Show: NUMB3RS

Genre: Action/Adventure/Suspense

Rated: T (some violence and language, but it'll be kept at a minimum)

Pairing: Don/Terry friendship

Summary: As Charlie works on his formula to find the perpetrators of a devastating robbery and murder spree, Terry disappears. When Don and the team are given an ultimatum, will they be able to find her in time and uncover the identities of the criminals before another attack?

Disclaimer: I swear I don't own NUMB3RS. I swear I don't make money by writing this. Please don't beat down my door and arrest me, nice-awesome-CBS-executive-people.

Chapter Three:

Don woke the next morning feeling refreshed and energetic, confident that the day would be a productive one – Charlie was so close to cracking the case. He showered and changed into a clean suit, grabbing a donut and coffee from the counter downstairs. He glanced out the kitchen window and saw Charlie already sitting in the passenger seat of the car, head bowed, a notebook open on his lap, and a pen moving furiously across the page.

Chuckling, Don took the keys from the rack near the door and walked out to the car, watching Charlie's head snap up as the door slammed shut.

"So, think it'll be a good day?" he asked, backing into the street.

Charlie nodded with an optimistic smile. "We're close. Really close."

It was good enough for Don.

So far, the day hadn't been going well. Don glanced up at the clock again for the ninth time in five minutes. It was 9:27, and Terry, who was punctual to the point of neurosis, had yet to arrive. She was nearly a half-hour late for work and hadn't answered either of Don's calls. He was starting to feel inexplicably apprehensive, but he tried his best to calm himself.

'I'll give her three minutes. Three minutes. Come on, you're worried for nothing – doesn't she deserve to be late once in her life? No big deal,' he thought.

The others were scattered throughout the briefing room, quietly working on tasks for the case. Charlie was back at the whiteboard, transferring new figures from a piece of scrap paper to his half-completed formula, and David and Agent Brooks were huddled around one of the back computers, hacking away at a profiling simulation.

' David's getting pretty good at that stuff. He's learning quickly,' Don thought, silently watching the pair from his desk, 'But Terry's got the handle on it. She can profile like there's no tomorrow –'

He looked back up at the clock. 9:28.

'It's fine,' he thought rapidly, 'She's just caught up in some traffic. I think that they're doing some road work on her street –'

Don suddenly sat bolt upright in his seat, remembering that she didn't have a car. It had broken down the day before yesterday.

He stood quickly, practically leaping up from his desk, and headed for the door, pulling on his coat as he went. David looked up at him curiously.

"I'll be back soon. Just hold down the fort for a while."

Without waiting for a word of acknowledgement, he rushed out to the parking lot and started the car, whipping out his cell phone to call her for the third time that morning. He let it ring nine times before finally giving up.

As he drove the twenty blocks to her apartment, Don attempted to calm his swirling mind with logical thought. 'Knowing Terry, she probably just stayed up late last night reviewing the files. She was exhausted and just forgot to get up this morning.'

Unfortunately, a sickening, nagging voice in the back of his mind kept interfering with his rational thought pattern. 'A half-hour late. A half-hour. And she's never late. Terry is never late.'

He gripped the steering wheel tighter as her building drew closer. Parking along the curb, he forced himself to take the time to deposit a quarter in the parking meter and forced himself to take the stairs one at a time.

Upon reaching her apartment, he knocked loudly. There was no answer, so he rapped again even more insistently. Alarm bells started to go off in his head when no one came to the door, and he took no time in letting himself in with the spare key she had given him a few months ago.

The apartment was dark and quiet. "Terry?" he called, hardly expecting an answer at this point. He moved quietly to the bedroom, knocking only once before entering. The bed was neatly made, and a pile of clothes was folded in a laundry basket, but there was no sign of Terry.

He hurried back to the kitchen and saw the blinking light on her answering machine. Don pressed the button and was horrified to hear his own voice coming from the machine; he had left a message last night, calling right after she left the office. He'd forgotten to remind her that weapons inspection had been moved to Friday. She'd never played the message. She had never come home.

Don bolted for the door, dialing Charlie's cell phone number as he went. He fought down waves of barely constrained panic as Charlie answered with a distracted, "Hello?"

"It's me," he said without preamble, "Terry's missing."

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