Oh, yes, the damn disclaimer: seriosuly, do we really have to do it? Because, Jeez, if I'd own them, I'd not be here writing it, I'd be the writeer of a TV Shows and, well, we'd have the LIsbon romance for real...meanwhile, I just "write, draw, create, dream, hope and believe in Bruno, waiting for him to be blessed bu the light of reason..." (No, this discalimer isn't mine, it belongs to one fo the girls who wite Mentalist fiction on the italian site efpfiction, but don't tell me many of you don't share this vision...).
Now, I know. I have the evil that men do on hiatus since this summer, and I just started craving touches. I'm well aware of this,but I couyldn't help it. I know it's short, pointless and silly, but, ehy, I got a bit of flu (first after 3 years) and that's what happens when I got flu...
What happened before and we didn't get to see:
A series of murders in Los Angeles with stunning similarities with the infamous serial killer from New York nicknamed 3XK, aka Jerry Tyson, forced Teresa Lisbon's CBI team to join forces with Detective Kate Beckett and her unit, in a battle against time to stop the homicidal maniac before it could be too late. Even with their best efforts, the two teams couldn't prevent the death of the second victim (a young woman called Rosalind Summer), but managed to save at least his third and last victim of the week, arresting the serial killer on the spot thanks to one of Jane's tricks. Even if the killer was now behind bars, there's nothing to celebrate: in his career, 3XK managed to kill 5 women in New York, and two more in California- and those were only they victims they were aware of. Both teams were in fact sure that the number of Jerry Tyson's victims was bigger than that.
During the week they got to work together, a strong bound of respect, and even friendship, had been developed between Lisbon and Beckett, straightened in good part by Jane and Castle, who were able to show the two women how stunning the similarities between them were: both female leaders in a world ruled by men, both suffering the violent loss of their mothers at an early age, both daughters of fathers who fell into alcoholism (even if Beckett had been lucky enough to not lose her father to alcohol), both had their mentors falling in love with them, and, mostly, both had to suffer for pain in the ass consultant (Jane) and "shadow" (Castle) who always got into troubles, come out with crazy theories (being mostly right), tended to be at the wrong end of guns, never followed orders and so on.
A particular bond developed between Castle and Jane as well, but not out of respect as in their bosses' case, Castle, one of the most prominent authors of Mystery novels on world level, always looking for new source of inspiration, enjoyed Jane's company, intrigued by his past in the carnie circuit, his previous life as a fake psych, but, mostly, his mentalisitic abilities- he even tried to convince Jane to teach him the basis of hypnotism, promising a dedication in his next book and a character inspired on him. Jane refused the dedication (but said nothing against the character inspired to him), but looked for, and even slightly enjoyed, Castle's company, having his full attention and devotion- a showman never stops being a showman.
And talking about books… the third novel of the Nikki Heat series was almost over, thus, the same could also be said for the 3 years agreement between Castle and the NYPD- between Castle and Beckett. That was probably one of the reason Castle found himself spending more time with the Californian team instead of his own, like he was trying to get ready to part ways with Beckett. Under Jane's "invitation", Castle decided to wait to be back to New York and have a chat with Gina, his ex-wife/current girlfriend/current publisher about their romantic status, and with Beckett as well- the mentalist had pointed out that there's a good chance of his feelings being reciprocated. Jane, instead, refused Castle's invitation to be honest with Lisbon on HIS OWN feelings, arriving even to deny it (even if it's due to the presence in her life of a boyfriend, billionaire Walter Mashburn, and the one in his own of a serial killer, Red John, that he swears to himself that he'll never act on them) and was sure he had convinced the author that he and Lisbon were only "partners".
Six months later, as Killing Heat is finally ready to invade the bookstore all around the globe, we find Rick Castle, still shadowing the NYPD team led by Beckett, finally into a happy relationship with the detective. In California, after eight years, Red John has been finally stopped. In the aftermath of his capture, Mashburn proposes to Lisbon, who stalls, due mainly to the fact that Jane has decided to keep working for them and she isn't sure what to do of their "relationship" and her feelings for the man. When the mentalist finds out about the proposal, their relation degrades, and to avoid further problems, Lisbon decides to call things off with the billionaire.
Until now, it hasn't worked….
What Castle wrote
"WHEN THE HELL WILL YOUR LEARN THAT YOUR ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES? JANE, YOU'RE NOT A CHILD ANY LONGER, YOU HAVE TO THINK BEFORE DOING SOMETHING!"
"WE GOT THE KILLER, I THOUGH THAT IT WAS WHAT YOU WANTED AS WELL!"
"JANE, HE IS DEAD! HE IS DEAD BECAUSE YOU THOUGHT IT WAS RIGHT AND FUNNY REVEALING HIS IDENTITY IN FRONT OF THE VICTIM'S WIDOW! NOW SHE COULD BE SENTENCED TO LIFE! AND MEANWHILE, ANOTHER MURDER TOOK PLACE, BECAUSE YOU DON'T KNOW WHEN TO STOP!"
"YOU ARE JUST JEALOUS BECAUSE I'VE BEEN THE ONE FINDING OUT ABOUT THE KILLER'S IDENTITY!"
"HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO TELL YOU THAT WE ARE SUPPOSED OT WORK TOGETHER? WHY DO YOU ALWAYS HAVE TO KEEP SECRETS FROM ME?"
"OH, SO THAT'S IT! YOU ARE STILL AMD WITH ME BECAUSE I DIDN'T TELL YOU ABOUT THE POEM RED JOHN READ ME!"
In the bullpen, the team stops in trance, realizing that the shouting and screaming from Lisbon's closed office are, somehow, over. Unfortunately, for personal experience, they know that nothing good will come out of this. This scene takes place, in fact, almost every day since the last six months, and usually, when one of them stops to scream, they can hear the sound of something hitting the door or the wall (thrown at Jane by Lisbon, mad in anger with him), followed by a red eyed Jane who slams as hard as possible her door and goes, normally, on his couch, giving her his back and pretending to not ear her when she calls for him. And then, for few days, they give each other the silent treatment, until they are forced to talk about a case (because Hightower orders them to), and then, it starts all over again.
They are not sure they can take it any longer. The situation has become unbearable. When they fight, they can't stand to stay in the same car, and as they drive to the crime scene, Lisbon with Grace and Jane with the guys, they can't help but complain about the other's behavior. Lisbon has been so upset recently that she has even started calling Grace in the middle of the night to talk about what a jerk and an asshole Jane is, while Jane, before the break-up, kept calling Cho (who, half of the times, just pretended to be listening to him) to share his hate for the billionaire, while now has turned to Grace as well, sure that, if someone could be aware of Lisbon's love life, it's her.
"JANE, COME BACK HERE IMMEDIATELY!" as Lisbon leaves her office, still screaming and looking at him, he is already on his couch, not answering to her and giving her his back. She simply slams the door back, angry. They'll go through hell for the whole day, of that much they are aware. And both Jane and Lisbon will be the one delivering it.
"Ehy, Jane, Castle send us few early copies of his new book. Do you want to read one? Maybe he kept his word and you're one of the protagonists!" Rigsby, a copy of the book in hand, and a sandwich in the other, is trying his best to alleviate the tension, looking at Lisbon's door and Jane with puppy eyes. He knows what people think of him, he is dense, but it's not true. He is just… he has never known normality. And he can't stand the thought that, from now on, that was going to be their normality. Besides, they are kind of tired of being caught in the middle of their little war, just because they can't admit what they feel for each other.
"I don't care about a stupid damn mystery book. The hell with it" he mumbles, without caring if they hear him or not. They do, though, and they don't even bother to ask Lisbon if she is interested- she'll not be as nice as Jane has just been, if they'll dare to disturb her.
The following day, when the three of them are in the kitchen taking a coffee, it's Cho who, throwing a copy of the book to them comes out with a plan….
"Boss, Jane's gotten into a fight! We were in interrogation room 5, and a guy had come to tell us he had seen another guy murder someone, and we didn't want to disturb you because we immediately understood he was just being crazy, but Jane said he wanted to have fun, and I'm so sorry, but we listened to him, because we wanted to teach the kid a lesson, but then they got into a fight and now I don't know what to do and…" As Grace enters into her office practically crying, talking without bother to breathe, in clear panic, Lisbon leaves her seat and joins the redhead on the other side of the desk, shaking Grace for the shoulders.
"Grace, calm down and breathe. Now, tell me what happened, and this time, I need punctuations and pauses between the words, ok?" Grace nods, and Teresa smiles, at crossed arms "good. Now, tell me again what happened."
"A kid, a teenager, actually, Emerson Grant, come into the bullpen, telling us he had witnessed a murder, and wanted to testify. From the way he was behaving, we immediately understood he was making things up, that he just wanted attention, so we just thought about taking his statement and then check once and eventually making it into pieces. But Jane, Jane decided the kid needed a lesson, so he brought him into one of the interrogation rooms, and then…" Grace collapses into tears, hugging an extremely unpleased and uneasy Lisbon like for dear life, her tears wetting Teresa's white shirt "and I don't know what happened, it was like a blur, and now they are both on the soil, and the kid keeps saying he'll call his lawyer, and I don't know if it's true, but he says that his lawyer is Sebastian Stark, the one nicknamed the Shark… and he says he'll report us all, and that he'll sign every possible form to avoid any of us from working again and.. and…"
"I'M GOING TO KILL THAT IDIOT!" without even bothering to wait for Grace, Lisbon simply walks in direction of said interrogation room, quickly. Outside, she stops for few seconds, taking big breaths at closed eyes to calm down. She is sure she'll need to be calm, considering that in few hours time she'll be without a job and a dead consultant, killed by her. She is still at closed eyes, when she enters in the room, and when she opens them, scanning the room for Jane and the "witness", she finds Jane only, sitting on a chair at the table, hands behind his head. "Where's the boy? And weren't you hurt?"
"What? No, I thought you were supposed to bring the witness here, for me to interrogate him!"
"What? Who told you so?"
"Cho told me to come here! He even gave me Castle's damn book in case "I got tired of waiting…" like I could lose time with something like that. I have more constructive things to do!" He walks to her, and looks at Lisbon, the wheels in his mind starting to work "waits a sec… why did you think I was hurt?"
"Grace told me they had a suspect here, and that the two of you had got into a fight and that he wanted to call his lawyer and Hightower in order to fire us!" She crosses her arms, hissing, now sure that they are up to something, and if Jane's mad expression tells her something, it's that, for once, he has nothing to do about it- in fact, her reasoning is proven right when, few seconds later, they hear in terror the sound of the door being locked from the outside.
"Guys, let us out!" They scream at the same time, turning to look at the fake mirror, where they know at least one of their co-workers are. It's then that they hear Cho's deadpan voice coming from the speakers- the same speakers they turn their attention to, like they were human and could allow them to leave.
"I'm sorry boss, but you forced us to do it. We can't take it any longer. Either you sort it out…"
"Either we sort it out or what, Cho? Are you threatening me? Have you forgotten I'm your boss? You don't want to go against your boss, right?"
"Ehy, don't forget about me! I can make your life miserable as well!"
"You already make our lives miserable. Elise can't stand any longer you calling in the middle of the night because you had a fight with each other. I can't stand it. So, either you sort it out, or you sort it out- and by that I mean that you'll not leave this room until you'll not have decided to call a truce. And, seriously, don't try to fake it, because I'll know it."
"Cho, please, what will the staff say when they'll find us locked here, I have a reputation and…"
"I have a reputation as well! And for me is even worse, because I'm a mentalist, I'm not supposed to fall for a trick like that!"
"I'll be here tomorrow morning at six and if you don't want the janitors and the whole CBI staff to see you closed here arguing, you better come to an agreement." For a long time, they don't hear his voice, and they are looking almost in tears of exhaustion at the glass and the speakers, when, suddenly, Cho's voice can be heard again "By the way, read Castle's book. And it's not a request, but an order. Just in case, I've underlined the part you need to know. See you tomorrow"
And with that, they know he is gone… but this doesn't stop Lisbon from throwing herself against the mirror, begging eyes, joined preying hands and a look of desperation on her face. "Cho…Cho, please, tell me you are joking…Cho, answer me!" At her back, Jane is sitting on a chair, feet on the table, the book on his lap, looking resigned and uncaring. He knows Cho, and if the man has decided to lock them there until they'll not come to an agreement, they'll be locked there until they'll have reached an agreement, point. "How can you be casual about this? You should be mad! You should unlock the door! You always do that on crime scenes! Why you can't do it, for once, when you are allowed!"
"I don't see where the fun in picking up a lock is, if you tell me to do it, Lisbon" he tells her starting to scroll the pages to see how much of the book has been underlined "Besides, if I do something like that, they'll just fund another way to force us to talk, and I don't see why wasting time that could be, otherwise, precious." He grins at her "Now, why don't you make yourself at home and we start reading what dear old Rick wrote and Cho wants us to find out?"
Lisbon doesn't dignify him with an answer-she simply sits at the other side of the table, crossed arms, and doesn't look at him while he starts reading out loud the paragraphs underlined in yellow…
Nikki looked among thousands of faces, all belonging to strangers. The traffic at the airport was considerable, but she knew without doubt that she'd not miss the well known pair of green eyes "I bet he is talking about your eyes" Instead, her attention was stolen by a tall man, walking towards her with a smile. She didn't know why, he wasn't even her kind of man, but she felt like she was somehow attracted towards him, and not on a mere physical level. Suddenly, the blonde man in three pieces stopped in front of her "Ehy, that's me! I can't believe it, he kept his promise! I'm one of the main protagonists! I hope he didn't make me the killer, though, it'd be rather inappropriate!" Nikki was so lost in the cerulean eyes that she didn't noticed Rook joining her, nor that the familiar green eyes were there as well, at the side of the charming and magnetic man "He really understood me, I'm impressed. Maybe I should start to give him some credit…" "I see you've already met Mister Elliot, Nikki" While Rook shook hands with one of Nikki's oldest friends, Special Agent Anne Denver, the detective looked in disbelief and sorry between Elliot and Anne and Rook. She couldn't believe she had missed the only thing she was looking for because of a man, a man who wasn't even her own, and she couldn't believe at the smiles Anne and Rook were exchanging. A sting of jealousy hit her……
"Great, now even your fictional counterpart tries to charm his way into women…"
"Hush, Lisbon, I'm trying to read here! Ok, let's see, let's see, where's the next interesting part? Oh, here we are, chapter two, when we arrive at the precinct…"
For the first time since he had met them, Rook saw Raley and Ochoa behaving like two independent units. The reporter didn't miss the reason behind the different behavior of the younger detective- even a blind man could have seen the looks he was exchanging with Danvers. The FBI agent didn't seem to mind the subtle flirting, but neither was she encouraging him too much. Truth was, it had been too long since the last time man had made a move on her, and she had almost forgotten how it felt to be wooed by males… sometimes, when she was alone in her room at night, it was everything she could think of, and she couldn't help but dream of a certain man holding her, knowing that there was no way it could come true. "You have never mentioned having a crush on Ryan... anyway, it doesn't matter…ok, look, there are few pages… and… As Raley's hand lingered on her own for longer than necessary, they smiled at each other in a shy way, and only then, hit by nausea, Elliot made his presence known, throwing with force on the table the book he and Rook had retrieved about the case… "What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means that Elliot is jealous, Einstein"
"That would mean assuming that I'm jealous of you, and that you and Ryan were flirting, which I don't remember happening."
"Well, contrary to your belief, I'm a very desirable woman, and men are interested in me! And by the way, yes, Ryan did flirt with me! Just because you don't give a damn about me as woman, doesn't mean other do as well!"
"I've never said you're not a woman, Lisbon, because believe me, I'm well aware of it, only, you're not my type."
"Oh, yes, and we all know which you type of woman is, right?" She snaps, and refuses to look at him.
"Ok, you know what, let's go on!" When he heard about the explosion, Elliot immediately flew back to the precinct, where, on her knees in a corner of one of the dark interrogation rooms, he spotted Anne. He run to her, like a starving man would run to an oasis, and took the dark haired agent in his arms. For once, for probably the first time in 20 years, Anne didn't fight the tears, as she and Elliot hold each other for dear life, but welcomed them. In many years spent working with her, Elliot had never assumed he'd lost her, not to death nor to another man. He had always thought she was going to stick around, never leaving his side. But Anne had almost died, and all the feelings he had pushed away since that day they had met in her office seven years prior, all the reasons he had always found to not confess her how he truly felt, vanished. Without letting it go of her, Elliot kissed every inch of her face, allowing Anne to taste his tears mixed with her own, but as soon s their lips met, Anne pushed him away, scared. Elliot would have done everything to understand if she was pushing him away because of his past or because of her own…
"Elliot's in love with Denver? But it's absurd! It's like saying that you are in love with me!"
"Yeah, Rick has this crazy idea that we are in denial of our feelings…"
"That's absurd… I mean, only because he and Kate are in love like Rook and Nikki fell for each other in his books, it doesn't mean that we have feelings for each other as well!"
Elliot pushed Denver against the wall, cornering her. He needed to do it, and he wasn't going to allow her to push him away a second time. Under his fingertips, he felt Anne shaking. He knew she was scared, but he hadn't understood of what yet. Was she scared of him? Or was she scared of the feelings she harbored for the man? As his lips found hers for the first time, he got his answer. Anne wasn't pushing away, she not only wanted it, she was a participant. Still crying, she let her hands running through his blonde curls, a motion she had wished to do since the day they met, and opened his mouth to him. Elliot bite her upper lip grinning, his tongue tracing the contour of her mouth, invading it, violating it, feeling Anne's moans of pleasure against his own mouth, her hands forcing him even closer if possible.
He felt like crying. Even if it had been a long time since last time he had kissed a woman, before his late wife he had been a womanizer, and never, ever, had he felt like that. His heart was exploding in his chest, happy and scared at the same time. He had almost lost her… and now she was his.
As he progresses with the reading, Lisbon, from mad, turns into embarrassed and blushes under his gaze. She looks away, everything to avoid his eyes right now. There's no way she is going to allow Jane to see what effect imagining the characters as them, kissing…
"Let me try something…" he grins, sure of himself, but smiling, and, somehow, he seems happy. Teresa can't remember the last time he has seen him that happy, or the last time they've been that long without being mad and mean to each other. It's been a while. And she can't help but missing it… she wants her Jane back. That's probably why, when he bites her lips, when he traces the contour of her lips with his tongue, when he kisses her with such a passion and an intensity she has never felt before, she allows him to, and participates, melting into him, moaning into the kiss, only, differently from Elliot, Jane's not grinning. She can say he is happy, she can feel the hint of a smile against her, but she can also feel…fear. That's when it hits her, that's when she remembers when all the arguing started, her mind adding his behavior to the words used by Castle - Elliot was scared of Losing Anne to another man or to death, Jane has started to be uncivil when things with Mashburn got serious, Jane was scared of losing her to Mashburn- Jane is in love with her.
"Maybe I was wrong" he says as he has to let it go of her for another dose of oxygen, and smiles when Lisbon doesn't smile, just arches her eyebrows unable to understand what he is talking about, scared that he could be referring to them "maybe psychs do exist, because what I felt? Exactly the way Elliot felt while kissing Anne." He laughs, and kisses her again, quickly, and sweetly, then lifts his own eyebrows at Lisbon, suggestively. "So, Cho underlined another part of the book that I'd like to try while we are here all alone and on our own, without anything else to do… and it may or may not be about missing items of clothing and lingerie…"
"So, there's no description of a date, before that? They just go directly to discharging clothes in an interrogation room?"
"Well, apparently Anne's not a prude… besides, she and Elliot had known each other for a very long amount of times, years and years, I mean, and he has wanted her for so long…"
Kissing him languidly and allowing Jane's hands to explore her body, Teresa makes him understand that Denver has wanted Elliot for a long time as well-and that she'll always wait for him.
