Disclaimer: I own nothing.

– – –

It'd been a frigid three weeks at the office. Well, technically two. Rosita called out for an entire week, and no one knew why. They thought maybe the last case had gotten to her, and she wouldn't answer the door or their calls, so they could only assume. It was sad to see, especially as not even Tara could get through her. They hoped she would be okay.

However that hope died when she got back and proved they had everything to worry about. She had the bitch claws out and dug them into Tara for some odd reason. The team had no clue what the hell had happened between them, but all the time they would find the two bickering and slipping in hurtful and snide remarks. It was beyond weird, especially since Tara had been so relieved and happy to see Rosita. She'd tried to talk to her, but Rosita had given Tara the "cold body". The cold shoulder didn't encompass how cold Rosita had been.

Tara had been thrilled to see Rosita again, after a week of trying to call and see her, trying to figure out where they were and how their relationship was, but the moment Rosita's onyx eyes met hers, she felt a chill slice through her. She had tried to be nice, offering Rosita some coffee from Starbucks, as she had to head out with Carol anyway, but Rosita sharply insisted she didn't want anything from her, precisely her. It had just been the two of them as Aaron and Glenn were with Boss, and Carol was collecting the report from the M.E. Tara tried to bring up Saturday, but Rosita shut her down and strolled out of the bullpen, ponytail bouncing the entire way out.

She didn't know what the hell had happened to Rosita the past week, thus she attempted to give her the benefit of the doubt. She was polite—overly so—and generous, even to the point of letting Rosita walk all over her now and then. She had reached her limit and tried again to talk to her, but Rosita once again refused. She got pissed this time at the icy wall Rosita had installed between them and came close to blowing up and nearly spilling their little tryst to the entire office. She swallowed her words and dragged Carol to the gym so she could beat the crude out of something while complaining to her friend about it. She didn't give any details, but she felt better by the time they left. The punching bag probably didn't feel the same way. Or her knuckles. Even through gloves and the tape, they were swollen and bruised. She knew Carol was concerned, but she couldn't tell her what happened. If she ever wanted Rosita to speak to her, or wanted Rosita and Carol to remain friends, she had to keep this to herself.

If she told Carol, she would confront Rosita, and that would be a nightmare for everyone. Carol didn't consider where she was whenever she confronted people. She just wanted to know the whole damn story, and she wanted to now it right the fuck now. It was terrible and awkward, because though she was small little toaster, she had volume and rage. She defended her family like a puma defends its family, and she didn't want to unleash that on Rosita, no matter how big of a bitch she was being. No one deserved the wrath of Carol. Well, maybe Shane and her asshole dad, but other than them, no one. If she could make Carol turn her little tornado self on them, she would have done it the moment Carol picked up a gun. She didn't want Shane dead, but she low-key wanted her father to at least taste death. Fucker nearly drove her to Death's doorstep.

Her grip tightened on her pen at the change in her thoughts, and she had to leave the bullpen before she snapped it in half.

Rosita passed Tara as she stormed off, and she blinked at the storm cloud hovering over her. She knew she wasn't the cause of it. She hadn't even spoken—er, ignored, really—the woman today, so it wasn't her. She wanted to ask what was wrong. Her heart was curious and concerned but her brain wanted to shut shit down. She hated to be in such conflict, but there was nothing she could do at this point. Nothing short of dropping to her knees and begging for forgiveness that was.

Tara had been so kind and keen on putting what happened between them in the past, but Rosita's was so terrified. She wasn't the type of woman who slept with her friends. She wasn't the type of person to do that. She wasn't always a good person, and she didn't always do the best or right thing, but she wasn't...an idiot. Well, she thought she wasn't anyway. She thought she could always keep herself in check when she was drunk, but she couldn't. She had done the one thing she swore to never do with her friends. They could talk shit, borrow money, stay over at her place, steal her clothes—anything—but have sex with each other. It was the one promise she'd made after fucking up a ten year friendship.

Only she'd been foolish then. She thought they could go back to how things were. It was one drunken night in college, but she was wrong. Things were entirely different, and they grew apart. She lost one of her best friends, because of tequila and jello shots. She vowed the day they stopped speaking to never allow that to happen again. Friendship meant the world to her. She didn't get involve beyond sex, so friendship and the intimacy it provided was all she allowed herself to have. She loved it, craved it, and she destroyed it. She took it and crushed it in her hands—twice.

She knew her approach with Tara was like cutting the ties with a machete, but she had tried the nice approach before. She tried the kindness and the smiles and the pretending, and it didn't work. They struggled and fumbled and sputtered until they crashed and burned. Rosita was left alone until she enrolled in the police academy. She was instantly suckered in by Carol and Tara. In fact she remembered how they met. She was standing just inside the door, and Tara had her arm around Carol's shoulder, harassing her, and she saw Rosita. She pointed at her and said she was one of them now. She then threw her other arm around her shoulders and lead her to the proper area. She kept it up until the instructor came in then she'd link their pinkies now and then whenever they had to stand, trying not to giggle.

Her chest ached, and she turned around to see Tara's back as she spoke with Boss, and she dropped her eyes to the floor. She loved Tara. She was one of her best friends, and now she wasn't. It was over. All the years, all the history, all the secrets and inside jokes and laughter and tears and bad puns were over. She didn't want them to be, but in the end it would happen. She simply had that kind of luck. People entered her life, she fell in love—or just loved them—she'd screw it up, and it'd end. In the blink of an eye years of talks and inside pranks and money pools, all the months of clothes shopping, going to the range together, picking on their squad mates, all the weeks of knowing exactly how she liked her coffee and surprising her with it now and then, and all the days of walking side by side, minds link as they focused on the case were wiped away like a child's tears. Regardless of how kind they were to each other now, it would happen. She knew that without a shadow of a doubt. When she fought, she only seemed to lose even more, to fall harder, and she couldn't do it, not with Tara.

– – –

The fourth week started out with a raging fight, Carol had walked in on it with Aaron who had tagged along with her as Tara had paperwork she needed to catch up on, and Glenn was practically hiding in the break room. The sharp-tongued Latina was raging about their suspect, and their resident lesbian was fuming about their victim. It wasn't pretty.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Tara held her hand up. "Oh, right, you just love to be wrong!"

"Just because she seemed like an okay person when she was alive doesn't mean she was!" Rosita spat. "You don't know shit about who this victim was! She could have been cruel and manipulative, as the man you all claim to have done it said!"

"We have no proof she was! We have mountains of evidence and witness reports against him!"

"You have one witness report!"

"It's still one more than you," Tara hissed.

All five homicide detectives jumped like school children who had been caught trying to steal snacks during nap time at the sound of their boss bellowing, "Espinosa! Chambler! My office now!" Boss never yelled, never scolded, never glared, but he was doing all of it now, and it was directed at the two mentioned cops. Nobody felt sorry for them as they'd been making this bed for a week now, so they hoped they both came out alive.

Rosita and Tara stood beside side by side dejectedly inside Boss's office, both avoiding eye contact with the tall, father-figure before them, and he shook his head at them. Rosita wanted to protest and sweep it under a rug, but it was far too late for that. Boss was in his Boss mode. And his Dad mode too. Damn, they'd really done it this time, hasn't they?

"What on earth is going on between you two?" he demanded once he'd shut his office door. "Explain it to me right now, and don't you dare try to charm me with your sarcasm, Chambler. I am in no mood for it."

"I don't know what you're talking about, Boss." Rosita crossed hers arms and looked over his shoulder. "We were just having a friendly debate ab—"

"Friendly my ass," Tyreese interrupted. "You've been at each other's throats for three weeks now. Three very long weeks." Tara opened her mouth, but he shut her down. "I don't want another word to come out either of your mouths unless it's the truth. So why are you fighting? What on God's green Earth caused this? Out with it."

Rosita inadvertently blushed and dropped her gaze to the floor, her hair cloaking her face.

Tyreese looked from one dark-haired woman to the next then sighed. "Do you want to talk it out alone first? Because none of us are leaving until this is resolved. I can't separate you two. You aren't partners, but you're disrupting the flow, the peace, of this office. I'll transfer one of you out if I have to."

Rosita's mouth ran bone dry and her heart stopped beating at the thought of being transferred out. Tears nearly crossed her eyes at the thought of packing up her desk, packing up the last few years of her life and strolling out that doorway for the last time. She couldn't do that. This job was everything, the people she worked with, the peace they gave the victim's family when they brought down a doer—it was her dream, her passion, her drive. It was the one constant besides family in her life. She couldn't be transferred. She'd worked too damn hard for this. She couldn't just...leave this place. The gross coffee, the smiles of her teammates, the rattle of handcuffs, the rush of taking down a particularly cocky doer who assumed they'd get away with murder was such a massive part of her life. There was no walking away!

Tara blanched and her heart dropped own to her knees, melting like chocolate in the sun, and she was ready to fight. She'd rolled her sleeves up and fight Boss right here, right now, to keep her damn job. She couldn't simply saunter out the doors for a final time just yet. She knew one day when she was old and white-haired, but not a day before. Hell, on the actual day they'd have to drag her wrinkly ass out of here, kicking and screaming. She was born to do this job, to stand shoulder to shoulder with her partner and take out any threat, to protect and serve. It was in her very blood, and she couldn't stomach not seeing Glenn, Carol and Aaron every day. Hell, even old Boss right here. They were her family now that hers was states away. She couldn't—wouldn't—goddamn refused to be forced to leave. He'd have to shoot her.

"Now I don't want to do that, so work this out, ladies. Work it out and make up, okay?" He opened the door. "You have thirty minutes."

"Yes, Boss." Tara nodded and closed the door behind him. "Blinds."

The two quickly twisted the blinds to his office shut for privacy, Rosita turned once her half was done, and Tara slowly finished her last one. She pushed her sleeves up and face the woman in the room. There was a weighted silence in the room, they didn't dare near each other, and the silence seemed to be paying rent as it was clearly here to stay. They had no words to try and evict it, and they shifted awkwardly, shifting their weight and gripping their wrists, eyes wandering to the pictures and medals in Boss's office.

Tara reached out and stroked the medal his grandfather had won in the war, and she sighed, withdrawing her hand and moving her eyes to Rosita. "Why the hell are you doing this?"

"Doing what?" Rosita met her eyes.

"Being so damn cold! If you were the weather, I'd have died from exposure!" She threw her arms out. "What the hell did I do to deserve this treatment, Rosita?"

"You had sex with me!"

"And you had sex with me!" Tara snapped. "We fucked each other, okay? I get that we crossed a line, and I get that you don't do that, but guess what, Espinosa? Neither do I! I'll joke to the high heavens about it, but I've never actually done it until...Saturday."

"It's my fault."

"No, it wasn't. It's on both of us. We're both adults who got drunk and let this happen. You can't assign on the blame on yourself. I won't let you."

She smiled faintly. "I'm sorry."

"You should be. You were really cruel to me. I tried to be...okay with you, but you...came out punching. I know you don't like what happened, but there was no need to—"

"I didn't say I didn't like it," Rosita corrected. "I don't like that I slept with my friend. As for the actual act itself...well, that was good."

"Good?" She crossed her arms. "You think I'm just "good"?"

She smiled, her walls shattering as she laughed, and she stepped closer toward her. "Okay, it was great. Are you happy now?"

"I was happy with good, but great's okay too." She smirked.

"I just can't believe it happened between us." She leaned on the edge of the desk and buried her face in her hands. "I promised I wouldn't sleep with any of my friends, not after what happened the last time, and I broke it. I was doing so well, and...God!"

"We obviously won't get passed this until you get over breaking that promise."

"I can't lose you." She dropped her hands and gripped the end of her blazer, shaking her head. "And having sex with you is what's going to make me lose you! It was just that one night, but it was enough the last time."

"We're not like the last time, gorgeous."

"We are. It is! It's the same thing, but a different person. We were both drunk, both good friends, both female." She leaned her head back and scoffed bitterly. "We can't avoid the fallout."

"Then we avoid the fallout."

"What?" She blinked. "What does that even mean?"

"Why don't we just...become more?"

"More?" She pushed off the desk. "More than friends?"

"I'm not saying we date and get married, but if you think it's going to help, why don't we just leave sex on the table? I mean, if not having sex is causing this to happen to us and our relationships at work then...we kinda have to. For their sake, I mean. It's totally selfish of us to, you know, not do this." She couldn't help the smirk she shared with Rosita. "I mean, am I wrong?" Probably, and that wrong would come back to bite her ass.

"Friends with benefits?" Her lips twitched around her smirk. "You want this?"

"Well, not really, but we can keep it causal." She shrugged. "And you won't lose me as your friend."

"But having more sex will only make it worse."

"I didn't say we were going to have sex again. I just said it was an option. I think...we need that option, don't you?"

"How would that work?"

"We won't be destroying our friendship, simply adding to it, and we don't have to act on it. Will that put your fears at ease?"

"And if we wanted to act on it?"

"Well, I'd like to have dinner first. I'm just that kind of girl." She grinned wickedly, and Rosita laughed, nodding. "I don't know, but we'll figure it out. You're a good friend, and we screwed up, but ignoring it isn't helping. We're going to kill each other, and to be honest, it wasn't...the worst thing we've ever done together."

"It was definitely better than last New Year's Eve."

"Anything we've done together can never top how bad New Year's Eve was." Tara could still feel the hangover, taste it even. So gross. "I don't even want to remember that."

She smiled softly and nodded again. "Okay. Let's do it."

"What, right here? I mean I know Boss is a clean man, but...nah."

She smacked her arm. "I didn't mean now. I just meant...okay."

"Okay." Tara reached out and tucked hair behind Rosita's ear, and Rosita flushed at the tenderness in the action. "I have a hair tie in my desk. Do you want to borrow it?"

"Sure."

She halted before exiting the office. "Are we good? I don't want to give them false hope."

Rosita smirked. "We're good."

"Good."

They were good, but things had changed. Rosita could feel that, see it, and she hoped to the high heavens no one else did. Their little patch would only last for so long, were anyone to find out, it'd peel right off.

––

"What the hell happened between you and Rosita?" Carol handed Tara a bowl of homemade beef stew that night. "You two were ready to draw blood one minute and now you're best buds again."

"We just worked through it."

"I've never seen Rosita liked that before, not even if we accidentally bring up Abraham." She crossed her legs. "Are you two really okay?"

"Yes, we're okay. No more fighting, I promise."

"Good, because I don't think any of us can survive you two doing that again." She didn't notice how Tara chuckled softly to herself as she turned on the movie. "I hope you don't mind horror. I was just craving Stephen King."

"No, it's cool. I could use some of the King's work to take my mind off our work."

"Here, here."

Tara softly laughed again at Carol's statement. She didn't know if she and Rosita would ever sleep together again, but to be honest she wouldn't mind. It had been nice and familiar to be with her. She was a good friend, and they came together in a way that they never had before. It didn't feel wrong until Rosita went ice bitch on her, and even then it only felt like a mistake. However of all the mistakes she'd made in her life, this was one she didn't want to undo. She wondered if that meant something, but at the sight of moving playing her thoughts were drowned by horror and the deliciousness of Carol's beef stew. There was plenty of time to think about how stupid her idea was, and how oddly right it felt with Rosita later.