After they'd each grabbed a quick shower and a couple of pieces of cold pizza Nick and Sara were on their way to meet Brass. Sara was acutely aware of the fact that her hair smelled like Nick's shampoo and she couldn't keep from smiling. Neither one of them was particularly talkative as they thought about what was happening between them. Sara was curious exactly what Nick's intentions were because she knew that her heart was already in too deep to let things go after one nice date. She wasn't ready to tell him that, but she was certainly feeling it. She really didn't want to get hurt again, she wasn't sure she could handle it.

Nick glanced over at her and noticed the somewhat serious expression on her face. He felt a bit of sinking feeling in his gut, but he reasoned that she might be thinking about the case and shouldn't jump to conclusions that she really wasn't that interested in him. He knew that there needed to be more dates, a lot more dates between them and he hoped that his eagerness wouldn't scare her off. He'd been pining away for her in some form or another since he'd met her, but he'd only admitted it to himself more recently where he knew he was going to have to do something about it or reconcile himself to either going crazy or consider becoming a priest. He'd actually given the priest idea some thought since he wasn't particularly keen on the idea of insanity. Of course that was before he'd asked her out.

Sara felt Nick looking at her and she let out a soft chuckle. "You know, you might want to try and pipe down over there, you're not letting me get a word in edgewise."

Nick laughed. "Sorry, you seemed lost in thought and I didn't want to interrupt." She really was beautiful and her smile made his heart flip.

Sara looked over at him as he drove, her voice was soft. "I really had fun with you." There were a lot of things she was saying in that simple phrase.

Nick grinned at her. "I really had fun with you too."

Silence descended on the Denali for a moment.

Then they spoke at once.

"I was thinking." Nick felt his words were tripping over each other.

"I had a thought." Sara giggled nervously as she realized they both seemed to be thinking along the same lines.

"You first." Nick was always the gentleman.

"Uh, no, you." This was one topic that Sara wanted to see his cards first before she gave a hint of what was on her mind. Despite the fact that they'd spent a rather cozy evening together on his couch, she wasn't going to let him know how deep she was in.

Nick felt a sudden drop in his stomach and forced a laugh out. "Ok." He gathered his thoughts and then glanced over at her, thankful for the red light. "I was thinking that maybe we could go out again, I mean, that we could just go out, I mean, that we could date each other."

Sara knew that she was smiling like a fool. Apparently all of her worry and concern was for naught. "Yes." She let out a nervous laugh. "I'd really like that."

"Ok." Nick felt a different kind of sensation in his stomach, but this was the kind that he felt when he went paragliding. He was so caught up in how her answer made him feel that he momentarily forgot that she wanted to say something too. "Uh, what were you going to say?"

"Nothing." Sara felt her cheeks hurting from all of the smiling she was doing. "I mean, I just wanted to see, well, what you asked me answered my question." She hadn't felt this tongue tied for quite a while.

Nick couldn't resist an opportunity to try and lighten the moment. "I always knew you wanted me."

Sara scoffed and Nick just laughed and they fell into easy conversationuntil they pulled into the parking lot of the police station where they were going to meet Brass. It didn't take long to locate him; he was standing in the lobby, just having gotten there himself.

He wasted no time on filling them in on what he knew. "Our vic is one Vanessa Ellis, age 32. She apparently wasn't supposed to be working, so no one knew she was missing until the night manager of the clothing store she worked in happened to find her purse sitting in the back office when she went to close up and prepare for the bank deposit."

"Has her family been notified yet?" Sara immediately switched into professional mode.

"Not so far." Brass continued as they headed down the hallway to his office. "I've got a uniform on trying to get in touch with her emergency contact that she'd listed on her employment application."

"We still aren't certain about the cause of death, but it may be accidental." Nick interjected.

Brass considered his words for a moment as they walked into his office. "You mean the gate on the enclosure."

Nick nodded. "That thing was an accident waiting to happen."

"Well, I like our vic for theft." Brass continued.

"She was stealing from the store?" Sara inquired hoping that this would explain the envelope of money they'd found taped to the dumpster.

"The manager indicated that there was a considerable amount of money missing and she gave me this." Brass handed over a handwritten note in a plastic evidence bag.

Nick and Sara did a quick read through of the note and as they did something occurred to Nick. "Ok, so she steals the money and tapes it to the dumpster. The only problem with that is she didn't have anything in her hands except for her keys when she went out to the dumpster before she was killed."

Sara nodded. "And who wrote the note? It sounds like directions for someone. She wasn't supposed to work, so are we sure the note was for her?"

"That's for you two to find out." Brass replied a bit dryly.

"Well one thing is sure, if someone else did put the envelope on the dumpster there's only one way to find out." Nick smirked at Sara.

She rolled her eyes. "Please don't tell me what I think you're telling me." She knew exactly what he was proposing; she just hoped that the coffee at the lab was fresh.

Nick just grinned at her. "Coffee and a movie, Sara?"