Baez walked into Danny's house, closing the door behind her. She took the stairs and rounded the corner. She was about to barge into the room, when she thought that might be rude. "Reagan! Can I come in?"
"Yeah, but be quiet."
She shrugged and made her way inside. A smile graced her face when she saw Linda snuggled up in Danny's embrace. Her head was on his shoulder, her left hand resting on his chest, and her right hand on his thigh. "Aww."
"You got the stuff?" Danny whispered.
"Yeah. But the box is still in the car."
"You want me to grab it?"
"If you'd please."
"Okay. Hold on," he moved his arm and slightly shook Linda's shoulder. "Come on, Linda babe, wake up."
She moaned and snuggled closer, "is it morning already?"
Baez choked down a laugh as Danny smirked. "No, Baez is back."
Linda rolled off Danny and looked at the Latina. "Hey."
"Hey. I think we've got some pretty good stuff to start to build a case against these bastards."
"Awesome... you want coffee?"
"If you don't mind."
"Nah, I was gonna make coffee anyways." She put her left hand over her left eye, "you take sugar?"
"Yeah. Thanks."
"No problem," Linda exited the room, still sleepy-headed.
"She's really cute when she's groggy," Danny smiled, getting off the bed.
"Wanna know what I love about you?" Baez watched him stretch.
"My charm? My good nature? My physique?"
She laughed, "other than your delusional humor? Just the fact you've got this tough, hardass, dancing-with-danger personality at work, but here? You're just a big, cuddly.... panda bear. You know, protecting your prize?"
Danny chuckled, "tell anybody you said that, and I'll kill you."
"Maybe you'd wanna put a shirt on first."
"What?" Danny looked down at himself, "oh, yeah."
"It's, like, twenty eight degrees outside. Why are you shirtless? I mean, I would've ordinarily assumed it was because of sex, but Linda's definitely not ready for that!"
"She's close..." he pulled a lightweight sweater over his head. "You wanna know what I like most about our friendship?"
"What?"
"We don't care anymore. We're not embarrassed by our love lives or normal lives."
"I'm not necessarily sure that's a good thing." Baez followed him down the stairs.
"Maybe not," Danny shrugged and immediately rounded the corner when he heard Linda say, "Ow!"
"Damn," she quickly made her way to the sink and turned the cold water on.
"You okay?" Danny walked up to her.
"Yeah, just burned myself... ah!"
"Can I see?" He held out his hand.
She smirked, "it's just a burn, honey. Nothing that won't go away in a few days." She showed him her pink index finger, "see? No worries."
"Good... I'm gonna help Baez bring some boxes in. We'll be right back, okay?"
"Mhmm. I'll be here." Linda looked at her burned finger. It hurt when it was burned, but it felt good, too. Almost like air had been let out of a balloon, she felt some release of pressure. She chewed her lip, flashing back to when she was shot. She had done a little self harm... a lot of self harm, but she got over it... a little bit.
No. Linda thought, I'm not gonna hurt myself. Self harm gets me no where... although... it does feel good... but... I did almost kill myself... she sighed in frustration. She'd let it go for now, but it was going to come back to haunt her.
A/n
Just decided this could be considered a "sequel" (not really) to Nightmares. Don't really have to read Nightmares to understand this, but the self harm is referenced back to that.
Happy reading