Disclaimer: None of these characters belong to me.
An Angel / Pretender crossover. Pg-13 at worst

Female Bonding
By Imzadi

The road gets rougher, it's lonelier and tougher,

With hope you burn up. Tomorrow he may turn up.


Ever since the world began, There's nothing sadder than

A one-man woman looking for the man who got away.



Lilah Morgan slid into the booth. "Sorry I'm late. Things got really hairy at work. I know you're not in town long so I feel really bad about this."

Miss Parker took a sip of her Cosmopolitan. She had started drinking them ever since she got hooked on Sex and the City. Another one stood in front of Lilah. "It's okay. Believe me, I know the problems with both of our jobs. After all, we basically work for the same people. They just go by different names. The Senior Partners. The Triumverate."

"How is it going? Are you still after Jarod?"

"For the rest of my life, it seems. We occasionally meet, touch, even kiss on occasion, and he gets away again. I wish we could just go away somewhere and be left alone. It'll never happen, though."

"He loves you, though. He always has. You are so lucky."

"Lindsey never loved you?"

"Never. I don't even know what it is that makes me want him. He's a shrimp, cocky as hell, three years younger than I am. He's just so damned handsome, even when he let himself go a little, after he lost his hand, and let his hair grow and didn't style it. I just wanted to jump him on his desk, my desk, the middle of the hall, anywhere. And now he's gone. At least he saved my life before he left."

"Tell me about it."

"They were going to name him vice president and terminate me, after spending close to half a million to give him a new hand. And when I say ‘terminate,' I mean it." Parker nodded in agreement. After all, there wasn't much difference between Wolfram & Hart and The Centre. "So he put on this fantastic scene. He shot the security guard in the foot with his own gun, shot up the boardroom while making this amazing speech about his ‘evil hand,' resigned from the firm, gave me the job, and pinched me on the butt on the way out. That's one of the only two times he ever touched me. The other was when he reached down my bosom to retrieve the microphone I was wearing to trap him."

"That's definitely conducive to romance. Betrayal."

"The situation seemed desperate then, and I had been working on him for three years and getting nowhere. Would you believe he chose a female vampire over me?"

"The notorious Darla? She was quite a beauty, as I recall."

"True, but she wouldn't give him the time of day. By the way, how's your family?"

"My evil twin brother is still running the firm and murdering Asian girls. My father is pretending to care about me as long as he can use me for his own purposes. And of course one or both of them had Tommy killed. My stepmother is dead. I delivered her baby before she died. He's either my half-brother or my nephew. I'm not sure which!"

"Tommy was the man you loved, besides Jarod, of course."

"Yes, I really did love him. The Centre had him murdered. Dad or Lyle probably did it."

"Family. Isn't it wonderful? Mom is getting worse and worse. It's either early-onset dementia or Alzheimer's. My father still pretends I don't exist. I have no friends except you, and I get to see you—what—once or twice a year. You at least have people who care about you: Sydney, Broots, and even Jarod."

"You're right. I guess the glass isn't almost empty. It's about a quarter full." Parker smiled wryly and motioned to the waitress. "Two more—each!"

Those two were followed by another two. It didn't really matter, though. Both Parker & Lilah could hold their liquor. After all, they had had lots and lots of practice.

"I hate my life. Nobody has ever loved me. Angel turned me down when I offered to buy his freedom from a demon fight club if he'd be with me. Then he locked Lindsey, Holland, about two dozen other lawyers, and me inside a wine cellar with Darla and Drusilla. And finally, after two years of trying to get him interested, he was having sex with me on his desk when he went into vampire mode and almost killed me. I can feel myself growing more and more evil and I don't even care any more. Would you believe I even want to take Angel's son alive so we can dissect him and see how he happened to be born? He's the son of two vampires, you know. Anyway, I thought I had made another friend once, a girl named Bethany Chalk. Unfortunately she learned that the firm wanted her for her telekinetic talent and that I had set her up. She left. Everyone leaves me."

"Lilah, for what it's worth, I'll always be your friend." She put her hand on Lilah's. "Do you want to eat something? I'm starved."

"Bloody red steak and something chocolate. Those are my friends now. Liquor, steak, chocolate. And you."

"What else is there?" She pictured Jarod, his dark eyes looking at her with love. When they were sixteen, they had made love, the first time for both of them. He would always be her love, and she would be his. Unknown to Lilah, she had also been the first woman that Lindsey had ever slept with, when he was a freshman and she was a senior in college. She had never told Lilah, who had been her friend and roommate. They had kept their sex lives private. Of course, she never dreamed that Lindsey would go to work at the same firm as Lilah. Now, of course, she'd never tell. Lilah was right: bad as Parker's life was, Lilah's was much worse.

Two huge steaks with baked potatoes, and two huge wedges of chocolate mousse cake later, the friends rose from their table.

"Would you like to come to my place for the night, Parker? We can sit up and talk and catch up some more."

"I'd love to, Lilah, but Broots and Sydney are waiting for me back at the hotel. I'll call you when I get back into town. It was good seeing you." You always make me feel better knowing that things could be worse, Parker thought.

"We might as well share a cab. I could drive, but I don't think I should."

"Good idea." They left the restaurant and hailed a taxi.

In a back booth, where they couldn't see him, Jarod watched them leave. Oh, Parker, I love you. I wish we could be together. And I'm truly sorry for you, Lilah. On his way out, he stopped to retrieve the tiny microphone he had hidden under the table. I wonder if I should call Lindsey and tell him. No, what's the point? He knows how Lilah feels; he just doesn't care. And Jarod went off into the night.

Contact Imzadi.

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