Authors Note: Long awaited, I'm so sorry. I hope it lives up to expectations, and that there's still a few people left around to read it.
Court reconvened at ten the following morning, but they'd met with Adam the lawyer at a coffee shop around the corner from the courthouse at nine. He oozed confidence, a bleeding wound of positivity and suredness that Jane couldn't quite get behind but refused to let that show on her face. Maura's testimony had been the strike of a match against a red phosphorus surface, an instant chemical reaction in her bloodstream that ignited a fire in her stomach, but she also had an intimate understanding of the woman who took the stand. Adam's strict dress code had succeeded in making the blonde look diminutive and defenceless while she answered questions regarding her abuse, sat beside enlarged images of herself with focus directed at the wounds she'd left her home with that night Jane had found her hidden in the closet.
Jane also had an understanding of the general demographic of the jury though, and they were her people. Working class for the most part, surviving but by no means strolling along the easy path of life and she'd seen in family and colleagues how disdain for the wealthy grew quickly like a tumour.
Adam is sure their case is strong, but Jane knew that domestic abuse victims were often met with harsh criticism, and she was almost angry at herself for having shared those same hostile views toward the one percent as if their issues were somehow less than hers. It was half the reason her stomach was in knots when Adam announced the notification he received about the jurors deliberation and her nervous energy made her want to wipe the confidence from his face with her fist like it could be some kind of jinx.
They entered the courtroom two separate bodies floating on anxious electricity but Maura seeked out Jane's hand once they'd taken their seats and the narrow digits were cold and clammy in her own. Jane gave them a gentle squeeze of reassurance, not that everything would be alright because the detective wasn't sure it would be, but that despite the outcome, Maura wouldn't face it alone. The blonde was turned slightly in her seat as if she were trying to place distance between herself and her estranged husband, but Jane watched as every few minutes their knees bumped and her gaze slinked in his direction to gauge his response to the judges words.
A juror stood, paper in hand and the buzz of the courtroom went silent, the tension palpable. It made Jane feel nauseous, she could only imagine how the woman beside her must be feeling.
"On the count of domestic assault and battery, the jury finds the defendant not guilty."
Jane's breath hitched in her throat and her gaze found Maura in her periphery and the smaller woman was blank. Her fingers froze in Jane's grasp and if the brunette were inclined to believe in such things, she'd swear she felt life trickle from the doctors fingertips into the abyss.
"On the count of murder in the first degree, the jury finds the defendant guilty."
A sigh sounds beside her and she glances at Maura to find her staring directly at Garret, who was returning her attention with irrefutable surprise. That arrogant son of a bitch was so sure that he'd sold his charm and the knowledge clouded her relief at the verdict and had Jane clenching her fists by her side. Maura's face in contrast was entirely unreadable, and that concerned her.
She was one of the first out of the courtroom, hadn't stayed long enough to watch guards escort Garrett back toward the holding cell and the brunette had been so surprised by the quick evacuation that it took her a minute to catch up. In fact, Jane had to take the court steps two at a time to finally reach Maura at the bottom, and she only managed to catch her by the elbow. "Hey," she breathed as they came to a stop. "Are you okay?"
Maura turned to face her, topaz speckled eyes welling with unshed tears. "Yes— No, I mean... I should be relieved, shouldn't I? Grateful that justice has been served and that he can't touch me again, that I'm finally free?" She paused to collect the tears beneath her eyes with her index fingers, but it was a movement made in vain because it only cleared the way for more to fall. "But I'm not—justice, it was served for Adam and I'm not ungrateful for that truly, but they found him not guilty, Jane. I had to sit there and detail some of the most shameful moments of my life, things I wouldn't have even told you—I… they saw the broken bones and the hospital reports, and they found him not guilty?"
Her confusion broke Jane's heart, standing there at the base of the courthouse steps with tears rolling from questioning eyes, like she was expecting the detective would be able to provide her some succinct and rational reason for the events that unfolded in the jurors deliberation. She, of course, could not.
"Maur," Jane sighed, trying to push into that one syllable the amount of empathy and hurt she felt for her best friend, and how desperately she wished she could provide the answers she was seeking.
The blonde's shoulders slumped, as if she really had been hoping for more, however irrational it may have been. She wiped under her eyes again and sniffled slightly, shifting on her feet. "It's okay, really. I just think I need a minute."
Jane nodded in understanding, reaching out to rub her palms smoothly down Maura's arms. "Do you want me to come?"
The doctor shook her head with a smile that lent itself far more toward melancholy than a smile should and Jane watched as she walked away with the feel of soft lips still lingering against her cheek.
It wasn't a minute, but a collection of many minutes that turned into many days and then, two and a half weeks. The air in Jane's guest bedroom still carried Maura's scent and all of her daily belongings but the blonde didn't appear or answer communication save a few spontaneous check-in texts. Jane was hurt but she kept it to herself, because although the situation had an impact on her emotions (ew), she didn't necessarily have the right to have an opinion on how Maura chose to handle her own trauma. It wasn't exactly a foreign reaction either, Jane thought, because distancing herself from people was how she coped with her own shit too. It just so happened that her nosey-ass family didn't always grace her with that space, or in the case of her Ma, even have a firm grasp on the concept.
She was expecting Frankie when the knock on her door sounded and she didn't think much of it as she moved to let him in, beer in hand and Sox t-shirt speckled with a ketchup stain above her navel. The blonde she was met with was a good foot and a half too short to be her little brother though, and entirely too beautiful. The surprising nature of her appearance caught a sip of beer in her throat and she managed to tamp down the cough without choking, because god damn it she was angelic. The shirt she was wearing hid the subtle swell of her stomach while still tapering at her waist and despite being almost six in the evening, she was still in heels.
"Hey Maur," Jane croaked, clearing her throat of her near choking experience before remembering herself and stepping aside. "Come in, you could have used your key, you know."
The doctor must have been expecting a different welcoming because the smile on her face was equal parts gratitude and relief. She didn't respond straight away, but did pass the threshold and placed her handbag on the table. Jane locked up behind her and fished her phone discreetly out of her pocket to text Frankie a reschedule request. Her first night with Maura back didn't feel like a Sox game night with her brother.
Together they ate the Thai Jane had ordered for her and Frankie, and when Jane finished the beer she'd already had cracked, they drank the wine Maura had bought with her curled facing each other at opposite ends of the couch. "I spent some time in Antwerp with my mother," she divulged three glasses in, feet casually rested in Jane's lap. "I mean, she was already there for a gallery opening and she didn't explicitly invite me until I told her I was in Brussels and she realised I was too close not to."
The relationship Maura had with her parents felt rehearsed and strained at best, as if she were a pawn in their ardent affair with social power and not much more. It was a difficult situation for Jane to imagine, in fact she genuinely struggled to imagine a world where her Ma wasn't both fiercely loving and unnecessarily proud. Hell, Jane had noted how bewildered Maura had been when Angela had embraced her and run a motherly hand through blonde locks soothingly.
"Was she nice?" Jane near grunted, unable to hide the protective nature of her feelings.
Maura smiled softly. "She was, well in the way Constance Isles is nice. She took me as her guest to the gallery opening and we spent the following two days together." Jane watched as her smile widened at a memory. "She even accompanied me to a medical museum in Amsterdam. It has one the biggest collections of preserved human mutations, some hundreds of years old. I found it very fascinating, both medically and historically but she looked rather ill the entire time. When we reached the cyclopean infants, she almost went vasovagal."
Jane laughed, emptying her glass. "She puked?"
"No, although I'm surprised she didn't," she replied on the back of a chuckle. "She almost fainted, the guide had to walk her out. Apparently it's not for those of a sensitive disposition."
"Only you would take your mom to a museum of dead babies in jars." She smirks, standing and holding out the empty bottle of wine as explanation.
Maura collected Jane's glass from the coffee table and followed her to the kitchen. "I had booked the tour before I met her in Antwerp, it seemed rude not to suggest she join me once I was with her." She said indignantly.
Jane observed as she went about washing their two forks and rinsing their glasses. "Hey, her loss."
Maura hovered by the sink and Jane watched as she set the second wine glass to the side before turning to face her and bracing herself against the counter. The detective was a little lost for words, surprised still with the unfolding of the night's events, but eventually she managed to summon a thought. The atmosphere seemed to change again.
"You look better," she offered as she tossed an empty beer bottle into the recycling bin. "Like the time away helped you make peace with everything."
Maura smiled, a genuine expression and ducked her head with a nod. "It did actually. I had a lot of time to think and put things into perspective."
"Good, you deserve to be happy Maur."
The doctor nodded again, leaning forward slightly while still gripping the counter behind her, knuckles white with the effort. "I missed you, Jane."
Jane didn't dare reach out like she normally may have, risked touching her when she felt high strung as if she were tip-toeing a precipice. Her feet felt half over the edge of a metaphorical cliff already and Jane wasn't even sure exactly what she was diving into. It was bigger than her though, she knew and promised to be either the best or worst gamble of her life.
"I missed you too cyborg," she offered back nonchalantly, because it felt the safest way to play it. As if they weren't teetering. She wasn't a gambler.
"No, I missed you." There was an emphasis on the central statement and when after a beat, Jane didn't reply, Maura shook her head. "It's stupid."
Jane replied before she realised she'd even formed the thought. "No it's not… and you're anything but stupid." She'd also stepped forward, a move she'd not given authorisation for, and reached out to envelope Maura's elbow and tug her a step closer.
The blonde moved languidly with the gentle draw as if she didn't have to think about it at all, and in turn wrapped nimble fingers around Jane's elbow. The detective quickly realised that the move was a mistake because they were closer than they'd ever intentionally been in the middle of an interaction and she could feel Maura's breath on her neck and smell the tart tannins of the wine every time she exhaled. It caused her heart to make its steady beat known and suddenly it felt as if it were in her throat. Jane felt like a damn teenager, and it shouldn't be this way with Maura, especially not after everything the other woman had been through.
But it was that way with Maura, and it had been since their first real conversation.
Jane chanced a glance down into hazel eyes, which met her almost challengingly and then everything happened both too quickly and too slowly for her taste.
Their lips met. Tentatively at first, testing the water and when neither retreated, it morphed into one of the most consumingly intimate kisses Jane had ever experienced. She wasn't sure if it was because it wasn't a man whose lower back her palm was splayed across, or if it was simply because it was Maura. A delicate hand was on the back of her neck beneath tangled raven curls and her skin beneath the touch felt hot. Maura had rolled onto the tips of her toes, leaning into Jane's frame and her breasts pushed against her chest with every inhale.
It shouldn't be happening, even so, that didn't seem to stop her hand from wandering up the back of Maura's blouse to brush the bare skin of her lower back. She was warm and smooth and so god damn intoxicating and then she released a sound somewhere between sigh and moan and Jane realised there was no stopping now. She stepped forward and Maura moved backward as if they were synchronized, until the doctor's back was against the fridge and Jane's leg was wedged smoothly between hers.
Despite being a good head shorter without her shoes and pressed firmly against a kitchen appliance, Maura was hardly the passive participant. She nipped at Jane's bottom lip, soothed it with the tip of her tongue and then used that same muscle to deepen the kiss. The brunette groaned, pressed her friend more firmly against her and ran her hand higher up her back until it could trace the clasp of her bra.
Precipice be damned, she'd jump over that bloody cliff if it meant she got to continue this feeling.
She pulled back though, really employed the full wheelhouse of her willpower and took a minute step backward so she could see Maura's face clearly. Her eyes were darker, her lips plump and cheeks flushed and Jane couldn't help but notice the way her chest raised with harsh and laboured breaths. "Maur," she breathed, scrubbing her hands over her face to try to clear the dirty thoughts that had taken up residence in her mind "What was that?"
Maura looked vexed at first, clearly mentally cataloging the turn of events to plot her next move. She didn't immediately step forward back into Jane's space like the detective secretly hoped she would, just met carob eyes with blown pupils. The air buzzed with generated electricity and they both stood in the kitchen for a moment in silence, before Jane watched mystified as Maura lifted her blouse over her head and dropped it unceremoniously to the floor.
"Oh," Jane breathed, and oh indeed. Her skin was not flawless, there were reminders of her past on otherwise alabaster skin and a gentle dusting of freckles across her chest, but she held herself bare before the brunette with such confidence that it was a turn on.
"A kiss." Maura answered simply, but her breath was still shallow and it gave her tone a unique whisper. "Although I think it's classified as making out, due to the involvement of our tongues."
"Maur–"
The doctor surged forward, evidently finding any further verbal communication unnecessary and suddenly she had Jane pressed against the counter while her lips encouraged the continuation of previous activities and her fingers wrapped around the hem of her t-shirt and lifted. Shirtless and still bewildered at the turn of events, Jane pulled Maura flush against her and with clear permission, bent her neck to allow exploration down Maura's neck and across her collar bone. Her head rolled backward, her hand tangled back in the dark hair at the nape of her neck and Jane, lips tracing the edge of Maura's bra, ran her hands down her back until they'd gripped the top of her thighs and lifted.
Maura emitted a squeak despite herself but wrapped her legs around Jane's hips on instinct, and found her lips again with her own. Jane stumped toward her bedroom and Maura laughed when she pitched them both forward close enough to the edge of the bed that they both landed stacked and sprawled in the middle. The sound runs a jolt of searing chill down Jane's spine, the ripple effect evident by the goose flesh on her arms and it struck her that she'd never heard someone laugh during sex before. It was refreshing, she thought and oddly intimate and freeing, and this woman she'd met who so vehemently refused to be a victim was smiling beneath her and against her with hands that refused to halt exploration.
"I've not," Jane began, but Maura shook her head and pulled her down to nestle atop her.
Against Jane's lips, she murmured "It doesn't matter, I'll show you unless you'd rather we stop."
Lost in the kiss for a moment, the brunette almost forgot to reply. When a trickle of thought managed to seep in through the cloud of arousal, she managed between kisses, "God no, I don't want to stop. Show me what to do."