*One month and sixteen days earlier*

She could feel his eyes upon her, could hear the minute twitching of his hand muscles upon her pen as he attempted, and failed, to hide his own minor irritation from her ever perceptive eye. How did he still think, after so many months of her working for him that he could hide anything from her.

"Mycroft. If you have something to say, then you should just spit it out. I could cut your tension with a knife"

His eye twitched slightly at the comment. Damn it. How was he meant to explain his growing irritation, not towards her personally but more towards himself, when all her reply would be is that his growing sentiment would eventually fade, that she was meant to be used as a tool, not seen as a woman with needs or feelings.

Hazel furrowed her brow as she noticed the grip on his pen tighten only slightly, could hear the change in his breathing that even he was unlikely to realise. Had someone caused him trouble, did he require her assistance?

"I feel that you have wronged me slightly, Hazel. We seemed to be making progress and, dare I say, becoming 'friends', as Sherlock likes to say. Yet, in these past few weeks, I feel that you have pushed me away when I have not warranted such behaviour. The promise that you would one day tell me further of your past now seems like nothing more than a ruse to gain my trust and favour"

It was not a complete lie but not the complete truth of his feelings. Truly, he felt that she had begun to push him away since beginning her dancing lessons, that in the few weeks since her assassination of his political rival, Sherlock had made more progress with Molly Hooper than he had with Hazel. Heavens, his brother had managed to first attain a coffee date and then a dinner date with the young pathologist, whilst he could barely get a hint of the more personal past that Hazel had mentioned to him.

Hazel supressed the urge to frown at his words, knowing that he had every right to say such things. It was true that they had moved forward from where they had begun and achieved a strange form of friendship. But that had been how her current problem had started, those feelings were beginning to grow stronger, into something she knew little of and that, in her computer enhanced mind, was the scariest thing she would ever face. It terrified her to tell him her darkest truths because then she would lose him forever.

"You don't understand Mr. Holmes… I am not someone that you should wish to know or be close too"

It wasn't for just for her own sake that she was afraid, but his also. She was a man-made monster, something to be considered as a horror, a nightmare to scare the children and adults alike. If he knew too much then, no matter how brilliant he was, how much influence he held upon the British government, he would be in a whole new world of danger and it would be all her own fault.

"And so we return to formality. I see how it is Miss Rose, then perhaps we should relinquish ourselves of these moments where we sit together. It is clear that they are not appreciated."

The pain in his heart felt alien as he cast a cold gaze upon her to cover his own damaged pride. How could she be so vacant in her own heart when his seemed to yearn even stronger. For her part, Hazel simply chose to turn her face away to hide the sorrow in her eyes that couldn't be removed. How could he be so dense? She could feel the tension and buried anger between them, heavy as concrete ad so easily removed if only their situation were different.

"And allow me to be clear on this Miss Nova Rose, but I do not choose to spend my time with others lightly. I abhor the concept of friendship and any emotional matter, yet I believed you to be the difference"

She couldn't take it any longer as each word cut like a knife, from his use of her fake name to how he accused her of intentionally hurting him, and she slammed her fist into the arm of the wingback armchair she had been sitting upon, shattering the mahogany wood beneath its cushioned fabric as she stood and stalked towards him, the fury in her eyes enough to make even him realise he had gone too far.

"You think I chose to be like this, that I ever had a choice to anything other? You truly believe that I wish to be alone? Then you are fool! For all your intelligence and power, you are nothing short of truly moronic. There's nothing I would love more than to live a normal life, to have friends and a family, to have a lover who I could share my heart with. But I can't. The only friendship I ever had before now was stolen from me when I was ordered to assassinate him. I murdered the man who named me Hazel!"

She was gone before he had chance to reply, his mind racing as he heard the door slam behind her as she seemed to escape into the garden and he found himself standing to follow, desperate for answers to the questions she had left behind.

She fumed as she stomped through the garden, aiming for the old oak tree that stood at the very centre of the vast grounds.

"What does he know of me! He thinks he can question me after only a few months of me WORKING for him? That ARSEHOLE!"

Her words only seemed to fuel her rage further as she climbed to one of the lower branches of the large tree, slumping against the trunk as she looked back at the house and began picking twigs to throw at the ground below. She wanted to scream, to hit him for his words as she cried to the heavens for her fate but realised that she could do none. She would not degrade herself further, would not lay a hand against the man she could never have and she sure as hell would never cry, she would not show such weakness. She scoffed at the thought, she had already become weak and it was because she had allowed it.

"I'm a disgrace"

"I wouldn't go so far as to say that"

Her eye twitched as his voiced drifted up from the ground below and she turned an annoyed gaze upon him as he stared back at her, expression carefully masked in an attempt to hide from her overly observant eye.

"Have you come to continue the fight? I am in no mood to argue with you Mycroft"

He smirked slightly as he moved to stand against the tree trunk below her, aware that it would do no good for his suit jacket but finding that he didn't care in that moment. She was all that mattered he realised.

"I would never wish to fight you, dearest Hazel. I would lose without a doubt. But I have come to ask you to let me in… I would never wish to force you into anything and I apologise for my words earlier, to realise that I will not turn my back on you now, I am too far gone to ever turn away now"

She felt a lump in her throat as her eyes began to fill and Mycroft's own widened slightly. She was crying and he knew that he was partially to blame, he hated the thought of causing her tears as she grimaced and swiped her hand against the offending tears.

"You have weakened me Mycroft. I haven't cried since my sixteenth birthday and yet, you have reduced me to that state once more with your kindness towards me"

"Some would say that it is progress rather than weakness"

Shaking her head, she couldn't help the small amount of laughter that escaped her lips as he smiled a little also.

"You have met my mother; you should know that it was never an option for me"

"You are no longer under your mother's control and you are free to cry when you feel the need too. You are only human after all and, as much as I thought I would hate to admit it, so am I. I have a heart Hazel, I have hopes and dreams just as any other, it is an inescapable fact of humanity. Our hearts yearn, feel beyond what we could hope to express and you have taught me that… I only wish to help you understand also"

His words sent a warmth through her soul as jumped from the branch and moved to stand beside him, realising the slight insanity of that moment. He was the man behind the British government, powerful and brilliant, unrivalled by any other including his brother, and she was the world's most lethal assassin, barely even human anymore and her hands tainted by a river of blood that his precious government had ordered for. Yet, there they stood, side by side with their heads hung slightly as their fingers touched and moved to lock fully together, a precious moment between them as two hearts slowly began to beat as one and two sets of uncertain eyes met each other, neither realising the true significance of that moment.

"We are a strange pair, aren't we Mycroft?"

"I believe we are Hazel, strange but brilliant… I will not pressure you further, I can wait to know more about you. But please, do not push me away again"