A/N: Set in Pink Chanel Suit, the scene where Rigsby and Grace are working at her desk. This whole situation is getting ree-goddamn-diculous. Just get back together already! Rigs' POV. I don't own Mentalist and am quickly getting to the point where I wouldn't want to. It's poisoning me.

Null and Void

Just like every other day I've ever seen her, she looked beautiful.

She was already digging deep into the paperwork in front of us. I'm heartened to see that my presence no longer unnerves her the way it has for so many months. She's content to sit with me, to work with me, and not let the tension between us bother her anymore. I'm saddened to wonder if perhaps her love for O'Laughlin has made that tension disappear entirely. That's what it must be, right? Love? Grace is so very careful when she gives her heart away, but when she does (and don't I know it), she gives it completely. So that would explain it. She's comfortable with me because she doesn't feel heartbroken anymore. God, that would be so unfair. Here I am, a tenuous fuckin' hold on my sanity, and there she sits, healed and happy and belonging to another man. I try to bite my tongue, but it evades me.

My eyes lingered on her flawless skin as I asked her about the foreign necklace nestled against it. She looked up, surprised at my question. My gut twisted when she smiled. Really smiled. She blushed and answered my next question about it being a gift. I tortured myself and asked if it was from him. Her smile killed me when it intensified and she said yes. Not only did she admit to the giver, she did it without a moment's hesitation.

She must love the man, that's as plain as day.

I dropped my head, my forced smile leaving a bitter, choking taste in my mouth.

For a tiny second, her expression softened and I saw that she could see my struggles. Mercifully, she ignored it and went back to work. She let me be sick without an audience, and I remembered again why it was so easy to love a kind soul.

Right from the beginning, she'd made it clear that she'd been hurting. She'd given me that solace, knowing that my dating other women was bruising the broken pieces of her heart. And she'd been such a trooper about it, too, saying it was no big deal, that she'd get over it, asking simply for my friendship. Her face had been so sincere, the pain in her eyes had gratified as well as stung me. Her sadness destroyed me, almost making me forget that she's the one who ended us, not me. Like always, I answered with no eloquence that I wanted to be friends, as well. I have no idea what I meant when I said that. Grace and I, for all of our closeness, were never just friends. Not even in the eighteen months before we'd been together. Looking back, I guess I hadn't let it happen. I wanted her too much. Fantasized about her too much. Friendship seemed like a neutered farce of what I really wanted. And everyone knew it too, Grace included. I thought I'd been playing it cool at the time, but on further examination, I can see now that I wordlessly confronted her every single day with how I felt. I followed too close when she took point. I defended her against Jane and pervy suspects when they overstepped their place. I made our stakeouts awkward on purpose a little. I stood in her line of sight more often than I had to. I shut down when she talked about dates. I bullied her boyfriend. And my eyes were full of so much interest, furtive appraisal and guilt that I'm sure it spooked her a little. Trying to befriend me wasn't possible, knowing what she knew. So politeness is where it stayed, only to skip over friendship entirely and land squarely in romance.

And that's exactly where I wanted us. For a few short months, I was a stupidly happy man.

I looked up at her, watching her diligence as she tore through the file in front of her.

The truth is that I want to reach across the tiny space between us, fist that delicate chain around her neck, and rip as hard as I can. Then I want to throw it out the window. Then I want to run downstairs, pull my car around and drive over that tiny proof of his ownership over and over until it's a dirty, glinting speck in the asphalt. Only then would I come back, cup my hands over that now empty space over her heart, and know it wasn't just empty of O'Laughlin's fucking necklace. It would be empty of him.

When I think of how many times I've kissed her there. That beautiful body of hers. Goddamn, she's perfect. Her arms went around my neck when she straddled my lap on the sofa. I'd press my forehead into her chest and just breathe her in as she played with my hair and murmured my name. She wore her own necklaces then. Shorter chains and more feminine pendants meant that I could kiss my way between her tempting breasts, north until I buried my face in her throat and groaned with need. She told me that she loved my eyes. My face. My tall body, which had skulked around her for so long that she'd forgotten what it was like to not feel me nearby.

O'Laughlin doesn't have my eyes or my damn face. As usual, he's shorter than me. All of them, no matter which men she allows into her life, will be shorter than me, unless she starts dating a Laker. So what the hell does she see when she looks at him? God, I'd like to know. It's driving me insane. Alone in her apartment, or worse, in her bed, when she touches his face or pets him with her electrifying fingers, does she think of me at all? Does she miss me? Can I even hope that she imagines me? When she looks into his darker eyes at a height closer to her own, is she disappointed?

I am, which is why I'm so desperate. As much as I want my height to ruin other men for her, Grace's red hair (at the very least) has ruined other women for me. The first thing - the very first thing - I notice about the women I meet is that their hair will never compare to hers. Blonde, black, brunette and every variation in between is just plain wrong. I feel so terrible, smiling politely at their sweet faces and instantly shutting down on them. My silence, a curse for so long, is a blessing as they chatter away and my mind goes somewhere else. Somewhere red. And while I've met taller women, Grace's height is also rare enough to make me miss it like crazy. Like Goldilocks, I'd finally found the woman who fit me juuuuust right. Not too small or big, not too hot or cold, not too soft or hard. Freaking perfect in every way. Goddammit.

His necklace caught the light and flashed in my eye, rudely bringing me back to the moment. Fuck you, O'Laughlin's necklace taunted me. Keep dreamin', buddy. She's mine now. This achingly pretty spot between her breasts that you love so much is just for me. You didn't spoil her like I do. You didn't love her openly like I do. I can walk in any second and steal her away. Lunch. Dinner. A quick fuck in my car. I can do anything. If you hadn't been such a pussy, she never would have even remembered my name.

I crushed my eyes shut, willing the voice to go away. It's not telling me anything I don't already know. Grace is gone. She's with another man.

I've lost the great love of my life.