A/N: Warning- this is a monster chapter that runs the gamut from silliness to serious drama. I couldn't find the right place to cut it, so I called it quits at two a.m. and figured I'd just dish up the entire beast. Because I'm greedy, I'm hoping you all will reciprocate and leave a monstrous number of reviews. ;D
Hugs,
MBA
Mondays were always awful- it was just a matter of to what degree they sucked. If it was a weekend that Lisbon's team wasn't on call, she went home and relaxed and rediscovered that she did, indeed, have patience. Then she'd behave like normal come Monday morning, alternately joking with her team and wishing longingly for another good ten hours of sleep. If she'd been in the office most of Saturday and Sunday because it was their turn on the duty roster, she was grumpy enough to threaten multiple people with bodily harm if they entered her office without donuts, coffee or good news.
Cho, smart bastard that he was (given their weekend), came bearing two of the three. "Chocolate with sprinkles," he announced, shouldering through her door to drop the donut and its napkin in front of her. "I grabbed it for you before Jane got to it."
Sadly, her supply of the treat had declined precipitously since Jane joined the team- not only did he favor her rainbow sprinkled, chocolate drenched donut of choice, but he was also disturbingly adept at getting to them before her. She grinned. "Which translates roughly to 'he's late today,' right?"
The small smirk on his mouth said that she'd been correct.
"I just got out of the department meeting. We're off weekends for the next month." Cho gave her a full-blown grin. A whole month off was unheard of. "And," he added, drawing the word out with relish, "the state budget was approved. The salary increase isn't rumor anymore. We go up eight percent across the board effective next month."
Lisbon thought about climbing on her desk and dancing a jig. She settled for a pleased laugh. There was a new couch she'd been eyeing for months- now it looked like she'd finally be able to afford it without using her credit card. "Great. Hey, thanks for taking that meeting for me," she said, still grinning.
Her second-in-command nodded. "No problem."
After he left, she contentedly demolished her donut, even swiping the spots of icing from the napkin with a finger. No weekend shift. More money. Jane missing her donut. Today was going to be a fantastic day; she could feel it in her bones.
---
"Lisbon!"
Damn. It had been a perfect Monday until the implied annoyance in that single word. She'd been just about to mention how nice it was to have Jane behave for a change, too. He hadn't even pouted when he'd noticed the lack of his favorite donut in the kitchen. "Yes, boss?" she called up to Minelli, who was peering down at her with a frown over the railing in front of his office, clutching a paper in his hand.
"Up here for a minute."
Climbing the spiral staircase slowly, she wondered what she was in hot water for this time. Probably Jane. He was the cause of a vast majority of her headaches.
She'd barely gained the top step when Minelli unceremoniously shoved the paper he'd been holding into her hand.
"Here," he announced. "Read it. Enforce it. I've got a meeting in ten minutes. See you later."
"Yes, sir," Lisbon mumbled to the retreating back. She scanned the memo quickly before calling out, "Hey, boss! It doesn't say why. Is there a problem?"
"Confidentiality, Lisbon. Medical tests are privileged. You have everything you need to know right there."
Sighing, she headed back to her team's bullpen in time to see Van Pelt gathering her keys. "Where are you off to?"
"Coffee run," was the dismayed reply. "I drew the short straw."
Craning her neck to look out the window, Lisbon noted the sheets of rain falling from the grey sky. It hadn't been raining when she'd come in, but even the fact that her umbrella was at home couldn't derail her good mood. "You know, I'll do it," she offered suddenly, glancing at the paper and holding out her hand for the keys to the Suburban. She smiled at Van Pelt, who looked afraid to hope she'd heard her correctly. "List of orders too, please."
Visibly grateful, Van Pelt dumped both in her hands hurriedly, as if afraid she would change her mind. "Thanks," she sighed with heartfelt emotion.
---
"Cho," Lisbon called, squelching into the office, stopping at his desk to deposit the first steaming cup. "Triple espresso with cream and sugar."
"Large hot chocolate." She offered the cup to Van Pelt, who pointed at Rigsby with a smirk.
"What?" he asked, collecting the offered drink. "It's good."
"Decaf, two sugars, no milk must be you, then," Lisbon noted, passing the coffee off to Van Pelt's eager hands. With a wicked smile, she carried the cardboard cup holder with three drinks over to Jane, who was sitting up and waiting with obvious anticipation. The damp, pervading chill of the day had settled in the drafty building, a fact she was all the more aware of now that she was soaked to the skin. At least she had a dry change of clothes in her office.
"That's me," Jane said, pulling a large cup marked 'T- XTRA SGR & HVY CRM' in black marker from the holder, only to have the cup plucked right back out of his hands. "Hey!" he protested. "Lisbon!"
She smirked evilly. "This one is yours." Lisbon passed him one marked 'CHAM T- BLK' with smug anticipation. The confounded look on his face was priceless. She turned on her heel, heading his impending complaints off at the pass.
Jane was, of course, having none of that. He followed her all the way to her office, trying to reach over her shoulder and get his cup while avoiding her slapping hand. "Ha ha, Lisbon, you've had your fun. May I have my tea now, please?"
Dropping her own cup on her desk, secure in the knowledge that Jane wouldn't touch her plain black coffee with a ten-foot pole, she ducked around him and headed right back out, the rubber soles of her sensible work shoes squeaking noisily all the way. "Nope. Minelli's instructions. 'Jane is to eat better and exercise more. Doctor's orders. Make sure he obeys.' And that's a direct quote, too. So no more tea with the works for you- you now like herbal tea. Plain herbal tea."
"I liked herbal tea before," Jane said weakly, eyeing the cup she kept just out of his reach, "but that doesn't mean I don't want my order. C'mon, Lisbon, last one for old times' sake, and all that." At her arch look, he snapped, "What are you going to do with my tea besides give it to me? No one else drinks it. You wouldn't waste money like that and we both know it, so just hand it over, Lisbon."
She reached the divider that separated their area from Jackson's team. "Maggs!" she called. "Hey, Magglianetto! You over there?" Even in her work shoes, she wasn't quite tall enough to see over the plastic divider.
"Yo," came the gruff reply. "What's goin' on, Lisbon?"
She sent Jane a winsome smile over her shoulder. "I got you a tea. You like extra sugar and cream, right?"
"Yeah," he replied in his thick New Jersey accent. "Blonde as Christina Aguilera and twice as sweet. That's me." A hand appeared over the plastic screening, grabbed the cup and disappeared again. "Thanks, Lisbon. You're a doll."
She smiled fondly at the blank wall. Maggs had been the very first agent she'd ever had assigned to her. "Yeah well, don't tell the rest of your team it's from me, okay? I don't feel like listening to them whine about not getting them anything."
"No problem. Next round's on me," he replied over the clacking of a keyboard. "Catch you later, Lisbon. I gotta report due in twenty."
She turned around, smile still in place, to see a very surprised Jane staring at her.
"I can't believe you gave my tea away," he murmured, stunned. "That coffee shop uses PG Tips tea, Lisbon. It's real English black tea, not the watery imitation bags we have here. I've been looking forward to a cup all day." He was further nonplussed at the dark humor in her eyes as she stepped closer and poked him in the stomach, her shoes making loud squeaks on the tiled floor. Even her hair was soaked, plastered to her head like a dripping black cap.
"Just wait until I send you running with Van Pelt," Lisbon announced with a self-satisfied smile. "Can't have our consultant dropping dead of heart disease in the middle of a case, now can we?"
"It's just a little high cholesterol," he protested. "I could just take a pill and not worry about it. And I got on that infernal treadmill three times last week, so I have been exercising." He paused, eyes wide and pupils dilated in surprise. "I really can't believe you gave him my tea, Lisbon. That was cold."
Rolling her eyes, she patted his arm. "I've read the warnings on my father's pills, Jane. They all say 'use in conjunction with a sensible diet and exercise,' which you'll be doing while here at work, since a little birdie told me you were walking so slow on the treadmill that a toddler could keep up instead of jogging. No more pizza or Chinese, either," she added as an afterthought. 'We'll start ordering the vegetarian option for you."
She walked away with the very amusing whine 'But Lisbon!' in her ears. It felt nice getting one over on Jane. The opportunity came around so rarely.
---
She'd known Mondays always sucked, but Lisbon had thought she'd encountered the first real exception. Even Minelli's surprise earlier that day had turned into a satisfyingly comedic chance to beat Jane at his own game. Instead, fifteen minutes before the night-duty team for the week assumed duty, they'd gotten the call. A state senator's family found in a ravine in the family Saab with two dead and one missing. Yes, all Mondays did suck after all.
The drive to Santa Cruz felt longer than it actually was, what with Rigsby putting in headphones in the back seat and Jane beside her, continually yapping about this, that and the other. He kept circling back around to her 'cruel' prank earlier with his tea.
"You know what, Jane?" Lisbon growled after twenty minutes of his incessant carping. "You're absolutely right. I'm sorry. I'd be happy to ignore a direct order from my boss. In fact, I'll let you sit on your couch all day every day." She kept glancing over at him, only daring to take her eyes from the road for a second at a time. "And I'll order you a dozen donuts every morning, fried food for every lunch and encourage you to actually sleep even less at night." She snapped her fingers and exclaimed sarcastically, "Oh wait. You do that already, you arrogant idiot. You have to take care of yourself, Jane. High cholesterol at your age is pure lack of good sense on your part and easily avoidable if you actually cared enough to try."
"It's not arrogance," he countered easily, choosing to ignore the rest of her tirade. "It's charm- flair, if you will. Innate charisma." He gave her a winning smile. "You either have it or you don't."
Lisbon rolled her eyes and gave him a good poke in the ribs with her right hand. "Stop coming up with synonyms. It's arrogance."
"You just say that because you're jealous," he replied airily. "You wish you weren't so easily embarrassed by attention."
"I am not," she exclaimed loudly, hurriedly lowering her voice when Rigsby shifted in the back seat. He'd been dozing. "I talk to people all the time in our work, Jane. It's impossible to be good at what we do and be shy."
"Ah, but that's work," he said with a knowing air. "Personal attention spooks you like a skittish cat." He pointed suddenly. "Watch out for that car."
"I see it." Smoothly, she changed lanes, avoiding the aggressive driver next to them. She made a face. "Nice comparison."
"Well…" He glanced at her out of the corners of his eyes with a sly grin. "Have you seen your hair when it's humid? You bear a remarkable resemblance to a cat with its back up."
Lisbon gritted her teeth. And to think she had at least another two hours of this to look forward to.
"What?" Jane asked innocently when she didn't respond. "I like cats. They're aloof and interesting all at the same time. Plus, they can go from cuddling you to scratching your face off in a heartbeat." He grinned. "Fickle, if you know what I mean."
She harrumphed and continued to focus on the road ahead of her. If they were lucky and avoided any serious traffic snarls, they'd get to the crime scene while it was still light out. If not, she'd get the pleasure of a bitchy phone call from Minelli demanding to know why they hadn't arrived on time. It was Monday. She grimaced and glanced at the phone lying innocently on the seat between her and Jane. One guess as to the more likely option.
---
Twilight was just starting to set in as she, Rigsby and Jane climbed out of the Suburban. Cho had called for instructions, and he and Van Pelt were now taking the sedan over to the hotel with their bags to check everyone in. On the bright side, Lisbon thought as she stretched her sore back, the second they were done here, unless there were leads the thirty-something police officers milling around hadn't checked out, she'd be able to at least go sit in a cozy hotel chair while the team went over options and information.
"Boss?" Rigsby stood with the crime scene kit, waiting for her instructions. Jane was still fiddling with something on the other side of the vehicle.
"Come on," Lisbon sighed, waving him over. "Let's go talk to the locals, find out the deal."
Over an hour later, full night had set in and she was ready to walk over to the nearest tree and begin bashing her head against it. The combination of the senator's status, the dead wife and child, a missing twelve-year old boy and the general political melee that ensued in such cases was ridiculous. The local PD were scowling at the state police, who were whispering on their cells and shooting her nasty glares. Screw 'em, she thought. It felt like everyone here was trying to look good for the camera crews across the road rather than find a missing kid and figure out who'd caused the accident- the woman had clearly not decided to turn right off the middle of a bridge with her kids in the car. She looked around in dismay as the reporters called out questions to everyone in earshot. The senator's handlers were the worst; they kept crossing the police line to murmur to various cops, only to retreat to the reporters' microphones. Publicity whores, the lot of them.
"I feel like I need a top hat and a bullwhip in this circus," Rigsby sighed as he came back to her. He offered her his notes. "M.E. said it's hard to tell from the field exam, what with the fire and everything, but she thinks a hole in the wife's skull was from a bullet rather than the explosion. The kid's neck was snapped." He swallowed hard and accepted the steadying pat his boss gave his arm. He could deal with a lot of crap, but the kids always got to him. "She said it was from the crash. Instantaneous."
Lisbon nodded, flipping through his notes. "Any sign of the missing kid?"
"Nothing." Plowing a hand through his hair, Rigsby looked around for Jane, but the darkness and the floodlights created weird pockets of shadow he couldn't see anything in. "They brought in the scenting dogs, but no hits. The senator insisted on a search party, though, so Forestry has been brought in to check the countryside."
"They're not going to find him out there," she mumbled, squinting at his cramped writing. "Terrain's fairly easy to navigate, and there's not a lot of scrub or undergrowth. Plus there are too many roads through this area- a twelve year old wouldn't be lost for long out here."
He had to agree. "Look, boss, you're not going to like this, but there's not much else I think we can get here tonight. Maybe we should go back to the hotel and start fresh in the morning."
Even though it was counter-intuitive with a missing child and a high profile case, Lisbon had to agree. She'd talked to everyone, down to the shaky rookie highway patrol officer that had first seen the smoldering car. There were no hot leads, no eyewitnesses, no trace of the missing boy. Their best bet was that smearing this all over the news would produce a tip. Reluctantly, she nodded. "Yeah, all right. I'm going to talk to a few more people. Meet up at the truck in twenty minutes. And Rigsby?" She waited until she had his full attention. "Go back and find the medical examiner. Give her our number; I want to know the second she identifies the caliber of the suspected bullet on the wife. It may lead somewhere."
"Yes, boss."
She watched him trot away and craned her neck for a view of Jane. He'd begun at her side earlier and had wandered off at some point; she shrugged. He'd turn up when he'd found something.
Spotting the man she wanted to talk to, Lisbon trudged back up the embankment. Marcus Williams, the senator's aide, was surrounded by the media. Well, she'd just wait for him then. There was something about the man that was simply too polished, too on the ball given the tragedy befalling his boss' family. She wanted to see if she could press anything out of him if she had a minute alone with him.
The slither of something sliding around her throat and into her blouse startled Lisbon badly. It had taken several moments to figure out that it had been her necklace snapping, and several more to discover that the cross was no longer on the broken chain.
"Dammit," she cursed softly, checking the ground at her feet and shaking out her blouse as inconspicuously as possible. The damn darkness would make it nearly impossible to find her cross if it wasn't right next to her. Sneaking a look over her shoulder to make sure no one was paying attention, she hooked a thumb in her bra band and tugged to see if the cross had lodged in there. A twig snapped behind her and she whirled around guiltily.
Jane stood a few feet from her, studying her quizzically. "You look upset, Lisbon. Do you need some cheering up?"
Before she could reply to his odd question, he'd closed the few feet between them and tipped his face down so close that she could see the dark blue flecks around his pupils in the floodlight blazing over her shoulder. Opening and closing her mouth, she couldn't get a sound out as he gently threaded his hands through her hair, closing one around the tangled waves at the nape of her neck. The knowing smile on his lips was enough to raise the hairs on her arms.
With a chuff of victory, Jane straightened, offering up a fist to Lisbon, who looked as if she'd been stunned. "Your cross," he explained when she blinked owlishly up at him. Flipping it over his knuckles, he waved it in front of her nose. "It was caught in the snarl at the back of your neck."
"Thanks," she said brusquely, snatching it from his grasp and threading it back onto the broken chain in her hand. "Find anything interesting?"
"That Williams guy is hiding something, but I don't think it has anything to do with this. Possibly embezzlement or fraud of some sort." Jane peered more closely at Lisbon who seemed strangely loathe to meet his gaze. He reached out on a whim and snagged the cross from her open hand before she could respond. "Do you mind?"
She goggled at him. The nerve. "I do, actually," Lisbon growled, trying to take her necklace back. Damn him, he wouldn't release it, and she wasn't about to risk yanking it out of his hand and losing it for real this time. "Jane, give it back," she huffed.
He didn't know what made him do it; maybe it was the Medina case a month earlier, or maybe it was simply the little thrill that rippled through him every time he got to do this particular parlor trick. Whatever the motivation, Jane soon found himself rubbing the tiny gold cross between his thumb and forefinger. "You miss your mother more at times like these, don't you?" he asked gently, watching her face.
Lisbon withdrew sharply, tearing her hand away from where it rested on the necklace he still held. "And how in the world do you know that?" she asked waspishly. "No, let me guess- it's the way I blink, or maybe how many times I swallowed in the last ten seconds." Every line in her body was fraught with outrage and tension.
"No," Jane responded in a calm voice. He wasn't trying to infuriate her; on the contrary, he wanted her to understand that bringing things out in the open would be cathartic for her. "Those things only tell me that you find my suggestion accurate. They speak to the symptoms, not the cause."
She glared at him, arms folded tightly. The night chill was suddenly much more noticeable. "Or you Googled me. That's it, isn't it?" She wanted to stalk away, but she wasn't leaving without her cross. "You asked one of the others where I'm from and Googled me. Well listen up, Jane. I don't want to talk about it." She enunciated very slowly and clearly. "Take your circus act somewhere it's appreciated and leave my history out of it."
"I didn't Google you, Lisbon," he denied gently. "It's simply that you never wear jewelry of any sort except for the cross on your neck. You're not overly religious, since you can tolerate my disdain for their false proclamations of divinity everyday. Therefore, it has sentimental value. The cases that we handle that involve family vehicular deaths -like today- always bother you the most, so I'd wager that you received the necklace from someone you lost to a car accident. The manner you behave in suggests it was your mother. You always try to take care of all of us, control everything, because you're afraid of losing someone else. You likely ended up having to assume her role as caretaker."
She faced him coolly. "I wore the necklace and earrings you gave me." Lisbon held out her hand in a silent demand. "I want my cross back now, Jane."
"You were playing dress-up," he rebutted. "The emeralds I gave you were just a fairy tale in your mind." He held the cross tighter. The moment he gave it back, she'd be gone like the fabled flash of green at sunset.
Biting her lips to keep from yelling, Lisbon lowered her voice further. "Jewelry in this field is frowned on. Now give it back before I take out my stun gun and zap you, Jane. I'm not playing."
Tracing the outline a final time, he extended his hand. "Your mother must have loved you very much to give you this, Lisbon. It's old; probably a family heirloom. She trusted you." The expression on her face told him he'd read wrong, and the little zings of excitement in his blood evaporated like water on a frying pan. "Lisbon-" He laid a hand on her shoulder.
"Don't touch me," she hissed as she shook him off, horrified to hear the thick tears in her voice as she physically recoiled from him. It had been decades since it had happened; she had no reason to be so touchy now, especially since she knew someday Jane would try to read her like this. She'd been a fool to react so strongly.
Mesmerized, Jane watched in horrified fascination as a single tear welled over her lashes and slipped past the curve of her cheek, catching and refracting the floodlights. The sheer condemnation in her eyes felt like the sharpest of blows and for the first time since he'd remembered Carol Gentry, Jane thought about how much his talents shaded towards violation. "I'm sorry."
Lisbon dashed at her eyes fiercely. "You don't get to apologize," she snarled, keeping her voice low. "You had no right, Jane. No right." Turning on her heel, she stalked away, only to stop after a few steps.
"Lisbon-" he tried, feeling ashamed.
She whirled to face him once again. "My mother died when I was thirteen years old. I can't even remember exactly what she looked like anymore, but I can remember that I never got to say goodbye. I never got to hear about family traditions or receive heirlooms she wanted to give me." She dangled the broken necklace with its little cross from limp fingers. "My father gave this to me before the funeral. It was my mother's, and he was throwing everything of hers away in a drunken fit. I cried, and I begged, and he woke up long enough to throw me a scrap." Her eyes held a terrible, hollow pain he recognized all too well. "Don't you dare tell me how you know my mother gave it me, Jane."
As she walked away, a small dark shadow among more shadow, Jane grimaced. He didn't know what he'd been trying to accomplish, but he knew he had to set things right.
He frowned after her, looked up at the sky for a moment and headed for the other side of the dusty road. Mr. Williams had finally stepped away from the press to take a phone call. Now would be a perfect opportunity to talk to him again; later at the hotel, he'd find a way to make things right with Lisbon.
Assuming she didn't leave him there in her rage.
A/N: Okay, because I just have to get this off my chest (my apologies for those of you who aren't into Battlestar Galactica- go ahead and skip to the last A/N):
The finale? Pretty awesome overall. The ol' girl's final mission? Fraktastic. The ending they gave to Kara and Lee? Unforgivably lame. Seriously. We waited four frakking years of love, hate and perfectly tortured interactions, now complete with flashbacks to the equally awesome beginning, to see THAT? OMGWTF *wields pitchfork* RDM had better watch his six. I was invested, dammit.
… Ahem. Like I said, sorry. Needed to get that out before I woke up my husband just to say, "I frakking hate Ron D. Moore for this."
A/N2: But this is a Mentalist fic, and Jisbon makes everything better, so do your little part for my emotional satisfaction (shamelessly swiped the phrase from 'Bloodshot', which was a great epi), please?
It'll only take you a second- that's right, I know you're looking at that little review button with the seductively (emerald) green writing. Jane's not the only one with skills, yo. Click it. You know you want to. :D
