Welcome! Unfortunately, I do not own FAKE. That honor belongs to Sanami Matoh-sama. But I will shamelessly manipulate her characters for the time being.
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Short chapter after a long break. Eh, you can't expect too much from me. I kind of let this story fall away for a while. I'll try to do better.

"It looks like someone had a rough night."

"A couple of someones, I'd say."

"Shut up." Ryo snapped irritably as he pushed his way through the early morning crowd and clocked in at the precinct. "I'm the one who was working all night."

Dee brushed coldly by him and punched in harder than necessary.

"You see that? And I always took Dee to be the one doing the working. You learn something new everyday." There was an uproarious laugh from those close enough to hear and quick enough to catch it. Ryo blushed crimson and left the group of guys in time to miss Dee crack a few skulls together. It was an ineffective way to deal with his problems, but damn did it feel good.

This was insane. There'd been another blow up on the car ride over, and Dee had managed to get out every thing he'd been bottling up when Ryo dragged himself into bed at 4 a.m.

And his partner, miffed from a night spent alone on his side of the bed when he knew full and well that Dee had been waiting for him to get home, had a few choice words to dish out as well.

The fight wasn't anything a few deep breaths, a short apology and a kiss wouldn't have cured, but by the time they'd ran out of shouts they were at the precinct. Too late for kisses then. Damn. What a shame.

With a tenseness Dee didn't normally let himself settle into, he sat at his desk and looked over the latest paperwork on their case. There was a summary of what Ryo and Diana had found last night after hunting down the bartender at a local club, giving quickies in the bathroom for $50. Rumor had it he liked it rough.

That would explain a lot, but he refused to give a semen sample. Dee looked at the guy's picture, a mug shot from a few petty theft charges half a decade ago and imagined his greasy voice offering Ryo a personal sample. He slammed the file on the desk. He knew creeps like that, and it never left the back of his head that these were the kind of guys the love of his life was working with on a daily basis as well. Even when he was completely pissed at him, Dee had enough energy to worry.

Ryo took the sudden slam to be a precursor to another argument, and he tried to head it off before his partner could start.

"Dee, you know what? This is ridiculous. If you're having such a hard time handling this, than maybe you need to-"

"Oh, I heard something happened. Don't mind me, I just want to say I witnessed the breakup first hand." Diana perched daintily on the edge of Dee's desk. Ryo gaped at her, but his lover seemed to have drawn the connection to where Ryo's words had been leading when she interrupted.

Oh my God. Was that what he'd been about to say? Ryo ran back over the cut off sentence in his own mind and couldn't pull up where it had come from. It scared him. He hadn't wanted to suggest. He loved Dee.

He did. Really. It was just...

Hm, I wonder what 'it just' is. I hope you wonder to. That means you should come back for chapter six. Whenever that comes, that is...