Title: Northern Exposures, Chapter 1/5

Rating: NC-17 for M/M oral sex

Pairings: Shawn/Lassiter.

Warning: Shassie Slash.

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Summary: Shawn and Lassiter travel north to repossess a yacht and discover more than they bargained for.

Note: Written for the Livejournal Journeystory Big Bang challenge.

Chief Vick was exasperated. "I am not sending my head detective on a three day trip for a simple asset forfeiture." She slapped her palm onto her desk and glared angrily at Lassiter, transferring it to Shawn Spencer and Burton Guster as they entered, in case they considered taking his side.

"But there could be evidence on that craft," Lassiter insisted. "Vital evidence that Emilio Vargas doesn't want us to find." Since his conviction for drug trafficking, items Vargas had purchased with the proceeds of his drug business were being confiscated by the police and sold at auction. Lassiter had been coveting Vargas' yacht since it was first mentioned in the interview transcripts, six months ago. That cruiser might go for a song, and Lassiter could already picture himself fishing from it off the coast of Santa Barbara.

"That possibility doesn't justify sending you to Eureka," Vick said. "You're of more use to me here."

Lassiter frowned. Picking up the yacht himself was an essential part of his plan. If he couldn't buy it before the auction, he could at least use the two-day trip as a test drive to figure out his maximum bid when it came under the gavel. It was a win-win scenario. If only Vick could be convinced.

"Lassie's right," Shawn chimed in. He put a hand to his temple, "I have a strong impression that Vargas used that boat to transport drugs."

"I don't need your help, Spencer," Lassiter growled and glanced at Shawn out of the corner of his eye. The psychic was wearing a lime green t-shirt that was so wrinkled Lassiter wondered if it had been manufactured that way. Coupled with his tousled hair, the man looked like he'd just rolled out of bed. The thought made Lassiter picture Shawn in bed, an image that he quickly pushed back into the depths of his subconscious. The situation was dire enough without adding in the Spencer issue.

Chief Vick caught both the glimpse and the grimace. It was evident to her that he felt Shawn's support would hurt, rather than help his argument. Looking up at Lassiter's tense face, she wondered how her head detective could still be so stubbornly hostile toward their consultant. Despite the number of times the psychic had come through for them, Lassiter just wouldn't budge an inch. She glanced at a brochure on her desk for a team-building retreat outside Fresno. For several weeks now she'd been thinking that some forced bonding time with Mr. Spencer was exactly what Lassiter needed. And a ten-hour drive to Eureka, followed by two days on the ocean was probably just as good as trust-building exercises in Fresno. It might be even better if it had a chance of getting them more leverage on Vargas.

"Fine." Vick said, and a malevolent smile ghosted across her lips, "If there's evidence on that boat we'd better send someone who can find it, wherever Mr. Vargas might have hidden it."

Lassiter's head snapped up, and his eyes went wide with panic.

"Spencer can't come!" He spoke before he realized the decision wasn't his to make. "I mean," he amended, "I don't think we need a psychic." He spat out the last word as offensively as he felt he could get away with, moving his jaw as if tasting something nasty.

"Come on!" Shawn said cheerfully, moving a foot further into Lassiter's personal space. "I'm great on road trips. We'll sing songs and play games. I'll bring all the good snacks. And having me along will cut your driving time in half. Easy breezy property-seizey"

"Either Mr. Spencer goes with you, or nobody goes," Vick said finally. She smiled to herself. Lassiter could be such a pain in the ass sometimes; it served him right to have to put up with Mr. Spencer for three days. Plus, she had some money left in the budget that needed to be spent before the end of the fiscal year if she didn't want to see her budget for next year cut. Paying his fee wouldn't be a problem.

Lassiter's face fell as his vision of two days of relaxed fishing on Vargas's yacht disintegrated before his eyes.

"Fine," he muttered. "Spencer can come."

"Eureka is a nice destination," Gus said pleasantly, trying to lighten the mood. "They have a kinetic sculpture race in May, Chicken Wingfest in September, and Mushroomfest in the fall."

Shawn looked at Gus with disappointment in his eyes. "Mushroomfest? Really Gus?" Although now that he thought about it, Wingfest sounded pretty good.

"Sequoia Park Zoo is there too," Gus added. When Shawn and Lassiter stared questioningly at him, he added. "It's California's oldest zoo."

"Nobody wants to see animals that old, Gus." Shawn pictured a herd of two-hundred year old zebra, their skin wrinkly and saggy, and shuddered.

"This isn't a sight-seeing trip," Lassiter said. "We're investigating one of the biggest drug trafficking rings ever busted in Santa Barbara." He smiled, proud of having had a hand in bringing in Vargas.

"Why are drug traffickers always a ring?" Shawn asked. Lassiter ignored his question, turned, and left the office.

"Sometimes they're a chain," Gus pointed out. "If Vargas cuts a deal they can move up the chain to whomever Vargas works for."

"The odds of that happening aren't very good," Chief Vick said, thinking back to their interviews with him. The man was belligerent, and uncooperative. Of course if Lassiter and Spencer really did find some more evidence in Eureka, Vargas might change his tune.

"With us on the case," Shawn said, "those odds just doubled. Maybe tripled." He looked at Gus. "Although that depends, really on how low she thinks they were to begin with, doesn't it? You're the one that's good with math."

"We should go," Gus said, observing that Chief Vick's patience was running out.

Shawn, noticing Vick's furrowed forehead, agreed. "Yeah," he said. "We should go."

Gus waited until the two of them were back in the Psych office to raise his question. He didn't understand Shawn's sudden interest in taking a ten-hour car ride north followed by a two-day boat trip with Lassiter. He was sure Shawn had a reason, and he was sure that reason would include why he hadn't invited Gus along. But he needed to figure out how to broach the subject without coming across as clingy. He could certainly go for three days without Shawn around, he assured himself. He might even be able to get some long-postponed tasks done around the office. He just wanted to understand why he would be doing them alone.

Gus leaned back against the cool imitation leather of his favourite armchair, and watched Shawn stride around the office, his eyes gleaming, looking for things to pack.

"It's a long drive to Eureka," Gus said finally. If his memory of having gone to Mushroomfest with his family when he was eleven was correct, Eureka was 592 miles north of Santa Barbara.

"Exactly!" Shawn pointed a finger at him and smiled enthusiastically. "That is exactly my point. I love how we're so sim patio on this."

"I think you mean simpatico," Gus said. Sim patio sounded like some kind of computer game where he designed his own veranda. He shook his head. "But even if you do, we aren't. I have no idea why you think this trip is a good plan."

"The answer is Maninblue42." Shawn went to Gus' laptop, and Gus leaped from his chair to intercept him.

"Shawn," he said sternly, "What have I told you about using my laptop to hook up with guys? You wouldn't believe the messed-up emails I still get as a direct result of your debacle on !"

Shawn detoured around Gus, grabbed the laptop, and held it just out of his friend's frantic reach while he brought up a webpage.

"No, Dude! Look at the profile," Shawn pointed the screen at him. "Maninblue42. It's Lassie."

Gus peered at the page Shawn had opened. It was, as he had feared, on an adult match site.

"That's not Lassiter." Gus stood and surveyed his friend sadly. Shawn's hopeless obsession with the detective had clearly led him off the path of logic into the dense forest of wishful thinking. Admittedly, the man in the picture did have a generous amount of chest hair peeking out of his dress shirt, but since the photo ended at the neck there was no way of positively identifying him.

"It is," Shawn insisted. "Look, it says he's a cop living in the Santa Barbara area, his age is right, he describes himself as tall, and—and this is really the most awesome part—he uses the term 'bi-curious.' It's perfect. I want to sleep with him, he's batting for both teams, and now we're going on a three-day trip alone together. It's synchronicity."

Gus considered pointing out that it hardly counted as synchronicity when Shawn weasled his way into accompanying Lassiter, but he decided to take another approach.

"The Santa Barbara area has thousands of police officers," he pointed out. "This could be any one of them."

"It's Lassie," Shawn persisted. "I'm sure of it. And if he wants to play Curious George, I'm willing to wear a yellow fedora and—"

"First of all," Gus cut in, "The man in the yellow hat is probably wearing a ten gallon Stetson. But even so, kindly refrain from dragging a beloved series of children's books into your sexual fantasy. Second of all, even if this were Lassiter's profile—which I'm not saying it is—he doesn't like you very much, Shawn. Why would he want to sleep with you?"

"I've got a good feeling about this," Shawn said. He put his hands to his head. "I sense this is our time."

"Uh, you do remember that I know you're not actually psychic, right?" Gus asked.

"I don't have to be psychic to read Lassie's mind," Shawn said. "He's been getting physical with me Olivia Newton-John style from the moment I started working with him."

"He's been slamming you into walls and putting you in headlocks," Gus pointed out. "In what world is that sexual?"

"Picture us in leather," Shawn suggested. "Does that help?"

"He's using the only method he knows will keep you from contaminating his crime scenes," Gus objected. "Frankly, I'm amazed he hasn't shot you."

"And," Shawn continued, ignoring Gus's argument, "I've caught him checking me out a couple of times now." Shawn smiled and stretched lasciviously. "He totally wants my bod."

"Riiiight." Gus wasn't convinced, and did nothing to hide the fact. "In case you're wrong, which I'm pretty sure you are, you might want to take your health insurance details with you, for when you make a move on Lassiter and he punches you in the nose."

Carlton Lassiter walked into the equipment room of the Santa Barbara Athletic Club and stepped onto a treadmill to begin his morning workout. He inserted the earbuds of his MP3 player and began to run in time to the disco beat of Stayin' Alive. The song made him feel fifteen again, which wasn't an entirely anxiety-free experience. He tried to remain focused on the treadmill's tiny display reporting his speed, heart rate and calories burned, but found his mind wandering.

Why does Spencer want to come to Eureka? He wondered. Apart from the man's compulsive need to push himself into every police case, I mean. Lassiter considered the possibility that Shawn had his own sights set on the yacht, but quickly rejected it. Spencer doesn't know a cruiser from a dingy.

There were many things about Shawn Spencer that Lassiter didn't understand. One of these was why Chief Vick insisted they work with him when the man was clearly a professional liar. Another was how Spencer was getting his information. Lassiter had investigated several avenues, but they'd all come up dry. He didn't seem to be getting outside help. But if there was something underhanded at work—and Lassiter was 99% sure there was—he would discover it eventually. As a kid he'd seen David Copperfield levitate a woman on television, and he hadn't rested until he'd learned how he did it. Spencer's bag of tricks couldn't be any better. Whatever he's got up his sleeve, I'll figure it out, Lassiter assured himself.

The most grating part of the whole hoax was Spencer's success. Whatever he was doing, it worked. Ridiculous playacting aside, he got the job done—sometimes in a way that made Lassiter feel distinctly inferior.

I solved plenty of crimes before Spencer came along, he thought defensively.

Lassiter jabbed a button on the treadmill and increased his pace as Survivor's Eye of the Tiger began to play. He'd never been afraid of competition. It was a healthy way to bring out the best in people. In the academy he'd enjoyed the contest between himself and Nick Conforth. Putting in maximum effort had never been a problem for him. But effort didn't seem to matter against Spencer. No matter how hard he tried, the fake psychic always pulled some last-minute move that won the day. Of course it was easier for people like Spencer, since they didn't have to think about little details like procedure, chain of custody, or how things would look in a court of law.

As Lassiter's sneakered feet beat out a fast pace on the treadmill it occurred to him that he would have developed a begrudging respect for Spencer by now if it hadn't been for the other issue. Initially he'd been watching Spencer like a hawk because he was looking for evidence against him. After a while, however, he'd noticed that his gaze followed the psychic without his even thinking about it. And their physical altercations, which at first had simply been an extension of their battle of wills, had gradually taken on a sexually charged element. A few times he'd caught himself admiring Spencer's ass. It was when he began to daydream about kissing Spencer's neck that the panic set in. First the man had invaded the station and undermined Lassiter's work life, and now he was perverting his sexual fantasies.

Damn you, Spencer, Lassiter thought, why did you have to dredge all this up again?

Beads of sweat ran down his neck and he pushed himself to keep pace, breathing hard, feeling his muscles itch and burn. It wasn't just being attracted to another man that was evoking his heterosexual panic. He'd spent six months in college accepting that he'd developed a crush on his criminology professor, Dr. Urquhart. The man was brilliant, and gorgeous, and he'd treated Lassiter more like a colleague than a student. Although Lassiter hadn't pursued it, the attraction had forced him to face some facts about himself—namely that his sexuality wasn't as straight as his target shooting. But then he'd graduated and met Victoria, and packed it all away in the back of his mind, along with his love of figure skating. Now Spencer had him completely on edge with his suggestive moves and lack of personal space.

And that sweet fucking ass of his.

He punched a few buttons, slowing the treadmill and jogged lightly as his breathing and heart rate returned to normal. His muscles felt a combination of pain and relief as he stepped off the machine. Given the way Spencer talked and acted, Lassiter felt comfortable laying the blame for his current sexual crisis at the consultant's door. Yet he was pretty certain that Spencer wasn't flirting with intent. The man was a total skirt chaser, and there was no way he could know the effect he was having. At least Lassiter could be grateful for that.

If I could just get this gay thing out of my system, he thought wistfully, I could get my focus back.

He'd taken steps to do exactly that. He'd been careful of course, making sure that his online profile didn't include any conclusive identifiers. Yet it had been two weeks now and he couldn't bring himself to respond to anyone. The emails he'd received in response to his ad were sleazy and off-putting to him. Some had even included explicit photos and descriptions of sex acts which sounded about as exciting as a colonoscopy. He told himself that the whole experiment was like fishing. There was nothing wrong with throwing a catch back if it wasn't what you were after. But some part of him wondered if he wasn't so much interested in men as he was interested in particular men. Was Spencer another Dr. Urquhart?

Lassiter shut off the treadmill and wiped his face with a hand towel, wondering how he was going to make it through a ten-hour car ride with Spencer, let along a two-day sea trip.

Whatever happens, he decided, I have to keep my distance.

Juliet O'Hara stirred her coffee angrily, and muttered to herself as she stared at the stack of paperwork in her In box. Walking by, Henry Spencer paused at her desk.

"Something wrong?" he asked.

Juliet stilled her spoon and looked up at him. Henry didn't often reach out to her like this, and she thought it was sweet of him to care.

"Thanks for asking, Henry." She smiled wanly and waved a hand at Lassiter's empty desk. "I have to drop Carlton off in Eureka so I can drive his car back," she said, her annoyance leaking into her tone. "That's like, a ten and a half hour trip, there and back, and I still have a ton of paperwork to do. I haven't even started the report on that series of arsons in Samarkand." She gestured helplessly at the forms before her.

"You volunteered for a drive that long?" Henry asked, casually.

"No." She took a sip of her coffee, found it too hot, and set the mug back on the desk. "Carlton just assumed I'd go." Although her partner was head detective, she didn't care for the offhanded manner in which he'd assigned her the task. They'd had their share of conflicts in the past, but lately it seemed as if Lassiter was particularly grouchy and irritable. Although she hadn't been brought up to say such things out loud, more than a few times she'd thought he really needed to get laid.

"He shouldn't have assumed that," Henry said with feeling. "You didn't become detective so you could chauffeur people around."

"Exactly," She relaxed, having found an ally in her grievance. After all, it wasn't as if she didn't have her own work to do. In fact, in addition to her regular workload she was still combing through stacks of documents taken from Vargas's many properties, looking for anything that might help them get a handle on him. It wasn't glamorous, but it was the kind of slow patient work that sometimes paid off.

Henry shrugged. "If you want to drive to Eureka and back by yourself, be my guest," he said. "But if I were you, I'd have better things to do with my time."

"You're right." Her eyes brightened and her face took on a determined look. She was a detective, not some rookie. She refused to be the cop who made coffee and got the assignments that no one else wanted. "I'm going to tell Carlton he can just forget about it. I am not a taxi service."

"Good for you." Henry smiled and bumped her outstretched fist with his own.

She turned back to her reports, feeling better than she had all week. When she confronted Lassiter later that day, she expected an argument. Everything seemed to be an argument with him lately. But he took the news surprisingly well.

"Looks like we won't need you after all," he said. "Henry's willing to drive us."

"That's great," Juliet said. While she was relieved, the feeling that she had been played was growing with each passing moment. Henry's motive, if he had one, was still unclear to her. She cornered him in the break room.

"Carlton tells me you're driving him and Shawn to Eureka," She said, trying to keep her temper in check. "What happened to 'I have better things to do with my time'?"

"I said 'If I were you.' I'm not you." Henry smiled without a trace of guilt on his face, and for the first time Juliet could see the family resemblance to Shawn. "I, for example know that there's a great tackle shop on the way to Eureka, and if I take the Dutcher Creek Road off Route 101, I can stay overnight at Lake Sonoma on the way back. I could be fishing by dawn."

Juliet crossed her arms. "That's not fair. You tricked me."

Henry shrugged. "Fair don't mean squat when it comes to fishing."

Juliet, no slouch in the fishing department herself, nodded to acknowledge the truth of his words.

"Fine. It's yours," she waved a hand in surrender. Chief Vick had hired Henry to work with their consultants, and keeping Carlton and Shawn from strangling each other on a long car ride definitely fell within his purview. Given how sneaky he'd been about getting the assignment, Henry deserved what he was getting. She smiled. "Enjoy your very long drive with Mr. Grumpy and Mr. Silly."

Henry laughed. "Silly wasn't one of the dwarves."

"Mr. Silly and Mr. Grumpy are characters from the Mr. Men books." She shrugged and shook her head. "I don't really know the seven dwarves. I've only seen Snow White once and the woodsman scene made me cry."

"That's ridiculous!" Henry blurted out. He saw heads turn in the bullpen and lowered his voice. "I saw Snow White in the theatre in 1958. I was four. The woodsman was twenty feet tall, but I wasn't scared, because he's clearly the good guy. He saves Snow White from the evil queen."

"What about the prince?" Juliet's forehead wrinkled in concentration. She barely remembered the movie, but she was pretty sure Prince Charming was the hero.

"The prince? Oh Please!" Henry scoffed. "He comes in at the end and takes all the credit. He's no different than those stuffed shirts down at city hall." Henry crossed his arms and glared at her, as if daring her to continue the argument. Juliet thought about Shawn and Lassiter spending ten hours in the car with Henry and almost felt sorry for them.