Author's note: thank you very much for all the reviews and don't be worried about these two, I don't know how to write a sad ending; as for Jane overreacting... Nobody's perfect and has more or less fair reasons to react this way.

Chapter Fourteen: How To Make Things Clear

A bit sheepish, James helped Maura to stand up and offered her an apologetic smile. The man was blushing. He looked embarrassed by the sudden situation. Running a hand through his hair, he didn't remain close to the honey blonde as if too afraid of another misunderstanding.

He shook his head. "I am sorry... Listen, I will go talk to her and make things clear. You don't have to go through that, it is unfair."

On the verge of crying, Maura shook her head and adjusted her clothes. "Jane can be impulsive, this is just fine." She swallowed hard. "Impulsive and possessive."

But it was just a misunderstanding and nothing else. The timing had simply not been the best. Their position on the floor either.

She and Jane were just at the start of something big, something they hadn't taken the time to discuss. It brought up a lot of insecurities; a lot of uncertainties. They had left behind a strong friendship for something they didn't control at all. Something blurry. It was too fresh, as much as her gestures towards James had been genuine – completely deprived of any desire to do anything with him – to the point she had barely noticed the way she was lying on top of him.

Yet now that she thought about it, Maura found Jane's reaction exaggerated. If the Italian had come to such conclusion so easily then she didn't have a good image of her to say the least.

"Don't be worried. I am going to find her now. I am not really in the mood for some jealousy fit." A bit annoyed – already losing her patience – Maura smiled at James and exited the room.

But as she made it to the entrance, the honey blonde suddenly realized that the surface of Laurence's house wouldn't help. There were way too many places to go and hide; from the stables to the attic. She didn't even include the park itself. Lacking inspiration, Maura climbed the stairs to the third floor only to find an empty bedroom.

With meticulousness, she stepped into every single room of the second floor: in vain. Same downstairs. Apart from a couple of relatives here and there, the mansion was desperately quiet. Out of despair, Maura took a coat and stepped outside before heading towards the stables.

She spotted Jane there, caressing Arsinoe with care.

"I don't like it much when you run away from me..." Hands in her back – daring a smile – the scientist approached the brunette. Her appearant lightness contrasted sharply with her latent panic. She wasn't good at confrontation. Not good at all.

Especially with Jane. She cared too much about her.

The detective turned her head around and locked icy dark eyes into Maura's hesitant hazel gaze.

"I don't like it much when the person I've just slept with seems to have so much fun with her ex. You know, the ex you didn't tell me about. So much for making me pass for your freaking girlfriend. What the hell are you doing, Maura? Small wonder why you don't have news from Annabelle."

Jane would have punched Maura in the face that the shock wouldn't have been worse. Feeling her blood turn icy in her veins, the medical examiner swallowed hard and looked aside. Her lips trembled in silence. She clenched her fists.

Out of anger.

"Don't talk about things you don't know." Her cold tone took her aback. She couldn't help it. If the first part of Jane's comment had made a wave of shame float around – because of her lies – the allusion to a person she didn't want to mention had released an impressive amount of anger through her veins.

"Things?" Jane raised an eyebrow, surprised and sarcastic. "This is how you talk about your exes?"

Maura briefly closed her eyes – as if to restrain her surge of anger – before snapping back. "She is not my ex. I never slept with Annabelle! Never!" And there she was, yelling hysterically over these ghosts from the past she had hoped long gone and forgotten. "Annabelle was my friend and nothing else! Nothing!"

Taken aback by Maura's sudden explosion of anger, Jane remained quiet. She had never seen her like that. A fury. The honey blonde had turned into a fury; releasing an accumulation of despair that long years of silence had thickened to the point it now looked as dense as stormy clouds in a summer sky.

"Who told you about her? Who? Deirdre? Amy? Apolline? Who? We never slept together! She just liked me and nothing else. She was my friend... You have no idea how much it meant to me... She was my first and only friend. Then they all ruined it! All of them, insinuating things that weren't true at all. They made her leave. She left me because of them and their freaking gossip!" Breathing loud – too much in pain to cry – Maura bit her lips, lowered her voice. "They pushed me to come out... They pushed me to say it." She swallowed hard. "They pushed me to admit things I did not know how to deal with."

Closing her eyes before a reminiscence she wanted to forget, Maura shook her head. Nothing had ever happened with Annabelle but a strong friendship yet before her family's insinuations, she had succumbed to the pressure and admitted a bisexuality she hadn't known how to handle by then for it being new; and too blurry.

She had been forced into an unprepared coming out and had deeply suffered from it.

Jane straightened up and lifted up her chin defiantly; not wanting to recognize that she had jumped to conclusions regarding Annabelle a bit too easily.

Not that she was to blame. Maura's relatives – all of them – had let her understand that the honey blonde had certainly been very close to a woman the scientist had preferred to never mention. The silence had only encouraged the mystery.

But too proud to say anything, the Italian didn't give in. On the contrary. "And how could I know, with all the things you hid from me? Your ex, your family assuming I'm your girlfriend because... Because you didn't dare to tell them the truth. And why? If not to satisfy your ego? You lied to me, and used me. And now I find you fooling around with your ex while we just..." Jane bit her lips and swallowed hard. She took a deep breath, trying to calm her heartbeats. "Nobody knows that I... You might have made things clear for your family but mine doesn't know about me. Nor do my colleagues. So maybe it's easy and okay for you but it's not for me. There's a lot of things... Many things I have to deal with..."

Troubled – and guilty of her lies – Maura tilted her head on a side and squinted her eyes with great confusion. Jane was literally stuttering, now. She looked on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

"Nobody knows I sleep with women. I never said it. Not even to you. And while I finally give in – thinking that in spite of the weight of irreversible decisions I take it's worth it all because it's you – I find you on top of your ex with your hand on his nape while his are on your hips. How am I supposed to take it?"

For long seconds, Maura remained quiet.

It might have sounded stupid but she hadn't assumed that the brunette lived this secret part of herself so badly. Not that she was very loud and open about it herself but she was fine with it. It didn't eat her out as it seemed to be doing for Jane. All of sudden, she realized how delicate the situation must have been for the detective if she hadn't come to terms with her sexuality.

As for the rest – making her pass for her girlfriend when she wasn't – she had no excuse for it. Not a single one. She had lied - somehow - and this wasn't excusable.

With a soft voice, Maura tried to justify the situation. "I fell down the ladder while taking wood inside... I fell down on James and we both landed on the floor. It goes as ridiculously as that." And then it hit her. "Who told you he was my ex?"

Jane shrugged. With her arms crossed on her chest, she had never looked so vulnerable, so unsure of herself.

"Who cares?"

Maura pursed her lips. They had lost themselves into a painful imbroglio; because of lies and untold things. But too stubborn to abdict, they both forced the way to burning – harsh – feelings.

"When? When did you learn that James and I had been in a relationship?"

Jane flinched. If Maura hadn't told her about him – nor about letting her family think that they were more than mere friends – she herself hadn't been honest right from the beginning for not having told her that she knew; that she knew who James was and why Maura had felt reassured stating she was not single anymore.

Nobody wanted to attend an ex's wedding while being single. She understood the lie but didn't excuse it yet had not done any better herself by not admitting what she knew and when.

They both had lacked sincerity. For way too long to not develop a bitterness that made the start of a new relationship unhealthy. What had happened to them? How could they have lost themselves into this? They had built a net of untold things and were now trapped in it. Trapped into their own lies. Cruel irony.

Jane ran her tongue over her lips and shook her head before looking down. "I fought against inner... Inner insecurities to open to you last night, Maura. And maybe – as you said – nothing was about to happen with James. Maybe I jumped to conclusions, but only because it's not easy for me. And because... You lied to me... You didn't tell me the truth about him and the reason of my presence here. So I don't know... I don't know anymore if I can trust you when you come up with such excuses." A bitter laugh hit the air as she shrugged. "I don't know... I'm sorry."

The brunette turned around and left, her whisper embracing Maura icily.

A bit shocked, the scientist walked back towards the house and stopped by the steps as she heard the tires of a car on the driveway. She watched how a taxi appeared through the fog and stopped a few feet away from her. The door of the backseat opened, Constance stepped out of it; all smiles.

"Bonjour..."

It might have been the sudden contact – the human touch – or just because it was her mother's arms that the gesture managed to bring a sudden warmth to her heart, contrasting sharply with the coldness of her body.

Unless she had simply lost any capacity to hold it together.

Whatever it turned out to be – as Constance hugged her tight – something broke into Maura and she burst into tears.