Chapter 35: Pecking Order

Author's Note: Holly is more forgiving about scary cop stuff, but her therapist is really earning that bill, I betcha. Now that one case is wrapped up, or at least Gail's part in it is done, it's time for something new.

"Officer Peck reporting, sir," Gail tried to keep any trace of a smile off her face. She was dressed in her normal uniform, complete with tie (clip on) and kit as requested.

Inspector David Butler looked up from his computer and smiled. "Don't look so serious, Peck." He stood up and extended a hand. "Welcome to Major Crimes. You already know Sergeant Best."

Shaking her new boss's hand, Gail nodded at the man to the side. "Hi, Frank."

"Hi, Gail, welcome to the third floor." The twinkle in Frank's eyes was comforting. "Nice job last weekend. That guy folded fast. I saw the tapes."

"Guess I put the fear of god in him," she grinned, gesturing at herself.

She was introduced around to the rest of the staff. The regular detectives worked on the first floor, with overflow and special crimes like Steve's work on two (she never understood why Steve insisted on working on the main floor). The third floor, Fifteen's top floor, was for major crimes and staff like her parents. Her mother's office when Gail was in school had been up here. Thankfully it was not Butler's office. Her father had once held a desk here as well, recently even.

Butler had converted the office into an interview room, preferring to sit in the open with everyone else. "You'll sit with Frank for now. I was going to have you start with a case you knew, but you wrapped that up for guns and drugs." Shaking his head, Butler gestured at the board at the end of the room.

Both of Gail's eyebrows rose and she looked at the board. The ambulance cases. "Sorry about that," she smirked.

"Don't be. I was going to have to wait another couple months for you without it." Butler put his hands in his pockets, like an overgrown schoolboy. "How's your brother?"

"Fine. He's got a sling to stop moving his arm around, but he's healing. Went home yesterday."

"Good," nodded Butler. "He's a good kid. Needs a steady partner." The Inspector, her Inspector, grinned. "His boss wanted Double Peck. I had to fight for you."

Gail quirked a grin, but held it tight. "Beat out a Staff Inspector?"

"Jarvis said you'd be better here. Two versus one." Someone called Butler's name and he nodded. "Best, get Peck dialed in."

Frank brought Gail to his desk and they sat down. There was an awkward pause before he chuckled and slid over a blotter. "For later." With intense sincerity, Frank ran her down on the crimes they'd be working on as well as a quick briefing on three task forces they were running in coordination with other divisions. For now, Gail's duties were to follow Frank and watch and learn.

While Frank was demoted from Staff Sergeant to Sergeant, the lateral shift to Detective Sergeant had done him well. Not that he'd been a bad boss, but the last two years had been especially rough. He was a good leader of masses, better than most, and Butler was wise to assign Frank to onboard new people. Not that Gail was really new. Frank knew it too, which made the day speed by.

Gail was home first, even with a trip to the gym with Traci, and spread her copy of the recent blotter over the kitchen island while cooking dinner.

"Oh you're all professional," laughed Holly, coming in from the garage. "Already got a case?" She swooped around to kiss Gail's cheek and look over her shoulder.

"No, just memorizing everything on the blotter. Frank wants me to look for patterns." She stretched her arms over her head and laughed as Holly's arms wrapped around her waist.

"So first day was good?" Holly smiled, looking as pleased as if she'd done it herself.

That was an odd question, Gail realized. "Weird. It's just ... Strange being upstairs all day. And I'm the only one in uniform," she grumbled. That part she hated. She wasn't a detective yet. That would have to wait until her mother had officially retired. A whole damn year unless she did something epic, something amazing.

Holly, however, pointed out a flaw. "Having seen your wardrobe, honey, it's probably better this way." Gail did not want to shopping for work clothes. "Maybe when you're in charge, you can get everyone to wear jeans and your slouchy blouses."

"In a million years," she complained. Gail leaned back into Holly and sighed, drinking in her presence.

Resting her chin on Gail's shoulder, Holly sighed and her hands drifted down to Gail's thighs. "You like it."

"I spent my day reading about robberies," Gail muttered. The hands on her legs squeezed and one moved up Gail's shirt, slipping under it, resting on her stomach.

"Major Crimes sounds a little petty." Holly's breath was distractingly pleasant on her neck.

"There's been swarming."

"Like bees?" Holly brushed a thumb across Gail's inner thigh.

Gail sighed, covering that hand with her own and bringing it up to her lips. "When groups, usually kids, crowd someone to rob them." Gail turned Holly's hand, kissing the palm. "I like it."

"I like how you caught your ambulance guy because I made you watch the greatest sci-fi show in the last 10 years."

"Neeeeerrrrd," smirked Gail.

"You watch reality TV," snapped Holly without any venom in her voice. The hand under Gail's shirt poked her, however.

"Hey, I watched that Lost Girl show with you. Didn't even have a single sexy librarian," she lamented and won a neck kiss from her girlfriend. "And it wasn't like the Firefly episode. Baby, you know real crime isn't like TV."

Holly sighed. "Well if it was they'd have caught the guys faster."

Letting go of Holly's hand, Gail spun the stool around. She tugged Holly by the waist so they were somewhat more entangled. Pressing her face into Holly's neck, she asked, "Would you go to the ballet with me again?"

"Will you wear that shawl thing again?"

"Maybe," grinned Gail. "Maybe something you don't have to use your teeth to unzip."

Holly groaned. "I hate zippers." Leaning back however, Holly smiled and kissed Gail gently. "I'll think about it. Just ... Bring Steve. Or make Traci promise to sit on him."

"I don't want to know what Steve and Traci do in their free time," winced Gail. "I'm hungry."

"You're always hungry." But she let go and asked, "What is for dinner?"

"Cheese puff crusted chicken." Holly made a surprised face and Gail smirked. "I made a broccoli salad thing too, shallots and onions and all that. I promise, it's good."

"Well... The mac and cheese thing was awesome," allowed Holly. "But Gail, just how many recipes do you know with cheese puffs?"

With a smile, Gail did not answer.

Holly liked the new routine. Gail had a normal kind of schedule, which meant they regularly had time together. There were now weekends, whole weekends which were consistently theirs. As summer ended, Holly dragged Gail to a baseball game and the lake, and lamented not having a summer cottage to hide in. That was when Gail mentioned that her family did have a cottage, or a cabin, she was unclear as to which, and that Gail actually had the keys.

"Will your parents be there?"

"Dunno... So yeah, there is that."

They decided not to risk it, which turned out to be providential when Gail found herself the unwilling recipient of an award for saving Steve's life and breaking open the Two Lakes little crime ring. Privately Holly though the name was dumb but Gail said criminals weren't always known for their smarts. Then she told Holly a hilarious story about a robber who had a custom license plate on his getaway car.

At the award ceremony, which was in public and outside, Gail was withdrawn and quiet on stage. She hated it and Holly knew it, so watching her girlfriend retreat into her comfortable angry shell was not unexpected. Getting a medal for doing her job had, per Gail, been stupid. If anyone deserved a medal for that crap it was Holly, and she threatened to submit Holly's name for an order of merit.

It hadn't taken much to talk Gail out of that idea as soon as Holly pointed out they'd make Gail give a speech.

With the new medal pinned to her jacket, Gail grumbled, "Can I just get drunk?"

Her brother slung his good arm around her shoulders, showing off his own medal (a reward for being stabbed apparently). "Yes, sister dear. I think tonight calls for drinks at the Penny with our beautiful women. Women we will go home with."

Since Steve had needed a little extra care and help after being stabbed, Traci and Leo de facto moved in early. That sped up the search for a larger place, which turned out to be close to where Traci already lived. Gail had been enlisted to help move and did not complain too much about it, though she and Holly gave the couple sports tickets. But now both Pecks were well and truly healed and happy, which they admitted was a strange place to be.

The Penny was packed with people who wanted to buy Gail a drink, most of whom were her former patrol mates though Detective Blackstone only stopped by briefly, getting weird looks from Nick and Andy. Both of Gail's rookies made an adorable honor guard, keeping track of everyone who bought a drink.

"This is cute," Holly informed Gail. "Gerald and Snowflake are getting along."

Gail squinted at them for a long moment. "Ah crap, they're boning." Holly nearly shot her beer out her nose much to Gail's delight.

Alas, Gail had not been joking and Holly was aghast when she spotted the two making out in a corner an hour later. Gail had sighed knowingly and complained about people in general being far too happy and perky. This led to Gail and Chloe arguing across at least four languages about happiness.

"It's disturbing, isn't it?" Dov sighed and handed Holly another beer.

"Mm, no thanks, I'm driving. Do they both speak a bajillion languages?"

"Chloe said Gail was cheating by not teaching her Punjabi I think, and Gail called her a snob for not teaching Swahili. Who even knows Swahili?" They shook their heads. "She's just going to go on and on, isn't she?"

"I'm afraid so." Holly smiled fondly at her girlfriend and her limitless future.

Dov sighed. "I miss the old days sometimes, when we were all rookies and she was just the bitchy, cold one who stabbed us in the back."

It was hard for Holly to see that Gail in her mind. She knew the other Gail, the sweet and sensitive one who was sarcastic and witty and defensive. "Which came first," wondered Holly aloud.

"Huh?" Dov looked confused. "You mean were we mean or was she? God, I don't even know. If she hadn't been dating Chris, maybe we'd never know." He paused and changed the topic, "Hey, what are you guys doing for the holiday weekend?"

Holly blinked. "Nothing," she realized. Gail had taken the long weekend off, since her new boss didn't like how much unspent holiday time she'd acquired. Holly liked Butler for that alone, though she had not yet met him.

And Dov smiled. "Do you like camping? We all go, it's like a tradition. Only we've never gotten Gail to come..." Dov gestured at their arguing girlfriends and frowned. "Crap."

Sweet and kind Chloe snapped. "Você é um saco!"

The argument looked like it was getting serious. "Let me think about it," Holly replied and stood up. She tapped Gail on the shoulder and as soon as the blonde turned to look at her, kissed her. The words stopped and Gail melted into Holly for the moment. "Let people be happy, honey," whispered Holly, taking Gail by the hand and sauntering back to the table.

Dov was slack jawed. "How did you do that?"

"Shut up," grumbled Gail, but she smiled at Holly.

But Dov was delighted. "You made Gail be nice! That's like a super power. You should, I don't know, get an award or something." When Gail raised her fist, Dov stopped. "Just ask her later."

"Ask me what?" Gail sounded suspicious and Holly kissed her again.

Kissing was a fast way to hush Gail up. "It's not later."

The odds of Gail wanting to go camping voluntarily were slim to none, but Holly felt it might be fun. She hadn't been camping in a very long time. Holly knew she would enjoy it, and she was pretty sure she could make sure Gail had a good time as well.

That day, today, was for Gail and her medal and Holly made sure she didn't suffer too much at the smiles and congratulations from her friends. Detective Rosati showed up, sans child or husband, to offer her congratulations to Gail and Holly had never seen Andy so mad. Gail promised to explain later. At that point, it was clear Gail's ability to tolerate the masses was wearing thin. Holly waved off many people who wanted to hug Gail, warning them in advance, and finally they made it to the car.

They didn't talk about anything on the way home. Gail tuned in the radio to Disney pop music and sang along, making Holly laugh. She even did a little shimmy in her seat. "You are insane, Gail," laughed Holly.

"I'm a little tipsy," admitted Gail. "But I'm happy. I love you and I'm happy."

In the last few months, Gail had taken to dropping the 'I love you' phrase more often. In public even. It still made Holly's body heat up and she shuddered. There was a thrill to hearing that from Gail. "Gail," she sighed, looking fondly at her girlfriend's reflection in the windshield, "Don't ever change."

Gail looked surprised. "I will. Change, I mean. It's inevitable." Reaching over, Gail rested a hand on Holly's thigh. "Am I changing in bad ways?"

"What? No! I love the way you, um, grow. I don't think I'm saying this right at all. Don't stop being you, Gail. I love you as sarcastic, and snarky, and ... and bitchy. I like your attitude." She took a hand off the steering wheel and covered Gail's hand with her own. "I like you very much, Gail."

"So you're not mad I told Chloe her roots were showing?"

"When did you say that?" Holly bubbled with laughter. "Also so are yours!"

"I'll have you know, this is my natural hair color," sassed Gail. "She started it, calling me a tucha and caminhoneira. Then I told her Dov was a broxa... It went downhill. She knows more dirty words than I do."

Holly rolled her eyes. "You like Chloe."

"I don't hate her." Gail sighed. "She's very good at being Chloe. I envy that." Holly just grinned. "Oh fine. I like her. She's not fake, she's actually really nice and awkward and god, she drives me up the wall with her perky optimism."

Good enough. "What was the sack thing she called you?"

"Huh? Você é um saco... She said I sucked." Gail shrugged. "We weren't being serious, you know. I mean... No one else speaks Portuguese in Fifteen."

"You two really are sides of the same coin," laughed Holly.

She laughed even more at Gail's absolutely horrified and offended expression.

She was supposed to be quiet and still and listen which wasn't a set of skills Gail really had a talent for. The listening sure, she was good. The sitting still and being quiet not too much. That was the worse part of her job. Gail rarely sat still at Parade let alone for a whole day. But she listened while fidgeting and reading, which Frank said was close enough.

When she heard them ask for Nemov, twice, she started paying closer attention.

"He's still on paternity leave, sir," explained one of the detectives.

"Damn it, doesn't anyone around here speak Russian besides Nemov?"

As Gail stood up, Frank hissed at her. "Not the time, Peck!"

But she ignored him. "Inspector Butler," she said directly.

"Not now, Peck," snapped her boss. "What about that guy in 27? He knows a little." The group started to argue about how much Russian needed to be understood, and was it Russian or a dialect.

Right. So she said a bit loudly, in Russian, that she spoke Russian.

The room fell silent. "What?" Butler put his phone down.

"I said I speak Russian. Nemov taught me."

"Your file says you speak French and Italian." Butler paused and looked thoughtful. "And Spanish and German. Are you holding out on me, Peck?"

"I speak Russian. And Punjabi. Officer Price is teaching me Portuguese." Gail had never bothered to add anything to her file because her mother would see it as a waste of time. Anything that wasn't directly cop related was a waste. Privately Gail didn't agree that multiple languages was a waste of her time, but her mother's opinion of her skills didn't matter much anymore.

Butler pointed at the chair at his desk and pushed over papers. "Can you read it?"

"A little slowly," she admitted and scanned the paper. "They're... They have the women captive." Her stomach turned and Gail read the letter aloud. They, whomever they were, had women. Girls practically, whom they smuggled into the country to be brides. As soon as she read it, Gail knew Butler would ask her to conduct the interviews. The letter was a plea, from someone to her family, to please take her back. Save her.

But they didn't have the brides, or anyone alive yet. They had two dead women, one of whom had the note on her person. The autopsy results, which did not have Holly's name on them, included photos with tattoos that Gail translated for them. She then found herself listening to phone conversations and putting her fluency to the test, translating on the fly. The hard part was when they used a couple colloquialisms she didn't know well.

The more she listened, the more she got used to their tone and dialect and cadence, the easier it got to understand. Once in school she'd played translator for some visiting deaf students, sitting beside them and real-time translating. That was easier than this, but she had been more familiar with ASL at the time. At last, she was able to get practical information. An address. And quickly following that they had a warrant.

"Grab your vest, Peck, you're coming with me," declared Butler, pulling his own on.

Finally! She was pleased to be tossed the keys as well, which would let her boss call in various things on the way. She shot a fast text to Holly, telling her that she was going out with Butler on a case and they'd have to skip lunch, before turning her phone to silent.

Frank was holding her vest up. "You impress the hell out of me daily, Peck."

Gail blinked, "Oh?" She didn't have a reply for that.

"I remember Rookie Peck. Detective Peck is going to be a hella impressive."

Compliments. Weird. Especially from Frank who had been rough on her in the beginning. "Doing my best, Sir," she said without sharing the grin she felt and pulled the vest on carefully. Then she hesitated. "Can I ask a favor?" Frank nodded. "Normally, when I go out, Holly calls Oliver if, um, she hears about stuff and freaks... But he won't know..."

Frank smirked, "I do the same thing about Noelle. Tell you what, unless we're both on site, you do the same?"

"Deal," agreed Gail and she tugged her phone out to tell Holly to ping Frank in case of emergency.

Butler shouted across the room, "Peck! Let's go, you're driving! You know how to get there fast?"

Gail looked at the address again and closed her eyes. "Yes," she said firmly, thinking up three ways to get around traffic. "Sir, it's okay that I'm in uniform?"

"Makes it more officially police to the losers," he grinned and Gail felt her happiest smile cross her face. Her boss called them losers too. Oh this was going to be as fun as working with Oliver.

She half listened to Butler on the phone, talking to the other detectives who would meet them there, and Oliver, who would arrange for backup to be on hand and possibly EMS. Hopefully EMS, Gail though privately. The alternative was a lot of dead women.

When she'd been twelve, her mother made her map out the city by hand, with all the major streets and as many minor as possible. When Gail was twenty, and the advent of Google Maps happened, she tried to argue that her mother's stupid tests were, in fact, ridiculous. Now that she was 28 (two months from 29) and there was GPS in every phone on the planet with real time traffic, she felt the memorization was stupid and brilliant.

They knew where the accidents were and the way the GPS wanted them to be routed, which was fine, but Gail knew shortcuts and cheats. And Butler was impressed. "Here's the deal, Peck," he told her. "I'm going to serve the warrant, you're my backup. Simple. We're going to walk around. You don't let on you know Russian, but if you hear anything or see anything, you tell me."

"Do we use code words?" Gail couldn't help the sarcastic quip as she parked the car. This was not her first time at the rodeo after all.

Butler smirked. "Funny." He adjusted his badge, hanging it around his neck. "The odds of this being the right place on the first go is slim to none, Peck." He got out of the car and looked around. "You're a good luck charm, though."

"Tell my partners that," joked Gail.

"Late bloomer," Butler declared, and motioned for Gail to follow him. She turned on the video camera and checked her gun. Here they go.

The door was answered by someone who barely spoke English, but understood 'police' and 'warrant' enough to let them in. Butler had explained he didn't think they'd absolutely need to have backup, but it was just a good idea. So as he argued with the men, Gail took the time to look around the room and pretend she didn't understand a word they were saying.

Four men, all compact and gruff, glowered. The one talked to Butler, while the other three argued if the cops knew anything. Gail absently picked up a book from the table. Russian smut. Awesome. She tossed it back down, keeping her face schooled to confusion, as if none of it made sense.

Butler continued to talk to the main guy, and one of his minions followed Gail into the kitchen. "What are you doing?" His accent was thick and clipped.

"Looking," she said plainly.

The man turned to the door and told his boss that the skinny blonde was in the kitchen. Could be worse. Gail popped open the fridge and looked at the inside. Beers, crappy takeout. The freezer, predictably, held vodka. Seriously, were they even trying?

The boss growled back that one of them should keep an eye on Gail, he would stay with the man. They argued who had to watch Gail, clearly underestimating her, which was fine. If you can't be strong, be clever. Gail looked around at the dirty sink and the mess. It only looked like the four men, no five, lived here. Keeping that in mind, that there was another man, Gail walked into the dining room. Used for storage. Most of the downstairs rooms seemed to be that way.

She glanced at the door to the basement and sighed. Gail didn't want to go down there but she noticed how the man following her didn't seem to react. Maybe no one was here.

"Peck, check upstairs," called Butler.

"Sir," she replied, and immediately the men started to argue. Nyet, a word everyone knew, was used loudly and Gail froze with one foot on the stairs. Her man, the one following her, grabbed her arm.

Not good. She turned slowly and glared at him. The hand loosened reflexively and Gail shook it off. "Hey, hey," shouted Butler. "Police! We can go upstairs." He waved the paper at them. "We have a warrant."

As two men moved to surround them, Gail listened carefully. They were talking about taking targets. "Sir," she said slowly, and reached to her shoulder, thumbing her radio on. "10-35." He'd been right, they didn't need a code. They had a code. They had hundreds of codes. They were the goddamned police.

She let go of the radio, stopping transmissions. Butler's eyes met hers, widening slightly, and they both put their hands on their belts as casually as humanly possible.

"Gentlemen," Butler said carefully. "What could possibly be upstairs?"

The men argued in Russian. The women were upstairs. Gail glanced up and took a step. All the men moved, their boss shouting. "No, not upstairs." Then he called a man's name.

Gail looked at Butler. His hand wrapped around the butt of his gun as did hers. "Okay, let's calm down. Peck, come on." They needed backup, clearly. Gail nodded and took a step back down the stairs.

There was a sound behind her. The name made sense. Oh shit. "There are five," she said loudly, drawing her gun and pivoting to look up. There was number five. The sound of a footstep and the sound of a larger caliber shotgun than she wanted to see.

Praying it was buckshot and not a 12-gauge, Gail's gun was up and centered. "Put the gun down," she said loudly, repeating it in Russian. Secrecy be damned. The man froze and told her to put the gun down instead. Gail repeated she was police and he should put the gun down.

Of all the things she'd done in her life, in her career, shooting someone was not an aspect of police work she'd ever wanted to do nor had she yet done. Most officers went their entire careers without ever firing at a person. Nick, the aberration amongst her friends, had killed before when he was in Afghanistan, but that was something else entirely. He hadn't wanted to talk about it much.

But right now she wasn't terribly concerned with what it would be like to shoot a man. The memory in Gail's head was the day she got her driver's license. That was the day her father had her drive them to the range and let her use the larger guns for the first (official) time. And that was the day her father demonstrated what happened to a bulletproof vest when you had a shotgun. More than a decade had passed since then and yet Gail knew the Level II vest she wore wasn't enough to stop that damn gun pointed at her.

As clearly and calmly as she could possibly be, she repeated the words. "Put. The gun. Down."

A normal LEO vest will not stop a 12-gauge shot. Even if you were supremely lucky, you'd have pneumothorax (collapsed lung) and months of recovery. Would I do that to you? To Gail? To Holly?

Maybe. But not in this fic. Neither Holly nor Gail dies. I don't consider that a spoiler. There are lots of horrible things besides death, after all. Other people will die.

The names Chloe and Gail called each other are nowhere near polite at all. Don't use them.