Dani Reese

Dani Reese is a police detective from NBC's Life. She arrived in Bete Noire in April of 2010.

Appearance
Dark hair, skin tone that isn't quite white (reflecting her half-Persian heritage), on the short side of average. She looks a little too pretty to be a cop, something that suspects, witnesses and fellow police officers often remark on. Strong, physically fit.

Personality
On the surface, Dani is a sarcastic, matter-of-fact, second-generation cop. She grew up in a cop family (though her father never wanted her to follow in his footsteps, as a law enforcement officer), she knew her whole life that she'd be a cop, and, once she became a cop, she was damn good at it. She's focused, she's cool-headed in the face of danger, and she knows what she's doing. Furthermore, she doesn't like people wasting her time.

Of course, that's just the surface. Beneath it, Dani buries one hell of a lot. Because of being that good of a cop, that bright of a rising star in the department, it meant that she was selected for an undercover op. It meant that she dipped a little too deep into drugs and sex and alcohol, and it meant that she had to go through rehab, and had to depend on her highly-placed cop father to bail her out, otherwise she would've gotten fired. She would've said that she was a social drinker. That she did "a little blow". And then all of that changed when her junkie boyfriend dumped her, and when everything fell apart.

Dani is an acutely sensitive person. She never quite fulfilled the expectations of her father, which weighs on her, even if she doesn't consciously realize it. Her failure haunts her, and the self-destructive cycle begun while in undercover ops never really stopped -- one-night stands, having a casual drink at a bar before heading to an AA meeting. She's already made up her mind that no one's going to get close. She used to describe herself as the type to get paranoid. Now she doesn't call it paranoia. It's justified. People are untrustworthy. She's better off alone.

And this is where her partner, Charlie, comes in. She shows little patience for his odd quirks of behavior, at first taking them for signs of unreliability. But, then, after being proven wrong about him -- after his leaps of intuition and his strange, sideways outlook starts cracking cases -- she starts to trust him. Starts to regard him as her partner. Even to the point where she'd lie to her boss, and take Charlie's side, in order to protect him. In spite of herself, she begins to trust him.

Dani's broken. But she's not about to fall apart, and she's not broken beyond repair. She just needs someone to trust.

Sexuality
''Man: Do you want to know my name? Dani: If I'd wanted to know your name, I would have asked for it. Man: Well, are you going to call? Dani: Can't call if I don't know your name.''

Sex, for Dani, is one-night stands. She's not interested in commitment. In fact, she's actively uninterested in commitment. When she walks into a bar, and picks out someone to hit on, she goes for the married ones. She gets drunk, and she fucks them, and she leaves. Physical release, and control, and the guarantee of no one ever leaving her.

On a more overreaching note, Dani is straight, and usually the dominant sexual partner. She likes being on top. She likes being in control. And she likes knowing that she can deny her partner if she wants.

Anyone who manages to keep her around for more than one night would find that she can be playful, teasing and fun in bed; and if anyone manages to keep her around for more than one night, she'll find out, again (because she's made herself forget) that sex with someone you care about is much, much more fulfilling than the drunken one-night stands she's used to.

In Bete Noire
When Dani arrived, she was almost immediately recruited into the police force by Sam Tyler, along with her partner, Charlie Crews. She became a detective in the new force, helping investigate the various murders taking place within the city.

Not too long after she arrived, she began to descend into her usual patterns. Drinks, one-night stands. One such one-night stand was with Laurence Dominic. And apparently the sex got a little too rough, because the next full moon, Dani found out that she was a werewolf. Since then, she has accepted her spot as alpha female, and become a small but fierce member of the werewolf pack.

One day, Charlie Crews disappeared from the city. Dani went into an emotional tailspin, self-destructive, and couldn't manage to pull herself out of it until she found another cop, Lance Blackthorn, using heroin. She confronted him, and he assaulted her. She ended up in the hospital, and finally that managed to snap her back into someting resembling emotional equilibrium.

She decided to let Lance out of prison and into rehab. And, almost immediately after, she was shot and injured in wolf form while tailing some drug suspects. Lance, not recognizing her, found her bleeding in an alleyway and patched her up. And now she doesn't know what to think about him.

Powers
Dani is a werewolf. She thus has the ability to shapeshift from wolf form to human form. As a wolf, she is small, and black-colored. Her clothes do not change, which causes many an inconvenience for her, and she does have limited pack radar, meaning that if she concentrates she can sense the location and status of other werewolves in the pack.