Note: Well, I'm back from my weekend away with the family. I've also started work again after having been off for 7 weeks so free time is a little harder to come by. My inbox exploded after the previous chapter and I liked reading people's different reactions to what happened between Jane and Maura. I hope you'll enjoy the next chapter as well.


Chapter 9

Jane woke to the sound of rain. It pounded against the window and lulled her back into the land of the living. Coffee coloured eyes fluttered open as the sound penetrated her mind. She lay on her stomach, with the bed sheets wrapped around her naked body. The bed was cold, she noticed, and she slowly turned her head to find that the other side of the mattress was unoccupied. Tentatively Jane reached out a hand to find the sheets cold.

"Maura?" she called softly, her voice low and raspy as if she'd smoked too many cigarettes the night before.

The images of the previous night came flooding back to her. Maura. She'd been here, in her arms and in her bed. They'd made love in a way Jane had never made love to anyone before in her life. Somehow Maura knew her in a way that nobody else had ever done. Jane felt the familiar throbbing between her legs as she remembered Maura's body, wet from the rain, pressed against her own.

She sat up when there was no answer and her eyes darted around the room, lingering for a moment on the alarm clock beside the bed. 5.45 am. It was still dark outside but dawn was only an hour away. Jane's gaze drifted around the room and fell onto the clothes spread across the plush carpet. She recognised her own but noticed that Maura's clothes were missing. Maura was gone.

"Fuck," Jane hissed as she slipped out of the bed. She flinched when she stepped on her badge and the plastic pierced the delicate skin between her toes.

She was butt naked but for once she didn't care. She padded across the room and stepped into the bathroom hoping that perhaps Maura had just taken a shower and was still in there. She knew, deep down, that she wouldn't find the medical examiner but as she walked into the empty bathroom, Jane's heart sank.

She turned on the shower and turned to the mirror to face her own reflection. She saw the dark purple bruise left behind just below her collarbone and her index finger circled it, remembering how Maura's searing lips had left it there. Tears welled up in her eyes without warning and she suppressed a sob as she stepped into the shower. Jane winced as the water poured down on her head.

What have I done? She thought as she rinsed her hair and tilted her head so that the warm water flowed across her face.

Maura had left sometime during the night. Jane didn't know when. All she remembered was that their time together had felt endless and that they had fallen asleep in each other's arms. She'd heard Maura's heart beat and felt it against her chest. But sometime after that Maura had slipped out from under the covers and from under her arms, took her clothes and left.

She's getting married, Jane remembered and covered her face in her hands. Tears mixed effortlessly with the water pouring across her skin. Somewhere deep inside she ached and the pain began to spread. It crept into her chest, filling up her heart, before it found a way into every other part of her body. Jane had never felt pain like it and she shivered. Her head snapped up when she remembered she was meeting Megan at the airport later her stomach turned.

She scrubbed herself down as best as she could, leaving her skin red raw, and stepped out of the shower. She dried herself off, slipped into a pair of black pants, a baby blue blouse and her blazer and brushed her damp curls out of her face. The dark rings around her eyes betrayed the lack of sleep and the turmoil she felt inside. Jane noticed her hands were shaking as she put on her watch and the nausea was overwhelming. When she turned around and saw the tangled sheets on the bed she felt every piece of her heart break inside her chest.

Jane left her room after picking up her badge from the floor and strapping her gun to her waist. Her footsteps echoed hollow along the hotel corridor as she walked to the elevator. She pressed the button for the lobby and stared down at the ground, unable to look at herself in the mirror for another moment longer. Gone was the longing, gone was the intense feeling of warmth she'd felt when Maura had kissed her. All that remained was shame, pain and resentment.

As she stepped outside she hailed a cab and glanced up to the grey skies. The rain fell in sideways sheets, relentless and unforgiving, and thunder rumbled in the skies over Boston. Large muddy pools of water had formed on the streets and she had to take a step back when the cab pulled up so that the dirt didn't spray up her pants. She climbed into the backseat, slammed the door and as she sat down she came to the heart wrenching conclusion that Maura had to have done the same thing in the middle of the night. She tried not to envision the forlorn sight of the honey blonde woman standing outside her hotel in the pouring rain but it was too late; the image had already etched itself onto her brain.

"Where to?" the driver asked and his voice knocked her out of her thoughts.

"Logan Airport arrivals, please," Jane answered. Her voice was constricted with tears and she caught the cabbie's eye as he curiously checked his rear view mirror, intrigued by the woman who had just gotten in.

She'd be way too early to pick Megan up but anything was better than staying in her room, surrounded by Maura's scent on her sheets or the confrontation with Deanna that would be inevitable. Jane rested her head against the window and watched as the raindrops slid down the glass. Traffic was still quiet. The only cars about were taxies ferrying people from one place to the next. Within the hour the roads would be gridlocked with commuters on their way to work.

The drive took the best part of half an hour, all of which Jane spent playing the events of the previous night over and over. She could still see Maura's eyes as they stood outside in the rain. She'd looked so hurt and so broken just before their lips met and Jane could barely bear the guilt of knowing that she was responsible for all of that. She'd lost herself in those sparkling hazel more times than she dared to admit and last night had been no different. She'd lost herself in Maura completely, just like she had always done.

Meeting Megan after leaving Boston had been a fluke. She hadn't been looking for a relationship. In fact, she didn't even want one but there was a downside to being alone and away from Boston and that was the loneliness. There was never anyone waiting for her at home or in a bar when she finished work and she'd missed the times where there was someone who would smile at her and could take the demons of her job away. Although Megan saw plenty of monsters herself, somehow she always managed to chase some of Jane's shadows away. But there had been one thing not even Megan had been able to erase; the memory of Maura.

She looked up, startled, when the cab pulled up in the taxi rank and Jane reached into her pocket to pay him. She then clambered out of the vehicle and quickly walked into the arrivals terminal. It was busier than the morning she had arrived here and she made a beeline for the first available coffee bar. After ordering herself a double latte and picking up a donut she found herself a quiet table to sit. She took the lid off her coffee and just stared at the liquid in her cup whilst picking away at her donut without actually eating it. The minutes passed slowly. Too slowly.

Her phone vibrated in her pocket and Jane fished it out. Her breath hitched when she saw those two words flash across her screen. Maura Isles. Her finger hovered over the 'accept' button but then moved to the 'ignore' one. She pressed it and released the breath she'd been holding as she put the device down next to her coffee cup. She half and half expected it to ring again but the screen remained blank. Maura didn't call back.

By the time she'd drank half her coffee and torn her donut to pieces without eating a single bite, Jane got up. She walked around the airport, wandering in and out of the shops. None of them really interested her but she just wanted to kill time. When her phone vibrated again she almost ognored it but checked the caller ID at the last second and saw Deanna's name.

"Hey," she said as she answered. "What's up?"

"I knocked your door. Where are you?" her partner asked.

Jane rang her fingers through her curls. "At the airport," she replied. "I'm meeting Megan, remember?"

"This early?" Deanna questioned. When Jane didn't answer she continued, "I was just curious how it went with Maura last night."

Jane swallowed hard and chewed the inside of her cheek. "It went allright," she answered and did her best to sound calm and normal. If Deanna found out what had really happened she knew that shit would hit the fan. The lump in her throat almost made it impossible to talk. "We talked."

"What about?"

"Stuff."

"Jane, c'mon. You haven't seen her for two years. Surely you must have talked about something?"

"She's getting married."

Saying the words out loud only made her hurt even more and Jane's grip on her cell phone tightened so much that her knuckles turned white. What she and Maura had done was wrong on so many levels. Maura was engaged. Jane was seeing Megan. She didn't even know where to begin to try and explain what had led them to end up sleeping together. All she knew was that they had.

"Really? Wow."

There was a stumbling sound and Jane guessed that her partner was still in her room, probably getting dressed. Judging from the slightly distant and hollow sound she suspected that Deanna had put her phone on speaker. She smiled to herself.

"People do that, you know," Jane heard herself say. Somehow the words came out without her mind really registering what she was saying. "They get married."

Deanna chuckled. "Normal people do, Jane."

"Are you saying I'm not normal?"

"I'm saying you're not the marrying type."

Jane thought about those words for a second and her eyes were drawn to the board that displayed the scheduled arrival times for the incoming flights. It would be another two hours until Megan's flight landed.

"Listen," she said, "when you get to BPD, get Frost and Korsak to organise the incident room ready for when Megan and I get there." She swallowed hard. "And ask Maura to join us. I think she should hear the profile too."

"Why don't you call her?"

"You do it," Jane answered quickly. Too quickly. "I don't really want to intrude on her too much."

"OK," Deanna answered. "I'll see you when you get here."

"Yeah, see ya."

She hung up and then scrolled through her missed calls. Maura's name popped up and her heart started beating faster. She knew deep down that she should have answered her call when it came through but she couldn't change it now. She pressed the 'call' button and brought the phone back up to her ear. It rang once, twice and then a third time. It continued to ring and eventually Jane reached Maura's voicemail. A single tear glistened in the corner of her eye when she heard the other woman's recorded message.

"You have reached the voicemail of Doctor Maura Isles, Chief Medical Examiner. If you leave a message I'll get back to you as soon as I can."

"Maura, it's me. I'm sorry I didn't answer your call earlier. I guess… errr… I guess I didn't really know what to say. I still don't. I just… I noticed you were gone when I woke up this morning and I wanted to say I'm sorry. I.. I don't know what else to say. If you get this message, will you call me, please?"

~()~

Maura played Jane's message for the sixth time. Red marks across her cheeks told the silent story of where her tears had been and her shoulders shook as she heard the other woman's voice fill her kitchen again. When the message finished she finally ended the voicemail and turned around, fresh tears streaming down her face again.

She knew that she should have regretted what happened between her and Jane but the realisation that she didn't had startled her. It had first hit her when she slipped out from under the soft sheets and quietly got dressed. When she turned around to see Jane still fast asleep in the bed, dark hair cascading down her back and her arm stretched out, covering the spot where Maura had been, she realised that all she really wanted was to get back into bed and never leave. When she closed the door to the hotel room behind her she knew that the best thing she could do was walk away and go home. Jane's hotel room, Jane's bed, was not where she belonged.

It had been a little after half past two when she got home. The front door had been locked but Matthew had left the chain off. She'd locked up behind herself and removed her shoes before walking over the wooden floor, careful not to wake him. She'd padded into the guest bathroom, took a shower and changed her clothes. As she washed herself she erased any trace of Jane still lingering on her skin. But the water couldn't wash away the memories and the images flashed before her eyes as soon as she dropped her guard. She couldn't forget Jane's searing lips against her own or her slender fingers carefully unbuttoning her shirt, soft fingertips grazing against her glowing skin.

She'd curled up on the couch with a blanket and a pillow but couldn't sleep anymore. Just after six o'clock she heard Matthew's footsteps in the bedroom and a few seconds later the door to the living room opened and he found her. He'd kissed her forehead and asked her where she'd been. For the first time in her life she lied and looked someone in the eye when she did it. The fact that she felt nothing, not even guilt, whispered to her that something had changed.

"I got called out to another scene," she'd answered and never even blinked as the words rolled off her tongue. She looked him straight in the eye and she lied. Perhaps it was because she was the daughter of a notorious mob boss and somehow those genes got the better of her or maybe it was just because she really wanted him to believe her. More than that, she wanted to believe herself. "I took a cab home but I didn't want to wake you. I know how tired you get after a long surgery."

They had breakfast together and he made her fresh orange juice. He looked through the morning paper as she stared through the kitchen window, watching the rain pour outside. Matthew then took a shower and got dressed. He kissed her goodbye. On her cheek, because she turned herself away from him. She doubted he even noticed.

Now she was alone, in the quietness of her own home. A home, she remembered, Jane had visited countless times. There had been moments where she almost believed Jane lived with her. She had her own drawer full of clothes; her beer had been in the fridge, she cooked more grilled cheese sandwiches in Maura's kitchen than she did her own and her cereal and instant coffee had their own place in the cupboard. Now there was white wine in the fridge and Matthew's organic granola in the cupboard. There wasn't any instant coffee and the smell of grilled cheese sandwiches had been long since forgotten.

Maura was snapped out of her musings when her phone rang and she spun around. Her heart sank when she noticed the unfamiliar number flash across her screen and answered. "Doctor Isles."

"Hi, Doctor Isles, this is Agent Deanna Perera," said the woman on the other side of the line. "Jane's partner." Maura didn't need reminding who the other woman was and felt irritation coil in the pit of her stomach at the use of the word 'partner'. "Is this a bad time?"

"No, it's quite allright," Maura answered, biting back her disappointment that it wasn't Jane who called her. "How can I help you, Agent Perera?"

"Our profiler will be joining us later to set up a more detailed and in depth profile of our copycat. We think it would be a good idea if you joined us. After all, you've been working the case since the beginning. Your opinion would be very much appreciated."

"Of course." Maura heaved a sigh. She wished there had been some kind of way she could avoid going to BPD today. The idea of facing Jane terrified and unnerved her. She wasn't sure she would be able to cope with laying eyes on the other woman and feeling the way she felt. "I'll be there."

"Great. We start at eleven. I'll see you then."

Maura ended the call and tossed the phone onto the island counter. Her eyes drifted around her living room. Since Matthew had moved in there had been some changes. He'd brought a leather armchair that she absolutely hated. He sat in it most nights, reading one of his medical journals. A couple of football awards dating back to his time in High School had somehow found their place on her bookshelf. She never really noticed them before but now she saw them properly for the first time.

She swallowed hard but the lump in her throat didn't move. Maura averted her gaze and stared down at her left hand. She hardly ever wore the ring Matthew had given her when he asked her to marry him because it would catch on the inside of her glove, causing it to tear. It was kept safely in her jewellery box and she only wore it on special occasions. She stared at her ring finger and wondered, for the first time, if it was all worth it.