vdistinctive | Geneva, Switzerland, late Thursday night (local time)

James Sterling, formerly IYS Insurance, now an agent of Interpol, was good. He was very, very good, quite possibly the top of his field. The number of times he'd backed Eliot and his team into a tie -- always a tie, never a win, not on either side -- was testament enough to that. The was no way Eliot would've been able to track the man down on his own, not across the 190 member countries the man could be working in at any given time.

Of course, James Sterling also had a daughter. And no matter how well Sterling had trained Olivia, she was still a teenager. Teenagers were idiots. They made mistakes. As had Sterling, it turned out, when he brought the Leverage team in on his mission to rescue her. The key to finding Sterling was simply to find Olivia.

There were easier ways to get the intel Eliot had promised Leland. For instance, he could be trying to bust into Interpol headquarters in Lyon, France, or one of the handful of regional offices around the world. A massive security system and actual armies worth of guards would definitely be easier than going directly after a man who knew Eliot's face and MO as well as Sterling did. But -- it just wouldn't be anywhere near as satisfying.

Yeah, Eliot thought, when Sterling clicked on the light after returning from dropping Olivia back off at her swanky Swiss boarding school for the night and saw Eliot sitting in the living room of his suite. This was much more satisfying.

"Spencer." Sterling actually managed to look almost bored when he said it. "To what do I owe the pleasure."

Eliot stood, cracking his knuckles and his neck. "Nah, Sterling. Pleasure's all mine."

The door fell shut behind Sterling and the fight was on.

Sterling had apparently learned a new trick or two, since the last time Eliot had beaten him up. For instance: this time he used his baton to desperately whack at Eliot's head instead of his hip. He managed to land a blow that split the skin over Eliot's right eyebrow, but that mostly just made Eliot angry.

A hotel like this one was going to be well-insured, so Eliot didn't worry too much about the damage to that wall.

"The hell do you want?!" Sterling shouted as Eliot slammed him down onto the desk (nice one, too, real mahogany; Eliot liked it when a place put that kind of effort into interior design) and pinned him in place.

"Who said I want anythin'?" Eliot smirked down at him, then yanked him up by his collar and slammed him back down again. Sterling gurgled, and Eliot frowned, knocking his head into the desk a few more times until Sterling stopped squirming. He stepped back, letting Sterling slide to the floor, and watched him for a few moments to make sure he was unconscious, then pushed his hair out of his face and winced. He pressed his thumb against the split on his forehead, then kicked Sterling in the foot once for good measure before rifling through his pockets to find his phone and any other electronics he might have on him. He figured those and the laptop should cover it.

Of course, if he just took them with him, then Sterling would know this was more than just a random revenge beat-down. Which meant Sterling would come after him. Maybe follow him to Fandom, put the students in the line of fire.

Eliot looked over the small collection of computer equipment. He dug around in his own pocket until he pulled out one of Hardison's magic little hacker thumb drive things, then looked at the electronics again. ". . . Dammit."

He was going to have to call Hardison.

[ooc: for him -- and let's be honest, potentially her -- on the other end of the phone.]

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