Author's note: This is published in the one-shot ROSA, but reproduced here for continuity purposes.

SLURP.

Rosa sipped the tea quietly by herself.

It was a sunny day in Florida, no sign of clouds anywhere, and Ft. Lauderdale airport was quite packed like usual. Rosa's flight was due to leave in an hour, but she needed to get through security first.

Oh, those TSA pricks! Their 'random' checks were not so random. Each time she went through security, the TSA made sure to inspect her personally.

She could blame it on the fact that she was an unaccompanied female, however as there were female TSA agents, that was not the case.

It was her name. Specifically, her ethnicity. Mexican. Rosa had to be checked for anything illegal.

Oh well, she thought while gathering up her belongings.

What's a girl to do?

*******************************************************************

Across the airport, he searched for the suspect that got away with 5 million dollars in drug money.

The DEA office had finally caught a lead for the criminal that robbed one of their fortified trucks in California carrying recently obtained drug money to be used in a trial in the States against a bad narco who controlled part of trafficking network of cocaine that slipped into the Southeastern US and parts of the Caribbean from Mexico.

There was only one obstacle in his way. A female criminal by the name of Sofia Cortez.

They had her name.

All they needed was a face to match with it.

********************************************************************

"Excuse me, miss. We will have to see your passport again," the TSA lady asked.

If Rosa was irritated, it was more so for the fact that they were currently delaying her arrival to Gate 1B where the American Airlines Flight would take off from. The plane would not wait for her as the pilot probably had a busy schedule lined up for the day.

I should have really woken up when my alarm rang, she chided herself.

Retrieving her passport from her purse yet again, she handed it to the TSA lady sporting a name tag with the last name Jones on it, and proceeded to look around the airport whils waiting for the lady to clear her.

"Ma'am, I'm afraid that you'll have to be asked a few questions by a federal agent regarding your passport," she mentioned after a few moments of looking carefully at the passport.

"I'm a US Citizen. I did not do anything wrong and you're going to detain me unlawfully?", she remarked once she sat down at a bench near the Security Check, and then sighed audibly.

"And we're going to have to pat you down so...", Ms. Jones told her.

Standing up abruptly, she headed towards another TSA officer.

Like she had predicted, they could not let her go one trip without the pat-down.

"Alright, you're clean. Follow me and I'll lead you to an agent who will question you."

Having already stood up, she proceeded to follow Ms. Jones while dreading going into an interrogation room. In reality, she had nothing to worry about as she had nothing to hide, but her gut instinct told her otherwise.

What if Homeland Security doesn't clear me? As her mind started to go 'round in circles with different scenarios that could possibly happen, there was one thought that scared her the most.

Did they confuse Rosa with someone else? And if so, would they clear her when they realized they made a mistake?

Reaching a table out near the food court, she was told to stay there. Figuring they had cameras in this airport, she remained frozen in place. If at that very instant, she would have had any primal urges to head to the restroom, she would have tried to hold it out of fear of being mistaken of trying to leave the airport.

Only a few minutes later, a man walked up to the table, sat down and introduced himself. He appeared clean-shaven, was smartly dressed in a black jacket with blue button-up shirt and matching black pants, and sported chestnut brown hair along with a very tanned appearance. She inferred he was Hispanic most likely, just like she was.

He introduced himself, saying,"Good afternoon, Ms. Cortez. My name is Pablo Flores and I am a DEA agent that is a part of Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Force."

"We have reason to believe you're a fugitive."

*******************************************************************

Looking her straight in the eyes when he said that, he saw no initial response.

No denial, no affirmation, nothing that would disprove or confirm the Task Force's theory that she had jeopardized years of intelligence and financial investigative information that should be in the hands of the OFC, (OCDETF Fusion Center), where they would store and analyze the evidence to help in their investigation to dismantle, in this case, the Pabon drug enterprise.

Could she of all people be heartless enough to do that? He had no idea.

"I'm confused," she stated suddenly, startling him in his thoughts.

"Is there something wrong with my passport? Why am I being questioned by a DEA agent? I thought it was going to be a TSA officer. Is this some kind of joke?", she inquired.

"I wouldn't joke to you about something serious as this, ma'am," he replied with a Texas drawl that suggested maybe Florida was not his original state of residence.

"Ok, Am I under arrest? I know my rights. Shouldn't we be in an interrogation room or something?", she responded back with a thick Mexican accent not uncommon to Northern Mexico. Mexico City perhaps?

Even though she was the suspect here, he had to admit he liked her tenacity. From what he observed, she seemed confident, knowledgeable of the law and had pulled the violation of rights card up front. If she was not the suspect, she probably was definitely a force to be reckoned with, meaning he would have to be careful with how to approach the line of inquiry.

Antagonize her and he would be stonewalled by a lawyer next time he saw her.

"Ms. Cortez...", he started only to be interrupted.

"Rosa."

"Pardon?"

"You may call me Rosa," she responded back.

***********************************************************************

In the heat of the moment, Rosa pondered something she would come to regret later.

You know if he wasn't asking me if I was a criminal or not, I would observe that he was kind of cute and maybe let him ask me out ...of course, only if he was interested and was currently single, she thought only to catch herself.

What was she thinking? Agent Flores was a DEA agent whose only interest right now is to catch a suspect. A fugitive as he said.

Why was she thinking these types of thoughts right now when she should probably be trying to get out of this interview without implicating myself in a crime that she hasn't committed?

Isn't innocent before guilty the way to go by in the US?

Then she had an idea. If I make him distracted and make him flabbergasted with my looks, he'll stop questioning me. Unfortunately, if that plan backfired, she would be in more trouble than she was when she started. The heat would only rise for her from that point on.

But it couldn't hurt to try, right?

"Mr. Flores...I mean Agent Flores...", she tried to think of something sexy to say. However, she didn't really have much practice seducing attractive men...dang it! Why did her thoughts betray her?

"If you call me Pablo, then I'll call you Rosa."

*********************************************************************

What was wrong with him? Letting the suspect call him by his first name was uncalled for, but in theory, it could work to make her feel comfortable and open up. If she wasn't the suspect, then he could just let her go, no harm done.

You want her to be innocent, he realized. There are women involved in the drug business as well, he reminded himself. Pablo had to be careful to not let an attractive face and a nice body....man, why did his thoughts have to go there?

"Focus," he muttered under his breath.

"Pablo, if you want to know who I am, I'm a woman who travels frequently for business and has lived in Florida for a long time. I'm not a fugitive and the only thing you're doing right now is cause me to be late to my flight which leaves in 10 min now." As she looked at the watch, one of her earrings fell out of her ear and she attempted to bend down to pick it up while sitting.

Quickly hopping out of his chair, he bent down on his knees and tried to retrieve the earring, but noticed something on the way up that caused him to drop it.

Her sleeveless black shirt was in the way which was displaying, well, her bulging breasts currently.

It took all in his willpower for him to pick up the earring again, stand up rapidly only to hit the table on his way up, dash back to his seat and sit hurriedly without letting his cheeks flush tomato red. Rubbing his temple, he thought to himself, I mean all women have breasts, I shouldn't be so embarrassed about...nope, still embarrassed.

***********************************************************************

I am so glad I loosened my left earring, Rosa thought. His face looked like it was constipated and he most likely blames it all on himself!

After this is all over, I'm going to be laughing my face off when I remember his eyes widening and his lips.... Too bad he's still probably going to let her go at some point because he looked fine as can be even if he was embarrassed, she thought.

"Rosa, you say? However, it says Sofia Cortez on your passport," he conveyed after he gathered himself again.

If he had wheezed from the effort, she probably would have thought it sounded sexy... bad brain. Reprimanding herself was getting easier to do as she kept catching herself in thoughts like these.

"Focus," she muttered under her breath. Freedom was in sight as long as she kept playing with his hormones, after all even the most intelligent man is a caveman at heart.

"Rosa is my middle name. It's what I go by. Everyone calls me Rosa."

***********************************************************************

She wasn't the only person to use nicknames. If this Sofia Cortez just happened to have the same name as the fugitive, who could say she was or wasn't?

At this time, he really wished they had captured a photo when that Sofia Cortez managed to break into the truck and steal the money. If the money wasn't going to be used in a trial in a few months from now, he probably would have turned a blind eye. Drug money was dirty money in his eyes. After trials, all the policemen did was use it to upgrade their trucks and equipment to catch more drug traffickers and money launders. Once money was stained with blood like drug money was, it was his thought that it should be burned. However, it was not up to him to decide and he had been the one chosen to find the one who had jeopardized months of investigation into Pabon, the narco, who was now sitting in jail awaiting his trial date. That's why what he was doing here was so important.

He could not let himself be caught off guard by some pretty face.

That was the plan anyhow.

******************************************************************

After a few more minutes of conversation with Agent Flores, another DEA agent appeared and offered a phone to Pablo. She wondered from when did she think of him as Pablo in her head, but the answer would not present itself to her easily. There was no way would she admit the reason out loud, especially in front of him.

He hanged up the phone, leaned into the ear of the other agent, and whispered something that caused the agent to run off. Slowly, he turned to her and offered a hand. Was he trying to shake her hand now?

"Rosa, I am so sorry I questioned you. We've done a quick background check and it seems what you told me...us, I mean, pans out and our conversation is done here."

"Am I free to go then?", she asked, confused at why the conversation had ended so abruptly.

What he heard in that phone call? Well, whatever they told him, she no longer has to worry about an interrogation in which they will actually Mirandize her which she was grateful for.

Too bad she would never see Pablo again. It was fun seeing him squirm and...other things she would never mention again or discuss with anyone ever.

As she started to walk away from the table to board her flight, Pablo looked down and called out to her.

"Hey, Ms. Rosa! You forgot your carry-on luggage!"

"Oh, sorry I'm so forgetful sometimes," she teased as she retrieved her purse from his hands.

Good thing her work briefcase was inside her large suitcase that went on the plane. It would be a tragedy if he saw inside it and saw her panties along with her work things.Pablo would be even more flustered than he already, she chuckled lightly as the thought of that.

"It's alright. Hey, I'm sorry about..." He seemed at a loss for words, was he perhaps apologizing for disturbing her from her airport routine? For all it was worth, he had made her time spent with him interesting.

She left with her purse and did not look back at all.

After all, she was in a rush to catch her plane and leave Fort Lauderdale.

**********************************************************************

The other DEA Agent, Agent Mills, ran up to him at the table once he sat down again.

"Hey, why did you let her go? You know she's the one now. Why didn't you Mirandize her and arrest her in the name of the United States Government?", Agent Mills asked.

"I was given an order to let her go this once. Anyway, who said I let her get away free?"

Agent Mills looked back at Agent Flores curiously, awaiting an answer.

"I placed a chip on her purse. We know which flight she's on and US Customs has been alerted to her presence. She won't be getting out of the country if she tries to," he quipped.

A TSA officer soon approached the two and asked them if they given them the right flight.

"What do you mean the right flight?", he questioned while standing up again.

"We've had several TSA officers waiting by her gate, and she's nowhere to be found. No one has used her ticket. It looks like she didn't show up at all,",the TSA lady with a nametag of Jones stated.

Agent Mills started to panic, but Agent Flores thought on his feet.

"I inserted a chip on her purse; we can track her movements across the airport," Agent Flores declared as he called agents back at the office through his Bluetooth to see where she could be at in the airport.

"Agent Flores," the tech guy on the other line answered, "I'm afraid we can't help you. The chip's either been turned off line which is highly improbably I might add or..."

"Or what?", Agent Flores inquired.

"The chip's been broken. And it takes a lot of force to do that," he answered.

"Man, that woman's pretty sneaky and here we thought she was some innocent babe..."

"Agent Mills! I'm trying to concentrate here,", Agent Flores barked.

"Sorry," he apologized to his superior. Agent Flores has had more experience than me, I should probably shut my yapper to let him think, he thought.

"Look at the airport footage near the airport bathrooms. If she dyes her hair or switches out her passport/tickets for someone else's, she'll probably do it there," he relayed to the airport security with as much authority as he could muster.

Just a few minutes later, one of the TSA officers showed him footage of a single woman matching Rosa's description, or should he say Sofia Cortez's description, going into the bathroom at the other side of the airport and coming out a few minutes later with a wig, sunglasses and a shiny new passport.

"Check if someone lost their passport near that bathroom. We may be able to find a witness who saw her there in the bathroom," he commanded.

"But it's the woman's bathroom...", Agent Mills interjected.

Rookies, Agent Flores thought to himself.

"Then have this lovely lady, Ms. Jones I believe?"

"That's right, Ms. Jones."

"Escort you to the bathroom and then she can search it for drugs/money/wigs/dye/anything that may be of relevance and you can ask any of the women there if any of them had their passport stolen..."

He was interrupted by another TSA security officer, Mr. Howard by his name tag, that they had found a lady who had Ms. Cortez's passport and was claiming hers had been stolen.

"There ya go, I'll go with you and question the witness and call other DEA agents to search the restroom extensively to find traces of evidence. Maybe she even left money in the bathroom? Unlikely, but we have to work on all theories right now."

"And what should I do?", Mr. Howard postulated.

"Mr. Howard and Ms. Jones, you should probably search all the airport and see if she's still in the airport. She may be trying to take another flight with a stolen ticket and she would have to pass through security..." They got his meaning and left without a word, splitting up to cover the airport faster, both talking into their walkie-talkies that a fugitive was on the loose.

She probably thinks she'll get away with this, doesn't she? he thought.

Previously, the phone call had told him to wait for backup and let the TSA escort her from the gate. However, he had anticipated this scenario, just like the one that was occurring, could happen. This type of criminal-she was too clever to let herself get caught easily. After having spoken to her briefly, he was reminded of the character Selina Kyle from the Batman movies; her downfall would be that she was too over-confident.

He would search the ends of the earth to find her.