A/N: This is going to be a tough chapter for some of you, just trust me when I say it can only get better from here. Please tell me how you feel, cause if this chapter doesn't make you feel... I failed.


Chapter Eight: In Another's Eyes.

In another's eyes
Starin' back at me
I see a sinking soul trying desperately
To turn the tide before it dies
In another's eyes

-Trisha Yearwood, "In Another's Eyes", from the album "Songbook".

"Get up," Maura tugged on Jane's arm that was hanging off the side of the bed, "Please wake up Jane." She had tried to be patient when she had arrived at Jane's apartment, she had made coffee and spent time basking in the view of the Charles River, but she soon became agitated. She needed to talk to Jane and she was tired of waiting for her fiancée to sleep off an obvious hangover.

Feeling the tug on her arm Jane made an exaggerated attempt at swatting away the annoyance before rolling over onto her back only to find her eyes falling on the semi perturbed Maura. Sitting up quickly and instantly regretting it as pain seared through her temple she husked out a barely audible greeting, "Hey Maur."

"We need to talk," she turned and started walking towards the doorway between the bedroom and open plan living area, "Now."

Jane exhaled slowly and closed her eyes; she was too hung over to have the conversation that Maura was obviously ready to have. She brought a hand to her forehead trying to will the headache away, cognisant of the fact that not only did she need to go out and face whatever Maura had to say; she had to tell her about Cate's visit. She considered her lesson learned and not being forthright and honest was no longer an option if she wanted to navigate this rough spot they were in.

Recognising that the longer she took to shuffle her butt into the other room the longer Maura had to work herself up Jane finally relented and fought against the exhaustion, dragging herself lethargically into the living area. She could tell that Maura was rightly worked up as she paced back and forth in front of the balcony windows. Feeling dizzy just from watching caused Jane to quickly find the couch and sit. "Okay Maur, let me have it."

Maura stopped pacing and turned to face her fiancée, "The crime lab results came back on DNA I scraped from under Valentina's fingernails; it belonged to the dead prison officer."

"Okay." This was not where Jane had envisioned the conversation would start, but now that it had she wasn't sure if she should share her theory about what had gone down.

"He had defensive wounds on him Jane." Her brow furrowed as she contemplated the irrational leap to conclusion she had made back at the morgue; that Officer Fallon had attacked the inmate with the intention to kill her. There were still reasons that the officer may have had defensive wounds on him, especially if he had been attempting to restrain the inmate; but deep down if she was to trust what her gut feeling told her she knew that he had intended to kill Valentina and had in fact succeeded.

Sensing the Medical Examiner's distress Jane decided to fill in the blanks as she knew them to be, "Fallon was on Paddy's payroll, I have no doubt that the riot was just a cover for a hit on Rossi."

Maura moved closer to Jane, taking up position in an armchair opposite the couch. Leaning forward with elbows on knees she studied Jane intently, "You know who the deceased guard is? How can you be so sure he is on Paddy's payroll?"

Jane rubbed her temple, anything to dull the thumping in her head. "Cate told me it was Fallon when I spoke to her and I have first hand experience with him."

"Right." Maura had flinched upon hearing Cate's name a stark reminder that there was a lot more she needed to talk to Jane about than what had happened to Rossi. She stood and walked over past the kitchen island to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water and walked it back over to Jane handing it to her; she had noticed the sign of discomfort. "Re-hydrate Jane."

Jane readily accepted the water and had scarfed half of it down before Maura had returned to her position opposite in the armchair. "Thanks," she managed to mumble before watching and waiting for Maura to say something more.

"It hurts Jane, it really hurts."

"I know Maur." She was only ninety five percent sure that her fiancée was talking about the Cate revelation, part of her wondered if it was about the grief over Rossi, so she didn't want to be too committal either way.

"I trusted you." The words fell out of her mouth a lot meeker than she would have liked, but Maura knew that their impact would be the same regardless.

"I know." Jane sighed, if she was going to do the right thing about that morning, now was the best time she may get to speak the truth. "I need to tell you something else," she held up a hand to shush Maura before she could interrupt, "I dunno why I did it Maur, but in the midst of my drunken haze I called Cate in the early hours of this morning. I apparently begged her to come over here and she did. Nothing happened though, I promise."

Maura started fidgeting with her engagement band as she tried to process yet another piece of information designed to rip at the fabric of everything she believed in. Still she decided to try and focus on the facts rather than the emotion, "If you don't know why you called her, how can you be so sure nothing happened?"

"She told me as much when I woke this afternoon and I trust her." Jane eyed her fiancée warily, looking for any hint of further irritation or hurt. The truth seemed to come with a cost lately.

"She was here with you all morning?"

"I was asleep." She put the emphasis on sleep.

"I see." Maura felt her anger begin to rise, but she tried to remain calm, anger was not going to allow for an open discussion.

Jane sighed, exasperated. "Look nothing happened okay? She's as pissed at me as you are!"

Maura sighed and rose to her feet, moving over to the balcony windows she stared out once again at the river. Her emotions were begging to get the better of her and it was clear the hangover was not helping Jane's patience. "Perhaps I should go. I'm not sure I can have this conversation calmly right now."

That was the last thing Jane wanted. She pulled herself up off the couch and walked over behind Maura where she wrapped her arms around her waist, but only after her fiancée had flinched but not retreated from the touch. She rested her chin in Maura's shoulder, "Please don't go Maur." I need you, I love you; please let me make this better the thoughts she never spoke.

In that moment when she had given in to Jane's touch Maura broke. All the emotions that had been fighting to come to the surface expelled themselves angrily as she turned around in Jane's grasp and pounded on her chest in an attempt to break free. "Let me go," she growled angrily, tears pouring rapidly from her eyes.

If you asked Jane about it later she would have said she didn't know why, but she knew that as she held on to Maura it was more than physical. She was holding on to their love, to their future. She feared if she let go it would be over and so she held on tight, taking everything Maura had to throw at her until she stopped hitting and merely trembled instead. "I will never let you go Maura."

"It's not fair," she sobbed as she wrapped her arms around Jane's neck and buried her face in her shoulder. "I hate him so much Jane, it's his entire fault. Everything. I don't know in what universe he thinks anything he has done has protected me or shown me love. All he has done is cause me misery and broken my heart time after time. He uses people Jane, he uses them and then he discards them."

Jane tried to soothe her fiancée by rubbing her back gently, but mostly she just listened as it was obvious that Maura needed to express all the pent up emotion she had been feeling. "I know Maur," she mumbled in support.

"It's because of him I am mourning a woman who tried to kill you; it is because of him I lost you in the first place. He took you away from me Jane and then manipulated me into a situation that turned so ugly." She paused to catch her breath for a moment before continuing, "And then what does he do? Has her killed, the one he manipulated in the first place. I hate him Jane, I hate him so much."

"It's gonna be okay Maur, I believe it." She held tightly until the shaking subsided and waited to see if her fiancée had anything else to say.

Maura didn't believe it. "And the worst part is that because of him you needed her and because of him, we're broken." She removed her arms from around Jane's neck and started to pull away.

Jane's heart sank the moment Maura had used the term broken to describe them. She dropped her arms and allowed the retreat. "You think we're broken?"

Maura looked down at her engagement band and worked it off her finger. Looking up at Jane and seeing heartbreak in those dark eyes only served to increase her own heartache. It wasn't Jane's fault, she knew this, but she also knew she had reached her breaking point. She couldn't do this right now and she wasn't sure she could do it again. She placed the ring in Jane's palm, closing her fingers over the band. "Yes," because if she was broken, then they were by default also broken.