"Mommy?" Noah enters the little study where his parents are working, and Maura looks up from her computer absently. Jane doesn't. She's re-reading the transcript of her interview with Shura Kohut, trying to pinpoint why it makes her feel so uneasy.
Det. JR: So you and your son were on vacation when the fire broke out.
SK: Yes, and I – we – rush back because my phone shows me the alert that there is smoke. We get there and there's nothing left. Just the house frame. Nothing more.
Det. BF: How long had you been planning that trip, Ms. Kohut? Did you tell anyone you planned to go on a vacation?
SK: What is this? I am a suspect already. Tell me, where am I supposed to live now? What kind of idiot criminal burns their own house.
Det. JR: You're not a suspect Ms. Kohut. Detective Frost is asking because the people who knew you were away are people we will question.
SK: I see. They burned a woman and child in my empty house.
: We don't necessarily know the age or gender of the people who died in the fire. The…evidence was too compromised for us to do much with it here.
SK: You sent it somewhere else?
Det. JR: We sent it to a Forensic Anthropologist. She and her team will be able to tell us more.
SK: She'll run…what…the DNA?
Det. JR: Ms. Kohut, We will do our best to determine what happened in your house. I assure you.
"I need new shoes," Noah says quickly. "Can we go get new shoes on Friday?"
Maura makes a disgruntled noise that makes Jane smile. "Now wait just a moment," she says. "That's not possible. I just ordered you that custom pair of Jordans not even a month ago. Those don't fit anymore?"
Noah looks down at the floor. "I lost them," he mumbles.
Now Jane does look up from her reading. "You what?" she says, and both Maura and Noah look around at her.
"I…lost them."
Maura looks dismayed. "Oh, Noah…where?"
Noah swallows hard, and Jane realizes that he is lying. "School," he says finally, and his voice is a little higher than usual.
Jane straightens, putting her work aside, and holds out her hands. Noah comes at once, though she notices he stops a little further away from her than usual. She frowns. "Noah," she says softly. "Don't lie to me, or your mother, do you understand?"
Noah nods.
"Did you lose your favorite pair of shoes that Mommy just got you?"
A head shake. Jane hears Maura suck in a breath.
"Did someone take them off you? At school or something?"
A long pause. A nod.
Maura lets the breath out low, anger and despair.
Jane reaches out and takes his hand. "We don't have to talk about what happened right now, since it's almost bedtime, okay? But Mommy and I are going to need the full story soon. Capice?"
"Capice," Noah echoes, looking glum.
"In the meantime, you need new gym shoes, huh?"
Noah glances at them. "I want Vans," he says quietly.
"You want wh-" Maura asks, shocked, but Jane shushes her with a look.
"Vans it is," Jane says gently. "Maybe a skateboard to go with them?"
Noah smiles weakly, nodding.
"Okay, Small fry. Go get ready for bed. Mommy's gonna check homework soon."
Noah nods, and hurries from the study. Jane turns back to Maura to see that the doctor is watching her with a combination of amusement and affection.
"You will explain this to me after goodnights, I assume?" she asks lightly.
Jane grins. "Yes," she answers. "After goodnights."
…
The attic room that used to be Jane's sanctuary is barely recognizable in its current state. She'd given it to him on his fourteenth birthday, when it was clear that he could no longer comfortably share a room with Noah. Maura had wanted to offer him the guest room, her mouth saying that she liked him close to the family, and her eyes saying she understood what the attic room meant to Jane.
But the detective had been adamant and, in the end, she'd gotten her way. The piano moved down to the family room, the old pull out couch that was older than the twins was relegated to the basement, and their oldest son got his very own attic pad, complete with skylight.
Now she stands in the doorway, waiting for him to finish what looks like calculus, so she can say good night.
"Sorry," he says, "If I stop in the middle of a question, I have to start over." He spins in his desk chair to face her.
"I'm impressed that you can start at all," she says with a smile. "Can I come in?"
He nods, and she steps across the threshold, moving to kiss him good night. "Hey, Levi," she says, pulling back at the last moment. He wasn't expecting it, and she gets a glimpse of his face waiting for her good night kiss, little kid expectant, comforted and secure.
"Yeah?" he says warily.
Jane clears her throat. "Look, I wanted to tell you that you should bring your girlfriend over to dinner some time."
"Aww, Ma…" He starts, but she waves him off.
"She's wrong that we would care about her past," Jane wonders if there is such a thing as a good lie. She wonders if this qualifies.
"Yes you would," Levi says, not meeting her eyes.
Jane puffs out her cheeks, trying not to get mad. "No, Levi. We wouldn't. Hasn't Mom always told you guys from the time you were little that no one is only good or only bad? Just because we spend time hunting the mostly bad people doesn't mean that we can't see the good. Or that we think everyone-"
"It's not about you!" Levi says over her, and Jane falls silent, waiting.
Levi sighs. "It's not about you, Ma, okay? Or Mom…I don't think you'd be able to see past what she did…If I'd known about it first then I wouldn't have even started talking to her, probably."
Jane waits, but Levi does not offer up any more information than this.
"So…then," she prompts finally. "What's the deal?"
"I can't explain it," he answers, and he finally looks up into her face. "I can't explain it Ma, but I really, really like her. And I want to hang out with her, and talk to her and like…I dunno. I like talking to her. She had some shitty – sorry – bad stuff happen to her when she was younger, and we talk about that sometimes."
Jane sits down in a chair by the desk, absorbing this. "Okay," she says slowly. "Okay."
"Yeah?" he looks hopeful. "Is it? Because, I know it's not just me you worry about, Ma. I wouldn't bring sketchy people around Noah or Sofia and Iz. I'm not a dick."
She laughs. She could hug him, but she refrains because she wants to be allowed back into his room.
"No. You're not." She stands. "We're here for you. You know that, right? Mommy and I are here for you even though you're the oldest and decidedly not a dick."
Levi chuckles. "I know. Thanks."
"Night, Lee."
"Night, Ma. I love you."
There is no better feeling than when your teenage son says 'I love you' first.
"I love you too."
She is content when she returns to her bedroom from the nightly rounds, but Maura comes into the bedroom after saying goodnight to their children with her brow furrowed. Jane looks up from her book to see that her wife is holding a little whicker trash can. "What's up?" Jane asks.
Instead of answering, Maura sits down on the edge of the bed and hands the trash can over. Jane looks inside. There are a couple crumpled pieces of paper, a tissue, and several little tubes of what look like lipstick. Jane looks up at her wife, trying to read her expression.
"I'm not sure what I'm looking at," she says carefully.
"All that lip gloss," Mayra answers, like this is obvious. "It's Noah's." She waits, but when Jane doesn't have the appropriate reaction, she sighs. "They're all Noah's, and they're not empty, Jane." She reaches in and pulls out a pale peach color. "We just bought this one together two weeks ago. He begged for it, he was three dollars short."
"Just like the shoes," Jane says. She tastes something unpleasant in the back of her throat.
Maura nods. "He was so excited about those. I know he's young, but he wouldn't allow someone to just take them from him." She falls silent, thinking. "I looked up those Van shoes that he wants. They are so boxy and ugly."
"And male," Jane supplies. "If he's being bullied…"
"Ah," Maura says, realization dawning on her features.
Jane rubs her face. "Did you talk to him about it?"
"I didn't see the trash until I was leaving," Maura sighs. "But I told him that we love him, and there's nothing that he can't talk to us about."
"What did he say?"
"He said he knew that."
"Was he convincing?" Jane presses, and Maura looks as though she is at a loss.
"I don't know, sweetheart. He didn't seem any different than normal. We said good night after that the way we always do. His work at school isn't suffering, he doesn't seem any more loathe to get up in the morning than he ever has." She worries her lip between her teeth and Jane sets the trash can on the floor before taking the doctor's hands.
"Do you want me to talk to him tomorrow?" she asks. "I know what it's like to be bullied for being a tomboy, this is probably pretty similar. If some little shitheads are giving him trouble because he likes to wear underwater blue-"
"I believe the term is cerulean," Maura says, smiling when Jane rolls her eyes. "I don't know. Do you think talking would help?"
"I don't think it can hurt."
Maura pulls Jane's hand to her face, closing her eyes. "He's such a good boy. He doesn't want to make waves. Have you noticed that he does his homework with Isabelle every night? Just follows her to wherever she's working and sets up beside her."
Jane nods. "He's the best," she agrees. "I'll talk to him, Maura, okay? We'll figure it out."
Maura nods, kissing Jane's fingers once before getting up and crossing to the closet to get ready for bed.
….
…..
Jane leans against the window, listening to her partner conduct an interview with Martyn Kohut. She'd managed to convince his mother that he might be able to add valuable information to the investigation, though her real motive was to see if she could talk to him alone. He'd stayed close to his mother, clinging to her hand throughout her tirade the other day. Normal, she supposed, given the circumstances, but it still raised many of Jane's red flags.
And then, after he had seemed so shaken on their previous trip, Shura had not even bothered to bring her son to the interview today. It was Liliya who arrived with Martyn in tow about twenty minutes ago, looking less pale but much more harassed than she had three days ago.
"My mother is working," she'd said when Jane had asked. "I'm an adult according to New York. I can be there with him."
"He's not a suspect," Jane had assured her. "None of you are."
And Liliya shrugged like she didn't care one way or the other.
"So, Martyn, where do you go to school?" Frost is asking now. He smiles at the boy, and Martyn offers a weak little smile in return. They'd decided that Frost would interview the youngest Kohut alone. Her partner was confident that he could find something they would connect over, and unlike Jane, Shura had not been screaming his name throughout the precinct yesterday.
"Boston Prep," Martyn says quietly.
"You a good student?"
"I try to be." Unlike his mother, Martyn doesn't have an accent. Frost leans back in his chair, trying to show the boy that he means no harm.
"Tell me what you understand about what happened, Martyn," he says. "I have a god son about your age. He's smarter than a lot of adults give him credit for. Can you tell me what you think is going on?"
Martyn shakes his head, glancing at Frost and then back down at his soda. "I don't know," he says, voice just above a whisper. "We went to Cape Cot for vacation and then when we came back our house was gone. All my toys. My favorite books."
Jane frowns and inside the interview room, Frost frowns too.
"Where was your vacation again?" Frost asks, and Jane can tell he's fighting to keep the laid back body language he'd adopted at the beginning of the conversation.
"Cape Cot," Martyn says, more clearly this time. "The ocean."
"That's a long drive from Boston," Frost says casually. "Or…did you fly?"
Martyn looks perplexed at this. "We….drove," he says finally. "Long drive, but. I slept a lot."
Frost nods, smiling, and Martyn relaxes visibly. "Can I just ask you three more questions?" he points a 'gotcha' finger at Martyn. "That one doesn't count!"
Martyn smiles, looking more at ease. "Okay," he says.
"Okay. First. How's your sister been dealing with all of this? She seem really upset?"
"I guess so," Martyn says slowly. "But I know she wants to head back to college. You know," he adds, "now that M-mommy's not dead."
Frost nods. "Two…how are you doing with all of this? Any nightmares? You think you might like someone to talk to about everything that's happened?"
"I shouldn't," Martyn says, and then, looking up as though he's been rude. "I mean…thank you. My M-mother is helping me."
Jane's frown is back. Does Martyn have trouble with his Ms?
"Good," Frost says, sounding genuinely pleased. "Last one, okay?"
Martyn nods.
"Do you love your mother?" He asks, and now he does lean forward. Now, it will be taken as a gesture of friendliness rather than aggression.
Martyn Kohut's eyes well up with tears.
…
Jane rounds the corner at the end of the hallway, scanning the visitor waiting room for Liliya. Next her, Martyn points. "There she is."
Liliya is in the corner of the room, back half turned to the door. She is on her cellphone, and she is having what seems to be a very animated conversation.
Jane smiles at Martyn and leads him over to her. When they draw close enough, she can hear snippets of the girl's side.
"I said when I get back to school. That's when I'll have time….And what are you going to do if I don't?" she pauses and whatever the speaker says on the other end of the line makes her laugh. "Sure, I'll believe that when I see it. You didn't have the balls to take care-" but she turns and sees Jane and Martyn, and she breaks off abruptly, snapping the phone shut without even saying good-bye.
"Everything okay?" Jane asks, resting her hand in the dip between Martyn's shoulder blades. He reminds her of Noah.
"Ex, uh, boyfriend," Liliya says. "He ready?"
"He did great," Jane says. And she watches as Liliya takes her brother's hand and leads him towards the exit.
She watches as they stop at the door, and Liliya bends to zip Martyn's sweatshirt, and rest her hand on the side of his face for a short moment, before taking his hand again and leading him out.
"This is all so fucking weird," Frost's voice, behind her.
Jane sighs and nods. "Yeah," she agrees. "I just wish I could put my finger on why."
…
…
Dinner is loud, a welcome distraction to a complicated and seemingly dead end case. Jane opens the door to the smell of tacos and the sounds of her children fighting. Maura had texted to say that Levi was home before curfew, and Noah had not brought Tommy Jr, so it would just be the immediate family for dinner.
Jane is glad. It's so rarely that she gets to see just her children and her wife. that they all sit down and eat together.
Sofia is arguing with Isabelle as they make their way into the dining room, and even Noah seems to be on the verge of a fight with Levi.
"But why," he whines after his older brother, slumping into the dining room chair next to him. "Why can't I have it if you've out grown it?"
"Sofia, you're being so obstinate. Mr. Marshall told you eight pages. That's why you got an A-," Isabelle says.
Jane, tired from a day of effort that provided more questions than answers, cannot help but smile at the two arguments going on.
"Noah, chill," Levi says gruffly. "I still want it."
"But," Noah begins again, but Maura intervenes, setting a large bowl of taco meat down in the center of the table.
"Noah," she says firmly, though her eyes are smiling. "Your brother's property is his property. It is his choice whether or not he wants to part with it."
"Unless it reeks," Jane interjects. Sofia laughs.
"He's too big for it," Noah says glumly, but at a stern look from his mother he closes his mouth and does not continue.
"Sofia," Maura says.
"I deserved an A," Sofia says evenly. "My paper was flawless, Mommy."
"Was there a word limit?"
"Yes!" Isabelle chimes in. "And she was 2400 words over."
Jane looks incredulously at her daughter. "Who do you belong to?" she asks, half joking, half seriously. "You went over the word count?"
Sofia sets her lips in a thin line. "I had a lot to say," she says through gritted teeth.
"Ah," Jane says with a wink at Maura. "There I am."
The rest of the conversation passes over the assemblage of tacos, and Jane watches her family with mounting adoration. Even when another scuffle breaks out over Isabelle's missing make up.
"I'm just saying," Bella says, with a shrewd look at her sister. "Since you started talking to Oliver every day after science, you've been watching how I do my make-up."
Sofia turns crimson. "I do not, Izzy!" she screeches, and both Maura and Isabelle respond in the same exact tone, with the same words.
"It's nothing to be embarrassed about," Maura begins, just as Isabelle says, "you don't have to be embarrassed, sissy."
They look at each other and laugh.
Sofia is not amused. "I don't have your lip stuff, Iz. And if I wanted to wear it, it wouldn't be any of the colors you have." She reaches for another taco shell.
"Mommy?"
"Look elsewhere," her mother says with a grin.
"Noah?"
Noah shakes his head without looking up, and Jane shoots a meaningful look across the table at her wife.
Isabelle is clearly not sold either because she sighs. "Can you just give it back?" she says, as though tired of the fight that hasn't even happened yet. "I don't care if you borrow it, but just make sure-"
But Noah shakes his head again, and this time when he looks up, he is wearing an expression that Jane cannot decipher. "I don't have your lip gloss," he says plainly. "I'm not into any of that sissy shit anymore."
…
…
Maura stops her. A firm palm against her collarbone, pushing lightly. She breaks off immediately, pulling out gently and kneeling upright, her hand coming to push her sweaty hair out of her eyes.
"I'm sorry," she says. "Did I hurt you?"
Maura shakes her head. She's breathing hard, post orgasm, and her eyes are still hazy beautiful. "No," she says between breaths. "Of course not, honey. It felt very, very good…but you're not here with me." She reaches down to Janes hips, loosening the straps, pulling the harness off, and Jane loves her for knowing everything.
"I'm sorry," she says again, for a different reason, and when she rests her forehead against Maura's breastbone, she can feel fingers thread through her hair. "Got a little lost," she murmurs. "It's not you, though. You're still the sexiest woman I know."
She feels Maura's diaphragm vibrate with a chuckle. "It did not occur to me that that might have changed," she teases.
Jane smiles, pressing a kiss to the skin under her lips, but then the worry returns and she sobers. "Do you think it's my brother?" she asks, pushing up so that she can rest her head on the pillow.
Maura's answer is careful. "Do I think what is your brother?" she responds. "And which brother are we discussing?"
"Tommy," Jane says, though she's sure Maura already knows. "Do you think he's why Noah threw away his lipstick?"
"Lip gloss."
"Yeah," Jane says, impatient. "Do you think it's Tommy that made him do that?"
Maura sighs, and Jane knows everything too. This thought has already occurred to her wife, and she has deemed the likelihood very probable.
"Sissy shit," Jane says. "That's straight out of my Pop's mouth."
Maura finds her hands in the dark. "I know," she says simply. "Is it wrong that it's harder for me to punish him than the others?"
Jane rolls onto her side. "I'm sorry, Maura." A new apology, and Jane does feel sorry. She feels as though she bears all of the weight of her youngest son's soul. He is their last, their most sensitive, their gentlest. Maura has protected him and nurtured him and brought him up to be exactly who he is supposed to be. And Jane, in turn, should have protected them both.
And she has failed.
Maura rolls onto her side too, so that they are nearly nose to nose.
"I'll fix it," Jane whispers, and Maura burrows into her, kissing her clavicle and humming contentedly.
"We'll fix it, Jane," she amends. "I love you so much."
Jane squeezes her. "I love you too." She feels Maura relax against her.
"Go to sleep, Sweetheart. We can't do anything about anything tonight."
But deep into the night, and then the early hours of the morning, Jane is mentally listing all the ways that she will be able to stop her brother from corrupting her son.
…
…
Hi Jane, it's Lydia.
Jane does a double take, glancing up at the red light where she is stopped to make sure it hasn't changed. Lydia? On her phone? Overcoming the momentary shock of panic that shoots up her spine, Jane tries to make sense of this. Tommy has Noah and TJ for the afternoon. He's taken them to a basketball game. Has something happened?
That is the only thing that Jane can come up with. She and Lydia are not on bad terms, but she can't remember the last time Tommy's wife texted her without any kind of prompting.
She has pulled over, and is about to answer the text, when another one dings through.
I'm supposed to pick up the boys from Tommysfriends house, but there holdin me an xtra 2hrs. Can you swing by for them?
Jane feels several levels of annoyance, not least of which is because of the horrible spelling in the message.
Where the hell is her brother? Why is he not with her son? Why didn't he call her about the change in plans instead of dropping her son and nephew off with a stranger.
She glances at the clock on the radio of her car. The results of the facial reconstruction from the Forensic Athropologist are supposed to be in at three. It is the last chance in their attempts to solve the thing before they are officially out of leads.
Jane taps the wheel. If she puts her sirens on after dropping the boys off at home, she can make it in time.
She texts Lydia back to send her the address, and then sends a message to her wife that she'll be up two boys for dinner. The responses from both women come simultaneously.
OMG thnkuuuuu! 24 Roxbury, Apt 13c. xxxxxxur best!
And.
Good! It's been far too long since TJ has been here!
Jane smiles and heads off in the direction of the address.
She is going to tell whoever opens the door that he needs to complain to the landlord about the broken lock in the entryway. She's even feeling magnanimous enough to offer to flash her badge to get the landlord moving. But she knocks on the door marked 13c, and it swings open, and all of her previous thoughts are wiped from her mind.
Standing in the door of the apartment is her father.
Frank Sr.
Her father.
And his hands are on the shoulders of her son.
...
...
See? That was faster than a year. Thank you so much to everyone for sticking around with this. I can't believe you all have been so patient. It will never cease to amaze me. As usual I ask that if you know the answers to the whodunnit, or you want to be spoiled, because you don't like to not know things, that you PM me, and don't blow up my spot in the comments. I know it might be obvious, but it's fun watching jane get to the end herself...at least for me.
Anyway. Hope you'll continue to enjoy. As you can see...Shit's about to go down.
like...way down.
happy reading!
tc