New season starts here in Aus tomorrow. Yay! To celebrate, I give you a new chapter.

As always, I hope you enjoy and big thankyous to all my readers and reviewers, all of you are awesome.

Disclaimer: Still not mine.

When Lisbon returned from the kitchen with a bowl of cereal in her hand, it was to find Jane lying on the couch, gazing dreamily up at the ceiling. There was something so endearingly familiar about seeing him this way, that it brought a smile to her face. Take away the jeans and T-shirt and replace them with a three-piece suit and it could have been just another day at the office.

They had a routine, the two of them. Lisbon would arrive in the mornings to find him snoozing on the couch and a cup of piping hot coffee waiting for her on her desk. At around five each evening, Jane would come into her office with another cup of coffee for her and a tea for himself, and settle himself on the red couch there until she went home.

He'd never told her why he did that, and she'd never asked. They didn't even talk all that much. She figured that he just liked the company, and she had to admit that after a tough day, it was nice to know someone else was there.

"Like what you see?" asked Jane. She felt herself jump slightly as his voice pulled her from her thoughts.

"Dream on," she said.

"Oh Lisbon, you really are a bad liar. Maybe you should re-read the CBI handbook section on interrogation."

"Don't have time for that," she snapped. "I'm too busy looking for the 'How To Handle Your Wayward Consultant' appendix. But they seem to have missed out that part. Perhaps the author died before its completion, of sheer irritation and despair."

"Isn't it exhausting, coming up with all this witty repartee so early in the morning? The sun's not even fully up yet."

She shook her head. "I always have a few key insults up my sleeve to throw at you, just to tide me over until my brain wakes up."

"Ah. Preparation."

"Always. Now move over so I can sit down."

"As you wish." Obligingly, he sat up and shifted across to make room for her. She smelled good he noticed, as she sat down beside him.

He wondered if Nick had thought the same thing when he had hugged her…and then kissed her. Bastard. Just thinking about the guy made him start hating him all over again.

Had Nick seen how pretty her dark hair looked as it caught the early morning light? Or could he tell, just from the set of her shoulders, that she hadn't slept well last night and that she must have tossed and turned a lot?

Did he find these things as fascinating as Jane did?

To cover the silence, he flicked on the TV. He passed over the cartoons and the music video shows and eventually settled on the news, mid-way through a report about a murder trial. Chuckling, he pointed out Rigsby standing awkwardly in the background of the shot; the team had worked this case a few weeks ago.

He saw Lisbon smile in satisfaction when she heard the judge had found the defendant guilty. The guy had been a nasty piece of work and he knew she hoped that a jail sentence might straighten him out a little. Jane wasn't so hopeful; people didn't change, but he'd always liked the way Lisbon chose to be optimistic about such things.

"You really miss it, don't you?" he asked, glancing over at her.

"Yeah. I do."

"Just gotta crack this case. We'll be back home before you know it."

"It's been two days and we're no further along than when we started! This isn't how I do things. I don't wait around for answers to come to me, I go out and find them."

"You're still going to get your answers, we're just going to have to find them a little differently."

She ate another spoonful of cereal. "I hate sitting around like this."

"I know you do, and I can tell you're itching to get your hands on a gun and go and kick down a door or two. But you can't do that until we figure out which doors need to be kicked."

"I figured I'd just keep going until I found the right one."

"You know you can't do that. We have to be sneaky about this."

"Fine. So we'll start by running background checks on everyone we've met so far."

She reached for her cell phone, punched in a number, and waited.

"Nick?" she said, when the call connected. "It's Teresa."

Jane stifled a groan.

"No, no everything's fine," said Lisbon into the phone. "I just need you to do some background checks for me. Since I'll bet you spend most of your time behind a desk, you seemed like the natural choice." There was a pause, and then she laughed, causing Jane to glare at the phone in her hand, furious at the person on the other end of it for being able to make her laugh that way. That was supposed to be his job.

Lisbon and Sheens joked around for another minute or so before she gave him the list of names that included Annabelle, Meg, and all the other people they'd met at the party. To Jane's great relief, she then hung up.

"He said he'd call if anything pops," she informed him.

"Fantastic," said Jane, dully. Just what he wanted, to have to endure several more minutes of hearing her giggling and mooning over this guy. Or even better, maybe Sheens could swing by the house and kiss her again, because Jane had certainly enjoyed that part as well.

"What's with you?" she asked as she finished off the last of her cereal.

"Oh, nothing," he said.

She raised an eyebrow. "Right. Nothing. I may not be a human lie detector like you, but come on, I'm not a total idiot."

"Never said you were."

"Then quit treating me like one, and talk to me."

He forced a smile. "There's nothing wrong, Lisbon. I swear."

She rolled her eyes in exasperation. "Fine, bottle it up. Keep it to yourself like always. See if I care."

She got up from the couch and walked towards the kitchen to wash up her empty bowl.

Lisbon rinsed her bowl and spoon under a stream of water. She always hated it when Jane got like this. He retreated into himself, sometimes for days at a time, shutting everyone out. And they couldn't afford to waste any time on this case. They needed to trust each other.

It was one problem she'd never had with Nick back at the academy. It had been a rough transition for both of them, so they'd always had each other's backs. Sometimes she thought that she might never have gotten through training without him.

As she turned the water off, she heard footsteps approaching. She didn't turn around or acknowledge him. If he wanted to talk, then he was going to have to initiate the conversation.

"Are you mad at me now?" he asked her.

"Yes, I am," she said, turning to face him with her arms crossed over her chest. "This is not how a partnership is supposed to work. I've worked a couple of undercover cases before and one thing I've learned is that the only person you can trust is your partner, and we can't even do that much."

There was a pause, and then she went on.

"How can we even try to keep track of all the lies we're going to have to tell these people if we can't even be honest with each other?" she asked him.

This was why she'd always hated undercover work. While Jane might thrive on spinning an intricate web of deceit and half-truths, she'd never enjoyed having to lie to get what she wanted. She'd always been an upfront sort of person.

He was looking at her now as though not quite sure what he was going to say next.

"Lisbon you can trust me," he said after a time. "And you know I trust you."

"With the shooting and the running and the saving your life, yeah," she said dismissively. "But you're not great at sharing what goes on up here." She reached up and tapped the side of her head.

"Well you're not exactly known for telling all about what you're thinking either," he said. "There's plenty of stuff that you keep to yourself."

There was another pause.

"So what are we going to do about this?" she asked.

"Well I don't see the harm in keeping some things to ourselves but you obviously seem to have a problem with it, so I propose another compromise," said Jane. "If either of us has a thought that might be pertinent to the case, we share with it one another."

"Fine," she said.

He held up a hand. "Wait a minute, Lisbon. This is a two-part compromise."

"Oh yeah? And what's part two?"

"Part two is that we have to trust that the other person knows what to tell and what to keep to themselves. Okay?" He held out his hand to her.

"Okay." They shook on it.

After a moment, inexplicably, his face broke into his trademark grin.

"What?" she asked.

"You know, I think that's the longest conversation we've ever had without yelling at one another, or you launching some kind of projectile at my head."

She smiled. One thing she'd always liked about Jane, he was a master at breaking the tension.

"I knew I should've brought that stapler with me," she said.

"Never mind. I'm sure you can find some kind of kitchen utensil to use as a substitute. I'll bet there's a meat mallet somewhere. That would do the job nicely."

"Or a rolling pin," she suggested.

"Vegetable peeler."

"Electric knife."

"Nasty," he said. "And let's not forget the classic frying pan."

They were both laughing now, and Jane found he had forgotten all about why he had been so grumpy only a few minutes earlier. There was something about sparring with Lisbon that always seemed to cheer him up, no matter how foul a mood he was in. He suspected that it had a lot to do with her smile. It was infectious; when she smiled, he smiled too.

As she laughed, a lock of hair had fallen across her face and without thinking; he reached over and brushed it away, his fingers grazing her skin as he did so. He let them trail down her face before he took his hand away.

Suddenly, the laughter died and the tension was back with a vengeance. They stood with their eyes locked on to each other's, neither of them seemingly able to breathe.

Without knowing for sure what he was doing, he took a step towards her. He saw her try to back away, but found herself hemmed in between his body and the sink. Suddenly bold, he took another step forward, making the distance between them even less. Now their bodies were separated by half an inch, if that.

He could see the panic in her eyes, knew without having to check that her pulse must be racing. Well, at least he assumed it was, if his own heart beating in double time was any indication. He could see her gearing up to say something, looking for an escape, but he couldn't let her ruin this moment, not now.

She started to speak, but he put a finger to her lips to silence her. His other hand he put around her waist, pulling her to him and he was pleased that she didn't fight it. Once sure that she wasn't going anywhere, he took his finger away and used that hand to cup her chin, drawing her face to his.

It seemed she had lost all will to resist as her lips parted and her eyes closed. He felt his eyes close too, still not believing that this was actually about to happen, and that it was real and not part of a ruse or fantasy. He could feel their breaths mingling together. One more second…

A sudden explosion of sound from the next room shattered the silence as effectively as a sledgehammer on a piece of fine china. His eyes snapped open and he felt her wrenching herself from his grip, and then giving him a little shove so she could get away.

"Lisbon…Teresa, wait." He reached for her hand. They could still salvage the situation if he could manage to override her flight reflex.

She snatched her hand out of his reach. "Jane please, just leave me alone."

Before he could stop her, she pushed past him and bolted for the front door. It slammed behind her. Jane echoed the noise by slamming his fist down on the marble countertop. It hurt like hell, but he felt so frustrated and cheated that he didn't even care. They'd been so close.

Resentfully, he stalked into the living room to find out what exactly he could thank for ruining the moment he'd been fantasizing about for months.

On the television was a replay of a basketball game the night before between the L.A Lakers and New York Knicks. One of the Knicks performed a spectacular slam-dunk, prompting a roar of cheering from the watching crowd.

He clicked a button on the remote and the screen went blank. He resisted the urge to hurl the remote at the nearest wall. Basketball. He'd always hated basketball.

Now he knew why.

Lisbon didn't have a clue where she was going. She didn't have her car keys, she didn't have her cell phone or her wallet, and she didn't even have a key to get back into the house. She didn't know what street she was on and she didn't even know in which direction she was heading. All she knew was that she had to put as much distance between herself and Jane as possible.

How could she have let that happen? How could she have been so stupid as to let herself get into such a situation? She should have pushed him away the instant she thought things might be getting out of hand, but instead it had taken that mysterious sound to bring her to her senses.

The whole time, her mind had been screaming "no!" at her with various degrees of urgency but to her shame, her body and her heart had drowned it out with a resounding "yes, yes, yes!" She'd let herself get carried away in the moment and she knew that she wouldn't have had the self-control to stop it on her own. She'd wanted to kiss him. Badly.

And what if that noise hadn't come at that exact moment? They could still be there now, kissing with her back pressed up to the sink or even worse, making their way up to the bedroom, shedding their clothes on the stairs as they went. She felt a shiver of excitement at the very thought, which made her feel even guiltier.

She'd always known this undercover thing was a terrible idea, and now she was certain of it. How was she supposed to go back and face him now, after this? There was no point pretending she hadn't been as into it as he was, she may have resisted in the beginning, but it hadn't taken her long to succumb, and annoyingly, Jane happened to be one of those 'if at first, you don't succeed," types.

He'd try again. She was sure of it. And if he failed, he'd try again, and keep trying until he got what he wanted. And she didn't trust herself to withstand the Jane charm offensive for very long, she was only human for heaven's sake, and he had the added advantage of knowing exactly which buttons to push.

There was only one thing for it. They had to get this assignment done and get back home to normality. Fast.

"Rachel! Rachel!"

She'd been so lost in her dissection of her and Jane's almost-kiss, that she hadn't even noticed someone had been calling her name. Well her fake name anyway.

She spun around and saw a woman in running gear waving to her from across the street. She waved back and as the other woman came jogging over across the road she recognized her. Meg, from the party last night.

"Hey," said Meg when she reached her, panting. "Thought you'd gone over to the Dark Side for a moment there."

"What?"

"Well you were walking along in a total daze, which is the usual mental state of people in this area. You had me worried there for a sec."

Lisbon forced a laugh. "Sorry. Just had a lot on my mind."

Meg smiled. "No worries. I always found that nothing clears your head like a walk or run."

Lisbon nodded distractedly, and the smile faded from Meg's face.

"Are you OK?" she asked. "You seem a little upset."

"I…" Lisbon began. Even if she weren't sworn to secrecy, she didn't know how she'd even begin to start explaining the events of the past couple of days.

"Fight with your hubby?" asked Meg, suddenly.

"Well, yeah," said Lisbon, happily accepting the excuse. "How did you know?"

"You've got that shell-shocked kind of look on your face," said Meg, kindly. "My sister used to look like that all the time before she wised up and got a divorce. Come on, you look like you need a coffee. My house is just around the corner, we'll pick up my car and I'll take you to my favourite little café across town. You'll love it."

"Thanks Meg," said Lisbon sincerely. "But you really don't have to."

"I know I don't," she said, waving off the protest. "But you look like you could use a friend right now."

Forty-five minutes later, they were seated in the café, each nursing a large coffee, (Meg had tipped the barista to add an extra shot into Lisbon's.)

"So," she said. "You survived Annabelle Beckett's society snoozefest last night? I'm telling you, there's not enough alcohol on the planet to make those things interesting."

Lisbon laughed. "I'll drink to that."

"I don't mean to pry," said Meg. "But you and your man looked pretty happy while you were dancing together. Like you were in one of those we're-insanely-in-love-and-don't-you-wish-you-were-us bubbles. Every person in that place was jealous of you guys. What happened?"

Lisbon took a sip of coffee, to put off the moment when she had to answer. Great, another person to add to the ever growing tally of people that thought there was something going on between her and her consultant. Just because she acknowledged that he was attractive and she liked the idea of kissing him, it didn't mean she was in love with him or anything, did it? But then she reminded herself that Meg thought they were married anyway, so it didn't really count.

Right?

"Did you ever really, really want to do something, even though you knew that you shouldn't?" she found herself asking.

Meg smiled, wickedly. "Totally," she said. "But I guess with something like that you have to decide whether or not it's worth the risk."

That, thought Lisbon, was very good advice.

Meg pulled her SUV to a stop outside Lisbon's house.

"Ugh, you live next door to Annabelle?" she asked, with an expression of distaste on her face. "I'm so sorry."

Lisbon shrugged. "I think it's kind of comforting to know that neighbours can be a pain no matter where you live."

"Fair enough."

"Hey thanks for today," said Lisbon warmly. "It helped a lot." It had been a long time since she'd just gone out for coffee with a girlfriend and relaxed a bit. She'd forgotten how good it could be just to sit and unwind and not think about guns or murder or crime scene photos. She should do it more often.

"Anytime. Intelligent women are a dying breed in this town. We need to look out for each other."

Lisbon got out of the car and made to shut the door.

"Hey Rach?" said Meg, making her pause. "Are you busy tomorrow?"

Lisbon shook her head.

"Because I have these vouchers for some day spa and they expire tomorrow. Want to come with? I already asked Vicky Madress but I still have one more."

Madress. Why did that name sound familiar? Lisbon cast her mind back. Madress, Madress. Then suddenly it came to her.

The file the CBI had sent them. Vicky Madress. Wife of Sid Madress, a convicted drug offender and suspected member of their cocaine ring. Perfect. With a little luck they could be home by tomorrow night.

"I'd love to," she said.

"Great," said Meg. "Now get in there and sort things out with your husband and I'll swing by at 10:00 tomorrow and pick you up."

She drove off.

Lisbon took a deep breath as she looked at the front door of the house. She couldn't put it off forever; she'd have to go in sooner or later. What would he say? What should she say?

Maybe they could just ignore the whole thing. Pretend it never happened. She liked that idea a lot. But how would he want to handle it?

Time to find out.

Jane had spent most of the day trying to figure out what he should do when Lisbon came home, and he had settled on two main options.

The first involved pouncing on her the moment she walked in the door. Take her by surprise, and start kissing her before she knew what was happening. He figured if he didn't give her any time to think about it, she'd be less likely to pull away from him and hopefully, less inclined to try and break his neck.

The southern areas of his body, that had been most disappointed by this morning's non-event were in roaring approval of this plan.

The other, more sensible areas were leaning more towards the second option, which basically involved backing off for the time being and trying again at a later date. This was important, and he didn't want to screw it up. If he rushed it, there was a lot more at stake than just rejection. It could mean the end of their partnership, the end of their friendship, and he wasn't prepared to lose either of those things right now.

But he really, really wanted to kiss her, and if they stayed trapped alone in this little house for much longer, he had a feeling that his patience and his resolve might very quickly run out.

The doorknob turned and she walked inside. He noticed that she looked a lot calmer now, more like herself than the hysterical state she'd been in when she'd left this morning. She even smiled at him.

"Hey."

"Hi. Good walk?"

"I ran into Meg. We had coffee."

"Nice. I've been waiting here all day for you to show up. You didn't take your key."

"I was in kind of a hurry."

"I noticed."

She walked a little further into the room but seemed reluctant to come too near him. He was glad he'd chosen option two.

"So, about this morning…"

"What about it?"

"Lisbon." She was too smart to play dumb. It didn't suit her.

"I was hoping we could just forget about it."

"I wanted to say sorry that it turned out that way."

"Yeah, me too. Now let's not talk about it anymore."

"Whatever you say."

He had a feeling she'd misunderstood him. He'd said he was sorry about how it had turned out.

He'd never said he was sorry he did it.

What I like about this chapter is that it has a bit of everything in it. Some bickering, some jealousy, some angst, some fluff. Hope you liked it too!