Greetings people...we're trying to get this one done, so don't kill us or hate us, ok? As always, read and review.

"Cassie, you're a nervous wreck." Sam chided as she, Janet, and Lena helped the young woman get ready for her date.

"Relax, it's just Liam." Lena said, with a slight wink to Sam. "It's not like he's going to bite or anything…"

"Hard, anyway." Nick said, as he walked in.

"NICK!" Cassie said, her eyes widening in nervous horror.

"What?"

"Keep that up…and whatever prayer you had of a fox trot tonight is gone." Lena said, giving her husband a glare.

"Consider it gone." He replied, swallowing.

"What are you doing here, Nick?" Sam asked, distracting the Kosoviches from one another.

"Liam's downstairs."

"He's WHAT?" Cassie practically screamed, grabbing the brush from her mother and running it through her own hair.

"That…was my eardrum…" Nick said, one hand over his ear.

"Go." Lena said, showing no sign of forgiveness.

As he left, Janet could have sworn that she heard: "Sounds like an angry tango night…" come from his lips.

"You can kiss any thought of that good-bye RIGHT now." Lena said, trying to calm the young woman.

"Cassie, you're going to dinner…not dancing…" Sam said, remembering her own nervousness when told that she would be dancing with her commanding officer on cable television. "And from what we could tell, you two didn't have a lack of conversation topics."

This won her a tiny glare from the young woman who grabbed her purse and hurried out the door.

"Well, that went well…" Sam said, referencing the nerves that Cassie had still displayed on her way out the door.

"No, it didn't." Janet answered, truthfully.

"I think I need a drink…"

"I think I'll join you."

"Me too."

"Well, Liam, what are your plans for the evening?" Jack asked, unsure of what exactly to ask the airman under these circumstances.

"I was going to take Cassandra bowling and then out to dinner." He said, nervously. This was his commanding officer, and he was being grilled about what they were doing. Needless to say, he was petrified that if Cassie didn't have a good time, he would find himself spending time in the brig.

"Cassandra? Going all formal?" Jack asked, surprised.

Liam tried not to blush. "Cassie is a little girl's name. Cassandra is a woman."

Jack raised an eyebrow, but both were saved from the impending awkward moment by the sound of shouting upstairs.

Jack gave the nervous young man a tight smile. "Nick was telling Cassie that you're here."

Unfortunately, instead of being comforted by this, Liam paled, wondering for a moment if Cassie really wanted to go out with him. But Cassie soon arrived at the top of the stairs and began descending down into the living room. Her long wavy brown hair was flowing freely. She was wearing a tan sweater and brown slacks. "Hi."

"Hi." Liam said, breathless. "Are you ready to go?" He asked, regaining his ability to speak.

She smiled. "Sure."

"Have her back by eleven, young man." Jack said, as they walked toward the car.

"Jack!" Sam scolded.

"What?"

"Just have fun!" She corrected before she closed the door.

"What?" Jack asked, again.

"She's twenty-four years old."

"So?"

"So, she doesn't need a chaperone!"

"I say she does!"

Sam raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really? And where're Janet and Daniel? They are her parents…"

He took a deep breath, and then nodded. "I know. I just…I'm feeling a little overprotective."

"A little?" She asked, skeptically.

"Okay, a lot overprotective."

"Oh boy…" Sam said, under her breath as she caught a sight of Grace and Danny holding hands as they walked into the kitchen.

"What? What's 'oh boy?'"

"Nothing, Jack."

He turned, and looked to see where Sam was looking. His eyes almost popped out of his head as he beheld his daughter holding hands with Nick's son. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and opened them, expecting it to just be a figment of his imagination. Unfortunately for him, it was not.

Shooting a look over at Nick, who had just come back downstairs himself, he jerked his head toward the kitchen. Obediently, Nick looked where was indicating and shook his head. "I guess it's about time we discussed the dowry…" The Aussie quipped.

Jack glared at him for a moment before a reluctant smile spread across his face. "Oh, I ain't paying you, buddy…you're paying me!

Nick heaved a sigh. "I suppose I have to do it…for my son…how much?"

"8 cows."

Sam rolled her eyes and shoved her husband good-naturedly before heading into the kitchen herself. She would never understand men...

"Have you ever bowled before?" Liam asked as he turned into the bowling alley.

"I've gone with the girls a couple times in college, but not really." she confessed as he opened her car door for her and helped her out of his tiny blue Mustang.

He chuckled. "Well go easy on me...it's been a few months."

"I'm sure you'll do better than me!"

Liam shrugged and gave her a small smile. "Make you a bet..." he offered.

Cassie scrutinized him for a long moment before replying, "What are the terms?"

Picking up one of the two toned bowling shoes and placing it on his foot, he looked at her and she could almost feel herself sinking into his hazel eyes. Mentally shaking herself, she focused her attention on his voice in time to hear him say, "Who ever loses has to buy the winner's meal tonight."

"You're on." she replied, reaching out and shaking his outstretched hand.

They walked toward the bowling balls and Liam said, "Choose your weapon."

Cassie chuckled at this and he gave her a cheeky grin. "Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all night." he joked.

She flicked him on the forearm and he gave her a look of mock hurt that had her outright laughing.

"Ahhh...I knew it." he said, looking at her with an expression that made her feel like she was slightly on display.

"Knew what?" she asked nervously.

He picked up a dark blue bowling ball and tested its weight before he answered, "I knew that you'd have a beautiful smile and I was right."

Looking into his eyes, Cassie saw no traces of flattery or guile, and her face flushed dark red.

"I'm sorry...did I embarrass you?" he asked nervously.

She put a reassuring hand on his arm and replied, "No...I'm just not used to compliments like that."

"That's a shame...someone like you should be." he said simply before turning his attention to the keyboard and inputting his and Cassie's names. Her face was still somewhat red, but she figured if she went out with Liam long enough, she'd stop getting some embarrassed everytime he complimented her!

Raising the ball in front of his face, Liam focused his attention on the pins directly in front of him. Taking three steps forward, he crouched down and released the ball perfectly. He succeeded in knocking over 8 pins and Cassie let out a low whistle. Liam came strutting back and he looked so funny with his neon green and black bowling shoes on that Cassie couldn't help but laugh at the absurd sight.

"You mockin' me?" he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Me? Mock you? Never." Cassie replied, just as deadpan. They contemplated each other for a moment before both of them burst out laughing. Liam walked over and retrieved his bowling ball. He was only able to add 1 more pin, giving him 9 on the first frame.

"Okay Cassandra...show me what you've got!" he said, giving her a playful evil eye.

Sauntering up to the holding pen where her bowling ball was kept, Cassie picked it up and before she could even take a step, Liam started coughing, but she could hear the undercurrents of laughter behind it.

Putting the ball down, she whirled around, both hands on her hips. "What?" she demanded.

Liam immediately had a contrite look on his face. "I'm sorry, but you're holding it in the wrong hand..."

Feeling like a bit of a fool, Cassie switched the bowling ball to the other hand and won a look of approval from Liam. Walking up to the line, she did some mental calculations in her head and launched the ball, knocking over 3 pins.

"Aww, man!" she groaned.

"Better luck next time...and aim in between the center arrows on the floor." Liam advised.

She nodded, and tried again, this time knocking 4 pins over, for a total of 7 on her first frame.

"Wanna forfeit?" Liam teased as he picked up his bowling ball to start frame two.

Cassie looked him straight in the eye as she strutted right up to him and whispered in his ear, "Not a chance, fly boy."

He watched her walk away, his jaw mentally scraping the ground. Liam could still feel shivers going down his spine from the way her warm breath felt on his ear.

Shaking his head in a desperate attempt to clear it, Liam bowled. He got 6 pins on the first try, then cleaned up the rest for all 10.

"Want me to help you with this one?" he offered.

"Sure!" she agreed.

Liam walked up directly behind her, taking her right wrist in his own right hand. "When you're releasing the ball, you're doing a funny thing with your wrist. You want to keep every thing nice and straight so the ball won't curve off to the side and give you a gutter ball."

She nodded, hardly believing the effect that he was having on her.

"When you draw back, keep a curve to your arm...that should help your trajectory and velocity."

Cassie was so comfortable with his nearness that the terms he used nearly escaped her. She turned her head and looked at him. "Velocity? Trajectory?" she queried.

Liam blushed a little and Cassie found herself thinking that he truly was the most handsome guy she'd ever met.

"Since I didn't go to college, I read a lot. I read about Physics, Archaeology, Astronomy...whatever happens to take my interest at the time." he shrugged.

They stood there gazing into each other's eyes for a long moment until they both heard the distinctive sounds of some VERY familiar snickering coming from behind them.

Cassie grip had somewhat slackened on the bowling ball, so when she whirled away from Liam to see if her suspicions were true, the ball hurtled through the air...and right into the leg of one Nick Kosovich.

Both Cassie and Liam's eyes widened with horror as the dancer went down on the floor. Before they could get to him though, he pulled himself upright and hobbled away as quickly as he could.

"Crap...I'm SO going to hear about this..." Cassie groaned.

Liam had a small smile. "Yeah...but at least he'll think twice about doing some "date recon"!"

Cassie had to laugh. "That's very true. Now, where were we?"

Nick hopped into the house on one leg and plopped down on the sofa. He hadn't even pulled up his pant leg to examine the damage because he was sure he REALLY didn't want to know...anything that hurt this badly was bound to be bad.

Gritting his teeth, he pulled up his left pant leg and looked at his leg. "Oh boy..." he groaned. His leg literally had a nice bowling ball shaped dent in it. As he was bewailing the coin toss that had sent him on this mission, Lena came into the room, a bag of ice in her hand. "Need this?" she asked, tossing it to him.

"I think I might need more than a bag of ice..." he said, gritting his teeth as he placed the bag on his leg. "This hurts like the blazes."

"What happened?" Lena asked, looking more closely at her husband's face. His normally tan complexion was almost white and she could have sworn there was sweat on his brow.

"Well, Cassie and Liam were in a somewhat close embrace at the time, so when she spun around, I think she forgot that there was a bowling ball in her hand, and it decided that it HAD to be introduced to my leg..." Nick joked weakly.

His wife gave him a look and he sighed. "That's what I get for agreeing to a coin toss with Jack." he grumbled.

"And usually YOU'RE the one with the good luck." she teased gently.

A small smile curved his lips. "I'm beginning to think that Danny's sucked me dry in the luck department!"

She had to laugh outright at this. "Yes, our son DID seem to acquire his share of the family good luck plus someone else's!"

Nick tried to laugh with her, but stopped quickly when he felt waves of pain radiating from his leg. Lena lifted the bag from his leg and gasped. "Nick, I think you need to have Janet take a look at this..."

He merely nodded his agreement and swung his leg down from the sofa. He barely put any weight on it at all before he collapsed on the ground, straining to keep himself from screaming out loud.

"Jack, could you give me a hand?" Lena called, her hand under her husband's elbow. Jack and Sam both came rushing in to find Nick on the floor in extreme pain.

"Sure." he replied immediately. Between the two of them. they got him into the backseat without much jostling of his injured leg. Closing his eyes as his wife high-tailed it to the base, Nick wondered if he could possibly fund a project to pave the road up to Cheyanne Mountain...

Liam lost to Cassie badly, but loudly declared that the only reason why he lost was because he was distracted by her beauty. Though Cassie could hear a ring of truth in this statement, she chose to take it jokingly. He escorted her outside and opened the car door for her again and she found herself wishing she'd met him sooner.

As they pulled up to the pizza place, Liam turned and looked at her with an expression of mock gravity. "Before we go in, there's something you should know about the two guys who run this place."

"Okay..." she replied, slightly bewildered.

"Their names...are Mario and Luigi." he began.

Cassie started to giggle and an answering smile spread across Liam's own face before he continued.

"They are Italian...and their father was a plumber."

That did it. She cracked up and Liam wasn't too far behind her.

"I've known these guys since grade school and I STILL have a hard time not laughing at them..." he wheezed.

"I can definitely see why!" she giggled.

Climbing out of the car and heading up the sidewalk to the restaurant, Liam opened the door for her and was immediately greeted by two tall, very Italian men.

"Hey, Liam! Too long, man!" the older of the two said with a grin.

"Mario, nice to see you!" he responded, a matching grin on his own face.

"And who is this lovely lady?" Luigi asked, bowing to Cassie.

"That's my date Cassandra." Liam said proudly.

She flushed under their sudden scrutiny and Mario said something in Italian to Liam. He rolled his eyes and responded in kind before whisking Cassie off to a booth in the corner.

"You speak Italian?" she asked as they placed their drink orders and got a basket of breadsticks.

"I hung out a lot with Mario and Luigi growing up, so I picked up some here and there." he said, aware that his cheeks were burning.

"That's really cool." Cassie said, sipping her soda.

The pair ate their pizza, talking of this and that before Liam looked down at his watch and said regretfully that they should probably be heading back, since he had a mission briefing in the morning. She agreed swiftly and after biding Mario and Luigi farewell, they left the restaurant.

"So...may I take you out again sometime?" Liam asked nervously as he pulled into Jack and Sam's driveway.

Cassie smiled at him. "I'd like that."

Reaching into his pocket, Liam pulled out a scrap of paper and a pen. Scrawling a number on it, he handed it to her. "I don't know how long this mission is going to take, but feel free to leave me a message or something, if you want." he told her.

Nodding, she was slightly surprised when he leaned over and hugged her lightly. "I had a good time...hope to see you soon." he said.

"Me too."

Waving to him as he drove away, Cassie allowed a big grin to spread across her face. Liam was great and she was glad she'd decided to go out with him. Maybe Nick was on to something... she thought as she walked up to the house.