For Fiona

1. A Green Bow

Lucy Chen found her shift on patrol to be quiet, but for several weeks as she rode side by side with Tim Bradford, every single shift was quiet; not necessarily due to a lack of calls, but more so because of how time between calls became eerily quiet. A charged quiet. An uncomfortable quiet. A suffocating quiet. A quiet they had never experienced together before THE kiss. The one she told her roommate, Tamara Collins, was meaningless. The one that was for work. The one that re-defined the best kiss she had ever experienced. The one that proved to be completely unnecessary, because Hajek did not call Jake Butler, Tim's doppelgänger, to engage him in what was meant to be their undercover operation before he got arrested for committing another crime. One kiss and everything Tim and Lucy had built between them toppled over and was replaced by the kind of quiet that was filled with boundless feelings neither had the nerve to express.

Tim, who used to love work, dreaded sitting in a shop next to the person who was once his confidant that turned into the only person he could not discuss something pretty important with. For the millionth time, he thought he had mustered up the courage to broach the topic of what had been unlocked because of their kiss and glanced over at Lucy, then he opened his mouth in the hopes the words would come, but he was interrupted by a dispatcher alerting them to a nearby call via their radios. Lucy gave him their signature almost imperceptible nod they exchanged when presented with a call to confirm that they were going to respond, and then she spoke into the radio to tell the dispatcher their decision. While they were having trouble communicating in every other regard, when they were working, their shorthand or wordless expressions still functioned properly- a small miracle all things considered.

When they arrived at the unassuming Dunne residence where they had been called to, Tim opened the door and Lucy walked in first with quiet feet and guns drawn. The living room was the initial room they entered. At the sight of two bodies, they exchanged a look and searched the rest of the house for who could have hurt the victims, but there was no sign of anyone.

"I didn't see a kid," he stated the obvious.

"Kid's room but no kid means they could be at school," she theorized, since their exploration of the house did indicate a child lived in the residence but was not, thankfully, present for the attack.

"Or abducted by whoever dropped those bodies."

"Always such a pessimist," she teased with a smirk.

He returned her small smile with one of his own. Sometimes, they experienced fragments of the relationship they used to have before their kiss created such a rift between them, and he craved extending those rare seconds for as long as possible, so he did his best not to say or do anything to disrupt her beaming up at him and the way her soft, fond voice flooded his veins. A knock at the front door interrupted their moment, and they snapped back to their high alert on the job demeanors.

She saw a familiar face through the peephole, so Lucy returned her gun to her holster before opening the door. "Hi, Nell."

"Lucy? What are you doing here? I saw a squad car out front and thought I would see what's going on," Nell Forester explained then adjusted her thick black rimmed glasses.

"This house is an active crime scene. I can't let you in right now. I'm sorry," she apologized.

"Active crime scene? Are the Dunnes okay?"

"I can't say," Lucy responded plainly.

"What am I supposed to do about Fiona?"

A little girl peeked out from where she was hiding behind Nell's leg. She had to be about three years old based on her size with big bright blue eyes, long brown wavy hair, a green bow in her hair, and a multicolored floral dress. Lucy bent down and gently said, "Hi, I'm Lucy. Are you Fiona?" The child only nodded meekly. "It's so nice to meet you. I love your bow." With a tiny curl of her lips, Fiona reverently touched the ribbon in her hair. "It's green. Is that your favorite color?"