A/N: Hey there, Septillionaire here. My first fanfiction! And it's the Mentalist; big surprise. First off, I'd like to shake you warmly by the hand for recognizing how great a show The Mentalist is.

This is a story I thought of while catching myself up on all the episodes I missed and reading all the Jane/Lisbon fanfics out there. Yes, all of them. Or at least 90%. Maybe 85%; some were not too good.

Oh, and I tend to get distracted and forget about the projects I'm working on, so the chapters may come few and far between, but if you read AND review, it might remind me to write more chapters.

Disclaimer: As Rent so eloquently put it, "You are what you own". I am not The Mentalist.

-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-

The first thing Teresa Lisbon realized when she woke up was that she didn't remember much of anything from the night before. She kept her eyes closed, trying to think back to – her date. That's right, she'd had a date with…God what was his name…Geoffrey Harrison? That was it. Well, she nearly chuckled, it must have gone well seeing as her hand was resting on someone's chest, presumably his. Presumably, that is, until she opened her eyes and saw she was lying next to the handsome (and at this point quite bare) Patrick Jane. Who was awake. And staring at her. With a smile that only widened as he realized she was awake.

Cop reflexes can really be astonishing, and Lisbon's were no different; it seemed that, as soon as she realized that the man under her covers wasn't who she thought he was, the gun tucked neatly under her pillow was in her hand, the barrel pressed against the side of Jane's head.

"Whoa there, Lisbon; stand down!" he said, hands up and open, his smile immediately flipped into an anxious frown. She was already five shades of red and going on six, clearly mortified to be under the circumstances she'd been so brusquely presented with. If he could just calm her down…"You don't want to shoot me." Worth a try, at least.

"Really?" she replied incredulously in the snarky voice she saved for all his other scatter brained theories. He cringed. "First tell me what the hell you're doing here, then we'll see about that."

He looked at her quizzically. "You don't…remember?"
"Remember what?"
"I mean, you were pretty gone last night, but still…you seriously don't remember? That's really interesting." He focused his gaze on her eyes, as if trying to figure out every inner working of her mind…
"Interesting?" Lisbon was already upset, but now he was just being annoying. "You know what? Fine. Don't tell me. I'm sure I'll remember the details of your sick little joke later." She stood, gathering a blanket and wrapping it carefully around her.

"Lisbon-"

She held up a hand to silence him. "Just…I'll see you at work." She exited the room, taking off down the hallway, and pretty soon Jane heard a door shut and water running. He knew that the only way to do right by Lisbon was to be gone by the time it turned off, so he sighed, got up, and started to dress.

Oh. My. God. Lisbon could hardly believe it, thinking it was just some bizarre dream, but the heat from the flush in her cheeks proved it. Had she…really…and Jane…no, impossible. Rules were rules. And she liked rules. Rules gave thing an order, a pattern, and the more one stuck to the rules the more controllable situations were. And the number one CBI rule was no dating coworkers. Not even mentioning the number one Lisbon rule, no personal life at the office. And now even that was shattered. But the hot water was helping. She was sure she could forget all about this by the time she got to work.

"I mean, if I don't remember," she said aloud, "Then there's a good chance it didn't happen, right?" Of course, that got her thinking of if it actually had, and imagining…she shook her head, dispelling all thoughts of that from her mind. There were more important things to worry about, such as the ten-some missing hours between last night and this morning. No way could she have been drunk enough on a first date to waste her memory of an entire night. No, something must have happened…she turned off the shower, wrapped herself in a towel, and headed back to her room. She froze, about to enter. What if Jane hadn't left? She peered around the wall and into the room. Empty. Thank God.

-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~-

The bullpen was a bustle of activity that Monday morning. Rigsby, having lost a bet to Cho, had gotten a tattoo over the weekend: a manta ray on his upper left arm (Cho's choice) that looked like it was swimming when he flexed his muscles. Cho brought it up every time they passed someone who hadn't heard, from Minelli (who pretended to laugh then sternly told them to get back to work) to the security guards to-

"Van Pelt, Rigsby got a tattoo." Cho said nonchalantly as Van Pelt rushed in, hoping no one would notice the fact that she was late by almost half an hour.

"Cho-" Rigsby tried to stop him, but it was too late. Van Pelt had come over, crossing her arms with a raised eyebrow.

"Oh, can it Rigsby. You remember the terms: winner gets to gloat." Cho said, taking a sip of his coffee.

"I told you, Rigsby, if you keep betting with Cho he'll do something permanent." Van Pelt laughed. "Let's see it then."

Rigsby rolled up his sleeve, relieved she approved. He flexed his muscles and Van Pelt laughed as the manta ray swam.

"Can I touch it?" she asked, and Cho choked on his coffee, snickering. It didn't help Van Pelt (who was now blushing) that Jane had overheard as he entered.

"Always interesting, you two. Though I would suggest a change of scenery for…intimacies."

Seeing as Rigsby was making an odd rattling sound instead of a coherent statement and Van Pelt was avoiding every pair of eyes, Cho took the liberty of explaining, though he left the details of the bet up in the air.

"Oh. Well done, Cho. May I?." Rigsby nodded, glad the attention was off Van Pelt, for her sake. Jane examined the tattoo carefully. "You bet you could fill up the SUV and get it back to headquarters faster than Cho, correct, Rigsby?"

"How did you-" Rigsby asked, startled, while Cho just stared at Jane, surprised but poker faced as usual.

"Well, you obviously went first, and when Cho made his run he took the shortcut past the California Aquarium, where they recently got two Australian-"

"Manta rays." Rigsby finished. "I was wondering what made him pick it."

"A subconscious decision, I'm sure, but his mind was connecting his victory with how he did it, so it's not too illogical." Jane hopped to lie down on his couch, shutting his eyes for one of his customary naps.

"Hey, Van Pelt, you seen the boss this morning?" Rigsby asked, now that the tattoo business was over.

"Actually, no. I was expecting to be chewed out over being late, but she wasn't in her office and her car wasn't in the lot."

Jane opened one eye tentatively. Where are you, Lisbon? He thought, staring intently at the elevator. As if on cue, the doors dinged and opened, and she walked out, flipping through the case Minelli had just handed her.

"Boss, where you been?" Rigsby asked, receiving a glare from her. One of those days, he thought, swallowing uneasily. "Sorry. Never mind."

"Sonia Keating was found strangled to death and tied up in the trunk of her car. The local sheriffs estimate she's been there a couple of days, but they can't find anything about her in their records. Van Pelt, I want you to run her name through every database you can think of and try and find out something that may have made her a target. Cho, Rigsby, Jane, we're going to check out the crime scene." She tossed a set of keys to Rigsby, but Cho caught them.

"Another term of the bet?" Jane asked with a smile as he followed Lisbon out. Cho nodded and allowed himself half a smile before grabbing his coat and heading out.