A/N Holly's POV. The first time they met. I sort of meant for all of these to go in chronological order, but I realized that I had stories that I needed to tell that came earlier. So they're out of order. Sorry! I hope you enjoy =]

"Holly, can you head down to a crime scene? We have a body."

I looked up from my notes. "Fresh?"

"Nah. Just bones. We need samples of everything, try to figure out how long it's been down there."

I stood up and grabbed my bag. "Address?"

He handed me a piece of paper with the location written on it and I headed to the car. Pulled over on the road outside of the ravine. I know I'm in the right place because the woods are swarming with cops. I spot the most heavily concentrated group of uniforms and haz-mat suits and move towards them. Ducking underneath the crime scene tape, I head towards the body, already running through my checklist of what samples I need to get. I'm so focused that when I hear someone speak, the words don't even register.

"Thanks, appreciate it."

She speaks again. "No, I said you're not allowed down there."

This time, I hear her. I turn around. "Me?"

She lifts her arms in confusion. It's like she's saying, 'Duh,' and I smile. She's adorable. Must be a rookie. I definitely would have remembered seeing her.

"Oh. No, I am," I tell her, laughing lightly. I can hardly believe I'm being forced to explain myself at a crime scene. If anyone less hot was trying to distract me right now, I'd be seriously pissed. As it stands, I'm just amused. I lift my bright red bag, a clear indicator of my status as a lab employee. "I need to get some samples."

"Who are you?" she asks, brow furrowed.

My smile widens. She's even cuter when she's concerned that someone is contaminating her crime scene. "The forensic pathologist."

"Oh," she says, stepping closer. She licks her lips. She probably doesn't notice that she did it, but I sure as hell did. "Well, you should have told me that before."

I cock my head as I look at her. "Sorry, I thought it was obvious."

"Only to nerds. Can you come back later?"

Did she just call me a nerd? I narrow my eyes at her, but can't keep the amused smile off my face as I launch into my watered down explanation for the necessity of my presence.

"You're not up on your medical jurisprudence. We need to determine the cause of death. I test the water for diatoms, and if we find diatoms in the bone marrow…" a thought occurs to me. "Oh, did you notice if the femur's still intact?"

She shakes her head. The look on her face is a little hard to read. The pathologist half o my brain is on autopilot, allowing the hot girl side to roam freely. If I had to guess, she's currently feeling a combination of annoyance and awe. I get that a lot. I smile and continue.

"I'll check later. If the diatoms match, we know the person drowned. If there aren't any diatoms, then we know the cause of death was something else. I'll need to consult with the forensic anthropologist. I'll grab some leaves, bugs, dirt so they don't have to come back. It helps in identifying the post-mortem integral."

"Why are you saying all these words?"

Oh my god, she's adorable. And possibly autistic? I'm going to assume that her social ineptitudes stem from nurture instead of nature. Her nametag says Peck. As in Superintendent Peck? If that frigid woman is her mother, that could explain her apparent inability to act like a normal human being. Her expression remains grumpy as I gaze at her appraisingly.

Fascinating. And hot.

I hear the detective announce that he needs someone to go to the morgue. I tear my eyes away from her, head towards the body, just in time to hear Peck herself volunteer. I turn back, my eyebrows raised.

She shrugs. "It's never to late to learn about medical jurisprudence." This comment is pointedly directed at me, but I just smile. Something about her disposition makes me want to climb inside her head, smooth out all the wrinkles in her forehead from the inside out. The sarcasm drips from her mouth, but I know her type. We'll see if she can take it as good as she gives it. There's gotta be something worth hiding underneath that rude, brassy, hardass cop exterior. I intend to find out what it is. The best treasure is always buried the deepest. I kneel next to the mossy bones that brought me here and suppress a grin. Medical jurisprudence also dictates that I don't look so delighted in the presence of a corpse.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I drove us back to the lab. She sat silently in the passenger seat next to me. I think she was pouting that I hadn't let her drive. I'd explained that the medico-van wasn't like her squad car, and that it wasn't legal for her to drive it.

I've found that cops hate nothing more than being told what is and isn't legal. Especially when the illegal thing is what they want to be doing.

At the lab, I positioned her against the drawers and told her not to touch anything. She rolled her eyes, and I smirked.

I began my examination of the bones, and I could feel her eyes on me. Whether she was staring at me with annoyance or curiosity, I couldn't tell. I didn't want to look directly at her. In case it was the second, I wasn't about to bust her. She could stare at me all she wanted.

"So," I finally spoke. "Do you have a name other than Peck?"

She glared at me from across the room. "That's Officer Peck to you."

I glanced her way. "Fine. Officer Peck, I'm Doctor Stewart."

"I thought you said you were a pathologist or something?"

Jeez. Maybe she really isn't the brightest bulb in the box. I gestured towards my lab coat. "They only let you wear these if you finish medical school first."

"And the glasses complete the uniform?" she shot back at me. "Just in case your status as a nerd wasn't fully solidified?"

I raised one eyebrow. "What've you got against nerds, Officer Peck? Some kind of reverse bullying in middle school? Were you…" I drop my voice to a stage whisper, "not very smart?"

Her eyes managed to get even narrower. God she's gorgeous. I shake my head. I'm enjoying the verbal sparring, and I can tell she is too. But I've got bones to focus on. Luckily, a metallic glint catches my eye almost immediately.

"Ah ha!"

She takes a step towards me. "What?"

I turn my head and glare. She retreats back to the wall. Once she's there, I answer her question by holding up the humerus.

"A metal plate in his arm. It's serialized. We can get an ID off of this."

I roll over to the computer. I would have thought the prospect of identifying the body would have at least caused some excitement for her. I glance towards her, but her face is still stony. Though I think I see something like curiosity glint in her eyes for a moment before she suppresses it. I pull up the database and begin typing in the serial number when I hear her speak.

"How did you know that?"

I swivel to face her. "What?"

"It just looks like a bone. How did you know it was an arm?"

I smirk at her. "You did hear the part about medical school, right?"

For a brief moment, I see her stony façade break. "I'm serious." She looks vulnerable, genuinely concerned that I think she's an idiot. It's only there for a second, but I see it. I quickly backtrack, making a mental note of her insecurity in this area. I stand and walk over to her, still holding the humerus.

"Here." I hand her a pair of rubber gloves, which she quickly pulls on. I hand her the bone, stepping close to her and running my fingers down the body. She touches it tentatively, and I smile. "It's not going to break."

I take her hand and gently guide it towards the upper extremity. "See? This is where it connects to the scapula."

She meets my gaze, confused. "Huh?"

I reach over and graze her shoulder lightly, demonstrating. "Here."

She swallows hard, and I take a moment to appreciate the soft hollow at the base of her neck where I can see her pulse thudding rhythmically.

I move our hands to the lower extremity, pressing her fingers carefully into the dimple at the base. "This is where it connects to your radius and ulna." Before she can ask, I gently place the tip of my finger on her elbow and press down. "Here."

She nods and takes a step away, handing the bone back to me. "Got it. Thanks."

I smile and walk back to the computer. It's found the correct entry and I hit print. Hand her the piece of paper, which she skims. I don't care about the identification. It's easier for me to make my own assumptions without worrying about fitting into some preordained formula based on non-technical character data.

She looks up from the paper. "So what are you doing over there anyway?"

"Putting together a puzzle."

Now that she has a few so-called facts in front of her, she wants to quiz me. "What can you tell about the person?"

I've already determined sex from the shape of the pubic bone. I quickly run my fingers along the inside of the jawbone at the base of the teeth, looking for age markers. "He's a full-grown male. Probably early 20s. Not archeological. His bones are still greasy." I smile. "And a bit smelly, you find?"

"Oh, I just thought that was you."

My smile widens. There she is. "We'll need to carbon date it, but I'd say he's been dead… ten years?"

The detectives from the crime scene enter the room, looking for an ID. I tell them we got lucky, explain about the metal plate in the humerus. Officer Peck fills them in on the name. One of the detectives, the guy, is inexplicably thrilled to hear that he knows of the dead guy on my table. They head out, and it's just the two of us again. Well, three, if you count Robert Robins. But I don't.

I continue my exam, and Officer Peck starts getting antsy. As I scrape particles for analysis out of the various fractures on his body, she starts reading titles from medical journals at random. She stumbles upon one of mine and seems pretty impressed. She should be. I'm impressive. I gather further evidence to support this claim when I realize that he was hit by a car. Or, more likely, a large van or truck. I try to point it out to her.

She leans over the body, our arms touching briefly. "Yeah, no, I just see bones."

I'm not too caught up in the excitement of new forensic evidence to notice how good she smells. She's right. Compared to her, I'm greasy bones.

She calls the detective while I continue cataloguing the injuries. I notice a significant amount of bone remodeling. Shit. When he gets back to the morgue, I explain. Significant damage to his bones throughout his childhood. Poorly or partially healed, for the most part. The damage to the ribs and pelvis were just the final nail in his coffin. I promise to search for any evidence regarding make or model of the vehicle that hit him. But that will take longer. The detective leaves and I check my watch. It's already past six. I don't do overtime for a body ten years old. I start to pack up my things.

"So, I'm Holly."

She swivels on her stool and looks at me. "I know."

Now it's my turn to look confused. "How?"

She points to the medical journals. "You wrote them, remember? 'Dr. Holly Stewart, PhD.' I'm not a total idiot."

I am momentarily chagrined. "I know."

She shrugs. "I'm Gail." She watches me pack up my things before turning on the stool and gazing around the room. I sense her hesitation to leave.

"Something tells me you like it here."

She sighs deeply. "I could live here." She turns back towards me. "Holly." A deep breath. "I'm like a cat. I'm very good at climbing trees. And then the minute that I get up there I don't…I have no idea what to do. I want to get down, but I don't know how to do that, so…I create an emergency situation to get out of it."

It's the most adorable speech I've ever heard. It's also the most words she's said to me all day in one go, and I can tell that it means something. I can tell she's opening up. Unfortunately, I have zero idea what she's talking about. "Out of the tree?"

"Of relationships."

"Ah." It all makes sense. I feel my heart sink slightly. Whatever her story is, it's obviously complicated. And likely does not involve women in the slightest. But I can deal with that. It's disappointing. But my interest in her does not go away just because the odds of her being interested in women have decreased. And I do actually know what she's talking about. I grab my bag and her jacket. "Yeah, I used to be like that. But it turns out that I didn't like men." I hand her her jacket, feeling my heart thudding in my chest. No matter how many times I say it, it still always feels like the first time.

She stands up, pulling on the bulky coat. "Well, I don't think I like men either."

I smile. I'll have to be clearer. "I mean I'm a lesbian."

"Oh. I mean I hate people." She walks away, leaving me standing there, a little dumbfounded. It was the most casual response I've ever received. And a perfect mix of honesty and sarcasm: my favorite combination. I can't help the grin that spreads across my face as I turn to watch her leave the room. What an incredibly fascinating woman. I'm not necessarily any closer to figuring her out. But my heart is buoyed somewhat by her casual declaration, as casual as mine. She hates people. But for all of the rudeness and sarcasm and intellectual resistance I was met with today, I didn't once feel an ounce of hatred.

The grin widens. She hates people. But she doesn't seem to hate me.

I shrug. I can work with that.