Chapter Text
The bar was too loud. The lights were too dim. And the whiskey was doing things to her spine that had no business happening in public.
Garcia leaned back against the scratched wooden table, the wood rough beneath her palms, the lacquer long since worn away by years of elbows, spilled drinks, and stories people tried not to remember. Her fingers drummed a nervous, uneven rhythm beside her untouched gin and tonic, condensation bleeding outward in a slow, creeping ring that soaked into the warped grain like it was being absorbed on purpose. The glass sweated. She didn’t drink. She just watched it melt, like that alone might fix something.
The rest of the team was scattered across the bar, each of them their own small island, pretending this counted as dry land. JJ’s laugh cut through the music—sharp, bright, pitched just a hair too high—following something Emily murmured into her ear. Rossi hunched over his scotch like it might confess something new if he stared long enough, swirling it once, twice, the ice clinking softly, insistently, like time tapping him on the shoulder. At the far end, Reid had trapped the bartender in a full-body lecture, hands carving shapes in the air as if the theory only existed if he could outline it, while the bartender nodded with the serene patience of someone well-tipped and well-versed in this particular ritual. Matt lingered off to the side, head bowed over his phone, thumbs moving fast—husband, father, anchor. Tara had disappeared toward the bathroom, probably smart enough to take a moment when she needed it.
Luke was across from her.
Watching.
Always watching.
His sleeves were rolled to his elbows, the fabric creased where it stayed there, forearms lean and corded, hands relaxed but ready like they always were. She hated that she noticed. Hated that her attention snagged on him without her permission, that her skin prickled under the weight of his gaze. He hadn’t looked away in at least ten minutes—not when JJ laughed, not when Reid gestured wildly, not when someone bumped the table hard enough to slosh drinks. His focus stayed right where it was. On her.
The air was thick with old wood and cheap beer and whatever vaguely citrus disaster the bar had decided to call an air freshener, but all Garcia could smell was him—faint cologne, clean and restrained, and something warmer underneath. Sweat, maybe. Heat. Trouble. The kind you didn’t recognize as dangerous until you were already in it.
They weren’t even fighting tonight.
That was the worst part.
They always fought. Bantered. Bit and nipped at each other like it was foreplay, sharp words snapping back and forth in briefing rooms and SUVs and hallways, tension coiled tight and humming. And maybe—maybe—it had always been foreplay. Maybe the friction, the heat, the way they circled each other had been building toward this exact moment: too loud, too dim, nowhere to hide, with nothing cutting left to say.
Tonight had been different.
Not the usual heavy. Not the familiar, compartmentalized kind of horror she could pack away into neat little mental boxes labeled later and therapy. This one had slipped past the safeguards. Crawled under her skin. Refused to stay put.
The case had been too much.
Kids. Small hands. Smaller bodies. Fear frozen into places it had no right to live. Knives laid out with deliberate care, their edges clean in a way that made her stomach turn. An unsub who smiled too wide when he talked about it—smiled like he was proud, like this was art, like he expected admiration for the precision of it all. And the worst part was his eyes. He never blinked. Not when he described the blood. Not when he talked about the screaming. Just stared, unbroken and pleased, as if daring anyone in the room to look away first.
Garcia hadn’t made it through the briefing.
She’d excused herself with a joke that fell flat halfway out of her mouth and locked herself in the bathroom down the hall. The tile was cold. The lights too bright. She braced her hands against the sink and stared at her reflection until it fractured—until the glitter and color and armor she wore every day couldn’t hold the line anymore. The sobs came sharp and fast, catching in her chest, her shoulders shaking as she tried to keep it silent. She pressed a hand over her mouth, biting down hard enough to taste blood, willing herself to breathe through it, to pull it together.
She hated that it still got to her like this. Hated that it always would.
Somewhere else in the building, Luke had found a wall.
He hadn’t said anything. Hadn’t needed to. The anger had coiled tight and hot in his chest, nowhere to go, no one it was allowed to touch. So he’d turned away before anyone could see it crest, driven his fist into concrete hard enough to split skin. The pain was immediate, grounding, sharp. A punishment. A reminder. Blood bloomed across his knuckles, bright and real, and for a second—just a second—it cut through the images replaying behind his eyes.
They hadn’t talked about it.
Not then. Not after. They’d both done what they always did: washed up, straightened their clothes, put the professional faces back on. Finished the work. Closed the file. Drove to the bar with the rest of the team like this was just another night, another case, another thing they’d survived.
Now they were here.
Pretending normalcy could be poured into a glass. That dim lights and loud music and sitting too close to someone who knew exactly how wrecked you were could smooth the edges. Pretending that laughter from across the room meant anything had been resolved. Pretending that the weight in their chests wasn’t still there, heavy and unmoving.
Pretending the ground hadn’t shifted beneath all of them.
“You okay?”
His voice barely rose above the music—something with too much bass and not enough soul—but it still reached her. It threaded through the noise, through the vibration in the soles of her boots, through the buzz in her head.
She lifted her gaze slowly, meeting his. “Define okay.”
A corner of his mouth twitched, not quite a smile. He let out a short breath, somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. The sound of a man who knew there wasn’t a good answer waiting for him. “Not sobbing in the ladies’ room anymore?”
She flinched before she could stop herself, heat crawling up the back of her neck. “You saw that?”
“I heard.” His jaw tightened, just a fraction. She watched it happen—the flex, the control, the way he reined it back in. “Didn’t want to push.”
Something in her chest gave a sharp, traitorous pull. For all his stoic, guarded, dog-man exterior, Luke Alvez was unfairly perceptive. He noticed things. The pauses. The cracks. The moments people tried to stitch over with humor and noise.
And he was gentle. Way gentler than she deserved tonight.
“I hate this job sometimes,” she muttered, eyes dropping to the slow swirl of her drink. The ice was mostly gone now, watered down into something that tasted like juniper and regret. “I know it matters. I know we help people. But sometimes it feels like I’m holding all the pieces… and none of them ever fit back together the same way.”
Luke nodded. That was it. No platitudes. No fixing. He didn’t rush to fill the space, didn’t try to smooth it over. He just waited. Like he knew silence, when held carefully, could be a kindness instead of a weapon.
Her fingers drifted back to the glass, pads brushing the cold surface, tracing the slick ring of condensation it left behind. She followed it slowly, deliberately, around and around, as if the circle might open into something else if she paid close enough attention. The chill seeped into her skin, grounding and distracting all at once.
“Why are you over here?” she asked, not looking up yet.
“You looked like you needed a friend.”
The word friend landed heavier than it should have. She finally lifted her eyes, one brow arching in practiced, playful suspicion, the familiar shield sliding into place. “And you’re volunteering?”
He shrugged—small, understated. Casual. Quiet. Like it meant nothing. Like he hadn’t scanned the room, clocked her posture, noticed the way her shoulders curled inward when she thought no one was watching, and made a choice. “Someone’s gotta keep you from pickpocketing the bartender.”
She scoffed on instinct, rolling her eyes. “I do not—”
The denial stalled halfway out of her mouth, snagged on the moment, dissolving into something half-indignant, half-amused that never quite took shape, because—
He was looking at her again.
Not the way people usually did when she cracked, when the glitter dulled and the jokes softened around the edges. Not with pity, or the sharp, uneasy concern that asked how bad is it going to get? Not like someone bracing for emotional spillover.
Luke’s gaze was steady. Warm. Unflinching.
Like he saw the crack in her mask and didn’t feel the urge to seal it, smooth it over, or look away. Like he understood that what lived underneath wasn’t something fragile or ugly—but something real.
Her breath caught, just slightly. An involuntary hitch she hated herself for.
She broke eye contact first, lashes dropping as her attention slid to the sad, wilted lime wedge clinging to the rim of her glass. The drink was still untouched, ice mostly gone now, diluted into something she no longer wanted. The lime looked like it had given up hours ago.
When she spoke again, her voice had shifted—lower, quieter, carefully controlled. “You know you don’t have to do this.”
“Do what?”
“This.” She gestured vaguely between them, fingers flicking through the small pocket of air that suddenly felt charged, intimate in a way she hadn’t consented to yet. “The whole emotional support pit stop thing. I’m not your project, Luke.”
She braced herself for it—for defensiveness, for a joke, for him to pull back just enough to give her space she hadn’t actually asked for.
He didn’t. He didn’t bristle. Didn’t retreat. His expression stayed open, grounded, solid in a way that felt almost unfair. “I know that.”
The certainty in his voice unsettled her more than an argument would have.
“Then what is this?” The question wasn’t sharp, but it hovered close to defensive. Protective. The kind of armor people reached for when they were exhausted and bruised and terrified of needing something they couldn’t control.
He didn’t rush the answer. Didn’t try to dress it up. He met her where she was, gaze level, presence unyielding but gentle.
“I just wanted to sit with you,” he said.
That was it.
No clever framing. No justification. No hidden expectation waiting to be paid back later. Just the truth, offered plainly, without flourish or bravado, like it didn’t need either to stand.
It stopped her cold.
She blinked, genuinely thrown, the words knocking the breath loose in her chest. Her mind scrambled for angles, for subtext, for the catch—but there wasn’t one. Just space. Just him, choosing to be there without asking her to perform or reciprocate or explain herself.
The noise of the bar dimmed—not disappearing, but receding, like the world had leaned back a step and given them room. The music softened into background hum. Laughter blurred. Even the clink of glasses faded into something distant.
And in that quiet pocket, Garcia realized—unsettled, unguarded, and more affected than she wanted to admit—that he wasn’t trying to fix her.
He was just staying.
Her fingers worried the napkin beneath her drink, folding and refolding it until the thin paper went soft and frayed at the edges. “Well. That’s very…” She stalled out, lips pressing together as she searched for a word that didn’t sound suspiciously like sweet or intimate or exactly the problem. “Un-you,” she finally landed on, squinting at him like she was diagnosing a symptom.
He grinned—and this time it wasn’t the tight, guarded version he wore like armor. This one reached his eyes, softened the hard lines of his face, made him look younger. Lighter. “Maybe I’m evolving.”
“Oh God,” she groaned, leaning back slightly. “That means you’re going to start using emojis unironically, doesn’t it?”
“Only the cowboy hat one,” he said without missing a beat. “And maybe the eggplant. When appropriate.”
She made an undignified choking sound, grabbed a loose napkin, and lobbed it at his chest. “Absolutely not. That privilege must be earned.”
He caught it easily, fingers closing around the paper, laughter breaking free before he could stop it. For just a second—just one—everything loosened. The pressure cracked. The weight lifted. The banter slid back into place like muscle memory, warm and familiar and safe.
And then it shifted.
Not abruptly. No sharp turn. Just a subtle change in gravity, like the room had tilted a few degrees without warning.
Because when she looked up again, he was watching her differently.
Not amused. Not teasing. Still. Focused. Like he’d settled into something deeper, quieter—waiting, not restraining himself so much as allowing space for whatever came next. The music kept pounding, glasses clinked, laughter rose and fell around them, but the space between their bodies felt suddenly insulated. Held.
The kind of silence that wasn’t silence at all.
And she felt it then. Caught it. The flicker in his eyes as her gaze lifted. The almost imperceptible drop of his attention to her mouth. The way his fingers curved around his glass—loose, casual, but with an undercurrent of intent that set her nerves alight.
Heat bloomed low in her stomach, heavy and unmistakable.
Her breath stuttered.
“Oh,” she breathed, the word barely more than air.
His head tipped, just a fraction. Acknowledgment. Not a challenge. Not a push. He didn’t close the distance, didn’t reach out—but the invitation was there now, undeniable, humming quietly between them.
Her spine straightened, instinct kicking in even as her pulse betrayed her. She swallowed, throat dry. “This is a bad idea,” she whispered, and it came out stripped bare of humor or deflection.
“I haven’t even suggested anything yet,” he replied, his voice lower now—roughened, like the bass in the music had dropped away or the room had shrunk to the space between their knees.
“You’re about to,” she said, unable to look away. He leaned in just enough to feel—not enough for anyone else to clock it, but enough that her skin responded instantly, awareness flaring like a live wire.
“And if I am?” he asked softly.
Her stomach flipped, a sharp, dizzy swoop that made her grip the edge of the table without realizing it.
She didn’t answer.
She just held his gaze, heart pounding so hard it felt like it echoed in her ribs. The air between them was thick now, charged with something both dangerous and tender, the kind of moment that rewrote things simply by existing.
The kind you couldn’t step back from once you acknowledged it.
And God help her—she wasn’t sure she should.
Neither of them moved.