A/N: These scenes are the ones some people felt were missing between Chapter 23 and Chapter 24 in my posted story Messed Up. I've filled in some blanks and upped the rating to M for language and adult situations. In order to get the back story, you will want to read Messed Up first.

Disclaimer: All characters belong to CSI:NY, its writers, producers and CBS. I promise to put them away neatly when I am done.

Another Fine Mess

Chapter 1: Cuddling Party

Danny tried, he really did, but the groan tore out of him when a sobbing Lindsay moved against him. Instantly she pulled away.

"Oh, Danny, I'm sorry! Your poor ribs."

He pulled her back, not without another grimace of pain. "Hey, don't go anywhere. What's a little pain between friends?"

"I couldn't tell you before, Danny. You're such a cop …" Her voiced died off as he looked at her.

"What does that mean?"

She flushed a little. "You're so like my dad."

"Well," he said with a hint of shock. "That's a buzz-killer if I ever heard one."

"Actually," she said quietly, "It's the biggest compliment I could give you."

She sat back down in the chair, urging Danny to lie back down and relieve the pressure on his ribs. He wouldn't let go of her hand, though. He had not let go all through the story, which she had told as if putting a statement on the record. Having heard it now, Danny wondered how many times she had given that identical statement in the past few years.

"Okay, Lindsay. I need more here. I get that you felt let down, betrayed by your family cutting you off …" he looked at her quizzically, waiting for her to take up the story, but she looked away.

"Let's go another way, then. Why New York?" Now that she was talking, he wasn't going to let her stop.

Lindsay looked up, a light in her eyes for the first time in days. "Well, maybe I was tired of looking at wheat!" She grinned when he let out a shout of laughter.

"See, I knew there was nothing to it! So you ran away to the Big Apple?"

"I met Mac at a conference – I was giving a paper …"

"On forensic work in small communities…" Danny supplied, then grinned at her shocked look.

"You checked me out?" There was a hint of outrage in her voice.

Danny shrugged. "Cop, right?"

Lindsay tucked that away to use against him later. "Anyway, long story short," and a world of pain she didn't want to re-visit, "I had changed my name, taken Anna Monroe's. My father … had cut me off by then, and I needed to start again. Mac gave a presentation about the lab here; it sounded like a dream come true. So I sent him a letter and a resume."

She cleared her throat, and continued, "Besides, Anna wanted me out of the Montana office; there had been some threats."

Danny sat up quickly when Lindsay's eyes filled with tears, then swore viciously as the pain took his breath away.

"Danny," she started, but he stopped her by pulling her up on the bed.

"Stay here, and I'll stop having to move." He urged her around until she was tucked in beside him, his good arm around her, her head on his shoulder. "Now, don't stop. You can tell me anything, you know?"

She was silent for a moment, then looked up at him. "Yes," she said simply, "I can tell you anything."

"So there were threats," his arm tightened convulsively. "What did your captain do about that?"

Lindsay laughed a little bitterly, "Well, seeing as he was one of the ones involved, the original threats came from him. Then there was the new captain. He said he understood what I had done, and why I had done it, but he wanted me gone, 'for my own safety'. My family refused to talk to me. There was just nothing to stay for."

The tears were falling again; Danny could feel the heat of them on his skin.

"Mac knew, of course, although I didn't tell him about my family's involvement. Anna might have. She was so angry at my father."

"Shouldn't she have been? Lindsay, you did the right thing. That should have counted."

"Talk to IAB if you believe that, Messer. No one likes the watchdog. My dad believed in the code – cops for cops. He wasn't involved in the corruption; he was too good for those kinds of games. But to take down your own, especially family…. You don't understand, Danny." She rolled over to look him in the face. "My father put everything into the job. After my mom died, it was all he had. I betrayed the family when I went after cops."

Danny nodded. The thing was, he did understand Lindsay's father. He just thought he was wrong. "Lindsay, your brother betrayed the code, too, didn't he? Why take it all out on you?"

Lindsay closed her eyes. "I didn't say it made any sense. Tim was my father's boy, through and through. I don't know how they've dealt with their relationship. Knowing my dad, they haven't. I broke more than a corruption ring; I broke the family."

Danny couldn't say anything else. Her voice was so defeated, so lonely. All he could do was hold her. The pain meds had finally kicked in and he was trying as hard as he could to stay with her, but he could feel himself drifting off, muscles relaxing.

Lindsay felt the change in him when the pain finally went away, and decided they had talked enough for now. She closed her eyes and snuggled in, chuckling a bit when she thought of a story Stella had told about Danny and her investigating a "cuddle party". She thought he was actually pretty good at cuddling.

When the nurse came through on her rounds, they were both peacefully sleeping, arms around each other. For a moment, she considered waking Lindsay up and sending her home, but she couldn't bring herself to disturb them.