A Cure for Frostbite

by Viv Martella's Ghost

Email:            martellas_ghost@yahoo.com.au
Fandom:           The Bill
Archivals/Lists:  posted to Sunhill and Fabulae lists for archival at
                  Jasmine Alley and Fabulae
Pairing:          Sharpe/McAllister
Rating:           PG
Status:           new complete story, a few minor changes
                  since sub to list
Category:         first time
Spoilers:         This story is set the day after episode 068 of season
                  18.  A few spoilers from there and previous episodes.
Feedback:         Feedback via email or onlist is very welcome.
Summary:          DC Sharpe comforts the tormented DS McAllister when she is
                  upset about baby matters.
Disclaimer:       The characters in this story, plotlines from episodes of
                  The Bill and all other The Bill stuff do not belong to me.
                  I have not profited in any way from their use and do not
                  intend any infringement of copyright.



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A Cure for Frostbite


"Mr Meadows tells me you've got good news."

McAllister looked up from her paperwork.  It was Sharpe, leaning
against the edge of her desk, with her arms folded across her lean
torso.

"Mr Meadows would," muttered McAllister.  "He's been following me
around like a stray puppy all morning."

"Yeah well, I'm happy for you, sarge," said Sharpe, ignoring the change
of subject.  "I think you've made the right decision."

McAllister toyed with a paperclip and barely grunted.  Having a
conversation with her was like pulling teeth sometimes.

"When's he coming home?"

"In a few days, after I sort a few things out."

The sergeant's gaze seemed to focus on something in the vicinity of her
coffee cup.

"That's great," said Sharpe, following McAllister's line of sight and
seeing nothing.  She eyed her curiously, trying to read the tormented
soul behind the icy facade.

"You must be looking forward to it?"

Anxiety flickered over McAllister's pale face.  She looked up at Sharpe
with a pained expression.

"I don't know," she whimpered.  "I don't know if I'm ready, Eva.  I
haven't got a nursery prepared for him or anything."

"It'll be alright."  Sharpe put a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"You'll see.  If you need a hand with anything, just give us a shout."

McAllister's eyes welled up with tears.

"I don't think I can do this on my own," she choked out.

Sharpe looked about the squad room, seeing Hunter and Drummond exchange
raised eyebrow glances then pretend to be busy with something on a
computer terminal.

"Come on," she said, taking McAllister's elbow.  "Let's get you cleaned
up."

Sharpe led McAllister into the women's toilet, with the DS suppressing
sobs and trying to keep a brave face.  Once they were through the door,
McAllister broke down into tears.  Sharpe offered her a hanky.

"Thanks," said McAllister, looking into the hanky before blowing her
nose.  Sharpe leant one shoulder against the paper towel dispenser and
jammed her hands in her pockets.

"Don't worry, it's clean."

"No," snivelled McAllister.  "I mean thank you for being so supportive.
I mean it."

Wonders will never cease, thought Sharpe.  "Don't mention it," she
said.

"I'm just so angry with Tom," McAllister exclaimed through gritted
teeth.  "I can't believe he did this to me.  To get me in this
situation, and then abandon me to it."  Her face wrinkled up in an
unrefined mess of pure misery.

"Look," Sharpe sighed.  "You're not abandoned, Debbie.  And you're not
alone.  The whole station's behind you.  You may not have a husband but
so what.  They're useless gits half the time anyway, and Chandler
wasn't exactly fatherhood material.  You're better off without him."

"I know," said McAllister, a tear rolling down her cheek.

Sharpe watched her weeping for a moment, before taking her hands from
her pockets and ditching her leaning post.

"Come here," she coaxed, taking McAllister in her arms in a motherly
hug.  McAllister stood rigid for a moment, unwilling to allow herself
to be subjected to this unprofessional interaction.  But she felt the
genuine warmth of Eva's embrace.  With a sigh of resignation and her
body racked by a fresh wave of sobs, she surrendered to it, wrapping
her arms around Sharpe's waist and burying her face in the crook of her
neck.  Tears plopped onto Sharpe's blue denim jacket.  Sharpe stroked
her hair and made soothing noises, letting McAllister cry her little
heart out.

"I'm sorry," McAllister blubbered into Sharpe's white t-shirt.  "It
must be the hormones."

Sharpe rolled her eyes and squeezed McAllister's slender frame a little
tighter.

"You're allowed to have feelings, Debbie.  If you let them out once in
a while they tend not to torture you so much."

Sharpe kissed her sergeant on the top of the head as she often did to
her young daughter when she was upset.  Wispy curls of blonde hair
tickled her face.  McAllister's reticent sobs began to subside.  Sharpe
kissed her head again, and passed a consoling hand up and down her arm,
caressing the delicate under side with a straying thumb.  Sniffing,
McAllister turned her teary face up towards Sharpe's.  Her furrowed
brow and questioning eyes betrayed vulnerability and confusion.  The
two regarded each other for a moment.

"You're very kind to me," said McAllister after a while.  The fragility
of the woman was completely obvious to Sharpe.  She was just one big
bruise that needed a tender salve and long term solicitude.

"Well somebody's got to be," said Sharpe quietly.  She stroked
McAllister's cheek with the back of her hand, and was rewarded with the
McAllister equivalent of a smile - a vague flicker at the corner of her
mouth.

"Besides, somehow you've got under my skin, Debbie."

Sharpe hesitated for a moment, then, with a cheeky glint in her brown
eyes, gave McAllister a juicy peck on the lips.

Surprised, the DS stood there in a red-eyed half pout, with her top lip
curled upwards and her teeth together, studying her underling.  A
little spot of saliva left by Sharpe's mouth felt cool on her bottom
lip.  Her eyebrows lifted as a realisation set in.  Her sorrows were
momentarily shoved aside and Princess Debbie's flattered ego came to
the fore.

"Eva," she began smugly.  "Are you making a pass at me?"

"No sarge," replied Sharpe.  "I wouldn't do a stupid thing like that."

Both officers held their gaze.  There were twinkles in both pairs of
eyes.

A couple of Sharpe's braids hovered flirtatiously in front of her face.
With a subtle raise of one eyebrow, McAllister took one step closer to
the DC.  More protruding parts of her body brushed tantalisingly
against Sharpe as she tucked the stray braids behind her ear, then
fondled her earring.  Her gaze flicked coyly from Sharpe's eyes down to
her mouth and lingered there a long moment, before returning, half
lidded, to her eyes.  Sharpe was content to observe the Sun Hill
mistress of flirtation at work.  She was glad to have gotten her mind
off the baby for more than one second.

McAllister allowed the corner of her mouth to curve upwards slightly
before lowering her lips to Sharpe's in a gentle, wet kiss.  Craning
her neck to kiss the taller woman, Sharpe took McAllister's hands in
hers and simply held them, palm to palm.  It was a gesture of
tenderness that shocked the DS by its unfamiliarity.  It made her heart
ache and her eyes filled with tears.  She couldn't hold them back, and
broke away from the kiss.

"Oh god," exclaimed a worried Sharpe.  "Did I hurt you?"

The bleary eyed McAllister shook her head.

"It's just," she started, wiping her nose with the back of her hand,
"No one's ever shown me real love or kindness in a long time.  Tom
tolerated me, but he didn't love me.  I thought that was as good as it
was ever going to get."

No doubt about it, thought Sharpe, this poor girl needs the love of a
good woman.

"Debbie," she said.  "Love isn't hard to come by.  You can have as much
as you want, from me or from anybody else.  All you have to do is stop
being such a stuck up cow.  It makes you very hard to like at times."

McAllister stopped snivelling.

"Am I a stuck up cow?"

"Well you can be yeah.  Didn't you know?"

McAllister shook her head.  Sharpe suppressed a smile.  God help her,
she liked Debbie McAllister.  She gave Debbie a quick peck on the cheek
to eliminate any doubts in her mind.  But the DS still looked
concerned.

"I don't want to be like him."

"Oh, blimey," Sharpe laughed dryly.  "You're not like him.  The man was
a rapist.  He was a nasty piece of work, and you're not like him at
all."

McAllister managed a semblance of a smile and dabbed her eye.

"Thank you Eva."

"It's my pleasure."

Sharpe stood on her toes to kiss McAllister on the forehead.  Then she
lowered her lips to McAllister's for another helping of trifle.
McAllister obliged, glad to lose herself in the soft muscularity of the
DC's luscious mouth.

"Eva," she murmured eventually.  "You're not doing this to get a
promotion are you?"

"Oh you are a sad case, aintcha?"

McAllister's eyes twinkled at Sharpe.  She licked her lips.

"I've got to ask you something," she said.  "What about your husband?"

"What, Paul?" replied Sharpe.  "Don't worry about him.  We haven't been
a proper married couple for years, not since he told me he was gay.  We
almost split up over it, only we were good friends and decided to stay
together to bring up the kids.  It worked out all right for me, anyhow.
As it happens."

McAllister nodded with a half smile.

"So no fear," Sharpe continued.  "There's always room for more in our
little extended family."

The idea of an instant extended family filled McAllister with horror,
being the stoic, self-reliant Scorpio that she was.  The chaos of other
people's lives would add unpleasant clutter to her life, which she
could barely keep control of as it was anyway.  She turned somewhat
cold.

"I have my own family now.  Me and Andrew."

Sharpe cursed herself for being so open with a woman who had no ability
to trust anyone.

"I know that," she said.  "I'm not asking you to move in.  But if you
want to be a part of my life, you'd be more than welcome, is all I'm
saying."

"Eva we hardly know each other," said McAllister stubbornly.  "And to
be quite honest, I'm not exactly dead keen on starting another
relationship in a toilet."

Pushing shit uphill in a snowstorm, thought Sharpe.

"Suit yourself.  Your loss, sweetheart."

But Sharpe didn't really mean that.  Flirting with McAllister was a
like picking a scab - once she started, she couldn't stop, despite the
repeated experience of pain.  She tugged at the scab.

"Look, why don't you just come over for dinner sometime?  I know
Joanna'd love to see you.  What about tonight?"

McAllister stared at a cracked tile on the opposite wall, thinking
about all the things she had to do and how she really didn't have time
for these complications.

"I have to go and see Andrew at the hospital."

"Well after that, then."

The cracked tile was clearly very interesting to McAllister, who kept
staring at it vacantly.  Sharpe almost got cross.

"It's just dinner.  I ain't gonna lock you in the coal cellar and keep
you as my whore for eternity."

McAllister blinked and looked at Sharpe, startled and somewhat amused,
but unsure whether or not she should pull rank in a fit of pique and
start bossing Eva around.  Sharpe's face broke out in a broad grin.

"Tempting as it may be."

There was something appealing about Eva, despite her pervertedly happy
and well-adjusted personal life.  The warmth returned to McAllister's
eyes, and Sharpe knew she was back on track.

"All right," said McAllister.  "Dinner tonight."



Paul Sharpe was a fine cook, and had outdone himself by making a high
stacked vegetarian lasagne.  It beat the baked beans on toast that had
been McAllister's mainstay for the last few weeks.  And it went down
even better with a nice bottle of red or two.

Joanna had been allowed to stay up late so she could share the meal
with her second favourite police officer.  She had shyly asked if
Debbie could read her a bedtime story, to which McAllister had shyly
agreed, after looking nervously at Eva.  Joanna took McAllister by the
hand and gave her a tour of her Pokemon collection, before climbing
into bed and choosing a book for her to read.  The DS sat down next to
her and Joanna pulled her arm into a convenient cuddle position.
McAllister opened the book and read the story, with Joanna occasionally
pointing out some of its more amusing features by means of an excited
giggle.  She was asleep before the end of the book, and Paul popped his
head through the door.

"I'll tuck her in if you like, Debbie."

McAllister extricated herself from the tangle of small child and went
back out to the lounge room.  Eva was pouring another glass of red.

"Shall we go and sit on the porch?  It's a lovely evening," she said,
offering a glass to McAllister.

There was an old settee on the porch that looked over a tree-lined
common.  It was just big enough for two people to curl up on.
McAllister sat down on it and sipped her red.  Sharpe plonked herself
down next to her and folded her legs up beneath her.

"It's a beautiful park when it snows," she said.  "All the kids round
here come to make snow Pokemons on the roundabout."

She noticed the trace of amusement on McAllister's composed face.

"So, did Joanna make you do the animal noises in the story?"

McAllister's lip curled in a smile.

"She told me I had to improve my elephant before the next time I
visit."

Sharpe smiled back at her.

"She loves that book.  It's driving me up the wall - we've been reading
it to her for the past three weeks.  I told Paul I'm going on bedtime
story strike until she finds a new one."

Placing her wine glass on the floor, she reached out a hand to touch
McAllister's shoulder, which flinched a little at her touch.
McAllister turned to her.  The street lamp cast a dim light on Sharpe's
face.  Her bright eyes surveyed her boss with a steady gaze, but she
made no move to do or say anything else.

Sharpe was wearing her sexy old jeans that McAllister now realised she
had often admired at the nick.  Placing one hand on Sharpe's sexy-old-
jeans-covered knee, McAllister leant forward to kiss her.  The DC
kissed her back, teasingly tentative at first, but then with more
vigour, pulling McAllister close until they were reclining back on the
couch, with Eva's back against the solid arm and Debbie on top.  Sharpe
let her right hand wander boldly over the curve of McAllister's shapely
bum.  With roving fingers, McAllister peeled Sharpe's t-shirt up her
belly a way and caressed the soft, brown skin there.  Sharpe shivered
and kissed McAllister's neck from ear to collar bone, soliciting a
series of satisfying groans, and making sure to leave a couple of small
bite marks along the way.

The front door had a simple lock, but Paul made a production number out
of opening it.  McAllister sat bolt upright at the sound and wiped her
mouth.

"Eva, I'm going to bed.  Can you look in on Joanna before you turn in?"

"Will do," said Eva, still lying against the chair arm.

Paul shut the door.  McAllister pursed her lips and looked out at the
common.  Sharpe drummed her fingers on the arm of the settee.

"So," she said, running a finger down McAllister's thigh.  "Are you
coming inside or what?"

"Erm," said McAllister, chewing the inside of her cheek.  "I probably
should be getting on home."

Watching her fickle sergeant, Sharpe sighed to herself.  Eva Sharpe,
she thought, sometimes I really do not know why you bother.

"All right," she said, getting to her feet.  "I'm well freezing.  And
it's my bedtime.  I'll be in the first bedroom on the left if you want
to come find me.  I won't lock the front door."

McAllister stood up too, smoothing her clothes down and putting on her
persona of complete denial.

"Cheers, Eva," she said.  "But I really should be off.  I have a life
to sort out.  A baby to raise."

"So I hear," said Sharpe, giving her the final once over.  "See you
tomorrow, then."

"Mm."

Sharpe went into the house and closed the door.  McAllister stood there
for a moment, trying to remember where she had parked her car.  The
night was cold and still.  Her flat would be colder and stiller.  But
it was hers, and she would cope, just as she had always done.  She was
a survivor, and she had to get on with her life.  Hers and Andrew's
life.  An image of vulnerable little Andrew McAllister lying in his
hospital crib flashed into her mind.  She gritted her teeth, willing
herself not to cry.  Her whole life recently just seemed like a blur of
crying, sobbing and weeping.  No more, she decided.  She was tougher
than that.

A light went on inside the Sharpe household, shining dimly through the
stained glass over the front door and bathing the front porch golden.
The pad of bare footsteps echoed through the floorboards.  McAllister
realised that she hadn't even said thank you to Eva for inviting her
into her home.  Eva was right.  She was a stuck up cow.

She shivered.  There was nothing for her at home, at least not until
Andrew was there.  And inside here, just through this door, was a warm
and beautiful woman who genuinely liked her for some reason, and who
was curled up in a cosy bed, waiting for her.

Debbie McAllister opened the door.



The End.