A/N: Next chapter is up! Please let me know if you are enjoying reading this. It will decide how far I want to take this one. I do have some great ideas for this story. As for All in the Waiting, I have a bit of writers block with that, but once I get over it, I will update as soon as I can. In the mean time, I'll keep working on this! Please REVIEW to let me know what you think!

"We have ID's on our robbers yet?" Arnold asked as he stepped back into the van.

"Yeah, guy in charge was Steven Mitchel, a rap sheet about as long as you can get, in and out of juvy since he was fourteen, a few B and E's, assault, grand theft..." The commander read off.

"So, it was only a matter of time before he stepped up his game. What about our accomplice?"

"Greg Harckum, according to his file, he was Mitchel's cell mate when he did a stint for armed robbery up in New York. Any idea why Mitchel decided to kill him?"

"Harckum probably wanted to give himself up, and Mitchel wouldn't let him. I could tell by his body language that robbing a bank was not his idea, he was scared and wanted out, but Mitchel didn't, so he shot him before he had a chance to. But we'll let the DA decide whether or not to add murder to the long list of charges he's facing."

"Alright, good job in there, Shortman. You heading back to the precinct?"

Arnold looked down at his watch, and started out of the van. "Paper work can wait till the morning, can't it? Something suddenly came up."

The commander waved him out and Arnold made his way back over to the ambulance in a brisk walk, where Helga was sitting. He was really happy to see her after all this time. People had left over the years, some close friends of his, others merely acquaintances, but Helga was always one of his biggest regrets. He never took the time to really get to know her. During middle school, they had gotten to the point of civility, then eventually to friendship, but she was always reserved, and he had never taken the time to tear down those walls. He always regretted that since she left.

As he came with in a few steps of the ambulance, she caught his eye, and he smiled brightly. The EMT had just handed her a few pills and a bottle of water, and she downed the pills with the water. "How's the ankle?"

"I'm not sure, I haven't tried to walk yet." She looked down at her injured ankle, and started to move it slowly in a circle. She shot him a glance and another sheepish smile before pushing herself up, keeping her weight on her left side, then gently putting her foot down on the ground, slowly putting more weight on it. He quickly stepped up, and placed a hand on her arm to help steady her, and she quickly grabbed onto his bicep when she limped forward.

"Think you can hop over to my car?" He asked.

Helga kept her gaze down on the ground, but her hand remained latched onto his bicep. "Uh..."

Helga tried to shake away her thoughts, she tried her hardest, but... she just couldn't seem to do it. As he placed his hand on her upper arm to help support her as she tested her ability to walk, she had latched onto his bicep out of instinct. But now, she didn't, for the life of her, want to let go. He was so much more muscular than the last time she had seen him. She was screaming at herself to let go of his very firm and very bulging bicep, but she just couldn't seem to do it. "Helga," She heard him say, and she snapped her head up to look into his soft gaze.

"What?" She asked with a very uplifting inflection.

"Do you think you can hop over to my car? There's a coffee shop not too far from here."

She shook her head, and quickly peeled her hand off of his arm. "Yeah, I think I can make it." She began to slowly hop her way over to where he was leading her. He stayed by her side, as she hopped over to the barricade, just as a CSU team was making their way past them and into the bank to process the scene. It wasn't too far, but for Helga and her sprained ankle, it might as well have been a forty mile hike.

But in time, she had made it to the passenger side of his dark blue crown vic. He opened the door for her, and helped her down into the passenger seat, quickly hopping over to the other side, and sliding in behind the wheel. He started the car, and backed up, slowly turning around and avoiding the coroner's van that had just pulled up, and drove off down the street. It wasn't until he stopped at the stop sign at the end of the street, that she had realized that she had left her car in front of the bank.

She looked over to tell him, but when she did, she just didn't have the heart to end this moment. He was just sitting there with his half lidded gaze and that soft, lop-sided smirk, his hair handsomely slicked back, with a pair of sideburns running just past his ears. She quickly averted her gaze, and looked back out the window, not wanting to get caught staring. After another minute, he was pulling his car into a spot outside of a small coffee shop, and hopping out of the car to help her out.

He opened the door, but stopped himself from helping her out right away, seeing if she wanted to try it herself. She swung her legs out, and grabbed onto the outside frame of the door, and hoisted herself up. She hopped over and closed the door, slowly following him inside the coffee shop. "Why don't you take a seat, and I'll go get us some coffee?" She returned his soft smile and hobbled over to the nearest pair of seats.

He returned a few minutes later, with two medium coffees, and had set one down in front of her. "I ordered it black, I hope that's okay. I didn't know what you took in it."

"Black is fine." She slowly lifted her cup to her lips and took a small sip. "You know, I uh... I never got a chance to thank you, for what you did back there."

Arnold let out a small chuckle, "I'm just doing my job, Helga."

"So... a hostage negotiator, huh?" She asked, finally looking up to meet his eyes.

"Yeah, I've been doing it for a few years now."

"You were... pretty amazing in there." She complimented with a blush rising at being so forward.

Arnold smiled brightly in return, and leaned back casually in his chair. "I've been in much worse situations."

"I think I'll take your word for it." They both laughed at each took small sips of their coffee.

"So, you're back in Hillwood."

"Yeah, I needed to come back to take care of Bob after Olga ran off with some rich guy."

"You know, everybody was wondering where you went when you left."

"Oh yeah? I didn't think I'd be that missed."

"Give yourself a little more credit, Helga." He said lightly. "We've all grown up, you may not have been the friendliest person around, but you were still our friend. We missed you." He shrugged.

She eyed him with a slightly pointed look. "We?"

"Yeah, I know Phoebe was pretty down in the dumps when you left. Did you keep in touch with her?"

"I tried, through e-mails, phone calls, but after she got into that private high school up north, she was always too busy."

"You know, she's actually back in town. She's working on being a prosecuting attorney, I've actually worked with her on a couple things. I could give you her number, if you want. I'm sure she'd love to hear from you, again."

"I'd like that." She said with a warm smile. It was true that she would love to see her best friend again. Even when she had moved, she just didn't connect with anyone like she did with Phoebe. She had friends, but she just didn't have a Phoebe. Phoebe was one of a kind.

"So where'd you move to?"

"Portland."

"Really?" He asked, seeming very surprised. "Wow, why the sudden drastic change of scenery?"

"My parents got divorced." She paused as she looked up and saw him soft expression, silently asking her to continue. "They had been fighting so much, and one day, my mom just decided that she had enough. She packed a suitcase in the middle of the night and left. Bob got served with divorce papers two days later, and I packed up my stuff and went to find her. My mom said that she had some old friends in Oregon who would help us out. Once we got settled, she started going to AA meetings, and was able to get a job managing clothing store. But... two years ago, she was diagnosed with liver failure, apparently she had just been drinking for too long. So, she passed, and I just stayed were I was, until a doctor called me about a month ago. They said that Bob had suffered a major heart attack, and was bed-ridden. So I came back to take care of him."

"I'm sorry to hear about your mom." He said genuinely. She had heard that enough times, and it always bugged her because they were just saying it because they felt they had to, but she could tell that he really meant it. "So, what are you doing now?"

"I managed to get a job at a department store in the mall. My mom hired me over the summers when I was living with her, so I have a bit of experience." She paused when she ran out of things to tell him about herself, and waited for him to ask another question, but as the long seconds passed, he never did. "So uh... other than talking down gunman, what have you been up to?"

He chuckled again and took another sip of his coffee. "Not much, really. After my divorce, I kind of buried myself in my job."

His light tone didn't sway her. Had he just told her that he had a divorce? Arnold, a divorce? What woman in their right mind would give him up? "You're divorced?" She tried to hide her utter astonishment, but it seemed that she didn't do it very well.

"It's a long story." He replied, not meeting her eye line.

"Well, it's not like we don't have time, unless you have somewhere to be?"

He met her eyes again and shook his head. "No, I'm free for the rest of the night." He looked down at his coffee cup and took a deep breath. "I met her when I was in college. We fell for each other pretty hard, and got married way too quick. It wasn't two months after we got married that we started arguing. And at first, I thought nothing of it, because I thought that that's just what married couples do, they argue. But then, pretty soon, arguing was all we did. She went to live with her brother for a while, to 'think things over'. I got served with the papers four days later."

"So, I take it it wasn't amicable." She said in a sorrowful tone.

"As amicable as any divorce can be." He said with a stiff shrug of his broad shoulders. "They made me see a therapist after a gave a guy a black eye in a sparing session. He helped me realize that I was in love with being in love, as cliche as that might sound."

"How long were you married?"

"Only a year and a half. We had only dated for a few months prior. We were both young, and stupid. But, that was about... four years ago. I've put it behind me since then."

"So, uh..." She hesitated before asking her next question, thinking it would come out wrong. "Any replacements?" She asked, immediately lifting her coffee cup to her lips.

She saw him smile above the lid of her coffee cup and shake his head. "No, like I said, I buried myself in my work. I just... never found the energy to start dating again." Helga suddenly felt the heavy thump in her chest subside, making it a little easier to breath. She didn't want to blame it on the fact that there was no one in pursuit of him, that she knew of, but it wasn't like she was really after him, was it? "What about you? Anyone special in your life?"

She smiled a somewhat pathetic smile and shook her head. "No one besides Jeffery."

"Jeffery? Who's that?" He asked with a raised eye brow.

Helga pursed her lips, "He's my cat, I got him when my mom died. Bob hates him." She said with a devilish smirk.

He laughed and picked up his cup again, letting a comfortable silence envelope them. Arnold looked down at his watch, and saw that they managed to kill an hour. "It's getting pretty late, are you needed anywhere?"

"Actually, I should probably get back home, Bob is probably already yelling down the stairs for me." She got to her feet, and picked up her coffee.

"You want me to drop you off?" He asked.

"Actually, my car is still back at the bank, and I don't exactly know if they'd let me by the barricade."

"Well, why don't I drive you back. Most of the team should be gone by now, so it should just be the clean up crew, but having a badge always helps." Arnold helped her hop back out to his car, and after a short drive, they were pulling up next to Helga's Ford Focus. Helga climbed out haphazardly, and hoped over to the driver side of the car, with Arnold coming to stand next to her, having just pulled two business cards out of his wallet. "So, this is Phoebe's card, I'm sure if you call her anytime tomorrow, she'll invite you to lunch or something, and this," he pulled out a pen and moved over and placed the card down on the hood of her car, and write down a number on the back of it, "is my card. My office number is on the front, and my cell number is on the back. Don't hesitate to call if you need anything, day or night."

She looked back up to him and smiled warmly, "Thank you, Arnold, and," she lifted her cup up to him briefly, "for the coffee."

"Anytime, Helga. Give me a call sometime, we can do it again."

She let her smile brighten as she shyly looked away. "I will." She turned around and opened the door to her car, digging her keys out of her pocket, and sliding in behind the wheel.

"I'll see you later, Helga." He said as he placed a hand on her door.

"See you later, Arnold." He closed her door, and she started her car, and started to pull out. He waved as she backed out, and she waved back, and drove off down the street, back home. She let a bright smile erupt onto her face, she knew she would have a hard time getting him out of her head this time. It was hard enough last time, but this time, he was so... different.

She parked her car, and slowly climbed out, and then hobbled up her front steps, unlocking her front door, and closing it behind her. "Hey, is that you Olga! Where the hell have you been?!" She heard her father shout from his room, immediately followed by a coughing fit.

She sighed heavily, "At the bank," she shouted, deciding to leave out the other minor details.

"Well, get me something to eat already! I'm starving!" Helga sighed, and went into the kitchen, grabbing a plastic container out of the refrigerator, and sticking it in the microwave. As the microwave buzzed in her ear, she pulled out the two business cards of her pocket, and locked at the top one. He did say she would love to hear from me again, right?