"So you busted Angelo up a tree spying on Charlie and you didn't arrest him?" Watson asks her sister as they talk in Charlie's office.
"I wanted to, but there's no real way to prove that he was spying on Charlie and any story he came up with would probably be believed. Besides, Charlie's worried that if she does make an official report about Rosey, then her father will find out."
"Rosey must really believe he can get Charlie back if he still hasn't told her father their engagement is over."
"Charlie could be married, with a dozen kids and he'd still think he could get her back."
"He's going too far Joey."
"I know that, but the more I think about it, the more I believe Charlie is right. As long as her father is in the dark, he stays away. I don't need his interference at the moment and we don't need Daddy Buckton putting pressure on my superiors to pull me out."
Watson sits back and considers it. "As much as I hate Angelo getting away with it, you're probably right. Her father would do anything to protect his golden boy and if he finds out about you."
"When he finds out," Joey interrupts.
"When he finds out about you, he's going to come after you hard."
"I can handle him. Look, I really want to bust Rosey for hassling Charlie, but if I started to arrest or report him for every little thing, it'd start to look like I'm harassing him."
"He's the one harassing Charlie."
"He can blame the end of their relationship for his behaviour, but we don't really want them to know why I have it in for him. And don't forget that Charlie made that complaint to my supervisor about my attitude toward Rosey a while back."
"Shit, I forgot. But since when has that bothered you, I mean, you've always done things your way and never worried about what your supervisors thought."
"It's different this time Georgie. I've been sleeping with the ex-fiancée of the man I'm investigating, so I have to be careful, because if I fuck up, then I'm not the only one who gets hurt. Both Charlie and Graves careers could take a hit if it looks like I'm letting my personal feelings interfere in an official investigation." She sighs in frustration, "For the moment, unless he does something I can't really ignore, Rosey gets away with it."
"Are you sure?"
"I want him for murder Georgie, and until I get him for that, I need to make sure everything is above board, especially when it gets out about my relationship with Charlie."
"Just watch your back around him."
"I always do. Now, perhaps you can tell me why you weren't with Rosey out on patrol?"
Watson grins cheekily, "Charlie's not working today, so as the senior officer here, I decided to assign myself to paperwork." Joey chuckles. "Even better, because Angelo has tomorrow off and I have Monday off, it makes today the last day of our rotation together."
"Until the next time," Joey reminds her.
Watson leans toward her in a threatening manner. "Joey, he had better be in jail by then or there will be nowhere you can hide from me if you subject me to another rotation with Angelo."
"I'll do my best."
Watson scowls at her. "It had better be your best, now, do you think tonight is a good idea?"
"No."
"So why did you agree?"
"It's kind of hard to say no to Dex."
"Yeah, it is."
Angelo smirks as he parks the squad car at the station. Jumping out, he rushes to catch up to the couple ahead of him. "Well, well, if it isn't Graves and her little husband."
"Well, well, if it isn't the big man who gets off at yelling at women in their own room in the middle of the night," Dex says without turning around.
Angelo resists the urge to shove him when they continue to keep their backs to him. "Tell me kid, how did you get a hot chick like her to take you seriously?"
"I offered her something that guys like you never could."
Angelo snorts unflatteringly. "Oh yeah, what's that?"
"Intelligent conversation, love, loyalty and fidelity." Dex glances at him over his shoulder, "I doubt you'd understand the concepts."
"You're a smartarse, kid."
Dex shrugs, Graves slender fingers squeezing his hand stopping him from saying any more. Graves spares a glance at Angelo, "Don't you have work to do, Constable?"
Angelo sneers at her, "I'm on a break." He looks her up and down, grinning, "If you ever tire of the kid and want a real man, give me a call."
Graves slides her arm around her husband's back, "I already have a real man, one who knows how to treat a woman properly."
Angelo shakes his head, still refusing to believe that the little runt could ever satisfy a woman like Graves as he shoves past them.
"Jerk," Graves mutters to his back.
"And Charlie was really engaged to him?"
She nods, "I'm sure she's probably regretting it by now."
"Penny, a guy like that isn't going to like his ex hooking up with anyone else, let alone another woman."
"We're aware of that Dex, Joey especially."
"I don't want you hurt again, Penny."
"Joey's the one that will be in danger once he finds out."
"And so will you because you'll be right there with her."
"She's my friend."
"She's mine too. Penny, I'm just asking you to be careful and to not put yourself in unnecessary danger."
Graves draws them to a stop. "Dex, I know you worry about me, even more since the attack, but you have to trust me."
"I trust you, it's him I don't trust. The guy has a serious problem."
"No shit, the guy is a deluded nut job."
"Nut job?" Dex chuckles, "Is that your professional opinion?"
"Just because my parents are head shrinks, it doesn't mean that I'm an expert on all the terminology. Can we just drop the food off to Georgie and Joey and find somewhere more private?"
"Sounds like a plan."
Walking Dex and Graves out of the station 10 minutes later, Joey goes back inside just as there is an explosion from Angelo.
"What the fuck is this?" Angelo holds up the stuffed toy in his hand.
Joey takes it from him, turning it over and over in her hands. "Yep, just what I thought." She tosses it back, "It's a kitten, Rosetta."
"I know what it is but what the fuck is it doing in my desk?"
"I don't know Rosetta, a kitten is usually found up a tree not in someone's desk."
Angelo glares at the other officers present when they snigger, realising that they knew about him being caught in the tree. Grinning, he holds up the toy, "The kitten I was getting out of the tree was black, not white."
"You sure it wasn't brown."
"It was black."
"I just thought that if it was brown, it might explain why I didn't see it, you know, it blending in to the branches."
"It was black, god damn it," he snaps.
"Fine, it was black." Joey shrugs, "No need to get so annoyed over a kitten Rosey."
"I'm going out on patrol," he mutters as brushes past her.
"Watch out for those kittens Rosey, I hear they're up every tree near Charlie's." Angelo storms from the station to the sound of laughter.
"You just had to do it, didn't you?" Watson asks her sister as she walks by her office.
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"I bet."
Joey grins, "You did say that I could piss him off as much as I wanted to after your rotation was over."
Watson chuckles as she returns to her desk. Joey ducks her head in the door, "Don't eat all the food."
"Piss off Joey, they brought it in for me."
"No, for us."
"They left it with me."
"At least leave me a sandwich," she mutters as she heads to her own office.
"Fuck," Joey mutters as they walk into the club, at the same time Graves moans, "Shit."
"A problem?" Dex asks.
"Martha," Joey says with distaste as they all look at the woman behind the bar.
"Oh, as in?"
"As in this could be an awkward night."
Charlie glances to her left for what she felt like must have been the thousandth time that night to catch Joey watching her. Offering her a smile, she turns her attention back to the others.
Watson keeps an eye on them from the bar as she gets the next round of drinks.
"Joey's wasting her time with that frigid bitch," Martha says as she sets the drinks down on the counter.
"They're just friends."
"Of course they are. Charlie's as straight as they come but Joey's not and I've seen the way she's been watching Charlie."
"Whether Joey likes Charlie that way or not, it doesn't matter because nothing will ever come of it." Noticing the way Martha was now watching her sister, Watson leans in closer, "I've already warned you to stay away from my sister, I won't warn you again."
"I don't know why you have such a problem with me hooking up with your sister."
"I don't want my sister mixed up in this."
"She wouldn't be." She sighs, "Georgie, I thought we were getting along."
"We have a business arrangement, nothing more."
Martha glares at her, "You really are a heartless bitch."
"Look in your own mirror Martha and stay the fuck away from my sister or we're through."
Martha grins cockily. "Once you're in Georgie, there's no going back."
"We both know that you have nothing to use against me Martha and you need my contacts more than I need the money."
"What would your sister say if she knew about us?"
"Go ahead and say something, she won't believe you, no one will." She snatches up a tray from the bar and takes the drinks back to the table, leaving Martha fuming.
"Fuck, I hate it when she's right," Martha mutters to herself, deciding to distract herself from Joey by flirting with Hugo who had been propping up the bar for the past hour.
"Martha, I'm gay," he reminds her.
"So, I like women."
"I don't, at least not in that way."
Martha grabs her breasts and pushes them up, "You sure you don't want some?"
"Sorry Martha," he shrugs, "You just don't do it for me."
Sighing as she failed to get a physical reaction out of him yet again, she leans her elbows on the bar. "You're lucky you're gay Hugo because I don't always take rejection well."
Hugo looks apologetic, "Hey, if I wasn't gay I'd fuck your brains out."
Martha looks him up and down, admiring his physique, "I can imagine."
"Why don't you pay a visit to Angelo, I'm sure he'd be up for it."
"Of course he would be up for it but I've decided that Angelo is not an option in the bedroom anymore."
"I'd almost feel sorry for him being dumped by both you and Charlie, if he wasn't such an arsehole."
Martha nods in agreement, her eyes once again wandering toward Joey.
"Charlie," Joey says between kisses, "We probably shouldn't be doing this if you want to keep us a secret."
"After sitting so close to you for nearly two hours, I just had to kiss you," Charlie says as she kisses her again, before stepping away. She smiles wryly, "Not the most romantic of places, I'll admit."
Joey chuckles, "Making out in the loos is certainly not my idea of romance, but," she wraps her arms around Charlie, "I'll take what I can get." Her lips finding Charlie's again.
"I thought you said we shouldn't be doing this," Charlie says a minute later.
"We shouldn't, which is why we'd better get back out there before people start wondering."
"I'll be out in a minute."
"You might want to splash some water on your face to get rid of that flush to your cheeks," Joey suggests as she steals another kiss. "It might look a little odd returning flushed from the toilets."
Staring in the mirror once the door closes, Charlie groans when she sees that she is indeed flushed. Splashing water on her face, she is just drying herself off when the door opens. "Hello Charlie."
"What do you want Martha?"
An hour later, a confused Joey walks Charlie to her car.
"Charlie, what's wrong, you've barely said two words in the last hour?"
With her anger building over the past hour, Charlie turns on Joey. "Did you fuck Martha, is that one of your secrets?" Her voice filled with hurt and anger. Charlie is even more shocked and hurt when Joey doesn't deny the accusation. "So it's true?"
Joey looks at her in dismay. "I'm sorry," she says weakly, devastated that Charlie found out like this.
"You're no better than Angelo," she says angrily.
Deeply hurt by the comparison, Joey's anger gets the better of her. "I am nothing like that bastard and you damn well know it. I have never cheated on anyone Charlie, unlike your ex."
"You slept with Martha and you never told me." She jumps into her car and drives away.
Watson rushes up to her sister, "Joey, what the hell happened?"
"Martha," she says, getting into her own car and following Charlie.
The others all turn to look at Martha who had watched on in amusement. "Was it something I said?"
"I told you to stay away from my sister."
"And I did. I just had a few words with Charlie."
Watson glares at her angrily "Why would you do that?"
"Joey was wasting her time pining over that cold fish."
"They were friends, Martha, nothing more. You just did this because you know how Charlie feels about you."
"Is it my fault Charlie can't stand me? Besides, if they're really friends, why should it bother Charlie if we slept together." She turns and heads back inside.
"Fuck," Watson mutters, knowing her sister had dreaded this moment. "I'm going home."
"Do you think Joey can explain to Charlie?" Dex asks in concern as they watch Watson walk away.
"It's not going to be easy, because she still can't explain why she slept with Martha," Graves answers.
"But Charlie's not with Angelo anymore, why should she care if there's more to the investigation than you've led her to believe?"
"Because it would open up a whole lot of questions which we really don't want asked at the moment." She sighs, "Until we make the arrests, we can't afford for Charlie to say something to Martha or Angelo. As much as we hate the guy, Charlie did love him and I don't think she will take the news of his other activities too well; we don't know how she will react when she finds out and the last thing we need is for her to confront him about what we already know. The same goes for her confronting Martha."
"I hope Joey can convince her then."
"So do I, because Joey's crazy about her and I'd hate for her to lose her. I'm just glad Leah and Roman had already left."
"They'll probably know by tomorrow."
"Shit, what a mess."
Dex puts his arm across her shoulders. "How about a walk along the beach?"
"Yeah, I think I could do with the fresh air."
Joey pulls her car up behind Charlie's, only moments after her.
"Charlie, please let me explain," she pleads as she races up the footpath.
"What's to explain, you fucked Martha." She slams the door in Joey's face.
Joey raises her hand to the doorbell, before changing her mind when she notices Bartlett walking by. "Fucking perve," she mutters. Deciding to avoid making a scene, Joey reluctantly gets back into her car. "Fuck," she hits the steering wheel. Wiping the tears away angrily, she drives off.
Next chapter, Charlie avoids Joey. Can Joey find a way to get her to listen to her?