It was the middle of the night by the time Jack Thompson walked Sheldon McFee into the SSR. The bullpen was deserted; Agents Li and Yauch, who were on the night-shift, had been called out to New Jersey to help the Chief with the body (identified at the scene by Mr McFee as being Leet Brannis, his employer) while Jack dealt with questioning and charging McFee.

They headed straight to the interrogation room; Jack dropped the file they had made up on everything Van Ert had said earlier onto the table and then deftly uncuffed one of McFee's wrists in order to lock the cuff around the small metal hook that was embedded into the table instead.

"Quite frankly, Mr McFee, it's getting late and I want to go home," Jack said in a casual, drawling voice as he walked around the table, folding his tall frame down into his own seat. "You've already been beaten up once tonight and I'm sure you don't want another pounding ... so let's try to get this over with as little fuss as possible," he added, casting the bruised and battered man sitting opposite him a smile that was just a shade off friendly. The threat had been implicit in his words; his knuckles still ached from pressing Van Ert earlier and he didn't much fancy another interrogation, but he would do what needed to be done.

"Hey man, I get it," McFee said, shrugging as best as possible while attached to the table and gesturing to himself. "Small fish, big pond," he said, aptly summing up his role. "All I did was drive a truck in exchange for a payout. I'm not stupid enough to try to protect them."

"Coulda fooled me," Jack said dryly, though in reality he was pleased the man was willing to talk. He opened the file to a new page and picked up his pen, knowing that they were alone in the SSR and it would fall to him to record McFee's words since there was no one behind the glass in the observation room. "Let's start with this woman who attacked you," he suggested, his pen poised to write. "Is she working for Brannis too?"

"I'd never seen her before tonight and we didn't exactly stop to chat," McFee admitted, looking chagrined at the fact that a dame had managed to thoroughly clean his clock and cuff his ass to a chair. "She came in, beat me seven ways to Sunday, tied me up, and then left with the truck," he told him simply. He tilted his head thoughtfully to one side and then half shrugged again. "Think she was British though, that's all I got," he added with a grimace.

Jack looked up from the file, a crease appearing between his brows. "... British?" he repeated, the smallest beginnings of a suspicion taking root in his mind.

"Yeah," McFee confirmed, his expression still pained. "When I came to she was muttering to herself about cups of tea and civilised interrogations," he said, which was hardly enough to pin a positive identification.

Thompson leant back in his chair and tapped the end of his pen on the table several times, frowning deeply at McFee. "What did she look like?" he wanted to know; he knew Carter had been in the observation room when they had bought in Van Ert (it had been down to her quick thinking at the Roxxon offices that they had nabbed him in the first place) but she was gone by the time he had finished with the full press. Dooley said she had gone home and he hadn't seen her since – in all honesty, he had been pleased that she hadn't watched the interrogation, his actions hadn't exactly been suitable for a ladies eyes.

"Dark hair, red lipstick, solid right hook," McFee told him plainly, making Jack clench his jaw – that didn't mean anything necessarily, there were no doubt plenty of women who matched that description, but now the idea was firmly planted in his mind he couldn't shake it.

He looked briefly over his shoulder to the glass that led to the observation room, wondering if they were still alone or if this whole conversation was being watched. "Anything else about her?" Jack wanted to know, turning back to McFee; he needed to confirm this suspicion one way or another.

McFee thought for a moment and then shook his head slightly. "Can't tell you much more than that, I was slightly distracted by all the punching and being hit with a table," he said sardonically, clearly feeling rather sorry for himself after his beating.

"Would you recognise her if you saw her again?" Thompson pressed firmly, still scowling deeply at the cuffed man and in no mood for humour.

McFee shrugged and Jack instantly got to his feet. He left the interrogation room without so much as another word and closed the door behind him, knowing McFee couldn't move since he was cuffed to the table. He stopped to check the observation room first, sighing faintly in relief when he saw it was still empty, and locked the door behind him with a key from his pocket so that no one could come in to watch the interrogation without him knowing. Jack then headed towards one of the store rooms at the back of the bullpen, where all of the files were kept. It took some rooting, but he eventually located Peggy's file; he opened it and flicked through the pages until he found a small black and white picture of her.

He went back to the interrogation room, where McFee was pulling slightly on his cuffed hand, evidently twitchy at having been left alone for so long with no explanation.

"This her?" Jack demanded, holding the picture up for the other man to see.

Sheldon took one look at it before nodding. "Oh yeah, that's her," he said instantly, grimacing once again and glancing questioningly up at Jack. "Who is she?"

Thompson clenched his jaw and looked down at the small picture in his hand, wondering what the hell he was going to do with this new information, wondering what the hell Carter had even gotten herself into here. There was a long silence, then he slowly pocketed the picture. "... No one you need to concern yourself with," he told McFee simply; he would deal with this.

The next day Peggy sighed to herself as she packed up her belongings to go home for the evening; the stitches in her thigh still hurt like the blazes and her day had been thoroughly unproductive. In between filing and coffee-runs she had been looking into the symbol that Mr Brannis had drawn in the dirt as he died, but thus far it was looking like the symbol had a specific relevance to Leviathan and didn't have any kind of corroboration to its standardised meaning of a broken heart, which meant she had been hitting dead ends all day. She had one more book among her belongings at Howard's penthouse (though having passed Mrs Fry's stringent interview that morning she would shortly be moving into The Griffith) disguised as the complete works of Shakespeare that she could consult, but she was not holding out much hope.

The only positive in the situation was that the pictures from the nightclub had turned up negative, with not one clear shot of her face. She had purposefully played dumb that morning when the Chief had asked her about DiMaggio so that they wouldn't look at the pictures too carefully, but she couldn't help but notice that Agent Thompson in particular had been watching her closely all day, downright staring at times.

"Carter."

Speak of the devil, she thought to herself as she walked passed Thompson's desk on her way down the bullpen and he called out to her. She paused to see what he wanted and he instantly grabbed his jacket and hat, gesturing towards the elevator as he fell into step alongside her. "Come on, let's grab a drink," he suggested casually as they walked, his drawling voice just a shade off neutral.

"No, thank you," she retorted crisply as she stopped and pushed the button for the elevator, wondering if the fact that he had been planning on asking her out was why he had been staring most of the day.

"I wasn't asking," Thompson said firmly, putting his hat low on his head and pulling on his grey suit jacket one sleeve at a time.

Peggy frowned at him, utterly unimpressed with his whole bearing and his arrogance in simply assuming that she would go out with him despite her refusal. "Didn't your mother ever teach you manners, Agent Thompson?" she said pointedly, casting a glare in his direction as the elevator doors opened. "I don't want to go for a drink with you."

She made to walk into the elevator and he suddenly grabbed her upper arm in a surprisingly tight grip, keeping her in place. She instantly opened her mouth to berate him for man-handling her, but he spoke over her. "See, I wanna discuss how you beat us to Jersey, knocked McFee out like a light, and then took off with a truck full of Stark's explosives," Thompson said in a low and dangerous voice, studying her intently as he maintained his grip on her arm. " … But if you'd rather do that in the Chief's office or the interrogation room as opposed to over a scotch, then that's fine by me," he added dryly; he released her pointedly and raised his hand, gesturing back towards the bullpen as if to imply 'ladies first.'

Peggy raised her chin, staring him down and not betraying even a hint of fear even while her heart was suddenly pounding in her chest. She didn't know how he had found out about her involvement in the investigation, but she knew that denying it would be fruitless; Jack was not the type to jump to conclusions without evidence, he had to have something solid to pin this on her. "By all means then, let's go for a drink," she said coolly, making him blink in surprise at her acceptance. She tilted her head to one side. "Did you have somewhere in mind?"

Jack took Peggy to a bar a few blocks away that he knew wouldn't be too busy, but also not so quiet that their conversation would be overheard. He was on edge the whole walk there, constantly shooting glances her way as her heels clicked alongside him. He wasn't sure what he had been expecting when he had confronted her – a denial, playing dumb, anything – but her calmly and coolly agreeing to talk had not been it.

They took their seats at the corner of the bar and Jack flagged over the bartender. "One scotch on the rocks; she'll have something fruity," he said lazily, ordering for her out of habit from past dates with various women.

"She will have a bourbon, neat," Peggy said curtly to the bartender as she settled into her high stool, elegantly crossing her ankles and tucking them behind the footrest. "And make it a double," she added, making him shoot a surprised look her way.

He waited until they both had their drinks and took a bracing sip of his scotch, preparing himself for the conversation to come. Placing his drink back on the bar, he rubbed his hand briefly over the lower half of his face. "So, spill," he ordered, finally turning to look at her.

Peggy was already watching him carefully, her dark eyes inscrutable. "Before I say anything I want you to tell me something," she said plainly, in a clipped tone that brooked no argument.

Jack shook his head. "You ain't in any position to be making demands, sweetheart," he told her in a drawling voice, picking up his drink once more. Peggy simply waited for several long seconds, still staring at him with those impossibly dark eyes of hers; he eventually sighed exasperatedly and gestured for her to ask whatever it was that she wanted to know as he took another bracing sip of scotch.

"Why didn't you go straight to Dooley?" she questioned simply, never once taking her eyes from him.

He swallowed hard against the burn of the alcohol. "Thought I'd give you the chance to explain yourself," he admitted honestly, tilting the glass slightly to stare down into the amber liquid. He'd been wresting with what he should do since the night before and had eventually come to the conclusion that he didn't necessarily want to get Carter in trouble - rather he wanted to know what the hell was going on and maybe help get her out of this if she had somehow gotten in over her head.

But first he had to know the full story.

"I'm grateful," she confessed, actually sounding genuine. "The last thing I need is the SSR running around after me like headless chickens." Jack looked at her once more, waiting for her to explain herself now that he had met her own demand. She did not disappoint; after taking a small sip of her bourbon, evidently accustomed to it since she didn't once flinch at the taste, she spoke softly, "I've been conducting my own investigation," she admitted in a quiet voice.

"Why?" he demanded, wanting to know far more than just that.

"Because I believe that Howard is innocent," she said plainly, with all the naïve conviction of someone who genuinely believed what they were saying.

"Jesus, Carter," Jack said, sounding slightly disgusted even to his own ears; he'd half hoped that she had somehow been roped into this against her will, not that she had turned vigilante against the SSR to help Howard Stark. "How can you be that stupid?" he asked her, unable to believe that she was so blind she couldn't see the truth. He put his drink down to face her properly. "Stark fled his trial on Capitol Hill -"

"Because they refused to even consider the possibility that his vault was broken into," Peggy interrupted sharply, evidently taking umbrage at his tone. "While they were blowing hot air he knew that weapons that were beyond dangerous were being sold on the black market."

Jack briefly clenched his jaw, irked at having been interrupted – irked at her utter conviction that Stark was innocent. "Are you in contact with Stark?" he wanted to know; she raised her chin slightly, but didn't reply. "Carter," he pressed in a slight snarl, guessing the truth easily enough from her silence.

"I have seen him, yes, but I do not know his current whereabouts nor do I have a direct line of communication," she admitted coolly. Well that was something, at least – if she'd known his whereabouts then he would have had no choice but to bring her in to get to Stark regardless of her own investigation.

He took a breath, still not knowing what the hell he was going to do with the knowledge that Peggy was working with Stark; what she had already confessed could see her in prison, possibly even the electric chair, and he didn't even know the whole story yet – he had thought that she had just been involved last night with McFee and the truck, not that she was conducting an investigation of her own. "You wanna explain to me what happened with the nitramine last night? How you managed to beat us there?" he asked, then drained the last of his drink in preparation for her words, knowing that he probably wouldn't like the answer if the way their conversation had gone so far was any indication.

She didn't reply instantly, clearly thinking carefully of what she wanted to say, and he shot her a look in response to her silence as he put his empty glass back on the bar with more force than was necessary. "I'm asking nicely here," he reminded her, with more than just a hint of bitterness in his voice. "You did just confess to what is tantamount to treason."

Peggy's jaw briefly worked, as if she was biting the inside of her cheek, then she spoke once more, "I had a rather early start yesterday," she said eventually. "Prior to joining you at the Roxxon offices I had been at the dairy harbour with the vita-ray detector. I knew from the Roxxon explosion that a milk truck was being used to move the explosives -"

"You were there too? Roxxon?" Jack interrupted sharply, since they hadn't known about the milk truck until he had questioned Van Ert.

Peggy nodded; Jack shook his head slightly and exhaled a shaky breath, unable to believe how much she had been doing behind their backs. "Jesus, next you'll be telling me that you were the blonde in the night club," he muttered to himself, seriously considering another drink to get him through this.

There was a long, poignant silence in which she simply stared pointedly at him, one eyebrow partially raised.

"... God-dammit Carter," he suddenly snapped in utter exasperation, abruptly remembering how she had been in the office pouring them coffee when he had been talking about Raymond's predilection for blondes – she must have heard everything he'd said and acted accordingly.

He flicked his fingers to get the bartenders attention. "Two more," he ordered brusquely, knowing he would need it to get through the conversation. He waited until they both had fresh drinks in front of them, though she had scarcely made a dent in her first one. "... You killed Raymond?" he asked in a hushed voice, staring at her as he remembered finding Raymond's body in his office; he had known she was involved, but to discover that she had murdered a man in cold blood -

"I didn't kill anybody," she said sharply, looking thoroughly annoyed that he would think such a thing. "I left with Raymond unconscious and the device in my possession, which I later diffused in my bathroom -"

Jack downed his second drink in one, unable to believe what he was hearing.

"- But I was followed by a man in a green suit, who I'm guessing is the one who killed Raymond after I left," Peggy told him, staring at him intently.

He swallowed his large mouthful of liquor. "Go on," he ordered weakly, his voice husky from the burn.

She huffed slightly, but nevertheless followed his order. "Using the materials in the diffused nitramine I was able to track its source back to the Roxxon refinery, where Van Ert had a production line of the explosives," she said in the concise and descriptive manner of one presenting a report to a superior. "Brannis blew the place before I could bring him in. The man in the green suit also hijacked the milk truck on our way back from Jersey last night, killing Mr Brannis."

Jack opened the file that he had bought with him from the office, finding one of the fake passports Dooley and Krezminsky had found at the Hotel Cosmopolitan thanks to the key left at the crime scene. "This him?" he asked, holding the passport up to her and tapping his fingers against the picture.

She glanced at it and nodded crisply. "Yes," she confirmed plainly, then leant slightly towards him, speaking in a low voice. "Thompson, Brannis was frightened. He mentioned … a person, or an organisation, I am not sure what, called Leviathan," she told him, making him frown at her. "He had double-crossed them to steal the weapons from Howard and wanted protection from the SSR."

"Wait, wait, time out," he said, holding up a hand to stop her as his scowl deepened even further. "... Brannis confessed to stealing the weapons?" he checked, raising a brow at her and wanting to make sure he had heard that right.

Peggy nodded and Jack exhaled a breath, staring down at the bar – that was a major game changer, they had been working on the assumption that Stark had staged the break in on his own vault in order to sell weapons to enemies of the United States.

There was a stretch silence in which she simply let him think. If Leet Brannis had stolen the weapons it meant that Stark was innocent of the break in, and if Brannis had indeed double-crossed this Leviathan, who ever they were, it meant that they had been the ones after the weapons in the first place.

They were looking at it from the wrong angle, Jack thought with a deep grimace. Brannis had been Russian (he had spent the afternoon pulling together everything they could find on him, including spending half an hour on the phone to an old friend in an embassy in Moscow) so it stood to reason that this Leviathan, whether they were a person or an organisation, was Russian too. Relations with the Reds had steadily been growing colder after the war had finished, especially with Russia emerging as a dominant power, and the knowledge that a Russian had stolen Stark's highly destructive weapons was disturbing to say the least.

This could be big, potentially much bigger than just Howard Stark, he realised, frowning deeply.

He sighed and, after a long moment, looked up at her once more. "You weren't alone last night, someone drove you out there," he said, assuming that there was still more to her story and guessing that she had to have a partner since she hadn't walked back from Jersey last night. "Who's your ally? Is it Stark?"

She frowned at him, looking slightly troubled. "I told you before, I don't know Howard's whereabouts," she reiterated, deftly avoiding the question.

"Then who are you working with?" he wanted to know.

Peggy took a breath and coolly avoided his gaze. "Now that I will not reveal," she said firmly, calmly picking up her drink to take another sip.

"Carter ..." he said warningly, his brow furrowed as he stared her down.

She looked unimpressed with his threatening tone. "What are you going to do, beat it out of me?" she asked somewhat cattily as she put her glass back down on the bar and turned to glare at him once more.

Jack clenched his jaw, making a concerted effort to control his tone and biting back the urge to snap angrily at her in response. "Look, I am trying very hard to understand -"

"And I am giving you a full account," she said impatiently, evidently unwilling to bend on this and betray her partners confidence. "Minus the name of my partner."

They held each others gazes for a long moment, neither of them backing down – Jack was the first to look away, dropping his gaze down to the bar with a faint huff.

There was another silence as he thought through what she had told him. He was well aware that she had done good work under the radar and had potentially unearthed something important here while they had been chasing after Stark.

"... Stark didn't blow Roxxon, nor did he job his own vault," he said finally, surmising what he had learned so far.

"No," Peggy confirmed, continuing to watch him.

Bracing one elbow on the bar, Jack rubbed one hand over the lower half of his face, still thinking hard. "This is bigger than I thought," he admitted to himself, wondering who, exactly, this Leviathan was and what endgame they were playing – they had to have been after Stark's weapons for a reason, and whatever that reason was it probably wasn't good for the Allies. "And we clearly need to look at it from a new angle ..."

He glanced at her speculatively; she had known everything they had before they did, working alone – Dooley had given him the lead on this case and if he wanted it solved then it was becoming increasingly obvious that he would need her, but he would be damned before he let her continue on alone. "What's your next move?" he wanted to know, genuinely curious about how she planned to proceed.

Peggy was frowning thoughtfully at his question. "Mr Brannis drew a symbol in the dirt before he died. I've spent the day looking at codes and glyphs but it has proven to be something of a dead end," she said frustratedly. Jack instantly grabbed a napkin from the bar and a pen from his pocket, passing them over to her to draw the symbol, which she did as she spoke – it was a heart with a wavy line through it. She was no longer tense, as she had been at the start of their conversation, rather instead she sounded like she was discussing ideas with a partner. "Demidov was Leviathan's clean-up crew, Brannis is the one I need to focus on to find the weapons," she continued, tapping her pen on the napkin, clearly thinking aloud. "He confessed to breaking into the vault, if I can figure out how he did that then maybe I can find a trail to follow …"

"You definitely trust him?" Jack wanted to check before proceeding any further with his half-cocked plan to help her with this investigation; she glanced up at him, confused. "Stark," he clarified, biting out the name.

"I do," she said instantly, making Jack wonder what, exactly, the nature of their relationship was. She shook her head slightly. "But the SSR is myopic when it comes to Howard; I know that there was no way they will even consider his innocence unless I present them with irrefutable proof."

"Then I guess we find irrefutable proof, the vault sounds like a good place to start," Jack agreed dryly, tilting his empty glass to look at the amber dregs in the bottom. He was well aware that Stark was still in contempt of Congress and possibly even guilty of selling weapons to enemies of the United States - but Leviathan had been the ones to clean out his vault, which meant that highly dangerous and volatile weapons were in the hands of an unknown, possibly hostile organisation.

"We?" Peggy asked sharply, staring at him.

He shrugged one shoulder. "I want this case cracked," he told her simply. "And, to be frank, I want to be the one to crack it -"

"Chasing that next promotion on the back of my coat-tails, are you?" she asked caustically, her lips set into a frowning red pout.

"- And at the moment the SSR is hunting dead ends," he finished as if she hadn't spoken. He spread one hand in a helpless gesture. "I hate to say it, but it looks like you're on to something here – we'll keep it under the radar though, I doubt Chief'll be as easily convinced as I was," he added, frowning at the thought of keeping this quiet despite the necessity for discretion – he wouldn't be doing anything illegal, per se, just looking at the case from a new angle.

"And what makes you think I'll accept your help?" she wanted to know, raising her chin and looking coolly at him.

Jack cocked his head and arched one brow at her. "The fact that I am willing to give you a shot at an actual case here," he said, knowing full-well that she hated the coffee-runs and lunch orders they sent her on. He then cast her a bland, half-smile. "And the knowledge that I could arrest you for treason at any time," he added bluntly, smirking at her.

"Blackmail, Agent Thompson?" Peggy surmised in an irked tone, still scowling disapprovingly at him.

His smile lingered as he gestured for the barkeep to bring him another drink. "Think of it as the metaphorical carrot and stick," he told her sardonically, then tilted his fresh glass towards her in a wry toast. "Besides, you don't exactly have a choice here, sweetheart," he reminded her, watching for her reaction.

She pressed her lips together into a thin line, then let out a gusty sigh and shook her head. "Fine, but so help me, Thompson, if you get in my way -"

"Shouldn't it be the other way around?" he interrupted mildly, raising a brow at her and feeling slightly galled that she thought he would hold her back.

She gave him a superior look. "I've managed just fine without you so far," she reminded him arrogantly.

He snorted. "Carter," he drawled, unimpressed with her tone. "You got followed from Raymond's club, Roxxon exploded, and the milk truck with the nitramine ended up on the bottom of the lake," he listed plainly, then spread his hands slightly with an arrogant air of his own. "Face it, doll ... you're gonna need some back up here."

Next up – Howard Stark's numberplate is pulled from the Roxxon debris …

Thanks to #CravingHoneydukes for proofing for me :)

So whaddya all think of the first chapter?