From One Patch to Another

Summary: Sam/Phil/Max/Other. Sam and Max are called into work a case but they appear to be investigating ex-Sun Hill detective DS Hunter, who is now working undercover in Walford under the alias of Jack Branning. Can they solve the case and will it allow Sam and Phil to have another chance at their romance or will his feelings for Ronnie Mitchell get in the way?

New Crossover fic from me! Dedicated to Beccy! Sorry it took so long to write, hun!
Please review and tell me what you think!! Xx

Chapter 1

Maybe this is it? She thought to herself, dumping her handbag and scarf down on the kitchen table before crossing to the hall to check the answering machine. It was as she had predicted; no messages. She tried to remember the last time someone had called her at home for something other than work. Maybe it was last week when Abi called to ask her for medical advice about Jared. It depressed Sam to think that even her daughter and her young grandson could get by without her.

Maybe this was how she'd grow old. She thought to herself, now filling the kettle with water and searching for a clean cup to make a drink of tea in. She didn't really want to be alone for the rest of her life but she also wasn't sure if she could throw herself into another relationship either. Love hadn't been on her side recently, not that it ever truly had. Possibly the only man she had truly loved and could have seen herself spending the rest of her life with was the one who had hurt her the most. Never in her life had Sam expected that she would fall for someone like Phil Hunter. He was everything she disliked in a person and in a man. When they had first met he had been an arrogant womaniser and she had hated him without a shadow of a doubt. At least until she had learned that this was just a façade that he hid behind and that he wasn't really like this at all. That was beginning of the chain of events that led to her falling for him. But now, like everyone else she had ever loved, he was gone.

The kettle boiled and Sam poured hot water and milk into her cup. Taking her tea into the living room she settled on the sofa and was about to reach for the remote controls when she heard the shrill beeping of her mobile phone coming from the kitchen. Sighing, Sam set her tea down on the low glass table and went back out to the kitchen to retrieve her phone. She didn't recognise the number but her curiosity won out and hit the answer button.

"Hello?" Her tone was guarded.

"Sam, it's Max, we need you down at the station."

Sam sighed down the line, but secretly she was pleased. Working was better than sitting at home all evening with nothing for company except the television set.

"Fine, I'll be right down." She said, hanging up the phone and tipping her tea down the sink. She picked up her coat from where she had literally just placed it down and left the house again.

"This had better be important, Max." She grumbled, entering the almost empty CID office.

"It is actually." He said, grinning up at her from his desk and leaning back in his swivel chair. "It's about Phil Hunter."

Sam tried to keep her face and voice free from emotion, but her heart was pounding in her chest at the mere mention of the name of her previous lover.

"What about him?" She managed to choke out, knowing she wasn't doing a good job and convincing Max that whatever he might have heard about her and Phil wasn't true.

"He used to work here, right." It was a statement, not a question.

"Yeah, in fact, you're the DS that replaced him." Sam said, her indignation making her speak before she had thoroughly thought through what she was going to say.

Max raised his eyebrows but didn't respond to this, it made a lot of things make sense though; such as the way Sam treated him. "Well, I've been told that when it comes to knowing Phil Hunter, you are the woman to go to."

Sam felt herself bristle and had to force back a sarcastic comment. "And your point is?" She avoided falling into the trap she was almost certain Max was trying to set.

"Well, guv, we're supposed to be working on a case involving him. It's a liaison case with Special Ops." Max explained, pretending not to enjoy the way he had interrogated Sam over the subject of Phil Hunter. He had heard plenty of rumours surrounding the legend of Sam Nixon and Phil Hunter but now he was beginning to realise that there was probably a reason for most of them.

"Right, I'm with you. Continue." Sam said her tone still as frosty and guarded as it had been earlier.

"Basically, they assigned him to an undercover operation in Walford to expose a gunrunning and drug smuggling ring."

"Right." Sam said, processing the information. "But what does that have to do with us here, at Sun Hill?"

"Ah, well." Max grinned. "Seems like one of their major players is someone we've been tailing for a while"

"Okay," Sam replied, this was making a little more sense now. "And what is our role in this?" She asked, crossing her arms across her chest and wondering why she was hearing this from Max and not from her superiors. "This is legit right, Max?"

Max pretended to be offended at this. "Of course it is." He sighed. "Basically, Special Ops want us to act as liaison for Phil while he's undercover." He looked at Sam as he said this but she had learned to cover her emotions by now, at least in front of him. "We're assisting him with information to help him catch whoever is behind the trafficking in Walford, and then we and the Special Ops team can share the collar."

"Makes sense." Sam concluded. "But this doesn't sound like work for someone at DI level." She mused.

Max grinned again and Sam longed to wipe the annoying smirk of his also annoyingly handsome face. "Because of your intimate knowledge of all things Phil Hunter, that's why."

"Tonight?" Sam said as she and Max walked out of the station and headed towards an unmarked CID car. "What kind of operation is this?" She wondered aloud.

"Come on guv, it won't be all bad." Max grinned as he opened the driver's door.

Sam rolled her eyes at him and muttered under her breath as she climbed into the passenger's side. Max may be infuriating her unbelievably but at least tonight she would be able to see Phil Hunter, even if it only was in a professional capacity.