NOTE: I'm publishing the start of this story now, before the new episode tonight negates the story I've imagined... Reviews are much appreciated, but I mostly hope you get some small enjoyment out of what I've written. I do not own Eureka or its characters, and this story is purely for fun! Thanks!

It was his eyes. They were so…blue. She was perfectly under control around him, except when it came to his eyes. Every time he looked at her. Or when she could feel him thinking about looking at her. Or when he was deliberately not looking at her.

"Damn it," Jo muttered distractedly to the empty office. Her brain was full of much stronger words for this occasion, but she rarely swore. A product of being raised Catholic, she supposed. Not that she was really a good Catholic anymore. A blush threatened to tint her cheeks when she thought about what her grandmother would say—all that premarital sex. And with an atheist, no less. It was definitely a good thing her grandmother had died years before one troublemaking, wisecracking, seriously un-Catholic Zane Donovan came into the picture. As soon as she thought it, Jo tried to take it back. That was a horrible thing to say about a family member, even in one's head.

Zane. Jo kept reminding herself that the past was the past and that she was completely over her former almost-fiancé. She had never been all that close to telling any other guy she loved him, let alone that she would happily (more than happily—ecstatically, blissfully, euphorically) spend the rest of her life with him. Coming back to the present to find that this Zane had never given her a rose on their non-existent first date, never kissed her slowly and patiently, never torn her clothes in his impatience to get to the fun stuff, never got on one knee to call her "JoJo" and lay his heart on the line. It almost broke her completely.

But that was all behind her. With time, she had moved on. Even when that idiot Fargo had spilled the beans about the other timeline to Zane, leading to predictable curiosity on his part and renewed heat in his gaze, Jo had remained strong. She let him kiss her that one time in Carter's office, but only to prove that her resolve was unwavering and that any "things" she might "feel" were just a healthy woman's response to any decently attractive man. They weren't emotions, they were urges. Normal, biological urges. And if she had given into those urges once or twice, or five…dozen times over the past six weeks, that was simply her way of working the stupid little biological whim out of her system. And now it was over, once and for all. Sunday night was the end, the absolute last time—it was a new week. Jo checked her watch. She was a whole 62 hours and 47 minutes into her new era.

Jo tapped a pen on her desk phone, trying to will it to ring. She desperately needed a project, anything to keep her occupied. Her brain waves appeared to be ineffectual, as the phone sullenly refused to oblige. It had been an extraordinarily quiet couple of days, with only a single security case landing on Jo's desk. Of course, the lack of outside contact might have something to do with the broken comm pad staring her in the face. Her personal communication device had gone on the fritz early Monday morning, and by midday the screen was reduced to a complete blank, punctuated by the briefest bursts of static. And now, close to closing time on Wednesday, there was still nothing coming through. Jo should have called it in right away, but she had balked at the prospect, with good reason.

Calling in the problem would require calling internal tech support, and she knew who would be on the other end of the line. Zane. That's right—the one and only mastermind of the Global Dynamics network, ex (please God, give her the strength to keep it that way—62 hours, 49 minutes) lover, blue eyes owner. Jo knew that he would come into her office, look at her and ask what she had done to her poor, innocent computer and that would be it. Years of Special Forces training had made her unshakeable, but thirty seconds alone with him in her conveniently private office and she'd be finished. Just the thought of giving in to her Zane-related urges once again brought a flush up to her hairline and a familiar heat in other, less mentionable parts of her.

Just as Jo thought she'd have to step outside to cool down, her phone finally rang. In her bordering-on-desperate need for distraction, Jo pressed the button to answer before

"Lupo."

"Uh, Jo? You realize I've been trying to reach you all day? Your comm must be down." Fargo. Bad sign.

"I, uh, hadn't noticed. Thought it was just a quiet week," she stammered out, crossing her fingers that Fargo was even worse at reading people over the phone than he was in person.

"A quiet week? At GD? Wishful thinking, huh?" Fargo let out a quick sigh. Finding himself director in this timeline had seemed to age him. Well, if not always in maturity, at least in the amount of sighing he did these days. Jo relaxed a bit, recognizing the signs of general frustration, rather than anger, in Fargo's voice. "Well, we've got to get that fixed down there. I might need you again, and it took me ages to find your actual phone number."

"Yeah, of course, I'll call someone in right away." That sucked. Well, Jo supposed she couldn't work outside of the loop forever. Maybe she'd call down to Henry's and see if Grace could spare him for a bit. Nice thing about living in genius central-plenty of other people who could fix computer issues. Plenty of other people who didn't put her stomach in knots and annihilate her self-control.

"No need, Jo. Your gracious director sent word down just before I called you. Someone should be there any second. You're welcome." The self-importance in his voice was grating. Trust Fargo to think he was doing her a favor and to expect her ever-lasting gratitude.

Jo didn't have time for this. Tech support would be knocking on her door, and she had a feeling that she knew exactly who it would be. Slamming the phone down with just a touch too much force, her brain was already racing with escape plans. She hadn't done lab security checks this afternoon, so it wasn't like she had no excuse to leave her office. Step one: get out immediately. She dove under her desk and grabbed for her shoes (what on earth convinced her to kick them off earlier-these were precious seconds she was wasting). Holding her heels in one hand, she figured she'd put them on once she was safely out of sight.

Barefoot, she was rounding her desk before she noticed that her door was already open.

"Fuck."