"It's a good lead."

Bess sat in the most comfortable chair in their living room, frowning at her cup of yogurt while Nancy stared at her expectantly. George was half-ignoring them, watching a sitcom, and dipping out of the bowl of popcorn between her and Nancy.

"Nan," Bess said, warningly. "Why can't Ned do it? Better yet, why can't you do it?"

Nancy sighed. "Because I can't very well go undercover if at any time I actually have to go back to my real job and go undercover," she explained. "You know that."

"And Ned?" Bess pouted.

Nancy slid over on the couch, nearer to Bess. "There's no way he could be as good as you," Nancy said, smiling. "You can talk anything out of anyone. I'm counting on that. Otherwise..." She shrugged. "I don't know what's going to happen to Celia, if we can't make some progress on this case soon."

"Oh, go ahead and do it," George said, still staring at the television, without even bothering to glance over at her cousin. "It's not like you don't want to."

Bess shot a dirty look at George, sighed heavily, then looked back at Nancy. "O-kay," she mumbled. "I guess."

"You are the best," Nancy cried, hugging her. "You know that."

"Yeah, well, if I find out this was just so you could get more alone-time with Ned," Bess said, mock-sternly, hiding her smile. "Because there was a time when you would have been the one to go undercover."

"I would," Nancy said, sincerely. "God, it'd be nice to do something like that again."

"And how long?" Bess unfolded her legs and headed into the kitchen, calling behind her.

"All I need to know is who Jack knew at the club, and why he was calling there so often. It shouldn't be hard. Unless there's something more to it."

George half-smiled. "There always is," she muttered.

Nancy could still hear the rain through her black-out curtains, even after she went to bed. She lay in the dark, and thought of how many e-mails she and Ned had exchanged, and his suggestion of a picnic lunch for Saturday if the weather was nice.

"Hello?"

"Hey," Nancy sighed, listening to Ned shift, the bedsprings creaking softly under him. "I'm sorry. I didn't think you'd pick up if you were asleep."

"Yeah, well, you get to talk me back down," he groaned, yawning. "You all right?"

"Have you ever been a bartender?"

"As in paid for it? No. Frat parties probably don't count."

"They don't," she agreed. "Frat parties?"

"Frat parties," he repeated. "Because I belonged to a fraternity. In college. Have we not discussed this?"

"Oddly enough, no," she said, folding her arm under her head and letting the phone rest on her cheek. "I would remember that."

"Why were you asking about bartending?"

"Because I'm sending Bess in undercover at the club where Jack used to work," Nancy explained, her voice a little slow with exhaustion.

"Still don't see the connection."

"She asked why I didn't send you, but..."

"But what? Am I still on probation?"

"A little," Nancy admitted. "I haven't seen how you react under pressure, yet."

Ned chuckled. "Remember that entire last date we had? Yeah. A lot of pressure was going on, there."

"That was nothing."

"That was something," he corrected her. "Are you in bed right now?"

"Yeah," Nancy admitted, closing her eyes, drawing her knees up a little.

"What are you wearing?"

The blush that had already begun spread over her, warming her face, and Nancy brought her hand up to the phone. "None of your business," she replied, keeping her voice light.

"I thought we were making progress," he said, matching her tone.

"How is finding out what I'm wearing right now, progress?"

"You're right," he returned. "I don't know how it's progress. I just know that it is. And after your cute little hypothetical, I don't think I'm being unreasonable."

"T-shirt and underwear," Nancy sighed, dropping her voice a level.

"Bra?"

Nancy paused for a beat before answering. "No."

"Nice," Ned sighed. "Always?"

"Not while I'm in the— why am I telling you this?"

"Because I'm your boyfriend," Ned said patiently. "This is the kind of thing a boyfriend asks his girlfriend if he doesn't have a chance to find out firsthand. And it's not like we aren't in bed right now. It's normal to talk about this kind of thing."

"We're not in the same bed," she pointed out.

"Which is why I have to ask. Instead of coming up with some inventive way to find out by myself."

"So what are you wearing, Ned?"

"Boxers," he replied. "No shirt."

"How do I know you're not naked right now?"

"You want me to be? I can do that."

Nancy chuckled. "I don't think I'm quite ready to talk to you while you're naked."

"You seemed to be fine with it, in that hotel room in New York," he reminded her.

"Yeah, well, that was different," she said. "Spy Nancy is better at dealing with that kind of thing."

"And what would Spy Nancy be doing, right now?"

"Listening to you tell me how to disable an alarm system, or where guards are stationed, or how much time I have before the dead drop..."

"And all Girlfriend Nancy wants is to find out if I've ever made a strawberry daiquiri before."

"Yeah," she admitted. "What would you be wearing if I was in your bed right now?"

"What would you?" he countered.

She smiled at the black-out curtains. "Good night, Ned," she murmured.

"Good night, Nancy," Ned replied. "Sweet dreams."

"Same to you."

"Oh, they definitely will be now," he promised. "And you know you can tell me if I ever go too far."

"How could you, from the other side of Chicago," she teased him, raking her hair away from her face.

"I don't know," he admitted, slowly. "I say stupid things when I'm tired. You know that."

"I deserved it," she replied. "Good night."

"Good night."

She snapped her phone closed and rolled onto her back, wondering how it would feel to nestle into a bare chest with a strong arm wrapped around her, some other rainy night.

xxxxx

Noon on Saturday, in Chicago. Nancy was standing next to a fountain, tapping her heel impatiently, her face in shadow under a tipped hat, her fingers at her ear like she was cupping a cell phone headset there. Noon in Chicago. The stars were already out overhead.

She sighed, and felt miserable.

The tech sighed impatiently back to her, into her ear, and then the voice of their boss came over the wire. "Walk it off, Drew."

"He's not going to show," she muttered under her breath, searching the horizon for any lit coffee shops, anything still awake and alive after the sidewalks had been rolled up.

"We don't know that yet."

She knew that was true but she hated knowing that back in Chicago Ned was doing something without her. Bess had gotten the job, though, had even managed to sweet-talk her way into working the Saturday night shift, and Ned had said maybe he'd drag Kent by so they could do a little sleuthing of their own. She smiled, remembering he'd said that word, sleuthing, drawing it out, grinning at the end.

But even that wasn't helping her mood. Another excuse missed, to wear some skimpy black dress around him, to watch him drink in her curves, to feel his hands warm on her hips as she danced too close to him. She closed her eyes, thinking to herself that they would definitely go dancing, when she came back.

Then a shape hurtled past her in the dark and she turned on her heel, quick as a thought, and took after it while the cacophony of voices sounded in her ear.

We will go dancing.