Previously:

The voice was familiar, as out of a dream. The closer she got to him, the more impossible it felt.

"I didn't hear anyone - "

"That you were willing to admit to."


Close enough to see him, her heart leaped into her mouth, but not from fear. Instead it was the shock of recognition and of disbelief in what she saw. "I used to hear your voice in my mind, all too often. How - "

"Surely you suspected I rigged the car accident? If everyone else believed I was dead, you at least had reason to suspect it was a rouse."

"So much time passed, and not a word from you - I didn't know what to think. Did you expect me to keep looking for you around every corner all this time?"

"No. I suppose not. But I'm hoping - " He paused. "There are things I want to talk to you about. I don't really want to do that in a parking garage. Is there somewhere we can go?"

"I was going home. You might as well come with me."

"Thank you."

She floated between joy at seeing him and anger that he had been gone so long and fear that when he left again she would ache as badly as she had the last time. "Why have you come back now?"

"Why did I stay away so long, you mean."

She responded only by unlocking the car doors and getting in. He followed and as he clicked his seat belt, he continued, "I found him. I killed him, Lisbon. He smiled when he mentioned your name. He must have thought it would distract me enough that he could get the drop on me. It did for a moment. You will be pleased to know he got the first few cuts in before I pulled a weapon - so it was at least as much self-defense as it was premeditated. I dared not come back to you then. Who knows how many other friends he had, ready to carry out their own vengeance."

"And now you come back?"

"I wanted to see you. I've wanted to see you every day since I left - make sure you were ok, safe, happy."

She did not know how to respond to that, so she fell silent.

Very quietly he said, "I did see you a few times. Minelli's funeral. When Cho - " At her pained look, he skipped ahead. "The last time was after that head injury - you had regained consciousness by the time I got here, but you were asleep." He fiddled with the radio, never quite satisfied enough with any of the music he heard to stay with one station for more than two songs. The drive to her place seemed to take longer than it ever had before.

She ushered him into her house. When she shut the door behind them, he turned to her. His eyes locked onto hers when he said, "Teresa, please tell me you don't hate me."

"You came back to see me when I couldn't see you - so you get the comfort, and I get the decade and more of silence. What do you want from me, Jane?"

"Want? I want what I wanted twelve years ago. Call me by my first name."

"You just told me you got what you wanted back then - Red John dead."

"That was what I needed - Red John dead, and you safe. What I wanted wasn't an option."

She gave him a hard look and waited.

"I wanted you. You know that. You had to know that."

"Ja - Patrick, I stopped knowing anything when it comes to you the moment you snapped the handcuffs over my wrist and left me. You can't think that would have no effect on how I feel, that I would just get over it, that you could come back now and we'd pick up right where we left off."

"Tell me you felt betrayed, brokenhearted, angry, then. Tell me you wanted to punch me or shoot me. It's perfectly reasonable. But tell me you don't hate me."

"I don't think I can - "

"Which? Hate me or tell me that you don't?"

"It's not that easy. I don't think I can give you what you want."

"It could be that easy. Let me show you again."

"No - tomorrow when I wake up and this was all a dream, it won't have been a happy dream. Last time you left, it hurt; I can't tell you how much. The nightmares will kill me, but I'll still have to get up and go to work. I can't afford to be a zombie again."

"Teresa, this is real. I won't have to leave again. It'll be good this time."

"You make promises like a deadbeat." She spoke quietly, weary and defeated. It was less an accusation than it was a way to keep herself from giving in to him. Still, anger flashed through his eyes.

"You're angry with me for not keeping promises that never got made? No, now when I tell you I won't leave, it's because I won't."

"What if I want you to?"

"I thought I was supposed to be the coward. Never thought you would turn out to be worse, Teresa Lisbon. Maybe I will need a butterfly net to catch pork chops yet."

She did not respond for a couple of minutes, needing to take the sting out of her heart. "Did you spend much time in the rural South while you were gone?"

"No, why?"

"Just wondering where the hell you got 'butterfly net to catch pork chops' from."

"I came up with it myself, just now."

"So is this senile dementia or were you always this strange and I've just forgotten?"

"What, it's a metaphor. And a subtle allusion to 'A Lion in Winter'. Don't pretend you didn't understand what it meant, or that you didn't miss my colorful discourse."

"Yes, Jane, your colorful discourse is what I was so heartbroken over." As she said this, the hint of a smile that had crept into his eyes disappeared.

"I'm sorry I hurt you. Every day I wished I could have done something different. But you were safe, and I needed that more than anything. So every day I knew I did the best thing for you."

"Patrick, the best thing would have been to let me run my own risks and face the danger with you. You made a decision for both of us you didn't have the right to. And it changed how I felt about you. One true thing you said then was that we don't get a happy ending. I want you to leave. Please go."

"I'll walk out your door now, but I'm not leaving again."

She raised her eyebrow at him.

"Call a cab for me. I'll wait outside." He stepped up to her, leaned in and kissed her cheek. "See you later."

She did make the call for him, and watched him through lace curtains while he waited. Part of her wanted to bring him back inside, and part of her wanted to vanish so he could not wear her down with his presence, no matter how indirectly.


A/N: When I wrote "Scarlet Runner Vines", I worded the the description of that place in the woods very carefully. Look closely and you will see that there is only one body there. Jane being alive now is not a ret-con. Muahahahahaahha! Mine is an evil laugh.