"So I gather that you're not sticking around for a late brunch," Gabriel surmised, leaning against the doorframe leading into the walk-in closet housing both his, and Fiona's clothing, and folding both arms across his chest to match the displeased frown he wore, as well, while she replied in the affirmative.

"I'm not, I'm sorry. But this is a last-minute work thing, Gabe. Kind of means I can't miss it."

"Last minute work thing with who?"

"Jimmy. Jimmy Riordan," Fiona confessed, wincing in preparation of the likely response Gabriel would give in response to the information, and keeping herself rather carefully fixated with her back to him, while she pretended to take a far longer time than she needed choosing the shirt she would wear for the day as a whole, "He's been brought in on the case I'm working, and I wanted to bring him up to speed."

"Talk about a blast from the past."

"Yeah. It's been a while."

"And it had to be today?"

"Seeing as it was his nearest day off, yeah. Yeah, it had to be today."

"Too bad," Gabe huffed, stepping forward when he realized Fiona appeared determined to continue perusing her shirts and blouses, and placing both hands on her hips to pull her back against his torso, instead, "I had some big plans for us."

"Big plans," Fiona repeated, recognizing the pressure of her fiance's hands at her hips as a worthy indication that he had likely seen through her attempts to avoid looking at him, and exhaling slowly as she plucked a light blue blouse from its hanger, and did her best to remain still as she felt Gabriel begin to mouth at the skin where her neck met her shoulder, "Gabe, I-I really can't be late for this."

"A quickie then."

"I just took a bath."

"That's never stopped you before," Gabriel pressed, tightening his hold on Fiona's hips, and shifting them both forward until he had her crowded against the fabric of her shirts hanging on the rack at the far end of the closet, while one hand slid beneath the hem of the camisole she had donned not long after exiting the bath, "Come on, Fi. Let me show you what you're gonna be missing."

"I can't, Gabe," Fiona replied, attempting to squirm out from beneath her fiance's hold, and frowning as she realized his hands were now holding her waist so tightly she was sure there would be bruises there, after the fact, "Please, love. Jimmy is-"

"Jimmy is what?"

"He's going to be picking me up any minute."

"Really," Gabriel snapped, dropping his hands from Fiona's waist as though he had just been burned, though he did not step back even though she finally turned to face him, giving him a look that suggested she expected him to move to allow her to pass back into their bedroom so that she could change, "To me that sounds a lot like a date, not catching someone up on a case."

"He offered, Gabe, what was I supposed to say?"

"How about no? That seems like a workable start."

"It's not that simple," Fiona protested, forcing herself to look her fiance in the eyes, despite how the glint she saw there had her fighting tooth and nail to resist the urge to instinctively pull back in mere seconds, flat, "Please, I'm not making this up."

"Could've fooled me."

"Gabe, please-" Fiona begged, honestly hating the way in which her voice cracked around the words, though she did not seem capable of doing a thing to stop it, "It's work! You've met with colleagues on your days off plenty of times."

"None of those colleagues were men that carried a torch for me, Fiona."

"Well good. I'd be a little alarmed if they were."

"For God's sake, babe, this is serious! Jimmy Riordan's been making eyes at you since you joined the force. How can you not see that?"

"Because there's really nothing to see."

"You know I love you, Fi, but sometimes you really are delusional," Gabe accused, aware of the way in which Fiona's face had blanched in response to his words, and yet still summoning the wherewithal to act astonished as she pushed past him and headed towards their bedroom not long thereafter, "I really think Aziraphale-"

"No. No, you don't get to do that."

"Do what?"

"Blame Zee for every time we have a disagreement," Fiona hissed, donning the blouse she had selected from the closet, and reaching to tug her hair out from beneath the hem so that it could fall across her shoulders once more as she headed towards the dresser across from the bed to begin brushing it back into a ponytail to keep the strands away from her face, "It's ridiculous, and more than a little offensive."

"Well I can't be the only one that's told you he can be a little-"

"A little what?"

"Off, sometimes."

"Actually, yeah, Gabe. You are the only one who's told me that."

"Then clearly you haven't been spending time with the right sort of people," Gabriel said, moving to stand in the center of the bedroom, and watching as his fiance reached for a tube of lipstick and uncapped it to smooth a thin layer over her lips without bothering to reply to him at all, "And I think you should let me drive you to this thing with Riordan."

"I'm not doing that."

"Why? You want some time alone with him?"

"Now who's being delusional?" Fiona quipped, replacing the tube of lipstick on top of her dresser, and turning to head towards the bedroom door, only to find that Gabriel had closed the distance between them to grab for her arms, using the surprise she felt at the contact to propel her backwards until her back collided with one of the knobs on her dresser drawer, "Ow, Gabe-let me go."

"Do you want him? Is that what this is about?" Her fiance insisted, his fingers curling around her biceps, in spite of the fact that she had let out the barest hints of a whimper as the act caused a sudden pressure around the skin of her still-healing gunshot wound, "Answer the question, Fiona. Do you?"

"No."

"Now tell me why I don't believe you."

"I don't know why you don't believe me," Fiona began, wincing against the tightening of Gabriel's hold upon her arms, and fighting with all she had to avoid a visible sigh of relief when her phone began to buzz where she had left it on top of the dresser, "But I-I need you to let me go. I promise, Gabe, this is just work, but you need to let me go."

For a moment Fiona almost believed Gabriel intended to maintain his hold upon her arms, her teeth digging into her lower lip to keep herself from speaking any further, and giving him the impression that he had not come to the decision to relinquish his hold on her on his own. Some small part of her knew that this was off. That having to beg the man she thought she loved to stop laying his hands on her was about the farthest thing from what she should have to be doing. But still, Fiona was far better served to maintain the status quo, at least for now, as opposed to pressing her luck, her awareness of the lingering buzz of her phone causing her to freeze until she was barely even breathing as she waited for Gabe to do something, one way or the other.

"Fine. Go," He spat, shoving her away, and causing her to bump into the dresser once again while he turned away, and shoved a hand through dark hair that had started to fall free of its ordinarily well-kept style, "Have fun with your little lover."

"Gabe-"

"Go, Fiona. But don't act like you're surprised if you come home, and I'm not here."

If she thought she could fool around, and act as though he would not be able to tell, then perhaps he could do the same thing, himself…

…

"You okay?" Jimmy inquired, dropping his hand back to his side after the attempt to place it at Fiona's back had resulted in her almost automatically flinching away, "You seem a little skittish, today."

"I'm fine."

"You're sure?"

"Positive," Fiona assured, forcing a smile to her lips despite the fact that she hardly felt it would be convincing enough to persuade her former partner to back down at all, "I'm just a little tired, that's all."

"That have anything to do with the knight living in your ivory tower?" Jimmy questioned, noting that Fiona's face seemed to crumple for only a moment, before she was rearranging her expression into something more resemblant of her typical demeanor as she replied.

"Nope. Just me."

"Really."

"Yes. Really," Fiona persisted, allowing Jimmy to pull a chair back for her at a nearby table, and taking the proffered seat while he moved to the opposite side to do the same for himself, "You're sure this place is okay?"

"It's perfect. Am I to assume that's your way to change the subject?"

"It might be. Is it working?"

"Only because I know you well enough to know I'm not going to get anywhere by pushing when you don't want to be pushed," Jimmy admitted, accepting one of the glasses of ice water that a waitress had already stopped by to give the both of them, and taking a sip almost immediately before going on, "So. Time to talk shop?"

"I think now is as good a time as any," Fiona agreed, fiddling with the straw in her own glass of ice water, and flexing the muscles of her shoulders for a moment to ease the tension that had taken root between them, "I think-I think someone might be leaking sensitive information about our case."

"That would explain why you and your partner were backed against a wall the other night."

"Precisely. But it gets a little more complicated than that."

"How so?"

"The person I'm suspecting the most, regarding this leak is-well, it's Gabriel's partner. Sandolphon."

"You're kidding me," Jimmy breathed, dragging a hand over obviously startled features, and leaning forward to allow himself the capability of speaking a bit more softly, to avoid the chance of being overheard, "Do you-do you think that Gabriel might be-"

"That he might be in on it, too? Honestly? I have no idea."

"Wow. Fi, I-I'm so sorry."

"Don't be," The young woman demurred, lifting a hand to tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear as it fell loose from her ponytail, and shaking her head to ward off the spasms of very real fear that threatened to send her into a panic if she did not keep them at bay, "We don't have any conclusive proof yet, but with how quickly those men were on us, and how Sandolphon claimed to have cleared the building beforehand-"

"You don't see any other way to explain it."

"I don't."

"Is he going to have any further reason to work with us in the future?" Jimmy asked, pausing for just long enough to wave off the waitress that had likely returned to take their order as he realized Fiona had almost immediately retreated just a bit from the presence, as though some sort of self-preservation instinct indicated that the other woman was some sort of threat, "We're fine for right now, thanks."

"Okay. You just let me know if you two change your mind."

Nodding by way of acknowledgement of the young woman's words, Jimmy returned his attention back to where Fiona still sat, arms now crossed before her chest in a gesture so defensive he was once again almost tempted to inquire as to what troubled her. It had to be more than just their case. More than the idea of being betrayed by one of their own, and the upheaval that would come about when everything came to light and the culprit was known to all. But knowing that she would likely rather focus on what they had initially ventured here to discuss, anyway, Jimmy bit down on the desire to question Fiona about her troubles, instead choosing to shift just a bit in the chair he occupied before realizing she was finally moving to reply to his earlier question after a small delay.

"I don't know. You know how Michael likes to throw partners together when one set fails to find a lead."

"And you don't think you and Ana will find that lead?"

"Honestly? It isn't looking all that promising," Fiona admitted, leaning forward to rest her head in her hands, and hoping that Jimmy simply took the act as an admission of hopelessness over the case alone, and not as further proof that something else was wrong, "But I'm-I'm waiting on a text from an informant, so maybe that will turn into something."

"I hope it does."

"Yeah. Me too."

"Do you know anything about this informant?" Jimmy mused, aware of the slight lift in one of Fiona's brows, and suppressing a slight grin in the wake of his pleasure over having regained the ability to earn at least some modicum of what might have been a typical reaction from a woman who he considered to be a very close friend, "Ah-ha. There she is."

"There who is?"

"You. Apparently all it took was a question about someone you barely know to bring you back to the world."

"That is-Jimmy, that is not what this is!" Fiona exclaimed, kicking gently at her former partner's shin beneath the table, and finding that she was completely incapable of restraining the soft laugh that broke free at his almost immediate yelp of protest, "It's not!"

"Uh huh. I believe you."

"I'm serious, Riordan. It's not."

"Keep telling yourself that, Fiona. I am never going to believe you," Jimmy teased, shifting to nudge at the toe of his former partner's boot beneath the table in retaliation, and this time not bothering to hold back his grin when she gave him the first genuine smile he had seen her wear all day, "How about I make you a deal?"

"What sort of deal might that be?" Fiona wondered, already suspecting that she had every idea what this proposed deal might involve, though she gave Jimmy the opportunity to bring it forward himself, without her assumptions getting in the way.

"I'll give up asking you about what's really going on to make you so jumpy if you tell me everything you know about your special little friend who's supposed to be texting you."

Whether she really relished the idea of opening herself up to more teasing about the enigmatic man she was supposed to be meeting later that weekend, Fiona appreciated that her companion was making the effort to distract her from something she would rather ignore for as long as she could…

…

As promised, it did not take Fiona long to realize that she had the house to herself after Jimmy had dropped her off, a soft sigh escaping as she toed her shoes off in the foyer, and padded down the hall into the den, instead. In truth, she would have been a liar to pretend she did not relish the solitude, her concern over exactly what Gabriel might be up to waning in response to the prospect of having the remainder of the afternoon and evening to regroup after what had transpired with her fiance earlier that very morning. It had not been the first time he had treated her in such a way, and she knew, somehow, that it would likely not be the last. But inasmuch as she wanted to believe that eventually, she would be capable of deciding when she had had enough, Fiona almost immediately shook herself from that particular line of thought, the idea of holding her own and telling Gabriel she was done suddenly far too daunting to entertain, at least at the present moment.

Truthfully, their relationship had developed almost before she could even blink, and yet the idea of ending things now still terrified her so fiercely that she almost could not breathe.

Determined to do whatever she could to distract herself from that thought before it could consume her, entirely, Fiona forced herself to turn her attention back to the task of maneuvering towards the den, hoping that a night of mindless television would perhaps ease her nerves and give her the chance to collect her thoughts for the moment Gabriel eventually did return home. But just as she had been prepared to take a seat on the sofa and reach for the remote to start the television, Fiona found herself distracted by the sound of her cell phone buzzing in her back pocket, her brow furrowing as she pulled the device out, and almost immediately bit down on her lip as she tried and failed to suppress the grin that wanted to toy at the edges of her mouth in response to the text scrolling across the screen.

Free tonight at ten, love. Meet at Siren's Cove?

Almost without second thought, Fiona was typing back her reply in the affirmative, a strange sense of what might have been only foolish optimism filling her as she stood once again, and prepared to head back to the foyer to grab her shoes and a coat, the realization of what the chosen meeting place really was hardly slowing her steps in spite of how she honestly wondered at Crowley's intentions in wanting to go there, to start with.

After all, Siren's Cove was known for being one of the higher end adult entertainment clubs that Soho had to offer…

…

Well hello, angels! And welcome (finally!) to a brand new update in one of my favorite Good Omens AUs! I am so, so very sorry that it took me so long to update this, as I have no real excuse aside from allowing myself to get pulled into a few other fandoms in the interim. But, as always, I really do hope that my unintentional delay didn't prove too discouraging, because I promise you I am not done yet! The fun is only just getting started!

As always, my heartfelt thanks go out to each and every one of you that has taken the time to read, follow, favorite and review this story so far (and special thanks to last chapter's reviewers: phoward, and ChiTown4ever for leaving such lovely feedback the last time around, as always!) I am beyond grateful for the continued support, and of course I hope you all enjoy this chapter every bit as much as you did the last!

Until next time, dolls…

MOMM