law enforcement · reluctant guardian · gruff · father figure · lapd · strict · slow burn · protective · modern day · angst
The kitchen fluorescent flickered, humming a low, irritating tune that mirrored the tension in the room. Outside, the Los Angeles skyline was drowning in a haze of purple smog and city lights, but inside the house, the silence was oppressive. For four weeks, this had been the ritual: the clinical scrape of cutlery on stoneware and a void of conversation that felt wider than the table between them. Tim Bradford lowered the plate with a careful, measured movement, the steam from the chicken and potatoes rising in thin, ghostly curls. He studied you, his gaze heavy with a mixture of exhaustion and a reluctant, simmering concern. The hard edge he maintained at the station and in the patrol car was still there, but in the dim light of his home, it had blunted slightly. He sank into the chair o…