Kensi winked at Deeks, turning on her overly tall heels before his shocked expression completely faded and her nerves settled in. She was in the empty ladies' room when it fully hit her that she'd kissed Deeks for no other reason than because she'd wanted to catch him off guard. And she'd almost forgotten what his lips felt like on hers.
With a shaky finger, she reactivated her comm.
"Kensi, what the hell happened? We lost contact with you for over eight minutes," Sam demanded in her ear. "We were about ten seconds away from bursting in there."
"Sorry, but Deeks had something important to tell me and your constant commentary makes it hard to concentrate," Kensi replied.
"I thought you were better at multi-tasking," Callen commented.
"What did Deeks tell you?" Nell asked innocently.
"I'll fill you in later." Kensi spoke through her teeth, mentally begging Nell to hear her plea to shut up.
"I'll remind you. You know, for the record." Based on Nell's voice, she'd gotten the message and would be demanding all the dirty details as payment for her silence.
"Alright, keep us updated if anything major changes."
"Mm," Kensi responded as another woman walked in, checked her hair, and went into one of the five stalls. She quickly washed her hands, heading back out to take her spot in the audience.
A routine with the majority of the dancers on-shift tonight was in progress, though she didn't see Deeks among them. Without him, Kensi found the dancing a lot less intriguing, but she cheered along with everyone else when it ended.
They'd only left the stage for a couple minutes when an angry shout broke through the babble of voices. Kensi leaned forward, frowning when the stage curtains fluttered as if something had fallen against them. A second later, a dancer crashed through, closely followed by a dancer with a buzz cut, who had clearly just pushed him. He shouted something unintelligible before throwing himself at the first guy.
Around her, people were reacting with varying levels of fear, anger, and apparent excitement. One woman even jumped up onto the stage to join in on the spectacle.
Clenching her fingers together, Kensi fought the urge to intervene and forced herself to stay in her seat. She was Tracey, not a federal agent trained in multiple forms of fighting.
"Hey, break it up!" a new voice shouted, and the club's owner pushed his way onto the stage. Neither of the dancers paid any attention to him as he tried to tug them apart.
Kensi's phone buzzed and she read a three-word text from Deeks.
"It's show time!"
What the hell had he done?
Making use of the increasing pandemonium, Kensi stood and wound her way between tables. She found the hallway blessedly empty. The owner's office had a simple lock, which she rolled her eyes at as she grabbed a lock pick from her purse, and bent down. It only took a few seconds to trip the lock, and then she was inside the small, cramped room.
She went straight to the laptop on top of the desk; it was still open and on, a spreadsheet pulled up on the screen.
"Eric, I need you to access a laptop for me," she requested, keeping her voice low. "It's turned on, but I don't have a USB on me."
"Ok, I'm going to request remote access," Eric said. "Let me know when you see it."
"Got it." Kensi gave him access, glancing towards the door as she watched Eric remotely navigate across the screen. "Be as quick as you can. I'm in the owner's office. Deeks caused a diversion, but I don't know how long it will last."
"Oh ye of little faith," Eric muttered.
"Is there anything else suspicious in there?" Callen asked as Kensi moved around the rook, careful not to disturb anything.
"There's a briefcase, with a combination lock of course. Let me see if I can get in."
While Eric worked, Kensi turned the briefcase on its side, pressing her ear near the lock. She'd just worked through two numbers when Eric announced,
"Ok, I transferred all the data over. You should be good to close out the remote access box."
As Kensi reached over to follow Eric's instructions, her phone vibrated in her in several long bursts.
"Crap!" she hissed, glancing at the all caps "Get out of there" on her phone along with the continued emergency alert from Deeks.
Quickly righting the briefcase, she made sure the laptop was open to the spreadsheet again, and crept towards the door. She listened for a few seconds, hearing no obvious sounds, and slipped out, heading in the opposite direction she'd come.
She reached the end of the short hallway, faced with the kitchen door and a second door emblazoned with "Staff Only". The sound of quickly approaching footsteps came from behind her just as the staff door jerked open.
A/N: Small duh, duh, duh.