A/N: Hi! I am Sheila and this is my first CI fic. I was supposed to be writing CSI right now, but got intrigued after the Law and Order CI marathon on New Years Eve. There is something about those two that intrigues me. They are both so isolated in their own ways, and so their connection is really potent, I think. I assume it will be BA romance, but the fic hasn't told me its moving in that direction yet. I hope you enjoy. I would love to hear from you.

Sheila

Something Precious

Chapter 1

A murder of a woman in a park; nothing remarkable, certainly nothing that should grab the attention of the major case squad. However, the case was not like any other. The victim was the rival of a certain Bettina Garcia; a woman who just happened to be Nicole Wallaces cellmate at Dannemora.

Bringing Nicole back from Dannamora seemed risky to Alex. Bobby always seemed to unravel just a little more than usual when she was around. Alex decided she would really keep a lid on Nicole's little games this time. She deliberately arranged to meet the transfer at the door, leaving Bobby pacing the squad room by himself. Nicole always came with challenges, and Bobby needed to keep his composure.

Alex met the blonde woman down at the entrance and went with her guards to the elevator. Nicole would always be beautiful. After two years in prison, she still looked liked the expensive blonde she had always been. Somehow, she came lip glossed and made up, and Alex wondered how she did it. When Alex put on lip gloss she usually chewed it off her lips within twenty minutes, and she was forever scrubbing under her eyes after eye make up that had drifted south. She always felt a twinge of envy when she saw Nicole. The woman was so effortlessly beautiful, and she knew that it rattled Bobby. As controlled as he tried to be, there was nothing like a beautiful woman to make him awkward.

Nicole smiled at her as if to a long lost friend, and Alex couldn't resist an impulse to roll her eyes.

"Alex," she said with such familiarity, "you look so…tired."

Alex smirked. "And you look so incarcerated. How's it going, Nicole?"

"A lot more stimulating than you might imagine." Nicole's accent was clipped and terse, and Alex suspected that she had touched a nerve.

"Well, I can't say we've missed you, but it's not the biggest surprise that you are once again gracing us with your presence." Alex took her by the elbow outside the elevator and steered her toward the interrogation room. She instructed Nicole's guards to settle her in the room and make sure that she was handcuffed to the table.

Then she turned to her partner who had his eyes on Nicole from the moment she emerged from the elevator. She walked up to him and put her hands on his chest. "Bobby, you need to focus. This woman is going to say something disturbing about your mother. She will comment on your abilities. She'll probably bring up the time she set it up for the doctor to take the fall, and how you fell for that, but you won't hear any of that 'cause you'll be too focused on what happened to Bettina Garcia. You understand?"

Bobby looked down at her. "I hear you, boss."

"Okay, I'm going to run this thing. You hear?"

"Geez, Alex, I think I can handle myself in there." His indignation was tempered with a tenderness toward her intentions.

She smiled. "It's about Bettina Garcia in there. Got me? Let's find out what Nicole's up to these days."

Nicole smiled brightly for both of them, and Nicole knew that the sociopath lived for these sessions in the interrogation room. Goren circled her and planted himself in the corner of the room. Alex sat herself casually across from the woman.

"I am so glad to see you all. It has been such a struggle to find intelligent conversation on my unit. Even the guards talk like women who know nothing more challenging than happy hour at the local pub. Thanks for bringing me down." Nicole relaxed back in the metal chair.

Alex smiled. "Seeing you is like penance. We gotta do it 'cause someone higher up tells us we have to."

Bobby snorted. Nicole turned her attention to him. "I've missed you."

He chuckled again. "That's like hearing from an STD you've been trying to beat."

Nicole leaned back and laughed. "You are both such comedians."

Alex sighed and spoke, "You ever heard of a woman named Roberta Jones?"

Nicole looked around the room. "I don't know. Maybe."

"You remember Bettina Garcia, right?" Bobby was leaning toward her on the table.

"I know 'Tina."

"She got released two weeks ago. We can't find her. Roberta Jones was killed two nights ago. You sure you don't remember her name?"

Nicole narrowed her eyes at Bobby. "So a murder happens within a hundred miles of my location, and I get pulled in. I'm flattered, sort of, but I really have not been that busy."

Alex slapped the table and grabbed her attention. "Do you know where Bettina is staying?"

Nicole leaned forward and smiled at Alex. "I don't know where Bettina is, but I do know something I think you might like to know, detective."

Alex sat back, unsettled. She was not prepared for another one of Nicole's surprises. She always directed those at Bobby.

Nicole saw the surprise in her eyes and smiled. "I've met someone who knows your nephew; the child you gave birth to."

Alex drew in breath sharply. Bobby turned to her. "She's trying to rattle you. Remember that. It's a game. Nothing more."

Alex nodded. Nicole smiled. "I have never met the little guy, but I did meet someone who has. I hear he is in a daycare in Brooklyn. Little People. I know someone who also has their child there. Do you remember a Robert Zinsky?"

Alex slammed her fists on the table and stared at Nicole. No sounds came out of her mouth.

Nicole smiled. "He has a four year old. Her name is Reina. They call her Ray-Ray. I hear she plays with Nathan. Very patient with him. Afterall, he is two about now, right?"

Alex rocked back in her chair. Bobby could feel the energy from his partner, and he reached out to steady her. Alex was out of his reach in an instant, and on her feet. She looked at Nicole for another minute, her eyes wide and bright, and then she bolted from the room. Bobby stared after his partner for a moment and then turned to Nicole. "You don't win this time. You're becoming derivative. We've come to know you too well."

"Bobby, don't you ever wonder why she has never called you Robert? It's Bobby or Goren for her only; must be something about the name Robert." Nicole smiled widely at him, and Bobby resisted the urge to reach out and slap her. Instead, he turned and ran out of the room after his partner. He looked around the squad room, and she was no where to be found. He cursed in frustration, and ran for the door. He found her in the stairwell on her cell phone. She was speaking in urgent tones to her sister. He could make out entreaties to get the child immediately and bring him home. A whispered argument followed with Alex threatening to drive down to Brooklyn and pull him out herself. The name Robert Zinsky was brought up, and the tones lowered after that. Alex finished the call, and dropped her head back against the concrete wall behind her.

Bobby waited while she caught her breath. He spoke softly, "Alex, I need to tell me what's going on."

She looked up, startled. "Did you leave her alone?"

He shook his head. "She's not going anywhere."

"You should go back in there. She shouldn't think she's got us worried."

He put out his arm. "She needs to see both of us."

Alex shook her head. "I don't think so. I go back in there, and I'll kill her. It's as simple as that. I go back in there and she dies."

Bobby's eyes widened and he took a deep breath. "Alex, I need more information. I'm in the dark here. Who's Robert Zinsky?"

She ran a hand over her face. "Not now, Bobby. Not now."

He looked at her for a minute, and then turned and walked back up the stairs. She didn't leave the stairwell until he came back and told her Nicole was on her way back to Dannemora.

………………………………………………………………………………….

Alex paced back and forth in her sister's kitchen while her sister and brother-in-law questioned her about the circumstances of her frantic phone call. She tried to stay patient with it although they acted like she virtually published details about Nathan's schedule around the five boroughs. Her cell buzzed and she was happy to pull it off her belt and plant it on her ear. Bobby's voice was no less insistent about details of what happened. She decided she needed to trade one inquisition for another, and told her sister there was a work emergency. Her sister was on her feet and angry, but Alex assured her that their mother was more than willing to take Nathan until another daycare situation could be found. As she left the house, the voice of her brother-in-law sounded, asking her how long it would be before another crisis would force them to find yet another daycare for their son. Alex closed her eyes and fled the house.

She met with Bobby at an all night diner near her home in Brooklyn. She looked weary to him, and he tried to temper his anxiety. He ordered coffee for her, and then told her there was a plate of eggs, bacon, and hash browns coming for her. She smiled a little and said nothing. She hadn't eaten since morning, and appreciated his ability to remember the little things she liked.

He waited until the food came and let her eat. He tried to throw in little comments, things that might amuse her, but there was a tension in the air and most of what he had to say fell flat.

Alex looked up at him, her blonde hair falling across her face. He waited for her to toss her head and she did. It always reminded him of defiance when she did that, and he liked it. She took a deep breath and managed a smile, "I know I am going to have to tell you everything, but you need to understand how hard this is for me. It was a long time ago, and I am ashamed of it, and I have worked really hard to grow beyond it. I don't talk about this with anyone."

Bobby nodded but said nothing.

"I was 19 when I met him. He was working Narcotics with my older brother, and he took my breath away. I mean…I couldn't see anything else when he was in the room. He was 30, and handsome and a hero on the squad. The stories I heard about him were amazing."

Alex reached for her coffee cup, but it was empty. Bobby signaled the waitress and patiently waited until she had taken a sip of hot brew. She smiled at him, but he could see the pain in her eyes.

"He told me that he was separated when we got involved. Had a wife and two kids, and he said that she had been cheating on him. I believed him. I believed everything he said. I was pre-law at the time, but switched to criminal justice. The lure of his life was too much. I graduated at 21, and got assigned to his squad after only six months in uniform."

She took another sip and stared off into the distance. "The first time he beat me up was after a raid where he shot a man dead. I didn't do something he wanted and that was all it took. Afterward, he explained that the stress of killing a man had been too much, and I should have known not to provoke him. I believed him."

Bobby tried to temper the anger rising in him.

"The second time, he broke my jaw, but I fought back this time. I found out he was seeing his wife. I also found out that she knew nothing about Robert's little girlfriend. I left him and moved in with my mom and dad. Within weeks, I was characterizing it as a mutual fight; was telling people I gave as good as I got. He showed up, and said that he filed divorce papers. Showed them to me. Said he couldn't live without me, and so I went back to him."

Bobby wished she would look at him. He wanted to show her that he felt no judgments. He didn't say anything though; he didn't want to interrupt the fragile flow of her confession.

"The third time was the worst, and I don't remember the reason we fought. I just know that I work up in the hospital with broken ribs, collarbone, and bruised kidneys. My face was a Picasso. My brother, bless his heart, told me he was kill him if he ever saw the two of us in the same room again, no matter what I wanted. I didn't argue with him, but I also didn't file charges. He was too connected. I didn't feel like I had a leg to stand on. Plus, you can't imagine my embarrassment."

Alex let out a breath and stared at the table for a moment. She could feel Bobby shifting, ready to talk, but she raised her hand to stop him. "I never went back to him, but we still worked the same squad. Big mistake. He started to harass me. I got a restraining order and got kicked back to walking a beat. One night I stumbled on a drug buy, and I was alone. I called for back up, and Robert was the closest. He never came. I was covering three guys who were not intimidated by the 22 year old girl holding the gun. They finally charged me and I had to shoot. I wounded two of them and the third got away. An investigation followed, and Robert said I was so rattled in my call that I gave him the wrong coordinates. I was the female who panicked. No one could trust me anymore. The tape of the call got "accidentally" erased. IAB ruled it righteous, but I got put on probation pending further investigation." Her eyes connected with his for the first time in minutes. "Robert made a mistake though. He dumped his new girlfriend in dispatch too quickly and suddenly a copy of the erased tape reappeared. The coordinates were good and Robert got transferred out of Queens. I never saw him again. Last I heard he moved to Philadelphia."

"He blamed you for all his problems," Bobby said with certainty.

Alex nodded.

"Nicole is telling you he's back."

"And near my nephew," she said grimly.

"You ran a search?"

"He's a Lieutenant, Queens Narcotics."

"Your old unit?"

She nodded. "You bet. He waltzed back in the same unit he got bounced from 15 years ago."

"You're going to go see him, aren't you?"

She couldn't meet his eyes for a moment. "I'm not afraid of him anymore, Bobby."

He shrugged. "That's great. When are we going?"

"No," she shook her head emphatically. "I have to face him alone."

"Alex, you forget who set this up. We don't go solo when Nicole's in the game."

"It'll look like I can't handle it."

"It'll look like you're a detective from the Major Case squad dropping in during a routine shift with your partner."

Alex rubbed a hand over her face. "You're not going to give me a choice, are you?"

Bobby put out his hand. "Come on. You need to go home. I'm your partner. I have your back and you have mine. That's how it works."

She let him pull her to her feet. "Bobby…"

"You were young, Alex, and you made the best of a bad situation. And you learned. You have nothing to be ashamed of."

Alex sighed deeply. "I've been saying that to myself for fifteen years."

TBC