Fandom: Murder Call (hint of Stingers)
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters Tessa Vance, Steve Hayden, Malcolm Thorne, Dee Suzeraine, Imogen ' Tootsie' Soames and Lance Fisk. They all belong to Jennifer Rowe and Hal McElroy, and Nine Network. Kristine and Pete (Ellen Mackenzie and Peter Church) belong to the producers and writers of Stingers.
Rating: R (M) (Some adult themes)
Summary: Attending yet another mutual friend's wedding, Tessa and Steve decides to do something crazy.
"I always thought I was going to end up with kids and hubby one day. Maybe even a dog. Now look at me. I'm 37 and the only thing greeting me at home is my 123rd goldfish."
"Then quit."
CRAZY
Written by neela
ONE
Another bright, sunny day. Another Saturday wedding in spring. Detective Senior Constable Tessa Vance felt like she had been trapped in the second verse of Stevie Wonder's "I just called to say I love you". As if reading her mind, the DJ put the record on and the crowd ooh'ed and aah'ed as the bride and groom stood up to dance.
"It's getting old," a voice broke her out of her mind. Tessa looked up to see her partner and recently promoted Detective Sergeant Steve Hayden sit down on a free seat and smiled.
"You took your time," she commented. "Traffic that bad or did you just want to avoid the tears and snot?" By that, Tessa referred to the heart spoken vows uttered at the ceremony and the event itself. She knew Steve didn't like weddings, though he always showed up when invited.
"Both," Steve grinned and winked at her. Tessa laughed, the first of the day. Over the years she had lost interest in weddings too, especially as that's what all her friends did. "Actually," Steve continued. "I got a call from Benton."
"A new case?" Tessa asked and barely managed to hide the degree of hope in her voice. Just as well no one was around to rat on her to the bride. Steve noticed and offered another smile whilst shaking his head.
"No. Just following up on some of the paper work from last week."
Tessa scoffed. "He's worse than Thorne. Though more of a paper pusher than anything else. Did you hear Thorne was moved up to Assistant Commissioner?"
"Yeah, I did. Didn't surprise me, really. He always wanted to get off the shiftwork and into more reasonable working hours. Not that he told me personally, of course," Steve added. He had loosened the tie slightly as if the wedding was just regular off-duty time. It was to them, but to some people a wedding still had a claim for respect and all that.
"He never did share much of himself, did he?" Tessa asked rhetorical, taking her third half-filled glass of champagne with a sardonic smile and gulping it all down. Steve's eyes followed her movement, but he didn't comment. "How long have we been on this, Steve?"
"I dunno. Ten years or so, I guess. I'm not keeping count."
"Yeah, I think you're right. Our first case together was the Fairview murder. Ruined my birthday...though, not by much," Tessa said grimly, glancing at her empty glass and thinking of coming home that night to find the apartment empty and Brett gone. The roses had never been taken out of the cellophane, the dinner had been left untouched and the champagne bottle unopened. Abandoned again because of the job.
"Not going senile already, Tess?" Steve teased her, leaning comfortably back against his chair. To all who looked, he would seem quite at home and pleased with the atmosphere, yet Tessa saw the slight crease between his brows and knew Steve wasn't feeling too sure of himself. At least he had company of someone equally minded, she thought wryly.
They fell to silence, glancing between each other and the dance floor where people were mulling around to the last verses of Stevie Wonder. The garden where the reception was being held was quite lovely, actually, when you looked beyond the gilded marquee and ornaments cluttered around. Tessa couldn't find very much joy in this, however. A waiter passed and she took the opportunity to catch two glasses of champagne.
"Want one?" Tessa asked Steve as she turned around, meeting his dark eyes across the table.
"Nah, I'm driving. Someone needs to bring you home before you start dancing on the tables," Steve grinned, still seemingly at peace with the situation and the surroundings. "You okay?" He both sounded and looked a bit concerned, reminding Tessa that somewhere beneath the tough and hard exterior Steve was a big softie.
"As well as can be," she replied cryptically and Steve let the subject drop.
Giving him what could only be half a smile, Tessa drank one glass and immediately started on the other. She didn't know why she felt the need to do so, only that it was extremely liberating to feel the liquid trickle down her throat and make her hot and relaxed.
"Think they'll be happy?" Tessa asked minutes later, gazing at the happy couple doing a slow dance to another sappy love song. Kristine and Pete had been her friends ever since Kristine moved in next door in Tessa's block some two years back. They were both police officers, Kristine working in a homicide unit in the suburbs and Pete doing some mysterious business that was all very hush-hush. Apparently they had known each other since Melbourne, but Kristine had moved up to Sydney later after some nasty stuff happening down there and Pete had followed the year after. Tessa had never imagined they would get married. But that's what all her friends were doing lately: tying the knot. The only ones who hadn't gone around to it yet were those still going steady (and not likely to marry right away) or stayed a free bird.
Drawing out of her musing, Tessa realised Steve hadn't answered yet and looked over at him. He was staring at her, something lurking in his eyes. Tessa didn't want to guess, but she reckoned it had something to do with Steve's past history with marriages. It had taken him years to admit being married once, now divorced. Another thing Tessa had never imagined.
Steve Hayden was, and had been for as long as she'd known him, 'a stud and heartbreaker', as her friend Bridget (married to Duncan Thompson six years ago and already mother of two) so eloquently put it ten years ago when Tessa came to Central Homicide. Always the charmer, he'd been quick to get girlfriends, but it never seemed to last more than a couple of months max. (Though that was several weeks longer than any of her boyfriends.) Tessa had a theory Steve hadn't gotten over his ex-wife yet and simply couldn't carry on for long. And there was also the side of too much commitment, too many demands.
He never replied to the question so Tessa let it pass and instead looked back at the couple again. "I think they will," she stated quietly, surprised her voice was wavering slightly. She cleared her throat as she felt Steve's eyes burn into the back of her head.
"How long have you been in the force?" Tessa asked. It struck her she'd asked the very same question several times before and more frequently in the past few years. She carefully schooled her features.
Steve's face was carved in stone as he replied. "Nearly twenty years, counting uniform and all that. Why?" Just like her question was repeated time and again, so was his and Tessa never had a good answer to it. Until now.
"It's been fifteen years for me. Almost half my life." She looked back at Kristine and Pete, watching the protective arm around her rounding waist and the slim palm caressing his shaven cheeks. "I always thought I was going to end up with kids and hubby one day. Maybe even a dog. Now look at me." She met Steve's eyes with a grim, ironic smile. "I'm 37 and the only thing greeting me at home is my 123rd dead goldfish."
Steve didn't say anything, just keeping his stare level with hers as the music changed from sappy love song to ultra-sappy love ballad. Not expecting him to answer, nor enjoying the sudden swirl of emotion at the depth of her stomach, Tessa fixed her burning eyes on a point beyond the gardens, a hint of downtown Sydney visible on the horizon.
"Then quit."
Tessa could hardly control her head as it snapped back to Steve, who was as stone-faced as ever but with that little smile of his that kept suspects guessing. "What?" she asked dumbly.
"Quit the job. Leave Homicide. Live life." He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, that Tessa had lived her whole life ignoring it for the sake of the victims and their families she encountered.
"You can't be serious!" Tessa said in disbelief.
"I know you, Tessa, and that admission was a question whether you meant it or not," Steve explained, palms up in defence. "I just figured you wanted an advise and I gave it. You should quit. The job's taken over your life. If you want to live, then maybe there's no other alternative."
"I can't quit Homicide!" It's my life, her mind added defensively. "I need—"
"Need what?" Steve interrupted her calmly. "To watch the horrors of mankind? To see what people do to each other every day? You can't possible mean that, Tess." His eyes turned softer as he looked away, hands resting on his knees but skin taut over the knuckles. Tessa suddenly felt the fight leave her, understanding the weight of emotion behind that stone-faced exterior of her partner.
"Maybe I don't," Tessa agreed softly, sighing. Her fingers played with the half-empty glass of champagne. "But still...It's what I've done for over ten years. It's what I was cut out for." That last admission was something she hadn't uttered for the entirety of hers and Steve's friendship. It had always been something that was understood but never mentioned.
Steve turned his head and smiled at her, the stony expression swept away like liquid and giving way for a dimpled sunray Tessa rarely saw these days. "You were cut out for many things, Tess," he said cryptically, "but I doubt Homicide was supposed to rule your life."
All of a sudden it struck Tessa that Steve sounded old and beyond his years and was abruptly reminded of the five-year gap between them. It never mattered before but now it seemed vital and she started to understand what drove him on this subject.
"I don't think you were cut out for this either, Steve," she spoke softly. Not aware she had moved, Tessa leaned over and laid her hand upon his.
Neither of them spoke, the moment transpiring inside a bubble of vacuum where the rest of the festivities were wrapped in cotton. Their eyes met. Tessa felt the warmth beneath her palm and tried to send a bit of comfort through the gesture. He had comforted her so many times in the past, the least thing she could do was try to repay it.
Startled out of her thoughts by a hot burst through her body, Tessa looked down and saw Steve's thumb gently caressing hers. She felt her eyes burn again and refused to stare at him, but couldn't find any strength to remove her hand. It was what she wanted, wasn't it? To comfort him. But as always, Steve managed to find a way to turn the tables away from his own misery. So typical.
"Do you really think I should quit?" Tessa's voice was quiet, unsure and thick with unshed tears.
"Yeah," Steve's baritone voice replied gently, the thumb stroking her skin ever so slowly and comfortingly.
"And do what?" she asked, eyes still mesmerised by the hands doing the tantalising dance upon Steve's suit-clad knee, more intimate than they'd ever been with each other. Tessa blamed the mood, the surroundings, and the champagne making her blood hot and head fuzzy.
"Have babies." His reply was so simple and teasing that Tessa couldn't keep the grin off her face. But then she sobered.
"I'd have to find a hubby first. I wouldn't want my kids to know their father as Sperm Donor #A-325K." Steve's laugh was heaven to her ears and Tessa finally dared to look up at him, seeing the face split in two in merriment.
"You'll find someone," he told her friendly. "You weren't the talk around the men's bathroom for nothing, you know."
Tessa didn't know whether to be offended or release the chuckle threatening to break past her lips and instead settled for a mock scowl. A tiny speck of warmth spread throughout her body and Tessa suspected it wasn't entirely because of the hand underneath hers. Through their ten-years partnership, Steve only paid her such underlying heartfelt compliments when she was incredibly down after a break-up or rejection. But the fact it only came occasionally made it feel even more special, especially from a friend like Steve who usually didn't share much of his personal thoughts.
"So babies and hubby," Tessa summarised, not about to continue down the lane Steve started. She knew he wasn't the big talker when it came to those things. Maybe ten years ago, but not now after all he'd seen. "But what on earth would I do? I swore I'd never go back to waitressing."
"You could teach," Steve offered with a grin. "I bet those cadets at the Academy could give you a run for the money and tickle your mind." Tessa snorted.
"More likely make me want to kill them. I do remember my days, you know far back in the Middle Age," Tessa jested, memories of all the fun she and Bridget had had at the Police Academy in their early twenties flooding back into her mind.
"Good to hear your sense of discipline hasn't changed much, then," Steve teased. His thumb was still stroking hers, almost absentmindedly as they both tried to ignore it with small talk and off-handed comments.
"Or I could travel again," Tessa suggested out loud. "Europe was fun. I'd love to go back there one time." The glass of champagne that had been momentarily forgotten in her other hand was downed and Tessa felt a little cheerier than before. The rest of the reception was still deaf to her ears, but Tessa didn't notice, only glancing across the table at Steve as a sudden thought bumped down on her.
"Come with me." Steve's eyes widened a bit at her sudden suggestion and his thumb stopped its ministrations. Tessa gripped his hand firmly, squeezing it encouragingly.
"I mean it," Tessa insisted. "Quit Homicide too. You've been at this far longer than me, Steve. If this is what I should do, then you should certainly do it." Besides, I'd miss you, her mind added.
Silence fell over them as Steve's face retained some of that stony expression from earlier, but Tessa could tell from the slight far-away look in his eyes that he was thinking. Mulling things over. Actually considering it.
"Come on, Steve," said Tessa, feeling a bit desperation fill her. "Marry me."
She didn't know what had made her say that and it was clear from Steve's even wider eyes that he was clearly just as surprised.
It had to be the wedding reception, she argued inside her mind, and the sudden onslaught of love songs intruding on their little moment as people laughed and talked in loud voices all around them. Or the champagne.
The hands lay completely still upon Steve's knee, both white-knuckled and tense as the silence between them stretched and the amount of joy and happiness surrounding them grew louder. Their eyes met, dark orbs swirling with something indecipherable and blue ones bold and reckless.
And then, out of the blue, the moment was broken as someone threw themselves over Steve in a happy squeal.
"Steve!" Kristine cried happily, closely followed by Pete who slapped Steve on the back in friendly camaraderie. "I'm so glad you showed up!"
Kristine stood back with a wide grin, beautiful in her strapless white wedding dress and obvious motherhood, her swell noticeable underneath the fabric. Her dark, short hair had been left down underneath a small and simple tiara upon her crown, and a diamond necklace perfected the attire. She was a couple of years younger than Tessa and had always been a workaholic, at least until Pete came into her life again.
"Yeah mate, we were kinda wondering where you'd disappeared to," said the happy groom. "Hard to be Detective Sergeant nowadays it seems. Lots to do, eh?"
Pete was wearing a custom-style black penguin suit over a white shirt and grey-striped bowtie and matching vest. Handsome in his forty-odd something years, he and Steve had become real good mates since he came to Sydney and they were often found in front of a cricket match or at the pub watching footy with the other lads.
"Nah," Steve said, hand retracted from his knee as Tessa stood to hug Kristine once more. "Paper work mostly. Same old, same old. Congratulations, by the way."
The men's conversation fell to deaf ears as Tessa turned her attention to her neighbour and good friend, smiling widely. "You look stunning, Kris. Can't believe you're actually married now. How's it feel?"
"Better than sex," Kristine winked, palm on her swollen belly and stroking it lightly. Tessa felt the happy mood from earlier vanish as the previous sullenness returned, but she kept it locked firmly behind a carefully schooled expression. "You okay? You seem a bit off."
As always, Tessa cursed Kristine's keen eye and put on a smile. "It's nothing. I'm fine. I'm really happy for you guys. Congrats."
Recognising her friend's uneagerness to share, Kristine only smiled softly. "Well, let me know if you need an ear. I'm just a knock away."
"I will," Tessa assured her, if only to stop the conversation where it was at. "Have you decided on where to go on your honeymoon yet?"
"Pete's been really secretive about it and hasn't budged yet, but I did overhear him talking to a travel agency the other day. And he also told me to pack light, so somewhere warm, I suppose." It was clear on her face how happy Kristine was at the moment and Tessa felt there was no way she wanted to bring that down. She looked over her friend's shoulder at Steve and met his glance briefly before quickly turning away.
"Well, enjoy your trip and try not to get involved in more trouble, okay?" Tessa teased lightly. "Pete would have my head if he realises how I've rubbed off on you."
"I won't," Kristine promised. "Can't say the same for you, though. But try to keep it to a minimum, okay? I don't want to come back and find you hospitalized or married or something like that." Feeling she had hit relatively close to home, Tessa gave Kristine another hug to brush off the uncomfortable questions welling up inside her mind. Why had she asked Steve that?
"I'll try," Tessa offered with a smile. "Now go and harass your other guests." Kristine laughed and nodded, stepping up to Pete and linking their arms. Moments later the happy couple had left them to pursue some old friends from Melbourne, leaving Tessa alone with Steve again.
Shifting on her feet, Tessa was at a loss for words as she forced herself to meet his eyes. In just a matter of seconds, she had turned their relationship upside-down. For ten years they'd been partners and best friends, never once doing something that could relate to intimate relations. Some things had been uttered in the dark of night and under heavy influence of alcohol, but that was years ago. Old flames died.
She hoped she hadn't jeopardized their friendship from one moment of recklessness.
"Look," Tessa started, "I didn't actually—"
"Okay."
"Huh?" Tessa stared at him dumbly, not believing her ears. Steve stepped closer, taking her hand again. She suddenly shivered.
"'Okay'," Steve repeated, face deprived of the stony expression and carrying a level of gentleness. "You asked me to marry you, and I said yes." His thumb started to stroke across her knuckles and Tessa felt her face grow hot and wondered whether her knees would collapse anytime soon.
"But why?" She was still confused. "I thought I'd just ruined our friendship. Isn't that what we are, Steve? Friends?" Wasn't that what we agreed upon?
"Yeah, we're friends, Tess, and that's why I agreed to marry you. I thought about it and I think you need someone who knows you. And who you know as well. Marriage's not an easy thing. I've got practice, you know," Steve added wryly.
Tessa thought about it and did see his point of reasoning. If she should marry someone, it would have to be someone she knew and someone she could get along with. She and Steve had had their fair share of squabbles over the years and had touched many areas of life together in the stature of being partners and friends. The only point they hadn't crossed off on their list was their love life. Sure, both were experienced lovers and all that, but neither had managed to keep a relationship going because of their job.
Their job. If both quit Homicide, what's the chance none of them could hit it off with someone else now that the biggest quarrel issue was out of the way?
Tessa didn't know.
But Steve's hand was so warm and soft around hers.
"Okay," Tessa agreed finally, meeting his eyes. "Let's give it a go."