Chapter Four

Jane was different after they discovered the message. He was back to how he used to be with a Red John case, nothing like he had been at the start of this case – especially nothing like he had been only a few hours ago. His coldness and determination was back, though his motive was different, Lisbon knew. It was the message that did it, or rather, Jane's interpretation of it. Granted, Jane was rarely wrong when it came to Red John, the way that the two connected and knew each other was incredibly frightening sometimes, but she honestly hoped that their involvement simply coincided with the message. She hoped that Red John simply meant that he was watching the case, that he knew they were assigned to it as per usual, or that for some reason he was still watching the house (must get agents assigned to protect the house, she mentally noted). She really, really couldn't stress how uncomfortable it felt to know that Red John may have watched her and Jane together.

Mark and Amanda, Melissa's parents, were less than thrilled with the idea of Red John coming back into their home. At this point, it was no doubt a Red John case, and it was being treated as such. More agents were at the house, an additional forensics unit on the account of him maybe leaving a trace of himself, but none of the team were hopeful. Rigsby and Van Pelt were ready to meet them at the office, still trying to connect the paper trail of Red John's connection to the family, and Cho was upstairs overseeing the forensics team and instructing the agents assigned to protect the family, should Red John return. Jane had insisted that he wouldn't, but Lisbon had insisted on it anyway.

"When did you discover the message?" Lisbon asked, sat in the living room with the parents just as she had done yesterday. Jane was walking around the room, a cup of tea that Amanda Joliss had made for him.

It was Amanda that answered. "Four o'clock," she told them. "I couldn't sleep. I've been spending time in Melissa's room; it helps me feel closer to her."

Lisbon frowned. "Ma'am, that room is still a crime scene-"

"I need to feel close to her," Amanda insisted. "She's my little girl, can't you understand that?"

Lisbon didn't answer that. She understood. She had sat in Ben's room for three days before her brother had intervened and moved her into her own room. "Did you have any visitors in the evening?" she asked.

Amanda shook her head. "We had some family over, but I checked her room before I went to sleep and the message wasn't there then. I woke up an hour later and there it was."

Mark frowned, finally having some input of his own. "These questions seem a lot like the ones you asked yesterday morning."

"Because it's a similar discovery," Lisbon told them.

"How is a message on a wall similar to my dead daughter?" Mark asked.

"Both could easily have been done by you," Jane shrugged.

Mark shot his eyes towards Jane, getting to his feet. "Excuse me?"

Lisbon stood up as well. "Jane, what the hell are you doing?" she hissed at him.

"What the hell do you think you're playing at?" Mark yelled at him, now standing right in his face.

"Well, it's obviously not your wife. She's heartbroken," Jane pointed out, indicating to Amanda, sitting so devastated on the couch that she'd barely moved when Mark began to explode at Jane.

"We lost our daughter," Mark hissed at him.

Lisbon stepped up, attempting to put a barrier between the two men. "Mr Joliss, I apologize-"

"I should hope so!" he shouted at her before turning back to Jane. "I'd expect more understand from you."

Jane didn't look phased by the man's anger. "Mr Joliss, I might understand what you're going through, but I don't understand why you're hiding something from us."

He frowned. "Mr Jane, I'd like you to leave my home now."

"Perhaps you should have said that to your daughter's killer," Jane suggested to him. "It's someone you know and trust."

The words had hardly left his mouth before Mark's fist was flying into his face.

Another broken nose to add to the list. Lisbon had lost count of the amount of times he'd broken his nose. Given the amount of bleeding this time, she'd taken him to the emergency room on their way back to the CBI. Counter in the waiting times and the very time-specific plans that Lisbon didn't intend on mission. They needed to talk to Melissa's friends, and all of them just happened to be having a gathering nearby in just under an hour. That was enough time to drop Jane off, resist the urge to tie him down to keep him out of trouble, and get there in time to question them all. There was just one problem at the hospital...

They'd given him painkillers.

"Come on, we're back," she told him.

"We're home?" he asked, pleasantly surprised with that.

"No, we're at the office," she corrected him, taking off her seatbelt and sliding out of the car. When he didn't join her, she went around to the passenger side and opened the door. "Come on," she prompted again, her voice stressed.

Jane looked around them slowly with a frown. "This isn't our home," he complained. "This is your car. Did I drive here?"

She rolled her eyes. "We do not have a home. I have a home, and you have a home, we definitely do not share one. And no, you definitely did not drive here, you're high on painkillers."

She pressed the button on the seatbelt and released him from the car. He seemed to be having trouble with that part. He stepped out of the car and looked up at the CBI building. He pouted. "This is the office."

"Good, you know where we are, your powers of observation are intact," she droned. "That means you're perfectly capable of walking on your own. Come on, I've got work to do."

Stepping out of the elevator, she directed him immediately to his couch. As usual, it was void of any objects other than the blonde man himself – who would be there as soon as Lisbon put him there. She'd already arranged a method of keeping him there. She just hoped that Hightower wasn't listening as they walked past her office. Jane at any point could blurt out or reference what happened the night before, especially when he'd admitted that it meant something to him, but Jane on painkillers? She dared not think about it.

"Now, Grace is going to stick around and keep an eye on you," she told him as the elevator doors closed behind them, grabbing his arm from stopping him from wandering directly into Hightower's office. "Once you're laying down, Cho, Rigsby and I are going to interview some of the kids at the party they're having."

Jane's face lit up like a child's. "A party! Can I come?"

"No," she told him. "I need you lying down-"

This time, his smile was different. "Really?" he asked, a seductive tone in his voice.

She rolled her eyes. "You are going to lay on your couch and sleep of the side effects of the painkillers, and by the time I get back you'll be...relatively normal."

He pouted. "How come you get to go to the party and I don't?" he asked.

"Because I'm working and you can't be trusted with adults, let alone teenagers," she deadpanned.

"You're not working, you're going to a party," he corrected her, trying to flick her fridge as they walked which left them both staggering around.

"I'm not going to be partying, Jane," she told him, pushing him towards the couch. When he didn't move she put her hands on his shoulders to almost forcibly sit him down. "I'm going to be talking to teenagers and hopefully I'll find out something that could help us do our jobs."

Jane sat down without further complaint, but he wasn't happy. "I wanna go to the party."

"The party is for teenagers. You are not a teenager," she told him.

"No, I'm an adult," he said, starting to smile again.

"Apparently so," she agreed tiredly, not wanting to go into his mental age when he was high on painkillers.

"I'm a grown man," he said, his smile spread.

"According to your personnel records," she humoured him.

He looked up at her, his grin covering his face. "I'm a gorgeous, sexy hunk of a man..."

"Jane," she snapped. "Time to lie down."

He gave her a hopeful look, patting the couch next to him. "Are you going to lay down with me?"

She scowled at him. "Jane, I am warning you-"

Somehow, he was still smiling. How he thought this was a humorous situation she'd never know. "Funny, you were warning me this morning as well," he mused. "But as I recall you were talked out of that. In fact, you were talked out of a lot of things..."

"Jane!" she snapped.

This time, a devilish glint joined the grin. "Remember that thing we did that you really liked?"

"Jane!" she snapped again, with more anger in her tone this time. She leaned down more to his level. "I know that you're stoned to high heaven right now, but please remember that Hightower may be listening to what you're saying."

He cocked an eyebrow at her, reaching for her hair again. "Does the danger turn you on?" he asked.

She stood up, flailing her arms somewhat as his reach felt short and he looked confused. "Why am I even having a serious conversation with you? It's clearly useless."

"I'm not useless," he defended. "I can be very, very useful..."

"Oh no," she said, swatting his hand away as he trailed it through the air, trying to touch her without concentrating on his own movements. "You are not talking me into this twice."

"I already did," he said, with a dopey smile. "This would be the third time..."

"Jane. Lie down. Now," she half barked.

He waggled his eyebrows at her. "I like your thinking."

"Jane!"

"Sure you don't want to join me?"

Her eyes flashed with anger. "If you do not lie on that couch right now, I will tie you to it."

"Promise?"

"Jane!" she snapped, fully shouting this time.

Before Jane could speak again, Van Pelt appeared at her side with a cup and saucer in her hands. "Everything ok, boss?" she asked hesistantly.

Lisbon groaned with frustration, turning her back and walking off, gesturing wildly behind her in Jane's direction. "Please, just...keep him here!" she snapped, leaving the room.

Jane kept his head on the ceiling. "Teresa? Teresa?" When he got no answer, his smile disappeared and he looked like a small lost child. "Lisbon?" He turned his head, seeing Van Pelt. "Is she gone?"

She nodded. "Yes, she's gone."

"Did I upset her?" he asked.

"More than likely," Van Pelt nodded.

Jane looked crestfallen. "Oh."

Seeing the 'kicked puppy' look settle in on his face, and half-wondering if the painkillers would actually make him cry to complete the expression, she held out the cup and saucer. "I bought you some tea," she said.

He sat up and took it from her, sipping it slowly. He instantly grimaced. "Not as good as Teresa's."

She frowned at him. "Lisbon never makes you tea."

"She did last night, after she asked me to stay and before...before we got a call." Thankfully for Jane's lower extremities, the threat that Lisbon had put on him to stay quiet obviously worked even with painkillers and a usual lack of restraint. "She did this afternoon, at the hospital. That's 2 cups. But that insinuates that something happened, so I'm not allowed to mention it."

Perhaps it hadn't completely worked.

By the time that Lisbon and the others returned that afternoon, the painkillers had worn off. She'd been tempted to time it on her watch and only return when he wasn't going to be annoying, and on any other case she might have done, but it was a Red John case, so she wouldn't. Interviewing twenty teenagers had taken long enough, though, even with two of them returning with them for more questioning. No sooner had she stepped off the elevator, Van Pelt had rushed up to her, looking irritated and shaken.

"Tell me you have something else for me to do," she begged. Lisbon frowned at her, and the younger agent fidgeted on the spot. She'd never appeared this desperate before, even when begging for more time in the field. "Please, boss, he's driving me insane."

Lisbon frowned. "The painkillers should have worn off by now."

"They did, hours ago," she confirmed. "He's like a three-year-old."

Lisbon nodded sympathetically. "Don't worry, you're off Jane duty now. I have something else for you to work on."

"Who are the kids?" she asked, watching Cho and Rigsby escort the two teenagers down the hall in the direction of the interview rooms.

"Melissa's best friend, Sarah Walcott, and her boyfriend, Dean Matthews. I need you to interview Matthews with Cho. Apparently he likes the ladies, and he's not a fan of Cho. See what you can get out of him."

"Thank God," she sighed. Lisbon stared at her. "Sorry, I know it's inappropriate, but Jane's been so irritating since you left that it's convinced me never to have children."

Lisbon actually chuckled to herself as Van Pelt disappeared faster than usual, and she approached Jane's couch. He was still lying down, twiddling his thumbs and staring up at Elvis. "What did you do to Van Pelt?" she asked.

Jane shrugged. "Her tea is nowhere near as good as yours," he defended, as if that were reason enough.

"I am not making you tea," she told him. "I'm too busy."

"I wasn't asking, just commenting," he said.

"I want you in observation," she instructed. "Cho and Van Pelt are interviewing the boyfriend."

He shook his head. "It wasn't the boyfriend. It was Red John, and the boyfriend is too young to be Red John."

"He might know Red John," she pointed out.

He screwed his face up, then unclenched. "It's silly. He has nothing to do with this."

"Fine, don't go then," she sighed. "You can stay on your couch a while longer."

Jane finally turned his head towards her, rolling it around on the arm of the couch. "Are you still mad at me for what happened with Mark Joliss?" he asked her.

"Yes," she told him bluntly.

"Oh," he said with disappointment. "I thought you might have forgiven me by now."

She shook her head. "I'll consider forgiving you if he doesn't file a formal complaint against the unit. Until then, you're staying in the dog house."

"Woof," he mocked, as she turned away from him.

"Shut up."

A/N: I hope you're enjoying this so far. I've almost finished writing up the rest of the chapters. We're looking at 8 or nine at the moment, and some serious Jisbon ahead. Also, for those of you who are on livejournal, I've recently set up an account on there and my username is sammysfreehugs. I'll be putting notice of updates to all my stories on there for those of you who are following Pursuit of Happiness and any of my other stories.