#mick rawson

He absolutely had a look — the same one he wore whenever he thought he was being charming, which, infuriatingly, he usually was. "I'm simply appreciating," he said, "watching a woman defend a breaded chicken cutlet like it's a matter of national security."

"It is a matter of national security. Regional pride, at minimum." You went back to butterflying the chicken breast, flattening it out with the side of a rolling pin while he watched with the fascinated, slightly alarmed expression of a man who suspected he was about to be handed a considerable amount of responsibility. "You breadcrumb it, you fry it — properly fry it, none of your air fryer nonsense—"

"Didn't say a word about the air fryer."

"You were thinking it. I could hear you thinking it." You breaded the chicken with practiced efficiency, egg and breadcrumb, and nodded at the flour dish beside him. "Your job is the white sauce. Don't panic, it's basically béchamel with delusions of grandeur. Milk, butter, flour, bit of garlic if you're feeling brave, and you whisk it like you mean it."

"I always mean it."

"Rawson."

"Sorry. Whisking." He hopped down off the counter, rolled his sleeves up with more ceremony than the task strictly required, and set to work at the stove beside you, and for a solid two minutes there was blessed, focused quiet — him frowning at the saucepan like it had personally wronged him, you frying the chicken in the pan beside his, the kitchen filling with the smell of hot oil and garlic.

"This is going lumpy," he announced, with the grim tone of a man reporting a hull breach.

"It's not going lumpy, you're just not whisking fast enough. Here—" You leaned over, one hand briefly covering his on the whisk to demonstrate the motion, quick and steady, and he went very still and very quiet in a way that had nothing to do with the sauce. "Like that. Faster. You're not stirring a cup of tea, Mick, put your back into it."

"Bossy."

"You're the one who asked to learn."

"I'm reconsidering my choices."

"Too late. You're committed. There's chicken in the pan and everything." You straightened back up, satisfied his whisking had improved to an acceptable standard, and left him to it, though you noticed — with some private amusement — that he kept sneaking glances over at you rather than at his own saucepan, which was doing precisely nothing to help his lumpy-sauce crisis.

Somewhere between the frying and the whisking, you'd started humming, and it took him a minute to place it as words rather than tune. "Juninho is magic," you sang, entirely unselfconsciously, tapping the fish slice against the pan for rhythm, "he wears a magic hat, and when he signed for Boro, he said, 'I fancy that.'"

Mick stopped whisking entirely. "I'm sorry, what was that?"

"Juninho. Best player Boro's ever had, no arguments." You said it like you were reciting scripture. "Little magician. You wouldn't understand, you're Welsh."

"I understood every word, I simply need you to know that was the single strangest thing I've heard you say, and you've said several strange things tonight."

"It's not strange, it's tradition. Every Boro fan knows that chant." You gave him a look daring him to disagree. "Don't laugh."

He was already laughing, properly, doubled slightly over the counter, sauce spoon still in hand. "'I fancy that.' Who wrote that? Who heard 'I fancy that' and thought, yes, this is going in the terrace chant?"

"It's poetry, Rawson."

"It's the least poetic thing I've ever heard, and I've heard you defend a chicken cutlet like it was a war crime being committed against it."

"You're just jealous Wales doesn't have a Juninho."

"We have several excellent players, thank you—"

"Name one that got a chant about fancying a football club."

He opened his mouth, visibly searching, and found nothing. "I'll allow you this one," he said, still grinning, shaking his head as he went back to his whisking. "Just this once. For the sake of the parmo."

"Wise man."

"You know, an hour ago I thought I understood you. Now I discover you sing football chants at chicken. There's clearly a great deal more to learn here."

"Told you. Multitudes."

"Terrifying multitudes."

"You know," he said, a few minutes later, once the chicken was crisped up gold and resting on kitchen roll and his sauce had, against considerable odds, come together into something recognisably smooth, "for a woman this passionate about a regional chicken dish, you've never once mentioned wanting to actually visit Middlesbrough with me."

"You've never asked."

"I'm asking now."

"In the middle of making a parmo?"

"Seemed as good a time as any. You're distracted, less likely to overthink it and say no."

You looked over at him — flour on his sleeve, sauce spoon in hand, entirely too smug for a man who'd nearly curdled a béchamel twenty minutes prior — and felt something warm and uncomplicated settle in your chest. "Alright," you said. "Yeah. I'll take you to Middlesbrough."

"Just like that?"

"Just like that. Fair warning, though — the accent's going to confuse you within about four minutes, and my nan will absolutely interrogate you about your intentions."

"I've survived interrogations before."

"Not from my nan, you haven't."

He grinned, the real one, not the performance he wore for the rest of the world, and reached past you for the grated cheese to finish assembling the dish — chicken laid out on a plate, sauce spread thick and generous over the top, a genuinely absurd quantity of cheese piled over that, exactly as tradition demanded.

"Under the grill it goes," you said, sliding the tray in, "and then, Rawson, you're about to have a religious experience."

"High expectations."

"Entirely justified ones."

You leaned against the counter next to him while it cooked, shoulder to shoulder, the kitchen warm with garlic and melting cheese, and he bumped his arm gently against yours, an idle, easy touch that had become a habit somewhere in the last few weeks without either of you remarking on it.

"For what it's worth," he said, watching the cheese bubble gold through the oven door, "I'd have eaten anything you put in front of me tonight and called it the best meal of my life. Didn't need the parmo to convince me."

"That's disgustingly sentimental for a man who spent twenty minutes fighting a sauce."

"I contain multitudes."

"You contain a lumpy béchamel and an ego. Barely multitudes."

He laughed — properly laughed, head tipping back slightly, the sound filling up your small kitchen in a way you'd quietly, privately decided you wanted to hear far more often — and slung an arm loose around your shoulders while you both waited for the cheese to finish bubbling, and neither of you moved to step out from under it.

"Middlesbrough," he said again, like he was trying the word out, like he was already looking forward to it.

"Middlesbrough," you agreed. "It's a long flight from here, mind. You'll survive it. Probably."

"With you there? I'll manage." He tightened his arm slightly around your shoulders. "Only fair, though — after that, you're coming to Wales. Six hours' drive from Cardiff to get to my nan's, give or take, but we'll make the time. She'll love you."

"Will she?"

"Completely. She'll have you fed within four minutes of walking through the door and married off within ten, so consider yourself warned."

It couldn't be anything more than that. You'd decided that a long time ago, somewhere around the third time you'd told yourself it was the last time. 

You and Mick agreed that you just needed something to blow off steam due to the nature of the job, it was… logical, it made sense. And yet it didnt stop the way your heart fluttered every time he looked at you, it didn’t stop you always wanting just a bit more than you allowed yourself to give.

It was Cooper that broke off first, wiping his face with the towel around his neck, and looked past Mick's shoulder at you like he'd been waiting for you to show up.

"You're up," Cooper said, tossing the towel aside, in the tone of a man who already knew exactly how this was going to go and had decided to enjoy it anyway.

"Ooh." Beth didn't even look up from her coffee. "This is going to be good."

Mick grinned, rolling his shoulders out, all faux-innocence. "Try not to take it personally, love. I imagine this one's over fairly quick."

"Do you say every woman?" you said, already stepping onto the mat. "Or am I just special?"

"Oh you’re definitely special, darling," Mick said, backing up a step, hands loose at his sides, "but I probably ought to be sparring someone who can actually put me on my back."

"You and I both know I’ve put you on your back more times than I can count," you said, before you could stop yourself, and immediately regretted it as Beth made a small, strangled noise into her coffee. “You were right about one thing,” you continued.

“And what’s that?”

“That you won’t last long.”

"Promises, promises, love," Mick said, already pulling his jacket off, and you tried very hard not to notice the way his shirt rode up when he did it.

The first few exchanges were almost professional… almost. You circled him, testing, and he let you, watching your feet more than your hands, which should have told you something. You threw a jab he blocked without even really looking at it, followed it with a low kick he stepped clean out of the way of, and for a second it actually felt like a fair fight.

Then he came in fast, and you barely got your forearm up in time to catch the strike aimed at your ribs, the impact jarring up through your elbow. You answered with an elbow of your own, close and quick, and felt the small, satisfying jolt of actually landing it… right up until he used the momentum of your own swing against you, catching your wrist and turning you half around before you'd even clocked what happened.

Focus, you told yourself, resetting your stance. He's not even trying yet. Which was somehow worse. You could feel him reading you, the way he always did, adjusting half a beat ahead of whatever you threw next, and you hated how much you liked it, hated the way your pulse kicked up for reasons that had nothing to do with cardio.

He had several inches and a good few stone on you and he knew exactly how to use both, crowding your space with every step until you had nowhere left to go but down. You threw one more strike, more instinct than strategy at that point, and he caught it, used your own weight to sweep your legs out from under you, and you hit the mat with his weight settled over you a half-second later, wrists pinned above your head.

For a moment neither of you moved. His face was close enough that you could count the number of times he'd shaved that morning and gotten it wrong, close enough that you could feel his breath, a little uneven, against your jaw. Neither of you looked away first. You were fairly sure that was the whole problem with the two of you, in miniature — neither of you ever looked away first.

"There she is," he said, low, like it was just for you, like there weren't half a dozen profilers watching this happen in real time. "Knew you'd end up under me eventually."

"Careful," you said, and used the half-second his grin cost him to hook a leg around his and roll, flipping the two of you so you were the one on top, knees braced either side of his hips, his wrists now the ones pinned.

For a second, nobody said anything. Mick looked up at you like he was recalculating something — like the ground had shifted a few inches to the left and he was still working out how he felt about it. His chest was rising and falling harder than the exercise alone accounted for, and his hands, pinned loosely under yours, didn't so much as twitch to get free.

You looked down at him and became abruptly, painfully aware of exactly how this looked; your knees braced either side of his hips, his wrists caught in your grip, both of you breathing like you'd run somewhere instead of just grappled on a gym mat. You became aware, too, of how long you'd let it go on. One second would have been fine. Explainable. This was closer to three, maybe four, and every one of them had felt like something was being decided that neither of you had actually agreed to discuss out loud.

Somewhere behind you, you were fairly sure you heard Gina mutter something under her breath. You didn't turn to check.

You got up fast, held out a hand, and hauled him to his feet like it was nothing. "Good spar."

"Yeah," Mick said, rubbing his wrist, eyes still on you in a way that wasn't remotely subtle. "Good spar."

"Okay." Beth set her coffee down with the particular finality of someone who profiled people for a living and had simply run out of patience to spend on the two of you. "I can't. I genuinely cannot do this anymore."

"Do what?" you said, too quickly, which was itself the wrong answer and you knew it the second it left your mouth.

"This." Beth gestured between the two of you, a single sweeping motion that somehow encompassed the spar, the eye contact, and, you strongly suspected, several months of history she'd apparently been cataloguing this whole time. "Whatever this is. I've let it go. Everyone's let it go. But I timed that little display just now, and it went on a solid four seconds longer than a normal spar debrief requires."

"It's called good sportsmanship," Mick said.

"It's called foreplay with a countdown timer," Beth said. "And that's before we even get into the coffee thing."

"What coffee thing?"

"Mick." Beth said his name like it was a verdict. "You brought her coffee this morning. Before she asked. Exactly how she takes it. Don't tell me that's a coincidence, I've watched you hand Prophet the wrong order for three years running."

"I know everyone's order, I'm the one who does the coffee run—"

"You don't know Prophet's order," Gina said from the corner, not looking up from her tablet, in the flat tone of someone contributing evidence to a case file rather than a conversation.

"He takes it black with three sugars,” you began, “Mick is aware that that's not an order, that's a cry for help—"

"See, this!" Beth threw both hands up, appealing to the room now, not just the two of you. "This is exactly what I'm talking about. You two have entire conversations that are just foreplay with punchlines stapled on. It's exhausting to be around. We are professional profilers, trained specifically to notice patterns of behavior, and none of us can profile our way out of the secondhand tension in this building anymore."

"She's not wrong," Prophet said, not looking up from his phone, in the tone of a man confirming a fact rather than picking a side. "I had a headache Tuesday. Lasted from the moment you two walked into the briefing room until the moment you walked out. Fairly sure it was you two."

"Correlation isn't causation," Mick said.

"It is when it happens every single day," Beth said.

"We don't know what you're talking about," Mick said, at the exact moment you said, "There's nothing going on."

"Right," Beth said. "Sure. Nothing going on. That's why you were just on the floor together looking like you wanted to fuck eachother dumb—"

"Alright." Cooper's voice cut through, flat and final, the sound of a man ending a meeting that had never officially started. "As we're a red cell, we don't run an HR department. As far as I'm concerned, what you two do or don't do on your own time is your business and I intend to keep it that way." He picked up the file that had clearly been the actual reason he'd walked in. "But right now we've got a case. Everybody up to the briefing room."

The room emptied out slowly, everyone throwing looks over their shoulders on the way out, Beth smirking like she'd won something. You bent to grab your jacket off the bench, buying yourself a second before you had to look at Mick again.

"Hey." His voice was quieter now, the performance dialed down to something that sounded almost nervous, which on Mick was its own kind of alarming. "When this case is done."

"What about it?"

"Dinner. Real one. Table, menus, me not making a joke every time you look at me." He said it fast, like he wanted it out before he could talk himself out of it. "Just us. No audience."

You glanced toward the door, toward the sound of Beth's voice still carrying down the hall, and looked back at him. "Yeah," you said, quiet, just for him. "Okay."

His whole face did something you didn't have time to examine before you were both moving, falling into step behind the others like nothing had happened, like the last two minutes hadn't rearranged something in your chest.

In the briefing room, you took your usual seat. Mick took the chair next to you, like always. Cooper started talking victimology, and you nodded along, professional, present, giving nothing away.

Under the table, Mick's hand found yours, folded around it like it belonged there, thumb tracing once over your knuckles before he let go and reached for his coffee, face perfectly straight.

You bit down on a smile and looked at the case file like you were listening.

Everything was going to be fine.

★・・・・・・★

He did, shifting his chair just enough to make room, and something about the small, easy way he did it — like your presence there was a given, not an intrusion — settled somewhere in your chest you didn't examine too closely. You made yourself tea you weren't sure you wanted, mostly for something to do with your hands, and sat down across from him at the small table instead of retreating back to your room like you probably should have.

For a while, neither of you said anything. The building hummed with the particular quiet of 3 a.m. — vending machines, distant traffic, someone's television playing low through a wall two rooms down.

"You're not actually going to drink that," you said eventually, nodding at his mug.

"Observant."

"How long's it been sitting there?"

"Long enough that I've forgotten what I put in it." He turned the mug a quarter turn on the table, an idle motion, like he needed his hands doing something. "You get used to it. The not sleeping."

"Do you?"

"No." He said it simply, without the usual armor around it, and it caught you off guard enough that you didn't fill the silence that followed, just let him have it. "Cooper says it gets better. It's been years and it hasn't gotten better, so either he's a liar or I'm defective, and my money's on the second one most nights."

"I don't think that's how it works."

"No?"

"I think some things just don't go away. I think you just get better at carrying them without it showing." You wrapped both hands around your mug, more for the warmth than anything. "Doesn't mean you're broken. Means you've been through something that leaves a mark. That's not the same thing."

He looked at you for a long moment, something unreadable behind his eyes, like he was recalibrating an opinion of you he'd apparently already formed and was now quietly revising. It went on a beat longer than a normal look should — long enough that you felt it, warm and a little unsteady, somewhere under your ribs — before he seemed to catch himself and glanced back down at his mug.

"That's uncharacteristically kind of you, for 3 a.m."

"Don't get used to it. I'm blaming the tea."

That got a real laugh out of him, short and surprised, and something in his shoulders came down half an inch. "The harder I try to forget," he said, quieter now, almost to himself, "the more clearly I remember. Told Cooper that once. Didn't expect it to still be true this many years on."

"What is it you're trying to forget?"

You expected him to deflect — a joke, a change of subject, the usual reflex. He surprised you by not doing either. He didn't tell you the specifics, not that night, but he told you enough. The shape of it, if not the details. Nights that didn't end when the sun came up. Things carried out of rooms he didn't talk about, from a life before the FBI, before Cooper, before any of this. You didn't push, and you didn't flinch, and you didn't reach for him with some performance of sympathy — you just listened, steady, letting him set the pace of it.

"You're very quiet about all this," he said, when he'd trailed off. "Most people fill the silence. Say something reassuring. Pat me on the arm and tell me it's all in the past."

"Is it in the past?"

"...No. Not really."

"Then I'm not going to lie to you and say it is." You shrugged. "I figure you get enough people telling you what you want to hear. Seemed like a waste of a perfectly good 3 a.m. to do the same."

Something shifted in his expression, something that had nothing to do with charm or bravado, something quieter and much harder for him to hide. "You're a strange one, you know that?"

"I've been told."

"I mean that as a compliment, for the record." He nudged his cold mug aside and, for the first time all night, looked genuinely, unguardedly tired rather than performing exhaustion for effect. "Cooper's the only one who's ever gotten the unabridged version of any of this. Feels odd, giving you the abridged one at—" he checked the clock on the wall, "—half three in the morning, over tea I'm never going to drink."

"You don't have to give me any version of it."

"I know." He said it easily, like it wasn't even a question. "Wanted to, though."

You didn't have a clever answer for that, so you didn't try to find one. You just sat with him a while longer, the two of you and two cooling mugs of tea neither of you particularly wanted, until the exhaustion in his shoulders finally started to look less like a wall he was holding up and more like something he might actually let himself put down.

"Come on," you said eventually, standing, holding a hand out to him — not because he needed help getting up, but because it felt like the kind of night where somebody ought to offer. "You're not going to sleep sitting up in a kitchenette."

He looked at your hand for a beat longer than the gesture strictly required, then took it, and let you tug him up out of the chair — closer than the small kitchenette really required, close enough that you caught the tired, unguarded look on his face up close before either of you thought to step back. Neither of you did, for a second longer than was strictly necessary. His hand stayed loosely around yours even once he was standing, like he'd forgotten to let go, or hadn't quite decided to yet.

"For what it's worth," he said, as you both headed back down the quiet hallway toward your rooms, his voice pitched low enough that it felt like it belonged only to the two of you, "this is the first 3 a.m. in longer than I'd like to admit that didn't feel like something I had to get through alone."

"Get some sleep, Rawson."

"Yes, ma'am." A ghost of the grin came back, softer now, more real than the one he wore for the rest of the team. "Same time tomorrow, if the ice machine's still driving you mad?"

"Don't push your luck."

"Wouldn't dream of it." He paused at his door, and for just a second the bravado dropped away entirely. He was still closer than he needed to be, closer than the width of a hotel hallway strictly required, and for one long moment neither of you moved to close the last of the distance or step back from it.

Then he leaned in — unhurried, like he'd already decided and was simply giving you a beat to stop him if you wanted to — and kissed you. Quick. Soft. Over before you'd fully registered it had started, his free hand coming up just briefly to rest at your jaw before he pulled back, watching your face with something far too pleased with itself for half three in the morning.

"Same time tomorrow, then," he said, like he hadn't just done that, like his heart rate hadn't visibly picked up either, the smug tilt of his mouth firmly back in place. "Ice machine permitting."

You laughed, a little breathless, a little unsteady. "You are an actual HR nightmare, you know that?"

"So I've been told. Repeatedly. In writing, once." He was grinning now, fully, the tired man from ten minutes ago tucked back behind it, though not quite as far behind as it used to be. "Didn't stop you kissing me back, though, did it."

"I hardly had time to do anything else, you ambushed me."

"Terrible tactics on my part. Should've given you more warning." He didn't sound remotely sorry. "Might have to try again sometime. See if I can improve my technique."

"Confident."

"Always." But something in his voice dropped, just slightly, shedding the performance for one honest beat, the same way it had over the tea an hour before. "I mean it, though. Thank you. For tonight. For — all of it."

"I know you do." You reached up, without entirely deciding to, and straightened his collar where it had gone crooked, an excuse to keep your hand near him a moment longer. "Go to sleep, Rawson. Properly, this time."

"Only if you tell me you'll still be in that kitchenette tomorrow."

"Wouldn't miss it."

He caught your hand before you could pull it back, pressed something quick and warm to your knuckles, and let it go before either of you could make more of it than a hotel hallway at 3 a.m. could reasonably hold.

"Goodnight," he said, softer now, all the cockiness momentarily set aside.

"Goodnight, Mick."

You were brough on as a late addition to cooper's team following Beth's death. You'd read about the case online, it sounded brutal. Cooper had to kill a manipulated and broken young man, or have his beloved team member killed.

It had taken a tole on him, a tole on everyone.

Beth despite being cold at times brought everyone together, they loved her like a family and now, well, its never easy when a family looses someone. Grief isn't a gun shot, its a slow burning fire that whenever someone blows on it you don't know if they are going to put it out, or make it burn brighter.

Unlike the rest of the team, Cooper didn't chose you, the director of the FBI selected you instead, which meant you didn't exactly start off on the right foot with the rest of the team.

But you were warm and understood their hesitation, but above all you were a damn good profiler.

Soon their coldness towards you melted away, you weren't trying to replace Beth, you were just there to help the team in whatever way you could. then somewhere along the way you were part of the team, and you couldn't imagine it any other way.

However, there was one slight tension that never quite left.

You were Scottish.

Mick was welsh.

Usually, this would have united you, simply due to your shared hatred of the English, however, that wasn't exactly the case.

when you and mick started getting closer he finally made a comment on your accent and you nearly threw a chair at him.

"I'm sorry love, but there is now way you're Scottish."

"excuse me?"

"I mean you just sound more English, no offence."

"says the 'Welsh' man who has a borderline RP accent? Usually I'd make sheep jokes but that's a bit difficult when it sound like you're going to have dinner with the queen."

"in what world do I not sound Welsh?"

"in what world do I not sound Scottish?"

somehow the bickering of the pair of you caught the rest of the teams attention, crouding round you both as if a show was about to begin.

you had heard the whispers circulate once you started to settle that you and mick had a 'thing'. it wasn't true of course, no matter how much you wanted it to be. you and Mick were friends, who had weirdly similar life stories and seemed to understand each other more than anyone, but you were just friends.

F. R. I. E. N. D. S.

It doesn't matter that you stayed round his for a week when your power went off. It doesn't matter that after a case he come round yours as he is a hopeless cook and you always 'accidently' make your portion sizes too big. It doesn't matter that you kissed when drunk once. It doesn't matter that you kissed when drunk twice. It doesn't matter that you kissed when drunk th-

none of that matter because you are jsut friends.

"can you two just kiss and make up?" Prophet sighed, "you're both British isn't that enough?"

he clearly did not expect the rage that that statement would elicit.

Rule number 1 about Scottish people, never insinuate that they are English. Rule 2, don't say that they are British.

"no self respecting Scott would ever say that they are British!" you practically shouted in the face of prophet making him back away, before you turned on your heels, pointing an accusatory finger at Mick, "the fact that you tell people that your British just means your probably not actually Welsh."

"American girls love British men, if I say I'm Welsh they probably have no idea what I'm talking about. I'd rather have them in my bed than explain my nationality tot hem."

"that's vile."

"that's the game."

"that's enough of that," cooper voice cut through the argument, "we have a case."

"this isn't over, Rawson."

"wouldn't dream of it ending, love."

★・・・・・・★

You entered into this weird game that just never seemed to end. now whenever accents inevitably got brough up everyone on the team simply rolled their eyes and ignored the never ending arguing of the two of you.

Prophet even thought it was funny to start playing a 'guess the accent' quiz on YouTube. everyone on the team had enough, but it was more than obvious that you had a Scottish accent and mick has a Welsh one.

it was damning evidence - but you didn't care, you wanted to win. win what exactly? you weren't exactly sure.

on thing you were sure about was you knew far too much about Wales, you looked up far too many obscure and weird facts to 'test' mick because a 'true Welsh man would know this about his country'. naturally he did the same about Scotland, which lead to a particularly heated debate about Greyfriars Bobby.

The arguments became almost routine.

Sometimes they started because someone on the television had an accent. Sometimes because Mick insisted Edinburgh wasn't that Scottish. Once, memorably, because he'd claimed Irn-Bru tasted "a bit overrated."

The team had long since stopped trying to referee. Prophet would simply sigh and leave the room. Cooper would continue reading his files as though the pair of you weren't threatening each other's ancestry over coffee. Garcia found the whole thing hilarious over video calls, and Gina...

Gina just watched.

t wasn't until a quiet afternoon, while the rest of the team were either buried in paperwork or grabbing coffee, that she cornered you in the break room.

"Can I ask you something?" Gina said, leaning against the counter with the sort of smile that usually meant she already knew the answer.

You looked up from the kettle. "Depends how personal it is."

"well, I guess I'll keep my mouth shut..."

"hey come on, I'm just messing with you," you laughed, "what's up?"

"oh nothing," she smiled poring coffee into her mug, "just you know," Gina began, stirring sugar into her coffee, "most people don't spend six months picking fights over accents."

"They're not fights."

"Mm-hm."

"They're... spirited discussions."

She laughed.

"I've worked with profilers long enough to know when someone's looking for an excuse to spend time with somebody."

You snorted. "We're friends."

Gina hummed into her mug.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"Gina."

"I just don't think I've ever seen two friends who argue that much just to keep a conversation going."

"friends can have on going arguments, it's called an inside joke, I'm pretty sure you have them this side of the Atlantic."

"He waits for you before briefing starts."

"...Coincidence."

"He drinks tea now."

"...Lots of people drink tea."

"He hated tea before you joined the team."

You opened your mouth.

.. and then closed it again, you had nothing to say. you didn't know that.

"He eats dinner at your apartment three nights a week."

"Because he'll burn water if I leave him unsupervised." you muttered

"Honey..." Gina laughed softly. "He's thirty-four, not twelve."

you simply rolled your eyes. unfortunately for Gina Mick cooks like a 13-year-old boy who has never used a stove before. he once called you to help him follow a recipe to make pesto pasta.... he used store bought pesto, what was there to help with?

then it hit you.

all the times he'd ask for your help on simple things, every time he'd fumble something just so you could help, none of that could be on purpose right?

Mick was a proud man he doesn't like asking people for help, except you of course. but he always said that you didn't count. he said that before the first time he kissed you 'this one doesn't count love,' and that phrase has been ringing in your ears ever since.

"We're just close." you muttered, feeling the weight of Gina's stare, god you hated profilers.

Gina tilted her head.

"Has he kissed all his close friends?"

Heat rushed straight to your face.

"...That happened twice." you whispered

"Three times." she offhandedly corrected, before showing you a slight smile.

You just stared.

"...People know about that?"

"we know far too much."

you shook your head with a laugh, you had work to do, and your tea wasn't going to brew itself, "you're wrong Gina, I'm sorry to burst your bubble,"

"whatever helps you sleep at night." she laughed as she turned away from you.

one thing was for sure, you couldn't see Mick today, or rather you couldn't be alone with Mick today. Gina was wrong there was and will be nothing between the two of you, no matter how good he is at kissing or how good he looks, there is categorically nothing but friendship and the mild war of accents between you and mick. nothing more.

★・・・・・・★

You made it exactly forty-three minutes.

Forty-three blissful, Mick-free minutes before he wandered into the bullpen with two coffees balanced in one hand.

"Tea," he corrected himself when he spotted you looking up from your paperwork. "Forgot Americans drink coffee like it's intravenous."

He placed the cup beside your keyboard without asking.

"...Thanks."

He frowned.

"No insult?"

"What?"

"You usually tell me I've brewed it wrong before you've even tasted it."

"I've decided to be the bigger person."

Mick narrowed his eyes.

"...You're ill."

"I'm perfectly healthy."

"You've called me English at least twice by now."

"I've decided to stop."

"...Right."

The silence stretched.

He looked almost... disappointed.

But that didn't matter, it didn't count, it was probably all in your head anyways, right?

you been given another case, you would think at least one psychopath would enjoy a weekend off, but apparently not. you were maing your way to the jet like usual, as Mick automatically fell into step beside you.

He always did.

You'd never noticed before.

Or maybe you'd just never questioned it.

still his presence, his closeness, felt like an intrusion. it all felt like too much. he didn't even know what he was doing to you. maybe he wasn't doing anything; maybe it was just Gina's words getting to you and there is nothing to read into at all. Maybe...

but your line of work doesn't allow for 'maybe's, you have to be certain otherwise people could get hurt, that's why you quicken your pace to match Gina's to make some unriveting small talk. you didn't look back, but you swore you could hear Micks footsteps stop for just a second.

It was later in the day and you were hunched over a map desperately trying to make sense of the sporadic nature of 5 abductions, trying to figure out a geo-profile when you were nearly sure that there was no coloration of the hunting grounds. you didn't hear the door open to the board room, it was only when you felt a warm and familiar hand rest on your shoulder that you related that someone had came in.

well not just somone.

"alight?" Mick said squeezing your shoulder as an attempt to get you to look up at him.

"What?" you huffed, eyes still locked on the map.

"You've barely insulted Wales all day."

"I've been busy, mick" you said vaguely gesturing to the map and several crossed out and scrunched up pieces of paper.

"You called me 'Mick.'"

"That's your name."

"Usually it's 'sheep shagger.'"

You couldn't help laughing.

"There she is."

he smiled as you looked at him for the first time.

He smiled when you finally looked at him properly.

It was unfair, really.

The stubble that always seemed to sit perfectly along his jaw despite spending half his life on planes. The tired blue eyes that somehow still held that irritating glint whenever he looked at you. His sleeves were rolled to his forearms—as they always were—and somewhere along the years you'd learnt every scar scattered across his skin without ever meaning to.

Gina's words echoed in the back of your mind.

He's looking for an excuse to spend time with somebody.

You hated that you couldn't stop thinking about them.

"Seriously." His voice softened. "What's happened?"

"Nothing." you shook your head looking away.

Mick's eyes were glued on you, "You're lying."

"I'm a profiler."

"So am I."

The room fell silent again.

Neither of you looked away.

You'd stared into the eyes of serial killers without flinching. Sat across from men who'd confessed to things that would haunt your nightmares for years to come.

Yet somehow you couldn't hold Mick Rawson's gaze for more than a few seconds.

You looked back down at the map, tracing roads that you weren't really seeing.

He didn't move.

He was waiting.

Of course he was.

He always waited.

"Why do you always ask me for help?"

Mick usually composed face falterd for a second, "...What?"

"With cooking. Technology. Flat-pack furniture. Directions. Everything."

"...Because you're good at those things?"

"No."

"...No?"

"You don't ask anyone else."

He just stares at you for a long moment before a tiny smile tugs at the corner of his mouth.

"...Gina got to you, didn't she?"

You frowned.

Got to you?

Of course.

That had to be it.

Gina had planted an idea in your head and now you were reading far too much into perfectly ordinary things.

You should've known better.

You were a profiler, for God's sake.

Gina was wrong.

There wasn't some hidden meaning behind every dinner, every stupid argument, every kiss that "didn't count."

You'd let yourself overthink it.

God, Gina was never going to let you hear the end of this.

"She didn't get to me." you insisted, refusing to meet his eyes.

"No?"

"No." you answered firmly, as though saying it with enough conviction would somehow make it true.

"Then why are you suddenly questioning why I ask you to make me dinner?"

"I don't make you dinner." you corrected, pointing your pen at him as though presenting evidence in court. "you just happen to be there."

he tiled his head with a slight chuckle, "You accidentally cook enough for two."

"…That's different."

He laughed properly this time, and you felt your stomach do flips; you hated it. Almost as much as you loved making him laugh.

"Is it?" he asked.

You open your mouth to argue—

A knock at the boardroom door interrupted you both.

Prophet poked his head inside.

"sorry to interrupt you love birds," he joked unaware of the tense atmosphere in the room "Cooper wants everyone in the conference room. Garcia found something."

The moment shattered almost instantly.

you both let out an awkward laugh, the job really had such a way with timings.

"Duty calls." you joked.

Mick didn't move immediately.

His eyes searched yours for another second before he nodded.

"Yeah."

He stepped aside, letting you pass.

Just as you reached the doorway, he spoke again.

"This conversation isn't over."

You glanced back over your shoulder.

"Thought you liked leaving things unresolved."

A crooked grin spread across his face.

"Only the accent argument."

you smiled to yourself, remembering when this all started,

"This isn't over, Rawson."

"Wouldn't dream of it ending, love."

★・・・・・・★