Jordan awoke the next morning to the familiar scent of dust, Lysol, and the week-old lingering presence of incense, a staple aroma that any Catholic school kid could recognize as belonging of that of a church. She rolled over in her bed sheets, clutching them to her cold skin with a shiver.

She smiled, taking in a deep breath. The scent that entered through her nostrils, albeit musty, was a comforting one. The sensation meant warmth and safety, two luxuries Jordan had been taking advantage of as often as possible in the past year she had spent at the convent.

Glancing toward the clock on the dresser in her small room, Jordan’s smile grew two sizes as memory assisted her.

And it was also Saturday morning, which meant two things. No classes, and an entire twenty-four hours that could be spent with her little brother.

At the thought, Jordan bounded out of bed. She snatched up the same pair of pants and wrinkled shirt she had worn the night before, brought them to her nose for inspection, and deemed them ‘wearable.’

After a quick shower, she pulled her long black tresses back in a ponytail and went to awaken her brother.

Jason’s room was right next to hers, with a door in between connecting the two together. Though Jordan and Sr. Rachel didn’t see eye to eye on many things, it had been kind of the nun to offer them the rooms. It helped a lot in keeping an eye on the little guy. If he had an itching for a bedtime story, wanted a glass of water before bed, or had a nightmare during the night, all he had to do was take a few steps forward and Jordan would be right there to provide assistance.

Standing in the doorway, Jordan gazed down lovingly upon her brother’s sleeping form. As there were no child-sized beds at the convent, Jason’s little body could have easily been mistaken for a stuffed animal or one of the pillows, lost in the soft array of covers that surrounded him.

Often she found herself in awe of how soft and small Jason was, but more recently, it was becoming more and more obvious that he was growing bigger by the minute. Sometimes she could swear Sr. Rachel put fertilizer in his mashed potatoes. So awe was put aside for later. Today, he just needed to get up.

Entering through the connecting door, Jordan grinned as her bottom bounced on the mattress next to Jason.

A tiny groan spurted from the three-year-old, still not yet awake.

She ruffled her hand through his full head of dark-brown, almost black hair. “Jay….Time to get up, Jay.”

The small mass shifted beneath the covers, looking over with slanted eyes. “Jor?” he mumbled, as ‘Jordan’ apparently had one syllable too many.

“Just me, buddy.” She lightly shook his shoulder. “C’mon, up and at ‘em. Places to go. People to see. Remember?”

Jason turned over, face into the pillow, repeating, “Places to go, people to see…”

Climbing to her feet, she picked up a toddler-sized white t-shirt and a pair of green corduroy overalls. “Exactly,” she declared, lying them out on the dresser.

When no other comment was made, Jordan looked over to see the child returning back to sleep.

She drew closer. “Do I have to bring out Grover?”

And his attention was had. Fully awake, Jason sat bolt upright in bed. “No!” he shouted at the top of his lungs, but there was a gleeful smile in place on his cheeks.

Jordan’s eyes lit up mischievously as she brought out the stuffed Sesame Street character from underneath his bed. “Oh, I think I do!”

Jason struggled to climb out of bed. “No, no! I’m up! I’m up!”

“Oh, too late! Time’s up! Here he comes!” With a war cry, Jordan leap on top of the bed with Grover held outward in her hand like a puppet. She clutched Jason around the middle and lightly wrestled him, using the faded blue monster to tickle underneath his pajama top.

Jason squealed, squirming in glee. “Stop!” he tried to get out between fits of laughter. “Gotta stop!”

“Oh, no! Oh, no! Oh, he’s ticklish today!” Jordan shouted back, showing no mercy to the toddler. “Oh, Grover’s got you now!”

“Stoooooop! Pleeeeease!” he let out, dragging out the word for what had to be a minute long.

“What’s the word?” Jordan asked him, hands digging into his sides. “Remember? What do you gotta say?”

“Uncle!” he shouted as he suddenly recalled. “Uncle! Uncle! Uncle!”

And like magic, Jordan’s hands and Grover gave retreat, leaving the little boy gasping for breath from the impromptu tickling match.

Exhausted, he and Jordan laid back against the mattress in unison.

“You ready to get up now?” she asked, short of breath.

“Yeah,” he said, still panting.

“Okay.” She rose to her feet and tossed an inanimate Grover onto his tummy. “Let’s get you your threads.”

Jason popped up in bed and picked up the stuffed animal. “Bad Grover,” he said in a very serious tone, shaking a finger.

Jordan let out a row of laughter, and running over, she held him close and smacked a kiss on the top of his forehead.

After he was dressed, she began putting his feet inside his small sneakers.

“Time for juice?” he checked.

Jordan secured the Velcro around his toes. “Yeah,” she said, grinning. Letting out a deep breath, she led him out of the room. “Time for juice.”

The two had their breakfast, and like always, their Saturday meal was accompanied by a trip through town. When Jordan suited Jason up in his coat, she could almost hear the sound of a captain from a sci-fi movie she’d seen on basic cable alerting her of her activities for the day.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to spend the day entertaining a three-year-old child in the lovely downtown South Bronx area.

Destination, she thought with a smile as they walked through the iron gates that opened to the outside world. The playground.

* * * * *

That same morning, Danny entered into the office, donning his usual fitted suit and tie… but not the full manifestation of his confident drive that tended to encompass his form.

Martin, staring at Danny with those eyes that seemed to bore right down through a person’s core, was the first to notice. He leafed through what Danny could have only assumed was the paperwork of the day. “Rough night?” he ventured.

Danny set his briefcase down on the desk. “What gave it away?”

“Tired eyes, five ‘o clock shadow…” Martin slapped the papers down on Danny’s desk. “You’ve got it written all over you.”

Danny smirked, lifting the papers to his eyes. “Good to see all those lessons in profiling paid off.”

“Did she have a name?”

“Yeah, right,” he said, bantering. “I should be so lucky.”

Martin let off a soft chuckle, lifting a cup of coffee to his lips. “Just checking.”

Vivian who had been listening to the conversation from a desk away, turned to Danny with an exacting, knowing voice only mothers possessed. “If not that, what kept you up all night?” The smallest shard of worry dripped into her tone, but it was there all the same.

Danny thought a moment before answering. “Family problems,” he said, still flipping through the pages Martin left on his desk.

Understanding that whatever was on Danny’s mind he intended to keep there, Vivian nodded and to Danny’s appreciation, busied herself at her desk without asking him to embellish.

Letting out a breath, he pretended to be intensely interested in the journals he was reading, when really the words were only blurring together before his bleary eyes.

It was at that moment that a familiar baritone caught his attention.

“Danny.”

The agent jerked upward in a conditioned alert motion that came from days, weeks, and months of taking head of the man’s authoritative voice.

“Hey, Jack,” he greeted.

“Samantha said you wanted to talk with me.”

“I do,” he said.

“Okay.” The two moved out of the common workroom and into the confines of Jack’s office.

Danny took in the atmosphere. He had been in this office many times before, but the preciseness of the workspace never ceased to amaze him. The whole room could have easily been cookie-cut from any movie set. It had the mahogany desk, the muted earth tones, the computer, the file drawers, the predictable picture of the wife and kids…

It had everything Jack could ever need, and yet it spoke not a word of the private life of the great man before him.

And there was a reason for that. Like everything else, it was exactly as Jack had intended.

The door shut behind him, and Danny took a seat in front of him.

“What’s on your mind?” Jack opened.

Danny sucked in a breath and dove in head first.

“It’s about Jordan.”

For a man who hadn’t heard the name in a year, Jack looked to be the very picture of normality. “Coliandri,” he answered, not an ounce of surprise belying his features.

Danny nodded, only now feeling the burn of the invisible spotlight cover his body. “Yeah.”

Jack nodded.

Danny was right. They did have something to talk about.