M.E. Time: Stiff romance

Amy walked into the break room. finding the sarge hunched over dozens of drawings he had made off the suspect. "Sarge, all of these are fine. How much longer are you gonna work on this?"

"It's questions like that that made Van Gogh cut off his ear." Jeffords felt attacked. "You can't put a clock on art."

Getting only a frustrated look from back from Santiago, he tried to calm down a little. "Ten minutes."

"Great. Let's catch this guy so we can give Holt some good news. I wanna cheer him up."

"Well, how do you even know he's in a bad mood?" Scully joined the conversation. " I mean, it's impossible to read that guy. The other day when I gave in my report, he looked so calm but I still had the feeling I did something wrong. It's like, 'what's that guy thinking?' You know? "

Santiago and Jeffords both looked at him confused. Remembering which report he was talking about, it was the only time they had ever seen the captain so angry. His screaming could be heard a block away.

"I can read him. And if anyone can figure out what's bothering him, it's me." Amy said full confidence. "He and I are exactly the same. Except that I'm younger, Cuban, female, single, and straight."

"Captain Holt's not gay." Scully laughed. Again both of them looked confused at the older man. "Captain Holt's gay?"

"Seriously, man, just retire," Amy said, not believing how slow the man was.

"Once I finished this I can maybe find Dewitt." Terry turned back to his drawing. "She's been avoiding me since yesterday."

"I wouldn't count on finding her, she isn't at her desk for the moment." Amy looked over at Emily's empty desk. "I tried to talk to her but she is even more closed off then Rosa."

Terry finished the drawing giving it to her. "You'll never find a better cop than her, she has one of the best track records. She just won't stay in one place for more than a year, she probably hasn't have found a place where she felt like home. I'm hungry anyone wants a yogurt." Terry changed the conversation, already having said too much.

Scully jumped up at the mention of food following the sergeant to the kitchen leaving Amy alone to think about his words.

Holt made his way over to Boyle's desk "Boyle, where's my paperwork on that DOA?"

"Still waiting on the autopsy report," Boyle explained. "Supposed to come in first thing this morning, - but so far, nothing."

"This is unacceptable. I'll call the M.E. and find out what happened." Holt made his way back to the office, only to be stopped by Peralta.

"Eh, bup-bup-bup-bup-bah. That's not necessary, sir. For the record, I think it's natural causes anyway, but I'm also the secondary in this case. It's my responsibility, so I will head on down there and pick up the report."

"Good. But don't ever bup-bup-bup-bup me again."

"Right, I don't know-" Jake tried to explain.

"Bup-bup-bup-bup Bup-bup-bup. Just go."

"Yep, I am going to regret teaching him that one." Jake sighed.

"Emily, can I show you something?" Boyle came up to her, with a map of files in one hand.

"Sure. What's the problem?"

"Do you remember the vacation the Patterson's were going on?" Boyle leaned against her desk opening the map, searching for a paper.

"Yeah, I'm still waiting until Miss Patterson was going to send me the confirmation for the booking."

"I thought it was taking to long for her to get it, so I decided to check her credit card statement." Charles pushed a paper in her hands. "Why did they book only one ticket then? Either she's lying or she knew he was gonna die."

"Well done Boyle." throwing him a small smile, giving him the papers back.

"This could be a murder." Boyle grabbed the papers, putting them back. "Where's that autopsy? Jake went down to the M.E. an hour and a half ago."

"Charles I know you and Jake are best of friends." She decided to choose her words carefully, knowing full well that Boyle was an excellent detective, albeit a little naive. "But you and I know that Jake likes beautiful women, doesn't matter what profession they have."

"I don't know what you're saying." Boyle looked confused, not knowing where she was going with this.

"Have you noticed that the M.E. is a beautiful lady." He nodded in understanding. "And that Jake, until now did all the communication with her and that it's taking a really long time for her to do her job, maybe because she is preoccupied with different things."

Boyle's face changed in surprise. "Jake wouldn't do that. I mean, he's really coming into his own as a secondary. I even thought about getting him something nice. Does he come across more as a Pinot guy or more of a Shiraz?"

"Follow me." If he didn't want to believe her he needed to see it himself. "We're going to get the autopsy report ourselves."

"Good call. Rosa do you want to come?" Boyle called out to her while following Emily to the elevator.

The three of them arrived in the morgue. In the middle of the room the unmistakable figure of their victim could be seen, still lying untouched under a blanket.

"Detectives." Dr. Rossi greeted them putting on her doctor's coat, her hair a little ruffled.

"Shirt's buttoned wrong." Rosa greeted her.

"Huh." She looked down to see the wrongly buttoned shirt. "So it is. Well, how can I help you?"

"Uh, we came by to get that autopsy report." Boyle took the lead. "Is Detective Peralta here?"

" I haven't seen him." she started to lead the three of them back out. "Thanks for coming by."

When suddenly coughing could be heard from one of the freezers.

"Hold on." Rosa opened the freezer, rolling out a naked Peralta.

"We were just looking for you, Peralta." Dewitt slapped him in the stomach getting a grunt of pain in response.

"Ah, thank goodness you're here. I am so lost." Jake tried to find an excuse. "Do you know where the vending machines are?"

"Look, it's not what it seems like." Jake had come out from his hiding space, now wearing a corpse blanket.

"Yes, it is."

"Yes, it is." He immediately agreed. "Here's what happened. I came down here to get the autopsy report and in conclusion, here we are. Now if you'll excuse me "

"Enough, Peralta." Emily voiced what everyone in the room was thinking. "Boyle gives you a little responsibility and this is what you do with it?"

"Look, I'm sorry I slowed down the autopsy results," He tried to apologize. "but everyone knows it's natural causes."

"Not anymore." Charles finally said something. "We think it could be a murder."

"Wait, like a murder murder, or, like, his mouth murdered him by making him eat so much food that his heart exploded?"

"Murder murder." Rosa answered. "We need the autopsy to be sure."

"I have not gotten to that yet." Dr. Rossi joined the conversation.

"You guys have been down here for two hours." Charles started to get angry for being so stupid to believe Jake could handle it. "What, did you have sex 40 times?"

"40 times? No, Charles, like Look, I'm sorry." Jake tried again to apologize to his friend. "We didn't know it was a homicide."

"Well, it shouldn't matter. I'm your primary and I asked you to do something." Charles started shouting. "So if it's okay, I'd like to be upset with you."

"It's more than okay." Jake understood his friends' anger. "It's okay times two. Now, Dr. Rossi, will you please perform the autopsy for us right now?"

" Actually, with a body this size, I'd need my assistant," She explained "and I gave him the rest of the afternoon off when Jake showed up."

"Guilty." Peralta tried to laugh it off only to be met with three angry looks. "Okay, fine. I will act as your assistant because I am a wonderful secondary. How gross could it be?"

The three detectives made their way out of the room. "Oh, you poor naive child." Emily laughed while passing by him.

Jake and Dr. Rossi had changed clothes now both wearing surgical clothing, standing over the cut open body of Mr. Patterson. "Just gonna need you to hold open this chest cavity for me." She grabbed his arm pushing it right into the victim's body.

"Oh, wow." Jake made sure to keep his eyes away from the squishy hole he was keeping open, not wanting to empty his stomach all over the floor. "Okay, I can do that. It's no big deal. Just like

holding open some slimy elevator doors. For a family of aliens " His curiosity got the better of him, daring to take a peek inside. "Oh, my God."

"Yep, there are some signs of stress on the heart," Dr. Rossi explained. "but that's not surprising. Oh, will you look at that stomach lining? God, that is just a beaut."

"Ugh." Peralta looked in disgust at all the things she was showing him, preferring for them to stay where they should stay.

"All right." She grabbed his hand again. "I'm gonna need you to go ahead and take your hand " Pushing it deeper into the cavity. "Yep, get it down there. Get it down there. Get it on in. There you go."

Jake could feel a squishy lump, where she was leading him. Grabbing it firmly he pulled it out. "Oh, that is so big." He looked in disgust at the liver in his hand.

"Caught him?" Captain Holt looked at the criminal currently locked up.

"Yes, sir. He was easy to pick up." Santiago answered. "He looked just like the sergeant's sketch." She showed him a perfect picture of the man they arrested.

"You could be a professional artist, boss." Scully complimented Jeffords. "Like on the boardwalk."

"You think I should draw caricatures?" The sergeant felt attacked. "That's garbage art! I don't draw giant-head people on surfboards!"

"I'm saying you could. You're that good" Scully answered not understanding he offended Jeffords.

"Captain, the credit really goes to sergeant Jeffords." Santiago tried to explain. "Without his refined artistic skills "

"Finish the paperwork by noon." Holt didn't let her finish. "I want it included in the crime stats." With that, the captain left back to his office. Leaving the sergeant and Santiago stumped at his reaction.

"I gotta say, I always hate how I look in pictures, but that is so flattering." The man complimented from his cell. "Also, I'm innocent. You got the wrong guy."

"Shut up."

"Sarge, I need you to do one more drawing for me." Santiago was still looking at Jeffords drawing, an idea popping in her head.

"What?"

Amy made her way over to the garbage bin where the captain threw his picture in. Holding it up in front of Jeffords he looked at it not convinced in the idea.

" It'll cheer the Captain up." She tried to assure him. "He'll be over the moon. He may even lean back in his chair a little and nod slightly."

"This is a lot of pressure. If I'm gonna do this, it has to be done right." He looked around, finding Scully coming out of the break room. "Scully, get me my oils."

"Paint or massage?" Jeffords kept his gaze on the man. "I'll get both."

"You know, this is one of the most unhealthy people I've ever seen." Dr. Rossi and Peralta were still digging into the man trying to find any signs of murder. "It's like cutting into a big, overstuffed ravioli." Jake sighed in disgust trying to get the picture out of his head. "Sure you want me to keep digging?"

"Unfortunately, yes." Jake needed to do this, he promised. "If the primary on this case says it's a murder, we have to treat it like a murder."

"Okay. Here we go." She moved her hand inside the cavity again. "Oh. Wanna see something cool?"

"No."

"Here it is." She pulled out an intestine. "That's what I'm talking about. Listen." Holding the tube closer to Peralta's ear she started to push on it, making squishy sounds. "Goosh."

"Mm-hmm."

"You know what that was?" She asked. Jake shook his head not really wanting to know the answer. "That was the air releasing from the large intestine. In the biz, we call that 'the death bubble.' It's pretty cool. Here, you wanna hold it?" She held the intestine up for him to grab.

"No!" He moved as far away as he could.

"Knock knock." Amy entered the captain's office holding the painting the sergeant had made behind her back.

"You can knock with your hands. Saying it is ridiculous."

"Okay." Amy was taken a little aback at his mood. She hoped her surprise would make everything better. "Well, I know you're having a bad day" Holt looked up at her angrily. "I think you're having a bad day. So, to cheer you up I had Terry do this painting to replace the photo you hated." She moved the painting from behind her back. Showing a beautiful oil painting of captain Holt.

"I threw away the photo because I think it's ostentatious to hang pictures of yourself." Holt moved from behind his desk. "Especially when you haven't earned a place on the wall."

"Oh."

"But you would have me hang a baroque oil painting of myself like I'm a North Korean dictator. What? No ornate gold frame? Why am I not astride my noble steed, clad in armor?"

"We could add a horse." Amy knew that were the wrong words as soon as they left her mouth.

"You just wasted your time, Terry's time, and now my time on this when you should have been filing a report on the purse-snatcher."

"Oh, I did," Santiago explained. "It's already in the system."

"Good." The captain looked a little bit relieved. "Thank you. Dismissed."

Amy left the office taking the picture with her.

Dr. Rossi pulled up a garbage bag, dumping it into Jake's arms. "Here are the contents of his stomach."

"Oh, that's where they went."

"And here's the really cool part." She waved him to get closer. "Get in here, look at the scarring on this liver. Cause of death: Poison. Ingested."

Peralta could feel the guilt creep over him. "Boyle was right. All right, I'm gonna go tell him." He started making his way to the changing room.

"Yeah, you could." She stopped him, looking at him seductively. "Or you could stay for a post-mortem."

"Nope." Shot the idea immediately down. "The spell has worn off. No more weird dead guy sex for me ever again. It's nothing personal, I just think sex is for the living. Isn't that right, buddy?" He moved the blanket away from Mr. Patterson's head. " Oh, my God, he has no eyes! Oh, that is terrifying."

Amy wouldn't give up so easily, she would make the captain happy whatever it would take. Entering his office again, she carried a pile of papers.

"What now, Santiago?"

" I figured out why you've been so tense." she started. "You're worried about the monthly crime statistics."

"That's not your concern." She got his attention.

She dropped the bundle onto his desk. "I just checked the stats myself. Our arrest numbers haven't improved since you got here. They're exactly the same as last month."

"If this is your strategy to cheer me up, it's backfiring."

"Sir, I don't think you realize how good flat numbers are." Santiago sat down. "I went back 12 years. A precinct's numbers almost always get worse under new leadership, but ours didn't. That's a win." She explained. "Morale is much higher, people are working harder, you're well on your way to earning a place on that wall."

"Thank you, Santiago." He was happy she made him realize he wasn't doing it that badly.

"You know, we're birds of a feather, you and I."

"I hate cliches."

"Cliches are the worst. Okay." She agreed with him grabbing her papers and making her way out of his office. Back at her desk, she couldn't stop herself from celebrating.

Mrs. Patterson was brought in, currently sitting with Peralta and Boyle in one of the interrogation rooms. Rosa and Emily watching from behind the mirror.

"We know you killed your husband. That cruise you planned was for one, plus the autopsy showed clear signs of poison." Boyle explained the situation to her.

"And for the record, the inside of his body was very gross."

"Noted. My only question is, why'd you do it? " Boyle asked.

"Um, he drove me to it." She confessed. "He had affair after affair. He was a real Don Juan."

"Permission to make a fat joke?"

"Granted." Boyle allowed it for once.

"Are you sure you didn't mean 'don flan'? Thanks."

"Nice." Boyle became serious again, happy to close this case. "Mrs. Patterson, you are under arrest for the murder of your husband."

Jake couldn't stop himself from smiling, just happy that his friend was right.

"Sarge, that painting is tight." Rosa complimented the painting of captain Holt.

"It's terrible. The brushwork is sloppy. There's poor use of negative space. I'm a fraud. "

"Not at all." the captain took the painting from his hands. "I'd like to take this home for my husband. He'll be glad you made me look so happy."

Once the captain had left, Terry moved closer to Amy and Rosa. "I was trying to make him look serious. I still can't read him."

"No one can."

"I can," Amy said. "He likes it."

This was Terry's chance the whole day she was avoiding him. She was getting ready to leave, first taking a candy bar from the vending machine from the break room. Wasting no time he entered the room locking the door behind him, making sure she had no way to escape.

"Can I get out, I have other plans tonight." She tried to pass him, but he wasn't having anything of it, not moving an inch.

"You first are going to listen to me." Terry was tired. The stress of creating the painting for his captain, and trying to get her to talk to him for the whole day, became too much. "Why were you avoiding me the whole day? I just wanted to talk."

"Well, I'm sorry I just…" Before she could finish Jeffords continued.

"I just wanted to say thank you."

"Thank you?" She had expected him to be angry with her, not thank her.

"For the doctor, My kids were practically asking when they would come back to her," Terry answered. "You were a lifesaver, I don't know what I would have done If we needed to go back to their previous doctor."

"That's it?" She looked at him in disbelief, feeling herself being stupid for avoiding him all day.

"I think so. Is there something else I should know?"

"No, forget it, just a stressful day." She grabbed her bag ready to leave, turning back at Terry. "I am sorry, for the avoiding part. It won't happen again."

"Don't worry about it. Happens to the best of us." Jeffords gave her a warm smile, showing that all was forgiven.

Later that evening the four of them had found themselves at the bar celebrating a case closed. Jake had even convinced Emily to come with them promising to stop bothering her, by asking questions, for a week.

"Nice job, Boyle." Rosa congratulated her primary. "You nailed it." The four toasted.

"Here. Of course, he did. He's a great primary." Jake confessed. "And I'm sorry I was such a bad number two. I may, for the first time, have been a bit of a jerk, and I'm sorry."

"The wonders haven't left the world yet. Peralta being humbled." Emily quipped, getting a laugh from everyone.

"What a wonderful moment." Boyle joined in, happy that his friend put aside his ego to help him.

"I agree, it is a wonderful moment."

"What a wonderful moment," Boyle repeated.

"Rosa, Emily, do you agree?" Jake looked at both women.

"It's all right."

"I will never forget this moment." Emily smiled at Boyle's happiness.

"~Wonderful moment~" Jake started to sing.

"~Moment Between two guys~" Charles joined in.

Charles phone went off at that moment. " Oh. D.A. wants to set bail for Patterson's wife."

"I'm the secondary." Jake stopped his friend from getting up. "I'll go back there and do the busy work. You guys stay here and keep celebrating."

"You sure you're not just sneaking off for more weird dead guy sex?" Rosa called after him. "

Jake laughed fakely. "We will never speak of that again."Never." Six eyes looked at him back, fully promising this wouldn't be the last time they brought it up. "Okay, bye."

"I also should be going. Otherwise, my partner won't be happy if I let the food go cold." Emily started to get up looking at the hour on her phone. "You guys have a good time." She waved them goodbye leaving Rosa and Boyle alone.

"Crazy day, huh?" Boyle started.

"I hate small talk. Let's drink in silence." Rosa stopped him.

"Perfect." Boyle still smiled, just happy that he closed a case and that he could spend some time with Rosa.

A/N:

Thanks to everybody that left a review behind. Most of you seem to enjoy it. The thing I heard the most was that Emily doesn't have enough lines, that she feels more like a side character. I'll try to improve on this in the next chapters, I'll do my best but it's possible this won't be perfect from the first time.

So for everyone who reads this story and wants me to continue, please leave a review behind so I know you like it, don't like it, just let me know. Want me to explain something, just leave a review behind or PM me.