Chapter Text
Yes, Lucy Tara is one hundred percent aware that she has a type.
The very first time she met Kate Whistler she felt those familiar fizzes of attraction that always bubble through her when she meets a certain kind of woman. Even at a glance, she could tell that Whistler was exactly how Lucy—whether she likes it or not— likes women: smart, buttoned up, commanding and somehow, alone. Oh yeah, and tall. Because what’s a little penetrating of aloofness to keep things interesting when you can throw in an almost comedic height difference?
She also instantly reminded Lucy of Audrey, Lucy’s first girlfriend. Well, her first…something. Reminded her in a way that both intrigues and kind of stings. Lucy doesn't know what it is that makes her like a moth to the flame of these kinds of girls. Girls who make it hard work just to get in their line of sight. Girls who make it practically impossible to penetrate whatever walls they've put up. Is it the challenge of scaling those walls? Is it the way they’re always pretending to be in command but if you look hard enough you can spy those little cracks and fissures and that other girl hiding underneath who’s praying she’s fooling you with her confident, hard edges? Is it the moments when they lets it slip and goes soft and open for a second? Lucy doesn't know. She just knows she’s a sucker for it.
Actually, Lucy saw Whistler before she met her. She was waiting outside to meet a contact about a case. They were late and Lucy was leaned against a tree, deep in her phone. But something about the woman walking—no, striding— past demanded Lucy's gaze. And it wasn’t just the eyes or that hair or those legs in that skirt, it was the way someone so self-contained could still give off so much information about herself.
The blonde woman didn’t glance around her as she walked. Didn’t seem to see the frenzy of people coming the other way as all the office admin teams made their way out to lunch. She didn’t stare at a phone as she walked, either, or look like her mind was on last night or on any of those things your brain gives over to when it finds a moment to break your concentration. Nope, this girl looked like she had her eyes on some prize that no one else could see as she marched along the sidewalk in her impossible heels. And for some reason, that made Lucy really want to stop her in her tracks.
Lucy ran track in high school. Not seriously. Gymnastics and then cheer took up all her free time. But her brother did always say she rushed headlong into every moment like some teeny bat out of hell. Track was a way of making that habit an off-season, extra-curricular string to her college bow. Just the way her parents liked it. And when she realised it was a way to run her problems so far out of her head that they stayed in hiding for a minute until she caught her breath again, she kind of got to like it.
She wanted to be a hurdler. Because she always did like to make things harder for herself than they had to be. When the coach kicked up a fuss, she showed him that YouTube video of that pocket rocket Jamaican who medalled at the Olympics even though she was half the height of the winner. He chuckled and reminded her that that was because that girl had a Jamaican coach. Lucy didn't care. She just wanted the challenge. There were already a lot of things Lucy had discovered she could make happen with sheer force of will. Why couldn’t this be one of them?
Audrey was another. The first time Lucy saw Audrey at track practice, it was her walk she noticed, too. A tennis player, she was willowy but strong. Off court, she moved slowly. She reminded Lucy of a racehorse or a plane, the way they looked strange and clumsy when they moved slowly on land, but made total sense in their element of speed. The first day, when coach paired them up for warm-up, Audrey gave her a morose wave. Bare minimum of acknowledgement, basically. And that's about all she got. All through the session, Lucy grabbed glances at her long auburn ponytail, the grey-green eyes, and her pretty, frowning mouth. She noted the way she chewed at her inner lip as she listened to coach’s instructions, her bitten-down nails and her perfect posture. There was something slightly regal about the way she stood, Lucy thought.
“Something uptight, you mean,” her friend Josh said when she pointed her out the next day at lunch. Lucy, as ever, chose to ignore him.
Audrey held herself so tightly and so silently, she became a challenge for Lucy’s charms. That was how Lucy won people over. Pure, doggish appeal. Over the first few weeks of training, Audrey stayed all focus and silence, giving Lucy barely a nod in response to her sunny greetings. This, of course, just made Lucy try harder. She couldn't resist a mission. Or a woman on a mission, it seemed. One day, at the end of practice, coach clapped his hands and said, “Okay, let’s do a light mile jog and we’re done.”
Lucy raised an eyebrow and muttered, “I believe in the existence of a light mile jog about as much as I believe in Santa Claus.”
She didn’t expect Audrey to respond, let alone to see the hint of a smile betraying her usual workout frown. Lucy instantly knew that producing that smile in full bloom would become her own personal challenge. “Sorry, I hope I didn’t just destroy any childhood dreams,” Lucy said.
“No, my brother already ruined my childhood in first grade,” Audrey said. “But thanks for trying.”
Lucy flashed her a winning smile. “My pleasure.”
This time Audrey’s smile was directed straight at her. Something hummed between them and Lucy left practice smitten and hopelessly hopeful. At that point she didn’t know that another of Audrey’s missions would be to get through high school without anyone knowing she wasn’t straight, and her relationship with Lucy would be collateral damage. That was one Lucy still wishes she’d figured out earlier. She also still wished that cute, intensely private giantesses weren’t like her own personal catnip. Because that makes the height difference is the least of her problems.
It was the same with Whistler. It was the conjuring a smile, winning a break in the weather from that relentless seriousness, that did it.
The second time that they crossed paths, Lucy heard Whistler before she saw her, her entrance to the office heralded by that purposeful clack of high heels in the hallway. Soon that sound would soon serve as either a warning or welcome, depending on the day and the mood. When Whistler marched in looking for Tennant, Lucy instantly recognised her intense, pale presence as the woman she’d seen a week earlier. When she announced herself as D.I.A, Lucy suppressed a sigh. Intelligence. Not likely a woman who is an officer by her age is going to be that interested in junior NCIS. But there was another of those challenges Lucy liked so much.
Tennant had called Whistler in about some arms runner the government already had eyes who was using the big island as a base. Whistler stood there in that pencil skirt, shoulders taut, hugging her folder and listening but not looking as the team took turns to run down what they knew. Lucy dropped a few comments but Whistler paid her no attention. But then Ernie came in with the some images. Lucy eyed the mess of takeout trash in a picture of suspects’s car and muttered quietly, “Apparently we could just park surveillance outside every Chuck E. Cheese in town. He’ll be there soon.”
That’s when she saw it: the tiny dance of a smile on the corners of Whistler’s lips. And the way her glance flicked sideways towards Lucy to see who made the joke. Inside, Lucy danced, too. A small victory, but a victory nonetheless.
Later, when she was driving home, she told herself not to even try to go there. It’s not like Lucy can’t find plenty of hot women online and in bars who don’t require a complete charm offence in order to capture their attention. And it’s not like she’s lacking for choice. Lucy is a catch, dammit. She doesn’t need to beg for scraps and smiles just to get a chance to see what’s inside these human fortresses. Why can’t she just go for actual, willing human beings?
Because the heart wants what the heart wants, apparently. Because she instantly forgot her own advice the moment she spotted Whistler at the bar at Major Randall’s retirement party. It was an evening event in the courtyard out back of the D.I.A building, all tinkling piano music, pressed uniforms and canapés. Lucy was standing with Jesse and Kai, bored out of her brain, when she saw her. She was leaned, one hand on the bar as she waited for a drink. The other clasped the chain at her neck. Her silk white shirt shimmered in the ocean breeze. At first glance, she looked like she was taking in the crowd, but even from this distance, Lucy could see she was miles away.
Curiosity got the better of her. With one beer under her belt already, Lucy did what Lucy always does in situations like this, she sauntered right over, catching Whistler on the terrace by the bar and thrust out her hand. “Lucy Tara. Junior investigator with NCIS.”
Whistler stopped in her tracks, wine in hand. She had the grace to only look slightly taken aback as she returned her hand shake.
“I met you the other day in our office, kind of.” Lucy turned on her most winsome smile. “I thought I’d say hi.”
“I remember.”
Not sure where to go now she's here, Lucy gazed around at the party. “These things always make me feel like I forgot to put a stick you know where before I came.”
Whistler sipped her wine and gave her a glimmer of a smile. “You get used to them. What’s NCIS doing here, anyway?”
Lucy bristled. “You know, we sometimes get invited to play with the big boys.”
“Sure, but we’ve all got better ways to spend a Friday night than to see off a man who never even acknowledged our presence. I know I have.”
“You do, do you?” Lucy raised an eyebrow.
“Yeah, I do.” Whistler didn’t elaborate. That’s when Lucy realised that not only did she share Audrey’s same lanky frame and rosebud frown. There was also that same sense that some part of this woman was so far inside herself she might not even know how to make it come out if she wanted to. And here Lucy is, intrigued instead of running scared all over again.
“I also have plenty of better ways to spend a Friday night,” Lucy said with a shrug. “But sometimes you’ve got to take one for the team.” She eyed her colleagues clustered by the food table. “Besides, Tennant told us it’s safe to leave as soon as the speeches are done.”
“She’s right.” Whistler checked her watch and frowned.
“Anyway, you’ve probably got big important Intelligence people to speak to,” Lucy said, taking a step back.
“Maybe.” Whistler tucked a stray wisp of blonde hair behind her ear and shrugged. “But I talked to them all day.”
“Well, I talked to tropical bird smugglers all day.”
Whistler pulled a face. “You did?”
Lucy stepped back in. “Former marine side hustle apparently.”
“Really?” Whistler leaned against the railing that divided the restaurant from the sharp drop to the ocean. “Do tell.”
And Lucy did as she was told as the sun settled closer to the horizon behind them, sending the ocean a brilliant ochre. When her story was done, they talked shop. Gossiped about the people in their offices they were allowed to talk about. Compared cases that weren’t too classified to compare. Whistler didn't seem like the type to talk about herself much outside of her job. In fact, Lucy got the feeling she was her job, so she didn’t ask.
Lucy couldn’t help liking this girl, though. The way she veered between intense and light in the moments she forgot she was at a work party. The way her brow huddled together when she talked about her job, or her eyes narrowed as she laughed at Lucy’s jokes. The way her smile was just rare enough to feel like a reward.
And the good news for Lucy was that with a couple of wines under her belt at an insufferably boring work affair, Whistler seemed almost amenable to Lucy’s light flirting. Not flirting flirting like you could say with one hundred percent positivity that this is what it was, but in the light way that could just be Lucy's personality. That's how Lucy plays it safe until she knows where she stands. But Whistler also responded in a way that told Lucy that she wasn't at all surprised by the fact it was coming from a woman, either. These things all just conspired to make Lucy turn on the charm and the quips a little more.
They bantered until one of the many middle-aged uniforms milling around the party stopped right in front of them, and smiled generously at them both. “Evening, ladies.”
It was almost incredible how quickly Kate buttoned right back up into CIA Officer Whistler. Speed of light, stuff. “This is Lucy, a junior NCIS agent,” she told him in this tight voice. She didn’t bother to offer Lucy his name.
He smiled and nodded. “Officer Tamagado."
“Nice to meet you, sir,” Lucy said, wondering if she should get out now while her pride was intact.
“We were just talking about a case,” Whistler told him quickly, as if she needed an explanation as why she’d be talking to a junior agent with nothing but a first name. Lucy didn’t want it to sting, but it did. She told herself she was going to have to think of Whistler’s reticence to properly acknowledge her presence as blistering social awkwardness. Otherwise it could only be read as plain rude.
“Well, sorry to talk more shop,” Tamagado said. “But I just wanted to remind you about that briefing on Monday first thing in the Ring Room,”
Whistler nodded, clutching at the light chain around her neck. “I haven’t forgotten, sir. I’ll have the papers ready for you tomorrow.”
“Lovely. Well, good night.” He nodded in Lucy’s direction and shifted back into the tide of people making their way to the bar.
Whistler let out a breath. “Sorry, he’s one of my bosses.”
“I figured.” Lucy watched as her gaze followed his trajectory across the courtyard. “Are you not allowed to have conversations with us lowly NCIS sorts?”
“What?” Her gaze whipped back to Lucy. “Of course. Why?”
“Never mind,” Lucy muttered. “And by the way, it’s Tara.”
“Sorry?”
“Tara is my last name. Agent Lucy Tara.”
“I know that.”
“Wasn’t sure you did.” Rudeness it is. “Anyway, I better go. See you around, Whistler.” Lucy turned and walked away.
Thanks for reading! Parts of this fic, as well as my other, The Second Time, have been adapted into a book called The Best Mistake, by Emily O'Beirne. Obviously it's been adapted to meet legal requirements, but it's based on these stories.