A/N: Just to be on the safe side, THIS FIC IS RATED R/NC-17 (it gets a bit racy in parts).
His keys jingled in the lock as he opened the door, careful not to make too much noise in case his daughter was napping. He had to be completely silent when Emma slept because of her constant fear that he was having fun without her, always slipping out of her crib to peek around the corner to see what he was up to. It drove his wife (who had a bit more freedom to move when it came to their daughter) nuts that she had to repeatedly usher Emma back to bed and begin the whole bedtime ritual from the top. Usually it worked out alright – he would use Emma’s naptimes as a chance to catch up on some homework for a case they were working on. A quiet hobby, research didn’t hold Emma’s short attention span, and dissertations on the inner-workings of a psychopathic mind were not something you could share with a one year-old.
Upon entering he heard an insistent hum coming from another part of the house – the washer and dryer running, he surmised. He had spent the day in court testifying against a man in an art theft/murder case. Eames hadn’t been there when the confession occurred (she had been in the opposite interrogation room getting the conflicting story from the wife), and what she did know could be found in her report, so she didn’t have to be called to the stand. Normally she would have gone anyway as his partner, but since having Emma the busyness of their daily lives had increased exponentially. Now, when one of them had the opportunity to shake off a responsibility to spend time with Emma or shorten their to-do list, they took it. The result was an almost perfectly run egalitarian household.
Placing his keys and folder onto the top of the high bookshelf just inside the doorway (so Emma couldn’t hide the former and color on the later, both of which she was prone to do) he followed the drone of the machines through the twists and turns of the small but comfortable home. The washer and dryer were located in the hallway behind folding wood doors between their bedroom and Emma’s. He bypassed the household item and moved toward the bedroom to hang up his suit jacket in the closet (so Emma couldn’t get finger paint on it . . . if having a kid did nothing else, it made you diligent on where you put your belongings).
“Hey,” a voice called out, “tall, dark, and handsome.”
Bobby jerked to a stop, turned, and saw his wife standing in front of the dryer looking in his direction. He pointed at himself questioningly as he spun around, looking for someone behind him.
She humored him with a smile, “Yeah you,” she crooked a finger at him, “come help me with this.” She threw a pile of clean laundry at him which he caught and brought over to set on the dryer next to her, picking up each item individually and folding it. In the meantime he had hung his jacket on the knob of the nearest door.
“How was court?” she asked as she folded closely next to him, her hip bumping and rubbing against his thigh -- whether she was doing it on purpose or not, he wasn’t completely sure. Either way, it (along with the hypnotic drone of the machines) was enough to distract him because he didn’t know how much time had passed before she spoke again.
They hadn’t seen each other all day or, it seemed, a long time before that. They had just finished a long, harrowing case the previous day when meanwhile, they had yet to catch their breaths from the one before that. During all of this was, of course, their precocious daughter who was exhausting enough on her own.
“Earth to Goren,” his wife’s voice echoed off the steel machines, nudging her hip into him a little harder. The smirk he caught out of the corner of his eye quitted any guilty feelings he may have had at zoning out. So it had been on purpose. “Court?” she prompted.
He dropped the shirt he was folding and turned to his wife, his hands drifting to her waist. He shrugged, “Guilty, twenty to twenty-five, just like we thought.” She seemed satisfied with the conclusion.
“Been thinking about you all day,” he murmured, leaning in to kiss her on the neck.
“Uh-huh,” she commented doubtfully. Despite her tone and air of indifference, she fisted his tie in her hand and tugged hard toward her, though she continued to fold with her other hand.
He tilted his head, coming at her from another angle. In an exaggerated huff, she threw the pants she was folding and turned to face him head on, eyes narrowed. He met her glare, flashing a little boy grin, continuing to get fresh with his hands. “You forget,” she chastised, “I know all your little tricks. First you get into my personal space to throw me off and get me all flustered,” he inched even closer, “then you pounce. Those Jedi mind tricks of yours don’t work on me, ya know.” He may seem socially inept at times but he knew the effect he can have on people and he knew how to flirt and what to say to a girl to get what he wanted, whether it be chicken parmesan, a confession, or a kiss.
And Alex was all too aware. “I’m immune,” she declared, even as her fingernails scraped his scalp and her hand wound into his hair, leaning harder into him and forcing his mouth harder onto her neck.
Bobby pulled back a little and spoke into the delicate skin of her neck, causing goosebumps to rise there, “Are you suggesting I stop?”
He felt her lips curl into a smile against his ear. “Now don’t go putting words in my mouth,” she reprimanded.
She backed off and he reeled a little bit in confusion. “Make yourself useful, detective.” She handed him wet clothes, he threw them in the dryer and turned the dial to thirty minutes. Just enough time to do what he wanted to do, he surmised.
Completing his assigned task, he circled behind her. She meant to keep him distracted, get him a little annoyed – it was more fun that way. “For someone who doesn’t follow the rules, you take instruction very well,” she commented, as she again folded clothes, pretending the whole while that nothing had been started.
He moved against her until her back was molded to his front. His palm slid under her shirt, fingers skimming then diving under the waistband of her jeans. Her head thudded back against his chest, her eyes closed. “Turn around,” he murmured into her ear. She was facing him before she even noticed what she was doing. Damn. He smirked in triumph, “For someone who says she only pretends to listen to me, you’re very receptive.”
“I said I only pretend I don’t listen to you. I listen if you’re gonna make it worth my while.”
He ignored her sassy mouth and backed her up against the dryer until she was leaning backwards at the waist. He knew he had her when she threw her arms around his neck in complete submission.
His hands slid to her waist and he lifted her up onto the dryer, kicking her legs on either side of the corner. He kissed her, making up for all the late nights at crime scenes and days surrounded by an impressionable youth. He purposefully took a step back so she’d have to lean forward to keep the kiss. When she did, she immediately stiffened as the vibration of the appliance hit her clit. Her hands went up to squeeze his biceps hard and she threw her head back. Her eyes never opened. He watched her face for a while, letting her lean into the vibration, rocking her hips back and forth. He tilted into her, using that quiet, commanding, dangerous voice he kept for the interrogation room, “See how good it can be when you listen to me?” A small noise in the back of her throat was all the response she could muster.
“Emma?” he mumbled between nibbles on her neck, quickly traveling southward.
“Um,” Alex shook her head trying to clear it – Emma? Emma? Who was Emma? “My mother’s,” Alex answered finally, pushing him away from her hard. Confusion was breaking through the haze of lust he was in. She whipped her shirt over her head, and any confusion of her motives instantly vanished as he launched back at her. Literally grabbing her, her thighs pressed tight to his, he lifted her off the machine, spun them around and landed with and “oomph” against the opposite wall. The breath was knocked out of her, which was fine with her because it just made the slamming of their pelvises all the more intense to her already hyper nerve endings. Her right hand traveled up the wall, her nails scratching into the surface, searching for purchase, leverage to get closer, push deeper.
Whatever master plan he may have had was gone now, but that was fine enough with him. He got the ball rolling and that’s as far as he normally ever got with Alex. Not far into their seducing of each other, he always reached a point when “all that damn thinking” as she put it, was forced out the window – some move she made, thing she said, article of clothing she took off.
They slid along the wall until they entered the bedroom. She considered the layers of denim and cotton barriers between them. “If you want this to get fun, you’re going to have to put me down.” “Down” wasn’t even out of her mouth when he unceremoniously dropped her on her feet.
She stood on tiptoes to kiss him as she worked at the buttons of his white button-down. He ran his hands from around her back to the front clasp of her bra. She let her arms drop and the straps slid smoothly down her arms and off, landing on the floor somewhere behind her.
He moved toward her again, but she shoved him against the wall yet again. Considering the rare opportunity of being alone, one would think they would revel in it and take their time. But they couldn’t wait. They needed each other and they needed each other now. Slow and languid could be later. Now they needed rough and loud and hard. She reached her hand into his boxers and when she found what she was searching for, she wrapped her fingers around him and his eyes slammed shut and his head thumped back against the wall. His face didn’t even register the pain in his skull. In fact, she had managed to wipe his face of all expression except complete and utter submission with a strong hint of lust.
They played with each other like that when it came to their sex life – see who would scream uncle first. She loved him like this -- just knowing that she had the NYPD’s best detective and resident genius at her mercy. She could ask him for anything she wanted, to do anything she wanted, and he would without question. Of course, she would never -- they didn’t play mind games like that. In the end, it never mattered who gave in. In fact, it was more fun when they didn’t – instead dragging it out for as long as they had time for.
She knew he wasn’t thinking right now – couldn’t if he tried. She wanted him to take her to Europe. She wanted to see him in even more of his element, wrapping his tongue around foreign languages and taking her through cities. Well . . . maybe there was one thing . . .
“Bobby,” she purred, stroking him. He still hadn’t opened his eyes, panting. Her other hand came up to roam his chest. “Bobby,” she implored more insistently.
“Yeah?” he got out between breaths. In his defense, she kept tugging on him harder and harder faster and faster.
“Would you do something for me?”
“Anything,” he answered instantly. She smiled prettily at his response.
“Take me away. Take me to Europe. Just the two of us. To Italy.”
“I don’t speak Italian that well.”
“But you would . . . for me,” she stated.
She could have asked and gotten the same answer when they weren’t in a sexual situation, but this was just more fun.
“Okay,” he breathed. Actually, he’d always wanted to take her places, show her cobblestone roads in English countryside and the top of the Eiffel Tower. She’d never shown an interest before, but with the surprise pregnancy and birth, there had hardly been any time to seriously consider it until now. But they could consider it later. Now wasn’t the time. And the only way they were both going to win right now was if they both gave in.
Bobby inhaled deeply and let out a relaxed breath, “God, we needed that.”
“Uh-huh,” was all the sound Alex could make in trying to catch her breath. She looked at him, fondness glazed over her eyes. She ran a hand through his tough curls, “Think you need a haircut, babe.”
“Yeah?” She nodded.
“I think I need one too,” she said absentmindedly, playing with the split ends of her hair.
He gently pushed her hand away and replaced it with his own less critical fingertips to run over her strands, “I like it this length.”
She looked at him suspiciously, “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” he confirmed. “I can grab it, tug on it. And the same reason you like it better when I don’t shave . . . I can feel it,” he leaned in, his hot breath on her ear, “when you go down on me.”
“Oh,” she sighed. But the damage had been done. Her leg slid up the sheet, slick with their sweat, and between his legs.
They spent the rest of the afternoon lazily going down on each other. God, he was right about the not shaving thing. There were about twenty different sensations going on between her thighs all at once.
He woke up forty-five minutes later. The bedroom door that led to the washer and dryer was wide open. He stuffed his hands under his pillow and watched Alex at the machines. She hummed quietly to herself as she bent over to change loads. She was wearing a fitted white t-shirt and white panties and when the hall light hit her just so, he could see right through both, which she wore nothing under.
He cleared his throat audibly and when she whipped around guiltily, he gave her an accusatory glance, taking in the cold bed next to him, her overabundance of clothes, and her distance from him. “Figured I’d try to get something accomplished,” she reasoned, but threw off her t-shirt and slid back into bed with him nonetheless. Their lovemaking had always had that effect – it calmed his mind and allowed him to sleep, but always left her energetic.
She rolled onto her stomach, blankets pooled at her waist. As he rolled over on top of her he fisted the white bed sheet and flung it off her causing goose bumps to rise on her skin. He kissed down her back. He methodically took her one arm and then the other and placed them straight out in front of her. He slowly spread her legs with his. She was completely lax underneath him, loving the feel of his weight pressing down on her and into the cool sheets. He entered her then.
This was another wonderful product of their lovemaking. He was always so enamored with her afterwards, like he couldn’t believe she’d allowed him the privilege and honor of fucking her, that he worshipped her body afterwards, with gentle, massaging hands on her back, breasts, and thighs. And she loved being manipulated by him like this.
A knock on the door interrupted any more fun, informing them of her mother’s return, daughter in tow. Alex got up to meet them at the door and retrieve her daughter while Bobby got dressed. When he did make it out to the living room, Alex was conversing with her mother, Emma thrashing about violently in her arms.
She was cranky and tired from being off her routine and most likely hungry. The baby made pitiful whining noises that she liked to fake when she was restless. Bobby scooped her up, kissing her silky hair while she squirmed, strode into the kitchen and plopped her into her high chair. She wiggled piteously some more when he turned his back on her to shift through the cupboards. She perked up considerably when she hung over the side of the chair and spied what he had in his hand when he turned back around.
He pulled up a chair across from her and reached into the striped bag, bringing out a familiar treat. He laid a half a dozen animal crackers in front of her. The baby eagerly reached out, misjudging her grasp a few times out of her eagerness before managing to shovel one into her mouth. Bobby picked up another, a bear if he wasn’t mistaken, and made it shimmy across the table, making animal noises all the while. The baby loved this of course, and clapped for the show her daddy was putting on for her, chewing on the crackers all the while. He airplaned some towards her mouth, which she opened like a baby bird, only to make it instantly disappear out of his hands, a magic trick she’d seen him do before. Emma liked this game until the cracker disappeared one too many times and she pounded her fists on the table, shrieking a little in her throat. Always one to indulge his little girl, Bobby chuckled at her impatience (which she probably got from him) and offered up the treat which the baby stuffed happily into her mouth. He heard Alex say goodbye to her mother and a few minutes later felt Alex’s hands caress his shoulders and slid down so she hung over his back to watch their little girl. Minutes went by before Emma shifted in her seat again and, to the best of her verbal ability and the sign language Bobby had taught her since birth, let if be known that she demanded a meal more substantial than the crackers in front of her. Sighing, Alex squeezed her husband one last time, “So much more Mommy and Daddy time.”
Friday, October 31, 2008
Monday, September 22, 2008
Spuffy: What You're Waiting For -- Chapter Four
CHAPTER 4 –
When Buffy opened her eyes the next morning, she was immediately met by expressive blue ones that must have been studying her for quite some time.
“ ‘M sorry about last night,” he rumbled, his early morning accent thicker than usual. He was sitting on the floor with his chin propped up on her bed, looking like a guilty little schoolboy with a riot of curls. The word “adorable” flittered through her sleep-addled brain.
“Me too,” she replied honestly, pulling back the covers and scooting over, inviting him to snuggle. This wasn’t the first time they’ve shared a bed. But it was usually when one of them had drunk too much or was forlorn about some aspect of their lives. They’d lie in bed, commiserating, before drifting off to sleep. He’d tried to cop a feel several times, but that was beside the point. “You’re nice enough to come all the way out here with me and then . . . .” she drifted off as she looked around her childhood bedroom. “Wait, how did I get here?”
“You better cut back on those pancakes your mum makes, luv, you weigh a ton,” he joked.
She shoved his shoulder, “Shut up. You just want to keep me in you debt.”
“And one of these days I’m gonna cash in,” he said rolling out of bed, feet hitting the floor. He stood before her in grey sweatpants and a green t-shirt. He clapped his hands together, “So, itinerary for today? There has to be an Apple Festival or a clog dancing performance to go to or something.”
Buffy smiled at his sarcasm and flung herself out of bed and quickly shifted through a drawer before settling on an outfit and taking it into the bathroom in her bedroom to get changed. She continued their conversation through the closed door.
“More like dress fittings. It’ll be me, Dawn, my mother, and some mysterious girl named Janice who I’ve heard everything about but have yet to meet. All would be very boring to you. You can hang around at the house and I could meet you afterward for lunch, though.”
He nodded, “Sounds good.” Buffy gathered her things and opened the door to reenter her bedroom, only to almost drop them on the floor when she took in his state of undress in the middle of her floor. His pants were just being pulled up over his hips and his chest was bare.
“What are you doing!?” she averted her eyes a little. Not like she hadn’t seen him shirtless or in his boxers before, but every time she did get a glimpse, she didn’t like the summersaults that assaulted her stomach.
“Getting dressed,” he replied, like she was a complete idiot.
“What if my mother walked in here?” she bent over and threw his shirt at his bare chest, which he caught.
“Then she’d get a free show,” he twirled his shirt around his head like an expert, then laughed when she turned three shades of red. “And since when have you been a blusher?”
Buffy gasped, “I am not blushing,” then felt a new wave of heat radiate down her neck. Since when WAS she a blusher? She shook her head violently, “Agh! You’re impossible. Get dressed, find yourself something to eat, DON’T snoop through my things, and I’ll talk to you in a couple of hours.” Instructions complete, she turned and left the room, and the house, and him.
Three hours later found Spike reclined on the Summers’ couch; his bare feet up on the coffee table and eating chips. He was home alone and taking full advantage. He glanced around the living room. He could honestly say he felt at home here. The big house with its worn furniture and years of memory scratched into the hard wood floors. It was such a contrast to his rather sparse, antiseptic living space in his rent controlled New York apartment. Granted, it was rather posh where city apartments were concerned, but it didn’t feel like home – just a place where his bed happened to be.
Unlike Buffy, Spike could see himself living in a small town someday. One where everyone knew their neighbors, births and weddings were town affairs and babysitters were trustworthy and easy to find. In New York, his neighbors were an up and coming rock star who was never home and a few beatniks who had yet to realize that communism was just not happening in this country. But he didn’t have any plans on telling Buffy about his warm and fuzzy feelings. She’d castrate him. Buffy was still pretty bitter about where she came from but Spike couldn’t see how. Seemed like an alright place to him. Don’t get him wrong, Spike loved being a big city boy who knew how to quickly and correctly place an order at Starbucks and was in no particular hurry to slow down. Sunnydale was just a nice change of pace, is all. He ruminated on all of this during commercial breaks of an A-Team marathon. Five episodes in, a knock on the door tore him away from Mad Murdock and company.
The door opened and a burly, Boy Scout type stood on the porch. White teeth and a bouquet of daisies met the look of indifference on Spike’s face. This must be one of the townies Buffy talked about, come around to see the bride-to-me most likely.
“Is Buffy in?” the guy asked, a hopeful little look in his eye as he desperately tried to hide the look of disappointment that came over his face when Buffy didn’t answer the door.
Spike stood a little straighter. Well if this pillock was here for Buffy, Captain Cardboard wasn’t getting far. Besides, he thought, sneering at the spray clutched in the man’s big knuckles, Buffy preferred roses, not daisies.
“No. Who are you?” Spike asked, squaring his body to further block the doorway when the boyscout’s gaze wandered over his right shoulder.
The boy flung out his hand, “Riley Finn, I’m an old friend of Buffy’s. You must be Buffy’s city friend in for the wedding.” At Spike’s raised eyebrow, he continued. “Word travels fast in this town,” he offered.
“I bet it does,” Spike replied in monotone. They stared at each other in silence. Spike watched as Finn rocked on his heels awkwardly. And Spike wasn’t about to save him.
“I offered to help set up for the ceremony,” Riley explained. The statement was met with silence. “So . . . when is Buffy expected back?”
“Don’t rightly know. She’s going to call when she’s done and I’m meetin’ her for lunch.” Spike purposely left the answer ambiguous. Let ‘im come to his own conclusions. Spike got his desired response when Finn’s eyes narrowed in what must signal his thinking process.
“I’m sorry, you said you were . . . ?”
“Spike,” he answered, purposefully using his nickname. There, let that spread around Small Town, USA. “She’ll see ya at the next barn raising,” Spike closed the door in Finn’s face and turned on his heels, pacing back to the couch.
He had changed his mind.
Small towns blow.
“I don’t like your boyfriend, pet,” Spike slid into the shiny, red diner booth across from Buffy.
She looked up from her plastic menu, puzzled, “My boyfr . . .”
“Ranger Joe came to call this afternoon,” Spike announced, interrupting her. God as his witness, he was not going to utter that name.
“Ranger Who?” she shook her head, her lips still puckered at the drawn out ‘who.’ “Spike, what are you talking about?”
Spike sighed, “Some guy named Finn,” he ground out.
He was annoyed. Walking around downtown Sunnydale was delightful, what with all the little, independently owned mom ‘n’ pop shops. But he couldn’t enjoy any of them because all he could concentrate on was this Finn character and who he was and what he meant to Buffy.
“Riley? What did he want?” Buffy’s slightly annoyed tone please him immensely.
“Don’t rightly know, don’t rightly care, what’s good here?” he picked up the menu and began to debate the merits of the BLT versus that of the grilled chicken sandwich.
Buffy put down hers, “Well he must have said something,” she insisted.
“Nope,” Spike answered instantly, continuing to peruse his menu, “came lookin’ for Dawn, even brought flowers for her. Told ‘im she was out to places unknown,” he fibbed tersely. He dropped his menu and looked Buffy in the eyes, “Any more insignificant others I should know about, pet?”
Right then, the waitress came to take their drink orders and to top-off Buffy’s coffee, but she took one look at the two of them in a staredown and she quickly retreated. Buffy, taken aback at his tone, put her forearms on the table and leaned toward him, “Hey, passive aggressive guy, you wanna take it down a few notches?” she hissed, glancing around to see if anyone else was watching the scene he was creating.
“What?” Spike chuckled brusquely. “Can’t take a joke? What?” he groused again when she continued to stare at him.
Buffy sat back in the booth and crossed her arms, “Sounds to me you’re a little jealous.”
“Hmph, jealous my ass. How was the dress shop?”
His hairpin turn of subject made her smile, but she said nothing. “Fine. I can’t believe it was so simple. As maid of honor I got to pick my own style. Though, Dawn wouldn’t let me get black. ‘Oh, Buffy, that is sooooo New York,’” she captured her sister’s voice perfectly, “‘And not in a good way.’” She returned to her own cadence, “I can’t believe the wedding’s tomorrow already,” she sighed.
Spike thought he saw a bit of remorse in her eyes. “Regret not coming a little earlier, pet?”
“No!” she sang at his raised eyebrow. He kept looking at her. “Seriously, Spike, I do not want to stay here any longer than absolutely necessary . . . now where’s our waitress?”
TBC
When Buffy opened her eyes the next morning, she was immediately met by expressive blue ones that must have been studying her for quite some time.
“ ‘M sorry about last night,” he rumbled, his early morning accent thicker than usual. He was sitting on the floor with his chin propped up on her bed, looking like a guilty little schoolboy with a riot of curls. The word “adorable” flittered through her sleep-addled brain.
“Me too,” she replied honestly, pulling back the covers and scooting over, inviting him to snuggle. This wasn’t the first time they’ve shared a bed. But it was usually when one of them had drunk too much or was forlorn about some aspect of their lives. They’d lie in bed, commiserating, before drifting off to sleep. He’d tried to cop a feel several times, but that was beside the point. “You’re nice enough to come all the way out here with me and then . . . .” she drifted off as she looked around her childhood bedroom. “Wait, how did I get here?”
“You better cut back on those pancakes your mum makes, luv, you weigh a ton,” he joked.
She shoved his shoulder, “Shut up. You just want to keep me in you debt.”
“And one of these days I’m gonna cash in,” he said rolling out of bed, feet hitting the floor. He stood before her in grey sweatpants and a green t-shirt. He clapped his hands together, “So, itinerary for today? There has to be an Apple Festival or a clog dancing performance to go to or something.”
Buffy smiled at his sarcasm and flung herself out of bed and quickly shifted through a drawer before settling on an outfit and taking it into the bathroom in her bedroom to get changed. She continued their conversation through the closed door.
“More like dress fittings. It’ll be me, Dawn, my mother, and some mysterious girl named Janice who I’ve heard everything about but have yet to meet. All would be very boring to you. You can hang around at the house and I could meet you afterward for lunch, though.”
He nodded, “Sounds good.” Buffy gathered her things and opened the door to reenter her bedroom, only to almost drop them on the floor when she took in his state of undress in the middle of her floor. His pants were just being pulled up over his hips and his chest was bare.
“What are you doing!?” she averted her eyes a little. Not like she hadn’t seen him shirtless or in his boxers before, but every time she did get a glimpse, she didn’t like the summersaults that assaulted her stomach.
“Getting dressed,” he replied, like she was a complete idiot.
“What if my mother walked in here?” she bent over and threw his shirt at his bare chest, which he caught.
“Then she’d get a free show,” he twirled his shirt around his head like an expert, then laughed when she turned three shades of red. “And since when have you been a blusher?”
Buffy gasped, “I am not blushing,” then felt a new wave of heat radiate down her neck. Since when WAS she a blusher? She shook her head violently, “Agh! You’re impossible. Get dressed, find yourself something to eat, DON’T snoop through my things, and I’ll talk to you in a couple of hours.” Instructions complete, she turned and left the room, and the house, and him.
Three hours later found Spike reclined on the Summers’ couch; his bare feet up on the coffee table and eating chips. He was home alone and taking full advantage. He glanced around the living room. He could honestly say he felt at home here. The big house with its worn furniture and years of memory scratched into the hard wood floors. It was such a contrast to his rather sparse, antiseptic living space in his rent controlled New York apartment. Granted, it was rather posh where city apartments were concerned, but it didn’t feel like home – just a place where his bed happened to be.
Unlike Buffy, Spike could see himself living in a small town someday. One where everyone knew their neighbors, births and weddings were town affairs and babysitters were trustworthy and easy to find. In New York, his neighbors were an up and coming rock star who was never home and a few beatniks who had yet to realize that communism was just not happening in this country. But he didn’t have any plans on telling Buffy about his warm and fuzzy feelings. She’d castrate him. Buffy was still pretty bitter about where she came from but Spike couldn’t see how. Seemed like an alright place to him. Don’t get him wrong, Spike loved being a big city boy who knew how to quickly and correctly place an order at Starbucks and was in no particular hurry to slow down. Sunnydale was just a nice change of pace, is all. He ruminated on all of this during commercial breaks of an A-Team marathon. Five episodes in, a knock on the door tore him away from Mad Murdock and company.
The door opened and a burly, Boy Scout type stood on the porch. White teeth and a bouquet of daisies met the look of indifference on Spike’s face. This must be one of the townies Buffy talked about, come around to see the bride-to-me most likely.
“Is Buffy in?” the guy asked, a hopeful little look in his eye as he desperately tried to hide the look of disappointment that came over his face when Buffy didn’t answer the door.
Spike stood a little straighter. Well if this pillock was here for Buffy, Captain Cardboard wasn’t getting far. Besides, he thought, sneering at the spray clutched in the man’s big knuckles, Buffy preferred roses, not daisies.
“No. Who are you?” Spike asked, squaring his body to further block the doorway when the boyscout’s gaze wandered over his right shoulder.
The boy flung out his hand, “Riley Finn, I’m an old friend of Buffy’s. You must be Buffy’s city friend in for the wedding.” At Spike’s raised eyebrow, he continued. “Word travels fast in this town,” he offered.
“I bet it does,” Spike replied in monotone. They stared at each other in silence. Spike watched as Finn rocked on his heels awkwardly. And Spike wasn’t about to save him.
“I offered to help set up for the ceremony,” Riley explained. The statement was met with silence. “So . . . when is Buffy expected back?”
“Don’t rightly know. She’s going to call when she’s done and I’m meetin’ her for lunch.” Spike purposely left the answer ambiguous. Let ‘im come to his own conclusions. Spike got his desired response when Finn’s eyes narrowed in what must signal his thinking process.
“I’m sorry, you said you were . . . ?”
“Spike,” he answered, purposefully using his nickname. There, let that spread around Small Town, USA. “She’ll see ya at the next barn raising,” Spike closed the door in Finn’s face and turned on his heels, pacing back to the couch.
He had changed his mind.
Small towns blow.
“I don’t like your boyfriend, pet,” Spike slid into the shiny, red diner booth across from Buffy.
She looked up from her plastic menu, puzzled, “My boyfr . . .”
“Ranger Joe came to call this afternoon,” Spike announced, interrupting her. God as his witness, he was not going to utter that name.
“Ranger Who?” she shook her head, her lips still puckered at the drawn out ‘who.’ “Spike, what are you talking about?”
Spike sighed, “Some guy named Finn,” he ground out.
He was annoyed. Walking around downtown Sunnydale was delightful, what with all the little, independently owned mom ‘n’ pop shops. But he couldn’t enjoy any of them because all he could concentrate on was this Finn character and who he was and what he meant to Buffy.
“Riley? What did he want?” Buffy’s slightly annoyed tone please him immensely.
“Don’t rightly know, don’t rightly care, what’s good here?” he picked up the menu and began to debate the merits of the BLT versus that of the grilled chicken sandwich.
Buffy put down hers, “Well he must have said something,” she insisted.
“Nope,” Spike answered instantly, continuing to peruse his menu, “came lookin’ for Dawn, even brought flowers for her. Told ‘im she was out to places unknown,” he fibbed tersely. He dropped his menu and looked Buffy in the eyes, “Any more insignificant others I should know about, pet?”
Right then, the waitress came to take their drink orders and to top-off Buffy’s coffee, but she took one look at the two of them in a staredown and she quickly retreated. Buffy, taken aback at his tone, put her forearms on the table and leaned toward him, “Hey, passive aggressive guy, you wanna take it down a few notches?” she hissed, glancing around to see if anyone else was watching the scene he was creating.
“What?” Spike chuckled brusquely. “Can’t take a joke? What?” he groused again when she continued to stare at him.
Buffy sat back in the booth and crossed her arms, “Sounds to me you’re a little jealous.”
“Hmph, jealous my ass. How was the dress shop?”
His hairpin turn of subject made her smile, but she said nothing. “Fine. I can’t believe it was so simple. As maid of honor I got to pick my own style. Though, Dawn wouldn’t let me get black. ‘Oh, Buffy, that is sooooo New York,’” she captured her sister’s voice perfectly, “‘And not in a good way.’” She returned to her own cadence, “I can’t believe the wedding’s tomorrow already,” she sighed.
Spike thought he saw a bit of remorse in her eyes. “Regret not coming a little earlier, pet?”
“No!” she sang at his raised eyebrow. He kept looking at her. “Seriously, Spike, I do not want to stay here any longer than absolutely necessary . . . now where’s our waitress?”
TBC
Spuffy: What You're Waiting For -- Chapter Three
CHAPTER 3 –
“What do you think of the word ‘choleric’?” She was sprawled out on her bed, laptop in front of her, contemplating her newest chapter on the unjustified anger of men when their cheating is discovered.
“It’s pretentious,” Spike retorted, his eyes never leaving the collection of yearbooks and photo albums he had discovered hidden away in the depths of her closet. He was reclined on the floor with his back against her bed, lazily flipping through each of them. “Who’s Will?”
“Huh?” she asked, only half paying attention to him.
“Buffy,” he recited out of the yearbook in front of him, “I love you more than anyone and I’m so glad I met you. Blah, blah, blah. Love Will.” He craned his neck to face her, “Who’s Will?”
“My high school lover,” she answered absentmindedly, concentration not leaving the computer screen.
“What!? Buffy, this is your sophomore yearbook,” he pointed, “It’s says here he loves some bloke named Xander too. What kind of freaky shit were you into, Summers?”
At his tone, Buffy tore her eyes from her Word document. He was really starting to get worked up.
“Will,” she emphasized, “Is short for Willow. I was joking about the lover thing.” She reconsidered, “Well, she is gay now so . . .”
“Oh,” he replied, considerably calmer. “Well then who’s Xander?”
“Xander and Willow were my best friends from high school,” she gestured to a photo next to him on the floor for proof. “I haven’t seen or talked to them in years,” her sentence trailed off, a flicker of sadness behind her eyes, but she quickly shook it away, back to her writing.
Spike lifted the picture in the air, studying it, “You going to look them up while you’re in town?”
Buffy nodded, “I should. They are coming to the wedding.”
Spike raised his brow, “Sure are a close knit bunch around here, aren’t you?”
“Part of our small town charm,” she answered, noticeably unimpressed by her home.
Spike glanced at the clock, “Wait, weren’t you supposed to be shopping for bridesmaid dresses or something?”
“Not until tomorrow,” she answered, “I didn’t want to go, but unless I want to get stuck with some tapioca nightmare, I’m going to have to suck it up. Dawn’s agreed to let me pick it out myself if I grace her with my presence.”
“Buffy! William! Dinner’s ready!” Her mother’s voice floated up the stairs.
Buffy turned to him in shock, “William? You let her call you William?”
Spike threw the books he was pouring over aside, getting up from the floor, “I told her she could call me that if she wanted to,” he shrugged, offering her a hand to help her up from the bed.
“You don’t let me call you William,” Buffy accused indignantly, following him down the stairs.
He shook his head, “I never said you couldn’t. You just don’t.”
“Huh,” Buffy huffed, mulling over his words in her head.
Thirty minutes later, her family was predictably engrossed in the many facets of William “Spike” Giles. Buffy poked at her mashed potatoes while questions were volleyed around the table.
“Where did you go to school, Spike?” her mother asked, all eyes on him.
“Oxford. I majored in English Literature,” he replied, relaxed. Too relaxed for being in a room full of nosey people he’s known less than twenty-four hours, Buffy thought.
“And you chose to be an editor? Why didn’t you become a writer?”
Buffy scoffed, “If you saw the office he has and his bank statement you wouldn’t be asking that question.”
“You make good money?” Joyce inquired after shooting her daughter a disappointed look at her rudeness.
“Yeah, and half of it’s due to me,” Buffy teased.
Spike rolled his eyes, “Yes, Joyce, the money is good, and I do freelance on the side. Being an editor allows me to write only when I want to and about the subjects I choose. It allows me to be picky and takes the pressure off. That way,” he added, a mischievous smirk on his face, as he looked at Buffy, “I don’t turn into an irrational phobic mess like your eldest here.”
“Yeah, who’s laughing all the way to the bank in her Jimmy Choos,” Buffy shot back, making a show of forking her salad into her mouth. “If my current lifestyle has been working so well for me so far, I see no need to change it,” she snipped.
Her mother leaned into the table, “Yes, but Buffy, when are you going to settle down and get married?”
“When I find a man who has more balls than I do,” she deadpanned.
Buffy was used to these remarks. When she had first told her family she was moving to New York to be a writer, you would have thought she had denounced God and declared herself a Satanist. The big city was a big scary thing for her family – a mysterious place. For months afterward, Joyce had told the inquisitive neighbors that her oldest daughter had gone to visit relatives, hoping Buffy would see the light and return home. And, just in case Buffy needed any more encouragement, every few days another envelope from her mother would arrive with newspaper clippings from The New York Times she had picked up from a bookstore. All the headlines were about rape, murder, or larceny.
“Can we be excused?” Buffy asked. Not waiting for a response she grabbed Spike’s arm, wrenched him out of his chair, and led him out of the kitchen.
Hours later found them outside on the side porch nursing beers. Buffy sat on the railing and Spike across from her, leaning against the house.
“What about your dad? Is he coming to the wedding?” Spike took a swig from his bottle.
Buffy huffed, “We’ll see,” she said doubtfully.
“Don’t you want him to pull through?”
“I don’t want him to suddenly pull through, no,” she looked off into the trees of her backyard.
Spike smirked a little. Buffy’s capacity to be self-centered amazed him sometimes. So did her capacity for complete selflessness. It was all or nothing with her. “Well good thing this wedding has nothing to do with you and what you want then, isn’t it?”
She whipped her head around, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
He shrugged, “Means your sis and mum want him there, so he should be.”
Buffy squared her shoulders, “But it’s the same thing every damn time he comes! He disappears to Spain for a few years with some secretary, shows up for one family event, and instantly he’s the most wonderful father and man on the planet! It makes no sense!”
“So glad you didn’t come out of the divorce bitter,” he commented dryly.
“Just like you handled your mother’s death so well?” It was a low blow but she didn’t care. That was a dicey piece of his history that not many were privy to and she knew it. “He left and turned my mother into a statistic.”
“Divorce made her a statistic? You convince thousands of women a year to leave their husbands just with one of those little books of yours!” he marveled.
“They are in unhappy marriages! They are desperate . . .”
“No,” he drawled, “you’re desperate. They are in flawed relationships. The first sign of a problem, even if it’s as trivial as leaving the toilet seat up, you’re running scared. And you’re teaching millions of women to do same.”
“What? Am I teaching the women you date to not put up with your crap and you’re all pissed? For a man who goes through women like socks, you fight an awful lot.”
“And for a woman who claims to have no intimacy problems with men you’re awfully quick to give up on them.”
“I help women get out of flawed and abusive relationships.”
“But you don’t write for that crowd. No, you write for women like you,” he took a few steps toward her, examining her, “mid to late twenties and unwilling to stay and work for it. You want it handed to you with a nice little bow.”
“I do not.”
“Oh, but you . . .”
“Stop it,” she ground out, holding up her hand. “Stop pretending you know every little facet of me because you don’t,” she stood and pushed past him into the house.
“Fine. ‘Cause this fight we’re having is probably going to be a chapter in your book!” he shouted after her, cursing under his breath. He took a couple long gulps of his beer, emptying it. He looked at the bottle, not really seeing the label. It was that tone. That cold, dead tone she used. Shouting he could stand. She could yell at him all she wanted, it didn’t faze him. It was when she turned all ice queen on him that really pissed him off, turning all her emotions off and completely disengaging. From him. From life. Channeling all his frustration and rage, he chucked the bottle into the woods, hearing the satisfying shattering of glass.
An uneasiness Spike couldn’t explain woke him a couple hours later. He lifted his head from the mattress on Buffy’s floor. There had been an argument about his sleeping arrangements earlier in the day. When Buffy’s mom found out Buffy had banished him to the cot in the basement, she chastised her daughter for a good solid hour. Buffy had given in, apologized to her mother for such blatant mistreatment of their houseguest, and offered to make him a bed on the sofa. Joyce had shot down that idea right off the bat because A. There was a draft in the living room and B. The rest of the family (Buffy excluded) were early risers and would be disturbing his sleep that he so honorably earned in his nine to five desk job. So, here he was on an extra mattress piled full of more pillows and blankets than one would ever need in California, next to Buffy’s bed.
A bed which, at the moment she was not in. A glance at the clock proved his suspicion of the late hour. Even Buffy, who heralded the genius that came to her late at night, usually forced herself into bed by now.
After their fight, possibly one of their ugliest (and that was saying something) Spike had stormed upstairs and fallen into a fitful sleep. Spike stilled and listened for any rustling in the house and heard absolutely nothing. He tried to force himself back to sleep. She probably bunked with her sis for the night, too pissed off to be in the same room as him. But something propelled him up and off of his comfy bed and his bare feet hit the cold wood floor of the hallway.
The thought of peeking in Dawn’s room to see if Buffy was there crossed his mind, but the potential shadiness of the action convinced him otherwise. Padding down the stairs as quietly as he could manage, he hit the foyer and hung a right to the living room. He was rewarded by finding a lightly snoring Buffy asleep at her laptop at the desk in the living room, her head and arm over the keys and her screensaver (a series of pictures which included some of the two of them) floating across the screen.
He stood and watched her for a moment, but took mercy on her for the crick in her neck she was likely to have in the morning. He approached her and gently rubbed her bare arm, whispering her name. When she didn’t budge an inch, he repeated her name a little louder, accompanying it with a brush of her hair out of her face. Her face scrunched up in agitation, the little crinkles appeared between her brows and her lips visibly pouted. A small growl made its way from the back of her throat. Spike decided that he was getting nowhere fast. And even if he did succeed in waking her, he wasn’t sure he wanted to deal with the mood she was likely to be in.
Mind made up, he softly slid his hand under her head, trying not to jostle her too much. Clearing her head from her keyboard, he powered off the notebook and closed it. Now without the light from the screen, moonlight singularly illuminated the room. Sliding her from the chair, he easily scooped her up into his arms. Still sleeping, Buffy leaned into his chest, one hand bunching into his t-shirt. He carried her upstairs and back into her bedroom. Pulling down the covers, he managed to slide her into bed without waking her. But just before he settled himself back onto his makeshift bed, he tucked the hair behind her ear and kissed her forehead.
“‘Night Buffy.”
TBC
A/N: The “more balls than I do” line was taken from Salma Hayek.
“What do you think of the word ‘choleric’?” She was sprawled out on her bed, laptop in front of her, contemplating her newest chapter on the unjustified anger of men when their cheating is discovered.
“It’s pretentious,” Spike retorted, his eyes never leaving the collection of yearbooks and photo albums he had discovered hidden away in the depths of her closet. He was reclined on the floor with his back against her bed, lazily flipping through each of them. “Who’s Will?”
“Huh?” she asked, only half paying attention to him.
“Buffy,” he recited out of the yearbook in front of him, “I love you more than anyone and I’m so glad I met you. Blah, blah, blah. Love Will.” He craned his neck to face her, “Who’s Will?”
“My high school lover,” she answered absentmindedly, concentration not leaving the computer screen.
“What!? Buffy, this is your sophomore yearbook,” he pointed, “It’s says here he loves some bloke named Xander too. What kind of freaky shit were you into, Summers?”
At his tone, Buffy tore her eyes from her Word document. He was really starting to get worked up.
“Will,” she emphasized, “Is short for Willow. I was joking about the lover thing.” She reconsidered, “Well, she is gay now so . . .”
“Oh,” he replied, considerably calmer. “Well then who’s Xander?”
“Xander and Willow were my best friends from high school,” she gestured to a photo next to him on the floor for proof. “I haven’t seen or talked to them in years,” her sentence trailed off, a flicker of sadness behind her eyes, but she quickly shook it away, back to her writing.
Spike lifted the picture in the air, studying it, “You going to look them up while you’re in town?”
Buffy nodded, “I should. They are coming to the wedding.”
Spike raised his brow, “Sure are a close knit bunch around here, aren’t you?”
“Part of our small town charm,” she answered, noticeably unimpressed by her home.
Spike glanced at the clock, “Wait, weren’t you supposed to be shopping for bridesmaid dresses or something?”
“Not until tomorrow,” she answered, “I didn’t want to go, but unless I want to get stuck with some tapioca nightmare, I’m going to have to suck it up. Dawn’s agreed to let me pick it out myself if I grace her with my presence.”
“Buffy! William! Dinner’s ready!” Her mother’s voice floated up the stairs.
Buffy turned to him in shock, “William? You let her call you William?”
Spike threw the books he was pouring over aside, getting up from the floor, “I told her she could call me that if she wanted to,” he shrugged, offering her a hand to help her up from the bed.
“You don’t let me call you William,” Buffy accused indignantly, following him down the stairs.
He shook his head, “I never said you couldn’t. You just don’t.”
“Huh,” Buffy huffed, mulling over his words in her head.
Thirty minutes later, her family was predictably engrossed in the many facets of William “Spike” Giles. Buffy poked at her mashed potatoes while questions were volleyed around the table.
“Where did you go to school, Spike?” her mother asked, all eyes on him.
“Oxford. I majored in English Literature,” he replied, relaxed. Too relaxed for being in a room full of nosey people he’s known less than twenty-four hours, Buffy thought.
“And you chose to be an editor? Why didn’t you become a writer?”
Buffy scoffed, “If you saw the office he has and his bank statement you wouldn’t be asking that question.”
“You make good money?” Joyce inquired after shooting her daughter a disappointed look at her rudeness.
“Yeah, and half of it’s due to me,” Buffy teased.
Spike rolled his eyes, “Yes, Joyce, the money is good, and I do freelance on the side. Being an editor allows me to write only when I want to and about the subjects I choose. It allows me to be picky and takes the pressure off. That way,” he added, a mischievous smirk on his face, as he looked at Buffy, “I don’t turn into an irrational phobic mess like your eldest here.”
“Yeah, who’s laughing all the way to the bank in her Jimmy Choos,” Buffy shot back, making a show of forking her salad into her mouth. “If my current lifestyle has been working so well for me so far, I see no need to change it,” she snipped.
Her mother leaned into the table, “Yes, but Buffy, when are you going to settle down and get married?”
“When I find a man who has more balls than I do,” she deadpanned.
Buffy was used to these remarks. When she had first told her family she was moving to New York to be a writer, you would have thought she had denounced God and declared herself a Satanist. The big city was a big scary thing for her family – a mysterious place. For months afterward, Joyce had told the inquisitive neighbors that her oldest daughter had gone to visit relatives, hoping Buffy would see the light and return home. And, just in case Buffy needed any more encouragement, every few days another envelope from her mother would arrive with newspaper clippings from The New York Times she had picked up from a bookstore. All the headlines were about rape, murder, or larceny.
“Can we be excused?” Buffy asked. Not waiting for a response she grabbed Spike’s arm, wrenched him out of his chair, and led him out of the kitchen.
Hours later found them outside on the side porch nursing beers. Buffy sat on the railing and Spike across from her, leaning against the house.
“What about your dad? Is he coming to the wedding?” Spike took a swig from his bottle.
Buffy huffed, “We’ll see,” she said doubtfully.
“Don’t you want him to pull through?”
“I don’t want him to suddenly pull through, no,” she looked off into the trees of her backyard.
Spike smirked a little. Buffy’s capacity to be self-centered amazed him sometimes. So did her capacity for complete selflessness. It was all or nothing with her. “Well good thing this wedding has nothing to do with you and what you want then, isn’t it?”
She whipped her head around, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
He shrugged, “Means your sis and mum want him there, so he should be.”
Buffy squared her shoulders, “But it’s the same thing every damn time he comes! He disappears to Spain for a few years with some secretary, shows up for one family event, and instantly he’s the most wonderful father and man on the planet! It makes no sense!”
“So glad you didn’t come out of the divorce bitter,” he commented dryly.
“Just like you handled your mother’s death so well?” It was a low blow but she didn’t care. That was a dicey piece of his history that not many were privy to and she knew it. “He left and turned my mother into a statistic.”
“Divorce made her a statistic? You convince thousands of women a year to leave their husbands just with one of those little books of yours!” he marveled.
“They are in unhappy marriages! They are desperate . . .”
“No,” he drawled, “you’re desperate. They are in flawed relationships. The first sign of a problem, even if it’s as trivial as leaving the toilet seat up, you’re running scared. And you’re teaching millions of women to do same.”
“What? Am I teaching the women you date to not put up with your crap and you’re all pissed? For a man who goes through women like socks, you fight an awful lot.”
“And for a woman who claims to have no intimacy problems with men you’re awfully quick to give up on them.”
“I help women get out of flawed and abusive relationships.”
“But you don’t write for that crowd. No, you write for women like you,” he took a few steps toward her, examining her, “mid to late twenties and unwilling to stay and work for it. You want it handed to you with a nice little bow.”
“I do not.”
“Oh, but you . . .”
“Stop it,” she ground out, holding up her hand. “Stop pretending you know every little facet of me because you don’t,” she stood and pushed past him into the house.
“Fine. ‘Cause this fight we’re having is probably going to be a chapter in your book!” he shouted after her, cursing under his breath. He took a couple long gulps of his beer, emptying it. He looked at the bottle, not really seeing the label. It was that tone. That cold, dead tone she used. Shouting he could stand. She could yell at him all she wanted, it didn’t faze him. It was when she turned all ice queen on him that really pissed him off, turning all her emotions off and completely disengaging. From him. From life. Channeling all his frustration and rage, he chucked the bottle into the woods, hearing the satisfying shattering of glass.
An uneasiness Spike couldn’t explain woke him a couple hours later. He lifted his head from the mattress on Buffy’s floor. There had been an argument about his sleeping arrangements earlier in the day. When Buffy’s mom found out Buffy had banished him to the cot in the basement, she chastised her daughter for a good solid hour. Buffy had given in, apologized to her mother for such blatant mistreatment of their houseguest, and offered to make him a bed on the sofa. Joyce had shot down that idea right off the bat because A. There was a draft in the living room and B. The rest of the family (Buffy excluded) were early risers and would be disturbing his sleep that he so honorably earned in his nine to five desk job. So, here he was on an extra mattress piled full of more pillows and blankets than one would ever need in California, next to Buffy’s bed.
A bed which, at the moment she was not in. A glance at the clock proved his suspicion of the late hour. Even Buffy, who heralded the genius that came to her late at night, usually forced herself into bed by now.
After their fight, possibly one of their ugliest (and that was saying something) Spike had stormed upstairs and fallen into a fitful sleep. Spike stilled and listened for any rustling in the house and heard absolutely nothing. He tried to force himself back to sleep. She probably bunked with her sis for the night, too pissed off to be in the same room as him. But something propelled him up and off of his comfy bed and his bare feet hit the cold wood floor of the hallway.
The thought of peeking in Dawn’s room to see if Buffy was there crossed his mind, but the potential shadiness of the action convinced him otherwise. Padding down the stairs as quietly as he could manage, he hit the foyer and hung a right to the living room. He was rewarded by finding a lightly snoring Buffy asleep at her laptop at the desk in the living room, her head and arm over the keys and her screensaver (a series of pictures which included some of the two of them) floating across the screen.
He stood and watched her for a moment, but took mercy on her for the crick in her neck she was likely to have in the morning. He approached her and gently rubbed her bare arm, whispering her name. When she didn’t budge an inch, he repeated her name a little louder, accompanying it with a brush of her hair out of her face. Her face scrunched up in agitation, the little crinkles appeared between her brows and her lips visibly pouted. A small growl made its way from the back of her throat. Spike decided that he was getting nowhere fast. And even if he did succeed in waking her, he wasn’t sure he wanted to deal with the mood she was likely to be in.
Mind made up, he softly slid his hand under her head, trying not to jostle her too much. Clearing her head from her keyboard, he powered off the notebook and closed it. Now without the light from the screen, moonlight singularly illuminated the room. Sliding her from the chair, he easily scooped her up into his arms. Still sleeping, Buffy leaned into his chest, one hand bunching into his t-shirt. He carried her upstairs and back into her bedroom. Pulling down the covers, he managed to slide her into bed without waking her. But just before he settled himself back onto his makeshift bed, he tucked the hair behind her ear and kissed her forehead.
“‘Night Buffy.”
TBC
A/N: The “more balls than I do” line was taken from Salma Hayek.
Spuffy: What You're Waiting For -- Chapter Two
CHAPTER 2 –
“Are you daft? Buffy, I am not going to your sister’s wedding with you. I don’t even know your sister.”
“Neither will half the random relatives there,” she defended.
Her nonchalance flabbergasted him, “Summers, it’s on the other side of the bloody country!” He whipped his arm out for effect, drawing the attention of the tourists who weren’t accustomed to the crazy locals. “Chances are you’ll whip out a pen in the middle of the ceremony and start taking notes on all the wrong reasons to be getting married in this day and age. Turn it into a book,” he grumbled, beginning to walk away.
He was crumbling and she knew it. He always averted those expressive blue eyes of his when he was weakening. “Which is all the more reason for you to be there with me,” she argued. “We will have been working on the book all they way up to the ceremony itself, therefore I will feel no need to be working on it during.” She gave him her winningest smile, satisfied she had stated her case.
“You’re off your bird,” he threw out, shaking his head.
ONE WEEK LATER . . .
“Buffy! You didn’t tell me you were bringing your boyfriend!” Joyce Summers exclaimed after the front door of the house on Revello Drive swung open.
“He’s not my . . .” Joyce’s eldest tried to explain but was unceremoniously pushed to the side by her relative. Buffy was left to stand idle in the doorway as her mother fawned over her new houseguest, ushering him into the kitchen with promises of hot chocolate with little marshmallows. Buffy jumped as a pair of long arms banded themselves around her waist.
“You came!” Dawn squealed.
“Of course I came,” Buffy replied, as if there had never been a question of her attendance.
Her sister didn’t seem so convinced.
“Come on, I wanna show you something,” Dawn started up the stairs with Buffy at her heels.
Dawn made a ceremony of opening up the door of Buffy’s childhood bedroom. Whereas the eldest Summers daughter expected to be greeted by her dated New Kids On the Block poster, she was instead met by a big conglomerate of white silk and lace taking up the majority of the bed.
“Isn’t it gorgeous?” Dawn exclaimed, picking up the wedding dress and twirling about the room with it.
“It’s something alright,” Buffy replied noncommittally.
Dawn plopped herself and the dress down onto the bed dejectedly and Buffy instantly regretted her lack of enthusiasm.
“Buffy, I know weddings are your thing and stuff, but can’t MY wedding be an exception? I really want you to be okay with this.”
“I’m happy for you, Dawnie, really,” Buffy said with true sincerity, wrapping her sister in a hug.
“Good,” she nodded breaking the embrace, satisfied for the time being, “Now, who’s the sex on legs downstairs?”
“Dawn!” Buffy said appalled.
She received a well-practiced eye roll from her sister, “Oh, come on, Buffy, I’m getting married in mere days. You don’t think me and Connor have never . . .”
Buffy’s eyes widened comically, “I am so not hearing this.” She placed her hands over her ears for emphasis.
Dawn laughed at her sister’s discomfort. “Come on, who is he? And don’t tell me he’s just your editor. I know you just told mom that.”
“Really, that’s all there is,” Buffy insisted, running her fingers over Dawn’s dress. She got a doubtful look from the bride-to-be. “Believe me, he’s only showing interest because I’m uncharted territory.”
“I don’t think so,” Dawn sang, prancing out of the room.
Buffy sighed, moving to clear the bed of wedding paraphernalia so she would have somewhere to sleep. The clocked glared a quarter past midnight, and Buffy yawned, exhausted from their numerous connecting flights.
A light knock on the doorframe brought her attention to Spike leaning in the doorway, the top few buttons of his sky blue dress shirt undone, showing off his collarbone.
“You’re family’s great,” he noted, entering the bedroom, not bothering to hide his blatant examination of her belongings, “Though your mother won’t stop trying to feed me.”
He reached around behind her, extracting some long ago forgotten item. With a quirked eyebrow he brought to her face a stuffed pig that had seen better days.
“Mr. Gordo,” she answered his unvoiced question.
“Of course,” he replied. He tossed the pig into the air, “I bet this little pig has witness all sorts of goings on in this room, curled up in bed with you at night . . .” he let the suggestive remark hang there.
“No, Spike, only your girlfriends would take part in bestiality,” she shot back.
Spike tilted his head, as if considering her for the first time and entertaining an epiphany simultaneously, “You say I’m a whoring bastard like all the other men in the world. What have I ever shown you that would lead you to crown me with that dubious title? Have I ever paraded girls in and out of my office? Received numerous phone calls in one night?”
No, he hadn’t done any of those things. In all reality, she couldn’t even name one of his girlfriends. Had he even had any since she’s known him? Well, she had caught him flirting with another author, Faith, but Buffy knew Faith flirted with everyone and it hadn’t gone beyond that. Besides, the dark fiction writer had moved out to L.A. since then and nobody had heard from her.
Buffy shook her head, unable to come up with a response, “You’re a pig, Spike.”
Spike smiled, “No, I believe that honor goes to Mr. Gordo.” He handed the stuffed swine to her. “Just something to think about, Summers. Goodnight.”
He turned his back on her and shut the door, leaving her confused.
TBC
“Are you daft? Buffy, I am not going to your sister’s wedding with you. I don’t even know your sister.”
“Neither will half the random relatives there,” she defended.
Her nonchalance flabbergasted him, “Summers, it’s on the other side of the bloody country!” He whipped his arm out for effect, drawing the attention of the tourists who weren’t accustomed to the crazy locals. “Chances are you’ll whip out a pen in the middle of the ceremony and start taking notes on all the wrong reasons to be getting married in this day and age. Turn it into a book,” he grumbled, beginning to walk away.
He was crumbling and she knew it. He always averted those expressive blue eyes of his when he was weakening. “Which is all the more reason for you to be there with me,” she argued. “We will have been working on the book all they way up to the ceremony itself, therefore I will feel no need to be working on it during.” She gave him her winningest smile, satisfied she had stated her case.
“You’re off your bird,” he threw out, shaking his head.
ONE WEEK LATER . . .
“Buffy! You didn’t tell me you were bringing your boyfriend!” Joyce Summers exclaimed after the front door of the house on Revello Drive swung open.
“He’s not my . . .” Joyce’s eldest tried to explain but was unceremoniously pushed to the side by her relative. Buffy was left to stand idle in the doorway as her mother fawned over her new houseguest, ushering him into the kitchen with promises of hot chocolate with little marshmallows. Buffy jumped as a pair of long arms banded themselves around her waist.
“You came!” Dawn squealed.
“Of course I came,” Buffy replied, as if there had never been a question of her attendance.
Her sister didn’t seem so convinced.
“Come on, I wanna show you something,” Dawn started up the stairs with Buffy at her heels.
Dawn made a ceremony of opening up the door of Buffy’s childhood bedroom. Whereas the eldest Summers daughter expected to be greeted by her dated New Kids On the Block poster, she was instead met by a big conglomerate of white silk and lace taking up the majority of the bed.
“Isn’t it gorgeous?” Dawn exclaimed, picking up the wedding dress and twirling about the room with it.
“It’s something alright,” Buffy replied noncommittally.
Dawn plopped herself and the dress down onto the bed dejectedly and Buffy instantly regretted her lack of enthusiasm.
“Buffy, I know weddings are your thing and stuff, but can’t MY wedding be an exception? I really want you to be okay with this.”
“I’m happy for you, Dawnie, really,” Buffy said with true sincerity, wrapping her sister in a hug.
“Good,” she nodded breaking the embrace, satisfied for the time being, “Now, who’s the sex on legs downstairs?”
“Dawn!” Buffy said appalled.
She received a well-practiced eye roll from her sister, “Oh, come on, Buffy, I’m getting married in mere days. You don’t think me and Connor have never . . .”
Buffy’s eyes widened comically, “I am so not hearing this.” She placed her hands over her ears for emphasis.
Dawn laughed at her sister’s discomfort. “Come on, who is he? And don’t tell me he’s just your editor. I know you just told mom that.”
“Really, that’s all there is,” Buffy insisted, running her fingers over Dawn’s dress. She got a doubtful look from the bride-to-be. “Believe me, he’s only showing interest because I’m uncharted territory.”
“I don’t think so,” Dawn sang, prancing out of the room.
Buffy sighed, moving to clear the bed of wedding paraphernalia so she would have somewhere to sleep. The clocked glared a quarter past midnight, and Buffy yawned, exhausted from their numerous connecting flights.
A light knock on the doorframe brought her attention to Spike leaning in the doorway, the top few buttons of his sky blue dress shirt undone, showing off his collarbone.
“You’re family’s great,” he noted, entering the bedroom, not bothering to hide his blatant examination of her belongings, “Though your mother won’t stop trying to feed me.”
He reached around behind her, extracting some long ago forgotten item. With a quirked eyebrow he brought to her face a stuffed pig that had seen better days.
“Mr. Gordo,” she answered his unvoiced question.
“Of course,” he replied. He tossed the pig into the air, “I bet this little pig has witness all sorts of goings on in this room, curled up in bed with you at night . . .” he let the suggestive remark hang there.
“No, Spike, only your girlfriends would take part in bestiality,” she shot back.
Spike tilted his head, as if considering her for the first time and entertaining an epiphany simultaneously, “You say I’m a whoring bastard like all the other men in the world. What have I ever shown you that would lead you to crown me with that dubious title? Have I ever paraded girls in and out of my office? Received numerous phone calls in one night?”
No, he hadn’t done any of those things. In all reality, she couldn’t even name one of his girlfriends. Had he even had any since she’s known him? Well, she had caught him flirting with another author, Faith, but Buffy knew Faith flirted with everyone and it hadn’t gone beyond that. Besides, the dark fiction writer had moved out to L.A. since then and nobody had heard from her.
Buffy shook her head, unable to come up with a response, “You’re a pig, Spike.”
Spike smiled, “No, I believe that honor goes to Mr. Gordo.” He handed the stuffed swine to her. “Just something to think about, Summers. Goodnight.”
He turned his back on her and shut the door, leaving her confused.
TBC
Spuffy: What You're Waiting For -- Chapter One
TITLE: What You’re Waiting For
RATING: PG-13
SUMMARY: Buffy Summers is a jaded writer. Spike Giles is her editor. When Buffy is summoned home for a family affair in the midst of her latest novel, she drags New York back home with her to little ol’ Sunnydale. Her two worlds are going to collide. And nothing will ever be the same.
CHAPTER 1 –
Buffy Summers yawned, re-crossing her legs in the plush leather chair on which she perched. Wishing she would have brought a magazine, she took to glancing about the room, searching for some aspect that she hadn’t noticed before. The rectangular office she sat in was more than familiar. She could map it out in her head – a wooden door led into the deep red toned room, an appropriate color for its dramatic owner. Its décor was minimal. A fireplace was built into the wall behind her. Swanky was an appropriate term. Only in New York.
Across from her, behind his mahogany desk sat her editor, William “Spike” Giles, both elbows on the smooth top as he hunched over her latest manuscript, thin frames perched on his nose.
Buffy fidgeted her hands in her lap. No matter how many chapters of her writing he read, and he had read every word she had written since she arrived in the Big Apple four years ago, she was still nervous for his opinion.
Sensing movement out of the corner of her eye, her gaze shot to the man in front of her. When he did nothing but turn the page and continue reading, failing to acknowledge her annoyance, she sighed deeply.
Why she subjected herself to this torture time and time again, she didn’t know. A sadist when it came to her writing, Buffy always chose to hang around his office while he poured over her writings. She wouldn’t let him go home to read it, like he did so many of his other clients. She wanted him to read her stuff right then and now and give her instant responses. She had tried leaving her manuscript with him overnight once, but she was so nerve wracked that she couldn’t sleep. Would he spill something on it? Or would someone steal it while he was at the gym? What if he read it and forgot to tell her some important aspect of his review the next time he saw her? He would have read numerous transcripts by then and would have forgotten the whole ambiance of the piece!
Ten minutes later, Buffy held her breath, straightening her spine, and waited for his final verdict.
He looked up at her.
“Your last sentence doesn’t make any sense.”
Making a noise of indignation, Buffy stood defiantly, coming to lean over behind him, reading the sentence he was pointing to. “Yes it does,” she said finally.
Spike shook his head, “It’s grammatically incorrect in so many ways it makes my head spin.”
“I’m experimenting with language,” she defended haughtily. “Who was Shakespeare if not a daring wordsmith?”
He shot her a look, “You’re hardly the Bard. And the fact that you would stoop so low as to use my idol against me does nothing but show your desperation.”
“Well other than the last sentence . . . which we’re keeping,” she added determinedly at his look he gave her over his glasses, moving back around the desk, “what do you think?”
He sighed, pushing the chair out from under him and standing up, “Yet another brilliant manifesto on how all men are pigs who take pride in nothing but sowing our wild oats and lying to you fairer sex.”
“Really?” She squealed, “Brilliant?” she asked, ignoring the rest of his unenthusiastic tirade.
“I’m sure you’ll sell millions, yet again, to the bitter women of the world,” he waved his hand toward the large window to his right, gesturing to the potential buyers that walked the streets ten floors below them, his voice lacking in excitement.
He walked around the perimeter of his desk, gathering up piles of papers and sliding them into his briefcase, Buffy hot on his heels and making her way to follow him out the door.
“So when you say ‘brilliant,’ is that more brilliant than my last book? Or is it a different kind of brilliant, because I think this one has a much different tone. Do you think I may loose some people or am I only in a situation to gain?”
“Summers,” he interrupted, “you are the only writer that I edit who I am also friends with outside work. You are the only one I have given my home address and phone number to. Please don’t make me regret it.” He made his way around the group of people exiting the elevator, entering and pressing the down button. Buffy came to a rest next to him.
“I’m dedicated,” she commented.
“You’re neurotic,” he answered as the doors closed.
Leaving the building, they waited for the light, crossing the congested New York street, Spike in his dark grey Armani suit, coffee in hand, and Buffy hurrying along beside him as much as she could in her sensible brown skirt, suit top, and heels.
“It’s Friday, Summers, why don’t you take some time off and relax? That’s what I plan to do.” They safely navigated the zigzagging taxis and reached the sidewalk. Spike spun in front of her, “Come out with me tonight,” he requested smoothly.
But not smooth enough, as Buffy easily dodged his statement with ease, “I’m afraid your idea of relaxation – a/k/a whoring your way around New York . . .”
“How many years have I known you, Summers?” he interrupted.
“Four and you’ve been trying to get into my pants for three of them,” she countered coolly. “I’m sorry, Spike, but it’s just not my idea of a good time.” She moved to go around him, but he blocked her path.
“I’ll show you enough good times to fill two of those books of yours,” he stated cockily, giving her a promisingly heated look that, for a split second, had her thinking twice. But years of practice had her brushing off the notion as ludicrous within seconds.
She looked at him, astounded by his persistence, “Where does this misguided optimism of yours come from?”
“Who was it?” he challenged, ignoring her question.
She shook her head in confusion, “Who was who?” She continued her way down the street.
“The man who ruined you for the rest of us,” he said, following her.
“For the rest of you?” she balked, “Like I’m some kind of buffet?”
Truthfully, there hadn’t been that many given the chance to ‘ruin her’. But those who had had been doosies. Firstly, there had been Angel. Who, to make a long and very melodramatic story short, left her after they graduated because he knew ‘it was best for her’. For about five seconds, there had been Parker, who had come closest to breaking her spirit. And then there was Riley, who had had the misguided notion that men were to protect women. When he discovered that Buffy was strong and independent enough to take care of herself and didn’t need to rely on him in any way, he bolted to places unknown. All these men and, as some New York shrinks would suggest, her father, left her with a jaded (and some would say bitter) outlook on romance. But the common factor of all of them? She had been perfectly content until they had decided it was over.
“Well you just wait for my next chapter,” she warned Spike. “It has to do with my friend Willow’s first love. First, she catches him in bed with another woman. Actually, it was the floor, but anyway, he up and leaves her without so much as saying goodbye and . . .”
The ringing of her cell phone interrupted her.
“Hello?” she answered brightly, only for her voice to drop into an annoyed anger, “Oh, hi. She’s what!? When? No, I absolutely cannot. This is unacceptable.” There was a pause as the person on the other line stated their case. “You know what? Fine.” She slammed the phone shut.
“Arch nemesis?” Spike questioned nodding to her phone, noting her hostile tone.
“Mother,” she answered in a huff. “I have to go home for my sister’s wedding in two weeks and this is the kind of warning I get.”
“Shotgun wedding?” he questioned the abruptness of the nuptials.
“No, we all had a pretty good idea this was coming. Since they met two years ago they’ve been joined at the hip.” Spike detected a hint of snarl in her voice.
“You don’t sound very happy for her.”
“They’re twenty -- much too young to be getting married.”
Spike shrugged, “They found each other and want to start their life together sooner rather than later. What’s so wrong with that?”
“They can’t even legally drink to their own toast,” Buffy merely grumbled in response.
“Well, good,” Spike remarked, “You can get some well-needed relaxation and fax me those chapters by the end of the week.”
Buffy’s jaw dropped, “I can’t do that!” She shook her head, “No, way.” She whipped out her cell, “I’ll just call my mother back and tell her I can’t make it. There’s just no way . . .”
Seeing she was serious, Spike grabbed the phone out of her reaching fingers, “You will do no such thing. You are going to your sister’s wedding,” he told her sternly. “You’re just going to have to suck it up about those chapters of yours because I will not be there to hold your hand.” She didn’t pitch the fit he thought she would, and instead cocked her head to look at him strangely. “What?”
“I have a proposition.”
TBC
RATING: PG-13
SUMMARY: Buffy Summers is a jaded writer. Spike Giles is her editor. When Buffy is summoned home for a family affair in the midst of her latest novel, she drags New York back home with her to little ol’ Sunnydale. Her two worlds are going to collide. And nothing will ever be the same.
CHAPTER 1 –
Buffy Summers yawned, re-crossing her legs in the plush leather chair on which she perched. Wishing she would have brought a magazine, she took to glancing about the room, searching for some aspect that she hadn’t noticed before. The rectangular office she sat in was more than familiar. She could map it out in her head – a wooden door led into the deep red toned room, an appropriate color for its dramatic owner. Its décor was minimal. A fireplace was built into the wall behind her. Swanky was an appropriate term. Only in New York.
Across from her, behind his mahogany desk sat her editor, William “Spike” Giles, both elbows on the smooth top as he hunched over her latest manuscript, thin frames perched on his nose.
Buffy fidgeted her hands in her lap. No matter how many chapters of her writing he read, and he had read every word she had written since she arrived in the Big Apple four years ago, she was still nervous for his opinion.
Sensing movement out of the corner of her eye, her gaze shot to the man in front of her. When he did nothing but turn the page and continue reading, failing to acknowledge her annoyance, she sighed deeply.
Why she subjected herself to this torture time and time again, she didn’t know. A sadist when it came to her writing, Buffy always chose to hang around his office while he poured over her writings. She wouldn’t let him go home to read it, like he did so many of his other clients. She wanted him to read her stuff right then and now and give her instant responses. She had tried leaving her manuscript with him overnight once, but she was so nerve wracked that she couldn’t sleep. Would he spill something on it? Or would someone steal it while he was at the gym? What if he read it and forgot to tell her some important aspect of his review the next time he saw her? He would have read numerous transcripts by then and would have forgotten the whole ambiance of the piece!
Ten minutes later, Buffy held her breath, straightening her spine, and waited for his final verdict.
He looked up at her.
“Your last sentence doesn’t make any sense.”
Making a noise of indignation, Buffy stood defiantly, coming to lean over behind him, reading the sentence he was pointing to. “Yes it does,” she said finally.
Spike shook his head, “It’s grammatically incorrect in so many ways it makes my head spin.”
“I’m experimenting with language,” she defended haughtily. “Who was Shakespeare if not a daring wordsmith?”
He shot her a look, “You’re hardly the Bard. And the fact that you would stoop so low as to use my idol against me does nothing but show your desperation.”
“Well other than the last sentence . . . which we’re keeping,” she added determinedly at his look he gave her over his glasses, moving back around the desk, “what do you think?”
He sighed, pushing the chair out from under him and standing up, “Yet another brilliant manifesto on how all men are pigs who take pride in nothing but sowing our wild oats and lying to you fairer sex.”
“Really?” She squealed, “Brilliant?” she asked, ignoring the rest of his unenthusiastic tirade.
“I’m sure you’ll sell millions, yet again, to the bitter women of the world,” he waved his hand toward the large window to his right, gesturing to the potential buyers that walked the streets ten floors below them, his voice lacking in excitement.
He walked around the perimeter of his desk, gathering up piles of papers and sliding them into his briefcase, Buffy hot on his heels and making her way to follow him out the door.
“So when you say ‘brilliant,’ is that more brilliant than my last book? Or is it a different kind of brilliant, because I think this one has a much different tone. Do you think I may loose some people or am I only in a situation to gain?”
“Summers,” he interrupted, “you are the only writer that I edit who I am also friends with outside work. You are the only one I have given my home address and phone number to. Please don’t make me regret it.” He made his way around the group of people exiting the elevator, entering and pressing the down button. Buffy came to a rest next to him.
“I’m dedicated,” she commented.
“You’re neurotic,” he answered as the doors closed.
Leaving the building, they waited for the light, crossing the congested New York street, Spike in his dark grey Armani suit, coffee in hand, and Buffy hurrying along beside him as much as she could in her sensible brown skirt, suit top, and heels.
“It’s Friday, Summers, why don’t you take some time off and relax? That’s what I plan to do.” They safely navigated the zigzagging taxis and reached the sidewalk. Spike spun in front of her, “Come out with me tonight,” he requested smoothly.
But not smooth enough, as Buffy easily dodged his statement with ease, “I’m afraid your idea of relaxation – a/k/a whoring your way around New York . . .”
“How many years have I known you, Summers?” he interrupted.
“Four and you’ve been trying to get into my pants for three of them,” she countered coolly. “I’m sorry, Spike, but it’s just not my idea of a good time.” She moved to go around him, but he blocked her path.
“I’ll show you enough good times to fill two of those books of yours,” he stated cockily, giving her a promisingly heated look that, for a split second, had her thinking twice. But years of practice had her brushing off the notion as ludicrous within seconds.
She looked at him, astounded by his persistence, “Where does this misguided optimism of yours come from?”
“Who was it?” he challenged, ignoring her question.
She shook her head in confusion, “Who was who?” She continued her way down the street.
“The man who ruined you for the rest of us,” he said, following her.
“For the rest of you?” she balked, “Like I’m some kind of buffet?”
Truthfully, there hadn’t been that many given the chance to ‘ruin her’. But those who had had been doosies. Firstly, there had been Angel. Who, to make a long and very melodramatic story short, left her after they graduated because he knew ‘it was best for her’. For about five seconds, there had been Parker, who had come closest to breaking her spirit. And then there was Riley, who had had the misguided notion that men were to protect women. When he discovered that Buffy was strong and independent enough to take care of herself and didn’t need to rely on him in any way, he bolted to places unknown. All these men and, as some New York shrinks would suggest, her father, left her with a jaded (and some would say bitter) outlook on romance. But the common factor of all of them? She had been perfectly content until they had decided it was over.
“Well you just wait for my next chapter,” she warned Spike. “It has to do with my friend Willow’s first love. First, she catches him in bed with another woman. Actually, it was the floor, but anyway, he up and leaves her without so much as saying goodbye and . . .”
The ringing of her cell phone interrupted her.
“Hello?” she answered brightly, only for her voice to drop into an annoyed anger, “Oh, hi. She’s what!? When? No, I absolutely cannot. This is unacceptable.” There was a pause as the person on the other line stated their case. “You know what? Fine.” She slammed the phone shut.
“Arch nemesis?” Spike questioned nodding to her phone, noting her hostile tone.
“Mother,” she answered in a huff. “I have to go home for my sister’s wedding in two weeks and this is the kind of warning I get.”
“Shotgun wedding?” he questioned the abruptness of the nuptials.
“No, we all had a pretty good idea this was coming. Since they met two years ago they’ve been joined at the hip.” Spike detected a hint of snarl in her voice.
“You don’t sound very happy for her.”
“They’re twenty -- much too young to be getting married.”
Spike shrugged, “They found each other and want to start their life together sooner rather than later. What’s so wrong with that?”
“They can’t even legally drink to their own toast,” Buffy merely grumbled in response.
“Well, good,” Spike remarked, “You can get some well-needed relaxation and fax me those chapters by the end of the week.”
Buffy’s jaw dropped, “I can’t do that!” She shook her head, “No, way.” She whipped out her cell, “I’ll just call my mother back and tell her I can’t make it. There’s just no way . . .”
Seeing she was serious, Spike grabbed the phone out of her reaching fingers, “You will do no such thing. You are going to your sister’s wedding,” he told her sternly. “You’re just going to have to suck it up about those chapters of yours because I will not be there to hold your hand.” She didn’t pitch the fit he thought she would, and instead cocked her head to look at him strangely. “What?”
“I have a proposition.”
TBC
Monday, July 21, 2008
CI: Telling the Fam' Chapter Three
You don’t have to say you love me, just be close at hand. You don’t have to stay forever I would understand. Believe me. Believe meeeee. Damnit, Linda! Bobby Goren cursed Officer Cornell’s overly chipper wife who always felt the need to bring her husband his lunch practically everyday, usually while humming.
See, this was why he couldn’t work without Eames – he got distracted. With no impending case to work on and nothing but paperwork to fill out, his mind wandered. Even before they were romantically involved, Alex was always there, prodding him along with the promise of the food they were going to have for lunch, if he’d just finish filling out the paper in front of him. At the very least, there would be someone to talk to. And Ross kept making excuses to hover around his desk and Alex wasn’t there to run interference. So he tapped his pencil. Threw himself back in his chair. Looked around. If only he had something to do. It drove Alex a bit nuts, his inability to focus on some things, but his capability to have a militant focus on others.
For example, she was good at surveillance, like sitting on park benches for hours on end looking for faces, yet, if there was forty-eight hours of security camera tape to pour over or recordings of interviews and phone calls from rambling murderers, he was your guy. He just needed to feel like he was doing something as opposed to waiting for someone to come to him.
And that’s what he felt like he was doing now – waiting.
Coffee, he thought, time for coffee. Time for an excuse to get up and move, really, but coffee was as good a pretense as any. Bobby stood up from his chair, glad to stretch. He turned to make his way to the coffee machine.
For the umpteenth time this morning, his thoughts wandered to what Eames was doing at that very moment. He checked his watch while he poured his coffee. She should be back by now. That was, if everything with her parents had gone smoothly. Considering he’d never met her family and all impressions he got of them were second hand from Alex, he couldn’t be confident.
Whenever circumstances with her family presented themselves, like when she was in the hospital, he always visited at off hours, so as not to intrude on family time. He was the one who had given her a window into his family, most of which had been unintentional – randomly running into his brother on the street, his mother’s failing health butting into his work hours and coming up in cases.
Alex had always kept her professional and private life separate. If there were stresses at home, she never brought them into the precinct and vice versa. They were opposites in that way. She was able to remain detached, always, whereas he threw himself in emotions first then was led by his gut. If there was any aspect of their partnership they got frustrated with each over, it was that. When his emotions got involved in a case, he grew distant and despondent. If she got emotionally involved at all, she got angry, but her head was always above water, in the game with him as a team, which was much more conducive to the job – and their partnership.
It’s a wonder she ever agreed to get involved with me, he thought, thinking over his past history. Hell, I wouldn’t get involved with me. Now that his mother had passed and Frank had gotten his life more or less together, Bobby’s life had calmed significantly and he and Alex hadn’t gotten together until after that. It wasn’t by design, well, maybe it was on her part. He wouldn’t have been a very good partner outside of work before that time.
The first few years of their partnership, he had dated women without major incident. But, in about the fifth year of their partnership, life had begun to butt in. And he hadn’t been in a serious relationship since then until now. Every spare minute had been spent either throwing himself into a case or visiting his mother or doing research for both. It was all for the best in the end. Alex had been a major fixture in his life during that time, whether she knew it or not. A touchstone for him, even if she felt he was pulling away. Just the fact of her allowed him to sleep at night. It still did.
Lost in thought, Goren accidentally filled two coffee cups out of habit and his hand was moving to scoop up a handful of sugars for Alex’s cup. Sighing, he threw the sugar down, checked his watch again, compared it to the clock on the wall, and went back to his desk.
“Goren!” an unfamiliarly deep voice boomed across the precinct. The entire Major Case Squad looked up at the burly man hurrying across the floor. He abruptly stopped in the middle of the room, looking around. Bobby could tell the man was agitated and wasn’t entirely sure which one he was. People who were on the phone abruptly ended their calls, those who were milling around the break room found a reason to return to their desks. “Which one of you’s Goren?” Yet, when twenty-five pairs of eyes landed on him, no one came to his aid.
C’mon guys, Bobby thought, you’d think you’d be safe in Goddamn police headquarters. The man had a visitor’s badge on, so he had cleared security. He took a quick glance at the door to the Captain’s office and took slight comfort in the fact that Ross was hanging out his doorway confusedly, taking some tentative steps toward the man. Though Goren was fairly certain Ross wouldn’t be in a complete hurry to take a bullet or punch for him, he might feel inclined to break it up a scuffle just to save himself paperwork and grief.
An older man, who had to be approaching his seventies, though he didn’t move like it, appeared behind the visitor. You could tell he and the younger man came from the same stock. Wait a minute, Bobby took a few seconds to really study them. The younger one looked familiar. From a picture. He ran his mind quickly over the cases they had recently gone over. All the lineups. No, not from work, somewhere else. Alex’s. Alex’s house. The pictures on her bookshelf. Pictures of her family. Suddenly, everything clicked into place. Eames’ brother. And father.
Jesus Christ they are going to shoot me.
Bobby found himself unable to form words so he just stood there like a damn guppy. The two men continued to search the room. “Dad look!” Eames’ brother pointed at the desk across from Bobby. He followed their eyes. The Santa mug. Figures, of all the people in the room, Saint Nick was going to be the one to give him up.
Eames’ brother took his index finger and followed a direct line from Alex’s desk to his, then up to Bobby’s face, who continued to stand there dumbly, coffee cup in each hand. There was a few seconds of a standoff before the two men started forward. Right then, he heard a voice of an angel break through the fog. “Nick!” she hissed, running after her brother and father. Never since knowing her was Bobby more relieved to see Alex. Though, “relief” nor any of its synonyms could be applied to her at the moment. Her livid eyes bounced around the room, visibly embarrassed at the scene her family was making. She shot some whose eyes lingered a little too long a pointed look and they instantly found whatever was on their desks suddenly fascinating.
She caught up with her family, who had continued to advance on Bobby, neither of them turned to look at her. “Dad!” she said, taking a deep breath. “They caught the first elevator and didn’t wait for me,” she explained, the last four words were hard as she glared at her brother and father. Her eyes met Goren’s apologetically.
Neither her father nor brother looked particularly sorry. Bobby took comfort in the fact he had some height on both the male Eames – apparently no one in the family was particularly tall – but where they lacked in height, they made up for in mass. Both men looked liked they’ve been around the block a few times, and wouldn’t mind going again if it’d be worth their while. “We told you, we didn’t want to hurt him, just . . . scare him a bit,” Nick shrugged. Bobby felt his blood pressure finally begin to drop.
“Fine,” Alex ground out, “you got what you came for, now both of you can leave.”
“In a minute,” her father said, absentmindedly patting his daughter on the arm.
“Eames!” a voice rang out. All four of them turned. While her father had not worked in Major Case, apparently he had been one popular guy. A couple of older men who worked in the precinct, who Goren didn’t know very well, were approaching the group, big smiles on their faces. Her dad’s old buddies. No wonder no one was in a hurry to come to his aid, they knew him.
“What are you doing here?” the other man laughed, shaking the eldest Eames’ hand.
Eames’ father turned a stern eye on Bobby, “Seems this one here got my baby girl pregnant.”
This was surreal. If this is what having a well-adjusted childhood meant, Bobby wasn’t sure he’d be willing to trade his in.
“Fitz, you didn’t know anything about this, did you?” he asked warningly.
Fitz shook his head dutifully, “No sir, or I would’ve been on the phone.”
“Oh, for the love of . . .” Bobby heard Alex grumble under her breath. He knew how much this bothered her – the buddy-boy system. He liked to think that was a part of why they worked together – professionally and personally – he wasn’t in the buddy-boy system. None of his close friends were cops. When he arrived at Major Case, most cops thought he was too out there, so he was left out of the loop, which was fine with him. Being eccentric or “an acquired taste” kept him out of all that. Maybe that’s partly why she dropped her partner reassignment request, she could do so much worse.
“But seriously,” his father’s stance finally relaxed, “we just wanted to come down and take you two to lunch. With Alex, who knows when we’d ever meet you. No hard feelings, huh son?” he held out his hand for Bobby, who took it.
Goren shook his head, “No sir,” he replied, a slightly dazed look on his face. He met Alex’s eyes over her father’s shoulder and didn’t read “danger” in them, so he just rolled with it.
“C’mon, grab your jackets you two, I know a place.”
TBC
See, this was why he couldn’t work without Eames – he got distracted. With no impending case to work on and nothing but paperwork to fill out, his mind wandered. Even before they were romantically involved, Alex was always there, prodding him along with the promise of the food they were going to have for lunch, if he’d just finish filling out the paper in front of him. At the very least, there would be someone to talk to. And Ross kept making excuses to hover around his desk and Alex wasn’t there to run interference. So he tapped his pencil. Threw himself back in his chair. Looked around. If only he had something to do. It drove Alex a bit nuts, his inability to focus on some things, but his capability to have a militant focus on others.
For example, she was good at surveillance, like sitting on park benches for hours on end looking for faces, yet, if there was forty-eight hours of security camera tape to pour over or recordings of interviews and phone calls from rambling murderers, he was your guy. He just needed to feel like he was doing something as opposed to waiting for someone to come to him.
And that’s what he felt like he was doing now – waiting.
Coffee, he thought, time for coffee. Time for an excuse to get up and move, really, but coffee was as good a pretense as any. Bobby stood up from his chair, glad to stretch. He turned to make his way to the coffee machine.
For the umpteenth time this morning, his thoughts wandered to what Eames was doing at that very moment. He checked his watch while he poured his coffee. She should be back by now. That was, if everything with her parents had gone smoothly. Considering he’d never met her family and all impressions he got of them were second hand from Alex, he couldn’t be confident.
Whenever circumstances with her family presented themselves, like when she was in the hospital, he always visited at off hours, so as not to intrude on family time. He was the one who had given her a window into his family, most of which had been unintentional – randomly running into his brother on the street, his mother’s failing health butting into his work hours and coming up in cases.
Alex had always kept her professional and private life separate. If there were stresses at home, she never brought them into the precinct and vice versa. They were opposites in that way. She was able to remain detached, always, whereas he threw himself in emotions first then was led by his gut. If there was any aspect of their partnership they got frustrated with each over, it was that. When his emotions got involved in a case, he grew distant and despondent. If she got emotionally involved at all, she got angry, but her head was always above water, in the game with him as a team, which was much more conducive to the job – and their partnership.
It’s a wonder she ever agreed to get involved with me, he thought, thinking over his past history. Hell, I wouldn’t get involved with me. Now that his mother had passed and Frank had gotten his life more or less together, Bobby’s life had calmed significantly and he and Alex hadn’t gotten together until after that. It wasn’t by design, well, maybe it was on her part. He wouldn’t have been a very good partner outside of work before that time.
The first few years of their partnership, he had dated women without major incident. But, in about the fifth year of their partnership, life had begun to butt in. And he hadn’t been in a serious relationship since then until now. Every spare minute had been spent either throwing himself into a case or visiting his mother or doing research for both. It was all for the best in the end. Alex had been a major fixture in his life during that time, whether she knew it or not. A touchstone for him, even if she felt he was pulling away. Just the fact of her allowed him to sleep at night. It still did.
Lost in thought, Goren accidentally filled two coffee cups out of habit and his hand was moving to scoop up a handful of sugars for Alex’s cup. Sighing, he threw the sugar down, checked his watch again, compared it to the clock on the wall, and went back to his desk.
“Goren!” an unfamiliarly deep voice boomed across the precinct. The entire Major Case Squad looked up at the burly man hurrying across the floor. He abruptly stopped in the middle of the room, looking around. Bobby could tell the man was agitated and wasn’t entirely sure which one he was. People who were on the phone abruptly ended their calls, those who were milling around the break room found a reason to return to their desks. “Which one of you’s Goren?” Yet, when twenty-five pairs of eyes landed on him, no one came to his aid.
C’mon guys, Bobby thought, you’d think you’d be safe in Goddamn police headquarters. The man had a visitor’s badge on, so he had cleared security. He took a quick glance at the door to the Captain’s office and took slight comfort in the fact that Ross was hanging out his doorway confusedly, taking some tentative steps toward the man. Though Goren was fairly certain Ross wouldn’t be in a complete hurry to take a bullet or punch for him, he might feel inclined to break it up a scuffle just to save himself paperwork and grief.
An older man, who had to be approaching his seventies, though he didn’t move like it, appeared behind the visitor. You could tell he and the younger man came from the same stock. Wait a minute, Bobby took a few seconds to really study them. The younger one looked familiar. From a picture. He ran his mind quickly over the cases they had recently gone over. All the lineups. No, not from work, somewhere else. Alex’s. Alex’s house. The pictures on her bookshelf. Pictures of her family. Suddenly, everything clicked into place. Eames’ brother. And father.
Jesus Christ they are going to shoot me.
Bobby found himself unable to form words so he just stood there like a damn guppy. The two men continued to search the room. “Dad look!” Eames’ brother pointed at the desk across from Bobby. He followed their eyes. The Santa mug. Figures, of all the people in the room, Saint Nick was going to be the one to give him up.
Eames’ brother took his index finger and followed a direct line from Alex’s desk to his, then up to Bobby’s face, who continued to stand there dumbly, coffee cup in each hand. There was a few seconds of a standoff before the two men started forward. Right then, he heard a voice of an angel break through the fog. “Nick!” she hissed, running after her brother and father. Never since knowing her was Bobby more relieved to see Alex. Though, “relief” nor any of its synonyms could be applied to her at the moment. Her livid eyes bounced around the room, visibly embarrassed at the scene her family was making. She shot some whose eyes lingered a little too long a pointed look and they instantly found whatever was on their desks suddenly fascinating.
She caught up with her family, who had continued to advance on Bobby, neither of them turned to look at her. “Dad!” she said, taking a deep breath. “They caught the first elevator and didn’t wait for me,” she explained, the last four words were hard as she glared at her brother and father. Her eyes met Goren’s apologetically.
Neither her father nor brother looked particularly sorry. Bobby took comfort in the fact he had some height on both the male Eames – apparently no one in the family was particularly tall – but where they lacked in height, they made up for in mass. Both men looked liked they’ve been around the block a few times, and wouldn’t mind going again if it’d be worth their while. “We told you, we didn’t want to hurt him, just . . . scare him a bit,” Nick shrugged. Bobby felt his blood pressure finally begin to drop.
“Fine,” Alex ground out, “you got what you came for, now both of you can leave.”
“In a minute,” her father said, absentmindedly patting his daughter on the arm.
“Eames!” a voice rang out. All four of them turned. While her father had not worked in Major Case, apparently he had been one popular guy. A couple of older men who worked in the precinct, who Goren didn’t know very well, were approaching the group, big smiles on their faces. Her dad’s old buddies. No wonder no one was in a hurry to come to his aid, they knew him.
“What are you doing here?” the other man laughed, shaking the eldest Eames’ hand.
Eames’ father turned a stern eye on Bobby, “Seems this one here got my baby girl pregnant.”
This was surreal. If this is what having a well-adjusted childhood meant, Bobby wasn’t sure he’d be willing to trade his in.
“Fitz, you didn’t know anything about this, did you?” he asked warningly.
Fitz shook his head dutifully, “No sir, or I would’ve been on the phone.”
“Oh, for the love of . . .” Bobby heard Alex grumble under her breath. He knew how much this bothered her – the buddy-boy system. He liked to think that was a part of why they worked together – professionally and personally – he wasn’t in the buddy-boy system. None of his close friends were cops. When he arrived at Major Case, most cops thought he was too out there, so he was left out of the loop, which was fine with him. Being eccentric or “an acquired taste” kept him out of all that. Maybe that’s partly why she dropped her partner reassignment request, she could do so much worse.
“But seriously,” his father’s stance finally relaxed, “we just wanted to come down and take you two to lunch. With Alex, who knows when we’d ever meet you. No hard feelings, huh son?” he held out his hand for Bobby, who took it.
Goren shook his head, “No sir,” he replied, a slightly dazed look on his face. He met Alex’s eyes over her father’s shoulder and didn’t read “danger” in them, so he just rolled with it.
“C’mon, grab your jackets you two, I know a place.”
TBC
CI: Telling the Fam' Chapter Two
“I’m pregnant.”
Alex stood in the doorway of her childhood home. She hadn’t even taken off her coat yet. She didn’t know what she thought would’ve happened had she at least took the time to sit down, but no, she acted like Nicole Wallace herself was hot on her heels and any minute was going to burst in the door behind her, screaming the news.
So okay, in her mind she had it playing out better than this. But then she had walked in and her dad wasn’t in the chair she had pictured him being in and there was her mother coming out of the kitchen, offering her coffee or tea and she just . . . she just . . . blurted it out.
Clang!
That would be her mother’s good china hitting the floor.
To see the blank stares of her parents made her secretly wish she had taken up Bobby on his offer to come, he would have (at the very least) got a couple eyes off her and onto him.
“What?” her mother gasped, but Alex’s eyes were on her father, who had silently accepted the news and sat there, considering his coffee. “Oh Alex,” her mother (always eager for a new grandchild) sighed happily, hands clasped at her heart. She rushed over to her youngest daughter, yanking her into a tight embrace. And for a moment, for a split second, Alex closed her eyes and thought everything would be okay. But just then she felt her mother tense and pull back hesitantly, “but . . .” she searched her daughter’s eyes, “we didn’t know you were seeing anyone,” she commented cautiously, throwing a nervous glance at Alex’s dad. The tone in her mother’s voice faltered considerably. Her hands dropped.
Oh -- so everything’s not so hunky-dory. “Well, I was . . . I mean, I am,” Alex quickly amended.
“Well . . . who is he?” her mother asked expectantly.
She knew this moment would be coming, obviously. But she found the name stuck in her throat just the same. What her family would think . . . if only she could explain first, work backwards somehow.
“It’s that partner of yours, isn’t it?” Alex’s head snapped up startled. It was her big brother, who stood leaning against the doorway to the kitchen, beer in his hand; he wore a dark blue t-shirt with his firehouse’s logo emblazoned on the left pocket. He must have stopped by to visit when he got off work.
Of all her siblings, this one she had the most problems with. Whereas her youngest brother was the jokester and her older sister her closest friend, Nick was the big protector of the four kids. Growing up this hadn’t been a problem for her sister, the princess, but Alex the tomboy had fought him tooth and nail since birth. He was a great father, and Alex got along with his wife Megan, but almost twenty years after high school, he still thought he knew what was best for Alex, just because he was first out of the womb. Alex had no idea he was going to be there, lurking. Had she known, she would have had considerably less of a problem keeping her mouth shut.
And his reaction and his accusation, however right it may be, did not bode well for Alex. If Nick was good for one thing, it was being used as a barometer to see where her father would fall on the issue.
By this time, Alex had gained back the use of her voice, “What? How did you . . .?”
“When you were pregnant for Lisa and Steve, do you know how many people thought you were having his kid? I lost count on the number of people I had to threaten to get the story straight.”
Alex had never heard that particular rumor. If there was ever a time Alex rued her family’s connections to the NYPD, now was it.
“What are his intentions?” her dad had finally spoken.
“Intentions, dad, really?” her old man was as old-fashioned as they came in all areas of life, including her own. While Lisa may have been the princess, Alex and her dad had always been sort of buddies – working on cars, the police department. As many differences as they may have had, Alex wanted him to be okay with this, maybe more than okay. Alex and Bobby had already made their decision, but it would be nice for some support.
“Well, are you getting married?” her mother piped up optimistically.
“We haven’t talked about it,” the questions were coming from all sides now.
“Haven’t talked . . .” her brother scoffed, “that’s the first thing I would’ve . . .”
“I thought you’d sworn off cops, what happened?” this from her sister, who had come out of the back bedroom.
“Lisa! God, is the whole family here!?”
“Almost,” Lisa commented offhandedly. Alex peered over Lisa’s shoulder, waiting for the in-laws or maybe her kid brother to come out of the woodwork. Why hadn’t she noticed the cars?
Her sister had been right, after her late husband, she had sworn off cops. But not out of fear of losing them in the line of duty. Joe had been a nice guy, and treated her right, but she had begun to doubt the lastingness of their marriage even before his life had been cut so tragically short. It didn’t make losing him any easier, but she had learned that she wanted to be more than just her job.
And then there was Robert O. Goren who, quite literally, was the job. But it was different. At work, she was NYPD and his partner “Eames” who he never mollycoddled because he was either too busy working out a case in his head and he didn’t have room in there, or confident she could take care of herself. Alex voted for the latter, but she was pretty sure it was a 50/50 mix.
But off the clock she was “Alex” his significant other who was carrying their child. Yes he would sometimes wake her up at odd times of the night to tell her about connections he had made about the case they were working on, but he was easily set back on course. Besides, they never got each other personal gifts, instead going on weekend trips to a place where no one knew them.
“Goren . . .” Lisa recited, “Isn’t he the crazy guy that throws himself off of buildings and slices his hand open in interrogation rooms? My friend Connie had to stitch him up once.”
“Yeah,” Nick agreed darkly, “and he’s also the one who got you kidnapped and tortured by that crazy mentor’s kid. Alex, this is hardly the type of man you want to have a kid with.”
Alex shook her head; of course he was going to bring up that incident even though it happened years ago.
Her mother gasped audibly, “Alex how could you?” She was almost certain she heard the words “mentally unstable” being mumbled by her father.
“It’s done,” Alex’s voice rose, putting the others to rest, “it’s already happened. We’re going to have this baby.” She looked at her family and was sick of the runaround. Better to get their bottom lines and work from there. Suddenly tired, she sighed, “So? What do you think?”
More silence. But everyone seemed to be looking at her brother, so Alex did the same.
“I want to meet him.”
TBC
Alex stood in the doorway of her childhood home. She hadn’t even taken off her coat yet. She didn’t know what she thought would’ve happened had she at least took the time to sit down, but no, she acted like Nicole Wallace herself was hot on her heels and any minute was going to burst in the door behind her, screaming the news.
So okay, in her mind she had it playing out better than this. But then she had walked in and her dad wasn’t in the chair she had pictured him being in and there was her mother coming out of the kitchen, offering her coffee or tea and she just . . . she just . . . blurted it out.
Clang!
That would be her mother’s good china hitting the floor.
To see the blank stares of her parents made her secretly wish she had taken up Bobby on his offer to come, he would have (at the very least) got a couple eyes off her and onto him.
“What?” her mother gasped, but Alex’s eyes were on her father, who had silently accepted the news and sat there, considering his coffee. “Oh Alex,” her mother (always eager for a new grandchild) sighed happily, hands clasped at her heart. She rushed over to her youngest daughter, yanking her into a tight embrace. And for a moment, for a split second, Alex closed her eyes and thought everything would be okay. But just then she felt her mother tense and pull back hesitantly, “but . . .” she searched her daughter’s eyes, “we didn’t know you were seeing anyone,” she commented cautiously, throwing a nervous glance at Alex’s dad. The tone in her mother’s voice faltered considerably. Her hands dropped.
Oh -- so everything’s not so hunky-dory. “Well, I was . . . I mean, I am,” Alex quickly amended.
“Well . . . who is he?” her mother asked expectantly.
She knew this moment would be coming, obviously. But she found the name stuck in her throat just the same. What her family would think . . . if only she could explain first, work backwards somehow.
“It’s that partner of yours, isn’t it?” Alex’s head snapped up startled. It was her big brother, who stood leaning against the doorway to the kitchen, beer in his hand; he wore a dark blue t-shirt with his firehouse’s logo emblazoned on the left pocket. He must have stopped by to visit when he got off work.
Of all her siblings, this one she had the most problems with. Whereas her youngest brother was the jokester and her older sister her closest friend, Nick was the big protector of the four kids. Growing up this hadn’t been a problem for her sister, the princess, but Alex the tomboy had fought him tooth and nail since birth. He was a great father, and Alex got along with his wife Megan, but almost twenty years after high school, he still thought he knew what was best for Alex, just because he was first out of the womb. Alex had no idea he was going to be there, lurking. Had she known, she would have had considerably less of a problem keeping her mouth shut.
And his reaction and his accusation, however right it may be, did not bode well for Alex. If Nick was good for one thing, it was being used as a barometer to see where her father would fall on the issue.
By this time, Alex had gained back the use of her voice, “What? How did you . . .?”
“When you were pregnant for Lisa and Steve, do you know how many people thought you were having his kid? I lost count on the number of people I had to threaten to get the story straight.”
Alex had never heard that particular rumor. If there was ever a time Alex rued her family’s connections to the NYPD, now was it.
“What are his intentions?” her dad had finally spoken.
“Intentions, dad, really?” her old man was as old-fashioned as they came in all areas of life, including her own. While Lisa may have been the princess, Alex and her dad had always been sort of buddies – working on cars, the police department. As many differences as they may have had, Alex wanted him to be okay with this, maybe more than okay. Alex and Bobby had already made their decision, but it would be nice for some support.
“Well, are you getting married?” her mother piped up optimistically.
“We haven’t talked about it,” the questions were coming from all sides now.
“Haven’t talked . . .” her brother scoffed, “that’s the first thing I would’ve . . .”
“I thought you’d sworn off cops, what happened?” this from her sister, who had come out of the back bedroom.
“Lisa! God, is the whole family here!?”
“Almost,” Lisa commented offhandedly. Alex peered over Lisa’s shoulder, waiting for the in-laws or maybe her kid brother to come out of the woodwork. Why hadn’t she noticed the cars?
Her sister had been right, after her late husband, she had sworn off cops. But not out of fear of losing them in the line of duty. Joe had been a nice guy, and treated her right, but she had begun to doubt the lastingness of their marriage even before his life had been cut so tragically short. It didn’t make losing him any easier, but she had learned that she wanted to be more than just her job.
And then there was Robert O. Goren who, quite literally, was the job. But it was different. At work, she was NYPD and his partner “Eames” who he never mollycoddled because he was either too busy working out a case in his head and he didn’t have room in there, or confident she could take care of herself. Alex voted for the latter, but she was pretty sure it was a 50/50 mix.
But off the clock she was “Alex” his significant other who was carrying their child. Yes he would sometimes wake her up at odd times of the night to tell her about connections he had made about the case they were working on, but he was easily set back on course. Besides, they never got each other personal gifts, instead going on weekend trips to a place where no one knew them.
“Goren . . .” Lisa recited, “Isn’t he the crazy guy that throws himself off of buildings and slices his hand open in interrogation rooms? My friend Connie had to stitch him up once.”
“Yeah,” Nick agreed darkly, “and he’s also the one who got you kidnapped and tortured by that crazy mentor’s kid. Alex, this is hardly the type of man you want to have a kid with.”
Alex shook her head; of course he was going to bring up that incident even though it happened years ago.
Her mother gasped audibly, “Alex how could you?” She was almost certain she heard the words “mentally unstable” being mumbled by her father.
“It’s done,” Alex’s voice rose, putting the others to rest, “it’s already happened. We’re going to have this baby.” She looked at her family and was sick of the runaround. Better to get their bottom lines and work from there. Suddenly tired, she sighed, “So? What do you think?”
More silence. But everyone seemed to be looking at her brother, so Alex did the same.
“I want to meet him.”
TBC
CI: Telling the Fam' Chapter One
Summary: “Isn’t he the crazy guy that throws himself off of buildings and slices his hand open in interrogation rooms?”
A/N: Everyone has their own take on what Alex’s family must be like, here’s a sampling of mine. Since the writers haven’t given us a clear picture of the Eames family, I took some liberties while still trying to be faithful to what we do know. This could be considered a continuation of my story "Overprotected".
“Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you? Seriously Alex, I’m responsible too ya know. This is my child too.” He was making a last-ditch offer to accompany her to her parents’ house to break the news she was pregnant. Since Nicole Wallace had so thoughtfully revealed to the captain and certain other key players in their professional lives, Alex could no longer put off telling her family. God forbid they heard it from someone else. She’d never hear the end of it.
She looked at Bobby from across his apartment. “I know that and you know that,” she reasoned, “But honestly, your being there might . . .” Alex searched for how to put it into words he’d understand, “heighten emotions and further aggravate the situation,” she finished finally. Cop terms, she thought, word it like one of those criminal profiles he likes so damn much.
She could see by the look on his face that her carefully chosen words hadn’t had their desired effect. “What?” he asked genuinely perplexed. “How can that be? Wouldn’t your family want the man responsible there?”
She leaned her hip against the counter, put her hand on her waist, and looked at him from underneath her eyelashes, “My family are cops, firefighters, nurses . . . they could make New York a very uncomfortable place for you, Bobby.”
“You make it sound like the mob,” he grumbled scrunching up his neck in an effort to look down, trying for the third time to knot his tie properly amongst their exchange.
She smiled at him exasperatedly, leaving the omelet she was making on the stove to walk across the wood floor to stand in front of him. She gently pushed his arms down to his sides, evening the silk in her hands, “I come from a family of cops, Bobby. They have guns.”
“Well, so do I,” he countered weakly.
“Yeah but they wouldn’t hesitate to use them,” she replied, straightening his tie.
“I’m going to have to meet them eventually,” he commented quietly in the voice that usually broke her heart, like a pathetic little boy. But today she was putting her foot down.
She gave him a look, “Come on, Bobby, this is the Eames family – we have a picnic for everything, you’ll get to meet them.”
He rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to say something, but she cut him off by quickly pressing her mouth to his and picking up his jacket, “Go to work. I’ll be right behind you.” He didn’t complain, just rubbed his hands over his mouth a few times and grumbled some words under his breath she chose not to acknowledge and saw him out the door.
TBC
A/N: Everyone has their own take on what Alex’s family must be like, here’s a sampling of mine. Since the writers haven’t given us a clear picture of the Eames family, I took some liberties while still trying to be faithful to what we do know. This could be considered a continuation of my story "Overprotected".
“Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you? Seriously Alex, I’m responsible too ya know. This is my child too.” He was making a last-ditch offer to accompany her to her parents’ house to break the news she was pregnant. Since Nicole Wallace had so thoughtfully revealed to the captain and certain other key players in their professional lives, Alex could no longer put off telling her family. God forbid they heard it from someone else. She’d never hear the end of it.
She looked at Bobby from across his apartment. “I know that and you know that,” she reasoned, “But honestly, your being there might . . .” Alex searched for how to put it into words he’d understand, “heighten emotions and further aggravate the situation,” she finished finally. Cop terms, she thought, word it like one of those criminal profiles he likes so damn much.
She could see by the look on his face that her carefully chosen words hadn’t had their desired effect. “What?” he asked genuinely perplexed. “How can that be? Wouldn’t your family want the man responsible there?”
She leaned her hip against the counter, put her hand on her waist, and looked at him from underneath her eyelashes, “My family are cops, firefighters, nurses . . . they could make New York a very uncomfortable place for you, Bobby.”
“You make it sound like the mob,” he grumbled scrunching up his neck in an effort to look down, trying for the third time to knot his tie properly amongst their exchange.
She smiled at him exasperatedly, leaving the omelet she was making on the stove to walk across the wood floor to stand in front of him. She gently pushed his arms down to his sides, evening the silk in her hands, “I come from a family of cops, Bobby. They have guns.”
“Well, so do I,” he countered weakly.
“Yeah but they wouldn’t hesitate to use them,” she replied, straightening his tie.
“I’m going to have to meet them eventually,” he commented quietly in the voice that usually broke her heart, like a pathetic little boy. But today she was putting her foot down.
She gave him a look, “Come on, Bobby, this is the Eames family – we have a picnic for everything, you’ll get to meet them.”
He rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to say something, but she cut him off by quickly pressing her mouth to his and picking up his jacket, “Go to work. I’ll be right behind you.” He didn’t complain, just rubbed his hands over his mouth a few times and grumbled some words under his breath she chose not to acknowledge and saw him out the door.
TBC
CI: Out of It
Summary: Begins with Eames and Ross busting Bobby out of the Psych Ward. PostUntethered
This was taking too long.
Eames leaned forward in her chair and tried hard to focus on the sound her boot heel made against the wood as her leg shook with impatience. For a full minute she managed to make Ross’ baritone and the warden’s placating assertions fade into a dull buzz. She had to. She couldn’t focus on whatever formalities they were going through -- couldn’t listen to that hag go on or she was going to lunge across the desk and shake the witch like a rag doll. And who could blame her?
She didn’t know where Bobby was. He was in this building, somewhere, but that hardly gave her any comfort. On the contrary, it made her more anxious. Alex had a deep suspicion he was in “Heaven” – whatever that meant. Bobby had only told her the manic ramblings of his nephew and she was hesitant to fully believe him. Now she was terrified it was all too true and not a one-time incident. She’d seen the body, the autopsy report, and she’d let him go in there undercover anyway – not that she could’ve stopped him, but the cycle kept playing though her head nonetheless – what if she had just told Frank to go to hell and not told Bobby? But Bobby would’ve wanted to know and they didn’t keep secrets from each other – they gave each other the honest to god, non sugar coated truth, always. The fact that he had even told her his plans and entrusted her to be his outside contact spoke volumes – he wouldn’t have told her anything up to a year or two ago, he would’ve just pulled away, told her to “trust him,” and that would’ve been it. And now he had landed himself in the psych ward.
And his fragile psyche couldn’t take it. Alex wasn’t worried so much what the guards were doing to him as what he was doing to himself – Bobby could be his own worse enemy and torture himself worse than any sadistic guard ever could. When she hadn’t heard from him in hours, she tried not to panic, tried to give him time to get to a phone, get to her, get himself out of whatever mess they had gotten him into. Again Eames cursed herself for ever letting him go on with this stupid plan. Instead, she’d given in to the silent threat of him pushing her away, retreating into his own head, and going on with the arrangement on his own with no contact on the outside. She could have been blissfully ignorant – imagining him on leave up in the mountains visiting his buddies and tinkering with cars and motorcycles. But what was the alternative? The abuse would still be going on and those bastards would continue without so much as a reprimand – a proper investigation and trial would take months, years. She couldn’t not be with him through this – not anymore, not after all they’d been through.
She knew she had had tears in her eyes when she went to the captain, begging him to get him out. She was fully willing to go by herself – no problem. She may not have been willing to play by their rules and go through protocol to get though the door, but instead would’ve charged in like a bull in a china shop – just like Goren. Instead she had stood next to the captain and danced in place, her legs visibly twitching to move, to get closer to him – to tear the place down looking for him. He would’ve done the same for her . . . he had. More than once Ross had given her the up and down, and towards the end a few glares punctuated the “what’s wrong with you? This is actions more becoming to your partner, not to you” question in his eyes. Even now the looks continued, willing her to keep calm, just relax, they had to go through the right channels. Screw the channels. She hadn’t heard from Bobby in hours and hadn’t seen him in days.
And the channels weren’t getting them anywhere. As she sat there and stared at the warden’s hard eyes as Ross tried in vein to convince her Goren/Brady was not a nutcase, but an important NYPD detective, she knew they had hit a wall. The evil wench was talking about making a few phone calls, calling together a meeting . . . things that would take hours, days even and neither Ross nor Alex was convinced that the Chief of D’s or any of the higher ups would be in a particular hurry to come to her partner’s aid.
Alex could stay silent no longer. “This is ridiculous. I want to see him and I want to see him right now,” she interjected.
The warden sat back in her chair, in no hurry to acquiesce, “And who are you?” Alex’s icy reception of her and the lack of impressive credentials in front of her name meant she didn’t have to concern herself with any of Alex’s demands.
The words were out of her mouth before she knew what happened.
“I’m his wife!”
Ross just about fell off his chair, but Alex fought the urge to look at him, and instead sat up taller, meeting Nurse Rachett’s eyes across the desk.
She was trying to recompose herself. “Oh,” she stammered, “well . . . why didn’t you mention that in the beginning?”
“Forgive me for thinking a Major Case badge and the Captain of the Major Case Squad would be enough,” Alex forced out, still fighting the reddening of her face, silently asking Ross not to contradict her or ask any questions. “And if you don’t let me see him I’ll sue you and this place so fast it’ll make your head spin. You have no idea of my means. I’ll have the Assistant District Attorney on the phone right now.” Actually, straitlaced Carver wouldn’t do crap for her, and once he heard her and Bobby’s names, probably would deny ever knowing them, but this lady didn’t know that. “I’ll own this place when I’m done and you’ll be out in the street.”
What the suggestions of a lengthy investigation and police couldn’t do, a direct threat of a pricey lawsuit did. The good warden must not have many friends in the legal system.
“I’m afraid your . . . husband . . . won’t be the same man you remember. He’s suffered a complete mental break. What you see may upset you,” she said trying to dissuade her. “Your husband will not be recognizable. If you could wait until we stabilize him . . .”
“I think I can handle it,” Alex interrupted her. Despite the certainty in her voice, the warden had planted a seed of fear in Alex. With Bobby forced to face his demons, would he still be there when he came back. Would he ever come back to her?
“Follow me.” The warden stood up primly and took her sweet damn time leading them through the twists and turns of the prison. Alex’s heart was in her throat when they passed under the ominous words “MENTAL OBSERVATION UNIT” painted above the doorway.
Ross saddled up next to her and spoke though his teeth, “I know we hit a wall in there, but I don’t think lies are going to help us or your partner in the end.”
Alex kept her eyes straight ahead and shrugged, “It got us in, didn’t it?” He may have replied but right then they reached Bobby’s cell. Alex tried to breathe evenly while they unlocked the door. Alex was peering over the shoulder of the guard that opened the door and forced herself past him to her partner’s side. With trepidation she took shaky steps into the small claustrophobic room. God, how horrible it must have been for him in here. Bobby didn’t like small spaces. She was slightly mollified to see him passed out on the shabby looking cot, like they had just thrown him there – at least he wasn’t awake to experience it.
“When was the last time he had something to drink?” she demanded, framing his face with her hands she looked accusingly from the woman to each of the guards. They looked at each other dumbly. “When!?” her voice rose. Ross had smartly stepped aside at this point and allowed her run the show. The guards each shook their heads and shrugged. The warden looked down at the floor. “I want some water in here right now!” Her forceful words had Sparky the guard, who she would personally seen burned at the stake, on his toes and running in the general direction of the requested beverage.
Ross turned to the warden, “May I speak to you outside a moment?” his stern tone reverberated off the walls. With a parting glare at Alex, she stepped out of the doorway into the hall.
With the enemy out of the room, Alex was allowed to fully focus in her partner. He was fading in and out of consciousness and ever once in a while opened his eyes weakly and looked at her with a mixture of confusion and relief. His eyes were cloudy and drugged – what the hell had happened in here? Giving him a once over, she could she he’d visibly lost weight but hoped he wouldn’t suffer any other short or long term damage if they got him to a hospital soon. She made the shaky call herself on her cell phone.
Alex didn’t know how long she sat there next to him, but didn’t move or talk to anyone until the paramedics edged her out of the way. “Four days without water” – Rogers’ words from the autopsy – kept flashing in front of her eyes -- “Chronic and acute trauma.”
Alex’s boot heels clicked and echoed off the pale green walls of the hospital, following the painted lines on the linoleum floor that led her to the correct wing of the building and Bobby’s room.
At the prison, when he had come to and was sitting up drinking water and conversing with Ross, she had stayed silent, leaning against the wall with her arms around herself watching him, afraid if she blinked she’d miss some sign of impending trouble. She didn’t say anything to her partner, and he’d said nothing to her, but their eyes met frequently. When they were taking him to the hospital she’d murmured to Ross she’d see them at the hospital while Ross rode in the ambulance to continue briefing the paramedics on what her partner had been exposed to.
Now at the hospital, she turned the corner into the doorway and was relieved to see he was looking a degree better. His color had returned but his brows were still furrowed and his eyes listless, though they had been for a good part of the year. He was in the street clothes he’d entered the prison in, his right sleeve of his button down was folded up to his forearm and he was playing with the spot where his liquid IV had been.
She crossed her arms and steeled herself as she entered the room.
He gave her a weak smile, happy to see her but tired and wary. They hadn’t spoken in something that wasn’t code in days. “Hey,” he greeted.
“Hey yourself,” she replied, her voice a degree harder. She couldn’t help but let her eyes give him the once over, double checking he was still more or less intact. He took her silence for something else.
“Look, Eames, I’m sorry . . .”
She shook her head, “You can apologize to me later, that’s not what I want right now. What I need to know is, is that it? Are we done now? Have you decided you are not the son of a serial killer? That you’re not crazy? Are you’re back with me?”
“I never left you Eames,” he defended.
“Yes, you did,” she insisted. “Who were you thinking about when you were in that cell, strapped to that table? When you threw that brick through that window?”
“You knew what I was doing when I did that.”
She was upset and let all the worry and the stress that he’d put her through wash over her. She was too tired to censor herself and hadn’t been sleeping properly. “I could say that was selfish of you, Bobby, but I don’t think you were even thinking about yourself. And you sure as hell weren’t thinking about me or you would have never had done that.”
“I never left you Eames,” he repeated, softer this time.
“Alex,” she insisted, tears pricking her eyes. “Call me Alex.” He only ever called her Alex in the most intimate of situations. Whereas she’d taken to calling him Bobby most of the time, he still held to calling her Eames, only now with a varying degree of softness and fondness that hadn’t been there before.
“Alex,” he concede and he looked at her as if seeing her for the first time, “How did you get to me?”
Alex visibly reddened. “I . . . I told Nurse Rachett I was your wife.”
By her tone, he knew she meant the warden. Bobby nodded and was silent, staring at his hands. “Was Ross there?”
Eames nodded and held her breath. Now she was the wary one.
“Well,” he started, rolling down his sleeve, hiding the restraint marks from her, and reaching out to her. Her shoulders relaxed, and relieved she took his hand immediately; he tugged her over between his knees. She rested her hands comfortably on the back of his neck, now almost eye level with him. Her thumbs caressed over his pulse points. He took one arm off her back and reached into his pocket, retrieving the familiar object and offering it for her inspection between his thumb and index finger. “Well, I guess you can wear this now, huh?”
Even the unflattering overhead fluorescent lighting of the hospital room failed to downplay the brilliancy of the family heirloom that he slipped into her left hand, the hand that she hadn’t realized how naked and vulnerable she felt without it.
END
This was taking too long.
Eames leaned forward in her chair and tried hard to focus on the sound her boot heel made against the wood as her leg shook with impatience. For a full minute she managed to make Ross’ baritone and the warden’s placating assertions fade into a dull buzz. She had to. She couldn’t focus on whatever formalities they were going through -- couldn’t listen to that hag go on or she was going to lunge across the desk and shake the witch like a rag doll. And who could blame her?
She didn’t know where Bobby was. He was in this building, somewhere, but that hardly gave her any comfort. On the contrary, it made her more anxious. Alex had a deep suspicion he was in “Heaven” – whatever that meant. Bobby had only told her the manic ramblings of his nephew and she was hesitant to fully believe him. Now she was terrified it was all too true and not a one-time incident. She’d seen the body, the autopsy report, and she’d let him go in there undercover anyway – not that she could’ve stopped him, but the cycle kept playing though her head nonetheless – what if she had just told Frank to go to hell and not told Bobby? But Bobby would’ve wanted to know and they didn’t keep secrets from each other – they gave each other the honest to god, non sugar coated truth, always. The fact that he had even told her his plans and entrusted her to be his outside contact spoke volumes – he wouldn’t have told her anything up to a year or two ago, he would’ve just pulled away, told her to “trust him,” and that would’ve been it. And now he had landed himself in the psych ward.
And his fragile psyche couldn’t take it. Alex wasn’t worried so much what the guards were doing to him as what he was doing to himself – Bobby could be his own worse enemy and torture himself worse than any sadistic guard ever could. When she hadn’t heard from him in hours, she tried not to panic, tried to give him time to get to a phone, get to her, get himself out of whatever mess they had gotten him into. Again Eames cursed herself for ever letting him go on with this stupid plan. Instead, she’d given in to the silent threat of him pushing her away, retreating into his own head, and going on with the arrangement on his own with no contact on the outside. She could have been blissfully ignorant – imagining him on leave up in the mountains visiting his buddies and tinkering with cars and motorcycles. But what was the alternative? The abuse would still be going on and those bastards would continue without so much as a reprimand – a proper investigation and trial would take months, years. She couldn’t not be with him through this – not anymore, not after all they’d been through.
She knew she had had tears in her eyes when she went to the captain, begging him to get him out. She was fully willing to go by herself – no problem. She may not have been willing to play by their rules and go through protocol to get though the door, but instead would’ve charged in like a bull in a china shop – just like Goren. Instead she had stood next to the captain and danced in place, her legs visibly twitching to move, to get closer to him – to tear the place down looking for him. He would’ve done the same for her . . . he had. More than once Ross had given her the up and down, and towards the end a few glares punctuated the “what’s wrong with you? This is actions more becoming to your partner, not to you” question in his eyes. Even now the looks continued, willing her to keep calm, just relax, they had to go through the right channels. Screw the channels. She hadn’t heard from Bobby in hours and hadn’t seen him in days.
And the channels weren’t getting them anywhere. As she sat there and stared at the warden’s hard eyes as Ross tried in vein to convince her Goren/Brady was not a nutcase, but an important NYPD detective, she knew they had hit a wall. The evil wench was talking about making a few phone calls, calling together a meeting . . . things that would take hours, days even and neither Ross nor Alex was convinced that the Chief of D’s or any of the higher ups would be in a particular hurry to come to her partner’s aid.
Alex could stay silent no longer. “This is ridiculous. I want to see him and I want to see him right now,” she interjected.
The warden sat back in her chair, in no hurry to acquiesce, “And who are you?” Alex’s icy reception of her and the lack of impressive credentials in front of her name meant she didn’t have to concern herself with any of Alex’s demands.
The words were out of her mouth before she knew what happened.
“I’m his wife!”
Ross just about fell off his chair, but Alex fought the urge to look at him, and instead sat up taller, meeting Nurse Rachett’s eyes across the desk.
She was trying to recompose herself. “Oh,” she stammered, “well . . . why didn’t you mention that in the beginning?”
“Forgive me for thinking a Major Case badge and the Captain of the Major Case Squad would be enough,” Alex forced out, still fighting the reddening of her face, silently asking Ross not to contradict her or ask any questions. “And if you don’t let me see him I’ll sue you and this place so fast it’ll make your head spin. You have no idea of my means. I’ll have the Assistant District Attorney on the phone right now.” Actually, straitlaced Carver wouldn’t do crap for her, and once he heard her and Bobby’s names, probably would deny ever knowing them, but this lady didn’t know that. “I’ll own this place when I’m done and you’ll be out in the street.”
What the suggestions of a lengthy investigation and police couldn’t do, a direct threat of a pricey lawsuit did. The good warden must not have many friends in the legal system.
“I’m afraid your . . . husband . . . won’t be the same man you remember. He’s suffered a complete mental break. What you see may upset you,” she said trying to dissuade her. “Your husband will not be recognizable. If you could wait until we stabilize him . . .”
“I think I can handle it,” Alex interrupted her. Despite the certainty in her voice, the warden had planted a seed of fear in Alex. With Bobby forced to face his demons, would he still be there when he came back. Would he ever come back to her?
“Follow me.” The warden stood up primly and took her sweet damn time leading them through the twists and turns of the prison. Alex’s heart was in her throat when they passed under the ominous words “MENTAL OBSERVATION UNIT” painted above the doorway.
Ross saddled up next to her and spoke though his teeth, “I know we hit a wall in there, but I don’t think lies are going to help us or your partner in the end.”
Alex kept her eyes straight ahead and shrugged, “It got us in, didn’t it?” He may have replied but right then they reached Bobby’s cell. Alex tried to breathe evenly while they unlocked the door. Alex was peering over the shoulder of the guard that opened the door and forced herself past him to her partner’s side. With trepidation she took shaky steps into the small claustrophobic room. God, how horrible it must have been for him in here. Bobby didn’t like small spaces. She was slightly mollified to see him passed out on the shabby looking cot, like they had just thrown him there – at least he wasn’t awake to experience it.
“When was the last time he had something to drink?” she demanded, framing his face with her hands she looked accusingly from the woman to each of the guards. They looked at each other dumbly. “When!?” her voice rose. Ross had smartly stepped aside at this point and allowed her run the show. The guards each shook their heads and shrugged. The warden looked down at the floor. “I want some water in here right now!” Her forceful words had Sparky the guard, who she would personally seen burned at the stake, on his toes and running in the general direction of the requested beverage.
Ross turned to the warden, “May I speak to you outside a moment?” his stern tone reverberated off the walls. With a parting glare at Alex, she stepped out of the doorway into the hall.
With the enemy out of the room, Alex was allowed to fully focus in her partner. He was fading in and out of consciousness and ever once in a while opened his eyes weakly and looked at her with a mixture of confusion and relief. His eyes were cloudy and drugged – what the hell had happened in here? Giving him a once over, she could she he’d visibly lost weight but hoped he wouldn’t suffer any other short or long term damage if they got him to a hospital soon. She made the shaky call herself on her cell phone.
Alex didn’t know how long she sat there next to him, but didn’t move or talk to anyone until the paramedics edged her out of the way. “Four days without water” – Rogers’ words from the autopsy – kept flashing in front of her eyes -- “Chronic and acute trauma.”
Alex’s boot heels clicked and echoed off the pale green walls of the hospital, following the painted lines on the linoleum floor that led her to the correct wing of the building and Bobby’s room.
At the prison, when he had come to and was sitting up drinking water and conversing with Ross, she had stayed silent, leaning against the wall with her arms around herself watching him, afraid if she blinked she’d miss some sign of impending trouble. She didn’t say anything to her partner, and he’d said nothing to her, but their eyes met frequently. When they were taking him to the hospital she’d murmured to Ross she’d see them at the hospital while Ross rode in the ambulance to continue briefing the paramedics on what her partner had been exposed to.
Now at the hospital, she turned the corner into the doorway and was relieved to see he was looking a degree better. His color had returned but his brows were still furrowed and his eyes listless, though they had been for a good part of the year. He was in the street clothes he’d entered the prison in, his right sleeve of his button down was folded up to his forearm and he was playing with the spot where his liquid IV had been.
She crossed her arms and steeled herself as she entered the room.
He gave her a weak smile, happy to see her but tired and wary. They hadn’t spoken in something that wasn’t code in days. “Hey,” he greeted.
“Hey yourself,” she replied, her voice a degree harder. She couldn’t help but let her eyes give him the once over, double checking he was still more or less intact. He took her silence for something else.
“Look, Eames, I’m sorry . . .”
She shook her head, “You can apologize to me later, that’s not what I want right now. What I need to know is, is that it? Are we done now? Have you decided you are not the son of a serial killer? That you’re not crazy? Are you’re back with me?”
“I never left you Eames,” he defended.
“Yes, you did,” she insisted. “Who were you thinking about when you were in that cell, strapped to that table? When you threw that brick through that window?”
“You knew what I was doing when I did that.”
She was upset and let all the worry and the stress that he’d put her through wash over her. She was too tired to censor herself and hadn’t been sleeping properly. “I could say that was selfish of you, Bobby, but I don’t think you were even thinking about yourself. And you sure as hell weren’t thinking about me or you would have never had done that.”
“I never left you Eames,” he repeated, softer this time.
“Alex,” she insisted, tears pricking her eyes. “Call me Alex.” He only ever called her Alex in the most intimate of situations. Whereas she’d taken to calling him Bobby most of the time, he still held to calling her Eames, only now with a varying degree of softness and fondness that hadn’t been there before.
“Alex,” he concede and he looked at her as if seeing her for the first time, “How did you get to me?”
Alex visibly reddened. “I . . . I told Nurse Rachett I was your wife.”
By her tone, he knew she meant the warden. Bobby nodded and was silent, staring at his hands. “Was Ross there?”
Eames nodded and held her breath. Now she was the wary one.
“Well,” he started, rolling down his sleeve, hiding the restraint marks from her, and reaching out to her. Her shoulders relaxed, and relieved she took his hand immediately; he tugged her over between his knees. She rested her hands comfortably on the back of his neck, now almost eye level with him. Her thumbs caressed over his pulse points. He took one arm off her back and reached into his pocket, retrieving the familiar object and offering it for her inspection between his thumb and index finger. “Well, I guess you can wear this now, huh?”
Even the unflattering overhead fluorescent lighting of the hospital room failed to downplay the brilliancy of the family heirloom that he slipped into her left hand, the hand that she hadn’t realized how naked and vulnerable she felt without it.
END
Spuffy: Out of the Rubble Chapter One
RATING: R
SUMMARY: Buffy Summers is living out every parent’s worst nightmare and it’s up to Special Agent William “Spike” Giles to find the person who kidnapped her daughter and bring her back (hopefully) alive. But as these two will learn, the closer they get to the truth, the closer tragedy will bring them together.
CHAPTER 1 --
Buffy Summers sat at her kitchen table, staring at absolutely nothing, ignoring the coffee in front of her that had long ago gone cold. A half-dozen police officers filtered through her house, their heavy boots echoing off the walls -- a constant reminder to Buffy that they were there, who would give anything at the moment to curl up inside herself and temporarily forget everything.
One uniformed man was on her phone, another two were huddled over her kitchen counter pouring over stacks of papers, and she could hear some others upstairs taking stock of her daughter’s room.
Molly.
Buffy had been sent by her local law-enforcement agency to the FBI because of the threat of her daughter being taken over state lines. In less then half a day she’d had local, state, then FBI law enforcement take over her house, setting up their temporary control center. The individual officers were faceless to her. Only the shade of blue of the uniforms changed.
Her front door opened and closed for the one-thousandth time in the past ten hours. The slamming rattled the doorframe and surrounding walls but Buffy showed no sign of having heard it. She was to sit and wait until she was needed to answer a question or answer the phone in case whoever had taken her daughter tried to contact her. If she was so called upon, she was to do it as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Though Buffy didn’t understand how she was to do both at once. But nothing had really made sense to her for hours now. She vaguely remembered Willow sitting by her side while the police asked her questions. It seemed so long ago now, but only a few hours could have elapsed.
So she sat. And the officers, for fear of getting emotionally involved, basically ignored her.
Ten hours. It had been ten hours since her Molly had been reported missing.
“Giles,” one of the officers acknowledged from her living room.
“Giles,” Buffy thought. She hadn’t heard that name yet. He must be new. So far she had encountered and Officer Joseph, Platt, Menendes, a hand full of Smiths . . .
“Ms. Summers . . .”
Buffy jumped in her seat at the sound, which was deafening to her ears. She took a moment, taking a deep breath, before swiveling in her seat to look up at the new officer before her. He was younger than most of his FBI contemporaries. He seemed to be of average height, lean, and muscular for what she could tell under his navy windbreaker which had ‘FBI’ emblazoned across the left breast and back. Though his most telling feature was his hair, which was dyed an unprofessional shade of blonde.
“I’m sorry to startle you,” the man apologized. “Ms. Summers . . .”
“Buffy,” she interrupted quietly. “Call me Buffy,” her voice sounded flat and lifeless and she made no attempt to alter it.
Agent Giles nodded and lowered himself into the seat across from her. He regarded her with a gentle firmness that suggested he’d done this many times before. “I’m sure you already went over this with the local officers, but I need you to answer some questions.”
Buffy nodded in consent.
“Do you have a recent picture of your daughter?”
“Oh . . . Yes,” she fumbled for and reached into her purse, sliding a picture across the table. “I took it last week,” her voice cracked, “At her fourth birthday party.”
Spike picked up the picture, studying it. A little girl with blonde pigtails and bangs beamed at him. And hazel eyes. She looked just like her mother.
“She weighs thirty-five pounds and is forty-two inches tall.”
Spike looked up from his paper, surprise at her anticipation of his next questions. Buffy shrugged, “This is the fifth time I’ve gone over this today.”
William “Spike” Giles was content with her answer. Good, she was talking and offering extra information. An agent he had talked to earlier told him he feared she was incapacitated, but Spike could see she was anything but.
“I’m sorry,” he heard himself apologizing.
Buffy made no answer.
Spike’s brow furrowed, “Who’s this with her?” he asked, pointing at the other two people in the picture.
Buffy leaned forward to see, “Willow and Xander, friends of mine. They’re practically family.”
“And her father?” he questioned his absence.
Buffy shook her head, “Haven’t seen him since I told him I was pregnant.” Spike continued to study her, “We were never married,” she added.
He opened the file in front of him. “It says in here she was abducted from her room.”
Buffy nodded solemnly, “That’s correct. Her aunt, my sister Dawn, was babysitting her. I first noticed she was missing when I came home and she wasn’t in bed where she was supposed to be. Or anywhere else for that matter,” she added quietly. “That was around a quarter after ten at night.”
He couldn’t help it, but a little bit of Spike’s heart pained for Buffy. She looked like a broken angel. But that was all she was going to get from him because Spike Giles never got personally involved. Ever.
“And where were you?”
His question must have sounded accusatory because the color drained from her face. “I was at . . .” she choked up, “at The Bronze with Xander and Willow. It’s the first time I’ve been out in years.”
“It’s not your fault,” he found himself saying instantly.
“That’s what the police kept telling me,” she looked down at her hands that rested on her lap. “Do you have kids, Agent Giles?”
Spike was momentarily thrown by the random delve into his personal life, but gamely answered, “No, I don’t.”
He had never had an affinity for kids, but it’s not that the thought had never crossed his mind. He was an only child and a loner of one. He had never been around small children and was in no position to settle down anytime soon. His job required more time than he could ever fairly split with a woman.
“Buffy, do you have any idea who might want to hurt you or your child?”
Buffy shook her head, “No one. Molly’s popular with the kids at school and I don’t have any close friends outside Willow, Xander, and Xander’s girlfriend Anya.”
“Was she at the party also?” Spike asked, motioning to the picture.
“Yes.”
“What about family?”
“We don’t have any. It’s me, Dawn, and Molly.”
Spike nodded. “Ms. Summers, I know this is going to sound trite and in no way comforting, but we will find her.”
Spike hoped she didn’t take note of his leaving “alive” out of his promise. He’d been on one too many cases where that promise would not come true. She answered with a nod that ended with her head hung towards the floor.
Though a parent’s worst nightmare had come true for Buffy Summers and she was rightly devastated, Spike knew that she was anything but defeated. She had conviction, although it was currently hidden behind sorrow, and he had the suspicion that Buffy Summers was going to show him a thing or two about what it meant to be strong before this ordeal was over.
TBC
SUMMARY: Buffy Summers is living out every parent’s worst nightmare and it’s up to Special Agent William “Spike” Giles to find the person who kidnapped her daughter and bring her back (hopefully) alive. But as these two will learn, the closer they get to the truth, the closer tragedy will bring them together.
CHAPTER 1 --
Buffy Summers sat at her kitchen table, staring at absolutely nothing, ignoring the coffee in front of her that had long ago gone cold. A half-dozen police officers filtered through her house, their heavy boots echoing off the walls -- a constant reminder to Buffy that they were there, who would give anything at the moment to curl up inside herself and temporarily forget everything.
One uniformed man was on her phone, another two were huddled over her kitchen counter pouring over stacks of papers, and she could hear some others upstairs taking stock of her daughter’s room.
Molly.
Buffy had been sent by her local law-enforcement agency to the FBI because of the threat of her daughter being taken over state lines. In less then half a day she’d had local, state, then FBI law enforcement take over her house, setting up their temporary control center. The individual officers were faceless to her. Only the shade of blue of the uniforms changed.
Her front door opened and closed for the one-thousandth time in the past ten hours. The slamming rattled the doorframe and surrounding walls but Buffy showed no sign of having heard it. She was to sit and wait until she was needed to answer a question or answer the phone in case whoever had taken her daughter tried to contact her. If she was so called upon, she was to do it as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Though Buffy didn’t understand how she was to do both at once. But nothing had really made sense to her for hours now. She vaguely remembered Willow sitting by her side while the police asked her questions. It seemed so long ago now, but only a few hours could have elapsed.
So she sat. And the officers, for fear of getting emotionally involved, basically ignored her.
Ten hours. It had been ten hours since her Molly had been reported missing.
“Giles,” one of the officers acknowledged from her living room.
“Giles,” Buffy thought. She hadn’t heard that name yet. He must be new. So far she had encountered and Officer Joseph, Platt, Menendes, a hand full of Smiths . . .
“Ms. Summers . . .”
Buffy jumped in her seat at the sound, which was deafening to her ears. She took a moment, taking a deep breath, before swiveling in her seat to look up at the new officer before her. He was younger than most of his FBI contemporaries. He seemed to be of average height, lean, and muscular for what she could tell under his navy windbreaker which had ‘FBI’ emblazoned across the left breast and back. Though his most telling feature was his hair, which was dyed an unprofessional shade of blonde.
“I’m sorry to startle you,” the man apologized. “Ms. Summers . . .”
“Buffy,” she interrupted quietly. “Call me Buffy,” her voice sounded flat and lifeless and she made no attempt to alter it.
Agent Giles nodded and lowered himself into the seat across from her. He regarded her with a gentle firmness that suggested he’d done this many times before. “I’m sure you already went over this with the local officers, but I need you to answer some questions.”
Buffy nodded in consent.
“Do you have a recent picture of your daughter?”
“Oh . . . Yes,” she fumbled for and reached into her purse, sliding a picture across the table. “I took it last week,” her voice cracked, “At her fourth birthday party.”
Spike picked up the picture, studying it. A little girl with blonde pigtails and bangs beamed at him. And hazel eyes. She looked just like her mother.
“She weighs thirty-five pounds and is forty-two inches tall.”
Spike looked up from his paper, surprise at her anticipation of his next questions. Buffy shrugged, “This is the fifth time I’ve gone over this today.”
William “Spike” Giles was content with her answer. Good, she was talking and offering extra information. An agent he had talked to earlier told him he feared she was incapacitated, but Spike could see she was anything but.
“I’m sorry,” he heard himself apologizing.
Buffy made no answer.
Spike’s brow furrowed, “Who’s this with her?” he asked, pointing at the other two people in the picture.
Buffy leaned forward to see, “Willow and Xander, friends of mine. They’re practically family.”
“And her father?” he questioned his absence.
Buffy shook her head, “Haven’t seen him since I told him I was pregnant.” Spike continued to study her, “We were never married,” she added.
He opened the file in front of him. “It says in here she was abducted from her room.”
Buffy nodded solemnly, “That’s correct. Her aunt, my sister Dawn, was babysitting her. I first noticed she was missing when I came home and she wasn’t in bed where she was supposed to be. Or anywhere else for that matter,” she added quietly. “That was around a quarter after ten at night.”
He couldn’t help it, but a little bit of Spike’s heart pained for Buffy. She looked like a broken angel. But that was all she was going to get from him because Spike Giles never got personally involved. Ever.
“And where were you?”
His question must have sounded accusatory because the color drained from her face. “I was at . . .” she choked up, “at The Bronze with Xander and Willow. It’s the first time I’ve been out in years.”
“It’s not your fault,” he found himself saying instantly.
“That’s what the police kept telling me,” she looked down at her hands that rested on her lap. “Do you have kids, Agent Giles?”
Spike was momentarily thrown by the random delve into his personal life, but gamely answered, “No, I don’t.”
He had never had an affinity for kids, but it’s not that the thought had never crossed his mind. He was an only child and a loner of one. He had never been around small children and was in no position to settle down anytime soon. His job required more time than he could ever fairly split with a woman.
“Buffy, do you have any idea who might want to hurt you or your child?”
Buffy shook her head, “No one. Molly’s popular with the kids at school and I don’t have any close friends outside Willow, Xander, and Xander’s girlfriend Anya.”
“Was she at the party also?” Spike asked, motioning to the picture.
“Yes.”
“What about family?”
“We don’t have any. It’s me, Dawn, and Molly.”
Spike nodded. “Ms. Summers, I know this is going to sound trite and in no way comforting, but we will find her.”
Spike hoped she didn’t take note of his leaving “alive” out of his promise. He’d been on one too many cases where that promise would not come true. She answered with a nod that ended with her head hung towards the floor.
Though a parent’s worst nightmare had come true for Buffy Summers and she was rightly devastated, Spike knew that she was anything but defeated. She had conviction, although it was currently hidden behind sorrow, and he had the suspicion that Buffy Summers was going to show him a thing or two about what it meant to be strong before this ordeal was over.
TBC
CI: A Woman Scorned
Okay, so she’d been annoyed with him before, sure. Even to the point where he knew she disliked dealing with bodies that had to do with their cases: he always came in and took over – poking everything, smelling things she’d never even contemplated smelling before -- in her eyes basically violating the corpse and her sacred professional space.
He always jumped the gun on things – over eager to connect the next set of dots in his brain. Impatient, asking questions she planned on eventually getting to, not standing to the side, bowing to her expertise like Eames had the common sense to do, and always offering up the answers before she gave them all the pieces.
As much as Bobby could read people and successfully manipulate personal space – when it came to getting answers, he was decidedly blind to others’ uneasiness. Or maybe he chose not to see the signals, he didn’t know. That’s what he liked about Eames -- she would tell him outright when he was doing something that annoyed her. And he’d stop . . . or try to.
But Rogers . . . Eames had clued him in multiple times about Rogers’ annoyance with his . . . over excited methods in her morgue. But he always shrugged them off – he’d gotten what he wanted, she’d get over it. He was just doing his job.
But that all faded into the blue when it came to how she was acting towards him now.
He could be wrong, but she seemed to be going out of her way to be extra nice to Eames. And Rogers was never extra nice to anyone. He’d ask a question and she’d either choose to ignore it and eventually answered it later, or she’d give the answer but give it directly to Eames. She hadn’t made eye contact with him since he’d entered the room – and even then it had been an icy one. Not that she usually gave them an overly warm reception, but he swore he saw her smile at his partner, not a hint of condescending to it.
Whatever she was trying to do it worked -- her actions had effectively silenced him. Instead of bending over to get up close and personal with the late Mr. Wilkenson, he stood to the side, trying to concentrate on the corpse in front of him. But he kept looking at Rogers, trying to diagnose her strange behavior. A glance at Eames offered him nothing. Alex either didn’t notice or was pretending like nothing was out of the ordinary and had the same look of polite, professional interest on her face as she always did -- looking but not getting too close out of personal choice, taking Rogers’ word for it.
Bobby wasn’t sure how many minutes had passed, but Rogers had deemed them informed enough and asked if they, or Eames really, had any questions. Well, he had a million of course, but was too apprehensive to ask them at the moment. Rogers dismissed them quickly and ushered them out of her hallowed workstation.
They rode the elevator back to their floor in silence, Bobby contemplating Rogers’ strange behavior.
“Eames,” he finally reached out plaintively.
“Huh?” she asked, eyes flitting over the copy of the autopsy in her hands.
“Did . . . err, I mean . . . did Rogers seem . . .,” he turned to face her, his hands fumbling with his words, “different, to you?”
Pause. Eames snapped the folder shut as she looked up. “I know you’ve been concentrating on other things, Bobby, but Rogers has been blonde for a while now.”
“No,” he shook his head frustrated, like a child who couldn’t find the right words to communicate properly, “No, that’s not it.” The elevator pinged and Eames continued to their desks, Bobby trailing doggedly behind her, not able to see the amused smirk on her face. “I mean, the way she was acting, did anything seem a little . . . off to you?”
She spun on her heels to face him finally, that smile still tugging at the side of her mouth. “You really don’t know why she’d be mad at you?”
Bobby tried, he really tried, but nothing in his brain was connecting any of his actions to Rogers. He hadn’t even seen her in the days leading up to his forced leave and this was his first day back in the morgue since. He shook his head, truly trying not to give up – it didn’t feel right to give up.
Alex sighed, looking around the squad room, not really sure how much she should be divulging. “When we came to bust you out of the psych ward,” she began, he lowered his head expectantly, “she and Ross . . .” she trailed off, feeling absolutely ridiculous discussing this – like a gossiping teenager at the mall. Alex was personally proud of herself, especially with having him as a partner, for staying above and out of the gossip mill. But if this was truly bothering him, and she could tell it was, she was not going to have his undivided attention on this case unless he got an answer, but he at least needed to meet her halfway. “They were dressed up . . .” but she could see he wasn’t. He shook his head and blinked slowly at her, giving her a look that made her feel like the idiot. Alex sighed and rolled her eyes, “You interrupted their date, Bobby,” she injected, a little louder than she had planned. Just rip the Band-Aid off, Alex.
Bobby was physically taken aback, and it took him a second to gather himself, “But Ross hasn’t acted differently toward me,” he argued.
“Ross is in a perpetual state of being exacerbated with you. You wouldn’t know it if he was mad at you,” she answered.
“Oh,” comprehension came over his face, looking off in the distance. “Oh!” he repeated, his eyes focusing on her. “So this is a girl thing.”
Alex smiled at him and fought the urge to pat him on the head, “Yeah, Bobby, a girl thing.” She turned away to sit down at her desk, this time knowing he was right behind her.
A few hours later brought a call in to Eames from the morgue – another body with wounds similar to those found on their guy.
Bobby paced a little bit in the cool room while he and his partner waited for Rogers to join them. When she did, she didn’t even look up from the autopsy report in her hands. Bobby cleared his throat. She didn’t even blink. Alex looked on amusedly. “Uh,” he started. Rogers’ hand stilled from where she was turning the page. “I’m sorry I uh . . .” he lifted up off his heels,
“I’m sorry I wreaked your date,” he finally got out. Her eyebrows shot up, but that was the only motion she made that insinuated she had heard him. After a moment, Roger took a deep breath in, held it, then exhaled slowly, bringing her head up to give him one of those looks of hers that let you know you’ve been studied and found wanting.
“Yeah,” she drawled doubtfully. “Sure you are.” She snapped the folder shut and nodded at the both of them and then to the body before them: “Annabelle Chester, female, age thirty-five, died of a self-inflicted gun shot wound to the head, but that’s not the interesting part . . .”
And they were off.
He always jumped the gun on things – over eager to connect the next set of dots in his brain. Impatient, asking questions she planned on eventually getting to, not standing to the side, bowing to her expertise like Eames had the common sense to do, and always offering up the answers before she gave them all the pieces.
As much as Bobby could read people and successfully manipulate personal space – when it came to getting answers, he was decidedly blind to others’ uneasiness. Or maybe he chose not to see the signals, he didn’t know. That’s what he liked about Eames -- she would tell him outright when he was doing something that annoyed her. And he’d stop . . . or try to.
But Rogers . . . Eames had clued him in multiple times about Rogers’ annoyance with his . . . over excited methods in her morgue. But he always shrugged them off – he’d gotten what he wanted, she’d get over it. He was just doing his job.
But that all faded into the blue when it came to how she was acting towards him now.
He could be wrong, but she seemed to be going out of her way to be extra nice to Eames. And Rogers was never extra nice to anyone. He’d ask a question and she’d either choose to ignore it and eventually answered it later, or she’d give the answer but give it directly to Eames. She hadn’t made eye contact with him since he’d entered the room – and even then it had been an icy one. Not that she usually gave them an overly warm reception, but he swore he saw her smile at his partner, not a hint of condescending to it.
Whatever she was trying to do it worked -- her actions had effectively silenced him. Instead of bending over to get up close and personal with the late Mr. Wilkenson, he stood to the side, trying to concentrate on the corpse in front of him. But he kept looking at Rogers, trying to diagnose her strange behavior. A glance at Eames offered him nothing. Alex either didn’t notice or was pretending like nothing was out of the ordinary and had the same look of polite, professional interest on her face as she always did -- looking but not getting too close out of personal choice, taking Rogers’ word for it.
Bobby wasn’t sure how many minutes had passed, but Rogers had deemed them informed enough and asked if they, or Eames really, had any questions. Well, he had a million of course, but was too apprehensive to ask them at the moment. Rogers dismissed them quickly and ushered them out of her hallowed workstation.
They rode the elevator back to their floor in silence, Bobby contemplating Rogers’ strange behavior.
“Eames,” he finally reached out plaintively.
“Huh?” she asked, eyes flitting over the copy of the autopsy in her hands.
“Did . . . err, I mean . . . did Rogers seem . . .,” he turned to face her, his hands fumbling with his words, “different, to you?”
Pause. Eames snapped the folder shut as she looked up. “I know you’ve been concentrating on other things, Bobby, but Rogers has been blonde for a while now.”
“No,” he shook his head frustrated, like a child who couldn’t find the right words to communicate properly, “No, that’s not it.” The elevator pinged and Eames continued to their desks, Bobby trailing doggedly behind her, not able to see the amused smirk on her face. “I mean, the way she was acting, did anything seem a little . . . off to you?”
She spun on her heels to face him finally, that smile still tugging at the side of her mouth. “You really don’t know why she’d be mad at you?”
Bobby tried, he really tried, but nothing in his brain was connecting any of his actions to Rogers. He hadn’t even seen her in the days leading up to his forced leave and this was his first day back in the morgue since. He shook his head, truly trying not to give up – it didn’t feel right to give up.
Alex sighed, looking around the squad room, not really sure how much she should be divulging. “When we came to bust you out of the psych ward,” she began, he lowered his head expectantly, “she and Ross . . .” she trailed off, feeling absolutely ridiculous discussing this – like a gossiping teenager at the mall. Alex was personally proud of herself, especially with having him as a partner, for staying above and out of the gossip mill. But if this was truly bothering him, and she could tell it was, she was not going to have his undivided attention on this case unless he got an answer, but he at least needed to meet her halfway. “They were dressed up . . .” but she could see he wasn’t. He shook his head and blinked slowly at her, giving her a look that made her feel like the idiot. Alex sighed and rolled her eyes, “You interrupted their date, Bobby,” she injected, a little louder than she had planned. Just rip the Band-Aid off, Alex.
Bobby was physically taken aback, and it took him a second to gather himself, “But Ross hasn’t acted differently toward me,” he argued.
“Ross is in a perpetual state of being exacerbated with you. You wouldn’t know it if he was mad at you,” she answered.
“Oh,” comprehension came over his face, looking off in the distance. “Oh!” he repeated, his eyes focusing on her. “So this is a girl thing.”
Alex smiled at him and fought the urge to pat him on the head, “Yeah, Bobby, a girl thing.” She turned away to sit down at her desk, this time knowing he was right behind her.
A few hours later brought a call in to Eames from the morgue – another body with wounds similar to those found on their guy.
Bobby paced a little bit in the cool room while he and his partner waited for Rogers to join them. When she did, she didn’t even look up from the autopsy report in her hands. Bobby cleared his throat. She didn’t even blink. Alex looked on amusedly. “Uh,” he started. Rogers’ hand stilled from where she was turning the page. “I’m sorry I uh . . .” he lifted up off his heels,
“I’m sorry I wreaked your date,” he finally got out. Her eyebrows shot up, but that was the only motion she made that insinuated she had heard him. After a moment, Roger took a deep breath in, held it, then exhaled slowly, bringing her head up to give him one of those looks of hers that let you know you’ve been studied and found wanting.
“Yeah,” she drawled doubtfully. “Sure you are.” She snapped the folder shut and nodded at the both of them and then to the body before them: “Annabelle Chester, female, age thirty-five, died of a self-inflicted gun shot wound to the head, but that’s not the interesting part . . .”
And they were off.
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