing long enough to breathe. “If all you want is some alone time with someone, just tell me already, you’ll get it.”

Her eyes back to Tarin, Rachel continued. But without talking over her sister, Lee couldn’t even respond, and despite herself a bit of a flush covered her cheeks. If only things had been that simple.

“And she wanted me to not only take Kevin, but to take him out of the country. Really, it can’t be that dangerous, can it? If it was, wouldn’t a professional….of some sort be better off dealing with everything?”

One thing became very clear, very quickly.

Tarin Brooks was a very…very stupid man.

The offer to answer Rachel’s questions in an easy and affable manner had been because Tarin had thought she was going to continue with her cute and slightly embarrassing insinuations that there was something scandalous going on between himself and Lee. Tarin had been ready for that, ready to shrug it off and deflect.

What he hadn’t been ready for was the absolute third degree that Rachel launched in his direction without even stopping to breathe.

She wanted to know about his powers. How dangerous merges were.

Then Rachel insinuated something about alone time again.

Then back to the merges. Tarin was getting absolute whiplash.

Rachel finally stopped talking and Tarin just stared at her for a moment before looking at Lee in semi-mute horror. Tarin waited a heartbeat, then he took a deep breath, shook his head a little, and smiled grimly at the woman sitting on the coffee table.

“Lee can’t help me during the day because I’m awake during the day.” He said evenly. “I don’t know about anything that has happened before, but from what Lee has told me these merges can be pretty dangerous. She has experience and knowledge about how to stop them. Something she saw made her recognize that I needed help.” As he spoke, Tarin’s eyes darted back and forth between Lee and her sister. How much was too much to tell?

“I’ve asked your sister the same questions you’re asking me numerous times.” He said, eyes settling on Rachel’s finally as he spoke, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but once she decides something is going to happen, it isn’t easy to convince Lee otherwise.” He said.

“And there’s nothing scandalous or salacious happening. I was in a really bad way when your sister found me. I’m pretty sure she saved my life.”

That said, Tarin looked back at Lee, silently pleading for her to fill in any gaps she thought he’d left, or provide any details she thought belonged.

The more that Lee got to know the man sitting on the couch with her, the more that she realized that him and her ex-husband were very, very different people. However, that look of panic begging for her help was almost identical.

Though, if all of those questions had been directed at her like that, Lee might be feeling the same way.

Lee gave Tarin a small, tight lipped smile before turning back to Rachel and was trying to figure out which question to answer first, with how much detail, when she heard Tarin’s voice.

Much of what Tarin was telling Rachel was stuff she had already told her sister. Hopefully hearing it again, from someone else, would be enough. But when she saw Tarin’s eyes darting to her as he spoke, she nodded encouragingly.

Then Tarin finished speaking and turned his eyes back to her. Another small, tight lipped smile before she turned to look at Rachel again. “First, what I told you five years ago is still true, Rach,” Lee said. How many times had she told her sister this now? “So you might as well stop poking me about it.” Lee saw Rachel roll her eyes slightly, but at least she didn’t say anything else about that topic.

“And do you remember how I told you that the spirits can’t…stay if there’s no energy there for them to hold onto? That makes me the professional for this. Remember when we were young and everyone was tired all the time? I do that, only multiplied to the point that Tarin is passing out where he stands. And then I do it again. As many times as it takes for the spirit to either decide to let go, or is forced to let go.”

Lee paused, only realizing when she went to blink that her eyes had slipped closed. Taking a deep breath, she looked at Rachel again. “If the spirit figures out what I’m going to do, or is still in Tarin’s head when he wakes up…Well, they’re not happy and have a tendency to fight back. And this spirit would have known what I was going to do the moment he saw me.

“And while I was hoping I was wrong when I called you on Friday, I feared that I was right. That’s why I didn’t give you any details, but wanted you to take Kevin if I wasn’t home by the morning.”

Taking a deep breath as she finished speaking, moving to lean back against the couch. Then straightening up as the straps on her vest dug into the bruises on her back and she squinted her eyes slightly and clenched her teeth in pain.

“I know I’ve said this before,” Rachel said, her eyes moving back and forth between Lee and Tarin, not even noticing the movement or slight expression of pain Lee showed. “But all this sounds absolutely crazy. You know that, right? And how would you even protect yourself if he fights back? You’re so much smaller.”

Lee filled in more blanks and Tarin nodded his head at the appropriate times to corroborate her story.

Hearing Lee talk about it all brought the memories of that night back. They’d avoided talking about the actual events since they’d occurred but now he could remember waking up in the chair, hands tied. Tarin could remember Lee’s hand on his neck, and what had happened when Tarin had realized that he needed to let the spirit out to get rid of it…

He shuddered as Lee leaned back against the couch and winced at the pain it still caused her. The bruises were fading slowly but surely, but not so quickly that she was already healed.

Rachel spoke, and for the first time since she came in and started bombarding him with questions and insinuations, Tarin found himself getting a bit irritated. It all sounded crazy?

“You think it sounds crazy…try living it.” He said, shaking his head, “You’re also severely underselling your sister.” He added, firmly but not unkindly, “She is one of the physically and mentally strongest people I have ever met.”

He smiled then, just a little bit at Lee, “I’m not remotely ashamed to say she absolutely kicked my ass.”

Lee understood where Rachel was coming from at least. It had been incredibly hard for her to believe when she was first told about the merging. And, while Lee hadn’t seen or experienced even a fraction of what she had since that day, Lee had most likely seen much more weirdness because of mutant powers than Rachel ever had.

But then Tarin continued speaking and Lee looked over at him in surprise. They hadn’t really even known each other for a week yet, and a good portion of that first day Tarin had been unconscious. Her eyes dropped for a moment as a slight flush crossed her cheeks before swallowing and turning back to Rachel.

“If you had come with me to the gym even once to see me spar, you might have an idea,” Lee told her sister with a slight shrug.

But Rachel was looking at Lee with a small, knowing smile on her face. She hadn’t missed that blush. They, especially her sister, kept saying that there was nothing happening, nothing there, but that was obviously not true. She’d just have to keep poking at them, pushing them together. It was weird, him being another Tarin, apparently, despite looking nothing alike. But Lee needed something good, and she certainly wasn’t doing anything like that herself.

“Yeah, but you know I don’t like fighting,” Rachel ended up saying, then wrinkled her nose. “And those kinds of gyms always smell.”

“I can always give you a demonstration after my next night out.”

“But you don’t go out anymore, Lee.”

“Exactly,” Lee replied with a shrug. “Guess you’ll just have to come watch me spar.”

Well. If nothing else, Rachel seemed to accept the story they were telling. Presenting a united front had done the trick and now Lee’s sister was focused on chatting with Lee about how she’d managed to miss the fact that Lee was super strong and fast all these years.

Tarin supposed it made sense with what Lee had told him about her upbringing. Still it was weird that she seemed to have reconnected with her sister, even lived with her sister, and her yet sister knew so little about the things that made Lee…well, Lee.

Rachel said something that caught Tarin’s attention though, and he didn’t stop to consider the wisdom of his next words before he spoke.

“Does she not go out any more because of the irresponsible things she supposedly did that she won’t tell me about?”

The moment that Lee heard Tarin’s question, Lee’s eyes widened in surprised shock. Then she turned to look at Tarin with an expression he had to be able to tell was silently asking him ‘how could you?’.

Hearing Rachel burst out laughing, Lee glared at her sister. Lee knew that Rachel hadn’t personally seen anything like what Tarin was asking about, but she’d been dating Matt for a while now. As Lee was glaring, hoping that Rachel wouldn’t say anything, Lee wondered how much Matt had told Rachel, and how badly she was going to have to thus kill him.

“I’m not sure about irresponsible,” Rachel said while still laughing. “But Matt’s said -”

“That I don’t go out anymore,” Lee quite loudly interrupted. “Because Rachel’s my babysitter, and I don’t want to go out to a bar alone.”

Tarin cringed and shrugged a bit helplessly at the look that Lee sent in his direction.

She was the one who had brought it up and then blushed so intensely and refused to elaborate on the issue. Desperate times called for desperate measures. That damn blush was at fault here and nothing else.

At least Rachel was laughing now, and she knew what Tarin wanted to know. What Lee desperately wanted Tarin not to know.

Lee was so desperate to keep this secret, in fact, that she launched into a blatant fabrication to change the subject.

Supposedly Rachel was Lee’s babysitter and it would have left Lee to go out by herself if she’d tried. At any point for the last six years. Did that mean it had been six years since Lee had been on a date of any kind? That just seemed…unlikely. Maybe his face showed what he thought of that particular excuse, maybe it didn’t.

“So, is there anything else?” He asked Rachel, to hopefully save himself from some of the wrath that was surely coming his way once Rachel left. “Can I stay?”

“I mean, he has said something along those lines too, Lee,” Rachel pointed out. “You really do need to get out and relax more. And you know even you can’t argue that.”

Lee just continued to glare at Rachel for the moment, though it was not as threatening as it had previously been. She seemed to have finally gotten the point, though, as she didn’t continue trying to tell the story, or stories…that she had heard from Matt.

Then Lee heard Tarin’s voice, and she turned her head to see that he was speaking to Rachel. Asking her sister if he was allowed to stay in Lee’s apartment. Lee wasn’t sure what she felt about that; it was her place, it was her decision. And she had already decided yes.

“Maybe,” Rachel said slowly, and Lee saw that she was now looking between the two of them again. “These merge…things. Is it going to happen again?”

Lee was already shaking her head before Rachel had finished speaking. “Everything will be fine. You don’t have to worry about that.”

“Maybe,These merge…things. Is it going to happen again?”

At the same time Lee told Rachel that she didn’t need to worry about merges in the future, Tarin said, “Not if I can help it.”

He continued, casting a slightly withering look at Lee, “It hadn’t happened but one other time in my entire life.” That time hadn’t been nearly as bad as this one.

“I don’t make the same mistakes twice. I know what to look for now, and Lee will be here just in case.”

Lee glanced over at Tarin when she heard him speaking as well, an eyebrow raised when she saw the look that he was giving her. But then she heard what else that he had to say, and Lee sighed softly as she shook her head. “And I’ve told you, you didn’t make a mistake,” Lee explained to him again, her voice gentle. “He, that spirit, was smart and knew how to hide from you. Because he’s done it before. Twice. And he had learned from those times, Tarin. But so have I.

“Don’t get me wrong, Tarin. Being prepared is never a bad thing. But him getting in your head was. Not. Your. Fault.”[/font] Lee just sat there looking at Tarin, trying to see if her words were going to sink in or if he was going to continue thinking that the merge, and how long it had gone on, was because of a failing on his part.

“But if it..The spirit. If it got-”

Lee’s eyes shot over to her sister. This was the last thing they needed, her adding to Tarin’s guilt with her questions. “Do you honestly think I’d have let him even step foot in the apartment if I was worried about another merge happening?”

“And I’ve told you that I’m not just going to be a helpless bystander in these situations.” Tarin said, meeting Lee look for look. The words were firm, but not sharp or snappy. As if Tarin were just stating facts.

“I don’t know the other Tarin, or how he used his powers, but there has to be another way to deal with this that doesn’t involve other people potentially putting themselves in harm’s way.”

It was easier to argue with Lee when someone else was there, but Tarin had been thinking about that exact point a lot.

Lee spoke again, to her sister, and Tarin studied his hands as they hashed this out. He had said his piece and the rest was really none of his business.