It was the end of her second week as an FBI agent. Teresa Lisbon came home to her new apartment. It was a large open loft-like space in an old warehouse building.. She'd furnished it in a spare modern style mixed with antiques and some mid-century classics. Jane had promised to come over and hang the huge painting she'd bought from an artist in Brooklyn.
Jane had wasted no time at work. He tossed the FBI directly into the deep end of the bottomless pool that was him. He made everybody involved in the case they were working totally nuts.
Teresa switched on the lights and picked up the stack of mail on the floor.
She smiled to herself. The great thing about dealing with Jane's behavior now was that she wasn't his boss. She was more his partner and liason. He would speak in Jane-ese and she would translate to FBI-ese. She realized that she was the only person who could speak Jane. Cho could get by but she was fluent.
And from now on, whatever crap Jane pulled, Fischer was the one left holding that particular bag.
Of course, Teresa did her best to steer him away from anything vastly illegal or borderline suicidal. Long years together had taught her exactly the moment when a witness or suspect was about to haul off and punch him.
She opened a bottle of white wine and poured herself a glass. She'd always admired Jane's brilliance and creativity. But now she could appreciate how fucking funny he was. The way he ran circles around people and deflated every puffed up jerk he met.
Sometimes she found herself rolling on the floor laughing which of course, encouraged him to be more and more outrageous. Making her laugh was catnip to Jane. In the past, the most he got was a sardonic smirk. Now she was his biggest fan.
She'd always been attracted to him but now she couldn't keep her eyes off him. There were no rules she'd be flouting if she gave herself the pleasure of feasting her eyes on him.
He had screwed her over, scammed her and abandoned her. But now, he'd reappeared and plucked her out of obscurity. She was attached to the golden boy, the phenomenal pain in the ass who'd brought the FBI to its knees.
And now she was waterskiing in his wake all the way to an amazing career. An amazing life if she could get him into bed and keep him there. That was her new project.
No one had ever taken care of her the way this impossible lunatic had. He'd thought of everything. Because of him, the FBI had given her a top position leapfrogging her over the heads of other agents. They'd paid her moving costs and given her a generous car allowance. She was part of the executive health plan. She had access to the executive gym.
She sat on the sofa and opened her mail. There was an envelope from the FBI. It was a paystub notifying her that her first check had been automatically deposited in her account. She put it aside and went on to riffling through the new issue of Elle Décor.
She took a sip of wine, rubbed her eyes and picked up the paystub again. Oh my god, this had to be a mistake. She was ashamed of herself but she hadn't realized the salary they'd proposed wasn't per month, it was per week. She gulped down the rest of her wine. No one in her family had ever- She had never even dreamed- Unless she was sorely mistaken, her salary was in the low six figures. And those six figures didn't even have a one as the first number. Her eyes filled with tears.
The crazy bastard had taken care of her in every way. He'd not only tied her to him, he'd given her her independence. She really really wanted to thank him.