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They don’t set out to keep it a secret. They can tell from the moment their lips first connect it’s something worth disclosing, from the way their nerves are still on fire as they rest their foreheads on one another to the uncontrollable smiles they have as they whisper “I’ve been waiting a long time for that” to each other.
They can tell, too, by the way they effortlessly come together a few hours later, “I love you”s whispered in between gentle touches that feel like fervent prayers, that neither of them has any intention of making this anything but permanent. They give it full voice in the early morning light, promises of how serious they are exchanged and leaving them floating on air.
They just want a few days to themselves before they tell anyone—a request Amanda murmurs into Sonny’s ear, her arm draped lazily over his chest and a slight hitch in her throat when she says it. But he nods into it, and relief floods through her at the knowledge that they have a few days more of this—the light way his lips pepper her skin with morning kisses, the way she runs her fingers through his thoroughly ungelled hair—before dealing with the eye rolls and “told you so”s and ethics lectures from superiors.
Just a few days to drink it in—that’s all they want. It’s just pretty hard to do that when your Captain is attacked less than twenty-four hours after you kiss for the first time and you’re suddenly working overtime and weekend shifts you weren’t expecting on top of childcare.
Olivia is physically okay—just a broken ankle and some bruises—but the air in the squad room is still thick four days later, the calls to the detectives actually assigned to investigate the case going mostly unanswered and the little information they’ve been able to gather on their own leading to nothing concrete, not to mention the other cases they’re supposed to be working.
Amanda’s nerves are thrumming as she sits at her desk, a tightness in her neck and a swirling in her stomach definitively not being helped by Joe Velasco, the new detective 1PP sent over to “help with the caseload,” the man who hasn’t stopped talking about “how rejuvenating hiking is” since he sat down at nine.
She’s biting her lip, trying to stop the half-formed retort that’s rising in her throat, when a familiar silhouette appears in her periphery, making warmth rush through her and a smile start to spread across her face—that is, until she remembers where they are and the air in her chest deflates.
“Carisi,” she mumbles, forcing what she hopes is a neutral nod. “Those for us?” she asks, pointing to the box his hand is wrapped around, like she didn’t text him thirty minutes earlier complaining that all she’s had to eat today is shitty precinct coffee.
“Yeah,” he says, eyes resting on her for just a beat before darting away. “Figured I could bring you some zeppole and pick up the DD-5s at the same time.”
“We’d be better if you could get us that warrant for the Brown case,” Kat says from her desk, arms folded across her chest and eyebrow raised.
“I’m tryin’, Kat,” Sonny sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose as he settles the box on the edge of Amanda’s desk. “You get me something from the surveillance footage and I might be able to do something.”
The standoff seems to end there, Kat flashing Sonny a curt nod before turning back to her laptop, and the tension starts to ease as Sonny turns toward Amanda, eyes sparkling and the ghost of a smile on his face—that is, until an arm comes between them and her ears start to fill with Velasco’s voice again. “These are for anybody, right?”
Amanda closes her eyes for just a second, swallowing the deep sigh she wants to let out. “Yeah. Go ahead.”
“Awesome,” he says, folding the lid of the box open, groaning slightly as he picks one up. “Are these from that place on 23rd? Sal’s, right?”
“Yeah," Sonny says, eyebrow furrowing. “How’d you know?”
“My mom used to take me there all the time,” Velasco says, “Always said they had the most authentic recipes.”
“Yeah, they do.” There’s genuine surprise laced in Sonny’s voice, a half-smile across his face.
“I’m half-Italian,” Velasco adds, gesturing between himself and the box, “My Ma would kill me if I started shopping at any of those fake-ass pop-up bakeries.”
“Mine too,” Sonny laughs, “The stories I could tell you.”
There’s something prickling underneath Amanda’s skin as she watches the way Velasco’s standing, the slight tilt of his head as he leans toward Sonny, and a heat rushes to her cheeks as she taps a hand on her desk impatiently.
“You’re here for these, right, Counselor?” she asks, grabbing the folders balanced on her desk and holding them in the air.
“Yeah,” Sonny says, moving his hands toward the files. “Gotta get back before Hadid kills me. Still got a lot to do on the Machado case.”
And if it weren’t for the way Sonny’s thumb gently rubs over the back of her hand underneath the folders as he grabs them, the heat might stay, but the softness in his eyes as he locks them on hers for just a halting moment is enough to saw down her edges, and the lightness she associates with him returns as his accent lilts over a goodbye.
She spares a half-glance at Kat, still hunched over the security footage, before locking her eyes on Sonny’s back, only dropping her gaze back to the folders when she hears the ding of the elevator.
“Italian, huh?” Velasco asks, and Amanda realizes with a prick of irritation that he’s also staring at the hallway. “What’s his deal?” The tilt of his head as he says it leaves no doubt to the implication behind it, even before the “He single or what?” he adds after a beat.
“I’m uh—I’m pretty sure he’s in a relationship,” Amanda stammers, swallowing hard and feigning interest in her laptop.
“Nah, he broke up with Nicole, remember? He told us about it at the wedding,” Kat says, head popping up from behind her computer. “Carisi barely has enough game to get in one relationship a year, let alone a second one days after the first ended.”
“Oh yeah,” Amanda says, cheeks flushing as she bites her lip to keep the actually that rises in her throat from spilling out.
But the hand she cards through her hair as she adjusts in her seat must not be as convincing as she thinks, because barely a beat passes before the junior detective’s voice fills her ear again, a teasing lilt running through it. “Unless you have something to tell us, Rollins?”
“Kat.” She hopes her voice is just forceful enough to hide the quiver that runs through her at the denial.
Velasco, still hovering over her, blanches slightly. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t know there was something—”
“There’s not,” Amanda says, a forceful edge to her voice. “He’s just my kids’ godfather.”
A trickle of guilt makes her wince slightly at the just, images from the few minutes they’ve managed to cobble together over the last few nights—Jesse balancing on the kitchen counter as he cooked, Billie curled against his chest on the couch—that prove it’s an understatement swirling before her.
“I just—I don’t think he really dates cops,” she adds, shrugging her shoulders and frowning at Velasco. “Sorry.”
“I say go for it,” Kat smirks, eyebrows shooting up. “Maybe if he starts getting laid more he’ll be less tense.”
Amanda’s lucky the phone happens to ring then, just loud enough to make Kat turn away and miss the cough Amanda sputters out—because if there’s one thing Amanda knows for sure, it’s that Carisi is definitely getting laid.
***
She’s pressing a kiss to Jesse’s forehead when she hears his key in the lock, sending a silent prayer of thanks that he’s coming now instead of twenty minutes ago, when she was covered in soapy water and trying to coax the overtired five-year-old out of the tub.
She makes her way down the hallway, breath catching at the sight of him stretched on her couch, sweatpants and a t-shirt already on, a smile crossing his face when he sees her.
“Hey,” he says, lifting an arm and patting the space next to him. “Missed you today.”
“Missed you too,” she breathes back, sighing as she sits, head dropping against his chest.
“Long day?” he asks, fingers starting to trace patterns down the length of her arm.
She nods, wrapping an arm around his chest. “Painfully long.”
“Anything I can do to make it better?”
“Not unless you can get Velasco fired.”
His arm stops moving then, head lifting slightly so he can look down at her, concern threading through his voice. “Did he say somethin’ to you?”
“No, I’m fine. Seriously,” she says, gently squeezing his hand to quell the fear sparking in his eyes. “It’s—it’s what he said about you.”
“About me? I’ve met him like twice.”
“He uh—” she starts, hand hovering over his chest. “He thinks you’re hot.”
He lets out a small laugh, shifting his shoulder lightly against her. “So do you.”
"I regret telling you that now,” she mumbles, tilting her head up to press her lips against his.
He smiles into it, thumb gently brushing her cheek. “No you don’t.”
“No, I don’t,” she smirks back. “But seriously, he might try to pick you up. Guy was persistent after you left.”
“All I gotta do is tell him I’m taken,” Sonny says, pressing his lips to her hair. “Very happily taken.”
“Yeah, I know,” she sighs, but despite the warmth that’s rushing through her, there's still a weight in her stomach that gives the words an edge as they leave her.
He catches it, of course, barely a second passing before his cautious “Are you—Amanda, are you jealous of him?”
“No,” she says, biting her lip when he raises an eyebrow at her. “I’m not jealous. I’m just—I had to lie to everyone’s faces today. Pretending like you weren’t that important to me, like I’d be perfectly fine with someone else asking you out—it sucked.”
He squeezes her a little tighter. “I know. I hated not being able to lean over and kiss you.”
The reason why he can’t, of course, floats in the air between them—but they’re here mostly because of her suggestion, and he knows her well enough not to bring it up, instead settling for another soft brush of lips and a whispered “But I can here.”
She reaches a hand to rub along the side of his cheek, waiting a beat before adding a shaky, “What if we made it so you could everywhere?”
His jaw tenses slightly under her fingers, eyes widening. “You mean—”
“Disclose,” she nods, words starting to spill out. “I mean, I know it’s not the best time with the Machado case and Liv on leave, but I just—I’m so tired of trying to pretend I’m not in love with you.”
Something soft crests in his eyes as she says it, a pool of emotion resting there that makes its way to the smile plastered across his face. “Me too. We can do it tomorrow, if that’s what you want.”
Amanda nods, getting in a quick “should wipe the smug look off Velasco’s face, too,” before she loses herself in his eyes completely, words failing her as she moves to show him exactly how in love with him she is.
***
It’s not something her boss should hear over the phone, so Amanda leaves her apartment an hour earlier than normal, dancing nerves temporarily halted by the steady weight of Sonny’s hand on her shoulder, his soft “you sure you don’t want me to come with you?” reminding her how to breathe.
So she just nods, a shaky “just stay with the girls until Sienna gets here” that he accepts, the goodbye kiss he gently presses against her enough to carry her from her apartment to Olivia’s. But for all the nervousness dancing through her, Amanda’s surprised at how light she feels when the words are out, when Liv’s smile and her warm “I’m so happy for you” are floating before her.
Amanda rises, legs slightly sturdier than the ones that carried her here, brushing a hand through her hair with a “well, I’ll let you rest,” as she gestures at the way Liv’s ankle is balanced on a pile of pillows in front of her. “We can talk about the paperwork or whatever when you get back.”
"Oh no, you’re not waiting for that,” Liv says, corners of her mouth turning up. “See Fin when you get in.”
Amanda closes her eyes for a brief second, swallowing hard before speaking. “He has to know, too, huh?”
“Well yeah, Amanda, that’s kind of the point of disclosing,” Liv says, tilting her head with a smirk. “But I really am happy for you. It’s been a long time coming.”
“Yeah, it has,” Amanda breathes back, flashing one last smile before leaving, weight lifted and nerves singing.
She’s still buzzing when she enters the precinct, bolstered by the See? Told you it’d be okay text from Sonny, so distracted it takes her a few seconds longer than it normally would to process that the red heart-shaped balloons in the squad room are tied to her desk chair, that there’s something laying flat on her desktop with a gaudy red bow slapped on top, and she stops cold, heat rushing up her cheeks.
She’s going to kill Dominick.
That is, of course, until she reaches her desk, pausing just long enough to push the bow aside and realize that her rage is directed at the wrong person.
“Seriously, Fin?” she half-yells, spinning around to find a smile splayed across her Sergeant’s face, eyes trained on her.
“What? Liv told me to give you the paperwork,” he quips back.
“I don’t think she meant like this,” she hisses, heat rushing through her as the uniformed officers slowly trickle in, eyebrows raised as they clock the balloons.
“I’ve been waiting five years for this,” Fin smirks, “I’m gonna do it how I want. Paperwork has to be faxed over to IAB by the end of the day.”
Amanda groans as she sinks into her chair, every word on the page beyond Disclosure of Personal Relationship blurring before her. She tries to take a deep breath, push the heat down so that she can maybe get something done today, but then there’s another voice in her ear, an amused lilt running through it.
“Morning, Rollins,” Kat’s smirking from her place over Amanda’s shoulder, “what you got there?”
“Please, like you he didn’t text you,” Amanda shrugs, gesturing to Fin with splayed fingers.
“Fine, he did,” Kat laughs, “it’s about time.”
“Shut up,” Amanda murmurs, though part of her warms slightly at the sight of the smile that crosses Kat’s face when she says it.
She’s just managed to open her laptop, gotten halfway through typing her password, when heavy footfalls and the voice she’s come to resent this week lets out an airy “hey, what’s with the balloons?” followed by an “Oh—does this mean she went through with it?”
“Yeah,” Kat says, “Thanks for your help.”
Amanda’s stomach drops slightly then, eyes darting between them. “What do you mean help?”
Velasco’s smiling sheepishly now, palms up in mock defense. “Don’t hate me,” he starts, looking sideways at Kat.
“I got Velasco to chat up the Counselor yesterday,” Kat shrugs, “Figured it would lead to something like this.”
Amanda’s mouth falls slightly open as she looks between them, face flushing. “Oh, very funny,” she says, arms folding across her chest. “Are you even—”
“Gay? Yeah, my boyfriend was cool with it.”
“I was going to say Italian,” Amanda breathes, the way Sonny’s eyes lit up when he recognized the bakery name flashing before her.
“Oh no, that was a lie,” Velasco shrugs, “Kat said that would definitely make you mad. And I’m guessing it worked.” He pauses a beat, guilt crossing his features before he adds, “I’m sorry. Kat promised me she’d do my paperwork for a week if I did it.”
There’s a few curse words rising in her throat when Fin cuts in. “Amanda, we had to. You and the Counselor suddenly stop eye-fucking each other after five years and we have to make sure you two are okay.”
Amanda sputters slightly, arms dropping and words leaving her chest.
“Don’t act like you don’t know,” Fin counters, eyebrows raised. “You two have been obvious for years, Rollins.”
“No we—”
“Yes, you have,” Kat cuts in, “I thought you two were already together when I got here. Like the precinct’s worst-kept secret.”
“Not anymore,” Fin smirks, and even though the embarrassment is making her cheeks burn, Amanda can’t help the way her lips curve slightly upward at the knowledge that her Sergeant is right.
No, they’re not a secret anymore. And the next time Sonny stops by the squad room, bakery box in hand, everyone knows he’s only really there to see one person, even before the soft kiss he places on her forehead fully confirms it.