When Tim was a kid -six, maybe seven years old- he told a lie. It wasn't the first time, not by a long shot, but for some reason, that moment had stuck with him. His family had lived pretty much hand to mouth his entire childhood. Consequently, everyone in their unit was expected to do their part to make the little money that came in go as far as it could (and by everyone, that meant Tim and his mother; God forbid someone told Tom Bradford he'd have to go without his favorite fucking liquor for even one fucking week). His mom, Faye, did her best to make do. She shopped at thrift stores, clipped coupons, accepted second-hand clothing from friends and co-workers. For Tim, stretching a dollar meant not asking for much, and his father made it clear that he was expected to take good care of what little he had. Tim got a new pair of pants only when his old ones consistently started showing above his ankles and had just been given a nice set of denim jeans when he had an accident involving thin, cheap construction paper and a permanent marker from his mother's sewing kit. Mom, seeing the black lines down his new jeans, asked him what had happened. Afraid of how his dad might react to his carelessness, Tim lied. He lied through his teeth, claiming a kid at school had marked up his pants on purpose to be mean. As he walked to the bus stop the next morning, Tim discarded the evidence, tossing both the paper and the pen into the neighbor's trash can.

Even then, he knew his mother didn't believe him, could see it on her face that she was not convinced by his story, but she did not argue. She did not shout or carry on that she knew he was being untruthful. That just wasn't her way of handling her son, and anyway, the unexpressed disappointment on her face was enough to make him want to give up lying for good. He never confessed and was never punished, and by the time he grew out of the streak-stained jeans, the run-in with the marker was all but forgotten. Still, the guilt over lying ate at Tim so badly he swore he'd never lie again.

An impossible thing to swear, that. Too large, too broad a promise to make and keep as a kid. There were smaller lies (yes, I did my homework) told at bedtime, bigger lies (I'm okay) told at his mother's funeral, and hundreds that landed somewhere in between. A handful of ill-advised sips stolen from his dad's bottles of bourbon, for example, or the occasional prank phone call on friends. There was a brief phase where he skipped English class in middle school, feigning headaches when it came time to read aloud.

It was strange that he thought of that childhood promise now, though. Now, as he sat outside the apartment belonging to his estranged wife. It didn't take much effort to call to memory his mother's disappointed expression as he had fibbed to her face, her blue eyes searching his, her mouth curving down into the slightest frown as she realized her only child was lying. What would she think of him now, Tim wondered. What would she have to say about what he was contemplating? He was far from the little boy who'd drawn on his jeans by mistake. This -what Isabel was asking him to do- was deceit on another level.

Isabel's boyfriend had stored drugs in her apartment. In a hurried whisper, she revealed he'd find a kilo of heroin tucked behind the heating unit, and the blood drained from Tim's face. A kilo? He had naively thought it would be something small, something easily discarded. Dime bags, maybe, divided and ready to sell. Not a fucking brick of heroin, and there was a split second where he had almost raised his voice at her before biting back his sharp reply. Chen was just a few feet away, and for all he knew, Vestri and Wolfe were around the corner. Even one shouted word could alert any or all of them to Isabel's request, so Tim bit his tongue. There was nothing else he needed to say, anyway. Isabel had already secured his help, and after months of her vehemently and sometimes violently refusing his assistance… well, he had to do this for her, didn't he? Help her, like he'd been trying -begging- to do all along?

Tim was ashamed at how easy it was to justify his actions as he stepped outside of his truck, casting a glance to the left, then right to make sure the coast was clear. With every step towards her building, he reminded himself of his reasons, flimsy and thin as they were. By taking the drugs, he was keeping it off the streets. Keeping it out of the hands of junkies and almost literally taking money out of the pockets of criminals. The blowback from the heroin going missing would land on Carson, not Isabel. When the detectives searched her apartment and found nothing, she had a better shot at a plea deal. He told himself it was a crime without a victim; the repercussions would be felt only by those who deserved it the most. Still, the unease in his stomach grew with every step, nagging, gnawing as he put on gloves, jimmied the lock open to her apartment, and let the door swing wide.

Tim had never been inside Isabel's apartment before. He didn't know what he was expecting, only realizing as he walked through the door that he'd prepared himself for something close to a drug den. It wasn't that. Her apartment was, as Lucy had told him, decent. Not quite nice, but not awful. It reeked of cigarettes, and the sheer white curtains were stained yellow from tobacco smoke. A few empty takeout containers sat on the kitchen counter, and another man's shoes stood by the door, but it was otherwise clean and pretty well kept. On the coffee table stood a picture of Tim and Isabel in happier times, her forehead resting against his, their smiles wide and genuine. Had they really ever been as happy as they appeared in pictures? Looking at it felt a little like how a dream faded after waking. He remembered it in flashes, in occasionally clear moments, but it was less and less tangible as time passed, seeming less real by the day. How had life led them here, he thought as he pulled a black garbage bag from the pouch of his sweatshirt, then silenced every thought as he reached behind the heater. Even as his hand groped blindly in the space behind the radiator, he'd held out for a miracle. Hoped that Isabel had been wrong. That Carson hadn't hidden anything or that she had misunderstood. Hoped that, somehow, he would be delivered from this entire shitty circumstance, but it was a vain hope quickly dashed. No sooner had he stuck his hand into the gap than it connected with a rectangular bundle wrapped in cellophane. He only looked long enough to be sure it was the heroin, then stuffed the brick into the garbage bag, anxious to get it out of his sight before he left the apartment.

Adrenaline made him want to run, but Tim knew sudden movement was more likely to attract attention than if he kept his pace slow and steady. So with his eyes set forward, he walked with intention towards his truck and had just opened the driver's side door when movement a few feet in front of him caught his eye. As Lucy turned to face him, his mouth formed her name without making a sound.

Disbelief hit Tim first. How? How had she known? He'd been so careful not to breathe a word to anyone. Surely Isabel would not have said anything. Maybe his demeanor -grave, distracted- for the rest of their shift had made Lucy suspicious. Leave it to her to figure out his plan with nothing more than long stretches of tense silence to go on.

His second response was fury, a wave of anger that burned quickly and with no rationale. What the fuck was she doing here? Didn't she know how dangerous this was? Did she have no sense of self-preservation; did she care for herself so little that she couldn't leave well enough the fuck alone? Tim slammed his car door and walked towards her, determined to make her go. Not for his sake, either; for her own, but if he knew Chen at all, he figured she wouldn't leave without an argument. He was correct. Being told to go earned him a flat-out "no" in response, but the way Lucy's lips trembled over that single syllable caused the first fissure to form in his confidence, a pang in the center of his chest that rippled outward. When he warned her that she was out of her depth, she retorted that so was he. Then, despite her claim that she hadn't come to lecture him, she began to do just that, reminding Tim that what he was about to do did not align with the man she knew.

"If you came all this way to analyze me-"

"-Tim, please," Lucy interrupted. "If you would stop trying to belittle me for one second, you'd see I want to help you. Do you really think that fixing this for Isabel is going to change her? It won't. All it will do is change you. Maybe that doesn't matter to you, but it matters to me." He bristled beneath her steady stare, sure she saw clear through the way he had to fake his strength. "Have you thought about that, Tim? Not just what this is going to do to you, but what it'll do to me to have to choose between protecting you and turning you in?"

"I would never ask you to protect me."

To that, she sighed, her shoulders lifting in a weary inhale. With her exhale, Lucy's voice came out hushed, a sentence that shook him as much as it would have if she'd thrown a live grenade at his feet.

"I know," she said. "But you should know, I would never make you ask."

It would've been easy to chalk that up to her being his rookie, to their connection as training officer and trainee. It would've been easy, and it would've been a lie. Tim knew that wasn't how she meant it. He could see in Lucy's face and hear in her words that it was so much more than concern for a co-worker that brought her here. Her protection was offered without caveat, spoken with a depth of feeling far beyond what was typical for two people in their positions. However Lucy had come to be there, she had not come as his boot. If she had, she would've reminded him of his responsibility as her training officer, of his oath to uphold the law. Lucy had come as a person who cared for him, as someone who knew with certainty how he'd regret helping Isabel and that that regret would destroy him.

She came, somehow knowing the terrible thing he'd been asked to do, and asked that if he would not think of himself, would Tim at least think of her?

He would. And he did. Lucy did not linger long after he had once more ordered her to go, and once she'd gone, he put the heroin back in the apartment.

Have you thought about that, Tim? Not just what this is going to do to you, but what it'll do to me to have to choose between protecting you and turning you in?

When was the last time someone said they would protect him? Tim couldn't remember. Perhaps no one had. Maybe Lucy had been the first.

Maybe Lucy had been the only.

I would never make you ask.

Six words. It had only taken six words to blow away the last of his doubts, to topple his rapidly weakening resolve like a house of cards. Six words and a single look, given through lowered lashes by brown eyes he was starting to know by heart.

For weeks, Tim had backed down from his certainty that soulmates weren't real, a belief that had been steadily chipped away since the moment he saw her face. Tonight was the first time he knew for sure. Soulmates were real, and Lucy was undoubtedly his. He could think of no other reason why she continued to care despite his attempts to push her away, could think of no other explanation for why she'd willingly put herself at risk for his sake. She had acted as his protector long before that night, starting with the day he'd been shot, and again when she'd held him together the morning Isabel overdosed, and countless other moments in between then and now.

There was more at work underneath it all, too, something deeper that had so far defied description. The seeing for him, the heat for her… maybe the way their bond had manifested had just been the symptoms, had only been the beginnings. Maybe soulmates were this; soulmates were what she'd done that night and dozens of times past, grabbing him as he leaned over the edge and keeping him from falling. She had seen him at his worst consistently, and not once had she been scared off. Not once had she run. She stayed when she shouldn't have, was strong when he was weak, and not once had he reciprocated.

Yes, all of this was true, and it had culminated in a final, unavoidable fact: he could not help Isabel. As he tucked the heroin back into its hiding spot, Tim's eyes burned with tears. He knew, by doing so, he was condemning Isabel to face the consequences alone. He knew she would never forgive him.

… And he knew, on some level, it didn't matter. The moment Lucy involved herself, it was no longer a choice between right and wrong. It became a choice between the two of them. His wife and his soulmate.

"Don't make me choose between you and her again," he said to Lucy the next morning, his throat so taut with tension that it came out almost like a growl. She had not been wrong to stop him, and he was not angry with her for placing herself in the middle. Hoping he would stop for her sake was a risk that paid off, but it was not a pleasant feeling; and Tim worried that, now that he'd chosen Lucy, there was a chance he always would.

The charges were increased. Tim had known they would be, and in the days immediately after Isabel's transfer to County, it felt like a haze descended. Every step was like moving through a fog, every interaction blurred and unclear. Guilt hung over him in a thick and heavy cloud, making his shoulders sag and sapping all of his energy. Bishop and Lopez made time to check on him, doing their best to distract him with a night out after work. Nice of them, but not necessary, and both women made the mistake of thinking his silence and soberness were nothing more than grief.

If only it were simple grief. Grief, Tim could handle. He'd been coping with the loss of Isabel's presence for a long time now. This was more than that; more, and worse in every way. He'd upheld one oath and broken another. Forsaking all others. Yeah fucking right. Who knew what would become of Isabel now? Right choice or not, it didn't sit well with him. None of it made him feel good or strong. In every aspect, he felt like a failure. As a husband. As a cop.

As a soulmate.

More and more of his focus had shifted to Lucy. Tim had started to regard his decision at Isabel's as the equivalent of a first, timid step in his soulmate's direction. After all of his declarations to the contrary, suddenly craving a place in her life felt hypocritical, more than a little juvenile, and plain old fucking stupid. Yes, he knew she was his soulmate, and he was hers. That was no longer in question for him. She'd once more managed to disarm him with a look and a sentence, blithely upending everything he thought he knew and leaving him off-kilter. Now, he wasn't sure whether he was worthy of her, and God, how fucking ridiculous was it that that was even a thought in his mind?

Fucking hell, his feelings were all over the map. No wonder he was exhausted.

He was careful to keep every interaction with her limited, if not blunt, determined to hold Lucy at arm's length until he figured out just what the hell was going on now. Whenever she tried to meet his eyes (and she did so quite often), he avoided her. The few times she succeeded, there was pity in her gaze. Pity and, unless he was mistaken, a little bit of disappointment. Tim could handle her disappointment (he'd earned that by now and had earned it in spades), but he quickly realized he loathed her pity and hated that she found him worth pitying. Why, whenever she saw his failures, was her first instinct to respond with compassion? Why did it seem easier for her to treat him kindly than to stoop to his level and meet him, blow for blow, bad decision for bad fucking decision? As fucked up as it was, he would've felt better if she were livid, and it wasn't hard for him to imagine her continued silence and growing distance were motivated by long-overdue anger towards her TO. Good, he thought bitterly. Lucy should be angry. At least that, he felt he deserved. Not her worry, and certainly not her kindness.

Tim should've guessed that it wasn't over. Hadn't he learned by now that nothing was ever tied up neatly? Not long after her transfer to prison, Isabel was returned to the Mid-Wilshire station, marched across the bullpen in an orange jumpsuit and handcuffs. Grey intercepted Tim, offering what little information he had. She was working as a CI, he said. Her contacts on the street helped her secure a plea deal. At least with the deal, she'd stay out of prison.

Damn it. This was his fault, wasn't it? By not helping, Tim had forced Isabel's hand; by leaving the drugs, he'd given her no choice but to barter for her freedom with the one bargaining chip she had: as a confidential informant, turning over valuable intel about the drug trade in the city. Even though Grey tried to frame her detective skills as an asset, Tim knew Isabel's past as a cop was a target on her back. The danger posed wasn't an if, but a certainty. He returned to the shop pretty wound up, and what little talking he and Lucy did to begin the morning saw him being unnecessarily brash and terse with her. His tone shifted only when an alert came over the laptop, and her horrified expression released in him a desire to be gentle that had never before come so easily.

"Officer-involved shooting," she had said, her voice straining as she revealed quietly, "It's Nolan."

His fears over Isabel faded to the background, replaced immediately by concern for Lucy. Shock played out over her face, her eyes welling a little with unshed tears as she read the alert a second time. The silence in the shop was pierced by the sound of his cell phone. It was Sergeant Grey. They were needed at the station as character witnesses for Nolan. As he pulled a u-turn at the next intersection, Tim cast a sidelong glance towards Lucy. "You okay, Boot?"

Her answer came out flat, almost mechanical. "Yeah."

"Are you really?"

"… No. I don't know if he's ever met a conflict he couldn't 'nice' his way out of." She added mournfully, "I'm worried what this will do to him."

Tim wished he knew what to say. Hell, a response was practically expected of him, but he didn't exactly have a speech in his back pocket for this kind of situation. He'd talked a few recruits through shootings before, but this was different for obvious reasons. A cut-and-paste answer wouldn't have worked on Chen. Her worry for Nolan extended beyond professional courtesy. She was concerned for Nolan as his friend, and Tim was worried for Lucy as her soulmate. A practiced response would not have worked because she was like no other rookie. He knew he should say something to try to encourage her, but all he came up with before they were separated was, "It's going to be okay, Lucy," and hoped that it would be proven true with time.

Officer-involved shootings were a complicated business. When the officer being investigated was a rookie, the scrutiny increased ten-fold. Tim didn't envy the interrogation awaiting Nolan and had little to offer the interviewers in the way of insight (seriously, his testimony was basically worthless but, due to protocol, required). What few facts he knew about Nolan had come through hearsay, so all Tim could do was offer his impression of the oldest rookie; that would have to be enough. Nolan was placed on administrative leave pending the results of the investigation. In the meantime, Talia had been given the "tap", a term that basically meant the detectives had their eyes on her and were looking at getting her to join their ranks. For the time being, she was asked to assist Wolfe and Vestri on the drug case they were overseeing. It just so happened the case they were working on was Isabel's. That was all good news for Talia; she had her sights set on climbing the ladder, and the detective's exam was the next rung on the way up to Chief. Her involvement was good for Tim, too, as she kept him apprised of what Vestri and Wolfe planned to do with Isabel.

It just so happened that this "plan" of theirs was a load of shit, half-baked, and really, really fucking dangerous. Tim learned at lunch the next day that, through a coordinated effort from the DA and the detectives, Isabel had been coerced into wearing a wire. Her boyfriend had been arrested, so they planned to have Isabel stand in for Carson in a purchase that, with any luck, would result in the arrests of some heavy hitters. The drug bust, Bishop explained somberly, was happening that night. No sooner had the information left Talia's mouth than Tim was on his feet, and before he could talk himself off of the ledge, he had stormed into the captain's office.

It was out of character for Tim to conduct himself in that manner. Respect for leadership and the etiquette expected when addressing superiors had been drilled into him since he was eighteen years old. He knew better, not just as a cop but also as a soldier. It spoke volumes of his recklessness that neither etiquette nor hierarchy was enough to make him pause, to keep him from bursting into his boss' office without announcement to demand an explanation for an op he had no part in.

The display earned him no favors with Andersen. When Tim entered, she'd been speaking with two uniformed men, and she dismissed them stoically before turning her attention towards Tim. Though she threatened him with leave and no pay, the threat fell on deaf ears, glossed over as he begged for her to reconsider. Isabel couldn't do the op, he said. She wouldn't be able to handle it. She was no longer the woman in her file, the cop that had been through dozens of busts just like this as a detective.

His pleading affected Captain Andersen enough emotionally that sympathy was plain on her face. She let Tim state his case without interruption, but he did not manage to move the needle of her compassion enough for her to withdraw the plan. The best she could offer, so she said, was to put him on the rescue detail. If the worst happened (and he was terrified it would), Tim would be the first in. She hoped that would be good enough.

It wasn't. It wasn't at all, but there was no more to be done. As he left the room with his head bowed low, Tim felt dread and the cold chill of fear as it settled into his bones.

A/N: When I started this AU in November 2020, we knew almost nothing about Tim's past except for Isabel and one reference to his abusive dad. By the time it came out in canon that Tim had at least one sister, I'd already committed to this version of him (only child, mom died when he was young). Hopefully no one is too bothered by the fact that Genny will not be appearing at any point in this fic!
Thanks to Heather and Mari both for reading this chapter through to make sure I was headed in the right direction, to Ash for being so encouraging, and to Daisy for distracting me with Jack Reacher when working on this got to be too much. :P Thank you for reading! The next update will be out on March 4th!