CHAPTER ELEVEN
A/N Last chapter was a bit bloodthirsty. I'm going to totally go in a different direction, we're going to slow things down a little and let folks have some much needed conversations. Thank you all for reading and dropping a line to tell me what you think.
"You might wanna slow just a bit, it's the next house on the left." Korsak directed as they shot down the residential street at seventy miles per hour.
"No time to slow down!" Jane barked dragging the wheel hard left and half flying, half tumbling into the gravel drive.
Korsak flung his arms up shielding his face. Gravel pinged so hard against the car he feared it would shatter the cars' glass and shred them to pieces. "I'd really like to live long enough to retire." He barked.
"Then I suggest you stop criticizing my driving and help me rescue Maura!" Jane slammed the car in park, unholstered her Glock and double-timed it to the front door.
On a silent three count, Korsak flung the outer glass door open and gave a hard kick to the solid wooden door. If the door had been locked, he would have found himself on his back wondering what happened as the door was solid oak. "Nice of him to leave it unlocked for us." He whispered and took a step inside.
Jane rushed through the door calling for Maura through every room. There could have been ten armed men waiting to ambush her. Her only thought was saving Maura. "Maura, where are you?"
"In here, Jane." Korsak called from the kitchen. "She's out cold, but breathing steady."
"Oh God, Maura!" All the pent up emotions rushed her. Jane dropped to her knees beside the sleeping figure draped across the table. With a trembling hand she smoothed the honey blonde hair away form the face she knew so well. "I keep putting you in danger. One of these days our luck is going to run out. I can't keep doing this to you, to us."
Korsak had stepped into the living room and called for the paramedics. He went through the house room-by-room, giving Jane time to process her emotions. "All clear." He called from the top of the stairs. The ambulance could be heard in the distance. He made his way back to the kitchen feeling ten years of tension roll off him. This had been a close call.
Jane was still on the floor her hands holding Maura's. She reluctantly allowed the paramedics to transfer Maura to a stretcher and load her into the back of the ambulance. "Go ahead, ride with her. I'll meet you there after I call Frost and Frankie and give them the good news."
Jane threw herself into his arms and buried her face in his chest. "Thank you for always being there." She gave him a tight hug and leapt into the ambulance.
A soft knock woke Maura from the light sleep she had drifted into after giving her statement to the FBI. She had been devastated after hearing that no one had survived in the barn. The charge Brian set had blown the walls in and cut off all avenues of escape.
"Feel like a little company?" Angela Rizzoli asked hopefully.
"I'm always up for a visit from you, Angela." Maura put on a brave smile and opened her arms to receive a welcome embrace.
Angela placed a take-out container on the bedside table and pulled Maura close. "You did everything you could." It was clear to see that Maura was blaming herself for the deaths of the four women in the barn. "If that rogue agent hadn't knocked you out and tried to blow the entire place away, you could have gotten a message to Jane and Korsak and things might have worked out differently. Might have. The important thing is that you are safe."
A shiver of revulsion raced over Maura. "Those Savages were using them for spare parts. Just taking orders and selling kidneys, livers and hearts to the highest bidder."
"Jane told me." Angela bit her lip seeing the look of distress that filled Maura's eyes. "And to think the wife had been a nurse. There are evil people everywhere. We just have to remain grateful that there are wonderful people like you to balance the world."
"Will you do something for me?" Maura asked her voice soft, her gaze on their linked hands.
"Anything, you just name it." She truly loved Maura as much as she loved her own daughter.
"The Agent-In-Charge, said Brian survived his injuries. Will you ask if he will let me visit him?" Maura gave a firm squeeze and finally met the warm gaze of Mama Rizzoli.
"Of course I will. You get some rest. I'll be back to take you home in the morning." Angela promised standing to take her leave. In her opinion, it should be Jane coming to take Maura home, but her daughter wouldn't hear it. Something was really bothering Jane.
"Isn't Jane coming…?" Why hadn't Jane been back? What message was Jane sending by her absence? She had heard from Korsak how broken up Jane seemed when they found her. The nurses had told her Jane stayed at her side until the Doctor made her leave the ER. That had all taken place while Maura had been unconscious from the drugged lemonade. Now that she was conscious again, Jane hadn't called or visited.
"We will all see you in the morning." Angela promised and dropped a kiss on Maura's cheek before leaving.
"Thank you for the soup, and please don't forget to tell Brian I'd like to talk to him." Maura closed her eyes and allowed her mind to drift. She just wanted things to go back to normal.
"I think this is yours." Frost said holding Maura's Mont Blanc pen in his handkerchief so as not to leave fingerprints on the expensive writing instrument. He had replaced Mama Rizzoli as Maura's ride home.
"My graduation present. Thank you for finding it."
"Actually, that appreciation belongs to Korsak." Frost stood shuffling from foot to foot. "Listen, Agent Banks is being transferred to a DC hospital later this morning, so if you want to talk to him, it has to be now. He's heavily sedated, but the nurse says he's in and out and pretty with it sometimes"
"He agreed to see me?" Maura asked breathless. What would she say to him once they were face to face?
"He is eager to talk to you, seems he wants to apologize for slipping you that drugged lemonade."
Maura tossed back the covers and slipped her feet into her slippers. She felt silly spending the night in the hospital, but everyone had insisted. Everyone except Jane. "Let's go." She walked toward the door waiting for Frost to join her.
"I'll be right here if you need me." Frost assured pointing to the wall just outside the room where Brian Banks lay in critical condition. He only hoped the Charge Nurse didn't pay a visit.
"Thank you." Maura faked a confident smile and slipped into the room.
"Y…you ca…came. So sor…sorry for drug…drugging you." Brian stammered floating in a morphine induced haze. He was amazed she agreed to see him. At least he hadn't ruined her life.
Maura pulled a chair close to the bed and looked at his drawn features. She had gotten an update on his condition every hour as the nurses came in to check on her. She knew he had lost his pancreas, one of his lungs had collapsed so he had a chest tube and he had lost several feet of his large intestine. But he had survived the first round of surgeries. If they could prevent infection, he could return to a fairly normal productive life. He was being transferred to Walter Reed Military Hospital for the remainder of his hospitalization.
She drew a shaky breath and asked the question that had been floating in her mind for hours. "Why didn't you call for back up? I know the FBI doesn't like to involve local law enforcement in their operations, but you went in alone. Why?"
"J..James." Was his one word answer. He hadn't saved him. His plan failed and now his partner was dead and his career was so over.
"Were you trying to rescue him, or ?" she couldn't bring herself to ask the question.
"He was m..my part…partner. My fau…fault in that me..mess." Brian drew a painful breath and pressed the button for another hit of soothing Morphine. All he wanted was to swallow his gun. This had been worse than any pooch screw he had ever heard about.
Maura stood and placed her hand over his on the medication pump. "I'm sorry for your loss."
"I'm not an agen…agent anym…anymore." At last the Morphine pulled him into it's healing arms to sleep for a few precious painless moments. He could escape the sight of a dead James as long as the drug cradled him.
Maura pressed his hand again and then fled the room to rejoin Frost. She dabbed her tear bright eyes and asked in a shaky voice. "Why hasn't Jane visited?"
"She's here." Jane stepped out of the shadow of the nurses station and nodded for Frost to disappear.
"Where were you?" Maura asked her voice choked with tears.
"Thinking." Jane led them down the stairs and out to sit on a stone bench overlooking a fountain surrounded by lilies.
"This isn't your fault. We work in a dangerous profession." Maura tried.
"I work in a dangerous profession. It's my job to put my life on the line every single day, but you. Your job is cutting up bodies. You didn't sign on to take bullets, get kidnapped and drugged."
Maura ran her fingers over the back of one of Jane's hands tracing the scar from Hoyt's scalpel. "True, they don't include classes on those subjects in the curriculum, but it goes with the job. Criminals don't want to get caught and they will do whatever they feel necessary to avoid getting caught."
"If you hadn't been going with me to talk to my asshole Father, you wouldn't have been taken." Jane snarled. The thought of Frank packing his new love into his car and just driving off into the sunset made her blood boil.
"Jane, you are my friend. I wanted to be there to support you." Maura traced the scar again. "If I hadn't been so dramatic in the parking lot, you wouldn't have been distracted. This whole mess was my fault."
"I know better than to get angry over a pair of ignorant rednecks. I was transferring my anger for Pop onto you and the rednecks. It wouldn't have mattered if they had been waving rainbow flags and wearing red slippers. My mind wasn't working like a cops'. It was working like a daughter betrayed by the Pop she idolized as a kid."
"That might have been a good look for those guys." Maura teased releasing Jane's hand.
"Maura, you mean the world to me. If anything…" Tears began sliding down her face and her voice broke. "I can't do this. We can't anymore."
"Sshh." Maura stood and pulled Jane to her feet. "No one is forcing us to put labels on ourselves or how we feel about each other. You are the most important person in my life. I want you to know that, but I also know that a knock on my door telling me something had happened to you would kill me as sure as any bullet."
Jane locked her arms behind Maura and pulled her close. She couldn't imagine not seeing Maura, not spending time with Maura. But she understood exactly what Maura just said. If anything happened to take Maura from her, it would be as if she died too. She pressed a soft kiss to the pulse thundering near her lips. "So what do we do?" She whispered fighting tears.
"We live everyday as if it were our last. Right now this is too intense, too raw. We can take it slow. Let it unfold as it will. Give these recent wounds time to scab over and heal." Maura spoke as strongly as she could manage, glad Jane couldn't see her terrified face. Was it worse to lose what they had, or one day lose Jane altogether?
"So, we keep things casual?" Jane asked taking a small step back. She needed to see Maura's eyes. There, the terror she felt. They were in the same emotional storm. Maybe Maura was right, they just needed a little time to heal. A little distance to make things clear. No one was losing anything or anyone. They would still see each other everyday and spend loads of time together. After all, they did work in the same building and Ma did still live in Maura's guesthouse.
"Sounds good to me, but you still owe me dinner Rizzoli!" Maura informed her smile almost reaching her eyes.
"I know this great little restaurant, it's in apartment 12. Seven sound good?" Jane teased.
"Sounds great." Maura agreed this time her smile genuine. They were going to be OK. It would just take some time.
The End!
A/N So this ends this little tale. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I'll be doing a little research and then I'll be telling my version of how Rondo came to be on the streets. I'd love to see you there!
A sincere thank you to those who reviewed!