Andy felt like jumping up and down in joy. Since that was hard to do in a public phone booth, she settled for actively fidgeting with her braids (she was really starting to like these, too bad working on the streets meant you had to keep your hair up and out of your face) while she summarised the whole conversation with Jinx to her handler, Wesley.

She had finally approached her. After days of probing and hasty departures, while Andy/Leila was sitting around about to die out of boredom, she had taken a moment with her alone and invited her to come work for them.

Finally! It was scary, especially with all the complications Sam had brought to the surface, but it was progress, and something to do.

"I kept to the script, don't worry. I said I'm not into hooking or something like that, and she laughed at me. Wouldn't tell me anything besides the fabricated story she gave Carly too."

She heard the rustle of papers on the other side of the line. "Did she give you any indication as to the location they're taking you?"

Taking you. Damn, that sounded weird. It was getting real now, the days leading up to this were just practice. Now she had to shine and perform on Oscar-winning level, or she could be in serious, life-threatening trouble.

"None. Do you have any idea how to narrow it down?" They could hardly stake out every location that was connected with these people, could they?

"My guess is, they're going to take you to one of the warehouses. But don't worry. We'll have a car follow you from pickup, and one on each of the prime locations. You'll have someone around at all times."

We, did that include Donaldson? Could she trust him to have her back in a precarious situation? Sam's words kept echoing in her head, but she still found it hard to believe a fellow copper, who hadn't even met her before this undercover operation, would want to harm her in any way.

"Am I going to be wired?" Andy didn't know which prospect scared her more; walking into a lion's den fitted with a discoverable bug, or her walking in there alone without any outside knowledge of what was happening inside; no one to keep her safe if things went south.

"No, they'd find it, too risky." Just like that, door number two was chosen for her.

"Okay." Andy tried to keep the fear and apprehension out of her voice. Her earlier ecstatic mood seemed to have cooled consideraly.

"Listen, don't worry. This is just going to be an introduction. They're not going to tell you all their secrets right away, so just try to get comftorable with these people. A little tension is no big deal, to be nervous is expected and in character. Just remember what we talked about."

Yeah, she remembered those hours they spent drilling her and practising conversations, but it had all been theoretical at that point. Now it was real.

"Call back as soon as you can after tommorow's meeting. Good luck."

Good luck? That was it? Andy agreed to call back after the meeting and hung up the phone.

Now what? She had a whole night and day ahead of her of nothing to do but worry about tommorrow, and she didn't feel like going back straight away.

Plus, she had promised to call Sam. Should she risk it? If caught, both their careers were over and done with. But if Sam was right and something was going on, she needed all the help she could get.

And Sam had always been the best in calming her down, reassuring her of her capabilities and boosting her self-esteem. She kinda needed that right now. She needed him. Since they had really 'started' as a couple they had been together all the time, and she found she really missed him now.

The initial euphorhia of finally moving forward with the case had made place for fear. Could she really do this? No more sitting around making conversation, but real undercover work.

Andy left the booth and hurried along the streets. She couldn't call Sam from the same phone booth as her handler, could she? If they found out, everything would go to hell. After her suspension, she had promised the tribunal that she could seperate personal from professional. But could she be held responsible if those worlds continued to clash?

Andy hurried trough a couple of blocks with suspicious occupants before reaching the other phone booth she had picked out earlier.

She closed the door behind her and sighed deep before dialing the number she knew by heart. This was so wrong.

"Yeah?"

Her heart jumped upon hearing his voice, which made her feel like a teenager. Why did he have this effect on her?

"Hi. It's me." She had earned the right to be his 'me', hadn't she?

"Hi. How are you?"

Did he really want to know? How could she explain the choking feeling that increased its hold on her as time progressed? Damn it, she felt like breaking down at the sound of his voice.

"Did I wake you?" She suddenly realised she had no idea if Sam had been working the day shift today, or not. Maybe he had been at the Penny tonight, and he had totally forgotten about his rookie girlfriend.

Sam chuckled. "No, you did not. Are you okay?"

Andy was still contemplating about how much she should tell him. Why did she call again?

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"What's wrong?"

He could still read her like a book, even over the phone.

"Nothing, it's just... I'm going in for real tomorrow. I'm meeting some players. Thought you might want to know."

So, she had called him. That was good. But it didn't really ease his mind, knowing that she was going to be in for real tomorrow, alone, and he couldn't do anthing about it. He didn't even know where she was going to be, or what she was going to do exactly.

She was meeting some people. Based on the neighbourhood and what he had learned so far, he had a few guesses on who the players were, none of them too appealing.

He had voiced none of his concerns to Andy, because she sounded scared enough as it was. He had done his best to reassure her, to build up her confidence.

Could she do this? Sam genuinly thought of her as a good cop, with great instincts that he could trust. But she was still so young, so inexperienced in undercover work. Well, she was doing this, so she just had to be ready to pull it off, and he just had to have faith. Nothing he could do tonight.

This was only the initial meet, nothing was going to go wrong, he had to believe that.

But then there was the issue of Boyd and his companions, and the possible conspiracy that he was trying to unravel.

At least he had work today to keep him busy. The whole team had worked together to get a child molestor of the street before he could take advantage of the six-year old he had taken that morning.

The boy was back home safe and sound, and the perp was locked up for a long long time to come.

All in all, a very fulfilling day, had it not been for that nagging feeling in the back of his head.

He had just declined Jerry's invitation for a drink (which dumbfounded everyone around, because the chance of that ever happening again were very slim), because he wanted to stay clear-headed and sober in case she called him tonight. Jeez, had being with her reduced him to a sappy guy waiting all night by the phone?

Suddenly Frank appeared in the hallway, and gestured for Sam to come to his office. He had no choice but to oblige, but Sam could imagine what this talk would be about, and he would have rather ran the other way.

"Sammy, good work today." Frank gestured to the chair in front of him, but Sam kept standing close to the door.

"Thanks boss. It was a team effort." Not that he hadn't enjoyed being the one that could drag the bastard out of the apartment and into his cruiser, but he had to admit that the rookies were on top of their game today.

"But that's not why I called you in here."

Well yeah, Sam figured as much. Congratiolations were given on the floor, the office was usually for something else intirely; being called into the principal's office was still not a good thing.

Frank spread his arms on his desk and looked at him intently. "What do you want with Donaldson?"

"Why, what have you heard?" Sam scratched his head to have an excuse to break eye contact.

"I heard you were checking up on him, and you went by HQ, to his office. So, what's this about?"

Sam could not just tell him everything, not without proof. This was not his friend Frank, but his boss, staff-sergeant Best. If he told him about his suspicions, Frank would have to do something about it, and it might not pan out right for him or Andy.

"I wanted to ask him about Boyd's dissapearance. I heard they were pretty close." That was genuinly going to be one of the issues he had wanted to raise with him, just not the main one.

"So this has nothing to do with the case McNally is currently on?"

Sam flashed his widest grin. "Is he on the same case?"

Frank slumped back into his chair and slowly shook his head. "You're treading on thin ice, Sam. Be careful, you're not the only one who's affected by your actions here."

The picture was recieved with a giggle. "This is her? She looks harmless."

After five minutes in this damn inclosed booth, in what must be the smelliest bar in the city, his level of annoyance had reached a new high.

"Trust me, she's not."

He decided against catching some kind of infection and left his smudgy overfilled glass untoutched.

"Tell me, why don't I just rid of her first chance I get?"

They had been over this. "Because that's not the plan." He took the picture back, and stuffed it in his bag. No reason to have to deal with a noisy waitress, who remembers a certain picture of a woman in uniform, and the man handling it.

"So now I just wait? Do nothing?"

Maybe there was more than one brain-cell present in the thick skull opposite from him, after all.

"Exactly. I'll handle the rest. Nothing will come through. I'll tell you when to act."

Could he leave yet? He felt like he was going to be sick if he stayed here another minute.

"After this, we're in the clear, right? Over and done with?"

He grabbed his bag and slid to the exit of the booth. "After this, I don't remember anything about you or your little friends, and you can do whatever the hell you want."