"Well at least you won't be walking funny anymore when you pick up Jack from the airport tonight," Jake Cohen remarked with a smirk when Brooke McCoy breezed past him as they left Sam Prescott's office.

"Shut up Cohen," she said with equal humor after she opened her office door. "I told you, Jack and I were moving furniture the night before he went to L.A. and I pulled-"

"Oh save it for someone can't tell when you've gotten some," the senior ADA shot back as he watched her collect her belongings. "What time does your Adonis return from the coast?"

"Eight o'clock," she said as she glanced at her watch.

"Then you better scoot. It's ten after five now and you never know when the train is going to be delayed."

"Agreed. Do you mind dropping me at the station?"

"Anything to keep you from being cranky," Cohen said with a wink as the phone on Brooke's desk began to ring.

The pair exchanged worried glances as Brooke reached for the receiver.

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It was almost ten when Michael Cutter and Jack McCoy pulled up in front of McCoy's brownstone.

"Mike I really appreciate you finding the time-"

"Not a problem Jack," the EADA replied as the button he pressed popped the latch on the truck of his sedan. "When Brooke called and asked me to meet you, she said the cops out her way had just booked the suspect in that child abduction case last March. I knew you wouldn't expect her to drop that just to play chauffeur."

"Not that it would have mattered what my expectations were," McCoy said with a smirk.

"Would it have mattered to you, if the positions were reversed?"

"How long haveyou been working across the hall form me, Mike?"

"Gee, maybe six months."

"Then you already know the answer to that, don't you," McCoy replied without missing a beat, as he opened the car door.

"Hey Jack speaking of cases, Connie is arraigning the suspect in that jewelry store murder I told you about while you were out of town."

"Anything out of the ordinary?"

"Nothing so far," he said as he shook his head.

"Good. Where due for a slow spell, maybe this case will be open and shut."

"Here's hoping," Cutter replied before McCoy closed the door.

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The next morning, Sam Prescott's eyes were glued to the lead story of the Islip Bulletin when he started down the hall way leading to his office. Having been in court all of the day before to wrap of the last of his open cases for the state attorney's office, Prescott had been unaware the man accused of raping and murdering six year old Chloe De Antonio had been not only charged but arraigned in night court, due in large part to the persistence of his EADA. As he paused to unlock his door, Prescott's attention shifted to an unexpected sound in the office across the hall.

Cautiously opening the door that had been ajar. Prescott found a case file on the floor, not far from his former wife who's head rested on the blotter of her desk.

"Lord woman, weren't you supposed pick up your husband at JFK last night," he asked as he gently shook her shoulder. "Mal? Mal, it's after seven…Come on girl, open those eyes. McCoy's probably got the 2 7 dragging the Hudson, tryin' to find you by now."

After a few more aggressive shakes, the sleepy blue eyes slowly opened; widening slightly as they focused on Prescott's troubled face.

"Sam?"

"That's me," Prescott replied as Brooke stared curiously into his amused green eyes.

"Hi," she replied dreamily as tried to stifle a yawn.

"Hi, yourself."

"What are you doing here," she asked as she carefully pulled herself up and her office chair back.

"I was gonna ask you the same question. Although the better question is, where does Jack think you are?"

"Don't panic Prescott," she said while she rubbed the sleep from her eyes before she moved towards the half empty pot of coffee across the room. "Jack called when I didn't pick him up at the airport. I told him I was going to be late-"

"Late? Darlin' it's seven thirty four, A.M. What in hell kept you here all night?"

Brooke gestured at the paper her former husband still held in his hand as she poured them each a cup of coffee.

"It should be front page news by now," she remarked as she handed him a mug.

"The De Antonio murder? Mal, I saw that you moved fast on that arraignment… stayin' for night court is one thing…but stayin' all night? Come on, I'll bet the cops haven't even completed their reports –"

"What they have all ready will turn your stomach. It did mine, "Brooke said as she reached for the receiver and began to dial.

"Most rape homicides aren't pretty, honey."

"Oh Sam, it's so much more than that, so much more," she said gravely just before she heard her husband's weary voice on the other end of the line.

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By the time District Attorney Jack McCoy entered his office the basket of assorted perishable delights his wife had ordered as a 'welcome home/ I'm sorry I didn't come home last night' peace offering had been placed on his desk.

McCoy had felt a mixture of relief and anger when he received a call from his wife explaining why her side of their bed hadn't been slept in. While he was relieved to know Brooke was alive and well, McCoy could feel his temperature rise as she described the case she already obsessed with.

"…the DeAntonio girl is just the tip of the ice berg," she said indignantly. "Jack, this son of a bitch was selling children. He killed Chloe DeAntonio to keep her from going to the police."

"That's no reason to take up residence in Islip," he barked.

"Well, as I'm concerned a raping, child murdering animal who sells newborns to the highest bidder is more than enough reason for me to spend every waking hour trying to put this son of a bitch away for life. Even if that means I spend a night or two in Islip occasionally."

"Newborns," he said with a sense of foreboding filling his consciousness.

"Yes, Jack. This bastard was selling babies."

Shaking his head, McCoy's annoyed scowl softened as he read the heartfelt apology on the attached card. McCoy pulled off the protective cellophane and slipped the half a dozen packages of gourmet nuts into the top drawer of his desk before placing the basket behind his desk, just before Mike Cutter opened his office door.

"Jack, the cops have some new evidence in that jewelry store murder that I think you might want to hear."

A few minutes later, McCoy was sitting beside Connie Rubirosa in his old office and listening intently to taped conversations that had led the detectives at the 2 7 to believe the murder was linked to an escort service called 'Excalibur'. After discussing the need to talk to the call girl who had been booked for the shooting the night of the murder, McCoy felt his throat tighten as he listened to the next client book a date.

Upon hearing a sickeningly familiar voice, McCoy's initial alarm was covered by the poker face he had perfected during his days in the courtroom.

"I've heard enough. Thanks," he said before abruptly making a bee line for his office.

God no, McCoy told himself more than once and he leaned back in the chair behind his desk. Not only is this going to destroy Donald Shalvoy politically, the effect sleeping with prostitutes will have on his marriage…on Rita… will be more than devastating

With a heavy sigh, McCoy took the half empty bottle from his bottom drawer, along with a glass. As he sipped at the amber fluid, McCoy thought about the idealistic young intern that had one of the worst cases of hero worship he'd seen in over twenty years with the DA's office.

Jack McCoy had met the current Mrs. Donald Shalvoy after interviewing a woman who had been brutally raped and left for dead. The task was one that normally would have fallen on his then assistant Serena Southerlyn, had she not been out with the flu. Just as he was leaving the victims room, the social worker on rotation for the local rape crisis unit came barreling passed him, with the wide eyed intern behind her.

After berating him for 'harrassing' a rape victim, the social worker had commanded Rita to wait until she called her and disappeared behind the heavy white door.

McCoy could sense the young woman's discomfort and gave her a reassuring smile.

"Would you consider it harassment if I told you to take a deep breath and count to ten?"

Rita gave him a startled stare before slowly shaking her head.

"Is it that obvious?"

"That she's is your first victim? Not at all," McCoy said before sitting beside her.

Rita smiled despite her nervousness at the obvious contradiction.

"Then why the counting and breathing tip?"

"Because that's what I do everytime I have to face a victim," he said with sudden seriousness as he slipped his card from his pocket to her hand.

Rita glanced at the card, only to hold it up and study the name she had heard bantered around by various mentors.

"You're Jack McCoy," she said with enough awe to make the older man's smile deepen.

McCoy still smiled as he remembered that look of awe on a face a few years younger than that of his assistant. How he hated to think of the look he'd see on that same face, once Donald Shalvoy's indiscretions became public knowledge.