With an eyebrow raised, she eyed them both with a suspicious glint in her eye.

Tina ignored the suspicious glances of Cheryl, “Hey Cheryl,” she greeted her, “Do you know when it’ll be possible for me to talk to Bette?,”she asked, while wiping tears from her eyes.

Cheryl still had an eyebrow raised as she responded slowly, “we could send the camp a signal to set up a call with Bette and the Colonel a few hours from now.”

“Thanks, that’ll be great. With all the stuff that’s happened to Bette, I think it’ll be a relief for both her and me to be able to talk a bit,” she responded evenly.  Noting the tension between the two, Tom stepped in, in the ensuing uneasy silence, asking Cheryl about whether or not she was going to handle liaison duties for a team from the government auditors, scheduled to arrive the following day.

Tina was shaking her head as she walked away, as soon as it was polite to do so, leaving Tom and Cheryl to talk.

She couldn’t figure out why, for some reason, Cheryl had been trying to get under her skin, ever since Bette had left in the helicopter that took the brunette to dangerous parts unknown.  There had been a few incidents already: first, Cheryl had minimized Tina’s worries, telling her that rather than worry about Bette, it would be better if Tina focused on other things, “Maybe reschedule your honeymoon activities?  Do your nails?”  Secondly, during the call with the camp, she’d only left a few minutes remaining in the scheduled call to Tina to talk to Bette, and then had cut off the call just as she and Bette were reassuring each other of their mutual love.  Finally, as Tina sat by herself in the cafeteria, forcing herself to eat a Cobb salad she’d selected from the dishes available, she’d overheard Cheryl wondering out loud to a group of embassy staff, why she was being asked to “babysit” all of these so-called VIPs the intelligence agencies like the FBI were bringing over to help with their operations.  “Shouldn’t they be taking care of their own people or guests?  I mean…we’re state and they’re intelligence.  The army guys take care of their own business, don’t they?  So why can’t intelligence?”