I do not own Blue Bloods

I had never been to a police precinct before. The atmosphere made me a bit nervous and the room I was in, with its green-tinged fluorescent lights, made me uneasy. I felt like I was the criminal in some sort of movie. Only I was with a sketch artist and was not being interrogated at all.

Joe had told me the man they found dead in the alley was an NYPD informant that had flipped on the gang he had been in. He was being paid to give information to a task force that handled major drug crimes in the city. It was late and I was very tired but the woman doing the sketch was very patient with me as I explained what the man looked like before it eroded from my memory.

"Like this?" the woman questioned having created her image in a software program on a tablet.

She had a kind face with a nose ring through the middle of her nose and wore a sweatshirt that said Defenders of the Galaxy in pixilated letters.

"Yeah but thicker hair he wasn't thinning at his temples he had nice hair."

The door to the room opened, jarring me a little and Joe walked in with two cups of coffee.

"I brought you another cup of coffee." He set one down next to the still full cup he had brought me earlier.

"I haven't finished the one you brought me before, quite yet." I smiled and shrugged a shoulder.

He reached for the old one and I opened my mouth to protest but was too late as he realized it was still full.

"Not much of a coffee drinker, huh?"

"No, I am, that coffee is just particularly terrible," I said, hoping the smile I wore would soften the insult.

He didn't seem insulted, he laughed, "Precinct coffee isn't top quality."

"It's okay, bad coffee holds a certain charm."

"But not for you?" He gave me a smile that made my heart skip in my chest. A grin that was higher on one side than the other, and he was wearing that damn leather jacket.

"No, I prefer my coffee a little stronger and not burned."

"I suppose I'll have to come to the bakery to see if you can make a better one."

"I won't even charge you." I smiled.

"How about this?" the artist asked me and poured over a rendering of the man who I saw in the alleyway. I took a deep breath in and let it out.

"Yeah, it looks almost perfect. I'm not sure I could help you make it better."

"It's really just a reference for the database for the previously convicted. If we have him in the system you can identify him with a picture we have on file," she explained, and I nodded not understanding anything enough to even ask a question.

"You said this guy got a good look at you Clementine?" Joe asked, and I nodded wincing. I should have run. But then no one would have seen that man get murdered, and he may have never gotten justice. Or maybe he would have and I had just made things overly complicated.

"And he followed you to the complex?" he asked.

"I have no idea," I sighed. "He could have, he shot at me but when I ran I didn't look back to see if he ran after me. I was just...trying to get away."

His jaw tightened with anger and I watched his fists clench before he relaxed back into a casual smile. I didn't envy the man who caused Joe Hill to become angry.

"I'll let you finish up and then I'll take you home." He left in a hurry and I was alone again in the unfortunately lit room, with the woman whose name I had forgotten.

"You know Joe?" she asked.

"Not really, we are neighbors, I see him in our laundry room sometimes." I was suddenly embarrassed to say I dropped food off at his door once a week and if he was home we would exchange pleasantries for about five minutes.

"He's a good detective."

"Are there bad detectives?"

"Plenty, but not Joe, he's as good as they come. A little go get 'em for most people's taste but he means well."

"I'm not sure why you are telling me that but... thank you?"

"You like him. So, I just thought I would tell you."

"You can tell that."

"Yeah, you're under the Joe Hill enchantment."

"It's got a name?" I leaned back, but I couldn't find it in me to be irritated with her. She was honest which I liked in a person.

"Yeah, until inevitably you will realize he is emotionally distant and as flaky as they come. Good detectives don't make good partners."

"Thank you for all this unsolicited information," I snorted. "Do you think he can tell?"

"Men are stupid," she said decidedly, and I laughed as she smiled and set her tablet down on the table. "Also, I know where to get you a good cup of coffee."

"If this is who I think it is, Joe, that woman cannot go home to her apartment," my boss said, as I looked at Clementine talking to Maisey in the interrogation room.

"Okay, what do you want me to do, Boss?"

"Can she stay with you? Set up cameras in her apartment and I'll place two protection units on patrol."

"Yeah, no problem. Let's nail this son of a bitch."

At least I didn't think it was a problem. Clementine was sweet as the fruit she was named for with some moments of whiskey bitterness. The only problem would be me, and how I had been attracted to her for the last two years she had lived across the hall from me. Dropping all kinds of things off at my door in her pajamas and always looking a little sad when I didn't invite her in. I didn't need distractions right now. I didn't need a short whiskey girl from Arkansas making my life more complicated than it needed to be. Though, true to my string of luck recently, it seems complicated was just what I was in for.

"I don't want her out until this bastard is caught. She can't go to work. Hell, I don't even want her at the grocery store unless you are there with her do you understand?"

"Yes, boss," I said.

"Find out if she's willing to testify. If she's not see if you can talk her into it. If she trusts you, use that."

Manipulate her into testifying. I scowled as I left his office. She wouldn't need to be manipulated. Not that I really knew her but she seemed like the kind of person who did the right thing for its own sake.

I had told her what we would need to do and she was so silent for so long that I was afraid I had said something terribly wrong. We got in the car and drove to her bakery where she put a handwritten note up inside the door that said she had a family emergency and would be closed for a while. After that, we headed back to our apartment units. I stood in her home as she packed a bag. She was still being very quiet which was making me nervous.

I placed the cameras around in inconspicuous places that would record and be sent back to the drug unit.

Her apartment was bright and happy. the walls painted in garish colors. I was pretty sure we had a no painting policy. She seemed to have forgotten because her kitchen was bright tangerine orange. She had painted the faux wood cabinets white and replaced the nobs with gold lion pulls. The living room was painted with thick black and white striped, furnished with two green velvet couches, and shelves covered in books and hand-painted vases of all sorts. Most of the walls were cluttered with art, all of it interesting and bright. The place was like a museum.

"What color is your room?" I asked when she came out, still trying to take in everything on display.

"Eggplant purple." She smiled, and I was glad to see it after our silent drive home.

"You must be tight with management," I commented, walking to the front door as she turned off all the lights.

"My uncle owns this apartment. He said I could do whatever I wanted to it; I rent directly from him."

"Actually, I think you've told me that before." She shut the door and locked it.

"I've told you three times actually," she countered, as we took the few steps to my door and I opened it for her and ushered her in.

"Sorry about that," I said, rubbing the back of my neck."

"Joe, in your line of work I can't imagine the things you have to see, remember, and retain. It isn't a problem if I have to tell you I rent from my uncle a few times." She stood awkwardly in my living room holding a backpack on one shoulder.

"I just have to change the sheets on the bed in my room and then you can get some rest."

"Where are you going to sleep?" She raised an eyebrow looking around as there wasn't much else for me to sleep on.

"The couch is deceptively comfortable."

She looked to the couch and then back to me, then to the couch, and then back to me again.

"Do you even fit on the couch?" She crossed her arms over her chest. The defiance in her eyes was shockingly attractive and I cracked a smile.

"I'll go get the sheets."

She followed me to the closet in my bedroom where I pulled out a sheet set and stood behind me as I moved to the bed.

"I can sleep on the couch. I'm smaller than you."

"I'm afraid my mother would somehow sense I was letting a lady sleep on the couch and come and kick my adult ass if I allowed that," I said.

"Sounds like a good lady," she conceded.

"She is."

"Might I be able to use your bathroom? I need to wash my face."

"Down the hall there, I would imagine the same place yours is." I held back a chuckle at the way she said wash and pulled the comforter off my bed and stripped off the sheets and pillowcases. Once I was done I threw the other sheets in the hamper and walked out to my living room.

Clementine had changed into pajamas. Shorts and a t-shirt with small dinosaurs on them. When I got closer I realized the dinosaurs were wearing party hats and eating cake. She was looking at all the pictures on my shelf. She jumped a little when she realized I was behind her.

"Oh sorry, I didn't mean to snoop."

"I totally snooped around your apartment so we are even." I bumped her shoulder and she smiled going back to looking at the pictures.

"Is this your mom?" she asked, pointing to a picture of me and my mother in front of a waterfall."

"Yep."

"She looks like she would kick your ass."

"She definitely would," I chuckled.

"Your brother? Dad?" She pointed to the picture that Frank had given me of my father on the day he graduated from the academy.

"Father." Even to my own ears, my voice sounded short, but she didn't seem to notice.

"He's a cop too?"

"Was, he died." I tried not to let the emotion leak into my voice and Clemintine flinched a little.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be, he died in the line of duty, protecting the city."

"Noble deaths are still sad for the people who lose them."

"I never even met him." Why was I opening up to her?

"A grief all its own. You look like him, he was handsome."

"You're saying I'm handsome?" I shifted the conversation. I didn't need to get into my family dynamics at that moment.

She turned and rolled her eyes at me picking up her backpack and heading toward the room.

"Have a great rest on that tiny couch, Hill."

I imagined her slipping into my bed with her sharp tongue and those blue eyes staring up at me from my pillow.

Stop. I told myself. You are here to protect her take a cold shower and calm down.