Maura pulled her coat tightly around her as she walked through the empty streets of Oxford. The silence around her only served to increase the intensity of the thoughts rushing around in her mind.
Jane was upset, that much was obvious. Maura, although she found it difficult to figuratively put herself in another person's shoes, could understand that her actions- the things Jane had seen- had shocked her friend.
Maura knew that her behaviour was uncharacteristic. Although she was no stranger to a one-night encounter with a nobody from a bar, Harriet wasn't nobody. Harriet was a friend, albeit from the past, who had reached out for her help. From Jane's perspective, Maura wondered whether it seemed that she had taken advantage of her friend's weakened emotional state for her own carnal needs, or whether her resentment was more towards Harriet for doing the same thing to her.
She hadn't been thinking. Not rationally. The gin had helped, but Maura had gone to bed with Harriet for reasons she still didn't understand. After Paris, after Jane, she had felt flat. Delicate. Like paper. Knowing that her best friend would be 343 nautical miles away when she returned, that her life would be different – emptier- seemed to melt her resilience and drive away from her flesh as easily as chocolate in front of a flame.
Guilt burned inside her, churning in her stomach. Never before had she regretted a decision as much as this.
Taking a moment to stop and breathe, Maura tried to rationalise her thoughts.
There was a shame in that moment she was unfamiliar with. A shame that had followed her, shrouded her, every day since Jane burst into that bedroom and caught Maura's eye.
A shame that came from the fact that she had hurt the one person in the world she cared about more than anybody else.
Jane.
Walking slowly up the concrete steps of Harriet's terrace, Maura took a deep breath. Preparing herself, she pushed open the door and was greeted with cold silence.
"Harriet?" Maura called into the dark hallway. "Are you home?"
Hearing no reply, Maura set her coat and bag down in the corner and walked into the kitchen.
Sitting at the table, Maura picked anxiously at her fingernails as she watched the front door, waiting for her friend's return. They had a lot to discuss for the sake of their own friendship, and for Jane.
/
As soon as the hotel room door closed, Jane sank to her knees behind it and held her head in her hands.
So much had happened in such a short time. Paris seemed like a distant memory, and the Maura she had left there was much lighter, less burdened, than the woman who had just walked out of her room.
They were both hurting. That much was obvious. Jane, for all of her faults, was fiercely loyal and protective. Maura, with her zest for life and love of adventure, was a shell of her former self. A shell who was in love with her.
Jane ran a hand through her tangled hair as the thought hit her.
Maura was in love with her.
She had said it out loud.
Under any other circumstances, Jane would have reacted very differently. In her head, when she had played out the fantasy that her best friend returned her feelings, she envisioned herself pulling Maura into her arms, and kissing her soft lips gently, meaningfully, before uttering the same three words back to the blonde-haired doctor.
It had been difficult to quash the urge to react the way she had always fantasised, but the residual anger, distrust and pain she had felt seeing Maura with another woman crashed over her mind like a tidal wave. She was, although she hated to admit it, jealous.
Jealous of a woman she had met twice. A woman who, in her mind, was playing a very complicated game with her best friend's feelings. A woman who had dragged them both half way across the world and got them caught up in this mess in the first place.
"God!" Jane cursed, pulling herself to her feet and throwing herself down on the bed. She had no energy left to pack, to book a flight, or to run away again.
The pillow across from her found its way under her chin as Jane breathed in the subtle scent of Maura she had left on it. Pulling a honey blonde hair from the white cotton, Jane sighed, succumbing to the urge to snuggle into it and close her eyes.
/
The room was dark.
The two, writhing bodies were covered only by a thin, white sheet, lightened only by the moon seeping from the crack between heavy curtains.
"Oh!"
Her head tipped back, eyes rolling as her hair brushed against the pillow.
"Oh!"
Her hands grasped forcefully at the sheet, pulling it out from under the mattress.
"Oh Jane!"
Green eyes found hers. Stared. Stopped.
Reaching for the door, Jane couldn't turn away. She couldn't stop watching as the dark-haired woman continued to lap at Maura's centre. Taunting her.
Slowly, she lifted her head and wiped her mouth.
Flicking her hair from side to side, the woman reached up and grabbed the side of her own face. Pulling, she ripped off the flesh to reveal an entirely new face.
Alice.
Jane's breath caught in her throat.
Alice Sands.
"Did you miss me?"
/
Turning on the lights, Jane sat bolt upright in her hotel bed. A cold sweat seeped from every pore as she grappled for her phone with her shaking hands.
Alice Sands was gone.
She was a ghost now.
That's all.
But she had to be sure.
Dialling a familiar number, she rested against the headboard and tried to slow her frantic pulse.
"Jane?"
Maura's voice brought her back to reality. Every fear seemed to dampen instantly.
"Jane are you okay? I've been calling you but you didn't answer."
"No... No I'm sorry. I fell asleep. Is everything okay?"
Jane listened as Maura took a shaky breath.
"Harriet is missing."