Notes: Thank you all for your comments on the last chapter, I'm glad for the most part it seems everyone was with me on that decision. Don't worry, the fate of Officer Kearns will be dealt with, I'll at least start broaching that subject in the next chapter.

CH 18: Fury and Forgiveness

The night had been rough. Maura would cry and then doze off and while she was sleeping Jane would allow herself to cry, then Maura would have a nightmare and wake up in a sweaty panic and Jane would push her feelings down and suck it up to comfort the quivering woman nestled in her arms. It reminded her of the shooting, the sense of helplessness, that there were just things beyond her control. All the months spent coming to terms with the unknown, accepting that she wasn't invincible that a sharp blade in a dark alley, a bullet from concealed weapon were part and parcel of her existence, just when she thought she was getting ok with that…this. She couldn't control everything around Maura either and that was perhaps the most frightening of all.

It smells like bacon. Jane began to stir, awakened by the savory aroma. Frankie can't cook.

"Maur…" Jane reluctantly shook the sleeping woman to rouse her. Maura, however, burrowed her face deeper into Jane's neck and chest, snaking her good arm under Jane's head, through messy brown waves in order to hold her tight.

"Maur…sorry baby, you gotta let me up, Frankie may be burning the kitchen down."

Maura's eyes snapped open, then she smelled the bacon, "Why does it smell like bacon? Frankie? Why would Frankie be here?"

Jane kissed her forehead, "Frankie insisted on staying the night, I think he's trying to cook, the operative word being 'trying' since I've actually seen the man burn hardboiled eggs."

Maura disentangled herself from Jane and rolled gingerly onto her back holding her right arm steady, her face, however, clearly gave away the pain she was experiencing.

"How are you feeling?" Jane sat up and leaned over her, rubbing her upper arm.

"Sore."

Jane retrieved Maura's sling and helped her sit up, "Come on, we'll see what Frankie's up to and get you some breakfast and then you can take one of your pain pills."

"Ma!" Jane exclaimed seeing that the source of the bacon aroma was not in fact Frankie attempting to cook but rather Angela, Frankie was seated at the counter waiting patiently for the breakfast spread to be laid out. Maura entered the living room at which point Angela blew right past Jane to throw her arms around her second daughter.

"Ma! Careful! Her shoulder."

"I know Janie!" Angela said tenderly wrapping her arms around Maura, careful not to touch the brightly bruised appendage. "Frankie called," she said as she guided Maura's head to her shoulder with one hand, rubbing soothing circles on her lower back with the other.

It must have been nice, Maura thought, to have grown up with this kind of genuine care and concern and its accompanying physical comfort. She wrapped her free hand around Angela's back and returned the embrace.

"Janie, go flip that bacon," Angela ordered, refusing to let go of Maura just yet.

Angela had fried up every breakfast meat product known to mankind, in addition to eggs and toast. Maura generally didn't eat such heavy and greasy items for breakfast…or at all, Jane mused watching in awe as her girlfriend devoured the meat buffet.

"Oh, so full," Maura said with a smile of satisfaction.

Jane was still nibbling on some toast when there was a knock at the door. Frankie popped up to get it. The familiar voice of Judith Isles drifted in from the open doorway.

Maura approached her mother, but Judith certainly didn't come bearing the same sensitive energy that Angela had.

"Were you going to call us!" Judith practically bellowed.

Jane stepped up next to Maura in her usual support position, slightly behind and to the side, her hand on the small of Maura's back.

I hadn't decided yet, Maura was thinking, "It was late last night, and I just woke up…how do you even know?"

"This isn't something you let you parents read about in the paper, Maura!" Judith dramatically waved a torn out piece of the Herald around.

"The paper?" Jane reached for the clipping and scanned it, Boston M.E. Assaulted: Sources report Boston's Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. Maura Isles was physically assaulted at the Dirty Robber Bar and Grill late Friday evening. The suspect, a Boston police officer is said by witnesses to have attacked the victim in the ladies' room. Witnesses report the assault may have been of a sexual nature and that the suspected officer was heard to make homophobic comments before the incident. No further information has been released by the Boston Police Department at this time.

"I can't believe they would print this!" Jane was fuming; she wadded the clipping up in her hand. Maura stared at the floor trying to compose herself and quell the tears that were threatening to fall.

"This is all HER FAULT!" Judith Isles yelled pointing at Jane.

"Excuse ME!" Angela Rizzoli came storming out of the kitchen.

"Oh God," Jane muttered under breath but loud enough for Maura to hear her, "You didn't happen to get those tranquilizer darts after all did you."

"Please don't let them do this," Maura pleaded, barely audible.

"Ma!" Jane launched herself in front of Angela.

"This is NOT Jane's fault!" Angela tried to maneuver her way around to Judith but Jane kept a vice grip on her arms.

"Ma!" Jane growled, "You are not doing this, do you understand me. Do not do this. Frankie! Take Ma back to the bedroom."

"She can't possibly…" Angela started again.

"Ma," Jane leaned in to talk so only her mother could her, "Please don't do this, don't make this harder on Maura, please Ma."

Angela stopped resisting Frankie trying to guide her back to the bedroom; she paused looking in her daughter's eyes and then glancing over at Maura who appeared on the verge of tears. She nodded and let Frankie usher her to the back.

Maura walked to the sofa, "Mom, sit."

Judith Isles made her way to the sofa, her piercing eyes locked on Jane as she sat down. Maura sat next to her, "Jane, sit" she motioned for Jane to join them. Tentatively sliding her arm out of the sling, Maura grabbed Jane's hand and squeezed it tightly.

"She brought this on you…" Judith pointed her finger accusatorily at Jane.

Breathe, Maura took a deep breath, "Mother, aren't you even going to ask me what happened or how I am?"

Judith's mouth fell open but she didn't have a response, she waited for her daughter to continue.

"He followed me to the bathroom and locked the door behind himself and he attacked me. He didn't rape me, not for lack of trying but I managed to fight him off until Jane realized I had been gone too long and came looking for me. She and the other officers kicked the door of the bathroom in and stopped him. He dislocated my shoulder, but other than that, physically anyway, it's just scratches and bruises."

Maura reached for her mother's hand, "Jane did not bring this upon me. This isn't her fault. Jane didn't force me to fall in love with her. She's an amazing, sincere and caring person that I fell in love with all of my own accord. Jane didn't initiate our relationship, Mother, I did. When I saw her in that hospital bed after the shooting and realized that I had been falling in love with her all this time and that I almost lost her before I even had the chance to tell her that, I initiated it. I initiated the first time we made love; I was the first one to say 'I love you.' Last night was really hard, I was angry, in pain, confused, and embarrassed. I still am all of those things, but I realized that this isn't my fault either. I can only be who I am, and love who I love. Yes, there are people in the world that hate me because I'm in love with a woman. That's whose fault last night was. It's ignorance's fault. But, I could not be in love with Jane and I could have married Garrett Fairfield or Gregory Chesterfield and still been the victim of a senseless and random act of violence. Jane and I, we see that darkness, Gay, Straight, Black, White, Male, Female, Young, Old the world we live in can be a terrible place full of blind and unjustifiable hatred. I see that world, everyday, but Jane has shown me that there's another side. There is beauty, and loyalty, selflessness and there is love, and most importantly she's shown me that I'm worth being loved. And no one's ever made me feel worthy of that before."

Jane gave up trying to hold back the tears, liberated, she let them stream down her face. She choked loudly and unceremoniously on her own snot as she sniffled and buried her face in Maura's neck, "I would have given anything for it to have been me instead of you…" she sobbed.

Maura let go of her mother's hand and stroked Jane's unkempt hair. Jane wrapped her arms around Maura's waist and cried, letting all of her pent up emotions leak out one teardrop at a time. Judith Isles watched the scene in front of her for a moment and then her hand which had been resting on Maura's thigh moved up to Jane's hand on Maura's hip. She pulled Jane's hand away and clasped it between her own as a single tear rolled down her cheek. They sat there in silence for a while, Maura's arms wrapped around Jane, one of Jane's arms wrapped around Maura and Judith Isles holding Jane's hand.

"Your father and I love you, we always have…" Judith started.

Maura kept her arms clasped tightly around Jane but turned her head to look at her mother.

"…I know I wasn't a very good mother…"

"Mom…"

"…No, let me speak. I've always loved you and your father and I we thought we were giving you everything you needed, everything our money could buy that you needed anyway. We're just not very emotional people and now I realize that there is a kind of love that we failed to give you. This relationship is still very hard for me, and it has nothing to do with you Jane, nothing to do with you as a person, at first I thought that maybe our distance, our lack of involvement when you were growing up…that maybe we caused you to be this way…"

"Mother, you didn't make me gay…"

"No, I…I think I'm realizing that now. I've actually been doing some reading, I know that sounds absolutely ridiculous but I felt like I needed to try to understand this, psychologically if that had anything to do with it or biologically. It's a slow process, for me, I hope you can understand that and bear with me when I fly off the hinge like this. When your father found this in the paper this morning, I…well, we felt like you didn't feel like you could talk to us, trust us and I know this isn't supposed to be about us, but it made me very sad. I think that's when I really realized that we failed you as parents."

Jane had finally regained her composure and sat up wiping at her face.

"Mother, I don't think you failed me. As I've gotten older I've realized that our relationship did lack some of the closeness that many parent-child relationships have. In many ways I think I'm just as much to blame for that, I didn't know how to ask for more and so I didn't. And since I didn't ask, you just didn't give. But, I don't hold that against you, I love you and Dad very much. You gave me a life I never would have had before; all of the happiness I have now, with my work, with Jane, you made that possible. I would like to think it's not too late to build a closer relationship, if that's what you want."

Maura looked down to see that her mother was still holding Jane's hand; she wrapped both her hands around them so that they were all linked.

"I would like that, and I would like to keep getting to know you Jane, if you can tolerate a crazy old woman like me."

Jane smiled and allowed a small laugh to escape, "Well, considering…." She nodded her head in the direction of the bedroom, "….back there, I'm pretty sure I can handle any and all kinda crazy you've got for me. In all seriousness, Mrs. Isles," Jane paused to look at Maura before continuing, "I don't even have words that can tell you what Maura means to me. Last night, the only thing I wanted more in the world than to kill that asshole was to grab Maura and hold her in my arms and never let her go. It's ok with me that you need time, my parents have had time to get to know Maura, before we were even together and I know that helped a lot when I told them about us. I think we can give you that time without judgment and expectation."

Jane Rizzoli, you never disappoint. Maura couldn't help herself, she drew Jane's face towards her and tenderly pressed their lips together allowing the kiss to linger unconcerned with her mother sitting just on the other side of her. She pulled away and let her hand move to her mother's forearm. Once again, the three sat in silence for a while.

Judith took a deep breath, "You must be exhausted. I should let you rest. Can I…Can your father and I…Can we, could we have dinner perhaps when you're feeling up to it, hopefully soon?"

Maura giggled at her mother's nervousness, "Yes, Jane and I have been talking about having dinner, all of us, you and Dad, and Jane's parents. Since you won't be in town for Christmas Eve dinner, we could do that in a few days, maybe when the bruises on my face have faded enough to cover up. We would really like for all of you to meet."

Judith paused in thought for a moment, "I think I'll tell Elizabeth that your father and I will drive over on Christmas Day and that we'll be having Christmas Eve dinner with you at Jane's parents' house…if the invitation stands."

"Of course it does," Jane jumped in.

Judith smiled and reached for Maura's face, hesitantly she cupped it with one hand and stroked the opposite cheek with the back of the other. After a moment of holding each other's sight, Judith leaned in and placed a kiss on Maura's cheek, "I love you, Maura." Judith looked over at Jane, "Thank you, for protecting my daughter last night."

Judith Isles rose, as did Maura and Jane in order to walk her to the door. Once she was gone Maura turned and nestled into Jane's frame, "Thank you," she whispered into Jane's neck.

Having heard the door close, Frankie couldn't contain Angela any longer; she made her way back into the living room. Seeing Maura's mother gone she steadily made her way over to her daughters. My daughters, she said to herself, it was as good as done. Jane loved Maura. Maura loved Jane. That was really all she needed. But, when Frankie had called that morning and told her what had happened it cut every bit as deep as if Frankie had called to report that it had actually happened to Jane. That's when she really recognized what she was feeling, that she considered Maura her daughter in a way that was distinctly separate from Maura being with Jane.

"Is everything ok?" Angela asked, a distinct concern and sadness in her eyes as she reached for both Jane and Maura simultaneously.

"Yeah Ma, everything's ok," Jane assured her.

Angela looked at Maura, wanting that same reassurance from her. Maura transferred her embrace from Jane to Angela, relishing in the maternal arms that enveloped her.

"Thank you for accepting me Angela, without reservation" Maura whispered.

Angela ran a hand through Maura's hair, trying to pull her closer she placed a loving kiss on her temple, "You call me Ma now."