"What are you doing Thursday night?"

Ned leaned back and grinned, glad Nancy couldn't see his face. "Anything you want," he replied.

"So we can go check out the club where Bess is working?"

Ned looked down at his blotter on his desk. Nancy had been out of town for almost a week, missing all their tentative dates, and he hated it. When he'd known she was gone, on Saturday, he had gone to the club with Kent to check the place out, and serve as Bess's informal bodyguards for the night. Bess had given him so many double shots, flirting with him the entire time, that Ned had woken up Sunday morning hungover and miserable and missing his girlfriend. Movies had gone unwatched, elaborate dinners had gone unmade. Television was only so much nonsense. He was falling apart without Nancy.

And she was asking him to go to the club again, her voice bright with the same excitement he'd heard other people express upon winning the lottery. He chuckled and shook his head.

"I think that would be an excellent idea."

The club was seedier than the ones he frequented, on the outskirts of the bad part of town, but the drinks were good, and if Bess just gave Nancy half as many drinks as she'd given Ned, he knew he'd have her back to his apartment and there for the night easily.

"Good. I think we should show up separately."

"What?"

"So that if one of us gets caught, the other one will be able to get away."

"'Gets caught'? What are we going to be doing?"

"Well," she drawled, and he could almost imagine her twirling a lock of hair around her finger, "Bess says there's a locked door that she can't account for, and she has some suspicions about what's probably going on, and we're going to need proof..."

"Proof? Like evidence your father can use in court?"

"Pretty much exactly, yeah."

"Evidence that should be collected by cops?"

Nancy sighed. "Look, we just... go in, figure out what's there, and once we know, for sure, we call the cops in. Although..."

"Although what?"

"Although, in my experience," she said slowly, "it just... seems like the cops come in really late in the game."

"You're scaring me," he admitted.

"Don't worry, I'll make you the lookout," she reassured him, brightly.

Bess, Ned had to admit, looked great behind the bar. She was completely in her element; outrageous and flirty, she flashed grins at the college boys and sultry smiles at the habitual drinkers. When Ned came in, Nancy was already there; Bess gave a little faint jerk of her chin and they met her five minutes later, in the alcove leading to the phones.

"You really, really need to be careful," she said, and he noticed her nervous gleam then. "You get caught? They won't find all the pieces of you."

That gave Ned pause, even if he'd never admit it. Nancy accepted it with horrifying calm. "In and out," she said, grinning.

Bess shot her a weak smile. "I mean it. You watch her back," she told Ned, firmly.

"I will."

Tightening the straps on her waist apron, Bess flounced back out, sliding into her place behind the bar. Nancy moved deeper into the shadows, trying the knob of the main office, as Ned moved to the edge of the doorway, keeping his gaze on the dance floor, always moving. He couldn't hear her pull the picks out, even though he was listening for it, through the roar of loud conversation and bass backbeats and heels and soles and heavy-bottomed glass tumblers against wood.

Ned blinked and saw Nancy with her hair flying in the smoke of a downtown club. New York. New York.

He reached behind him and found Nancy's shirt, the slick fabric sliding between his fingers. She froze.

"Someone's coming?"

Ned skimmed his fingers up her back and caught the tie. Her shirt was one of those slippery shapeless things, that hugged her breasts tight because it was tied at her back. With a jerk of his fingers, the tie was swinging loose to her knees.

"What?"

"Just a precaution," Ned muttered back, sliding back through the shadows to his perch. "Hurry."

With a muffled snort Nancy bent back to her work, and released that same soft pleased cry when the lock gave under her fingers. Resisting the urge to glance back at her, Ned sidled out, nodding to Bess to make him a drink. When it was ready, Ned, keeping a sharp eye on the doorway, strode over to the bar, fighting the urge to break into a run.

"How long have you two been friends, again?" Ned asked, before downing half his drink with the first sip.

"Since we were old enough to talk."

"How many stomach ulcers do you have?"

Bess laughed and swatted at him. "You'd be amazed, what you can get used to. Joey just walked in; you need to look out."

"And which one is he?"

"Dark suit, maroon tie—oh, sorry, dark purplish tie."

"I know what maroon is."

"Oh, do you, now?" Bess raised an eyebrow, then held a finger up, gesturing for him to hold on. Ned wandered back into the alcove, miming trying the doorknob as he peered in at Nancy, who was shuffling through papers on the desk. Composing his handsome features into a disappointed frown, he headed back to the bar.

"Anything you need to tell me?"

"Maroon was one of the colors of our rival school."

"Sure it was."

Ned turned around, bracing his back against the bar. "He look all right?"

"Joey?" Bess scrubbed at a pool of condensation. "If by 'all right,' you mean 'like a loaded pistol,' then totally."

Ned finished his drink. "I don't like this."

Bess tapped him on the elbow, and dropped her voice so low that he had to strain to hear it when he turned around. "Then get out now," she said softly. "This? Is not going to change."

Ned was about to reply when Bess suddenly glanced at the door, and her face drained, her skin turning pale. "Go get her, whistle or whatever."

Ned put his glass down on the bar and headed for the alcove, shouldering into the room. Nancy's head snapped up and when she saw the look on Ned's face, she hurriedly lifted her shirt, showing Ned the barest hint of bra, and slid a handful of papers between her stomach and pants, letting her shirt fall to cover them. She fairly sprinted across the room, but when Ned heard footsteps approaching, he grabbed her. She only had time to glance up at him once in momentary confusion, bleeding to understanding, before the doorknob was moving.

Maneuvering so he was between Nancy and whoever was at the door, he angled her so she was braced, from the knee down, against the beat-up leather sofa facing the desk. He threaded his thumb through her belt loop and slowly inched her jeans down a little, carefully, to keep the paper from crinkling, and gave her one hard, bruising kiss before his teeth were gently pressing into the join of her shoulder and neck.

"Ned," Nancy said, her voice wavering a little, and he wondered how much of it was true, and how much was her playing the part.

"Hey."

In the movies there was always a sound, of a gun cocking. When Ned turned, his arms still at Nancy's waist, after the brief glimpse of Nancy's wide blue eyes and parted lips, the automatic in Joey's hand came as a total shock.

"Hey, man," Ned apologized immediately, holding both hands, palms out, in the air. "We'll leave. No big deal."

"What were you two doing in here?" Joey had no neck and a sparse goatee and looked like he had no sense of humor whatsoever.

"What did it look like?" Ned replied, keeping one hand up, catching one of hers with his other. "Just calm the fuck down. I'm sure there's an alley out back."

"Alley?" Nancy turned and there was almost no hint of nervousness about her; all of it was swallowed by her indignation. "Is that what you had in mind? God, I knew this was a bad idea." She released his hand in disdain, nearly throwing it, and went to stand in front of Joey, and Ned's heart clenched when he saw that she was standing directly in the trajectory, the path he was trying to keep her out of. "Hey, you can have him. He was all full of himself, telling me he owned the place, but I'm guessing that was another lie, too." She snorted.

Joey, glancing between the two of them, lowered the gun, and Nancy, with a swivel of her hips, was past him. She was in his old position at the mouth of the hallway, though, as Ned put his hand back up.

Ned gave Joey a you know how it is shrug, and Joey pushed back his coat, revealing another gun in his waistband.

"Go for the alley next time, dickwad."

Ned cut his eyes, but nodded, following Nancy out. She made a point to flounce away from him, and Bess was flirting with another guy at the bar, but her gaze rose apprehensively to Nancy. Ned let her go, although everything in him was telling him to follow her.

"Another?"

Ned nodded curtly, drumming his fingers on the bar. He glanced over at the alcove. The space between his shoulder blades was starting to itch.

"Cash out?"

"Yeah," Ned said, reaching for his wallet. He should be trying to pick someone up, he knew. When Bess came back, his drink in tow, she handed over his bar tab and Ned handed back a bill without even looking at it, catching her hand in his.

"You're not doing anything later, are you?"

"You mean besides putting up with more utterly charming guys like you?" Bess grinned.

"Yeah, that."

"Well, honey, I would love," she leaned over, displaying another few inches of cleavage, "to show you a damn good time, but I have a girlfriend who will be very disappointed if I don't get home. To see if she's maybe at her boyfriend's place. Because, let me give you a tip, there is nothing that makes a girl hotter than a super-secret mission."

"Right," Ned said, releasing her hand. "That's a good tip."

"Thought you might like it."

Before he walked out, Ned glanced over at the alcove. Joey was staring back at him.

And then, it took every ounce of will he had, to leave Bess in the club.