A/N: Hi, welcome back to Private Eyes. I haven't QUITE finished this episode, writing-wise, but I'm close enough to the end to publish part 1 of this ep. I give you Take my Husband, Please

Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck

"Hey, how the hell are you out of your room?" the man asked as he walked into the server farm, seeing Chuck.

Chuck just shrugged. "I'm good," Chuck told them.

The man looked at his buddy, and both of them pulled out a weapon, aiming it at Chuck's head. He raised his hands. "What's stopping us from killing you and taking the plans right now?"

"You know the passcode to get into the system?" Chuck asked. The men exchanged a look. "Didn't think so. I haven't downloaded it yet. I wanted to make sure I gave the plans to the right people. I just want to go home and see my wife."

"How do you know we're the right people?" the first man asked.

"Because this is when you tell me who you're working for," Chuck said. The two men exchanged another look. "Listen, Robert told me, to make sure I got the right guys. He told me it would ensure my safety."

"He did, did he?" the lead guy said. A smirk was on his face. "Well, we work for Volkoff."

"Okay," Chuck said, nodding. "Any chance you put those guns away so you don't accidentally shoot me in the back as we're going to server room?" The men gave him a look. "Fine," Chuck said, turning. "We'll go, and I'll download the plans, and then I can go home?"

"Yeah," the first guy said, smirking where Chuck couldn't see him. Chuck led them down the hallway to the room door. He hoped to God this worked, because if these two killed him, Sarah was going to be so pissed at him.

}o{

You know how this works, that is later. This… this is now.

"It was a dark and stormy night."

He felt the blonde snuggle closer to him. She paused, lifted her head, and looked out the open French doors at the water. Turning, she looked back at him.

"What?"

"Chuck," Sarah said with a put-on exasperated sigh. "It's morning-thirty."

"Actually, about ten forty-five local time," Chuck told her.

"Like I said, morning-thirty." Chuck snorted. "The sun is shining, there's a breeze blowing off the water, and the sky is clear."

"It was hot," he said in a low tone.

"I wouldn't say hot… but it's warm," Sarah agreed, snuggling against him.

"The kinda hot that made you want to sleep without a stitch of clothing on. But not just hot. The air was alive… and oppressive. It was thick enough to cut with a knife, and then pull back the knife to see it had rusted."

She lifted the covers. "Welp, you're right about not having a stitch of clothing on," Sarah agreed.

"The window was open to try to cool the office. But the streets still radiated heat, and it wafted like the smells of a bakery below – covering you, enveloping you – and squeezing you until you could just barely breathe. The heat had caused a thunderstorm to break, and the rain was coming down, providing a bit of relief."

She sat up, the covers falling away, showing she was, in fact, not wearing a stitch of clothing. "What office? I mean I smell the food, but what rain?" Chuck tried to answer, but couldn't. She reached down, and pulled the sheet up, covering herself.

He swallowed.

"I'd been working this case for a while, and I worried I might be working it for the rest of my life."

"I do appreciate the film noir accent you're doing," Sarah told him.

"She'd walked into my life, and turned it upside down," Chuck continued. Sarah giggled. "She had legs… legs that went all the way up, and Lord… did she know how to use them."

"Well now you're just mixing genres," Sarah said, moving the sheet, exposing one of the said legs. "Film noir and ZZ Top mash-up is a choice."

"If she were a spider, I was ensnared in her web," Chuck continued. "And to be honest… part of me didn't mind being her meal."

"You calling me a cannibal?" Sarah asked.

"This broad," he continued, and then paused, giving her a worried look.

"I'll allow it, but only because you're trying to give of the essence of the time," Sarah said. He nodded his head.

"She had strolled into my life, and I was hooked on her. She was the drug I didn't know I needed, but I had to have to survive."

"Okay," she said, laying the pointer finger of her left hand across his lips. "I think you've talked enough, Mr. Walker."

"I do apologize Mrs. Walker," Chuck replied as best he could, with the finger over his mouth.

She wiggled her fourth finger, the ring glinting the incoming sunshine. "That's Mrs. Bartowski to you, Sir."

"My apologies," he said to her. "By the way, have I thanked you for this glorious honeymoon?"

"Well, you thanked me for quite a few things last night. But in therapy, I have been told that I need to work on receiving, so if you need to thank me some more…" She waggled her eyebrows at him.

"Well, as a married man, I do have certain responsibilities that are required of me." He wrapped his arms around her and gently lowered her to the bed.

"I expect you to be attentive to detail," she said, as his lips hit her throat and her eyes lids fluttered.

"I will do my best, and continue to practice until I get it right," he murmured into her skin.

"God, I love you," she said

After that, she really couldn't put together complete sentences.

}o{

"How you doin' over there?" she asked him several hours later, as they lay on the beach, relaxing. Chuck was in a pair of board shorts, and Sarah was wearing a green bikini. "Don't burn, because I have plans for you tonight."

"Would those be the same plans you had for me last night?" Chuck asked. Sarah grinned, bouncing her eyebrows. "I do love a good repeat performance." He took a deep breath, and gave a supremely happy sigh.

"You know we have to go back in a few days," Sarah reminded him.

"Yeah," Chuck said, the satisfied smile still plastered on his face. "I mean, we'll have been here two weeks, and while I could do this forever…" He trailed off.

"You miss it, don't you?" Sarah asked, grinning.

"Of course I do," Chuck said. "But think of it; now we're not Moonlighting, or Remington Steele anymore, we're Hart to Hart." Sarah snorted at him. "What?"

"You… Are… Such… A… Dork," Sarah said, emphasizing each word.

"And you married me," Chuck reminded her.

"Yeah, I did," she replied, her voice dripping with something that Chuck couldn't identify, but it made him shiver in the best way. "I married the shit out of you, and I'm going to keep on marrying the shit out of you."

"Can you keep marrying someone once you're married to them?" Chuck asked.

"Tell you what… you take good notes, and find out exactly what I can do, buster," Sarah told him.

"What if I break my pencil?"

"Then I'll just have to keep going over it with you until you memorize it, and it's seared in your brain," Sarah said with a shrug.

"What if it's seared in my brain, but I keep acting like it's not, so we can keep going over it?" Chuck asked.

She shook her head. "Apparently you need a lesson. Come on," she said, getting up out of her chair.

"Right now?" he asked. She gave him a look. "Right now," he said, hopping up out of the chair to follow her back to the room.

}o{

Meanwhile, back at the ranch (I just always loved that phrase…)

Ellie was sitting at the conference table at the detective agency. She was going through files comparing things to each other, as Casey, Carina, and Dan quietly sat nearby.

"Zondra requests that anything we discover, we inform her of at her earliest possible convenience," Dan told the group, sliding his phone back into his pocket.

"No she didn't," Carina said, shaking her head. "She told you if you find out anything to contact her ASAP." Dan chuckled. "I'm honestly not sure what I'm hoping we find." Ellie looked up at Carina. "If you verify what we think, then it's bad for your brother. But if it is what we think… it makes our investigation much easier."

"Well, I can tell you," Ellie said, laying down the papers to look at the other three, "it's bad for my brother."

Anna walked up to the table. "So, we have the choice of letting all of this go, or doing it behind Chuck and Sarah's back," she pointed out. Everyone turned to her. "What?" she asked with a shrug. "You all were going to talk around it for an hour and eventually come to the same conclusion. I just cut through the bullshit."

Carina stared at Anna for a moment. "That's usually something I would say."

"In this particular instance, you're too close to Chuck," Anna said. Carina lifted an eyebrow at her. "Oh, I know I am, but I also have to deal with them every day, which gives me some ability to think critically of both of them."

"Fascinating," Dan said, watching the two with amusement. He turned to Casey. "Are there any cases you could give them, while we do what we can about this?"

Casey thought for a second. "Well, I do have a bit of a weird one…"

"That's perfect," Anna said. Casey raised an eyebrow at her. "I mean, you know how Chuck loves a weird case, and you don't."

"Heh, it is a win-win," Casey said, grinning.

}o{

Monday morning found the two standing in front of the door to the office. Chuck turned to Sarah. "I'm kinda disappointed."

"Oh," Sarah said, turning to him with a querying expression. "Have I done something?"

"You didn't change my name on the door," Chuck told her, with a wink.

"Well, you did your husbandly duties so well on our honeymoon," Sarah began.

"Listen… I truly feel bad about you paying for it," Chuck told her.

"I told you how you can pay me back," she said, a sly grin on her face. "And you've made some nice installments already."

"Is that what we're calling them now?" Chuck asked. "Installments." Sarah shrugged and her grin grew. Chuck found he was fighting off a blush. "Would it be wrong if we snuck away at lunch?"

"Sir, I am a professional," Sarah told him. "We can send Anna out for lunch and use my office."

"Why can't we use my office?" Chuck countered.

"Cause I'm first on the window, duh," Sarah said, pointing to the door as she opened it and walked inside.

"Duh, Chuck," Chuck said, making her laugh. He walked in behind her, as happy as he had ever been in his life. Their life… amazing… some would even say awesome. Personally, professionally, and every possible way…awesome.For once, for once in his damn life, he didn't feel like the other shoe was about to drop directly on his head. He walked over and began to make the coffee.

"You know, I'm not gonna lie, I wanted to tell you while we were in Greece that you didn't have to make me coffee. There were people all around there to wait on us, and make us coffee," Sarah said, leaning against the doorway, watching him.

"I think you're a coffee voyeur," Chuck told her.

"Only when it's you making it," Sarah told him. Chuck cleared his throat. "What?"

"Well, it's just… the past few weeks we've been a little… extra."

"A little?" Sarah asked, grinning.

"And we are back at work," Chuck pointed out. "I'm just saying… maybe at work we should…"

The door opened and Anna walked in. She stopped as she saw the two of them. "Listen, if you two are going at it, I need you to put a sock on the door handle, or text me, and tell me to take the morning off."

Sarah looked over at Chuck. "You were saying?"

Chuck shrugged. "My bad!"

}o{

It was sometime later that Sarah opened Chuck's office door, in time to see him drop a bunch of tennis balls he was apparently juggling. She stood there a second, looking at him, and then glanced around the room. He was sitting there, one leg crossed over the other, hand on his cheek, the elbow resting on the top of his other hand, trying to appear nonchalant.

And failing horribly.

"Bored?"

"No," Chuck replied. "Just… figured now that I got the girl, I might need to up my game to keep her."

"And you thought juggling tennis balls was the answer?"

"I mean, you don't start with running chain saws," Chuck replied. She couldn't help but giggle at that.

"Well, we have a client," she told him. He jumped up, excited. "Want me to help you pick up the balls?"

"Nope, I'm going to let them lay there and let them think about what they did," Chuck told her, coming over to her. Sarah shook her head, threaded her arm through his, and the two walked over to her office.

"Mr. Bartowski, Mrs. Walker," the client said, shaking their hands. "I'm Claudia Jameson."

"It's actually Mrs. Bartowski now," Sarah said, grinning, as everyone took a seat. "But please, call me Sarah."

"Can I call you Mrs. Bartowski?" Chuck asked. Sarah gave him a look, and Chuck went red realizing what he had said in front of their client. He turned to her. "I'm Chuck, and I apologize, this is literally our first day back from our honeymoon, and I'm still on cloud nine."

"You have nothing to apologize for," Claudia told them, a sad but happy look on her face. "I love, love." The happiness fell from her face. "It's why I'm here, actually. Detective Casey thought you could help me."

Chuck looked at Sarah. She gave a small headshake, begging him to let the Detective Casey part go. "So, what can we do for you?"

"I received this from my husband," Claudia told them, handing them a letter. Chuck took it, looked at it, then handed it to Sarah. "As you can see, it's quick, to the point, and basically says that he's leaving."

"It's an email," Chuck said. "That's not exactly foolproof evidence."

"It is when the company insists that the only way to access the email account is through biomarkers," Claudia replied. Sarah looked at Chuck, confused. "A thumbprint." Claudia was silent for a second. "I don't guess you know of my and my husband's past?"

"No, we have no knowledge," Chuck told her.

"My husband's name is Stewart Jameson," Claudia began. "We met…." She stopped, shook her head, and sighed. "I was an escort."

"Okay," Chuck said, nodding.

"I know who I am, Mr. Bartowski," Claudia said. "I'm attractive, look good as someone's arm candy, and I can make a lot of money doing it. I don't anymore, not since… not since I started dating Stewart." She paused again.

"I promise you, Claudia, whatever you tell us – provided it's legal – will stay between us," Sarah told her. Claudia nodded.

"My husband had a terrible stutter around women," Claudia told Sarah. "The prettier, the worse it got. So, he decided to hire me to practice talking to women and get over the stutter. We would go out, and just talk." She had a warm smile on her face as she reminisced about their past. "He told me why he hired me, and I was stunned. 'Why me?' I had asked. And he told me, 'If I can talk to you, then I can talk to any woman. There's no one prettier than you.'"

Chuck let out a low whistle. "Nice," he said, grinning.

"And he meant it," Claudia insisted. "After his stutter was 'cured,' I… I asked him out."

"I'm guessing he said yes?" Chuck asked.

"After he peeled himself off the ground from collapsing in shock," Claudia said, grinning. "We started to date, fell in love, and got married. I began to try and find other work. I even went and finished my college degree. After we were married, he got a promotion at his job, and they had to do a comprehensive, very invasive background check."

She went silent for a moment. "Your past came up?" Sarah asked. Claudia nodded. "Was it held against him?"

"It didn't cost him his promotion, but his supervisor… he's a real horse's ass," Claudia said, frustration on her face. "The son of a bitch kept telling Stewart that I would cheat on him, and that I was probably still escorting on the side.

"Stewart didn't believe it for a moment, but when Stewart went missing, Robert told me that Stewart had enough of my 'whorish' behavior and had left me."

Chuck had to adjust his jaw. He had clenched it in rage. "I take it Robert is Stewart's supervisor?" Chuck asked.

Claudia nodded. "Robert Cline," Claudia answered. "I really don't like him."

"I kinda hate him," Sarah told Claudia. Claudia gave her a grateful smile. "Claudia, I have to ask, because it may come up somewhere and we have to know everything-"

"I haven't cheated on Stewart," Claudia said quickly, and forcefully.

"No," Sarah said, laying her hand on Claudia's arm to try and soother her. "That wasn't what I was going to ask. I was going to ask if there have there been any fights between you two? Has he acted strangely?"

"No, nothing like that," Claudia admitted. "I mean, I got a little upset with him the other day leaving one of the kitchen cabinets open. But I think he does that on purpose to get a rise out of me."

"Does that work?" Chuck asked.

"Like you could stand the kitchen cabinets to be open long enough for it to get a rise out of me," Sarah muttered, making Claudia chuckle.

"Things like that," Claudia said. "But a… a fight? No. Acting weird… I mean he got excited about Ahsoka Season two being announced."

"Nothing at all weird about that," Chuck said.

"Yeah, cause that's normal," Sarah groused.

"Some people get excited about a Housewives reunion," Chuck said, giving her a pointed look. "And the Bachelor finale."

"And that's weird?" Sarah asked. Chuck just shrugged. Sarah turned back to Claudia, who was grinning at the two. "Sorry."

"Don't be," Claudia said softly. "But to answer your question, no. Nothing seemed off. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary."

Chuck looked at Sarah. "I'd like to try and find him." Sarah nodded. "We will be glad to take your case."

"Thank you," Claudia said, standing. They shook hands, and Claudia left.

Chuck stood there a second before turning to his wife. "This Cline dude sounds like he's something else."

"He does," Sarah said. "How about you take lead on that part, so I don't punch him?"

"Just for clarification – is what you said in favor of me taking the lead, or in favor of you taking the lead?" Sarah shrugged. "Great."

"We should probably do it in the morning," Sarah said. "I think we both need some cooling off."

"Are you talking about our feelings toward Robert, or the feelings we're having to each other?" Chuck asked.

Sarah stood, walked over in front of Chuck, and leaned down, her lips an inch from his ear. "There's no way I'm ever going to cool off from the way I feel about you." With that, she straightened, turned, and walked over to her desk to sit down. She looked at him. He had barely breathed since she had spoken. "You okay?" He shook his head and stood. "Heading to use the shower? There's a cold setting on it." He nodded as he walked out of the room.

Sarah smiled, proud of herself.

}o{

"Okay, Anna has found out this guy likes to eat his lunch outside at the same time every day," Sarah said coming into the living room. Chuck had just finished the dishes, while Sarah had been making some calls, trying to find the best way to approach Robert Cline. "Gonna watch something?"

"Yeah, Morgan has been raving about this spy movie I should watch," Chuck told her. "You don't mind, do you?"

"No," Sarah said. "Sorry, I can't get into them like you do." Chuck couldn't help but laugh. "I mean they are so unrealistic." Chuck hit play. "Hey! That's the Superman dude from Impossible Mission."

Chuck was silent for a second. "That's Mission Impossible," Chuck said gently.

"Yeah, whatever," Sarah replied. "My God, she's gorgeous in that dress." She turned to Chuck. "Don't you find her gorgeous?"

"I'm not answering that question," Chuck muttered.

"Chuck, for the love of God, what woman can get mad seeing that singer in that dress, and their significant other says, 'Yeah, she's hot.'?" Sarah asked.

"It's Dua Lipa and yes, she is gorgeous," Chuck admitted. They watched for a bit. There was a chase scene, and Dua Lipa was on a motorcycle, driving through Greece. "I don't remember this part of Greece."

"Like we went anywhere but the beach and our bed," Sarah reminded him. Chuck grinned. "I've done that."

"Done what?" Chuck asked. "Driven a motorcycle like that, through Greece?"

Sarah nodded. "Nice use of the brake," she added. "That's very hot on your leg, you know." Chuck turned to her. "Riding a motorcycle in a dress like that, with no leg protection."

"And of course, you always use protection," Chuck said, chuckling to himself.

She leaned over. "I'm going to bed. You can watch the movie if you want," she said in a low voice, "or, you could come to bed and see what else I ride that's hot." With that she got up and headed to the bedroom.

She smiled as she heard him trip as he tried to turn off the TV, get off the couch, and scramble behind her.

A/N: These two are worse now that they're married, aren't they?

Next time:

"I'm sorry, you don't have time for this, you're obviously working," she said, gesturing toward the keyboard he was typing on.

Chuck picked up the keyboard, went to toss it, and stopped. "Sorry, these break easily, and while you are loaded, that's an unnecessary cost." He opened a desk drawer and put the wireless keyboard in there, shut it, turned to her, hands clasped in front of him on the desk, his attention on her. "I'm all yours."

"I'm aware," she said, grinning at him. She put her hands on the edge of his desk and leaned toward him. "Can I say, I like this whole married, working together thing?"

"Yes, yes you may," Chuck said, a grin on his face, slowly leaning toward her.

"I mean, you'd think we'd calm down the ridiculousness of us," Sarah continued.

"Common misconception in media," Chuck replied, moving even closer. "Writers believe there must be tension between the two characters to keep peoples' interest. Happens all the time in comics, movies, tv shows…especially those dramadies that are either on The CW or should be on there."

"I mean, two people, working together on a case, with all of that tension…" Sarah replied. "Who needs strife between the couple?"

I SAID WHAT I SAID