Written for the het_bigbang on on Livejournal. Thanks to Karlamartinova for beta-reading.
"For the last time, Chris: I can't move into the Quarter!"
"Let me guess, LaSalle is playing estate agent with you too?"
Chris pointed an accusing finger at Brody- she didn't have any right making fun of him, not when she loved the place he had found her. Not when his little sister felt the same about the little apartment he had provided for her.
"Let me arrange a visit and you'll see that you'll fall in love with it!"
Georgie went and sat on Chris' desk- something he didn't particularly appreciated- and crossed her arms; Chris sat at his desk and turned his tablet, behaving like she wasn't there to begin with. A bit like they were two children.
"You hate driving, and if you want to be at walking distance from here you have to settle with the Quarter." Chris kept looking at his device while he spoke, like she wasn't even there, and he did so calmly, and was so sure of himself, of what he said, that it was quite unnerving. "Besides, girl, you've got French Quarter written all over you."
"First, you can't be reading me. I'm the one with the people-reading skills. And Brody too. Second, I don't hate driving, smartass."
Yep, childish all right.
"Then, the reason you don't want to move in the Quarter is that you don't want to be my semi-neighbor and you just don't have the gut to admit it."
"When I say that I can't move into the Quarter, I mean that I can't afford to move into the Quarter, not that I wouldn't like to. I can't even rent there. Not on a cop salary." She turned slightly to face him, eyes penetrating him like they were laser beams. There was a part of her that was just getting annoyed with him, as he had been trying to get her to move in said apartment since Day One, and that part of her was just that close to start being mean.
Two minutes, another remark and she was going to tell him something in the line of not everyone's lucky enough to be from Old Oil Money, sweetie.
Only, she groaned inside, she doubted she would. She could be mean- God and her siblings knew that. But not so much. Not when she knew that Christopher and his father had had such a troubled relationship, that the old man had died unsatisfied and bitter because neither of his sons- especially Christopher, the Crown Jewel of the LaSalle family- hadn't followed into his footsteps, nor had oil in their veins.
"So you want to be my neighbor." He grinned satisfied.
"That's not what I'm saying, and anyway, I thought you said it's few minutes from your building, which means that I wouldn't be your neighbor." She pouted. He had always loved when she did that. That pout made her lips very, very kissable. Not that he had never thought too much about that. He wondered, thought, if she knew this little piece of information and liked to use it against him.
"If I were to live five minutes from you, I'd be at your place the whole time. Just saying."
Brody snapped her tongue against her cheek. "You know that you are giving her a reason not to move close to you, right?"
As the very mature man he could be, Chris balled up a sheet of paper and threw it at Brody, who took it and sent it back at his own address, sticking her tongue out.
"C'mon Georgina…" He was sing-songing. Their conversation was getting on border-line ridiculous, they were practically proving Pride right: how many times had he called them "children" since their first case together a long time before?
She sighed, her eyes closed. "If I say yes, will you stop calling me Georgina? I hate it."
He shook his head, smiling. "Cannot do. That's your name, ma'am."
"Technically, Georgina's my middle name, and I'm pretty sure you know it."
"I know that, Christina Georgina Newman, but there's only room for one Chris here."
Brody snickered, which got a death glare in answer from Newman. "Why can't you and Pride be like any other cop and federal agent I've met in my very long career and just call me by my surname? New-man. Can't you see how it slips on your tongue? It's even easier than Georgina."
She made a face, quite disgusted. If there was something she enjoyed less than her middle name, was having LaSalle calling her by it- or even just thinking about him calling her like that- just to get a rise out of her.
He made a comment about Georgina being a nice southern name, and immediately she threw him a balled up sheet of paper, just like he had done before with Brody; grinning, Chris received it like it was a tennis ball- with his tablet. The same tablet he then offered her, one eyebrow lifted.
"What's that?" She asked him, skeptical, before taking the device from his own hands.
"It's called a tablet. It's a technological device that implements the working of both a computer and a phone in a shape that's smaller than a computer but bigger than the average smartphone."
Newman chuckled, shaking her head. "Yeah, listen, you know that sarcasm is considered the lowest form of wit, right?"
"Any kind of wit is still good for me, Georgina." He chuckled as well, smiling, and went at her side. "Those, Georgina dearest, are pictures of your future apartment."
"In your cloud?! Seriously, Chris, how many people do you know that are renting off apartments?" Meredith went behind them and got a glimpse of the pictures, all clearly home-made and definitely not professional, nor to be used under any professional guise. "Quarter's not my thing, but you could have at least showed them to me!"
"Place belongs to a former detective I worked with back when I was NOLA PD. Got married and moved up north six months ago, still haven't been able to sell it yet. Its' still on the market, that's why it's just a week by week deal." Chris rolled his eyes and put the tablet once again in Georgina's hands, his gaze on Brody. "Besides, you are no Quarter girl, Brody, but you so are, Georgina dear."
She sighed, pouted. "I don't want to see it just to fall in love with the place and then discover that, after all, I can't move in there... it would be…"
"You are not dating an apartment. You are not marrying an apartment. You can go and give a look at this apartment and it's not gonna be awkward if you'll not take it." Chris rolled his eyes, took back his tablet. "Besides, you can't keep living in a B&B."
Georgina sighed; part of her didn't want to give in to Chris' demands, fearing that, with him, it would only be the beginning, but he had picked up her curiosity, ignited it with those simple shoots.
"Can you arrange a visit?"
Chris practically beamed with happiness and pride. "I've got one even better: I have the keys. First moment you are free, we are a go."
They didn't talk about it for another couple of days, though; they had gotten a case, that had turned into a bigger case and had given them more problems than what they had originally assumed.
It was already night, and Pride had already gone to tend to the bar, when Meredith retreated to join her boss.
"You coming along?" She asked as she was practically already out of the door; Georgie was tempted; she hadn't had dinner yet, and she would have found food at Pride's. But, he would have probably asked her to help him out, like he always did with all the members of the team, and she was so tired she could barely stand, let alone work some more.
"Nah, I think I'll pass. I may have a date with some fluffy pillows, after all." She smiled, that tired smile of hers, that it didn't reach her eyes, then she grabbed from the back of the chair her leather jacket and her purse from her closed drawer, and walked out; she checked the time, wondered where and when the next bus would stop so that she could go back "home", when Chris sprinted before her and stopped in front of her petite frame.
"Hi?" She asked, smiling- a smile that, he noticed, that time was reaching her eyes, maybe because it was embedded with curiosity. And, who knew, maybe, deep, deep down, even affection.
"Let's make a deal." He was a bit too serious, Georgie realized, but, gulping down a mouthful of saliva, she realized that in his eyes she could just see how much… fond of her he was; she had always considered Chris a good friend, and she knew he felt the same, but she knew also something else- a terrible truth that had driven her away from New Orleans many years before: she had always liked Chris LaSalle a bit too much- which was a recipe for potential heart-break.
"Let's go and see the apartment. It's just five minutes from here by foot. Then we grab a bite and I drive you back to your B&B."
She took a big breath, wondering what she was supposed to say: it sounded an awfully lot like a date.
But then again, they were merely "grabbing a bite". And besides, it was just so that she could see the place. Because they had been clear about the whole thing. They couldn't date. She had reminded him all the reasons they had never done so just a few weeks before, when she had landed back in town. And Chris was a smart man, who wasn't the type to sleep where he ate- a man who was acting a bit childish in his way of moving on, but ehy, she wasn't one to talk. If he thought that sleeping around and partying all night long could get him closure, so be it. Not everyone could be like her who had compartmentalized her feelings after her husband's loss and got lost in the job, turning into an Ice Queen..
So, it was ok. She could do it.
"All right." She shrugged, and Chris simply nodded, proud of himself.
He wasn't an idiot. He knew her. He could read Georgina all right: she thought it wasn't a date- but he was going to prove her wrong. He would show her domesticity, gave her dreams and hopes and he was going to charm his way into her life. Slowly. Killing her reserves softly. And then, before she could see it- before she could realize it- it would be time to get back to Los Angeles, but getting on a plane would be the last thing on her mind.
He would be. And staying.
In an hot, Alabama summer, Christopher LaSalle had told his brother that he had met the woman he would have married- and then, he had lost her; Savannah had been the one who had gotten away. He wasn't going to make the same mistake twice.
I've got her, Cade. He thought, already foreseeing what he would have said to his big brother on their next phone call. I've got the girl of my dreams. And this time, I'm not letting her go.
"I thought you would have been more thrilled." Chris ate his Boudin Balls with Garlic Aioli while walking at Georgie's side; they had taken different things from the Que Crawl food truck – Georgie had chosen french fries with Parmesan Reggiano -each of them paying for themselves ("It's not a date, Chris, I can't have you paying me dinner!"), and yet, they were stealing food from each other.
"Uhm. I don't get exited easily. When you live in a base as long as I did, you learn that there's no need for anything fancy." She said with a mouthful of food. "But yeah, I love it. So, if you can get me this lovely apartment for so little, I'm on board."
Chris was going to answer her that, of course he could get her the apartment at the promised price, maybe adding some flirt to it, even, when he heard someone calling him at his back.
"Yo! LaSalle!"
They both turned, and saw a guy approaching them- a bit older than Chris himself, dark, tall, dressed carefully and with an high-end suite, with the weird, and yet stylish, addiction of a leather jacket.
Chris did his best to smile and greeted his friend despite the burning desire of being anywhere but there: he was trying to charm a lady, and he didn't want to have an audience, or having Georgina find an excuse to bail on him. "Keith Trevor! Long time no seeing!"
"Well, hello!" Chris rolled his eyes as Keith, still shaking his hand, turned a lecherous gaze on Geordie, turning on the charm. He chuckled. Like he hadn't invented the trick himself… "Sorry I ruined your date… didn't see you were in good company."
Chris gnashed; he wasn't an idiot, he had known Keith a long time, and his "friend", if he could be called like that, knew exactly what he was doing. It was probably some kind of payback for some date he had ruined to Keith himself in the past.
"Oh, no, It's not a date. We are not dating. We just work together." She felt the need to clarify, but her cheeks were red, and her voice low and hoarse; Chris grinned a little at that, hoping that it was for him- that she just didn't know what he wanted and was wondering the same things he did; was he pissed that she was dismissing the idea of dating him? Of course. But at least she was almost stuttering.
"That's Georgie Newman, my new partner. Georgie, that's Keith Trevor, my former partner. Way back when I was NOLA PD…" He introduced the two of them. Casually. Like often people did. Why shouldn't he have done otherwise, after all? He didn't want to seem the odd man out, or creepy.
"I can speak for myself, Chris, thank you very much." She shook Keith's hand, a little too flirty for Chris' taste. "Detective Trevor, nice to meet you."
She was still holding his hand, and her eyes had fallen on the badge around his neck- a golden shield; she was so taken by him that she didn't even notice that Chris had been introducing her with her nickname, and not, like usual, Georgina - a name that he had turned into a pet-name when it came to him, something that he alone wanted to use for her, nor with her full name.
Chris cleared his throat, not wanting to be the third wheel- something that Keith was supposed to be. And yet his "friend" wasn't getting any hint; he and Georgie kept talking and gossiping about people she had met since her return and he knew and it felt like it had passed an eternity when it had been merely few minutes.
Chris shook his head, trying to insert himself in the discussion when they started talking about a detective they had been working with during their last case and whom Keith knew personally. It couldn't be too late. Ok, Georgie seemed to fancy Keith, but hey, it didn't have to mean anything. She could still be his.
After all, they had just met Keith by chance. She was probably going to forget all about him in a matter of hours anyway.
Like it hadn't happened at all.
