A/N: Takes place after what I call "The Best Hug on TV ever!" episode (The Jewelry Store one). I like to think that the conversation in Love Run Cold never happened. This is based on Carrie Underwood's song Some Hearts off of her Some Hearts album. I own nothing about CSI: New York except for the first and second DVD box sets. I do however own Jasper Denham and the relationship between him and Lindsay. I am an advocate for Women's Rights. I fully believe that all guys who abuse their girlfriends, sisters, wives should be castrated and put away for life.
It was like any other day that Lindsay Monroe had since moving to the bustling enterprise that was New York City. She went out to a crime scene with Danny, came back to the lab and worked hours processing clothes, shoe prints, fingerprints and bullet striations. Working quietly beside her was the one person who made her go weak in the knees. That person was Danny Messer.
I've never been the kind that you call lucky
Always stumblin' around in circles
But I must have stumbled into something
Lindsay had never been too lucky in love. The last boyfriend she had back in Montana was not Mr. Right or even Mr. Right Now. He was just Mr. There. She didn't like to talk about him or her life back in Montana because of all the bad memories she had there.
Jasper Denham was the guy that every girl wanted to be with. Somehow Lindsay had landed him. Things had been great at first but then things got bad for them. Jasper did not like all the long hours that Lindsay spent at the lab. Like most ranchers, Jasper had a temper. And at times his temper would flare at Lindsay.
Lindsay did the one thing that she could do to get away from him. She took her dream job in New York. Her first day on the job she was thrown head first into a New York mafia murder. That was where she first met Danny Messer.
Danny was so unlike all the other guys she had known in her life. Danny had an air of confidence; he was almost too damn cocky for his own good. One of her favorite memories of Danny, besides the first time they met was after Danny's high class food case. He had brought in deep fried breaded spiders, mealworm spaghetti, wasp tamales and an assortment of other "Bug food." They had spent pleasant time talking about the other weird food they had eaten as kids.
Look at me am I really alone with you?
I wake up feeling like my life's worth living
Can't recall when I last felt that way
It still made Lindsay nervous to be around Danny alone. She couldn't help but see Jasper's temper in her mind whenever she got close to Danny. It was so hard to let go of the past because to let it go would mean she'd have to admit she had been in an abusive relationship. The memories came back in full force after Stella's ordeal with Frankie.
She had shown a side of her that she never wanted Danny to see. That fearful, nervous, jittery girl she was when she was with Jasper. She didn't want to be that girl with Danny. She wanted to be the cool, clam, fast talking New Yorker that Danny was. But if she had taken the time to notice, that's not what Danny noticed about her. Danny liked that she was still a country girl. He liked her innocence about the city. He liked how she could put him in his place with a simple sentence like, "Have you even seen a wheat field?"
Guess it must be all this love you're givin'
Never knew, never knew
It could be like this but I guess
Then came the scariest moment of her entire life. Looking up at the large African man with the gun in her face demanding to know who she was. She heard him cock his gun and then everything became a blur. She dropped the bag with the smoke bomb jumped in front of the girl and pulled her under cover. She heard shots fired and then through the smoke she heard a very distinct voice.
"Lindsay? Lindsay?" she heard Danny yell.
She was a little shook up but all right. He held her close to him. She had no idea that he was terrified of coming that close to losing her. He held her while the others arrested the African.
Some hearts they just get all the right breaks
Some hearts have the stars on their side
Some hearts they have it so easy
Some hearts just get lucky sometime
Some hearts just get lucky, lucky sometimes
She was lucky. Danny was a great guy. He cared a great deal about her and she knew that. She knew that when he tried to talk her out of being the decoy. He didn't want her to do it. But he would never admit that it was because he loved her. That wasn't Danny.
Now whod've thought someone like you could love me
You're the last thing my heart expected
It surprised her that she felt this way about Danny. He was this rough and tumble New York boy and she was a rancher's daughter from Montana. Talk about from different cultures. Danny grew up with an older brother who was in a powerful gang. Lindsay's older brother and his friends tipped cows for fun. Danny was the last thing she was looking for when she came to New York. Jasper was still too fresh in her mind.
Whod've thought I'd ever find somebody
Someone who, someone who makes me feel like this
"What'cha thinkin' 'bout, Montana?" Danny asked with his eyes glued to the electron microscope.
"Home, people I left behind," Lindsay replied.
"Really, like who?"
"My older brother, sister, Dad."
"Well I am coming up a bust on matching this fiber," Danny said, pushing away from his work table. "You wanna take a lunch break?"
Well I guess…
Some hearts they just get all the right breaks
Some hearts have the stars on their side
Some hearts they have it so easy
Some hearts just get lucky sometime
Some hearts just get lucky, lucky sometimes
"I'd like that Danny," she said, smiling. "Just no mealworms, wasps, or spiders."
"How about pizza and cannolis?"
"That'll do."
They hung up their lab coats and headed out to the closet Italian place. Sitting across from Danny in the restaurant made Lindsay nervous. The last time she went out, things had not turned out well. She smiled warmly at Danny but the tension was there. Danny could feel it as well.
It was a tiny, local place that they went to all the time. She had just finished a major case and she was in the mood to celebrate. The beer came in pitchers and Jasper was downing them faster than the waitress could keep them coming. Lindsay had barely anything to drink that night. Jasper got to playing pool with some of the locals and things got heated. The bartender threw Jasper out and Lindsay left with him.
They had gotten around the corner when he lost it. He slammed Lindsay against the wall holding her tightly there. She wasn't that big to begin with so fighting off Jasper was not going to be an easy match. She managed to kick him hard enough to get away but he caught up with her and he beat her up pretty bad. He had broken her nose, left wrist and bruised several ribs.
"Lindsay? You look like you're a thousand miles away," Danny said, reaching for her left hand. She pulled it away but Danny caught it in his gentle hand. "Talk to me."
"Just thinking about the last real 'date' I had. Things had not turned out well."
"What happened?"
Lindsay began to tell Danny about Jasper and more about her life in Montana. She told him about her horse Yankee, the trails she had made with her brother and about the mountain spring they had found in the back acreage of her father's ranch. She could see the rage building behind his eyes when she told him about what Jasper used to do to her.
"That's why you've distanced yourself from me all this time," Danny said, massaging her once broken wrist with his fingers. "I'd never do anything to hurt you Montana. I got too many people who kick my ass clear to Jersey and back if I did. Big brother Louie for one, Big Daddy Marine Mac, Flack, Stella, Hawkes even Adam. Aiden would come back and haunt my ass if I did anything like that."
Lindsay couldn't but laugh at what Danny said. She knew it was true. She knew that Danny's feelings for her were real and not something he put on so she'd be with him.
Even hearts like mine get lucky, lucky sometimes
Even hearts like mine
"What did I do to deserve a guy like you Danny Messer?" Lindsay asked, lightly squeezing his hand.
"Even broken hearts like yours get lucky," Danny said, raising her hand to his lips, kissing the knuckles lightly.
Some hearts they just get all the right breaks
Some hearts have the stars on their side
Some hearts they have it so easy
Some hearts just get lucky sometime
Some hearts just get lucky, lucky sometimes
Soon their lunch came and Danny was teaching Lindsay that you didn't have to cut up a New York slice of pizza in order to eat it. There were a lot of country girl habits that he was going to have to break her of. The first thing he had to teach her was how to properly eat pizza.
"Just fold it in half and take the biggest bite you can," Danny said, demonstrating, dripping pizza sauce onto his shirt.
"At least I eat my lunch and not wear it Danny," Lindsay teased.
Then their cannolis came. Danny held one and held it out to Lindsay. She took a bite and got a little of the cream on the corner of her lip. Danny reached across the table to wipe it away with his thumb. Out of memory of the last time a hand came towards her face she flinched and pulled back.
" Montana, I'm not going to hurt you," Danny said, looking her dead in the eye. "I promise. I care about you too much to hurt you."
Some hearts they just get all the right breaks
Some hearts have the stars on their side
Some hearts they have it so easy
Some hearts just get lucky sometime
Some hearts just get lucky, lucky sometimes
"I know Danny. I know."
In that small moment of letting Danny wipe away the cannoli cream, Lindsay's mind was erasing every moment of her life with Jasper Denham. All that was left in her relationship memory bank was every moment she had shared with Danny. The first time they met, when she yelled at him in the Darius case, inviting him to Mac's show at Cozy's, eating bugs in the break room, holding his hand outside the doll shop, being carried by him during her shoe experiment, him chasing after her when she lost it on the limo driver after Stella shot Frankie, hearing Sid tell her the real reason why Danny called her "Montana", him holding her after the smoke bomb. Some hearts just get lucky sometimes and she had gotten lucky. She got Danny.
They finished their lunch and walked out of the restaurant into the bustling city. She didn't even flinch or pull away from Danny when he slipped his arm around her waist. She leaned into him, finding her place under the crook of his protective arm. She liked how she felt there, she liked being that close to Danny. She was finally, truly happy about being in New York.
