Chapter 5 – Digging Up Bones

She was sitting in the small bullpen, her feet shaking back and forth in nervousness. She watched Jane cross into Minelli's office, the photographs clutched firmly in his hand. He hadn't said much on the way over to the CBI. He was broodingly angry with her for disobeying him and wandering off, but she suspected he was also very upset she had seen and deduced that the golden-haired woman was his deceased wife.

She tried to see into Virgil's office, but the black partition only made the top half of them visible, and when Jane sat down in the chair, the only thing she could see was the top of his golden curls. After a few moments of cumbersome glances from Cho and Rigsby, Virgil Minelli opened up his office door and called out to her.

"Come in here," he told her, motioning her with one hand. "Have a seat, Ms. Lisbon."

Lisbon entered the office and sat down in the chair next to Jane. Jane didn't look at her, instead choosing to focus on Minelli, who came to sit back down. Minelli slid the two photos they had found at the victim's home toward her.

"Do you know why Red John would leave these at our vic's house?" he asked. "Why these two, particularly?"

"I told you, Virgil. She doesn't know a goddamn thing! She found them simply by snooping around and disobeying me," Jane piped up. "Actually, it's all your fault. You are the one who made me bring her along. We could have had Cho babysit her."

"Since when do you answer for her?" Minelli snapped. "Your ass is already on my crap list, Jane. Don't make me wipe with it." He turned back to Lisbon. "Let's forget that question for a moment. Where did this photo come from?" He pointed to the picture of her.

Lisbon reached over and plucked up the picture. The photograph of her was a memory that slowed time. Peripherally, she was aware of Jane and Minelli eyeing her cautiously. She couldn't take her eyes away from it. She was distracted by it because the memory was vivid. It was like colors on a page highlighting what had been a perfect life before. It was something she longed for again. Happiness and fulfillment. She memorized it well. Her fingers reached out to stroke it, recalling back to that time. Her husband had taken it. It was of her smiling shyly at the camera as he cajoled her to look up at him. Sorrow befell her in waves as she smiled at the memory. It was one of the best times of her life. It was half a dozen years before... She suffocated the memory she kept playing back in her mind. She looked up at Minelli and then at Jane, both who were watching her. She delicately cleared her throat.

"It was in a frame on my dresser," she said softly. "He must have taken it before he fled. Or before. I don't really know," said Lisbon truthfully.

"Okay," said Minelli. "Back to my original question, then. Do you know why he'd leave these two photos?"

Jane clicked his tongue and Minelli looked at him with a piercing look before turning back to her. Lisbon nodded her head and tilted her head to the side, looking at the two photographs side-by-side.

"A message," she told them. "He's very melodramatic. He tends to act in a fit of grandeur. He likes to taunt and play because you have been looking for him for years, and you still haven't caught him. I imagine he killed that woman to get Jane and I to that house so we'd see his handy work and find his prize," she explained. "As far as Jane's wife's photograph, I suspect he's trying to tell me something."

"Don't speak of my wife," Jane told her slowly, frowning.

"Not your call, Jane," Minelli said. "Not this time around. I know this is a sore topic ever since Sac PD, but you can't take it out on Ms. Lisbon," he replied to Jane, holding up a finger because Jane was going to interrupt him.

"Jane tells me you knew it was his wife," Minelli said, sighing as he turned back to her. "Can you tell me how you knew that? Jane doesn't speak to anyone about it, and he informed me you knew it without him saying a word." Jane's frown deepened.

"Uh," she said, shifting in her seat. "I study people, sir. It's sort of what I do."

"Read people?"

"She gets inside their head," Jane spoke up. "It's irksome. It irks me."

"I take his micro-expression when he examined the pictures," she stated, ignoring Jane with a curl of her eyes. "He widened his eyes and audibly inhaled at the golden-haired woman's photo. That's a sign that he was having a reaction to someone familiar to him," she went on. "He also turned hostile when I asked him about it. The wife part was a rather natural reasoning from his earlier admission that she was no longer alive."

Jane involuntarily turned to her and she caught a look of sadness in his eyes. The same sadness she felt and reflected when she looked at the photo of herself on Minelli's desk. She suspected Red John's goal was just that. Running around digging up a lot of old bones. The peculiar placement of her photo and Jane's wife's was not lost in Lisbon. She thought she knew exactly what it was doing with hers in a dead woman's home, but she didn't want to be presumptuous about it.

"How did Red John get Jane's wife's picture if you don't me asking?" she asked.

"I do!" Jane said emphatically. "I don't think you have a right to know anything about my wife."

"Jane," called Minelli. "I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt because I know it's hard," he told him, shaking his head slightly. "But this isn't something we can dismiss. Her picture was with Ms. Lisbon's. Now, I know you know where it came from, and I know you don't want to talk about it," he pushed the golden-haired woman's photo toward Jane, "but if you want to keep Ms. Lisbon alive, it's about time you start talking, even if it does hurt."

"Virgil..." Jane warned, sitting up in his seat. "I don't think I want to dig up those bones about Lucy."

"No, it's okay," Lisbon told them, making both men turn to her. "When he's ready to tell me, he will. I understand the damage talking about it can do. Trust me." She handed him a little grin, which he didn't seem to acknowledge.

His wife's name had been Lucy. She knew a few vital things about Lucy Jane: she was deceased, she had golden hair and blue eyes, and Red John wanted Lisbon to know about Lucy. A connection between Lucy and Lisbon. But how, why? Without Jane explaining anything to her about Lucy, Lisbon was in the dark. She couldn't say what happened to her, but that Jane felt both sorrow and intense guilt. Something Lisbon shared with him about her own family.

"What about the upside down frown?" he asked. "Jane tells me you think it is some kind of message. You seem to think it's toward you? You think he's angry or sad that he didn't get to finish you?" Minelli said. "Sorry for the bluntness."

"I understand. Yes," she nodded her head. "Everything he does is a message. The way he cuts the artery in the neck, the way he applies the blood to the walls of his victim's walls. Even the knife he uses is a message. It says he's precise and clean."

Jane looked at her sharply, wanting to ask her how she knew so much about Red John. He thought he knew the most about the killer, but he was starting to doubt that. He said nothing, though, just watched her. Lisbon was grateful for that. She didn't want to have that conversation right now. But as he had things he didn't want to speak about, so did she.

Minelli was silent for a minute, looking from Jane to Lisbon. Finally, he sighed and sat back in his chair. "Fine. Head back up to the cabin. Take the photographs. We've copied them. If anything else comes up, I will let you know. And if I were you, Jane, I'd keep that gun nearby. We've got a body count to tell us how smart this guy is."

"Gotcha, Boss," Jane stated. "Come on. Let's just get going. We have a long drive ahead," he said to Lisbon, walking past her in an exasperated stride. "That should be fun."

It was hours later that she pulled the roasted chicken from the oven and carved it, setting the pieces onto the plate and bringing it over to the island with the other items she heated up for them for supper. She poured them each a half a glass of wine and sat down beside him. He was still being very icy with her, choosing not to speak to her since they left the CBI.

"I'm not particularly hungry," he told her, pushing his plate away and instead downing the wine in one gulp.

"Jane," she told him, picking up her fork and picking at her food. "I'm sorry I disobeyed you, okay?"

"No, you're not," he told her. "You think you are, Teresa."

She turned to him and sat her fork down. "It's not my fault."

He nodded his head and reached over the counter for the bottle of wine. "Right." He poured himself another half of glass. "I know that."

She couldn't tell if he was serious or being sarcastic, but it didn't matter. It was the best she was going to get out of him. She turned back to her food and let him gulp down the second half of his wine, licking his lips and sitting quietly for a moment. She ate a bit of her chicken and pushed her plate away from her. She turned to Jane and sighed.

"I didn't want to do this because I wanted to respect your wishes," she started off, "but I think it is only fair. You don't want to talk about your wife, Lucy, and I understand that. You don't trust me, and I don't trust you. But you want to catch this guy and you are avoiding the obvious."

"The obvious?" he asked, raising an eyebrow to her, refilling his glass for the third time.

"Yes. You know that I know she was murdered by Red John," Lisbon said. Jane stopped pouring the wine and set the bottle down with a thump. "And you know that the photographs were a message to you just as it was to me." She hesitated. "You feel an immense measure of guilty conscience. Probably bottle it down. Your defensiveness when it comes to her is because you are afraid that if you show weakness, people will know the shame and pain you feel," she read. "You are angry and resentful of anyone who gets close enough to you because you don't want to let go of the pain. You want to punish yourself with it. Let it fester." She cleared her throat. "Your love life—and personal life in general—has suffered because you push people away. I am no stranger to this, Jane. Only I don't think, in your profession, that is a smart thing to do."

"I told you to stay the hell out of my head! Where are you getting this?" he asked, shaking his head. "What's your aim here? Do you get some kind of sick enjoyment out of reading people's tragedy? Going to make me cry? Should I see if Sac stocked tissues?" he asked derisively. "I don't see any men lining up to find you, either, sweetheart!"

"When are you going to stop asking me that, Patrick?" said Lisbon, annoyed. "I can't repress it. I have to read you. It's in my human condition! And, I am not looking for romance! I've more important matters to care about. You know he is saying that you couldn't save your wife, and you won't be able to save me."

Jane was silent for a long time after that, his eyes never leaving Lisbon's. Finally, Jane stood angrily and walked away from her, but came back and pointed a finger at her. "You don't get to say that to me."

"I'm sorry."

"You don't know anything about Lucy or what happened. You guess and you use your skills that you used to con sick, down on their luck, poor people with to make assumptions and trouble," he told her, the wine starting to make him sway on his feet. "You think that deep down inside I've got a grudging respect for your genius or whatever it is you think you have," he told her with a cynical smile. "The truth is, deep down, I'm scared of you. You've got no limits, you've got no common sense. And one day you're going to create one mother of a disaster for yourself and you're already starting to drag me with you in doing so."

"I am just telling the truth," Lisbon defended. "Red John murdered your wife, and nearly murdered me! He's taunting you about it." She was hurt by his words. More than she believed she would be.

She looked on as Jane closed his eyes and attempted to bring his anger under control. When he reopened them, he stared at Lisbon for a long time before he sighed in defeat. He sat back down on the stool and pulled the photograph of his wife from his jacket pocket. He sat it between them on the island and put a hand through his blond curls. She hesitantly turned herself in her chair and saw he was staring at her, his eyes expressionless and his face a mask of stone. What was the use in hiding it? If the look on her face was any indication, she already knew most of it. Most. Not all.

"Lucy was thirty-two when she was murdered by Red John," Jane told her very softly. "Victim number thirteen. He, uh, he came in through our unlocked kitchen door while I was working the graveyard shift for the Sac PD," he said. "I came home one night in October. I remember that it was colder than any other night here in California." He pressed his lips together, looking past Lisbon rather than at her. "I instantly knew something was off. Something didn't seem right, you know? I called out to her to let her know I was home. Usually, she would meet me at the door and lead me upstairs." He looked back down at the picture of Lucy and touched her printed face with his fingers. "I just thought she was asleep. When I got to our room, it was... It was all so messed up. She was lying on the mattress, bleeding. I put...I put my hands on her throat to try to stop the bleeding, but she was already gone. She was cold to the touch when I cupped her cheek begging her to breathe for me." He began to cry, his tears falling unabashedly. "I didn't save her. I couldn't."

Without thinking, Lisbon brought her arm out and touched his upper arm with her hand, squeezing gently. He looked up at her and suddenly felt ashamed for crying. He tried to hide his face by lowering it back to the photograph, but Lisbon reached the hand on his arm out to lift his chin for him to look at her.

"You have a lot of guilt and accountability that you feel," she whispered. "But the guy is smart and careful. This wasn't on you, Jane. You have to know that you couldn't have saved her. She was beyond help."

"I could have saved her, Teresa," he whispered back in a watery voice. "I had a chance. I had it, and I didn't get it done. It was my fault."

"What do you mean?" she asked, confused, letting go of his chin.

"That's a story for another time, Teresa," he told her, his face leaning toward hers. "You're the first person to ever get what happened out of me not directly involved in it. Why do you have this effect on me that makes me want to tell you things?" he asked quietly. "I don't trust you, yet I tell you this stuff."

"I suspect it is the wine inhibiting your rationalizing abilities," she told him. "Alcohol tends to overproduce transmission to the brain."

"Maybe," he breathed, his eyes fluttering from hers to her lips and back up. "Maybe you make me doubt myself. You always seem to know what I try so hard to hide." He sighed. "Both from myself and everyone else. Maybe it's because I relate your own guilt and responsibility. Maybe it's something else entirely."

She knew what he meant by that. Her own guilt and pain were plain as day on her face and in her green eyes. Her own cards, however, were closely guarded. She would not tell him anything about her own situation. The trust wasn't there yet. He had only admitted what she already knew, just filling in the details of it. His confession was also the result of alcohol and anger.

"I don't have—"

"Yes, you do, Teresa. I may not have your skills, but I do have eyes that see."

He was so close to her now that she felt his breath on her face. She cleared her throat and slid off the stool away from him, giving herself a gap. She released a breath she didn't even realize she was holding. Her fingers went automatically up to the ring around her neck, as it did when she was stressed or in anxiety.

"I showed you mine," he said quietly. "Now, show me yours."

She shook her head slowly. "I think I should go to bed." She turned to head back to her room, but Jane caught her upper arm. He spun her around gently. "Jane. Please."

"When you are ready to tell me, you will," he told her, using her own words from earlier in Minelli's office. "But you will at some point. You have to. I'm the only one who knows what it's like, Teresa." He let her arm go and watched her take a step back. "What it's like to come home to his handy work."

"Good night, Jane," she said, turning from him and disappearing into the living room and back into the hallway.

"Good night, Teresa," he whispered, turning to grab the rest of the wine he didn't drink in his flute and his wife's photograph off the counter and headed toward the couch.

He thought he could hear faint crying from her room. He had the strange urge to go and console her. He didn't, however. It wouldn't do them any good at this point. He plopped down on the couch and sighed, taking a long sip of wine and looking at the photo of his wife and listening to the controlled weeping coming from her room.

"There is our connection," he said to the photograph, downing the rest of his wine. "Red John."