"Lisbon?" he said, and then his eyes fell on her arm, peeking out from behind her desk. "Lisbon!" he repeated, alarmed.
He leapt off the couch, and within three strides was behind her desk.
She lay twisted on her side. Her right arm was pinned beneath her head, her left falling over her torso. Her dark, wavy hair partially obscured her face.
He immediately knelt over her.
"Lisbon?" he murmured anxiously, touching her shoulder. "Teresa?" he tried again, louder. He shook her gently, using his other hand to brush her hair out of her face, stifling a moan at the sudden paleness of her already-alabaster skin. "Uhhh…" he mumbled, trying to tamp down his growing panic.
"Teresa!" he called to her again, wondering why she hadn't answered him, wishing desperately she'd open her beautiful green, irritated eyes and bark at him, demanding to know why he was hovering over her and yelling at her.
At that moment he really needed to hear Shut up, Jane! or Jane, stop hovering, I'm fine!. But no such reprimand came from her pale lips.
He straightened and turned to look through the blinds out into the bullpen.
"Hey guys!" he yelled. "Anyone? Ah, need some help in here, please!" His eyes scanned the office for the familiar faces of his teammates, but at that moment, there wasn't an agent in sight.
"Cho! Rigsby!" he called again, mentally cursing when he heard his own voice breaking. It would never do for any of them to catch him at a moment of weakness or vulnerability.
He was Patrick Jane: nothing rattled him, nothing unnerved him, or caught him unawares. That was the perception that had to be maintained. Finally someone appeared in the door.
"Hey Jane," Van Pelt said pleasantly. "The guys are at lunch. What's up?" she asked, her delicate brows first lifting, then frowning, in confused amusement. "What's going on? Why are you behind Boss's desk?" she asked, moving closer.
Instantly her expression shifted from amusement at Jane's 'antics', to fear upon finding her stronger-than-diamonds boss now lying at Jane's feet.
"Oh my God!" she exclaimed. "What happened? Is she okay? What's wrong with her?" she questioned in a rush, her voice rising.
Jane realized he needed to get control here, or he'd have to deal with one what-he-assumed-was-unconscious woman, and one well-meaning-but-hyperventilating woman. He raised his hand in a calming, 'stop' gesture, which seemed to have the desired effect.
"Breathe, Grace," he ordered firmly, but soothingly.
She did so, and he then turned his attention back to Lisbon.
"She's fine," he lied quietly, cradling her cheek in one hand, checking the pulse at her throat with the other. "I believe she just passed out, although from what, I'm not sure, yet."
He stood, repositioning himself at Lisbon's head, lowering her right arm to her side, then lifted her upper body against his chest, cradling her head against his shoulder.
Grace immediately grasped the small woman's calves and flats-encased feet, and together they lifted her off the floor and carried her the few feet to the couch. Setting her down on the huge sofa which, at the moment, Jane thought, seemed to dwarf her, he propped her head against one pillow, and elevated her feet with another.
"I'll go get a damp towel from the kitchen," Grace said, now fully back in agent/concerned-but-rational-friend mode, and darted from the office before he could reply. Not that she expected him to.
He sat next to her, and immediately lifted her right hand, lacing his right-hand fingers with hers, and placing it in his lap. His other fingers gently covered the pulse at her wrist.
Two obnoxious thoughts began to battle for prominence in his head as he fixated on her face: one, her normally exquisitely-warm skin was now ice-cold, the unwelcome chill currently seeping into him. Two, her rock-steady, Gibraltar pulse was skipping much too fast for his liking.
Her chest rose and fell almost imperceptively with each shallow breath, and almost completely absent from her lovely face was his favorite Lisbon-blush. Even her closed lids were nearly translucent.
Suffice it to say, the whole picture was just wrong.
"Lisbon," he murmured, keeping his voice low, but insistent. "Lisbon, it's Jane. Can you hear me?"
No response. He glanced down at their joined hands.
"Teresa, if you can hear me, squeeze my hand."
Still nothing. He looked again at her face, his concern growing.
In an attempt to bring warmth back into her chilled skin, he moved his fingers from her wrist and began to rub her slender fingers with his palm. He did this for a full minute, but there was still no response to his stimulation. He put his fingers back at her pulse.
Van Pelt reappeared with a damp kitchen towel, and upon Jane's statement that their boss and friend was still unresponsive, grew even more agitated. Finally, after a brief debate over how to help her, Van Pelt's agitation boiled over.
"Boss is unconscious!"
Jane sighed, trying to stay patient. 'This woman is a trained, gun-toting, state law-enforcement agent?' He disentangled his and Lisbon's fingers and reached for the towel.
"Yes, I know," he replied calmly, moving the cloth from her forehead to press it gently against her cheek, then down to her neck.
"If you'll recall, Grace, I was in here when it happened. It was I who called you for help."
"Yes," she huffed in irritation. "I know that. But we have to do some-"
"I am doing something; I am keeping her cooled off. 'Although she hardly needs it, her fingers are like icicles', Jane thought.
"I am keeping her feet elevated, and monitoring her vitals." He looked at her. "You're the CBI agent, Grace," he reminded patronizingly. "If you're so eager to do something productive, you could start by looking for her phone."
Grace frowned. "Why Boss's phone?"
"Ah, because she had gotten a call and was talking to someone when she fainted," he replied condescendingly. "She was behind her desk; I believe you'll find the phone somewhere underneath it."
Grace went behind Lisbon's desk, did a quick cursory check, then dropped to her knees for a better look.
"Got it!" she announced, standing back up. She held the electronic gadget to her ear, but received only a dial-tone, so she hung up.
"Do you know who Lisbon was talking to?" Van Pelt asked.
Jane shook his head. "Just that they were telling her something terrible," he supplied. "Her tone and demeanor changed compl-" he was cut off as the phone rang again.
"Maybe this is them, calling back!" she chirped, her expression brightening. "Van Pelt, CBI," she answered professionally.
"This is Detective Todd Wilcox, Chicago P. D.," said a brusque man in a tell-tale Chee-caago. "I'm trying to reach Teresa Lisbon at the CBI in Sacramento."
'Chicago?' thought Van Pelt. 'That's where Boss is from.'
"I'm Agent Van Pelt, I'm on Lisbon's team," Grace explained. "Has something happened?"
"I called a few minutes ago, but I guess we got disconnected. We received a call early this morning from the Illinois State Highway Patrol that there'd been an accident…"
Van Pelt, her stomach plummeting in heart-breaking comprehension for her boss and friend, listened in wide-eyed dismay as the cop from Lisbon's hometown relayed the news that a car had skidded full speed on a patch of black ice and hit a guard rail.
"...driver was identified as Thomas Mitchell Lisbon," the detective continued. "Records identified Teresa Lisbon as next of kin…"
As he continued, Van Pelt carefully lowered and covered the receiver with her fingers.
"Jane," Grace said softly, this time not bothering to keep her voice from shaking. "Lisbon's brother Tommy is dead. There was an accident, something about icy roads. His car slammed into a guard rail…" she trailed off tearfully.
Lisbon's disjointed words from just before her collapse echoed perfectly through Jane's head: "'Oh my god, no…not…oh no. Please, no…not To…'"
"Please, not To…" he reasoned aloud. "Not Tommy," he finished in understanding. He looked sadly at Lisbon, stroking her cheek with the drying towel.
His favorite pint-sized agent was so strong, so fearless, forever tackling her job with steely-nerved fervor. He was constantly in awe of her skill in reducing even the nastiest, most heinous, unsavory characters into quaking, quivering, fearful messes.
But she was also Teresa, the protective sister-turned-foster mother to three quarrelling younger brothers - brothers whom he knew she felt guilty about not seeing more often. She didn't discuss family often, but when the subject did come up, he could plainly see the guilt and regret so poorly concealed in her bright green eyes.
So he knew without a doubt what getting that call had done to his unshakeable Lisbon.
He foresaw the anger, and the anguish, and the inevitable guilt she'd undoubtedly feel when she woke up, and he silently cursed the twisted fates that could so cruelly take both her beloved mother, and now her little brother in senseless, stupid car crashes.
If Jane had believed in God, he would have cursed Him too.
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A/N - ok, ok, please don't me mad at me for killing Tommy, now that we've all met him, and realize he's the kid from "E.T." Also, this is a Jane/Lisbon story; Van Pelt will not really play a central part here, she just helped start it off. She'll be the main focus of my next story!