*** The stage is set, the motivation has been established...so when does the action start? Marshall's hands are tied at the moment, and Mary's stewing too. Faber's a pro at working the system, but can he even avoid this horseman of the apocalypse? The agenda isn't always set...***

***I continue to thank you all for your wonderful reviews!***

The forces of retribution are always listening. They never sleep.

– Meg Greenfield

May the table set before them become a snare; may it become retribution and a trap.

– Psalm 69: 21-23

Marshall watched her in his periphery; assessed her physical and mental state. Aggravated and slightly off balance, Mary moved things around on her desk without purpose for a few minutes before rubbing her face with her hands and settling into her chair. Sighing and muttering under her breath, she settled on opening her mail with vigor, one knee bouncing with a visible tell of continued tension. He wanted to check the motion; to provide a balm of some sort. He stared at her knee.

She had somehow become tangled in his legs, her head resting upon his abdomen with her tangled, blonde hair splayed over his pelvis. Comforting and tantalizingly arousing at the same time. Her arm lay stretched up to his chest and he slowly ran his fingers over her fine-boned digits and hand. He sighed slightly as he saw the reddened cuticles on a number of fingers, a visible measure of her level of stress, and gently brought the fingers to his lips for a whisper of a kiss. Smoothing her arm back against his chest, he reached her forearm and marveled that he could completely wrap his hand around the well toned limb. Deceptive strength there. Coiled tightly and not to be underestimated despite the small girth.

Mary hummed sleepily with the tactile stimulation, and her fingers twitched against his chest as her head nestled more securely into his belly. The small, contented movements in the graying dawn infused him with a feeling of intense protectiveness that surprised him. He knew the perils she faced every day, same as his own, but this day he wanted her close to him. Behind him. She was being hunted. Reaching down to hold her to him, Marshall silently renewed his vow as her keeper. Her protector. Her lover.

"Helloooo?" Faber's voice wrenched him from the early morning memory like nails on a chalkboard.

The agent was standing at the doorway, a patronizing, smug smile on his face as he stared at Marshall. "Really, both of you are going to ignore me now? Did she forbid you to talk to me today?"

Marshall glanced at his partner before slowly turning to face Faber. Mary had pointedly repositioned her chair to present the man at the door with a view of her back. Schooling his face into false indifference, Marshall pushed himself out of his seat to take the three steps that would bring him to the door.

He needed to treat the man on the other side as he would a particularly unsavory witness; with forced politeness held in place by the knowledge that the interaction was of finite length and not to be repeated in the near future. There could be no hint that he had overheard the discussion in the lockers, no tell to tip his hand before he was ready to confront the man. And Marshall didn't yet know when that would be, but it would be soon. Face to face. Private. A corner of his mouth turned up slightly with the thought.

"Agent Faber," he stated formally. "Please help yourself to some coffee and get settled in the conference room. I've got some pressing issues to address yet this morning, but we'll get underway shortly."

Marshall watched Faber assess him with slightly narrowed eyes and hurried to throw off any suspicion. Motioning towards the kitchen, Marshall raised his eyebrows and shared a feigned commiserating look with the agent. "Please…there's some Danish too. I'm sure you know how it is some days…too much work and too few to do it."

Faber, seemingly appeased, shifted his briefcase to the other hand and patted Marshall on the shoulder with a sigh. "Ah yes, yes I do. Some of us are expected to pull more than just our own weight." His eyes slid pointedly to Mary, then he looked back at Marshall with a wink as he turned towards the kitchen.

Marshall felt his eye start to twitch with the touch and the insulting comment, and seriously wondered if the ramifications for smashing the man's face in immediately would really be all that bad. Just a quick release of pent-up fury that would leave the slime with a severely stained shirt and a plastic surgery bill that would strain the agent's salary. It would only take a moment…just a quick twitch…Je ne te quitterai point que je ne t'aievu pendu.

"You are aware that the Danish over there is about three days old, right?" Mary's voice cut into the brief silence following Faber's departure, shattering Marshall's thoughts.

Marshall looked at her questioningly, brow furrowed. "What?"

She studied him. Leaned forward to put her elbows on her desk with a tilt of her head and furrowed brow. "Are you okay? That's not a look I see often…and not in the office."

He took a deep breath to calm runaway emotions. "What look?"

"The one that usually causes grown men to shit their pants." Mary followed Marshall's prior gaze towards the kitchen. "Granted, the recipient is a worthy candidate, but you're usually a bit more subtle. Something you'd like to share?" She raised a suspicious brow as her eyes slid back to him.

Turning back to his desk, Marshall took the time afforded to him to cover the distance to mull over responses in his mind. He wasn't quick enough.

"This better not still be about our conversation last night, Marshall," Mary sighed and crossed her arms over her chest. "You're fixating and it's pissing me off. This is not about you."

"You know it's partially about me, Mary, because it's about you." She opened her mouth to respond and he held up a finger as he sunk into his seat. "But I know better than to fight your battles. There were some disturbing reports in the intel bulletins this morning and I'm just sorting out some brain poison. Faber doesn't help." He purposefully turned his attention to the keyboard and began to type. He could feel her staring at him.

"Fine," she said, less than convincingly. "He's gone by lunch and we don't need to talk about it after that."

Marshall just nodded in her direction and bent to an assumed task. He was hoping she'd read his reaction as preoccupation and leave him alone. He needed to think. To plan. He could feel her eyes boring into him.

"When, exactly, did you get into the office -" Mary's question was mercifully interrupted as Stan emerged from his office.

"Mary, Marshall," he began, still squinting at the message pad he held, "there's been a fairly verifiable report that Tommy Forrest and an unidentified female have been seen frequenting a Motel 6 in the Coors and Central neighborhood."

Stan looked up to meet Mary's eye with the announcement. She grimaced slightly and sent Marshall a suffering look. "Yeah," Stan continued, "my thoughts exactly. Not a neighborhood any kid needs to be hanging around in, much less a kid with no street cred and little experience holding his own."

"I guess I'll go get him, then," Mary sighed, shrugging into her jacket and checking her gun and extra clip. "Do you want me to take Charlie or Nate?" The two younger inspectors had been doing ride-alongs as part of their probation period.

"I want you to take Marshall," Stan said. Both inspectors raised their eyebrows, paused in their respective tasks as they waited for clarification. "I just don't have a good feel about this, Mary, and I want you two together."

Ten minutes were wasted with Mary's ineffectual arguments about the perceived mistrust in her abilities, Stan's rebuttals and stern orders, and Marshall battling relief and disappointment while trying to stay out of the way. He was going to forego his chance to mete out some form of justice against Faber in order to accompany his partner without second thought, but a primal force within him screamed 'foul!' His only hope lie in a quick resolution of the hunt for an errant child, and a return to home base for the final play of the game.

Marshall took one last look into the conference room as he and Mary readied to leave the office. Stan had evidently approached Faber with the change of plans, and the agent stared steadily at the departing inspectors as Mary stabbed at the button for the elevator. The doors slid open and Marshall placed a hand on her lower back to prompt her access as he broke eye contact with the other man. Allowing his hand to slide south and rest on the upper curve of her jean clad ass, Marshall smirked as he knew Faber was noting every downward inch.

/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\

"Jesus," Mary said, exasperated, "we deal with tweaked out meth heads for two hours, make two teenagers cry and barely avoid World War III at the Forrest's crappy house and we have to come back here to this?" She was glaring at the tableau in the conference room.

Marshall followed her gaze to take in Stan and Charlie talking with Faber as the agent began to place file folders back in his briefcase. Charlie was perched on the edge of the conference room table, laughing as Faber must have told some form of a joke. Stan smiled wanly, his eyes noting the arrival of Marshall and Mary; particularly Mary. Presumably excusing himself as Charlie and Faber continued to chat, Stan ducked out to approach his returning inspectors.

"The safe house passed with flying colors. All the i's are dotted and the t's crossed and the FBI is just waiting to send us the latest and greatest criminal too good to pass up." Stan's lighthearted tone of voice didn't match his serious visage.

"Great," mumbled Mary as she slid past the shorter man. "More trash for the FBI's dumping grounds. Fitting that they'd send Faber for the job."

Stan turned slowly to continue to face her and cleared his throat, "He had some nice pictures of a Mexican beach…with you on it." The words stilled Mary's movements.

Marshall watched the color drain from Mary's face, and she clenched her jaw as she stared down at her desk. The silence in the room was punctuated by the muffled scrape of chairs being repositioned in the conference room, and Marshall glanced up to see Faber smirk as he watched Stan out of the corner of his eye. Marshall knew the color was rising in his own neck as his body grew hot with anger. Bastard.

Mary audibly sucked air in through her nose and looked up at Stan defiantly. "It was my vacation. My time." A quick glance at Marshall before looking back at her boss. "And, as you can most certainly tell, it's in the past."

Stan stepped close to her desk and ran his fingers along the edge as he pondered her words. Watched the trail he traced as Mary waited.

"I'm not judging, Mary," he finally said, looking up at her. "But there're things about Agent Faber that are…concerning. I know his father fairly well. If you need something…" he trailed off with the offer, rapping on her desk once with his knuckles before stepping back.

Marshall's gut churned at Mary's obvious distress and the implications behind Stan's statement. Another short, shared laugh between Charlie and Faber reached his ears, and Marshall's decision was made for him. Quietly excusing himself, he pivoted to step out of the office on a path towards the restrooms. Mary watched him until he was out of sight before replying to Stan.

"Everything's fine, Stan, thanks," she said simply, accepting her boss' nod and eventual retreat as the last time she'd hear the issue addressed.

/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/

Faber let himself out of the suddenly emptied office as Charlie shared a parting joke and wandered back to his desk. Mary was not to be seen, and he nodded at an inattentive Stan as the older man was immersed in an intense conversation on the phone. It was too quiet. Mike wasn't used to the inactivity of the Marshal's office; better suited for the hustle and bustle of the busy Federal Building in Denver. There was no chance at social advancement here, no visual cues of social status or badges of power that he could use to plot the proper interactions to bring him closer to the inner circles. No skirts. No cleavage. Just work. Shuddering slightly with a grimace, he charted a course for the restroom.

He had planned to drive as far as Sante Fe for the afternoon, possibly do some shopping at the turquoise vendors for a bauble for Cassie. The thought of the young office intern in the tight pencil skirts caused his lips to twitch into a grin, and he picked up his pace. Rounding the corner towards the back hallway, he had a random thought and slowed again.

He hadn't seen Marshall leave. Mary's partner disappeared sometime after the pair returned, but Faber couldn't remember how long he had been gone. The thought made him pause; not that he viewed the man as a threat, geeks had fallen before him before, but sometimes it was just better to know where all the checkers in the game were positioned. Less chance of getting…jumped. And he liked his latest Armani suit; brushed, smoky gray wool blend with just a hint of pinstripe. It would be a shame to wrinkle it while teaching Marshall a lesson.

Boy is probably licking his wounds somewhere in the recesses of the locker room. Faber entertained himself with the thought as he picked up his pace. The marshal's proprietary move earlier that day still irked him, but he doubted there was much to it other than show. He had no idea what Mary would see in the man. There was no flair. No desire to be Best in Show. The man existed in the plane of unnoticeably normal, and Mike just couldn't imagine Mary showing the slightest bit of interest in a conquest without a peacock feather to his name…much less sleep with him. Shaking his head with inappropriate images of limp dicks, Faber shouldered his way into the men's room.

***Well now...this could get pretty interesting pretty quickly! I can't believe Faber showed Stan and Charlie pics of he and Mary in Mexico. I bet Mary didn't even *know* he had pics. Da bastard. Marshall's just about ready to take this guy apart. Stay tuned! And please...REVIEW! Love them :) ***

***Je ne te quitterai point que je ne t'aievu pendu - I will not leave you until I have seen you hanged.