DISCLAIMER:: still not mine

A/N:: still here waiting for the world to end. as per the request of a loyal fan i am posting chapters 10 and 11 (not 12 though; i have to leave a little mystery). enjoy! and if we're all still here tomorrow, i might post 12.

-/-

They were all seated around the table again, brainstorming this time.

"He's not wasting any time, killing one vic a night."

"CSU found no prints at either crime scene."

"No trace evidence either, no hairs, no foreign fibers."

Jane sighed and tossed the file she was flipping through on the table with a resounding thud. "So in other words, we have nothing? Where are we on our fan letters? Please don't tell me none of them panned out?"

Moore cleared his throat. "We narrowed it down to five possible suspects. Two had alibis, one is recently deceased."

"What about the other two?" Jane leaned across the table. It was the closest thing they'd had to a lead since the autopsy of Nia Kettner.

"One traces back to a Mr. Harold Limon who has a PO Box up in Salem. However, Harold Limon, our supposed author of some pretty grotesque stuff, has been dead for over six years, nearly three years before he started writing this garbage. And the other goes back to the address of a vacant house out in upstate New York. It's a dump of a place that's been declared unsafe to inhabit, but the owner is not willing to have it torn down. It was her childhood home. I had the owner checked out and she's clean, but that doesn't mean someone isn't using the mailbox to send and receive mail. The carrier on that route said he's delivered several letters there in the six months he's had the route but every time he comes back to deliver another, the box is always empty. Somebody's grabbing it."

Jane frowned. "How can Harold Limon's PO Box still be receiving mail? If he's been dead for six years, he obviously hasn't been making payments."

Moore nodded. "That's what crossed my mind too. The employee I spoke to said that our particular PO Box is paid for in cash by a young woman on the first of every January and July. He gave us a description, but he doesn't know her name."

Everyone looked so defeated. They all knew how strict of a clock they were on. If this unsub kept up the frequency of his kills, they'd have another body on their hands by the morning. And there wasn't enough man power to patrol every inch of Boston and the surrounding suburbs.

"I might have a link between our two victims."

Every head in the room whipped around to face Maura. She hardly ever spoke when it wasn't related to an autopsy or crime scene analysis, and she most certainly never used words like might. Or at least she never used to.

When she saw that no one was objecting, she continued. "CSU found Repronex in the house of our second victim, Nia Kettner. Of course, since the womb is missing from both our victims, I can't say with absolute certainty."

"What's Repronex?" Darren Crowe raised an eyebrow. He took a long sip of his coffee.

"It's a fertility medication containing hormones from the purified urine of…"

Darren Crowe spit out his coffee in a blast, narrowly missing Korsak. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Ugh, I'm sorry I asked."

Jane ignored him. "Go on Dr. Isles."

"I think our connection is a fertility clinic in Newton."

Jane shook her head. "There was no evidence of any fertility treatments in the Ries residence."

Maura nodded. "I know, but I… had a hunch. I looked up fertility clinics in the Newton and Brookline area and came up with three possible. After that, it was a matter of calling them. Delow Women's Clinic in Newton has both Nia Kettner and Marnie Ries as patients."

"Our common link." Korsak looked at Dr. Isles in wonder, as did the other detectives at the table.

Jane raised her eyebrows. "What about doctor/patient confidentiality? How did you get them to give up that they were patients?"

Maura shrugged. "I pretended to be Marnie Ries wanting to make an appointment and then I called back and did the same for Nia Kettner."

Jane was amazed. Maura had always been interested in only cold hard facts. If there wasn't solid evidence to support something, she simply refused to acknowledge its existence. And yet here she was, acting on instincts and tracking down leads that they, the trained professionals, hadn't yet thought of. Not to mention, she had blatantly lied about her identity, twice, and had been convincing.

Jane looked at Korsak, Crowe, and Moore. "We need a list of employees for the Delow Women's Clinic. A list of patients would be nice, but I'm sure they'll claim doctor/patient confidentiality. I want the files of both our vics, don't take no for an answer, threaten a warrant if you have to."

The boys nodded and dispersed.

"You, are brilliant." Jane smiled at Maura.

Maura smiled back, but didn't respond. She grabbed the autopsy reports she'd brought up with her and got up.

"Maura?"

She looked up at Jane. "Hmm?"

Jane crossed the room to stand before her, avoiding her eyes. "I was uh, wondering… do you still love me?"

Maura set down the reports and put her hands on the sides of Jane's face, lifting her gaze. She leaned in, her lips moving dangerously close to Jane's, coming so close there was less than a centimeter between them. She pulled back, her eyes intense with longing and another emotion Jane couldn't read. "We can't do this Jane…"

"Do what?" Jane leaned back in, closing the distance between their lips once more.

"This. Us." Maura closed the last inch and her lips pressed roughly against Jane's.

The detective pulled Maura's thin frame heavily against hers. She'd forgotten how amazing the forensic pathologist felt against her, almost as if they were made to fit together.

Maura was, of course, the first to pull away, though she kept her body pressed into Jane's. "I can't stay in Boston, you know that?"

"But you're here now." Jane graced Maura with that signature crooked grin that made the ME bow to her every whim.

"If we're going to do this Jane, we're to go into it knowing that it will end. Are you okay with that?"

Jane nodded. What she didn't say was that it didn't matter to her what Maura said about going back to San Francisco; she'd change her mind. All she needed was a little time and she'd remind Maura of every reason they'd been amazing together. She'll stay. I know she'll stay.