"The truth is, we all need someone to blame and half of the time it s not even the right person. Why else do people blame the whore instead of their husband or wife who kept their marriage a secret for a night? Or why people blame the parents of a depressed child who opened fire in a school building? The truth is, it s easier to blame someone else than to realize the real criminal is the person we love and other times its easier to blame someone else than to blame ourselves."

[partnersinfire]

"Tell me again why do you take more than a few cases at a time?"

"Because I like knowing that it s going to get done right, Jenna replied as she kept her eyes down on the case folder she was looking at. I know. It gives us less girl time. We ve had this conversation a billion times, Lexi."

"You have a bunch of people working for you, Lexi replied dramatically as she raised her hands up, what s the point of working in a big fancy law firm if you can t hand people the work you don t want?"

"Have you seen half of the people that work here? Damon included. Jenna looked up momentarily from the file to give Lexi a look. I m better at doing these things on my own than I am handing them out to people. Besides, I hand work out. Just not the important stuff."

Lexi glared at her friend and was about to respond until a knock on Jenna s office door interrupted her. She looked behind her to see the man walking inside and as much as she tried not too, Lexi couldn t help but look back at Jenna with wide eyes.

"I'll um leave you too alone. She gave her friend a questioning look as she got up from the chair to leave the two of them in peace."

"Wow," Jenna said as she leaned back in her chair, Alaric Saltzman. "You re not here to arrest me are you?"

Alaric chuckled softly to himself as he took the seat that Lexi was sitting in only moments ago, "No. How long have you been waiting to use that joke?"

"Oh a good three years or so, Jenna replied with a tilt of her head. So how are you? I assume the whole detective thing is still working for you."

"Yeah," Alaric nodded, "but that s not why I m here."

"Then why are you here?" Jenna leaned forward as she watched Alaric. Three years ago, Alaric was her partner. Three years ago, they had been friends but ever since Jenna dropped out and went back to her old career, their partnership and friendship had been lost.

"Well, you are the best divorce lawyer this city has so.." Alaric's voice trailed off as he glanced away from Jenna. Best divorce lawyer or not she wasn t the only one in this city. He could have went to anyone else and yet he found himself here. Isobel and I are getting a divorce.

Jenna took in a breath before letting it out. She wasn t sure on how to react to that. Was he really coming to her to take over his case? To split everything down the middle? To make sure he got what he deserved? Maybe partnership never really dies.

"Why don't we go get a drink?" Jenna got up to grab her coat, "It feels like a Jack Daniels kind of night."

Alaric couldn t help the soft chuckle that he let out as he got up from the chair, "Jack Daniels it is." He smiled at Jenna as they made their way to the door and out of the office altogether.

[partnersinfire]

5 years ago:

Jenna couldn t help the look of confusion on her face as she watched the other male detectives gather around her partner. Was it someone s birthday? Did someone die? She didn t know and the fact that no one seemed to be getting any work done around here when they all had open cases bugged her. Jenna was always up for a good time but she liked to keep that separate from work. That s what made her a good detective.

"Um hi," she said as she got through the crowd of people, "what's going on?"

"Our buddy over here got hitched", one of the male detectives replied with a stupid grin on his face as he patted Alaric on the shoulder.

"Hitched? As in married?" Jenna asked. She was trying to hide it but she couldn t help but glare in her partner s direction. "Well congrats or whatever people say." She shrugged as she turned on her heels to walk back to her desk. She sat down in her chair as she angrily pulled more work appropriate shoes from her bag.

Alaric watched as Jenna stormed back to her desk. As much as he wanted to bask in the happy moment and all the congratulations, he figured he might as well see what was bugging his partner. "Excuse me," he said politely to his friends before approaching his angry friend s desk.

"Can we talk?"

Jenna glanced up as she finished tieing her shoes before she got up form her seat figuring that a more private set of scenery would be better than having this conversation in front of everyone. The moment they both stepped into an empty interview room, she let him have it.

"Married?" Jenna asked with an almost look of disgust on her face. "Really? Like what? Like at the court house?"

"It was Isobel s idea," Alaric replied knowing full and well that would only make his friend angrier but it was true.

"And you couldn t have picked up the damn phone?" Jenna didn t get it and she didn t see his fascination with this Isobel person. Sure, Alaric told her all about her: how they met at college and how they dated on and off for a while.

"What do you want me to say, Jenna?" He stepped forward to rest his hands on her shoulders. "I didn t do any of this to hurt you."

"I'm your partner," Jenna replied stressing the word partner hoping to get her point across to him better. "We're supposed to tell each other these things and right now it's looking like I m the last one to know."

"Yeah, well, Isobel is my partner now." The moment those words left Alaric s mouth he wanted to take it back especially with the hurt that filled Jenna s light eyes. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt her but the last person he was thinking about when he made this decision was Jenna. He knew how that sounded but ever since Isobel came back into his life he found himself more focused on his relationship than he was with his partnership.

"Is that right?" Jenna removed Alaric s hands from her shoulders as she shifted around. Alaric had seen that move too many times in the interview room. It usually ended with someone getting their face slammed into the table or someone s hand broken.

"Well since she's your partner now you can take her on calls. Yeah, I mean why not?" Jenna gave Ric a sarcastic smirk as she threw her hands in the air. "You can interrogate suspects with her and you can go undercover with her and when some dumbass opens fire on you, you can expect to have her take a bullet for you next time and not me."

"Jenna I -"

"You know what Ric I get it." Jenna shook her head not bothering to let him finish his thought. "I get it. Best friend gets a girlfriend and they shut everyone out but I thought we were closer than that. I thought at the end of the day you would always have my back and I would always have yours. That no matter what, we wouldn t abandon each other but obviously that s not true now is it?" Jenna stared into Alaric s blue eyes as if she was searching for something - anything but it only ended with her being left dissappointed.

"I have a case to work on." She moved past Ric, allowing her shoulder to bump into his.

"That's our case, Ric corrected her as if it made any difference."

Jenna opened the door and glanced over her shoulder to look at him, "Not anymore. After today, I'm requesting a transfer."

"The truth is, most of us yearn for a sense of partnership. Whether it s a family member, a friend, or even a lover. We look for someone to blindly follow us into the darkness. Someone to be there at our beck and call. Someone to stand by our side when the tides roll in and there s a danger we may drown. But partnership, like most fairytales, have no real foundation - no real truth. That s why we stop believing in the fairytale - happily ever after ending - when we do. We realize stories are sometimes based on nothing but lies and more times than not, so is partnership."

Note: I'm sorry if anyone read this without any of the right punctuation marks. For some reason my document didn't save them.

I semi came up with this idea watching Fairly Legal. I love the main character and what she fights for. I also came up with this idea with a mixture of watching Matt Davis' episode of In Plain Sight which surrounded the idea of 'partnership' and 'blind devotion'. Not to mention I'm a hardcore Olivia/Eliot fan (SVU) and love the idea of partnership and what that means. Hope you guys enjoy. I would love reviews and for more of this story (graphics, videos, etc) you can go to lesliexhale-fanfiction(dot)tumblr(dot)com.