Author's Note:- Sorry for the delay. I could list the excuses, but I won't. Instead I hope you enjoy the update as always. Thanks to eblane for proofing this for me.
Chapter 37"What we got?" Jane husked, snapping the white latex gloves into place.
"Vic's name is Gina Randall. Thirty-two. Markings indicate she was beaten, dragged here and then sexually assaulted." Frost said, addressing his partner.
Jane caught Maura's eye briefly as the M.E. busied herself with the body in the littered alleyway, before holding up a small plastic object for the detectives to view.
"She was also diabetic. It appears her glucose pump has been crushed."
"Ok, so she may have come outside to use it then right?" Frost suggested.
"She would have had to have checked her levels between five and ten times a day, so it's possible." Maura said, her focus on Jane, her eyes trying to convey her need to talk. Alone.
"It still wouldn't explain how she ended up down here." Jane replied, holding her gaze steadily.
"The last reading shown was four hundred."
"That high?"
"Extremely, yes. She would have been displaying signs of slurred speech, irregular movement, poor co-ordination."
"She'd have looked drunk then?" Frost offered with a nod.
"Indeed."
"So she would have been easy to overpower." Jane muttered, crouching down next to the victim and examining her head. "Looks like she was hit with something rectangular. Like a piece of two-by-four maybe." Her fingers pulling the knotted hair around the open wound as her brown eyes darkened in sadness.
"I can't confirm that. I need to run more tests." Maura said, both flustered and frustrated.
"Like this?" Frost shouted, holding up a long piece of wood that was stained on the end.
"Yeah, that'd do it." Jane replied standing up to examine the weapon, a smirk on her lips.
"She is wearing a wedding ring." The M.E. said, raising the victim's left arm.
"Start with the husband then." Indicating to Frost. "What does it say about relationships that we have to check out the partner first?" She sighed, looking in Maura's direction as she watched the honey-blonde pull out a purse and stare blankly at the worn photo inside the sleeve.
"Well it may not be a husband at all." She said, handing over the evidence.
Jane looked at the two attractive women in the picture, recognizing the victim and noticing two gold bands on the appropriate fingers. She passed it to Frost. "Ok. Let's go talk to the wife."
"I'll call you when the results are back." Maura said, calling after her.
The detective turned and smiled before disappearing out of sight. The M.E. sighed, already missing the feel of their connection however tenuous it was at the present time.
…..
"What do you make of her?" Jane asked, after escorting Gina's wife Mel out of the interview room.
"What a waste?" He grinned.
"Shut the hell up!" She replied, a low chuckle escaping past her lips.
"At least I got you to laugh."
"Yeah? Consider yourself lucky I don't punch you for that one."
He smiled. "Well her alibi seems solid. I'll check it out while you head to the morgue."
"Maura hasn't called me yet." She said, shuffling the papers up from the table and tucking them under her arm.
"Since when has that ever mattered?"
Jane exhaled deeply before looking her partner in the eye, noticing the grin still firmly in place. "Fine. You go deal with that and I'll meet you back in the pen."
He nodded, before leaving her alone in the corridor staring at the elevators, her thumb nervously dancing on top of the case file. "Fuck it." She muttered, striding towards the steel doors and punching the down arrow.
The journey seemed to last an eternity, but as the morgue came into view, Jane had to steady her nerves. She swallowed hard and made her way into the room towards Maura who was dressed in her black scrubs, hair tied back, examining one of the victim's hands.
"You got anything for me?" Jane husked, breaking the uncomfortable silence. Her voice caused the M.E. to look up suddenly.
"You scared me." She gasped.
"Sorry." She smiled warmly, moving towards the autopsy table, her deep chocolate eyes finding the hazel-green ones instantly. She grabbed the edge of the cold metal trying to tear her gaze away and focus her attention on the woman lying dead between them. But she couldn't.
"I…" Maura said, trying to will her vocal chords to function as she lost all sense of purpose in the wake of Jane's attention. "I…"
"Have something for me?" She prompted kindly.
"Yes…yes." She replied, thankful for a body to talk about. Any body except the living, breathing personification of her ideal stood a mere four-feet away. "She was most certainly assaulted post mortem. Her diabetes already compromised, added with the stress of the attack brought on Hyperglycemic Hyperosmolar Nonketotic Syndrome." She stated, with a decisive nod.
Jane widened her eyes and waited. And waited.
"Oh. Oh, a diabetic coma." Maura said with a smile.
"And that's what killed her, or was it the blow to the head with the big piece of wood?"
"She would barely have been aware of the injury being sustained as her body was already in shock, her heart shutting down."
"So the perp raped her first then beat her once she was dead?" She asked incredulously.
"No. That assault was also post mortem."
"Jesus." Jane whispered, casting sad eyes at the dead woman's face. "Who would do such a thing?"
"I don't know. But I did also find this." Maura continued, holding up the hand she had previously been examining.
There was a marking on it; lettering in ink. MERCH.
"Looks like a stamp from a bar or nightclub. There were a few in the vicinity." Jane said. "I'll check it out."
"There's no need." The M.E. said, her words drawing the detective's full attention.
"Oh?"
"It's a well know lesbian bar."
"Right. And you know that…? Actually it doesn't matter. I'll check it out with Frost."
She turned to leave.
"Jane?"
The brunette looked back and caught her eye. "Yeah?"
"Are we going to talk about the letter?" Maura asked nervously, a soft crinkle forming on her forehead.
"Not here." She husked, shoving her hands in her pockets.
"That's fine. Maybe once we're done here we could get a drink?"
Jane caught the hopeful tone and it almost broke her heart. She needed this. She needed Maura.
"Sure." She said with a smile before striding out of the morgue and leaving a very optimistic M.E. to carry on with her work.
…..
"So this could be a hate crime then right?" Frost said, watching the leader of 'Sons and Daughters of Adam' being shown out of the bullpen.
"It could be yeah." Jane replied, her face set in anger.
"Either way that guy is a fucking prick." Korsak said, looking up from his desk.
"I should arrest him anyway." Barry continued protectively.
"If only." She replied, answering the phone on her desk. "Rizzoli…Ok. I'll be right there."
"Anything?"
"Maura wants me down in the lab, they got something else. Frost can you check out Gina's phone, laptop, diary, anything that may give us an idea of her whereabouts and movements leading up to her death?"
"No problem."
"I'm going to run some checks on this so-called 'Christian' group." Korsak said gruffly.
She nodded and headed back down to the morgue, making her way to the lab.
"We have got no match in CODIS." Maura said with a smile.
"And that's happy news?" Jane said with a frown.
"No, but I can tell you the killer is a woman."
"A woman? But why…how?" She replied, stumbling over her own questions and rushing to conclusions.
"We found deer-skin fibres most commonly found in the manufacture of work gloves. There was sweat found for the DNA analysis, suggesting a tear in the fabric."
"So then a male accomplice raped her afterwards?"
"No. A non-biological, phallus shaped object was used." She said, tilting her head.
"You mean a dildo?" Jane answered, under her breath, wishing that Maura's assistant wasn't stood so close by.
"Yes I believe that is the popular term for it." She grinned, amused by her detective's inability to discuss sex. "Did you know that a 28,000 year old phallus was recently found in a German cave? The ice aged men were using it for making flints."
"Really? I think those cave ladies were using it to make sparks of their own."
The M.E. laughed, eliciting a chuckle from Jane too.
"Hey we got something." Frost said from the doorway.
"Ok, I'm on my way."
"I'll come too." Maura added, following the detectives back upstairs to be met by Korsak.
"Seems like Ms. Randall had been on to a few online dating agencies, most recently becoming a member of this one." He said, angling the computer screen for them all to see.
"So this may not be a hate crime after all." Jane suggested. "It could just be personal."
"Yeah that's what we were thinking." Barry said, pulling up his chair and accessing the site further.
"She looks a lot like you on this picture, Janie." Korsak said, looking from the screen to Jane then back again.
"There is definitely a strong resemblance, yes." Maura concurred, causing the brunette to roll her eyes.
"So we both have dark hair and good skin. So what?" She countered.
"It's actually much more than that. Structurally your zygomatic bones, maxilla and the distance between the frontal process and mental protuberance are identical, not to mention the…"
"Ok. Ok. I get it. We coulda been separated at birth."
"Well that's impossible Jane as you are a few years apart in age, not to mention racial profiling, DNA…"
"I'm thinking we bait a trap!" Vince said out of the blue to three confused looking faces. "You know, like a honey trap."
"Oooo." Frost said with a grin and a click of his fingers. "I like it."
"And how exactly do we do that?" Jane said, leaning against her desk, arms folded.
"With you. You'll be our honey, hunny." Korsak said, chuckling.
"Very funny. I'm not going on any lesbian dates to catch a killer. No." She said, making to leave.
"Wait. Just hear me out." He said, his tone serious.
Jane sat back again and listened.
"Gina Randall was obviously on here looking for a date right? She was found with a stamp on her hand for a lesbian bar only meters from where her body was dumped. Seems to me like she may have met someone there. The killer possibly, or at least someone who may have seen her alive."
"Man's gotta point." Frost added, his comment rewarded with a stern stare from the brunette.
"And maybe this woman has a type you know? So, we get you online, set up with an account and a picture and see if we can't lure her out." He said, finishing with his plan.
"And how are we going to gather evidence? Stick a fork in 'em?"
"You buy them a drink then take the glass."
There was a deafening silence that descended over the bullpen as all eyes waited for Jane to respond in some way to the only suggestion and lead they had. In all seriousness, for her own part, she couldn't see a better alternative, however uncomfortable this operation would make her.
"Fine. I'll do it." She said with a low moan.
"Great! Do you want to do your own profile or should…"
"I don't want any part in that." She replied. "I'm gonna grab a coffee from the machine."
After the doors shut behind her Frost and Korsak huddled round the computer.
"Come on Doc. You know her better than anyone. Help us out here." Vince said with a smile.
"Ok." She replied, taking center stage in front of the keyboard. "So we have to assign her a type." She indicated, reading down the list of options.
"Jane is definitely fine." Korsak said, before hearing the sniggers of laughter beside him. "What?"
"We could go with fine, yes." Maura said, memories of Jane's lithe body under her touch setting her heart on fire.
"I was thinking sporty or butch." Frost said, meeting their eyes. "Listen, I've seen her break a chair over the head of a meth crazed gang banger. She put him right out!" He said, using his arms to mimic the action.
"She's my…friend. I'm not putting that as her description."
"I'm just saying, is all."
"So we're left with fine or lipstick lesbian." She said.
"I love undercover!" Korsak said with a chuckle, as Barry uploaded a recent photograph.
"You done yet?" Jane said reappearing with two coffees, placing one down in front of Maura with a soft smile, both sets of eyes momentarily lost in the others.
"I have a section here to check off what type of women you're interested in." She replied, feeling her cheeks color.
"Preferably ones that aren't selfish, ambitious psychotic bitches." Vince said with a grunt.
"I'll just select feminine, sporty, lipstick lesbian and professional as Gina had those as her options." The M.E. said hurriedly, clicking next.
"Ok." Jane said, exhaling a breath.
"Now we just have to sell you." Frost said. "I've contacted the site already and had Gina's profile removed to anyone looking except for us. I suggest we use hers."
"That works for me." The brunette said, sipping her coffee as she tried in vain to ignore the throbbing pulse in Maura's neck that was begging to be kissed.
After a few more clicks the profile was live on the web and ready to be cruised.
"Done. You're hooked in." The honey-blonde said, looking pleased with herself.
"It's hooked up." Jane responded warmly.
"Nice work Doc." Korsak said, squeezing her arm tenderly. "Now we wait and see what hits your profile gets over the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours and then arrange you some dates. I'll get onto the club now and organize things."
"We'll need someone to collect the evidence too." Frost said.
"I can do that part." Maura replied. "That way I can keep an accurate record."
"Ok. Good." Jane said. "I'm going to run this by Cavanaugh for approval first."
"I'll hold off until you get back then." Korsak responded.
"Well one thing's for sure if she doesn't go for it, you're taking that damn profile down!" She grunted.