Title: What's Needed Author: Mariel Category: J/S Rating: I dunno, so just in case, let's say R Summary: It starts with a missing twelve-year old and goes from there. Sometimes what's needed is all you can do.

What's Needed by: Mariel

Chapter 1

Shelly Smith tossed her bedclothes to one side, rose, dressed quickly, and ran downstairs. Taking her place at the kitchen table, she reached for a box of Frosted Flakes and shook the white-iced flakes into a bright blue bowl. Pouring more milk over it than she knew her mother would approve of, she gulped down a few mouthfuls, then noticed the time on the clock. As she put down her spoon, her mother came into the kitchen. "You're running late," she warned. Shelly nodded. Rising, she went over to kiss her mother on the cheek. "Have a good day. I'll see you later," she said. Her mother smiled and turned to clear the table.

Shelly's voice soon wafted down from the front hall. "Mom! Where're my black shoes?" "In the closet," her mother called back. Shortly after, as she reached for the milk container, Monica Smith heard the front door slam. She winced at the loud sound, shook her head, then continued her morning chores.

-14 Hours Missing

Samantha Spade put her pen down with a clunk and pushed slender fingers through already disheveled blond hair. It was ten p.m., they'd started the kind of missing person's case that morning that always bothered her, and she was more than just a little frustrated at the lack of progress they'd made.

A warm hand on her shoulder made her lean back and look up.

"You should go home, Sam," Jack Malone told her in a quiet tone.

"You, too," she replied, her voice soft.

He moved to lean against the edge of her desk. "Yeah, well..."

She understood. Sitting here in their offices seemed a better choice somehow, as though, should they wait long enough, the missing would appear to them, healthy and whole by some miracle that only their vigil would grant. Staying here, when all that could be done appeared to have been done, was the one thing left to do.

Just as reluctant as he to call it quits, she looked at the files she'd been making notes on. Impulsively, she asked, "Would it be crazy if I suggested we take those across the street and go over them again while we get something to eat?" She placed a hand over her stomach. "I'm starved."

He smiled. "Crazy? No. But I know you're just trying to delay calling it a night. Besides," he added in a quieter tone, "you know our leaving together would be noted."

She gave him a dark-eyed look. "So is our being the only ones still here," she said. Before he could say anything in response, she raised her hand. "I know, I know... it's just that sometimes I feel trapped, you know? I-" She left the sentence unfinished, her voice trailing into a silence that said more than she felt able to say aloud.

They regarded one another a long moment. No need to rake up memories here: memories were constantly with them, stirring up a longing that they never, no matter their resolutions, managed to rid themselves of.

Both started when the phone on Samantha's desk rang shrilly.

Gathering herself quickly, she rolled her chair up to her desk and lifted the receiver. "Agent Spade."

Thinking the call might be personal, Jack rose, pausing only when Samantha placed a restraining hand on his arm. A quick shake of her head, and he subsided back into his former position, his hands gripping the edge of her desk on either side of him. He watched quietly while she asked questions and made notes.

He liked watching her.

Phone back in its cradle, Samantha twisted to one side and looked up at him. Tapping her notes with her pen, she said, "Looks like the father has gone missing, too. The Murray Smith registered at the Delta just showed up, and he isn't ours. New Orleans police did a check of the other hotels and came up empty. Our Murray Smith definitely wasn't staying where he told his family he was last night." She frowned. "We'll have to check the phone company to see where that call was made from. And we'll have to check flight records. It may be that the last we know of him is when he left his house Monday morning."

Jack did some calculations. "Today's Tuesday. Shelly went missing today, fourteen hours ago, give or take. Father last heard from by phone Monday evening from point now unknown. If he didn't go to New Orleans, Shelly's disappearance may have something to do with him."

"Why would he take his own daughter?" she objected. "Nothing we've seen so far indicates there'd be a reason for that. I don't see the point." In spite of her words, however, Samantha felt a glimmer of hope stir. If the father had taken her, chances were she was alive.

Jack shrugged. "I don't know, but it's too much of a coincidence to ignore."

She nodded, then rose and walked over to examine the frustratingly empty white board.

An eight by school photo of Shelly Smith smiled down at her. Twelve years old; attended grade 7 at Fredrick Douglas Academy. Mother: Monica, aged thirty, a stay at home mother, Father: Murray, aged forty-five, owner of a small software company. Freckle-faced, with thick wavy reddish-blond hair, her features showed an emerging beauty that in a few years would entrance every teenage boy within miles. At 8:20 a.m., Shelly had left home for school and disappeared. And, after hours of questioning and investigation, that was the last they knew about her movements.

Samantha did know other things, of course: at 9:15 a.m., the school's safe arrival program had alerted the mother that her daughter had not arrived at school. By 10:30 a.m., after phoning around to all Shelly's friends' homes, Monica Smith had contacted the police. By 2:30 p.m., the police had made preliminary contact with the FBI's Missing Persons department. By 3:30 p.m., Martin and Danny had begun the routine of interviewing the mother, examining the girl's room and talking to her friends.

A side note on the board said the father was on a business trip and had not yet been contacted.

She erased the notation and filled in the latest: father's location unknown.

Crossing her arms, she frowned.

"Looks like you got your reason not to leave."

Jack had silently walked up behind her. His voice came from a spot within her personal space, but not so close that they would appear inappropriate. Still, she felt a familiar, soft tremor run through her in response to his nearness.

She turned, smiling slightly. Resisting the impulse to reach out and touch him, she said. "I'll check the airlines and the credit cards."

Jack nodded and moved with her, heading towards his office. "I'll have a look at his bank records and find out where that phone call to his wife was made from. Let me know what you find." He thought about the interview with the mother and the impression that had been given. "Guess all is not as perfect as she wanted us to think."

Samantha raised one elegant eyebrow. "It never is," she said softly. Sitting down, she reached towards her computer and began to delve into Murray Smith's spending and travel habits.

Two hours later, Jack looked up as Samantha paused in his doorway. Her straight, shoulder-length hair was now pulled back into a tight ponytail - she kept, he knew, an endless supply of elastics in her top desk drawer for this purpose. As always, a few recalitrant strands fell down to to touch her jaw. The look she threw him told him she was more than a little frustrated.

"No luck?"

Bypassing the chairs set in front of his desk, she came around beside him. Placing a sheaf of papers on his blotter, she turned to sit on the edge of his desk. "Nothing. Nada. Zilch," she reported, grasping the edge of the desk tightly. "Last travel ticket purchased eight days ago was a two day trip to Detroit, which he used. Got back last Wednesday. Spent two hundred and thirty dollars at a men's store in a mall near his home on Saturday. Put gas in his car on Sunday."

Jack leaned back in his chair. "The phone call he made to his family Monday night was from a pay phone in Queens. We'll work on that tomorrow. The most cash he's withdrawn from his bank account at a time is two hundred dollars, last Sunday. That wouldn't get him far. I checked back over the last twelve months; he takes out a couple hundred in cash fairly regularly - twice a month or so - but he'd have to be awfully careful to make it add up to anything."

Samantha didn't look excited by the information. "That's pocket change. It certainly wouldn't support a getaway with a child."

Jack agreed.

"Maybe he's seeing someone," she offered. "Maybe the business trip was a cover story for a romantic getaway."

"To where?" Gesturing towards the credit card records, he added, "He isn't using his cards to stay anywhere."

"So the woman's local. He's at her place."

"His wife and their neighbours didn't indicate there was a problem."

Samantha shrugged. "It's easy to keep things from the neighbours. And maybe the wife doesn't know there's a problem - or maybe she just doesn't want to admit to one. Regardless, we've got to find him."

"We'll talk to the mother tomor-" Jack stopped himself and checked his watch. "Later today," he amended. "I'm sending you home now. You're officially through for the night. Leave now, and you'll get a few hours sleep, at least."

"What about you?"

He lifted a shoulder and let it drop. "I'll leave in a half hour or so."

Understanding the need for time between their departures and hating it, she nodded. "Okay, then." Pushing herself easily away from his desk, she had more difficulty pushing away the memories of their leaving together, and of where they went and what they did...

"See you tomorrow," she said quietly, the shadows of their past hovering in the air around her.

He nodded, then looked over at his computer screen to stop himself from watching her walk away.

End Chapter 1