Disclaimer: Imagine does not own the Ocean's series.

Summary: Recon work at the Oasis! (And another potential catfight.) Annnnnnnnnnd a little Rusty/Lily. ;-)

A/N: Imagine asks politely for more reviews. Imagine wants constructive criticism. Imagine wants to be able to put what her reviewers want into her chapters. Imagine is also talking in third person. "Please enjoy the story and review!" Imagine says. Oh, and Imagine is sorry for the hold up. Imagine has temporarily lost her muse for Ocean's.

"Leah?" I said, looking down at the latest brain-flattening edition of math homework. "Can you help me?" I looked up and noticed that she was fixedly staring at the television, mechanically lifting popcorn to her mouth without even sorting through the burnt ones. "Uh, Leah?"

"What?" she said, not turning around. "I'm watching General Hospital. Leave me alone."

"What's with you and all that drama?" I asked, grudgingly returning to my homework and erasing the last six problems in frustration. "Can you please help me with the Math Nazi's homework? Please?"

She muted the television and turned around, glaring at me. "Lily," she said, "go ask Adam or somebody."

I sighed. "Adam's not home and neither is Paul. They're both at work."

"What about Madison or Gabriel?" Her attention was slowly trickling back to the television. She turned around and turned the sound back on, activating the high-pitched wailing of somebody-who-got-cheated-on-by-someone.

"Gabe's at the gym and Madison wouldn't help me with anything." I turned the page in my textbook so fast that it ripped down at the bottom. I scowled and wrote out the rest of the problems, struggling to figure them out.

"Why don't you ask Rusty or Linus?" she said. She was quickly tuning me out and I had no choice to argue with her. Would you really wrestle with an angry cougar?

Didn't think so.

I got up with my textbook and binder and shuffled down the hallway. I didn't want to ask anyone for help -- actually, I wanted Leah to help me -- and I definitely didn't want to ask either Rusty or Linus for help. They were to busy. They told me themselves last night that they were up to their chins in blueprints. I scowled and came to the doorway of Rusty's bedroom. I knocked on the door. "Rusty?"

"Yeah?" His voice was hoarse, like he just woke up.

I walked in and saw him sprawled across his bed, a glass of wine in his hand, his eyes trained on the small television which had Oprah jabbering away on it.

Talk about awkward.

"Uh, I was wondering if you could help me with my math homework, but since you're busy…" I scowled and turned to walked back down the hallway and bother Leah until she helped me with my stupid math homework.

"Yeah, sure," he said. He sat up, groaning a little. The bed groaned too. He rubbed his eyes and yawned and set the wine glass on the bedside table. He patted the bed next to him and rubbed his eyes again. "So, what type of math homework you got?"

"Extremely difficult stuff," I said, putting the textbook down in front of him. "Algebra."

He glanced at me like are you kidding? "That stuff's easy."

"You're not the one failing math." I turned to a fresh page of loose leaf and wrote down the page number, all that jazz.

"Okay…" He studied the page for a few minutes. "Okay. So, X plus Y to the sixth power is equal to 143." He looked at me.

"Um…?"

He made a face and tried a different tactic. "Say we pull off 143 heists in Europe. You pull off X, and I pull of Y to the sixth power."

"How come you get the sixth power?" I asked. I loved annoying him like this. It was entertaining.

"Do you want me to help you with your homework or not?" he asked. He was glaring at me, but a smirk was twitching at his lips. "Fine."

And so it went like that. The unknowns were how many jobs we could pull off each, and we figured it out from there. There was a lot of laughing and joking around, mostly by me, and we finished in about an hour.

I got up and took everything with me. "Have fun with Oprah," I called over my shoulder as I walked down the hall. "Make sure she gives away a house."

"Will do!"

"Sounded like you guys had fun in there," said Leah when I came into the living room and threw all my stuff down on the couch. "Who knew math homework could provoke laughter?"

"Hardy har har," I said. "What time is it?"

"Almost one."

I got up and bolted for the bathroom. I just remembered Gabe's picnic thing! I scowled at my reflection in the mirror and started brushing my hair. I yanked at a particularly stubborn knot and winced. I put the brush down, put my hair up in a sloppy bun, and then took off for my room to change.

Someone knocked on the door. "Can I see what you're wearing?" asked Leah.

"One second." I zipped up jeans, checked my appearance in the mirror (again, guilty as charged), and then let Leah in. "Okay?"

"Yeah, you're such a babe," she said, telling me with her hands to turn around. "Gabe's gonna be drooling over you today!" She grinned when I smacked her. "Who's the abusive one now?"

"All right," I said, skipping out of my room with my shoes in my hand. "I'll put my shoes on in the elevator, I'll see you later."

"Peace!"

I ran down the hallway, probably forgetting my keys to the apartment, and called the elevator. The doors opened and I found myself with an empty elevator. I got in and put on my Nikes, tying the laces in the weird way I learned how to tie them when I was five years old.

The elevator hit the ground floor and I took off for Central Park, which was just across the street from my building. I crossed the street and then remembered that Central Park was pretty big…and I didn't know where Gabe was meeting me.

So I texted him.

Where r we meeting?

I got a text back: Strawberry Fields. Yay! I happened to love the Beatles. I walked down the block for a while, my hands in my pockets. I loved Manhattan. Did I mention that already? Sorry. I'm a little happy right now.

He was sitting on a plaid blanket with a plastic bag sitting next to him. He was laying on his back, his hands behind his head, staring at the sky. I walked up to him and peered down at his face, blocking out the sun. He opened his eyes and grinned at me. "Hey," he said, sitting up. "Wanna sit?"

I sat down on the blanket and grinned at him. "Cliché blanket, dude," I said, chuckling a little, "where'd you get it? 'Picnics-R-Us'?"

"Don't hate, appreciate," he said, handing me the plastic bag. "And there's your picnic basket -- sorry I couldn't get you the clichéd one, they were all out." He smiled. He had a gorgeous smile. What am I saying? It was just a friend-date.

But when I told Leah that, she said there wasn't a such thing as a friend-date.

How does she know, anyway?

I opened the plastic bag and took out a thermos and a plastic plate of salad covered in plastic wrap. "Were they out of lunches, too?" I asked, raising an eyebrow and gesturing to the salad plate thing.

"I'm a guy," he said. "Guys don't know how to make picnic lunches. I tried!"

I took the plastic wrap off the salad and took the dressing (which was also in the bag, but in a mini thermos) and made myself lunch.

We talked about basketball mostly, and then we talked about the world around us. And then we started playing Would You Rather…?

"Would you rather…go out on a date with Joe Jonas or Brad Pitt?" he asked. He was lounging on his elbows, looking up at me.

"Joe Jonas, mostly because he's closer to my age. Brad Pitt's forty-four." I chewed on a cherry tomato thoughtfully, thinking up his would you rather. "Would you rather…meet Jessica Alba with a booger coming from you nose and sticking to your earlobe or jump out of plane with no parachute and a smelly instructor?"

"Wow, you think up good ones!" He sat up a little, grinning. "Um, the second one. Miss Alba will just have to wait until she dies and comes to Heaven to meet me."

"Other way around, doofus," I said, laughing. "You would have to meet Jessica Alba."

"Ruin the rest of my dreams, why don't you?" He laughed and sat up. "Do you realize how funny you are?"

"Well, I've been told that I have a sense of humor, but it's usually in the sarcastic manner…" Rusty always told me to watch my humor because some people (mostly him) got tired of it and didn't want to listen to it anymore.

"I'm not saying it sarcastically," he said, his voice a lot softer than it was a minute ago. "I'm saying it like a real person would say it. That you are funny."

I could honestly say I was blushing. Literally, my cheeks were heating up and it wasn't from the sun. I leaned on my elbow, tilting my head a little at him.

The smile that was on his face slowly drifted away, replaced with a content expression. He reached up with one hand slowly, brushing the hair away from my face. He started to lean up, his body unfolding with each movement. He was closer now, so close I could smell the cologne he wore on the weekends (he told me so.) He was about to kiss me when --

"Oh my God!"

We sprang apart, startled. I squinted into the sunlight and saw a girl's frame come marching towards us. I could only think of one person: Hannah. I shifted, moving away from Gabriel.

"You're cheating me? With her?' Hannah's voice rose a note and she brandished her Coach bag angrily at Gabriel. Her eyes were reduced to slits and her mouth was curled into a rabid-dog-like snarl. "How could you? I trusted you!"

"Hannah, stop making it sound like a soap opera!" said Gabe, not moving. He squinted up and her and lazily flicked his hair out of his eyes. "We were over, Hannah. You need to understand that."

"Over? We were never over, Gabriel!" She suddenly turned to me, her glare icy. "And you! You little brat! First stealing my position and then my guy! Where did you come from, anyway? How'd you get into Clearwater?" She took a step forward, her Jimmy Choo flip flop on the hem of the picnic blanket.

"Hannah, do me a favor and take a deep breath --"

"Shut up! You're just a geek in popular kid's clothing! You're nothing!" I literally thought she was going to spit in my face. She was making this so dramatic, and I wondered if it was ironic that Leah had been watching General Hospital before I left the apartment.

"Hannah, listen to me," I said, standing up. "I didn't steal your position and I definitely did not steal Gabriel from you. I don't know what the hell Madison's been telling you, but I am not what you think I am." I took a deep breath and glanced down at Gabriel, who still hadn't gotten up. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going home."

"Wait, hang on, Lila," called Gabriel, standing up. "Can we work this out?"

"I don't have a problem with you," I called over my shoulder, "but it's Hannah who has a problem. She can talk to me when I'm ready, and I'm definitely not ready now." I bent my head and headed back to the apartment, boiling on the inside and cool on the outside. I wasn't in the mood for a cat fight, if you're wondering.

A taxi honked at me as I J-Walked the corner, and I just hurried across the street and went into the lobby of the building.

Along the way to the elevators, I passed Linus. He looked like he was on his way out somewhere, maybe to find me and drag me back up to the apartment for some rethinking. When I passed him, he turned around and looked at me like I had fourteen heads.

"What's wrong with you?" He followed me up the stairs to the elevator bank. His hands were in his pockets and he honestly looked like he wanted to listen to some sixteen-year-old's boyfriend/popular girl trouble. "Anything I could help with?"

"Not unless you have a degree in child psychology." I pressed the up button and waited impatiently for the elevator to come down. "Or you have a strange sense for sixteen year old girl problems."

"I was sixteen once," he said, like it was a random fact he found out in the newspaper fillers or something. "But I wasn't a girl." Now he was getting uncomfortable. He was shifting around and putting his hands inside and outside of his pockets, chewing on his spearmint gum like he was going to break his teeth.

"Relax, Linus, I'm not gonna put a load on you," I said, glancing at him reassuringly.

He calmed down a lot after that.

We rode up the elevator in silence, him blowing bubbles with his chewing gum and popping them inside his mouth. I just leaned against the wall and watched the numbers on the elevator's screen flick past.

He and I got off on the right floor and walked down the hallway, passing our neighbors. We didn't bother to say hello because the woman had a really mean Chihuahua that had a liking for my fingers.

"You're home early," said Leah curiously when I opened the door and let Linus in ahead of me. "Did something go wrong?" She was still in her soap opera mode, with the popcorn bowl sitting comfortably in her lap and her pajama top a little lopsided.

"Later," I mouthed over my shoulder, going into our room and closing the door.

Not even two seconds after I closed the door, someone knocked on it. "Lily? Could you come out here for a second?"

Rusty.

I opened the door and glared up at him. "Yeah?"

He shoved something in a dry cleaners' bag into my hands and then went off rambling about going to the Oasis to get some recon work done. "Put that on, do your…girl thing and meet Linus, me and Leah down in the lobby by four." He turned and started to walk away.

"Why is Leah going?" I asked. Sorry, I was on temporary-dumb-teenager mode.

"It's recon work. Everyone should be going, but we're too big of a group and we can't split up because you're minors."

"Exactly, and I'm not twenty-one, so why am I going?" I shifted the dry cleaners bag in my arms and noticed something shiny and purple.

Uh oh.

"You'll look twenty-one. I've set Madison on making sure of that." He retreated into his room and slammed the door, like I had suddenly turned into a cranky wife.

I went into my room and first examined the dry cleaners bag. I had a very bad feeling about this bag right here and I wondered if someone in the universe (most likely Rusty) was having a sick laugh at my expense (again, most likely Rusty.) I laid the bag on my bed and took off the plastic covering. It was a dress. Not only a dress, but a dress for a woman much older than I am, which probably added to the whole twenty-one thing.

It was purple and the chest line was sparkly silver sequins. It reminded me sharply of Eva Green's dress in Casino Royale, and I wondered vaguely if this was an exact replica, except for the fact that it didn't have that plunging, almost embarrassing chest line that showed off the wearer's cleavage. At the bottom it was mostly silk and I felt as though I was going to a prom rather than a casino.

"Lily?" Leah opened the door and quietly came in, padding in her sock feet. "Do you like the dress? I got a black one that's just like it." She came over and ran her hand down the dress, smiling a little.

"I guess I like it," I said, shrugging. "But I'm personally going to kill Rusty for making me wear this." I scowled and went to go find Madison, who was going to be my makeup artist for the day.

She sat me down in a chair in the bathroom and made me look at myself in the mirror. "You've got a great complexion," she said, acting like a professional. She took out a little plastic baggy full of makeup supplies, mostly eye shadow, eye liner, mascara, lipstick, blush, lip liner -- shall I go on? "But you should bronze it. Just a little bit."

She started with the eyes. She gave me a dark purple eye shadow and applied it carefully. She did the eye liner on both the top and bottom, then gave me the mascara to put on myself (I had a nasty encounter with one of the girls at the orphanage -- let's just say she made me go around wearing an eye patch for a week.) Then she did the blush, and then the lipstick and gloss, and then did my hair in a messy ponytail with bangs in the front (who knew I had bangs?)

She told me to get into my dress and to take her black stilettos from the closet, that they'd serve me well, but they had to be back in the closet by morning or she'll hunt me down and gorge my eyes out with the heel. (She didn't actually say that, but I figured she would.)

I changed into my dress, got the stupid stilettos from the closet and put them on. They were the most painful shoes in the world. I looked at myself in the mirror and decided suddenly that I looked good.

It was only three o'clock, so I decided to hang around for a little while. I got my iPod and started listening to the James Bond theme song. More irony!

Leah came out all dolled up and ready to go. She grinned at me and we shared head phones on the way down to the lobby.

When we got down there…oh my god. It was like witnessing James Bond all over again. And we were just going to a freakin' casino. It wasn't like it was all that important to dress up, but there they were in all their glory, standing there in tuxedos and cummerbunds and all that jazz.

I think I was actually swooning a little.

Leah's grip tightened on my arm when she saw the two of them, standing there near the lobby doors like the two womanizers they were. (Not Linus too much, but he was up there with Mr. Ryan, trust me.)

"Well, don't you two look ready to take on the world," I said, trying hard not to sound to sarcastic. I didn't want to ruin the James Bond-y moment. "Where're your silencers, Misters Bond?"

"Very funny, Lily," said Rusty with an eye roll, but he actually looked a little proud of himself when he offered me his arm and I took it grudgingly. "We're dressed for success."

We took a cab for Times Square (A/N: I just thought of Cash Cab, lol) and didn't talk along the way. Rusty confiscated my iPod because he thought I would actually listen to it at the casino, oh the drama!

"Rusty," I said, "do you really not trust me?"

"No," he said, putting my iPod safely in his jacket pocket, "I honestly don't. This is serious, okay?" He lowered his voice and said, "Please just do what you have to do."

"Okay," I said, actually agreeing to him this time. I laughed a little at the surprised expression on his face when I said okay.

We talked very little on the way over there, because we all knew what we were going to do. It was a serious job, a very serious job, and I had to hold my tongue if I was going to get out of it alive. This was messing with the logic of many things, like order. When we cut power, things are going to drop into chaos.

The taxi cab pulled up in front of the Oasis. It was a tall, shiny building (yes, I know, that was a third grader's description) with plate glass windows dyed blue. People were mingling outside and in the foyer, all in fancy dress and sipping small, dainty glasses of champagne and talking quietly with one another.

Rusty paid the cab driver and hustled us all out, stepping out onto the curb with the air of someone who knew exactly what he was doing. He walked directly into the crowd, us following closely behind, and led us into the foyer of the casino, which was much louder than the small group of people outside.

"It's gonna get a little crowded," he said. He looked a little unsure of what to say here, mostly because he probably worked with guys who understood this without having it said. But since it's me and Leah, he has to go step by step. "So here." He handed me, Linus and Leah those small, silver Mike & Ike looking things that Linus and I had used back in Florida. "They're on."

I put mine in my ear and heard Rusty's breathing, because he was the only other one who had put his on. He was holding his Mike & Ike close to his chest, which made his breathing audible.

And then I lost it because Linus and Leah put their mikes in.

Then we separated. I wandered close to the poker tables, contemplating whether or not to sit down and start playing. But then I remembered that I was here on business, not pleasure, and that I had no money to stake myself in the game anyway. What a downer this night has become, huh? I livened up a little bit and strayed close to the stage, where a crooner was warbling some sad song about a woman he'd lost when he was young.

"Lily?" That was Rusty. "Are you doing what I asked you to do?"

"You didn't ask me to do anything," I said, cupping my chin in my hand. "But yes, I am. I'm looking for potential escape routes, people to look out for, et cetera."

I thought I heard him breathe a sigh of relief. "Okay, thanks for actually cooperating." He went on talking to either Linus or Leah -- I couldn't tell -- and I continued to look for the things I checked off with Rusty.

There was a door at the far end of the theater. Next to the door handle was a slot that you would normally see on an ATM machine. It blinked a few times with green dots, and then went dark. Then it blinked again, several times, and then stopped again. I guessed that this was where the guards put their passes to get into the "backstage" of the casino. In fact, a heavyset guard in a tan shirt and uniform pants came up to the door, slid his card in and paused, waiting for something. A beep, almost inaudible, could be heard through the crooner's singing, and the guard opened the door wide and let a stream of florescent light come through and giving me a peek at the taupe walls. He then went in and shut the door quietly behind him.

"Got an access route," I said to Rusty, interrupting him in a conversation. He paused, and I guessed he started moving, because snippets of conversations could be heard through the mike.

"You do?" he asked.

"You doubt me?" I said, sounding a touch hurt.

Minutes later, he arrived at my side and sat down easily, like a big, blond panther. He searched for a waiter, waved him over and called for a brandy on the rocks. "Congrats," he said, folding his hands and looking at me without a smirk on his face. "You've taken one step closer to being a world-class thief."

"It's such an honor," I said sarcastically, sitting back in my chair. There was a candle on the table between me and him; I pulled it closer to me and started twirling it, ignoring the dull burning feeling from the warm glass.

There was a pause. He got his brandy, the waiter bringing it over and a silver colored platter and placing a cloth napkin next to Rusty's hand. Rusty thanked him with a nod of his head and sent him away. I was very, very, very tempted to say something sarcastic about the silver platter, but I stopped myself because the crooner actually started singing "Here Comes The Sun," by the Beatles, and I literally felt my cheeks heat up and a burning to start at the back of my eyelids.

You see, the song was very special to me. I know that sounds weird coming from me, the sarcastic, who-cares-what-anyone-says Lily Carson. But when I was little, my daddy and I used to dance in my living room to this. And believe it or not, it was one of the best times of my life and I could hardly remember it. All I could remember was my mother's laughter when my daddy used to pick me up and twirl me around to this song, and the swooping feeling I got when he put me down and started dancing with me.

I couldn't remember their faces.

"You okay?" His voice startled me. I looked up, noticing that my hands were trembling. Our eyes met and I felt okay for a minute.

"Um, yeah. I am." I took a deep breath and tried to ignore the sound of the drums when the song entered it's second to last chorus. "Yeah." God, what a baby. I got over my parents' deaths, believe me. It was just a crazy, emotionally-taut day and I was just feeling a little overwhelmed.

"Well, when you say you're okay, and then you're not actually okay, that's consider lying," he said, sipping his drink. He sighed and put the glass down, scrutinizing me again. I hated it when he did that!

"Linus said that you lie all the time in this business," I said, all traces of my emotions gone. I chewed on my bottom lip and took another deep breath.

"Yeah, but right now's not the time to be worrying about lying," he said, his voice incredibly soft for a guy who liked to be sarcastic and loud and immature. Man, he could be backwards sometimes! I shook my head at him and he smiled a little, showing his dimples. I didn't know he had dimples. "Are you okay or not?"

"Yes, I am," I said, more confidence in my voice now than before. "Aren't you supposed to be being the big bad casino robber right now, Dr. Phil?"

All traces of his smile disappeared and he smirked. "A second ago I was helping out a friend of mine who seemed to be unhappy," he said, his sarcasm returning just as mine had. "But now that friend seems to be back to her normal self, so I will go back to being the big bad robber who's going to blow the Oasis down."

"Hey, you're not the only one doing this," I said, watching him unfold himself from his chair and stretch like that big panther cat I thought he looked like. "Remember there are eight of us going along with you."

"Yeah and the only one who'd be going to jail is me this time," he said, a little under his breath.

"Huh?"

He looked startled and then recovered, rolling his eyes. "Just do me a favor and just keep doing what you've been doing," he said, turning on his heel and leaving me along at that table with nothing but his empty brandy glass and the flickering candle.

Rusty's POV

I have never known a woman or a girl who has ever made me feel so stupid in my entire life except for one Lily Carson. She has a way of looking you in the eye, telling you something about the way you dress, eat, sleep, talk, laugh, smile, whatever, and making you feel like the biggest, most complete idiot in the entire world. But she did it with a smile and sometimes a laugh, and that made everything you felt about being offended/insulted/feeling incredibly stupid disappear in the blink of an eye and you're back to being friends again.

When I left that table, with her sitting there all alone with the candlelight flickering on her face and making her look like a sad angel who's been kicked to many times in the gut, it made me feel like that idiot mentioned above.

And I have no idea why.

Now, if Danny were around, I wouldn't be doing anything like this at all. It's like, without him, I'm a totally different person. Well, not exactly, but I'm still different.

Like sitting there, asking if Lily was okay after she looked like she was about to bawl her brains out. If Danny were here, I never would've sat down at the table in the first place. Now, without Daniel Ocean to keep me in check and make sure I had that witty, tough guy façade up, I felt like a totally different person.

I walked through the casino with my shoulders back, my head high, feeling that surge of overconfidence I always felt when I walked through a casino that I knew was gonna be robbed by either me or someone else. The poker tables were loud and rowdy, and I was an inch away from joining. The blackjack, the roulette, the rummy were all equally loud and rowdy, but I had no intentions of joining any of them.

So I sat down at a slot machine. "O magic slot machine," I muttered, taking out a chip I had found on the floor, "let luck be a lady tonight." The song ran through my head when I slipped the chip into the slot and pulled the handle, watching nonchalantly as each of the rollers changed and came up with zip.

"Rusty." That was Linus, trying to be that pestering, busy little bee that always seemed to buzz around my ear. "Toulour's here."

Honestly, I wasn't surprised. That guy was like a stalker or something. "What?" I said, getting up. I surveyed the casino and saw Linus up on the balcony above me. "Again, Linus."

"Toulour is here."

This guy, Francois Toulour? He's like a stalker. But he's a sent stalker, to stalk me and Danny whenever we're trying to pull a job. Normally we would have picked him out by now, but since this wasn't the heist, number one, and number two, it was just Linus who was looking out for him, we couldn't have picked him out as quick as we should've.

"Girls," I said, getting Lily's and Leah's attention. "Time to go."

"Already?" said Leah, sounding disappointed. I didn't say anything and started towards the entrance, keeping a look out for Toulour.

"Why are we in such a rush?" Lily was moving, I could tell, but she didn't want to move. "Who is this Toulour person and why are we running away from him?"

"We're not 'running away'," I said, walking past the poker tables and the roulette wheels. "We're just retreating for now."

"What Rusty's trying to say --"

"Linus!" snapped Lily. Wow, she could get mean. "I'm trying to listen!"

And she was. I found her underneath the balcony, (wow she got there fast) and listening to Toulour's conversation with two giggling model-waitresses that have become the fashion statement of the year.

Seeing me out of the corner of her eye, she got up and made her way over, not even glancing over her shoulder at Toulour. She frowned and then looked up at the balcony, where Linus was oh-so-nonchalantly leaning against the glass wall, waiting for the signal to come down.

"You can come down here, you know," she said, obviously to Linus and not to me.

He nodded and then headed for the staircase.

"Where are you?" she snapped into her mike. "Let's go. I don't care, Leah, c'mon."

"Who died and made you boss?" I asked, raising an eyebrow at her. "C'mon, we gotta get away from Toulour.

"Why?" she asked again, a certain innocence to her voice that reminded me of my third-grade days when I stole that bully's PB&J sandwich.

Good times.

"Because," I said, pushing my way through the crowd and snatching Leah from the crowd in the process. "We have too. I'll explain later."

Linus was waiting at the door for us and we all burst out onto the street, searching for an empty cab. I knew to flag one and not to accept any of those on the street, because they could be planted…I went to the curb and flagged down a cab, herding all of them into the backseat and told the cabbie to go for Central Park West -- we'll walk the rest of the way.

"So," said Lily, breaking the silence. "Care to explain now?"

I scowled and rubbed my hand over my face. I got what I needed, though -- access routes, guard stations, camera locations, all of that. But now I have to explain to Lily why the hell we got out of there so fast.

"On past jobs, this guy Toulour figures he could follow us and ultimately make fools of ourselves. He's failed many times, but since this is the one time where I don't have Danny, he thinks he's gonna get it this time." I took a breath and glanced at Linus for support.

Who knew I would be glancing at people (especially Linus) for support?

"Uh," said Linus. Gee, that was helpful. "Um, yeah."

I was just glad we were heading home with all of our fingers, toes and fingernails, because who knew what Toulour would've done.

Lily's POV, The Next Morning

Yo, I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want

So tell me what you want, what you really, really want

I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want --

I reached over and slammed the Snooze button so hard I was pretty sure I cracked the outside of my alarm clock. I yawned, stretched, and untangled myself from my sheets. I had the worst headache I have ever had in my lifetime, and I figured it was a case of "casino-hangover".

I shuffled into the kitchen and yawned again, smelling bacon and toast through my daze.

"The dead lives!" crowed Adam, clattering plates around on the counter.

I opened my eyes the best I could and looked down at the plate he was fooling around with. On it was two strips of charred something that looked strangely like bacon and blackened pieces of toast. "What'd you do to these things?" I asked sleepily, snatching a piece of toast and shuffled into the living room, flopping on the couch and landing on someone I didn't notice in my sleepiness.

"Hey!"

Oh, god, I landed on Rusty. I got up and took a bite of my toast, looking at him through the strands of hair that had fallen in front of my face. "Sorry," I said, swallowing. "Didn't see you there."

"Mhmm-hmm," he said, going back to reading…blueprints. Again.

I finished my toast and went back into my bedroom to sleep a little more. I took a peek at the clock and realized that it read seven o'clock, and that I still had three hours left to sleep.

Yippee.

Author's Note: I'm sorry for the hold up! I lost my muse for Ocean's and things have been really, really, really busy. The beginning of this chapter was slightly rocky, because it's not…exciting, I guess, but it gets better towards the middle. Please, review! Also, I have another question for you guys, but you have to promise that you will REVIEW ON THE CHAPTER AND NOT JUST ANSWER MY QUESTION. (Sorry for the caps.) The question is:

Should I write a sequel to this?

No ideas at the moment, just if I should. I have an idea for the sequel, but I'm not telling you! (smug smile) Again, thank you for reading, skimming, reviewing, whatever. Thanks! ;-)