AN: Thank you for your reviews, I'm really glad that you like this story and that you find it interesting!
"Have you just slapped me?" Jane asked amused, touching his cheek.
Crap. She thought absently. "I'm sorry, ok." She said, biting slightly her lower lip.
"No, you're not." He laughed in response.
"Ok, I'm not sorry I've slapped you but that was totally unprofessional and I shouldn't have! I'm not like this.. usually, I mean." She said, passing an hand through her hair; she couldn't stand his perpetual and obstinate gaze and he had perfectly noticed it. She turned herself, trying to escape from his eyes and to find a friendly face in Van Pelt when she hit accidentally a pot of flowers with her elbow making it fall on the floor and break into pieces.
"Fuck." She said out loud this time. Jane couldn't help but laugh. "Are you going to destroy everything concerning me? My cheekbone, my pot of flowers and what else, my dignity?" He asked, teasing her and pretending to be hurt. She looked at him, exasperated, for a second and then "Van Pelt!" She called, maybe with too much fervor.
"Am I making you nervous?" He asked, showing to her his brilliant smile.
"Oh, shut up!" She snapped back. Van Pelt who had been busy with the searching, more or less professional searching, around the studio finally arrived.
"Oh my God, what happened?" She asked confused.
"Nothing dear, Teresa just hit me with that pot of flowers." Jane answered, pretending to be in pain.
"Boss is it true?" She asked incredulous.
"Of course not Van Pelt, are you insane? Just bring some ice for Mr. Jane, please." She said, her level of jumpiness was probably touching the sky. "And stop laughing, for God's sake." She yelled at Jane.
"Sorry Boss." He said, mocking her. Van Pelt came back with some ice and handed it to Jane; she couldn't help but notice his handsome aspect, even in that absurd situation. She smiled shyly at him while Lisbon rolled her eyes watching the scene.
"I didn't know policewomen could be so attractive, are you a model or something?" He asked her , kissing her hand, expertly.
"Oh, you're too kind Mr. Jane!" Van Pelt replied politely.
"Ok, are we done with the telenovelas here?" Lisbon asked.
"Oh my! Already jealous, Teresa?" He realized in that moment that he had found a new passion, he simply loved to tease her.
"Call me Lisbon, please." She answered, ignoring his question.
"Ok Teresa." She rolled her eyes, another time.
While Jane was busy with the ice pack in his hand, Lisbon approached Van Pelt, being careful not to be listened; the redhead informed her Boss that everything was ok in the studio, nothing strange or out of place. It hadn't been an official search, they didn't have the warrant anyway, but with a general and attentive look around, the young agent hadn't found nothing suspicious. Besides Lisbon had had the same feeling once entered, despite the absurdity of Jane's behavior.
"Would you mind tell me why are you here?" The man in question asked. Lisbon approached him and tried to start again with a total different approach, more professional at least.
"Mr. Jane did you know Melissa Hasting?" Lisbon asked.
"Teresa, do you have any idea of how many girls enter in this building? I can't remember every single one so I honestly don't know, do you have a pic?" He said. A pic, of course, why she had forgotten about that? Frankly, she couldn't almost recognize herself. She gave him the pic, looking fleetingly at it and trying to hide that sensation of inquietude that hit her like a fist in the stomach. Jane told her she knew the girl, she was a model, one of the last new entries in his studio. Lisbon told him what had happened to her and in what she had been involved.
"She became my informant and… she found out strange exchanges right here, in this studio, before dying." She said, putting away the pic with the purpose not to look at it again, at least for a while. That pic was a reminder of her failure and she knew to be coward, doing everything to avoid it; like when you see that stubborn spider web in the corner of the wall, you know it's there but you keep trying not to look at it because if you can't see it, it doesn't exist. It's called laziness in that case; in this one, it was cowardice, fear, worse things than laziness in her diary.
"Look, I don't know what you're talking about, I'm clean, you can overturn this place right now.. my house too if you want, I have nothing to hide." He said seriously. Lisbon didn't know why but she believed him.
"We will! Thank you for your time Mr. Jane." She answered, ready to leave the place.
"I was wrong about you." He said suddenly, making her stop; she looked at him curious. "It's not the afterglow.." She was about to interrupt him but he was faster, touching slightly her arm to hold her in that place.
"that brightness in your eyes I mean.. it's something else.. it's sadness. You have sad eyes, Teresa. They seem two big pools of sorrow ready to explode." He said, looking at her and not leaving her arm. "Are you sad Teresa?" He asked finally.
"None of your business." She answered, still not moving and challenging his gaze.
"I wish they were." He said, almost in a whisper. They kept looking at each other, none of them able to find something more to add, none of them ready to end that small but intense contact though.
"Paddyyyyyy!" The atmosphere broke when a little girl, seven years or maybe more, irrupted in the studio like a little hurricane and launched herself in his arms.
"Charlie, what are you doing here?" He said, hugging her and trying not to suffocate between her thousand golden curls.
"Is your girlfriend?" She asked, speaking too loudly into his ear and indicated Lisbon with her small index.
"No, she's too beautiful for me." Jane replied, smiling toward Lisbon. She rolled her eyes but couldn't repress a small smile in response.
"I like your hair." The little girl told Lisbon.
"Thanks, but yours are better." Lisbon replied. It wasn't hard to believe, looking at that waterfall of sunny curls.
"Can I look at the pics with the puppies?" Charlie asked to Jane; he smiled, then he took an album from a drawer and gave it to her. The little girl took a place on a small couch near the window; she was surely familiar with that place and Lisbon found herself curious about her role in Jane's life.
"Is your daughter?" She asked to Jane when Charlie was away.
"No." He replied, too fast and too sharply.
She looked at him surprised for that bitter answer that she wasn't expecting. "I should go now." She said.
"We'll see you soon." He said, finding his confidence again.
"I guess not." She answered.
"Well.. you show up and then you shy away but I know pretty soon you'll be walking this way." He answered absorbed.
"Is that a song?" She asked suspicious.
"Nope." He lied.
Jane was collecting the hundreds pics of puppies that Charlotte had left on the couch, on the floor and almost everywhere in the studio; it was his usual post Charlotte activity and it had become a sort of habit, a pleasant one. Charlotte occupied an important piece of his heart, the little girl lived with Sam and Pete, two friends that he had met a long time ago and that worked in the fashion business like him; they had adopted Charlie just born and he found himself unable to stay away from her and her solar soul almost immediately, besides there was this special connection between them, that sort of understanding that made him smile every time she smiled.
He wasn't surprised about it.
Speaking of smile, he hadn't forgotten that brief, almost imperceptible, moment in which Teresa had smiled; it had been just a hint, like a whisper, but he had found it overwhelming . Maybe because he was so used to see plastic and fake smiles every day that when he found a real one, he couldn't allow himself to lose it. He needed to see her again, to feel that inexplicable and total unexpected pull once again. He decided to be impulsive, a way of living that didn't really belong to him, at least not anymore; he took his phone from the pocket and made a call.
"Pete? It's Patrick, look I need a favor. I need to arrange an event, a charity event, better, and invite models and people in the fashion business, you know."
"Why?"
"That's not important why, I just need to do it and pretty soon, next week for example."
"Are you kidding me? How can I organize an event like that in few days and.."
"Thank you! I knew you wouldn't have disappointed me! Give a kiss to Sam and Charlie!"
Lisbon spent the day between working on the case and wondering what was going on in her cloudy mind. There was something that was making her distracted and pensive at the same time, sensations that she couldn't allow herself to feel, not in that painful situation. She couldn't admit, even to herself, that the meeting with Patrick Jane had upset her; it wasn't because he was incredibly handsome, it was the way he kept looking at her, like she was totally transparent to his gaze. She had had the impression to be naked in front of him, thing that didn't happen often to her, especially because she was Miss discretion and she didn't like to open up with people, with a stranger even more. "Big pools of sorrow." He had said. She was annoyed by the way she had reacted in front of him, like she was totally lost, maybe because nobody had never found the time or better the will to take care of her, to understand what was happening in her secretive mind. The paradox was she didn't want nobody to do that, or maybe that had been her conviction, until two eyes, foreign eyes, big pools of mystery to quote him, had challenged her in that obstinate way, finding that truth not too hidden in her, but hard to recognize. She had a strange feeling, she felt a little addicted to that inappropriate intrusion, she needed more of it. She took Melissa's pic from her pocket and stared at it but she didn't cry. It was the moment to take her responsibilities, to be the one to solve the situation. Suddenly her phone rang and she realized she had been lost in her thoughts, an habit quite persistent lately.
"Lisbon." She replied, not recognizing the number.
"Hi, sad eyes!" Jane's voice said seductively.
"How have you found my number?" She asked a little annoyed.
"I have my ways, anyway I wouldn't be so grumpy if I were you."
"What do you want?" She asked.
"I had forgotten to tell you that there will be a party next week, an important event you know.. models, champagne and gossip.. that kind of trash, I think you could be interested in it.. for your case I mean." He said, not realizing he was almost keeping his breath, waiting for her answer.
"I am interested indeed, very interested to be honest.. look, send me the details ok? See you." She said, suddenly finding hope again.
"You're welcome, Teresa." He said sarcastically to an empty phone.
Lisbon felt the excitement that was growing inside her, she had something new, a new occasion and she couldn't waste it. Now there was only a little problem, what the hell she would have worn?
Next chapter: the party! The song in this chapter that has inspired me and that will come back for sure during the whole story is "Sad eyes" by Bruce Springsteen, a totally J/L song. I hope you liked this chapter.