#burgstead

MARINA IS THE REAL MVP FOR THIS 🆗🆒 also re: jake & kate content above is below haha

*update: thanks to Tracy we now have even more content with her and Marina! YAY 😀⤵️

I’M BACK!!!!!! 

Wow, guys, it has been a really long time! I caught a new episode, and I was pulled back to this story. I reread what I had already written- some of it needs some serious TLC- it’s crazy how much your writing can change and how cringy parts of your old stuff can be. And I surprisingly found my old notes saved in a file. I thought they were all in my storage unit in TN. I’m ready to do some minor alterations to previous chapters and start writing this story again! I am in my Master program so my time is a bit limited but I’m great about writing when I want to procrastinate homework. 

For those of you that stuck around through my prolonged absence- you guys are real troopers and this chapter is dedicated to you. If your new here- I hope you’ve enjoyed what you’ve read so far and let’s keep truckin’. 

You can read the rest of the series HERE  

Jay & Kim 6x11 

Kim quietly makes her way into the bedroom, setting her bag by the closet. It was late, almost two in the morning. Jay was asleep on his back, one arm thrown over his head and blankets kicked down by his thighs. His face was relaxed, and his breathing was even and quiet. She kneeled next to this side of the bed to gently place her hand on his chest, sliding up his smooth skin to his shoulder. 

Jay had always been a light sleeper and easy to startle. This was the best way Kim had found to wake him. His eyes barely fluttered open when his hand had grasped hers, holding it down to his peck. He groans softly, scrubbing his other hand down his face, “’ Ey baby,” His voice is deep and thick with sleep. “How was your trip?” Kim couldn’t contain her smile. 

“It was amazing.” It had been so good to be out with her girlfriends. Being away from home and reprieve from worrying. In the beginning, she had called obsessively to make sure everything was okay and running smoothly. Allie had gotten tired of it fast and had stolen her phone and replaced it with a glass of wine. Their friend group hadn’t been together in years. They had spent their days catching up, laughing, gossiping, shopping, pampering themselves, and of course, finding Allie the perfect wedding dress. 

“Good,” His thumb caressed her hand, finding a blunt, hard shape of her nails. He lifted it to see better. Kim had freshly manicured nails, square-shaped, painted a nude color with a design on her ring finger that he couldn’t make out in the darkness of the room. She smiled guiltily at him. 

“You might not be so happy when you hear how much money I spent.” He raised a challenging eyebrow at her. He doubted she could have spent too much money. He knew Kim was a saver, and he still wasn’t sure if it was because she wanted to feel secure with the money she had or if she just felt bad about spending money on herself. 

“I’m not worried about it.” He kissed her hand, interlocking their fingers. “When did you get in? I would have picked you up.” Kim felt a warmth start in her chest and pulse through her. She knew he would have, and that had been the plan until her flight got delayed. When the plane had finally touched down in Chicago, it was late, and she hadn’t wanted to bother him with picking her up. So, she just called an Uber instead. She pressed her lips together as she thought about her last conversation with Allie.  

It had been after everyone else had left to go home. Allie had told her she planned it that way so they could have a day to themselves. They had been the start of the friend group and had known each other the longest.  

Allie had spent the first half hour reaming her out for almost missing the get-together. Allie was aware of everything going on, but she still looked unmoved as Kim gave her the unfiltered update. Allie was notorious for blaming boyfriends, not unreasonably, for the girls not being able to get together over the last few years. So, Kim came to Jay’s defense unprompted. “Don’t blame Jay, it wasn’t his fault.” 

“Good because I’m not. This one is all on you, girlypop.” Allie had rolled her eyes at Kim’s shocked expression, “I met the man, remember? I grilled him for quite a while before deciding that he was good enough for a chance with you. Jay is a fixer and one of his love languages is acts of service- Hello military anyone- and he may be more observant than most men because he has to be for his job, but he isn’t a mind reader.” Kim stared blankly at her best friend.  

Allie merely sighed. “I love you, girl, but you’re so stubborn and you hate asking for help. You feel like you have to do everything yourself, deal with everything yourself, and worry about everyone else and forget about caring for yourself.” Kim’s eyes averted, not ready to hear the truth, “And maybe at one point you did have to. But Jay- he wants to be there for you. I can see it. I know deep down you can too. But he can’t help if he doesn’t know what you need.” Allie had nodded decisively at her friend's quiet contemplation and stood from her seat, “I’ll let you marinate on that while I get us another round of mimosas.” 

Kim knew Allie was right. When Kim had her meltdown, spitting out her frustrations and anxieties, she had made it seem like her and Jay’s relationship had all been struggle and strife. But that wasn’t true. A lot of horrible events had happened. Messy feelings. Uncertain outcomes. Struggles and shaky, emotion-filled decisions. But one thing had always been solid. 

Their relationship.  

Jay had wanted to help. It was clear as soon as she walked in the door. There were no boxes to trip over. It was such a little thing, but meant so much. There was no doubt it had taken time.  Acts of service are one of his love languages.   

“I know...I missed you.” She mumbled, leaning forward to brush a kiss against his lips. His hand came up to cup her cheek and pulled her back down for another. 

“I missed you, too.” Kim smiled against his lips, feeling his scruff tickle her cheeks. She loved it when he missed a few days of shaving, but it always left her with a hell of a beard burn. He heard her soft giggle, he made eye contact with her, and she knew what was coming a second before it happened. She barely had time to get his name out before Jay pressed his face into her neck and rubbed his stubble across her sensitive skin. She giggled louder, playfully pushing at him as she attempted to break free. 

One of his arms held at the nape of her neck while the other swept down her back to grab her ass and lift her around him. Her back found the soft mattress as he pinned her down. She squealed his name as he started tickling her ribs. He tickles her until she is out of breath, chest heaving.  Then there is a quiet moment of realization that Jay is on top of her, pinning her down, their lips just inches apart. The air between them grew thick and hot with tension. 

Then it snapped, lips colliding in a desperate kiss. A bruising, messy kiss. Jay’s hands are helping tear off her clothing. He pushes her legs apart with his thigh. Her nails dig into his shoulders as he pushes into her in one thrust. It’s been too long. Way too long. Her legs wrap around his waist, and Jay sets a brutal pace. She presses her face into his shoulder as she comes to muffle the sound. The clench of her around him brings him close to the edge. Only another minute before his strokes got sloppy and he thrust one last time hard and deep as he came. 

xxx 

Jay comes home late, alone. Zoey and Will are on the couch watching TV and eating. They look up at his arrival. “Kevin doing, okay?”  

Jay drops down onto the couch next to him. “Yeah, he got discharged a few hours ago. Kim is staying with him tonight. They wouldn’t release him without someone being there to keep an eye on him.” It had been a long day. One person had gotten off. One shot. One dead. Jay scrubs his hand over his face. Jay is offered food, but he declines. Zoey heads off to the shower, and Will brings him a beer on his way back from the kitchen. 

“You okay?” Jay scoffs, it was a stupid question after the day he had just had, and takes a pull of his drink. “I don’t just mean tonight. You’ve been... a little on edge since I got here last week.” Will analyzed his younger brother. “Is,” The redhead hesitated as Jay’s piercing stare was turned to him. “Is everything okay with you and Kim? Things seem a little...Off?”  

Part of Jay wants to tell his brother to fuck off and mind his own business. To not project his failing relationship with Natalie on him. The other part needed his older brother. They had always taken care of each other. The distance that had been between the two of them since the Buerk incident and their father's dying had lessened, but there was still some tension that was lingering. “I don’t know, man.” Jay sat back further into the couch. “Things were off before she left, but she seems okay now. We seem okay now. We haven’t had the time to really talk about it fully, but she said that she was just overwhelmed. And I get it, this year has been a complete shitshow and she’s barely blinked...” 

“But, “ Will prompted his brother. He could practically hear the hundreds of different thoughts flying through his mind. Jay scoffed, scrubbing his hand down his face. 

“But I can’t help but feel like I’ve already lived this before.” 

“You mean with Erin? Damn, that girl really fucked you up.” Jay is silent but downs the rest of his bottle. Will does the same and stands up, “We need more beer.” Will returns and puts the cold bottle into Jay’s hand. “Kim isn’t Erin. I know you know that Kim isn’t Erin. So, what triggered all of this? You guys been fighting?” 

“Not any more than we ever have.” Jay meets Will’s eyes and swears, looking back down at his bottle. Will was as stubborn as he was. He could sit there all night and wait for Jay to actually say something. “Erin moved out maybe six months after we moved in together. When we got back together, she didn’t want to move back in. She said she never wanted to live with me again. It’s been almost four months since Kim moved in. We just started having problems-” 

Will holds up his hand to stop him. “Don’t do that to yourself, Jay. You’ll drive yourself crazy. You’re creating problems that aren’t there.” Jay turns to his brother, eyebrows raised, and gestures to him with the hand that is still holding his beer. 

“Yeah? Because you're such a relationship expert. You’ve been sleeping on my couch for the last two weeks because you are avoiding talking to Natalie.” Jay's voice is even, but his words do have a sharp undertone. Will huffed, shaking his head and deciding to take that hit. Jay was trying to deflect.  

“Well, from experience, I can say you are not the easiest person to live with.” Will’s voice was light with humor, succeeding in breaking some of the tension. “But I highly doubt that Kim would have moved her niece in here if she wasn’t planning on staying.” Jay eyed his older brother wearily. Will just took another small sip from the bottle, gaze going back to the TV. “Just saying. Maybe give her a little more credit than that.”  

“You going to give Natalie the same credit?”  

There was a long pause. The Halstead brothers had different attachment issues. Will was anxious while Jay was avoidant. Will wanted to hold onto his relationships so tightly that it often caused problems because his partners felt overwhelmed by it. He wanted his partner to know that he was always there for him. Jay gave space when he felt things were going wrong. He tried to give them space to figure things out for themselves before talking about it, making things seem like they weren’t as big a deal to him while he waited. To take the pressure off. They were both at odds with the change in dynamics and scrambling to figure out exactly what they were supposed to do. 

“Speaking of credit.” Will reached the side table and handed Jay a flier. The paper was advertising soccer tryouts. “Zoey brought this home today.” 

“She wants to play soccer?” 

“No, I don’t think so.” They both turned to see Zoey pad into the room. Her hair was dark with water, and she was scrunching it in a cotton towel to form her curls. It scared Jay how much she had done in the last year. She had become more preoccupied with her appearance and clothes. Nothing too overwhelming, but between her and Kim, he struggled to have access to the bathroom. Now Will was here, and Jay seriously considered taking his lunch break at home so that he could take a shower in peace. They should have just paid the extra money for an ensuite bathroom. It wasn’t a mistake Jay would make again just to save a few bucks.  

“Why not? You brought it home. You have to be at least a little bit interested.” 

Zoey shrugged. “I played when I was younger. It was an impulse thing.” Jay’s detective eye watched her handle fiddle with the towel. “I’m not even sure if I will still like it. Besides, it would be really hectic. I’ve been struggling with grades; it costs a lot of money with all the traveling, commitment, and...time.” Watching her, Jay knew that these worries didn’t come for Zoey. He was willing to bet his next paycheck that they came from Jordan Silver.   

“You get on the team, Zoey. I got the rest of it, okay?” 

xxx 

   “I’m okay, Kim.” Kevin could feel her dark eyes watching him, even with his eyes closed. She had been hovering like a helicopter parent ready to swoop in.  

“You were just shot, Kev.” He shifted on the couch. He felt uncomfortable no matter how he lay. Even with the pain meds, his wound was still pulsing. But it reminded him that he was still alive. Breathing. Unlike DeVante. He had felt so many emotions knowing that he had died on the table. It had all fizzled into an encompassing numbness. 

“You don’t have to stare at me.” 

“You’re lucky I’m not sitting next to you and holding your wrist to keep track of your pulse. I’m already on edge about Antonio.” Kevin scoffed good-naturedly and looked at one of his closest friends. She looked as rough as he did. Her body slumped forward, betraying her with signs of exhaustion. Her chestnut locks pulled back into a messy bun, making it that much easier to see the dark circles under her eyes. Kevin noted that she had started chewing on her nails again. They were short, and the skin around them was in various stages of busted open and healing.   

“That wasn’t on you.”  

Kim’s eyes went to the wall to the right of them. Her right hand raised to her mouth before realizing that she was being watched, returned it to her lap, and started tapping her fingers on her thigh. “He was my partner, I should have known...or at least suspected. I had no idea about any of it.”   

“None of us did. You know- you've had a lot going on yourself. And something else has been up with you, too.” Kevin had noticed it gradually over the last few months. Kim had been such a big help with his brother and sister when he was raising them that he wanted to make sure that she knew that she had the same support from him with Zoey and Nicole.  

Kim didn’t like to ask for help any more than he did. When they had been partners on the beat, they had learned to read each other impeccably and anticipate the other's needs. It might have lessened with time and not being paired up as frequently, but it was far from gone. When she and Halstead had started dating, he had picked up a lot of that weight. Kevin would always be there for his friend and help her out when she needed it. But Halstead was an attentive partner, and their relationship was stable. It wasn’t like when she had been with Ruzek. That had been all ups and downs, and Kevin had to support her as much through their relationship problems as through the extra burden and stress of day-to-day life.      

“We aren’t talking about me right now.” Kevin didn’t miss the speed at which Kim’s focus shot to him and then down to her lap. 

“You're deflecting. Who’s been calling you?” Kevin locked onto the conversation that he had been wanting to have with her for the last few weeks. It was a lot easier thing to focus on than thinking about- 

“What?” Kim practically jumped at the question, and her expression went from tired to alert.  

“Someone has been calling you. You have them on mute, so it doesn’t ring, but you get tense every time they call. And start getting fidgety. Like you are right now.” Kim stopped the tapping of her fingers and rubbed her hands down her thighs. “Kim, what is going on?” She pressed her lips together and shifted in her seat. 

“It’s my dad.” 

“Your dad?” On the long list of things he expected that hadn’t crossed his mind. “I thought...” 

“That I haven’t spoken to him since I was thirteen? Yeah, I haven’t.” Kim swallowed hard, and Kevin recognized the signs of the dam about to burst. “When Jay’s dad was in the hospital...I called him. I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. I didn’t even know if that was still his number.” 

The pause wasn’t long, but it was heavy with emotions and indecision. “I didn’t talk to him. I hung up before it could even fully ring. It must have notified him, though. He called me back a few weeks later. I didn’t answer, and I thought that was the end of it.”  

Kim had hoped that had been the end of it. She had felt ridiculous. Like an anxious little girl who knew that their dad could solve all their problems. It had been a long time since her father had even resembled that kind of man. Kim often wondered if she had fabricated how he really was to help soothe some of the ache from the bruises he had caused.       

 “Now he’s been calling again. He must still be on Nicole’s emergency contact list because he knows that she is in a program.” Kim didn’t know how that could still even be possible. Nicole had been her emergency contact since she was fourteen. And when Kim had turned eighteen, she had been Nicole’s until she had married Jordan. Kim had still been on the list, just not number one like she used to be. “He doesn’t know where she is in rehab at but he is blowing up my phone trying to find out because he wants to go and see her, which is an absolutely awful idea. I’m sure you can imagine. But he won’t let up.” 

“Why haven’t-” 

“Why haven’t I blocked him?” Kim finished for him, laughing bitterly. She shook her head like she knew she was being stupid but couldn’t help herself. “I don’t know. He’s my dad... Jay just lost Pat on bad terms. What if...What if I regret it?” Kim had felt selfish in all of it. Jay wanted so badly to fix his relationship with his dad. He had tried up until the day that he had been declared brain-dead. Kim knew how much Jay still regretted how things had ended. While her own dad had been blowing up her phone, leaving her increasingly long voicemails. All she wanted was for him to lose her number and never reach out to her again.  

“How does Jay feel about it?”  

Kim’s look said it all. “He doesn’t know. Kim.”    

Kim pressed up to her feet in one quick, smooth motion. “How’s your shoulder? Do you need some water? I’ll get you some water.” She was already halfway to his kitchen before she was done speaking.  

Jay Halstead and Kim Burgess

Hi anon! Thanks so much for the prompt! This is set slightly in the future of my It Was a One-Night Stand Until I Woke Up Next to You verse.

...Or it could be because they had a baby together. So Kim and Jay were always together because they were doing the whole co-parenting thing. (And if some feelings had developed since that night of comfort that created Penny, well neither Jay nor Kim were willing to admit it yet.) 

“Hi, baby. Oh, wow you’ve gotten so big! I’ve only been undercover for two weeks. How is that possible? What has momma been feeding you, huh?” Jay asked, picking up Penny after she not so much as crawled as she scooted to him. He pressed an exaggerated kiss to her forehead that made her laugh.

“Are you done with the case?” Kim asked, coming out of her laundry after throwing a load of clothes in the washer. 

“Yeah, flipped a guy and now the case is closed. ASA said it’s an open and shut case.” Shifting Penny to his hip, he made his way to Kim’s kitchen and she saw him place their daughter in their highchair before he offered, “You want me to make dinner…in your impossibly small kitchen?” 

Kim rolled her eyes. This was a bickerment they’d had since before Penny was born. Jay was a traditional kind of guy and Kim knew that. So it didn’t surprise her when he suggested that they move in with each other so he could be around to help with Penny. But people already thought they were together because of their daughter. (Voight had tried to give them both disclosure papers a handful of times. Each.) She didn’t want anymore confusion than there already was. 

She had already been down that road with Adam once. Even though she and Ruz were good now, she couldn’t afford to get hurt or confused like that again. It wasn’t just her Kim had to think about anymore. She also had their daughter now.

Summary: An AU of Unintentional - Before Kim can put her plan into action, Jay asks if he’s going to be a dad. Part 2/7 of @kim-ruzek’s birthday fics!

Warnings: pregnancy, morning sickness

Words: 2.4k

Wanna join my taglist?

—

When Kim pulled into Jay’s spare parking spot she stared at his truck in his spot. She had about thirty minutes until Will arrived to take care of him, and it was thirty minutes to break her heart.

If things had been different and she’d been able to tell him about the baby already. If she could have told him and gone to the first appointment together, announcing that this was Baby Halstead. His hand in hers as they got to listen to their baby’s heartbeat. But instead she was about to break her heart and make herself completely upset. It was for the right reasons, but it hurt even before she’d made it to the apartment.

UNDERRATED DUOS: 

day 3: blood loss | k.b. & j.h.

summary: routine operations never do go smoothly.

pairing: kim burgess x jay halstead

cw: major injury, blood, gun violence

word count: 1168

read it on ao3

After all of this time: all of the warzones, all of the patrols he’s been on, the undercover work, the arrest attempts, the sound of a bullet hitting someone is still the most jarring noise Jay’s ever heard. It crosses a line from jarring to horrifying when he sees his partner collapse in a heap on the floor, blood seeping from her thigh. He doesn’t hesitate to put a bullet in the shooter’s skull, grabbing his radio and calling in the shooting and an ambulance for his partner.