A/N: Sorry for the delay. No excuses, just wanted to apologize. Here's the real Chapter 4. I removed that God awful author's note. Remember, if I ever do that again, punch me. Okay, few things to address before we get on with the story. 1.) Thank you to everyone who's been reading. You've been a wonderful audience. I hope you continue to be entertained. 2.) I know Jane has been MIA for a while, but he will be back, I promise. I believe the next chapter or the one after, we'll go back in time and see what Jane did prior to when Cho, Van Pelt and Rigsby discovered that he was indeed missing. 3.) There's a clue at the end of the chapter. If you have theories about this clue, feel free to comment on them. I take reviews, PMs, smoke signals, carrier pigeons, you name it. That's it from me. Enjoy!

Spoilers: S1 Finale. If you seriously still haven't watched it yet, go do it now.

Warnings: This chapter is pretty kid friendly, except for the smidgen of violence. I don't think the rating will go up as I originally intended.

Disclaimer: Don't make me say it again. Fine, I don't own anything and although I want to, I'm not making any money from this *sigh*

Chapter 4 – Lisbon Had Enough

Lisbon wearily glanced at the ragged gash on her leg. The blood mercifully had clotted quickly, leaving only a dark red stain on her pants. Rohen stepped out not too long after giving her the lesson that she wasn't going to forget anytime soon. She was tired, hungry and alone. Her knees were scraped from being tossed around and her wrists were bruised from her struggles to get free. She wanted nothing more than to be curled up in her bed at this moment, enjoying the peace and quiet, instead of in limbo in this nightmarish Hell hole.

"Did you miss me?"

Lisbon glared at Rohen smirking in the doorway, without uttering a single word. He came in with a brown paper bag, setting it down on the table.

"I just had a lovely chat with one of your friends."

Lisbon immediately perked up.

"Sweet voice," he purred. "I can tell she's a red head, my kind of girl."

"You stay the Hell away from her," Lisbon growled.

"Don't worry, your pretty little mind, I don't think she'll find us in time anyway."

"You underestimate my team."

"I don't give a rat's ass about your team. My prize is Jane."

Clenching her jaw, Lisbon's mind began to kick into overdrive. She was done playing mind games with him, time to flip the tables and switch tactics.

"So tell me why all this trouble, Red John? Since you're going to kill me anyway, I like to think I deserve some kind of explanation."

He sniggered.

"You really think that psychological babble will work on me?"

"I don't know. You tell me?" she challenged.

"If you think I'm just going to spill all of my dirty little secrets to you, you're more pathetic than I thought."

"Oh I don't know about that, at least I'm not sloppy with my work."

With narrowed eyes, he glared at Lisbon. Bull's-eye. She hit a nerve.

"Sloppy?"

"Please, it's so obvious that kidnapping me wasn't part of your grand plan."

"Did Jane teach you how to be so aggravating or was that something you picked up all on your own?" he patronized.

"Jane can go to Hell for all I care. I'm quite perceptive when I need to be."

"You're a terrible liar, Agent Lisbon," he paused, before he continued. "Fine, I will admit, I never intended on killing you, at least not this soon."

A nostalgic expression flitted across his face, his arrogant smirk growing bigger by the second.

"Oh but when the opportunity presented itself, I just couldn't help it. I fully expected you to bring Jane back to the cruiser and we would have made the drive to Sacramento. Both of you safe and sound. I had my fix of torturing Jane. Actually, I wanted to disappear for a while, you know, unwind, relax. I hear Hawaii is nice this time of year," he paused and laughed. "Only Jane must have said some real hurtful things to you because you looked hopelessly destroyed. That pathetic, lying, little worm. How dare he. And so here we are. When I'm done with you, I get a front row seat to watch Jane's guilt eat him alive."

Lisbon felt positively disgusted, a blinding rage building within in.

"You know, everything panned out more beautifully than I ever imagined. Jane fell for my little trap, rid me of Dumar and, and my dear, he gave me you. I should really be thanking him right now."

"You're nothing but a trash talking puppet, Rohen. I don't believe for a second you're Red John. He wouldn't do things on a whim."

"If you want I can give you a nice matching scar on your other leg," he warned, his voice dripping with malice. "All you have to do is keep talking."

"Seriously, Rohen? Threats?" she scoffed. "If you were Red John, the real mastermind, you would have killed me ages ago. So the question is who's pulling your strings?"

For a relatively large man, he moved quickly. His face was in hers, his blade dug deep below her chin. Only this time, she didn't feel the least bit afraid, her body pumped on adrenaline and pure hatred. She was done being scared.

"You're not going to kill me."

"The knife in my hand says otherwise."

His mouth was almost touching her own but she didn't turn her head away. The tense stalemate was broken by the shrill ring of a phone. Lisbon cocked a brow at Rohen, a smirk settling on her lips. Her sudden brashness surprised even herself.

"Aren't you going to get that?"

Rohen gritted his teeth but reluctantly released his hold on Lisbon. He was just about to leave the room when he stopped mid-stride. With a menacing glint in his eye, he whipped around and thrust his heel into Lisbon's wounded thigh. A blood curdling scream tore through her throat as searing pain shot up her body. She could only watch as Rohen strode away, satisfaction infused into each step, as her cheeks moistened with unbidden tears. Flipping open his cell phone, he answered the call.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Rohen."

Lisbon strained to hear the voice on the other end. It sounded familiar. Her eyes flicked up, landing on his lips, as they twisted into a crazed grin.

"Mr. Jane," Rohen greeted smoothly. "I've been expecting your call."

"Did you find Jane's phone?" Cho asked Rigsby.

"Nah, before you got here I chatted with the waitress again. No one matching Jane's description ever set foot in the diner."

"Well it's here somewhere. GPS doesn't lie."

"I guess I can check the trash out back."

"Alright, Van Pelt and I will look inside. Maybe our waitress was busy and just missed Jane."

The men nodded as they parted ways. Van Pelt remained where she stood, still somewhat in shock. She refused to believe that Rohen was Red John, sure that they were different people. Their names had to be purely a coincidence.

"Van Pelt?"

Shaking herself from her thoughts, she looked over at Cho and regained her composure.

"You alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," she replied stiffly.

Cho looked as though he wanted to say something but decided to keep quiet. The pair walked up the steps and into the diner. Lacey's had seen better days. The once bright red linoleum table tops were faded to a light pink, peeling at the corners and stained with rings from old coffee. The smell of grease and cigarettes hung in the air and had seeped into the fabric of the chairs, foam visible along the stitched seams. Cho lifted his chin in the direction of the restroom and Van Pelt acknowledged. While he disappeared into a small hallway, she moved towards the cash register where a pretty red head was flipping through a magazine. Leaning across the counter, Van Pelt placed her badge in front of the girl's eyes, she immediately looked up.

"You must be Courtney Redding, I'm Agent Van Pelt."

"Look, I've already told the other really cute agent everything I know."

Van Pelt felt an immediate twinge of jealousy at the way Courtney said 'cute.' She pushed the feeling from her mind, berating herself for having such an irrational reaction. Courtney was staring at her, clearly annoyed, as she closed the magazine and tossed it to the side.

"I know," Van Pelt replied, evenly. "I just want to confirm a couple of details."

Blowing her bangs out of her face, Courtney threw her hands up in the air.

"Fine, whatever."

"You work here alone?"

"No, it's me, Denny, Chase and Lee in the back cooking. Obviously it's not just me."

"You told Agent Rigsby that a woman with dark hair and a uniformed man walked in here at six this morning?"

"Yes, that's right."

"Are you sure it was six?"

"Look, like I told him, I'm not a hundred percent sure because our stupid clock is broken but I have a great sense of time."

"Was this the woman you saw?"

Van Pelt handed over a picture of Lisbon.

"Like I told…"

Courtney trailed off as she got a better look at the photo.

"Hang on, no, no this isn't the woman that was in here."

"It isn't?"

"No, I've never seen this woman before."

"But you told Agent Rigsby…"

"I told him that I saw a woman with dark hair, I never said it was this lady."

Van Pelt was stunned as Cho approached her.

"I've got nothing," he announced.

"Well, I do. Courtney says that Lisbon was never here."

"She wasn't?"

"All she told Rigsby was a woman with dark hair was in here, not Lisbon specifically."

"Rigsby doesn't have a picture of Lisbon on him," Cho added, in sudden realization.

"And we jumped to conclusions."

Van Pelt turned her attention back to Courtney.

"Can you give us a better description of these two people?"

"I'm sorry. They were barely in here."

"Anything at all, Miss Redding," Cho said. "Even if you think it's irrelevant."

There was a long moment of silence as Van Pelt and Cho patiently waited for Courtney to dig deep into her memory.

"The deputy, his name it started with an 'R' or a 'P'," she whispered, in deep concentration. "I can't really remember. Ro something?"

"Rohen?" offered Cho.

"Rohen," she said, testing the name out loud. "Yeah, that could be it."

"Anything else?"

"Uh, they were talking about baseball."

A faint alarm went off in Cho's mind.

"Baseball."

"I think so. She had on one of those caps with the team logo on it."

The alarms were now deafening.

"Boston Red Sox," he supplied.

Van Pelt was now looking over at Cho, her mouth slightly open.

"Yeah," Coutrney replied. "How did you know that?"

His stone faced expression didn't falter.

"I must be psychic."

Van Pelt was about to ask him to elaborate when Rigsby came rushing in.

"Oh God, you smell awful," she gasped, covering her nose with her hand.

"Sorry," he replied, sheepishly. "I do have something, though."

In his hand, Rigsby was holding a couple of gears and loose springs.

"That's garbage," Cho deadpanned.

"Actually it's not, they're parts for a clock."

"Well," Courtney interjected. "Our clock is broken."

She was batting her long lashes at Rigsby. Van Pelt rolled her eyes.

"Yes, but why would you take perfectly fine parts and just throw them away?"

The smile on Courtney's face faltered ever so slightly at Rigsby's veiled accusation.

"M-maybe one of the guys, uh, threw it out," she stammered.

"Nice try, Courtney, mind telling us what you're trying to hide?" he asked. "I don't want to have to tell your parents that their daughter is going to jail for obstruction of justice.

The girl looked petrified and was teetering on the verge of tears.

"Okay, okay," she conceded. "Don't tell my parents."

"Talk," Cho ordered.

"The blond man, you were asking about, he was here."

"Jane," murmured Van Pelt.

"Sure, whatever. He said he was a cop and he was asking questions. The same questions as you."

"Did you tell him everything that you told us?"

"Well, yeah, except about the baseball," Courtney replied miserably. "He told me not to tell anyone he was here. He's not going to kill me for telling you, is he?"

Courtney's eyes were wide in fear.

"No, he's not," reassured Van Pelt.

"How much money did he give you to keep quiet?" asked Cho.

Avoiding the gazes of the three agents, she drew invisible circles into the Formica counter top with her finger.

"A lot," she whispered.

The three agents exchanged glances. Rigsby shook his head as he looked at the gears in his hand and then up at the broken clock. A neuron fired somewhere in the back of his brain.

"Courtney," he said slowly as he began climbing onto the table closest to the clock. "Did the blond man take the clock apart?"

"Yes," she admitted. "I didn't know why though."

Van Pelt and Cho watched as Rigsby ripped the clock effortlessly from the bracket it was attached to. He slid out the backing and immediately recognized the foreign object wedged inside before fishing it out with his hand.

"Bingo," he exclaimed. "I found Jane's cell."

Taking the phone from Rigsby's grasp, Van Pelt quickly switched it on and began searching the inbox. There was only one unread message. She hit 'open' and the team stared at the tiny screen.

DJR:)

C10is0RH

LH=Bard'sCelia

4!LBlauEichel

VMAg20

TNO

No one said a word for a long time before Rigsby voiced the thought on everyone's minds.

"What the Hell is that supposed to mean?"

TBC