The Nerd Versus the P.I. Family
By Steampunk . Chuckster
A/N: I'm back. Thanks for reading and reviewing. Means a lot. Wear a mask and socially distance. I'd like to be able to go places again. Thanks.
Summary: Sarah Walker has uprooted her life, leaving her job with the LAPD and going it alone as a private investigator, all in the hopes it provides her with less dangerous stakes and a schedule she can control so that she can handle her most important job, raising her toddler, a bit easier. But when the single parent thinks her computer might've been targeted by a criminal, she has to request help from the unlikeliest of sources: The Buy More Nerd Herd.
Disclaimer: I do not own CHUCK, I do not own its characters, I am not making money from posting this.
"Oh. Oh, I—" She gaped. "Um…"
Shit. What did she even say? How this must look to—Oh God. She hoped he wasn't a client.
"Hi." He cleared his throat and shifted his weight. "Sorry. I'm…from the Nerd Herd. You called us and said you—Well, you know that."
Oh.
She lowered her hand from her head where she'd been feeling for a potential knot after she smacked it against the cabinet on her way up, and she glanced at her watch, furrowing her brow. He was a half hour earlier than the guy on the phone had said they would be."Oh, you're…earlier than I was…ready… I-I mean, this wasn't… My office isn't normally like…this." She winced, looking around the place.
"Did someone break in?" he asked, the concern in his face sincere.
Her eyes widened even more, surprised by his response. And then amusement flooded through her at the ridiculousness of this situation. It crossed her features and she dropped her hand to the crooked filing cabinet with a bit of a tired slap, letting out a quiet giggle. "God, it really looks like it, doesn't it?" He just stared at her, still looking concerned. "No, nobody broke in. I'm…" Looking to see if someone bugged her office. She'd sound like she was fucking nuts if she said that. "Um, I'm tidying up. That's all."
It probably looked to him like she'd been tidying down.
Pulling plants out of their pots? Seriously, that really was too much.
She kept seeing his eyes shift to that in particular. God, he thought she was crazy. She knew it. And it didn't really matter to her, let him think that, except that she really needed someone with some computer expertise to help her out and she didn't want to scare this one off.
"Do you need help?" He cleared his throat and pointed to the plant, a bit of a crooked smile on his face. He shifted his weight uncomfortably. She imagined he wanted to hightail it the hell out of here and away from the nutcase standing at the other end of the office.
At least he was positioned close to the escape route.
"Uh, no. No. Thank you, though. Kind of you to offer. I'll…um…pick this place up. Soon. Later." She gave him a weak smile.
She'd searched high and low. And she realized she still hadn't slipped the ceiling panel back into place over her desk after she'd lifted herself half into the freaking ceiling to search with her flashlight for bugs there. She'd found bugs all right, but not the electronic kind. And she'd screamed and nearly fell the eight feet down onto her desk.
That was all she needed, a broken spine, a snapped neck… and her parents would have to raise her son without her.
She shivered.
"Are you sure everything is okay?" the Nerd Herd guy asked, taking a step closer, thrusting his hand out towards her, palm up. "I've got my phone on me. I can call the police if—"
"No, seriously. It's not… It's okay. I'm fine. It's just a mess. I-I did this. Nobody broke in."
He licked his lips, his brow furrowed in concern still, as if he was trying to decide if he believed her or not, and if he didn't believe her, why in the hell she'd lie to him about it. She thought that would be fair enough if he was thinking all of those things. And then he finally nodded. "Okay. Just making sure."
And then he cleared his throat and looked around again. He looked like he was way out of his depth in this situation and she couldn't blame him.
She imagined he'd driven over here expecting to sit down, do something with her laptop, get paid, and leave.
And instead, he'd just walked into this.
Sarah was pretty sure her behavior wasn't making him feel any better, either. So she made to walk around the cabinet to introduce herself, but then she doubled back, deciding to right the filing cabinet instead. It just felt like the right thing to do in that moment. So she grabbed it and hefted to put it back on its proper base. But just like that a pair of hands joined hers on the other side of the cabinet.
"Lemme help," he breathed, wrapping an arm around the front of it. He didn't move her out of the way like he was some big strong man who could do the heavy lifting for her. Instead, they worked together, getting it back in place with a thump. "Against the wall?" he asked.
"Um… Yes. Thank you." She blinked at him, surprised enough by his actions that she pulled her hands away and just let him scoot it against the wall. "Perfect," she breathed. "Thanks."
She took him in, his dark brown curly hair, his warm profile with angles in all the right places, and as he strained to shift it a little more into the corner, his eyes narrowed a bit, but she still saw they were an amber color. Even in the mere attempt at natural light coming in through the window, she got a good look at them.
And then she looked down at her desk pointedly as he straightened to his full height again.
"Thanks for that."
"Oh, sure. No problem."
"Not exactly what they pay you for," she said, finally looking up again and giving him a closed-mouth smile. She stuck her hand out between them and he blinked at her, then looked down at her hand. "I'm Sarah Walker. I placed the order of service. The guy I talked to on the phone must have made me sound like a crazy lady…" And this hadn't helped at all, she was positive.
"Oh. No, he didn't—" He stopped then and shook his head, narrowing his eyes. "What am I saying, 'he'? That was me. I mean, I'm the guy you talked to on the phone." He chuckled and took her hand quickly, as she'd just had it hanging there between them awkwardly. "Chuck. I'm Chuck."
"Oh." His voice had sounded different. Or maybe she'd just imagined someone different might show up, someone not so…this guy. "You must think I'm, uh, sort of unbalanced." She laughed as he shook his head and made a face. "Not sure I believe you. I would think I was crazy if I walked in on this."
He looked a little amused.
"I'll be honest. If I was a potential client coming in here looking to get set-up in a new job, I'd probably…look for another employment agency," he said, wincing. "But I'm not. I'm just a guy who fixes computers so…"
She wasn't offended by his honesty. In fact, she found it refreshing. But then she realized what he said and tilted her head in question. "Employment agency?" She gave him a confused look and then she put two and two together. "Oh. You saw Walker Agency on the door and figured this is an employment agency."
"It…isn't?" he asked. "Sorry. I didn't mean to assume. There are just…"
"I know. Employment agencies in LA are like Starbucks in Seattle. One on every block." He chuckled at that and nodded. "I'm actually a private investigator." She reached back, haphazardly shoving at some papers to grab her tin of mints, popping it open and thrusting it out between them as she sat on the edge of her desk. "Mint?"
His jaw had since fallen open. He was full on gaping. She squirmed a bit after he stayed silent for longer than twenty seconds.
"So…no on the mint? Or…?"
He jumped a bit, shaking his head. "No! I mean, yeah! Sorry. Yes. Sure. That's…I'd love one. Sorry. Jesus."
Sarah'd gone through a series of shutting and reopening the lid of the tin as he contradicted himself, before she finally giggled and opened it up, shoving it towards him. "Take one."
"Thank you." He did, carefully pinching one between his fingers and popping it into his mouth. "And I'm sorry for—But you got me good." He chuckled and pointed at her.
"I…got you?" What?
"Yeah. I thought you were serious about being a private eye for a sec. That was good." He grinned, amused.
Sarah smiled back and pressed her lips together, raising her eyebrows. "No, I was being serious, but nobody's ever called me a private eye. That's a new one."
His grin faltered. "Hah. You're—Wait. You're serious? The agency part of Walker Agency…" He opened and closed his mouth a few times in a mimicry of what she'd just done with the tin of mints. He gawked in shock and then he finally spoke up, his voice soft with disbelief. "Agency, as in…a detective agency? You're really a private investigator?"
Watching him closely, starting to feel a distinct spark of amusement in her chest at how difficult it was for this to settle in his brain, she shrugged matter-of-factly. "Yep." Then she stuck out her arm. "You wanna touch me?" His voice got caught in his throat and a wheeze sound came out in stead. She winced. "Sorry. Bad joke." She pulled her arm back in and cleared her throat, tossing the mints back onto her desk.
"You're a private investigator…? A P.I.?" His eyes widened. "I'm standing in a real life detective agency right now," he breathed, looking around it. "Oh my God."
She wasn't sure what to make of him as she tilted her head and furrowed her brow.
He must've noticed the look she was giving him because he held his hands up by his shoulders. "Sorry. I'm sorry. I'm being ridiculous. It's just that I've never…" He cleared his throat. "I've never seen a…well…" He gestured to her.
Sarah inwardly rolled her eyes. "A female private investigator?" she asked drily.
"No, I've never actually seen any detective agencies in real life!" Well. That was…unexpected. "I've never met a private investigator! This is… I don't mean to embarrass you but this is the coolest thing I've ever heard in my life."
Sarah laughed, shaking her head. "What?!"
"No, seriously!" he laughed with her. "This is awesome! P.I.s are always in the old movies and the TV shows from the 'seventies, you know? But, like, actually standing in your office right now, in front of an actual P.I. is really—I'm losing my mind. This is cool."
All she could do was laugh again. If she wasn't already leaned against the edge of her desk, she would've been knocked back on her ass by this guy. He was so genuinely taken aback by her existence, not because she was a female private investigator and his brain had some dated notion of gender and certain professions…but simply because he'd never met a private investigator in general before. He was full-on geeking out over her profession.
Who was this guy?
"Well, we still exist. Case in point." She gestured up and down her figure with a graceful hand.
"No, I know. I know that…now. I mean, I knew it before, too. It's just that…I don't know. You're like…icons of my imagination and to meet you for real and—So do you solve cases?"
"Um…that's typically…what I do, yes. I wouldn't make much of a living if I didn't," she said, giggling as he thunked himself on the forehead with the heel of his palm.
"Oh. Duh. Right. Stupid question. I'm…" He shook his head and rolled his eyes at himself then, pulling the messenger bag he wore over his shoulder up and smacking it with his free hand. "I'm going to stop being totally mortifying and maybe I can get down to business here. It sounded like you, uh, may or…may not…have a computer problem."
She didn't blame him for the dubious look on his face.
"Right. That. Um." She stood up from her desk and walked around it, going into her bag, pulling the carrying case out, and then tugging her laptop out of that. She cleared off the desk by pushing papers to the edge of it, trying not to think about how awful it would be to organize those again. (That was for Future Sarah.) And then she set it down and gestured at the innocuous looking MacBook. "There she is."
"A-ha. Okay." He moved to right the chair that she'd tipped on its side to check its legs for bugs. And then he set his bag on it before coming around to carefully squeeze past and stand next to her to look down at the computer. "So what's going on with it—uh, her?"
She giggled at the way he corrected himself, finding it almost cute.
"Okay, you have to understand. The reason why I was acting so weird over the phone about this is because—"
"You're a P.I.! Come on! I totally get it. You don't want to say certain things over the phone in case some bad guy is tapping your cell or something. Makes perfect sense to me." He shrugged.
Sarah felt a smile slowly growing on her lips, and then she laughed, shaking her head. God, he sounded just like her dad. "It's just…a good idea to be safe. Especially since I'm in the middle of a, um, sensitive case."
He was gaping at her, she realized, and he was standing a lot closer than he'd been the first time he'd gaped at her about her job. He must've realized he was doing it and he spun to look down at the laptop, clearing his throat. She'd never had anyone react this way to her line of work before. He was acting like Max had the first time he'd seen an elephant on television.
"So what is it you need me for, then?" Chuck asked, a curious look on his face.
"It's like I tried to say over the phone but it came out…super cryptically. I don't know if maybe my email might be getting hacked. Or…" She pushed her hands to the back of her neck and threaded her fingers together, making a frustrated sound. "I don't know. That's the problem. I just keep thinking maybe there's something, something I'm not picking up on. I can't shake the feeling."
"Mmm. Mhm. That's your P.I. gut." He nodded sagely.
She turned an amused smile on him, trying not to laugh. "My P.I. gut?"
"Yeah. You know, that feeling you get right under your ribcage." He put his hand on his abdomen. "When you think something is fishy, or someone's lying to you. A witness. Or some kinda sketchy dame who shows up at your door needing your help, see?"
Sarah couldn't help but giggle. "Right. My P.I. gut. That certainly comes in handy."
"Are you making fun of me?" he asked, a light in his eyes as he gave her an amused side glance.
"Nooo, of course not." They laughed together. "But you're kind of right. I do have a bit of a gut for things and I think…it's me. Somehow. I think I'm the leak."
"The leak?" he asked, furrowing his brow in question.
The private investigator gave him a long look, a thought starting to to spark in her mind…She kept it locked away however as she reached down to open up her laptop. "Is there a way for you find out if my email is being hacked?" she asked, signing into her system and stepping back again.
"Definitely. I can do that. And I think I might get the gist. I, uh, I watch a lot of movies—"
"I couldn't tell."
He gave her a look, then chuckled, turning to face her. He was secure, she had to give him that. She could tease him and he didn't take offense. In fact, she thought it might even please him. She liked that.
"You have information, maybe about a client or something, information you haven't shared with anyone else. And it turns out someone else has gotten their hands on that information. You think they got it off of your laptop maybe…"
Sarah nodded. "Yeah, actually. Pretty good guess."
"Maybe don't knock the movies, P.I." He shrugged cockily.
"Wow. Maybe don't be so cocky. Especially not before you've even solved my problem."
"We don't even know yet if there is a problem."
"Better get to working then, huh?"
His jaw fell open. "Wow. Wowww."
He laughed, and she laughed with him, walking around the desk. "Do you want water or anything? Coffee?" she asked.
"You know what? If I can get some coffee…Wait, no. Don't. Don't go out of your way to—"
"What 'out of my way', it's literally right out here. I'll put the pot on. It's just one of those little pods you stick in the thing."
He chuckled, smiling at her, his nose wrinkling. "Okay, then. Thank you."
She shrugged as if it wasn't a big deal and then ducked out of her office into the waiting room. She wondered if making a joke about not spying on her while she was out of the room would be appropriate with this good-humored stranger she'd only met a few minutes earlier, and she decided against it as she prepped the coffeemaker.
But then she heard him shuffle over to the door and she turned to look at him over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised, the filter in her hand. He blinked a few times, rapidly, and then he looked away, and she had a feeling she was witnessing the polite and sincere, though a bit obvious, acknowledgement from this Nerd Herd I.T. guy that he found her attractive. His attempt to cover it up was sweet, she couldn't help thinking. And he wasn't making her uncomfortable, so that was new.
"So! Um, I need your permission first before I do this."
"Oh. Do I have to sign something before you touch my computer?"
"No, no. Not that. But um… Actually, it'd be easier if I showed you."
She raised her eyebrows. "Okay. Let me just get this coffee going. If that's okay."
"Sure!" He walked further into the waiting room and watched her work, sticking his hands in his pockets, leaning against the wall. "This is nice, having coffee available for your clients, erm, the folks in the waiting room."
"Thanks."
"Does it work?"
Sarah gave him a wry look. He didn't seem to miss much.
"Honestly, by the time the pull of coffee works its magic, they've usually already decided to hire me. So I guess to answer your question: Nah, it doesn't work."
He grinned. "So you're saying I shouldn't be putting a coffeemaker next to the Nerd Herd desk…"
Giggling, she shook her head and pressed start on the machine. "Do you want people crowding around your desk for free coffee?"
He winced. "Ooooooof, no I do not. You make a good point, Miss W—"
"Just Sarah. Please." She smiled.
He smiled back. "Sarah. It's enough helping people with their phones and their tablets and their computers. I don't want to have to help them work the coffeemaker too."
She laughed, pushing a cup under the spout for him and watching the hot liquid spill out and fill it. "I don't have creamer or sugar, though. Which, I know, kind of defeats the purpose of the coffee in the first place if you're not a black coffee person."
"Listen, beggars can't be choosers. Either take the black coffee or don't." He nodded once emphatically. "As it so happens, I'm a fan of black coffee. Especially today."
She handed it to him when it was finished. "Why especially today?"
"Thank you," he said, taking it from her, their fingers brushing. She noticed it acutely. "Well, I've got a big job ahead of me here. I need my coffee as strong as possible."
"A big job? You already found something that bad?" She widened her eyes.
"No, I haven't even started looking. But you know it's gonna be a big job when you don't even know what the job is yet, or if there will even…be a job. I'm confusing myself now. Can I just show you the thing I'm doing?"
Laughing, she nodded and gestured for him to go first.
He led her back into the office and carefully set his cup down away from the electronics, before he went into his messenger bag and pulled a jump drive out of a small inner pocket. "On this drive, I have a program that will do an extensive scan of every last facet of this device. From the apps and documents you have on it, to your email, and it will even check it on a physical, mechanic level. So the keys, the mousepad, all of this." He gestured to her laptop.
"Oh. Okay, great. How long will that take?"
"Honestly, a few hours. Especially since I don't even know what could possibly be on here, if there's anything at all. Unfortunately, I can think of a lot of ways someone could access another person's device. And a lot of them are extremely easy to miss, virtually invisible."
"What the hell?"
"Yeah." He pressed his lips together and shrugged. "The cyber world can be terrifying. Only thing is, and I'm honor bound to tell you this… This program that I have on this drive, the one I plan on using on your device? It isn't anything that anybody else in this business would be using, it isn't anything you can purchase, it isn't on the market." She frowned in confusion. "And that's because I built it myself. It's my own program. There's no copyright on it or anything. I haven't tried to sell it yet. But it works! You can trust it on your laptop. I promise."
This time Sarah gaped at him. "Wait, you built a program that will do a full sweep of my laptop to look for incongruencies or evidence someone hacked into it? You built it yourself?"
"Yep!"
"I'm incredibly impressed," she drawled, sitting on the edge of her desk again and just watching him. "Chuck was it?"
"That's right." He was blushing, pulling on the front of his navy blue button-down and fidgeting.
She watched him for a long time, long enough that she could see him getting uncomfortable. But she was trying to gauge him, trying to read him, figure out just how much she should trust this random guy who popped up from the Buy More Nerd Herd. She'd learned all too well not to trust people. And it wasn't just about the case or her laptop. It was about men, people in general, but mostly men. She'd met guys through her work who were charming enough, disarming, seemingly harmless, but they'd been criminals, con artists, fraudsters.
There was also the chance whoever had broken into her laptop to take that information on that case was a guy just like this Chuck. Or maybe it was Chuck.
He picked up his coffee cup, obviously for something to do while she stared at him hard, trying to make her decision. And as he brought it to his lips to sip, he winced, burning his mouth a little and hissing. "Jesus fuck!" And then he looked at her with wide eyes. "Sorry. I hope you're not Catholic!"
She cracked up. "I'm not anything," she reassured him. "I don't believe in the law all the time even." He raised his eyebrows, both surprised and interested, she thought. "There's what's right, and then there's what's legal. But, uh, don't tell anyone I said that."
She trusted him. It wasn't necessarily the fact that he'd burned himself on the coffee, or that he'd just freaked out that she might be specifically Catholic when he'd used the Lord's name in vain. It was just…all of it. The full package.
And she needed to know what was going on. If this program of his did the trick, she'd worry about the potential repercussions later. She was already on thin ice anyway if it turned out she was the leak.
"Chuck, I'm going to trust you with this. Mostly because I know if anything goes wrong, your whole company is liable and I don't think you'd mess around with that." His eyes popped as he looked at her. "That's not a threat. I don't threaten people." He gave her a doubtful look. "Well, at least I don't threaten I.T. guys who are just trying to help me out."
He grinned, his nose wrinkling again, and he chuckled. "I only felt a little threatened for a second there, and don't worry, I didn't particularly dislike it." If he hadn't turned back to her laptop to stick the drive in the USB port on the side, he would've seen her jaw drop a little, her tongue pressing against her cheek, eyebrows raised, a bit of a surprised smile growing on her face.
Was that flirting? Had he just flirted? Had he meant to flirt, if it was flirting? Or was he totally clueless about how that had sounded?
"Good," she said slowly, not quite sure how else to respond.
"So what I'm going to do is run this on your laptop. Depending on the size of the hard drive and how much you have on here, and what sorts of nooks and crannies it finds to stick its fingers in and feel around for stuff it thinks shouldn't be there…er, weird imagery, sorry." She giggled. "It's the best way I can describe it, through. And when that's over, I'll run it specifically geared towards any email addresses you need it to check."
She nibbled on her lip thoughtfully. "Hmm. 'Kay. How do you know when it finds something?"
"At the end, a list pops up on the screen. I go through each one separately and check it out. Usually it's nothing, but if there's a virus it always finds that, no matter what kind of virus it is. And if any other devices are connected to this one, whether because you connected your cell phone or an iPad…or someone else gained access to it…" He paused and Sarah felt a chill go through her at that. "…GreyWolf will find it. And I take a look at each thing separately to suss out what's dangerous and what isn't. So there's a human element to this too. We cross check each other."
Sarah widened her eyes and raised an eyebrow. "You I.T. guys are funny."
"Funny like ha ha or funny in the head?"
She laughed, moving to actually sit on her desk, not caring about the papers crinkling under her backside as she did so. She'd figure all that out later. Future Sarah. "No, it's just the way you talk about your program, like it's a friend of yours."
"Well, more a coworker, I'd say. We don't grab lunch or celebrate holidays together or anything."
Sarah laughed again, shaking her head. "That's fair."
"I get it. I probably sound a little bit like a weirdo, but I created it, you know? I built it. I named it, you know? And sometimes when I watch its little cyber brain go to work, it's easy for me to see it as a living thing, you know?"
She was tired and strung out over this whole case and the potential that she was the leak. And then there was the lack of sleep the night before because Max had resisted staying asleep—a rarity for him—and called for her more than three times because of "nightmares", forcing her to finally just let him sleep in the bed with her, which had ended up with him practically lying on top of her and kicking her in his sleep. She didn't know how parents dealt with toddlers that did that all the time. Max was usually a lot better of a sleeper. She was done with that.
All of that was why seeing this Nerd Herd employee peering at her laptop with his warm eyes as he talked about a hack-finding program he built himself like it was a little person made her melt a little bit.
Maybe it was as simple as the fact that she was a mother now. It was probably weird to compare, but she'd given birth to her own little person, and seeing Chuck get this way about something he'd created made her chest feel warm.
"It's like The Brave Little Toaster," she said quietly.
He rocked forward in laughter. "Cool. Great. Yep."
She giggled through her nose and reached down to put a hand on his shoulder. "I'm teasing you. I actually get it. I totally get it. Maybe not literally, because I've never built a crazy intense computer program that finds shitty hackers on people's devices, but I think I get it on a deeper level."
Chuck turned to look up at her and smiled. "Well, at the very least, me an' GreyWolf have to be simpático. It's a meeting of the minds. Maybe that's why I haven't put it out on the market yet or tried to put it on the tech industry's radar, even if it might make me a load of money. First of all, I really need to refine it a lot more before it can be mass produced and sold. And secondly, it isn't super user friendly. It is for me, but I created it. I don't know that it would work well for anyone else. I know how to guide it, I know how to mold it to different systems so that it's best effective, you know? Maybe some other tech savvy dude wouldn't be able to do that, you know? It just…melds with my brain, and the way I work is the way it works. I don't know if any of that makes sense." He scoffed and shook his head, rolling his eyes at himself.
She watched as a shyness came over him and he reached up to scratch the back of his head before going back to work. She wondered if he meant to say any of that, or if she chatted him up enough that he felt comfortable to explain his insecurities with this program he'd made, and the hurdles he saw in front of him as he tried to make it into something that could make him successful.
"It makes sense," she said quietly. And she thought maybe he could use a compliment. "I feel like I might've gotten lucky catching you on the phone when I called the Buy More this morning."
Chuck blushed and let out a mute chuckle, ducking his head. "Don't say that until I'm able to actually help you." He bounced a bit in the chair then. "Though I won't lie, I'm super interested to see what sorts of things it picks up after what you've told me. Never ran GreyWolf on a private investigator's computer before."
Sarah thought she probably should've been annoyed that he was so blatantly excited about the potential of finding some awful thing on her laptop—she'd prefer her laptop to be clean, thank you very much. But instead of being annoyed, she just thought it was a combination of odd and cute. He was a nerd, a geek or whatever. And this stuff apparently got him going.
Which made sense, considering his line of work.
She supposed she'd struck gold getting a guy who actually liked this stuff and was good at it. Good enough that he had a whole program he'd built. She heard a quiet voice reminding her that she still hadn't seen this program do its thing yet.
And even when she did see it doing its thing, she'd have no damn idea what she was looking at.
"Should I feel special?" she asked, crossing her legs at the ankle and smirking down at him.
He grinned at her screen, typing away. "What do you mean?"
"I'm the first P.I. who gets the GreyWolf treatment," she said with a shrug. "Sounds kind of special."
His brown amber gaze slowly swept up her torso to her face. Not exactly in a leering sort of way, the way she'd unfortunately gotten used to over the years. It was more reverent…surprised, almost. And then there was awe in his face as he met her gaze. "Yeah," he said quietly then. "You should."
Then he winked and went back to work. That was unexpected. She took a deep breath, tucking a bit of hair behind her ear.
"How long does something like this take?"
"It'll be a few hours."
Her jaw fell open. "What?"
"Yeah. If you'd brought your computer in to our Nerd Herd desk at the Buy More, I would've kept the computer in the back to run the program and sent you away until the end of the day. Once I got everything it found checked and whatnot, I'd call you to come pick it up." He made a face then. "Actually… If I'm being totally honest with you, any ol' regular Joe Blow who brought their laptop in to my desk wouldn't be getting the GreyWolf treatment."
Sarah raised her eyebrows. "So why do I get the GreyWolf treatment?"
He seemed not to know how to answer that for a good twenty seconds. And then he stuttered out an, "Uhh, w-well, um, i-it…Um." Clearing his throat, he shrugged. "This is a very sensitive situation. You're a private eye so this is related to a case that probably…I don't know, I imagine there are lives at stake here. It feels like a big deal. And, um…"
"You geeked out over the whole P.I. thing and think it's cool?"
He winced. "Yeah, that about sums it up. I'm not proud of myself."
Sarah giggled and shook her head. "Listen, I'm reaping the benefits of it, so I'm not complaining. I guess I don't know enough about tech and how complicated this sort of thing is, because I didn't realize this would take so long."
He gave her a wide eyed look and pulled his hands off of her keyboard. "Oh. Yeah, I should've told you that before I started this. I can stop it if you'd like. It won't break it or anything. If you have other things you need this for. I should've—"
"No, no. No, it's okay." She thrust her hand out towards him, interrupting him. "This takes priority over everything else. I'm not mad at you. Don't worry. I'm just commenting on my own lack of…knowledge on these things. Please stay and do the job. I'm actually kind of…begging you." She pressed her lips together and furrowed her brow in a wince.
"You don't have to beg me," he said, a certain warmth and gentleness to his tone. He met her gaze again and smiled a little. "This is a pretty fascinating job and, well…in the spirit of honesty, it's easy to get in a bit of a rut when you're in my line of work."
She smiled back and nodded. "Hm. Seen one computer, seen 'em all, huh?"
"Something like that," he chuckled. "It all sort of…melts together. It's better than it used to be. The Buy More takes good care of me now."
"Well, they should. You're obviously an asset."
That made him look up at her in awe again, and then he blushed and chuckled, ducking his head. "Naaaah…"
"Well, I don't know if you're going to fix my problem yet—even though I have faith you will—but what I have seen so far is excellent customer service. You arrived on time—"
"Early, really," he said with a wince.
She chuckled and shook her head. "It's okay. I prefer that to late, even though you saw me being a complete freak, which was…uh, embarrassing."
"Oh don't be embarrassed on my account, please! You have no idea the shit I've seen working for the Buy More since I was…like, sixteen. As crazy as it was to see this mess, it was more just…not what I was expecting. I'm fine. No one attacking me. No one yelling at me. Nothing terrifying."
Sarah gaped at him. "I'm not even going to ask."
"Don't." He shook his head vehemently. "Really. Just don't. Trust me."
She giggled. "Well, not only were you on time, you're going out of your way to go above and beyond with this program of yours—this GreyWolf thing. So, yeah… Good customer service."
Sarah decided not to say the other things she was marking off with the Nerd Herd tech. He hadn't ogled her or stared at her legs or hit on her, in spite of the innocent slight flirtation she thought she'd picked up on earlier. Maybe that had just been a projection; after all, she had to admit to herself that she thought he was kind of cute. And definitely not anything like what she was expecting to show up.
And on top of that, he just seemed genuine and kind. And patient and thoughtful.
He was only taking up the space he needed. He was asking her before doing things to her laptop, without just assuming he could do whatever he wanted because he knew more than she did. And he was answering her questions without even an ounce of impatience or annoyance.
And there was absolutely no air of self-importance or superiority. He had yet to patronize her about her lack of tech know-how or scoff at her questions. He didn't make her feel stupid.
He was just doing his job.
She found she was actively growing to like him. Or maybe not that exactly. Maybe she'd liked him immediately and the longer he sat here, the more she liked him.
"Well, thank you," he said, nodding humbly. "I appreciate that. I'll also appreciate it if you fill out our online form that asks how your service was and say all of what you just said."
They laughed together as he typed a few more things, then he pushed his chair back a bit and clapped his hands. "So here's the bad news… Normally, I'd say I could just get out of your hair and come back later to check on it in a few hours, but I…have to be here to sort of…guide GreyWolf. So I…can't leave. If you have work to do and need your office, though, I can just take this out into the waiting room and handle it there. It's completely up to you."
So that was how today was going to be then. Her and this I.T. guy, this "nerd" from the Nerd Herd, for a couple of hours while he guided his GreyWolf program to search for hacks on her laptop.
She nodded. "Okay. Whatever you need to get this done. And you can use my desk, it's fine," she said, giving him her most hospitable smile. "I can't really do anything without my laptop anyway." Then she looked around her office. "Actually, I might, uh, work on making my office not look like…well…"
"Like Taz went through it?" he filled in. She gave him a confused look and he blinked. "Taz. The Tasmanian devil that tornadoe'd around. You know, with Bugs Bunny and Daffy…Duck… Ahem."
Sarah pushed herself off of her desk and snorted. "Oh, that guy. Yeah, you're right. It does look like that."
She winced as she turned away from him and slowly started to gather things off of the floor. She wasn't looking forward to this part of the day at all.
}o{
Chuck peeked up from her laptop to watch for a few moments as she leaned down to scoop up a couple of files that had been on the floor, thumbing through the pages inside of it, organizing them.
What had actually gone on in here, he wondered? She said her office hadn't been broken into, but she seemed pretty nervous that her laptop had been. Was she keeping the truth from him because he was just an I.T. guy the Nerd Herd had sent to help her with her computer?
He didn't blame her for it.
She was a private investigator, which was honestly just the coolest freaking thing he'd ever had happen to him ever in his life. He wasn't totally oblivious. He'd seen the look on her face when he'd been surprised about her being a P.I.. And he saw the first thing she'd jumped to: he was yet another guy who was shocked to meet a woman who was a private eye.
He hadn't just been saying it. He'd meant it when he insisted the fact that he was standing in the office of a private investigator was where the shock had come from. It was just like those old film noir movies he and Morgan used to illegally download off of the internet when they were growing up, the same ones that had prompted the two thirteen year olds to order fedoras online and try to make their own film noirs with Mrs. Grimes's camcorder, complete with little stubby cigars made out of paper bags they cut and rolled up tight.
But he imagined her work was dangerous. And that made him want to know just what had happened to her office.
This simply wasn't what "tidying up" looked like. It looked like tearing down.
Sarah turned and looked him right in the face suddenly and he freaked, immediately looking back at the laptop, typing up a storm to send GreyWolf in another direction.
"…What?" she asked in the awkward silence that pervaded after she caught him staring. God, he hoped she didn't think he was staring because he was ogling her or checking her out or something. Because as objectively stunning as Sarah Walker was, he wasn't here for that reason. He was here to help her.
And he thought maybe he'd be able to help her better if he knew just a bit more.
He let out a rough breath and then rubbed his hands up and down his pants. "Okay, I totally understand if you tell me to mind my own business, but I don't believe that this mess is the result of you tidying up your office." Sarah squirmed uncomfortably, but to her credit, she didn't break his gaze. "You're obviously worried someone broke into your computer… Did someone break into your office? I know I already asked but…the truth…"
She just watched him closely for almost a whole minute, almost as if she was weighing telling him the truth or not.
Again, he didn't blame her in the least. Who was he, even? He'd been sitting here for maybe thirty minutes at the most.
But then she sighed and walked up to her desk, setting the file she held down before bracing her palms on the desktop and hunching down close to him. "Look, it isn't anything against you, Chuck. But I'm working with some highly sensitive material, evidence that came from the LAPD and DA's office. If I told you anything more than that, I'd have to kill you."
Chuck blinked, then sat back against her chair, doing his best to control his features and keep from laughing outright. Instead, he kept the game going. "And then you'd have to solve my murder and pretend you weren't the one who did it aallll the tiiime."
She looked surprised, then laughed, like it had bubbled up from her chest suddenly. It made his own chest feel like it was filled with light. "You're quick. I like that."
"Thanks. And joking aside, message received. You can't tell me more than you already have. I get it." He smiled understandingly and bobbed his head.
She stood to her full height again, which was pretty tall, especially with the heels she was wearing. And then she gave him a long look. "Thank you. For not pushing, I mean."
"Hey, it's okay. None of my business anyway. This is my business," he said, pointing at the screen.
"Speaking of that, anything popping up?"
"I won't know until GreyWolf does its thing. When it's finished, that's when the list pops up. And then begins the painstaking process of checking everything out that looked fishy to my bud GW."
She looked curious at first at the nickname, and then he could see it click in her head and she chuckled. "God, you are a geek."
"Nerd. I prefer the term 'nerd'. You know, like Nerd Herd."
"Oh, I'm so sorry. Nerd. You're right." She smirked, then went back to slowly picking things up, straightening them, going to the filing cabinet to actually put things away.
Chuck watched her secretly whenever he could, specifically when her back or profile was towards him, when she wouldn't notice. And he took her in head to toe, not to ogle weirdly enough, but to try to get some feel for the type of person she was.
And even though he said and knew that this really wasn't his business, he wanted to see if he could pick up on cues to figure out what in the hell was going on here.
As GreyWolf did its thing, he watched as Sarah Walker meticulously slipped the files in their proper spot in each filing cabinet drawer. And then she stooped to start righting the furniture, and every time she did, he watched her hand sweeping over the edges, running her fingers underneath as if she was searching for something.
But when she turned back to face him, he darted his eyes subtly back to the screen.
"So…tell me, Chuck. Do all of you Nerd Herd folks have your own programs that you carry around with you to use on jobs?"
He tilted his head, narrowing his eyes a bit. "I can only speak for the Burbank Buy More, and I'm definitely the only one there who's this intense."
"I really did luck out, then."
Chuck sniffed in amusement, then widened his eyes and pressed his lips together, puffing out his cheeks. "Um. You'll never quite understand just how lucky you got today."
She straightened her back and faced him head on, raising an eyebrow and smirking. "Oh, really? You're that great, huh?"
He could hear and see that she was teasing him. And he could feel a blush on his cheeks, the heat rising from his button-up collar.
"No, it-it's more like the only other guy who was on shift at the time you called this morning is, um…to put it nicely, he's undesirable. That's really the nicest way I can put it." He winced up at her and shook his head.
"And you're desirable by comparison?"
She was definitely teasing now. And if she wasn't so radical, so awesome, so jaw-droppingly gorgeous, nice, and a complete badass who was very out of his league, he might even say that had been…flirtation.
"In comparison to Lester? Honestly? Yes."
Sarah laughed. "You're really digging this whole honesty thing today, aren't you?"
"What can I say?" he chuckled. "I'm an honest guy, I guess."
"Seems that way." She looked at him quietly for a few seconds, and they met gazes and smiles. "So if you'd sent this other guy instead of just coming yourself, I gather he wouldn't have this…GreyWolf program. But would he really be that bad?"
"Yes."
"How? Why?" She came in closer, rounding the desk to be on his side of it and sitting on the edge again. "He's just a person," she said with a shrug.
"Jury's out on that one."
She cracked up. "That's mean."
"Is it mean? Or is it just the truth?"
"It could be both," she said, giving him a look.
"Okay, well…touché. Point taken." But then he really didn't want her to inwardly think that he was being mean or spiteful, even if she was outwardly laughing about it. "I probably do sound super mean, joking aside." She shook her head to try to deny it. "But I'm telling you right now, if I'd sent him instead of coming myself, two things would have immediately happened. Both would be unprofessional because that's what he gets paid for I guess." She widened her eyes but leaned in, seeming intrigued. "The first thing he'd do is he'd hit on you. Hard. And I'm not talkin', like…" He gave her his best smolder. "Well, well, well, helloooo gorgeous!"
She rocked forward, laughing. "Is that your typical go-to when you're hitting on a woman, Chuck?"
"No!" He gave her his best offended look. "I'm just—Never mind." He huffed in frustration at her, unable to keep from blushing a little. "I mean, it isn't the usual pick-up line."
"Is that usual?"
"Stop it!" She laughed again and he couldn't help cracking a smile, even as he glared a little. "He's going to hit on you in a way that will make you wanna install an alarm system in your home for when you go to sleep."
"Ew!" She made a face, chuckling. "Come on, I've gotten some real doozies. I think I could've handled a pick-up line, however…creepy."
"You say that now but you haven't met him. Nor have you been hit on by him. And listen, I don't want that for anybody, let alone you." He shivered and typed a few things to send GreyWolf in a new direction.
"Let alone me?" she asked, raising her eyebrow and smirking.
Damn. She heard everything, didn't she?
"Um. What?"
She gave him a knowing look. "Okay, I'll be nice and let you off the hook on that one."
"Thanks." He clicked his teeth together and sent her his oops look, making her giggle.
"Two things."
"What?" He gave her a confused look.
"You said there were two things he would've done if you'd sent him instead of coming yourself."
"Oh. The second thing he would've done is he would've pushed you to tell him everything that's going on around here. Where I backed down 'cause it's none of my business, he would pester and pester and pester…"
"Lester would pester?" Chuck cracked up and then slow clapped for her. She sent him a dubious look. "You're really clapping for that? No accounting for taste."
He laughed again. "What can I say? I like a good dorky moment. From the right person."
"Dorky?" Her mouth fell open. "Excuse me?"
"Look at who you're talking to, Sarah. There's no way that was anything less than a huge compliment."
She snorted and shifted to lean on the edge of the desk again, one thigh propped along the desktop. He studiously didn't look at it. But gosh it was right there. Damn it. "I guess I'll take it then. And as much as I'm sure I'd be able to handle it easily enough, I am genuinely counting my blessings that I got you instead of Lester Pester."
"Me, too. I'd be so pissed if I missed out on seeing a real live P.I. agency. Man, I'd be soooo pissed."
She stayed there, perched on her desk, looking down at him as he worked, chatting with him, their laughter ringing through the office, as Chuck felt genuine warmth start to settle itself between them.
And instead of his usual go-to of wondering how in the hell a "girl like this" could look at a guy like him in this way, or talk to him in this way, Chuck decided to just let this wash over him and enjoy it while he worked.
A/N: Is that you, rhyming dork Sarah? In just chapter three?
Yep. I did that. If you don't like it, eat it.
-SC