In the 19th century, Paris underwent a major, city wide revitalization, organized by a man called Baron Haussmann at the direction of Louis Napoleon III. The overcrowding, the narrow streets and hopeless tenements of the old city bred disease, despair, and discontent—and it was too easy to stage rebellions and build barricades in the street. Haussmann led a decades-long effort to change the very structure of the city. Block by block, the buildings in the city were torn down, and from the rubble, a new city emerged.

Haussmann believed that a city should be modeled after a living body. Wide plazas were scattered throughout the arrondisments to host markets, the city's stomachs. Two large plots of land at the west and east end of the city were designated to be parks, the city's lungs, to let its people breath. Most important were the streets. City streets needed to be wide, like arteries, so that the lifeblood of the city, its people, could move throughout.

Matthew Morgan loved Paris. The lights, the museums, the gardens, the architecture. Matt had spent too much of his life studying 19th and 20th century European history not to love every inch of this city.

But as a pavement artist, Paris was paradise.

Between the locals, the savvy tourists, and the less-than-savvy tourists, Matt could get lost anywhere. Long lines and tour groups he could hide himself in, with something to catch his eye in every direction, that he could just stop and stare at. He could blend in anywhere.

He was thrilled when, after finishing a mission in Kiev, he got a call asking him to drop by Paris for a few days. He was to rendezvous with an operative, codename Themis, who had just been in Berlin. Langley had realized that, based on the intel that Matt and Themis had provided them, their missions were closely linked. Matt was asked to meet Themis in Paris, and continue their investigation on a few assets who had apparently gone to ground.

Matt's handler had told him to be in front of Notre Dame at 1600 hours. It was his job to approach Themis, a young woman who would be identified by the bouquet of purple and white hydrangeas she held in her arms.

So there he was, sitting in the shade of a tree at the edge of the stone paved square, eating some strawberry sorbet, and fiddling with a camera. Notre Dame was to his left, and across the river was the famous bookstore, Shakespeare and Company. Matt had considered stopping by to get a souvenir for his mother, but then a kind elderly couple asked him for directions and he missed his train, and he wasn't sure he would have the time to buy a book before meeting Themis. So instead, he bought a single scoop of sorbet, and decided to wait in the warm sunlight of the Parisian spring afternoon.

Matt loved his job.

He noticed the woman just as the bells began to strike four. Her back was turned to him, and she was staring up at the cathedral's two towers. The bouquet of flowers was cradled in her arms, setting off the flowing white blouse that she wore. Her hair was long, dark, and shiny, and as Matt slowly stood, he fought the desire to chuckle.

Here he was, in Paris, on a beautiful spring day, and he would be spending it with a beautiful woman.

If only the boys back in Nebraska could see me now.

Themis stood in place, so Matt approached her from the left, taking a wide turn through the crowd so that she could see his approach in her peripheral vision. As soon as Matt could really get a look at the woman's face, for some reason, he fixated on her nose—he'd never really had any strong opinions on noses before, but maybe he'd never seen a perfect nose before, because hers was perfect.

"Hydrangeas?" He asked, looking down at the bouquet. She, Themis, turned to him, her sharp eyes examining his utterly generic appearance. "Now there's something that reminds me of home."

She shrugged.

"I can never get them to grow at home. I guess the soil's too rocky."

"Pleasure to meet you, Themis." He said, smiling as the last knell echoed through the square.

"You too, Flatwater. Would you like to find a bench? Maybe across the river?"

"Sure."

They walked across the bridge, winding their way through the crowd, but sticking close together. There was a small, square park, next to Shakespeare and Company. There were a dozen people around, most of them older, though there were a few children sitting in the sunlight with a who was reading a picture book to them.

They sat on the oldest bench, crumbling and with peeling paint. But it had the greatest visibility of the street, so Themis and Flatwater sat, side by side.

"You have a scrambler?" She asked, looking at a man sitting three benches away who was wearing a large, puffy coat in the warm spring sun.

"Yes." He said, holding in the shutter button on his camera.

She watched him, and as they settled onto the bench to talk, she quietly said, "My name's Rachel, by the way."

"Matthew."

She nodded again, and quietly, began to tell her story.

"I was called to Berlin six days ago. My mission was to find an ex-KGB informant who had not answered any communications from the agency for the ten-previous days, despite the fact that he has been very cooperative in the past. I talked to seven of the informant's associates, and they provided seven different stories about what happened to him. One said that he went on a cruise in the southern Caribbean, another that he needed to visit his sick mother, and one even said that he had gone skiing in the Himalayas." She rolled her—sparkling green—eyes and smiled faintly at that last excuse. Matt couldn't help but smile in return. "But there's security footage of the man arriving at le Gare du Nord two days ago, and so I'm here."

"I was just in Kiev," Matt added. "On roughly the same mission. I was searching for two informants, both of whom had a history of being less-than-cooperative with the agency. One has been apparently underground for two weeks, and the other missed a meeting with a friend of mine last week. Neither of the men have been spotted by anyone, so I was sent here on the chance that our subjects have the same destination in mind."

As Matt finished his story, the woman nodded thoughtfully.

"Well." Themis, or Rachel, said, standing. "Shall we start with the usual suspects?"

"I've already made a reservation at Chez Laure at 9."

"Perfect. I think we'll have just enough time to check out the boathouse just east of here before we have to get ready for dinner."

Matt and Rachel strolled leisurely along the Seine, and spent a little over two hours surveilling a boathouse in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower. In that time, they didn't see a single person of interest, or a single sign of activity.

They walked to the metro together, and agreed to meet at the metro station closest to Chez Laure half an hour before their dinner, and walk to the restaurant slowly enough they could detect any tails.

At 2030 hours, Matt spied Rachel standing just before the exit stairs in the metro station. She was wearing a beautiful green silk dress that made her eyes pop, and showed off her graceful collar bone. There was small bag slung over her shoulder, which she held tightly against herself as she stood among the crowd. She was standing out of the way, but she wasn't going unnoticed—Matt saw three different men doubletake as they passed her.

"You look lovely." Matt said. She jumped, and turned around.

"Thank you. You look nice as well, and can I just say—you're quite the pavement artist, Matthew."

"Thank you, on both accounts."

With another shared smile, they turned, and walked up the flight of stairs to the streets of Montmartre above. Once they were above ground, Matt offered Rachel his arm, and they walked down the street, in completely the opposite direction as the restaurant.

"So Rachel," Matt asked. "Do you happen to have a sister—I'm assuming younger—named Abby?"

"Yes." She said slowly, looking at every inch of Matt's face for any sign he was going to say something off-color. "How do you know Abby?"

"We were allies in a war against one of the break room coffee machines one night, about a month ago. There we were, exhausted and up to our necks in paperwork, and the coffee machine just wouldn't do anything."

"How did you fix it?"

"We slapped it a few times and it started working."

"Such technical finesse." Rachel said with a smirk. They cleared their corner, and continued walking east. "So do you frequently hang around headquarters late at night to do paperwork?"

"It's been known to happen now and again. Why?" He asked, a little bashful.

"Well, it's been known to happen to me now and again. I was just wondering why I've never seen you around."

He shrugged, and they flipped their direction without a single word passing between them.

"Maybe I'm just better at being a pavement artist than you are at remembering faces."

He was teasing her, she knew it.

"Please." She said, exaggerating her disgust with him. "I went to Gallagher. I don't forget a face."

"I think being Phineas "Titan" Cameron's daughter might have something to do with it, too"

"Maybe." She conceded. She stared straight ahead.

"I should be honest with you—I might have written a research paper in college about your father and his associate's work in founding the Agency."

"Really?"

He nodded, and hummed.

"You see, I, unlike you, am the product of the Nebraska state public education system and a library card. I studied history and international relations at Georgetown. That paper caught the attention of a few Gallagher alumnae who work there, and, well. I guess I caught their attention by association."

She hummed.

"I'm sorry, I didn't make you uncomfortable by bringing up your father, did I?"

Rachel shook her head.

"No, no. I'm used to it. When I was at Gallagher—my first year especially—half of my classmates would never leave me alone about him, and the other half were terrified of me because they were convinced my dad could have their parents fired if they did something wrong. Even two of my roommates were too afraid to practice fighting with me in our Protection and Enforcement classes in case they hurt me and then be blacklisted from ever working for the federal government."

Matt laughed once, a warm and bright sound, as the two of them cleared another corner. They were nearly to the restaurant.

"For the record, Rachel Cameron, I'm terrified of you for your own sake."

"What, have I scared you off already? Or have you heard stories about me?"

"You haven't scared me off—yet. But for honesty's sake, Joseph Solomon is my roommate and best friend."

"And he told you about Kinshasa?" She asked, her clearly marking the question as rhetorical. Matt turned his head, slightly, to check to see that he hadn't offended her—rather, in the light of the diffuse street lamps, Matt could see that Rachel was faintly blushing.

"Yes." He admitted. "For the record, if I had been there, I would have applauded."

Rachel tossed her head back and giggled. She took a deep breath, and the two of them could see the restaurant just around the bend in the street, so together, they slowed. Brushing the hand that wasn't already wrapped in Matthew's arm against his shoulder, Rachel muttered "The fact that that mission report isn't more highly classified is the only evidence that anyone should ever need to know that I am not benefitting from any kind of favoritism for being Phineas Cameron's daughter."

Again, Matt laughed.

"You don't need to be modest. Everyone who has heard the Kinshasa story—and that's a select group of people, I promise—has been nothing but impressed."

"What a flatterer."

But by this point, they were close enough to the restaurant that they could not have slowed down and given themselves more time to talk without attracting attention. So the entered the restaurant, and were seated at the table next to the window.

Dinner was more subdued than their conversation on the street, but under the scrutiny of the maître d' and the responsibility of watching the warehouse across the street, there was little they could find to joke about. Instead, they pretended to be a happy couple in the midst of a journey across Europe.

Before their first course arrived, they discussed their fictional plans for their trip to London. As they ate their appetizer, they discussed their favorite paintings in the Musée d'Orsay, and just as their entrées arrived, they were discussing the finer points of Versailles. As they finished their crème brûlée and the single glass of wine they were allowed on the job, they were trying to decide if the Henley could really be better than the Louvre.

Regardless of the excellent meal and the conversation, Matthew and Rachel left Chez Laure and stepped onto the quiet street with forced smiles on their face. Earlier, they had agreed that the warehouse across the street was their best shot at finding their missing ex-KGB agents.

"Not a single sign of life for the entire night." Matt whispered, knowing Rachel was as anxious as he was.

"It doesn't look… Well. It looks pretty open. Do you want to get a little closer?"

"I'm game." Matt answered. He took a deep breath, and took Rachel by the hand. With a dreamy look on his face, he looked up and down the street, and then up at the sky, looking like a tourist who couldn't believe he was in Paris with his paramour. Next to him, Rachel did the same.

"Clear."

They ambled across the narrow street, to the brick building, and an alley that led to the side door. The double doors were large and black and wooden and—

One was open.

With a look at Rachel, Matt crept toward the open door. He checked for any kind of security or sensors. Behind him, Rachel retrieved a small handgun from her purse. Seeing that the door was clear, Matt turned back to Rachel, to see if she was ready. At her nod, he nudged the door open with his foot, slowly. No alarms went off, and there did not appear to be anyone waiting immediately by the door, so Matt threw the door open wider, and Rachel took two large, purposeful steps into the building, her gun at the ready. Matt waited with bated breath, and when no gunshots rang out, he exhaled, but he tensed again when he heard Rachel groan.

"Flatwater. I found our missing assets."

Silently, he crept around the door. As he walked to Rachel's side, he took a quick breath, and realized immediately why she groaned.

"Ugh." He groaned, fighting the urge to cough. "I don't think I want dessert anymore."

In the light of the old, exposed bulbs, almost twenty feet in front of them, were five corpses. They were all men, all middle aged or older. Their wrists and ankles were bound. Two of them were on their backs, the other three were face-down, but Rachel and Matt could tell that all five of them had been shot in the head. Their bodies were bloated, and there was a swarm of flies that had collected around the bodies.

"Those two are your informants, right?" Rachel asked, holding one hand in front of her mouth as she gestured casually toward the two closest bodies with her gun.

It also smelled horrible.

"Yeah. The youngest one is yours, right?"

"Yeah."

As Rachel crept closer to the bodies, Matt looked up at the metal beams supporting the ceiling. There wasn't a single sign of a security in the building, and there definitely wasn't an assassin hiding above them, waiting to drop down and kill them both. They were in the clear.

"I'd say we're about a day too late to talk to them." He heard Rachel say, her voice still muffled by her hand.

"And the other two bodies?"

"I don't recognize them."

Matt kept closer to the bloated bodies, trying not to gag as the overwhelming stench of the dead bodies hit him.

"Neither do I." He forced out.

For a moment, he and Rachel just stood there, side by side, looking at the half-dried blood and gore, watching the flies flit from body to body.

"Well, let's look on the bright side." Matt said, forcing his voice to sound chipper. "This means less paperwork for us."

Beside him, Rachel's eyes sparkled as she giggled behind her hand, but then she took a sharp breath and had to stifle a gag.

"Don't make me laugh." She said, fighting to get control of herself.

"Sorry." Matt said, winking. She replied with a weak smile, and turned on her heel and walked out.

"C'mon. Let's get some fresh air before we call Langley. You have a camera, right? Because that means you're the one who can get up close and personal with them."

Matt followed her through the open doors, a smile stretching across his face as he went.

Dead bodies aside, he really did love Paris.