Is the FBI a romance killer? Perhaps not. But a sibling might be.

Fruit in the Arsenal

Had she been any other woman, she'd have thrown a fit. A resplendent tirade, complete with flying hairbrush, shoes, toaster and possibly pineapples. (Don't ask her why there was fruit in the arsenal.) The only thing that saved him from the attack of the object-hurling girlfriend was his own nature. Amita realized that he'd have felt compelled to analyze the trajectory of each item and rate her throwing skill. Plus rank her accuracy. Which rather took the fun out of the activity.

Breakfast plans waltzed out the door with Charlie. Again. Had it been a breakthrough, she would forgive. Had it been his father requesting his assistance, she would have let it slide. Had it been another woman, she would…Well, she would have killed him, resurrected him and then killed him again (clemency is for nuns).

But of course, none of these scenarios had driven him from their comfy bed at the ungodly hour of 4 am. By the second ring of his cell phone, her incoherent thoughts still managed to psychically predict the caller. Don.

She was all for relatives, mind. But family was only for the waking hours, which she was hereby going to designate as consisting of sun-up to sundown. The time in between was created for lovers. And lovers should not have to untangle their limbs before dawn to heed the summons of a brother. Unless he was dying. Which she could arrange.

Charlie was a genius. This was indisputable. And jolly good for the FBI for recognizing his value. And yippee for the people who were saved by his astonishingly complicated calculations. But she was a brilliant mind in her own right. And dangerous math, the kind that projected the most thorough ways of killing, was becoming a field that warranted her study (a woman applied to a mission could be lethal).

The sun peeked around the curtains, telling her to stop ruminating on impending murder and locate breakfast on her own. And find a waffle iron with which to bash Charlie upon his return. Maybe amnesia would do him good.