"Hmm, apparent skull fracture," Maura appraised the head of the floater that had washed up on the north bank of the Charles. She rotated it with care to get a closer look at the depression.
"Holy crap, it's my first murder," Frankie gasped, standing to see what she saw. He'd been at the scene where the body was recovered, all thanks to Frost and his kindness. Now he was about to break a case still in uniform and he felt elated. Until Maura shook a finger in his face.
"Stop right there!" she shouted, and he recoiled. "I can't take it. I can't do it," she huffed, malice wafting off of her.
Frankie smelled it and shrunk away. "What? W-what'd I say?"
"This man might have hit his head when he jumped," she said, stepping closer with each word, "or slammed into rocks when his bungee cord snapped. For all I know, Wile E. Coyote dropped an anvil on his head!"
"It was just a gut feeling. I…" Frankie trailed off, and for Maura, it sent her over the edge. Brash Rizzoli conjecture left a trail of frustration in its wake, frazzling her nerves.
"This," she pointed to the body on the slab, "is a scientific process. Do you understand, officer? You and your sister are soalike and it's infuriating. But you're still moldable, so listen carefully: in here, you do not guess, leap to conclusions, speculate, theorize, wonder, or tell me about your gut. Am I clear?"
Frankie held up his hands, but he smirked, too. So this was about Jane. Of course it was about Jane. "Yeah, Maura. Clear. I can see why it'd be aggravatin'," he said.
Maura sighed. "I'm sorry, Frankie. You're not aggravating."
"But Janie is," he replied, standing and going to her.
"So aggravating," Maura confirmed, tearing up.
Frankie put an arm around her. "You know," he started, "she likes that you put your foot down. As much as she throws her weight around, she doesn't like it when people back down from her. Makes her lose respect for them."
"She told me that us fighting was making it not worth it. Making us not worth it," Maura whined. She hugged him from the side, giving into the need to touch with tenderness instead of anger.
"She's an asshole," Frankie said. "You know she doesn't believe that."
"I told her as much," Maura responded, breaking their embrace. She smiled at him in thanks. "And then I said some very mean things that I can't take back."
"We've all done that," he said. "Just say you're sorry and make her do the same."
"You believe she spent 25k on yoga? In five months?" Jane sauntered back into the bullpen, talked to Frost before she'd even passed Korsak's desk on her way to his. She stretched her left arm by pushing it with her folded right one, wincing at the pop of her shoulder when she did it.
"Enlightenment is expensive," Frost said, "how was Sensei Matta?"
Korsak rolled his eyes. "Nowhere to be found. Apparently he camps out in Western Mass more often than not. We went through yoga hell for nothin'," he complained. He'd never felt more fortunate to be back in a nondescript brown suit.
"You actually had to do yoga?" Frost snickered, still at his computer, but swiveling in his chair toward Korsak at the caseboard, "and you lived to tell the tale?"
"Barely," Jane teased as well, "and we had to pretend to be married."
Frost mimicked vomiting. "God."
"Hey," Korsak said, "watch it."
"Ok chuckleheads, enough," Jane regrouped them after a few minutes of ribbing. "What's the sensei's government name?"
Frost cleared his throat and turned back to his monitor. "Matthew Moore. He bought 20,000 acres out in Western Massachusetts all within the last year."
"So that checks out," said Jane.
"Yeah and it's all protected land," Frost responded.
"How?"
"Using their nonprofit religious exemption."
"Oh shit. Now I got a real bad feeling."
"I've also been through all of BCU's security footage of tunnel entrances. Rachel started goin' in about five months ago, right after her parents separated. Then she stopped for months. Started goin' in again two weeks ago, last time was three days ago," Frost explained. He showed her his screen, the stills from the security tape zoomed in to see Rachel walking into the entrance late at night.
"I wanna know what happened two weeks ago," Jane said.
"Me too," Korsak chimed in. He scanned the board in front of him and begged it to show him something he hadn't yet seen.
The answer came in the form of Dr. Maura Isles getting his attention with a throat clear. "The victim's rash was caused by benzene and 1,4-dioxane - likely from a fresh water source," she said to him and him only, "I've narrowed it down to seven lakes in Western Massachusetts."
Jane's ears perked up. "Are you saying those lakes are polluted?" Fight and decorum be damned, she needed to know.
"I'm not. The PH levels and mineral content are," Maura snapped.
"Swell," Jane said, "My sprout troop used to have sleepover camps at one of those lakes."
"You were a sprout trooper?" Maura asked incredulously.
"Yes. Why is that so hard to believe?" Jane stalked toward her.
"You mean because it is your duty as a sprout trooper to be kind, friendly, and generous?" Maura replied as though it were obvious, meeting Jane step for step.
"I was so sweet and kind, I won 'sweetest camper' two years in a row," Jane shot back, "so ha ha."
"Was no one else there?" Maura said with raised eyebrows. Frost and Korsak shared a frightened glance.
"Maura…" Jane warned.
Suddenly Maura was all business again. "The pollution must be recent because it's not showing up in any of the water quality reports."
Frost was desperate to discharge the volatility in the room. "Bet you that's where Rachel was driving that campus car to. She probably was trying to figure out what was polluting the water," he said to Jane.
Jane sighed and shook her head. "Well shit. That's a small needle in a big haystack."
"I'm going there and doing my own water quality testing," Maura said to Korsak before walking away.
Korsak looked quickly between Jane and Maura, and suddenly was struck with an idea. "Hey, Dr. Isles, since you're going anyway, would you get a statement from Matthew Moore? Goes by the name of Sensei Matta."
Clearly it worked because Jane stomped over to them, pointing at Maura. "Oh hey! You can't have a medical examiner go get a statement from a suspect! That's my job," she yelled.
"Hey," Frost stood up, "you two can go together."
Jane snarled. "I'm sure she's taking a different road."
"You're right, I am," Maura said.
"There's only one," Korsak corrected them cheerfully with a finger in the air.
Maura looked at Jane, took in the curvature of her body, all bent and commanding in anger. She found herself, strangely, wanting to be stuck in a car with her for a few hours. "I have to go get a few things," she said, and walked back toward the elevator.
"I'll tell Cavanaugh," Jane announced, apparently wanting the alone time too.
"Swing and a miss," Frost gloated, making the motion of swinging a bat at Korsak.
"Hey, where's your car?" Korsak asked, chuckling. Frost regarded him in a happy confusion until the caller on the other end of Korsak's phone picked up. "Hey Mo, it's Korsak. Got a couple of violators out front. How soon can you be here?"
"Hey! Don't forget your lunch!" Angela's call-out served as a grotesque caricature to the very real problem of both Jane and Maura's cars being towed away from the curb.
"My car!" Maura shouted, ignoring Angela.
Jane whipped her head around to see her mother behind her holding a massive cooler bag. "What is that?" she snapped.
"Mortadella on focaccia with a little roasted red pepper," Angela stated proudly, holding the cooler out to her daughter, who didn't take it.
"Really? With the Italian work lunch? Korsak put you up to this?" Jane all but exploded when she saw Frost pull up.
"All I'm goin' through, and you two can't be civil?" Angela said, looking between Jane and Maura, Maura conspicuously not looking at either of the Rizzolis.
"Don't you dare pull the annulment card," Jane warned.
"Jane, it's not a card," Maura chose that time to walk towards them, sticking up for Angela in the meantime.
"Exactly! He wants me to sign a paper that says I didn't want you kids!" Angela said.
"Ma," Jane bent her back so that she could be level with her mother, "we're grown ups. We know you wanted us." She shook her Italian hands pointedly, thumb against her other fingertips, and stared at Maura.
"If you're such a grown-up, then act like one and stop this!" Angela chastised.
Frost felt like he could finally get a word in edgewise, so he did. "Hey, just saw your cars getting towed. Wanna take mine?" He grinned.
Maura licked her lips before addressing Jane. "It is more energy efficient if we take one car," she said, lobbing Jane the only excuse they needed to just get away.
Jane took it to the basket. "Fine, but I'm driving," she agreed. She snatched the cooler from her mother, threw it in the backseat, and then waited for Maura to get into the passenger seat before pulling away. "Put ya damn seatbelt on," she said.
"It's on," Maura growled, shoving it across her body and clicking it in place. They pulled away from the curb without so much as a wave to Angela and Frost.
"They played us, Maura," Jane finally said after an hour or so of silence on the road.
"They did," Maura replied. "But just because they want us to stop fighting."
"Well they should butt out."
"Maybe they're right."
"About what?"
"Maybe I want to stop fighting, too."
"I've been wanting to stop."
"You've wanted to stop since we first slept together," Maura sighed, "but you haven't put the work in to making this go away."
"I know," Jane said. It was the first time she hadn't come out of the gate in defense of herself and Maura nearly squealed in some unnameable emotion. "I'm… bad at it."
"So stop that," Maura pleaded, "stop being bad at it. You are so good at everything when it comes to me."
"I am usually pretty good at you," Jane answered. She smirked crookedly and closed-mouthed.
"And this time, I'm giving you a roadmap," Maura said.
"I don't need a roadmap," Jane sneered. She put her hand on Maura's knee unconsciously.
"Not for that, you don't. But for this, you clearly do. And you're still not taking it. Imagine my annoyance when it could all be so simple."
"I'm a little bit hard to love," Jane said in acquiescence. She removed her hand to make a turn.
"Yet I love you anyway," Maura laid herself open. "You know that. It's what makes you so sure of yourself."
Jane shivered. "Do you love me… like that?" She felt bold in the way that Maura had just said.
"We are not having a conversation remotely resembling that until you tell me you're sorry for what you did. And you know I don't mean shooting my father."
"I'm not sorry for that," Jane started, and Maura bristled. "But for hurting you… for even putting you in that position… for sending you in as bait… I'm - I am so sorry for that," when she finished, Maura grabbed Jane's now free right hand on the center console with the intention to slide it up the inside of her own thigh, overwhelmed by the relief of finally hearing what she had wanted Jane to say for days. However, just as soon as she had entwined their fingers, Jane pulled away.
They approached a guard booth with a young man carrying a clipboard inside. He exited, standing in their car's way. "Love and light," said Jane cheekily, reciting the catchphrase she had heard too many times when she and Korsak took their yoga course at his Boston location.
"Love and light," he replied, "You here for the retreat?"
"Yes," Jane answered simply.
"Ok, what's your name?"
Maura watched a sliver of panic flash across Jane's face, gone as soon as it came, replaced with a brilliant smile. "Oh, uh, our names may not be on your list. We, uh, we just ascended. Today in fact." She rubbed a hand on Maura's forearm and smiled at her. Maura smiled back.
"Oh," the man frowned, "Well, unless you have your double platinum soul certificate, I can only allow you to go as far as the public picnic area."
Jane's fingers lingered on Maura for a few more beats until she slumped her shoulders in faux disappointment. "Oh. Well, we understand. Love and light."
"Love and light," he replied, and opened the gate for them. As she looked in the rearview mirror, she watched him write down their license plate.
"Let's hope he doesn't run that."
"There's the lake." Maura pointed to the murky water just to their left as they struggled through the wild brush.
"Nothin' gets past you," Jane joked, "Oh look, homo sapiens."
Maura glared at her, but said, "I deserved that." They kept their eyes on the outdoor yoga class occurring just a few hundred yards away, ducking for each moment they might be spotted. Maura took a few photos with her phone, crept down low to get a sample of the water, when she noticed a large pump coming out of the ground nearby. She moved to point her phone at it, but because her hands were full, the phone slipped out of her hand into the lake. "Shit," she cursed. "Jane, we need to leave."
"No, I need to talk to Matthew Moore," Jane whispered in kind.
"No. Listen to me. We're in danger," said Maura.
Jane then noticed the armed men in tactical pants and black t-shirts scanning the area. "Those don't look like yogis. What did you take a picture of?"
"I'll tell you in the car, let's go," Maura tugged at Jane's arm, who stayed put to get a better look at the guards clearly coming their way. "Please! Trust me." That convinced Jane. She nodded to Maura and they got back in their car. "Rachel definitely swam in that lake."
"How do you know?" Jane was definitely interested now, sparing quick glances Maura's way as she sped down the dirt road back to the entrance. Her brow raised itself in deduction.
"The defatting of her skin," Maura said, "and I know why it's so polluted. I saw fracking equipment."
"What's fracking?"
"It's a controversial process to drill for natural gas. They pump hundreds of chemicals thousands of feet underground, and it pollutes groundwater," Maura explained.
"You gotta be kidding me," Jane soured, "that's why we pulled a Thelma and Louise?" She watched Maura more than the road now.
"Well, Jane, it's illegal here."
"Oh shit," Jane said. "Rachel was a geologist. Maybe Sensei Matta didn't bring her here to sleep with her, maybe he brought her here to help."
"Yeah, but she wouldn't have helped. Her interest was in the environment."
"Exactly. So maybe she had that scientist's eye, saw what you saw. Maybe she uncovered the fracking and that's what-"
Jane didn't see the pickup truck headed straight for them because her eyes were on Maura, but Maura saw it - all she could do was scream when it plowed into the driver's side. The force of the impact sent them spinning, the car tumbling straight into a ditch, landing upright and battered.
Jane coughed, winced at the sting of blood in her eye as she tried to bring the world back into focus. Her left side felt like she'd just been at the bottom of a Patriots dogpile. She searched for Maura as soon as shapes started to become objects, and her stomach plummeted into her shoes when she saw the blood coming out of Maura's nose. "You ok?"
Maura looked as disoriented as Jane felt. "I… I think so," she croaked. Her body was a throbbing epicenter of pain, but none of it devastating. The smoke in the car from the impact obscured Jane from view and she desperately needed to see her. "What about you, are you alright? You took the brunt of that."
Jane coughed again to clear blood and phlegm from her pharynx. "Yeah, I'm ok. A little battered and bruised, but I'm good," she said in her own New England voice. The smoke had dissipated enough for them to share a glance, and immediately Jane swooped in for a kiss.
The sensation intensified the ringing in Maura's head, but she accepted the sign of life gratefully. Accepted Jane into her mouth gratefully. It was wet and passionate and she could taste a metallic tang on her tongue.
It was also short. "God that could have been bad," Jane said as she broke them apart. "Mmm," she grunted, reaching in between Maura's legs to grab her cell phone. "Crap, my phone is wet," she complained, and she grazed Maura's left leg on the way back up. It was stuck between the control panel for the unmarked and the dash itself.
"Oh!" Maura yelped in pain. She pulled her lips back, grimacing, trying not to cry.
"What? What?" Jane panicked, eyes wide, "can you move your leg?"
"No, it's stuck," Maura said after a few attempts at pulling it out.
"Ok," Jane affirmed, and she moved to help Maura remove her leg from its position when gunshots pelted the side of the car. "Fuck," she grunted, then crouched into an offensive position with her weapon drawn. "Get down, get down, get down!" she repeated to Maura like a mantra, firing a bullet to punctuate each command. She shoved the passenger door open as she stretched her body on its back, abdomen clenched tight as it held her up. Maura moved toward the now open door, but couldn't get through. "Maura, get out of the car. Get out of the car!"
Gunfire continued to threaten them. "I can't get my leg out!" Maura cried, trying her damnedest to move.
Jane was in fight mode - she only heard bullets and the sound of her own voice. "Maura get out of the car!"
"My leg is stuck!" Maura tried again, less words, hoping to convey her helplessness appropriately.
"Maura go, run!" Jane shouted. She pushed Maura's calf hard enough that it dislodged, and finally Maura was out. Jane followed suit, still firing her weapon at the two men shooting at them from the top of the embankment. "Stay down, stay down," she ordered while Maura covered her ears and shook at the cacophony of the firefight.
Jane touched her back and pushed her towards the forest. "Go for the treeline. Go! Go!" Maura did as told, and Jane fired off a few more shots before following behind with a leading hand on Maura's backside.
The sun began to set, and Jane and Maura were deep within the trees. "It'll be dark soon," said Maura; her leg initially had felt ok, but now it started to ache with more fervor.
Jane had taken on the job of navigator and therefore did not notice. "Yeah, not good. We gotta find a way outta here."
"Can we rest for a little bit? Just five minutes?" Maura asked, her question small and timid.
Jane stopped, turned around. "What's wrong?"
"I'm just tired," Maura fibbed. Technically true, but her leg hurt and she needed to rest it if they were going to keep going like this. "I'll be more useful to you longer if I sit for a few minutes."
Jane shrugged, found a small area for them to take a break. She wouldn't admit it, but she probably needed it, too. Her head was pounding. "You're always useful to me. Let's rest here. But I swear to god only five minutes, Maura."
"Yes. Five minutes," Maura sighed as she lowered her body down into the grass next to Jane. She put her hand over Jane's just to verify she was real, that she was alive.
"We're in deep shit," Jane pointed out. The dark approached and there were men that wanted to murder them. It hardly needed to be said.
"No kidding," Maura replied, and they both smiled ruefully. "But there has to be a way out. We'll find it."
Jane regulated her breathing, making it rhythmic and even. "If we don't…"
"We will," Maura interrupted.
"If we don't," Jane continued on, "I'm gonna say it again - I'm sorry. I'm sorry that shooting your dad hurt you. I'm sorry that I had no other choice. I'm sorry that the guy I fucked nearly got us all killed and I'm sorry that I let him come between us enough to-"
She was crying, and Maura put her hands on either side of Jane's face to calm her. "Hey, you get too worked up," she said, and they shared a soft laugh. "We're not going to die. But thank you for apologizing."
Jane just nodded. "You know what I'm not sorry for, though?" she sniffed and looked off into the nearby brush.
"What's that?" Maura asked.
"Us… getting to know each other," Jane said quietly, head now down and hands now rubbing together.
"I don't regret that, either," Maura confessed. "And I hope we get to do it again, sometime soon," when Jane looked up at her, the bridge of her nose hot with a blush, Maura smiled. "But I hope that we get to do it right this time."
"Have we been doin' it wrong?" Jane asked, not sure she wanted to know the answer.
"No," Maura clarified, "but we've been doing it angrily," at that she ran a contrite finger over the sallow bruise on Jane's pulse point.
"That caught me a lotta grief with both my brothers and the guys, by the way," Jane said.
Maura blushed next. "I'm sorry. Heat of the moment," she explained. "But as good as the angry sex has been, I don't think it will be half as good as…" she searched for the words.
"The make-up sex?" Jane supplied them. Both she and Maura chuckled bashfully.
"That works. Your brother knows," it was a vulnerable moment and Maura felt like she could no longer keep the secret.
Jane glared, not necessarily at Maura, but in her direction. "Which one?"
"Frankie," Maura whispered, "he guessed all on his own."
Jane groaned. "He'll make detective one day," she stated begrudgingly.
"He told me about this thing, this concept, in your culture," Maura, suddenly anthropologically inclined, said.
"Oh yeah?" This piqued Jane's curiosity. "What did he say?"
"He tried explaining something to me he called the 'Boston Kama Sutra," Maura replied.
Jane shot up. "Ok, break's over," she shouted, ears dark red. "Let's go, Maura."
Maura sat down still, confused. She looked up at Jane, now full height and extending a hand to her. "But Jane-"
"Nope," Jane rebutted loudly, "time to go."
Maura took the hand offered and got up gingerly. Clearly Jane did not want to talk about it and she wasn't going to push it. Plus, the pain in her leg had gotten considerably worse. Her limp was far more pronounced. As soon as she was up, Jane dropped her hand and took the lead again.
They walked another half hour until nightfall. The dark overtook everything and now in the nighttime, Maura's pain and prognosis became much more dire. "Jane," she called out, barely able to put any weight on her leg, but Jane kept on.
"C'mon. We gotta try to keep goin'. C'mon," Jane called back, slinking through the trees.
"We haven't seen them in hours," said Maura. "I need to stop." This time, she didn't wait for the OK before stopping in a small clearing.
Jane took this as serious. "Ok," she said, "what happened? Did you pull somethin'?"
Maura shook her head vigorously, groaning. "No," she put her leg out and Jane grabbed it. "Take it off, take it off," she said to Jane, pointing to the zipper on her boot.
"A'right, a'right," said Jane, doing so. When she did, Maura's calf and shin were covered in black splotches, and it felt hard to the touch. "Christ, Maura. Your leg. It-it's hard and it smells like a dead body. What is that?"
Maura massaged her leg as hard as she could given the pain. "It's compartment syndrome," she said.
"Well, what does that mean?"
"The post-tibial artery must have ruptured in the crash."
"But you been walkin' on it!"
"Agh," Maura moaned when she couldn't take her own touch anymore, "blood from the artery is leaking. The pressure builds, and now the blood is trapped in one of the lower compartments of my leg."
It sounded serious, but Jane didn't have an MD, so she felt lost. "Ok, bottom line it for me," she pleaded.
"The blood supply to my lower leg has been compromised," Maura said. When Jane nodded, she continued. "I'll lose my leg unless-"
"Unless I get you to a hospital, Maura! C'mon!" Jane finished, begging.
But it was the wrong answer. "No," Maura corrected, "unless you do a fasciotomy. I need something sharp."
"What? No, Maura, I-" Maura pulled some lip gloss and a nail file out of her pockets as Jane talked. "I'm not gonna cut your leg off with a nail file."
"Do you have any sugar packets?" asked Maura, ignoring her sarcasm.
"No, why? Did you bring coffee?"
"I could use it to dress the wound. Do you still have your phone?"
"Yes. Yes, why didn't I think of that? We can use it to call 911," Jane said faux seriously. "Oh wait, it's busted," she snarked, on high alert, when she pulled it out of its place on her belt.
Maura took it and pulled the glass from it. "The touch screen is gorilla glass." She began to cut at her skin with the glass.
"No. Maura, I'm not… I'm not gonna do this," Jane whined, realizing exactly what Maura was about to ask her to do.
"It'll work. Ok," said Maura. "You're gonna make a 6-inch incision right here, and a 5-inch there," she motioned to the inside and then outside of her calf. "Ok? Just try not to cut the superficial peroneal nerve."
"No," Jane said again, "I can't do this. I don't know shit about medicine."
"Take off your shirt," Maura said.
"What? Right now? Ok, now I know you've suffered a head injury," Jane said frantically.
"To bind the wound!" Maura scoffed. "Ok, come on. Let's go."
"Oh god, Maura. Please," Jane asked, peeling out of her t-shirt, "please don't make me do this. I'll make it worse, please."
"Listen to me," Maura said, holding Jane's head for the second time that evening. "Listen to me. You are so smart, and capable, and deft with your hands," she hyped Jane up for both of their sakes.
"Baby, I'm sorry," Jane said, her voice so raspy and broken, "I can't do this."
"That's bullshit! Your instincts for physiology and athleticism are… unmatched. Ok? You don't need a fancy degree for this. You're pretty good at me, remember? You're going to do just fine. Once you make the double incision, you massage the wound like this," she made a rubbing motion down the length of her leg. "The blood will be black. Keep going until it's not."
"I can't," Jane felt nauseous. "I can't. I'm so sorry, I can't do this."
"I really like my leg, Jane," Maura said with tears in the back of her throat. "I know you really like it, too. So please, please help me save it."
Jane's mind flooded with protective instinct at being asked, specifically by Maura, for help. She also pictured all the times Maura had wrapped her legs around her in the past few days, and said a prayer to steel herself. "Ok, ok," she breathed in, taking the glass from Maura.
"A'right. You ready?"
"I'm ready," Maura said. She pulled Jane to her again and gave her a bruising kiss.
This filled Jane with even more resolve. "Ok, let's do it then," she said, cutting a long, thin line into Maura's leg.
Maura locked eyes with her. "Use more pressure. I'm ok. I promise I'm ok."
So Jane did - she cut with certainty and she cut deep. There was the black blood that Maura had told her about. When Jane started to expel the blood with her fingers, Maura screamed, throwing her head back in agony. Jane shot forward. "You alright?!"
"Shit! I'm not ok," Maura gasped out before she fainted.