Just a one-shot that came to mind and that I couldn't get rid of. And yet, despite it, I couldn't think of an appropriate title so suggestions are welcome. It's not been checked so mistakes are on me, and as always, the characters, yada yada yada are not mine because if they were they'd be together by now and all these ridiculous guys that come in and out of their lives would definitely not exist. Seriously, someone needs to convince Angie to do a gay plot...

Anyway, here we go. :)

Maura closed the door resting her forehead against the cool wood. Eyes closed, she tried to quell the panic their visitor had paid, shuddering as hands that lay flat vainly tried for some semblance of grounding. Anything to erase the last half an hour of their lives.

Moving away, she turned, wrapping her arms around herself as she took stock of their house. Dessert lay half eaten on the table, half-filled glasses next to it, the soft, glow of dimmed orange lights cast the perfect finish to what had been their date night, something they'd both been looking forward to given their schedules and the recent birth of their daughter. Time to themselves, time for themselves months in the making as they'd adapted to the new but welcome change in their lives.

They'd slipped into it seamlessly, effortlessly. Laughing and chatting, coming together, bonding like they had done when they'd first gotten together, giving in to their desires to make the other theirs, to be able to call them their own. They'd been happy. Giddy almost, enclosed in the four walls of their home while the moon and stars shone brightly above them, casting light along the way giving the darkness of the night a lighthearted feel.

But then a singular knock had caused their night to become hideously wrong, making the darkness insidious, and threatening all they held dear. Ian had turned up, laying claim that he wanted access to his daughter. He wanted to be in her life. He wanted to be her father. And if Maura would have him, her husband. That they could be a family. Just the three of them. They belonged together; him, Maura and Emma, and if he'd had the balls to stick around and put down roots earlier, he would have proposed and it would be them married, not her and Jane and didn't the fact that she came to him asking for his sperm mean something? Didn't it indicate that on some level, she wanted them to be together, be a family? That because she had asked him to be the donor, on some unconscious level it demonstrated a want to have a connection to him, have his children, become a family. Properly. Never mind the crack of the wine glass in her wife's hands or her presence as she stood behind Maura or the curse that he could go to hell uttered from her wife's lips. Never mind the fact that she didn't love him or that their child was actually hers and Jane's, not his at all; a choice borne once they had gotten married to make their family complete. He was determined in his mission and it had taken tremendous effort on her part to get him to leave.

Deciding that the mess, physical anyway, could wait till morning, she trudged up the stairs in search of her wife, her mind a whirl of thoughts and processes, the first being that she would have to contact their lawyer first thing tomorrow to see whether he had any ground to stand on, whether he could become a permanent fixture in their lives. Thankfully, Frankie had taken Emma for some serious uncle and niece bonding time convinced, like his sister, that education on how the Red Sox were the greatest team in the world, was a necessity for any Rizzoli or person for that matter and of course, that one could never start too early for such wise teachings. She'd rolled her eyes fondly, smiling nonetheless as she'd kept to herself that her six month old child wouldn't know any better.

If she'd thought this night couldn't get any worse, it certainly did the moment she came to the doorway of their room. She simply stood, mouth agape as she watched Jane throw something into the bag she had open on the bed, her eyes tracking each and every movement.

"What are you doing?" she asked, her voice hoarse.

"Packing," came the terse reply.

She took a step inside, panic filling her every pore. "Don't do this. We can work this out. I'll call my lawyer in the morning, now even," she pled, going for her phone.

Jane gave a bitter laugh, shaking her head. "We shouldn't have to. I should have put my foot down from the very start. From the moment you came up with the absurd idea. I knew it. I knew something like this would happen." She raked through her wardrobe, pulling at various work clothes she would need before throwing them haphazardly in the bag. Maura winced at their treatment, going against the urge to say they would wrinkle. This was not the time.

"What - what do you mean?"

Flinching at the curse word that echoed from the bathroom as something fell over, she waited for Jane to reappear.

"I mean I should have said no the moment you suggested Ian be our sperm donor," she let out through clenched teeth.

"I - I don't understand. You said you were okay with it. You said you understood."

"But I never said I agreed with it!" she roared, whirling round to finally face her wife, hand slamming down on the dresser. "Fuck!" She clenched her teeth as a sharp throbbing pain reverberated from her hand to her arm, the numbing pain from the place where the glass stem had cut adding to the effect. Only now taking stock of the loosely tied bandage, Maura gasped.

"You cut yourself. How bad?" she asked going towards her wife. She stops midtrack as her wife holds out a hand, the word "stop" dying from her lips.

Jane sighed deeply, the fight going out of her, leaving her feeling nothing but drained. Tonight was supposed to be a good night. "I understood your reasons. I got the fact that if anything were to happen, that should you not be a match for her, it would be good to know who her donor was but it didn't change the fact that I felt like a third wheel between the two of you. That this was something..that it was going to give you both forever, a connection, that you'd both be inexplicably bound to the other by virtue of the fact that you're her parents, that you two would..." She blew a frustrated breath of air, the errant curl flopping straight back in front of her eyes. "I don't...I mean...you know," she says, gesturing wildly. "Sometimes, I'd lay awake at night, put my hand over your stomach and I'd be in awe of this life that was growing inside you that we'd created. And then it would hit me. I had no part in creating her. But he did. He wormed his way into your life in the same way he wormed his way into your body and it made me sick. But I kept quiet. I thought I'd feel differently when she was born. That the moment I held her in my arms, I'd be like any other new parent and get lost just looking at her, that I'd do anything for her, you know?"

Funnily enough she does. "You're her mother. I'm her mother. We're her parents," she says, coming to stop in front of the detective. She takes hold of her wife's hands. "I don't love him. On some level, I don't believe I ever did. I just enjoyed the attention. But I love you. I've always loved you. He's not her father. He's merely her sperm donor. Isn't that what you always tell me when I feel insecure about my own roots? My own abilities? As a mother, as a wife and as a person? Blood doesn't make family. Love does." They've been through this before but she'll go through it again, these insecurities her wife seems to have when it comes to Ian, or any other man in fact. She goes to brush the curl aside, tucking it behind her wife's ear. It's one of her favourite parts of Jane because only she gets to do this.

"And yet, it doesn't change the fact that when I look at her, I'm reminded of him. That it's his eyes staring back at me. His chin that she has. There's nothing of me in her. And I sometimes wonder, if we'd chosen differently..someone closer to me, someone who had brown eyes or my skin colour, someone whose face isn't all I see every time I close my eyes, someone who was never involved with you, who I could never put a face to, a nameless person..."

"Oh Jane..." Her heart aches for her wife. For the words and turmoil a single decision on her part has created. She should have listened more when Jane had refused to use Tommy or Frankie as their donor. She had wanted a Rizzoli baby, or at least one that looked like Jane but Jane had been adamant that she wanted a little Maura, whatever that meant and none of the donors had matched the profile they'd been looking for and the ones that did, had been anonymous which meant that in the event something ever happened like their child would require a bone marrow transplant or something or other that life could have never prepared them for, they would never have the option of getting in touch with their donor. And they had been oh so desperate for a child to call their own. To cement their bond to each other even more. So when she'd thought of Ian, she jumped at the chance. Cajoling, pleading, wheedling. But she should have listened. Better. More. Harder. She should have put more weight behind her wife's hesitancy. Made her sit down and tell her why she had been so averse, so halting. But she'd been so happy, throwing her arms round her when she'd finally said yes, that she'd put aside the lingering doubt she'd seen in her wife's eyes and started with their plans, the first being to get in touch with the broad Australian. God, what sort of wife was she? To completely cast her aside, ignore that little niggling voice in her head when she'd written that email to him to ask for his sperm that told her that to run it by Jane again because even though she'd said yes, she was certain that there was still an underlying tension that remained, that there was something Jane was not telling her. Simply so they could have a child.

It's then that it hits her. 'If this is what you want, then let's do this.' Never, not once in any of the conversations they'd had, had Jane said that it was what she wanted too. God, she'd been so stupid. She really was a dumb genius.

The detective pulled away, desperate for some distance and Maura felt the loss as acutely as if her own heart had been pulled from her chest. "I should have seen it coming. I saw it coming" she corrects. "I knew how much he loved you. I knew he'd be back, Emma giving him all the more reason to return but as with everything, I can never say no to you and I should have. That's on me. I should have voiced my concerns, my reluctance. Now all I'm left with is the knowledge that he and you will forever have this bond and I'm left not being able to do a single thing about it." She hung her head, running a hand through her hair. "It's hard enough to be steeped with the knowledge that I'm never going to be the one to get you pregnant, to know that it's in part my child that's growing inside you, but this..." she says, gesturing around her, "this just takes it to a whole other level." Her last words are uttered in complete defeat and she steps round the blonde towards the bag on the bed.

"Where will you go?" Maura asks, turning.

"I don't know. I just know that right now, I can't be here."

"Please don't do this. Please stay and let's work this out. We need to work this out, find out whether or not he has a claim."

"Do you think he does?"

The question comes out of nowhere and takes her aback. "I- I don't see why he should," she stutters. "It's your name on her birth certificate. You who has parental responsibility. She's our daughter by default of us being married to each other, by the fact that we chose to have a child."

"And in the eyes of the court? The best interests of the child?" Jane asks quietly, finally meeting her wife's eyes. "In the event that the court decides it's in the best interests of our child to know who here father is, to know where she comes from, her roots..."

""She comes from us! She's our child!" Maura wails, effectively cutting Jane off.

"Do you honestly believe they will see it like that?"

"I- I don't know," she says, shrugging her shoulders.

"Yeah. Neither do I." Resigned, she picks up her bag throwing it over her shoulder. They've come to an impasse, the situation too complex to simply be solved overnight.

"How long will you be gone?"

"I don't know." The answer does nothing to qualm Maura's nerves and insecurities that perhaps, this move - their resulting choices - has pushed Jane too far and despite it being on the tip of her tongue to ask 'what about Emma?' she doesn't in fear of it being the tipping point. If you had asked her earlier that day her wife's commitment to them, her reply would be certain and most definitely instantaneous. Now, she just doesn't know. She doesn't know how far Ian will push, how much of the right they have as her parents is absolute or how the court will rule should it ever come to that. And as much as she is grateful for their daughter, she knows now how ludicrous her suggestion was, and wishes, without a doubt that she could take it back. They had plenty of donor options after all. All she had had to do was put aside her requirement for them to be in contact with their donor. Just in case.

"I just need time to decide if I can do this. Go through all of this 'malarky' " she says throwing a hand up in the air in search of a suitable word for the mess and chaos that had rained down upon them within hours, "and that if I can, whether I can stand by and watch as he plays a part in her life, in our lives. I know as a parent, there should be no question of that, that the love you have for your child should be unconditional and I can't really explain that it is and it isn't, but right now, I don't know if I'm strong enough to do that." The brunette's torn. Torn between the love she has for their child - wanting to whisk her away, all of them, far from the graspings of a certain Ian Faulkner - and the degree of uncertainty that their future holds. She doesn't know if she can just stand and watch as Ian comes into their lives, smoothing a hand over her child's hair, teaching her how to ride a bicycle. She should have spoken up. This...it's on her.

Maura nods. She understands the turmoil because she too used to imagine what it would be like if Jane ever got pregnant with Casey's baby. Whether she would be able to stand by her should Casey decide not to stay, whether she'd look at the child and see nothing but him thereby breaking her inside. She'd never thought that perhaps Jane might have felt the same. She hadn't thought period. And now? Now, her whole world was crumbling around her.

Jane goes to move past her, her footsteps leading her further and further away from the chasm that's already been created. Hand on the pendant Jane recently gave her as present last Christmas, she tugs it back and forth, closing her eyes to prevent the tears that threaten. She doesn't think she can watch her walk away. She hears her go next door to the nursery, quiet murmurings and whispers before the door gently closes. She wants to say something more, wants to reach out but by the time she utters the words 'I love you,' she hears the click of the front door signalling her wife's departure. And it's then and only then that she lets the tears flow.

Maura shot up from bed, the words 'don't go' nothing more than a whisper in the darkness that surrounded her. Tears streamed down her face. She blinked, trying to control her breathing as she looked round. Calming slightly at her familiar surroundings, she reached for her wife only to find her side cold, the reminder of why coming back to her. After putting forth her suggestion of asking Ian to be their donor, an idea which Jane had vehemently been against, an argument had ensued leaving the brunette to suggest that they needed some time apart for the night to calm down and get their bearings back. She hadn't fully understood what Jane had meant by the parting remark that she needed to think of the consequences of such an idea, to put all that she abhorred about the nature of what ifs and actually take time to consider that aspect before it came back to bite them, or rather her, in the ass. Which led to the brunette sleeping elsewhere and her in fitful rest and with the remains of a horrid dream. She understood now.

"Jane?" she whimpered.

Climbing out of bed, she put on her robe, going in search of the tall detective. Checking the guest bedroom, she started to panic when she didn't find the usual mess of blankets and lump on the right side of the bed but instead, a clean, freshly made bed, completely devoid of human life.

"Jane?"

"Maur?" Maura rushed out of the room to see Jane's face appear from the top of the stairs. She'd been downstairs on the couch watching a replay of the Red Sox, unable to sleep when she heard her wife frantically call out for her. Maura ran towards her, throwing herself into her wife's arms, wrapping her legs around a lanky waist. Burying her head in the crook of her neck, she sobbed. It was a mixture of relief and terror. Relief that she was still there, that she hadn't just walked out and sheer fright from both the effects of her dream and the thought that Jane had truly left.

Alarmed, Jane settled the blonde on the banister. "Maura? Baby, tell me." She goes to pull back to take a good look at the blonde and hopefully resolve this sudden bout of waterworks but Maura simply tightened her hold, refusing to let go. Through the flowing tears and many hiccups, she hears the muffled words 'I'm sorry' over and over. "Okay. Okay, I tell you what. How about we discuss this in bed? Let me take you back to bed and you can tell me what happened." But Maura shakes her head, the memory of her dream still fresh in her mind. She wants to go nowhere near where her nightmare took her.

"Downstairs," she murmurs, worn out from her crying bout. The detective agrees more to appease than anything else and carefully makes her way down, the blonde still wrapped around her. Snuggled on their extremely large couch, she pulls the blanket over them as Maura settles on top of her, ear to heartbeat. Running her fingers through smooth curls, she asks the question on the forefront of her mind. "You want to tell me what that was all about?"

"I had a dream." And she goes from there. Outlining every nuance, every detail. By the time she finishes, warm tears are running down her cheeks once more creating wet patches on Jane's tank top.

"Oh, Maur." Jane sighs.

"You were right." Jane looks down at her wife, brows raised. It's not very often she hears those words leave the ME's lips. Maura swats her knowing full well the look she's been given. And yet, it's her turn to sigh. "You were right when you said to think about the consequences, what could happen, what it could lead to. So forget any suggestion I gave about using Ian. I never want to give you any reason to look at our child and wonder if the donor is ever going to turn up one day out of the blue. I never ever want you to question your connection to our children. They will be great and they will be loved and most of all, they will be ours regardless of which of us is linked to him or her biologically."

"I know that."

"No Jane, I mean it," she says looking up. "I want the donor to be anonymous, however long it may take to find one that matches the other. We have time. I can wait. And in the event that something were to crop up that's out of our control, we will deal with it together. As a family. No donor input and all." Jane remains quiet, silently mulling.

"You know I would love any child of ours simply because they came from you," she murmurs, and it's things like that that make Maura love her even more. Giving a gentle squeeze to the waist beneath her, she responds.

"I know." Steeped in the knowledge that Jane is referring to both their earlier conversation that evening and the resulting consequence of her dream, she's grateful for the reassurance. But the effects of her dream remain and if there's one thing she's sure of besides the fact that she wants a child with this woman, it's that she refuses to lose her, and more than anything else, that what ifs play a large part in life. "But I don't want you to."

"Okay." She runs her hand up and down Maura's back, an act of soothing which often calms her wife. "Do you want to go up to bed?"

Maura shakes her head. "Comfy," she murmurs nuzzling into Jane. "Can we just stay here? Just you and me."

"Of course," she replies, pressing a gentle kiss into blonde locks. Maura sighs from the contact, her nerves settling down as the motion of Jane's hand lulls her slowly to sleep.

"I love you," she whispers.

"I love you too."

Heh, I got you there didn't I? For a moment, at least a portion of you believed that it was real. But I'm a strict Rizzles fan all the way. Which means any children between the two of them, would never ever include any exes. Just the thought of Ian makes me wrinkle my nose in disgust. His character really does rub me the wrong way. Gah! Anyway, enough about him.

I know nothing about Massachusetts state law. I'm afraid my legal knowledge only extends as far as the UK by virtue of the fact that that was what I trained in so I apologize if factually, the plot is wrong. But then, this is fiction which means the mind is allowed to conjure any such idea however far fetched. ;)

I hope you're all having a good start to the week. Bring on the weekend! It can never come early enough. ;)