A/N: Hey guys. So I'm back to writing unrelated one shots, meaning that this chapter and the ones after are not connected to the last few.

In case anyone as forgotten, AnimeGirl23 was kind enough when my story started to allow me to use inspiration from her story "50 Sentences". Some of the one shots come directly from the prompts of her story, which I develop into larger one shots or chapters. So a big thank you to her!

Anyways, please continue to review, send me prompts, and leave constructive feedback. Everything helps! I tried to make this an actual case, but I don't know how convincing I made this, so please tell me your thoughts. This will not be a full storyline, just a one shot. A little awkward, a little weird, but funny, I think.

Just a mild warning: this has brief mentions of trafficking and prostitution. I think it's all okay, but just in case.

Enjoy!

"Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention please."

Nate strode - actually, he might have skipped, he was that happy - right in front of the couch where the rest of his team was lounging, with a smile on his face that made him look like the cat that caught the canary.

Eliot's eyes flickered open from their hazy midday doze and were immediately alert, ready, his instincts dormant but not extinct from his temporary hiatus from "hitter duty", as Parker called it. He quickly assessed Nate's face, the smug smile, the bright feverish look to him, and he caught the subtle gleam of excitement in his eyes. Eliot sighed. He knew that look. He knew that look very well. He had memorized that look over the last five years of working with Nate Ford and the rest of this crazy crew, and it so resembled the look Eliot got (or he was told that he got) when he let the best inside take control for just a little while, when his specific skill set was called into action. It was the look Parker got right before she leapt off a high rise building, before her harness could catch her weight.

Eliot leaned back further into the leather of the couch, wrapping his arms around Parker, loosely protective, as she snuggled - or rather, burrowed - into his side. She grazed his ribs and he masked a wince of pain, and shifted. Bad idea. The shift of his weight irked his shoulder and caused another jolt of pain to ripple through his body. He carefully adjusted his leg on the ottoman in front of him.

"Eliot?" Parker whispered. She kept her voice barely audible, and Eliot felt a flush of warmth. She knew - somehow she always knew when he was in even the slightest bit of pain. And the last thing he needed right now was for everyone - Nate looking at him eagerly, Sophie sitting just a foot away with her magazine and Alec right behind them with his laptop and console - to get all wide eyed and worried and mother-henning him like they had been the last six months. So Parker kept her voice so low only he would hear, and only she could feel the slight pressure of his hands on her back, and the small nod he did in response to her unasked question.

Six months ago, a job had, in all honesty, gone as bad as jobs could ever go. All five of them had ended up in the hospital for various injuries, most of them superficial. Sophie and Parker came away with nasty concussions and cuts and gashes, Alec had a few cracked ribs and Nate even had a punctured lung. But Eliot - Eliot had gotten the worst of it. It made sense, to him at least. He was the hitter, the protector, which meant he would always take the brunt of the punches, always, if it meant the others were safe. And while he hated the fact that his team still had injuries, he was still able to save them from suffering his fate.

Second degree burns on his upper thighs, rope burns on his wrists and ankles, shallow stab wounds along his stomach, whip lashes across his back, a hairline skill fracture, a gunshot wound in his left shoulder and his right kneecap, bruising around his neck, a broken nose and some chipped teeth, two black eyes, and a dislocated jaw.

That was his price that he payed in full for his team members to get to safety. And it was all worth it - to him at least. To the others, it was downright stupid and terrifying, seeing as he almost died. He did - his heart flatlined in the ambulance. But he was alive and for the last six months, Leverage and Associates had been on temporary hiatus until their hitter was back on his still slightly woozy feet, in top form as always.

Of course, not everyone adapted to relaxation very well. Sophie, of course, had no problem taking things slow and doing some local auditions and online shopping. And Hardison was killing time and his brain cells with his constant gaming, playing World of Warcraft, Shadow of War, Fortnight and Call of Duty. And Parker - well, Parker did what Parker always did when Eliot got hurt: she held onto him and didn't let got for anything. It was like she was afraid he would disappear, or maybe she thought that by holding him tight, she was pushing all the broken pieces back together. Six months, and Parker hadn't stolen so much as candy from a baby, or rappelled around the city, or done anything except hold onto him. Even now, when he was healed except for residual scars and aches and sore spots (for anyone else, it would have taken a year of recovery or more, but he was Eliot Spencer. He didn't have a year to heal, not with the line of work he was in), she snuggled and cuddled deeper into his side, and Eliot clung just as tightly to her.

It felt nice, having someone, having this kind of contact and having it mean something. For almost half a year, Eliot had actually gotten…accustomed to what he could only assume was a normal life, with friends who cared about him and the girl that he love- that he liked a lot. A whole damn lot.

But he knew Nate. Knew him pretty well, actually. Eliot could see how restless Nate was getting without having a job to keep him occupied. Nate Ford was a man who thrived off of the con, off of any scam and slip and trick and sleight of hand. Eliot had known, sooner or later, that this was coming.

"What'd we got, Nate?" Eliot sighed, swallowing another groan and Parker shifted again, jostling his ribs. Sophie looked up from her magazine briefly, and Eliot heard Alec telling his friends online to hold up a second.

"Oh, I am so glad you asked, Eliot." Nate gave a Cheshire Cat grin as he pulled the clicker from his jacket pocket and swinging around to face the monitors. "Meet Simon Nichols."

A full blown headshot of a young man in his twenties came up in front of them, looking exactly like someone copy and pasted it from a corporate website. He was startlingly handsome, almost too perfect, and that was what caught everyone's undivided attention.

Because no one was perfect. They knew that better than anybody.

"Wait, wait, wait. Hold up. What's this?" Hardison pulled his headphones off and hung them around his neck, rubbing his bloodshot eyes blearily. "We off hiatus?"

"Nate, is this a job? Do we have a job?" Sophie put her magazine down and visibly perked up excitably. Then, so quickly it might not have even happened, Eliot saw her smile drop just a centimeter as she glanced his way. "But…are you sure…? I mean, six months…"

"Was too damn long to begin with." Eliot cut in sharply. Parker jumped a little in his arms but didn't pull away. "I was ready for action three months ago, but it was you guys who insisted I needed longer to heal. Come on, Soph. I'm fine. It's killing me, just sitting here under house arrest like this. I can pull a con, and I can sure as hell do my damn job. So let's hear the low down and move on already. I'm fine." Parker did pull away then, and Eliot had to work hard to mask the surprise and the disappointment he felt at the lack of contact. She had this strange look on her face, an expression he couldn't read, and that worried him just a little. He considered himself to be a bit on an expert at all things "Parker", especially after knowing her for five years, working beside her, thieving beside her. Not knowing what she was thinking now was almost enough to sidetrack him from the game plan.

Almost.

But Nate was rubbing his hands together, eager to get started, and Eliot could feel Sophie's motherly eyes on him. So he stubbornly turned away from the women and set his steel blue eyes on Nate, knowing that despite the lie everyone knew Eliot told them just now, that he was fine and wasn't still in some kind of minimal pain, Nate would be too ready to pounce on this new con to actually sideline him - at least right now. Instead, Nate nodded once and motioned back to the handsome photograph still glowing on the left side of the screens.

Eliot studied the image quickly, taking note of the prim powder blue suit, the perfect, pearly white smile, the slick, styled blonde hair - and the cold, calculating black eyes, where the equally calculated smile didn't quite reach. It was an image alright - one the man in the picture wanted you to see. Eliot was more than familiar with the type. Yeah, he could imagine the trouble this young man could cause in their world.

"Simon Nichols." Nate repeated, now in full swing of his spiel. "Son on Albert Avery Nichols, CEO of the multi-million, international escort service, Gentleman Class Enterprises."

"Oh I know them!" Hardison exclaimed, drawing four pairs of raised eyebrows in his direction. The hacker froze, suddenly aware of what he just let slip, and Eliot knew if he could, the man would be blushing redder than that dopey Flash t-shirt he was wearing right now.

"You know them?" Eliot asked sarcastically. "Gee, Hardison. What a lucky coincidence."

"Uh, oh, I, uh, I mean, I've heard about them. From a friend, obviously…what I meant…okay, no. No, you know what? I know GCE, alright? I'm a good client of GCE. GCE does me, for me. Kay? I know their motto, I know their girls. They friendly. They nice. They talk to me. I like talking. Sometimes I just want to talk, and they talk. Plus I did some work back in the day for them so they got me for life, and it's a good deal! See -"

"Yeah. Yeah, I think we all see." Nate cut in quickly with a barely disguised look of shock on his face.

"Man." Hardison sighed, rubbing his face. "Knew I couldn't keep it on the DL forever."

"Hey man, it's all good." Eliot said, and the hacker perked up for just a second. "I mean, I always figured that's where you got your dates."

"Okay, you know what-"

"Alright, enough. Enough!" Nate raised his hands to silence them. "Look, what you all do in your free time is your business. And while I may question some of that…questionable business, Hardison's connection to GCE might come in handy for us."

"So what is it exactly that GCE's done, Nate?" Hardison asked. "Look, everything in their business is by the books. Besides the point that they hired me once upon a time ago, there's nothing criminal in their business or activities. I mean, an escort service is legal, provided the escorts don't have sex with the customers."

"Why not?" Parker spoke up.

"Because then it would be prostitution." Nate finished. "Okay, here's the company. What Gentleman Class Enterprises does is it hires men and women to be escorts for paying customers, in the sense that someone, say Hardison, paid for a date to a wedding, or a movie premiere or so on and so forth. They are merely there to be plus ones. Nothing more, nothing less. It's like a one-date dating service."

"And that's a multi-million dollar business" Sophie gawked.

"And entirely legal. The men and women who work as the escorts do not have sex with paying clients, seeing as that would be a form of prostitution." Hardison said. "The CEO, Arthur Avery Nichols, does all his business by the book, and each escort's contract specifies the rules of his company and what the purpose of their position is."

"Paid dates." Eliot muttered. "Jeez, who knew there was an untapped market in lonely losers."

"Hey, this lonely loser isn't afraid to open a can of whup-ass on your broken behind."

Eliot turned his head and growled, low and guttural, under his breath, and heard Hardison audibly gulp. He smirked as he turned back around, then saw Parker watching him with that blank eyed stare again and the smile fell from his face. What was going on with her? Eliot reminded himself that this was Parker and was a crazy enigma wrapped in a freaky mystery. She could be upset, or she could just be observing him, or she could be thinking about a million other things, like cookies or rabbits or skydiving off the Statue of Liberty. So why did he care so much about what was on her mind right now?

"Okay. So this is a perfectly legal multi-million dollar company that does nothing wrong, or even remotely suspicious, and takes care of the client liability by ensuring in the employee contacts the rights and offers of the positions." Sophie summed up, sighing. "Nate, I'm not seeing a reason for any kind of con on GCE."

"That's because we're not running a con on GCE." Nate said.

"But what about Simon, there?" Eliot asked. "You said he was the son of the CEO of the company."

"I said he was the son, not that he was following in Daddy's footsteps." Nate clicked the remote again, and right next to the headshot of Simon Nichols, another photo came up, followed by copies of what looked like legal documents. The photo was of a sleazy kind of building, with neon pink lights and blue palm trees framing the entrance. Above the door was a canopy with cursive writing in gold lights that said Ladies Choice.

"A strip club?"

"A strip club." Nate nodded. "You see, one of the stipulations of GCE's contracts was that no one affiliated with the company is allowed to own or be otherwise affiliated with another business in opposition to theirs. Meaning, no other escort-type service. But Simon Nichols seems to have other ambitions outside of what Daddy wants."

"Okay…so Simon's running a few strip clubs around town. Sounds like that's his and Arthur Avery's problem." Sophie said. "Why are we getting involved?"

"Because it's not the strip club we're looking at." Nate said, and he clicked the button again. This time, a picture of a young girl, about nineteen years old, came onto the screen, and Eliot got a bad feeling about where this job was heading. "This is Maria Jacobs, the daughter of our client. Her mother came to me about a week ago, saying she was worried her daughter had gotten mixed up with something at the club where she worked. So I did a little digging on my own -"

"On your own?" Hardison interrupted, the disbelief evident in his voice. "Nate, you can barely work your cell phone. How'd you get all this?"

"Hardison, believe it or not, I'm a little more tech savvy than you give me credit for." Nate said sourly. "Anyways, I did some digging on my own and I found that Simon Nichols does not directly own Ladies Choice, but a man named Hal Walton does, and, as the owner and proprietor, all proceeds go into a bank account under that name. A bit more digging revealed that up until a year ago, "Hal Walton" didn't exist, and no one has any idea who he is, not even the people who work for him over at the club."

"So you think Simon created an alias in order to run his own side business and make some extra cash?"

"And no one knows any different because no one digs deeper than the surface." Parker said. "It's pretty smart. Not genius, but smart."

"But again, not really something we sink our claws into. Why does Maria's mom think she's in trouble?" Sophie asked.

"Because she's gone missing."

No one spoke for a few minutes. Eliot's bad feeling grew worse as he realized where Nate was going with this case, why he took it, and why they couldn't afford to say no, even with Eliot still barely out of commission.

"It's a trafficking ring." Eliot whispered.

"Most likely." Nate said softly. "I mean, there's nothing confirmed. It could be trafficking, or prostitution, or maybe Maria just ran off. But her mother was scared that something was going on in that club, and with everything we know now, with Simon Nichols and GCE and the fact that there's some kind of front going on in the club, we can't afford to not take the job."

Eliot ducked his head for a second before looking at the rest of his team. He could see the unshed tears glittering in Sophie's eyes, the determined set of her jaw. He glanced at Parker who was cracking her knuckles nervously, though when she glanced over to him and caught him staring, she winked. And then he turned his head to take in Alec Hardison, who was already on his feet, arms crossed. Finally, Eliot turned around to face Nate, and he gave a feral smile.

"We're in."

"Alright team." Nate clapped his hands together. "Let's go steal a strip club."

Eliot ended up being sidelined. He hated it - but he really didn't have room to argue after he'd collapsed. He'd taken one punch to the head from Nichols' goons and gone down like a sack of bricks, and once he'd woken up, Nate had sternly told him he was off the job unless it was surveillance. With a blow to the head and to his ego, Eliot had sulked as he accepted the recon bit for this con.

Now the job stood like this - Nate was the owner and proprietor of another nightclub somewhere in Las Vegas and he was traveling with one of his "girls" played by Parker, and his business associate, played by Sophie. They had made sure to frequent Ladies Choice often enough in the last two weeks so that they could get an eye on Simon Nichols, as well as give him the chance to check them out. Once he did, Nate and Sophie would lay into him about their own club, and Parker would grift her way in as a sorely mistreated yet talented showgirl. Simon Nichols, being the greedy sociopath he was, would leap at the chance to offer her what would seem a better deal, but in reality he would buy and sell her to the next highest bidder once she signed that contract. Then Hardison would come in as a prospective buyer and somehow, he'd end up buying hold of not only Parker, but any other girls Simon had, specifically Maria Jacobs, if she was still here.

That was there master plan, minus Eliot's role, which had been another trafficker. But once Nichol's goons had gotten hold of him when he was doing some recon of the back rooms, his bit in the job was done. So now he was sitting in the back of the strip club, nursing a beer, his baseball cap pulled low over his eyes, keeping his eyes on his team. The first part of the plan had gone smoothly - meaning "Silver Antwerth" , played by Parker, was now employed by the Ladies Choice gentleman's club. Now Hardison was in place next to Simon Nichols in the corner by the backstage doors, and Eliot could hear them muted in his ear, talking about possible sales and "customers" and the best routes to move the girls. Eliot knew Hardison was stalling for time, but he hated having to hear Nichols talk about all the things he's done to young girls over who knows how long, how he's moved them and kept them quiet and mistreated so they wouldn't cross him or the men he sold them to. He tried to tune them out, knowing that if he didn't, he'd blow this entire job by walking right up to that bastard and killing him on the spot, as painfully as possible.

Eliot turned his attention to where Sophie and Nate were huddled. Nate was hunkered down a few rows back from the main stage, and Sophie was behind him, pacing back and forth nervously, though it didn't look it. Eliot knew she was worried about how Parker would…perform. And for that matter, Eliot was nervous too, but not entirely for the same reasons. Eliot took another swig of his beer as he though back to the conversation he and Parker had a few hours earlier.

"So.. I'm like Batman." Parker adjusted her bra and panties in the full length mirror of the dressing room. Eliot tried not to stare - he had seen her change a thousand times before in the middle of cons. If there was one thing Parker was not, it was shy. But there was something intimate about the lingerie she was wearing now, even if it was technically a stripper costume. She was playing a bit - Silver, a stripper. It wasn't Parker, it was a character. But why didn't his heart seem to get what his head already knew?

"No, you're not - you're not Batman, Parker!" Eliot sighed, leaning back into the couch. He was supposed to be keeping an eye on her before the show that night, where Simon Nichols was going to sell her, along with all the other girls he was trying to traffic, to Hardison. But Eliot was starting to realize he might be in over his head with this assignment.

"Batman has a pole. This has a pole. Batman slides down the pole. I slide down the pole. Ergo, I'm Batman." Parker said blankly, and while it all sounded like something Parker would say, there was something missing in her voice.

"Okay. Sure. You're Batman." Eliot whispered, and finally, she turned around. Eliot could feel the breathe catch in his chest at the sight of her and - what was happening to him? He never felt this way before…had he? What was the matter with him?

"Did you really hate us taking care of you when you were hurt?" Parker said suddenly. Eliot blinked in surprise. Where did that come from?

"What?"

"When Nate was talking about taking this job. You said you were sick and tired of being on house arrest, that you didn't need us hovering or mother-henning you. Did you hate being taken care of? Did you hate Sophie making you soup and changing your bandages, or Nate taking you to physical therapy or Hardison finding really awesome war movies to watch or me -" Parker broke off there but Eliot got the rest of the picture.

Did you hate me lying there with you?

For a minute, Eliot was silent. He didn't think Parker would have really taken those words to heart. Seriously, he was Eliot Spencer. He was always snarky, always grouchy, always snapping at them for one thing or another. He was the lone wolf of the group. That was who he was, that was is character. But maybe something had changed over the last few months…maybe he wasn't as alone as he thought.

Eliot stood from where he sat and walked over to Parker, who was frozen in place, no emotion evident on her face.

"Parker." Eliot said. "I could never hate you."

It was all he said. But it was enough. Everything else could wait until they weren't in the middle of a serious con, but right now, just those few words were enough to make Parker break into the sweetest smile he had ever seen. Parker leaned forward and pressed her lips lightly to his cheek, and as she pulled away, she whispered,

"If I'm Batman, does that make you Robin?"

Eliot knew he and Parker would have to talk about everything at some point. Or maybe not. Neither of them were big on talking about personal feelings…but somehow, Eliot didn't mind the thought of really talking to Parker. Maybe she'd help him figure out what the hell was wrong with him…

"And now," a voice came through the speakers as the swingy song ended, and the dancer Eliot had barely noticed sashayed off the stage, "coming to the Ladies Choice stage for the first time, give a warm welcome to….SILVER!"

And there was Parker in that damn lingerie and Eliot watched with greedy eyes as she swung around that pole, as she whipped her hair around her face and flashed the crowd a convincing smile, making the sleazy men go absolutely wild over her. Eliot glanced back to where he knew his teammates were and was unsurprised to see the absolute shock on their faces - Hardison looked like he was having a bit of trouble containing himself as it was. Sophie looked appalled, but there was a bit of pride in her expression too. Eliot returned his eyes to appraise Parker's lithe build, his drink forgotten and he settled back to enjoy his surveillance.

In a few minutes, the real con would start, and it would invariably hit a snag when a new buyer came into the picture, offering more money than Hardison could get at the last second. A little later, they'd be off trying to rescue sixteen young girls from Simon Nichols' trafficking ring, headed for a plane bound for Barbados, and they'd put the bloody bastard (Sophie's words, but, no pun intended, Eliot fully planned on beating him bloody) in either a body cast or a prison cell (either which was fine by Eliot, though the body cast was much more tempting). And after that, maybe Eliot and Parker would talk or she would watch him train or he would buy her cookies and they'd be back to normal.

And a little while after that, Sophie would give each of the men of Leverage a hard head slap for the way they kept drooling over Parker in her stripper outfit, but it would be worth it because while Parker might have sucked at small talk and flirting and every other social interaction on the goddamn planet….she sure could strip.