"Nice work," Lee said, as Francine finished her report of her activities. Lee, Amanda, and Francine had gathered in Lee's motel room to debrief and regroup.

"That is what they pay me for," said Francine, as she swung her purse over her shoulder and brushed past Lee and Amanda, headed for the door. "Now I have to go hassle someone about my room. Seems they lost my reservation."

She turned and smiled. "Now, you two sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite."

"Good night Francine."

"Good night, Amanda," purred Francine.

Looking at her magazine, Amanda rolled her eyes without looking up. Francine was the type who would purr at you while sticking her claws in your back. All she needs is a little catnip.

Closing the door behind her, Francine shook her head. She had seen that scenario too many times before. I wish Lee would just get on with it, she thought. The sooner he sleeps with Amanda, the sooner he can move on from this silly dance. What does he see in her? She shrugged. Probably wants to add a suburban housewife to his list of conquests.

She looked at the room number the clerk just gave her. 204. Ugh. Same floor as Amanda and Lee. "I am really not interested in seeing a repeat of Lee's exploits like Prague. And Panama. And the Philippines," she thought as she walked off the elevator.

Down the hall she saw Lee and Amanda standing outside one of the rooms. Looking very intimate. "Let's have some fun," she thought.

"Well, they found my room. I think the night manager liked me." Francine walked right through Lee and Amanda. "Here it is, 204." She looked up at them, wide-eyed. "What's uh, happening?" She watched as they shifted uncomfortably.

"Nothing."

"Nothing, nothing. Just uh, closing down for the night."

"Oh, good. Well, I'm gonna be up at the crack of dawn. I'll knock on both your doors."

She threw back her head and gave them her best cheerleader smile. After she shut the door she smiled slyly to herself. Good luck being in your own beds by 6 am, she thought.

Outside in the hall, Lee and Amanda finished saying good night, reluctantly parting at Amanda's door. As Lee opened his door he looked back at Amanda's room. "That was close," he thought. "Damn Francine. She does know how to ruin things." Still, he thought, it was probably just as well. Amanda was different, and he felt differently about her than any other woman. She deserves better than a tryst in a tacky hotel in rural Virginia.

Francine listened carefully as she opened her suitcase. She heard one door close, next to hers - Amanda's room. Two minutes later, she heard Lee's door close. "Hmm - sounds like restraint from Lee. Well, that's out of character."

Before Lee even had a chance to put his key down, he heard a door.

Amanda opened her door and looked down at Lee's room. Should she . . . ? She shook her head. Bad idea, she thought. She ducked back into her room.

Francine heard Amanda's door close, followed by what sounded like Lee's door opening again.

This is ridiculous, she thought. "Why do I always have to be the dorm mother?"

She opened her door and came face-to-face with Lee. She cocked her head and raised her eyebrows.

Lee looked like he'd been caught out after curfew.

"Hi," she said.

"Hi," Lee gestured vaguely toward Amanda's room. "Uh, um," he cleared his throat and glanced around uncomfortably.

"Well, good night," and he slid back into his room.

She gave her best look of innocent bewilderment and said "Good night." As the door closed behind her, she looked in the mirror.

"Someday, Amanda is going to thank me."

Ice Cream? Or Chocolate?

A few days later, Francine took a deep breath as she knocked on the door of the agency's resident "shrink."

Although she wouldn't admit it to anyone, these required visits with the therapist after particularly difficult missions (and what wasn't difficult?) often helped her sort out her emotions. It kept her on her game, tamped down any feelings of angst, anxiety or inadequacy.

"Hi, Francine - c'mon in," said the psychologist. "Ice cream? It's delicious and keeps the demons away." He bent down to his freezer and pulled out two ice cream bars.

"Uh, no, thanks," she said. Bad enough that ice cream would mean an extra 30 minutes in the gym, but her recent sojourn with Amanda in the deep freeze at Marvelous Marvin's took her off frozen foods for a while.

The doctor pulled out a folder, tore the paper off his ice cream bar and took a look at the first couple of pages. "So, want to to tell me about this one?" he said, taking a bit out of the chocolate covered vanilla ice cream.

"Well," said Francine, "we received a credible threat from a former agent now working at Marvelous Marvin's regarding a possible extortion plot . . ."

The doctor held up his hand. "I read the report, Francine. I don't need the play-by-play, just what your observations and feelings about the events." He glanced at the notes. "I see you were assigned to accompany Lee Stetson and Amanda King."

"You used to be Lee's partner, didn't you?"

Francine shifted uncomfortably. "Not exactly. We were assigned to the same places and worked together a few times, but no one is really Lee's 'partner.'"

The psychologist nodded. "I would agree, although Mrs King has shown remarkable staying power with the elusive Scarecrow. But," he added, "tell me about your role in this case."

Francine pulled herself up. "I joined Scarecrow and Mrs King on the second day, in the undercover role of a hooker." She looked at the doctor. "I'm good at it," she said, daring him to make a spurious comment.

"I'm aware, Francine," he said. "Using sexual attraction can be one of the most effective ways to extract information from a suspect or subject of investigation." He looked over his glasses. "As long as the persona doesn't get in the way of your work."

Francine nodded. She'd heard this before, and was perfectly comfortable with her role.

"Now," said the doctor, "Tell me about working with Scarecrow and Mrs King. What are your observations?"

"Well, frankly," she said, "I wish they would just get on with it."

"It?" he asked, pen poised above the report.

"Yes," she said. "We all know Lee gets his eye on someone, and charms them until one or the other, usually he, has had enough. He's taking forever with Amanda." She recalled in her head, her encounter with them in the hall outside their hotel rooms during the Marvellous Marvin case. She almost wished she had just walked in on them having sex, instead of the intimate moment in front of her. And the look on Lee's face when she opened the door and saw him halfway in and out of his room, like she had caught him sneaking up to the girls dorm or something.

"I see," said the therapist, jotting something down in the folder. "And then I see that you and Mrs King were virtually kidnapped and imprisoned in a freezer, likely to die until Agent Stetson found and released you."

Francine silently thanked him for not saying "rescued" - she hated the idea of anyone "rescuing her." She could take care of herself, thank you very much.

"So?" he asked?

"So . . . what?" she replied.

"So, this report says you were imprisoned and then rescued - nothing about what happened inside that freezer. Did you try to escape? What did you talk about?"

"Of course we tried to escape! But it was airtight," she responded. "As for what we talked about, well, as I recall," Francine wasn't going to tell this guy about her rant on Lee and how he wouldn't come to rescue them because he was just like all the others in her life who had just, well, left. "As I recall, she called me a witch."

"A witch?"

"Yeah. I think she meant 'bitch' but Amanda would never let a word like that pass her lips."

The doctor smiled. "You're probably right." He flipped some pages. "Shall I tell you her account of the conversation?"

Francine shrugged.

"She said you were remarkably calm, and your conversation about chocolate kept her from panic and, she believes, unconsciousness or worse."

Francine felt an unexpected feeling of warmth. "Well I guess if it helped her . . . " she shrugged again.

"She adds that Lee came to rescue you after all, despite what you had said. What was that about?" he asked.

She sighed. "Nothing. I was just calculating the odds that's all. Good thing I was wrong." But, she would never forget the look of tenderness that Lee gave to Amanda as he walked them out of the freezer. She had never seen anything like it on his face before and it touched her - not that she would ever say so out loud.

She stood and gathered her things. "So are we done?"

He stood as well. "For now." He shut his folder. "But stay in touch - we all need help when the status quo shifts."

Francine nodded, not entirely sure what he meant. What she did know was that Amanda's box of chocolates (worth 30 minutes at the gym), along with a glass of wine and a good romance novel waiting for her at home.

Her kind of ending.