Disclaimer: I still don't own Numb3rs or any of the characters.

Author's Note: Sorry! I meant to update sooner. Bear with me, and I should be able to wrap this story up quickly. Promise!

This is a Season 1 story.

Special thanks to Mt.Suz!

Chapter 10

As Charlie was leaving class the next day, he turned on his cell phone to find three voicemails from Don. Each message asking Charlie to call in a more urgent tone than the last.

Ignoring the final message from another caller, Charlie immediately called Don.

"Eppes."

"Don, what's wrong?"

"Charlie! Finally! Listen. I don't have long, but I need to know: last night, in the bar, what did you and Terry talk about?"

Charlie hesitated. He was less than eager to reveal they'd been talking about Don behind his back. Stalling for time, he asked, "Why? What's going on?"

"Terry," Don groaned. "She's been on my case all day and I don't know why."

Charlie snickered, relieved that his brother's crisis wasn't anything more serious. "Well, a hangover can make anyone…"

Don cut him off. "No. Uh-uh. This is personal. This is about me being punished."

Charlie dropped onto a convenient bench next to the bike rack. "Okay, so what did you do?"

"Hey!" Don exclaimed in an affronted tone. "Why assume it's my fault?"

Charlie patiently waited.

After a moment, Don grudgingly acknowledged, "Yeah, okay. But precedent aside, I still don't know what I did. I finally asked her, and she said 'Maybe Charlie can figure it out.' So, it's gotta be something you figured out and talked about with her. Right?"

Thinking back over their conversation, Charlie said, "Well, I told her I thought you had another objective for the basketball game besides winning. I told her it seemed like you were ducking fights with Alex and letting Terry fight him for you."

There was a pause on the other end. When Don spoke again, there was a slight smile in his voice. "You figured that out, huh? Not bad, Charlie." Then, in a brusque tone, he said, "Okay. Thanks."

Click.

Charlie stared at his phone in disbelief. Only Don would consider that an acceptable end to the conversation. He quickly hit the speed dial number for Don's cell.

"Eppes."

"Hey! You can't hang up without an explanation. What's going on?"

Charlie could just barely make out the "Oh, man" Don muttered before he said in a louder voice, "Hang on." Charlie couldn't hear anything for a minute, but presumably Don was moving to a private space to talk.

When he came back on the line, Don said, "You can't repeat this to anyone, okay? About three months ago, I asked Alex for a favor. No big deal, just… see if he could get some of his contacts in Washington to speed something up, you know? Make sure a certain file made it to the top of the list."

Charlie listened to Don's vague description and decided to let it slide for now. Shaking aside his thoughts, he picked up the conversation. "But if Alex gets pissed off at you, maybe that file gets buried at the bottom of the list instead."

"Right," Don sighed. "And this favor – it should be coming through any day now. I mean, I'm not gonna throw the game or anything, but I can't exactly get in his face right now, you know?" Charlie could hear the frustration in his voice and was dying to ask more questions, but he knew it wouldn't do any good. He'd already pushed to get this much out of Don. Charlie knew his brother well enough to know that pushing further at this point wouldn't work.

Instead, he decided to move on to a different piece of the puzzle. "Okay, so why is Terry mad? You asked her to distract Alex from going after you, right? Clearly, she hasn't had a problem with it so far."

Don sighed into the phone. "I didn't. That's the problem."

"I don't understand."

"I didn't tell Terry what I was up to, alright? I decided not to tell anybody in case it didn't work out. She's mad because I kept something from her."

Charlie had to admire Terry's poker face. Last night, he'd pointed out something she'd missed, and she never gave any indication she wasn't already in the know.

Don continued speaking, his voice rising as he warmed to the topic. "But I didn't have to ask her to help me. Because I know she'll not only watch my back, but take on Alex or anybody else the second I hesitate. I know because she's the best partner I ever had. I know because she's Terry. And Terry… can move very quietly when she wants to."

Charlie was thrown by the abrupt change of topic until he figured out what must have happened. "She's standing right in front of you isn't she."

Don was too busy to answer. "Hey, Terry. How's it going?" The pained yet slightly bemused tone of his voice said he was busted and he knew it. "You, ah, you look very nice today."

Charlie tried to help by coaching, "Try complimenting something specific."

"I really like that gun holster. Is it new?"

Charlie's eyes flew open wide. "No! Bad! Pick something else."

But Don continued his conversation with Terry uninterrupted. "Leather, really? Hey, a comfortable holster is hard to find. Adjustable, huh? Nice."

Charlie couldn't believe that was working. Either Terry had overhead Don's comments about how much he admired her as a partner; or she found his floundering charming in a pathetic sort of way.

Don said, "Uh-huh." There was a pause before he said, "I don't think that's a good idea."

"What? What's not a good idea?" Charlie asked.

Don ignored him and continued speaking to Terry. "Besides, Charlie's too busy to talk right now." Don's sentence was punctuated by a loud "Ow!" and his voice sounded far away as he grumbled, "Hey, no hitting!"

Terry's voice came on the line. "Hi, Charlie," she greeted in a friendly tone.

Charlie quickly covered the phone to stifle a laugh at how easily she'd claimed the phone from his supposedly tough big brother. As soon as he could swallow the laugh, he asked, "How much did you overhear?"

"Enough," she replied.

"Is he's forgiven?"

"Maybe. He still has to learn it's not good to keep things from me. And that it's okay to say nice things about people to their faces instead of just behind their backs." Clearly, her comments were directed as much to Don as Charlie.

"And everyone thinks he's the more socially adept one of us," Charlie complained.

She laughed. "Well, until he improves his social skills, I guess it's up to us to look out for him."

"Yeah? And if Alex tries to provoke him during the game?"

"I'll knock Alex down and you can step on his neck."

Charlie laughingly agreed. It wasn't until after they'd exchanged goodbyes and ended the call that it occurred to him to wonder if she knew that was supposed to be a joke.