Depressing little oneshot.
Disclaimer: Not mine. *sigh*
She stood in the women's restroom of the CBI headquarters. Her hands gripped the sides of the sink and she was hunched over, chest heaving furiously as she tried to keep her sobs quiet. She had her eyes squeezed shut, although she could feel the unwanted moisture in them beginning to work its way through her tightly closed eyelids. The last case that had hit her this hard was when Bosco and his team were killed, and even then she hadn't cried this hard.
The very last thing she had wanted to do was arrest that poor woman. She would have loved to set her free. She would have loved to buy a ticket for the next flight out of the country, set it in the woman's hands, and tell her to get the hell away from here. Far away. As far as she could possibly get. Teresa despised the fact that Ellen Williams would spend a very long time - possibly the rest of her life - in jail.
Mrs. Williams didn't deserve to go to prison. Yes, she had shot and killed her own husband. Yes, she had done everything in her power to make herself look innocent. And yes, she had lied to the police and to her own children, but Teresa Lisbon would have released Ellen Williams from their custody in a heartbeat.
Now, Mrs. Williams' two daughters, thirteen-year-old Anna and nine-year-old Keira, would be fatherless, technically motherless, confused and heartbroken.
"Why did you do it, Ellen?" Patrick Jane asked the woman as he sat across the table from her in Interrogation One. He rested his folded hands on the table in front of him, giving her a small smile that Lisbon knew was secretly a know-it-all smirk in disguise. She had all of his facial expressions memorized. This was not a genuine smile.
Lisbon and Cho stood behind the glass, watching. Anna and Keira were with Van Pelt and Rigsby, who were trying to distract them and dodge any question the girls had about their mother, what they were doing here, and what was going to happen.
Ellen Williams leaned forward, staring Jane directly in the eye. "Do you have children, Mr. Jane?"
He answered automatically. "No."
"Do you know what it's like to love someone enough to kill for them?"
"Yes," he replied curtly.
Ellen nodded. "So do I. My girls mean everything to me. Their father was hurting us, the girls especially. Anna has a bruise the size of a softball on her shoulder just because her dad had a rough day at work." The woman swallowed hard, blinking away tears that had sprung to her eyes. "Keira, my baby, has a permanent scar on the side of her stomach because 'Daddy' shoved her so hard she fell into the sharp corner of the coffee table. So yes, Mr. Jane, I killed my husband. I confess. I understand that I'm going to jail, but at least I know that my daughters will be safe, and that Brian will never be able to hurt them again."
She killed her abusive husband, to save her children, and Lisbon was the one who had to put on a professional, brave face and arrest the woman.
This case had brought back too many memories. Teresa remembered when Tommy turned twelve, and instead of bringing home a birthday cake, her father brought extra alcohol for just himself, and he beat his eldest son half to death. That was Tommy's gift for his birthday. A near-death experience.
Lisbon thought back to her freshman year of high school. The first semester had just ended, and she was sprinting home, report card in hand, to show off the 4.0 she had rightfully earned, to her younger brothers. As she hurried through the front door, a broad smile on her petite, fifteen-year-old face, her father snatched the report card out of her hand, smacking her across the face for no reason at all.
Now, Teresa looked in the mirror. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her face was splotchy and drenched with tears and sweat. She reached up and traced the small scar that lined her hairline, which was from when she was sixteen, and her dad had sent a glass beer bottle flying across the room.
She had a dilemma to face now. She could either return to her team in this ugly condition, or she could stay in here and let them grow suspicious until they came looking for her.
She didn't even have time to decide when the second option panned out immediately.
She heard someone fumbling with the doorknob to the women's restroom, which she had locked as soon as she came in and saw she was alone. She glared at the rattling doorknob, sighing heavily.
To her utter shock, someone had picked the lock successfully, and the door swung open.
Standing before her was, nonetheless, the lock-picking master, Patrick Jane.
Lisbon gasped softly, quickly wiping her tears away and regrouping her expression so her features appeared angry. "Get out of here, Jane."
He ignored her. He didn't even say anything. He just stepped into the room, shutting the door behind him and re-locking it.
"I said get out." She tried to make her voice firm and strict, but it cracked, giving her away.
He took two steps toward her, reaching his arms out as if to silently say that he wasn't going to hurt her. "Lisbon-"
"Get out, now," she growled between clenched teeth, trying to appear angry when she was actually desperate.
He didn't buy it. He reached his hand out to grasp hers, and as he tried to tug her toward him, she fought back. "Don't," she hissed, trying to pull her hand away.
"Why won't you let me help you?" he whispered, hurt touching his sea-blue eyes.
"Because there is nothing you can do."
"I can do this." He tightened his grip on her hand and pulled her toward him again, taking her into his arms and holding her tight.
"Jane, let go of me!" she demanded, trying to wiggle her way out of his tight grasp. Who knew he could be so strong?
"Jane, let me go," she begged weakly, squeezing her eyes shut and feeling fresh tears fall on her cheeks. She felt his chin rest on the crown of her head, and she sighed. "Let me go," she murmured again, bottom lip trembling.
He chuckled softly, as if this were funny. He pulled back, smiling comfortingly down at her.
"I'm never going to let you go."
Thank you for reading.