AN: I didn't manage to get a chapter posted yesterday so I'm posting 2 today. So if you're following this story and came straight here for today's update, go back and make sure you didn't miss chapter 3! Awkwardorableness galore in that one! lol

Monday was moving day. It worked out well, leaving them the weekend to get their things together and mentally prepare.

For her part, Sue required a lot of mental preparation.

Early Monday morning, when they were both dressed and ready for the day, Lucy stood at Sue's open bedroom doorway, and said to Levi, "Get her for me, would you, buddy?"

Levi put his paw on Sue's lap, getting her attention from where she was sitting on the edge of her bed and staring out the window. She absent-mindedly reached down to pet his head. He nudged her, then looked back toward the door, and only then did she follow his gaze and realize he'd been alerting her to something, not giving her comfort.

"Oh! Sorry, Luce, what did you need?"

Lucy smiled, walking in and seating herself next to Sue. "No problem, I hadn't said anything of importance. I was just coming to check whether you're ready."

"Bags are all packed, everything's all set for Levi. Most of the stuff we'll need is going to be brought by the moving van anyway. Should be ready!"

Lucy laid her hand on her friend's arm and gave her a significant look. "So the stuff is all ready. Are you all ready?"

Sue hesitated a moment at that. "I know I'm not trained for longer undercover operations, but I took the basic courses at Quantico and Jack will be there to help out, so I think it'll be okay, I'm just . . . ."

"Nervous?"

"Yeah . . . I guess . . . ."

"Well, I know you've been in situations several times where you had to improvise and you rock at it. I think you'll do great."

"Yeah . . . ."

Lucy eyed her, gauging her response carefully. "Unless . . . what you're nervous about has less to do with being undercover and more to do with . . . with whom you'll be undercover?"

Sue's eyes widened right before closing as she bit her lip. Lucy nodded, touching Sue's arm to encourage her to re-open her eyes before responding. "I thought so. Girl, what are you worried about? You and Jack get along great. This could be a fabulous opportunity!"

"I know. That is what I'm worried about."

"What?"

"Luce . . . you and I both know that there's always been a certain amount of . . . attraction . . . between me and Jack. I just . . . living in the same house with him . . . eating dinner with him, acting like we're married in . . . in almost every way? I don't know if I can handle it."

"Well, I mean, if something were to happen between you two, that wouldn't be the worst thing would it?"

"It could be! I mean, there are only a few possible ways it could go: we try to pretend it didn't happen, which sounds like torture; we ruin our good friendship, which would be torture; or we get a good thing going ourselves but we break up our team, and breaking up the team would be—"

"Torture?"

"...I was going to say terrible, but yeah."

"Sue, as my mother would say, you're borrowing trouble from tomorrows that may never come."

"What does that mean?"

"It means, you're worrying about things that might never happen. Maybe living in the same space for a while will be the best thing for you both! Maybe it'll bring you closer together, or maybe it'll break the attraction and you'll just stay good friends without all that tension, or maybe you'll be too busy keeping an eye on the suburban terrorist watchlist to think about any of that. Don't get yourself all worked up about it ahead of time, okay?"

Sue sighed. "I know, you're right."

"Of course I am!" Lucy teased, bumping their shoulders together playfully. "And right now, I'm also right that we need to get moving—so that you can get moved! Temporarily. Hey, maybe you'll find something on your first day and move right back out!"

"I doubt that."

"Yeah, me too. But I'm looking forward to getting my roomie back so I can hope!"

Lucy, Sue, and Jack were going over a few final plans in the bullpen while waiting for the others to finish up some work when Tara came in, waving a hand to get Sue's attention, and said, "Ladies and gentlemen and furry canine agents, may I have your attention please! Here presenting the latest in fall fashions are Myles, Dimitrius, and Bobby!"

The three guys walked in behind her, dressed in coveralls designed to disguise them as employees of a moving company, with varying degrees of humor and willingness to play along with her little announcement. Myles rolled his eyes and limped along with his cane, giving a half-hearted little wave. Dimitrius followed with a little more swagger to his walk. Bobby, ever the ham, cat-walked in, pulled his cap off his head, spun around, replaced the cap backwards, then moonwalked over to his desk while pointing finger guns at his coworkers.

All of them got cheers, whistles, and applause.

"Thank you, thank you," Myles said dryly. "Now if the happy couple could please make their way to their car and start driving to their new home, we at Aardvark movers would be happy to meet you there shortly after your arrival."

Jack worked hard to not exchange yet another awkward glance with Sue, instead focusing on the next step in the assignment. "Alright, you heard the man!" he called out to the group. "Let's get this show on the road!"

As they were all headed to their respective locations, Myles was muttering, "Aardvark Movers. Could they not have come up with a better name? Honestly, you'd think they're trying to make it obvious when something is a cover. If people in this city had any sense they would realize that every stupid-named . . . ."

Bobby was the last to leave the room, though, tapping D and saying, "Hey, I'll be just a minute, 'kay, mate?"

Once the rest of the deployed agents had left the room, he stopped at Tara's desk. "Hey, uh, you like that band Mojo Gogo, right?"

Her eyes widened. "Um, I'm only a card-carrying member of their fanclub! I mean, not that I'm a literal member of an actual club or have a card or anything, I just—uh, yes, why?"

"How would you like to see the band perform tonight, up close and personal?"

"I'd love it!" she cried excitedly, then immediately switched to narrowing her eyes with suspicion. "What's the catch?"

"You have to go with me."

Lucy, who'd come up behind them, leaned over and said, "Pretty big catch."

Tara shrugged a half-agreement with the teasing. Bobby ignored them and continued. "You know the, uh, benefit that the director requested-slash-demanded I attend? Mojo Gogo is the entertainment. Well, I thought it'd be nice to, uh, take someone who would actually enjoy the evening, and I figured I'd save you another night of staying at home pining for, uh, still-in-New-York Stanley."

"I appreciate the offer," Tara said. "But what about Darcy? Doesn't she like Mojo Gogo?"

"She does but, uh . . . well, plans have changed," he said cryptically. She nodded in understanding, but her face showed confusion, and he opted to be fully honest. "Actually, we broke up."

"Oh. Um . . . Bobby, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, so am I. Yeah, so is she. But, uh, I still got to go to this thing. So, pick you up at 7?"

"Uh, sure."

The actual process of moving things in went well. The guys got everything situated quickly, Myles having a fabulous time ordering around the other "movers." There was even a moment when Sue was able to catch Betty Vanderwylen's eye, as she returned home from somewhere and saw them moving in, so she waved a little. First contact—not bad for the moving van not having even left the driveway yet!

And then it had, and the guys were gone, and Jack was looking at Sue and joking, "Honey, we're home," and . . . it was just the two of them.

After a nervous moment, they smiled at one another and headed back inside. Jack reached out and took Sue's hand, which caused her surprise. "Neighbors may be watching," he mouthed at her, and she smiled and tried to look like he was saying something really sweet.

To break the tension, she teased as they got to the doorway, "Aren't you going to carry me over the threshold? Isn't that tradition for the first home together?"

He laughed. "Well, I would think that our apartment of the past six months was our first home wasn't it? Or even longer than that—what do you think, would we have lived together before we were married?"

"Uh, no," she said quickly.

She started to move in from the porch, but he dove in and scooped her up into his arms.

"Jack!" she half-shrieked and half-gasped, laughing. "What are you doing?"

He smirked and said, "Carrying my bride over the threshold, of course."

He brought her inside and kicked the door closed behind them, then lowered her to the floor, though he didn't release her right away. Instead, he gazed down at her and she back at him, each breathing deeply and unwilling to be the first to turn away. After a few moments, Levi pushed in between them, clearly wanting a bit of the attention for himself. They both laughed at him, and tried to pretend they hadn't been standing in a way that was . . . well, given the closed door, probably not necessary for their cover, and certainly not reasonable for coworkers and partner agents, no matter how much they might also be friends.

"Um, we should probably start unpacking the rest of the stuff," Sue said.

"Yeah," Jack agreed. "Time to set up housekeeping."

There was another charged glance between them at those words, before they each chose a direction, Jack heading to the kitchen to organize groceries and dishes, and Sue heading to the living room to set up decorations. Without saying it, they both seemed aware that working on stuff in the same room may not be the best idea right now.

Most of the day passed that way. They checked in with one another regularly, verifying that the other was fine with something they did (as though which cupboard held the plates for the few days they would be here really mattered) or taking a peek at the Vanderwylen house. But for the most part, they each did their own thing.

As dinner time approached, though, Sue left her work where she'd been making the beds in both the master and the guest bedroom (trying hard not to think about the sleeping arrangements they hadn't yet discussed) and went to find Jack. "Hey, do you want to order a pizza? I don't really feel like cooking after all the work of moving today. Who knew it was so hard to move when you didn't even really have to pack your own stuff?"

He laughed. "I know, there isn't even the emotional stress of getting relocated or anything, and it's still exhausting! But . . . ." He paused as though debating whether to say what was on his mind, then, apparently having decided it was worth saying, he continued with, "if you were really my wife of only six months, and we'd just moved into our first house that we own together, I don't think I'd be eating pizza with you on our first night there."

"Really?" she asked suspiciously, anticipating a joke because her heart refused to believe he meant anything else. "What would we be eating?"

"Wellll . . . if you and I . . . I mean, my wife and I . . . just moved into a new place . . . I think I would want to have a romantic dinner with her to celebrate. And I can't really cook a romantic dinner, so . . . ."

She waited expectantly. "So . . . ?"

He hesitated, appearing to listen for something, then his shoulders sagged slightly as he smiled wryly. "I guess my timing's a little off." He glanced at his watch, then lifted his head quickly and perked up as he said, "Or theirs is, but that's the bell I was waiting for! Oh, no, I've got this one, Levi," he added quickly, holding his hands out to stave off the dog that was running to alert Sue of the sound. Sue turned too, catching Levi in motion. Once they had him settled, Jack continued while backing toward the door. "Look, um . . . I want to get this set up before you go in. Could you wait in the living room?"

"Sure," she replied, though a bit uncertainly. Between his random babbling about what he would do if she were his wife, and then having clearly planned something, but juxtaposed with the fact that they were not actually married, she had absolutely no idea what to expect.

Without anything else to do, she puttered around the living room, arranging a few more items, breaking down a few boxes that they had finished unpacking and storing the flattened cardboard in the closet to reconstruct for use when moving out, and placing some pictures on the mantle. She smiled as she looked at the picture of her and Jack from their "wedding day." They had gone with the picture of them standing nicely side by side, but she had managed to convince the photographer that she should have a picture for her wallet "just in case someone asked if she had one with her," and she was able to actually get two—one of the ones when he was holding her in his arms, and one of the ones after he'd set her back down.

She only hoped that anyone with any clout in the FBI who happened to see those pictures just assumed that she and Jack were really good actors, because the expressions on their faces as they looked into one another's eyes . . . .

She felt a tap on her shoulder and turned around to find those very eyes staring at her. "Dinner is served," Jack said formally, with a slight bow that still allowed for her to see his lips. He straightened and held his arm out to her.

She smiled and took it, allowing him to escort her. "Why, thank you, sir."

They entered the dining room and she gasped. The lights were dimmed, with candlesticks in the middle of the table, and the places at the head of the table and kitty corner to it were set, with a full steak dinner and baked potato dinner laid out on them. "How—?"

"I found a place that delivers all the components. It's specifically set up to deliver a romantic evening." He pulled her chair out for her and she sat, still glancing around the table and the room, and at Jack, in wonder.

After he'd sat and poured their wine, she said somewhat wryly, "So, to be clear . . . this is only what you would do if we were married and had just moved into our first house?"

"No," he replied simply, and then smiled when she furrowed her brow at him. "For one thing, if we were really married and had really been moving we would have had a lot longer to plan the move, which means a lot longer for me to plan how to surprise y—my wife on the first night in our new home. For another . . . ." He stopped, seeming like he was going to say something else, but finding safer footing with, "I would have grilled the steak myself if we really were moving in, because I guarantee the grill would be moved in before we were."

She giggled. "Okay, but . . . as far as being undercover goes . . . why do it now?"

He shrugged. "You never know who might be peeking through the windows. Besides, like I said, keep the lies as few as possible. If for some reason anyone asks what we ate for dinner on our first night here, you can tell them how your suave and debonair husband provided a lovely romantic dinner for you." He jokingly preened as he said this.

"Or," she returned with a smirk, ready to get back to their usual barbs and banter, "I could tell them that my husband couldn't even figure out how to cook a meal, and he's so cute in how he tries but I'll just have to work harder to train him."

He arched an eyebrow. "Cute?"

Flushing, she glanced down to her food, focusing on cutting her steak as she quickly said, "For the cover." She winked at him as she added, "Some prevarication must still slip through, after all."