Cat looked up as Vincent opened the bathroom door. Her breath hitched when he appeared in nothing but a towel with water still dripping from his hair. O.M.G. She wasn't sure if her heart could take this on a daily basis, but it sure would be fun to find out. Especially if she could lick those little rivulets of water running down his-

Catherine's thoughts were halted by a low growl from the other side of the room. She looked up from his luscious body to gaze into eyes which were now… glowing. Oh my. Vincent heard her heart begin to race even faster, and tried to turn away thinking she was frightened. Cat vaulted off the bed and was at his side in an instant, grabbing his hand and tugging him back around.

"Oh no you don't," she scolded him. "Don't you ever hide who you are from me. I won't stand for it."

Vincent's voice was a little more gravelly than usual when he answered her. "I don't want to scare you, Catherine."

Cat smiled tenderly at him. "You could never scare me, Vincent. I love you. Claws and all," she added with a wink. He rewarded her playfulness with a rumbling chuckle.

"Sure, you say that now," he teased, "but you keep thinking what you were thinking when I came out of that bathroom and you may find yourself mauled by a frisky beast." Vincent saw her shudder, and momentarily thought he'd managed to elicit a fear response from her after all - until he realized that the idea actually turned her on?! Well now, this was getting interesting, he thought with a sensual growl.

Catherine held her hands up in a gesture of surrender. "OK, OK. I'll try to get my wayward thoughts out of the gutter – for the time being anyway." She fluttered her lashes coyly at him, and he chuckled. "I wanted to talk to you anyway. You know… if you would stop distracting me…"

"Oh? Should I get dressed?" Vincent's hand lifted to the knot at his hip, his wicked grin letting her know she was about to get an eyeful if she said yes. They had both crashed hard the night before, after driving nearly around the clock in shifts. Considering the fact they hadn't made love yet, she decided the temptation might be best kept under wraps – literally – until a more appropriate time. Still, she smiled at the thought of all that magnificent maleness on display for her eyes only. "Earth to Catherine?" Catherine came back to reality, blushing, realizing that Vincent knew exactly what she was thinking. The evidence of his awareness was clearly rising behind the scrap of terrycloth twisted around his lean frame.

"Yes, you ought to get dressed in the bathroom," she clarified, denying herself the view she longed for. "I have some news to share with both you and JT."

Vincent's face became solemn in a heartbeat. "Oh. That kind of talk." Sighing, he grabbed up his clothes and disappeared back into the bathroom.

Ten minutes later they were all assembled in the coffee shop next door to their hotel. They chose a booth in the corner, speaking quietly to avoid being overheard. "So the last assassin was arrested and is being held without bail," Catherine informed them. "They still don't have a positive ID on the guy. Apparently this guy and his goons are so far buried in the government, the Feds don't even know they exist. No fingerprints, no DNA record. Nada."

"I don't suppose Joe and Tess can make him squeal like a little piglet?" JT asked hopefully.

Vincent reclined back against the booth and sipped his coffee. "I say, if no one wants to claim him, who will ever know – or admit to caring – if we just kill the bastard? Disconnected people disappear every day…"

"As heartwarming a thought as that is," Catherine responded, "this thing is bigger than that one agent. There are still the two guys in that van outside Sinai that you saw, and whoever the ringleader of the operation is. We need answers more than we need vengeance at this point."

"Did Joe and Tess have anything else to say?" JT asked.

"Just the usual. Be safe. Keep in touch. And my personal favorite – Stay out of trouble."

"Don't they know that trouble just follows you wherever you go?" Vincent said with a smirk.

Catherine's eyebrow lifted as she countered with a chuckle, "Yes, you certainly do."

A/N: I'm still waiting for my muse to drop the rest of the blueprint for book 2 on me. Ideas are coming together. Hopefully by the end of the month most of the distractions with my mom will be over and I can throw myself back into my writing. Thanks so much to those of you who didn't give up on this story, even when it seemed like I had. You are all the best! But then... what else would I expect from my Beastie pals?