Dating

Author: Joy

Email: Julianna@ziplip.com

A/N: Okay Eli and I were having a discussion about the weird abbreviations you find in reviews and author's notes on this site. So please tell me WHAT THE HECK DOES RMTLAO MEAN ANYWAY? If you would like to give me the heads up on this and other letter combos I would be so grateful.

Ian was waiting for Vicky when she finished the last of her paperwork for the evening. "Oh" she muttered bashfully staring at the pages in her hand. A police officer had walked in on them earlier staring at each other. Vicky had been sure he would kiss her but it took so long that the officer even became impatient.

"Hello," Ian said quietly. "I returned to find out if our dinner date was still canceled or if I am permitted the pleasure of your company this evening."

Vicky drew in a deep breath, "I love the way you say things" She looked down again, "Maybe we should do dinner another night."

He crossed to her quickly with his brow furrowed. "What have I done to upset you now?" He was right next to her as her spoke.

"NothingI'm just embarrassed by my behavior earlier. I guess I thought tonight was sort of cursed."

Ian's gloved hand stroked her cheek, "If you do not accompany me, I will sit alone in the restaurant staring at your place cursing myself for my folly."

Vicky's eyes flitted to Ian's face swallowing slowly, "You didn't do anything wrong."

"I upset my"

"Your what? What am I Ian? What do you want me to be?" she asked softly looking down.

Ian imitated an action he had seen Gabriel do with Sara and leaned their foreheads together. "My first," he whispered. Lightly he kissed her forehead before leaning on it again. "I was not permitted to spend time with others Vicky. I was not joking when I said you are the only person that has ever shown any enjoyment over my company."

She tilted her head away and regarded him for a moment, "No high school sweetheart or college crush?"

"I did not go to high school or college. I was tutoredalone. Always alone." He watched pain flash through her eyes on his behalf. "You can only long for what you experience as normal. No one to compare tono one to be envious of. It is only now that I comprehend what I have missed and even then only partially."

Ian ran his fingertips down her cheek and across her jaw line. With a smile he murmured, "So I wish to have you as my sweetheart as you put it."

Vicky giggled like a schoolgirl for a moment, "Sounds like fun."

"I'm sorry," she muttered somewhere a midst his coat as she buried her face in his chest.

"For?"

"Getting all jealous."

Ian smirked stroking her hair with his hand. It was very different from Sara's darker, curly. The ringlets that twirled around his fingers fascinated him. "I take it as a compliment. Jealousy is a sign of attraction. You were very jealous so I assume you are very attracted."

She thumped his chest lightly, "Stop making fun of me."

"I am not. I truly enjoyed the attentionas soon as I knew you did not actually hate me AND you were not going out with Detective McCartey. It is not nice to attempt to make another jealous."

Vicky pouted a bit, "You deserved it!"

"How prêt ell is that true?" Ian questioned.

"Wellyou were hugging Sara and it wasn't a little hug. That was more of an embrace and it lasted a long time with the looking at each other and the"

Ian tilted his head to hers blinking slowly. "Why would I want to be with someone that has no interested in me at all when I could be with someone that would get this 'worked up' over me hugging a friend in need of comfort It does a lot for my ego."

"Yeah well you were all ego sauntering in here, messing with Jake's mind, staring at me so hard I couldn't swallow, and generally acting like I was Mina before the first bite," Vicky announced.

"A literary reference I enjoy. Have you read Dracula or are you basing this off that Anthony Hopkins movie?" Ian asked.

"I've read it."

"So is Dracula a romantic, a lunatic, a bastard, a hereticwhat is he?'

Vicky saw a perfect set up, "He's youall you." Ian raised an eyebrow. "Highly intelligent and attractive. Able to move about in the light but is better suited to the shadows. He shines on his own but only cares what his Mina thinks of him. Dracula is a romantic and a lunatic by nature of his love for one woman. Everything in his life is about reclaiming his lost love." She looked at him with shy eyes and whispered, "I just hope I'm not fooling myself into thinking I'm starring as Mina in this picture when I am actually just Lucy."

Ian kissed her forcefully. He didn't know where the instinctthe hunger came from but he knew he was claiming Vicky in some small way. Leaning their heads together again, he panted, "Minaalways Mina. I am incapable of spending time with a Lucy" He sighed, "The whining alone would frustrate me to distraction."

Vicky chuckled. "For a guy who hasn't dated, that was a good kiss."

"Thank you. I have an active imagination and dream life."

Vicky was now out right laughing with her head on his chest and her arms around his waist. Ian caressed her back as they just sort of held each other.

"You accomplished your goal you know," he confessed. "I was jealous."

Vicky grinned, "I have to admit it was kind of a power trip to have two men fight to be my dinning partner."

Ian grinned, "Who would not fight for that privilege?"

She looked up into his face with a small smile before pushing up to kiss him softly. "Take me home so I can change and we'll see if we can still make our reservation."

He chuckled, "Not to worrythey will take us whenever we arrive."

"A man with connections."

"Sometimes its nice to be wealthy."

"Nahjust nice you are you," Vicky soothed kissing his cheek.

Danny stared out the window for a moment and watched as his partner's love strolled to the precinct steps. It had been a few days since the water pitcher incident and since Jake lost out to Nottingham. McCartey was still grumbling about safety issues, ex-girlfriends, and general avoidance of the two women in love that were in his general vicinity. At least with his ex he could not take the call or skip the email. Sara however sat a few feet from him and he had to go to the morguehe was a homicide detective.

"Hey gorgeous," Gabriel said leaning on Sara's doorframe at work.

Danny looked up and smirked, "Hide the coffee pot. She might decide to soak him again!"

"No wayThat would be wasting good caffeineand my Sara never wastes good caffeine." Gabe stated.

"I am sitting right herelay off," Sara snapped.

"Poor baby," the hacker said before placing a small kiss a top her head.

"So what's up Gabe? Just stopping by?" Jake snipped not looking up. The general level of love in the air was getting to him these days.

"It's quitting time. Thought I'd walk on over and snag a ride"

"You walked over to catch a ride home?" Danny questioned.

"NoI walked over to catch a ride to Sara's homei.e. getting to wrap my arms around my girlfriend's middle while she tries to kill us going at break-neck speeds," Gabriel explained which promptly got him a slap to the stomach. "Besides there is a park closer to Sara's place than mine."

"We're going to the park?" Pez asked.

"When was the last time you were on a set of swings?"

Danny suddenly burst into a hysterical fit of laughter. He cracked up entirely too much for the question. Gabriel was confused, "What?"

Sara pointed an annoyed finger at her partner, "Say it and die!" she threatened.

Danny couldn't say anything laughing so hard his eyes had begun to tear.

Gabriel and Jake looked at one another. "His laughter is directly linked to Sara and her last experience on a set on swings. Dare I ask?" Sara's locked jaw informed the dark haired man he would receive no information willingly. "Danny?"

"SwingsPez on swingsfall oversleep twisted haaahaaa" Danny was jabbering nonsensically gesturing to his clothes. "Catch a draft?" he announced and fell back into a fit of laughter. "No beer for you!"

Gabriel tilted his head from the gushing Asian man to the very pissed Italian woman. He smirked, straddling a chair before his love, "Let's see. Drunk on a swing, fell over got twisted up in the chain. Now I'm guessing you either your clothes got caught and came off or you took them off. The joke became 'Catch a draft?' and 'No Beer for you!' How'd I do?"

Sara's glared, "Well fine. I told some of the guys I could drink as much as they couldand I won. Well the guys wanted to get even so they spiked my beer the next time we went out. I decided it would be a great time to go swingDanny found me an hour later asleep with my head on the swing seat in jeans and a bra because I had managed to catch my sweater in the chains of the twisted seat. Danny woke me up to those two lovely catch phrases."

"I promise not to let the mean old swing eat your clothing," Gabriel said rubbing Sara's arms and shoulders.

"Bite me!" she growled. Gabriel leaned into her neck where upon she grabbed him quickly and whispered, "Don't do did it unless you mean it."

He stared at her quite confused then kissed the side of her throat. "Ready to go?"

"Sure."

Gabriel helped Sara into her coat and they left the building. Jake looked up from his notes to Danny. "How does he do that?"

"Do what?"

"A woman that hates having doors opened for her is getting coats put on her and crap like that I mean what is it that he's doing to make her lesshostile?"

Danny smirked. "Oh she's still hostile but Gabriel has so many of the qualities she wants in a guy she recognizes that the gentlemanly stuff comes in that package as well."

"Huh?"

"If she wants a guy that likes to kiss as much as make love than she has to be willing to have him want to walk closest to the curb and open doors for her. It's just part of who he is. It's what Gabriel said about Sara. If he wants that amazing passion for life than he has to be prepared for the occasional temper tantrum."

"Whatever," Jake grumbled.

"What is your problem? I know you weren't that into Vicky to be this snarky."

Jake grit his teeth, "My ex is getting married."

"Ahh."

"Don't AHH me oh Asian Master. You're happily married and happily pregnant. Sara is in love. And the one woman I was really attracted to around this place is dating a man that I don't trust any further than I can throw him," McCartey hissed. Taking a deep breath he said, "Is it too much to ask that when I stop looking for Miss Right Now and start looking for Miss Right that everyone else not just have it fall into their laps? I mean really. How ironic can you get?"

"Come on. I'll call Lee and we'll drown your sorrows for a while."

"Can't. They have life rafts. I know from experience."

"Jake"

"Danny"

Woo shook his head. "Fine then I'll go home, tell my matchmaker of a wife my partner is looking for Miss Right and see how fast her friends are lined up at your door."

"Whatever it takes," Jake groaned.

Danny just rolled his eyes. "One girlfriend made to ordercheck please."

A/N: I have this whole scene planned out in my head for the park but for some reason the gargoyles (Nuana, Anselm & William. Nuana sits on my husband's nightstand.) felt the need to torture Jake. I swear it's the name. They just can't let people named Jake be happy.

PS Review!