Author's Note: Thank you very much for all the reviews and messages, I'm really glad to see you're liking this story so far.

Chapter Fifteen

"You are staring at me."

Maura's comment made Lucy burst out laughing. Her voice rose loudly in the small courtyard of Maura's townhouse and swept away the quietness of a sunny morning. Maura glanced at the guesthouse. Angela was already gone. At least she wouldn't overhear the conversation she was now having with Lucy which was reassuring. There were some things Maura didn't want to share with Jane's mother, obviously.

"I am staring at you because you are in love, Maura Isles." Lucy picked up a strawberry and gave Maura a mischievous wink. She giggled, happily. "And it hasn't happened for a while..."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Maura immediately grabbed her glass of fresh orange juice. She wasn't thirsty, she simply needed to hide her sudden blushing behind something. She glanced at the door that she had left open ajar and thought about her sunglasses she had put down on the kitchen counter. If she had known that the conversation would take such turn then she would have put her sunglasses on to avoid Lucy's eyes. Bad move.

She had spent the evening with Jane. They hadn't jumped on each other though. They had taken their time instead, and they had talked a lot. Jane's two-week suspension weighed on her shoulders. Almost as much as O'Donell's remark. Maura had tried to calm her friend down a bit. Her words had been vain. What Jane needed was pure and bare sexual release.

Every single time.

"Please... It's so obvious!" Lucy adjusted her sunglasses on top of her nose and folded her legs under herself. Maura didn't work this morning and Lucy didn't have to go anywhere. They both had time to speak. "How did it happen? How did you go from being friends to being lovers? These things happen a lot more often than we imagine."

Maura tried to smile but her efforts remained vain. She felt emotionally tired and completely lost. She and Jane were losing control of the situation. It was obvious.

Perhaps talking about her doubts and fears with Lucy would be relieving. Maura knew that her friend wouldn't judge her. She trusted Lucy.

"It just happened." Maura shrugged. She had fantasized about this moment so many times that it was now strange to finally live it for real. The words wouldn't come out. They stayed trapped in her throat and made her feel dizzy. "We were talking and all of a sudden... I don't know. We kissed."

What Maura remembered from that night of March was the mysterious pride she had felt and the sentiment to finally be alive. Reality had hit her like a ton of bricks afterward but since Jane hadn't run away from her then Maura had embraced it with a surge of lightness.

She didn't explain it. She only had facts to talk about, and a whirl of feelings that she didn't know what to do of.

"There's Mateo."

"Oh, please. I'm not stupid, Maura. Mateo's nothing for Jane. The person she spent the evening with is you, and not him. That should tell you something. Mateo is just as unimportant to her as Finn is for you."

"You don't know the real Jane. The one you've seen is different. She was... Something has changed, you know. Jane has changed."

Lucy looked down at her plate. A mysterious smile played on her lips. She let her fingertips brush the edge of the teak table. Slowly. Peacefully.

"We all change when we're in love. Listen..." Lucy leaned over and rested a comforting hand on top of Maura's knee. "I won't be in Boston forever so if the two of you could accept whatever you're feeling before I go, that'd be great. I want to see you happy, Maura. And you're that close to embracing it."

...

Jane sat down on a bench and focused on the Charles River. Jo Friday jumped on her lap and quietly settled there.

She had woken up early and sore. This two-week suspension had a bigger impact on her state of mind than what she would have imagined in the first place. She didn't manage to accept it and yet she knew that she didn't have much of a choice. Bored, she had got up and had spent a couple of hours on her laptop looking for a present. Maura's birthday was coming and Jane still had to buy her friend something.

The last time they had celebrated Maura's birthday, their friendship looked like a friendship and nothing else. This year was the first time that Jane didn't know how to define the bond that deeply linked them.

Life could be strange, sweet and abrupt at the same time. It was the conclusion Jane had come up to after spending too many minutes in the shower. She was thinking about that night of March way too much, today. It haunted her mind and made her heart beat faster because she remembered absolutely every single feeling she had felt by then.

She had seen it as an evidence. The moment her lips had brushed Maura's breasts and her hands had caressed her hips, Jane had realized that it was what she really wanted. Not just with Maura but with her life in general. Perhaps she should talk about years of denial and repression. She honestly didn't know. But the appealing taste of doing something she saw as somehow prohibited had soon turned into an evidence and she couldn't live without it anymore.

The O'Donell incident was just an excuse. She had released her frustration on her colleague instead of dealing with it properly. Cavanaugh was right: it wasn't how it was supposed to work.

"I hate this life."

"Well, you'd better fix it then because you can't get a new one."

The remark caused Jane to jump. She turned her head and stared at the person who had just talked to her. She frowned, confused.

"What are you doing here?"

Frost sat next to Jane on the bench. He was wearing casual clothes, not his usual suit. Jane glanced at their surrounding but there was nobody else to be seen. They were alone by the Charles River, in the first hours of the morning.

"I wanted to have some news... You didn't answer your phone last night and your neighbor told me this morning that you were probably on the esplanade."

Alright.

Jane gave Frost a smile but not a single word passed her lips. She didn't know what to tell him. His visit was unexpected. The thoughts she had had about her and Maura began to vanish as she tried to focus on the time being.

"I don't hate my life that much. You don't have to freak out."

Frost smiled. Jane often wondered why she had landed such a nice work partner. Frost was everything she wasn't: wise, calm and friendly. He was exactly what she needed.

A bit like Maura, except Maura reached a level of dependence in Jane's head that very few people could understand.

"O'Donell is an asshole. Don't waste your time overthinking what you did. To be honest with you, I'm kinda jealous you're the one who hit him because I would have loved doing it myself."

"What? Nah, c'mon. You can't say that." Jane shook her head. "You can't say that because you're Carebear Frostie. And Carebear Frostie doesn't do bad. Unlike me."

Besides, Frost couldn't understand why Jane had had such violent reaction with O'Donell. He didn't know for her and Maura. Nobody knew for them. And if most of the time, the secret nature of this friendship with benefits made Jane happy, she had to admit that it could also make her feel very lonely.

She couldn't talk about it to anyone, not because she was afraid of people's reaction but because she didn't have the courage to put words on her problems.

"You'll be back in no time."

"Hmm."

"Take it as a sign. It's the summer and you've just got handed two weeks of vacation: enjoy them! Go somewhere..."

Jane nodded evasively. She didn't want to leave yet it seemed the best option she had right now. Of course, she hoped that Maura would come with her.

Maura was another source of stress. They hadn't left Boston for a few days since they had begun to sleep together and Jane was afraid that heading to a different place would have an impact on their relationship. What if a new environment suddenly highlighted what she didn't want to see?

It freaked her out.

"I don't really know where to go. I... I don't know." Jane took a deep breath before closing her eyes. The sun was caressing her face, a soft breeze brushed her nape. Her surrounding was peaceful yet she was very nervous herself. "Do you know this feeling, when nothing makes sense anymore and you realize that what you've taken for granted is not?"

"Yes..."

Jane kept her eyes closed. She didn't have the courage it took to look at Frost. A world of darkness was comforting. She bit her lower lip as a wave of regrets rushed throughout her body.

"Well, this is how I feel right now. My life... My life's upside down. I need to come to terms with... With a few things. Things aren't as easy as I thought they were." She could hardly tell Frost more, not because she didn't trust him but because her current state of mind was way too blurry. "It's not that you have to achieve anything. It's that you have to get away from where you are."

A confused smile played on Frost's lips. Obviously Jane's latest remark was a complete mystery to him. Amused and almost serene, Jane shrugged before focusing anew on the Charles River.

"Marguerite Duras: The Lover."