They've stayed at the Blue Bird as long as they could, but miracles are impossible even for Patrick Jane (even if their story of star-crossed lovers makes everyone teary, especially women), and real life sort of called. Because Teresa has to get her place back, and because, well, she did get four weeks of leave, but she can't spent them all in their love-nest in Miami.

(He is pretty sure he wants to buy something there. One day they'll have their neighbours over, and over tea, he'll casual let it slip that it's in the hotel at the end of the road that he professed his eternal love to her for the first time. Sort of.)

They can't get a direct flight, and somewhere in the middle of their… trip, they have to stop for something (he doesn't pay attention, nor he bothers to ask Teresa what it is about. He rather prefers looking at her like a dreamy teenager), and they end up in a third order motel near the airport to spent the night.

He doesn't care about the place; he has been through worse in the years spent in Sacramento (and he does live in a trailer now. Even if he has an hunch Teresa wouldn't like spending the night there. Maybe it's time to consider a more permanent kind of residence), and besides, all he cares about is being with her and making her smile. Which she has done a lot.

Until now.

Because she doesn't like the hotel, and it's not like they can choose another room or whatever, so Teresa simply makes that funny thing with her nose, like she was a brat (or Samantha from Bewitched), and she eyes the bed with something very close to fear; part of him would like to laugh, because she looks like the heroine of one of those romance novels she says she doesn't like, and yet has a huge collection of, the kind where the virgin heroine is left all alone to share a bed in a secluded place with the vagabond/renegade hero/whatever, and she looks at it like the bed alone could force her to lose her virtue.

Too bad he is pretty sure that Teresa is scared, but not of sex (he has it covered, been there, done that, they both enjoyed it very much), but… uhm, how can he gently puts it? Germs? Bacteria? Body fluids? Dirtiness (and not of the kinky and sexy and absolutely light variety)?

He sighs (hoping she didn't hear it): he has the vague idea sex isn't in the picture right now. Hell, he has the vague idea that even sleeping in that bed isn't exactly in Teresa's mind right now.

"Reese…" he sighs at closed eyes. He knows she doesn't like the place, and he absolutely hates doing this to her, but traveling by plane always made him cranky, and besides, he is still under some pretty heavy painkillers (having sex in the shower at the Blue Bird hasn't apparently been such a good idea. He really should have thought about it better, before standing for so long on his feet. On second thought: it was oh, so worth it.), so he really, really, needs to just sleep. For a short while. Then, if Teresa will ask him to leave and choose another place to stay, so be it, he'll pay with his own money.

She looks at him with a smile, the kind she has on when she understands him and wants to help him and she is just being caring and affectionate (a bit like he was a puppy), and standing on her tip-toes she kisses his chin (she loves doing it. Especially if he hasn't shaved in a couple of days. Better yet, three.); she looks at him, and she can see how tired he is; hell, there are so many lines on his face because of pain and stress and painkillers and all that jazz that he even looks older….

"It's ok, Jane. Just take a nap. I'll go and see if I can find a decent coffee around here." She kisses him again. And then again. And then a third time, because she can, and when she leaves the room she is looking at him like a teenager in love, blushing, and she can't help but keeping sending kisses in his general direction.

(Yes, it's the kind of woman she has turned into because of him. And she absolutely loves it.)

He does as she says, and he falls asleep; when he wakes, he sees that there's her watch on his nightstand, and that it's been hours (and he doesn't know if he is getting a decent sleeping pattern because she tires him out with regular sex or if it's just because of her presence), and he smiles because he hears the shower going in the bathroom, and he has come to enjoy Teresa under the shower spray- him, and his manhood as well. And that's why his best friend takes life, getting hard, filled with blood as Jane's mind gets filled with images of having sex with his sweet Teresa under the water jet.

He stands up and throws his clothes on the floor, and then he runs in the bathroom; it's not exactly the sexiest place on Earth, and the grey curtain is sort of… well, it's not really killing the mood, but looking at his penis Jane knows that it is at least diminishing it.

Smirking and licking his lips like the cat who got the canary, Jane throws open the curtain, and enters in the small space, Lisbon looking at him curiously, like they've never done this before (What the hell?); he looks at her quizzically, because, all right, he knows she doesn't like the place, and it's not a sexy or romantic location, but it's them they are talking about, and in the last few days they've never been able to keep their hands to each other, so, again… what the hell?

And then, he sees them.

And it's them that kill the mood.

She is wearing neon green flip-flops to shower, and it's not just that they make her less attractive (because she still is), but, neon green, really?

She looks at him like an angry little, bad-ass princess as she sees his eyes focused on her feet- and definitely not because he finds them sexy (which he normally does; their third night together he played with them a lot. And she, uhm, used them as well on him, in a rather… spontaneous way. Even at dinner. In the lounge of the hotel.) "Ehy, flip-flops are the least. I even considered showering dressed… I mean, have you seen this place? We didn't get to stay in this sort of holes not even when we worked at the CBI!"

She pouts, and he smiles, shaking his head, his nose buried in her dark locks as she takes him in her arms, and even if he'd like to have his way with her, and say something in the line of, It's lucky you didn't get dressed then, he doesn't; they just stay up in the shower, embracing and kissing and just simply making out like hormonal teenagers, for as long as they can.

(Or at least, until the water doesn't turn cold, and they run away from the shower shrieking like little girls. Still laughing, though.)