Over the past two years, Sadie excelled in both her thief- and police-type training. Though nothing had prepared her to deal with one of the dangers of being a teenager- her first crush!

When Sadie was fifteen, her parents had told her that they would be having a guest living with them at the farm for a while. She didn't pay that much attention to what her parents said, but she knew that there was some new recruit who was going to be spending some time at their house while he went through training and got settled in. In fact, over the years, Carmelita and Sly had gotten the reputation of being one of the more sociable and hospitable couples at Interpol. With Sly's help, Carmelita's frigid exterior had melted and she was more friendly and personable with her fellow coworkers: besides all the male flirting and female backbiting stopped when she got married and had her daughter. It was also known around work that the two did have room for guests at their home, since they had thrown the occasional party at their home. It was only natural for the Brass to ask the Coopers if they wouldn't mind hosting one of their new recruits: he was an eighteen year old fox from Los Angeles, and this was his first time out of the States. The Interpol Brass thought that it would be best for him if he stayed with one of the officers while he was training, so he could ease into his new life. Sly eagerly accepted, he said that he knew what it was like being an 'American in Paris' and joked that it might be nice to have another guy around the house. The couple was told that this new officer would take a cab from the airport to their house when he arrived in Paris in two days.

Before their new guest arrived, Sadie's parents reminded her that she should make sure to keep any questionable belongings of her father's out of sight, that she wouldn't be going through 'thief training' with her father for a while but instead would have officer training with both her parents and that she shouldn't mention anything about her family's true past. If this new officer brought anything up, he would be told that it was just an unfortunate coincidence that Inspector Cooper shared the name with the Master Thief. Sadie just rolled her eyes at her parents: she knew better. The teenager was not thrilled about having to share her home, let alone her bathroom with a complete stranger, but her parents gave her no choice. Sadie was not pleased with her new situation and showed her displeasure by being in her room, video chatting with her cousins on her computer, when she heard the new guest arrive and introduce himself to her parents.

"Hi, Rick Fuentes. I really appreciate the fact that you're letting me stay here while I get moved in, Lieutenant Fox, Inspector Cooper," the six foot, svelte, muscular fox with short brown hair and hazel eyes said as he shook hands with Sly and Carmelita.

"We're glad to have you Rick. Why don't you bring your bags in and we can get acquainted before we show you your room."

"Yes Inspector Cooper," Rick replied politely.

"It's okay Rick. We have a rule: when we're not at work, it's Sly and Carmelita. Okay?"

"Okay sir. I mean Sly."

Rick brought his bags in and placed them in the hallway. He then followed the couple into their sitting room as they all sat down, Rick in an armchair across from his hosts.

"So, Fuentes, eh? Is Rick your given name then?" Carmelita asked the new officer slyly.

"Well, no it's actually Enrique, but I like Rick better."

"I thought so, you being from Los Angeles and all. You shouldn't be ashamed of your Hispanic heritage, hermano," Carmelita replied.

"Now querera," Sly playfully admonished his wife, "he likes his name the way it is, besides you don't want to scare him off before the first day, that's what the basic training is for," Sly said with a big grin on his face.

Carmelita looked around the room, getting more displeased by the second.

"Now where is that daughter of yours?" she asked her husband as she left the room and called upstairs.

"Sadie, where are your manners? Get down here and meet our guest."

"Si madre," Sadie yelled down the steps, a devilish grin on her lips since she knew her mother didn't like her daughter calling her that ('madre is my mother', Carmelita would remark).

"Gotta go guys, I have to meet the 'rookie'," she said to her cousins.

"I'm sure everything will be fine, besides, maybe he'll be cute," Tonya said.

"That's great coming from you cuz," Sadie remarked as Tonya disconnected.

"Well, have fun." "Yeah, loads of fun," her younger cousins Chelsea and Ben said as they made faces and started laughing as Sadie turned off her computer.

"Sadie! Ahora!" Carmelita called up the stairs, getting more aggravated at her daughter.

"Coming!" Sadie yelled as she ran out of her room and rail slid down the banister.

Her mother came out of the sitting room again and caught her sliding.

"You know better to do that with our new guest here," Carmelita angrily whispered at her daughter as she grabbed her and brought her into the sitting room.

"You'll have to excuse Sadie, she's usually more punctual and polite."

"Mom, I had to say goodbye to the gang first, we were on the computer. It would have been impolite if I just left."

"Dios, 'the gang. Why don't you just say your cousins?" her mother replied exasperated.

"I think the name's cute, querera," Sly added with a smile.

"Enough of that," Carmelita said curtly though she smiled at her husband when she said it.

"Now, where were we? Oh yes, Rick Fuentes, this is our daughter, Sadie. You'll be staying in the room next to hers until you get situated at Interpol," Carmelita informed Rick as she finally calmed down.

"Hi, nice to meet you," Rick said as he extended a hand to Sadie.

"Yeah, likewise," Sadie said as she put her hand out to shake his and then looked at the man whose hand she was shaking for the first time since she came downstairs. Her mouth started to open as she gazed upon the eighteen year old, muscular Adonis in front of her.

"Oh, wow," she uttered before catching herself, "I mean hi." She tried to look nonchalant as she tried to hold back her blushing.

Rick didn't seem to notice, as he sat back down in his chair and started talking to Carmelita, who sat in the chair next to him.

Sly noticed his daughter's actions and gave her a hug as she sat next to him on the sofa across from the two police foxes.

"Don't worry, you're not the first Cooper to fall for a good looking officer of the law, mi hija," Sly whispered to Sadie as he gave her another hug.

"Dad…" Sadie whispered, obviously irritated as she blushed when he hugged her again.

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The good, or maybe the bad, news was that as Rick spent more time with the Coopers, he started treating Sadie like a little sister, and as such, hardly paid Sadie any attention the whole time he stayed with her family. During the few months he did stay at the Cooper house, Rick was trying extremely hard to make the force and so he tended to stay late at Interpol headquarters training. When he was home, he was more interested in discussing goings on at work with his new mentors than anything else.

Things didn't seem to be any different after Rick made the force and got his own place on his own. During his first official year on the force, he would visit pretty often, but usually to discuss cases with his mentors.

"Are there any leads into the money missing from those Internet accounts?"

"No Rick, we've had our best tech guys on the case and they can't figure it out. The money just seems to vanish, without even the hint of a trail to what account it ends up in. It's like the computers are stealing the money themselves," Carmelita replied.

"Maybe we should have my tech guy look at it, huh, querera?"

"No Sly, I know how busy he is and I don't want to bother him with something I'm sure our force can handle."

"Man, do you guys talk about anything else than work anymore? I mean, this is as boring as when you were discussing the 'syndication' or whatever they call themselves."

Sadie vented, tired of being ignored every time Rick came over her house. She was used to Rick ignoring her, but not her parents.

"It's the 'Syndicate', Sadie, and it's a very interesting case, even if there is nothing to go by," Rick corrected her.

"Who cares? I'm just surprised you even remembered my name," Sadie said, as the sixteen-year-old left the kitchen in a huff.

"What's with her?" Rick asked his friends, not aware of what they obviously saw. Sadie still had an enormous crush on him.

"Don't worry, she'll be fine Rick," Carmelita assured him.

"That's good, but what do you guys think about this Syndicate case?"

"Well, Interpol has been working on it for about a year and we've gotten nowhere. From the little knowledge we have, it seems to be an extremely secret criminal organization that boasts members from six continents and the members are thought to be rather prominent public figures, which is why we're having a hard time finding their criminal activities mixed in with their legitimate businesses," Carmelita explained.

"Any leads?" Rick asked.

"Yeah, but our boards are covered with possible suspects. We have a who's who of known criminal bosses, suspected bosses, well known public figures accused of criminal activity, well known public figures suspected of criminal activity and even just shady-seeming famous and public figures. All we have though is a picture album of the underworld's most famous, though we don't even know if some of these suspects have any criminal connections, so we can't pursue anything……"