Title: Comes in Threes
Author: amazonqueenkate
Claim: Jacqui Franco
Fandom: CSI: Vegas
Theme: (Set 2; #40, procedural)
Rating: PG
Summary: Sofia Curtis notices three key differences between herself and Jacqui Franco.
Author's Notes: Inspired by and somewhat for goodnightlady, who was good enough to put up with my ridiculous flailing and Jacqui's insecurity.

If Sofia Curtis was seized in a dingy alley and forced, at gun point, to choose the member of the Clark County Crime Lab who was most opposite herself, she wouldn't even have to think before answering.

She'd choose Jacqui Franco.

From the first moment she saw the other woman – Jacqui answering Greg's questions about a certain suspicious fingerprint while she stood in the doorway watching – the thing that most struck Sofia was simply how different they were. She was short – far shorter than Greg while in tall shoes, which was an accomplishment – and dark, with a mass of brown curls barely pulled back and piercing dark eyes. She hardly looked at Greg, too, focusing instead on the computer monitor in front of her. If she noticed Sofia in the doorway, she never acknowledged it.

And the second time she laid eyes on Jacqui – this time passing her in the hallway on the way to speak to Grissom – it struck her that Jacqui had actual curves: breasts, hips, thighs, ass. She'd nearly walked right into the wall as she'd watched Jacqui stride by, not because she'd been checking her out, per se, but simply because it struck her so.

By the third time – a quick stop over at the print lab to pick up a folder that Greg had left behind – she caught a glimpse at Jacqui's small hands and short fingers, and suddenly felt self-conscious of her light hair and sleek runner's body she'd never been able to rid herself of.

After a few seconds of blank staring, Sofia blinked and realized that Jacqui was staring right back at her with those dark, careful eyes. "Need something?" she asked evenly.

Sofia forced a little smile and lifted the folder. "Forgot this. Sorry."

Jacqui frowned slightly and then dropped her head again. "That's fine."

And that was the second difference Sofia noticed, though it took several somewhat-unnecessary errands to the fingerprint lab to find it out: Jacqui Franco was insecure.

Sofia had always prided herself on her self-awareness, but Jacqui just did not have that air about her. She spoke evenly but often sharply, using sarcasm regularly and sometimes with the same bitter edge employed by Hodges. Occasionally, she'd smirk and say something cocky – "What can I say? I've got the magic eye," she told Catherine one day when Sofia was half-listening – but for the most part, she walled herself in her print lab and kept to herself. Other than Catherine and occasionally Greg, actually, it seemed that Jacqui said very little to anyone that wasn't related directly to work.

Even after Sofia's presence passing her lab had started to coax a causal "hey", Jacqui never worked to open any sort of dialogue other than that one syllable – so meaningless, so short, so insignificant – and a nod through glass. But sometimes if she timed it right, Sofia could catch her standing in front of the mirror in the women's restroom, clipping and re-clipping her curls away from her face or smoothing over her freshly touched-up makeup. She always glanced at Sofia without speaking and never stuck around long enough for Sofia to finish her feigned visit to a stall.

Jacqui never took off her lab coat at work, either, another strange quirk Sofia noticed on another out-of-place stop in the fingerprint lab, looking for boxes of lift tape she knew had been moved into DNA. The air conditioning had been on the fritz for three days and Sofia – who tried her best to stay professional – had come in wearing her most work-appropriate sleeveless top and lightest pants. But Jacqui's knit shirt barely boasted a scoop neck and she still wore her lab coat in the face of ridiculous heat, and Sofia watched her work, sleeves rolled up to her elbows.

"Do you have a problem?" Jacqui asked after a few moments, not glancing up from the prints she was hand-processing.

Sofia frowned and grabbed a box of swabs off the shelf. "A/C's out," she stated, clutching the box as though she'd been looking for it all along. "Aren't you hot?"

Jacqui shrugged, glancing across the lab through thick bangs. "Not really."

Sofia tried, very vigilantly, to stop watching Jacqui after that interaction, figuring she'd either be labeled a stalker or drive herself to insanity. Jacqui and she were polar opposites, both physically and personally. Other than sharing a workplace, they had nothing in common, and it'd become evident that Jacqui would never say more than three words to her. It'd been odd of her to be interested in the interactions. Really, She never should have started in the first place.

Sofia was thinking that very thing while pouring over cell phone histories at the end of one shift when a voice commented behind her, "You've stopped coming by."

Jacqui stood in the doorway behind her, looking slightly uncomfortable with her hands in her lab coat pockets. Her eyes met Sofia's and then glanced away as she stepped into the room, shrugging. "I mean, you're busy, and that's fine, I just noticed that it's been a couple days, so I thought I'd say hey."

"Hey," Sofia replied, and tried to suppress a smile. Instead, she watched Jacqui scan the phone histories, hovering near her shoulder. It was either in interest or avoidance, but for all her time as a CSI, Sofia could not tell. Sofia could also not come up with anything intelligent to say; she wanted to add to the conversation, but she'd never said more than a meaningless "hey" and was not sure what the next syllable should be when Jacqui was actually in the same room.

Finally, Jacqui nodded. "Hey," she repeated, and glanced right at Sofia, her dark eyes earnest but also touched with just a bit of apprehension. She paused for a moment and then added, "Don't think I didn't notice."

"Notice?" Sofia asked unnecessarily.

"You. Stopping by. To say hello, or fill up on swabs." She smirked slightly. "You must swab a lot of suspects."

Sofia smirked back. "It happens."

"Yeah." Jacqui pursed her lips – painted dark; Sofia had noticed that Jacqui liked dark lip color – and watched Sofia carefully, the practiced caution of a woman who made her life studying small details. "Do you, maybe, want to get coffee after shift? Or a muffin or something?"

For a moment, Sofia simply stared at her. It was a long enough moment that Jacqui pulled her eyes away and looked back at the phone histories, tiny rows of numbers and locations that meant very little even in context. "Yeah, okay, it was stupid, never – "

"I'd love to," she interrupted, smiling. Jacqui blinked and looked back at her, and then smiled tightly, too. "You just..." She paused. "You surprised me."

Jacqui's smile spread, just slightly. "Believe it or not, I'm a surprising person."

Sofia brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and realized that she'd perhaps discovered an entirely new difference between the two of them.

"Oh, trust me," she replied, "I believe it."