Dance With Me
AUTHOR: Lucky.
DISCLAIMER: Except for the creations of the author, all characters, characterizations, situations, and locations described in this unsolicited and not-for-profit work of fiction are the property of ABC Television, Capitol Cities, Inc., Steven Bochco Productions, the many talented people who created the world of NYPD Blue, and the actors who have made that world such a lively place. The author would also like to extend her personal gratitude to Mr. Scott Cohen for his light, his vitality, his inspiration, and for being such a compelling muse. Thank you, sir.
Set about two weeks after the end of Butterfly. Posey and Harry are
on their way to their new office upstairs from Homicide for the very
first time.
FEEDBACK: To Lucky
"You nervous?"
"No."
"Good. When I pass out, try not to let me go all the way down the stairs."
Harry chuckled, slipping his fingers around hers from behind. Concern echoed in his voice. "Honey, you're trembling."
"Shh. Don't tell anyone."
They passed the landing for the Homicide office and Posey glanced at the doorway, seeing Danny glance up from his desk.
Behind her, Harry harrumphed and pressed her up the next flight of stairs. "Department's lucky that door's open or he'd be leaving nose prints on the glass."
They rounded up the last floor to the new office, and Posey stopped at the closed door, trying to take deep breaths. Harry ran his hands over her arms with a grin.
"Come on. This can't be that traumatic for you. You moved all the way from Detroit to New York and you didn't seem this upset about it."
"Not that I'd have shown you."
His eyes sparkled as he smiled. "You're hiding something."
She rolled her eyes at him and shook her head a little, gathering herself. "Okay. I can do this. I'll just... I'll be Cybill Shepard and you can be Bruce Willis."
"Can I keep my hair?"
Posey laughed aloud and Harry laced his fingers through hers. "Come on, babe." He let her go and turned the doorknob, pushing it open.
The room was empty and dancing with dust. There were what looked like five desks in the room, but they were all covered with sheets that hadn't been moved in years and standing in entirely random places around the room.
"Oh, for the love of my mother and an eightball, what the hell did they give us?" Harry closed the door behind him and looked around.
"It's not very pretty right now, I'll grant you that." The voice that came from the aquarium office door on the far end was smooth, touched with Irish brogue. Harry and Posey both turned to see a tall, striking woman with a firefall of thick curls dripping over her shoulders and down her back. She wore a black suit with matching slacks, and an emerald green silk blouse beneath. "If you can find a clean place for your coats, you're welcome to put them there." She approached them, Posey first, extending a hand to her. "I'm Lieutenant Sherill Perry. You must be Detective Jackson."
"Yes," Posey shook her hand. "Just Posey, please. It's a pleasure to meet you."
Sherill smiled, offering her hand to Harry. "Detective Denby, Sherill Perry. Pleased to meet you."
Harry took her hand, but only held it in his. "My pleasure." He let go just before he would have been holding on a little too long.
Sherill turned and went back into her office. "I'll be in here cleaning dust off of... everything. Take a look around, get yourselves settled in, and then come see me."
"Sure, Lieu," Harry offered, stuffing his hands in his pockets. As soon as Sherill was out of earshot, he gave his head a little shake. "Woof."
Posey cracked him across the arm. "Could you wait until we're a week in to start making a drooling ass out of yourself?"
Harry shrugged off his trench and folded it over his arm. "Drooling ass. That doesn't sound pleasant." He looked around for a moment. "Is there a flat surface without a year's worth of filth on it to put my coat on?"
Posey had wandered off to one of the adjacent rooms. "There might be a closet in here. I think this is our locker room."
Harry followed the sound until he found her. The single bench was covered with another dirty cloth, but Posey had found a coat closet and had taken off her coat. "Give." She held out her hand and Harry gave her his coat. As she hung it next to hers, she continued talking. "There's another door on the inside wall."
Harry walked over, rolling the sleeves of his oxford up as he did. He checked the door, opening it up and looking inside. "Oh for Christ... Don't they have union guys to clean around here?"
Posey followed him. "What is it?"
"I think there's supposed to be a bathroom under the science experiment."
Sherill's voice came from the locker room door. "Good news. The department says they're sending up a crew to help us set up. We should have phones and a fax and a copier... soon."
Posey eyed her. "Exactly how soon are we talking?"
Sherill sighed, fluffing her curls. "About a week."
Harry folded his arms and hissed a little, then said, "Great. Posey and I will just go out on canvass and tell all the criminals to put it on hold until we get our fax machine."
"Harry," Posey tried to stop him under her breath, but Sherill leveled a finger at him and started.
"Look, I don't run the precinct, and I'm not any happier about it than you, but you're more than welcome to go back to Narcotics if this is too stressful for you. I was told to keep the clamps on you and I will unless I see from you that I don't need to. Understood?"
Harry stood, blinking in shock, caught completely off guard by the way his new lieutenant went from Sheena Easton to the Loch Ness Monster. Then he tightened his arms over his chest and glared into the filthy bathroom, turning away from Sherill.
"I'm glad we understand each other, Detective Denby."
Posey heard him huff, but Sherill either didn't notice or didn't care. "I'll see if I can move things along a little. You two keep getting acquainted with the place." She left in a steady clack of heels on hard floor.
Posey dropped her head for a second, then lifted it to look at Harry's angry profile. "Still think she's sexy?"
He gave a bitter little smile, nodding. "But I don't quite feel like telling her about it anymore." He dropped his arms from their fold, shoving his hands into his pockets and thinking for a moment, then, "I'm gonna see what I can do about rounding up a cleaning crew. You take notes on whatever canned welcome speech she's written. I'd rather not let it waste my time."
He walked away and out of the locker room, and Posey heard the office door slam behind him as he left.
"I see Detective Denby has chosen not to join us."
"I guess not." Posey tried to smile at her new superior officer, and Sherill met her attempt with cold blue eyes.
"I need to get something out in the open with you, Jackson. I know you and Denby are personally involved with one another and I need your assurance that you won't let it interfere with doing your duty to the department and the precinct."
"I don't see why it would."
Sherill folded her arms, nodding thoughtfully as she rested her weight on the corner of her desk. "Has he spoken to you at all about his prior activities as an undercover narcotics officer?"
"Yes, he has."
"To what extent?"
Where are you going with this? "I really don't think I should discuss this without Harry here."
Sherill seemed to accept that. "Okay, then. Let's talk about your activities in the Detroit Police Department. I hear that you were instrumental in getting bad cops off the streets there."
I'm really starting to get unhappy with this conversation. "I was lead detective to an interdepartmental task force assigned to investigate police homicides."
"Why did you transfer to NYPD?"
"Because I was tired of ratting out my brothers. Where are we going with this?"
Sherill's eyebrows jumped, but she took the request in stride, cutting to her point. "There is information circulating that Detective Denby is still involved in below-board operations gone sour. I need you to..."
"Wait a minute," Posey waved her hands in front of her, interrupting. "Are you telling me that this whole thing... the new department, the simultaneous promotions... are all a cover to expose Harry Denby as a bad cop?"
Sherill put out her hands in a calming gesture. "No, no, no. The department and promotions are valid. I'm just telling you..." She smiled a little, restating herself in a gentler tone, "I'm asking you... to keep an eye on him."
Posey narrowed her eyes a little. "You're asking me to use my personal contact with Harry, which up until two weeks ago was itself a rumor, as a front to confirm other rumors about him? With all due respect, I think you misunderstand the nature of our relationship."
"And I think you misunderstood the nature of my order."
You're gonna order me to rat out my own lover. Okay... "How did we get from request to order?"
Sherill sighed. "I can see this was an error in judgment. I'll put in the request for your transfer back down to Homicide this afternoon."
"You would blackmail me out of my promotion to get what you want?"
"Nobody's blackmailing anybody, Posey. Harry needs a partner he can count on."
Posey's ears burned and she had to reign herself in to keep from shouting at the lieutenant. "You mean a partner you can count on."
Sherill came off her desk, standing toe to toe with Posey and planting her hands on her hips. "No, I mean a partner he can count on. A cop in the wrong place can end up dead. If he's headed in that direction, I want to know so I can get him out of it before that happens."
"And what if it just kills his credibility as a detective?"
Sherill gave a knowing little laugh. "With all respect to your partner, he's already done that quite well on his own, thank you."
I will beat that smirk off your face, lady... "Well, I don't see where Harry even has the time to be involved in anything worth investigating right now. The most illegal thing he's done in the past month was dress up like a delivery boy and sweet talk my super into letting him into my apartment when I wasn't there. In my official capacity as the lone-wolf detective on the Harry Denby trail, I formally report the matter closed." Posey blazed into the lieutenant's eyes for another moment, then turned to leave her office.
Behind her, Sherill sighed and muttered, "Fine. If you won't work with me, I'll find someone who will."
Posey froze in her place. You mean you'll find someone willing to tell you what you want to hear. Dammit! If I don't do this, she'll find someone who wants to dig up dirt on Harry, and as much as I could hurt him, I'm the only one who won't be trying to. Posey realized she was completely stuck. She could either let this woman annihilate the man she loved, or she could hit the self-destruct button on her relationship and pray that Harry could turn it off in time. Slowly, she turned back to her superior with a blank face and rigid body.
"I'll do it."
"Splendid. I knew you'd understand."
"I don't. Don't ever mistake me about that. Just tell me what you know."
Continued in Part 2.
