AN: Thanks everyone for your reviews. Much appreciated. Sorry for the delay on this one... lots of work and home stuff and then it turned out to be a long one. Hope you like. :)

Jane woke to Lisbon saying, "I have to go." He pulled her tighter instinctively.

"Jane," Lisbon said. "I really have to go."

He opened his eyes. The room was brighter, the day already started. "I know," he said. He didn't want to let her go, didn't want to start the day, this day in particular, but once he loosened his arm around her, she slipped out and headed for the bathroom. Soon he heard the toilet and then faucet water running and when Lisbon returned, she looked fairly freshened up and chilled. She came and slipped back under the covers, pressing up against him for his warmth. He ran his hand up her arm.

"I'm just going to get warmed up, then I have to go," she said. "What are you going to do?"

"Did Rigsby ever go to the library?"

"Jane."

"If not, can you send Cho?"

"Jane, you can't just hole up in here and ignore everything."

"Why not? I didn't ask for those people to show up in my life."

"No. But they are here." She reached up and touched his bruised cheek gingerly. "Can I say something?"

He sighed.

"I've seen you provoke people for all sorts of reasons, but it's usually always a means to an end. Last night you were intentionally cruel to Ryan as a way to be cruel to Patricia."

Jane really didn't want to get into this. Ryan was someone else he was putting onto his Not Thinking About list.

"Jane?"

"What?"

"Leave him alone. He's an innocent."

"He's 26 years old."

"He's no match for you. You could cause unnecessary damage."

A protest was bubbling up, but before he could formulate it, Lisbon said, "Patricia has some explaining to do, but that boy has nothing to do with your legitimate anger at your mother. And you are a little bit jealous of him. That's not a good mix of emotion for anyone, but in your hands—"

"I'm not jealous," Jane said. "I just didn't like his attitude." What 26-year-old walks into a safe house full of CBI agents and starts demanding to know what is going on? Lisbon looked at him with a half-smile-half pitying and half disbelief. He frowned at her. "I'm not jealous."

She lifted up onto her elbow and leaned in to kiss him. That was more like it. He trailed his fingers up her arm to her neck and pulled her in for a deeper kiss. She let him, but soon pulled back. "I have to go."

"Will you come back tonight?"

He saw her thinking through his question and an ache of sorrow passed through him. A door had opened and he did not want to close it again.

"I don't know, Jane. I don't know how that is going to look to the team."

"Right."

She sat up and reached down for her clothes. "Come have breakfast with me," she said.

"I'd rather take a shower with you."

She stood and pulled her panties on. "Yeah, I am not going down to the team freshly showered and wearing the same clothes as yesterday."

"So you'd rather just go down there smelling like me and sex," he said smiling.

She was slipping her arms into her bra. "You're not going to play any games about this, Jane, are you?"

"No, of course not. I, more than anyone, know how serious this is." He had held off on thinking through the possible consequence of their night together, but now the gravity of it hit him with a sickening force.

She hooked her bra behind her and searched his face. "I've been thinking about that." She sat down and took his hand. "Red John has already asked you to bring my head on a platter. I don't think he'd be happy just killing me at this point. He wants you to do it."

"I don't think we can guess what Red John wants at this point. He's taken a serious turn." The wild fear he had felt the night before returned. "No one can know that we're … that we've taken a turn."

"We're in a house with three detectives and a pretty good psychic," Lisbon said.

"She's not a psychic."

"Still, she's pretty good. But, Jane, we don't even know what this is." She tightened her hold on his hand. "And considering the circumstances, this really is not a good time to figure something like that out."

"I'm not asking for us to figure anything out about this. I'm just asking you to come back tonight."

"Red John—"

"I don't want to talk about Red John," Jane said in a rush. "Not here. Not like this. I don't want him here between us."

Lisbon closed her mouth and looked at him. He saw her concern and hated it. "Okay," she said. She leaned over and kissed him again. She sat back up. "Come have breakfast with me. I don't know how much I'm going to see you today."

"I know what you're trying to do."

"What?"

"You're just trying to get me out there."

"Well, you do have to eat." She stood and pulled her pants on. "And I don't want to just leave you in here. But if you're coming out with me, you really should wash your face. You still smell strongly of me."

She smiled sweetly at him and it pulled a smile out of him.

"I will only want to touch you the whole time," he said.

"So it will be good practice in restraint." She smiled sweetly again as she pulled on her blouse and began buttoning. "Come on, it'll be nice. I'll make eggs."

Jane saw she had his blood on her shirt. He sat up. "I'll make the eggs. You keep Ryan off of me."

Lisbon left to check-in with the team while Jane got dressed. He pulled on his pants from the day before and a fresh linen shirt and left it at that. He didn't feel like getting all buttoned up. He really just wanted to sleep all day, and he thought he could actually pull it off without any pills. He'd get some food, hang out with Lisbon, avoid Patricia and Ryan and then come back to sleep. And he'd make sure Cho knew what to look for at the library. The downside of not thinking was excruciating boredom.

Once dressed, he lounged on the bed to wait for Lisbon. He wasn't about to go out there alone, and he knew she'd come looking for him when she got back upstairs.

Which she did. She opened the door without knocking and said, "Are you coming or what?"

Jane stood up and smiled. "Yes," he said walking to her.

She smiled disapprovingly while shaking her head. "You're a coward," she whispered when he was close enough.

"Meh," he said and reached out to slide his hand down her waist to her hip. He smelled scented lotion, or scented soap. "I can still smell me," he whispered back.

She swatted him away. "No games, Jane. I'm serious."

"I know. So how did the team take you spending the night with me?" he asked.

"They were fine. They're worried about you." She opened the door wider for him to pass through.

"Agents first," he said, smiling.

"Such the gentleman," she said, which made him smile wider.

He followed her down the hallway. "You seem to be walking just fine," he mused, which made Lisbon stop and turn on him.

"I mean it, Jane," she said.

He saw the fear and uncertainty that lay just beneath her toughness and he was immediately sorry. "I know," he said. "I know."

She turned back and he followed her out into the living room. Ahead he saw Patricia sitting at the kitchen island. When they arrived, Jane busied himself with the tea kettle and ignored her "Good morning."

"Good morning," Lisbon said. She came over and poured herself a cup of coffee before going over to sit opposite of Patricia at the island. "How is Ryan doing?" she asked.

"He's… better. He's still sleeping. We were up quite late."

"Look, I think you understand why we brought him here without informing you," Lisbon said.

"You don't trust me," Patricia said.

Jane put the kettle on to boil and turned to lean against the stove, arms folded in front of him.

"That's a serious withholding of information, especially considering the circumstances," Lisbon said.

"Yes, and I think you understand why I withheld it, considering the circumstances. And I would imagine by now you know that there are others, whole countries, in fact, that do not know my husband and I have a son." Patricia looked at Jane. "I am sorry Ryan hit you, Patrick. That is not normal behavior for him."

Jane raised his eyebrows to show how unimpressed he was with this information.

"Are you okay?" she asked. She clearly meant more than his bruised face, but Jane didn't answer.

"Ryan was provoked," Lisbon said. "That's not going to happen again, right Jane?"

Jane looked at her and he recognized the familiar refrain—Lisbon asking him to behave, to hold himself accountable, to play by the rules, play nice—but this time he saw something else in her face, an uncertainty that implied disappointment. He realized things were going to change now between them because this time he heard an even older refrain, and with it came an old pull he hadn't felt since Angela. For the first time in over a decade he found himself wanting to be the person someone else thought he was, someone better, not the man he knew himself to be. He couldn't answer her, because to acknowledge his acquiescence to Lisbon suddenly seemed a little bit like cheating on Angela.

"Right Jane?" Lisbon asked in her I know you can hear me so why aren't you answering tone.

His throat was closing up, but then he heard Patricia say, "Oh," in a way that made him turn to look at her. He saw her look of understanding, like she'd just seen something that surprised her, that she wasn't expecting, but that suddenly made sense.

"Oh, what?" he asked with a venom that sprang up immediately.

She was startled by his sudden attention.

"Oh, what?" he asked again, an angry heat rising up.

"I—" Patricia looked between Jane and Lisbon with confusion and stammered, "Nothing—"

"You don't know anything. Stop pretending that you do," he said.

"All right," Lisbon interjected, spreading her hands out before her. "I don't know what in the hell just happened but I'm going to be the one asking the questions," she said. "Jane, please."

Jane pushed off the stove and turned to start making breakfast. He found a skillet and set it on the stovetop.

Lisbon asked Patricia, "Can you tell me why you would keep your son a secret? Not just from us, I mean."

In the fridge, Jane found the makings for a cheese omelette and he pulled them all out and placed them on the counter.

"I know it must seem odd," she said. "You likely know that Ryan is not a U.S. citizen."

"Yes. That is very odd," Lisbon said.

"But it was necessary, or so we thought at the time. You see, Ryan was born into an environment of his parent's fears. I never planned to marry or have another child. Not after what I had been through. I could not imagine opening myself up to something that had proven so risky, so painful."

Jane found a bowl and began cracking eggs into it.

"But I met my husband a few years after I landed in Palo Alto. He was starting his doctorate at Stanford and he would camp out with his books and notes at the diner I was working at. My husband comes from a traditionally wealthy family of doctors, lawyers, and judges. The women play tennis and tend to the children with the help of nannies and prestigious schools. He had a very protected upbringing. When he became interested in me, I tried to dissuade him, but he was persistent. It was an odd and lengthy courtship, if you can even call it that. It all happened mostly during my shift hours." She gave a breathy laugh. "He was shocked by my past, and I did tell him everything. Really, I told him hoping it would cause him to lose interest, but it only made him become protective."

Jane added oil to the hot skillet and then whisked the eggs and milk.

"By the time he finished his dissertation a few years later, I was in love with him. He was steadfast and honest and he was, for whatever reason, in love with me. When it became clear he would be leaving the country and making a career of field work, he asked me marry him and come with him. By then I couldn't imagine not seeing him every day."

Rigsby appeared with a coffee mug in hand and seeing Jane at the stove he came over to stand next to Jane and peer down into the bowl.

"Hey," he said to Jane. "You doing okay?"

"Yes," Jane said and he reached to add more eggs.

"Thanks, man," Rigsby said and went to fill his mug at the coffeemaker.

Patricia was still talking and while Jane pretended disinterest, he was anything but. The story she told was the bridge over the wide chasm between the carney world and the one she now inhabited.

Jane whisked the extra eggs in and then poured them into the hot skillet, adding a handful of shredded cheese. Rigsby came over and leaned on the counter next to Jane, nibbling on the cheese.

"We had been in Kalimantan only a few months before a kidnapping of an American infant rocked the expatriate community there. The poverty in Indonesia is staggering and the expatriates who are there working seem wealthy in comparison to the natives, but they are often researchers like my husband or middle management of international non-profits. The ransom was too high and the U.S. government was no help. Two months later the baby was delivered dead to her parents with obvious signs of malnourishment. The cause of death was shaken baby syndrome."

Jane turned and leaned on the stove again, watching her.

She shifted uncomfortably on the counter stool. "It was upsetting to the entire community, but for me, it was traumatizing. It brought back all the memories of how I lost… how I lost you." She looked up at him briefly and he caught a fleeting glimpse of the depth of her pain. She quickly looked away with something very close to shame flickering across her face. "And how I lived after."

Rigsby shifted awkwardly next to Jane.

"You could say I fell apart, but it was worse than the first time. Randall had to take time off from his work and he very nearly moved us back to the states. It was a few more years before he ever brought up the subject of having children again." She was talking quieter now and focusing on the countertop in front of her.

Jane saw her determination to tell her story when she clearly didn't want to. He turned to tend to the omelette, though he suddenly wasn't hungry anymore and wished he had stayed back in the bedroom. The tea kettle came to a boil, and Jane took it off the burner. He didn't feel like having tea either. He found plates and forks for Lisbon and Rigsby and split the omelette in half.

"Thanks," Rigsby said, taking the plate offered.

Patricia continued, "And it took another year of negotiating the terms under which I would agree to bring another child into such a brutal world. Randall calls Ryan his Treaty of Versailles and he's the German who had to make all the concessions."

"And that was not declaring him a U.S. citizen?" Lisbon asked. "I don't get it."

Jane brought Lisbon's plate over to her and sat down on the counter stool next to her.

"That was one of the concessions, yes. By then I was working with the police throughout Indonesia on missing children cases. I knew that Americans, in particular, were targeted and that the Embassy lists were the often the first place kidnappers found their subjects. The other was that we moved to Brunei so Ryan could be born there. Brunei is a little sliver of a First World country in the midst of Third World realities. The hospitals were better, the privacy laws are strictly enforced, and the protection of foreigners is seen as essential to the economic growth of the country. Kidnappers do not dare to cross the border into Brunei when there are so many easy targets outside of it. The major concession was that Ryan and I would go very long stretches without seeing Randall. His work was in the jungle mostly and I could not take Ryan there very often, because of the cost of hiring armed security."

Her story explained why she never mentioned Ryan in her interviews. Jane looked at her, trying to separate his old emotions of sorrow and anger out so he could see her more clearly. Was she really everything she claimed to be? Could she really be trusted? He knew she had seen the change between him and Lisbon, and that scared him. That was potentially dangerous. He noticed for the first time that she had a moleskin journal, one of those blank travel journals, to the right of her and a pen sticking out from the place she had obviously been writing. How had he not seen that before now? He was not himself and it was starting to grate on him. Everything about her seemed natural, normal, and he couldn't help but think it was too normal, too natural. Could she really be that open and transparent? Jane had to admit that he didn't have a clue.

Patricia was looking at him now, reading him. "You've remembered something," she said.

An internal alarm went off in an instant. Was he really that easy for her to read? "No," he said. Why did she elicit such immediate responses? He hated his loss of control when with her.

"Yes, you have."

His jaw clenched involuntarily. "No," he said more forcibly. "I still don't remember anything about you."

He saw her brush off the sliver of hurt he'd cause as she continued reading him. "You've remembered something, though."

A noise behind him drew her attention away from him and he saw immediate concern on her face. He turned to see Ryan crossing the living room towards them looking much more subdued and cautious as he got closer to the kitchen. He had obviously slept in the clothes he'd shown up wearing-expensive jeans and a dark blue dress shirt now badly wrinkled.

Jane turned back and looked at the plate of food in front of Lisbon. "How are the eggs?" he asked, though he saw she still hadn't touched them. He looked up and saw her looking at him with a mixture of -was that pity or concern or anticipation of the worst? He didn't know and he didn't like it.

"Ryan," Patricia said, smiling tentatively as he entered the kitchen. She held her hand out to draw him towards her. He followed her lead and went to her. She reached out and grabbed his hand. "Are you hungry?"

Ryan shook his head and looked around the room with a fair amount of chagrin, which pleased Jane immeasurably. When Rigsby came over to stand next to Jane at the island, holding his plate and eating, but keeping an eye on Ryan, Jane couldn't help but smile and look at Lisbon. Rigsby had his back. Lisbon rolled her eyes at him, and Jane had the fleeting memory of her beneath him in the throes of ecstasy and he had a sudden and burning desire to kiss her into another such situation.

"Okay," Patricia said. "There's coffee and tea if you want it."

"Mom," Ryan said with great reluctance, "I've decided I'm not going to stay here." He looked at Lisbon. "I understand that you are calling this 'protective custody' but we are not obligated to stay here. We are not under arrest."

"That's true," Lisbon said. "But it is in your best interest to stay here where your safety is ensured."

"It's my understanding," Ryan said, speaking directly to Lisbon, "that there is no assurance of safety here, that any association with my half brother, in fact, ensures a very real lack of safety."

"Ryan!" Patricia admonished.

Ryan put his hand out to his mother. "No, it's true," he said to her. "Nothing good will come from this. We have to leave. Nobody really knows you are his mother. But being here, staying here, as if you need protection, will only alert those who want to know that there is actually a connection between you. There is no connection. We have to leave."

Jane watched as Patricia shook her head and pulled on the hand she was still holding. "No, Ryan, no."

"Actually," Jane said, his icy voice betraying nothing of the hot anger boiling up. "He's absolutely right. What a smart boy you raised, Mom."