Chapter 2: The right choice?

If she knew only one thing for sure, then that: Her reactions were back to normal speed again, maybe even a little bit faster because of the high adrenaline level in her blood. It was a forceful, heavy attack that she had started, to be sure to knock the "whoever-it-is" intruder down at the first strike, so that she could be at his or her accomplices a glimpse of a second later. They must not escape; therefore she had to be fast…

But she realized somehow in the middle or only quarter-to-go movement, that this was not a target to knock down. And there it was; her time-frame to react; fast and in the part of a second. With a let-go of all her attack plans, she braked her muscles to a full stop, but this was like been hit by a heavy punch-bag. The speed she had gathered before still forced her forwards, so the only possibility to avoid a crash was to try to turn the direction somehow. That misled her completely, but the wild force of the attack was finally gone. It was a half-soft, non-hurting thud when she collided with the body in front of her.

Out of whatever cause, most likely only to prevent her from toppling over any further, she wrapped her arms around the figure and came to a sudden, secure stop. Wow, that was close… only to think about the possibility that she was so near to hit him with that mighty, aggressive blow was making her sick – oh yes, she had belt him one once, cause he earned it with one of his games; but… this attack was not meant for a friend who had gone too far.

»Um, oops. Mistake.« she said. »Sorry for that…« the next moment he embraced her so firmly that she could only react with an asking: »Yarg?« never knowing, whatever this word or sound may mean.

Jane let go of her immediately, as if he was afraid that he had hurt her and that her strange word was some sound of pain. At first he must have been smiling, but now his body stiffened as if he froze within a second. She knew by the first look in his face that this was serious, and that caused an icy shudder run through her body. Oh crap.

Teresa suddenly felt so misplaced like never before, although she was at his side as ever. But she should be looking at the scene with the eyes of an Agent, not with the eyes of the victim that had red paint all over her body.

Jane was still speechless, looking at the ghastly scene with a mix of disbelief and shock. He seemed to scan every piece of the room and his gaze also flickered over her body, short, but long enough for her to recognize the questions that he was burdened with, but did not dare to ask. She never, never, never wanted to be in this situation! Why the heck was he here, it would be much better; much better; if he had never seen this, as she planned. She would prefer it to be clean and back in the HQ than here. It would have been much easier to cover-up this, if only she knew. It would have been the best, but now the chance was gone.

»Do you think it was him?« she requested, only to make him speak.

He looked at her again, but Lisbon had the impression that he was trying with all his strength to be calm. He analyzed the markings and also her painted toe- and fingernails and said: »If not, it was a really good copy. There are details in those lines, the public never knew… from what I can see the marks should be a mix out of stabs and cuts, deadly of course if done with a knife, but causing a lot of pain before he finally ended it.« He traced the red lines with his hands, but did not touch her, only formed a picture, finishing with the smooth cut through her throat.

»Why did he not kill me, if it was Red John?«

»I don´t know. I am more than happy that you are alive, but I don´t know. He cleared his throat. »Did he lay hand on you?«

»I…« she hesitated, then she explained it for him and for her in almost emotion-free words: »I was unconscious for a time and can´t remember… I am pretty sure that the person who did this took me out by an electric shock. I got those small electric burn marks here on my shoulder.« She moved the collar of her night dress a little bit to show him, and re-arranged her garment, while she talked on, as if she was reciting a stranger´s medical report: »It must have been the utmost quantity such a shocker can provide, and my body is still in an uncertain state, it tickles all over. I was not able to do any move of resistance, so… the possibility exists. I can´t remember a thing. But if yes, I don´t think that he left traces.«

»Lisbon…«

Teresa cut his words: »Enough about that, and don´t try to contradict me now. You just listen.« She said with hard words. »I can´t reverse that now and I can´t delete your memory, as I can´t delete mine. But we must not; I repeat; must not talk about this ever again. This is and will be our secret, for a very long time if needed. You´ll go now. I´ll clean up here, have the last two days of my free weekend and no one will ever know.«

»But…«

»No one will ever know!« she repeated. »It´s my decision. Don´t try to change it.«

»But…«

»Jane, no!« she growled. »I need you to leave now. Just turn around and go. We´ll see each other on Monday, in the HQ, as it was planned.«

»But…«

Now she started to sound like ice and flames: »One more word, and this is the end of our friendship! I am serious. There will be no investigation, because this has never happened. I am ok… or will be, as soon as I got a long shower.«

For one moment he seemed to need the maximum strength to resist the wish to come any closer, do something completely different than she wanted him to do. Lisbon could not avoid noticing that she had to hold her back too; but this was her weak inner self, the part of her soul that she always kept locked away. It was not useful in this moment. It was never useful, it was confusing.

»Go please.« she repeated, but with a much softer voice than before.

He reacted with no counterargument, but told her: »It was a short message from your phone.« and took out his cellular. Lisbon looked at the display when he had chosen the right page. There were only a few words. I got her at the Woodlane Inn Room 23 in Cisco. That was all, the message was sent about one and a quarter hour ago. Lisbon slowly reached out for his hand and he did not resist, when she moved his finger to the "delete" button. The message disappeared from the screen, as if it had never existed.

Then he smiled weakly and turned around to leave.

»Thank you.« Lisbon said at low voice. »It´s the best we can do. Believe me.«

He did not reply.

:-:

When the door was shut again, she took a deep breath. That he had been here was really shocking; but at the same time some kind of a brush that cleared out her mind. Now she knew what she wanted to do; without doubt. The best thing was to let nobody know.

This was an attempt to lure Jane into a trap. Why else should anyone do this? Maybe this person would try again if she or he knew that they did not react in the proper way and she could turn this thing against the unknown person. At first she deleted the sent message in her cell-phone. She knew that, if it was really Red Johns doing, she would not need to clean the keypad of the small phone – there would be no fingerprints. Of course he would have used gloves. His work was always clean, well planned and correctly done – therefore the police got no trace on him until this day.

She stepped under the shower and to her relief the color was easy to get off with soap and a little bit of scrubbing. Slowly she regained more and more sense back of her body and probably she had been right, she did not feel like as if somebody had had his turns on her. Or maybe not? Of course she would visit her doctor as soon as possible, but she needed a regular term; if she´d insist on an emergency treatment because of such a question, at least her doc would be suspicious and she never wanted any suspicious persons. She was about eighty percent sure that her visitor had only painted those lines on her body, and not touched her otherwise. Teresa shook her head. To her displease she had to admit that this did not mean very much at this time. No... she would feel it if she had been abused, even if there were no obvious signs of counteraction because if she was unconscious and had no chance to fight. But could this only be caused by an electric shock? Usually those devices stunned the victims, made them unable to move or to resist for a time, but a complete loss of all memory? And for so long? Maybe she had been drugged by someone but… No! Not again! Her decision was made. There won´t be investigations. It was her profession, just the person she was, that made her think about it. But she must handle it as if this was a bad dream, only a bad dream, for Jane´s sake.

She started on her bed and rearranged it to normal state, then she turned on the spooky smiling face at the wall. Something was strange on it, she knew – ok, it was not painted with blood; that was the first and most remarkable thing. The face was slightly open at the top, the mouth smiling, as ever. But then there were the eyes… they were thin red lines with their outer edges higher than the inner ones, making them look somewhat evil. All the other pictures of Red Johns "smiley faces" on the walls flickered through her head. Usually the outer ends of the eyes were directed a little bit downwards giving the face a slightly sad, but not evil smile… was this change some sign that it was not him? Wow stop! She did it again, what a curse must be laying on her! The curse of being a law enforcement officer. Repeat: This was no evidence cause this has never happened, remember that.

Encouraged by the fact that the color of the felt-tip-pen had been easy to remove from her skin, she started to work on the wall with white soap foam, toilet paper and teeth-brush. Finally she must have re-dissolved the white wall paint so much that she could remove almost all traces of the red color. Only if one knew that the face was there one would notice the place, and if she could get some white paint in the morning, even if it was just the opaque white out of a water-paint set, it would look all right again.

Yes, it was the best to cover it all up, swallow it down and forget it. Of course it would be much easier to handle if Jane had not been here and seen it. But as soon as she started to think about it again, it was clear that this intruder had sent Jane a message; there was no other way! Whoever this person was and what his or her motives were, one main goal must have been to get him. And how could anyone be any surer, that Jane would do something, than in showing him the whole mess. Maybe this plan-maker thought that she´d still be out of sound mind when Jane arrived here, and that she could not give him clear orders. Ha! This went wrong, you smart-aleck. You won´t get us with such a simple trick.

She had to admit that she was not really sure, whether Jane went really back home or the "wherever-place" where he used to sleep nowadays; but if he still was watching the room she also wanted to teach him a lesson.

So she lay down again in her bed after a long stretch and cuddled up under the thin blanket. Whoever was watching her; Jane, the nightly intruder, some nosy neighbor or the night-owl that was hooting softly at a tree nearby… they all should see that she stood firmly behind her decision. This has never happened. That´s definite!

:-:

Surprisingly fast she had found her sleep, and no alarm clock was there to disturb her, only the song of some bird, that had chosen the tree outside to present his melodies to the world. The color at the wall had re-dried, and there was only the dim shade of some pink left. Either she had to explain that to the hotel owner, or she would get some paint and remove the last faint of color.

Whatever she was up to, now it was breakfast time and Teresa still wanted to make her hiking-trip through the woods. She was not a professional hiker, and did it less often than she maybe wished, and exactly therefore it was a new adventure and she did not want to miss it. So she dressed up in her outdoor outfit and went downstairs.

»Good morning Mrs. Pike.« she called to the older Lady who run this bed-and-breakfast inn. She had had one breakfast here, yesterday, and it had been delicious. The ageing Mrs. Pike tried to serve her guests fresh coffee or tea to the table.

»Morning, Miss Lisbon. You go on one of the trails today, I suppose?«

»Yes, I plan to do it, because I have to leave tomorrow afternoon. So I want to use this day. But first I have to get me some food and a bottle of water for the tour, then I can pack my backpack.«

»I see.« the owner of the Inn said. »So I´ll wait with cleaning your room, until you´re ready. You can use my bike to go to Simmon´s Grocery, it´s parked just around the corner. So you´d be faster and you´d not need your car.« Mrs. Pike poured some coffee in Lisbon´s cup.

Teresa replied: »Oh, that´s really nice of you, thank you.«

The older woman smiled: »It´s ok, of course.« She turned around and went to the next table, where she also had a little small talk with another guest.

:-:

Not an hour later Lisbon was back from her little ride to the town´s center. It was a nice trip and a cute little town. She got everything she needed in the little shop, also the cover-up-color for the wall, and some food supply for the day outdoors. The paint was drying while she packed her backpack, and when she was ready to leave the room looked used, but not as if something had happened. She could only hope that Mrs. Pike or the room maid would not notice anything; otherwise she must think for a good excuse.

The hiking paths that led into the Nature Preserve started almost at the backyard of the little Inn, only the public parking place for visitors had to be crossed ere she was at the entrance to the woods. It was a wonderful place and there were a few routes that would fit a relaxing day´s trip. She chose the one that led to one of the little lakes, if it was hot in the afternoon she maybe could swim a little bit there. At first a family with two children was right behind her, but after the next crossroad she was alone – the quietness was such a difference to the busy town life she was used to. She walked on at a good speed, inhaling the wonderful fresh air and enjoying the bird´s songs and the sun that flickered through the mighty trees.

Although now and then some darker thoughts kept trying to creep back into her mind, she always managed to store them away in a black cupboard. Maybe with a little effort this cupboard would once turn into a safe, and she would forget the code how to open it, but right now she was busy with only banning and blocking the uneasy facts. The fight kept her busy all day long, and was not forgotten when she finally arrived back in the little town, to get some dinner.

:-:

Back in her room she was relieved that the color on the wall was so good, that she herself could not tell where exactly the red face had been. While she was looking at the wall, being relieved that the evidence was destroyed; her "police-lady" professionalism started to be a pain in the neck again. It was so seducing to try to solve that riddle. It started by the simplest question: How did this felt-tip-pen attacker came in, without her hearing him? Why did the electric shocker take her out completely? Red John loved it to torture his victims when they were still conscious – at least the evidence facts said so. She must have been blacked out like dead meat, there was no memory. Her thoughts went back to drugs. Maybe knockout drops, but that would mean someone was already after her when she was in that little beer-bar yesterday evening – she had not seen anyone. Back to the room´s facts: Could it be possible that someone came in here without her noticing?

Not through the window of course, never. It was an old fabricate, and the opening mechanism squeaked out loud, when she moved it. And second to that the window had been closed from the inside last night. Also the door handle issued a little squeal if used; she had heard it clearly when Jane came in…

Jane. By the thought of him her insides twitched; she felt guilty that she had sent him away with so harsh words. What must he be thinking about her? Crazy hellcat, she called herself. How could she ever have dared to threaten him that she would quit their friendship because of that? I must be out of mind. Of course he was worried, good gracious heavens, what would she do, if she would find him like this? The very best would have been if he never came here; but as she had seen, the person behind this plan had lost no time to make clear that Jane knew it. And that was like the poking sting of a hornet, deep inside. This person was serious and maybe the strange attack on her was only the beginning.

This brought her to the next theory and slowly she started to wonder why she did not think about all this in the night – instead she found an easy, relaxing sleep. A short in-between-thought referred to the drug-idea again, but then she returned to the other thing. What if she was only the first one to get such a visit, what if… this was a major thing, a bigger plan, and what if she had chosen the wrong direction? She was the leading Agent in the RJ case, everyone knew, and Jane was her consultant, everybody all around California knew that. Of course Red John must know – ridiculous if not. It was unlikely that this someone would go after Jane; if he or – maybe she? – wanted to provoke him to do something stupid, it was not useful to attack or kill the main target. But then there was the team. And suddenly fear reached out to her, even more than the night before.

It would be pathetic and totally wrong to say that she did not care for what happened to her own body and mind because of that nightly attack; but she cared so much for her team, her friends, that she suddenly understood how Jane must feel right now.

Oh dear, I am the stoniest and ignorant person I know! How could she ever send him away in a physical and psychical state like this? This was the worst thing I ever did to him, and I can only hope that he´ll forgive me once. It was not his fault that he had been here; it was all a big trap. They should have talked.

The next moment she shook her head. He would learn to cope with it, as she would, they will meet on Monday and as soon as he´ll see how firmly she stood behind her choice, he would understand, yes, he would. She was sure that her nightly attacker would be very surprised about the fact that she´d remained cool and did nothing, no try to catch him – or her? – Nothing at all, even send Jane, the RJ expert, away and forget it all. This would confuse the person behind this totally, and with a little bit of luck discourage him or her so much that this was it and nothing ever happens again.

And what if not?

God, why could her mind not be silent! Why all those questions, that´s nerve racking!

What if this ignorance would provoke a second, fiercer attack?

Stop thinking! It´s better to forget it. You´re going to get insane.

Or not… With a resolute turn she went to the cupboard and took out her small suitcase. In a hurry and without thinking on something else she started to pack up her things and was ready within a few minutes.

Mrs. Pike was a little bit shocked that she wanted to leave so late at night, but nevertheless the older woman noticed that Lisbon was in some troubled state of mind. The Inn-owner did not ask why she left, but Teresa reassured her that she loved the place and that she´ll come back once, and that it were only personal reasons why she had to leave now. Shortly later she sat down in the car and started the engine.

It was like taking uppers and downers. Her mind changed like a flag in the wind. In exactly this moment she wanted to skip her plan to go back to Sacramento right now, because she was convinced that she was totally right with everything that she had done. This was the best way to end this thing before it started to get really big.

But admit it; it was already big, it was so powerful that it kept messing up her brain as if some burglar was rummaging through a house, throwing everything aside what he did not like. She would have to clear that. It was not so easy to lock away an attack; the first time she seemed to understand the obligate psychological treatment after a shoot-out or an endangering or threatening situation. There were parts of her that she usually ignored, and they were revolting against that ignorance with all might now.

And the next second everything was different again… Rrah! She needed something to focus on; and not constantly asking herself if she was doing the right thing now or not, or which side was the better to follow.

»Jane, where are you?« at least she had made the choice to call him. It would be better to sort it out now between the both of them, instead of having this wall between them when they met in the HQ on Monday. If she finally decided to let be like it was, they could discuss it under four eyes and the team would not be troubled; or worse, endangered. They were all involved in this case somehow and if Jane´s judgment was questioned again… uh, she did not want to think about that.

His voice was low and indefinite: »I am in the Parkway Extended Stay Motel, in Sac. Room Twenty-nine. You coming?«

»I shouldn´t have been so rough to you. We must sort this out, so I just drop by, ok?«

»You were in shock state.« he replied. »You don´t have to come.«

»Do you mind much, if I do?«

»No.«

They disconnected the line, but Lisbon was at the motel not a long time later; she had hesitated to call until she had seen the nightly lights of Sacramento just before her car.

:-:

Finally she stopped her car next to her consultant´s old Citroen; and went up the open staircase to the balcony-like corridor that led to the rooms. When Jane opened his door, she realized at once that he hadn´t been sleeping since they met; and that he was deeply worried. He let her pass by and closed the door behind.

»Like tea?« he asked. »Got some ready.« He pointed to the tiny kitchen-thing he had there, in this small motel room. It was not more than a microwave and a water boiling machine, maybe a cupboard for spare microwave food and some plates.

»Yes, thank you.« Lisbon replied and looked around in the one-room-apartment. »I can´t believe that it´s still Saturday. Barely enough, but still…« she cleared her throat. »I should have explained to you why I wanted to forget this all. Not because I am afraid about the investigation, and the questions someone would ask me. I am not afraid about the truth, a med rep, maybe. It was also not some silly try to ban this thing from my mind by just ignoring it. That won´t work, it only makes me crazy. It´s because… Red John is dead. And he must remain dead. Otherwise they´ll be after you.«

Jane turned around so fast that he nearly dropped the tea-cup from its plate; for safety he put it on the shelf, while he said: »And this Lisbon, is what I feared most of all.«

Teresa was confused: »I think, I don´t understand…«

He approached her with two hurried steps and looked her in the eyes: »I don´t want you to do this for me. Not… for me.«

For one single time she let her other side act and speak, she reached out for him and placed her hand on his shoulder: »If not for you, then for nobody. Ok?«

Jane seemed to be stunned, which was not difficult to be if one was so very weary like him. Lisbon smiled and started to turn away to get her tea, when he suddenly made her stop with an unexpected reposition. She kind of moved into his gentle kiss and was astonished by this mind-blowing touch; it was hard to believe how fast the little shock melted away and left nothing but indescribable… even words started to melt away… who needs words…

It felt like a loss when he backed off, whispering: »Sorry for that...«

»Don´t do this.« Teresa said, when she noticed that he reached out for his suit jacket, and was heading for the door. She stepped in his way. »Stay, Patrick.«

»Stay?«

»Yes. Please stay.«