First of all, thank you for everyone who's held on and keeps coming back to the story. I'm also usually better at reviewing, and for that I'm sorry. Just to make it up to all of you, I heard some of what you've said ... so I added a scene and a little bit of information into this chapter. Thanks for the comments! I hope to get back with everyone soon! Until then, here's the next chapter ... enjoy!


Across the Line 9

Mac drove them back to the city that evening, and dropped them off at different lines. It was New York City, and while it was almost impossible that they would be caught together, they didn't take any chances. Danny snaked his way toward his home, doubling back twice, before he stopped at a small diner no one went in unless they were a regular.

Danny knew most of the cooks, so the aged exterior and seventies interior didn't phase him. He sat alone in a booth and waited for his secure line to ring.

He smiled a little when he answered the phone. "Hey."

"I'm home," she said—he'd made her promise to call when she got there. She wasn't living alone. Mac had her living with army major he knew from combat. He promised him that her military training was based in special ops.

It was better than Lindsay living on her own, for sure. Someone had entered and bugged her apartment at some point. She'd played up to Pierson, telling him that she trusted his advice because she felt like her place was unsafe, but in the end she'd moved out without question, and let Mac handle the details. Pierson of course, had said to stay, but had promised to check in with some of his pals to see if anything had been reported in the area.

Danny had the scanner Mac had loaned him in his bag, just in case his own place was bugged. He hoped it was, and he planned to use it to his advantage.

"I guess you're going to sleep."

"No—I'm always a little wired when I get home. Besides, I slept in the car."

"You do have that way about you." He grinned a little—he liked watching her sleep. "Must be a Montana thing."

"Long roads—"

"Wheatfields."

She snorted. "You know the advantage to driving along in Montana at night, as opposed to New York is that its completely dark. You can pretend you're just about anywhere with the depth of the dark around you."

"I guess that's where you got that over active imagination."

"Who says it's over active, Messer?"

He laughed, thankful that the world had somehow righted itself. They talked about nothing, the bantering opening up something inside of him. Neither wanted to hang up.

He might have regretted the late night, especially when he was called out to a crime scene at three a.m., not more than thirty minutes after he'd lay down in his own bed, but he didn't. He felt lighter than he had in months.

Crime scenes had become less vocal since Pierson. Danny understood now that Stella had more or less been controlling the conversation. He'd let her, in many ways. It was a job.

But now it was more; it was a holding pattern until the truth came out. It was a way to stay below the radar, while they worked for justice.

And it was a place he could remember his time with Lindsay, doing much the same thing. In the quiet he could think of what he would say to her, and what she might say back. He could imagine her smile as he quipped about the lace bra he found underneath the body.

He couldn't help but smile a little.

He was surprised though when after nine am, as they finished processing the scene, Lindsay showed up at the door to collect the evidence boxes. She'd been in jeans and a t-shirt for the entirety of their time at the club and with Mac, so he'd nearly forgotten about the dark suit and heels.

But they'd also made an agreement. At least, he'd thought they had.

He passed by Stella and walked over to the door to accept the clipboard from Lindsay. The look in her eyes was a warning, but he ignored it. "I thought—"

"Detective Messer," Lindsay cut him off as she stepped to the side to reveal a man in a pinstripe suit, who looked a little thin. With eyes that were sunken in, receding hair line and a thinning beard, he nearly asked if he was a new mortician, taking Sid Hammerback's place.

But it seemed a little disrespectful to Sid.

"This is Orin Mason. Captain Pierson is having me bring him along to introduce him to each of the crews. He is basically to be thought of as an accountant for the crime lab."

There was more in her eyes than she let on in her voice.

"And of course you remember Adam Ross. I asked him to come along to help deal with the ... paperwork," she said the last work carefully, using her eyes to let Danny know it was her way to keep her promise.

It meant she was not alone.

Danny met Adam's eyes; in them he saw nervous energy and loyalty. Whether or not he knew what was going on, he knew something was wrong. Also, it was clear that Lindsay trusted him specifically if she asked him along.

In a gesture meant to showcase more frustration than he felt, he shoved the clipboard into Lindsay's hand and turned away, giving Orin Mason as well as Lindsay his back. He glanced at Stella, and silently asked her to step in and take care of it.

He let them talk it out, and worked the information Lindsay had given him through his mind. Orin Mason was another one of Pierson's watchdogs. That meant Pierson was getting nervous about what was happening in the field, maybe more nervous about the field than he was about the lab itself.

Which suited Danny fine.

He waited until Stella signaled that she was walking out with Mr. Mason and Detective Monroe. Adam had finished recording the information in the box, and stood to carry it out.

"Adam," Danny stopped Adam with a hand to his forearm. "Watch out for her, okay?"

Adam didn't ask. He seemed to get it. "Already am, Danny."

Danny waited for Stella to return and watched as she closed the door of the apartment and secured it with an official crime scene seal. As she turned to head out, she smirked at Danny. "About time."

"For what?"

Stella lifted those sculpted eyebrows with a knowing smile. "It's good for you, you know."

She was talking about Lindsay.

"Yeah."

As they reached the elevator, she reached out and pushed the down button. "We should celebrate... you feeling better and all. It must have been some bout with that virus."

She said nothing else, but later that day she passed him a note. It was a place called Harlem Street, at 8 pm.

Danny knew it, and had been inside before. At 8 o'clock it would be crowded and dim. It wasn't a cop joint, it was too new to be, and it wasn't any of their normal haunts.

"You might want to change clothes," Stella cautioned.

It was the last thing she said before they parted ways for the evening.

~ny~

Danny arrived at the place a little before 8. It was a little classier than he remembered, and served fancy drinks in frosted martini glasses. It was defiantly more of a Stella place than his own. And it seemed a lot of women and college age kids agreed.

He sat down at a booth and ordered a beer, and thought about that conversation of pizza and wine he'd had so long ago with Lindsay. It seemed long ago now.

He was surprised when Flack walked through the door and headed over. "This place has picked up its clientele since the last time I was here," he said as he slid into the booth.

"Up or down?" Danny wondered as he took a swig of the beer. "I was thinking this was different during the Rancini murder."

"One might say its improved," Flack grinned as the waitress came over and took his drink.

Stella came over before the waitress left, and brought Hawkes. She slid in the booth beside Danny.

"I want to know what's really going on with you and Lindsay," she said to Danny. Across from her Flack and Hawkes looked at him expectantly.

"What?"

Stella elbowed him. "It's just unfair that you had to wait until the rest of us couldn't enjoy it."

"Just tell her, Danny," Flack said. "Pierson's entrance into the picture blew the whole pool out of the water. No one thought you would take this long."

"Which means it goes to the last man standing," Hawkes mourned bitterly.

Stella reached across the table and squeezed Hawkes's hand. "Which means we all lost to Kale, and his guess was a month ago. Now spill."

Danny couldn't stop the grin, but he could control the information. "We've gotten over our ... recent differences."

"Oh, come on, Danny. That's all we get?" Stella pressed. She looked at Flack and Hawkes. "You should have felt the sparks flying when she walked in the room today."

"As long as Mason didn't feel them."

"So you've met our new accountant?" Hawkes asked. "I wouldn't worry about it, Danny. You'd have to be living to feel something, and the man's two steps passed dead already."

"Yeah, but he's there to observe and report." Danny through out. "But we were caustic and careful. As careful as we could be."

"So?" Stella prodded again.

His sigh was quick and frustrated. "We're together, that's all we know. It's enough or rahter, we're enough that this can't stretch out much longer." He'd decided for himself that he'd go, and take her with him. They could find another place … or maybe hole up in Mac's backwoods cabin.

He doubted any of that was an option in Lindsay's mind.

"Do you trust Mac, his decisions, the way he's doing things?"

"Yes," Stella said without hesitation, but slid a comforting hand through the crook of his arm as Danny sighed. "But Mac knows we have our own operation going on here. He's trusted us to move on the information he gives us in the way we choose to do so. And he trusts us to gather and gain any kind of information or ground that would put this to rest. It's time we step up the game on Pierson's men. Someone will lead us somewhere."

"But?"

"But the key," Flack motioned toward Danny with the neck of his beer, "is finding out who's at the top of this, and our closest bet to meeting that goal is via Pierson."

Hawkes nodded. "He's arrogant Danny. He's already made a mistake of believing he can control Lindsay, of believing he can control us. He's going to make another mistake soon."

Danny grimaced. "Which means Lindsay stays where she is."

"For now."

~ny~

It was dangerous to pretend, to slip off into another world without worries, so she stayed aware as she wove through the city. She stopped and changed from her suit into jeans and a long sleeved t-shirt. She added a long wig of auburn hair and left the suit behind. She would have to go back and pick it up later, but it was okay. It just so happened that she wasn't the only person Pierson underestimated. There were others throughout the city that she had tracked down that had been fired or removed through Pierson's call.

It gave her hiding places and allies who flew far below Pierson's radar.

But still, as she stopped and exchanged the wig for a ponytail, baseball hat and glasses, and overlaid the t-shirt with a Giant's jersey, she stayed focus. The funny thing was that she looked and felt more like Lindsay Monroe now than she did when she was in the lab.

She still had a mission to complete for Mac. He'd given her a zipdrive with a computer key that she had to slip into Pierson's computer. It would give Mac and the FBI open access to the files on his server. It was nearly impossible to do with the glass walls.

But she was waiting for a chance.

She did push that out of her mind. Tonight she was going to be Lindsay Monroe, and she was going to spend time with Danny.

An hour had passed before she walked into the sports bar Danny had recommended. It was just off Staten Island. It was a place that was owned by an old friend, a place connected more to his days in school, with baseball, than in more recent years. He got back for special occasions, the door always open.

But it wasn't a place he'd frequented in a long time. In fact, he was more likely to hang out with his old crowd on the holidays on Staten Island than at the bar itself.

Danny was at the bar when she walked in. She spotted him through the noisy crowd. He pushed up off the stool and walked over.

"So this must be Montana," the bartender quipped over the noise as Danny slid his arms around her.

"Cute," he said, but Lindsay wasn't sure if it was for the bartender or her outfit. With the way he was looking at her …

"Does the job," she told him as the crowd around them pushed them even closer together.

It felt good to simply be held, to be drawn close to him and to know it was where she wanted to be. It had been nearly a week. They'd talked on their secure line, probably more than Mac would ever believe possible, and they'd made plans twice only to cancel.

"Come on," he led her over to a table in the corner in the shadows, but in view of the television that took up most of the wall. The tables had speakers in them, so they could hear the game.

But on top lay a bouquet of daisies wrapped in green floral paper.

The laugh escaped her as she looked up at him. "You brought me flowers."
He shrugged, and pulled her with him into the booth, even as she reached for the flowers. "Seemed apt, since I was going for a date and it was in your date rules." He nodded as the bartender came over himself and sat two mugs of beer down for them.

Danny slid his arm along the back of the booth and nodded toward the bartender as he walked away. "And I told Mike, since your rules state that we should tell people. But don't worry. He only knows you as my friend Montana."

"ha ha," she said as she elbowed him. "And I got the feeling he'd heard about Montana before."

Danny shrugged. "I don't know. Flack's been known to come here." He moved the flowers off the table. "Speaking of … you're lucky you got flowers. Flack said it would count here if we tried Mike's pizza and removed every other slice. Pizza's decent. But it seemed somehow wrong on a first date."

"This doesn't bother you," she noted. "The dating thing and … us?"

"This?" he shook his head. "No. The way we're having to do it? Sure. But I like to date, I like you … and its more than that, so I'm going to stop now."

"Afraid of saying something that might embarrass your friends, Messer."

"No, but I'm not sure how deep we should take this until we can take it deeper." He picked up his beer. "Now enjoy, Monroe. Mike makes decent pizza, but he makes his own brew and its amazing. Keeps this place alive and allowed the theater set up in this place."

And so she did. She leaned back, and for a moment set the battle with Pierson aside, enjoyed the comfort of Danny's presence, and watched the game.

Well … watched and participated in the cooperate atmosphere of it all.

~ny~

Dale Pierson was gone for the evening. Lindsay breathed a sigh of relief when that news was passed to her. She'd been sure she'd he was working against her. Not that Dale Pierson ever really stayed late. He didn't keep the same death-defying hours that Mac had—not that everyone would. Still, she'd hit a run of luck that caused the delay. Now that things with Danny had changed, now that she had some sort of hope, she just feared that it would all slow down.

Of course, it wasn't just that she was waiting for Pierson to leave. She also had to wait for an importune moment where a crime scene took essentials out, for a moment when Pierson's second hands were also occupied.

At night the crime lab was lit with minimal lighting. Lab techs worked around the clock processing data, but it was a smaller staff. There was less talking, especially since they had received a memo stating that the laughter that had been heard in the trace lab was unprofessional.

Lindsay was sure Mac thought the same thing, but he didn't punish them for the occasional release.

Taking a deep breath, she carefully went over the details of the plan in her head as she gathered her props. It was a dangerous thing to work in an office with all glass walls—if one wanted to sneak around.

And Lindsay had learned to do just that.

Thankfully, her job under Pierson allowed her some access to his office. It was one of the early contentions between her and Danny. She knew what it made her look like, one of the sniveling weasels from one of the mobster movies she'd seen. Knowing what she'd become, even in pretense, made her sick.

He didn't have to hate her when at times, she hated herself.

One thing wearing her hair up did was keep her periphery vision completely open. Taking a deep breath, she left the office she shared with other lab techs and carried the file of daily paperwork to Pierson's office.

~ny~

Another week had passed, and still his single evening with Lindsay remained his only evening. Danny itched, held on the edge of his life, keeping his ears open. When he wasn't working a crime scene he navigated the city with Flack and Hawkes, Scanetti, and a handful of other cops who were loyal to Mac and Stella. Nearly two weeks had passed since learning the truth.

And he was ready for it to be over.

They met again, just the four of them. A small club, another place on some corner of New York. Somewhere during the evening, a knot formed in Danny's stomach. He listened as Stella laid out a number of plans, and orchestrated their responsibilities. There was little they could do about their schedules. They pretty much remained on call with their resources spread out all over the city.

As they left the club, Flack walked Danny home, having took the subway system instead of his official ride to offer more security for their venture.

"So you all right?"

It had become clear over the last two weeks that Flack and Hawkes had been working with Stella for awhile now. Did it bother him?

"Yeah," he admitted. "Until Lindsay walked into the apartment this morning with that creep Mason on her tail again and I realized how ..."

"Obvious you are?" Flack filled in and laughed when Danny grimaced. "Come on Danno. Those sparks between you and Monroe have been flying she you met at the zoo. It's not a surprise that you've finally staked a claim, it was more of a surprise when—"

"I cut her out of my life?"

"Yeah, but I was going to say 'when it took you so long.'"

"She's ... different," Danny surmised, thankful when Flack's cell went off.

"For you she is, in a dozen different ways," he glanced down at his phone. "I got to go. I've got a potential homicide..." he showed the message to Danny. "Looks like its near your place."

"I'll go with you," Danny told him, "for old time sake."

~ny~

Walk straight ahead, she told herself. Look mentally busy. Distracted. It was her chance. She knew who was out of the building, and who was in trace and in ballistics. There was some event that night, but Stella was on that. She'd passed on the information with the hope that it would take them to the top person.

Still, she had a job to do here, and with the lab mostly empty it was her chance. She opened the folder and glanced through it as she walked. It was an art she had perfected since coming to New York.

As Lindsay opened the door to Pierson's office, she was fully aware. She heard the hum of the air conditioning. It was dim in his office, which illuminated the lights of the city through all the glass. She aware that people could see her in nearly every direction.

She knew precisely where the snag was in the carpet and made sure her heal hit in just the right spot.

As she threw herself forward, she tossed her folder just enough so that it went sprawling over the other side with the waterfall of papers she managed to push off. She pushed up, panicked and hurried around the desk.

The thumb drive was out before she knelt down. It held a government program that would circumvent Pierson's security and download specific data that would allow them to access his encrypted files on the server. She stuck it in the computer and then focused on the papers.

She scanned the paperwork, looking for anything out of the ordinary. The chances that he would leave anything incriminating on his desk was doubtful, but she believed in chances.

She missed the opening back door. Missed the warning.

"Can I offer you some assistance, Detective Monroe?"

~ny~

The officer who had secured the scene waited just outside the alley. Flack stopped briefly to speak to him, but Danny headed on back. The light was dim and the man was badly beaten, but his identity was clear.

He cursed under his breath just as Flack joined him.

"You know him?" Flack asked.

"Yeah—by picture. This is the guy who attacked Lindsay," Danny looked at Flack. They had lost their lead to Pierson. They were back to square one.

"His name's Max Holder."