Coming Home

Amita had been surprised to hear Terry's voice on the phone and questioned the agent as soon as she got to the building.

"I thought you were in Washington."

"Yeah. I begged the director to let me do this case. It's the least I can do for Don and Mr. Eppes."

"What did you want me to look at?" Terry opened the file and turned it to face the black-haired woman.

"The algorithm. Does it remind you of something?" Amita looked at it closely before her eyes widened.

"Looks like Charlie's from the case with the missing girl. But that wasn't a real working algorithm."

"Is it possible to modify it to make it work?" Amita looked at the document again, running her hand down along the numbers.

"The techs pulled that from the hacker."

"Do you have a list of the banks hit?" she asked suddenly. Terry nodded, withdrawing another sheet of paper from another file. Amita looked down the list, eyes widening as she went.

"Terry, Charlie worked on computer security systems for all of these banks."

"They're all government institutions with the richest clients. It doesn't surprise me." Then Terry understood.

"They kidnapped Charlie to hack into the banks and electronically transfer money." She stood up to run the news down to the techs so they could start tracking an account number for the transferred money. Then turned back.

"Can you track the money back to the original IP address?" She asked.

"Can I?" Terry moved back to the woman.

"I know how much Charlie means to you. I'm giving you the chance to help on this case."

"Are you serious?" Terry nodded.

"I… don't know if I could."

"Work on the case or track the address?"

"Tracking the address is the easy part. Not to mention with the stuff they're using they're going to need some serious coolant to keep the monitors running while they do the complex hacking. Even with the creator of the system it doesn't make it easier, really. Charlie has to ask the banks to let him in so he can fix bugs in the system…"

"Amita," Terry stopped her. "It's up to you whether or not you work on this case. We're not going to force you if you don't want to."

"Charlie would have done it for me," she said finally. Terry grinned and motioned for her to follow.

"Terry!" She stopped, almost with a growl, and turned to face the approaching Caleb.

"Have you ever heard of someone named Raymond Dannacher?" Terry narrowed her eyes in thought.

"Not that I can recall, why?"

"Um…" Amita spoke up tentatively. "He did some computer work for Charlie once. We were working on my thesis at the time." Terry nodded in reassurance. This was good.

"You remember him?" Amita nodded.

"He wouldn't leave me alone while he was there. Plus, he kept glancing around the room at Charlie's work. You know how he leaves it all up on the boards." Again, Terry nodded.

"His name came up when we were searching though possible kidnappers. He's got a couple attempted kidnappings on his rap sheet," he finished. "Hello." Amita smiled shyly.

"Amita Ramajuan, Caleb Haynsworth. Haynsworth, this is Amita," Terry introduced, a look warning Caleb to stay away from the woman. Caleb smiled and said a polite 'pleased to meet you' before turning back to Terry.

"You want to tag along?" Terry rolled her eyes good-naturedly.

"I'm just going to take Amita down to our techs. The algorithm Gulle brought me is Charlie's from a previous case."

"Good luck," Caleb said pressing the elevator button and waiting with them.

"On what?" Terry elbowed Caleb hard enough to make him wince.

"The rumour mill's been working overtime again?" she asked sweetly. Caleb only nodded, knowing better than to antagonize Terry when she was violent.

"Don't listen to anything people say. Most of them are really nice, if a little territorial."

"Any computer geek is," Amita replied with a grin, lifting the bag at her hip slightly. "It's why I have mine." The doors opened on none other than Don Eppes.

"Amita! I didn't know you were here," Don said as they boarded the car.

"I needed her help on something," Terry replied vaguely. She'd forgotten to mention to Amita that Don was not to know she was on Charlie's case. The pain flashed in his eyes and she knew the feeling. As great as Amita was, she wasn't Charlie and never would be. Still, Terry liked the woman and if she could be of any help, Terry wanted her on board. Caleb stepped off at the ground floor but Don stayed on making Terry curious.

"Don?" He wasn't looking at either woman.

"Dad called." Terry absorbed the news carefully.

"He asked about dinner tonight." Terry and Amita exchanged glances.

"Dinner?" Terry asked anxiously.

"He wants me to come for dinner."

"That's great isn't it?" Don shrugged as the elevator stopped and Amita and Terry moved to get out. She looked back at him before stepping out.

"Give me ten and we'll get some food?" Don nodded silently and she graced him with an encouraging smile. The doors closed and Terry was off to find the tech that had provided her with the algorithm.

She made it to Don's desk in under ten minutes and sat on the edge while he finished up a phone call. Megan was working away at her desk and David wasn't around. The other agent was there. He spotted her and made his way over.

"Sorry, I don't believe we've met." Terry smiled, knowing full well Don and David had probably talked about her in the past.

"Terry Lake. I apologize for the late introduction, I've been a little caught up in my case." He smiled as he shook her hand.

"No worries. Colby Granger. It's a pleasure to meet you after everything we've heard." He chanced a glance at Don, who had one ear plugged to block out their conversation.

"I'm glad you're here. He seems better from yesterday." Terry shrugged.

"I don't know if I did anything," she answered honestly. "He slept and ate."

"And it always makes us all feel a little bit more human," Colby answered wisely and Terry laughed. It wasn't much longer before Don hung up. Terry's attention was immediately directed at him and away from Colby, something that didn't go unnoticed by Colby or Megan, sitting within observation distance.

"Ready to go? I'm starved," she said, pushing herself off the desk. He looked at her disbelievingly.

"You ate almost more than I did at breakfast this morning," he said. Terry shrugged.

"That's only because your stomach shrunk because you're not taking care of yourself," she answered, the superiority of her tone making him smile.

"Okay, smart ass, let's go." He placed his hand automatically on her lower back as they walked towards the elevator, Terry telling some sort of animated story while Don listened. Megan and Colby looked at each other.

"You think it'll work this time?" Colby asked.

"If he's not stupid enough to let it go again," Megan responded.

"Terry and Don?" David asked knowingly, having returned from his errand and dropping a file on Don's desk. "There was a betting pool before Terry moved away…"

"Okay, tell me about dinner," she said when they were comfortably seated in a booth in the café around the corner. Neither had wanted to go too far for work-related reasons.

"Dad wants me to come."

"And you don't want to."

"Don't start profiling me," he all but growled.

"I'm not," she said calmly. "It's written all over your face. Why?"

"Huh?" He tried to hide behind the menu, but Terry knew better and pulled it away from him.

"Why do you not want to go?"

"Terry…"

"Don…" Her tone was scarier than his was and both were well aware he'd never hurt her. Don wouldn't give in.

"I want to understand, Don," she said softly. "I want to know what your problem is with your childhood home."

"It's Charlie's."

"So?"

"So, I don't want to think about him being somewhere that's not home." Terry nodded as she considered his words.

"I can go with you, if you want." Don shook his head.

"I'm not going to pull you into this." She smiled and settled her hand over his, letting him know her next words weren't meant to be of insult.

"I'm all ready in this, Don. The moment you called me, remember?"

"I'm sorry about that."

"What's there to be sorry about? I was honoured you reached out to me." He looked down at the table, drawing abstract patters on the top.

"I didn't know whom else to call," he admitted finally. "Dad was having a hard enough time as it was without my issues adding to it. It wouldn't have been fair to him."

"Don, I'm fine with it. I'm glad you called to tell me." He gave her a small smile.

"You would have tanned my hide if you found out Charlie was missing and we hadn't told you." She grinned in reply, showing how true the statement was. However, the grin faded and she was forced to bring them back to the original topic.

"You have to face it sometime, Don. Whether it's now or later, you're going to have to walk into that house comfortable in it." He hated when she was right.

"You'll really come with me?" She nodded solemnly.

"I promise. I'm here to help," she vowed. They were interrupted by her ringing phone. It was Caleb, whom she'd call to let him know she wouldn't be accompanying him to Dannacher's last known address.

"Lake."

"No Dannacher but we've got a sister, Alexis. Says she hasn't seen him in two weeks, but she's lying."

"Okay. Give me fifteen minutes to finish up my lunch and we'll have a chat with her. By then Amita should have been able to track the IP address of the hacking computer."

"Sounds good, thanks Lake."

"Always. Keep out of trouble until I get there."

"What are we doing with Ms. Dannacher?" Terry's grin turned evil.

"Let her stew."