Eames paused, and sized up the woman in front of her. Bright red hair, green eyes, pleasant face with freckles, flatteringly cut silver-grey suit with white blouse, pantyhose and heels, interesting antique silver earrings, light perfume, binder of papers, harried expression and air of needing to be somewhere else fast. Interesting accent, too - English was obviously her native tongue, but Eames thought the accent sounded vaguely familiar. One part Midwestern, one part… ah, that was it. One part Russian, if Eames' memory of the people they'd interviewed on the Shorokogat case was correct. Probably someone going to the conference upstairs who'd got off at the wrong floor? But no, she'd said she was looking for Bobby…

"…it's just, they're changing the running order of the conference and I need to speak to him before it starts if that's possible."

"Right. He got called downstairs, but he said he wouldn't be long… he'll probably just go straight up there."

"Okay… perhaps if I go up there and wait for him, you could pass on the message? It's just that one of the other speakers isn't here yet, so they're moving the agenda forwards - I'm on first, then he is."

"Not a problem, I'll pass that on."

The young woman smiled, a genuinely warm smile revealing white teeth. "Thanks. If you'll excuse me…" She smiled, turned, and trotted off hurriedly in the direction of the elevators. Eames, watching her go, thought she looked a little unsteady, perhaps not too used to wearing heels? She wondered with a private snigger whether she should call the young woman back and provide her with a warning about the consequences of falling for the Goren brand of charm, since she had no doubt that her partner wouldn't leave the conference without getting a phone number, at least. She suddenly realised she'd forgotten to get the woman's name, and called out to her, but the elevator doors had already closed. She strolled over to the vending machine and, feeling virtuous, selected the decaff. Just then the elevator doors re-opened and a familiar tall figure emerged.

"Bobby? Over here." She relayed the message, adding a description of the woman in question. He seemed to know who it was, nodded his thanks, dove back into the office, retrieved his notes for the conference, and then hurried out, waving a fast goodbye. Interesting. Ah well, back to the desk.

Several hours later, as the office slowly emptied for the weekend, she was discussing the progress she'd made on the case over the course of the afternoon with Captain Deakins. She was also simultaneously wondering whether to accept an invite for girls-only drinks that night from Sergeant Rosie Alvarez, an old acquaintance from her days with the Vice squad, when her partner finally returned. He looked a lot less distracted, and a lot more relaxed. Perhaps he had been worried about giving that speech. They spent an hour going over the case and catching up, then Bobby looked at the clock and began gathering his things. He looked around, and frowned with annoyance and concern.

"What's up?"

"Nothing… have you seen a couple of sheets of paper with handwriting on them?"

She resisted the urge to make a flip comment along the lines of Oh, just a couple of dozen today, and shook her head. "You lost something?"

"I hope not…" He continued looking. "I was sure I'd put them somewhere safe." He actually looked worried.

"Did you have them with you earlier?"

"Yeah." He was bending at the waist and rooting through the drawers of his desk.

"Well, they've got to be here somewhere - you haven't been away from the desk apart from the conference all day."

"True." He kept looking, then glanced at the clock again. She took pity. "Two sheets of paper with handwriting - is it your handwriting?"

"Some of it."

"Well, I'm sure I'll recognise them. I'll look for them myself if you need to get going. What do they look like?"

"You're sure? Thanks, Eames. It's two sheets of paper, one of them's got my handwriting on - the writing's in German." He looked extremely relieved. She wondered exactly what was special about the papers, maybe it was something to do with Morelli's case? The media had been all over the case of the amnesiac man found sleeping under a piano in a bar at night; perhaps Morelli & Goren had found out something about him?

"Is it to do with Morelli's case?"

"Ummm…. He's got some papers from an interrogation we did that he needs translated."

"Is that why he gave them to you?"

"Yeah... yeah, that's right."

"You got plans for the weekend?" she asked, beginning to go through through the papers all over their desks and stack them away.

"Uh, yeah…" His voice trailed off, either losing his train of thought or being so fascinated by it he'd forgotten he was speaking. "Umm… see you next week." And, for the second time that day, he practically sprinted out of the office. Deakins had wandered across to her desk to say good evening, and they stared after Bobby in silence.

"Is it me, or has he been acting weird lately?" she asked.

Deakins made the inevitable reply. "More weird than usual? Yes. I'm surprised he asked for leave next week."

Yes, that had been a surprise to her too. Bobby usually took some time off in summer to catch up with his old friends and travel a little, but, being a single man with few relations, almost never asked for time off at short notice. It had been a surprise to both herself and Deakins when he'd said he wanted to take some leave for the first part of the week immediately following the conference. They could afford it - the case they were working was important, but they'd put in some extra hours and pretty much everything was wrapped up - but it was a little out of character.

"I'm not sure whether to be worried that he needs the time off, or take it as a good sign that he recognises he needs it," she mused out loud.

Deakins shrugged, and smiled at her. "With him, who knows? Have yourself a good weekend." He left the office, no doubt already looking forward to two days away from the office with his family.

Eames watched him go, and thought about her plans for the evening. She was going to visit her family for the day tomorrow, and she'd been busy all week with no time for housework or anything but the case they were working on. She should really go home and tidy up, perhaps even hit the gym for half an hour first, then maybe use up the leftover salad and cold chicken in the fridge... The heck with it. She picked up the phone, and called Alvarez to accept the drinks invitation.

As she was replacing the receiver, she knocked a file off the desk. Crouching down to pick it up, she noticed two sheets of handwritten notes in a plastic wallet stuck in at the back, hidden behind some papers she'd seen Bobby reading earlier. He'd obviously picked them up in a bundle and not noticed the extra sheets when he put the papers back in the file. She glanced over the notes. Yes, they were obviously the right ones. Two sheets of paper, all four sides covered in handwriting. Interestingly enough, one page of notes was unmistakably Bobby's, but the handwriting on the other page - neat, looping - she did not recognise at all. Possibly Morelli's? No, he didn't speak German, obviously, or why would he have asked Bobby to get the papers translated for him? Perhaps he'd asked Bobby to interrogate the homeless man, or someone who claimed to know him, and this was the transcript or something. Intriguing.

It occurred to her that she could do Bobby and Morelli a favour. The bar she and Alvarez favoured for their little catch-up sessions was just round the corner from Dr Fritz Hoffman's home. Hoffman was yet another of Bobby's useful acquaintances; a retired German pathologist, whom the NYPD occasionally retained as a translator. She could drop this off with him and get it translated for Bobby to give to Morelli when he got back from leave, so he didn't have to do the translation himself on his first day back.

Quickly, she went over to the copier and ran off two copies, in case Hoffman needed them to write on whilst he was translating. Feeling fully justified in accepting Alvarez's invite, she donned her coat, applied a little lipstick, tucked all the papers in their folder carefully into her purse and departed.