DISCLAIMER: I do not own Rizzoli & Isles nor any of the characters from the show. I am writing this purely for entertainment, not profit. Rizzoli and Isles are property of Tess Gerritsen and TNT.
Please find the full disclaimers in the beginning of Chapter 1.
Chapter 4
Jane spun so fast to look at him, that the world spined around her, and her hand missed the corner of the kitchen aisle where she had been supporting herself, meaning she stumbled to the floor, sitting awkwardly.
He immediately leaned down to help her, and was surprised by the strength of her scarred hands around his neck.
"What did you say?" her eyes were mad, and spit escaped her mouth as she asked the question.
He could see she was furious. He used his two hands to try to pry her hands off his neck.
"I… can't… breathe…" he tried, feeling his vision blurring on the edges.
She released his neck, and he stumbled back, sitting on the floor in front of her, coughing and breathing hard.
"For someone half drunk, you are fucking strong." He tried.
"Don't you dare mess up with me, Dean. What did you fucking say before?"
He was surprised. Jane had raised herself enough to pick up a knife from the kitchen block, and was now crouching in front of him, threatening him with the knife.
"Lower the knife, Jane, please, or I will have to handcuff you. We will have a civilized conversation."
She exhaled, and stood, placing the knife back on its place.
"Don't play with me, you son of a bitch… You don't need to mess up with my head this way to get my attention… Telling me she is alive is a cruel sick joke, and not even you should go that low..." Jane said, hurtful, tears trailing her tired face, while she filled another glass of water with a shaking hand and drank it to try to calm the mad pounding of her heart.
She was about to drink another glass of water, but shook her head, and again reached for the cabinet door. She would need a whole lot of alcohol after Dean's stunt.
Dean stood, and this time he held both of her arms.
"No more drinking. I need to talk to you. You need to hear me out. Without trying to kill me in the process. Can you do that?"
"Will you leave me alone if I do it?" she sighed, resigned.
"I promise I will leave you alone the moment I tell you what I came to tell, if that is what you want after you hear me."
"Great, so the earlier you begin, the earlier you will leave." She again removed her arms from his grip, picked another glass of water, and moved to the living room.
She noticed he had picked out the littered bottles that had been spread around, and the room looked like a room again.
He followed her, massaging his neck, where the angry marks of her tapered fingers were beginning to show.
"I would never make a cruel sick joke like that to you, Jane…" he exhaled, looking deeply into her eyes. "She is alive."
He watched Jane's eyes go wide, and her entire body grow tense.
"Hear me out, please. Her life is still in danger, Jane. Witness Protection has her."
He watched Jane's face turning from grayish pale to transparent, as she stood stumbling, barely reaching the trash can in the kitchen to throw up, kneeling awkwardly on the floor, retching and sobbing at the same time.
He resisted the urge to stand up and help her. Jane Rizzoli had always been a wild animal, magnificent to watch. But a wild animal, when seriously wounded, was deadly.
He gave her time, and after a few moments the retching and sobbing became dry heaving, until she stood and walked unbalanced to the bathroom.
She came back with her face still dripping wet. And she had her gun on her hand.
He looked at her with wide eyes. This was a completely crazy side of Jane.
"Jane…"
"You had to wait three fucking weeks to tell me that, you son of a bitch? Do you realize how many times I rolled this fucking gun in my hands in these past three weeks thinking how easy it would be for me to join her?"
"Jane…"
"Answer me!" She yelled, wildly, spit scaping her mouth. She was angry.
"For the first three days, she was dying, Jane. Nobody believed she would survive…"
Instead of lowering the gun, she approached him, and he could see she was seething with anger now.
"She was dying, alone, and you didn't tell me so I could be there for her?"
He swallowed, hard.
"You were already grieving for her loss, Jane. I didn't want to cause you more suffering for nothing…"
"For nothing?" she raged. "For nothing? Don't you think knowing you are not alone even as you are dying is worth more than nothing?" She could not control the violent sobs raking her frame, her arm holding the gun was shaking, and he stood to finally force her to lower it, removing the gun from her hand, and forcing her to sit down.
"I am sorry, Jane..." He exhaled.
"Tell me everything, Dean, and God help you if you keep anything from me this time. I will chase you all the way to hell if I need to, and I will shoot your balls and watch you bleed slowly to death."
He sighed.
"She was shot in the head, as you saw on the video. But because she saw her assailant, she moved, slightly enough, and it turned out the shot was not immediately fatal, hitting the base of her neck instead. She was removed from the scene barely alive, but the specialist assured there was no way she would survive, it was just a matter of hours. She was dying, in a coma and on a respirator."
Jane covered her mouth to stifle a sob, tears streaming down her face. He knew he was hurting her, but he needed to tell this part to get to the rest.
"What you probably don't know yet, is that all the deaths were connected. When Hope was killed… Paddy had also been killed in prison that night in California – that was why I was already in Boston. They killed Paddy's father in the public housing he was staying at, Jane. Maura… she is the only remaining lose end."
"Is she… Is she really still alive?" Jane asked. Hopeful. Doubtful.
"She is. She survived the first hours, that became days, and after seven days they were able to remove the respirator. And five days ago, they were finally able to move her out of hospital to a new location. She is conscious, and she has no apparent cognitive impairment, but there was severe damage to her spine, so she can move, but she cannot move well. And she is not happy that this decision was made for her, even if it was for her own protection."
Jane stifled another sob.
"Where is she, Dean?"
"Witness protection, Jane."
Jane looked at him for a few moments, squinting her eyes, fighting her alcohol foggy brain to follow her line of thought.
"You would not have gone through all the trouble to force me to hear you out if you were not going to tell me where she is, Dean. Spill the beans."
He exhaled.
"What I am about to do can cost me my career, Jane. I am not sure anymore if I want to risk my career for someone whose judgement is impaired by alcohol."
"Don't you fucking judge me…" She hissed. "You kept the truth from me!"
"And I am trying to redeem myself, I swear, Jane. To protect her, she is literally in the middle of nowhere. I haven't seen or spoken to her. But based on the little I got from WitSec, she is not in a good place mentally or physically. You know she is not someone who easily connects with living people, and it is being even worse with her WitSec assigned agents. The fact that she is in physical pain, with her mobility restricted, and all alone, against her will, concerns me. WitSec will do what they must do to keep her alive. But I am concerned that keeping her alive will cost her sanity."
Jane looked at him, suspiciously. She could not imagine Dean worried about Maura. Or she could. He was an ass, and his priorities came first, but as long as what he was doing didn't get in his way to success, he had helped Jane before.
"Keep going."
"Since you already did the hardest part – taking an unpaid leave without a return date… Maybe you would be willing to go underground to be with her... WitSec cannot even begin to suspect you reached out to her, or they will move her again. But from what I grasped from WitSec she really could use your help, Jane. I can't tell you how long this will last – but if you would be willing to continue on an unpaid leave until at least she is in a better place physically and mentally…"
"Where is she, Dean?"
"In the middle of nowhere, Idaho."
"Fuck. Not a place for someone mobility impaired." Jane muttered.
"She is alone, in a remote farm. WitSec settled her five days ago. They were there again yesterday, leaving supplies for her that should last for another seven to ten days, and they will revisit her every seven to ten days to replenish her supplies."
He could see Jane was furious.
"Are they out of their minds? Anything could happen in seven to ten days to someone who is in recovery of such a serious wound…"
"If she was anywhere easy to find, Jane, she would be dead by now. She was lucky to have escaped from death in that direct head shot. She won't survive another attempt. WitSec is keeping her alive."
"God, but at what cost?"
"That is where you can come in."
"How do I get to her?"
"You need to be willing to go completely underground, Jane. No computers. No cell phones. No internet. You cannot fly or drive. You will need to rely on public transportation. Trains. Buses. Pay every ticket and everything you buy with cash." He opened up his coat to give her a big waddle of cash, in all denominations. "Don't use your credit card, or withdraw money from your bank account. You will disappear as much as she does. Don't carry a gun during the travel, you don't want to get arrested. To your family, say you were sent undercover overseas, so they don't look for you for at least a few months. I don't know how long it will take for us to make sure she is safe, but we are working 24x7 to capture whoever is behind the murders."
Jane nodded.
He fished a map from his pocket, and some old-fashioned train and bus schedules.
"I didn't think they had paper anymore."
"Most people think the same. But before we do this, you need to eat. You are no use for her in the state you are, Jane. I know you want to leave now. But you need to eat, and sleep. And it goes without saying that drinking more will not help you."
She stood and picked a bowl, putting cereal on it. The milk on her fridge was sour, so she threw it on the sink. Instead, she picked a powdered milk can, mixed it with water, and poured on top of it. She offered the bowl to him, he just shook his head.
"This is a start. If this remains in your stomach, we will call for a pizza and an icy cold bottle of Coke. And then you will sleep. You will not leave until tomorrow morning."
"I have no idea what time it is, to be honest. Or if it is day or night. Or which day of the week it is." Jane admitted.
"It is 3.52PM, it is a Thursday of the third week since you began your unpaid leave."
Jane nodded, munching the cereal without pleasure.
"So how do I get there?"
Dean opened the map and the schedules, and they began to trace a route.