This is a new story. What you're about to read is something that has been in my head for a while. I wrote most of it probably a month ago, but finished it yesterday and today.

Just so you know, I'm still writing Suburban Expansion, so don't worry. If you haven't read that, I think you might want to? This is me cross-selling, but I'm bad at it. No wonder my sister is the marketing major.

So here goes...

She could handle it.

...Or at least that's what she told Graham. He asked her if she was ready. Bryce, her partner and lover had just been killed. She said she was fine. After all, he went rogue, destroyed the intersect, sent the intersect files to a possible boss of his named Chuck...He practically betrayed her. She said she was fine. She lied.

Graham was relying on her to be the cold and calculated agent that had propelled her into elite agent status. Sarah thought she needed to prove herself again. One of the best? Not anymore. Bryce was gone. Now they assumed she was the best. Ideally, she was the same girl who had been essentially training for this work her entire life. No man was going to cloud that vision for her. Her feelings for Bryce couldn't get in the way of her being an amazing agent, no matter how hard it was to look at those pictures of them in Cabo knowing he had lied to her, and knowing she'd never see him again.

The only remaining piece of the inconclusive puzzle of Bryce's rogue status was this guy Chuck. She had never even heard the name come up in all the years she'd known Bryce. A further background check clued Sarah in that Chuck used to be Bryce's roommate back in college. Figures he'd been rogue that long...Chuck must've been powerful financially and just persuasively to influence Bryce Larkin to break into a highly guarded government building to copy the files of the intersect then destroy the rest of it--a suicide mission.

Sarah was entirely taken by surprise to find out the infamous Chuck worked at a Buy More as a Nerd Herder when she finally went out to California. Sarah surmised that maybe it must've been a cover. Underneath it all, he had to be hiding important secrets.

Though as potentially bad Chuck could be, he didn't seem that way at all. Sarah was trained to read people extremely well. From just their first meeting, something inside of her was telling her that he was not a bad guy. Graham's constant pressure told her to think otherwise. John Casey from the NSA would be sent in soon. "Cold-school." She was running out of time.

Graham approved her to go off the grid for a bit to get to Chuck. A date would only suffice. With each passing minute of their conversation, the date started to feel more real than fake. Chuck was real. He wasn't a secret terrorist. He was goofy, adorable, funny, and genuine. If anything, this was all an accident. Bryce probably didn't mean to send the e-mail to Chuck in the few seconds before his death. All she needed to figure out now was if Chuck saw the e-mail, but that would be for later.

While talking about being her personal baggage handler, the conversation essentially had to do about Bryce; however, Sarah didn't even think about the complete sadness she had been feeling for the past few days about Bryce's death. He made her forget.

"I like you, Chuck," she says earnestly.

Casey with his NSA minions have already shown up. She takes a few out on the dance floor, completely oblivious to Chuck. And when she quickly leads him out of there and picks the lock to the nerd herder, he still has no idea what's going on. John Casey keeps hitting their car as they reversed down the road. Chuck's freaking out, looking every which way and shouting the occasional blurb. Bryce was always calm in situations like this. She even tried asking for Chuck's help in which way to turn, but he wasn't clear. Sarah and Bryce were a great team, because they never had a lapse in communication. When they reach the bottom of the concrete stairs on another street, Sarah doesn't hesitate in speeding down the road, and making multiple other turns.

"Listen to me, Chuck. Those men will hurt you. They're from the NSA and they're after you."

"Me, why? Wh-wh-wait-wait, why me? I'm nobody. I'm the supervisor of a nerd herd at a buy more. Maybe one day I'll be assistant store manager, and I don't even know if I want that job. Well, you know that's not your problem."

Chuck just verified what she had already determined. He was nobody. Just an innocent guy that is now being wrongfully hunted by the NSA.

"We have to get you somewhere safe which means you're not going home tonight. That's probably the first place that they're going to check which seems stupid, because of course we wouldn't go there-"

"Wait, what about Ellie and Devon?"

"Who?"

"My sister and her boyfriend."

"Oh, right. Don't worry, those guys are not going to hurt innocent civilians."

"Then why are they trying to hurt me?"

"How well do you know, Bryce Larkin?"

"How do you know Bryce?"

"We worked together at the CIA."

"The what? The CIA?! Bryce is a spy? Bryce Larkin from Connecticut is a spy?"

"A rogue spy. Did he try to contact you?"

"I haven't heard from Bryce in a...Wait, no, he sent me an e-mail."

"Did you open it?"

"No. It was a line from Zorc."

"What?"

"Zorg. It's-It's a video game that we used to play. It was a riddle, and I solved it. And then there was all these a-a-a pictures. Lots and lots of pictures."

"You saw them?"

Chuck's facial expression said it all. He saw them.

"Your computer. Did you back it up? Is there an external drive?"

"It crashed a week ago. Wait, hold on a second. Was I not supposed to look at those pictures?"

"...No."

After they ditched the car in a parking garage and stole a different one, Chuck remained silent (or basically just in shock) for the remainder of the trip to her hotel. It was a lot to handle. One day his life was completely normal. Well, a gorgeous stranger being interested in him wasn't normal...Chuck meant the day before his birthday, before he got that ridiculous e-mail. Though right now he was freaking out, something about Sarah soothed him. While he sat on the bed, completely mute, watching Sarah pace around the room made him ignore the fact that she only went out with him to get information from him.

Wait.

"You only went out with me, because you had to find out about the e-mail, right?"

"What?" said Sarah, taken aback. She didn't think this would be the first thing out of his mouth right now.

"I guess it's pretty obvious-"

"Chuck, this is a matter of national security. Of course I asked you out to get some answers."

"Right. No, I get it-"

"But I meant what I said. I do like you, Chuck. I don't think I've ever met anyone like you."

"Really?"

"You seem morally sound. You're funny. All around a great guy." Basically, the opposite of Bryce.

"You make me sound fantastic."

"Maybe you are. Not to mention, you are very cute."

They exchanged smiles before both awkwardly stopped having finally noticed that.

"You know, Chuck," interjected Sarah, "Tomorrow we'll go to D.C., and get whatever you saw out of your head."

"Promise?"

"I can't really make promises, but you can trust me...I want to help you."

"So we'll probably never see each other again...That's too bad. All craziness aside, this was the best date I had in years."

"Me too."

Unaware until this moment, Sarah couldn't remember her moving forward, and Chuck getting off the bed and walking towards her. It must've happened somewhere in between talking, or while talking. Either way, he was probably only a foot away from her. His proximity-- or basically his presence made her not be able to think reasonably or logically...Or even think at all. She just knew how it felt.

As for Chuck, the same went for him. Jill who? Even while they were talking about Bryce, old feelings of hatred for stealing Jill from him and getting him kicked out of college never even registered. At first there were negative feelings for getting him into all of this. That's true. Now, however, Chuck had somewhat positive feelings about Bryce for getting him into all of this. That was more clear than ever when Chuck realized Sarah's hand was grasping his shirt.

Sarah faintly knew why she held onto his shirt, wanting to keep him close to her. But when he gripped her waist, her conscious tapped into her subconscious, because she only had one thought when he did that. She wanted to take off her bullet proof vest to feel his touch really on her.

A rational and smart agent would've immediately raised a red flag at herself and at the situation.

That agent was nowhere near this hotel room right now.

Sarah can hear it now. "Walker likes to get involved on the job." But this job will be done after tomorrow.

That leaves tonight open for them to...get involved.

If you think I should continue or think anything else about this story, let me know.