She's been into Diego Hargreeves since her police academy days, which is to say, a nearly obscene amount of time. It's hard to pinpoint exactly how long it's been, though, because as with most things, falling for him was a rather fluid process. One minute she was reveling in the fact that she was suddenly single for the first time in three and a half years. The next, she was hanging off every word in his tirade about saving teargas for bad guys rather than protestors. And yet, it also felt so sudden. As if he had come out of nowhere and clotheslined her the way he did one of the instructors in restraint training.

And while it's hard to say when she fell for him, why is entirely too easy. She liked him because he wasn't afraid. He was stupid and brash, but he was bold and honest when it mattered. But more than that, she liked how he cared so deeply and passionately about doing the right thing rather than doing things the right way. Even when it cost him.

Also, his forearms.

She's watching them now, muscles rippling under his tight long sleeved shirt as he raises the gun, his gaze intensely focused on the target. She hopes he doesn't see her staring in his periphery because it's pretty obvious she's not just checking his form. There's a breath and then he fires five rounds into the piece of paper, every shot precise and lethal.

"That's how it's done, baby," he grins, laying the gun down as he steps back to direct his excitement at her. As if he'd ever done anything less than absolutely perfect at the range. Still, she can't help but smile back even as she roll her eyes. She loves it when he calls her baby. Even though he only ever says it to tease her, it still feels like it's her nickname and hers alone.

Yeah. She's got it bad.

Which is unfortunate because he simply doesn't. He's never so much as shown a single bit of interest besides the first day he met her, and let his eyes linger on her body a little too long. But after that? Nothing. It soon became clear that he only had eyes for Eudora, and while it was tempting to be jealous it was all too understandable. She was gorgeous and smart and kind and obviously going to make a damn good cop. But even after that imploded, he never seemed interested. She'd come to the conclusion that they were simply too close, which was unfortunate but also fine.

It would be fine.

She just needs to follow her friends' advice and find someone new to focus on. And not just flings. She's tried the "get over by getting under" method and it just didn't work. She needs romance, a good personality, someone she wants to see again outside of the bedroom. What she needs is a boyfriend. Instead she's gotten:

Ghosted more times than she can count

Four no-shows for dates

One catfish

Five break up texts

Seven dick pics

Six angry men calling her a whore

Three dates that were meant for other people

The most recent of the "oops I texted the wrong girl" dates had been a week ago, and she suspects it's also the reason Diego dragged her out to the shooting range today. Diego doesn't talk about feelings-she learned that real quick-but he's more empathetic than he looks. He just doesn't know how to translate that into words. Thus, shooting range. It's sweet.

Except for the fact that he's an insufferable show off. That makes it a bit less sweet.

"Yeah, yeah, cheater," she huffs, moving forward to take his spot at the firing line. Obviously she can't tell if he cheated, but his arms had looked a bit too low for one of those shots to be as perfect as it was. She picks up the gun, waiting for his instructions, eyeing the target.

"Head right 7, body right 9, body bullseye, head bottom 9, body bottom 8," he decides. Of course he gave her more body than head shots.

It's tempting to insist that he keeps up the pretense that this is an even and fair competition and give her another head shot. But her time is running out, and who is she kidding-she'd like the win. So, she nods to confirm his choices before lifting the gun up and taking a breath in to clear her head of all else, the constant rejection, the unrequited crush, the stress at work, so she can focus. And then, she breathes out.

Her shots aren't as pretty as Diego's, but they all hit their marks.

"Not bad," he says as she places down the gun and then spins around to grin at him.

"Not bad?" she echoes back, gesturing to the target. "That's the best all day."

"That's the best you got all day," he corrects, smugly. "Not the best."

The smile vanishes from her face, replaced with narrowed eyes. "You're a dick."

He laughs then as she double checks the chamber to make sure the gun's unloaded and ready to be packed up. "A huge dick," she clarifies, placing the firearm in its case and turning to follow him out.

"Better than a small one," he shoots back, removing his headphones once the two enter the lobby.

If it weren't for range safety and all that, she'd kick him in the back of the knees. Instead, she settles on glaring at the back of his head as he checks both of them out, stuffing her safety glasses and headphones into her bag.

"I really hate you, you know that right?" she asks as they push through the door and out into the parking lot.

"Not sure I'd say that if I was the person who needs a ride home," Diego smirks at her over his shoulder as the pair reaches his car.

"Like there's even going to be room for me in the car anymore now that your head's so big," she says, reaching over to flick him on the side of the head. Before he has a chance to respond she speed walks to the passenger's seat and gets in before he can lock her out.

"You're lucky I like you," Diego says, pointing a finger at her before he climbs in, sticks the keys in the ignition and shifts into reverse. She takes her cell phone out of her pocket as he pulls out of the parking spot, hand resting on the back of her chair so he can look over his shoulder. Her cheeks grow hot and she's thankful that his eyes are on the road and hers are on her phone screen.

There are approximately 16 unread messages.

None of them are good.

In fact, she's feeling pretty crushed as she scrolls through them. It doesn't help when Diego withdraws his arm to shift the car into drive. He pulls out of the parking lot and onto the main road, and she tries to pull herself together but ends up just wilting into her seat. It's not ber friends' fault. Yesenia's babysitter fell through. Galilea was caught up with more work than she anticipated. Lilly probably really did need the extra time to study for her actuarial exam. These were all reasonable excuses. But it still sucked.

"What's up?" Diego asks as the car slows to a stop at the red light.

"Nothing," she says absent mindedly, texting out a message to the group. Life happens How about next Saturday?

Diego's eyes dart to her before going back to the road as the light turns green. "Diana," he prompts.

She turns off her screen and casts a look at him. "It's really nothing; my friends just cancelled on me tonight." He remains quiet and she tries to push out the growing frustration that she's been planning this for a solid week and it's only now, hours before, that all of these conflicts pop up. "We were supposed to go out," she sighs. "You know, do drinks and dancing."

He's silent again, only the sound of the turn signal clicking echoing throughout the car. "Alright, so what time tonight?" Diego finally asks, pulling her from her thoughts.

It takes longer than it should to piece together what he's offering, but the thought of Diego taking her dancing is just too much on so many levels. The most immediate level being how absolutely hilarious it would be to see Diego dance. The thought alone elicits a surprised laugh.

"What's so funny?" Diego asks, his brow furrowing. It's clear he wants to glare at her but the car ahead moves, and he takes his chance to make the left turn.

"You want to go dancing?" she asks, through giggles.

"And?" He sounds offended, but she's still trying to picture Diego on the dance floor and every resulting image is sending her into further hysterics. He catches on, eventually. "You don't think I can dance!"

"Mm-mm," she hums, shaking her head, and there's literally tears coming down from her eyes as she pictures Diego doing the Hitch dance at the club. God, he always knew how to pull you out of your spirals.

His face screws up into a frown, and she can vaguely tell he's annoyed. Unfortunately, she can't bring herself to care. "I'm a great dancer," he protests, turning onto her street.

"Ok, ok," she says, finally calming down enough to stop laughing and wipe away the tears from her eyes. "Meet here at 9 and we'll decide on a place?" she asks as he pulls into a spot near her building.

He nods, still clearly annoyed, but he's a good friend, better than most, and doesn't rescind his offer. In return Diana gives him a beaming smile as she climbs out the door. Almost immediately she turns around and tap on the window. He raises an eyebrow and rolls it down.

"Yes?"

"You know you're not allowed to wear that, right?" she checks, pointing at his black on black tactical uniform. He looks as if he's a real life Batman. Right now he's giving her the Batman glower. "I'm serious, Diego. Go shopping if you have to."

"Bye, Diana," he says, pulling away from her without even bothering to roll the window up. She smiles to herself and walks to her building's front door. She cannot wait for tonight.

Diego knocks on her door a few minutes after nine. It's tempting to give him a hard time about being late, to tell him that she thought yet another friend had abandoned her in her hour of need, but seeing as he had to rearrange whatever plans he had in order to take her out dancing, she decides to let him off the hook.

She's kind of glad that she didn't come up with a witty line for when she opened the door because holy shit, he's handsome.

In a way, he's stuck to the usual uniform. It's black on black, and he clearly has put no effort into his hair or shaving the stubble lining his jaw, but he's missing the usual tactical harness, armguards, and gloves. Instead, his arms are on full display, and while she's able to admire his muscles under his usual tight black shirt, it's nothing compared to what that short sleeved button up is doing for him. He looks broader, fuller, and more human than she's ever seen him.

"Look at you, all cleaned up," she says, allowing her eyes to run over his body under the pretense that she's teasing him. "Do a twirl for me," she demands, spinning a finger. He rolls his eyes, but slowly spins in a circle so she can admire each angle. "It'll do," she pronounces, allowing him into the apartment.

"Glad I meet the standard," he says, coming in further. She's still staring at him and are able to see the exact moment his eyes land on the two shot glasses and bottle of tequila placed out on the kitchen island. His eyes light up and naturally, he makes a bee line for the booze. Even more naturally, she follows him.

"We're gonna have a good time, then?" he asks, eyeing the tequila.

"Oh yeah," she confirms, grabbing the shaker of salt from the table on her way into the kitchen. Diego pours out a shot for each of them, sloshing a bit on the counter as she salts her hand. When she passes the salt over to him, their fingers brush causing a warm and tingling sensation to stir in her stomach. She probably shouldn't have already taken a couple of sips from the bottle. Maybe if she hadn't, she wouldn't be watching him so intently as he licks his hand. She's able to tear her eyes away to grab a lime and place one in front of him as he finishes.

"To a good time," Diego says, raising his glass to hers. She clinks her shot glass against his before swiping the salt off her hand with her tongue, following it with the silver tequila burning its way down her throat. Placing the glass down, she grabs the wedge of lime and bites into it, allowing the lime juice to ease the sweeten the sting.

"Mmm," Diana hums, taking the lime out of her mouth and placing it on the opposite edge of the cutting board from the rest of the lime slices. Diego places his wedge over hers and looks at her

"Another?" he asks, and well, she can't let the rest of the lime go to waste. Besides, even well drinks are expensive these days.

After their second shot, Diego moves to clean up the island as she watches. "Taxi should be here at 9:30."

"You decide on a place yet?" he asks, and she hums a yes, eyes on him as he places the bottle of tequila up with the rest of her alcohol. It's easy to blame the tequila, but she's not sure if that's 100% why she feelS the surge of almost overwhelming tenderness for him.

"Hey, Diego?" her voice comes out a bit smaller than she'd like, and he notices too because he turns to face her immediately, eyebrows raised. "Thanks for coming out tonight."

He relaxes, shoulders dropping slightly, and his smile which always looks like it's caught between being a smirk and a genuine grin comes out. "We're supposed to be alone together, right?"

"Right," she agrees, and she's certain he'll see the affection glowing off her like some kind of aura. Except he turns quickly back to dump the cutting board and knife into the sink.

"How's all that going by the way?" he asks, still bent over the sink. He has to mean dating. Or maybe her feelings. She's proficient in Diego-speak but she's not sure if she'll ever be fully fluent. He's hard to read his words; it's much easier to read his face.

"I think I meant what I told you," she says with a sigh. "I think I'm done with all that."

He turns around to face her then, and she can see the concern and sadness on his face. Sympathy is a rare emotion for Diego, and she doesn't like how it makes you feel. "Look, if you want to find someone, you can't give up."

"It's just hard to put myself out there when I know none of them are right," she says, frustration and an aching loneliness fizzing under her skin. "You know? None of them are you." The words come out too fast to stop, and it takes less than a breath to wish she could grab them out of the air. Her face is growing hot, but she pushes it back down and quickly tries to remedy the situation, "I mean none of them are like you."

He seems a bit frozen as well, assessing, and she wishes to God that she had another shot of tequila right now to take her attention off of the way his brow creases slightly and mouth turns down. "You don't want me," he says finally with a shake of his head.

She does.

She really does.

"What's wrong with you?" she asks, not liking his tone or the way he's still frowning slightly and can't meet her eyes.

He shakes his head again but steps forward to stand across the island from her. "I'm not going to psychoanalyze myself, but I gotta lotta shit. I don't know if you could put up with two of us. And I'm not letting you throw me away for some guy who came after."

She sits there quietly, taking in his words and trying to hear what he's saying. What he's really saying underneath and she don't like any of the deductions she's able to come up with. "Diana?" he asks, tilting his head slightly, and she knows she's been quiet too long right after he's been as vulnerable as he can be.

"You know I don't consider it putting up with you, Diego-right?" she asks quietly. It's important he knows. He has to know at least that.

He gives an attempt at a smirk, but it doesn't make it to his eyes. "What else would you call dealing with my bullshit?"

She reaches out to him, wiggling her fingers in an insistence that he take her hand. It takes a second, and some aggressive eye contact for him to take it, but when he does, she folds her hand over his, smoothing over the knuckles with her thumb. There are scars there. Probably from his childhood. Or last week. "I'd call it returning the favor."

He snorts but doesn't take his hand away. Instead he squeezes her hand, and she knows he'll never tell her that he loves her, but this feels pretty close. She squeezes his hand back.