Sarah vs covers, lies and ticking time bombs

A/N You were probably expecting an update on the Morgan-torture, but it just took a whole season of The Big Bang Theory to get me from f...ing furious to 'committing homicide is wrong'. Will update that story as soon as the funny returns.

Anyway, here's an update on this one – finally! It's gonna snow and it hasn't snowed here since 1981 (and no, I'm not old enough to remember). The chapters are short, but I'm a little pressed for time at the moment. I don't own Chuck.

Chapter 2

Sarah parked in her usual spot on the farthest side of the parking lot. It would look suspicious for the Wienerlicious girl to drive a Porsche, but it was a small price to pay. She usually loved the brisk walk, but today the Buy More was too far. Yet, at the same time it wasn't far enough. What if her plan didn't work? How did they get to this point in the first place? Oh yeah, she lied again. The one moment she was straddling him in the closet of the Wienerlicious to preserve the cover and now she has to convince him not to break up with her. Or fake breakup their pretend relationship. It was a little hard to compartmentalize at the moment. She thought back over the past couple of days.

Sarah's eyes narrowed when she spotted the brunette hanging around Chuck's neck. She felt an unfamiliar pang in her chest. It couldn't be. Was she jealous? That's ridiculous. She couldn't be jealous unless...damn it, she was jealous. Maybe she was overreacting. Maybe she was just a happy customer...who brought him lunch? Sarah couldn't decide what upset her the most. The fact that another woman was clearly making a move on her boyfr...asset or his reaction. Or her own reaction. She had to get to the bottom of this, but they had a mission, that's why she was here in the first place. Sarah quietly slipped around the side of the store so she could come up to Chuck from behind and in full view of the skank trying to chat him up. No harm in marking her territory.

"...I'd love that, Lou. This is kind of the biggest honor...Sarah." Step one, the element of surprise, piece of cake.

"Hi. I'm Sarah." She gave the brunette the biggest smile she could muster. Women felt worse about taking guys from girls who were nice.

"Lou. Lou is her name. This is Lou. I was fixing Lou's phone for her, Lou." Chuck always babbled when he was nervous. If Sarah didn't know him so well she would have thought that it was because he was caught in the act. But then again, he couldn't look at either of them. "Who's that? That's Sarah."

"Yeah, she said that. Uh, who's Sarah?"

"Sarah is, hmm… What's the best way to describe? Sarah is my…" Now Sarah was getting a little worried. If nothing was going on, surely he wouldn't struggle to tell Lou who she was? Or supposed to be? His girlfriend. Hang on, his cover girlfriend. She wasn't supposed to be…man this was screwed up. She needed to focus.

"Girlfriend," Sarah supplied. It was the right answer, but she wasn't all that sure what it meant at this point. Cover girlfriends were not supposed to get jealous.

"Mm-hm." Chuck was clearly very uncomfortable.

"Nice to meet you." Sarah extended a hand to Lou. It wasn't her fault Chuck didn't tell her. Maybe it just didn't come up or maybe…no, she wasn't going to go there.

"Nice to meet you, Sarah. Uh, you should refrigerate that. It'd be a shame for the Chuck to make you sick." Lou left and Sarah felt relieved. No need to worry about the competition. Lou bowed out gracefully.

"Yes, absolutely, I… Great idea." Sarah's relief was short lived. Chuck didn't look too happy about what just happened. She glanced at the package in his hands again and made a mental note to bring him lunch tomorrow. That's something a girlfriend would do. It would reinforce the cover too. Speaking of the cover, they had a mission to take off.

"Uh, there's more to the Mason Whitney incident than we thought. Let's go Chuck."

Sarah grabbed Chuck's hand and with a "come here" let him to one of the tables outside the Wienerlicious. This little side mission couldn't have come at a better time, but she knew Chuck was nervous about it, so she had to talk him down. She couldn't take the chance of letting him back out of it. The earlier incident with Lou made her realize that she needed to reinforce the relationship with him too and not just for the cover. As much as she could anyway.

"I just wanted to make sure we're all set for tonight's mission."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's been a while since I've slept with someone. Not, not, not slept with someone, but slept with…it's actually been a while since I've done either one, so…" He was babbling again and she found it adorable. At the same time it made her a little nervous too.

"Chuck, listen, I know this is kind of uncomfortable."

"I'm fine. It's fine." Chuck couldn't quite look her in the eyes though. She remembered how he choked on his coffee when she suggested it was time for them to make love. She took a calm sip of hers to disguise the fact that she slipped up with her phrasing.

"It's just that we have to do it. I mean, not, not do it…" Why do words always have double meanings when they're not supposed too?

"I got it."

"…so we don't blow…" O God, this conversation was a Freudian minefield.

"I got it."

"…our cover." Maybe she should just stop talking now.

"I got it, I got it."

"Okay." Sensing the end of their little discussion, Chuck left for the BuyMore, but then he spotted Lou in the parking lot.

Sarah watched as they shared a somewhat tense conversation. Lou was clearly still upset that Chuck didn't tell her about his girlfriend, but it seemed like they came to some sort of understanding. Surely Chuck didn't tell Lou that their relationship wasn't real? No, he wouldn't. But when he closed Lou's car door for her, she did a quick scan of the parking lot to make sure their cover wasn't compromised by Chuck's actions. It didn't take her mind of the jealousy that flared up again. Taking care of a girl who was after Chuck was easy, but what was she supposed to do when he was the one who was clearly interested in someone else?

A/N For the confused one's among you, here's a rough timeline. Chapter 1 takes place at the end of 'The truth', with a reference to the break-up scene. All the names in the first few paragraphs are the aliases Sarah had while on the road conning with her dad. The first paragraph of this chapter takes place right after Chapter 1, then it's a flashback to the Charah moments in the episode 'The truth'. By the end of Chapter 3 we'll pick up with 'The hard salami' and take the story from there. And yes, the story will be from Sarah's POV.

The jury is still out on 'Chuck vs Season 4' – 9 reviews and 5 alerts out of 500 odd hits – still deciding whether that constitutes enough interest. Anyway, time to hit the books - had a nasty surprise on Thursday when I realised that my exam was moved to the next day and not on Monday anymore as previously advertised.