Since the start of the show, Tim and Lucy have been one of the main dynamics. Their relationship has grown over the years. It started with Tim as her training officer and Lucy as his trainee, but it quickly became more than that.
Season 4 was notable for the pairing as it explored their relationship deeper outside of those roles while still working together. They’ve always been involved with each other’s personal lives outside of work, but it’s taken to another level this season as well.
5. The Hug (Episode 1, “Life and Death”)
In the season premiere, Lucy loses her best friend, Jackson. After watching the footage of his death, she decides she can’t go back to their shared apartment. Tim offers for her to stay at his place. When there, the two talk more about what happened. Tim comforts her with a hug, and after the pair separate, they stand close together, staring at each other. When Tim tells her that he’s going to bed, the two go back and forth about who is going to take the couch before Tim agrees to let Lucy take it. They’re both shown lying awake in their respective spots with clear tension between them until Lucy decides to get up to go to Tim. She’s interrupted when he gets a call that they found out where Angela was taken.
4. The Moment of Vulnerability (Episode 9, “Breakdown”)
Tim’s sister, Genny, and their dad show up in the middle of the season. Before this, the only mention of Tim’s family has been small comments about his dad being abusive. When talking to Genny, Lucy learned some of how Tim was raised. After a story about their dad leaving Tim in the park with only a compass to guide him home, Lucy absent-mindedly compares how Tim taught her as her training officer and his use of “Tim Tests” to how his dad treated him.
In the following episode, Lucy helps Tim and Genny work on fixing up their childhood home to resell it. While tearing open a wall, Tim finds a gun. He and Lucy investigate where it came from and learn it was used to kill Tim’s neighbor when he was younger. Tim’s dad alibied out back in the day, but he tells Lucy that it wasn’t a strong alibi because it was the neighbor’s wife who vouched for him, and they were having an affair. Tim spends the episode thinking that his dad did it until Lucy discovers it was actually his dad’s mistress. Tim confronts his dad, and afterward, he tearfully talks to Lucy about how upsetting it was that his dad never tried to protect them but covered up a murder to protect his mistress. After that, he tells her that the “Tim Tests” don’t make him like his dad, and she agrees, telling him, “I know. You’re nothing like him,” before pulling him into a comforting hug. It’s a very vulnerable moment that we don’t often see from Tim, and it’s nice to see him let Lucy support him.
3. The Dance (Episode 18, “Backstabbers”)
At the end of season 3, Tim asks Lucy to save him a dance at Angela’s wedding. With the wedding cut short due to La Fiera kidnapping Angela, they never got that dance, so when Nyla and James get married, Tim reminds her of just that. The pair happily slow dance while Tim talks to Lucy about an issue she’s been having with the pair being work partners. Earlier in the episode, Lucy had realized that Tim was getting the credit for all of their arrests, which upset her. It’s during the dance that Tim talks to her about it properly. He tells her that he’s going to list her as the arresting officer moving forward and giving her all the credit despite him being the superior officer. The dance is special itself, but the long wait on finally getting it made it even better.
2. The Double Date (Episode 12, “The Knock”)
During season 4, Tim starts dating again. His girlfriend, Ashley, gets four tickets to an exclusive fine dining event that’s hard to get into. When they need to find another couple to go with, Tim suggests they invite Lucy rather than another couple that Ashley wants to ask because he knows Lucy really wants to go. She doesn’t have a date, so Tim sets her up with a lawyer, Chris, whom Lucy had been rivaling with a bit but has started to warm up to.
At the dinner, Tim and Lucy get wrapped up in conversations with each other and accidentally exclude their dates. It starts with Lucy picking food off of Tim’s plate that she knows he doesn’t like and continues into work stories and talks of personal details they know about each other, like that Tim wants his ashes spread at Dodger Stadium when he dies. The conversations show off how well they know each other and how much time they spend together while also awkwardly putting their dates on the outside of the conversation.
1. The Kiss (Episode 22, “Day In The Hole”)
In the season finale, Tim and Lucy agree to do an undercover operation where they play a couple after they learn that the original people involved look just like them. The two meet up to discuss their backstory and iron out the details of the case. Lucy details a steamy first meeting and get-together for their roles, leaving Tim visibly shocked. After that, Tim awkwardly mentions they’ll probably have to kiss during the operation to make this convincing. After some more awkward back and forth, followed by some banter, Tim leans in for a barely-there peck. Lucy proceeds to ask, “Is that it?” and as Tim sputters to defend himself, she pulls him into a deep kiss. They continue to kiss for a moment before being interrupted by Lucy’s roommate, Tamara. Tim leaves after that but pauses outside her door while looking conflicted.
The Rookie returns for season 5 on Sunday, September 25 at 10 p.m. EST on ABC! Watch to see what comes next for Tim and Lucy! Check out our other coverage on the series here.