Note: Thank you to my friend for the prompt, I hope this exceeds what you were expecting... ;) there's a very, very good chance a second part will be written, eventually.
"Maura, hurry up, we're gonna be late," Jane shouted up the staircase. She shifted from one foot to the other, hobbling across to the kitchen. The dress she wore would have been a hell of a lot more comfortable if it wasn't for the thong Maura insisted she wore. She bent over and lifted up the skirt, fingering around until she could pull the string from her butt. She sighed, checked the clock, and groaned loudly. "Come on, Maura."
She didn't even want to go to the charity function. They were always so pompous and full of rich people throwing money around. The last event she went to, she was certain she was the poorest person in the room. Even the charity that supported children in poverty were richer than her.
"Maura!"
She slouched onto a stool by the counter and drummer her fingers across the worktop. Maura's cell phone lit up beside her, beeping repeatedly before stopping again. She glanced across at the screen, but before she could be sure as to what it was she'd read, the screen went black and the thunder of heels on the staircase pulled her attention away.
"There it is," Maura said, marching across the room with practiced ease. Jane stood up as Maura took her cell from the worktop. "Are you ready?"
The words barely came out. "For a while."
"Are you sure you want to drive?" Maura asked, slipping the offending phone into her clutch. Jane gulped, her throat closed over, dry as a bone. All she could do was nod.
Maura glided across the room, the long skirt of her dress swirled around her. She belonged in a Disney movie; Beauty and the Beast, probably, on account of her love of books. For a moment, Jane's legs wouldn't work. She stared at the skirt of her own dress, but she couldn't move.
"We're going to be late," Maura said, holding her hand out and motioning her to follow.
With another nod, Jane rushed to the cupboard, grabbed a glass and filled it with water. She guzzled it down, catching a few droplets on her chin before they could land on her bare upper chest, or worse, the dress Maura insisted on buying. The thousand-dollar dress Jane feared even moving in. If only she hadn't insisted on the shoes to match.
She wiped her chin with a towel, grabbed her sneakers and clutch, hiked up the side of her dress, and stumbled her way through the house toward the car.
The shoes were on the back seat, so Jane could drive safely in her sneakers. She cursed herself for not using that as an excuse to wear them in the house before climbing into the car. At least she had a valid reason why she hadn't considered such a possibility.
The message.
Surely she had misread it. Her own name stood out instantly, twice, perhaps she hadn't fully taken in the words surrounding it.
"Chuck Barrowman is going to be the compère, he's excellent, full of beans," Maura said, listing several important people as they set off across town. "I absolutely must introduce you to Doctor Helene Dubois, she's a fascinating lady, lots of colourful stories about her sexual encounters in the Sahara Desert."
Jane choked on fresh air. She coughed loudly, hacking away as the imaginary blockage in her throat consumed her momentarily. She gripped the wheel, her knuckles paled instantly. She flinched when Maura placed a hand on her back and made slow circles with her palm.
"Are you okay? Would you like to pull over?"
"No," Jane whispered, clearing her throat as she regained control of her body, and the car.
Colourful stories about sexual encounters. Jane wondered who exactly had sent Maura the message, and why. The last thing Jane needed to be thinking about, on her way to an important function, was the sexual encounters of a woman she anticipated to be at least two decades older than them.
"She tells horrific jokes." Maura laughed. It sounded somewhat alien, briefly. "What do you call a horny lesbian dinosaur?"
The car swerved to one side, Jane pulled the wheel and steadied the vehicle. She glanced across at Maura, aghast.
Maura chuckled as she answered. "A clitosaurus."
Jane's throat grew dry again. She coughed loudly. "Can we please just get to the function?"
Narrowing her eyes, Maura stared at Jane. After a moment's silence, and another couple of coughs from Jane, she pulled a packet of mints out of her purse and handed one to her.
"This will help your throat until we get there."
"Thanks," Jane said, slipping the white tablet shaped mint into her mouth. She sucked it, focusing every ounce of attention on the flavour as it coated her whole mouth.
Why had she looked at Maura's phone? It was her own fault. Now every little thing seemed to make it worse, and Jane didn't anticipate the rest of the evening being any easier.
She pulled up outside the entrance of City Hall. A man in a red vest stood beside the car, waiting patiently for her to get out and hand him the keys. She pulled on the door handle, about to exit, when Maura gripped her arm.
"Don't forget your shoes," she said, moving her arm through the gap between the seats and reaching for them. She sighed and manoeuvred herself up onto her knees. She reached forward with one hand, her other one flailed about until it landed on Jane's thigh. She froze, a tingling sensation travelled through her lower body. Before she could respond, Maura moved backward, the shoes in hand. "Got them."
The dryness in Jane's throat became itchy and she fought the need to cough again. She placed her feet on the sidewalk outside the car, switching shoes slowly, to delay the moment when she would have to be alone with Maura again. She threw the sneakers into the foot of the passenger seat and handed her keys to the valet.
"Take me with you," she muttered, before Maura linked her arm and dragged her through the entrance.
"I do hope Doctor Lucius Featherstone is there tonight, he was unable to attend the last function due to kidney problems. He's not been well for some time."
"Hopefully he's okay now. You know, that joke wasn't funny," Jane said, a delayed response to something that only left her feeling uncomfortable. Not because she wasn't happy enough to joke about lesbians with Maura, they joked about a lot of things.
"Are you okay?" Maura asked. She handed a jacket over to the cloakroom attendant and slipped her ticket into her clutch.
"Fine."
They walked along the hallway towards the function room. A man appeared from the men's toilets, and Maura rushed forward, kissing him politely on the cheek and accepting his kind words. Jane hovered on the side lines, not wanting to have to converse with strangers in penguin suits.
"This is Detective Jane Rizzoli," Maura said, holding out her hand. When Jane didn't respond, she frowned, spotting Jane a few feet away. Jane raised a hand but didn't move. "We work together. We'll be on table eight, come find us after the meal."
The man nodded curtly and scurried off. Jane approached Maura, all too aware of the feel of her own body as she clumsily moved across the carpet.
"You look pale," Maura said, linking her arm. "You've been coughing a lot, perhaps you're coming down with a cold."
"Alcohol," Jane said, falling into step beside Maura. "I'll be okay then."
Two scotches on the rocks and a glass of champagne later – which she only realised after she'd finished meant she couldn't drive them home – and Jane wasn't sure she was okay. She still didn't quite know what the message on Maura's phone intended to say. She sat at table eight, watching Maura deep in discussion across the room. At least being accused of coming down with a cold gave her an excuse not to do the rounds.
"I have two more people I must speak with," Maura said, rushing back to the table for a sip of her drink before continuing on to the other side of the room.
Jane stared at Maura's glass, at the spot where her fingers had disappeared a moment earlier. Beside it, Maura's clutch lay on the table. Clearing her throat, Jane rubbed the back of her neck and sneakily glanced at Maura, deep in conversation once more.
The cell phone was locked, but Maura mustn't have checked it since before the message came through as the preview was still on the screen.
"Fuck," Jane gasped, then covered her mouth as a number of people stared at her. She pushed the cell back into Maura's clutch and signalled to a waiter to bring her another drink.
'What do you fantasise about most? Jane eating you out, or you eating Jane out?'
After confirmation that she hadn't misread the message the first time, Jane didn't have much of an appetite for the exquisite four course meal placed in front of her. She felt hot, like she had a fever, but aside from a tickle in her throat, didn't feel the stuffiness than usually came with a cold or the flu. She struggled her way through, barely listening to the speeches between the main course and dessert.
Once the cheese course had been cleared away, the room grew dark and the stage lit up. The frontman of a band introduced himself and they began playing a popular song with an amended rhythm. Jane tapped her foot, absentmindedly following the beat.
The sound of Maura's laughter barely infiltrated the loud music, but Jane still heard it all the same. She turned and found Maura staring at the screen of her cell phone. Jane's cheeks turned a shade of crimson, and she was thankful the room was not light enough for Maura to notice.
"Who's that?"
"Who is who?" Maura asked, glancing up and around in search of the person Jane was looking for.
"Your phone." She realised how brave it was to ask, considering what she'd read, but she felt considerably more uncomfortable the longer she sat beside Maura, trying to pretend that she wasn't turned on by the smell of her perfume. "Who made you laugh?"
"Just a friend."
"Anyone I know?"
"If you must know, it was Helene Dubois."
Gritting her teeth, Jane's voice sounded harsher than she anticipated. "Why is she sending you messages when you're going to see her tonight?"
"She sent it earlier, I must have missed it."
"Right." Jane turned around and watched the band finish up their song and start a new one. It was only Maura's voice behind her, once more, that made her turn around again.
"You really shouldn't send messages like that, Helene," Maura laughed. "Though I will admit, I'm not feeling very hungry right now."
"I see." A woman's voice. Her accent had a European sound that Jane couldn't place. "You said I would meet Jane tonight?"
"Yes," Maura said, noticing for the first time that Jane was staring at them both. "This is Detective Jane Rizzoli, Jane, this is Doctor Helene Dubois. I'm sure she'd be happy to tell you some of her stories if you ask nicely enough."
"So," Helene said, grinning. "You're the Jane I've been hearing so much about."
"Really?" Jane asked, feeling a little perturbed. In part that the woman was closer to forty than sixty, and had a body that could only be described as supermodel-esque. Without superior knowledge on the matter, Jane suspected an element of plastic surgery, particularly around the chest. "I've heard very little about you."
Maura shook her head. "Jane!"
"I just mean," she said, clearing her throat, her cheeks flushed again. "Maura doesn't really tell me much about the people she meets at things like this until I come to a function."
"It's a pleasure to put a face to the name," Helene said, nudging Maura and winking at her. "You didn't tell me she was such a stunner."
"Erm." Jane shifted in her seat, regretting it the second her thong shifted position and she grimaced. She stood up, picked up her clutch. "If you'll excuse me, I need to go and powder my nose."
Twenty minutes later, with another glass of wine in hand, Jane walked across the function hall and hovered at a distance. Maura sat in her seat, laughing uncontrollably with her hand on Helene's shoulder. She'd purposefully stayed away longer than was necessary, just to test the water, to see whether Maura would notice that something was wrong. The fact she was still sat there, enjoying her evening, made Jane a little jealous.
But then Maura laughed again, her mouth opened and her head lolled about, and Jane couldn't breathe. It wasn't like she'd never noticed how attractive her friend was. She saw it more and more, and tonight…Jane rested a hand on the bar to steady herself and the bar attendant handed her another glass of wine. She downed the first and carried the second toward Maura.
A few feet away, Jane allowed herself a moment to look her up and down. She was most familiar with her head, on account of the fact that she looked her in the eye more often than not. Her neck was long, elegant, like a swan poised in the water. Her toned arms framed her supple breasts. The dress Maura had chosen had a cut lower than her usual attire, right down the centre of her body.
She breathed in, her breath hitched in her throat, and continued her glance down to her legs; crossed, her tanned skin peered out from underneath. Given how often Maura worked out, Jane anticipated that her thighs were like steel, and should she ever get the opportunity to taste some of her offerings, Jane knew she'd be in a very vulnerable position.
"There she is," Helene shouted, waving her hand toward Jane. She stood up and motioned for her to return to her seat. "I thought you wouldn't mind my sitting here while you were indisposed."
"Not at all," Jane said, forging a smile.
Helene trailed a hand across Maura's shoulder and down her arm, her fingertips too close to the body she, herself, was struggling to cope with. "I'll leave you now, Maura, but call me next time you're in New Haven."
Jane perched on the edge of her chair, her mouth agape. She placed her half empty glass on the tablecloth, and beside it, her clutch.
"I wondered where you were, are you okay? Do you need to go home?"
"I," Jane began, but she couldn't find the words to respond. Her head felt fuzzy, her tongue a block of concrete. She didn't want to accept it was because of the number of alcoholic drinks she'd had over the course of the night, but it was the most obvious explanation. "No."
"I appreciate you not returning immediately, it was wonderful to catch up with Helene. We don't see each other nearly enough now she's teaching at Yale."
"But you message," Jane said.
"Yes, we message."
"About me."
Silence. Jane closed her eyes, regret filtered through her blood stream with every passing breath. Why did she have to say that? She lowered her head onto the table and groaned.
"Are you sure you're okay?" Maura asked, circling her palm across her back again. "How much have you had to drink?"
"You didn't answer," Jane mumbled into the table cloth.
"I message Helene about a lot of things."
"Right." Jane lifted her head and stared at Maura.
Concern etched across her face, but Jane didn't imagine it was about the friend with whom she seemed perfectly comfortable to discuss their non-existent sex life with. "I think I should take you home."
"No." Lowering her head again, Jane tilted it to one side, to give herself a better chance of breathing properly. "Don't wanna ruin your night."
"If you're unwell," Maura said.
Jane shook her head against the tablecloth and stretched her arms out across the table in front of her. She groaned, a churn of sickness spread through her stomach. Perhaps the alcohol did have something to do with how she was feeling, after all.
Covering her mouth, Jane lifted her head once more. "Okay, but you stay, I'll get a cab."
"I'll get you some water, then we'll find you one."
x
Laughter pulled Jane from her sleep, tugging her from the warmth of her dreams. She opened her eyes and stared up at the ceiling of Maura's guest room. The clock on the bedside table read 01:24, later than the usual time Maura came back from a function. The laughter continued.
Maura wasn't alone.
Jane stretched her arms above her head and yawned, covering her mouth to stifle the sound. She slipped out from under the bedsheets and crept toward the bedroom door. The original plan for the evening was for Jane to stay over, but given that she wasn't feeling well, Jane wondered if Maura had forgotten.
She stared through the tiny gap where the door was ajar. Maura stood in the hallway, her arms draped around Helene Dubois, their lips pressed together in a passionate embrace.
"F…" Jane pressed her lips together, blunting the word. She resisted the urge to slam the door closed, and peered back through the gap.
Maura's leg bent at the knee, their mouths worked together in perfect harmony, tongues moved back and forth. Kissing someone like that meant something, and Jane had never seen Maura in such an intimate embrace before. Not even with Jack, and she was almost certain that Maura had fallen in love with him.
"This is why you need to quit your job and come teach at Yale," Helene whispered, trailing the back of her hand across Maura's cheek. "We could do this. Every. Single. Night."
Maura's eyes creased at the corners, she looked happier than she'd appeared for a long time. "You know I can't."
"Jane."
"Amongst other things."
"I guess I'll have to be happy with the occasional mutual boost in immunoglobulin A, but mostly I'll have to be happy with a fucking good fuck."
Silencing her, Maura placed her hands across Helen Dubois' thighs, pulling up the back of her dress as she thrust her tongue down her throat once more. Jane swallowed. Her heart thrummed right through her body, from her head to between her legs.
Her reaction was not something she welcomed, and she was relieved when Maura and Helene disappeared into the bedroom.
The bedroom.
Discussing your sex life with your best friend was something they had taken to doing on occasion. But not this. Maura gave plenty of hints through the years about possible connections with women, but never this. Jane curled back under the bedsheets and stared at the ceiling, consciously aware of every creak and groan that passed through the walls.
A loud panting broke the near silence, followed by grunts and moans that increased in volume with every passing second. Two voices, whispering, moaning, panting through the walls.
Jane crossed her legs and tried to turn her thoughts to baseball, or her mother's cooking, anything to distract her body from the sexual feelings that attempted to consume her.
The attraction Jane felt for Maura was new. It wasn't that Jane hadn't considered her sexual ability, or didn't acknowledge the elements of Maura's body that she appreciated. But until she'd read that message, she hadn't noticed how much her body wanted Maura.
"Oh God," one of the voices shouted. Definitely Maura. Jane closed her eyes and listened to the sound of her increased sexual pleasure.
"You like that, do you?" Helene asked, her voice purred like a cat. "I bet you'd like it more if I was Jane, wouldn't you?"
"God, yes," Maura moaned.
Jane bit down on the inside of her cheek and nearly cursed out loud. She gripped the bedsheets in her balled fists. Her stomach muscles tightened, but the tingling sensation, the pulsing, between her legs intensified.
"You're not being fucked by Helene Dubois," Helene said, her voice barely audible over Maura's groans. "I'm Jane. My tongue is Jane's tongue, my fingers are Jane's fingers."
"Jane," Maura gasped, her moans increased as Helene quietened down and within a few moments, Maura screamed out, and the noise on the other side of the wall dissipated.
Jane's whole body relaxed against the bed. In her mind, Maura was doing the same, as she came down from her climax. Her throat was dry, but as Jane trailed her fingers down between her legs, she felt how wet she really was.
Before she could run her fingers across the sensitive pulse, Helene moaned, a guttural cry as she reached her own crescendo. Jane froze, unsure of what to do. She felt anger prickle across her neck like hives. Jealousy pushed her further away from the sexual desires burning between her thighs.
"I'll see you in March," Helene said, fifteen minutes later, and the bedroom door opened, then closed. Followed by the front door. A ship in the night, been and gone before Jane was even supposed to know that she was there at all.
Maura was alone.
It took every ounce of Jane's energy not to climb out of bed and rush to Maura's door. Her fears stopped her. She rolled over and closed her eyes, hoping that maybe now she could fall back to sleep and pretend that the night had never happened.
Until Maura groaned again, a soft buzzing provided background noise.
Jane's body responded. She squirmed about, until she lay on her back with her hips pushed upward, her fingers drawing circles across her clit. She bit down on the inside of her mouth, rocking her hips back and forth to the sound of Maura's moans.
The gasp of Maura's breath grew louder, more hurried, until she sounded like she on the verge of screaming again. Jane thrust her fingers deep inside her body, circling her clit with her other hand until she couldn't take it anymore. She took her fingers off her clit long enough to push the bedsheets into her mouth. She bit down, her jaw clenched as she resisted the urge to scream. Maura went first. Jane's heart raced, her whole body spasmed, her hips bucked, and she fell down against the mattress.
"Thank you for making my fantasy more realistic," Maura whispered. Jane froze, her fingers still tangled up in her bodily fluids, poised above her clit, too sensitive to touch. "I just called to thank you for giving me the best orgasm I've had in a long time. Goodnight, Helene."
All that was left was silence.
Jane trailed her fingers along her opening, coating her skin and bringing it to her lips. She sucked and licked, lost in the sensuality of her own body's ability to produce so much pleasure.
Maura must have fallen asleep, because there wasn't another sound from the other room. Eventually, Jane rolled back over and went back to sleep.