The smartphone in front of Charlie Robbins, head of the FBI, buzzed on the table. He looked at the display and frowned a little. It was a Boston number. He knew who was calling him at that moment.

He briefly stroked his short gray hair and looked down at himself. He'd been in better shape before when he was still in SWAT.

He took a deep breath and answered the call. "Robbins."

"Bell here; good afternoon, Charlie. Can I have a minute with you?"

"A minute, yes."

"Listen," Bell seemed to collect himself for a moment, "it's about our mutual associate, Dr. Isles."

"Katherine Isles?"

"Right."

"What's it about?" Even though Robbins knew, of course, he wanted to keep Bell wriggling a little.

Bell paused for a moment and cleared his throat. "The Melanie Mcbride case and the so-called God of Blood. Dr. Isles also helped with the plan to turn a young woman into a murderer."

Robbins nodded slowly. "Do we know if she killed anyone?"

"She was certainly involved with the truck driver at the rest stop."

"That's conjecture, but Melanie, not Dr. Isles, committed the crime."

"But Dr. Isles supported the idea in question."

"Didn't she coordinate the plan with Lt. Rizzoli and Chief Rizzoli, Chris?"

"In a way." If Bell realized, Robbins thought, that the conversation was slipping away from him, it was just as well. "In a way? And why are you blaming others for something Chief Rizzoli waved through? Because you didn't seriously call me to play Sherlock Holmes with me and speculate about who this Melanie might have killed."

"Charlie, I'll be honest: we need a statement. Three people must go on forced leave; otherwise, the press will follow us to the toilet. And they are Elizabeth Rizzoli and Veronica O'Laighin ..."

"Haven't they already been suspended? And the third is Dr. Isles?"

"That's right."

"And you need my okay for that because she's fifty percent FBI."

"That's right."

"And you won't get that okay."

There was a brief silence on the line. Then Bell grumbled again. "Excuse me?"

"Are you hard of hearing? You're not getting my okay for this."

"Charlie," Bell began, "we're in a horrible position in front of the Boston Senate."

"...Local politics is your problem! You're the BPD!"

"The FBI is meddling, too. The Secretary of the Interior --"

"You leave that one to me. Because we're the FBI!"

Bell said nothing at first. "So you're refusing to come clean?" he then asked. "Then I'm afraid I'm forced to say who's preventing me from coming clean, in case anyone asks."

Robbins stood up from his chair. "You will? Then I'll tell you this: or rather, we won't be telling you and your screwed-up, pseudo-cool filthy town anything at all shortly! There are no warnings about attacks that also affect the government, and you won't get no support from the NSA, no support from the FBI investigators, and no more help. Do you want war? You can have it!"

Bell was at a loss for words.

Instead, Robbins continued. "Dr. Isles is fifty percent with us. She stays on duty. That's my last word. If you don't like it, write to the Home Secretary." He bared his teeth. "But then I'll suggest a third name to shut the press up. Do you know what name I mean? Guess yours!" He ended the conversation and looked to the side. "Well, Kate. Italian vacations with your family will be nothing!" Katherine was still sitting at the restaurant table in the hotel where she and other conference members were staying. "He won't cause us any more trouble. You're staying on the job. With the FBI and the BPD."

Katherine nodded slowly. "What makes you so sure he won't cause any more trouble? I thought he was going to call the Secretary of the Interior."

"He can do that. He knows that if he does, I'll call the Home Secretary, too, which will be ugly. Or he can accompany your family to Italy and stay there forever. Because he won't stay in his position after the leave of absence."

xxx

Nikki and Ashlyn were sitting in the officer's living room with a glass of white wine when she heard a key in the front door. Her little brother Ben was on the living room floor, preoccupied with old Blu.

Mike poked his head into the apartment and frowned a little. "Am I interrupting?" he asked, putting the trolley case and his bag down in a corner. "I'd have a white wine like that too!"

"Go on," Nikki replied, "we need to have another toast now that we won't seen each other for two weeks."

Mike went into the kitchen and opened a cupboard. "Two weeks of not seeing each other?"

"I've been suspended," she said, taking a big gulp from her glass. "For four weeks, two of which I'll be spending in and around Italy, the flight's already booked. And Ash is coming with me." She had liked the vacation option by now, and it felt like the best solution. She had cried for some time after the conversation with her grandmother, first in the toilet, then in the stairwell, and later in her car. What had she done? Turned a young, promising woman into a murderer. She had talked to Ashlyn for a long time.

It's not your fault, Ashlyn had said. She was already susceptible to the dark side. Besides, it wasn't just your idea. Everyone went along with it. Even Jane, even though she's so fucked up now.

Nikki had said it was Melanie's own decision, but she wasn't of age yet. Didn't I influence her?

Ashlyn had denied this consideration several times. But her sister's doubts remained.

Nikki had tried to apologize to Melanie's parents in some way. She had tried to call Melanie's mother, but no one had answered her cell phone. She had written to her and asked her for forgiveness via several contacts and detours; the BPD had sent psychologists; Jane, for all her formality, had even arranged a cash injection for her father at a bank in case he was no longer able to do his job correctly. The family would not have any loss of earnings. But nothing could be done. The Mcbride family had disappeared, and it would stay that way.

You're right. Ashlyn had replied, it would help if you got out of Boston for a while, out of the USA. The two of us are going on vacation- shopping, doing nothing, forgetting everything- and returning stronger. I'd love to come with you. I haven't been to Italy since I was a child.

"Well, I still have to work at my agency," said Mike, pouring himself a glass of white wine, "besides, I should tell Jane at some point what I've decided whether I'm going back into active police service." Katherine had immediately told him about the conversation with Robbins and Bell. He had to grin when he learned that Bell had finally met his match. He wasn't Bell's biggest fan himself. "And what exactly are you two up to?" He furrowed his eyebrows. "You don't work for the BPD. So Jane couldn't have suspended you."

Ashlyn pulled the corners of her mouth down. "No, I'm still on vacation; that's why I'm still in Boston."

"And where exactly are you going?"

"Florence," Nikki said. "A distant cousin of Ma's, Marco, has an apartment there, right by the cathedral he's renting out. We're even getting two weeks free because the kitchen is still being renovated. But there are no workmen available at the moment. We can make coffee, but we'll eat out for everything else."

Ashlyn pulled the corners of her mouth down and lifted her shoulders. "That's what they tend to do in Italy anyway.

Little Benjamin scrambled to his feet and waddled over to Mike. "Mikey."

Mike smiled a little and ruffled his hair. "Well, little man." Then he turned back to Nikki and Ashlyn. "So the ladies are vacationing in Europe. Two of them. And I'm staying here all alone?"

Nikki got up from the couch and went to her boyfriend, kissing him in greeting. "Well, you're needed as a top performer in your company and the BPD. In theory, you can still come with me?"

He took a deep breath and looked closely at Ashlyn. "We wanted to go to the UK next summer, Scotland and all," he explained to the younger woman. "Haunted castles in England. Chillingham Castle in Northumberland is supposed to be great. One of the most haunted places in England."

Ashlyn made a face. "Isn't that a bit pubescent, going to those haunted castles?"

He lifted his shoulders and took a sip from his glass. "We could combine it with a whisky tour. And we could also visit the Monsters of the Deep exhibition in Cornwall. Apart from that, The Chillingham chandelier is supposed to move at night."

Nikki blinked a few times and frowned a little. "So you pay for noise at night? I get that for free in a lot of places in Boston."

Mike rolled his eyes with a smile.

"Besides, I'm sure Florence will be haunted too," Ashlyn added, "the palaces there are old enough."

"Well, Florence," Mike said, kissing the young officer again. "Always a good idea, of course. The Uffizi is supposed to be much better now; there's even an American manager there. Salvini initially wanted to kick him out because he's not Italian, but the American did his job so well that he couldn't afford it."

"We'll see the Uffizi, of course, Palazzo Vecchio, Palazzo Pitti, all that." Ashlyn already had a guidebook in front of her.

"And when are you planning to leave, if I may ask, as an uninvolved outsider?"

"First thing tomorrow," Nikki replied with a frown.

"Tomorrow," Mike mumbled slowly and scratched his hairy chin thoughtfully. He'd been so busy over the last few days that he hadn't shaved.

Ashlyn rolled her eyes and slowly got off the couch, gathering her things. "It's okay, it's okay, I'll go so you two can ... say goodbye." She went to Benjamin and picked him up in her arms. "Come on, Ben, let's get you home."

"Ash," Nikki laughed, looking at her boyfriend seriously and giving him a pat on the arm, "please stay a little longer. Mike didn't mean it like that."

He laughed when he saw the look on Ashlyn's face and raised his hands apologetically. "I didn't; please stay a little longer."

"It's okay," Ashlyn replied as she tried to put her shoes on her little brother, who was sliding back and forth on her lap. "It's time for Ben to get home anyway, plus I have a few things to pack."

Nikki took a deep breath. "You sure?"

Ashlyn nodded slowly. "Yeah, sure." She walked over to the officer and kissed her sister on the cheek. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yeah," Nikki murmured, looking at Mike wide-eyed as Ashlyn and Benjamin left the apartment.

He laughed briefly and furrowed his eyebrows. "What?"

Nikki snorted and rolled her eyes.

xxx

Jane sat down on the couch in her living room, sighing loudly, leaned her head back, and closed her eyes.

"Rough day?" a more than familiar voice asked, and the Chief's head snapped back up. Maura came to her wife with two glasses of wine.

Jane took a deep breath and frowned a little before accepting one of the glasses. "Tough weeks. We all assumed, naively as we were, that the media storm wouldn't materialize. And now it's hitting us with full force." Maura sat down next to her wife and licked her lips. This storm had also hit her and her office, but not as severely as the BPD. "I'm surprised Bell hasn't already demanded my head on a silver platter."

"Would you stick your neck out?" the prosecutor asked.

"To protect the rest of the team? Without batting an eyelid," replied the Chief, sipping her glass. "I've achieved everything I wanted to achieve and much more in my career. Liz and Nikki, on the other hand --"

"Still have a long way to go," Maura added, pressing her lips together.

"Yes," the Chief sighed and furrowed her brows. "I'm partly to blame for this whole mess. If I hadn't agreed to this stupid idea --"

"Liz had still found a way to involve Melanie in the investigation without informing you, which would have made things worse and forced you to take far more drastic measures," Maura replied when Jane fell silent. "It might have forced you to disband Elizabeth's task force completely. Tying Nick to a desk, possibly transferring Nikki somewhere she'd be so unhappy that she'd end her young career as a cop, possibly terminating Elizabeth from the force, and dissolving the contract between the BPD and Katherine once and for all. Elizabeth --"

"I know Liz was trying to weave a safety net between herself and her team," Jane murmured, looking at her wife intently. "I didn't do it any differently back then; I was the safety net."

"You still are today," the greying blonde replied, raising her eyebrows slightly.

"The safety net?"

"That and part of Elizabeth's team; otherwise, she wouldn't have let you in on her every move."

"I don't know if I should be happy about that. It's just given me more gray hairs."

"Did you let your superiors in on everything back then?"

"No, because I knew they would try to put obstacles in my way."

Maura took a deep breath and looked closely at her wife. "Elizabeth, on the other hand, learned from your mistakes and involved you, didn't go behind your back."

Jane nodded slowly. "Yes, you're right. Still, the last case could have devastating consequences for everyone, and I have to enforce them."

"I wouldn't want to trade places with you," Maura replied, lifting her shoulders in a tight smile as the Chief looked at her. "Sorry."

The Chief nodded before she rolled her eyes and sipped from her glass.