Monday, 6:45 P.M.
Her awful date with her girlfriend forgotten, Jane had reluctantly left the crime scene to the remaining techies while following Maura in the coroner's van with her Aston. Each mile of stressful rush-hour Boston traffic dissipated with the simplicity and elegance of the leather lined interior of the expensive sports-car. For the first time since everything that had happened several months ago, Jane welcomed the silence.
Maura and me…we haven't always been like this, Jane wondered as she took in the faded vividness of the Boston sunset with unseeing eyes. They had been and still did have good moments of pure bliss but the constant bickering along with the underlying tension of Jane's inability to talk to Maura was creating an obvious strain. It was becoming harder and harder to maintain a sufficient barrier between their work and private relationship. Even now as the orange sky reluctantly gave way to the crimson hues of late evening, Jane's mind was awash with details that her face struggled to repress.
*!*Flashback*!*
Slivers of moonlight flickered across the two intertwined women, exhaustion having finally taken the place of passion. Locks of brown met with blonde upon the stained sheets and, after briefly tussling for dominance, they had declared a pleasant truce. Silence spread through the blonde's darkened bedroom.
"Why don't you talk to me?" Maura said as exhaustion of a different kind became stronger in the privacy of their bed. A growl worked its way up her throat before Jane could restrain it as Maura's illuminated hands mapped out the smooth rise and fall of her still erect nipples, glistening with the remains of their previous actions. Jane's breathing was coming in shuddered gasps, her body again rising to the challenge that her girlfriend clearly wanted to impose.
A breeze shivered through the blinds before Maura's hands reached the seizing expanse of rippling muscle and taut skin. "I hate…talking. More…god, just more of this, please."
"Tell me," Maura pleaded softly as she continued to move further toward her goal. "Tell me why. Why don't you talk to me?"
Despite her lack of rest, Jane knew she would not be getting any sleep for a while longer. The brunette thought her stamina was legendary but Maura was proving to be insatiable. Impossibly long fingers probed the depths of Jane's existence with a level of skill that marveled the detective; each rapid caress of Maura's tongue on her clitoris combined with the changing rhythms of her investigation concerning Jane's clenching sex taking her farther up the hill.
"Please," Jane pleaded desperately as need quickly replaced pride.
The blonde stopped her task briefly. "Tell me, Jane."
The answering scream echoed throughout the room before Jane could process that she had released it. "Because…I'm scared, Maura. Scared of all of this, with you and me. Being with you scares the hell out of me. Are you happy now?"
*!*End Flashback*!*
After that conversation, everything had changed between them for the worse. Right after Jane had confessed to Maura she had immediately gotten up from the bed, dressed in silence, and went for a run…for about; oh, I don't know, three hours. She knew that her best friend loved running in a way that Jane never could or would in this lifetime but even she was worried after the first hour. When she did finally show up…Jane could still remember the conversation vividly in her mind. She gripped the Aston's steering wheel impulsively with the same frustration that had overcome her control that night.
*!*Flashback*!*
With a jolt, Jane's crumpled frame jolted upright from her awkward position on Maura's comfortable couch. The blonde's face fell as soon as the brunette's impossibly tangled locks cleared in her vision and she strolled by the detective as if she wasn't even there.
Excitement taking over her best judgment, Jane vaulted over the couch and grabbed her girlfriend's hand before she could walk away. "What the hell were you thinking? Who goes out running in the middle of the night? Rapists, Maura. Rapists and serial killers. I know you sometimes forget that the world isn't all Happy-Green-Acres, but I need you to try a little harder using that big brain of yours for common-sense. You could have gotten hurt." Jane exclaimed before her voice trailed off in a whisper. "I could have lost you."
"I know."
"Is that all you have to say?" Jane asked furiously, her hand ripping through the tangled mess of her long brunette locks. "What's going on with you? You've always been odd but this is beyond your usual. I said I was sorry for saying what I did. I…I didn't know what I was saying, Maura. You're a big girl, Maura, so why the fuck are you making childish decisions like going for a run in the middle of the night without even taking your phone?"
The blonde's eyes remained glued to the floor. "Because…"
"So we've gone from two word answers to one word answers…we're really getting to the heart of the matter aren't we?" Jane's voice dripped with sarcasm, but as Maura's face lifted toward her to reveal the tears that had flowed from red veined eyes, sadness soon took its place.
"I wanted to know what it felt like…to be scared of something you love with every fiber of your being." The tears that had stopped flowing had now resumed again as the shocked detective felt even more depressed for making Maura cry.
"Honey," Jane muttered. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
The detective moved Maura into her arms, releasing the tension of the night. Each muffled wail from the distraught blonde in Jane's arms made the frustration she felt even more poignant. But, despite her efforts to stay focused, the slight aroma of sex still hung in the air around the two of them, reminding her of what they were doing together.
The moment of reassurance was quickly broken as the one factor that the two lovers had forgotten about popped up at just the wrong time, Angela Rizzoli.
"Janey, what's going on? Is Maura alright?" Angela asked innocently.
Maura quickly separated from Jane's embrace, smiling briefly toward Jane's mother before running back to her bedroom. "Ma'…come on! This isn't your house! You can't just go traipsing around in the middle of the night like Boston's very own Batman. Shouldn't you be sleeping?"
"I saw the lights and I heard you trying to whisper so I assumed something was wrong," Angela walked toward Jane and looked quizzically in the direction of Maura's bedroom, "and looks like I was right. Is Bass okay or is it something else?"
Jane sighed, knowing she would end up sleeping on the couch now that her mom was up and alert. There would be no way she could sneak into her girlfriend's room without causing her mother to start asking unnecessary questions that Jane didn't particularly feel ready to answer. It killed her to know that Maura was alone when she needed her the most to comfort and assuage the doubts and fears running through her mind but there was nothing she could do, except wait and hope that Angela went back to bed fairly quickly.
"Come on." Jane said with one last hopeful look toward Maura's door. "Let's go make some coffee."
*!*End Flashback*!*
Typical of her mother, she had refused to go back to bed, chatting Jane up until the bright colors of day hit the windows of Maura's home. By the time she had managed to slip away, Maura was sleeping soundly and Jane could hardly find the will to wake her. With everything that had happened that night, she deserved some peace even if it was just in her own mind but far too much was still left unsaid from the both of them. They had woke up at different times and Jane couldn't even stay for lunch because she had to check up on Jo Friday and attempt to wash the stack of clothes that had been accumulating. I wanted to talk to her, really I did, but there never seems to be any time or, more importantly, the right time never seems to present itself, Jane wondered as her mind went back to the small spat that they had had at lunch earlier. That certainly wasn't the right time, she mused as the hum of the engine eased the detective into a further state of relaxation. At least she's trying to make an effort to get me to talk, unlike me. All I ever do is run away or deflect from the issue by using anger or work to disconnect myself her and us. She doesn't deserve that. God, what's wrong with me?
Jane's head sunk toward the steering wheel, the sudden wave of self-grief shocking her into submission. Never had the detective felt such an unbelievable sense of anxious indecision. She was completely at a loss with how to handle this situation properly and not being able to find a proper solution that would bring the desired results was problematic. But, the congested traffic subsided, movement increased, and Jane forced her focus to return back to the task at hand. Catching a potential serial before he could kill again was far more relevant, despite her heart telling her otherwise. With a slight press against the acceleration pedal of the Aston, Jane powered through the now clear streets behind the coroner's van. A hum of approval rose in a rising crescendo from the finely tuned engine and even more memories took hold, despite Jane's best efforts to ignore them.
*!*Flashback*!*
"You're going way too fast, Jane," Maura screamed, clutching the seatbelt. "I said you could drive the Aston, not race it through the streets like some kind of…street racer."
"Wow, I'm reeling with that comeback." Jane said exaggeratedly while skillfully maneuvered the sports car through a corner, braking slightly but quickly resuming speed upon exiting the corner. "Come on, you have an Aston Martin DB9. The top speed is nearly 200 miles per hour and you rarely take it over 75. This baby wants-no, needs me-to drive it fast to release all of the 500 horses that you refuse to use. This is a favor to you, honey. And, don't worry, I'm a detective. What's the highway patrol going to do, pull me over?"
"The top speed is closer to 190."Maura's stated simply, her mind processing the information at lightning speeds. "But I guess if I used slicker tires for increased traction it could increase the top speed to 200…hmm, maybe I should take it to a race track to prove my hypothesis?"
"I can drive you there?" Jane asked excitedly, turning toward Maura with a smile.
"No," the blonde rolled her eyes as the environment blurred with the increasing speed that Jane was managing to coax from the willing machine. "I have no intention to extend this experience any longer."
"Come on. You know you love it when I go fast." Jane teased suggestively, honking from annoyed drivers barely noticeable in the noise insulated interior of the Aston. "You didn't seem to complain last night too much. You seemed to like it quite a lot, actually."
A blush of embarrassment rose to Maura's cheeks as she quickly turned away from the preoccupied detective. "What we do in the bedroom has no bearing on our current actions. You're just trying to provoke me."
A laugh of genuine happiness came from Jane's mouth. "Is it working?"
"Yes," Maura smiled, turning her head back toward her pleased lover.
"Good," Jane stopped briefly to shift to a higher gear for even more speed. "I love seeing you get a little crazy for me."
*!*End Flashback*!*
Knocking coming from the driver's side window stole Jane away from the pleasant reverie of happier times. Impressively, she had managed to drive to BPD with only half of her brain focused on driving and the other half on vacation thinking about Maura Isles. God, what if I had hurt someone? Sweeping the thought aside, the harried brunette spent a millisecond resuming her identity as detective and downed to window to meet Frost's confused face. His eagerness toward seeing Maura's car up close was obvious as he subconsciously bounced on the balls of his feet.
"Korsak has already gone inside to put our Jane Doe's fingerprints in the system to see if a name pops out in a database somewhere." Frost said, looking up briefly as if remembering something of importance. "Maura went inside with the body. She told me that she'll call once the autopsy is complete. Most of the CSU techs have started preliminary analysis of the evidence from the scene and should have it back within a couple of hours at the most, but you know how those lab guys go. They spend so much time holed up in their mass-spectrometers that they've forgotten the rules of society. A couple of hours to them could mean a couple of days to us."
Normally, Jane would have ripped Frost a new one for talking negatively about the techies that had sometimes, more often than not, opened cases wide open for the unit, but she knew there was truth behind his words. The crime scene techies were notoriously notable for being just like the head medical examiner; methodical, slow, and precise which was great to brag about at conferences but not so great in solving cases in a timely manner. More times than she was willing to say, Jane had to light a fire underneath Maura's and the techies' asses to get them to work with a little bit more urgency. She hoped it wouldn't come to that, again.
"Let's try to think positive, alright? Korsak has the right idea. Let's work with what we have and concentrate getting all we can out of it. If our Jane Doe is in the system, it'll make things that much easier." Jane said, hands running through her loose curls anxiously.
Frost nodded approvingly but his gaze remained glued to the beautifully curved lines of Maura's car. Following his eyes, she quickly raised the window and exited the car after taking the keys from the ignition. Damn Frost, you're practically drooling over a piece of metal. "Do you want me to introduce you two? I was chatting her up and I think she's really into you," sarcasm obvious in the amused detective's voice.
"You're so funny." He muttered sarcastically, closing the door gingerly behind Jane. "Why does Maura let you drive her car, anyway? I'm close to her and she's never even offered me a ride home but you get to drive it…by yourself, nonetheless. Is there something you'd like to confess, Jane?"
The brunette's body tensed slightly as they began to climb the stairs to the elevator that would take them up to their desks at BPD. Frost's question surprised her not because he asked it, but because it surprised her in the first place. Even though she and Maura had started dating after everything that had happened several months ago, hardly anyone had put the two of them together intimately yet. Had someone asked Maura about us? I've been trying to teach her how to, at the very least, bluff but that hasn't been going very well…oh no, she's probably spilled her guts to Korsak, the father figure of the homicide unit.
In response to her anxiety, Frost extended his hand toward Jane's shoulder in an attempt to comfort his partner. "Hey, you okay? What's got you so riled up?"
"Nothing," she croaked, shying away from his touch. "Let's just spend our time trying to catch this guy before he escalates into something worse or decides to skip town. Hopefully Korsak or Maura have got something for us to pound the pavement with."