I wasn't planning on updating today, but when you're home sick from work and your family is watching football...things happen. Enjoy!


"So are all of you coming to our place for Thanksgiving?" Lisbon asked, pressing the correct button on the elevator. The occupants shifted themselves around as the door closed.

"We wouldn't miss it," Wylie said. "Are you going to make mashed potatoes with lumps?"

"That's the only way Jane will eat them. Mimi too," Lisbon smiled fondly. "She takes after him."

"That's terrifying," Vega said.

"I know I'm supposed to respond by telling you that no, it's wonderful and beautiful and perfect," Lisbon said, a mischievous grin on her face, "but yeah. Terrifying does describe it sometimes."

Wylie looked more pleased than anything. "I'm not terrified of any situation where the mashed potatoes are with lumps."

"I will be there providing the kid isn't still sick," Theo said. "I don't want to bring her around Michelle and Mimi if she's contagious and I can't ask the sitter to be away from her family on Thanksgiving. I can't even ask, because she would. She'd drop it all in a second."

"We understand," Jane said, nodding. "The kids are the most important thing."

"I'll make some Chayote salad," Vega said. "And bring it with us."


"Good, you guys are here," Cho said as Lisbon, Vega, Wylie, Theo, and Jane walked off the elevator. He blinked. "Did you come together?"

"No. Coincidence," Jane said. "And not a terribly unlikely one either, with the four of us coming in two groups of two and an identical start time, if you think about it the odds suggest us taking the same elevator about once every..."

"You can tell me all about it later," Cho said dismissively, gesturing to a tall, commanding man walking up to them. "This is Agent Donald Cranston."

"Don," the man said, nodding to them.

"He will be working with us on this case, he's one of the original officers to pick it up. We have a suspect. Luis Bejarano."

"Multiple witnesses saw him fleeing one of the crime scenes," Don said. "We picked him up an hour ago at a car wash. He isn't talking."

"We also have another witness who wants to add to her statement," Cho said. "Lisbon, she's in room three. Take Kemper, the two of you work on her. Jane, once we get information on him I need you to judge the truthfulness. Wylie, continue the leads you were working on last night, Bejarano may not be our guy and even if he is..."

"He may not be working alone," Don said. He gestured to Vega. "You go with him."

"No," Cho said as the others began to walk off. Vega froze in mid step and backed up to stand just behind Cho when he gestured for her to come back. "I want her to talk to Bejarano."

"I've requested they send..." he wiggled his fingers to demonstrate his mind going blank, "that little woman from the second floor up. To try and talk some reason into him. She'll probably be able to communicate with him a little bit better than you or I."

"I was going to have Agent Bonaventura talk to him," Cho repeated. "She's incredible in the interrogation room."

"Oh," Don said, scoffing and looking mildly amused. "I don't think so."

"Excuse me?"

Cho silenced Vega by holding up a hand. "What's the issue, Don?"

He shrugged, as if it were obvious. "You can't exactly blame me for being…wary…of Agent Bonaventura being on this case."

"Tell me why," Cho said. "And then I'll see if I can blame you."

A smug smile came over Don's face as he folded his arms. "Agent Michelle Bonaventura. It's the worst kept secret in local law enforcement that she's really Agent Michelle Vega, who allegedly suffered a fatal GSW to the abdomen by one Steve Sellers, five years ago."

"How does her identity discredit her ability to work this case?" Cho asked, folding his own arms. He was significantly shorter than Don, but somehow he seemed more imposing.

"Her father. Badilón Vega, if my slight digging is correct, he didn't exactly come to this country by way of Ellis Island."

Vega literally felt the temperature of her blood increase.

"If...if I do recall correctly, didn't he come to this country in a similar fashion as the people we discovered last week. They're smuggling them in with shipments of other contraband that some local authorities have been paid to look the other way on." Don looked down – literally – at Vega, and sneered. "This...agent...could very well be sympathizing with the burglars, rather than the Americans."

"If I may," Vega said, standing up in line with Cho to face the taller agent. "My father came to this country with his baby brother to escape horrid circumstances in Cuba. His siblings who were unable to come with him died. You want to know what the conditions were like? Read any reputable history book. He made it to Miami and got a job, worked fourteen hours a day for months. He ended up in the U.S. Army for nearly forty years. I was born here, I started off in the military and ended up here, working for the FBI, back here even after what happened to me. Don't look down your nose and differentiate me from "the Americans." Don't you dare." She stood up straighter, jutting out her chin. "And you know what? I'm going to go and get you the answers you want. You don't have to wait for 'that little woman from the second floor'."

Vega marched toward the interrogation room, the young man sitting quietly at the table. He looked up when she entered, appearing ready to make some snide comment. She didn't let him.

Vega slammed her hands down on the table in front of him. "Esta bien, voy al grano. Dame los nombres o por todos los santos esta mujer embarazada te arrogara por esa ventana. Ah, ves que hablo en serio verdad? Por tu carota veo que me estás tomando en serio." She pulled a piece of paper and pen out of her pocked and slapped them down in front of him. "Ahora tienes diez segundos para escribirlos. Ándale pero ya!"

Less than a minute later Vega marched out of the interrogation room, handing the piece of paper to Don. "This is who he is working for," Vega said. "Now if you need me, I'll be in the break room. I'm eating for two and trust me, you don't want to encounter me pissed off and hungry."


Thanksgiving chapter is next! I'll post a Christmas chapter is we get nearer to the holidays as well.