A/N-Fair warning: there is a mood shift ahead...After all, this story does need some conflict...

Jane strode across the park towards the crime scene where the techs were already starting to process the scene. She grumbled to herself about the asshole, no name beat cop who had made her park her car so far away. The guy didn't realize that he was wasting precious time in the first 48. Besides, the weather was raw and dreary, and it seemed that this weather always made her hands ache, which would in turn bring back memories of Hoyt. So, needless to say, Jane was in no mood to talk about anything outside of the case at hand.

"Hey, Rizzoli," one of the techs nodded as Jane walked by. She nodded back to him because she actually didn't mind the guy.

"What've we got here?" Jane asked Korsak, who was crouched over the body.

Korsak looked up to see Jane for the first time and raised his eyebrows.

"Did we call you away from a date or something?" Korsak asked.

"No, why?"

"Nothing, just not use to seeing you all dressed up at crime scenes is all," Korsak said. He gestured to the shirt Jane was wearing, part one of the more casual outfits Maura bought Jane. "Is it new?"

"Yeah, it was a gift," Jane said crossing her arms over her chest. "Now can you please tell me what we've got, or am I going to have to wait until Frost is done puking in the bushes?"

"Not much," Korsak said as he stood up and gestured to the body. "Found a license on him, says him name is Joe Asimov. About four or five deep stab wounds and a few superficial defensive wounds on his hands. This section of town is well known to vice, so we're thinking possible drug connection. Patrol's out looking for witnesses in the neighborhood."

"M'kay, let's take a look," Jane said as she bent down to get a closer look at the body. She took gloves out and pulled them on to take a closer look at the vics hands. She had found that sometimes you could tell whether the perp was a lefty or righty based on defensive wounds.

"Who gave 'em to you?" Korsak asked as he bent down so that he was level with Jane.

"Huh?" Jane asked, looking up while still holding the dead man's hand.

"The clothes. You said they were a gift," Korsak said. "Who gave you the clothes?"

"I don't know when you became such a fashionista," Jane said as she went back to examining the body. "And if you really must know, Maura got the outfit for me. She spent a frigging fortune, and I feel guilty, so I'm wearing it, alright?"

Korsak shrugged and looked down at the body as Jane continued her examination.

"Speaking of which, here she is," Korsak said, waving the ME over to the body.

"Hello," Maura said as she pulled on a pair of latex gloves. "I'm sorry that it took so long."

"Yeah, no big, I just got here too," Jane said as she stood up from the body. "We have a Caucasian male, late twenties, id'ed as a Joe Asimov. Stabbed to death."

"The apparent cause of death, you mean?" Maura corrected.

"Maura, look at the guy. He's lying in a pool of his own blood with some seriously deep stab wounds. What do you think, he died of smoke inhalation or something?"

"It's unlikely, but I can't rule anything out until I perform the autopsy," Maura said as she crouched down next to the body to examine the stab wounds to his chest and stomach.

"Really, Maura?" Jane whined.

"Yes, really," Maura said, looking up from the corpse, and at Jane for the first time since arriving. She smiled brightly when she saw that Jane was wearing the white v neck top and black pants. "You're wearing one of the outfits I bought you!"

"You mean there's more than one of these?" Korsak interjected, glancing in Jane's direction.

"Oh, yes, I got her a beautiful McQueen dress," Maura said, still looking at Jane as she rose. "It looks stunning on her. I just had to buy it."

During the entire exchange, Korsak looked on as if he were not a part of the conversation. Normal people would have responded to Korsak by looking at Korsak while speaking to him. Not Maura. Nope, the ME managed to glance at Korsak only for the few seconds that he was speaking. As smart as she was, and Maura was wicked smart, Jane thought the woman could use a remedial course on subtlety and not flirting with friends while at work. Jane could not imagine she was that irresistible.

"M'kay, well now that that's all cleared up, I would really like to find the guy who killed this kid," Jane said as she flexed her hands to keep the dull ache in her palms from settling too long in one place.

"You mean man or woman," Maura said.

"What?" Jane asked.

"If this is in fact a murder, as it appears to be," Maura said. "The murderer could be male or female. Your use of the word guy eliminated females as potential suspects."

"Maura, you know that these types of murders in these locations are almost always guys, and I swear, if this isn't a murder, I will quit BPD and become a supermodel," Jane said.

"There's no need to go to such extremes to prove your point, Jane," Maura said. "Besides, you don't have the posture to walk the runway."

"But I'm sure I have the stunning good looks, right?" Jane quipped, cracking a small smile as she bent down to take another look at the corpse. As much as Maura's quirks drove Jane crazy, the ME had this really...unique way about her that never failed to get Jane to crack a smile at least once in a conversation despite any shitty circumstance.

"Yes, you do indeed have the looks," Maura said, as she too bent over so that she was eye level with Jane. Jane looked up from the body at Maura only to realized that, yet again, Maura was giving this sexy little half smile as she made direct eye contact. "And you can be quite charismatic and charming when you need to be."

"Yeah, but she's only charming when she wants something," Frost suddenly chimed in, apparently having wandered over at some point during their exchange.

Both Jane and Maura looked up at the pair. Korsak stood there with his hands in his pocket, and Frost, despite the fact that he had just emptied the contents of his stomach into a nearby bush, was smiling as he looked from Jane to Maura and back again.

Jane looked pointedly from one man to the other, but wasn't able to get much of a response. Frost appeared to be developing a resistance to Jane's best death glare and Jane wasn't happy about it.

"Maura, do you think you could go get the paperwork going to get this guy into autopsy?" Jane asked. "Its suppose to rain later, and we don't want to ruin the evidence."

Maura nodded, oblivious to the looks between Jane, her partner and ex-partner since Jane had turned to face her partner. Maura did, however, sound a bit confused by the sudden change of subject.

"I'll have Susie get the paperwork," Maura said slowly, as if distracted by some other, far more important thought. "We can have him in autopsy in a few hours if I get the papers started."

After Maura walked away, Korsak looked ready to speak. Jane, however, had an idea of what he was going to say, and she did not want him to start in on the whole Jane likes a lady thing, not if it involved Maura. She especially didn't want to hear itafter the flirting and fake romancing to get clothes at a steep discount had left Jane wondering if Maura actually believed that platonic friends acted that way on a regular basis. Jane knew that Korsak's ribbing would be good natured, but Jane just couldn't deal with it at the moment.

"Not a word," Jane said as she got up, punctuating each syllable.

"I wasn't gonna say a thing," Korsak said, then he patted Jane on the shoulder and wandered towards one of the techs.

"But she is a good looking lady," Frost added.

Before Jane could respond, he hurried off in the direction of a beat cop who had just arrived as back up. Jane turned back around and looked at the body. She rested both hands on her hips and sighed. This thing with Maura was a turning into something more complicated than she could have ever expected.

Maura had only known Jane for a few months, but she and Jane had developed a close relationship rather quickly. Maura often wondered if that had something to do with their earlier sexual connection, but she tried not to dwell on it. Maura had other things on her mind; Jane was bothered by something.

As they worked, Jane acted gruffer than usual; Maura had grown accustomed to Jane's 'tough guy' attitude, but this was something more than that. Maura understood Jane well enough to know that much, but her power of observation ended right around there. She needed to determine the root of Jane's apparent moodiness, and Jane's single-minded focus on her work was proving quite an obstacle in even coming close to the subject during their conversation. Jane appeared to be making a conscious effort to focus intensely on the case at hand to the exclusion of everything else.

So Maura decided to embark on an investigation not unlike the kind of investigation that Jane was in the midst of performing for the Asimov case. Having performed the autopsy, Maura was essentially on call, so she had some extra time between the handful of natural cause autopsies to perform her investigation. She decided to start with Jane's fellow officers, although she decided that going to Frost or Korsak might tip Jane off and needlessly upset her friend. Therefore, Maura, against her best instinct, went to the next available officer in this case, Detective Crowe. It certainly wasn't ideal, but sometimes even Jane needed to interview a shady character to get crucial information on a puzzling case.

"So, let me get this straight," Crowe said as he leaned back in his chair. "You wanna know why Rizzoli's being especially bitchy?"

"Not bitchy," Maura said. She found the word distasteful and inaccurate. "A bit unhappier than usual."

"Rizzoli is never really happy," Crowe said as he absently fiddled with his pen. "And as for her general bitchiness, she doesn't really need a reason. Seems to come so natural for her."

"Oh," Maura said. "Well that's, um—

"You want to know what I think?" Crowe asked as he leaned forward in his chair, then added before Maura had a chance to say she did not particularly care to hear his opinion. "I think she just needs to get laid."

"Do you?" Maura said. She left her answer short to keep from having to tell him that she knew for a fact that Jane had been laid in the past three months.

"Yeah, you think you could maybe work on that for us," Crowe said. He looked Maura up and down before speaking again. "I mean you two do get along awfully well. Aren't chicks like one too many shots from going gay anyway?"

"I believe that is only in mainstream pornography," Maura said. "Although sexual fluidity in the human species is far more common than previously believed."

The more she spoke with Crowe the less she liked him, and Maura really tried not to hate people. So the 'google-speak,' as Jane called it, would work in this case as a tool to end an increasingly awkward and frustrating conversation.

"Thank you so much though for that insightful commentary," Maura said. "I have to go now though."

As much as it had been insightful commentary from Crowe, it was more insightful with regard to Crowe's rather unsavory, crass personality than with regard to Jane's current attitude shift. She would just have to talk to those closer to Jane. It was off to find Detective Frost.

Jane hated that she hated so many people. It wasn't really the kind of hate that made her wish they would fall in front of an oncoming train or get shot in the leg and bleed out slowly; Hoyt was the only person she hated that much. No, hate probably wasn't the right word, more like extreme impatience with anyone trying to have any kind of extended conversation with her. Jane wanted to stay completely focused on her work, and unnecessary socialization at work just tended to annoy her these days. Jane needed focus at the moment more than she cared to admit.

There were a lot of things that Jane didn't care to admit to herself and others these days. But work helped to fix those problems, or at least ignore the problems. So when she learnt from Crowe, of all people, that Maura was asking about her feelings and Crowe suggested, pig that he was, that she might benefit from getting laid a little more often, Jane was furious. She didn't need to think about her feelings, so Maura sure as hell shouldn't be concerned about them either. And the doctor definitely had no reason to think that Crowe would be of any help.

"Maura, what were you thinking?" Jane snapped as strode into the morgue.

Maura looked up from a dull looking textbook on fossilized remains.

"I've thought a remarkable number of things. You are going to have to contextualize the question," Maura said as she closed the book and looked calmly at Jane. Jane wondered if Maura did that on purpose, completely missing the point so that Jane to explain everything step by step.

"Talking to Crowe of all people, you know," Jane said.

"I was concerned about your well being," Maura protested.

"Well, then don't go to the biggest asshole in the Boston Police Department. Ask me," Jane said.

"I've made attempts to ask, but lately you haven't been open to much conversation that doesn't have to do with work," Maura said in even, measured tone, a very reasonable voice that made it difficult to be angry with her. "Or was I mistaken? Are you willing to answer questions about your emotional well being?"

Jane had to give Maura credit for reading her like a book, like a really easy book with pictures and everything. Didn't mean she had to like it.

"Yes, I dunno, no, I guess not. But c'mon, I mean, Crowe? Seriously," Jane said. "You know him, what a creep he can be. You know he suggested you and I have sex while we're at it."

"He made the same suggestion to me," Maura said. "And although it was crassly worded, he is quite perceptive based on our past sexual history."

"Are you serious?" Jane asked, and when it was clear that Maura was, Jane added. "He wasn't being perceptive, Maura! God, I mean, he was just using his eyes, for christssake!. I, you, he, you know you have got to stop with looking at me the way you do. I mean, I have to stop too, but you really need to stop."

In all of her stuttering, mumbling, and starts and stops, Jane had finally found something to latch on to, a concrete reason to be pissed, or frustrated at the very least. Now she was going to have to stick with it.

"Which look?"

"The one that says that you've seen me naked," Jane said. "It's pretty obvious, and I know Frost sees it too. I already have the lesbian rumors without dealing with that shit too."

"Is that so?" Maura asked, her eyes narrowed.

"Yeah," Jane said.

"Well, Jane," Maura said with an edge to her voice. "First of all, it is not an I saw you naked look."

"No? What is it then?" Jane responded.

"It is an 'I gave you multiple orgasms and thoroughly enjoyed it' look," Maura said. "And second of all, sometimes those lesbian rumors that you are so concerned about, however crudely articulated, have a basis in truth."

Jane was at a loss for what to say. Maura sometimes acted so clueless, then other times demonstrated an awareness and sharpness that Jane did not expect out of her at all. This conversation was proving to be a demonstration of the latter.

"Are you for real?" Jane asked.

"Well, I'm no cyborg," Maura said coolly as she rose from her seat. "I have an autopsy coming in soon, and you have a murder to investigate. Don't you, detective?"

Maura had never called Jane 'detective' before, not in the serious, professional tone she was speaking in now. To hear her use it in so cold and professional a way gave Jane another, entirely different moment of speechlessness. Jane was hurt, and though Jane knew that she deserved the cool treatment, it struck her all at once that she had been a royal bitch to the one person besides her mom who had cared enough to want to find out what was wrong. Maura went about finding out in a pretty ridiculous way, but Jane knew that the doctor meant well, that she always meant to do right by Jane, to help her through a rough time. And Jane had gotten irrationally pissed off as a defense mechanism to keep her pain from both Maura and herself.

"Yeah, I should get going I guess," Jane said.

Jane nodded, got up, and left the room.

A/N-I did offer fair warning...I just hope it doesn't feel too abrupt. Things will become clearer in next chapter, and the abruptness will, I hope, make more sense. The suddenness is partly by design, but I do hope it isn't too off putting. I tried to integrate some of the friendly banter from the show in there at the beginning so it's not too unbearable...

Also, don't worry that this is suddenly going to become super angsty...like I said, this story needs some conflict to keep things interesting :)

Thoughts? Questions? Concerns? C'mon, I know there ought to be some concerns after this chapter :)

Thank you all for the piles of reviews...a few more would make for a great belated birthday present!