Stuck In A Moment
DL The memories of some situations in life are always going to stick to you like glue. For Lindsay, this was one of them.
Disclaimer: I have custody of my Muse and the plot but I humbly acknowledge that I have no jurisdiction over the characters themselves.
A/N:- This idea popped into my head fully formed one day and just wouldn't budge. It's different to what I usually write in that it has a much lighter, humorous anti-Angst tone. It's basically plotless humour and fluff that I hope you enjoy!
'Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of' – U2
"I could charge you with sexual harassment."
"There is nothing sexual about this. It's purely innocent to me. However, if you're entertaining sexual thoughts then-"
"This is all your fault!"
"My fault? It's not like I planned this! I was doing the brave, heroic thing of protecting you……"
"From WHAT? A cat?!"
Two hours earlier ……..
"I knew it was going to be one of those days." Lindsay sighed, staring out of the passenger window.
"One of what days?" Danny asked, looking across at her.
"You know one of those days where everything that can go wrong goes wrong."
Danny chuckled. "It's not the end of the world Montana. We're just stuck in a traffic jam."
"The same traffic jam which I got stuck in on the way to work this morning only to arrive and hear Mac send us back in the direction which I came." She complained. "Glah. I need coffee." She sat, letting her head fall back and hit the head rest.
Danny tapped the steering wheel as they moved forward a few inches. "Late night last night?"
"Hmm." Lindsay replied non-committedly.
Danny felt his stomach clench in an automatic spasm of jealousy but before he could dig deeper with a carefully angled carefree comment, the traffic finally started moving again and he had no choice but to turn all his attention to the road.
……………
"You're late." Detective Angell remarked, looking at her watch as she slipped her cell phone back onto her belt and headed towards them.
Lindsay muttered something incoherently as she pulled her kit out.
"Traffic." Danny told the Detective. "What have we got?"
"Cleaner came round to Denise Mcqueen's house about an hour ago and found her lying face down in a pool of blood in her living room. Victim was thirty years-old and an artist which you'll see the minute you step into her home." Angell told them as they walked into the building and headed up to the third floor.
As soon as they walked into the apartment, Lindsay immediately saw what Angell meant. The place was decorated in dark reds and browns with paintings lining each and every wall and there were vases and decorative plates displayed on tables and in cabinets. The apartment was pretty big which gave a direct indication of her wealth and where there was money, there was always a motive for murder. Lindsay put down her kit and started snapping photos of the living room whilst Danny examined the body.
"Looks like she took a bullet to the chest." Danny said, kneeling down and taking photos of the large blood pool surrounding the body.
"And I don't think she's been dead long." Lindsay muttered.
Danny looked up at her. She was standing by a wall on which the victim had just started what looked like a mosaic. There were tubs of small tiles on a coffee table near by and a picture of what the finished work would look like. "How d'ya know?" He asked.
"Come here for a minute." She asked leaning forward and examining the wall closely.
Danny put down his camera and pushed his glasses further up his nose. "What?" He asked, standing next to her wondering what a half-tiled, half blank wall could tell them.
Lindsay was just about to answer him when there was a large crash coming from the kitchen. In an instinctive reaction Danny grabbed Lindsay and pushed her against the wall, shielding her from whatever the possible hidden perp had planned ………… but no explosion or gun fire came and only a long-haired tortoiseshell cat came running into the room, took one look at them and scampered back the way it had come.
Feeling slightly foolish Danny gave Lindsay an apologetic smile. "Sorry. You were saying?"
Lindsay stared back, eyes wide with a horrified look on her face. "I was about to say that the superglue on the wall was still wet." She said weakly.
It took Danny a beat to process what she had just said but when he did he immediately began to try and move off her in a somewhat frantic panic but no matter how hard he tried to pull his hands away from the wall they refused to budge during which all the time Lindsay was giving him a 'I told you so' glare that in the end he gave up even trying and just looked back at her, trying to access the situation. Here he was pressed up extremely intimately to his work partner whom he really liked but who probably really hated him right now. Her back and legs were well and truly stuck to wall and Danny was thankful that where her head was tiles had already been laid because he did not want to be responsible for Lindsay having to chop half her hair off. His left hand was resting above her hip dangerously close to a part of her body which if he was actually touching would have sexual connotations but his fingers were touching the wall and therefore stuck and his right arm from the elbow to his wrist were leaning against the wall just above her shoulder. Things were looking bad.
Lindsay could not think of any words she could manage to splutter which would do justice to how she felt at their current situation. She tried, she really did, but she just couldn't think of anything to say to Danny.
"Woah I'm sorry." Detective Angell said entering the room and then seeing the two CSIs in what looked liked to be a state of passion, quickly averting her eyes. "I'm not interrupting am I?"
Finally realising what it would look like to the outside observer and feeling a mixture of embarrassment and anger at Danny for getting them into this position in the first place, Lindsay found the power to speak again. "Yes you're interrupting us slowly get more and more stuck to this wall."
"What?" Angell questioned with a mixture of curiosity and disbelief.
"Montana was about to show me something and then there was a crash from the kitchen and I thought that a perp was hiding in there or something so I just reacted-"
Angell quickly pulled her gun out from her holster, her eyes searching the room. "Is he still here?"
"There was no perp. Only a cat." Lindsay said, rolling her eyes.
"And the victim was obviously in the middle of creating a mosaic or something when she was killed and the glue was still wet-"
"And you're now stuck?" Angell said, holstering a gun, an amused smile growing on her face as she approached them.
"It's not funny." Lindsay shot, failing to see how being stuck to a wall for the rest of eternity was even faintly amusing.
"Sorry." Angell said, clearing her throat to stifle a laugh. She grabbed Danny's right shoulder with two hands and pulled but his arm didn't budge a bit. She tried again and then again with his left side but nothing moved.
"I'm going to have to phone for help." She announced, walking away. She was just about to head outside when she just couldn't resist it. "Don't go anywhere."
"You're real funny." Danny said, twisting his head slightly and shouting after the detective.
"I knew it was going to be one of those days." Lindsay sighed.
Danny turned back to look at her. "You knew you were going to get stuck to a wall and you still came to work?"
Lindsay gave him a withering glare. "Cats scare you easily do they Messer?"
"Hey! You're not the one whose skin is going to get ripped off trying to remove us from the wall." Danny complained but deep down he wasn't really worrying about that. Right now he had the chance to stare at Lindsay as much as he wanted without it seeming obvious and he could never remember having the opportunity to be this close to her before.
"No I'm just the one being groped by a guy who's afraid of felines."
"I'm not groping you!" Danny said, defending himself although he was very close to doing so.
"I could charge you with sexual harassment."
"There is nothing sexual about this. It's purely innocent to me. However, if you're entertaining sexual thoughts then-"
"This is all your fault!"
"My fault? It's not like I planned this! I was doing the brave, heroic thing of protecting you……"
"From WHAT? A cat?!"
Danny grinned. "You know you're real cute when you're mad Montana."
Lindsay opened her mouth to say something but then abruptly shut it again and averted her eyes. She felt herself blush slightly and she hated the way she always felt like a schoolgirl around Danny. "Don't flirt with me when we're like this."
"Who says I'm flirting with you?" Danny smiled. His eyes were bright blue and sparkling and though the fingers on his left hand were stuck, he still managed to graze his thumb over her hip sending shivers down her spine.
She lowered her eyes and stared at a button on his shirt trying to control herself. "Danny …."
He lowered his head slightly to meet her eyes. "Yeah?" He said, his voice low and husky.
Lindsay stared at him. She'd be lying if she said she hadn't imagined being in this position with Danny before – although in her mind it was in her apartment and there was a lot more movement going on. It was crazy but she was sure there were hundreds of women in New York who would be dying to be in her place right now. She let herself lower her gaze to his lips and entertain the possibility of 'what if' but before anything could happen they were well and truly interrupted.
"You two have got to learn to keep your hands off of each other during work hours!" Flack chuckled as he, Hawkes and Angell entered the room.
"You called THEM?!" Lindsay cried accusingly, her lust quickly turning to anger. Before Angell could defend herself, Sid and Adam walked in too.
"Slow day at the lab." Hawkes explained with a shrug as he joined the others laughing.
"Oh could this get much worse." Lindsay muttered.
"Give me your camera Hawkes." Flack said, starting to take photos of Danny and Lindsay. "This is something Messer's gonna wanna remember."
"Shut it Flack." Danny growled, futilely attempting to move again.
Stella wolf-whistled as she came in, a smile on her face and even Mac struggled to hide the grin threatening to break out on his face.
"Great. Now the whole gang's here." Danny sighed. "Anyone else you've forgotten to invite?"
"Am I going to have to give you two the talk on professionalism during work hours?" Mac asked, walking up to them, assessing the situation.
"There was a crash and I reacted and a cat-" Danny trailed off as the whole team erupted with laughter. "I don't know why I bother." He muttered, realising that Angell would have already told him what had happened and he was just teasing them.
"Please just get us unstuck." Lindsay asked, looking pleadingly at her boss.
"I'll try." Mac smiled. "Hawkes you finish processing the body and then go back to the lab with Sid and Adam. Angell go and track down the victim's family. Stella, we're going to need a sharp knife and some hot water. And Flack, don't you have something better to do?"
"Nah, I'm off shift now. Got all the time in the world." He grinned, grabbing the camera again and taking a few more photos.
Lindsay groaned exasperatedly. "This day just gets better and better."
Danny couldn't help but smirk slightly. "You think this is funny?!" She exclaimed.
"Not funny ….. just unexpected." Danny said quickly.
"You think it's funny. I can't believe you, I – just – aargh!" Lindsay exclaimed, closing her eyes.
"I think the only thing to do Danny is that we're going to have to cut off the sections of plaster you're attached to and then hopefully when we stick your hand in some solvent, the glue will dissolve." Mac said, examining the wall.
"What about me?" Lindsay asked.
"I think you'll be okay once Stella helps you get out of your clothes."
To say Lindsay looked thunderstruck would be the understatement of the century.
Danny chuckled at the thought but secretly right now it was both his biggest fantasy and biggest nightmare to see the young country girl in her underwear.
If Lindsay wasn't so sure that Mac rarely joked, she could have sworn he was pulling her leg about this. Sure, looking at the cases they'd worked, strange things did happen in New York but this – THIS was just way out there.
As Adam wrapped Janice McQueen's body in the sheet, he leant over and muttered to Hawkes "There's no justice in the world when we have to pull overtime working this case whilst Messer and Flack get to see Monroe in her underwear."
Lindsay overheard him, as did everyone else in the room and her whole body tensed in frustration. "No one is seeing anything." She shot.
Adam shrugged. "I meant it as a compliment Lindsay. You do know you topped the list for the female the NYPD cops and CSIs would most like to-"
"Erm Adam. There's a reason why we don't talk about that outside the locker room or pub." Flack said giving him a look.
"Tell me that he's lying." Lindsay said, her eyes focussed on Danny.
He shrugged. "As much as I'd like to say anything to stop you being mad right now, if I told you that then I would be lying."
"It's like being in high school." She shot, glaring at the row of guys staring at her amusedly.
Danny leaned forward. "Told you you were cute." He whispered into her ear.
"Save it Messer. You're all a bunch of incredibly sad lonely men who are all going to feel my wrath as soon as I'm free."
"Ooooh!" Flack laughed. "Being stuck to a wall not agreeing with you Monroe?"
Before Lindsay could say something really abusive Stella came back.
"Alright everyone, clear out and let me help this troublesome twosome out of this mess."
The guys chuckled and Hawkes, Adam and Sid moved the body onto a stretcher before carrying it out. "I'm going to do a walk through of the other rooms again and check that Hawkes didn't miss anything." Mac announced, looking at Danny and Lindsay with the clear beginnings of a smile on his face. "I'm sure Stella will have it handled here."
"'Kay." Danny said, his back was really beginning to ache having to hold himself away from Lindsay in this awkward position.
"Shall we get started?" Stella asked brightly.
"You have got to close your eyes." Lindsay instructed.
Danny opened his mouth to say something but Flack got in there first. "What's the matter Monroe? It's not like he's not going to see you in your underwear eventually!" Flack called as he slowly made his way to the door.
Danny chuckled slightly and Lindsay turned a bright red. "Flack…." Stella said warningly.
"Just remember, this is going to be a tale and a half to tell the grandkids one day!" was the young Detective's parting remark as he left to head back to the lab intent on spreading the gossip.
"Hurry up Stel I don't think Montana can wait much longer to go wring Flack's neck." Danny laughed at the look of pure frustration on his companion's face.
Stella started undoing Lindsay's blouse buttons and Lindsay looked at Danny defiantly. "You're meant to have your eyes closed."
"You think I'm going to miss out on two hot women undressing each other right in front of me?!" He cracked. Lindsay gave him a menacing look and Stella promptly hit him very hard over the head.
"To think you guys are meant to be New York's finest." Stella sighed. "And they still ask us how come we're single eh Lindsay!" She chuckled.
"Exactly." Lindsay said, giving Danny a pointed look making him shut up and twist his head the other way as Stella finished her task.
Lindsay managed to wriggle out of her blouse and mourn the loss of one of her favourite items of clothing as her friend carefully sliced down the front of her trousers leaving her free the crawl out under Danny to freedom.
He had been very good about not giving into temptation but just when he thought he was safe, he opened his eyes to see Lindsay pulling out a blue NYPD jumpsuit which was the only other clothing item they had with them. His mouth went dry as he couldn't help but let his eyes run over her body. He knew it was wrong and now really wasn't the time for letting his mind run wild ……… Lindsay looked up and caught him staring at her before he could look away and he braced himself for her anger but it never came.
"It's been that long since you've seen a girl in her underwear has it Messer?" she smirked, pulling her hair out from where it had been tucked in the collar of the jumpsuit. She looked at him cockily, enjoying the uncomfortable look on his face, glad to have the upper hand now that she was free and he was still stuck. Secretly though seeing him look at her like that had flipped her stomach upside down and she had to say something to cover her embarrassment.
Danny heard Stella chuckling behind him and he looked away from Lindsay.
"I'm going to head back to the lab and find some clothes." Lindsay said.
"Okay, my keys to the SUV are over there." Stella said directing her over to her bag.
"You're just going to go and not wait for me?" Danny said, regaining his power of speech.
"I think we've seen enough of each other for today." She shot and then she was gone.
Danny sighed as Stella started chiselling at the dried glue and plaster.
"You have got it bad." Stella smirked.
"Yeah I guess it doesn't get much worse than being stuck to a wall." Danny sighed.
Stella laughed. "I was talking about you and Lindsay."
"Stell ….."
"Everyone can see it."
Given that he couldn't run away and Stella was his only ticket to freedom, he guessed that he was going to get driven into this conversation eventually. "What do you mean everyone?"
"Everyone including Lindsay." Stella told him. "She wants you to chase her."
Danny thought about the moment earlier just before everyone barged in and then back to the look she had given him whilst she was getting dressed. He couldn't wait until Stella got him off of this damn wall.
……………
Lindsay had just finished her shower and pulled on some fresh clothes when Danny walked into the locker room looking slightly exhausted, his left hand in a bandage and a new shirt on.
"Hey!" He greeted with a tired smile.
"Hey!" She replied. The shower had caused her to calm down a lot and gave her time to think and she was no longer so tense and angry.
"Hell of a day eh?"
"Yeah." She smiled. "I'm sorry for getting so mad at you before …. You were being protective and you didn't know the wall was covered in glue and you meant well …."
"And I'm sorry for getting us stuck to a wall." Danny said in reply.
Lindsay laughed lightly and then dropped her gaze to his bandaged hand. She reached out to touch it. "Is it bad?"
"Nah. Give it a couple of days and it'll be fine."
Realising she was still touching him, she dropped his hand and looked at him awkwardly. She was usually oblivious to these kind of things but even she could feel the tension between them.
"Want to go grab a drink?" Danny asked hopefully.
Lindsay nodded. "Sure." She said, leading the way out of the locker room.
They had taken one step out when the whole corridor erupted with cheers and wolf-whistles from every lab tech, CSI and cop not out in the field and in the middle of the crowd was a grinning Flack. Then the crowd parted slightly revealing the fact that the walls were covered with dozens and dozens of enlarged versions of the photos Flack had taken earlier of Danny and Lindsay stuck to the wall.
Lindsay ripped down a few as she marched down the corridor. "Your obsession with Danny and me just proves that your sex life must be really bad Don." She said with a fake sweet smile on her face as she thrust the paper into his chest.
Danny grinned as Flack's face fell slightly and everyone started laughing. He followed Lindsay as some of his colleagues patted him on the back, wishing him luck.
They got into an empty elevator and Lindsay rested her head against the wall. She felt like she was going on her first date with Danny except it wasn't a date, it was drinks and as to what had nearly happened between them earlier, she must have imagined it.
Suddenly the elevator jolted and shook slightly and saw Danny had hit the 'Stop' button. He didn't give her a chance to question his actions before she found herself pinned against the elevator wall, his mouth on hers, his hands moving up her body.
She kissed him back hungrily, her arms around his neck, her hands in his hair holding him against her. To say it was passionate would be a big understatement …. It was mind-blowing.
"That was because I really regretted not kissing you when I had you stuck to a wall earlier." Danny said as a way of explanation as they came up for air. Lindsay nodded slightly. "We okay?"
"Yeah we're more than okay." She said quietly, reaching up and kissing him softly again
Danny grinned and hit the button to get the elevator moving. He couldn't wait until they got to somewhere more appropriate so he could kiss her like that over and over. He hit the button again. And he hit it again. And again. And then more frantically and still the elevator refused to budge. "I think we're stuck again." He said turning to her sheepishly.
Lindsay certainly looked surprised but she didn't seem half as mad this time.
A/N:- Hehe that was fun to write! Feedback is greatly appreciated.