Chapter 11: A good colour on you

The next day Arizona was busy typing up a situation report in the base apartment, grateful for the distraction of work. That night she had laid in bed thinking over her discussion with Addison. It was a big thing for her to have told someone about what had happened with Callie, and then to admit that she still had feelings for the brunette. Massive in fact! Up until then, it had been a huge secret that she had been carrying around with her. She wasn't ashamed of what had happened back in training college, but it had ended so badly, she just hadn't wanted to discuss it with anyone. Nearly seven years on and Callie was making her body react in ways it hadn't for a long time, the neck blushes when she was near, the butterflies in the pit of her stomach...it was confusing as hell. Arizona had never had feelings towards another woman since Callie. Sure, she thought Jennifer Beals was still stupidly hot, but in real life she had never felt any attraction or desire to be with anyone else. She had been attracted to Tom and now she was attracted to Callie...again. Maybe she was gay...or maybe as Callie had joked that time they had kissed for the first time...maybe she was just Calliesexual.

Arizona smiled to herself as she remembered the scene by the lake and how amazing that kiss had felt. Her daydreaming was interrupted by her phone buzzing to life and she saw Addison's face pop up on the screen.

"Hey, Addison. All OK?" the blonde asked down the phone.

"No," came the reply back, Addison's voice being flat and businesslike gave away more than any words could. "Can you talk?"

Arizona could hear the tension in her friend's voice and quickly looked around the room. Lexie was busy tapping away at some code sequence whilst Ben slept having covered the nightshift. Carina was in the kitchen with Mark who had just returned from Cadiz. She could hear the FBI Agent trying his hardest to flirt with the Interpol agent, who, strangely to Arizona, seemed to be enjoying his attempts.

"Sure. Just give me a minute," Arizona said as she opened the glass patio doors and headed outside making sure the door was closed before speaking "OK. Go ahead," Arizona said, taking a deep breath in anticipation of what was coming.

"The local police have found a body in a disused warehouse."

Arizona closed her eyes and took another deep breath, "you think it's DeLuca?" Arizona asked with concern.

"The body was so badly beaten it wasn't possible to ID at the scene so they are checking dental records. I..umm...I'm on my way to the morgue now." Addison explained as she felt a lump form in her throat. "Is...is Carina there?"

"Yes, she is. Do you want me to tell her?" Arizona asked as her eyes fixed on the young Italian who was sipping a coffee laughing at something Mark had said to her.

"No. Let's wait until we know for sure, I just wanted to say make sure she isn't on her own OK?" Addison asked.

"OK, I'll keep an eye on her." Arizona said before turning to look out at the view "You OK?" She asked her friend with concern.

Arizona heard Addison take a deep breath, "it never gets easier does it….you know….losing one of your own." The redhead said softly.

Arizona thought back to her third operation when they had been sent to Colombia to investigate a brutal cartel and a colleague had been killed. "No it doesn't," she replied as she remembered how hard it had felt at the time, how they had channeled all of their anger and emotions into their work, in order to honour their fallen agent. "Call me as soon as you know"

"Will do," Addison said before ending the call.

A few minutes later Arizona heard a tapping on the glass door and turned to see Callie standing there, staring at her. Arizona felt the now familiar flurry of butterflies in her stomach at the sight of the FBI Agent, but she knew she had to ignore them. She was still getting used to seeing the brunette again. Even though her immediate reaction whenever she did see her was one of excitement, she had a job to do.

Arizona took a deep breath and beckoned with her hand for the brunette to join her outside. She watched as Callie carefully closed the patio door behind her and studied the blonde.

"Everything OK?" Callie asked. They might not have seen each other for nearly seven years, but Callie could still tell when something was bothering the blonde.

"Umm yeah. All fine" Arizona lied, turning her attention to the brunette now standing in front of her. "How was Cadiz? Is she willing to help?"

"I've just emailed you the incident report, but yeah, it went well," Callie responded as she continued to study the blonde's body language, something was definitely up. Arizona would often chew on the inside of her cheek when something was bothering her and Callie could see the tension in the CIA officer's shoulders. She wanted to shake her head and tease it out of Arizona. Why on earth did the blonde think she could possibly hide something from her? But Callie chose to remain professional. She had come here to report on her part of the mission and that was what she was going to do. She was no longer going to torture herself with the whole Arizona thing.

Arizona was preoccupied, her thoughts clearly elsewhere as Callie filled her in on their successful trip and how Mark had used his charm to convince the sister to help reach out with Zaynab. She was staying in a hotel nearby and the plan was to approach Abu's wife tomorrow as she left the Mosque.

"That's great," Arizona said without much enthusiasm as she stared beyond the brunette's shoulder through the glass doors and watched Carina. Arizona knew the body found was likely to be Andrea DeLuca and that pretty soon the young Italian would be told the awful news that her brother was dead.

Callie watched in silence as the blonde's slender hand reached up to play with the green birthstone around her neck, something she did often when she was deep in thought. Ever since she had caught a glimpse of the slender silver chain and birthstone around the blonde's neck she had been trying to understand why Arizona would still have it, let alone wear it.

"I can't believe you still have it," Callie said softly, eventually breaking the silence. The words were out before she realised it. Apparently, her curiosity got the better of her.

"What?" Arizona said realising she hadn't really been listening. She was too busy thinking about poor DeLuca. She directed her eyes and her attention back to Callie and watched as the brunette took a step closer to her. Arizona felt her heart rate increase as she did so. Her eyes honed in on the Latina slowly started to move her hand towards the blonde's neck. Arizona's pupils dilated on their own accord as her body started reacting to Callie's presence, to her familiar scent.

Callie was caught in a spell as she watched those blue eyes grow bigger as she inched nearer. She watched Arizona's pink lips part slightly, watched her pulse point in her neck speed up. She still had the power to do all of that to the blonde, without even touching her.

Snapping out of the spell just in time, Callie pulled her hand back and cleared her throat which had suddenly grown dry. It was unfair really. It was easy to hide behind the assignment. Convenient to not address anything under the guise of having to fully focus on the task at hand. But this tension was affecting both of them.

"The necklace…," she said, clearing her throat again as she redirected her hand away from Arizona, softly touching her own bare neck instead before adding "...you still wear it."

Arizona's hand shot up and touched the vibrant green stone as she briefly held Callie's questioning gaze before turning to face the view of the city. She remembered the day they had given each other the same necklace and they had promised to never take it off. It had been a promise she had kept…she had never taken it off, not for one day, not even on her wedding day.

That was a promise she had managed to keep. It just wasn't the important one...the one that mattered the most.

"I never took it off," Arizona whispered as she continued to stare out at the rooftops. This was the longest they had been alone together without tension or a fight, and Arizona didn't trust herself to look at the brunette just yet. There was so much she wanted to say to Callie, so many questions she wanted to ask her ex-lover. But they were not ready for that yet, and this was not the place. Arizona took a deep breath in as she felt movement behind and closed her eyes as she felt Callie's arm gently brush up against hers as the brunette joined her looking out over the rooftops of Seville.

Callie felt a wave of nostalgia flood through her as she absorbed Arizona's words. She remembered securing the catch around that slender neck before leaning down and placing soft gentle kisses all over that neck. As the brunette stood beside her ex-girlfriend she could hear her trying to control her breathing as she slowly turned to look at Arizona, who was staring back at her.

"It's a good colour," Callie said eventually before realising her words didn't really make much sense. "Green..," she added quickly, gesturing towards the birthstone again. "It...umm it's a good colour on you...I've always thought that."

"Thanks," Arizona said softly as her mouth formed a small smile. As soon as the word had left her lips she had started scolding herself for her inadequate response. She had lost count of the number of times she had played this scene out in her head over the years, imagined the moment when she would be alone with Callie again, and words had not failed her then. She had clearly forgotten the impact the brunette had over her as she swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat and opened her mouth to say something, but closed it when she realised she didn't know what she was going to say. Her heart was telling her to respond "It suited you too! But then again….everything suited you!", but her head had other ideas and was yelling at her to keep it professional.

"Listen, Callie…" Arizona started speaking giving into her head as usual "...I'm sorry for coming over a little heavy-handed yesterday morning, it's just this is a big case for me, well for the country and I umm.."

Callie shook her head interrupting the blonde, "It's OK. You umm you were right." If Callie was surprised at the words coming out of her mouth, Arizona was even more, her eyes widening at the FBI agent's apparent U-Turn.

The brunette continued. "I am sorry for last night, you know for breaking protocol," she said, pausing as she licked her lips and held the blonde's gaze, "I umm... I think I just needed to blow off some steam.."

Blow off steam? What the hell did that mean? Arizona's mouth opened as she went to ask, but her phone started ringing and as she looked down at her screen she saw it was Addison and she was instantly back in the real world.

"Sorry...I umm...I need to get this," Arizona said apologetically as she nodded to her phone.

Callie saw the tension form on the blonde's face again and guessed that whatever the call was about, was not good. Callie reached down and before she regretted it, she gave Arizona's slender hand a gentle squeeze before leaving the CIA Officer to her call. As she closed the glass patio door behind she watched as Arizona closed her eyes to the news she was hearing down the phone. Arizona's hand came up and pinched the bridge of her nose before she opened her eyes and looked through the glass door, past Callie and towards Carina DeLuca who was about to hear the news that her brother was dead.

Addison had insisted on telling Carina the news in person and as she took the young Italian into Arizona's apartment to break the news, the CIA Officer called a meeting with the rest of the team. "Sloan, Torres...I know you knew DeLuca and are close to Carina so I am sorry for your loss. You have the rest of the day off so you know..go do what you need to do...go for a run or a swim, just stay in touch and be careful." Arizona looked over at Callie who was struggling to keep her emotions in check. "I know some of you have heard me say this before, but we are NOT losing anyone else to these bastards."

Arizona had wanted to speak to Callie but kept her distance as she watched the two FBI agents hug each other before leaving the apartment. She knew that wasn't her place anymore and was pleased the brunette had Mark to look after her. And whilst there was nothing they could do to bring Andrea back, they could at least try and find his killers.

Seville, Next Day

Callie popped into the base apartment, where Lexie Grey was typing away on one of the computers. Ben Warren had stepped out to deal with something, so the young CIA officer was by herself. "Hey Grey," Callie said wearily as she walked over to her teammate and plopped one of the coffee cups she was carrying in front of Lexie. "Just reporting that I'm back...you know, like the good girl that I am," Callie tried to joke, but the fact of the matter was she was wrecked after another night of no sleep.

"OK, I'll update the log, but you...umm might wanna steer clear of Robbins," Lexie said matter of factly.

"What? Wait..what?" the brunette responded confused as to what she had done now. She had played by the rules, logged her location, she had even personally announced her return just now. What could possibly have set Arizona off this time?

The young FBI agent seemed to think about saying more for a moment but changed her mind taking a sip from her coffee. "Mmm, thanks for the coffee," she added, turning her attention back to her screen in an attempt to avoid getting caught up in whatever was going on with Robbins and the FBI Agent.

The raven-haired woman carefully studied Lexie's facial expression and raised her eyebrow. "Spill it, Grey," she said firmly. Lexie had seemed a little obnoxious and holier than thou at first, but Callie had worked her charm on her and found her weakness in double espressos. She had decided to cut the kid some slack as she was just trying to make a name for herself. Plus, the CIA seemed to train its officers to look down on FBI agents.

"OK, but you didn't hear this from me….," Lexie said, crumbling under the stare coming from Torres. "Robbins asked me to update her on your locations...every night," Lexie said as she waited for the brunette to react to the news.

"I don't fucking believe it!".

Yeap there it was. Lexie thought to herself as she watched Callie pace up and down the room switching between Spanish and English swear words. This was exactly what she had wanted to avoid.

Callie ran her hands through her hair and mumbled something in Spanish, before closing her eyes and trying hard to compose herself. She let out a deep breath and crossed her arms in front of her chest. "This has to stop," she added, in English this time so Lexie could understand. "Where is Robbins now?"

Lexie bit her lip and flashed Callie an unsure look. She had grown to like Callie, but ultimately Officer Robbins was her boss.

"Come on, Lexie, if she gets to know my location, I get to know hers." This time, Callie's voice sounded more gentle, pleading. The woman knew how to get things done and one catches more flies with honey than with vinegar.

"She's swimmi…" Lexie didn't even get to finish her sentence before the FBI Agent had turned and stormed out the door heading to the rooftop swimming pool to tell Arizona exactly what she thought of her.

Ever since a child swimming had always helped Arizona relax. She had been a serious child growing up and set high standards for herself, and so when things got too much she would take herself off to the nearest pool. As her body glided through the cool water she felt the tension and stress she had been carrying around work itself out of her body. For the first time in days, her mind was at peace, and as she swam up and down the pool, lap after lap, she focused on her strokes and breathing. She pushed herself to go faster, to see how long she could hold her breath for, to do ten more laps before she eventually ran out of steam. She rested at the end of the pool and took deep breaths, her lungs burning from her effort. She was exhausted but in a good way and felt like a different person as she climbed out of the pool.

"You're tracking me?" Callie yelled as she stormed through the door towards the blonde CIA agent who had just stepped out of the pool.

Arizona's zen-like feelings evaporated immediately as she spun around to see a furious-looking Callie marching over towards her like a raging bull heading towards the matador and rolled her eyes. This was getting ridiculous.

"Apparently, I need to. Do you realise you are putting us all at risk with your antics?" Arizona ran her hands through her wet hair, squeezing out the excess water onto the floor.

"My antics," Callie repeated, "and what exactly do you mean by that?" Her blood was starting to boil and she really had to force herself to stay calm. Arizona was so out of line here, but she was still her superior. She was, it suddenly dawned on Callie, also not wearing many clothes.

The blonde was wearing a brilliant red speedo costume that seemed to make her blue eyes even brighter. Callie felt her heart rate quicken, a mixture of anger and a reaction to the scene in front of her. If Arizona had caught on, she did not show it, while blue eyes held their gaze before slowly flicking her head down and up again, water drops flying off in all directions, some landing on Callie. As the cold water hit the brunette, it brought her back to her senses. She was angry. Arizona was being unfair and that made her mad as hell.

"Callie, we're not having this discussion here," Arizona replied, trying to regain some control of the situation. The fact was she was standing at the edge of the pool, dripping wet, and was not prepared to have a stand-up argument with the FBI Agent.

As she went to walk past Callie and grab her towel off the nearby chair, the brunette had other ideas. The taller woman stepped in her way, blocking her access, narrowing her eyes as she gazed directly into Arizona's blue ones.

"Oh yes, we are!" Callie said firmly, causing the smaller woman to stop in her tracks. "I promised you yesterday that it wouldn't happen again. And for the record, Arizona, I, unlike you, don't make promises I can't keep." Callie couldn't stop herself from bringing up the past. To date, they had both avoided the elephant in the room, but it had just come out. Callie was sick of Arizona's perfect persona, especially since the blonde was the one that had messed up.

Arizona froze at Callie's words. They had been deluding themselves to think that they could just pretend that the past did not exist, pretend that they could get on and work without addressing what had happened all those years ago. Callie had broken first. She had mentioned the promise. The promise that they had made to come out to their parents the night before graduation so they could be together. The promise that Arizona had broken.

Callie scoffed before continuing. "You know what…..I never pegged you for someone who only did half the job…..someone who acted on only half the facts," her voice sounded eerily calm, mirroring exactly the opposite of how she was feeling inside. One step in the wrong direction, one wrong word from Arizona, and Callie felt she might explode. She just was not sure whether it was with rage or something else. Her eyes dropped of their own accord as she watched a droplet of water slowly make its way down the blonde's neck and disappear into the valley of Arizona's breasts.

"Callie, let me pass," Arizona said firmly as she held the brunette's gaze, her heart rate increasing by the second as she saw the anger in those brown eyes as the taller woman refused to move.

"Agent Torres…" Arizona said in a raised voice "I am in charge of this operation and I can ask for location reports on any of my officers if I damn well please!" She was getting sick of the agent questioning her authority at every turn.

"And do you?" Callie challenged back, "do you get location reports on Officer Warren or Agent Sloan?"

Arizona didn't respond, instead, she held the brunette's gaze. No. No was the answer.

"Didn't think so," Callie responded by shaking her head

Arizona swallowed before her mouth opened to respond, but just when she was about to speak up, Callie interrupted. "Well, IF you had bothered to get all the facts Special Operations Officer Robbins," Callie put extra venom into the blonde's job title, "you would have known that the location I spent the night last night was actually Agent DeLuca's hotel."

Arizona felt a shiver run through her body as she realised she had messed up.

"Agent DeLuca, Carina, is a friend of mine. You know, a person with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically one exclusive of sexual or family relations?" She bit her lip and leaned forward, almost literally getting in Arizona's face. She was challenging the blonde and she did not care if there were going to be repercussions. Arizona was in the wrong here, not her. The fact that she was quoting the definition of 'friend' from the dictionary almost verbatim was just a dig. One that she took great pleasure in. "Since my friend is hurting, I went over there to console her."

Again, Arizona's mouth opened to say something, but somehow she stopped herself and her mouth closed again. Callie was really getting under her skin and she had to force herself to stay calm. She was embarrassed by her actions and realised that she had acted out of personal rather than professional feelings. Callie knew this and was baiting her for it. What was worse was that it was working. She watched as those brown eyes made their way down her body before returning back to her blue eyes. It was then she realised Callie's reaction was not purely anger, there was a hint of desire there, she had seen that look before.

Callie had control here and she intended to use it. Tilting her head she ran her eyes up and down the blonde's body, taking in the toned thighs and slender waist before she decided to push a little further, knowing damn well she was already crossing the line. "What's with the obsession about my whereabouts, Arizona?"

She had carefully observed the changes in Arizona's body language and she knew she was getting to her. After such a shitty day and having spent the night comforting Carina, she decided to have some fun with it. Callie paused before going in for the kill, "are you jealous?"

Their faces were now almost inches apart and Callie's all too familiar, sweet scent filled Arizona's nostrils. It was not helping. A red blush slowly started to creep up her chest and neck. Having Callie so close to her was fueling a very different kind of emotion. Something she had not truly felt in a long, long time. It felt like a spark, the start of a fire in the pit of her stomach and it rapidly spread all over her body, putting every nerve ending at attention. Her eyes darkened and she narrowed them, not letting up as she gazed right back at Callie. No matter what, she was going to give as good as she got. The fucking nerve on this woman. It was infuriating and intoxicating at the same time.

"Don't be ridiculous," Arizona had eventually responded as she brushed past Callie and finally picked up her towel, wrapping it around her chest in an attempt to hide her by now clearly hard nipples. She had needed to get away from the brunette, put some distance between them before the overwhelming desire to kiss the FBI Agent got the better of her. She was so close to crashing her lips against Callie's, pushing her tongue into her mouth and letting out all of the frustration and anger she was feeling there and then.

She had felt jealous this morning when Lexie had informed Arizona that Callie had spent the night at a hotel and not in the apartment block like the rest of them. The blonde had headed up to the rooftop pool to work out some of the frustrations, but Callie had found out and now she felt foolish. She felt foolish and embarrassed and angry at the way Callie was being all sanctimonious.

"You know what?" Arizona said angrily as felt her emotions get the better of her and start to take over "... if you wanna talk about knowing all the facts…how about we talk about YOU not knowing all the facts. How about we talk about you choosing to not open my letters, to not knowing what actually happened on graduation day!"

Arizona had broken a promise, but she had tried to explain her reasons why, but Callie had ignored her attempts and Arizona had spent the last six years wondering how different her life would have been if the brunette had just read her letters. Wondering what they could have done together if she hadn't been so stubborn.

"Really Arizona? You really wanna go back to graduation day? OK, sure….." Callie said as she mentally rolled up her sleeves and prepared for a battle she was easily going to win " let's talk about how you took the easy option, how you chose Team Arizona, how you put yourself first and broke the promise we made." Callie stared hard at Arizona who seemed frozen to the spot, but the brunette wasn't finished yet. "How about we talk about my family disowning me, talk about the awful things they said to me when I told them about you. Told them about this amazing woman I was head over heels in love with. I went through so much shit with them… alone Arizona...I went through that on my own because you chose YOU! You picked normal...you picked a great career, happy marriage...you wanted the perfect life more than you wanted me!" Callie's voice wobbled with emotion.

Arizona had had enough. Yes, she had made a mistake, but what Callie was saying just wasn't true and it was driving her mad. She took a purposeful step towards the brunette and she replied in kind, with a firm voice, although on the inside she was quaking. "You think you know me, don't you Callie?… You think you know everything there is to know about me, but you are wrong."

Callie scoffed at the blonde's words.

Arizona narrowed her eyes at the FBI Agent. "For the record...my life has been anything but perfect. My marriage is over and I spend all my time at work because...because it's all that I have. So no, I don't have the perfect dream life you seem to think I have!" Arizona could hear her voice almost crack with emotion and she quickly ran her hands through her wet hair, tugging at it slightly as she did so. She let out a deep breath and slowly looked up at Callie.

Shit, she hadn't expected that! Callie was silent as she absorbed the information. The ring was missing because her marriage to Tom was over. She had racked her brain, coming up with reasons why Arizona would not wear her wedding ring, but divorce had been the furthest option on her mind. Just as she was about to respond the door crashed open and both women turned to see an out of breath Mark standing there bent over as he took some deep breaths.

"It's Zaynab," he panted slightly, "she's agreed to help." Mark stood up straight and realised he had clearly walked into something big between the two ex-lovers. He could see Callie was emotional. Whatever had been going down would have to wait. "She arranged a meeting with Abu at eleven hundred hours".

Arizona looked down at her sports watch, her eyes going wide as she saw the time. "That's less than two hours away!" she said in a panicked voice as she looked back over at Mark.

"I know! So get your arses downstairs so we can go catch the son of a bastard!"