Forgetting

………

Today, she had remembered. Now, all she wanted to do was forget.

My response to 'Run Silent' and 'All Access'

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"You wanna talk to me about what happened at the precinct?" Danny leaned his head out of the doorjamb of the bathroom, mumbling through the toothbrush hanging from his mouth. She knew this was coming, she knew he would be on her case as soon as they walked through the door of the cozy apartment they shared. She hadn't wanted to burden him with her secrets, he was having a hard time dealing with Louie being in a coma, as it were. His father had called while they were en route to the original scene, leaving a message for him stating dully that they were going to take Louie off life support the next day if he didn't show any signs of improvement. Danny had chosen not to respond to the message right away, instead, throwing himself into his case.

At least one of them had a level head.

She hadn't wanted to get into this. She had left it all behind her, in Bozeman. She shouldn't have lashed out at their suspect. She turned to him, and her breath hitched in her chest at the sight of him, leaning casually on the doorjamb, in an undershirt and a pair of worn boxers, vigorously scrubbing his teeth, attention completely focused on her.

"Spit it out, Montana. What's going on?"

"Nothing. Just worried about Stella. I'm fine."

"Nah, see, that's not the whole story, I don't think." He disappeared into the bathroom, and she smiled softly at the sound of him spitting into the sink and rinsing off his toothbrush. "Talk to me, Linds."

"Your boys are playing in Boston tonight." Lindsay avoided the subject, hoping that the Yankees game would be enough to distract him from prying into her past. He climbed into bed beside her casually, glancing at the TV in the corner with the images of Fenway Park smattered across the screen.

"We gonna play twenty questions or something?" He settled back against the pillow that he propped up against the headboard, and quietly observed her tense posture. On the television Joe Torre and Terry Francona had already begun to argue over a bad call.

"I said it's nothing. I'm fine." She was being short with him, and instantly she felt horrible. None of this was Danny's fault.

"We've all got triggers, Linds, every crim has issues with certain cases, but Flack said she's doing okay. She's gonna be fine. Mac said we could call her tomorrow maybe."

"Will you just watch the damn ballgame and leave me alone?" She wiped a tear from her eye, not willing to let it fall, and laid down with her back to him. He frowned, turning his attention completely from the baseball to his… Lindsay. He loved her, somewhere, but they hadn't decided, well, agreed, on a definition for this thing they had. He removed his glasses, rubbing a hand over his eyes before running it through his short hair. He turned to her, running a hand along the curve of her hip gently, trying not to appear hurt as she flinched at his touch.

Something was going on.

He leaned over her carefully, slipping his fingers beneath the hem of her, well, his, shirt, to feel the smooth skin on her stomach. She tensed, and swatted away his hand halfheartedly.

"Linds."

"I'm not in the mood for strip baseball, Danny."

"We can go see her tomorrow. I'll go with you. She's okay, Linds."

"I just." Lindsay rolled over onto her back, her side coming into contact with his abdomen intimately, but neither paid attention. Danny wiped the tears that had welled in her eyes away with the pad of his thumb, and bit his lip in concentration, waiting patiently for her to finish her thought. He cocked his eyebrow at her as she choked out a short laugh, and wiped her tears away roughly with the back of her hand.

"You gonna talk to me Montana?"

"I just, I know."

"Know what?"

"I know. What she's going through. Stella." She offered him a shadow of a smile as the realization softened his expression.

"When was this?"

"I, um. I had just become a level two." She winced, shifting so that she was propped halfway up against the headboard. "I was on call, and well, unconscious when my beeper went off. When I didn't call in, or show up at the crime scene, my partner showed up at my apartment."

"Lindsay." He placed a soothing hand in her lap, relieved when her fingers found his. She teared up again, but shook her head, blinking them away.

"I promised myself that no one from New York would ever see me cry about it, and here I am, not even two sentences in." He smirked, but brought her hand to his lips and pressed a gentle kiss to her knuckles.

"It's okay. When we're here, it's just you and me. Forget the city." She smiled faintly, and nodded.

"We have jealous, possessive, abusive boyfriends in Montana, Detective." She winced, turning her attention away from his brokenhearted expression, and towards the game of the TV. "That's why I came to New York."

"Linds-"

"I left for the job that was the farthest away, everybody always looking at me like I was going to break, or I was halfway dead. It's not what I am. I mean, I had the training, I had the piece, but he was bigger, stronger, and didn't exactly play fair."

"Obviously, he beat up a girl."

"He wanted me to quit my job."

"What?"

"He proposed, wanted me to come back home, start a family, improve my horrid cooking skills, and ensure that his dinner would be on the table at six o'clock every night when he came home from the factory, lie back and let him get me pregnant over and over again." She turned to him, running a hand through his hair affectionately before continuing. "I obviously declined."

"And he hit you. Bastard."

"He married my cousin, actually. But that's a really long potentially incestuous story." She smiled softly, and he leaned up to kiss her gently before setting down to lay against her lap, using her thigh as a pillow, watching as Mark Loretta hit another double.

"You're okay now, though, right? Like he's in Montana, not stalking you?"

"Yeah, he's in Montana."

"It's okay to be a victim, Linds." His words were muffled against her leg, his breath warm against her skin. "It's okay to need help."

"I'm okay. Just, today, I just. I don't know. Today I remembered." He nodded in understanding, shifting along her body to press a slow, lingering kiss to her hip, then her stomach, before forgetting about the ballgame and catching her lips delicately.

"I'm a good distraction. How bout I help you forget?" He mumbled against her lips, and she smiled.

"That sounds lovely."

His chuckle rumbled through her, and he shifted on top of her fully, wedging his knee between her thighs. He needed this, he needed her. He needed to show her how much he loved her, slowly, deliberately, sweetly.

And they both needed to forget.

………

A/N: just a little one shot. There was definitely some moments in those two episode that got me thinking…hehe. Especially when he chased after her down at the station. Whoa.