Fic: Shock and awe (2/2)
Title: Shock and awe
Fandom: Murder Call
Characters: Imogen "Tootsie" Soames, Lance Fisk, Dee Suzeraine, Malcolm Thorne, Tessa Vance, Steve Hayden
Prompt: 005. Outsides
Word Count: 2254
Rating: PG-13 (T)
Summary: Outside perspectives on Tessa and Steve's budding relationship. Set post-series.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters. They belong to Jennifer Rowe, Hal McElroy and Southern Star. I make no profit out of this.
Haven't read part 1? Go here.
SHOCK AND AWE
Part 2
Really, she was just going to pop in and out. Five minutes max, just on her way to dinner with Lance. It wouldn’t take that long. She knew visiting hours would be over by the time they’d finished dinner, so she’d wanted to take this little moment to check in on Tessa, see how she was, and promise to come back for a longer visit tomorrow.
Of all the things she could’ve expected from walking in unannounced to Tessa’s room, though, this hadn’t been on the list. She stopped short, her mouth opened in a half-uttered ‘hello’, and blinked her eyes a few times before quickly taking a step back. Any sense of decorum and decency would’ve had her retreat fully, but…she couldn’t help it. She needed to sneak a peek just to confirm she hadn’t seen wrong.
Steve and Tessa were kissing. A very gentle, sweet kiss by the looks of it, and it was just as clear that they had no idea she’d been about to burst in on it all and probably cause them to jump apart like two teenagers caught in the act. They were completely cut off from the rest of the world.
Tootsie felt her expression, previously tense with worry, break into a wide grin. Her chest felt lighter, a thrill of exhilaration spreading through her body. For some reason, she almost wanted to do a little dance. She couldn’t quite explain it; she cared for both of them dearly, but they’d danced around each other for so many years that she’d given up on ever seeing them together.
But maybe now…
Sneaking another peek, Tootsie saw the kiss had come to an end, with Steve seated on the edge of Tessa’s bed and her hand caressing his cheek. The softest, most wondrous expression Tootsie had seen in a while was on Tessa’s face. A blushing smile replaced it at something Steve said, something she couldn’t hear from out in the corridor, and Tootsie smiled too.
Her five minutes were up, but she didn’t care. Tessa was in good hands. Maybe even the best of hands. Leaving the bouquet of flowers she’d brought at the nurse’s desk, with instructions to give to Tessa when she was ‘available’, Tootsie left the hospital.
And when Lance asked her why she never stopped smiling that night, she just gave him a mysterious smile in return.
***
Fisk wasn’t a man of grandiose gestures and a particularly well-developed sensual life, although Imogen always claimed the opposite. When he looked at the world around him, he didn’t focus on the minute details of someone’s behaviour.
Well, not normally. Ever since he was a child, his focus had been on his environment, not the people in it. A psychologist would probably say it stemmed from his mother leaving when he was a boy, and there was perhaps some truth to it. But that’s not all it was. He’d always been this way, as long as he could remember.
He liked to watch someone’s shoes, to see the wear and tear, the blemished or unblemished leather. It was the same for someone’s clothes, cars, books, hairstyles, furniture. A well-organised room was compared to a cluttered space. A torn shirt was compared to an ironed one. A mug discoloured from years of use was compared to a paper cup. They all told a story and he wanted those stories, those mysteries. He wanted to hunt it down, to play a part in its unravelling, to find the villain at the end of the path. It’s what’d made him choose his profession.
But in this job you couldn’t always get by without looking at people too, so he’d learned, adapted, and that evolution had brought him here: to contemplate what he’d seen, what he’d learned, and what sort of conclusion he could draw from that.
It’d started with a new hairstyle. Continued with more frequent laughs; a freer kind. Shirts were ironed crispier than usual. The ties were a touch more colourful, a tad more vivacious. Suit pants were replaced by suit skirts that were newer, slightly less drab.
Those were examples of the more indirect evidence. The direct evidence, of course, wasn’t hard facts. It was a soft tone, a gentle smile, and a silence that seemed more significant than he realised at the time. It was, for lack of a better word, a hunch. Fisk wasn’t comfortable with hunches, but this particular one had its basis in already established hard facts: Vance and Hayden were no longer just partners and friends.
Exactly which category they belonged to, Fisk didn’t know. He’d have to gather more evidence for determining that - evidence that could be trusted and not just Suzeraine’s fanciful gossip. But he felt certain he’d get to the bottom of it eventually. Like many scientists and unlike certain pathologists and constables, he was patient. He could wait.
Fisk allowed himself a small smile.
Yes, he could wait.
***
She was like a dog after a bone. As soon as the possibility jumped into her head, Dee couldn’t let it go.
She pestered Tessa about it. Pestered Steve about it too. Tried to catch them in the act, to disprove their lies, but they were a couple of sneaky bastards. Steve was a stone when he got a mind to it. Tessa would’ve usually caved by now, but she hadn’t, which Dee supposed meant something.
But she had a plan now. A fool-proof one. And all it needed was their annual Christmas gathering at the bar and some well-chosen words to the owner.
“You can’t back out now!” Dee was grinning, a gleam in her eyes. “Everyone else’ve done it. You don’t wanna break tradition.”
“A stupid tradition,” Tessa muttered below her breath, and made as if to leave the spot Dee had more or less pushed her into. To Dee’s delight, however, Tessa was held back by Steve, who looked just a little too relaxed and thrilled for someone still keeping things under wrap (according to Tootsie).
“’s probably not so bad,” Steve said, a grin on his face.
“That’s right,” Dee agreed wholeheartedly, and the people closest to them roared in agreement too. Tessa blushed heavily, clearly annoyed and bothered by the amount of attention they were getting, but Dee didn’t care. “So pucker up, buttercup!”
Tessa rolled her eyes and turned decisively to Steve, who already stood ready with a wide grin that turned into overdramatically puckered-up lips. With a slight groan, Tessa grabbed hold of his shoulders and pushed herself up on her toes so she could give him a quick peck on the lips.
“Noo,” Dee yelled good-naturedly, “do a proper one!”
Tessa glared at her and Dee was thrilled to see that Steve didn’t. In fact, he was grinning wider than ever and suddenly swooped Tessa down into a low dip to kiss her like he actually meant it.
“That’s it!” Dee whooped and the others chimed in, the volume increasing when they noticed Tessa holding on for dear life - and then kissing Steve back like she meant it.
Coming up for air and balance both, Tessa and Steve didn’t seem to have eyes for anyone else for a moment until Tessa sent another glare back at Dee and then deliberately stepped away from the radius of the mistletoe.
Judging by the number of times Steve’s hand was touching Tessa’s lower back that night and the equal number of times Tessa blushed, though, Dee counted her mission as a success and decided to back down.
For now.
***
There’d been times in the past when he’d wondered. Sometimes, he’d even tried to probe very gently to see if there was something hiding beneath the surface, but up until now, he’d never found any cause for concern. Friendship and partners, that’d been all there was to it. There’d been rough spots, sure, and moments when he’d worried he’d lose one of his detectives to the darkness of this work, or at least that he’d have to reassign them to other partners.
Things were different now. Thorne wasn’t ignorant. The way his best Detective Sergeant had reacted to his partner being shot, and then how they’d both behaved afterwards… It’d been a far cry from their behaviour during that art gallery case half a year ago. He’d thought it’d only be a matter of time, and he’d been right. Being right wasn’t always a blessing, though.
Peering up at his two detectives above the rim of his glasses, Thorne chewed the inside of his cheek. “I will have to reassign you.”
It was the local policy. The brass didn’t want any conflicts of interests, or any domestic disputes interfering with the job. Although Thorne felt sure Homicide currently had a bit of leeway considering the losses and trauma they’d experienced four months back, he wasn’t sure this was a cause to try it out on. There were other things higher on his list of priorities, such as overtime pay.
“We know,” Steve said evenly, his hands settled calmly behind his back. He exuded only professionalism. Thorne knew that whatever decision he landed on, Steve would respect it. As he should, too, considering it’d taken them months to come clean to him.
“You should have come to me with this before,” Thorne said, folding his hands together, his gaze steady on both of them. Maybe I could’ve helped you.
“We know and we’re sorry, sir.” Tessa wasn’t as calm as Steve, and yet she wasn’t as nervous as he’d sometimes seen her over the years. If anything, it told him that this was serious business, not some casual fling.
“All right.” Thorne let out a little sigh and looked down at the paperwork he’d been working on before they came to see him. “Go back to your case. I’ll call you when I have news for you.”
Perhaps he should’ve yelled at them. They looked like they’d expected that. They also looked like this had stung more than his bark. Sharing a wary look, Tessa and Steve excused themselves and left his office. Once the door was shut, Thorne looked up and peered through the blinds to see them return to their desks.
No inappropriate touches. No deviance from the routine they’d acquired over the years. All in all, it seemed just like business as usual. He supposed he should be happy with that, but he wasn’t. They were his best team, the ones with the highest rate of solved cases, and they knew each other inside-out. They’d tried some other partners on occasion, but no one had clicked like those two. And now he had to break them up.
Thorne sighed again, then sat back in his chair, fingers stapled together beneath his chin, deep in thought.
***
“We’ll be all right.” Steve pressed gentle kisses down her neck and shoulder. “We talked about this. We’re prepared.”
Curling back into his embrace, Tessa sighed. “I know. It’s just… It’ll be different not working with you. I’ll miss it.”
“We’re still at the same station, the same unit.” Running his hand softly down her side, Steve dragged his nose up the back of her arm and found his way back to her neck. His low reverberating voice sent comfortable shivers down her spine. “It’s not like we’re going cold turkey. We might even work together on some cases again.”
Tessa hummed and closed her eyes, letting his caresses come to the forefront of her mind, pushing back the nagging worry that things would be too different in the morning. That despite their sacrifices now, things wouldn’t work out once the job got to the better of them, like it’d done before.
“Tess.” She opened her eyes and craned her neck so she could look him in the eyes. Steve looked conflicted between amusement and seriousness, but once he saw her, he smiled. “It’ll be all right.” He kissed her softly on the lips, reeling her in with his sheer magnetism. “You want to get some sleep instead?”
“No,” Tessa said, rolling onto her back so she could put a palm on his chest and play with the few hairs she found there. She smiled, relishing how he made her bold, confident, safe. As if she could do anything and it’d be okay. “Not tonight.”
“Okay.”
Steve’s voice was soft. Gentle. Warm and comforting. Just like it’d been that day when he’d kissed her for the first time.
His actions matched it.
His eyes stayed locked with hers the entire time. Electrifying. Magnifying. Pulling her into the deep with him, then plunging her into the waves. His hips rolled slowly, deeply, dragging it out until she lost control; until she raked her nails across his back, clutched him close, and nudged him over the edge with a soft “Steve”.
She loved to watch him lose control. She loved how it made her feel strong, to feel like an equal. And she loved how he snuggled close to her afterwards, as if he couldn’t get enough of her.
“I love you,” she whispered into his ear, sure that he could hear how hard and fast her heart was pounding from where his head rested on her chest.
Steve tipped his head up, a soft grin on his face. “I love you too, Tess.”
Tessa couldn’t help match his grin and squeezed him tightly with her arms. “We’ll be okay.”
Drawing a gentle kiss from her lips, Steve’s eyes twinkled. “Told you, didn’t I?”
FIN
Fandom: Murder Call
Characters: Imogen "Tootsie" Soames, Lance Fisk, Dee Suzeraine, Malcolm Thorne, Tessa Vance, Steve Hayden
Prompt: 005. Outsides
Word Count: 2254
Rating: PG-13 (T)
Summary: Outside perspectives on Tessa and Steve's budding relationship. Set post-series.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters. They belong to Jennifer Rowe, Hal McElroy and Southern Star. I make no profit out of this.
Haven't read part 1? Go here.
SHOCK AND AWE
Part 2
Really, she was just going to pop in and out. Five minutes max, just on her way to dinner with Lance. It wouldn’t take that long. She knew visiting hours would be over by the time they’d finished dinner, so she’d wanted to take this little moment to check in on Tessa, see how she was, and promise to come back for a longer visit tomorrow.
Of all the things she could’ve expected from walking in unannounced to Tessa’s room, though, this hadn’t been on the list. She stopped short, her mouth opened in a half-uttered ‘hello’, and blinked her eyes a few times before quickly taking a step back. Any sense of decorum and decency would’ve had her retreat fully, but…she couldn’t help it. She needed to sneak a peek just to confirm she hadn’t seen wrong.
Steve and Tessa were kissing. A very gentle, sweet kiss by the looks of it, and it was just as clear that they had no idea she’d been about to burst in on it all and probably cause them to jump apart like two teenagers caught in the act. They were completely cut off from the rest of the world.
Tootsie felt her expression, previously tense with worry, break into a wide grin. Her chest felt lighter, a thrill of exhilaration spreading through her body. For some reason, she almost wanted to do a little dance. She couldn’t quite explain it; she cared for both of them dearly, but they’d danced around each other for so many years that she’d given up on ever seeing them together.
But maybe now…
Sneaking another peek, Tootsie saw the kiss had come to an end, with Steve seated on the edge of Tessa’s bed and her hand caressing his cheek. The softest, most wondrous expression Tootsie had seen in a while was on Tessa’s face. A blushing smile replaced it at something Steve said, something she couldn’t hear from out in the corridor, and Tootsie smiled too.
Her five minutes were up, but she didn’t care. Tessa was in good hands. Maybe even the best of hands. Leaving the bouquet of flowers she’d brought at the nurse’s desk, with instructions to give to Tessa when she was ‘available’, Tootsie left the hospital.
And when Lance asked her why she never stopped smiling that night, she just gave him a mysterious smile in return.
***
Fisk wasn’t a man of grandiose gestures and a particularly well-developed sensual life, although Imogen always claimed the opposite. When he looked at the world around him, he didn’t focus on the minute details of someone’s behaviour.
Well, not normally. Ever since he was a child, his focus had been on his environment, not the people in it. A psychologist would probably say it stemmed from his mother leaving when he was a boy, and there was perhaps some truth to it. But that’s not all it was. He’d always been this way, as long as he could remember.
He liked to watch someone’s shoes, to see the wear and tear, the blemished or unblemished leather. It was the same for someone’s clothes, cars, books, hairstyles, furniture. A well-organised room was compared to a cluttered space. A torn shirt was compared to an ironed one. A mug discoloured from years of use was compared to a paper cup. They all told a story and he wanted those stories, those mysteries. He wanted to hunt it down, to play a part in its unravelling, to find the villain at the end of the path. It’s what’d made him choose his profession.
But in this job you couldn’t always get by without looking at people too, so he’d learned, adapted, and that evolution had brought him here: to contemplate what he’d seen, what he’d learned, and what sort of conclusion he could draw from that.
It’d started with a new hairstyle. Continued with more frequent laughs; a freer kind. Shirts were ironed crispier than usual. The ties were a touch more colourful, a tad more vivacious. Suit pants were replaced by suit skirts that were newer, slightly less drab.
Those were examples of the more indirect evidence. The direct evidence, of course, wasn’t hard facts. It was a soft tone, a gentle smile, and a silence that seemed more significant than he realised at the time. It was, for lack of a better word, a hunch. Fisk wasn’t comfortable with hunches, but this particular one had its basis in already established hard facts: Vance and Hayden were no longer just partners and friends.
Exactly which category they belonged to, Fisk didn’t know. He’d have to gather more evidence for determining that - evidence that could be trusted and not just Suzeraine’s fanciful gossip. But he felt certain he’d get to the bottom of it eventually. Like many scientists and unlike certain pathologists and constables, he was patient. He could wait.
Fisk allowed himself a small smile.
Yes, he could wait.
***
She was like a dog after a bone. As soon as the possibility jumped into her head, Dee couldn’t let it go.
She pestered Tessa about it. Pestered Steve about it too. Tried to catch them in the act, to disprove their lies, but they were a couple of sneaky bastards. Steve was a stone when he got a mind to it. Tessa would’ve usually caved by now, but she hadn’t, which Dee supposed meant something.
But she had a plan now. A fool-proof one. And all it needed was their annual Christmas gathering at the bar and some well-chosen words to the owner.
“You can’t back out now!” Dee was grinning, a gleam in her eyes. “Everyone else’ve done it. You don’t wanna break tradition.”
“A stupid tradition,” Tessa muttered below her breath, and made as if to leave the spot Dee had more or less pushed her into. To Dee’s delight, however, Tessa was held back by Steve, who looked just a little too relaxed and thrilled for someone still keeping things under wrap (according to Tootsie).
“’s probably not so bad,” Steve said, a grin on his face.
“That’s right,” Dee agreed wholeheartedly, and the people closest to them roared in agreement too. Tessa blushed heavily, clearly annoyed and bothered by the amount of attention they were getting, but Dee didn’t care. “So pucker up, buttercup!”
Tessa rolled her eyes and turned decisively to Steve, who already stood ready with a wide grin that turned into overdramatically puckered-up lips. With a slight groan, Tessa grabbed hold of his shoulders and pushed herself up on her toes so she could give him a quick peck on the lips.
“Noo,” Dee yelled good-naturedly, “do a proper one!”
Tessa glared at her and Dee was thrilled to see that Steve didn’t. In fact, he was grinning wider than ever and suddenly swooped Tessa down into a low dip to kiss her like he actually meant it.
“That’s it!” Dee whooped and the others chimed in, the volume increasing when they noticed Tessa holding on for dear life - and then kissing Steve back like she meant it.
Coming up for air and balance both, Tessa and Steve didn’t seem to have eyes for anyone else for a moment until Tessa sent another glare back at Dee and then deliberately stepped away from the radius of the mistletoe.
Judging by the number of times Steve’s hand was touching Tessa’s lower back that night and the equal number of times Tessa blushed, though, Dee counted her mission as a success and decided to back down.
For now.
***
There’d been times in the past when he’d wondered. Sometimes, he’d even tried to probe very gently to see if there was something hiding beneath the surface, but up until now, he’d never found any cause for concern. Friendship and partners, that’d been all there was to it. There’d been rough spots, sure, and moments when he’d worried he’d lose one of his detectives to the darkness of this work, or at least that he’d have to reassign them to other partners.
Things were different now. Thorne wasn’t ignorant. The way his best Detective Sergeant had reacted to his partner being shot, and then how they’d both behaved afterwards… It’d been a far cry from their behaviour during that art gallery case half a year ago. He’d thought it’d only be a matter of time, and he’d been right. Being right wasn’t always a blessing, though.
Peering up at his two detectives above the rim of his glasses, Thorne chewed the inside of his cheek. “I will have to reassign you.”
It was the local policy. The brass didn’t want any conflicts of interests, or any domestic disputes interfering with the job. Although Thorne felt sure Homicide currently had a bit of leeway considering the losses and trauma they’d experienced four months back, he wasn’t sure this was a cause to try it out on. There were other things higher on his list of priorities, such as overtime pay.
“We know,” Steve said evenly, his hands settled calmly behind his back. He exuded only professionalism. Thorne knew that whatever decision he landed on, Steve would respect it. As he should, too, considering it’d taken them months to come clean to him.
“You should have come to me with this before,” Thorne said, folding his hands together, his gaze steady on both of them. Maybe I could’ve helped you.
“We know and we’re sorry, sir.” Tessa wasn’t as calm as Steve, and yet she wasn’t as nervous as he’d sometimes seen her over the years. If anything, it told him that this was serious business, not some casual fling.
“All right.” Thorne let out a little sigh and looked down at the paperwork he’d been working on before they came to see him. “Go back to your case. I’ll call you when I have news for you.”
Perhaps he should’ve yelled at them. They looked like they’d expected that. They also looked like this had stung more than his bark. Sharing a wary look, Tessa and Steve excused themselves and left his office. Once the door was shut, Thorne looked up and peered through the blinds to see them return to their desks.
No inappropriate touches. No deviance from the routine they’d acquired over the years. All in all, it seemed just like business as usual. He supposed he should be happy with that, but he wasn’t. They were his best team, the ones with the highest rate of solved cases, and they knew each other inside-out. They’d tried some other partners on occasion, but no one had clicked like those two. And now he had to break them up.
Thorne sighed again, then sat back in his chair, fingers stapled together beneath his chin, deep in thought.
***
“We’ll be all right.” Steve pressed gentle kisses down her neck and shoulder. “We talked about this. We’re prepared.”
Curling back into his embrace, Tessa sighed. “I know. It’s just… It’ll be different not working with you. I’ll miss it.”
“We’re still at the same station, the same unit.” Running his hand softly down her side, Steve dragged his nose up the back of her arm and found his way back to her neck. His low reverberating voice sent comfortable shivers down her spine. “It’s not like we’re going cold turkey. We might even work together on some cases again.”
Tessa hummed and closed her eyes, letting his caresses come to the forefront of her mind, pushing back the nagging worry that things would be too different in the morning. That despite their sacrifices now, things wouldn’t work out once the job got to the better of them, like it’d done before.
“Tess.” She opened her eyes and craned her neck so she could look him in the eyes. Steve looked conflicted between amusement and seriousness, but once he saw her, he smiled. “It’ll be all right.” He kissed her softly on the lips, reeling her in with his sheer magnetism. “You want to get some sleep instead?”
“No,” Tessa said, rolling onto her back so she could put a palm on his chest and play with the few hairs she found there. She smiled, relishing how he made her bold, confident, safe. As if she could do anything and it’d be okay. “Not tonight.”
“Okay.”
Steve’s voice was soft. Gentle. Warm and comforting. Just like it’d been that day when he’d kissed her for the first time.
His actions matched it.
His eyes stayed locked with hers the entire time. Electrifying. Magnifying. Pulling her into the deep with him, then plunging her into the waves. His hips rolled slowly, deeply, dragging it out until she lost control; until she raked her nails across his back, clutched him close, and nudged him over the edge with a soft “Steve”.
She loved to watch him lose control. She loved how it made her feel strong, to feel like an equal. And she loved how he snuggled close to her afterwards, as if he couldn’t get enough of her.
“I love you,” she whispered into his ear, sure that he could hear how hard and fast her heart was pounding from where his head rested on her chest.
Steve tipped his head up, a soft grin on his face. “I love you too, Tess.”
Tessa couldn’t help match his grin and squeezed him tightly with her arms. “We’ll be okay.”
Drawing a gentle kiss from her lips, Steve’s eyes twinkled. “Told you, didn’t I?”
FIN