Forgive the short chapter, if it can even be called a chapter… I have hit a writer's block. Big giant heavy one too, at that. Guess you'll have to settle for this for a little bit. Okey dokey, I'll go find something to awaken my muse, then, while you read.

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Anger was not a strong enough word for what Clarice felt at that precise moment. She wasn't sure that anything could really describe it to her satisfaction. The letter lays unfolded on the counter as Clarice paces the kitchen. On one hand, she is privately thrilled to hear form him, but at the same time there is a stone in her stomach at the sight of the copperplate script. She cannot turn the letter over to the FBI, to do so would mean more trouble for her than for him. She never turned over the previous letter, and to do so now would complicate things and probably cause her to lose her hard won place in Behavioral Sciences. God damn Lecter and his games. Did he honestly think she had nothing better to do than play games? She wasn't a child anymore, she was an adult, more so than that, she was an FBI agent.

The letter is picked up once again and she has to restrain herself from wadding it up and throwing it across the room. She wished she could do that, but rather to Dr. Lecter than to his notes. She was not going to crawl back to him and beg for his help. No way. Starling's don't do that. We can stand up to life on our own, thank you very much and good day. Unfortunately, he was already there inside her head and mocking her. Ridiculing her and her background. Telling her that she would never be anything more than her mother was. Working in the motels on Route 66, watching the black and white crow steal from the cart. His voice told her that she would never be anything more than a well-scrubbed rube with a little taste. Starling finally got angry enough to silence him.

"Shut up, Dr. Lecter!" she cried, unfortunately out loud, startling her visitor who stood in the doorway. The normal person would have been shocked by this, made to wonder if she was as crazy as the men she seeks to capture. Will Graham was not normal. A grim smile twisted in his distorted features as he caught her eye.

"He got in your head too, didn't he?"

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