"I don't know what to do."

For as long as she lives, Jane will never be able to get the image of Maura, dumbstruck and frightened on a sidewalk bench, out of her mind.

The other images (Maura in interrogation, Maura in prison orange) will fade with time, but this one will stay with her forever.

She watches as a tech puts Maura's medical badge and key card into an evidence bag.

"I did this," she says under her breath.

Frost shakes his head, chancing a hand on her shoulder. "No," he says. "No."

"I should have gone looking for her last night. I shouldn't have left her."

"You couldn't have predicted this," Frost says, and Jane looks into his eyes.

"But what is this, Frost?" she asks. "What the fuck happened last night? You didn't see her this morning. She was disoriented, confused. She didn't remember coming home. When I asked her if she was okay, she said, and I quote, "my head is killing me."

Frost looks as disturbed by this news as her children had upon hearing it this morning.

"Okay, that's scary to hear personally, Jane, but in terms of what's happening here? It's a good thing?"

"It's a good thing that my wife was drugged to incoherence and might have been in a car with a dead man?"

"Yes," Frost says urgently. "Think about this like a cop. Just try," he says, seeing the look on her face. "What would this be?"

Jane tries to focus, and as she does, a realization comes over her. "Someone drugged her?" She realizes she is asking him even though they both know he doesn't have the answers. "Someone, maybe he drugged her and tried to hurt her and she fought back."

A noise behind her makes her whirl around. A uniform has arrived, and is trying to handcuff Maura.

Before Frost can say anything, Jane is back beside the doctor, putting herself between them, hands out.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" She barks at him.

The young man appears to already be shaken by the task at hand, and when Jane yells, he drops the handcuffs in surprise.

"I-I'm sorry, Detective Rizzoli," he stutters. "I, um, I have to take Dr. Isles in for questioning." He looks around Jane at Maura. "I'm - I'm sorry."

Maura shakes her head, but doesn't answer. Her arms are still folded around herself.

"You have to take her in for questioning?"

"Y-yes?" The officer says, starting to look a little bit green. "She knew the victim. Her, uh, her ID badge was found at the scene of the crime. I have orders to bring her to the station."

"Yeah?" Jane asks sarcastically. "Orders from who?"

"Orders from me,Rizzoli." Korsak has arrived on the scene, looking grim. "You know that it's standard procedure."

Jane lets herself back down, just a little bit. "Sir, with all due respect, this isn't a standard case. Maura isn't some sleazebag suspect off the street."

"All the more reason to treat this by the book." He steps forward as Jane opens her mouth to protest. "Look," he says firmly. "I don't like this any more than you do, but it's how it's going to go."

Jane doesn't move back. "Maura didn't kill Brad Adams," she growls.

"I know that," Korsak says, his tone inflected to show just how he feels about her thinking that he would believe that. "And when we prove that she didn't do it, I want to evidence to stick. And so do you."

Jane grits her teeth. She is about to say that no one is ever putting handcuffs on her wife, but a hand on her arm makes her turn.

"It's okay, Jane," Maura says softly. She meets Jane's eyes, and though hers are still deadened, she seems more alert than usual. "Vince is right."

Jane faces Maura fully, putting her hands on both of her biceps. "I'm not going to let them arrest you like you're a criminal Maura. You've obviously been given something. I shouldn't have even let you come out this morning."

"Then they would have handcuffed me, without you there, in front of our children," Maura says. "They are right. I need to go in for questioning."

She wants to fight them, Korsak and Maura, to tell them they are wrong. But the part of her that is a detective, and not a mother or a wife, knows that they are right. She turns back to Vince reluctantly. "She's not getting handcuffed," she says firmly.

Korsak nods somberly. "Will you go with Officer Raines please, Dr. Isles?"

Maura smiles weakly. "Yes," she says. "Of course."

Jane grabs her hand before she can begin to move. "I'll be right behind you," she says. "Everything is going to be okay."

Maura blinks at her, the same foggy smile she'd had this morning. Jane wants to pull her close enough to her body that she could actually disappear inside of her.

Their hands drop, and the absence of contact makes her say it again, just to reassure herself.

"Everything's going to be okay."

…

…

Something is buzzing and buzzing against her jawbone, rattling the inside of her head like a maraca. She rolls away from it, wanting only for the vibration to cease, and then she finds herself tipping over the edge of a cliff.

Sheer panic makes her go rigid, and she throws herself back, towards the horrible buzzing, where at least she knew that the ground was solid.

She sits upright, blinking at the blurred outline of a massive black cave.

"Mommy?"

A voice too close to her left ear makes her jump.

"Mom? Holy cow, what happened to you?"

Another voice, from behind her, and she blinks again and the black cave is not a cave at all, but a television. Her television.

She turns her head, and looks into the concerned light eyes of a little boy.

"Mommy?" He asks her.

"Noah," she says. The name comes to her like a prophecy. This is her son, Noah. That is her television. The cliff she'd been about to tumble off of is her couch. She's sitting on her couch in the living room, and it is Saturday morning.

She opens her mouth to say more, because her son is still looking at her expectantly, but before she can there is a thundering from above them.

"Hey! Is anyone up!" Someone is yelling, running around upstairs. "Levi? I need you to get up, now!" That voice.

It is so familiar.

"Ma?" Sofia's voice behind her. "Why'd mom sleep on the couch.

Abruptly, the thundering stops. "What?"

And then Jane is in front of her. Maura smiles, though the muscles around her face feel like they have been numbed.

"Maura, Jesus. You scared the hell out of me." Jane puts her hands on both of Maura's knees, squeezing her kneecaps and looking up into her face. "Did you have a good time last night?"

Did she have a good time last night. She tries to remember.

She gets nothing.

"Maura?" Jane sounds worried now. "Honey, look at me. Are you okay? Maura?"

Maura puts her hand to her temple. "My head is killing me," she says.

…

…

Jane doesn't do the interview. Korsak won't let her. At first she is furious about this, and then, as she watches her wife answer questions through the glass, she is overwhelmingly relieved not to be the one in there having to remain impartial.

The detective doing her interview, a guy named Jason Greene, who Jane has heard good things about, leans forward slightly.

"Dr. Isles, will you take of your jacket for me?" He asks gently.

Maura does as he has asked, and Jane has to turn away from the sight. She puts her hands over her mouth, not because she wants to scream, but because her stomach has heaved more forcefully than ever before.

"Frost," she manages.

"Yeah," he says quietly. "I see them."

Maura's forearms are patterned with bruises. They are the red and blue color of ones newly forming.

"Multiple hematomas," Jane hears her mumble. "Likely offensive in nature."

She whirls around. "No!" She yells, despite the fact that Maura can't hear her. "No, no, Maura, don't explain them."

"These would form if I...threw a punch? And it was blocked by someone's arm?"

Panic. Jane can feel it in every single pore of her body. "No," she says again. "Frost, make her shut up. She has to stop talking."

Jane moves toward the door of the interrogation room, and Frost grabs her arm, holding her back.

"You can't go in there," he says. "I know you want to, but you can't."

"She may not be able to," an imperious voice says from the door, "but I certainly can."

Both detectives turn to see Constance enter the little hall outside the interrogation room. She is followed by a tall, bronze skinned man in a very expensive suit. Jane doesn't know how the woman knew what to do, or even where to come. The phone message she'd left while speeding to the precinct can't have been terribly coherent.

"Detective Frost," Constance says without the hint of a smile. "Please let us see Dr. Isles. This is her lawyer. That interview is over."

…

Despite Constance's arrival with legal counsel, the decision is made to take all of Maura's clothes into evidence. They also decide to run a tox screen, and to check for signs of sexual assault.

Constance finds Jane leaning against a vending machine down the hall from the interrogation room.

"They're going to take her clothes now," Constance says softly.

"Okay," Jane says, moving back toward the room. "I'll-"

Constance stops her. "She doesn't want you to watch," she says, and although her face looks sympathetic, her voice is the same, no nonsense tone she'd had earlier.

"What?" New worry and panic expand inside of Jane. "Why wouldn't she-"

"Darling," Constance cuts her off, and now her voice does soften. "Think how frightened and humiliating this must be for her."

"I could help her," Jane says, hearing how childish that sounds. She knows what Constance is going to say before she does.

"It would help you, Jane, to be there. Let's wait here. And then, if it seem necessary, we'll call the children. I've got Levi on standby."

Jane shakes her head. "I should have gone looking for her," she says, aware that she might be repeating herself. "I should have stayed with her last night."

"And left your nephew in a situation where he felt unsafe?"

"Maura felt unsafe."

"She doesn't know what she felt. Do not add to the anxiety of the situation by blaming yourself for something you had no control over. How many times in the past have you split up in order to conquer some challenge or another."

Jane closes her eyes, and nausea overwhelms her. "What if he hurt her?"

"My daughter would say that one is not able to cross a hypothetical bridge."

"Maura would…" the words are hard to get out. It seems like there is not enough air in the little antichamber where she and Constance are standing.

"I can't breathe."

Constance puts her hands on both of Jane's cheeks. They are cold. It feels good. "Shh," she says. "It's going to be alright. You are going to get her out of there."

Her eyes are wet. "I can't cry," she says fiercely. "I can't cry...The kids always know when I've been crying."

"Okay," Constance says, running both her thumbs over Jane's cheekbones before dropping her hands to her shoulders. "Then you won't cry," she says. Her voice is hard, and does not leave room for disagreement. She presses Jane into a straighter stance.

"You won't cry. Your children need you to be strong. Maura needs you to be strong right now."

Jane nods. "I can be strong," she says, and as the words leave her mouth they seem to become true. She looks into Constance's intense, blue eyes.

"Maura didn't do this," she says lowly. "She didn't do this."

"I know," Constance answers. "And you'll prove it. I have complete faith in you."

…

…

He is a little rough. She is wearing heels that are not suitable for work, and so she stumbles a bit on the ramp that leads to the back door of the morgue.

Dead people come down this ramp on their way to their funerals, she thinks, watching Brad work her key card.

She wonders who would do her autopsy, should she need one.

How much wine has she had.

"Show me the files," Brad says, and her body moves in a haze of detached obedience.

"Show me her body."

She does. It occurs to her that if she were to die a natural death there would be no need for an autopsy.

"Do you know the rules about chain of command in an ongoing murder investigation, Dr. Isles?" He asks her conversationally.

She doesn't want to answer, but her head nods up and down of its own accord. Of course she does.

"Of course you do."

He shoves her paper files into his shoulder bag, and then sits down at her desk. "You record your autopsies, I assume," he sneers at her. "So let's just grab those pesky mp3s, do a little cold storage tampering, and then we can be on our way. Does that sound good?"

It doesn't, and all she wants to do is tell him so.

But he asks her for her password to her laptop, and when she opens her mouth to tell him to dream on, she hears herself say her twins' names, followed by her birth year.

He laughs as he types the information in.

"I gotta say," He chuckles. "You look great for your age."

…

…...

Frankie and Angela are waiting for her when she and Constance enter the bullpen. Angela's eyes are swimming with tears, and Frankie looks little boy scared. She hasn't seen that look on him in more than 15 years.

"What?" her heart feels like it is being squeezed by a giant fist. "What is it?"

Frankie looks as though he's going to burst into tears. "Brad Adams," he says. "He's not who he said he was, Jane."

The fist around her heart squeezes tighter. "He wasn't a doctor?"

"Far from it," Frankie scoffs. "He was a bouncer."

"A what?" Jane stares blankly.

"At a club," Frankie clarifies. "His above board job was a bouncer at a club downtown."

Jane folds her arms, hoping that will keep her rising terror from leaving her body. "And his underboard job?"

Frankie takes a breath. "He was picked up for fraud a couple years back. Petty larceny. Breaking and entering."

Jane is watching his face. "There's more," she says. "Frankie, there's more. What is it?"

"It looks like she tampered with evidence."

This is not what she was expecting. "What?"

Frankie's lower lip is definitely quivering. "She was here last night, Jane. She swiped her card at 2:34am."

Jane closes her eyes. They are going to arrest her wife. They are going to arrest her because they have evidence against her that points to obstruction and murder.

"She needs to go to the hospital," Jane says, her eyes still closed.

"What?" Angela looks at her stricken. "Why? Why would she need to go to the hospital."

But Jane is already turning back to the hallway that leads to the interrogation rooms. If she cannot stop them taking Maura away, she can at least make sure that she is taken care of before she goes.

She meets Korsak as he exits the holding room, and when he holds up his hand to stop her, she shakes her head.

"She needs to go to the hospital," Jane repeats. "She was drugged, and possibly assaulted. So she goes and gets a formal exam. And then she comes home until the paperwork is done and the warrant goes out."

Korsak regards her for a moment. "We have to keep all her personal possessions here," he says.

Jane gives a curt nod. Behind Korsak, Constance emerges with her arms tight around Maura's shoulders.

Maura is dressed in a pair of scrubs that is too big for her, and she looks like she's been crying. When she looks up and sees Jane, her face is nothing but blank shock. It melts into watery relief when Jane holds her arms out.

"I think I kissed him," she says into Jane's chest. She is shivering. "I think...I was in his car. He...blew me a kiss, maybe? Oh, Jane."

"Shhh," Jane says, ignoring the way her insides coil like springs. "It's okay. It's okay. We're going to take you to the hospital for a full work up, and then you're coming home."

Maura's hands clutch tighter at the fabric of Jane's coat. "Home," she murmurs. She pulls away and looks up into Jane's face, her eyes scared, but finally alert.

"They said I was here last night. I don't remember. I don't-"

Jane leans to kiss the side of her mouth. "Right now, all I care about is that you're okay physically, Maura," she says quietly. "We will sort everything else out after we make sure that whatever he gave you didn't cause any other issues. Okay?"

Maura's eyes well up with tears. "The kids," she says.

Jane glances at Constance, who is looking back at her, face like granite.

You will be strong.

"The kids are going to be fine. Everything's going to be fine. You go with your mother and the lawyer to the hospital. Detective Greene and I will follow you. Okay? Then you come home until…" she can't make herself say it, so she just pulls Maura closer again.

"I love you so much, Maura," she whispers. "You didn't do this."

"What if I did this?" Maura mumbles back. She sounds so deflated. "What if I did this, Jane."

"You were drugged. You were possibly attacked. Whatever happened is not you doing something, Mo. Please, don't think that way."

There are more tears, hot on her neck, and Jane swallows hard, trying to think of something more she can say.

But the lawyer steps forward, looking apologetic. "I'm sorry. We should get going."

Maura pulls her arms from around Jane's waist slowly, like the movement is difficult.

"I'll be right behind you," Jane says again. "We're going to figure this out."

And only when Maura is down the hall and around the corner, does she allow herself to slump against the wall, and cover her eyes.

…

…

When Jane gets word from Frost that they will be there to arrest Maura within the hour, the two of them sit their children down and tell them what is about to happen.

Maura expects Noah to be the only one who cries, and so she is surprised when Sofia is the first to break down.

"No," she says, coming to sit on Maura's lap. She curls up like a much younger child, and cries into the bend of Maura's neck. "No. Mommy. You didn't do it. Just tell them you didn't do it."

Maura strokes up and down her daughter's back, trying to swallow past the lump in her throat enough to say something comforting.

"Little growl," she manages. "It's okay, honey."

Sofia just holds tighter.

She and Jane are the only ones who open the door thirty minutes later. It's Detective Greene and his partner, whose name Maura can't remember. She turns to Jane.

"You'll talk to TJ."

"I will," Jane answers. She's struggling not to cry. She's doing a wonderful job, and it makes you love her more than ever.

"And don't forget to send the brownies when you send McKenzie's letter. Though I don't think there's any need to worry her."

"You're going to make her fat, Maura. And you'll be back before there's anything to worry about."

"I love you, Jane. I'll see you soon."

Jane doesn't look away when they cuff her, though this time she also doesn't make a move to stop them. It is taking a physical effort to restrain herself, Maura can tell, and when they read the Miranda Rights, the brunette's lips press into a thin, pale line.

"Do you understand these rights as I have read them to you?" Detective Greene asks.

"Yes," Maura says. And her voice cracks.

She knows it's that crack that makes one tear break free and slide down Jane's face, and so she doesn't fault her for it.

She says I love you again.

Jane says I love you again.

And then they are leading her away from her home, and her family.

And she is alone.

…

…

Jane orders two pizzas for dinner, calling in the usual before she can think about it. The kitchen and living room are eerily silent. She knows that all four of her children are home, but they seem to be keeping out of her way for the time being. She isn't sure whether or not this makes her happy, or incredibly sad.

But when she yells up the stairs that the pizza has arrived, they all come down immediately. And though none of them mention that she has accidentally ordered a pizza with half of Maura's toppings of choice, Levi and Isabelle each eat a piece, so that when they are finished, it is as though the Doctor was there, and has just headed away to her study, complaining about too many carbohydrates.

Isabelle reads to them all that night, the next chapter in the book Maura picked out for their family reading before bed.

Jane kisses them all goodnight, and each one of them says they love her first, like an offering and a promise.

She didn't know that she needed them not to blame her until she saw the action unfolding.

Levi knocks on her door that night, almost midnight, and she's just settling down, but it's too late for him to be up.

"Hey," she says, happy to see him. "I just got a text from Korsak. He wants to meet bright and early tomorrow, try and get a jump on this."

"That's cool," Levi says, still standing in the door. "I'm gonna stick around home anyway, so I'll be here."

"Thank you," she says, meaning it. "That means a lot to me. Have Nadia over, if you want to."

Levi smiles. "K," he says, and then he stands there, looking increasingly awkward.

"What is it Lee?" She asks, nervous. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he says quickly. "I just thought…" he glances at her. "I just thought you might want like. Company?"

What Jane wants, is to cradle this boy in her arms the way she did when he was eight and caught pneumonia.

Instead, she scoots over and throws the covers back.

"I love you so much, Levi," she says, when he's settled down beside her. "Thank you for this. And for whatever you said to your siblings before dinner. We're going to make it through this, and mom is going to be okay. You're the best brother, and one of the best sons we could ask for."

And Levi, because he is all of those things, flips the light by Maura's bed off and pulls the covers up around himself with a grumble.

"C'mon mom," he says gently. "Don't make it weird."