A/N: Time to slowly tie up all those loose ends.. Didn't I read somewhere that I should only publish the final chapters if there are a bazillion reviews & favs or something? Or cookies? Hmm... :-o


When the first beams of the early afternoon sun peeked into Maura's room and tickled her nose, the blonde slowly opened her eyes. After a moment of confusion and disorientation, her eyes adjusted to the light and all the memories poured right back into her mind. And though she knew she was safe in her hospital room, she instinctively searched for Jane. When she found her sitting in the chair next to the bed, dressed in a fresh shirt that Frost had brought her and absentmindedly flipping through a police file, Maura's pulse slowed down and her fear gradually ebbed away.

"I don't even get breakfast in bed?" she joked.

Jane looked up from her files and smiled at ease. "You mean lunch in bed?"

Maura arched her eyebrows in surprise. "What time is it?"

"Half past noon," the detective informed her.

"Oh, goodness," the blonde sighed and sleepily rubbed her head.

"What? Should I have woken you for your morning run?" Jane teased.

Maura carefully sat up a little, leaned against the pillows in her back, and tried to suppress a yawn — with limited success. "I guess, now I know how you feel when you don't get your coffee."

"Does that mean you'll finally stop nagging me about my caffeine intake?" the brunette asked hopefully.

"I don't think so," the medical examiner stated rather factually.

"Well, you'll be pleased to hear that I won't be having any more of that dishwater they call coffee in here," Jane grimaced. "Anyway, your doctor said you could be discharged tonight if you're feeling okay."

The blonde's face lit up with relief. Despite her medical training and familiarity with even the tiniest aspect of the human body, she hated being a patient in a hospital herself.

"You'd need someone to look after you though," Jane added. "Just in case, you know. And to get you something to eat and all that."

Maura pondered the situation for a second. "Do you think I could… I mean… would it be okay if I asked your mother to—"

"What? No!"

The medical examiner wrinkled her forehead, unsure how to react to the detective's blunt refusal.

"Hello? Remember me?" Jane waved at Maura. "I'm your best friend, so it's my task to take care of you."

"But you can't cook!"

Jane arched her eyebrows. "Excuse me?!"

"And you do need to rest at some point, Jane," Maura quickly added trying to cover up her blunder.

"Well, it's not your job right now to worry about my well-being, Dr. Isles," Jane objected. "Plus, there'll be plenty of opportunity for me to get some rest. All I'll have to do is make sure you stay put, heat up some soup, and feed your turtle."

"Tortoise," Maura instinctively corrected her. She knew that the detective was very much aware of the difference between turtles and tortoises by now. But Jane seemed to take special delight in teasing Maura with her incorrect terminology. And to be honest, Maura enjoyed the habitual back-and-forth as much as Jane did.

"Eh, whatever," Jane grunted, a cheeky smile playing around her lips.

A short, shy knock interrupted their friendly banter, and both women turned to the door. When Angela peeked into the room, Maura greeted her with a smile, whereas Jane focused back on her files and pretended to be busy.

"Hello, Maura, how are you feeling?" the Rizzoli matriarch asked caringly as she approached Maura's bed.

"Much better already, thank you," the blonde stated. As she noticed the cup of coffee from the Division One Café in Angela's hand, she glanced at Jane and frowned at her unusual reserve towards her mother.

Mama Rizzoli herself seemed equally unsure about how to deal with her daughter's behavior and sheepishly offered her the cup with the still steaming brew. "I brought you coffee, Jane. I know how watery the stuff is they're serving in here…"

The brunette just shook her head without looking up. "Thanks, but it's not that bad."

Maura frowned at the detective's blatant lie and questioningly looked at Angela, who put the cup on the nightstand and pouted her lips. "Well, I'm gonna go talk to the nurse to make sure you get a decent lunch, Maura. It's important for you to eat well now."

Before Maura could object, Angela had already scurried out of the room. The medical examiner turned to Jane and stared at her friend with irritation. "Okay, what was that all about?"

The detective shrugged, her eyes still glued to her files. "Nothing."

"Jane?!"

Slightly startled by Maura's harsher tone, the brunette finally looked up.

"What's going on?" the medical examiner demanded to know.

Jane sighed. "I might have… uh… blamed Ma for your kidnapping."

"You did what?!" Maura gasped.

"Well, she'd been out with Cavanaugh again and…," Jane tried to explain her frustration but realized that she couldn't put into words why exactly she was mad at her mother. "I mean, if she had been home the other night—"

"Then what?" Maura cut her off. "It wouldn't have changed anything. Maybe he would've gotten to me at another time then, or worse, what if he had hurt your mother?"

Jane rubbed her eyes, unable to come up with another reasonable argument.

"You'd better apologize to her, Jane."

"Uh-huh," the detective grumbled into her hands but didn't move.

"I mean right now!" Maura ordered.

Jane looked up in amusement, oblivious to the seriousness in the medical examiner's voice. "Come on, we got a serial killer running around out there. I got more important things to do."

Seeing that Jane had no intention to go after her mother, Maura sighed and heaved herself up from her pillows.

"What? What are you doing?" Jane asked in confusion.

"Well, if you won't apologize to your mother, I will," Maura declared and pushed back her blanket.

"Why the hell would you apologize to her?"

"Because I'm friends with someone as stubborn as you."

When it dawned on Jane that she wouldn't win this fight, she grumpily dragged herself out of her chair. "For God's sake, lie back down, Maura!"

"You're going to apologize to her?" Maura asked just to be sure.

"Yeah, yeah, alright," Jane grunted.

"Good." Exhausted, the medical examiner sank back into her bed. "I don't think I would've made it past that door."

Jane tried to put on her most disgruntled face, but since the blonde's encouraging smile instantly nipped all her frustration in the bud, she just rolled her eyes in feigned annoyance and headed out of the room.

Maura chuckled to herself and crawled back under her blanket. Just as she had gotten comfortable again, Jane rushed back into the room, snagged the cup of coffee from the nightstand, and grinned. "If I have to apologize, I might as well take this…," she declared and darted out of the room. The medical examiner shook her head in amusement, buried her face in the pillows, and smilingly dozed off.

Outside of Maura's room, Jane let her eyes wander around until she spotted her mother in front of a vending machine at the other end of the hallway. She took a sip from her coffee and strolled towards Angela.

When she reached her, the Rizzoli matriarch had just put another coin in the machine and was contemplating her choice.

"Don't buy those granola bars," Jane warned her in an apologetic voice. "They're dry and icky."

When Angela kept staring at the machine's assortment of snacks, Jane slouched her shoulders and let out a sigh. "I'm sorry, Ma. I'm… I shouldn't have yelled at you the other day. It really wasn't your fault."

Pondering whether or not to accept Jane's apology, the older Rizzoli woman entered a few numbers into the vending machine's keypad and waited for a chocolate bar to drop down. She picked it from the tray and finally turned to her daughter, her eyes already giving away that she had long forgiven Jane for her harsh words.

"I know you were stressed," Angela said understandingly.

"Yeah, but still," Jane objected. "I shouldn't have let it out on you. I'm really sorry. And I'm happy for you and the lieutenant. He's a good guy, and after everything Pop put you through…"

As she noticed Jane's remorseful puppy-dog eyes, Mama Rizzoli seized her chance at one of those rare mother-daughter cuddling moments. "I will forgive you if you let me hug you."

Knowing that there was no escape this time, Jane grimaced and leaned forward. "Help yourself."

Delighted, Angela flung her arms around Jane and enjoyed every second of the awkwardly long embrace. She probably wouldn't have let go off her daughter for at least another hour if it hadn't been for the sudden buzzing of the detective's phone.

Squirming free of her mother's arms, Jane whipped out her phone and checked the caller ID before answering. "Hey, Frost, what have you got?" As she listened to the news from her partner, her posture became tenser and her eyes filled with determination. "I'm on my way," she said and ended the call.

"What is it?" Angela asked curiously.

"I gotta go," Jane declared and then hesitated. "Can you… stay with Maura for a while?"

"Of course," her mother eagerly agreed.

"But try not to drive her crazy, okay?" the detective grinned sheepishly and earned herself an admonishing gaze from the Rizzoli matriarch. "Love you, Ma," Jane quickly appeased her and dashed off.


When Jane entered the homicide squad room at Boston Police Headquarters in the early afternoon, she found Frost and Korsak in the middle of a heated argument in front of the white board and a map of Massachusetts.

"I'm telling you, it doesn't take more than two hours to Great Barrington," Frost claimed and demonstratively traced a route from Boston to the town in the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts on the map in front of them. "Normal people don't stop at every picnic area to look for abandoned pets like you do!"

"Yeah, and normal people wouldn't abandon their pets in the first place," Korsak objected. "But there are enough nutjobs out there who do."

"Ahem," Jane cleared her throat and joined her two colleagues. "You kids having fun?"

"Mr. Snailpace here won't believe me that you can reach the Berkshires in about two hours," Frost complained.

The brunette tried hard not to laugh at the thought of her last trip on the highway with Korsak. "Come on, you've seen him drive. I'm surprised he can get there in less than a day."

"At least I'm not BPD's record holder with the most speeding tickets," Korsak retorted and mischievously grinned at Jane.

"Well, I just don't like wasting half my day on the road, that's all," Jane defended herself but then got serious. "Anyway, where is the husband?"

"Waiting in the interview room," Frost informed her and handed his partner a police file from his desk. "With a nice story…"

"Is that so?" Jane curiously arched her eyebrow and quickly studied the file with the summary of John Christle's arrest.

"Claims he's been in the Berkshires all week and sublet his house about two months ago," Korsak added.

"Yeah, right," the brunette snorted as the three of them headed down the hallway.

Once they had reached the interview rooms, Jane, Frost, and Korsak wordlessly entered a room on the right, in which John Christle was nervously seated at the table and clinging to an almost empty water bottle in his hands. Dressed in a scruffy shirt and dirt-stained pants, with a three-day stubble and bleary eyes, he looked like he could use a few hours in the drunk tank before being interviewed about his involvement in the West Roxbury killings.

Jane and Korsak sat down on the two chairs opposite their hung-over suspect, while Frost leaned against the wall behind them and attentively studied John Christle's face.

"Nice time of the year for a trip to the Berkshires, huh?" Jane started her interview and glanced at the police file in front of her.

"Not really," Christle shrugged apathetically.

"So what were you doing there?" the brunette followed up.

The interviewee impatiently rolled his eyes. "I've already told the other cops. I was mourning my wife because it would've been our fifth anniversary this week and we got married at that retreat."

"You mean the wife you cheated on?" Jane asked dryly.

"Jeez, you really wanna start this again?" Christle glared at the detectives. "I loved my wife, but at the time, we were having some issues and I made a mistake, alright? It happens… People make mistakes."

"Did you also mistakenly kill those three women in your house on Stratford Street?" Korsak interjected.

"No! I haven't been there in weeks," the suspect objected. "I… I can't go back there. After Darlene's death, I've tried to sell the house, but it's a buyer's market right now. So, when this guy showed up and wanted to rent the house for a few months, I gladly agreed."

"This guy…?" the sergeant wondered.

"Yeah, Jay or Jake or something… I don't remember his last name… It sounded foreign," Christle explained. "Said he had a temporary job in the area and couldn't find any other place to stay nearby. We've exchanged a few e-mails and then only met once for the key delivery."

"And I take it you have no written documentation of your arrangement?" Jane asked sardonically.

"Well, the house had been cleared out, and he paid upfront in cash," the suspect excused his casual business approach. "It didn't really matter to me."

The brunette browsed through her file and revealed a wedding photo that showed the Christles smiling happily ever after. She flipped it over and pointed at the PICTURE PERFECT logo on the back. "You had your wedding shots taken by this Picture Perfect studio?"

John Christle nodded insecurely. "Yeah, we got all our photos taken by them. Darlene was interested in photography and went to a lot of the studio's workshops. Why does it matter?"

Jane leaned back and contemplatively studied the suspect's face. After a few moments, she whispered a faint "be right back — gotta check something" into Korsak's ear and left the room.

Christle nervously wiggled on his chair and glanced at Korsak and Frost. "I swear, I've been at the retreat in the Berkshires all week. You can check my credit card history and all that."

"Already done that," Korsak stated factually. "But you could've easily driven back and forth between Boston and Great Barrington. It's just a two-hour ride." The sergeant prankfully peeked at Frost, who gave him an approving smile.

"Look, I know you don't believe me," Christle insistently leaned forward. "But I really loved my wife, and I wish I could turn back time and bring her back, but I can't. I've fucked up, I know. But I didn't kill her… or those other women."

When Korsak and Frost responded with silence, the suspect rested his head on his hands in frustration. Before he could contemplate his current misery any further, the door swung open and Jane returned.

"Show me your face!" she demanded and expectantly stared at Christle.

"What?"

"Your face — let me see it!"

Hesitantly, the suspect let his hands sink down and revealed his face. The brunette squinted and thoroughly inspected the man's ruffled appearance. Apparently unhappy with the result, she grabbed the police file from the table, then signaled Frost and Korsak to follow her outside. Her two colleagues exchanged puzzled looks and curiously left the room with her, while John Christle remained behind in utter confusion.

"What's going on?" Frost asked as soon as the three of them had gathered outside.

"I just called Maura to ask if she could identify the killer," Jane explained. "She's not sure, but she said they had a fight and she scratched his face."

"Don't tell me this is another dead end," Korsak sighed. "You believe his story about that subtenant?"

"I don't know," the brunette shrugged. "Any news from CSRU and the crime lab?"

"They're working on it," Frost said. "They found DNA and various finger prints, but even if we match them to Christle, it doesn't necessarily mean he's our killer — it's his house after all."

"So what do we do?" Korsak asked.

Jane ran her hands through her hair in frustration. "Let's check every damn detail of his story… The sooner we figure this out, the better. And the crime lab had better find something…"

"What about him?" Frost nodded towards the room with John Christle still inside.

"Let him stew for a while," Jane grunted. "He's got a lot to think about."

"Alright," Frost and Korsak agreed in unison.

Jane checked her watch and hesitantly looked back and forth between her colleagues and the police file in her hand. "I… uh… I gotta pick up Maura from the hospital. Can you—?"

"Don't worry, we got this," the older sergeant assured her. "We'll call you as soon as we find anything."

"Okay, thanks, guys!" the brunette smiled in relief and waved with the file. "I'll see you later."