I am lying with my eyes closed on my couch at the FBI.
Lisbon is hard at work doing The New York Times Crossword Puzzle online. They get progressively tougher as the week goes on and it's Thursday. She calls out to me, "Genealogical giants, seven letters?"
"Mormons," I call back. She looks at me askance. I say, "It's a fascinating fact that the Mormons—"
Lisbon cuts me off. "I'm sure it is Jane. Tell me later. I think I just figured out the top right." She figured it out? She's now muttering to herself. "If 12-down is Mormons, then 17-across is monarchy and 23-across is rodomontade." I see the top of her shiny little head bent avidly to the screen as her fingers dance across the keyboard.
I'm proud of her. I was worried that she would agree to take on the paperwork generated by our cases, but instead she leaves it to Kim, who appears to revel in that sort of thing.
So this afternoon, both of us are lounging here in the bullpen while the rest of the FBI marches in lockstep with the rulebook.
"Hello, Teresa." The soothing French accent is like fingernails across the blackboard of my mind. I open my eyes to see Teresa give Thierry Delhomme her widest smile.
"Thierry, I have a clue I've been saving for you." He leans over her and looks at the screen. She points. "Town that gave the world les blue jeans, five letters?" She looks up at him fetchingly. He opens his mouth to answer.
"Nîmes!" I call out. "Denim is a material created in Nîmes, France. Hence, Bleu de Nîmes."
They look at me as if I've just tried to cut in on the dance floor. During their first dance at their wedding.
"Bleu de Nîmes. Very good, Patrick," Thierry says with only a quart or two of condescension. They both look back at the screen. If he leaned over just a half inch more, his aristocratic snout would be nesting in her hair.
"Anybody want a cup of tea?" I stand. They're enthralled by 107-across. I head off for the break room.
Thierry Delhomme from Washington DC by way of Paris is here consulting for the FBI on anti-terrorism ideational polyhedral kvork framis.
Thierry skied for the French Olympic Team. Thierry recently returned from a journalism assignment on behalf of the New Yorker for which he was embedded with the troops in Iraq for four months. Thierry has a degree in Latin from Oxford and a master's degree in economics from Princeton. Thierry is a published poet and a photographer of some note. Thierry's family owns half of Bordeaux. Thierry is 6'1" and built like an Olympic skier with thick wavy auburn hair and pale hazel eyes.
Patrick Jane is an idiot.
I think my window with Teresa may have closed. It was only a twelve-year window. Why so hasty, Lisbon?
Guess what? With its international prestige and unlimited resources, the FBI provides a steady stream of hot and cold-running prince-like men. Far more than Sacramento did.
And Lisbon is a superstar here. With a kick-ass nationally known reputation and a bitchin' bod to go with it.
Me? I'm the man who escorted Teresa Lisbon to Austin. And while Thierry has a good shot at her, he's only one of the living gods sniffing around her daily.
I have to tell her soon. On the off chance that my loving her would cut any ice.
Cho is suddenly there as Cho often suddenly is.
"Jane, there's a woman downstairs in the lobby who wants to see you."
I ask, "Did she say what it's about?"
Cho says, "She'll only talk to you."
I head for the elevators. Cho follows
She's standing with her back turned when we reach the lobby.
She's tall and very slender. Pale pale blond hair worn straight to her shoulders. Her outfit is something you might see when Kate Middleton attends Ascot. Fitted ice blue shift with a matching coachman's coat. She carries a small clutch purse.
"You wanted to see me?" She turns. You would think it was Grace Kelly or Catherine Deneuve or Ingrid Bergman when they were Lisbon's age. She looks terrified.
I extend my hand. "Patrick Jane."
She stares at my hand like she's afraid to touch it.
She fortifies herself with a deep breath and shakes my hand.
"Megan. Megan McAllister. Tom's wife."