Jamie was partnered for the day with Laura Martinez, the same rookie who'd responded to the robbery call with them, as her TO finished out his own modified duty. He was initially happy to be riding with her – she seemed like she had a good head on her shoulders, and besides, out of all the free agents at the precinct she was about the only non-jackass. But by the time they'd reached the sixth hour of their tour having exchanged probably six sentences the entire time, it was getting old. He didn't know if the rookie was quiet because of what had happened with the shooting, or if it was just her personality around a senior officer, but not being small-talk-inclined himself made the silence almost painful. Coupled with the fact that it was a relatively slow tour, Jamie was really missing the ease of conversation that he had with Eddie.

He glanced over at Martinez where she sat in the passenger seat twiddling with her phone. She noticed him staring at her and gave him a small smile. Bolstered by the sign that she at least didn't hate him, Jamie decided to bring up the elephant in the room – or the car, as it was. "Look, I want to apologize for what happened a couple weeks ago."

She put the phone down on the seat beside her and furrowed her brow. "For what?"

"For leaving the scene like that. For encouraging you to leave like that. It was unprofessional and as the senior officer I should've known better. And I don't know what kind of a rip you caught – "

"I didn't get a rip." He stopped in his tracks and looked at her quizzically. She shook her head. "Sarge was kind of weird about it, actually. He pulled me aside and told me not to do it again, but he didn't seem that pissed off. I was expecting him to suspend me or put me on a desk or something, but nothing happened."

Jamie snorted. "Yeah, I think I got the brunt of it." Seeing concern flash across the rookie's face he hastened to add on, "As I should have."

She nodded understandingly. "Don't worry about me. I'm fine." They lapsed into silence for a moment.

"Why'd you do it?" Her question caught him off guard.

"Why'd I – "

"Why'd you leave the scene if you knew? It's not like we could have done anything."

Jamie sighed. He'd asked himself the same thing in the days following the shooting, and had yet to come up with an answer that he could voice to himself. "I don't know."

She nodded, clearly feeling like she might've crossed a line in questioning him and not wanting to pry further. But somehow Jamie felt like he owed this woman something – after all, he'd basically hijacked her from a scene and had her do something that, had Renzulli not been so tremendously understanding of the situation, could well have gotten her in serious trouble. And somehow verbalizing this stuff to a rookie who was clearly too intimidated by his authority to ever repeat any of it was liberating. "I think I just felt like I couldn't sit there and do nothing. You know? Like, in that moment, when all that was going down, I knew the rules. I knew what I was supposed to do, and I knew what the consequences could be. I just didn't care."

For a moment he thought he'd gone too far, especially considering the fact that Martinez already probably had doubts about his mental state after sitting with him in the ER. But he looked over to see her nodding. "I get that."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, I do. Um…my girlfriend, she had cancer – she's doing okay now, but last year she was pretty sick. And that was while I was in the academy, and I had this exam, it was some community policing thing. But then the hospital called me, and it wasn't even that urgent, they just had some test result or something, and I knew if I missed the exam I'd have to redo the whole course, but I just – said screw it. I took off. And then it ended up being nothing, so…" She trailed off. "That's not really the same thing, I guess."

Jamie shook his head, chuckling slightly. "I guess it sort of is."

The rookie's eyes widened as she looked over at him.

He hurried to backtrack. "No – Eddie and I, we're not – it's not like that. It's complicated."

She grinned. "Oh, it's complicated. I've heard that one before."

He shook his head. "Yeah, yeah. Really, it's not." He narrowed his eyes at her amusedly. "That would be against the rules."

She raised her eyebrows. "I know you've got a reputation as the golden boy around here, Reagan, but I gotta say I'm not seeing it."

"Hey, I may not be Patterson but I'm still your TO for now. Watch it, rookie."

She laughed and drew her hand up to her forehead in a mock salute. "Copy that."

After an interminable eight hours answering phones and filing other people's reports, Eddie was entirely ready to go home. As she wrestled to pull the top she'd worn in that morning on over her sling, all she wanted was to go home, order takeout, and vegetate in front of the TV. She wasn't an introvert by any stretch, but after spending the entire day talking to what felt like every moron in Manhattan, she thought she could understand how Jamie felt after she would drag him to three bars in an evening on some Friday nights. She heard the door swing open behind her, but didn't turn around.

"Hey, Janko! How was the first day back?" Sarah's voice was absurdly perky and Eddie felt an irrational rush of annoyance. She turned to her colleague and wrinkled her nose.

"Ugh. Don't ask."

"That bad?"

"Worse. One guy called, wasted out of his mind, because his girlfriend cheated on him with his boss."

"Geez. What'd he want you to do?"

"How the hell should I know?"

Sarah chuckled. "Hey, you can't drive with the sling on, right?" Eddie shook her head curtly. "How you getting home?"

"Bus, probably."

Sarah scoffed. "You're not taking the bus all the way to your place."

"Well, what do you want me to do?"

"Get Reagan to drive you. He has a car, right?"

Eddie rolled her eyes. "Reagan lives in Brooklyn Heights. My place is like, nowhere close to on his way."

"Oh, as if he cares. He'd drive you to Jersey after tour every day if you asked him."

Eddie sighed. "Not now."

"I said nothing. Just – don't be stubborn. Let him help you out." With that, her colleague strode away, swinging the door shut behind her. Eddie shook her head incredulously – in all that unsolicited commentary, her friend hadn't even bothered to get changed. She did have a point, though. At the very least, she was sure Jamie would give her a lift to the bus stop, which would be nice considering the fact that it was about twenty degrees out and the streets were icy as all hell.

She walked out of the locker room to find Jamie leaning against the wall outside, as though he'd known she'd be looking for him. As she approached him, he looked up from his phone and scrunched up his face sympathetically. "How was tour?"

She shook her head and leaned against the wall beside him.

He nodded. "Yeah, don't miss it."

She shot him a glare. "Way to rub it in."

"Sorry."

"Who'd you end up with today?"

"Martinez."

She couldn't immediately place the name, but when she did, she looked up at him incredulously. "How was that?"

He stifled a grin. "Pretty good, considering. She's not bad for a rookie."

Eddie raised her eyebrows, masking the pang of actual jealousy that his words sent through her with an exaggerated version. "Should I be worried, Reagan?"

Jamie looked down at her, cracking an amused smile. She chafed under the realization that her jealousy hadn't been as well-hidden as she'd hoped. He shook his head. "She's a good kid, but she barely said four words all tour. I think I started hallucinating conversations with you in my head by the end of it. Believe me, you got nothing to worry about."

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously for a moment. "Good. I have to say, though, sitting in silence for eight hours sounds pretty good right about now." She shook her head. "Which reminds me – you think you could give me a lift to the bus stop over on Sixth?"

He nodded. "Yeah, of course. How about I just take you home?"

"No, that's too far out of your way and the roads are crap."

"You shouldn't take the bus with your shoulder."

She rolled her eyes at him. "Because this line is so crowded at this time of night? Jamie, I'll be fine."

He chuckled and shook his head. "Janko, just take the offer."

Eddie looked up at him thoughtfully for a moment before nodding. "Okay. Only because I value your peace of mind."

"Janko, you're like, the single biggest drain on my peace of mind – "

She grinned. "But you love it."

He shook his head and slung an arm around her shoulder. "All right. Let's just go before I change my mind."

They were only a few blocks from the precinct when Jamie suddenly pulled to the side of the road and slid the car into park. Eddie looked over at him quizzically from the passenger seat. "You okay?"

He nodded and looked over at her. "Don't be pissed."

She quirked an eyebrow at him. "Why would I be pissed?"

He shook his head and broke eye contact, staring out the front windshield. "I realize now looking back that it was a bad idea – actually, I thought it was a bad idea from the get-go, but –"

"Jamie! What did you do?"

He looked back over at her apologetically. "Right now Sarah and a bunch of the others are over at McCready's waiting for us. For you, really. She wanted to have a party for your first day back and somehow she roped me in to take you over there."

Eddie's mouth dropped. "She set this up! She came in to the locker room while I was changing and she was all, 'Oh, you can't take the bus, get Reagan to give you a ride'! And I fell for it. Damn."

Jamie winced. "We don't have to go if you don't want. I can text her now and tell her – I don't know, you were too tired or something, or I forgot."

She reached over to the driver's side and put a hand on his arm. "Jamie, relax. It's fine."

He looked over at her and raised an eyebrow. "It's fine?"

"Yeah, it's not a big deal. It's sweet of her. We can head over there."

"I thought you wanted to go sit in silence for eight hours."

She sighed. "Okay, in retrospect, I'd be bored as hell. I need to talk to intelligent people."

He studied her face for a moment, and finding her genuine, grinned. "Well, we could just go out, if that's what you want."

She rolled her eyes. "Screw you."

He laughed. "Too easy." He flipped on the turn signal before glancing over at her. "You sure? They'd totally understand if you're not up for this."

She nodded. "Who am I to turn down free drinks?"

He nodded acquiescently before switching the car back into drive and pulling away from the curb.

Arriving at the bar, Jamie wondered facetiously if Sarah had really gone all out on the invite list. There was usually street parking in this area on weeknights, but tonight the streets immediately around McCready's were crammed with parked cars that, had he been on traffic patrol, would have kept him busy for the entire evening. He circled the area a few times, going progressively further from the bar until he finally pulled into an open spot around five blocks away. He glanced over at Eddie in the passenger seat. "Up for a walk?"

"Sure."

He sighed. "It's not too late to back out of this, you know."

She grinned at him. "You're not getting off that easy, Reagan." He rolled his eyes before getting out and coming around to swing open the door on her side. She patted his arm as she stepped out of the car. "Such a gentleman."

"Yeah, yeah." She detected a faint blush on his face, as though he was embarrassed to be caught in the act of doing something chivalrous for her. "Let's go, Janko. Longer you keep them waiting, more boozed up they'll be when we get there."

She laughed, shaking her head, as they made their way down the block. "You know, partner, I'm beginning to think you're trying to convince me to blow off this party because you don't want to go."

He chuckled. "You should've made detective a long time ago."

"Yeah, well. We knew that already." She pulled her jacket tighter around her shoulders. "But you should be glad I'm still on the beat. What would you even do without me?"

"You know, I got through like thirty years of my life without you, Janko. Don't get a big head."

She linked her arm through his. "That's just because you hadn't met me yet. Now you could never go back. You're hooked." She didn't know what was making her so bold – she couldn't blame it on the alcohol this time, since she hadn't had anything to drink. But somehow, walking down the street with him at night in their civilian clothes, she couldn't hold herself back.

Their linked arms meant that she was stopped in her tracks when he stopped walking. She turned to him curiously. He looked down at her with an unreadable expression on his face. She narrowed her eyes at him. "What?" Her tone was light, but she felt a twinge of nervousness. Their usually delicate dynamic had been even more precarious than usual lately, and she worried for a moment that she'd pushed him too far.

He studied her face for a moment before cracking a small smile. "So just to be clear. Are you saying you've spoiled me for life?"

She felt a grin breaking across her face and fought to contain it. "I guess you could say that." She wasn't sure what he was getting at here, but didn't want to ask.

He shifted his hand further back on her good arm, pulling her closer to him. "Guess I could." He wasn't making eye contact with her anymore; his gaze had shifted over her head and his eyes were contemplative.

She exhaled softly and leaned back, pursing her lips as though steeling herself. "I know."

He quirked a brow at her. "Know what?"

"What you're thinking. Eddie, we've been down this road before." She deepened her voice in a poor imitation of his. "It's a bad idea – for a lot of reasons."

Jamie winced, still holding her elbow to keep her close. "Am I really that predictable?" She nodded solemnly. "Damn."

She gave a half-shrug. "It's starting to lose its sting." She chuckled self-consciously as she spoke, but there was a layer of something unmistakably sadder in her tone.

He puffed out a breath. "Eddie, I don't mean – "

"It's fine, Jamie." Her tone was sharper than she'd intended. She softened as she continued. "I don't expect anything." His brows drew together doubtfully. She rolled her eyes. "I'm serious, Reagan. I shouldn't have said that. Let's just go and have a good time." She tugged her arm free and took a few steps along the sidewalk before turning back to him with a quizzical look. "Coming?"

He shook his head as if to clear it before falling into step with her towards their waiting friends.

Jamie wasn't the most natural partygoer, but usually he at least tried to avoid playing wallflower all night. Granted, Eddie was usually a big part of the reason why, with her insistence on dragging him into conversations or, occasionally, onto the dance floor. Tonight, though, she was the woman of the hour, being surrounded by friends and well-wishers from the precinct dying for updates on her condition. He was always sort of amazed at how many connections she had within their house; while he had casual friends in the precinct, their relationships didn't really extend beyond hellos. Eddie was really one of the only ones that he'd call up just to hang out, or talk to about anything deeper than weather or football. Given the fact that he was her partner and he had the whole sordid suspension story, he could probably have soaked up some of her spotlight had he wanted to. But tonight, his natural instinct to sit against the wall with a drink was winning out. So as Eddie socialized, looking like she was having a lot more fun than he'd have expected given her earlier hatred of the world at large, he sat by the bar, trying not to watch her as he turned his beer around and around on the counter.

What she'd said on the walk over had bothered him more than he'd let her know. He didn't really feel that he had any kind of right to express that to her, though – everything she'd said was true, pretty much down to the words that he'd been about to say. It was undoubtedly hard to balance the conflicting instincts he felt every time he looked at her: on the one hand, his 'boy-scout' nature wanted to adhere strictly to the rules of the patrol guide and of their partnership. But the part of him that just wanted to say to hell with the rules and give in to every suppressed emotion also liked to make itself known. She tended to get the short end of the stick with that, unfortunately. He knew he was guilty of starting things that he had no intention of finishing.

What he couldn't quite figure out, though, was why the thought of finishing what he started was so terrifying to him. If it was just nerves, just a fear of looking like an idiot, he'd be able to understand. But even that was something he rarely felt around Eddie, not because she wouldn't tease the life out of him but because he knew that no matter how big of a fool he made of himself she'd never actually let it change her opinion of him. And recent events had proved that where she was concerned, he had no problem abandoning the patrol guide. So this had to be something bigger.

He knew the answer deep down, really – he'd even told her about his fear of losing a partner that too often manifested in extreme overprotectiveness. She seemed to understand, too, as well as she could for someone who'd never been there. At least, she didn't tend to push too hard when he did pull away, something that made him feel in equal parts grateful and guilty. Grateful, because to have someone who could read him so well and who did and said exactly what he couldn't even admit he needed was something he didn't think he'd ever had in any kind of relationship. But he knew that it was unfair to her to become collateral in the never-ending battle between his instincts – a civilian casualty, as it were, and one that he feared would eventually become too beaten-down to keep returning to the fight. There was a part of him, probably the part that had watched too many teen romances with his sister as a kid, that said that if he really cared for her – always stopping short of anything else even in his mind – he would end the partnership, let her really make a go at finding a relationship without the albatross of his commitment issues around her neck.

He chuckled quietly at that thought. Commitment issues was never a term he'd have thought he'd be using to describe himself, the man who'd gotten engaged at twenty-four after a seven-month relationship. But there was really nothing else to call it, at least not in the traditional romantic playbook. She wanted something defined and real with him, and he was too afraid to give her that. He was committed to her, for sure – as a partner, as a best friend, as a confidante and drinking buddy. But he couldn't take that next step that she'd been carefully trying to nudge him towards for – what, years now? She'd have denied it, but he could never lose the image of her in the locker room on her one-year anniversary on the job. Her how do I look now? had played on repeat in his head for a solid week after that. Even now, after she'd laid out all her feelings in front of him, she'd always left the ball in his court. I know that you're my partner, and I don't want to do anything to screw that up. She'd said it so easily, as though really all she'd wanted from that night was to get things off her chest, but he knew that she'd secretly been hoping that he'd finally agree to pursue what they had.

After she'd been shot, as he'd sat there waiting in the hospital fully expecting to hear that she had died, he'd thought about it. He'd been hit with the regret first; what if she were to die and he'd never given them a chance to figure out what was there? What if, God forbid, she died wishing he'd given her more than he had? Then, of course, the morbid voice in his head that had only grown in strength as he'd lost more and more people had convinced him that it was good that they hadn't pursued anything. After all, if she were to die, he would've been there for the last moments of her life. He didn't know how he'd be able to deal with being the person to pull up at the hospital after she was already gone and be stuck wondering for the rest of his life if he'd have been able to change anything if he'd been there.

He sighed and took a long swig from his beer bottle. He knew that alcohol was probably not the best fix for this – if anything, it'd just lower his inhibitions again and put them in yet another position that he'd have to backtrack from. He was glad, then, when he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder from behind. Turning, he saw Eddie standing behind him and tried to force the brooding off of his face. She furrowed her brow. "You okay?"

"Yeah, fine."

"You didn't talk to anyone."

He smiled tightly. "Yeah, I mingled a bit. Didn't want to steal your spotlight."

She narrowed her eyes dubiously. "Okay. You still good for a ride, or was that just a device to get me here?" There seemed to be a challenge in her tone, which he filed away with everything he'd never understand about her.

"No, I'll take you. You want to head out now?"

"As soon as you're ready." She seemed to have retracted into politeness now, which is how he knew he'd pissed her off. Their relationship had passed the point of non-ironic formality about half a second into their first interaction, and now it only manifested when she was angry at him.

After saying some brief goodbyes, they started off down the sidewalk in relative silence, all of the camaraderie of earlier seemingly erased. Jamie was still lost in the spiral of thoughts that'd consumed him at the bar, Eddie casting him tentative glances every so often but choosing not to pry. Once they were about two blocks away from the restaurant, Jamie stopped suddenly. Eddie turned back to face him, casting a confused look at him.

"Eddie, I'm sorry." He surprised himself when he spoke.

She looked up at him with an inscrutable expression on her face. "Sorry for what?"

He sighed. "I know I've been sending mixed signals. And that's not fair to you, because you've been pretty clear on what you want for…a while."

"I don't want to push you into anything you don't want." Her response was quiet, and he knew she was dreading what he would say.

He shook his head. "You're not pushing me into anything. I – I want this too."

She furrowed her brow. "Then why are we drawing this out, Jamie? I mean, if I've learned anything lately, it's that we could basically die at any time." She chuckled self-deprecatingly. "If this," she gestured to the space between them, "is something that we both want, why wait?"

They were questions that he'd asked himself hundreds of times, but to hear her articulate them so boldly was frankly a little bit daunting, especially since the only answer he'd ever been able to come up with would probably make her cut and run. She wasn't backing down, though, continuing to stare up at him with this combination of earnestness and nerves and hope that made him want to say to hell with it and kiss her right then and there. He restrained himself, though, knowing that doing that without a conversation would fix exactly none of their problems. Taking a deep breath to clear his head, he reached for her hand before he formulated a response. She squeezed back immediately, even before knowing what his response was going to be, which filled him with a rush of affection and dare he say it love for her.

"I don't know. Honestly, logically it probably makes sense for us to go for it."

Her eyes widened and a grin began to spread across her face. "Is that the most romantic thing you've ever said?"

He chuckled. "Shut up, I'm trying to think."

She nodded and mimed putting a finger to her lips. "Sorry. I know how hard that can be for you, Harvard."

He shook his head amusedly, tugging their joined hands closer to him. "You tend to have that effect on me." He could actually see her force herself not to make a smartass comment, which he appreciated. It was true that just her presence in any kind of off-the-job setting tended to throw off his normally focused thought processes, and her constant derailments of the conversation certainly didn't help. He closed his eyes for a moment to collect his thoughts.

"Eddie, I want this. And I want to – take the plunge, or whatever. But I don't know if I can."

Her face fell imperceptibly, but she kept hold of his hand. "Is it because of the shooting?"

"I don't know? Probably on some level." She nodded. "But I also – I don't want to not ride with you."

"You're thinking about what we're giving up." She wasn't asking a question, just softly alluding back to their dance together months ago.

"Sort of, I guess." He shook his head. "No, actually. It's not that. I rode with Martinez today, and – " He chuckled. "Actually, it sort of sucked today. But like, in the future? I could do that again. I could be a TO. And you'd be a damn good one. I almost feel bad monopolizing you away from some rookie." The corner of her mouth quirked up as he continued. "In my head, I know that we could be okay riding with other people."

"But?"

He dropped his head. "Yeah. But. I don't know what it is – it doesn't even make sense to me."

"You're scared." He looked down at her quizzically. "You feel like if we don't ride together, something bad will happen to me and you won't have been there." She raised her eyebrows at him as though seeking confirmation. His lack of a response didn't deter her. "You think that somehow us riding together will make sure that you're the first to know if anything happens. Even though, as we've seen, shit happens even when we are partnered up. And…if we were to be together, you'd be the first person they'd call anyway."

He stared at her for a moment, trying to process everything she'd just said, before huffing out a laugh. "Guess I can't logic my way out of that one."

She shook her head. "Guess not. And I went to state school, Reagan. How's that make you feel?"

He rolled his eyes to the back of his head before tugging her forward and pulling her into his arms. His next words were muffled in her hair. "You really think we could do this?"

She slipped her head out from under his to look him in the eyes. "I really think we could."

Kissing her was distracting enough that he didn't feel the rain beginning to fall.

I'm sorry for the long delay on this final chapter! It's been a crazy couple of weeks. Hopefully the long chapter makes up for the wait, I considered splitting this one into two but I couldn't justifiably put off the ending any longer, LOL.

Thank you so much to everyone who has followed and reviewed! I really appreciate all of the feedback and support, and thank you for helping motivate me to complete and share my first longer story. I may try to work on some shorter one-shots and missing scenes in the next couple of weeks (including a possible alternate ending for this story), and if anyone has any prompts or requests I'd be happy to give it a shot.

Thank you all for reading, and please don't hesitate to leave any feedback on this chapter or the story as a whole!