They pull up to the little house in the middle of the day. Maura looks at Levi in the rearview mirror as the little boy looks out at his old home. It looks like a perfectly normal place on the corner of a perfectly normal block. There is nothing to suggest that a double murder and kidnapping happened here just under a month ago.
"You ready, Levi?" she asks quietly, and two blue eyes find hers in the mirror. "If you want to wait longer, we will under-"
"Is Jane here yet?" He cuts her off like he's not listening and then seems to remember his manners, "Sorry," he says, quickly "I didn't mean to-"
But Maura waves him away, pointing at Jane's cruiser parked a little ways in front of them. "She's here. That's her car right there. I bet she and the girls are inside." Maura watches as Levi nods, looking comforted.
Something happened between her wife and this boy in the flooded basement in Revere. Maura knows it's something more than the two sentence explanation Jane had given at the hospital, and even something more than the version she had given Maura a couple of days late. Although she is practically itching with curiosity, Maura does not press either of them, knowing that one or the other will talk when ready.
They are here to pick up Levi and Noah's things, clothes books toys, anything you want to bring with you to Beacon Hill.
"Maura?"
"Yes, Honey."
"Is mom and dad in there?" When she meets his eyes in the mirror again, she knows he is not asking about whether or not they are alive, but about whether or not their bodies are there.
Noah looks up from his car seat happily. "Mommydad?" he says looking out the window expectantly.
Maura takes a breath. "No. They're not in there."
Noah's face falls, but he doesn't say anything.
Levi looks back at the front door, nodding and then his face cracks into a grin as it opens and Jane appears, holding tight to Sofia's hand.
He looks at Maura, who nods, before he unbuckles his seatbelt and jumps out of the car.
"Look, Noah, She says, turning off the ignition. "Who's that?!"
Noah looks around, and he smiles widely. "Jay!"
Maura smiles, nodding. "That's right, Little man! Let's go see!" She opens her door as Noah wiggles excitedly in his seat.
It would be fairly easy to get Noah to call her "Mommy" and Jane "Mama," but both women have decided against it until they are officially named parents, and even then they want to leave it up to the children.
This return to the crime scene, to the Owens' house, had been Jane's idea.
She'd suggested that Noah and Levi could go and get some items from the house if they wanted, and Levi at least had jumped at the opportunity, his rare smile lighting up his face.
"Are you sure it's a good idea?" Maura had asked her in bed that night.
"They lost their parents Maur…but they don't have to lose the memories, right? We can get them pictures and their toys and stuff…That would probably be good for them, right?"
And Maura had kissed her. Hoping that was enough of an answer.
Sofia follows Levi through the house, keeping her distance like she seems to understand that he is doing something important. Isabelle stays with Jane in the front hall, looking all around.
"Why are we here, Mama?" she asks, whispering, just in case.
Jane watches Levi and Sofia out of sight. "We are here to pick up a few of Levi and Noah's things so that they can feel more comfortable with us.
Isabelle looks to Noah in Maura's arms, and Maura sees the wheels turning."Are they gonna stay with us for a long time?"
Jane glances at Maura. "Yes." She says finally. "They are."
Isabelle chews her lip, but does not ask any more questions.
"I'm going to go see how he's doing in there. Iz, you want to come with me?"
Isabelle shakes her head, dropping her mother's hand and moving to Maura. "Mommy, pick me up," she says.
"Bella, you're a big girl," Maura begins but Isabelle cuts her off.
"I want you to hold me."
Jane glances over her shoulder to look at Maura who gives her a meaningful look. Two sets of arms. Four children.
It begins.
Jane sighs and pushes open the door of the bedroom where Noah and levi slept.
Levi is sitting on the bottom bunk, his face is tear streaked. He has not seen the detective yet. Jane goes to comfort him, to tell him they can come back, but then her eyes fall on Sofia, who is standing in the middle of the room, in front of a pile of clothes and a duffel bag.
As Jane watches, she holds up a striped t-shirt.
Levi nods once, and Fia drops it into the bag. She reaches down and picks up a pair of tan pants.
Levi shakes his head and Sofia throws it aside, bending down again.
Jane watches astounded, until Levi says, "I don't want any more of that stuff." And Sofia nods, looking around the room.
"This self now," she says, struggling to drag the duffel bag to a shelf where lots of the boys toys reside. She picks up a model airplane and shows him.
"Daddy made that for me," Levi says, his voice straining against tears, and without skipping a beat, Sofia crosses the room and hands it to him. She doesn't linger near him, just turns back to the shelf and hold up another toy.
Levi shakes his head.
Jane turns away, walking back down the hall.
Maura is sitting on the couch with Isabelle and Noah tucked into her side, and she looks up at Jane as she appears.
"How are they doing?"
Jane glances over her shoulder, and looks back at Maura, smiling.
"Perfect."
...
Wednesday. No cases have come in and they are not on call. Maura carries Noah up the front walk from the car, reaching for the mail with one hand and holding tight to the baby with the other. Both Sofia and Isabelle had been clingy infants. Not in the sense that they wanted to be held all the time, but in the way that when anyone picked them up, they held on like leeches. Noah seems blandly disinterested in holding tight to Jane or Maura, and he makes little effort to hang on when Maura needs both her hands. But he wants to be held all the time. Maura sighs, trying to ease her keys out of her opposite pocket with one hand.
She sets Noah down on the floor in the entry hall as she flips through the mail, making her way to the kitchen. Noah toddles after her quickly, intent on keeping her in his line of sight.
"Up, Momo, Up!" He says catching up to her as she pauses at the kitchen counter, setting Jane's mail aside. He has not yet mastered the syllables of her name, and Maura smiles as she bends to lift him again. Maura's arms are tired, she is out of practice at holding on to a child so much, and this child feels different in her arms. Like a shoe that someone else has worn.
"We'll grow into each other, won't we Noah," she says quietly, bouncing him up and down to make him smile. "We'll get used to holding and being held by something different. Won't we?"
He giggles, "yeah!"
She smiles and presses the flashing button on her answering machine. Why they have an answering machine still is beyond her, absolutely no one important uses their home phone. She frowns as an unfamiliar voice floats out of the little box.
"Hey, Jane, it's Leah…McCarthy," Maura stares at the answering machine, frown deepening, Noah sees where she's looking and turns his head too, trying to make his eyebrows contract like Maura's.
"who?" he asks, Maura shushes him.
"It was really good to see you yesterday, however briefly. We didn't get to catch up nearly as much as I wanted to…" There is a pause, and several things are happening in Maura's chest that she cannot name, but the one thing she can makes her breathless with anger. Jane saw Leah and didn't tell me.
"So…Anyway, I think you might be at the precinct, which is where I'm heading…So maybe I'll catch you there. And If I don't catch you there, definitely give me a call…you have my number…It's been way too long…By Jane."
"Bye!"Noah says cheerfully, and Maura looks at him, feeling like the room has gotten much, much warmer.
She sets Noah on the kitchen counter and leans against it, trying to control her breathing. Her first thought is that she should go to the precinct. Jane is there with Levi, picking up a few things before swinging by to get the girls from daycare and come home.
Maura's second thought is to erase the message and wait for her wife and time how long it takes Jane to mention that she ran into her ex-girlfriend.
She looks at Noah, swinging his legs idly over the counter, looking at his fingers.
"Noah. Do you want to go see Jane and Levi?"
Noah brightens immediately, nodding "Jay? Brothah?"
Maura nods and Noah reaches out for her as she grabs her coat again. That is all the convincing she needs.
...
Maura would know Leah McCarthy anywhere, and as she rounds the corner and heads into the bullpen, she feels her stomach tighten. Jane is leaning against her desk, speaking to a tall skinny blonde woman who is leaning in to catch Jane's words like they're the most interesting thing she's ever heard.
"Oh, my Gosh, that is so amazing!" Maura hears the woman say, and she feels her face get hot. She stands in the entry way, torn. Wanting to watch her wife interact with this woman, the most important relationship she had while Maura was gone, and also afraid of what might happen if she does not intervene. Leah's body language makes Maura seethe with anger. She leans towards Jane with a clear and singular purpose. To get to her.
Maura glances at Jane's coolly impassive face, watching her wife's brown eyes sweep the woman in front of her, like she's looking for something.
"Jay!" Noah has spotted her and calls out, making the detective turn and look around. She smiles when she sees Noah, but then she sees Maura's expression and she goes a little pale.
Noah wiggles and Maura lets him down. Following him on only slightly more stable legs.
"Jay!" the detective scoops the little boy up in her arms, planting a big wet kiss on his neck. He squeals in delight. Leah is looking at Maura, frowning slightly, like she's a mild inconvenience and not Jane's wife.
"Maur," Jane says, and if she's surprised to see the medical examiner, she doesn't say. Maura leans in to kiss her, and Jane answers the way she always does. Maura slips her hand around Jane's waist, turning to look at Leah. She smiles sweetly.
Leah raises her eyebrows slightly. "Leah, this is Maura," Jane says.
"Maur, this is Leah McCarthy, she just transferred back to Boston from Seattle."
"mm," Maura says non commitally "Honey, where is Levi?"
Jane hides a surprised smile at the pet name behind a flick of her head. "Frost took him to see some weird digital, something…" she says.
Maura turns back to Leah, who fixes her face quickly to one of pleasant interest. "How do you know Jane? Did you two go to the Academy together?"
She sees Jane's face work on staying blank out of the corner of her eye. Maura knows exactly who Leah is. They have no secrets from each other.
Leah looks a little bit sour as she responds, "No…Jane and I lived together…For a while, actually," She appraises Maura for half a second, and Maura reads her easily. She still wants Jane. "You've been all over Europe, Jane tells me. I can't imagine all the wonderful things you…did."
Maura narrows her eyes a bit, and unbidden, the image of Jane with her arms wrapped around this woman comes to her. She swallows.
"It's lovely, but it doesn't compare," she says, and there must be something in her voice, because Jane squeezes her, standing up a little straighter.
"Maura is the best Medical Examiner Boston has ever had," she says, and her voice is casually inflected to suggest that she's the best at other things too.
Leah's blush is fast and complete, but she bites her lip and looks at Jane, reaching out to tickle Noah's chubby leg. "Seattle's squad is pretty great too. I learned a ton out there."
Maura gathers herself, suddenly loving her big brain. "Seattle has almost 23% less crime than Boston does," she says, finding her brightest smile, leaning forward to take Noah from Jane's arms, placing a kiss on her wife's cheek. "So I'm sure there was plenty of time for low stress training and running scenarios." She smiles at Jane, who honestly cannot hide her shock now. "I'm going to go look for Levi. You almost ready?"
Jane nods dumbly, and Maura can feel her eyes on her as she walks away. Jane's eyes. On her.
Right where they should be.
...
"Was she ever this good?" Maura's hand works her wife expertly. Jane's eyes open wide and she looks up at Maura, her face half shocked half hazy with pleasure. As soon as everyone was down, Maura had wasted no time in pushing Jane down on the bed and stripping her. She feels the need to put her mouth on every part of her, reclaim her.
Jane had made no protest, letting Maura press her back against the pillows and work her up, moaning quietly as the doctor had entered her, finally.
"n-no," Jane stammers, her eyes shutting tight as Maura changes her rhythm, pulling a low growly moan from the brunette.
"She could never make you feel like this," Maura says, watching Jane flush, her head rolling back and forth, shaking no. "n-ever" she says her breath catching as Maura adds a finger. "no one," she manages, rolling her hips against Maura's hand, "no one but oh, God…Maura."
It's one of her favorite parts of this position, watching every part of her wife come undone so completely. She feels powerful and loved and strong. She bends to kiss Jane's shoulder, her fingers moving faster, harder, pulling Jane closer to the edge. Demanding that she meet Maura there. The brunette groans underneath her and her muscles flutter. "You're mine," Maura whispers, and Jane nods, wrapping a leg up and around Maura's waist. "No one else's
"I hate how she was looking at you. I hate that she had you…still wants you…Not that I blame her…But I want you. I get you…You're mine," The more she says it the more possessive and aroused she feels, and she bites down hard on Jane's shoulder, moaning as her wife cries out softly, fingers scratching at her back. "God, you're beautiful… And you're perfect, and I love you. I love you so much, Jane."
Maura pulls back, wanting to look down at her when she comes. Want to see the emotions pass over Jane's face.
She's crying.
Jane has shuddered beneath her with what Maura assumed was the beginning of her release, but when Maura looks down, she is crying big gasping tears, even as her back arches up against Maura's fingers and she begins to tighten and fall into her orgasm.
"Jane!" Maura tries to stop, tries to hold back, but even as she pulls out, even as she stops her own hips moving, she realizes that it's too late for both of them. "Oh," she says, her head falling onto Jane's shoulder beneath her as her climax hits her. "Oh, no, Oh, God Jane," she hisses and her hips buck once against her wife, even as she tries to suppress the feeling. They cling to each other hard, pressed against each other by the strength of their release. And then Jane's muscles finally relax, and she falls back against the pillows, still heaving, tears still slipping down her face. Maura presses in against her side and they lie together, Maura running her hands through Jane's hair as the taller woman curls into her, trying to control her tears.
"Talk to me," Maura says, her free hand rubbing up and down Jane's back. "Jane. Did I hurt you? Honey, talk to me, tell me what it is. I'm so sorry, I."
"I love you so much," Jane's voice is muffled against Maura's chest.
Maura pulls her tighter, "I love you too. I'm sorry. Are you hurt, Jane?" Maura pushes Jane's head gently so she can look into watery chocolate eyes. She feels her chest tighten in panic. Not only does Jane look like she's in pain, she looks scared too. Scared of Maura?
"Oh, God," Maura says, and her hands move to cup Jane's face, to pull it towards her kiss the lips, the side of the mouth, the high, beautiful cheek bones, still wet with tears.
"Jane. I'm so sorry. I-"
"I don't deserve you," the whisper is low and harsh.
Maura looks down at Jane, too startled to even hold on tighter as Jane swings her feet up and out of the bed, reaching for her shirt.
"What?"
"I don't deserve this. Any of this." Jane says, and she's pulling on her sweats as Maura stumbles out of bed, looking around for the robe she'd discarded hours earlier. "Jane, honey, wait…wait!"
Jane stops half way to the door.
"this… this is about Leah? Because, baby I know you would never do anything. I just...got jealous." the admission makes her blush all over again.
Jane sighs, not turning around.
"She didn't care about me. Not really. She liked that I was good at my job, because it made her look good by association. She liked that I was totally whipped. That I was terrified enough that she would leave to do whatever she wanted…I" Jane runs her hand through her hair, and tears are in her eyes again. "Why did she have to come back now?" She looks at Maura like she might have the answer, "I let you down. I let you down and I-I promised Levi that…and I can't possibly keep it." She shudders again. "And she's back to show me exactly what I-"
Maura grabs at Jane, pulling her close, shaking her head back and forth, trying to pick one of the thousand things in her head right now that she wants to say. It's not about Leah. It's not even about their sex. Not really.
"You didn't let me down, pretty girl, you could never let me down. Why would you say-"
"I didn't get to you. I didn't protect you. I told Levi that I was good at that sort of thing. But I couldn't protect you from that boy. I couldn't protect you from knowing what it's like to pull the trigger and watch the life go from someone's…" Jane looks away. Maura traces her jaw with her hand.
"I know what you think of, when you go out to do your job. I know what keeps you so steady," Maura says softly.
Jane looks at her. Maura smiles.
"You think of me being gone, don't you? You imagine me leaving you?"
Jane sniffs, "It's an old trick," she says after a moment, "It just happens to work really well for me."
"what does?"
Jane looks at her, and then takes a shaky breath.
"You find what matters most. You find it and you hold onto it and let it fill you," Jane's face flashes bright as a car swings around the curve outside. "And then you lose it. You imagine it gone or lost or shot" with no gun in her hand, with no suspect threatening, Jane's voice breaks as she pictures it.
Maura holds onto her tighter, knowing what is playing through her mind, and how it feels.
"And then," Jane's voice gets a little stronger, "You go and take it back."
Maura nods. She knows.
"With Leah, I could be fickle because she was fickle. Not come home because she wasn't always home. Walk out on her when she cheated because she walked out on me when Tommy got put away."
Maura grits her teeth, hating.
"But you. You and those girls…and now those two little boys. You're what matters most. You are the things in my life that I can't…" Jane clenches her jaw, She looks at Maura "I thought you were gone. She says quietly. When I got to that car and found our children. I thought I was going to walk around the side of it and see you…" Jane pulls away from Maura and leans against the window sill, and her muscles ripple with the effort of keeping it together. Maura thinks that she will never see anything as beautiful or as devastating as Jane at war with herself. "And when I saw Leah, I thought…My first thought was…I belong with her because I could die on the job and she might not even know for a couple days. And how did I stumble into…" She turns and looks at Maura, then away like the sight hurts her eyes, "I don't deserve this."
"Jane." She says, gently, but firmly enough that the brunette looks around. "Come here."
Jane does and Maura feels her heart beating hard in her chest. She looks up at her wife. Her protector and her confidant and the best friend she's ever had.
"We should not work," she says quietly. "We should not be as successful or lucky or as together as we are. Statistically speaking, I should be at you all the time and you should be tired and defeated by now. It happens the majority of the time. In couples that work together."
Jane kisses her forehead, "Did you just make me the man?"
Maura smiles, "Yes. Now listen, because I am a doctor." Jane chuckles, "We shouldn't work. But we do." She squeezes Jane. "Honey, we…You and I are the best team. Everywhere. Period. There is nothing I wouldn't face with you. And no challenge I wouldn't take on with you. We're about to take on two more kids…if that doesn't tell you something about my commitment, then I don't know what will."
Jane opens her mouth to speak, but Maura forestalls it.
"I was wrong," she says quietly, and Jane stares. "When I asked you, all those times, at the beginnings of all those cases to keep me safe?" She feels Jane tense, "I was wrong. It's not what I should have been saying."
She pulls Jane towards her and kisses her softly, feeling the taller woman relax against her. "what should you have been saying?" Jane asks as she pulls away.
Maura leans her forehead against Jane's.
"I should have said: Remember that you are loved. Remember that you are what matters most to me. to our girls," she pauses, "To Levi."
Maura squeezes Jane, placing one kiss to the woman's collarbone.
"I should have said… remember that you deserve this. And protect it."
Jane almost melts against her, and Maura slips her hand to the base of the brunette's skull. holding on.
"Maur,"
"Jane."
"I want to go check on our children."
Maura smiles, pulling away. No one has made any sound, but she understands Jane's need to put eyes on them. she tightens her robe and takes Jane's hand.
"let's go."
okay. so first let me apologize for how late this is. I'm not going to spoil last night's episode for you if you haven't seen it, but let me just say that it broke me. Like literally broke me to the point where I was like...WHY SHOULD I WRITE THIS STUPID FANFIC IF JTAM IS GOING TO DO SHIT LIKE THAT. oh god, maura. my sweet beautiful maura...guys...PM me about it if you feel strongly (don't review with a spoiler please)...i can't even.
anyway...I'm back after my weird existential crisis. and here is a long ass (possibly really bad) chapter. Let me answer your question right now. Leah's not gone...no way. she's not a quitter. Even if Maura did verbally bitchslap her several times.
Once again, your reviews have also reduced me to a crying lump of gratitude. There's so many of you. and you're all so nice. honestly. We are half way done now, friends. can you believe it? (yes, that means that there will be 25 more.)
No hope. I'm sorry, but I can't. I love the Constance I've made. She just got back in Maura's life, and she's gonna have the biggest test coming up. So...No hope. To the guest who asked if we would get to see more of jane and Levi in the basement...um...yes. I'm just saving it for emotional reasons. lol.
BNH, jobee, davis, AE, fuzzysandwitch, jmpack, ireallyneedalife, rizzyandizzy, maygan, gemsofodin, anniemj, islandlover, THANK YOU. so much.
you don't know what your reviews mean.
honestly.
happy reading!
t.c.