Some things are better left…Unsaid
By Alekat
Written 10/10/2006
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters but I did borrow them for just a little while.
Rating: M
Pairing: Danny/Lindsey
Spoilers: "Not what it looks like"
Summary: The title says it all..
Forks and knives clinking against chipped dishes and the smell of early morning fresh brewed coffee assaulted his senses the moment Danny Messer walked through the door to his favorite café. He made his way to his usual table and, nodded to his favorite waitress, and with a wry grin, signaled her to place his regular standing order. He considered eating outside but the early November chill in the air had followed him, it seemed, into the café as he found his seat near the window. Danny pulled his jacket tighter wishing that the owner would cut the patrons a break and turn the heat on just once before the first snow arrived. Knowing that would never happen he sighed and stuffed his hands deeper in his pockets as he sat staring at the early morning traffic just beginning to stir. The busiest city in the world was just beginning to awaken and he was an unsuspected witness to the multitudes now making their way to work or school or shopping. Tourists flocked to the city at the beginning of the holiday season for the sights, sounds, shopping and all that the city had to offer while dressed in its seasonal finery.
The waitress sat 3 plates on the table, only one of which was his usual bacon, eggs, and biscuits and he nodded his thanks as his best friend, Don Flack, slid in across from him. Don was always just in time for Molly, their normal waitress, to have his breakfast sitting on the table. Danny looked from his plate to Don's. Don was no slouch when it came to food. His plate was always filled with lots of eggs, sausage, and gravy with a side dish of a heaping stack of pancakes. Looking at the gravy made Danny think of Montana who would, no doubt, have ordered grits with her breakfast. He shook his hands from his pockets and picked up his coffee turning his thoughts elsewhere.
Very little conversation ever took place at this early morning meeting. The pair had been having breakfast at the same time every morning since they were rookies at NYPD more then fifteen years ago. Their daily breakfast continued through Flack's journey up the ranks of the force while Danny had deviated from his original plan to become a detective like his friend had. Danny, instead, became a Crime Scene Investigator. Still a detective in his own right but when he solved a crime the evidence took on a new meaning. Flack would track down the suspects while Danny was chasing the evidence. They made a likely pair of friends and one usually could pick up on a problem with the other, as was the case today.
"Hey Messer, what's wrong man? You haven't touched your eggs." Danny shrugged and Don continued, "If you're not gonna eat'em, can I?"
He nodded and watched as Don swapped his empty plate for Danny's and began wolfing down Danny' s breakfast. Not that it had ever been lax, but Flack's appetite had steadily increased after he had been released back to active duty following his stint in recovery from injuries received during a cell phone bombing at the beginning of the summer. He claimed the three months of hospital food, bland diets and soft serve items, were a thing of his past. Hunger was not something Flack relished and he was enjoying his newfound freedom to enjoy life; his second chance to enjoy everything anew.
Flack watched the pained expression on his friend's face and asked, "Is it Cindy? Did you two break up again?" That question got a small gesture from Danny, an eyebrow lift for the briefest moment. So Flack pressed on, "Okay, is it something at work?"
Between bites and chewing Flack continued his one-sided conversation, "So it's something at work. Did Mac take you off the promotion list again? Did Stella insult your dog?" His assault was met with no resistance until he asked, "Was it something during the Holly Go Lightly case? Lindsey going in as a decoy, maybe?"
This got the result that Flack was looking for. Danny's face turned red and he drew in a deep breath that he held for just a moment longer than necessary.
"Look Danny, you either want to drop ideas of a relationship with Lindsey or look for another job. Mac will never let you two be together as long as you work together."
"I know." Danny's words were barely above a whisper. "I never meant for this to happen. She wasn't supposed to get to me this way."
"What about Cindy?" Flack hadn't heard his friend mention the girlfriend in quite some time.
"She split a month ago." Danny fiddled with the spoon in his coffee. He had yet to eat or drink anything. Of course, there was nothing left on his plate thanks to Flack's newfound pet tapeworm.
Flack snorted, "A month ago. And you haven't said anything." He shook his head in disbelief that he had not even noticed his friend's new single status. Heck, they could have been hitting the clubs. Flack had not done that since before the bombing.
"I've had other things on my mind, man." Danny, let go with an exasperated sigh, took a sip of his coffee and signaled for Molly to bring him a warm cup. "This thing with Lindsey is complicated."
"That's a line of crap and you know it, Danny." Flack retorted, "It's obvious! You're in love with her."
"In love with who?" The question was soft and low and both men looked directly into Lindsay's soft chocolate eyes.
Danny almost spilled his coffee and Flack choked on his eggs. Lindsay patted him on the back and slid into the seat next to Danny. She gave each man a curious glance then asked, "Well?"
Neither man moved to answer so she continued on, a smile blooming on her face, "Aw, Come on guys, tell me. I love a little gossip every now and then." Before either could answer her, all three pagers went off.
As the three made their way out of the diner to Flack's car, Molly took their money and handed Lindsay a bag with her breakfast and a tall cup of coffee. Just a normal start of the day for CSI agents in New York City.
At nine am the traffic on Canal Street was buzzing to and from the Holland Tunnel so the detectives were careful of their surroundings. Danny and Lindsay headed for Mac's SUV which was angled about the same as Flack's sedan mostly on the sidewalk to ward off prying eyes. As they headed around the back of the SUV, a car headed southeast out of the Holland Tunnel almost clipped Lindsay. Danny saw the car and grabbed her, pulling her roughly against his chest. Both were breathing heavy as their eyes locked, hearts pounding from the adrenaline rush and maybe something more. The tension in the air around them was heavy, thick like the fog hovering above. He moved to brush her hair from her eyes only to be stopped when she pushed the offending stray lock behind her ear.
Stella Bonasera's voice from behind the SUV pulled them from the stolen moment and Danny felt his heart break at the loss of contact as Lindsay pulled away, her uneasy smile letting him know the feeling of loss was mutual.
"Danny, Mac needs you inside." Stella came around to meet the pair, "Lindsay, will you help me with the body out here?"
"Sure," Lindsay grabbed a toolbox filled with supplies and followed Stella to the crime scene marked on the sidewalk by bright yellow tape covered in black lettering. The tape had been strung from the bumper of Mac's SUV to a nearby paper stand and in a circular route across the sidewalk to where a body was seated on a bench in a slumped position.
Danny glanced over his shoulder as he headed in the cab office door to find Lindsay watching him. A sweet smile from her warmed his heart and he winked at her, keeping the mood light, before disappearing through the door.
Lindsay wound her way through the labyrinth of glass hallways from the UV lab to trace. She found Danny leaning over the evidence table; his expression conveyed his intense thought process. Something she found extremely attractive. The man was amazing when so intently focused on solving a crime. She watched as he pushed his glasses up on his forehead and focused on a tissue sample he placed under the microscope. She had never been attracted to a man with glasses before now but this man and those glasses turned her insides to Jell-O.
He knew she was there and he hoped she was watching him for purely personal reasons but her question successfully shattered that hope. "What have you got on the substance from the bench guy's cheek?"
A sigh escaped as he answered, "Pine sap." He turned around not bothering to push his glasses down also not knowing that that sight was potentially her undoing.
Mac came into the room from the other hallway with Stella and Flack in tow.
"Did you say Pine Sap?" Stella asked as she and Flack came to a stop side by side. Flack reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a notebook, and pen then started making notes.
"There's not a single pine tree anywhere near where we found the body." Mac commented as he took the printout that Lindsey was passing to him showing the sample readouts.
Flack spoke up, "No but I had the beat cops do a sweep of the docks and there was a boat offloaded to a rail car carrying fresh cut pine trees. I'll go back out there and check it out."
"Good idea. I ran our John Doe's prints through AFIS and couldn't find anything," Lindsay said. "Most of the transients in the city have been printed at one time or another."
"This might not be just another homeless murdered." Stella added as she pulled on a pair of gloves and began processing a fiber that she had been carrying in an evidence bag when she entered the room.
Danny added, picking up a bag and emptying its contents on the lighted table in front of them, "Maybe instead of these dirty, ragged, sweat soaked clothes indicating he was homeless, they tell us another story."
"What are you thinking?" Lindsey stepped closer to Danny to look at the blue, red, and yellow flannel shirt with holes torn in the lower parts of it.
Danny raised the leg of the dark gray work pants and said, "I'm thinking this residue could be from the pine trees on that boat."
"Like maybe he's a lumberjack instead of being homeless?" Stella questioned and Danny nodded his response.
"Lindsey, go with Flack in case he finds something that needs to be processed." Mac told the group as he headed out of the lab.
At a quarter till midnight, the locker room was quiet and dimly lit when Lindsay entered and made her way to the lockers set aside specifically for the CSIs. She had thought everyone was gone but her until she turned the corner on the row of lockers and found Danny. He was pulling a gray T-shirt over his head and she could see his tattoo, a leftover, from his short stint in the Tanglewood Boys when he was younger. They had talked about it at the hospital vigil after the bombing when neither could sleep for fear that Flack might stop breathing. Those first few nights after the bombing and Flack's surgery had been long sleepless ones. Mac and Stella had taken the first night watch so Danny and Lindsay had taken the second. During that vigil, Danny had opened up telling her about his initiation that ended without incident. Had he gone through with it, his objective for initiation was to kill a rival Pelam Bay gang member. But his brother Louie had seen it coming and found a way to stop it. The resulting aftermath had completely played itself out a few months back when the members of the Tanglewood gang beat Danny's brother to death. Louie had been in the very same hospital as Flack was in; a memory that was still fresh in Danny's mind all this time later.
Danny looked up into her obsidian eyes and whispered, "Montana." Their eyes held as every movement spoke volumes pulling them on autopilot toward each other till she melted in his arms. His hands trailed up her bare arms, across the straps of the pink tank top she was wearing, settling on her face where he gently pulled her to him. When their lips met, it was like fireworks on the fourth of July. Feelings and suppressed emotions bubbled to the surface as he trailed kisses along her bare neck to her shoulder where he lifted one strap and eased it down to her elbow before rationale won over impropriety.
Both took a ragged breath and stepped back from the other. She smiled up at him as she lifted her tank strap and in a seductive drawl, asked, "Your place or mine?"
He let out a tumultuous breath and whispered, "Mine's closer."
She rose up onto her toes and kissed his cheek, brushing her thumb across afterwards to wipe away the remnants of her raspberry lip-gloss.
The few seconds it took for each to grab their coats and backpacks were almost too much for them. At the locker room exit, Danny pulled her into his arms for a mind-numbing, knee weakening kiss that would hopefully hold them at least to the subway.
Cold November air brought them together once again a block away from the building where they had spent most of the day. There was too much space between them so Danny pulled Montana into his side and wrapped his arm around her waist holding her close. The subway was just ahead but he needed to feel her lips on his once more before they were in a crowd so he directed them to the alleyway just outside public view from the street. There he leaned against the cool brick building and pulled her to him. They shared another heated kiss that left both breathless and longing for closer contact.
Needing to be in charge for just a moment she pulled him toward the underground opening to the subway tunnel. They raced down the steps hand in hand and slid through the doors just as they were closing. Their playful laughter rang out in the near empty subway car and an older couple at the back of the car smiled at the young lovers.
Danny held her in his arms with his left hand behind her on the metal pole nearest the door and cupped her wind-chapped cheek in his right palm. The subway lights flickered on and off, as he leaned in to capture her pouty full lips, his hand slipped down inside the collar of her jacket feeling the cool bare skin where she had not put anything over the tank top. He made a mental note to thank her later for one less layer of clothing that he would need to remove when they finally made it to his apartment.
When the subway stopped, he pulled her along beside him, her steps just a bit shorter and quicker than his to allow her to keep up with him. The anticipation was killing them slowly. A soft snow had begun to fall and the sidewalk was beginning to get slick. A man walked out of a coffee shop causing Danny to stop short and Lindsey to slip. He caught her and held her tightly reminiscent of the actions from earlier in the day and whispered in her ear. "If we don't get to my apartment soon, I'm going to ravage you on the street."
At the front door of his brownstone apartment, he fumbled for the keys finally needing her help to open the door. They stumbled in the door and up the stairs to the bedroom where the world around them finally disappeared in a haze of discarded clothes and whispered confessions of love.
The End.