A/N: Thanks to anyone who keeps favoring and following me and the story; you guys are amazing! I should have answered to any registered users by now, if I didn't, I'm sorry, and remember you are always in my thoughts and I am ever grateful for your support.

Guest #1: Having Jane overcoming his issues with paternity in the span of a chapter without having to talk (or deal) with it would have been too out of character, considering we've been talking about a man who is still wearing the ring of a woman who's been dead for 12 years, so… but I'm glad to hear you are liking it anyway, and actually enjoying it more because of the angst.

Guest #2: the first chapters reflected the "honeymoon phase" of the relationship, and the spirit of the show in the first few seasons; I don't agree that having Jane "emotionally abusive" may be Out of character; Jane, and "my" Lisbon sees it that way too, is a scared man who has never truly dealt with guilt and grief, who has come to a point where he is divided between being faithful to his past and/or his future. Also, if we want to really analyze Jane on a psychological level, we can say that, given his carnie uprising, and from what little we know about his father, Alexander, it may be right to say that Jane has troubles to fully "understand" the emotional working of other humans, and how he is supposed to be dealing with it, as he may have lacked emotional education growing up as a kid. He knows he is doing mistakes: he just doesn't know how to do otherwise, in a certain sense, and add to that fear of abandon and a certain level of depression that has never been cured, and you'll get yourself a lethal mix. Frankly, talking about Jane as abusive or a story needing warning seems exaggerated: cold shoulders and huge fights happens every day in every family, without them being abusive.

Scared that it would happen again, Teresa didn't try to seduce him again, and allowed him to make the first move; she thought that, changing the situation, he would have answered in a different way to her body. But it happened again. And again. And again. She tried to talk with him, but he didn't want to listen, didn't want to talk, and he kept pushing her away, both physically and metaphorically speaking. They had reached a point where they lived through the motions like they were an old married couple: they gave each other cast kisses in the morning when they left for work, often in separate cars; they would cook, they wold clean their place, kiss each other goodnight and then they would go to sleep in their bed – where Jane would sleep on the far side from her, giving her his back.

She had always been the one who cared and comforted, and she knew she was supposed to be doing the same here, trying to re-awake his self-confidence in the bedroom and his libido, but she didn't know what to say, nor how to break the topic to him; every time she tried to open her mouth, he froze her out, and after few weeks she started to do something she had never thought possible: she resented him, and regretted each and every choice she had ever made concerning him.

The fact was, she knew him, and knew there was nothing wrong with his body. She could have believed that the first time he had been mentally exhausted, but when it happened four times, she knew that, if there wasn't any physical problem- and he had gotten her pregnant- than the reason had to be psychological in nature. Many men didn't found pregnant women attractive, but she wasn't showing yet, the only indication, visible only to someone who would have seen her naked, where her slightly bigger breasts. Then, it had to be the pregnancy in itself; he was angry, hadn't really forgiven her for what he saw as a betrayal. God only knew if she knew he could be vengeful and knew how to carry a grudge, but given what was at stake, it was too much even for him.

Unless, the betrayal wasn't on her side. After all, along with vengeance, Jane had carried along with himself for over a decade guilt as well; he had never really forgiven himself for what had happened to his first family, so what if the trouble was the fact not that she was pregnant, but that she was carrying his child? She tried to mention to him once, but he snapped at her, saying that, as he had never listened to real shrink, he wasn't going to start with an amateur one- especially not one who didn't believe in shrinks in the first place. Also, he had kind of gotten used to the idea of having a child; she wasn't going to say that he was ready to welcome their baby, far from it, but at least he hadn't asked her to abort, or suggested breaking up.

Teresa sighed, looking at the phone. When Pete had contacted her during Jane's exile in south America, he had left her his number, and a part of her, a very masochist part of her, wanted to call Jane's old friend and ask him if Jane had welcomed Charlotte into the world. She feared the implications of a positive answer, because it would have meant that it wasn't a child he didn't want, nor his child, but Teresa's baby. It would mean that when she had looked into his eyes and saw love she had been wrong, because she had been just a rebound, to keep him company and warm his bed. He had been able to fool them, both until she hadn't gotten pregnant, but now his body wasn't obeying to him any longer. He probably thought he was betraying the memory of his beloved ones; Angela had been pure, and yet passionate, love, his one and only, while of Teresa he was probably only fond. He didn't love her enough to want a child with her, his wife. His mind rejected the child, and his body answered by rejecting the mother, too.

She told herself again and again that she had been waiting for the other shoe to drop; Jane had never told her he loved her, she had known that when he had suggested marriage he was doing it to help her saving her pride and because he was looking for companionship. Yes, she had made the mistake of falling again in love with him, but she knew him: she couldn't expect a man who had worn for over twelve years the ring of a dead woman to fall for her.

And yet, she knew they had been happy together.

She shook her head. It was time to stop thinking like that and accept she was just second best in his life. Yes, she didn't want it, and no, it wasn't enough, but there was nothing she could do to change it, and worst of all, she had always known that eventually things would have ended up just like that.

Few weeks later, she discovered that it was time to start wearing maternity clothes when she tried to put on her favourite jeans and failed miserably.

"We have to tell Abbott." She told him, well aware that he would have put her on desk duty; but she didn't care.

"I thought you had already told him." Jane dismissed her, keeping reading the newspaper. She didn't even bother to shook her head. People at work had been starting to notice there was something different about her, and even if Jane was careful and helpful with her, he seemed to keep ignoring the baby altogether. He never mentioned it, but if they started telling people, it would have been impossible for him to avoid, always, the topic. "Well, you can tell him today, right?"

She had pictured Jane holding her hand while they did so together, or at least being at her side. Determinedly she put the picture out of her mind: apparently, it wasn't going to happen that way.

"You've been feeling better lately, haven't you?" he asked her suddenly, his nose still buried in the newspaper as to fake nonchalance or a feeling of annoyance. She turned, and looked at her husband quizzically, and barely resisted the urge to sigh or scream in his direction; here he was, showing again his good side, and doing his best at pretending he wasn't doing just that. That was what she hated, when he got all hot and cold with her.

"Yes." The morning sickness had almost gone, and she had begun to feel less lethargic. Physically she was full of wellbeing, in spite of the constant ache that seemed to have settled around her heart, and the strain of lying in bed each night longing to reach out a hand and touch him, but not daring to.

She was anxious about the way he would receive the inevitable congratulations, but she needn't have worried. A little bitterly, she remembered herself there was a reason he had been such a good and successful con-artist; his imitation of a proud father-to-be and loving husband couldn't have been faulted. For some reason it angered her, and she was still nursing a simmering resentment when they got home in the evening. And yet, they got through their routine, and she wondered for the whole dinner if he had any hint that she was mad with him.

Later, he had checked something out in the garage, and when he returned he found her re-arranging the pillows on the couch, picking them up from the floor. "Why don't you leave that?" he said, watching her fish a small dark red pillow from under the sofa. "Aren't you tired?"

"Someone has to do it," she snapped. "and I'll probably still be tired tomorrow."

He looked at her sharply and then took the few steps separating them and put his hand on her shoulders, forcing her to look at him. In the last few weeks, he had always been the one pushing her away; for once, she felt like being the one doing so. "Are you resting enough? Has the doctor given you some vitamins?"

"Yes, I am, and yes, he did, and what do you care, anyway?" she snapped, gritting her teeth like a feral animal protecting her own cub.

"Don't be ridiculous! Of course I care!"

"Oh, about your housekeeper, perhaps, or whatever I happen to be for you." she said sarcastically, fighting back the tears. She was Teresa Lisbon, damn it, she hadn't cried as a child when her own father hurt her; she wasn't going to do so because her own husband was doing the same, but to her soul.. "But you don't give a damn about me as your wife. No, wait." She said, lifting her right index and grinning wickedly. "Let me rephrase it: you don't give a damn about me as a person!"

He went white, his mouth thinning ominously. "That's unfair, Teresa. You know that I care about you."

"That's the point, Jane. You care about me." She said, shaking helplessly her head. "And it's all I have any right to expect, isn't it?'

"What the hell are you talking about?" He said, staring at her like he was seeing her for the very first time, paling. "You know what? I'm sorry, but I don't feel like indulging your obvious desire for a good row at the moment." She simply snorted. "Now what?"

"You are being patronising! Patronising and oh, so superior and in dire need of the last word in every argument. And I'm sick of it!"

"Of what, precisely?" He stood with his hands in his pockets, looking controlled and cool, inflaming her temper still further.

"Of your whole attitude! You're like some little golden boy, laying down the law and making all the decisions, and I'm supposed to obey without question…"

"Oh, please, Lisbon…" he interrupted.

But she wasn't to be stopped now. "…like a good little wife from Bewitched or a child. Well, I'm not a child any more, I'm not your little partner in crime that you can boss and order around. I'm a grown woman, whether you like it or not. I'm your wife, and I'm having your baby. I know you don't like the idea, but you'll just have to live with it. I'm sorry, but if you didn't want any children that were not Angela's, if you didn't want anyone who wasn't her… you shouldn't have married me. Or anyone!"

His hands left his pockets, and his eyes went to her as he tried to understand what she was trying to tell him, "You don't know what you're talking about!" he wanted to clear the air between them, wanted to have explanations and maybe, just maybe, explain himself, but she rushed past him, trying to avert the threat of tears, not wanting him to see, and started to rearrange the kitchen.

A couple of hours later, Jane was in their room when she entered, standing at the window with his hands on his hips, staring out into the dark. He turned as she came in and looked at her, stern, like her father had looked at Tommy when he used to get in troubles as a kid. "What did you mean by that last sentence, exactly?"

"Nothing," she said tiredly, her mouth opening in a yawn as she retrieved her jersey from the bed. "Let's not argue any more, Jane. We are both tired, after all." Jane looked at her retreating into their bathroom to change, and, closed the blinds, he did the same; when she was back in their room, he was already underneath the covers, faking sleep, and she joined him, carefully to stay at his side, her eyes fixed on his back, desiring to reach out but knowing all too well she wasn't allowed to any longer.

Sometimes in the middle of the night, she woke suddenly, dragged from sleep by some sound that set her heart pounding; her eyes went wide, searching the darkness without knowing why. Then it came again, a deep, masculine moan of anguish, and Jane stirred restlessly beside her, his slurred voice moaning the same sentence again and again. "No. Sweetheart, no. Don't die! Please don't die."

She turned to him quickly, leaning over him as his head moved jerkily from side to side on the pillow. "Oh, Jane…"

He moaned again, and even in the darkness she could see the faint sheen of sweat on his forehead. "No…" He said again, and then, with a sound like a choking sob. "NO!"

'"Jane!" She shook his shoulder. "Jane, it's a dream! It's all right. Wake up."

He shuddered, and his breath seemed to stop. Then his eyes flickered briefly open and he put up his hand to feel hers on his shoulders, then slid his fingers up her arm. "Oh, God," he said, on a note of deep relief. "A dream. You're not dead… oh, sweetheart, I couldn't bear it!"

His arms came around her and pulled her down to him, and his cheek felt burning hot and damp with sweat. His hand feverishly stroked her hair. "You are safe. You are wise. You are loved" he whispered, and was instantly asleep again.

She lay against him, held in his sleeping embrace, and tears trickled from her closed lids. He had been dreaming of Angela and Charlotte's death and thought it was his late wife comforting him, telling him it wasn't true. He had gone to sleep again thinking it was her in his arms, even after all this time. Teresa's heart contracted with pain for him. It wasn't his fault that he had love, and still did, Angela more and still grieved for her in his dreams. Perhaps he was dreaming of his first wife now, of the happiness that they had shared. Hopelessly, she wondered if the memories would ever fade, if she could ever begin to replace his dead love. She had to try, it was the only way to make their marriage work.

In the morning she woke up first, and started to ease herself away from him, but the movement disturbed him, as his arms tightened around her shoulders, and he opened his eyes. As she lifted her head and looked into them, she saw a strange expression in the green-blue depths, before he said huskily, on a note of enquiry, "Ehy?" like he didn't know what else he was supposed to say. After all, something had to have happened, as they hadn't touched each other in weeks.

Feeling a need to explain, she said almost defensively what had happened during the night, blushing like she ashamed of her own reaction. "You had a dream… a nightmare."

"I remember." He said. "God, it was horrible." His hand on her shoulder gripped suddenly, bruising the tender skin.

"It's all right now." Of course it wasn't all right; Angela was dead, and he probably wished he hadn't woken this morning and discovered that his nightmare was true. She wondered how many other mornings he had woken to the same cruel realisation. Was this the reason of his insomnia?

She stirred again, and he begged her to stay a little longer with him in bed. He closed his eyes, pushing her head down again on to his shoulder, and she supposed, with a faint sensation of gladness, that if she wasn't his late wife she was at least someone to hold on to for comfort. At the moment, with the memory of his distress last night still fresh, she didn't mind. It was enough that he wanted her here, close to him, that she could give him her silent sympathy and compassion, and that he seemed to need it.

"You'll be a great mum. You are already blooming" He suddenly said. "Are you feeling all right?" He never referred to her pregnancy, even obliquely, unless it was to express some concern for her health.

"I feel wonderful." She told him. "You don't need to worry about me." She stirred at his side; it was on the tip of her tongue to ask if he remembered last night and his nightmare, but before she spoke he said if she had any plans for the afternoon.

"I don't think I want to go out." she told him, sincerely. She had already planned her morning, but hadn't thought about anything for the afternoon. It would have been nice, though, for the two of them to be alone, in their own home. Not long ago she would have predicted with accuracy exactly what they would have done with an afternoon to themselves, but things were different now. "But maybe we could invite someone for dinner? Kim said she wasn't sure about a first date with Cho, maybe we could, you know…"

"Yeah…"

They spent the day as they had planned, and when evening came, Kim and Cho joined them for a first unofficial date they weren't even aware of; it was after midnight when they left, and Jane yawned as they heard the engine of the car fading down the street. "Coming to bed?" he asked as Teresa picked up the glasses to carry them to the kitchen.

"Yes, of course." She remembered a time when he would have kissed the skin of her neck while saying, silently begging her to accept to have sex with him, but now they weren't intimate any longer, and once said the word he retreated to their room. It will get better, she assured herself. She would have to learn to settle for what Jane could give her and not demand more than he had ever promised. Maybe that was the root cause of the problem. She had let him know how much she loved him and made him feel guilty about being unable to return it. He had asked her once to ease off. Perhaps if she played it cool, made it less obvious how she felt, he wouldn't feel so pressured and things would come right. The terrifying rift was already healing she knew it, but there was still a dark shadow laying over their happiness.

When she joined him in the bedroom, she was surprised to see that he had a glass of whisky on the dressing table. He was pulling off his shirt, pausing to take a sip before unbuckling his belt, and a part of her remembered her own father, getting lost at the bottom of a glass, but maybe she was seeing too much into it; sleeping pills didn't work on Jane, he had once told her, so a little alcohol in his blood and his mind was the only way to rest his eyes. She got undressed and used the bathroom, and when she came back he was sitting on the bed in his pyjama trousers, finishing the drink. He looked up and went into the bathroom without a word, and when he came back he turned off the light and got into the bed beside her and sighed heavily.

He reached out an arm and put it around her, pulling her over to lie against him, her shoulders resting against his chest. "I've drunk too much." He confessed, rubbing his chin over her hair. "Sorry, sweetheart."

"You have drunk a lot tonight." She dared to say. "What's the matter?"

He sighed again, and his arm tightened slightly around her. "That dream, it's been haunting me all day. I can't get it out of my head."

"Try to forget it, Jane." She kissed him softly, tentatively, hoping, but afraid to be too aggressive in case it wasn't what he wanted.

He lifted his hands to hold her head, and took over the kiss, turning to push her back against the pillows, touching her face and neck and then her breast. Then he buried his lips in her neck.

"Not when I'm half tipsy. It wouldn't be fair to you, and drink is notoriously apt to impair a man's performance. Sweetheart, do you mind if I just hold you until I go to sleep?"

"Of course I don't mind." She stroked his hair, filled with a melting tenderness. He sounded almost pleading, something new in her experience, as though he needed her there to keep away the dark dream. "It's all right", she murmured, her arm cradling him. "Go to sleep."

But the whisky and her arms couldn't keep the dream from returning. He had slipped from her hold and turned away as he slept, and she woke to hear him gasping in distress. She touched his cheek and her fingertips came away wet, and she knew he was crying in his sleep.

When she woke him, he grasped at her as if he was drowning, and choked out, "I won't let you! I won't let it happen! You won't get them!""

"Jane..." she said urgently. "Jane, wake up, it's me, Lisbon…" She used her last name; for some reason, she had been having an hard time lately to refer to herself as "his" Teresa. Besides… wasn't being Jane and Lisbon the foundation of who and what they were? Lisbon had been the one to keep him grounded, after all. Maybe… maybe she could do the same, again, only in a different situation, and maybe, with a different result; back then, she hadn't been able to talk him out of killing Red John; but right now, maybe she could still save them, save their marriage.

He gave a great shuddering sigh, and said, "Teresa…. Oh, Teresa, hold me, please, sweetheart. Let me hold you."

She went into his arms and wound hers tightly about him. "You were dreaming about Angela again." She said. "It's only a dream, Jane. That's all over now. You got Red John, you remember?"

"Angela?" he said slowly, his speech slurred. "I haven't been dreaming about Angela. It's you. It's always you.."

"Me?'" She raised her head, trying to see his face in the darkness.

"Hold me." He muttered. His hand came up behind her head, pulling her down to him again. "I was so frightened. There was nothing I could do. I opened the door of our bedroom and found you, and the baby…."

"What?" she asked softly, fumbling for his hand and holding it tightly.

"You were both dead. And it was all my fault. I failed you too…"

She went cold. "But it didn't happen." she said, bringing his hand to her cheek. "I'm not dead, Jane. I'm perfectly all right. You got Red John. He never hurt me, and he never will."

He moved his head restlessly. "You are married to me, Teresa. You're having my baby. And I ruin everything I touch."

"Jane…" she breathed. His speech was slurred, but she understood exactly what he was saying. She struggled out of his arms to switch on the lamp, and leaned over him as he blinked in the sudden glare. She grasped his shoulders and said the words she had said many times before. "Look at me, Jane. It wasn't your fault. He did it. And you're not going to cause me any pain. I'm not leaving. We are not leaving."

His face was pale, and his eyes looked glazed. Gradually they cleared, and he passed a hand over his forehead. "I'm sorry, it's just… the dream…"

"Yes." she said, looking at him anxiously. "I know."

"Turn the light off." He asked her drowsily, closing his eyes. "I'm all right, now. Just stay with me and don't go away."

She switched off the light and lay down with her head on his shoulder, his arm curved around her. She felt his chest rise in a sigh, and then his breathing slowed and evened out and she knew he was asleep again. She lay awake for a time, her brain trying to bring order to random thoughts and memories. If she could only concentrate, she thought, irritably. But she was tired, her head muzzy from the sudden awakening, and after a while she too drifted into sleep.