Disclaimer: The Mentalist, its characters and universe belong to Bruno Heller and CBS. I'm only a fan, writing this for love of this TV show and personal pleasure.

A.N.: This is for 2x16 "Code Red". This came out shorter than what I've been writing recently, but I quite liked it.

Loving Him was Red

Forgiveness

As the elevator doors closed, Jane turned to Lisbon with a conciliatory smile. "Can I buy you dinner? To make it up to you."

She remained facing forward and looked at him out of the corner of her eye. "No." She said airily.

"Oh come on. Please?" He insisted, his voice equal parts whiny insistence and playful joking. "You know I meant well."

"Sometimes I really don't know," she replied as she turned to him with a frown. "I'm starting to agree that you're something of a mean, irresponsible sadist."

"Hold on. How was I irresponsible?" He shook his head slightly and gestured with a hand in protest.

"Oh so you don't object to mean and sadist?" She raised her eyebrows at him with a sarcastic smile.

Jane ignored her and carried on with his point. "I just uncovered a murderer and thief, preventing him from selling a powerful bio-weapon in the black market that could cause the death of thousands of people."

"Yeah, and in the process you made dozens of people go through the wrenching agony of thinking they were just about to die a horrible death, not to mention their families and loved ones," Lisbon countered, and now she was the one shaking her head and holding a hand up. "What if someone had decided to take a shortcut by killing themselves?"

"Well, the act of suicide isn't something so easy to do," he said, his voice growing quieter and more serious then. The elevator doors opened and they walked out together as he kept talking. "Only the truly hopeless and desperate resort to it. Most people feel the pulse of life too strongly to try to end their own lives, even in such a situation. Besides, it was over so quickly that no one would've had any chance to do anything." He finished with a dismissive shrug.

"You always got an answer for everything, don't you?" She rolled her eyes a little at him. "What about the fact that you were walking around with a vial of the actual deadly virus in your pocket the whole time? You could've tripped or fallen somehow and that thing would've actually killed us."

"Harken said the flasks were unbreakable, it was quite a minimal risk," he nodded at her as they walked past the security station at the lobby. "One worth taking in order to save so many potential lives and getting justice for Alicia Seiberg."

"You just like messing with people's heads and causing drama." She retorted as they went out the door and down the couple of steps at the entrance.

"Well, I'm not sure about drama, but there's certainly a lesson in forgiveness here." Jane stopped and stood by the steps, rocking a little on the balls of his feet, his hands going into the pockets of his jacket.

"Ha," she exclaimed, turning around to face him with a frown of disbelief while a sarcastic smile tugged at the corners of her lips. "I'm not forgiving you anytime soon."

"I'm not talking about me," Jane said calmly, as he paused for a moment and his eyes searched for something in her face. "You're right. Let's take a rain check on dinner. You should call your brother Tommy."

Lisbon blinked her eyes a couple of times up at him and her mouth hung slightly open as she processed his words. After a moment, she recovered herself and started to shake her head at him, her hands going into the pockets of her pants. "Look, I appreciate your concern, but─"

"No buts, Lisbon," he interrupted her with a smile as he held up the index finger of his right hand. "This is the upside of getting your life back! You can see it all clearly now and do the things you need to do but had been avoiding so far. Whatever issue that happened with you and your brothers, your own dying wish was for you to work things out and forgive each other. Don't leave that for your actual deathbed, because then it will literally be too late."

She crossed her arms defensively over her chest as she frowned at him, worrying her lips into a cross between a pout and a stern line. She rocked her weight from one foot to another as she turned slightly away from him, glaring at him out of the corner of her eyes. "You're still not forgiven."

"It's okay. I'll work to win you back," Jane gave her one of his bright smiles, as he could see he'd gotten through to her. "Dinner tomorrow, then?"

As usual, she tried to keep the stern line on her lips, but failed miserably as a small smile emerged on her face despite her best efforts. "We'll see." Lisbon told him softly, and she turned to go towards her car. "Good night, Jane."

"Good night, Lisbon." He watched her walk away for a moment then he also turned and went to his car.