A/N1 Long day traipsing around Barcelona. But I found a few minutes for words. A quiet chapter, as the plot starts to take on a more determinate shape.

Thanks for the reviews and PMs. Love to hear your thoughts.

Don't own Chuck - but not nearly as puzzled by that as WillieGarvin.

Chutes and Ladders

CHAPTER EIGHT

Boggle

Chuck set the keel of the Crown Vic to the breakers and eased her into the nighttime traffic. The stakeout had veered around crazily. Chuck had kissed Sarah - cover kiss, pretending to be an amorous couple - and the kiss had transmogrified from cover to real, from pretend-amourous to full-on-amourous the second his lips had touched Sarah's. He had kissed her but there was no doubt: she had kissed him back, heartily, hungrily. Amazingly. His head was still abuzz and his body aflame. He could have driven by the glow he was giving off, shutting off the Vic's headlights altogether.

What did it mean? Was she not just his client? Was she ever his client? That was no client/employee kiss. That was. That was what? That was epic. Like a movie kiss, except Sarah was more beautiful than anyone he had seen on screen. That was a kiss that demanded its own soundtrack.

Thinking of music, and not knowing quite what to say to Sarah, Chuck turned on the radio. Just as he did, his favorite indie station began to play Gaslight Anthem. The song, a full, resigned, gentle sadness, played. Chuck knew they were both listening.

But boys will be boys and girls have those eyes
That will cut you to ribbons sometimes.
And all you can do is just wait by the moon
And bleed if it's what she says you oughta do.

You remind Anna, if she asks why,
That a thief stole my heart while she was making up her mind.
I heard she lives in Brooklyn with the cool,
Goes crazy over that New York scene on 7th Avenue.
But I used to wait at the diner, a million nights without her,
Praying she won't cancel again tonight.
And the waiter served my coffee with a consolation sigh.
You remind Anna, if she asks why.
Tell her it's all right.

You know it's hard to tell you this.
Oh, it's hard to tell you this.
Here's looking at you, kid.

The song ended and, out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Sarah smile ruefully. The last line seemed to echo around the car, bouncing their earlier Bogey and Bacall (with a dash of Bergman) back and forth between them.

Chuck sighed, a silent consolation. Maybe nothing would come of it, but he had kissed Sarah Walker. She had kissed him back.

No one could take that from him.

ooOoo

Sarah thought she heard Chuck sigh. She cleared her throat. The song had made her happy and sad all at once. She was still trying to get her pulse and her breathing under control, even though Barney's interruption had been a while ago.

"Chuck, you didn't notice, because you were talking to Barney, but when Sasha and her parents went back into the house, Virginia, Sasha's mom, scanned the perimeter too. She was more subtle than her husband, but I think the police car unnerved her a little. Just thought I should mention that…"

And not talk about that kiss. Those kisses. Those life-changing kisses.

She felt like it was time to end the client/employee ruse - or whatever it is. She had never felt that, felt like that kissing a man, felt not just her body respond (And did it ever!) but her whole...life. She had tasted Chuck and found him sweet, too sweet to part with. She was his and he was hers. Her PI...her funny, charming land-yacht captain (I love his crazy car), her Chuck. Hers. But now she had to tell him. That kiss might have been prompted at the moment by an attempt to cover the stakeout, but it had told Sarah everything, more even than the look he gave her when he picked her up. They were together. She was his. More than anything, she wanted him to know that, but telling him would mean admitting to the client/employee ruse - and it would mean sharing more of herself than she had ever shared with anyone. No one knew the story of her past except her father. What would Chuck think of her once he knew, knew it all?

Here's looking at you, kid.

Would Chuck look at her the same way after he knew what she had done, knew about the car, the apartment, her untouched but banked gray-water money?

I do a really good Ingrid Bergman. Maybe...No. Not a good idea. Not after those kisses.

Sarah let the worries go and she slid along the seat. She had slid away as they left the neighborhood, but only to put on her seatbelt. Now, she stretched the belt as far as it would go and moved almost against Chuck. She reached out and rested her hand on his thigh. She sighed. In hope, not consolation.

ooOoo

Chuck let the Vic drift into a parking space at Sarah's apartment complex. He shut off the car and they both waited for the rattle to end. Chuck was not sure what to make of Sarah sitting so close, her hand on his thigh but he made himself simply exist in the moment. The Crown Vic shuddered her last, and Sarah turned to Chuck, her face earnest in the moonlight.

"Chuck, my dad...was...a salesman. I worked with him...for him...for a while, when I was younger. One time, we...sold cars. I drove a Porsche as part of the sale. I loved it. Later, I came into...some money...and that car was my fondest dream. So, I bought it. Not the most prudent decision, I guess…But I don't want you to get the wrong idea...I didn't come from money, I don't have a trust fund; I'm not slumming it as a kindergarten teacher as some rich kid's suburban Peace Corps gig. I'm just a girl...from a mixed-up family...who is still mixed-up herself."

Sarah stopped. Chuck could tell that what she had just said had been hard for her to say, costly in some personal way. He couldn't claim to fully understand it, but he knew she was giving him something.

He looked into her face. Her gaze was as open as it had ever been. His eyes flicked down to her lips, involuntarily, and he saw her lick her lips, also involuntarily.

He did not lean in. Instead, he reached out and ghosted the backs of his curled fingers against her warm cheek.

"Sorry for kissing you like that."

"Like that? That was not kissing for which you should ever apologize."

Chuck grinned and looked away, embarrassed. "Um...thanks...but I didn't mean how, exactly, I meant when and why. Cover, you know. The surprise of it."

She gave him an enigmatic smile. "Well, I can now say I have been caught necking in a parked car. Another item off my bucket list. Although that was not the verb I wrote down."

ooOoo

She giggled again. She had been doing that since she met him but only now noticed it. A musical sound from herself she almost did not recognize, that she had thought was reserved for her students, her kids. Evidently not.

ooOoo

Chuck laughed in response. "I am a full-service PI, I will have you know. Dastardly criminals captured, bucket list entries marked off…"

"'Dastardly'?" Sarah shook her head in amusement. "I've got a sort of...long list, Chuck. It may take you a while, if you are willing to...um...change the terms of our arrangement."

Chuck just nodded. Then Sarah leaned in and gave him a quick peck on the lips. Then, grinning: "Here's looking at you, kid."

She got out of the car before Chuck could move. She waved to him and gestured for him to stay in the car. A moment later, she was gone, inside her apartment.

Boggled. Chuck was absolutely sure he did not know what had just happened, what any of the evening meant.

Boggled. Still, he felt as good about the world, as alive in it, as he could ever remember feeling. He started the Crown Vic - she started right up, like she was feeling good too, her starter whirring madly like Chuck's heart - and he drove toward home, singing for himself the words to Here's Looking at You, Kid.

And all you can do is just wait by the moon
And bleed if it's what she says you oughta do.

ooOoo

Sarah got inside and closed her door. She leaned back against it, panting. It had taken all her willpower not to ask Chuck inside. To start work on her bucket list. She put her fist to her face, thumb-side toward her, and bit her index finger near the knuckle. She was not sure how she would get to sleep.

I am absolutely crazy about him.

Boggled.

Tuesday, March 28

Chuck put a little water in his cactus. He straightened his taped-up, red-eyed frog. He was pondering Sasha and her parents, the oddity her parents' behavior. Something was up. Witness Protection, something of that sort, seemed to be involved. But there was still something about the whole situation that felt off. It might have been the rubbery bacon he ate next door with his runny scrambled eggs, though. Chuck's tiny office was in a throw-away space in the corner of an out-of-date, Dollar Store-style strip mall. It was in between a Dollar Store and a greasy spoon that actually succeeded in greasing all its utensils, The Go Fork Yourself Cafe.

The Cafe's owner, a whip-skinny man named Billy Powell, was convinced he'd come up with a great idea: a self-serve diner. At breakfast, there was a long bar of warming trays and moist heaps of scrambled eggs and chewy rashers of bacon, dry biscuits, etc. At lunch, the food changed out to burgers, dogs and buns, packets of condiments, fries under a heat lamp. Chuck had tried to tell Billy that every middle-of-the-road hotel in town served the same breakfast, and every fast-food joint a better lunch, but Billy refused to listen. The amazing thing is that the place had caught on, and now had a set of regulars large enough to keep the doors open. Chuck worried that the regulars would be dying off of heart failure in large numbers any day, and he felt bad for Billy, so he ate there a couple of times a week, hoping that he wasn't killing off years of life expectancy.

So, yeah, maybe things feel off because I Forked myself. Or maybe something really is going on.

Chuck set up another deep dive into the Internet, trying various combinations of names near the Monroe's. The computer search was going to take time, so Chuck went to his file cabinet and took out a file marked, simply: B and J.

He had no problem believing Jill had chosen Bryce over him. But he still had very little sense of why Casey would have asked him to tail Jill. Other than meeting Bryce, she did nothing suspicious on those evenings, although they did normally begin at FARMA. It was odd for a corporate lawyer like Jill to work Saturdays, but Chuck had no reason to think it couldn't happen. Casey's comments the other day had him wondering if there was some connection that led from FARMA, through Jill, and all the way to Larkin.

Chuck got out his notebook and his stubby golf pencil. He started brainstorming. The storming had only gotten started when Casey himself came through the door. He did not look happy. He walked right up to Chuck's desk and loomed over him, like a solid stone cliff. Chuck wondered, as he often did, how Casey made it as a detective. He had a cop's face all day long.

"Morning, Casey."

"Grimes."

"What about him?"

"Alex."

"What about her?"

"At her house this morning. Answered her phone when I called. Grimes." Casey wrapped a massive fist in his other massive hand. Then he punched the second with the first. Chuck felt the power of that punch across the desk. He gulped for his little buddy. But, hey, good for my little buddy. Hope that pre-performance anxiety did not carry over into the performance.

"I'm going to kill him. But since you are my friend and his friend - God only knows how that is possible, but there you have it - I wanted to pay you the courtesy of letting you know in advance of your friend's deceasement."

"Deceasement? Is that even a word, Casey?"

"Don't know, Bartowski. Don't care. Clear enough. Screw Webster's." Casey turned to leave.

"Whoa, whoa, there big fella! Your daughter is a grown woman. You hurt him, you hurt her, and things between you two are already precarious enough, aren't they?"

Casey's heavy shoulders bunched tight, held, held, then sagged. He turned back around.

"He's going to hurt her."

"Why do you think that?"

"Because he doesn't understand how precious she is." Casey looked shocked to hear those words fall from his own mouth. Chuck had to will his jaw not to hang.

"But if you believe that, Casey, and I know you do, then you and Morg agree on the most important thing of all, because he believes that and I know he does."

Casey took a moment then sat down in the chair. As usual, it gave out a doleful call for help. Casey ignored it. Chuck watched the chair legs bend outward.

"So he really cares about her? Then why did he make her chase him, play hard to get, color her hair?"

"Not because he is some kind of player, Casey. Think about it. The Morg? A player? The little man who Putt the Fun in the Hole?"

Casey's face turned red and he slammed his fist into his hand again.

Chuck hurried on. "Ok, not the best slogan and not the right time to remind you of it, but I am thinking about its form, not its content. It's silly, Casey, but harmless and good-hearted. That's the Morg. Alex is smart, Casey. She's your daughter. What is Rhonda always telling you?"

Casey squirmed in the chair. The chair squealed in woody agony. "To trust my daughter."

"So, if she thinks Morg is worth it, why don't you trust her. I believe she's right. I know he's crazy about her."

"And the underwear model, the one from Sexy Underpants, Etc.?"

"Not a part of the picture, Casey."

Casey took a deep breath. "Well, okay, Bartowski...if you say so, but your ass is on the line here. He hurts her, I hurt him. Then I hurt you too. That clear? Hate to do it, but, you know..." Casey shrugged, his shoulders a rippling mountain range.

"Yeah, Casey, completely clear."

They sat and looked at each other awkwardly for a moment. Then Chuck shifted topics. "So, tell me about Bryce. What did Rhonda tell you? Why have I been tailing Jill?"

Casey looked around the office, as if someone else might be in there. As it was, between Casey, Chuck, and the cactus, there was hardly room to breathe. Even the red-eyed frog looked cramped on his lily pad.

"Look, Bartowski. This ain't your case. It's mine. Mine and Rhonda's. She okayed bringing you in to help, given the...sensitive...nature of the investigation, but we can't take you on board completely. It could end up blowing back on us - and on you too.

"But, see, FARMA was accused of dumping toxic waste - around here and in other places. They got off. This was a few years ago. Your legal skank got them off. She did it before you two were dating. But it was a big win for her, moved her up in her firm, with a bullet, so to speak. We think they are still dumping. That's not our investigation, though. We are worried about the recent whistleblower. Brian Feckman. Started making anonymous calls a few months ago, claiming that the dumping had never stopped and was increasing. The shit those places dump ain't nuclear, you know, but it's deadly. Still glow-in-the-dark shit. Anyway, the calls stopped.

"A while back, we found a body out in the desert. FARMA employee. Supposedly got lost and died out there, but it's suspicious. He was a regular hiker, knew the drill, according to friends. Larkin got himself involved in the case. Weird piece of micromanagement. Then he starts up with legal skank not long afterward. It all looks funny to me. Rhonda went up to the park and found a phone in the lost-and-found box. No one ID'd it, cause it was a burner. Don't know who turned it in or when. Turns out, it's the same number as the whistleblowing calls. We haven't logged that evidence yet. No one knows Rhonda found it. The guy at the park just handed her a box of broken GPS's and empty backpacks. He didn't know the phone was in there. She'll have to log it soon. We've been digging into the guy's life and past, hoping to get a better sense of what he knew and how he knew it. Get ahead of the game before anyone knows the phone was found. And, yeah, I know, the chain of evidence and all...but this is a bizarre situation."

Chuck nodded slowly, thinking. "Okay...But I have to say, other than the fact that Jill regularly visits FARMA on Saturdays - at least when she is in town - and usually before dinner with Bryce (though she does that on non-Saturdays too), there's nothing I've seen that suggests anything...nefarious."

Casey raised an eyebrow at 'nefarious', then apparently remembered his 'deceasement'. "No, I get that, kid. But I do wonder why she's working on Saturdays and just before dinners with Larkin. Any chance you can get into FARMA one Saturday and find out what she's doing in there on the weekend?"

Chuck chewed on his bottom lip. "Maybe. Let me see if I can come up with something this weekend."

Casey got up, and the chair made a sound like a sigh of relief. "Can't you get some man-sized furniture in here, Bartowski?"

Chuck gestured at the tiny office. Casey nodded in resigned annoyance. He left muttering under his breath about the world shrinking to favor Grimes.

ooOoo

Sarah finished for the day. She and Jerri were tidying up the classroom. Sarah was humming the Gaslight Anthem song, but not really aware of it.

Jerri, hearing Sarah humming, smiled. "So, Sarah, seen any more of Mr. Chuck?"

Sarah shook her head no but she could feel the heat of her blush. Jerri gave her a suggestive smile. "Your body seems to be divided in its opinion, Sarah. Which is it?"

Sarah could feel the weight of Chuck on her again, could taste his kisses. She had done her best to keep them out of her mind all day. Sasha's having another bad dream at nap time had kept thoughts of Chuck at arm's length for a while. But Sarah had caught herself daydreaming about that kiss, and daydreaming about talking to Chuck, telling him things she had never told anyone. She felt like it was time to tell him more than the generically true but specifically misleading story she told him about the Porsche, about her dad. She just needed to find the right time, the right place, the right context.

"I...He...Last night, he kissed me."

Jerri grinned, pleased. "And…"

"And...yes."

"Yes?"

"Yes. Yes."

"Does he know? Know it's yes?"

Sarah felt her excitement ebb. "No. No, he doesn't know. But he will, soon." He will.

ooOoo

Sarah grabbed her things. She was planning to go to the gym after work. She wanted and did not want to run into Ellie Woodcomb there. Sarah had no idea what to tell her.

A/N2 More to come. Does Chuck's new computer search yield any information on the Monroes, on Sasha? Will Chuck get into FARMA to spy on Jill? What is Sarah going to tell Chuck, and when? Will Ellie be at the gym? All this next time, Chapter 9, "Truth or Dare?".