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summary she'd spent three years keeping her work and her personal life in completely separate boxes. then happy went to prison and she drove to stockton in louboutins and blew the whole system up.

prompt – lincoln lawyer crossover, partner!reader, prison yard, happy possessive and soft, old client cameo warnings – prison setting, possessive behaviour, suggestive comments, soft happy word count – ~4k note – I had this idea after being obsessed with both shows - let me know if you want a part 2!

requests are open :)

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Mickey found out on a Tuesday.

She was in his office going through the Vasquez appeal when he looked up from whatever he was reading and said, completely casually, "The SAMCRO case."

She didn't look up. "What about it."

"You're taking it."

"I'm considering it."

"You don't consider cases." He leaned back in his chair. "You assess, decide in forty eight hours, move on. You've been sitting on this one for a week." A pause. "Which means it's personal."

She put the Vasquez file down.

She'd told Mickey about Happy six months into the relationship. Not because she'd planned to — because Mickey noticed things before you'd decided to tell him and it was always better to be upfront.

His reaction had been three questions.

Does he know what you do? Yes. Does he have a problem with it? No. Okay.

That was it. Mickey had gone back to his file and never mentioned it again. One of the things she respected about him.

"It's personal," she said now. "He's one of the six."

"The Stahl setup."

"Yes."

"Federal weapons charges."

"Procedurally compromised. Three violations I've already identified. There's a real argument there."

Mickey looked at her for a long moment. "You'd be good on it."

"I know."

"Cisco has contacts in Charming—"

"I don't need Cisco's contacts. I have my own."

"This crosses your line," he said. Not an objection. Just a fact.

"I know that too."

He picked up his file. "Then go handle it."

She drove to Stockton the next morning.

The yard was exactly what she'd expected.

Loud. Concrete. The specific energy of too many people in too small a space, recalibrating the moment something new walked into it.

She walked in like she owned it. That was the system — always had been. The Louboutins were deliberate. The blazer was deliberate. The first thirty seconds of entering a difficult room determined everything after it and she'd learned that in her first year of practice and never forgotten it.

The yard noticed her.

She didn't look at it noticing her. She kept her eyes on where she was going — the far end, where the guard had told her SAMCRO had their corner — and walked.

She saw Happy before he saw her.

His back was partially to the yard, talking to Jax. The posture of him so familiar that something in her chest did its usual thing. She told it to wait. She had a job to do first.

She was halfway across the yard when she saw the other face.

Marcus Webb.

She nearly stopped. Caught herself. Kept walking. Former client — three years ago, robbery charge she'd knocked down to a misdemeanour. He'd seen her too. She filed it. Dealt with later.

The comment came from her left.

She stopped.

Turned.

The man was against the wall. Arms crossed. The specific confidence of someone who hadn't yet learned what kind of mistake he was making.

"I need you to not do that again," she said. Completely even. The courtroom voice — the one that never needed volume. "I have a meeting to get to."

He smiled. "Or what?"

She held his gaze for two seconds. Then she looked past him.

Happy was already moving.

Happy had seen her the moment she walked in.

Fourteen months. He'd known it was going to be long — had prepared for it, had done long before. But there was something specific about this fourteen months. She'd written. Not often, they were both too careful for that, but enough. Short precise letters that said less than they meant. He'd read between every line.

He'd watched her cross the yard. Watched the yard respond. Watched her face stay completely composed through all of it.

Then he watched the man open his mouth.

He was moving before the sentence finished. Not running — he never ran, it implied something he wasn't prepared to give — just moving. The walk that cleared space without requiring anything to be said.

He stopped behind the man and waited.

The man turned around.

Happy looked at him.

That was it. Just looked at him. Waited for the mathematics to finish.

They finished quickly.

"I didn't know she was—" the man started.

"Walk away," Happy said. Quiet. Flat.

He walked away.

Happy turned to her.

She was looking at him with the expression he'd spent a year learning. Composed surface. Several things underneath it.

"You didn't have to do that," she said.

"I know."

"I had it."

"I know that too." He looked at her. "You always have it."

She held his gaze for a moment. Then something shifted — the professional layer dropping, just slightly. Just enough.

"Hi," she said. Quieter.

"Hi," he said.

The table.

Six of them — Jax, Clay, Bobby, Tig, Juice, Happy. Her at the head with her file open. The attorney, not the girlfriend. She'd drawn that line before she walked in.

Jax watched her with the careful attention of a man still making his decision. Clay was harder to read. Bobby asked smart questions. Tig she kept in her peripheral vision. Juice was quiet.

Happy sat at the end and said almost nothing. She didn't look at him more than the others. Couldn't afford to.

"The Stahl deal," she said. "Three procedural violations. Any one is arguable. All three together and our position is significantly stronger." She looked at Jax. "I need the full timeline. Everything."

"Everything's a lot," Clay said.

"Attorney-client privilege covers everything you tell me. That's what it exists for." She met his gaze. "I can't help you with half the picture. Everything."

Bobby looked at Happy. Something passed between them.

"She's good," Bobby said. To Happy. Like it was a confirmation.

"I know," Happy said.

She kept her eyes on the file.

Two hours. By the end she had the timeline, the Stahl language, the procedural failures she was already building around in the part of her mind that ran parallel to everything else.

She was closing the file when someone approached from behind.

"Counsellor."

She turned.

Marcus Webb. Hands visible. Expression careful. He'd learned things in here.

"Marcus," she said.

"Didn't expect to see you."

"I could say the same."

He glanced at the table. Back at her. "You representing these guys?"

"I am."

He nodded slowly. "I saw something," he said. "Few months back. Might be relevant to a federal setup." A pause. "If you need witnesses."

She assessed him quickly. Marcus Webb had been a good client — honest within his limits. No reason not to trust the offer.

"Thursday," she said. "I'll be back. We talk then."

He nodded. Stepped back.

She turned to the table. Six men watching her.

"Former client," she said. "Might have something useful." She stood up. "I'll be back Thursday with the initial filing. Between now and then — don't do anything that makes my job harder."

"Define anything," Tig said.

"Tig," Jax said.

"I'm genuinely asking—"

"Whatever you're considering," she said pleasantly. "Don't."

Tig looked at Happy. Happy said nothing. Tig subsided.

She picked up her file.

The gate.

Happy walked her over without being asked. He always did things like that — just appeared beside her, moved with her, the proximity she'd stopped noticing the absence of and had now noticed the return of acutely.

The guard was at the gate. Two minutes, maybe three.

She stopped. Turned.

He looked at her the way he looked at her when there was no one else — full attention, unhurried, taking stock. She let him. Happy needed to see things with his own eyes. She'd learned that early.

"You lost weight," he said.

"I've been busy."

"Eating isn't optional."

"I know."

"I'm serious—"

"Happy." Quiet. "I know."

His jaw moved. The tell she'd catalogued — the one that meant he was managing something he didn't have words for yet.

"That man earlier," he said.

"Is handled."

"If he—"

"Happy." Firmer. "He won't. And even if he tried—" she held his gaze, "—I handle myself. You know that."

"I know that," he said. "Doesn't mean I have to like watching you walk in here alone."

She looked at him. At the yard behind him, the concrete, the fourteen months of it. At the expression he had right now — not the enforcer, not what the yard saw. Just him. The version that only existed in the space between them.

"I'm not alone," she said. "You're here."

Something moved across his face.

He reached out — both hands, not the brief touch from earlier but something deliberate — cupping her face the way he did when he meant it. Looked at her for one more moment.

Then he kissed her forehead. Slow. Certain. Stayed there a beat longer than necessary, thumbs brushing her cheekbones, and she closed her eyes and let herself have it. Just a second. Just this.

When he pulled back he didn't move his hands straight away.

"Thursday," he said. Into her hair. Rough.

"Thursday," she said.

He let go. Stepped back.

She looked at him one last time — Happy Lowman, in a prison yard, watching her go with the expression that was only ever hers — and walked through.

The gate closed.

She didn't stop walking. Didn't let herself feel it until she was in the car with the door shut, and then she sat there for thirty seconds with her hands on the wheel and let it be as big as it was.

Then she started the engine.

She called Mickey.

He picked up second ring. "How'd it go."

"Good. Three violations, a potential witness, timeline supports the argument."

"And personally?"

She looked at the prison in the mirror.

"Fine," she said.

"Right," Mickey said, in the tone that meant he didn't believe her and wasn't going to push it. "Lorna will set up the filing schedule. Cisco wants in on the witness angle."

"Tell Cisco I'll handle it."

"He'll want to help."

"He can want things," she said. "I'll call you tomorrow."

She pulled onto the highway and drove back toward Los Angeles with the case file on the passenger seat and fourteen months of something to undo and the absolute certainty of a woman who had crossed her own line and would do it again without a second thought.

Thursday, she thought.

She had work to do.

KATE SHARMA

Day 15 of Old Art

feeling those autumn vibes, so more OTGW x Moomins happened 🍂

I have a another draft for this crossover, it be aaaaaangst though...

and finally Wirt is playing the oboe, not the bassoon! I really enjoy drawing Wirt, he's so precious.

This is my page piece for the "Return to the Unknown", the 10th anniversary celebration zine for Over The Garden Wall!! I love all the episodes, but i always LOVED how unsettling the Lorna episode was, so I'm delighted I got to draw a piece depicting it!! <3

Hehe ~