Haha-so much hate for Dov. There will be some explanation as why Dov has an anti-Gail agenda eventually. I wrote this a bit rushed as I'm away for the weekend and wanted to get another update in beforehand.
As always reviews are really appreciated, thank you for all the support.
Paulinemcc- thank you for all the reviews!
Jskippy- Yeah Steve is weird… there may be reasons. Maybe.
Tumbfr- I love the rambling too, I just hope I'm doing it to Dr Stewart's standards and more rambling to come.

So now to deal with the morning after

Chapter 11- Introductions

Holly had laid there for what felt like hours before she finally fell asleep. She wanted to leave, but leaving after what happened and in the middle of the night, it wouldn't look she spent hours lying there, staring up at the ceiling trying to process what had just happened.

When she woke up it was dawn, the light just creaking into the bedroom, Holly hadn't even noticed when she came in last night that next to the few boxes sat some blinds. There were no curtains and the light was shining in around the bed glowing beautifully around the blonde who laid next to her. The beautiful blonde who was snoring softly and muttering in her sleep. She had drank a lot last night and would be in need of water and her next dose of painkillers when she woke up, and from Steve said a coffee.

Taking a moment to watch the blonde before slipping out of bed, she went on a hunt for coffee. She found, unpack and set up the coffee machine. Gail obviously hadn't been in here long if something so basic wasn't set up. There was coffee granules and sugar, a few basic things in the cupboard, but the fridge was empty, no milk black coffee it is. Grabbing a half open box of cereal, juggled the coffees, water and cereal back into the bedroom.

She spotted the pain meds sticking out of the blonde's jeans, and she put them on the bedside cabinet next to the water and coffee before getting back into the bed coffee in hand, and cereal box sat on her lap.

"Mmmmm…" the blonde hummed, "coffee" The way the word slipped out it was almost erotic, like a moan. Holly couldn't help but stop, hand mid way to her mouth a handful of cereal in tow, and stare slightly slacked jawed. Regaining her composure she popped the cereal on her mouth and munched just loud enough to make sure the blonde was aware of her presence.

"Morning," she finally said, taking a sip of her blonde rolled slightly, her hair was a mess, sleep around her eyes, and she was looking up with a frowny face and barely opened eyes, she's still kind of cute. She just groaned, turning back over, and sitting up. Taking her time she reached across herself popping a few pain meds, followed by a long swig of water, then a few sips of coffee before finally turning and speaking, the silence was killing Holly.

"Why are you here?" Her voice was huskier than last night and slightly accusing.
"You don't remember anything from last night?" Holly quipped back not missing a beat.

The blonde just frowned again, facing forward out of the window, the sun was coming up over the tops of the distant buildings now and the window gave a prefect view out. "You bought me back here with Steve. You looked after me." Each statement was an accusation, an accusation I can't deny. "Then you stayed, why?" Holly couldn't help but smile, her head tilting slightly as she did trying to look the blonde in the eye.

Finally making eye contact she extended her hand, "I'm Holly Stewart, its nice to finally meet you."

It had been two and a half weeks since that morning, that morning, with Dr Stewart and Gail had done an excellent job of avoiding her. Gail had let her in for some reason, she had only met her twice, and both times it wasn't really her. She had been a different person in gay bar, in the morgue she was a criminal, even if she had saved the doctor it had been instinct. It had only been that morning sat in her bed, drinking coffee, talking and eating cereal straight out of a box that they were properly introduced to each other.

Holly wasn't like everyone else, she handled all the sass Gail could throw at her, and in the morning Gail was even less friendly than normal. They had chatted about nothing for over an hour, neither of them breaching the topic of a kiss. Eventually Holly asked about her time undercover and surprisingly, even to herself, she answered. It felt good to have someone to tell someone who wasn't judging her mental state, or didn't know who she was before, just someone who wasn't judging her at all.

Gail had even asked her about her dreams, if they were regularly and when they started, the doctor took her time but answered all her questions; no matter how obscure they would have seemed to her.

The whole morning had made Gail so relaxed, she felt less stressed than she had in months. The tension on her shoulders was lifted, she found herself smiling. When Gail had gotten up to go to her appointment with the department shrink they had exchanged numbers. It was only when she sat down in the shrink's office actually speaking, talking about her feelings just had she had to Holly that the impact the woman had had on her, this beautiful, kind, intelligent and amazing woman who wanted to get to know her. And Gail was not the kind of person to just open up. So she did what she always did and ran, hid, from the doctor and her feelings.

Luckily after two weeks and several physio and shrink appointments later she was cleared for desk duty, giving her something to distract herself from her thought. Moping around her flat had only caused her more confusion, she had unpacked, bought more furniture, stocked up all the cupboards, fridge and freezer there was only so much to do.

But now it was day 3 of desk duty and it was killing her, the first day she had been put with Officer Shaw, he was a nice older guy and would be her TO. She had expected 'the talk'- the I'm your boss, listen to me, I know best, do as I say not as I do but he cut through the bs and got to the point, "yes you have undercover experience, and you probably have more knowledge of the police force than most of the rookies who came here before you, but you still need to catch up. And it's my job to make sure you can and do."

Day two Chris had volunteered to be on desk duty but 'luckily' for her Staff Sergeant Best had already assigned McNally. She wasn't as cheery as usual and had been pouting and frowning for most of the day. She made it til the last hour of her shift and McNally's fifth exasperated sigh til she cracked. "WHAT!?" She snapped.
McNally jumped slightly looking like a deer in headlights. "Sorrweee…" She squeaked out.
"No don't be sorry, just stop sighing and moping and being all depressed. That's my thing."
McNally actually chuckled at Gail's last statement. "I am sorry, I just things have been weird her recently…" And then suddenly Gail knew everything, everything from the last few months, she was completely up to date on hook ups, crushes and the complete list of top five fuck ups of the rookies. McNally isn't too bad.

Day 3 she was stuck on the front desk with Dov, he kept sending her evils, which she was more than happy to return, prick. She had been a bitch in the academy she knew that, she was a bitch to everyone equally she didn't discriminate. So sure people didn't really like her, but with Dov she couldn't work out a rational reason why he hated her so much. She didn't spend too much time questioning it, he wasn't worth it but there wasn't much else to focus on.

"Hey Peck! You clear to drive?" Oliver popped up behind her.
"Yes, please tell me you have something for me" She was begging. Although her arm was still meant to be in a sling now in a loose cravat sling which was just hanging around her head, rather than the tight triangle one she had had across her body. She had pretty much full mobility in her arm and had been cleared by the physio to drive just before she started back at work. And hopefully within the month she would be cleared for active duty, once her abdomen was completely healed.

"Good I need some results from the lab and you can go get them, maybe put some pressure on the techs."
The Lab… Gail had tuned out after that it was only after he shoved the folder into her hands and added "What are you waiting for that? You can take squad 1509."

Holly was a scientist first, in her mind science made life simpler. There were very few things Holly puts above science. There are some things Holly knows she can never understand and she learnt at a very young age sometimes the best thing you can do is enjoy them. Coincedence- a remarkable concurrence of events or circumstances without apparent causal connection, a bit like staring at your phone wishing for a response from a certain person then them casually walking into your lab like they haven't been ignoring you for two weeks and three days, not that Holly was keeping count.

After the morning she had spent with Gail, she felt a hundred times better, like a weight had been lifted. She knew that everything that happened that day in the lab had been the right thing, that Gail had saved her, and in return Holly her. She knew that by taking the life of someone she didn't know she had saved a kind hearted and loving if a bit closed off police officer. She knew she had done the right thing. And on top of all of this she thought she had made a friend.

But after two weeks and Holly sending a few easy going 'hey, how are you?' and 'fancy grabbing a drink?' texts with no response, she was starting to think she had scared off the blonde with her honesty. The blonde had asked curiously in the morning wanting to know about Holly's dreams, how she was feeling, why she had saved her, and Holly had taken her time but answers truthfully.

So after staring at her phone for five minutes wondering if to text the blonde again and looking up to see her standing there in the doorway to her lab looking everywhere but at Holly, she couldn't help but smile at the mystery of coincidence.

"Hi," The blonde seemed sheepish somehow, fiddling with the folder in her hands.
"Hello, Officer Peck." She was trying to be professional, if Gail didn't want to be her friend then that was that, if she did then the ball was in her court.
"I.. erm, Officer Shaw gave me this…" She held her hand out to Holly who had walked round the counter she was working towards the young officer taking the folder from her.
"Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet, he wanted me to check on some results, maybe get a rush on them. The tech downstairs said you were working on it."
"Yep that's me, the DNA is still being worked up, will probably take a couple of hours more"
"And you can't make it go any faster?"
Holly arched an eyebrow at the challenge, "Yeah sure I'll just rush the polymiserised chain reaction not like that's important, maybe you could chip in, how are you with identifying short tandem repeats?"
"You could have just said no."

After half an hour of uncomfortable silence, Gail cracked. "I don't want to be here."
"I hadn't noticed." Holly replied very blandly. The blonde had been huffing regularly, and had called Officer Shaw twice to see if she could leave and come back before the end of her shift to get the results, he had refused making her stay in case the results came back quicker, and she had very loudly stated her dissatisfaction at the situation.

"I'm sorry. I don't like it here. After…" After a moment of silent Holly looked up from her computer and saw where the blonde was staring, out of the door across the hallway into the morgue.
"Gail…"
"I'm sorry Holly, I'm not good at this stuff. Being a nice person doesn't come naturally to me."
"I don't believe that."
The blondes head shot up, "It doesn't matter if you believe it, its true. I'm not a nice person."
"You are to me."
"You're different."

Before Holly had a chance to respond, her computer dinged, the results were in and Gail needed to leave. She printed everything off and walked her out of the lab. Holly was mouthing the words, trying to speak.
"I get off in a hour, do you want to, I don't know, go for a drink or something?" Gail spat out the words, so quickly they almost merged. Holly's slightly lopsided grin spread across her face. "Is that a yes?"
"Yes, it's a yes… Why don't I pick you up? I had something planned for tonight you might like."
"Yeah sure, I'll text you my address."

Next chapter will be super long I think, but won't be up 'til Monday earliest! Camping out at a rugby tournament this weekend so hopefully the weather is still good!

Any suggestions of what you want to see let me know in the reviews! I didn't really want any drama between Gail and Holly but it wouldn't be Gail without a little bit.