Title: After he's at her door.
Author: Loz
E-Mail: loz06(at)yahoo(dot)com
Rating: T
Category: Neil/Andrea...All Neil/Andrea
Series: Yes…Stay tuned another three possibly four.
Spoilers: No, I think everyone's safe.
Archive (if applicable): The good, the bad and the very ugly it's all appreciated.
Summary: Neil arrives at Andrea's late one night, much is said by both, but Andrea still feels unsure of what she should do.
Author's Notes: My first in this genre…fillin' in the mushy bits we don't get on TV. Please forgive any glaring inaccuracies I live outside the UK.
Disclaimers: So no one comes knocking at my door…I don't own any characters featured here.
There's a distinct chill in the air although Andrea is indoors. On the witness stand she feels vulnerable and alone. The room is dark except for the main players who are lit by harsh down lights. She turns her head, shocked to see her father sitting in judgement - the only man whose opinion has ever mattered to her. Neil is sitting in the defendants' chair, head down avoiding contact. Is that shame written on his face?
On the jury sit her peers and friends, Kerry, Yvonne, Honey, Lance, Steve and Amber. Their expressions are a tossed salad of emotion - disappointment, anger and feelings of betrayal. Amber seems to be the only one who thinks it's an achievement she's seeing a married man. In the crowd sits CID, Jack Meadows, Gina Gold and Adam Okaro. Andrea assumes they're dreaming up ways to fire her with maximum humiliation.
The light dims till only one remains, it's the most frightening of them all. Standing at the prosecution table is Philippa Manson.
"Ms Dunbar, do you consider yourself to be a good person?" Philippa moves from behind the table.
"Yes." Andrea answers hesitantly, telling herself to be careful.
"Do you also consider yourself to be a good policewoman?"
"There's a certain amount I still have to learn."
"But for your experience level, you'd consider yourself to be doing a good job." Philippa steps closer.
"Yes."
"What qualities do you think a good person and policewoman has?" Andrea knows enough about Philippa Manson to know this line of questioning is going somewhere damaging. Somewhere in the pit of her stomach she figures it out.
"I don't know, loyal, dependable, compassionate, friendly and kind."
"What about honesty, fidelity, ethics, virtue and decency?" Philippa suggests.
"I guess." Andrea treads carefully knowing Philippa is getting close to dropping the bomb.
"And would you consider, say having an affair with a married man to be in conflict with the qualities I just mentioned and you have told the court you embody?"
"Anyone would." Andrea tenses. Philippa is only a question away. The lights on her are brighter and she can once again see the familiar faces in her life, judgement written all over them.
"Then tell the court Ms Dunbar, are you not currently conducting an affair with my husband?"
Andrea Dunbar sits up suddenly in bed. Around her the bed sheets are crumpled and untucked. Her head is damp, a fine sheen of sweat clinging to her forehead. Covering her chest with her right hand she concentrates on calming her heart that is galloping as though she is chasing a criminal down an alley.
A sudden chirping makes her jump and reignites her thumping heart. She grabs her phone, immediately silencing its peace-shattering tune. Flopping back onto her pillow, she notices for the first time it is damp as well. It's a matter of moments before the night's quiet is broken again, this time she studies the number. Not recognising it leaves her without a name to curse.
"Hello." She says through gritted teeth. Every part of her expects this to be a wrong number, so she rolls over getting comfortable in her bed again.
"Andrea." She knows the voice and has times when she's wanted to shout to all that she'd recognise the voice anywhere, anytime. It's the voice that trips her heartbeat in a different way.
"Neil." He sounds distant but his voice always has a warm enveloping effect on her.
"Andrea."
"Neil, its four thirty in the morning." Andrea rubs her eyes and sits up again.
"I'm outside your door Andrea."
"What's going on Neil?" Next to her, Andrea switches on the lamp and squints for a moment.
"Please, Andrea." Something in his voice tells her not to question further.
She wraps her dressing gown around herself and fumbles her way through the dark. The scant light is enough to outline the furniture and prevent lower limb damage. A quick check of the peephole confirms it is Neil. His right arm leans against the doorframe supporting his body weight, his tie is askew and his head hung.
The vague lighting of the stairwell casts a strange colour over his skin.
He looks up as she opens the door, meeting his eyes to hers.
"You're hurt." She says with realisation. Later she'd think back to this moment as a protective, caring instinct kicks in, it hasn't run this deep and emotional in a long time.
She takes his hand and ushers him through the doorway, pointing him to the sofa. The smudge of grey on his left cheek is minor compared to the cut on his forehead and the bruised left eye that is developing. She studies each inch of his face and reaches a hand to delicately touch the swelling on the lower right of his jaw. He winces with the slight pressure of her hand; covering it with his own he moves their hands further up his face.
"I have to get you to St Hughes." Andrea says watching his eyes shut down slowly.
"I've been checked out," he replies, his voice soft and a far cry from his usual commanding tone.
In the bathroom Andrea finds her first aid products lacking, there are no children prone to scraped knees in this flat. On her way to the kitchen she glances at Neil who is resting his head on the back of the sofa, eyes closed.
"I'm not much of a one woman emergency team." Andrea apologises as she sits back down, Neil smiles.
"Someone banged you up good." She waits for him to flinch as the cotton doused with antiseptic brushes over a cut. He neither flinches nor speaks.
"You gonna tell me what happened?" His eyes open studying her face as she continues to tend to him.
"They didn't react to the raid well." His voice is soft, a hand reaching to twirl a section of her dark hair.
"That much is written all over your face." He smiles at the humour. She waits for further detail, placing ice in a bag. His head falls back and eyes close again, it's a few minutes till Andrea speaks again.
"Why did you come here Neil?" The ice pack rests in her hands; her eyes watch her hands manipulating the cubes in the bag.
"I wanted to see you." It should be a simple and acceptable reason.
"So what, you had a bit of an adrenaline rush earlier in the night and you thought you'd cap it off with some sex?" His eyes fly open, features hardening.
"Do I look capable of carrying you over my shoulder to the bedroom?" His hand reaches for hers but she shuns the gesture.
"I don't know what you think Neil, you arrive here in the early hours of the morning, face a mess, I fix you up and maybe you think the service doesn't end there."
"Don't be ridiculous Andrea, I didn't ask you to play nurse."
"That's just it you haven't asked me anything, you didn't even ask if I would come to the door, you've barely said a dozen words." The ice rolls onto the floor and Andrea stands unsure of her next move, is it to show him the door?
"Andrea, I came here because I wanted to see you, because I had a hard night at work, because I knew you'd understand that after all the debriefing and the pub at some point you need to drop the subject or you'll beat yourself up over the smallest mistake forever to come...because you're uncomplicated and you understand the job and..."
"And what?" Her legs bend beneath her, perched on the edge of the sofa again.
"And I wanted to see you."
"I'm sorry." Neil opens his arms, an invitation to curl up against him that she accepts. She pulls the throw from the top of the back of the sofa. It hits their heads as it tumbles down, eventually manipulating it so it covers them both.
"I'm happy you're here." She whispers against his chest.
It is the sun that awakes Andrea, creeping over her eyelids as it does the horizon each morning. She finds herself looking at Neil's tie, still pulled loose above two undone buttons. A protective arm has curved gently around her middle. He'd never stayed till the morning before...not that he'd arrived early in the night. She lightly presses a finger against the dusting of chest hair, which his open shirt has exposed.
"Hope I didn't wake you." His voice precedes a chaste kiss on the forehead. She slides up the sofa till her head rests on the pillow next to him.
"How'd we get to be lying down?" Andrea asks brushing her index finger along the underside of his chin.
"You fell asleep against me last night and some of my limbs started to go numb so I had to move us." He follows with a proper good morning kiss.
"Were you awake just then?" Andrea tests the swelling, running her hands over his jaw and mentally comparing it to earlier that morning.
"Yeah, I was just lying here watching you sleep." His eyes leave hers, throat clears and head dips down, a sure sign he's climbed back into his shell.
"What time is it?" Andrea asks lifting his eyes to meet hers once again with the same index finger under the chin.
Neil pushes himself up to see the clock over the back of the sofa. "Seven."
"I've gotta work today." Andrea sighs knowing she can't make this last.
"Don't go." He replies, tone serious.
"Am I hearing right?" Andrea teases. "The big, bad DI wants me to call in sick."
"Or don't call in at all."
"Neil!" She exclaims her mouth a large 'O', surprised at his attitude.
"What's gotten into you?"
"Let's spend the day together."
"You must have taken a bad knock to the head last night." Andrea isn't sure if he's kidding or not.
"Suit yourself." Neil shrugs which only spurs Andrea on.
"Alright here I go." The smile cannot be wiped off her face as she gets off the sofa heading to the phone.
"It's done." Andrea announces once she's given her excuses. Neil is standing behind the sofa smiling. It dawns on her there's something she should have considered before making the call but it didn't occur to her till this point. The smile that reflects Neil's drains from her face. "What about your wife?"
In the beginning there was a mutual understanding about what they expected from one another. It wasn't as if Andrea cared about Philippa's comings and going, but he'd used her so many times as a reason not to see Andrea.
"I rang her from outside the flat and told her the raid had gone badly and I wouldn't be home till this evening. She's got a big case on that she's barely lifted her head out of in the past few weeks anyway."
"Won't she call you during the day?"
"She never calls for any reason; emergencies are what I have a mobile for." His face having returned to neutral while he explained, regains a smile.
"Were you really watching me sleep this morning?" Head tilted Andrea feels a smile of her own light up her face. She steps into his arms capturing him around his waist.
"That and listening to you snore." He grins.
"I do not!" She protests pulling herself closer to him.
"You sounded like this." Neil explains following with a sound resembling a combination of heavy breathing and a farm pig.
"That's it!" Andrea puts on a mock serious face and wiggles from his embrace.
"You're so easy to wind up." Neil laughs. Andrea brings his hands behind his back as if he were to be arrested for making false accusations against a police officer. The joke goes no further as Neil flinches and pulls out of her loose grip. "Easy."
"Neil what's wrong?" The fun is over and Andrea worries somewhat. When he's less than forthcoming, she pulls off his tie and makes quick work of the buttons on his shirt. She exposes the shoulder that caused Neil to wince, shocked to see the extent of the purple bruising.
"It's not as bad as it seems." Neil tries to cover.
"Sure it isn't Neil." Andrea retorts studying his eyes. Something tells her to remove the shirt altogether. There are four other bruises the size of her fist on his front and six on his back.
"Someone beat you badly." Andrea says running her hand over the bruise on his abdomen. Her eyes, looking at his, tear up, threatening to overflow.
"I'll live." he replies slowly capturing her lips with his. They make love being tender with his wounds but not deterred by them.