"Someone want to tell me why we're chasing this broad? Our perp is a guy. I just think it would be nice to chase him. Or am I being unduly old-fashioned with the whole investigative thing?" 

Kerry bit her lip. Carter wasn't much on brains, but he did exasperated like a fish did water. His scant build meant his physical presence wasn't any more imposing than his mental presence. The pale skin and lackluster eyes, the inability to control his own vocal cords when excited, all attested to runt-of-the-litter genes he'd inherited from people who'd been swimming in the shallow end of the gene pool for far too long. Hand it to him, he was as determined to claw his way out of mediocrity as their perp was to claw his way into infamy. After all was said and done, Carter wasn't without a certain sex appeal. Chief among his positives were handsome facial features that would stand up to time and lean, sinewy muscles. 

She shifted her attention to the giant flat-screen wall monitor, on which was pictured the live helicopter chase footage. The control room she had set up at the NYPD precinct, while she was on loan to them, wasn't all that big, so in an uncharacteristic effort to play nice with the locals, she decided to keep her voice low so as not to embarrass Carter. Moreover, as, being the person in charge, all ears had a habit of being on her even when her mouth wasn't flapping particularly for their benefit. "Our perp's a man, alright. And so is that lady you're ogling." 

"No way," Carter blurted, staring at the monitor and pointing. "Look, lady, I'm a red blooded American male. That means I can spot real pussy from the fake stuff at a hundred yards-well, at any distance, really. The picture can be smudged worse than this. It's a psychic thing that I wouldn't have to explain to you if you were a red-blooded American male." 

It was Sam's turn to stifle a smile; Sam was technically Carter's superior, but he'd long ago given up fighting her. Carter was admittedly the more intellectually challenged of the two, explaining why he hadn't yet caved. Sam's bald head and paunch made him look like a black Buddha in his early years-well, prior to enlightenment. Although Sam himself was closer to retirement age.  

"I'm telling you, your she is a he," Kerry said to Carter. 

"And I'm telling you... I mean, maybe if she wasn't such a dish. But my dish radar is even better than my female radar. Take you, for instance," he said, gesturing by running his hand up and down her. "You're a dish and a half. That there, on screen," he said pointing, "is a dish and three-quarters. No offense." 

"None taken," she said smiling. "How much you want to bet on it?" 

"My next paycheck. How's that for confidence?" 

"Ouch. I don't want to hurt you that much, not on a first date. I'll settle for half your paycheck." 

"Ma'am," Milo, one of the FBI agents said, coming up to her. "We're not going to be able to continue to follow her where she's going. The chopper is risking getting entangled in all those low-hanging city wires as it is." 

"Not a problem." 

"Not a problem, she says," Carter mumbled, crossing his arms defensively. "So now you don't just have superior pussy sense, you can see through walls too." 

"The fire escape he just ran up to the third story of that brownstone..." Kerry explained, "It leads to a theatrical supply outlet. He's looking for his next disguise. So the next time you see him he'll be... well, something other than a hound-dog-attracting female, anyway. Since he's probably figuring he was a little too successful at getting and holding your attention, Carter." 

Once again Sam smiled warily and lowered his eyes. 

"You want to defend me here?" Carter said, directing his attention at Sam.  

"Actually," Sam said, putting the deep baritone of his voice behind his next statement aimed at Kerry, "I would like to know how it is you know that particular suite he slipped into is a theatrical supply outlet. I have the diagrams in front of me, and the specs don't even show that." Sam had earlier pulled the blueprints for the buildings in the vicinity, once her agents had the perp contained to a one block radius and began closing the net.  

"I have every room in every building across Manhattan that could relate in any way to our Mr. Carl Felton memorized; their exact locations, as well as what support he could get from them. Come on, Sam, this is America's most wanted. Now, maybe if he was second on the list I might have cut him some slack. But he's killed more people than all the agents and cops in this building, and that's saying a lot, considering the trigger happy jokers surrounding me now." 

Sam sighed mightily. "And how is it you trust your knowledge above and beyond my computer copies, which I just printed out five minutes ago," he said, waving the sheets at her. 

"Because, Sam, not every business in New York registers what they're doing. Some are looking for a lower tax bracket, some just to get around zoning ordinances, others because their clients would just as soon not show up on anyone's radar, let alone ours. In the case of our Neal Waterford..." 

"Christ, she has the business owners' names memorized too!" Carter cut in. He threw his cup of coffee against the wall screen to punctuate his frustration, as well, of losing sight of the hot tamale. Their femme fatale was now fully ensconced in the building, which no helicopter angle appeared able to penetrate no matter how the birds maneuvered around the edifice. The projection on the stone wall didn't seem to mind the rude assault any more than Kerry did. 

"Our Neal Waterford," she said, smiling, "is hoping for a lower tax bracket, as his margins are rather thin, being as most of his clients are actor wannabes, as opposed to the real thing." 

"Ma'am?" Milo said, still afraid to leave her side. 

"Let's get the cameras on all doors and fire escapes leading out of that building," she said, returning her attention to him. "He'll have to emerge as something sooner or later." 

"Should we send in some people?" asked the Italian Milo, with thick black hair and an even thicker mentality. He had the lock-jaw determination to never let go of a pit bull, but first he had to get his teeth on the perp, something he hadn't been able to do for some time. That was why in fact he'd lost the case to Kerry Pierce. It had to be riding him to be taking orders from a female to boot; he was quite old school about these things, coming from a class of Italian family which still believed in arranged weddings to wives who had no say in the matter. 

"You can, if you want. But he'll be gone before you're even up to the third floor." 

She returned her eyes to the screen to take in the new camera angles. Her second in command at the bureau didn't even have to relay the orders. Looking around, he could see as much, further pissing him off. Milo didn't like that all ears were on her and not on him; though that part she could empathize with. Nothing like a botched chain of command to screw the pooch when it came to government intervention in anything. 

"There he is," Kerry said. "The old lady with the seeing eye dog." She was pointing to the figure exiting the front of the brownstone. 

Sam threw his papers in the air as if it were New Years. Carter slipped into a familiar slouch in his swivel chair, not familiar to him, just to every other beaten man in the bureau in her wake in the last few years. "Not for nothing, lady," he pointed adamantly at the screen, gesturing, though his body language already belied his surrender, "but I know an eighty year old when I see one. You can't fake arthritis and a curved spine like that. And you can't fake blindness. Not to a trained eye like mine. Hell, even a professional actor would need time to get into character and perfect a role. Time he sure as hell didn't have." 

"How do you know he didn't play this role before?" Kerry said gesturing to her second in command. "Now's the time to move in, Milo." 

Milo adjusted his face into a mask that showed a lot less frustration than he was feeling, nodded stiffly, and grabbed a couple pin-stripe-suited agents. "You two are coming with me. I want to see this for myself." Kerry realized right away that Milo wanted his two most loyal lapdogs at his side as witnesses when he finally showed her up. He relayed the order to the ones manning the electronic surveillance equipment for them in turn to signal the agents on location to close in on their new mark. But that order had already been given because, once again, no one was listening to Milo so much as to Kerry. 

There was nothing to do now but wait for the agents on the street to descend on their prey.  

"Well, if you're right," Sam said, "it's the first mistake he's made, choosing a character that can't exactly run fast without giving himself away." 

"You're right, Sam. That is the first mistake he's made. Getting cocky. It's a lethal mistake around me." 

Sam sat up straighter on his stool. "You hear that," he said, picking the papers off the floor and smacking them against Carter. "Twenty years on the force, and I finally guessed something right on this case. Don't I feel special?" 

"Well, I'm still batting a hundred, so I'd appreciate it if you gloat over in the corner by yourself and not interrupt my depression." 

"You giving up on your longshot play already?" Kerry said. "The horses aren't across the finish line yet." 

"Yeah, well, when Milo looked every bit as surprised as me, heading out the door, I figured that couldn't be good. We never disagree on this case, and we're both always wrong." 

Kerry smiled kindheartedly, despite herself. "I suppose it does matter who your friends are," she said. "More so, if you're forging an ad-hoc family around yourself, which I guess is the game we're all in, running from one assignment to another." 

"Does that mean we made the cut?" Sam said. 

"You two make a great pair of sidekicks. Wouldn't have it any other way." 

Suddenly Carter wasn't slouching so much anymore. "Well, I guess if we get to tag after you in that tight-ass man-dress, which doesn't de-feminize you in the least, by the way-still trying to figure that one out-all is not a total loss." 

"Stop making me smile on command, Carter. It's not befitting a woman of my station." 

Carter shouted, "God damn it!" as his eyes went to the wall screen. Sam handed Carter his coffee mug so he'd have something to throw. Carter promptly hurtled the coffee mug against the wall with the backstabbing image on it. The agents had surrounded the old lady and were rudely ripping off her counterfeit hair, breasts, face, and hunch back. Even the dog barking at them was all too happy to be released from bondage, clearly having never seen the "blind woman" in his life before today. The pooch immediately ran away to get as far as possible from the rest of them. The cameras zoomed in to confirm that not only was this a man, and not a woman, it was Carl Felton. "Well, I'll be...." 

"Don't say it," Kerry warned. 

"...a monkey's uncle," Carter said, deflating again, and slouching into his chair. Only this time, he shook his head, as his eyes went to the ground. "How did you know? What gave him away?" 

Kerry smiled, more ruefully this time, and averted her eyes from Carter and his personal pain. "The dog. It was pulling on its harness hesitantly, like it didn't know what to do with it, or with her. He was wrestling to keep the dog in check too much, which was noticeable even from here, and it was requiring more strength than any eighty-year old woman was capable of just to keep that dog from bolting."  

Sam nodded for one of the agents to show a replay of the footage. The agent, just as curious himself, had already cued up and zoomed the footage without being told. Carter still hadn't summoned the will to look up. "Is she lying or is she lying?" was all he said. 

Sam, seeing the zoomed footage on replay for himself, said, "Nope, she's not lying." 

"Well, boys, I guess you're finally rid of me," Kerry said. 

"You mean it?" Sam and Carter said at once, springing out of their chairs and rushing to shake her hand at the same time. "It'll be a shame to see you go," Sam said, "being as we both enjoy checking out your ass so much. But as you can see," he said, pulling his Playboy magazine out of his outside suit jacket pocket and unfolding it, "I've been getting ready for this moment for some time." 

Kerry had to smile at the image of Miss July, which really did look like a pinup version of her, down to the blond hair falling just at the shoulder, and the piercing blue eyes. 

"I just want to thank you for saying I really was part of the family all along," Carter said. "But, you know what they say about empty nest syndrome? It's just something we all have to face sooner or later." 

Her lips curved upwards. She didn't mind admitting she'd grown fond of these two bozos. They at least put some character on the faces of otherwise dull minds. Something that wasn't so easy to do, as her years with the bureau would attest to. "That's it, boys. Wrap it up," she said to her team. The twelve plus agents in the room were just a small fraction of the ones at her disposal. Many were on location rounding up America's most wanted right now. 

"Not so fast, ma'am," Overeager said, rushing up to her. He'd earned the nickname by not exactly keeping it a secret that he'd do anything to bump Milo out of the way so he could assume his position.  

Rather than ask him what was up, Kerry just grabbed the paper out of his bony hand. If Carter looked anemic, he was Dead Man Walking, Overeager's other nickname. She would get a quicker response reading between the lines for herself. "Looks like you're stuck with me a while longer, boys. A husband and wife combo of bank-robbers just moved into the America's most wanted slot." 

"Oh yeah?" Sam said skeptically, grabbing the sheet out of her hand and checking out the photos. "How is it I never heard of them?" 

"Because they just hit the bank of the man who's the primary funder of the president's re-election campaign."  

"That would do it," Sam mumbled, his eyes still on the paper.  

Carter grabbed the sheet away from Sam. "These are just bank security camera photos. There aren't even any names to go with them. I've never seen a file so incomplete."  

Kerry smiled. "Is that cool or what? This one's gonna be fun, boys," she said, taking the sheet back from Carter. 

"Excuse us," Carter said, taking Sam by the arm. "We just have to find a roof to jump off of." 

"Take your time," Kerry said absently, returning her eyes to the photos of their two latest marks. "The case is just getting started."