Dempsey and Kilhane entered the SI10 offices to a massive cheer from the team as everyone was in to help with the collar.

'Nice shot Jim,' Chas slapped him on the back, 'buy you a pint later.'

'What do you mean nice shot, I missed. I was aiming for the cockpit,' he laughed with pure masculine pleasure at sticking it to the bad guys.

'Did you have any training on how to fire an R.P.G.,' Hargreaves asked as she was curious as to how the D.I. had got authorisation to use the weapon.

'No, I just thought how hard can it be?' Dempsey shrugged and then saw her horrified expression. 'Course I had training, you think they'd let me take charge of a weapon like that; Kilhane's been trained too, we got skills here people.'

Harry handed James a cup of coffee. 'Spikings is already on the phone negotiating our budget and it sounds like it's being drummed up from other teams in the Met which is going to make SI10 popular.'

'Hey, we just took down a major terrorist cell, Kilhane's lucky to be alive; going undercover with those animals ain't easy, they should be pleased to give us their budget.'

'Well I don't think he's going around with his hat asking for change,' she gave a small smile, 'whose idea was it to circle the plane with vehicles.'

'Mine why? To be honest I didn't think they'd try to drive right through them; you'd have to be crazy to try that,' he drank some of the coffee. 'Still got the chopper, fancy a trip to your pop's? Plenty of room to land there.'

Harry looked at him with that patient expression he hated. 'I think the last thing you need at the moment is the label of maverick, oh and that brings to mind another issue. Can I have a word?'

'You can have a whole dictionary, you're looking particularly hot today Detective Inspector,' he followed her to her office.

'It's about D.I. Parker,' she saw his face darken and held up her hand before he could speak. 'Spikings asked me about the injury and I told him what happened and he's handling it officially so I don't want you to get involved.'

'Duly noted,' he agreed easily without having the slightest intention of doing as she asked. There was no way Parker was hitting on Harry like that; what did she take him for?' He ignored some of the kisses he'd put on the D.I. without her permission in the past cos they'd kind of been necessary for the undercover work or that was his excuse anyway.

'Dempsey I mean it,' he'd given in far too easily and he always did that when he was going to do the opposite; like the time she'd called him in on the Giardino case and he'd acquiesced and then gone his own way. 'I don't need any more notoriety, I'm not happy about making things official but I could hardly say no to the Chief Inspector. And if you do intervene it could affect the case as they may allege that I put it around within SI10.'

'Hey, you're entitled to have a relationship Harry,' he got up and came and sat on her desk. 'Okay, I can see where you're going with this but it ain't over, it's gonna be a late night are you going to the pub later on.'

'Yes of course, it was a good collar everyone will be over there, it would look odd if I didn't,' she put her head to one side and looked up at him. 'It was a fantastic shot James, were you nervous?'

'Bit tense; didn't care about the combatants particularly, good riddance in my book but I had Spikings budget and insurance rattling around my brain. In the end, I just thought screw it and just went for it.'

'You certainly did,' she smiled at him and laughed. 'It's on the news, Chas has taken a video of it.' Harry being an alpha female and excelling at everything she did very much admired excellence in others. For the past three years, she'd tried to show Dempsey she was as good as him and it was at times like this she realised why she was so strongly attracted to him.

His warm gaze met hers and he got the idea that his actions had got Harry all hot for him which wasn't a bad thing. 'You can show me your appreciation later but right now I've got to check on the arrests and make sure we've got all of them.'

'Yes of course,' she watched him walk out and her hormones did a happy dance; well every now and again it was just nice to be a female and enjoy the fact. And her partner in crime could certainly help with that.

-oOoo—

'Where've you been,' Dempsey made a space for Harry near the bar and shielded her from the crush with his larger frame.

'Well I couldn't get near you because of your fan club; I had to practically fight my way to the bar,' she smoothed back a wing of her hair. 'I can see quite a few of your former dates in here and there's Suzanne, a would-be date.'

'If you'd been nicer to me earlier there wouldn't've been former dates; you just ruthlessly rejected me so I found consolation elsewhere.' He drank some of the beer and dragged on his cigar and looked down at her his gaze wandering over her beautiful face and then lower to the curve of her breasts. 'Nice blouse, get you out of it in seconds,' his dark eyes met hers and he smiled as her skin heated. 'I can see the idea appeals to you, which is nice.'

'I thought we agreed that we would follow a certain protocol in this kind of situation,' her blue eyes chastised him but she wasn't really annoyed and he knew it.

'I flirt, I always flirt so that ain't different from before and I ain't talking to the other girls' cos you get funny about it. You always did come to think about it.' She was used to his attention and when another female came into the territory Harry turned on the frost.

'Don't flatter yourself Dempsey, I used to feel sorry for them,' Harry picked up a drink from the bar. 'You were always very charming to the females concerned but you were like Teflon as far as commitment went. Any attempts at moving forward in the relationship just slid right off.'

'That's cos I was into you,' he smiled at her as if to say touché. 'Well maybe not for the first-year cos you were just a hot, pain in the ass. But then I got to know you better and I liked you as well as the hotness. If you ever wanted to dress up in Sharon's little bar outfit again though… I mean national hero; should mean something.'

'Queen and country,' Harry murmured her blue eyes mocked him in the usual fashion as in her opinion she didn't need to do anything other than turn up and be willing to engage to get James hot under the collar.

'Yeah that kind of thing,' he laughed at her expression. 'I'd be fine with it,' he took the roll of her eyes as read but wondered if she'd still got it or that hooker outfit that was good too. Although at the time he'd just been mad at her for blowing his cover so it was probably not wise mentioning that at this delicate stage of their relationship.

Harry gave him a deliberately sensual look and licked her bottom lip as if to recover an errant drop of her drink.

His eyes darkened and then his stupid brain took in her amused expression, 'do you know what; you're still a pain in the ass.' She was always playing that one-upmanship, you're more into me than I am into you, game and he'd show her what she got for that later.

'I've no idea what you're talking about,' she brushed against his lower body with her derriere as she moved to put her glass back on the bar.

'Let's not get X-rated here,' the American growled as his body reacted in response, 'cos your little protocol is likely to go right out the window.'

Spikings came over and took one of Dempsey's beers and Chas came up on his shoulder and Jim offered a drink to the D.I. to make a point to the boss. The Chief Inspector had grown up in the school of hard knocks so the Yank's point was lost on him or water off a duck's back.

'The Home Office have agreed to fund our expenses on the last caper so that's something of a relief. I hate wrestling with the budgets as it is so yes Dempsey I am the unsung hero here so thanks for the pint.'

'You're welcome,' the Yank responded sarcastically and then he tensed, he'd seen Bunny Schofield enter the bar with a number of his officers and Parker was one of them. 'You got to be kidding me.'

'Leave it to me Detective Inspector,' Spikings strode off in Bunny's direction as D.C. Fry who'd had a few pushed Parker on the shoulder in an aggressive fashion.

Harry groaned and grabbed Dempsey's arm. 'Don't you dare get involved in this,' she hissed.

Hargreaves rushed over as half the bar started a John Wayne, western style fight, she distracted Harry which left Dempsey unleashed and he went in to get Parker off Fry.

'Harry you should leave,' she grabbed her friends arm and pulled her outside of the pub. 'I can't believe Schofield brought them in here, what was he thinking?' Joyce brushed down her jacket and picked a piece of glass off Harry's.

'Maybe the paperwork hasn't got that far, look I need to go back in there and get Dempsey…

'I'll go,' Joyce went back in and found Dempsey who had a choke hold on Parker, 'D.I. Dempsey, you're wanted outside,' she shook his arm to get his attention and he dropped the other guy who was purple in the face.

Schofield had got his other officers back together and they were leaving and Parker joined them after muttering some curses at the Yank. Tables were righted and any glass brushed up and Fry had an ice pack on his eye as did Morrison.

'Chief Inspector Schofield and I will settle the bill George,' Spikings reassured the publican whom he knew well.

'Ask your officers to keep it down I've got my license to think of and the neighbours can get funny about this kind of thing not to mention the brewery.'

'Understood,' Spikings looked over at Fry and shook his head. 'Young hothead,' he growled and then spied Harry re-entering the pub. 'Are you all right D.I. Makepeace?'

'I'm fine sir,' she looked over at her ex-partner who appeared unfazed by the whole thing. 'I left with Sergeant Hargreaves as Chief Inspector Schofield's team came in.'

'Ye-es, well we might have to do some horse trading which I strongly suspect was the aim of Fraud's visit, although Chief Inspector Schofield says that he hasn't received the documentation reference your injury, Harry. I understand team loyalty and that goes for both divisions. We'll see. Fry and Morrison go and have your injuries photographed by medical first thing tomorrow.'

Suzanne Leyton strolled over and joined them. 'I saw a flash go off and I just happened to have a camera in my bag so I took some photographs of the incident just in case the photographic evidence might be biased. I'm happy to hand it over if you would like to get it developed, I have a few holiday snaps on the film so I'd like to get those back.'

Spikings was aware that Fry had been taunted into the first punch and that Fry had been outraged that anyone would hurt D.I. Makepeace or Helen of Troy as he was now mentally calling her. Dempsey had only entered the fray when Fry had been overpowered by Parker and was getting a hammering that exceeded any crime he'd committed. I mean a push to the shoulder was hardly the same as several blows in the face. Parker's purple face in Dempsey's choke hold was something the Chief Inspector pushed to back memory and he hoped any film taken had been in black and white rather than colour.

—oOo-

Harry was very quiet on the way home and Dempsey guessed she was in a snit about something. He thought through the incident. Fry had been an idiot and started the whole thing but it was hardly brutal behaviour; a bit of an annoyance admittedly but he wouldn't have hammered some rookie for that. It would be great if Suzanne had got Parker doing that on film rather than him pulling Parker off Fry and then ramming him up against the wall. Knowing his luck, he'd be featuring largely since Suzanne had a thing for him, so Parker's turkey face could be front and centre.

'I can't help thinking men are very stupid at times,' Harry broke the silence. 'I mean why would Chief Inspector Schofield bring his men to SI10's local other than to cause a brawl. Nobody goes into another division's local without being invited it's like an unwritten law.'

'Maybe Parker recommended it cos he'd been romancing you in the Ambercote; probably had some attraction for him.' Dempsey could give the needle as well as receive it. 'I mean if you'd avoided him like Joyce did you'd have saved yourself a whole lot of grief. I mean even Spikings gets tetchy over the number of officers we get hanging round the place cos they think they've got a chance with you. I mean you're so nice to them; make them so welcome they never want to leave; the place gets overcrowded.

'I'm civil to colleagues and that's all, you're acting as if I'm some kind of flirt which I'm not,' Harry fired back. 'You're just jealous and possessive and if I so much as smile at some other man you behave like a Neanderthal.'

'Oh really, well what about you and chicken soup, Suzanne? You got in a mood about that and had me down as a womanizing lout. So, if we're talking about jealousy you ain't got no room to talk.'

'Well it's just a bit much that the case with Parker may get dropped because of my male colleagues getting into a fight with the officers from Fraud. He'll probably try it on with some other woman who isn't so good at self-defence and it will be my fault.'

'The way I'm hearing it, it's my fault or maybe my powers of observation aren't as sharp as they might be.' He responded sarcastically as he pulled into her drive. 'Don't bother saying you're not inviting me in; I already got the message loud and clear.'

'I'll see you in the morning,' Harry responded icily, 'goodnight.'

'Yeah goodnight,' he drove back to his place. Earlier she'd been all invitation and then cos Schofield's team make trouble all of a sudden yours truly is some kind of pariah. I mean Parker was still alive and kicking although he was expecting to see him in one of those surgical collars if Fraud wanted to milk it. Maybe they should play snap and make sure Fry looked bad on the other hand the kid probably didn't need the window dressing.