#AND NACE SIGNED MY PHONE CASE

[c28hunter]

I actually have pics also with Jan, Bojan nad Mark

But Nace deserved his own post 😌

[scarletslippers]

hugging with height-difference + giggling while kissing. Nace together working on a case in Nick’s loft while having dinner then Nancy looks at Ace laughing (he rarely does it) after she says something about murder and “I love you.” “I love you too, Nance.” “No, I don’t mean like “You’re my best friend and I love you. You are… I mean you are my best friend but I… I’m in love with you. Probably always have been.” And Ace goes silent for a second because he never thought Nancy could love him back and she takes it as a bad sign and tries to leave but he manages to stop her before she can. feat Nick and George finding them sleeping on the coach and proceeding to take pictures. Days later their phones are blowing up because Bess had included them in a group chat called “have a Nace day” and Ryan, Carson, Rebecca, Grant, Nick, George and Jesse are all part of it and the group chat is basically they gossiping, bets and pictures of nace while they aren’t looking

Oh my goodness, Anon. I feel like you dropped a fully-formed fic here for me to read and enjoy instead of a prompt!! PLEASE go write this, because it sounds amazing, and you certainly do not need me to write it for you.

I took some of your idea, but went in a little different direction because as soon as you said height difference, I had an idea. That, and, my established nace brain rot agenda is seriously hijacking all my fic ideas. I hope you still like it!! Read on AO3

Hugs #24 - Hugging with height difference, Kisses #26 - Giggling while kissing

“Remind me why our witchy Bess isn’t hanging this thing by magic?”

“Because Bess already made all the decorations and we have to contribute something. Also because you knew that us hanging them would give you a chance to hold onto me on the ladder and have a nice view of my ass.”

A smug smile is clear in his voice. “That is true.”

Nancy begins her descent, stopping one rung too high so that she’ll still be taller than Ace. She turns carefully on the step, his hands firm about her waist. 

“Not that I’m complaining,” she murmurs, fingers linked casually behind his neck before sliding one hand into his hair to tug him up to her for a kiss. 

Once everything has been hung, it’s time for finishing touches - Bess leaving them very specific instructions for flower petal array and color placement. The devil is in the details, Nancy! Surely as a detective, you would know that!

“What do you think, Ace?” Nancy asks, when she’s just about done. 

“Mhm, looks great,” Ace responds from his new post on the couch. 

“You’re not even looking. And you are decidedly horizontal for someone who is supposed to be helping decorate this place.”

Ace cracks one eye open and fixes her with it. “I’m supervising.”

“Like hell you are.” Nancy throws the last of the flower petals into the air in defeat, laughing as she heads to Ace. Her hair curtains around them as she leans to kiss him, laughing again, startled, into his mouth as he suddenly pulls her down on top of him. 

She’s busy settling into him when he grumbles into her hair, “George and Nick better appreciate this. Watch them be so deliriously happy on a post-honeymoon high that they don’t even notice.”

———

Nancy doesn’t remember falling asleep, but the harsh buzz of Ace’s phone vibrating on the coffee table certainly startles her awake. “Is that the damn group text again?” She groans. 

“Yeah. Yet another reminder not to underestimate Bess,” he says, shifting the phone down so that Nancy can see it from her vantage point. 

It’s a picture of them, asleep on the couch, clearly not more than an hour old. She must have stopped by to double check their work. A snarky text along the lines of how long do they think they can hide this accompanies the photo. 

“How long should we make them sweat it out before we tell them that we know they know?”

Ace shrugs as best he can beneath her. “I don’t know. I’m having fun, aren’t you? It’s definitely enjoyable to watch Bess lose it every time I very subtly hold your hand at the Claw. I’m impressed she hasn’t cracked yet.”

“And they still have no idea you hacked the group chat?”

“Oh, Ted knows.”

Nancy’s head shoots up at that, propping her chin on Ace’s chest to stare him down. “Ted knows? How does Ted know?”

“She helped me hack in.”

“Like you needed her help.” Nancy returns with skepticism. 

“Well…it was faster and easier to hack it with her help. Plus she owed me one.”

“For?”

He laughs, surprised she hasn’t figured it out. “You really think Ted created and maintained an anonymous fan site, complete with online store and officially licensed merchandise totally independently?”

“You knew about the Fan Fans website?”

“Yeah, I -“

“That means you knew about -“

Ace shrugs again. “You are plucky, Nance.” Kisses her hair. “Just admit it and embrace the cute.”

[lady-himbo]

In Your Shadow

sort of Javier Peña x reader, platonic!Steve Murphy x reader (she/her pronouns; no Y/N used)

Javi keeps getting the credit for work he didn’t do, and she’s pissed. Chaos ensues.

Word count: 2500+

Warnings: angst and frustration, lots of cursing, potentially horrid Spanish (I’m learning, I promise), smoking

A/N: This is based on the song Shadow by Unlike Pluto. You can find pieces of the lyrics in the dialogue. You can also find the translations of everything said in Spanish at the end! Feel free to correct me on anything; like I said, I’m learning Spanish, and I appreciate any advice. <3

“... and thank you again to Agente Peña for providing this invaluable intel.” As the meeting adjourned and several individuals voiced their praise, she charged out of the briefing room and into the office, seething, death-gripping her files to her chest. Hot on her heels, Steve attempted to pacify her.

“I’m sure he didn’t mean to steal your thunder, honey. He’s just-”

“What? He’s just what, Steve? A senior agent? Running the show? A man? Tell me, what exactly justifies him getting credit for the shit I’ve worked months on?!” The files were starting to crumple in her grasp.

“Well, I don-”

“This isn’t even the first time he’s done it! He’s gotten recognition for my informants, my intel, my translations, my briefings, my goddamn livelihood!” Her voice was starting to raise in pitch and volume as tears gathered in her eyes. Steve held his hands up, trying to silently reason with her. “I can’t win, Steven! I work my ass off day and night for this fuckin’ job, only to have the rug pulled out from under me because I’m ‘not working as hard’ as holier-than-thou Javier goddamn Peña and his massive ego! I have to live under it and, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, it casts giant shadows!”

Unfortunately, the source of her rage had picked an inopportune time to waltz in. With only a second to register Steve’s panicked look, Javi might as well have wandered into the middle of a firing squad. The execution probably wouldn’t have been half as painful.

“You motherfucker!” she yelled, slamming the now torn and wrinkled papers onto her desk with a clatter. “You lying, power-hungry, manipulative bastard! You fuck every other woman you get the chance to, but you’ve decided to fuck my life instead! I’ve worked for fucking months; hundreds of hours and sleepless nights on this information, and you’ve taken all the credit! Again!”

Javi, oblivious to the full impact of this outburst, opted for the worst possible response. “Come on, sweetheart, we’re working as a team. Plus, you asked me to hand it in to Noonan. If you wanted to take credit for it so badly, you should’ve just talked to her yourself!” Steve visibly cringed and gestured for him to cut it out. Too late.

She stalked forward and, though Javi tried to back up, she had him backed into a corner. “You pompous ass! ¡Más tonto y no naces!” She’d broken out her Spanish. Oh boy. “I can’t even talk to Noonan because she always tells me to run my ideas by your incompetant ass! You cast a shadow over everything I try to do; it’s not like I can get anything worthwhile done when your massive ego’s towering over my ambitions!” She jabbed a finger into his chest, punctuating her words. “Nothing I’ve ever done here has ever mattered to the agency, because I live in your shadow and you’ve taken all of it from me! When will you move out of my way and stop treating me like a fucking doormat?!”

Javi was starting to get defensive, which was never a good sign, especially when Spanish started to get sprinkled in. “¡Oh, lo siento mucho!” he shot back sarcastically. “I wasn’t aware that all the work you get authorized by me to do was proprietary!”

“Are you fuckin’ serious?” she spat. “All you had to do was say the report was from me! It’s not proprietary, Peña, it’s my goddamn right to present the information that I spent my own money, overtime, health, and physical fucking safety to acquire! I’m sorry that I have a genuine interest in making sure this case gets handled right instead of spending my every waking moment getting my dick wet in my informants!”

A small group was starting to gather near the office, waiting to hear if Peña finally got his ass handed to him. This didn’t seem to bother either agent as they glared each other down. With Peña’s pride now on the line, no holds were barred, and he was ready to bust out personal attacks.

“Any competent agent would’ve just handed their shit in themselves, but no, you’ve gotta rely on someone else to do it for you.” He was livid; his pride had been damaged while he was riding the high of gloat and achievement, like getting laid and immediately being punched in the balls. She wasn’t letting this one go, and it was obvious he wasn’t either. “God! You’re like a cloud every time you walk in here, bitching about how little sleep you’re getting or how your work is piling up; a fuckin’ rain on my parade!” He stepped forward, crowding her, his posture more and more assertive with every word. “¡Madura de una vez! You’re an adult, a government agent, taking down a drug cartel run by Pablo fuckin’ Escobar! No one’s getting sleep, and it certainly doesn’t help when you’re whining about it! Maybe if you stopped, you’d have time to turn in your own reports and get the credit you don’t deserve!”

Escobar himself could’ve walked through the office and no one would’ve noticed. Javi’s mouth slammed shut the moment the words left, but they seemed to echo in the eerily silent office. Her shoulders sagged, and she stumbled back a few steps, trying to steady herself.

“Fuck, I-” Javi choked on his words. Her eyes were red, her cheeks stained, but her face was frighteningly level.

“Yeah, tienes razón.” Her voice was hollow, tired. “It’s always stormy lately. I guess I’m just under too much pressure; it’s driving me insane. There’s only one way to relieve it.” She slipped off her gun holster and unclipped her badge, pressing them into his chest. “I quit.” Without a second glance, she stormed out of the office.

Two weeks later, her desk was cleared out, her files and informants were on a list to be redistributed to the rest of the unit, and the office was uncomfortably heavy. Javi was smoking way more than usual, everyone avoided him like the plague, Steve was bored, the case was at a standstill, and the quiet was palpable. She was no longer a colorful presence flitting around the tables, leaving a rainbow of Post-it Notes in her wake, charting cell signals, calling out for advice, chatting on the phone in Spanglish, humming quietly or bobbing her head to the radio, popping up to refill her coffee cup and offering to refill everyone else’s every couple hours, then rushing off to the bathroom when she’d had too much. She was a constant presence the unit soon realized they’d taken advantage of.

The phone on Steve’s desk rang mid-morning, and he stifled a yawn as he picked it up. “Murphy,” he grunted.

“Hey, Stevie,” came a familiar voice. “¿Qué pasa?”

He brightened. “Hey, hon.” He felt some of the tension leave him, but it was still there. “We’re fuckin’ stuck. Nothing’s happening, everyone’s lifeless, and Javi’s still moping. Eso es lo que pasa.” He could hear her breathy laugh; she was always proud when he practiced his conversational Spanish with her. She’d told him she felt it was an honor he was comfortable enough to try it out around her. “What’s up with you?”

“Ahí vamos; he estado mejor. I’m sorry you have to deal with-” she stopped and huffed, then her words became muffled. “Tengo una cita con la embajadora, huevón. ¡Estoy al teléfono!” She yelped. “¡Tócame otra vez y te rompo la nariz!” There was a brief commotion, then a thump, and suddenly, her voice became clear again. “Sorry, I’m waiting on Noonan. I’m supposed to meet with her today to finalize my paperwork.”

Steve sighed. “You’re really going through with this, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess I am.” Another voice called her name in the background, then spoke quietly for a moment. “What?! ¿Qué quiere decir ‘no está aquí’?” The voice spoke again, then there was a pause. “Okay… Si, todo bien… Está bien. Listo.” Then, back to Steve: “Noonan didn’t show. Some emergency meeting. Just great; I guess I’m rescheduling.”

“Maybe it’s fate!” Steve teased, only half joking. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Javi trudge across the office to the coffee pot, give it a long, forlorn look, then trudge back towards his desk. His eyes were heavy, his shirt rumpled, even his mustache looked sad. As he plopped down amongst towers of papers, Steve cleared his throat and made a show of nestling the handset under his chin. “Well, whatever the case, that gives me time to convince you to stay with us. Your desk looks stupid empty.” Though he was deliberately looking away, he could see Javi’s head and shoulders snap up like he’d heard a gunshot. On the other end of the line, she laughed.

“Don’t try to sweet talk me, Murphy. I’d welcome the company, though.”

“Of course!” he replied, making sure his smile was as cheesy as possible. “I’ll meet you outside in a little bit?” She agreed.

Steve busied himself with pretending to look busy for the next half hour, then announced he was going to talk to Carrillo. As soon as he turned the corner and was sure he was out of sight, he watched Javi scramble out of his seat and out the door.

Outside the building, she was sitting on a bench, her back turned. Lazy wisps of cigarette smoke danced in the wind in front of her figure, and Javi suddenly felt very insecure. He called her name, uncomfortable with the way his voice wavered. She jumped, then, after a beat, slowly turned towards him. “Come mierda, Javier.” He didn’t let her words deter him, approaching the side of the bench. She glared up at him. “No me joda. I’ll finish up in a second and leave.” He wrung his hands, feeling small under her stare.

“I’m going to sit with you,” he declared.

“Please go,” she said, softer this time. “I just wanna feel the wind one last time before I leave. Just wanna look at this shitty masterpiece of a city; really take it in.”

He ignored her plea and sat, far enough away that he didn’t feel like he was ganging up on her. They just sat, and she took long, deep drags of her cigarette. After she eventually ground the butt into the pavement, he took a deep breath.

“I’m sorry.” He left the declaration hanging in the wind for a moment, before plunging on. “I’m sorry for what I said, and what I’ve been doing to you. I’ve been a selfish asshole, and you were right to call me out on that. I’m not going to convince you to stay, because you don’t deserve to be dealing with my bullshit all the time. You’re talented and selfless and I never appreciated everything you sacrificed for us until it was gone. I just- fuck, I feel like such a piece of shit.”

“You are.” He blinked owlishly. “You’re a self-centered, impulsive manwhore with a weird mixture of self-hatred and a superiority complex. You’ve been a horrible coworker and I almost feel ashamed that I tried so hard to be your friend.” He ducked his head, trying to hide his mortification. “Almost.”

He peered back up at her, cocking his head in confusion. “That said, you’re a great agent, kind and sympathetic when you wanna be, passionate about the work we do, and, when you keep a level head, you’re fun to work with. I don’t know if I can forgive you right now for all the shit you did, but your apology goes a long way. I appreciate that.”

She took a deep breath, then stilled, staring out into the movement and noise of Medellín. He watched her for a few minutes, though it felt like hours. He watched the clenching and unclenching of her jaw, the gentle rise and fall of her chest, the flutter of her eyelashes; all the details he’d been too busy to notice. “Penny for your thoughts?”

She looked over, raising an eyebrow. “I don’t know. I’m just thinkin’ about life. What I want to do.”

“I know it doesn’t amount to much, but I’d like you to stay.”

“I can’t- I mean, I can, it’s just that- fuck, I don’t even know,” she mumbled, furrowing her brows to try to stop a tear from slipping down her cheek. “It’s just that, by all official records, I’m pretty much worthless here, y’know? All my abilities go unnoticed and it’s like I’m not even there. I know you don’t mean to stand above me, but you are, and the shadow I live under is killing me. It’s taken my job, my self worth, my… being. I can’t live like that anymore, constantly working at the precipice of death, of destruction, of failure, and the one thing I can do to help isn’t even appreciated as my own. It’s just… cold.”

Javi nodded. “After you left, I went up to Noonan and explained what’d happened; that I didn’t deserve any of the credit I’d been given.”

“Well, that’s not true! The things that you did you deserve credit for. You’re incredibly talented, Javi, just not with my intel.”

“But… you do deserve the credit I get. You deserve so much more than you‘ve ever gotten. What I said was so selfish.”

She grabbed his hand. “Javi, selfishness aside, I know you’re in a dark place. We all are. After all, we’re government agents ‘taking down a drug cartel run by Pablo fuckin’ Escobar’ and we don’t get any sleep.” She smiled at her usage of the words he’d berated her with weeks earlier. “I should’ve taken more initiative to turn in my own work; it was silly of me to put that on you. I know you’ve got your own mess going on. Plus, I said a lot of awful things right back. Most of them I meant, some of them I didn’t, but I could’ve handled it all a lot better. I’m sorry we didn’t work this out earlier.”

Javi squeezed her hand, feeling a little warm tingle in his stomach. “Me too.” He sighed, raking his other hand through his hair. “I- er, we really do need your help. You’re priceless.” She exhaled sharply, tilting her head back and forth as if weighing her options.

“Fine. I’ll talk to Noonan.” Javi’s face lit up. “But on two conditions.” He nodded. “One: I get recognition for my past and future work, and two: you promise to work with me and call on me if we have any issues. We can’t have these communication errors any longer if we’re gonna catch these bastards.” She paused, then smiled lightly. “Also, you owe me a lot of coffee.”

Just as Javi agreed, Steve came out of the building. He stopped a few paces from them, looking back and forth from Javi’s pink cheeks and goofy grin, her teary eyes, and their interlaced hands. “I’m sorry, what did I miss?”

She laughed as they pulled their hands apart and she wiped the tears away. “I’m keeping my job.”

“That’s amazing! …Peña, what did you dose her with?” Javi let out the fakest laugh he could, but smiled along with it. She sighed softly, the breeze dancing across her skin.

“All I want is to cast my own shadow.”

Translations:

¡Más tonto y no naces! - If you were any dumber, you wouldn’t have been born!)

¡Oh, lo siento mucho! -> Oh, I’m so sorry!

¡Madura de una vez! -> Grow up!

tienes razón -> you’re right

¿Qué pasa? -> What’s up?

Eso es lo que pasa. -> That’s what’s up.

Ahí vamos; he estado mejor. -> Fine, I guess; I’ve been better.

Tengo una cita con la embajadora, huevón. ¡Estoy al teléfono! -> I have an appointment with the ambassador, asshole. I’m on the phone!

¡Tócame otra vez y te rompo la nariz! -> Touch me again and I’ll break your nose!

¿Qué quiere decir ‘no está aquí’? -> What do you mean ‘she’s not here’?

Si, todo bien… Está bien. Listo. -> Yeah, all good… all right. Okay.

Come mierda -> Eat shit

No me joda. -> Don’t fuck with me.