Chapter Four

Bo sought out Dyson as she and Kenzi walked into the police station; everybody knew who she was by now and nobody tried to stop them. It was one of the many perks of having a cop for a boyfriend. There had been a twist in the case they'd been working, and her first port of call was usually to check in with Dyson and now Ava.

They'd been approached by a woman who'd come home to find the entire contents of her house missing. Her son, a man in his early twenties, had disappeared at the same time. The son had since turned up as a body with unusual injuries. Bo was sure Dyson must know something about it by now.

"Hey guys," Dyson said, crossing the room to kiss Bo's cheek. Bo greeted Ava, who nodded back to her. Though she hadn't minded Ava at first she was starting to develop a dislike towards her. She couldn't help being suspicious of her motives with Lauren.

"To what do we owe the pleasure?" Dyson asked.

"We were hoping you'd know a thing or two about this dude," Kenzi said, opening her newspaper and holding up a picture of the young man who'd died.

"Funny you should ask. Fae kill. Just got assigned to finding out who offed him this morning," Dyson said, scanning the article. "We were just going to go and see Lauren, she's been working up the autopsy report."

"Great, we'll tag along," Bo said.

"Do we really all need to be there?" Ava cut in impatiently. "We can just go and see her and report back her findings to you, though you could just had the matter over to the police."

"Great. C'mon Bo, let's go down and get ourselves some breakfast, I could do with getting a little pork on my fork," Kenzi said, grabbing Bo's hand.

"No. I'd really like to go and see what the autopsy findings are myself," Bo said, digging her heels in. "Why don't I just go and I'll fill you guys in instead?"

"Bo. You know this is official police business. We have to check it out ourselves," Dyson explained, smiling indulgently at her. Bo glanced at him and realised that he might actually think she was jealous of Ava, and thought that she was trying to cut into the time they spend alone. It didn't hurt to let him think it.

"Fine, Kenzi you go and have breakfast yourself and the three of us will go to Lauren's. Sound like a good compromise?" Bo said as though daring Ava to block her again.

"Fine," Ava agreed reluctantly.

X X X

"Hey Lauren," Bo said casually as they filed into the lab. Lauren looked at each of them in turn, her face not betraying any emotion.

"Are you all here about the Jenkins body?" Lauren asked. She went over to her desk and picked up a file. "I've been on it all morning - I've worked up a cause of death and preliminary findings but there's a lot more to do."

Lauren looked at the three of them, struggling to figure out who was the most appropriate person to give the file to. Bo stepped forward before anyone else could and took the folder.

"Can you give us a bit of a layman's run down before we look at that?" Dyson asked, putting his hands on his hips. Bo was too intent on looking at the file to notice how annoyed he was that she'd taken the file. Lauren ran through her findings.

"I've done some further research as well, you can have my notes," Lauren offered, going over to her desk and clicking open a document.

Before Bo could respond, Ava was behind Lauren. Bo's clocked how closely Ava stood to Lauren, witnessing the flare up of energy that sparked between them particularly from Ava's side. Her hand was pressed to Lauren's back possessively. Bo saw Lauren glance nervously over her shoulder and step away from Ava.

"I can print a couple of copies of this out," Lauren said.

Dyson was right; there was something going on between the two of them.

Bo snatched one of the copies out of Lauren's hand when it was done then smiled brightly at the two of them, trying to cover her irritation. After thanking Lauren she got out of there as quickly as she could.

She failed to notice Dyson's reaction when she didn't give him a second glance on her way out of the door.

X X X

Lauren was just finishing her microwave dinner when she heard a knock on the door. She had no plans but assumed it must be Ava. She opened the door with a smile that faltered when she saw it was Bo, and she tried to recover quickly. Bo hadn't been over to her apartment since before that night. And she had a pretty good idea why she was here.

"Hey Bo, come in," Lauren said. She stepped aside to let Bo enter, and noted Bo's curious look around the room. Later she realised that Bo must have been looking around to check if she was alone.

Lauren allowed herself to hope for a second that Bo had come for a reason other than Ava. "Is this about the case?"

"No actually, I wanted to talk to you about something else," Bo said, leading them over to the couch.

"What's going on?" Lauren asked as she sat down awkwardly. It was easier for her to pretend that she didn't know, to prolong the moment where she might have to lie as long as she could. She was mad at Ava for being so obvious at the lab. Bo might have been able to read energy but the way Ava had touched her must have removed all doubt and made it difficult for her to deny to Bo. Lauren didn't know what Ava's motivation was, but she hated being treated like the pawn she always had been in the fae's lives.

"What's going on between you and Ava?" Bo asked, then held her breath for the answer.

"You know, I'm not really comfortable talking about this," Lauren said. She was surprised to see that despite the way things had been between them, Bo actually looked hurt.

"I just want to make sure you know what you're getting yourself into," Bo said.

"Thanks, but I'm okay," Lauren replied. She couldn't settle on a response between vexed and touched. Bo had shown no signs of caring about her over the last couple of months – this wasn't how she wanted her to start.

"I just don't want to see you get hurt," Bo persisted. "You know how a lot of the fae can be. They play games with humans."

"I know that. I'm not going to get hurt. It's nothing really," Lauren said.

"But you are sleeping with her, aren't you? There's no point lying about it with me Lauren, you know what I can do."

Lauren shook her head slightly. "I'm not lying about anything. I just told you I don't want to talk about this. Thanks for your concern but I can take care of myself."

Bo shifted in her seat. Lauren could see that with Bo's characteristic stubbornness, she was not going to drop it. "Why do you have to go for Dyson's partner? Did you think that might feel a bit awkward for me?"

Lauren's mouth dropped open slightly. She hadn't thought about that, but considering that this was supposed to be so private she couldn't see how it should affect anyone else. The last thing she'd imagined was Bo finding out about it.

"I'm not doing it to get at you. And in fact, it's really none of your business," Lauren said. She felt herself slowly marching towards anger. Bo hadn't listened to her when she'd needed it the most. And yet now here Bo was, demanding answers from her.

"Fine, I'll go," Bo said sharply. "I just thought you were better than this." When Lauren didn't respond she pushed harder. "I guess you must like being treated like a pet."

Lauren heard herself make a quiet sound of disgust but no words came to her tongue. It was the most hurtful thing Bo could have said; but then she supposed that was exactly the point of it.

"I'm sorry," Bo said with a rush, already regretting her words. Sometimes Lauren was so emotionally controlled, so reasoned. When she knew what buttons would get a reaction, she couldn't help pushing on them.

"That's okay," Lauren said mechanically. She just wanted Bo to leave so that she could fall apart a little. At times like this the distance between them was a widening chasm and she felt foolish for ever thinking they could bridge it.

Lauren stared at her hands, and she saw out of the corner of her eye as Bo got up off the couch. She imagined she saw Bo's hand reaching towards her, but perhaps she hadn't meant to get so close.

Sleeping with someone else hadn't changed a thing. She still missed Bo even when they were sitting in front of one another.

"Well, I'm gonna go I guess," Bo said slowly, daring Lauren to ask her to stay.

"I'll see you around," Lauren said flatly, and she said nothing else as she saw Bo out.

X X X

Bo approached the entrance to Lauren's lab. Since the night before she hadn't been able to get it out of her head; Lauren's hurt feelings and her own. She'd wanted to talk to someone about it. As soon as she'd uttered Lauren's name, Kenzi had rolled her eyes, so she'd dropped the subject.

She'd been completely unprepared for how it had made her feel. The knowledge that Lauren and Ava were sleeping together had struck her like a blow. She hated the idea of anyone else putting their hands on Lauren. When she thought about Ava's fingers touching Lauren she wanted to break them off. She wondered what they were like when they were together. Did Lauren respond to Ava the way she had to her? Did she move the same way, make the same sounds? It was torture to think about it but she couldn't stop.

Lauren was in a consultation with a big, heavily muscled fae when she walked into the room.

"Whoa, sorry I should have knocked," Bo said. She caught a dirty look from the fae, who was incongruously modest and was covering his chest with his shirt.

"It's okay, we were just finishing up," Lauren said, and they shared an amused look. It made Bo's heart skip a beat; maybe Lauren wasn't as mad at her as she'd thought.

The big guy glared at her as he walked past, an injured look on his face as he still held the fabric against himself.

"Didn't mean to interrupt," Bo apologised.

"It's okay, he's just very shy," Lauren explained. "It took me about half an hour to get him to take his shirt off."

"No wonder he needed to see a doctor, there must be something wrong with him if he didn't want to take their shirt off for you," Bo teased, emboldened by Lauren's smile. She loved watching the shy, pleased look Lauren had always gotten on her face when Bo flirted with her.

They gazed at one another for a long moment. "I didn't mean for it to go like that last night," Bo said. "I didn't come around to attack you."

"Okay." She folded her arms, speaking slowly as though carefully choosing her words. "But I just wish you wouldn't think of me like that . . . just because I'm here doesn't mean that I'm some sort of fae groupie."

"Of course I know you're not like that, that's why I worry so much about you," Bo said, her voice softening. She hesitated before saying, "I still care about you, you know."

"I didn't think that was the case," Lauren replied. She was aware that she risked sounding self-pitying but it was true; Bo's coldness had convinced her that Bo would never care about her again.

"As a friend I mean," Bo clarified awkwardly.

"I knew what you meant," Lauren said quickly.

"So we're all good?" Bo said.

"Yeah," Lauren smiled at her. She felt needy, like she would do anything to have Bo come over and hold her. She was getting ahead of herself – she'd just have to be content with the fact that Bo was even talking to her again.

Bo hesitated for a second and Lauren could swear that she was having similar thoughts.

"You can stay here for a minute if you like? We can brainstorm some stuff for your case," Lauren said, seizing the opportunity.

"Sure, that'd be nice."