A/N: An early update just because I got some really terrific news when I got home from work today and I'm giddy with excitement!

Some suspension of belief is required here regarding Maura's M.E. duties/responsibilities, but it's no worse than the actual show I suppose. She's a good girl and we love her so just go with it, okay. You'll be rewarded in the end.

CHAPTER TEN

Declining countless offers from Angela to wash the blood out of her BPD Athletics t-shirt - she had dozens of them, it wouldn't kill her to put one in the trash - Jane finally managed to leave her mother's house and go home to her apartment.

Jane entered and Casey was out of his recliner, rushing across the room the second he saw the state she was in. "What the hell happened?"

She waved him off and he stood still as she moved further into the apartment. "Oh, nothing. Me and Frankie were shooting some hoops and he caught me in the face. No big deal." She walked into the bedroom and stripped off her grey t-shirt, returning to the living room seconds later in it's navy blue twin. Grabbing a beer from the fridge and sinking down into the couch with a huge sigh, she looked up at Casey who was still stood by the door, hands on his hips, clearly displeased.

Trying to lighten his suddenly stormy mood, she popped her feet up on the coffee table and laughed, "You'da thought Frankie had shot someone the way Ma chased him for cleaning me up with her best towel."

"Disgraceful."

She chuckled and swigged from the bottle, "Yeah, it is." She laughed again before grabbing the TV remote, "She loved that tea towel."

"Not him."

Preoccupied with channel hopping, Jane wasn't looking at Casey when she murmured, "Hmm?"

"It is disgraceful. But it's not him. It's you."

Removing her feet from the coffee table, she muted the television and put down her beer bottle, "Excuse me?"

His brows were drawn into a fierce scowl and he was all but pacing in what little space was available between the front door and the living area.

"I'll never understand it. Why you do it…" He was shaking his head, as if he was just talking out loud to himself rather than to his wife.

He was unreasonably agitated and Jane was confused. Softly, she asked, "Casey, what's going on?"

He looked up at her and gestured a hand towards her face, "Am I supposed to be happy that my wife has two black eyes now?"

Jane swallowed, trying and failing to keep herself calm, before standing up to face him, "Is this the part where you tell me I'm not ladylike enough? Again?! Like I haven't heard it every… single… day since I was old enough to understand there was a difference between girls and boys?"

"It's bad enough you come home from work looking like that sometimes, do you really have to spend your free time getting roughed up, too?"

This is ridiculous, she thought, as her voice rose an octave in disbelief, "It was an accident! It's not like I went out looking for trouble, so what's the problem?"

"My problem is you acting like one of the boys all the time. I know you love your job but do you always have to be so… tough."

"You have no problem with women serving in the army… Colonel. I'd say that's pretty tough, wouldn't you?" Jane scoffed, "It's quite the double-standard you've got there!"

"That's different," he dismissed. Then after a beat, "They're all goddamn dykes anyway."

Jane's chin snapped back and her eyebrows shot up. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. "Is that what it comes down to?" she fished, running a theory as she spoke, watching his reactions and going with her gut. "You don't want me acting like those women? Is that it?"

He didn't deny it, just stood there, looking at her, making it worse.

Jane's blood boiled and she raised her voice. Her arms flailed and hands gestured wildly as she ranted, "You know what… you can take all your snide, chauvinistic comments and your thinly-veiled contempt, and y – your… crude jokes and your shitty gifts that were plainly all about pleasing you and never about pleasing me and you can stick them where the sun don't shine!" She was on a roll and she took his momentary shock as an opportunity to carry on. "As if the way I look, or dress, or behave…" She jabbed a pointed finger into her own chest repeatedly, painfully, "… has anything to do with who. I. Am. In here."

She was crying and he was speechless.

"What the hell are we doing, Casey?" she sniffed, her voice quieting back to normal volume.

"What do you mean?"

"I tried to change you when we first got together, tried to make you stay here, for me, and you couldn't do it. But I shouldn't have done that, anyway, because that's who you are, the army runs through you and even injured you wanted to be there instead of here. And you've tried to change me, too. Expecting me to quit my job, trying to convince me I'd be happy and fulfilled playing the doting housewife, serving mint juleps to your army buddies or whatever. We've tried everything to change each other, instead of accepting each other. This hasn't worked from the beginning and we've been kidding ourselves."

"It wouldn't be so bad if you were home more."

Jane snorted humorlessly, "If I were home more." She nodded at the irony and ran her tongue over her bottom lip. He was looking at her like she'd finally realized how neglected he felt and it really was the last straw. She let rip, "You've got a fucking nerve, you know that?! You don't care how much I work when you're gone for six months at a time. You don't ask if I'm okay, check if I'm eating right, or – or worry that I'm not sleeping. You don't like a lot of things about me. You don't like my friends -"

Casey scoffed, butting in, "I do like your friends, but when you're ditching me to go hang out with the likes of that Frost guy, I mean… who knows what silly ideas he's putting in your head. What do you guys even talk about anyway? Do you get tips on how to dress from his mom or something? I'll bet it was his idea for you to set up that BPD softball team, wasn't it? He probably got that from his mom too..."

Casey was still talking but the words faded out as Jane blinked. Her throat had closed up and her eyes stung. Never had she heard such obnoxious diatribe. His self-pitying, immature, ignorant, hateful words cut her, slashing back and forth across her abdomen until she felt physically sick. Suddenly, there was a ringing in her ears that made her wince a little as the room faded back in.

"… even saw a little boy playing out front the other day; running through the sprinklers wearing a goddamned tutu. Your mom might not be as crazy as you think if that's how it all starts!"

Quickly losing the battle to remain dry-eyed, Jane snatched up her keys and stormed out. She slammed the door with every ounce of force she could muster, warning Casey off following her and putting a barrier in between them for a head start in case he did exactly that.

The point at which the almost justifiable slanging match - on her part - had degenerated into spiteful, personal insults – on his - had been the point at which she couldn't stomach looking at him any more.

oOo

The drive to Maura's house never took very long, but sufficient time passed today for Jane's surging adrenaline to wear off and for her tears to finally breach their dam. They ran their course down her face, pooling at her chin and dripping onto her t-shirt as she breathed raggedly, brokenly, for long minutes.

Upon reaching Beacon Hill, the brunette dried her face before exiting the car, cursing the redness in and around her eyes that she couldn't hide no matter how hard she wished it otherwise. Jane was certain her best friend would instantly notice something was wrong, it terrified and excited her in equal measure; she wouldn't have to hide any more, couldn't escape it.

The effort Jane employed to prevent her tears from starting again was considerable when Constance Isles opened the front door instead of Maura. This scenario wasn't the one Jane had played through her mind on the way over. She faltered, dismayed, and looked down at the ground as her shoulders became tensed and she crunched her long fingers into fists over and over again.

"She's not here, dear," Constance stated politely.

Jane just stared at the doorstep between them.

The older woman dipped her head to coax Jane's gaze to meet her, "Jane? Are you okay?"

"Oh, um… yeah." She sniffed, her chin trembling without permission, "Is Maura not home?"

"She went to the precinct, I believe."

Jane turned and left, but not before meeting Constance's kind eyes fully and whispering, "Thank you."

oOo

There was just one Criminalist working in the lab when Jane passed by, peering through the vast glass wall that separated the scientists' area from the corridor. Susie Chang was examining several close ups of what looked like severe bruising on a victim with a magnifier. She never looked up, oblivious to the detective's unexpected presence, totally focused on her task and Jane wondered if the lack of staffing today meant the guys hadn't caught a new case yet.

Ordinarily, Jane would stampede like an untameable stallion into Maura's office, without announcement or invitation, her long, almost-black, wavy hair buffeted by her haste, completing the illusion. But today, her footsteps were muted, thanks to sneakers instead of heeled boots, and measured as she came to a silent stop outside Maura's office window.

The blonde was working on her laptop, her hair imperfect and her clothes as casual as any human alive had ever seen her wear outside of her own home, and Jane watched her, entranced, through the open blind. She was breathtakingly, undeniably beautiful.

Jane could have stared, day-dreaming for five minutes or fifty, it was anybody's guess how long she stood there, but she was jolted awake by Maura calling out for Susie. Had she somehow indicated her presence in the corridor? Had she shuffled her feet unknowingly, or spoken aloud to herself? She didn't know. Either way, she was surely about to be intercepted by Susie coming one way or Maura approaching from the other, so she bit the bullet and stepped into the doorway.

"Oh, Jane! What are you doing here?"

The detective took several more steps inside Maura's office but couldn't take her eyes off the floor. So many new and strange feelings coursed through her. "I was looking for you… actually. I needed to -"

The doctor pointed at the brunette's red and swollen nose, "Get that looked at?"

Looking up, Jane mumbled, "Huh?"

"Looks like a hairline fracture… of the nasal bone above the lateral nasal cartilage."

"I took a knock, but it'll be fine," Jane dismissed.

Standing and stepping from behind her desk, Maura offered, "I can pop it back for you."

"You can?"

The blonde nodded, "Mm-hmm." Stepping closer to Jane, the M.E. gripped the detective's chin firmly, holding her face in place. "May I?"

Jane nodded, her eyes pinned on the beautiful lips that hovered inches from her own.

Suddenly, as Maura reset the bone with a snap, there was a shooting pain in her face and her head pounded just as ferociously as when Frankie had first collided with her. "OW! Jesus. God, that hurt."

Maura chuckled lightly, sympathetically, "Sorry. It's not disfiguring but you should put some ice on it to take down the swelling and reduce the bruising."

Absently, Jane murmured, "Okay."

Cupping the brunette's cheek, Maura continued to inspect Jane's face closely, turning it this way and that. After a few seconds she was happy that the nasal formation was correctly aligned and was certain that with the proper care it should heal without any further issues.

Jane's dark chocolate gaze flicked repeatedly from Maura's mouth to her gorgeous hazel eyes and back again.

Maura's eyebrows drew together the moment she caught the dilation of Jane's pupils. She withdrew her own face slightly as her breath hitched.

"Don't -" Jane rushed, her voice breaking, latching on to Maura's wrists where the doctor's hands still held her face. The brunette's voice was almost a whisper as a lone tear tracked a course down her to her chin. "Please, Maura."

Maura shook her head lightly, "I -"

Another whisper begged, "Kiss me."

Conflicted but resistant, Maura held on. Sadly, she said, "No."

The brunette tugged on the doctor's hands, pulling their bodies ever closer, "Why?"

Maura couldn't escape Jane's burning gaze, and turned her eyes down to the scant space between them, "I've already ruined two marriages, Jane. I can't be responsible for that again."

Deflated, Jane loosened her grip and stepped away.

The moment Maura slipped free, she whispered, "I'm sorry" and fled next door to the autopsy suite.

The detective's heart was in her feet and she wiped a palm over her face as leaden steps carried her slowly back out into the corridor and away. Sullen and disappointed, she barely acknowledged the passing criminalist until she heard her name being spoken.

"Huh?"

Susie was smiling but appeared nervous, "I said are you still working the Beechgrove cases, too?"

Frowning, Jane asked, "What do mean, too?"

Pointing towards Maura's office, she explained, "Dr. Isles. She's managing the evidence for the assaults. I know that's not your area but I thought maybe…"

"Is that why you're here?" Jane interrupted.

"Yeah, she's been a slave driver these past few weeks, had me in here every weekend re-examining all the injury photos, matching bruise patterns and cataloging every detail." She blew a big puff of air out from between her lips, exhausted. "She's really gonna nail the Bannister case, though. Those nurses aren't gonna know what hit 'em."

The criminalist's pun was truly dreadful but still garnered a tiny snicker from the brunette. Then the detective's eyebrows rose, the Bannister case? "Wait... Eddie Bannister? I didn't know she was dealing with that."

Susie shrugged, "She didn't want to take any chances with the prosecution I guess and I don't mind working extra hours; she pays pretty good overtime. That poor guy had no family so I think she felt sorry for him." The criminalist gave another shrug as she walked backwards away from the detective, "Even though he was a bit shirty by all accounts."

Jane laughed, turning determinedly back the way she'd just come. Smiling fondly, she let out a long breath, "I bet he was. Bitchy old queen." She lengthened her stride and straightened her shoulders, walking tall for the first time in days. She'd left the assault cases alone after Cavanaugh had convinced her it'd be taken care of, and Maura hadn't mentioned her involvement. Why? The doctor's kindness never ceased to amaze her. The woman was thoughtful, caring… amazing, and Jane couldn't just walk away without a fight.

She found Maura back in her office and this time she didn't hesitate to sweep into the room exactly like she owned it and everything it contained. Closing the door with some force, she startled the Medical Examiner into a spin, turning to face the determined detective with an expression of shock.

Jane sighed, "My marriage was ruined long before you came back."

The pause between speech and movement wasn't long enough for the doctor to take action, but any ideas she'd had about declining the attractive brunette's advances again flew out of her along with the air in her lungs as Jane's glorious lips met hers. Self-control abandoned, Maura allowed Jane to guide them both a short distance across the room until Maura's ass met the edge of her desk.

Pressing ever forward, the brunette swept her hands up and around Maura's body, causing a series of arousing moans from both women, until she was cupping the doctor's face at the jaw.

Long fingers tickled at the hair behind her ears, sending a shudder rippling down Maura's spine.

As their passionate kiss broke naturally and Jane pulled away with her eyes closed, the blonde took a moment to breathe and to steady herself. Her voice was low and scratchy as she regarded the toothy grin that developed on the detective's face, "Jane." Her breath caught in her throat when the taller woman opened her eyes, moist and sparkling. "This isn't a good idea."

Jane's wanting mouth descended upon the doctor again as she whispered, "I think it's a very good idea."

For days and weeks, ever since Maura's revelation, Jane's private desires had swung wildly back and forth like a pendulum. On the one hand, she wanted to nurture and protect her cherished friendship, to preserve its stability, to ensure the continued existence of the one thing she couldn't do without. But on the other hand, she yearned for more, wished for the confidence that would allow her to gamble, for the courage to take her friendship and place it upon the playing table, wait for the flop, and hope she wouldn't get swept away by the river. In private, thoughts of Maura and what they could be together had threatened to drown her.

Now, wet tongues slid against one another amidst caressing plump lips and nipping teeth and the only solid thought in Jane's head was the question of why she hadn't been all in since the beginning.

Both women were smiling; their eyes wide open, absorbing every detail even as they continued to share tender kisses.

Jane's hands grasped blonde hair, pulling the doctor into her fiercely, claiming her, and Maura allowed it, clinging to the brunette just as firmly.

Melting underneath the heat of the detective, the doctor whimpered; no one had ever desired her this ardently, driven her arousal so quickly, or inflamed her lonely heart so fully.

Maura's hands moved from Jane's back to press gently against the detective's chest. As much as she wanted this to continue, she didn't want her own rapidly-escalating desires to overtake Jane's unconfirmed intentions. She was about to give them pause in order to ask what Jane wanted, was just trying to summon the determination to break from Jane's consuming mouth, when a clipboard hit the floor by the doorway and they snapped apart, both turning to the source of the noise.

Susie Chang stood in her blue lab coat, mouth agape, sheets of paper fluttering to the ground around her feet. Jane and Maura stared at her for several long seconds until the criminalist bent down to quickly retrieve her report. "I'll just, er -" She pointed back towards the lab, "I'll come back later."

The lab assistant disappeared quickly around the corner and Jane stepped away from the doctor once more, a full palm covering her red face as she grumbled, "Shit!"