Bacon. He took a deep breath. Yep, it was bacon. He lifted his head and smacked it on the underside of the coffee table. "Damn!" Rubbing his head, he wondered how he got under the table. "Barek!"

"Good morning, Mike."

"Did you move the coffee table?"

"I didn't have to. You rolled under it all by yourself."

He got up and threw his blanket onto the couch. Muttering under his breath, he headed into the kitchen where he stepped around Barek at the stove and Eames at the sink to pour himself a cup of coffee. "How about we find this freak and do whatever it is we have to do so I can have my bed back?"

Barek looked at him. "Lead us to him, Logan."

He frowned. "We've had this conversation before and I ended up being offered as bait."

He looked over his partner's shoulder at the breakfast she was cooking. Eames grinned at him. "Do you like having food in the place, Mike?"

"Sure, it's great...if I have someone to cook it. Either of you want to marry me?"

"Sorry," Eames answered. "I'm spoken for."

Barek laughed. "In your dreams, Logan."

"You know it, baby," he replied, laughing as he ran from the kitchen when she turned toward him brandishing the fork she was using to turn the bacon. From the safety of the living room, he called, "Where's the big guy? He go for another walk?"

"He knows better," Eames answered. "He's still sleeping."

"How'd you manage that trick...or don't I want to know?"

"No secret. I clubbed him over the head."

"I wouldn't put it past you after that shiner you gave him."

Barek looked around the corner at him. "That was a love tap, Logan. You want one?"

"I hope no one ever loves me that much, thank you. I think I'll just resign myself to a life of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and cold cereal." He took a chance on returning to the kitchen for more coffee. "Can I wake Goren?"

"Why?" Eames asked. "He'll be up soon."

"This whole 'I have a plan' idea with no details has me nervous."

"Oh, come on, Logan. Where's your sense of adventure?"

"I left it in the produce section of the supermarket. I may never eat another tomato."

Barek handed him a plate. "Here. Eat your breakfast and quit complaining."

"Think you can win me over with food?"

"I know I can, but right now I'm just trying to shut you up."

He took the plate and laughed as he sat down at the table with it. He was halfway through eating when Goren came down the hall from the bedroom. "You look a lot better. Feel better?"

"Depends on what you mean by that."

"Never mind; don't explain. Just get breakfast and sit down here and tell me about this plan of yours to catch Wolf Boy."

As he sat down, Eames set a plate in front of him. "Feeling better?"

He met her eyes, and she wasn't sure how to interpret his look. But he nodded and she lightly touched his cheek. He watched her walk back in to the kitchen and sighed softly. A few moments later, she returned with a plate of her own, Barek right behind her. "Okay, Bobby," Barek said. "Let's hear what you have to say."

"Two weeks," he said. "He'll be feeling the urge to kill starting to build, and he's not going to be able to put it off for long. A few days at most. The longer he waits, the more...vicious his attack is going to be. He's going to look for Steve and Kelsey, so we are going to have to use them to draw him out."

Eames stared at him. "You can't be serious."

"He prefers his primary targets, but he has already proven he will settle for secondary targets if he has to. I don't want that to happen. Enough lives have been lost. We'll wait until the last minute to use them, but I'm not exactly sure what the last minute is, so we're going to have to guess. The longer we can put him off, the more desperate he'll get. Desperation will make him careless."

"Suppose we miscalculate and he goes after another target?" Barek asked.

"Then we have two weeks to come up with another plan," Logan answered.

Goren shook his head slowly. "I don't think he's going to give up...if he can find out where they are."

"No, Bobby..." Eames protested.

"You're going to dangle them like a carrot before a hungry pony, aren't you?" Logan said.

"Are you absolutely sure we can protect them?" Barek asked.

"We have no choice. We have to draw him out, and they are the only bait we have. As attractive as it may sound to chain Logan to a lightpole, he's not the target Wolf is seeking. We have to use them and we have to protect them, at all costs."

Logan shook his head. "No wonder you kept this to yourself. As a plan, it sucks."

"Got a better one? I'm all ears if you do."

"Now you ask for my opinion, when I got nothing."

Eames studied her partner. "How do we bait him?"

"If he hasn't found them by Sunday, we send them out for a walk near Logan's place. We know Wolf has been watching us there. He'll follow them back to Lewis'."

"That's very risky."

"He's not going to make himself known. I'll stay nearby, just in case."

"You?"

"He's not going to touch me until after he takes his twelfth victim. I'll be fine."

"Suppose something happens and we can't protect them?"

The steely determination in his eyes made her flinch. "That is not an option, Eames."

"I agree with Logan," she said, frustrated with him. "This plan sucks."

Goren threw his hands out, palms up. "Let's hear a better one. If you can tell me how to do this any other way, I'll jump on it. If not, then it's all we have and we have to run with it. We just better make damn sure we don't trip and fall."

"That's a big order," Logan muttered. He studied his hands for a moment. "All right, man...what do we do?"

The four detectives sat around a table in a small restaurant in Long Island City, about four blocks from Lewis' apartment. They had been spending every night since Thursday watching the place. During the day, two unmarked cars were stationed there. Between ten and eleven at night, another unmarked car relieved one team while they relieved the other. The fact that they'd heard no more from Wolf was sending Goren's anxiety level through the roof. Conversation with him was brief and distracted. Eames knew he didn't realize he was being that way, and she was trying hard to be understanding. She knew he was worried about how this was going to play out, and he was feeling guilty about endangering Kelsey and Steve. He felt particularly bad about the risk to Lewis, who had no role in this whatsoever beyond his friendship with Bobby. He now regretted asking him to let Kelsey and Steve stay with him. Of course, Lewis brushed off any apologies; he was glad to help and he genuinely liked the young couple. And Kelsey and Steve were both eager to help, in spite of the risk; they trusted him. They had readily gone out that morning, walking in the neighborhood near Logan's, around through Goren's neighborhood, which wasn't far, and then by subway back to Long Island City and Lewis' apartment. Goren had followed at a discrete distance and was pleased that they had gotten over their understandable reluctance to ride the subway, but he saw nothing out of the ordinary. Kelsey, however, was deeply unsettled, and Goren took that as a sign that Wolf was nearby.

Eames knew he was anxious to get on with this and the stress of waiting was getting to him. She had let him retreat only so far; she was not going to let him withdraw any further. It was time to break through and make contact.

Halfway through the meal, Eames nudged him. No reaction, so she nudged him harder. He looked up from the file at her, his eyes questioning. She sighed to herself. "Are you going to eat?"

The look on his face told her he'd forgotten they were even in a restaurant. She reached over and gently took the file from him, giving him a look that dared him to object. He did not take the dare. She closed the file and slid it onto the chair underneath her, sitting firmly on top of it, again daring him to do something about it. He just looked away. Reaching toward him, she rested her hand on his arm, squeezing firmly until he finally looked back at her. "You have been getting more and more difficult and I think it's time you stopped treating us like we don't exist."

He frowned. "I haven't..."

Logan nearly choked on the bite of pork chop in his mouth. "Excuse me," he said once he'd swallowed. "Does anything outside that file even register with you? You've been an ass, Goren."

His eyes shifted to Barek, who nodded. Then he looked back at Eames. "I..." He sighed heavily. "I'm sorry. I...you should have said something."

"I tried to. You told me to shut up and I almost punched you again."

"I never told you to shut up."

"Not in those words, no. But your manner and your tone spoke volumes."

"You took it wrong," he said defensively.

Logan snorted. "How to you misinterpret 'Bug off'?"

"I meant that."

Barek laughed, stifling it quickly when her partner glared at her. "You did ask for that one," she said. "You were trying to annoy him."

"Well, it was better than being ignored."

"Then don't complain."

Goren looked at his plate, then he met Eames' eyes. "I, uh, I really am sorry."

"I know. But where did it get you?"

With a sigh, he answered, "It just gave me a bigger headache."

He studied the food on his plate until Logan said, "That's food, Bobby. Remember? You put it in your mouth, and chew and swallow it. Maybe your headache will get better if you try it."

Barek added, "You can't survive for long on coffee and an occasional danish."

When Eames slid her hand onto his thigh, he closed his eyes. Softly, she said, "Please eat."

He closed his hand over hers and looked at her. "It's going to be over soon. He won't be able to wait another twenty-four hours." His eyes shifted toward Logan and Barek. "This is your last chance to back out. He will not go after you as long as you don't go home until this is over. He's not going to go looking for you."

Logan replied, "You're safe until he takes his twelfth victim."

"Eames isn't."

Firmly, Barek said, "We're not going anywhere."

Logan nodded his agreement. "I made a commitment when I opened my big mouth, and I don't back out on my word. However this plays out, we're in it till the end."

Although he wasn't hungry, Goren forced himself to eat about half his dinner. His mind was circling the case like a vulture over a kill, and now he couldn't force it away from the fact that the fate that awaited them all somehow depended on him.

They lingered over their meal until after ten, when the restaurant closed. Then they made their way to the black Explorer and headed back to the street where Lewis lived. The lights were off in the apartment as they pulled into the alley behind the building. Eames turned off the engine and shut off the lights while Goren radioed for one of the unmarked cars to go home, verifying that the other was in position at the front of the building. And so they sat in silence, waiting, as they had for the past four nights, for something to happen.

Well past midnight, Logan broke the silence, asking, "Does this guy even know where we are?"

"I don't know. But if he doesn't show up tonight, he's going to choose another target and wait two more weeks to come after us."

"No way...call him and tell him where we are. I am not putting up with you for another two weeks...not the way you've been. I'll step out into the street with a friggin' flag and wave his ass down."

"Quit ranting," Barek told him. "We'll deal with whatever comes along, whether we like it or not."

"I won't like it," he replied sullenly.

Goren turned to face him. "I apologized," he said. "What more do you want?"

"Okay, that's enough," Eames finally stepped in. "Arguing is going to get us no where. Now pay attention."

"To what?" Logan snapped. "There's a rat over there almost as big as the dog I had when I was a kid. And a flickering streetlight at the end of the alley. What do you...oh, shit...please tell me I'm seeing things..."

He wasn't seeing things; the others saw it, too. Quietly, Goren said, "I'll go. You follow after ten."

"Bobby..." Eames started to protest.

He touched her arm. "Six more victims. I'm still safe."

He met her eyes and touched her cheek. No words were necessary. He slipped out of the car and vanished into the shadows of the alley. After counting to ten as slowly as she could, Eames said, "Let's go."

They got out of the SUV and headed into the alley where Goren had vanished a few brief moments before.