Prologue

Welcome to Book 3 of the Intersecting Lines series.

When I started this way back in July 2012 I truly had no idea of the size of what I was embarking on, nor how welcoming the readership here would be. Now the Intersecting Lines universe is approaching almost 1 million words across all the stories. Thank you to all my readers for the time you have given, to read, to comment, to follow and favourite, it is really gratefully appreciated.

A quick synopsis of what has gone before for new readers.

In Intersecting Lines Book 1 Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles, about seven months after moving from friends to lovers, have taken a secondment in Los Angeles to give their relationship a chance to grow far from Boston and the often hostile attention their relationship has brought; Maura to take over the Medical Examiner's role for the Los Angeles Police Department and Jane as a detective assigned to the LAPDs Major Crimes squad, under Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson (The Closer).

There they meet Natalie Dearing, the LAPDs new media manager and her partner Anastasia Romanov, the newly assigned FBI Liaison Officer to the LAPD. During the next several months a friendship grows between them which in turn expands to take in Brenda Leigh Johnson and her close friend Sharon Raydor, the head of Force Investigation Division, the section that investigates officer-involved shootings.

With the help and active encouragement of all four, Brenda and Sharon build upon their friendship; both are single and lonely and are encouraged to act upon their potential as a couple, Sharon having previously been involved with a woman. Overcoming their misgivings and fears, Sharon and Brenda have embarked on a relationship while working together to investigate a series of suspicious shootings at the hands of two detectives, members of the LAPD's Robbery / Homicide squad.

During their time in Los Angeles, Jane and Maura were instrumental in closing several major cases, including a deranged sniper; a drug-cartel linked mass shooting and a car bombing at the LAPD Annual Ball. Following an invitation from Deputy Chief Johnson, they have decided to stay in Los Angeles and build a new life for themselves there.

Book 1 ended at midnight on New Year's Eve, when Jane proposed to Maura in front of their closest friends, Olivia Benson and Alex Cabot (Law and Order: SVU) visiting from New York, Anastasia and Natalie and Brenda and Sharon.

Intersecting Lines Book 2 picked up less than a month later and saw the group solve a number of high profile cases, including the death of a rap star, a home invasion ring, a weapons smuggling operation and eventually unravelling the actions of six corrupt officers who were acting as paid killers for a drug cartel. It also put Olivia back in touch with her former rookie on the beat, Kate Beckett (Castle) during a night at a ball in New York.

Book 2 ended with Anastasia proposing to Natalie and Jane and Maura planning their future wedding and family.

If you would like some backstory to Jane and Maura and Olivia and Alex getting together, please read my short story 'Hearts on the Shopping Block', which deals with that specific night. Additional background on the friendship between Olivia Benson and Kate Beckett can be found in the short series 'Hampton's Hiatus' and the longer story 'Breaking Barriers' which features Olivia and Kate, with cameos from the teams from Castle and CSI – NY.

Other stories dealing with the people of the Intersecting Lines 'verse' can be found in my ongoing series of short stories posted as 'Intersecting Lines; Possession and Passion' and 'Intersecting Lines: Drabbles'.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, I hope you decide to join me on their journey.

Intersecting Lines Book 3

01 Shopping

Jane's viewpoint

I should hate, this, I really should. Not only were we out shopping, not even close to one of my favourite things, but we were out clothes shipping, up there with shoe shopping as stuff I hated with a passion. My idea of clothes shopping was simple, I liked to walk in, find something I like, a button down maybe, make sure it fitted; buy four or five all the same then walk out; shopping done and on to something I actually liked doing.

Unfortunately that's not how Maura operated; she'd been appalled, discreetly but still appalled, when she'd first seen my shopping style in action. In her case shopping involved lots of 'compare, contrast and consider' then move on to the next store and do the same, over and over until she'd exhausted her options; and me too. Then and only then would she finally make a decision and, retracing our steps through all the stores, buy something form here, something from there, somehow despite the process she ended up with it all coming together to look amazing on her.

Mind you, this was Maura we're talking about, she makes anything look good; hell she makes scrubs look sexy and let me tell you, television to the contrary, scrubs are not fashionable. In fact Maura had once told me that the scrubs you see on the television shows are actually tailored to the actor's body shapes to make them look better, they're nothing like the real things which have all the tailored shape of garbage bags, given all that I was at a loss as to how she looked so good in them till one day she confessed that she ordered her scrubs from one of those same companies. It might have been cheating, but I'd always appreciated the sight of her looking so good in them, now even more so as I occasionally got to see her take them off too.

In this case while we were out shopping we were well out of her usual haunts; instead passing through a series of high-end men's clothing stores, looking at wedding suits. Maura had taken my statement that I wasn't going to wear a wedding dress pretty well all things considered, mind you when I told her I was thinking of a men's-style wedding suit I could see she'd found that idea more than satisfactory, she'd loved it every time I'd won a tuxedo to one of her fancy social events, as her behaviour when we'd got home and me out of it had happily proven.

So now we were looking at suits, I'd had a vague idea of what I wanted, or so I thought, but honestly I'd never seen so many styles, I thought guy's clothes were so much easier than women's but I was reconsidering that as I looked at rack upon rack of suits with tails, with vests, single breasted, double breasted, you name it and there was a huge range of styles in every colour of the rainbow and that was before you got to waistcoats and cravats and ties and cummerbunds and everything else.

We'd been at it for a couple of hours and I'd finally put my foot down, holding out in the face of that teasing pout and demanding we call a temporary halt for a coffee. So now were sitting in a café, enjoying the peace, if only for a moment; naturally being Maura and clothing we're talking about the moment didn't last long as she started quizzing me for my thoughts and preferences on what we'd seen so far.

"I dunno Maur, don't you have a preference? I mean a wedding's all about the bride, no one's gonna care what I'm wearing, all eyes are gonna be on you" She shook her head with a smile.

"Au contraire darling, not only will what we select have to compliment what I will be wearing, but we have to find an outfit that suits both Olivia and Anastasia's quite diverse body shapes, their figures are both significantly different than yours and thus we need to determine a style that is suited to each of you" I raised an eyebrow.

"Nice play on words there Maur" I smiled as I saw her mentally replay our conversation before a grin broke out.

"Yes, it was actually, wasn't it?" I nodded, happy to see her happy.

"That it was" We sat back, enjoying the sunshine, I have to say while I missed some of the best parts of Boston, friends and family, the Sox, the Patriots, that sort of thing, the worst of Boston's winters weren't part of it. Los Angeles had turned out to be a really good change; here we were sitting out enjoying the warm afternoon as we sipped our coffees, from where I was sitting right now life was pretty damned good.

Mind you that summed up most things out here. We'd found a good place with the LAPD, some outstanding friends in Natalie and Anastasia, my boss Brenda and her partner Sharon, the guys in the Major Crimes team, since we'd got here we'd done a lot of really good work and enjoyed most of it.

There'd been downsides of course; having cartel assassins and gangers coming after us because we were closing in on a gang of corrupt cops hadn't been part of the plan but we'd survived everything and seen them arrested personally, even Maura and Natalie had been part of the arrest team, making sure those six corrupt cops would stand trial before going to jail for the rest of their miserable lives.

Mind you, that was far too morbid a set of thoughts for a glorious afternoon like this, something I pointed out.

"You sure we have to do this Maur? Surely there's something else we could be doing on a fantastic afternoon that'd be a lot more fun" Naturally she quickly shot that idea down.

"Jane, we need to make some progress on our wedding plans, and your ensembles are a key part of that. I simply cannot progress my wedding dress and the bridesmaid's dresses without knowing what Olivia, Anastasia and yourself will be wearing" I tipped my head to regard her.

"I thought that was what all those Skype sessions with Nat and Alex were all about?" She waved a finger at me cheekily.

"That is simply agreeing on overall styles Jane, to make an truly informed decision we need to know the style, cut and colours of the suits you and your grooms women will be wearing" I smiled a little.

"I'm sure Liv and Ana will look fine in whatever you end up choosing" She frowned prettily even as she replied.

"The decision is a joint one Jane; we must both be satisfied with the final choice" I shrugged, explaining the truth as I saw it.

"It's your decision really, if it was up to me I'd probably choose the first thing that looked half-way decent and be done with it" I saw that hit home, she was scandalised, in a very restrained, Maura-like manner.

"Jane! That is most definitely not the attitude" she admonished me. "After all, as you have so often put it, we are only going to do this once so it must be done right" I nodded, a little chagrined.

"Yeah baby, I know, it's just I'm just a little out of my depth here, this isn't my thing y'know" She nodded as a soft smile appeared, laying a hand on mine.

"I do darling and I appreciate that you have been, for you, very patient today" I nodded, happy to have put a smile there before turning back to the subject at hand.

"If I have to wear something at the neck, I kinda like the idea of a cravat" She tipped her head to regard me, obviously considering the image.

"Yes, I can see that would work; not only is it less constricting, it does look very stylish" I shrugged.

"I like it because it means I don't have to wear a tie, god knows how guys do it?" Maura's smile widened.

"If it was to be a necktie, tradition suggests that a bow tie would be more appropriate for a wedding" I shook my head definitively.

"Those things are a pain in the ass to tie" Last time I'd worn one, back at the Mayor's Ball in New York, Maura had ended up being the one tying it; I sure as hell didn't have a clue. God knows how she knew how to but then this is Maura we're talking about; nothing really surprises me anymore about that encyclopaedia inside her head. The woman in question tipped her head to regard me as she replied.

"I could just teach you Jane, it really is not that hard" I shook my head at that.

"Nope, happy to pass on that" Maura nodded once as she accepted my statement and spoke.

"I agree that a cravat would be a more than acceptable substitute" I decided to turn the conversation on her for a moment.

"So what are you wearing?" She gave me a small, one-shouldered shrug before answering.

"I have not yet determined, something appropriate, white is most likely but we are still considering options" By 'we' Maura meant her, Natalie Dearing and Alex Cabot, our best friends. They'd been talking about styles and trains and beading and all sorts of other stuff for ages, they Skyped back and forth all the time, I'd even got yelled at for walking past a couple of times and daring to look towards the laptop screen.

"I'm sure you're gonna look great in whatever dress you wear" I got a sly look and a cheeky smile.

"I was referring to the bridal lingerie, tradition suggests white, ivory or cream is appropriate" I opened my mouth to say something then paused as my mind raced off on its own wicked tangent, lots of images of Maura in white, sexy lingerie laid out across our bed; naughty, naughty, deliciously naughty mind.

Maura's smile widened, she knew exactly where I'd gone with that and obviously approved. I took in the slightly satisfied expression and decided to tease her.

"I know I'm not supposed to see the dress, tradition and all, but the lingerie, that's different" One perfect eyebrow got raised slightly disbelievingly.

"Oh really?" I nodded, hopefully kinda convincingly and tried for confidence in my voice, after all I was suddenly really motivated.

"Yeah, how about we finish up here and head off to some of those top end lingerie stores you and Nat and Alex like so much and we can pick out a few for you to model for me tonight" Maura considered it for a moment before her smile got all wickedly sexy all at once.

"On one condition" I nodded, happy to do anything she asked if it involved Maura and lingerie.

"Sure, what is it?" She leaned forward, a trifle conspiratorially and lowered her voice.

"We also select several sets of my choice for you, after all I am not aware of any rule that states the groom cannot also wear lingerie and I too would appreciate a show" I nodded eagerly, more than happy to say yes.

"Deal" We smiled happily across the table before she leaned even further in, her voice low and sultry, doing naughty things to my self-control, I associated that voice with all sorts of carnal pleasures; I wasn't disappointed.

"Nothing says that we would have to wait until tonight, after all we have the rest of the afternoon free" Her eyes ran over me suggestively as she continued. "After all, you did suggest there were other things we could be doing this afternoon"

I'm sure my smile turned slightly feral as I raised my arm and my voice, never taking my eyes from hers, seeing the wicked amusement dancing there.

"Check please"