A/N: After this chapter, there are only two left! Thank you for reading and reviewing to all of you who have so far.


"C'mon Janie," Frankie Jr., wrench in hand and oil rag over his shoulder, pleaded with his sister to see reason, but it was all for naught. "Try to see it from his perspective. Do I think it's a dumbass decision? Yeah. But I learned a long time ago that ya can't talk Tommy out of somethin' he's already got his mind made up about."

Jane, in jeans, a leather jacket, and a mean scowl, took a swig of her beer while she watched her brother tinker with his motorcycle out in Maura's courtyard. "Well we could at least try - this lawyer is gonna screw his chances of gettin' the full payout if he goes through with it," she said, leaning against the brick wall of the main house and looking down at her bottle. Her other hand fiddled with a loose string in her pocket as she wove it around her index and middle fingers in an unrelenting pattern.

"I don't disagree. But I also know that I've never had the pressures of a kid, of a family on me. So, agh," he replied, waving his hand as if to dismiss the topic of conversation altogether.

"Those pressures are exactly why he should be playin' this smart, talkin' to Frost's lawyer," Jane said with a little more passion than she intended. When she heard her own voice rise and saw her brother flinch, she sighed. "But you're right. Once he's decided, it's done."

Frankie nodded, and stood up from his place in front of the dismantled engine to sip on his own beer. "I think we just have to hope that he gets enough of a lump sum to mean somethin'," he said quietly.

They stood together for a while, not talking, not needing to. Frankie worked at the makeshift workbench against Maura's wall; Jane crossed her arms and used her thumbnail to peel at the label of her Peroni. "He's tryin'," she said, glancing at him with a sad smile.

"He is. He's the kid who just needs a little more help, is all," Frankie assured her with a hand on her shoulder. "Ma coddled him."

"Speakin' of," Jane said, "what do you wanna do about Ma?"

Frankie furrowed his brow. "What do you mean?"

"The tax money. What should we do?"

"Nothing. Maura's right - we do judge," Frankie shrugged. When Jane glared at him, he stared back pointedly. "And clearly Ma doesn't want us to know. You shouldn't have opened up her mail."

"I wanted to help, Frankie," Jane replied, running her hand through her unruly hair. "I still wanna help."

"She doesn't want our help, clearly," he told her, turning his back and bending over to pick up the spark plug he had left on the tarp. His broad shoulders stretched the fabric of his worn black t-shirt. "It's been over two weeks and not a peep."

"It just makes me so sad," Jane commented, crunching some loose dirt under her harness boot.

"Me too, Janie," Frankie agreed, tapping the toe of his shoe against her own absentmindedly. "But maybe we should just count our blessings that she's got one of us to confide in."

Jane chuckled humorlessly. "Who'd've thought that we'd be the problem siblings this time around?"

Frankie broke into a wide grin. "There's a first time for everything. Speakin' of problem siblings, how's life with Cailin?"

"Pretty good," Jane said, peeking over her shoulder at the closed back door just to her left, "A couple of weeks go by and now they kick me out to have girl time on the couch."

"Well, at least that means we get to spend some time together," Frankie said, and when his sister blushed, he half-hugged her. "How does Maura feel about it all?"

"She's eating it up. It's been kind of nice for her to have more than just us around, you know? Not that we're bad, but…"

"We're not blood," Frankie finished for her, and Jane nodded.

"Yeah. Exactly. And she's never had blood before. At least not blood that wasn't headed for death row," she joked, and her brother laughed.

"I mean, she wouldn't be the first of us with family in prison," Frankie said with a twinkle in his eye, handing Jane the push broom, knowing that she would help him clean his mess off the strength of making Maura happy alone.


"Ok, but one day, we really will have that glass of wine together," Cailin snarked as she took her mug of tea from Maura. She sat with her feet curled up under her on one of the armchairs next to the couch, while Maura took the corner seat closest to her.

"Maybe. But today is not that day," Maura replied. She blew on her steaming cup and pulled the throw blanket over her legs.

"But Jane and Frankie are drinking," said Cailin, smiling as she pointed toward the closed door that led to the courtyard where, in fact, the two eldest Rizzoli siblings were drinking.

"That's true," Maura conceded, "but they are both legal drinking age. And they drink beer a lot together. It's one of the ways they fortify their bond."

"Wine could be a way that we fortify ours," Cailin responded, throwing up her free hand when Maura looked at her severely. "Alright, alright, I'm kidding. Tea is great. But seriously, tell me more about them. They're like twins."

Maura sipped thoughtfully. "Jane and Frankie?"

"Yes, Jane and Frankie," Cailin said, "they look, sound, and act the same. Not to mention that they have the same exact job."

"They're very close," Maura said. "They've been that way as long as I've known them, and probably since they were small. They'd kill for each other, have killed for each other, several times, actually."

Cailin slurped noisily, shocked. To her credit, she said nothing about that shock. "Intense," she noted cooly. "Do you regret not having that? Not having a close brother or sister relationship?"

"Not really," Maura said. "I've often wondered what it was like, but not until I met them did I feel like something was missing. And as soon as I felt that lack, they filled it." When she saw Cailin stare awkwardly into her tea, she revised. "I am glad that we're getting to know each other."

"Me too," Cailin brightened. "But they do make it look fun," she said.

Maura adjusted her legs under her blanket. "They make a lot of things look fun. It's sort of their… thing."

"Being appealing?" Cailin asked, smirking at the way Maura flushed at the question.

"Something like that. They're young, vibrant. Alive. Very passionate about a great many things."

"And they look nice, too," Cailin cut through the chaff. "I'm sure all the defending each other's honor keeps them in shape."

Maura laughed lightly. "I suppose it does."

Cailin laughed back, and then they fell into a comfortable silence, her countenance growing more earnest as time passed. "Is that how Jane got that thing on her stomach?"

"Yes," Maura said, guarded but willing to at least hear her out. She didn't pretend to not understand exactly what Cailin was referring to.

"I swear I wasn't looking like that. But she had this nasty scar that I noticed the other day," Cailin said quietly. "It looked… traumatic."

Maura stiffened. "Not like that, huh?" she tried to tease, but it fell flat.

"How did it get there?" Cailin pressed.

"I was there when it happened," Maura said. She sighed loudly when she saw that Cailin was still waiting. "A few years ago, there was a hostile takeover at BPD. A dirty cop had killed his partner and was looking for evidence that would incriminate him in our crime lab. Frankie was hurt in the siege and… and while I waited with him in the morgue, that dirty cop took Jane hostage. Frankie was dying; he had massive internal bleeding. Jane knew that there was very little time before the paramedics would be too late. So, while that man held her in front of him as a human shield, she took his gun and shot him through her own body. On the front steps of headquarters."

"Jesus Christ, Maura," Cailin breathed, "that's, that's… you were there? You watched it happen?"

Maura hadn't realized that talking about it would make her as emotional as it did. "They… liberated us, for lack of a better term, just as it was happening. I made it upstairs as quickly as I could, but she was already on the ground when I got there." She didn't cry, but the image of Jane, flat on her back and eyes in a death flutter, still hollowed her out inside. She hadn't been allowed in the back of the ambulance that took her to Mass General. "I didn't see the shot go off."

"I'm sorry I brought it up," Cailin said. "I thought it was going to be, I dunno. I thought it was going to be a badass story."

Maura shrugged, some of the darkness inside of her dissipating when she heard Jane and Frankie's voices from outside. "It still kind of is. But only because she lived."

"You told me the other day that she would do anything for her brothers."

"And I meant it."

"So… what do you think she's going to do for Mrs. Rizzoli?" asked Cailin. She peeked over Maura's head to the door to make sure the Rizzoli siblings weren't on their way inside.

"I don't know," Maura answered honestly. "But as much as she would do for Frankie or Tommy, she would do even more for her mother. So I'm sure she'll figure it out."

"I don't know if I would take a bullet for my mom," Cailin said, wrapping her fingers around her tea for the comfort. "Would you?"

"For Constance? I don't know, but when she got hit by a car last year, I would have given anything to have taken her place."

"Parents are complicated," Cailin replied, and Maura could see something like sadness brewing beneath the statement.

She decided just to nod in agreement.

"Am I allowed back in yet?" Jane saved her from having to talk about Hope with Cailin, who, while she could probably commiserate, had spent an entire life with Hope. As her daughter. Something that she and Maura did not have in common. Maura knew herself, too. She knew herself well enough to know that there was a chance she'd say something to mess it up, to hurt Cailin.

"You were never not allowed," Maura called behind her shoulder, eyes locking on Jane when she walked her three empty bottles to the recycling bin tucked away in the island. "Where's Frankie?"

Jane smiled when she noticed she was being watched. Then she made her way over to Maura, sitting down right next to her on the couch. "He's putting up a few things and then he'll be in. Apparently he and this one have a date," she said, pointing at Cailin.

Maura nearly fell out of her seat; Cailin sat up straighter. "Mario Kart isn't a date, Jane. It's war. And I'm going to cream him if he's been drinking," she said.

"I'd say that your sister let you set up video games in here is a win for both of you," Jane snarked.

Maura only squeezed her thigh lightly, unable to deny that such a concession was extremely out of her character. "I'll admit I was feeling charitable in the moment. And your brother can be quite convincing when he wants something."

"How do you think we got the basketball hoop installed at the old house? Or the trampoline? It wasn't because I asked," Jane said sorely.

"That trampoline was the best," Frankie's unabashed Bostonian echoed into the warm living area, just as he closed the door behind him. "And you know it's because you don't know how to sweet talk, Janie. You never learned that you catch more flies with honey."

"I don't know if that's true," Maura said as she sipped noisily. "She got me here."

"Thank you," Jane said to her with her hands out and her head bowed.

"I don't think that was sweet talkin'," Frankie said with a wicked smirk, and then he winked at Cailin.

Jane glowered at him. "Do. Not."

He couldn't help it. How could he not tease Jane, given the chance? "Cailin - you've been here like a year now. You ever heard of the Boston Kama Sutra?"

"Frankie!" Jane and Maura, mortified, shouted at once. He only cackled.

"Is he pestering you?" Angela Rizzoli, still in a nice overcoat, made her way into the living room from the courtyard just as Jane was about to escalate to fisticuffs.

"He was bein' inappropriate in front of the child," Jane said petulantly.

"I'm 19!" Cailin retorted.

Frankie gasped in faux hurt. "I was just explaining the story of how Jane and Maura got together!"

Angela chuckled as she took the third seat on the couch, between Jane in the middle and Frankie on the other armchair. "Ok, maybe that's not the most family-friendly story to share, honey," she said to him, patting his arm. He laughed quietly, too, giving the game up to revel in the first moment of mirth he had shared with his mother in the past week or so.

"Ok, now I have to know," said Cailin.

"Another time," Maura told her.

"When you're older," Jane teased, and Cailin groaned.

Despite all the light ribbing and general good cheer, Angela soon turned quiet. "Listen, kids," she said, leaning back so that they could all see her. When Cailin turned, too, she revised. "Jane, Frankie. Maura," she started, "I need to ask you somethin'."

"Yeah, Ma," said Jane, turning towards her. Frankie scooted forward, too.

"Did either of you… did you three..." she said, struggling with the right words.

"What is it?" Frankie asked, brow bunched forward in concern.

"Are you alright, Angela? Are you feeling alright?" Maura chimed in, hoping medical assistance wouldn't be needed.

"Yes, yes. I'm fine. Great, actually. You three didn't do anything stupid, did you? Something stupid and chivalrous that I'm going to have to owe you for?" Angela asked.

"What are you talkin' about?" Jane replied. "What's goin' on, Ma?"

"Yeah, I'm confused," Frankie said. "I haven't done anything different."

"Me either," Jane said, "but you'd tell us if you were in trouble, right?"

Satisfied enough with their answers and their ignorance, Angela ended her cryptic interrogation. "Yes, I would. Something strange happened to me today, but I'll figure it out, ok? I just wanted to make sure you kids weren't involved. Well, I wanted to ask you before Tommy got here."

"Tommy's coming?" asked Maura.

"Yeah, he called. Said he had somethin' to tell us," Angela shrugged. "I think it might have to do with his lawsuit."

Maura got up to make more tea, and Jane bit her cheek to stay quiet. Frankie did much of the same.

"I hope it's good news," Cailin piped up from her perch, anxious to dispel the mood in the room. "But I've got a lab to study for, so I'm going to leave you all to it. Good night!" She rose, took her mug to the sink, and the rest of the people in the room all said their goodbyes distractedly.

They all jumped a little when the doorbell rang, just moments after she retired to her room. Jane hopped up, desperate to unleash her nervous energy, and opened up the door. Tommy stood there, opening up his arms wide when she saw her. "Yo, sister!" he shouted, gathering her up in a hug so strong she left the ground.

"Ouch, Tommy!" Jane yelped, spine cracking from top to bottom, "what's with you?"

He put her down and then winked at her. "Hey listen, help me out. I brought dinner from Sorellina's," he said, throwing his head in the direction of Maura's front stoop. Jane scrutinized him, walking slowly toward the takeout boxes outside, wary of a trap or a prank.

Frankie looked at him like he'd grown a second head, possibly a third. "That's a five-star restaurant, Tommy. What are you up to?"

"I just wanted to do somethin' nice for everybody," Tommy said indignantly, but there was a twinkle in his eye. He and Jane hauled the heavy bags to the kitchen island, and then he produced another bag with a bottle of wine. A very fancy bottle of wine. "I don't drink, but I was told by the guy at the store that this goes perfect with red sauce."

Maura held it up, inspected it, impressed. "It does. It's also quite expensive."

Angela stood up and walked over to them. "Look honey, maybe it's best that you don't spend your money like this."

Tommy smiled so wide his eyes crinkled. "I'm celebratin'. My case against the Storrow Center settled! I got three hundred thousand bucks," he announced.

"Oh, Tommy!" she exclaimed, hugging him tightly. "I'm so happy for you."

"I just got paid today," he explained, "I didn't want to tell anyone when I found out last week. I wanted to wait until it was real, you know? But I want you to stop worryin', ok, Ma? About me. And now you can also stop worryin' about, you know, your financial issues."

Angela's face dropped, her mouth open and her eyes already wet with tears. "Tommy, you didn't."

He just raised his eyebrows and smirked. He popped open the container with the most expensive spaghetti and meatballs he'd ever purchased and rummaged in the bag for a fork, until Jane socked his arm. "Ow!"

"Didn't what, huh? You paid off the debt?" She yelled.

Frankie practically skipped over to him. "You paid off the IRS?"

Maura was just as taken aback. "Twenty-seven thousand dollars?"

"How did you three know?!" Angela turned to the rest of her children accusingly.

Jane faltered. "Uh, well, we…" she started, eyes on Maura, who threatened her with a glare, "No. I. I was, uh, shit. It was-"

Tommy couldn't watch his big sister drown anymore. He smirked. "I told 'em. Look, you shouldn't have to do everything on your own. They wanted to help, just like me."

This assuaged Angela. She grabbed him by his neck and kissed his cheek loudly. "Oh, Tommy. Thank you. Listen, I'm gonna pay you every penny, son. I promise. With interest."

"Ma, look. I owe you plenty. No payback required," he said as he hugged her back. When she released him, thanking him quietly, he took off his jacket, ready to eat for real.

It wasn't to be. "I'm proud of you, Tommy," Jane said to him, squeezing his arm so that he faced her. "You're the man Pop never was."

He blushed. "You don't have to get all mushy on me, Jane."

"Well I can if I want to," she said, wrapping both arms around him tight, pressing him into her with conviction. "Oh I love you so much," she said happily as she kissed the side of his head, "I love you. And listen, you are not allowed to do this on your own, a'right?"

"Yeah. Janie and I are gonna split this with you," Frankie said, moving in for a hug of his own. It was stiffer than Jane's, with a few more back claps, but just as warm.

"Thanks, bro," Tommy said, lapping up the attention. "Well, since we're all huggin' here, can I hug Maura, too?"

Maura laughed and came from behind Jane to open her arms to him. "You bet," she said, and he latched onto her.

Jane immediately glowered. "Hands where I can see 'em," she said evenly.

"What?" Tommy, said, laughing, unable to help the teasing in his voice. When he let Maura go, he put his hands on his hips and looked at his family with pride, with accomplishment. "Alright. Who wants to eat? I got enough for Cailin, too, if she's still around."