The beginning half of this chapter took me (no kidding here, folks) five tries to get it to a point where I could stand it. I still don't like it that well, but it should clear up a few questions left over from chapter 2. . . I hope, anyway. The beginning of the chapter is Terry's POV, in case I didn't make it clear enough in the writing.

Disclaimer:Checks: Nope, still don't own the show or the characters. Darn it.

Dedication: Hmm. . .I'm dedicating this chapter to all my reviewers. . . because you're all wonderful and I love you all!

Chapter 3:

The Hardest Thing

"Last chance." Don warned, digging through the pocket on his shirt for his cell phone. "I'm ordering. Are you sure you don't want anything?"

I laughed, "I'm sure."

"Okay. . ." He replied in a teasing 'you'll-regret-it' tone. He dialed, placed his order, and flipped the phone closed, sliding it back into his pocket.

We drove in silence while I cast my mind around for something to say. Finally, it settled on, "Are you worried about this case?"

He was so quiet that for a moment, I was afraid I had pried where I didn't belong. I was just opening my mouth to apologize when he answered, "Yes. It's always harder when the vic's just a kid, you know?" He was driving with one hand, eyes fixed on the road ahead. His other hand was fussing with the strap on his holster. I watched him closely for a moment before realizing that he was trying to get the gun out.

"Would you let me help you with that before you get us both killed?" I offered quietly.

Reluctantly, he removed his hand, and I leaned across the center console to unhook the strap at the butt of his gun. I eased the firearm from its case and laid it across my lap, turning my head to gaze out the window as I attempted to control my nervous breathing. I hadn't been that close to Don in. . . well, too long. I'd forgotten how good it felt.

Don cleared his throat, easing the nervous tension somewhat. "Thanks, that was really killing me."

For an instant, I thought he was thanking me for moving out of his personal space, but I realized quickly that he was talking about the gun, which had apparently been causing him an awful lot of discomfort. I offered him the closest thing I could get to a normal smile, "No problem."

He pulled to a stop at a red light and turned to face me. "Terry, can I ask you something?"

I turned too, meeting his intense gaze and feeling myself drowning in those impossibly dark eyes again. Get a hold of yourself, Lake. I commanded, then replied, "Sure."

He searched his mind for the right words, "Before, when we were still dating, you said that-"

He was interrupted by the blare of the horn of an irate Chevy van behind them. The light had changed, and the driver had grown impatient.

Don turned onto East Avenue, and I waited patiently for him to finish his question. However, he seemed lost in thought and disinclined to continue the conversation we'd been holding. Timidly, I prodded him. "Don?"

"There it is." He announced, pointing across me to where a gaudy neon sign split the darkness, claiming loudly to have "The best China in town!"

"Yes, there it is. Now what were you saying?" I attempted to force him back to the conversation at hand.

He eased into a parking space and turned off the car. "I'll. . . I'll tell you when I get back. I promise."

"Okay." I leaned back in the seat and crossed my arms over my chest. "You'd better."

"I will." He opened the door and jogged off, disappearing around the corner of the building.

After five minutes or so, I began to get a little irritated. What is taking him so long? I wondered, clearing a small circle in the fog on the inside of my window. Maybe they're not finished with his food yet.

However, when nearly ten minutes had passed and he still hadn't returned, I decided that it was time to find out what was going on. I unhooked my seatbelt, opened the door, and strode (much more confidently than I felt) around to the front of the building.

There was no sign of my friend. A small brown paper bag lay on the ground, leaking a bright orange sweet-and-sour sauce onto the concrete. A can of Coke (my favorite) lay exploded next to it, still fizzing.

And I knew.

"Don! Don Eppes!" I called, hurrying into the restaurant.

I raced to the young Chinese boy behind the counter. "Excuse me." I panted, waving to draw his attention to me. "Where did the man that was just in here go?"

The boy shrugged, apparently unfazed by my growing panic. "I was reading. I saw nothing, I hear nothing, I know nothing." He said impudently.

"Well, what happened? Where did he go? When did he leave?"

He ignored me for a moment, then turned to me. "I know nothing. I said."

"If you're lying to me, if you're hiding anything, I will find out, and you'll be charged as an accessory in the kidnapping of a federal officer. I don't think you want that. If you saw anything, you'd better tell me!"

Now, I noted with some satisfaction, there was worry in his eyes. "I really didn't see. He came in, got his food, left. I went to back, read news. You came in. That's all."

I groaned, frustrated. I spun on my heel and hurried back out the door to the parking lot. "DON!" I called on the top of my voice.

Not even a cricket answered me. Fighting back the growing panic and the tears, I hurried across the pavement to the car. I had some calls to make.

37 hours, 5 minutes left

3:25 a.m.

David watched with concern as Charlie hung up the phone. Charlie was shaking furiously again, and nausea lurched in his stomach at the memory of his father's broken, frantic voice. He crossed his arms as if to shield himself from the onslaught of memory. "What did your father say?" David asked.

"He's on the next plane out." Charlie replied shortly, dully, sitting down at the table and pulling the papers toward himself. He patted his pockets, then raked his fingers through his hair, then rustled through his papers.

Terry pulled a pen from her coat pocket and laid it on the table in front of him. "Here you go."

"Thanks." He said absent-mindedly. "None of you happen to have a wall map of Pittsburgh, do you?" He asked, already hard at work. He raked his hands through his hair aggressively. It was obvious that he was overly frustrated, and the fact that Don was the only one that could calm him in this state made his absence more conspicuous.

"Yeah, right here in my pocket." David teased him gently.

Charlie rewarded him with a small, forced smile and pushed to his feet. "Okay, I'll go get one."

"No, I'll go. I could use the walk." Terry volunteered, standing up from the armchair she'd been curled into. "You work."

"Are you sure you'll be okay?" David asked, concerned.

"I'll be fine. I'm just going to walk to the CVS next door. I'll even take my gun, and you can watch me from the window if you'd like." She promised.

David chuckled, a sound without much humor, and nodded. "Okay. I'll be watching."

She flew out the door, glad to be free of the oppressing silence and the suffocating heat of the small hotel room. When the elevator doors dinged open, she hurried into the deserted lobby, adverting her gaze from the window she and Don had stood before only hours ago, and out into the street. She strode confidently through the night to the drugstore, where a bored-looking teenage boy sat behind the counter, scouring the contents of a car magazine.

"Excuse me." She called, catching his attention. He glanced up, and a hormonal smile curved his lips at the sight of her. She dropped her gaze in a very un-Terry-like manner, avoiding his eyes. She just didn't feel like dealing with it right now.

"Hey. How can I help you?" He asked.

"I need the largest map of Pittsburgh you have, please." She told the floor.

"That would be this one." He pulled a cardboard tube, about four feet long, from under the counter. "7 feet long, 4 feet wide. 29.99."

"I'll take it." She was replying even as he finished. "Hold it for me for a minute."

She hurried through the store, dropping pens, tape to hang the map, highlighters, and, as an afterthought, a bright blue scratch-free window paint pen into her basket. She rang up her purchases, nodded at the boy's too-sweet "Goodnight!", and made her way quickly back to the hotel room. She knocked on the door and David opened it immediately.

"Thanks, David. Hey, I brought you something." She directed at Charlie. She dug through her bag and tossed the chalk down on the table in front of him.

He pounced on it with the closest thing to excitement they'd seen from him in days, and the most emotion they'd seen in hours. "Thanks!"

He quickly set up station at one of the huge floor-to ceiling plate glass windows and began scrawling. Outwardly, he appeared to be calm, focused. Inside, however, a storm of doubt, fear, and rage tore his spirit apart. Never before had he ever had to do something like this. Never had the stakes been this high. Never had he been the one to make the decisions, to save the lives. He had to be right. He had to. The result of any wrong answer, of the alternative, was something he couldn't bear to think about. He could face life without his mother, who had been the center of his world, with his brother at his side. Without Don, he knew he could never make it. For Don, he had to be right. And for that scared little college girl. For Don and for Chrissie.

Terry moved away to hang the map. As long as she could keep busy, she wouldn't have to think. She realized that that, whether Charlie would admit it or not, was also attributing to his frenzied, ceaseless work.

She finished unrolling the huge map and taped it to the wall with David's help. With nothing to occupy her hands, she began to pace. David caught her arm and whispered in her ear, "Want some coffee or something?"

"That would be wonderful." She replied softly. He directed her to a chair and moved to the bathroom, where a two-cup coffee maker sat serenely on the counter. She curled up in the armchair, content, for the moment, anyway, to brood and worry. She played with the necklace at her throat as she watched Charlie's hand dance across the window. He was shifting from foot to foot, keeping his body and mind occupied, just as she was.

32 hours, 37 minutes left

9:57 a.m.

She was jolted awake about six hours later by Charlie's triumphant shout. "I've got it!"

"You figured it out?" Half-dazed by the only six hours of sleep she'd gotten in nearly three days, she was a little groggy. "The whole equation?"

"Well, the part that will give us the square. See, I think he's giving me an area to work with, then we have to figure out where exactly he is. I think if we find him, we'll find them. This will tell me how wide an area we need to search."

As he drew it out on the enormous map, a flutter rose in hear heart. Somewhere inside that not-so-big box was Chrissie Baxter. . .and Don.

"Done." Charlie said, relieved, as he stepped away from the wall. He admired his work, studying the square that covered about eight city blocks. Exhileration swelled in his heart as he glanced at his watch, calculating the time left. There was still thirty-two and a half hours! There was hope. Hold on, Don. He thought, as though his brother could hear his telepathic message. We're coming. I promise.

"That's wonderful, Charlie! David, he's got it!" Terry called, assuming that her colleague, like herself, had fallen asleep somewhere.

"He went to pick Dad up at the airport." The small amount of jubilation that had colored Charlie's voice a moment ago had evaporated. His shoulders seemed to sag, as though dread, guilt, and fear were a physical weight on his thin frame.

"I thought you wanted your father to come." She said, confused.

"I did. I do. I don't know…" He laid the marker on the table with a sigh.

"So what is it?"

He looked away, obviously not too comfortable with answering.

"You can talk to me, Charlie."

"I promised." Charlie said, voice thick. "I promised to take care of him. What am I going to say to Dad?" Guilt reared again, so violently that he feared he might be sick. Try as he might to quash it, he couldn't quite erase the feeling. He knew, somewhere deep within, that he couldn't be blamed for what had happened. None of them could. Still, he thought as he began to re-check his equation, I promised. He had promised his mother that he would allow anything to happen to his older brother, and he knew that Don had sworn the same oath of him. They had promised and, even though he knew it wasn't so, Charlie felt as though he'd broken it. . . the only vow he'd ever taken that truly, deeply mattered to him.

He was saved the pain of worrying about it anymore, however, by the door flying open, revealing his father in the doorway. Before he could say anything, Alan Eppes had swept across the room and caught his younger son in a bone-crushing embrace. They stood together, silently, while David gently steered Terry through the adjoining door to her room, effectively giving father and son some privacy.

TBC….(hey, at least it isn't a cliffhanger this time…)

Midnight Dove: Glad you like it! Heh heh. . .I know I'm awful, but I just couldn't resist it! Something was bound to happen to him. I love David, too. I'm sad that he's not a very big character on the show yet. I think he's great. And very under-utilized. :Nod:

BrokenSpirit20: Commercial breaks always seem so long, don't they? I hate them. Who cares about the sponsors anyway? Here's an update, don't worry! I'm so honored that you like my story so much. Makes me feel great. -D

The Smiley: You have an awesome name! I really worked hard on Charlie's emotions this chapter for the reason you mentioned. I hope it comes across that way. Thank you!

wandering ghost: I'm glad you think it's getting better. It's really starting to drive me crazy. This is the longest, most in-depth, most difficult story I've ever written. It's very challenging. I am loving writing it, and I'm so glad you're enjoying reading it. The "girly coffee" conversation was fun to write, too. Thank you for the compliments, you make my day!

SapphireFae: I'm glad you think it's interesting, and I didn't end this chapter with a cliffhanger:) Hope you like it, and thank you for your review!

Teyla Sheppard: I'm really glad you like it:Blushes: I'm really enjoying writing it. Don't worry, we'll hear more from the kidnapper soon…and the next chapter should really make you smile. I grinned the whole time I was writing it, so I really hope you enjoy it. I know it's hard on Charlie. I made it that way. :evil grin: He's so much fun to torture, just because he's so dang cute. I'm glad the interaction came across well. I've worked really hard on this chapter, so I hope it comes across well.

strangexbutxtrue: :evil grin: Yes, Don. Thanks, I thought it was pretty good myself for 3:30 in the morning… x.x I thought it gave me a little leeway with the characters, and it makes me feel just a little better writing them, because a bit of OOCness can be excused in this case, I guess. I like your idea. I really like it. Hmmmm….yeah, definitely going to use that. Hey, you just re-wrote my whole ending, and I like it better! Thanks:Races off to find her notebook:

Len: Ah, yes, I am mean. But it is so much more fun to be on this side of the cliffhangers. :angelic smile: No cliffy this time, though. Yeah, math finals suck, don't they? I failed algebra 2 twice….that's why you won't find any real math references in the story. ECK! Don't you LOVE Don and Terry? Especially together! Hee hee…

SharpShooter626: Oh, yeah. I love to mess with my characters. :D I've done a lot, but don't worry too much. . . yet. :Whistles innocently to self:

LeoDiabla: Heh heh….I love you, Dylan! Don't worry, I'll take good care of Don. . . (Okay, I know that didn't sound as reassuring as I meant it to. . . Oops! Hee hee) Hey, somebody had to do it! It was inevitable-D

I'm glad you like it. The characterizations are stressing me more and more as I get into this story. AAAH! But as long as they're coming off good, it's worth all the re-writes I've done. I hope you like this chapter too. I know we're only on the fourth episode. . . :sniff: but hey, episode 5 comes out tonight:Happy grin:

AdiktedNos: Hey there to my favoritest little brother. Sorry, kid, your screen name wasn't hard to figure out. You know I love Don/Terry too, and cliffhangers are just too much fun to write. I couldn't help it. I'm finishing, I'm finishing! This is the only notebook I've carried for weeks, you know! LOL! Love, your sis

Takada Saiko: No, no, don't fall:Helps you up: There there, it'll be alright, I think. I'm glad you think I write well. This story is seriously stressful sometimes. EEK! Don't worry, Charlie will take care of him. . . NOBODY messes with Charlie's brother. Come to think of it, nobody messes with Don anyway. Thanks for your review!

Thanks, everyone!