Chapter Eleven: Backbone

Gone were the pumpkins and fall-colored wreaths.

Autumn had zoomed past in the blink of an eye, what with Maura's preoccupation with having Jane in her bed at least three nights out of every week. The love goggles had stayed on well past their honeymoon phase, which was a term that Maura didn't fully understand until one decent google search later… The silliness of it all, to think that the way she felt would last only months. No, Maura was content to spend years like this on her happy little Jane-shaped cloud.

The weather had cooled and the fireplaces both upstairs and downstairs had been put to good use.

The winter holidays in Odessa were cheery and rife with frosted windows, electric icicle lights and glass blown ornaments hanging everywhere. Maura tugged at her dark gray chesterfield coat as she stepped back out onto the street, rubbing her arms against the chill of the wind. Someone from inside the church behind her called out to say goodbye and she turned with a smile and a wave.

Alcoholics Anonymous meetings were a bit of a trial run at first, if she were being honest. Maura had dipped her toes with nearly four different groups until she found one palatable enough to continue. Her initial inquiries into the whole thing had been slightly discouraging, to say the least. A general practitioner in the area had mentioned (possibly half-heartedly) that "AA isn't for everyone" and as a result, she found it hard to let that go. Thankfully, the group she ended up with had a pretty widespread schedule and the atmosphere of calmness was a welcome respite compared to the previous overly caffeinated, chain-smoking jittery folk that crowded her former attempts at meetings. Maura had nothing against them, of course, it was just difficult to feel herself relax in the environments that had come before. While the unintentionally harmful saying "AA isn't for everyone" might be true for some people, Maura found merit in the meetings she regularly attended now and for that, she was thankful.

Jane was chittering in her ear exuberantly about having tackled someone at work the day before and Maura laughed. Her phone then vibrated with another notification about its low battery, and she groaned.

"Jane, my phone is dying. Let me let call you when I get back to the house."

"Alright, drive careful. Any ice on the roads over there?"

"Mmm, not so much in the city. What about you?" Maura sighed, waiting for an answer. "They preemptively salted the pavement everywhere, though…" The continued silence made her drop her hand to look at her phone and saw that its screen was blank. "Jane? Hello?"

Maura cursed quietly and tucked her now dead phone back into her coat pocket. Jane would just have to wait. Her exhaled breath billowed into a cloud as she stepped carefully off the curb and climbed inside of her car, and as she sat, she stilled in confusion. Where were her keys? Maura turned her head to look in the passenger's seat and realized that she had left her leather Prada shoulder bag there in full view of the parking lot. If she had made that same mistake back in Dallas, that bag almost certainly would have been gone by the time she got back into her car. Was that where her keys were? Why were they not in her pockets?

Out of nowhere, something cold and sharp nicked the underside of her chin when she leaned, and a gloved hand shot around to cover her mouth.

Maura's muffled scream amplified in the small cab of her car, its blood curdling effect ringing loudly in her ears. She lunged for the handle of her door, but the back of her head met the top of her seat with a small bounce, and she was pinned.

"Very unwise to leave your car unlocked at night, Maura dear." H spoke from where he hid himself in the backseat and slowly moved his hand to allow her to speak. Bold of him to assume that she wouldn't scream again. Maura swallowed and shot her eyes to her rearview mirror.

"Tell me, have you made friends?" He asked.

"What do you want?" Maura spat quickly, her chest heaving up and down with panicked breaths.

H smoothed the sharp instrument at her throat further onto its blunt edge and then leaned forward to speak a bit closer, "You know exactly what I want. Except this time, I need double the amount."

Maura scoffed, "Double? What on earth could you possibly—"

"It's best not to ask questions." He interrupted, jabbing the cold feeling of steel further into her neck. "Your dear old dad, he did the same and look where that got him…"

Maura felt lightheaded all of the sudden. She blinked rapidly past her state of shock and did her best to quell the angry twinge to her voice, "What are you talking about- Did…" She choked for a second, "Did you murder my father, H?"

H growled viciously and gripped her tightly by the throat this time, pulling her back against the seat as hard as he could. Maura thought that the next few seconds might be her last as a tear rolled from the corners of each of her eyes. She shook, clawing at the hand that obstructed her trachea. She couldn't breathe. Surely he wouldn't mean to kill her… Not if he still needed her? Maura thought of Jane and how torn apart she would be to find her like this, dead in her car on a bitter cold winter's night. Alone.

"I didn't have to kill him, the stubborn old coot worried himself to death. Am I really so frightening?" H asked with what sounded like a poor attempt at a pout.

Maura did her best to shake her head "no" desperately, and then the hand around her throat finally let go. She coughed and sputtered for breath, and then the dizzy spots behind her eyelids finally began to dissipate.

"Now," H continued, "Double the papers and drive into the north side of town morning after next." He instructed, reaching around to drop a burner phone into her lap. "I'll be in touch."

"I can't come up with that many names in such a short—"

"You will, or I'll pay a visit to our mutual dark-haired friend back east. Cute dog… What's its name, 'Wednesday' something?" His grotesque smile widened in the mirror, "I remember my first puppy…"

Maura knew damn well that H knew the name of Jane's dog. It was far likelier that he knew much more than that but chose to feign ignorance instead. Perhaps he did have a sense of self-preservation, after all. The man was not only cold, but calculating in nature. The thought of him anywhere near Jane filled Maura with a rage, which sent her own sense of self-preservation flying right out the window.

"You so much as even think to touch her and I will never give you anything ever again. You might as well cut my throat here and now, because I will not live in a world without her. That much I can promise you."

In the blink of an eye, something shot through the cushion of her head rest to come out on the other side right next to her ear. Maura froze. Before she knew it, one of the back doors of her car opened and the sound of road salt crunching under boot heels finally allowed her a full breath.

"Two days." H said before shutting the door with a firm -thunk-.

Maura slapped a hand over the lock button, smashing it with her pointer finger several times in a row just to be sure. She put her other hand over her heart and began to breathe deeply, amazed to still be alive. The pounding that came from behind her ribcage was so fierce that it was almost painful, and in that moment of eerie, heart-throbbing silence, all Maura could think about was how badly she wanted to run to Jane.

Her hands fumbled towards her coat pocket to reach for her phone, and she jabbed hurriedly at its screen to no avail.

Damn…

Nearly forgetting the sharp implement that had been stabbed through her seat's head rest, Maura carefully leaned out of its way and pulled it free. She couldn't believe what she held in her hands.

A scalpel?

…Is he mocking me?

Tears began to drip from her eyes, and her nose ran like a faucet. Was there truly no safe place for her? How far would she have to go? Maura's state of shock would last until she was safely behind the locked door of her bedroom and willing her phone to charge faster so that she could call Jane. That feeling of safety would be well on its way soon enough.

"Frost, did we get a hit on those prints?"

Jane turned back and forth in Maura's kitchen at just past two o'clock in the morning. She ran a tired hand through her dark and wavy hair which looked like it was in dire need of a brush run through it. The bags beneath her eyes weren't so much dark circles, as they were clear indicators that she carried a great deal of stress in them. It seemed that Jane had dropped everything when Maura was finally able to call her.

"What? Not even a partial?" She wheeled to a stop, tossing her hand in the air with a huff of frustration, "What about the burn phone?"

"Jane, what is he saying…?" Maura asked, tugging lightly at Jane's elbow to keep her from turning away again.

Among the few striking similarities that Jane and Maura shared, their habit of anxious pacing was held high among them. Where they differed was their work ethic. Maura of course was hard working, but Jane could be obsessive even to the point of detriment. She would forget to eat, refused to sleep, and at times could hardly finish a single conversation…

The detective shrugged out of Maura's grasp and then immediately turned to her in apology, realizing her neglect. She covered the speaker end of her phone with a hand and whispered, "Turns out it was just your prints. The rest is clean." Then her brow shot upward with the voice from the other end of the phone and she turned her attention away again, "Alright. Call me if you find anything." She finished with a nod, "Yep. See y'all in a bit."

"What else? There has to be something…" Maura asked, still feeling somewhat shaken up.

Jane sighed and rubbed her eyes with her thumbs. "Does the name Charles Hoyt mean anything to you?"

Maura shook her head at first, and then she stopped. Stricken with a sudden realization, she placed her hands flat upon the island counter and leaned heavily onto them. "The forged papers I told you about… They were all earmarked with the letter 'H'. It seemed to upset him when I brought it up as his name."

That unyielding urge to deaden her senses and to slow the rolling wheel of her mind grew stronger the more Maura catastrophized about her situation. She hadn't had a drink in weeks since her last upset, and the guilt from slipping even then seemed to pale in comparison to the addiction ever present within her body. Her first relapse so soon after her decision to become sober had rocked her world. Everything was a reminder. Maura's eyes began scanning over the whisky glasses in a nearby cabinet, the crystal ones of her father's that she had felt too hard pressed to throw out or to donate.

Jane noticed and reached out with a long arm to tap at the bottom of Maura's chin, capturing her attention once more. I was so wrong… Maura thought. This would be so much harder without her… She shook off her runaway train of thought a moment later and tried to tilt the corners of her mouth into a smile. All Jane did was give her a squint.

"Maura, have you been taunting your extortionist?" She asked with a deadpan expression.

"I—" Maura billowed a long-held breath and went to her elbows upon the counter, too exhausted to explain. "Yes?"

"Well, that's ballsy."

"I don't know what came over me—"

"Your backbone, maybe?" Jane suggested playfully, stepping slowly into her space and dotting a light kiss upon the top of her head.

Maura turned and folded herself inside of Jane's arms, feeling as though she could curl up and fall asleep there. "I suppose so."

"See, it's this long thing right about here—"

A set of fingers drummed their way up the length of Maura's spine on the outside of her silk pajama top, tickling her slightly. Maura wasn't exactly in the mood for Jane's clever sense of humor at the moment, but it did bode well for her nerves just to be touched by her. Every other thought in Maura's head ever since Jane had stepped into the house was "What if that's the last time I ever see her come sweeping in the door like that?" or "What if this is the last time I get to hear her voice?" The never-agains plagued her constantly, leaving little room for anything else.

What if tonight is the last night she ever kisses me?

Maura was tired of the ceaseless battle for ground within her own mind. It would do well just to leave it for a moment, if that were even possible. She rolled Jane's meteorite necklace between her thumb and forefinger, observing the tight leather-corded knot above it and how it looked so worn already as if Jane gripped it there frequently.

"Jane…"

"Yeah, baby..." Jane cooed, rubbing small circles into Maura's back now.

"This is such a nightmare." Maura sighed, her shoulders feeling heavier than ever, "Can we just… pretend for a moment?"

"Pretend- What do you mean?"

Maura shook her head, blinking her way towards some kind of explanation. "I don't know. Can we maybe pretend that we're not here?"

"…Alright." Jane gave an affirmative tuck of her chin, following Maura's line of thought a little better now. "Where would you wanna be?"

Maura gave a sad smile and then rested her temple back against the plane of Jane's wonderfully structured collarbone. "Paris. At the Hôtel La Comtesse. One of the suites there has the most perfect view of the Eiffel Tower..."

"Close your eyes." Jane whispered with a bow of her head.

Maura's eyelids fluttered shut. She breathed slowly, concentrating on each exhale. The steady beat of Jane's heart against her ear calmed her immensely as she was allowed to float away, as gentle as the Parisian wind. Jane's voice surrounded her…

"Do you see it?"

"Yes. It's beautiful…"

"Is it day or night?"

"It's the nighttime."

"Where are we?"

"…At the window. I can feel the warm breeze on my skin."

Jane's hands slid up the length of Maura's arms to turn her by the tops of her shoulders. Then they slid down the sides of her torso, delicately fingering over the little hills of her ribs. Maura could feel the warmth of Jane's breath upon the soft and exposed baby hairs of her nape and she sighed again slowly with each press of Jane's lips there. The feeling was electric, and it rooted her in the fantasy completely.

"What do you hear?" Jane asked as she smoothed her hands around Maura's waist. Her fingers crept inside the stretchy waistband of her pajama pants then and began to sink lower, but ever so slowly.

"There are people down below on the street. I'm not sure if they can see us…"

"Would you care if they did?"

Maura shook her head without hesitation. "No."

"How long have we been here?"

"Days. We've hardly left the room." Maura shuddered at the feeling of Jane's fingertips dipping inside of her underwear. She trapped her bottom lip between her teeth to stifle a moan.

"…And what have we been doing?"

Maura's lip escaped with a subtle -pop-, "Oh- this…"

"Just this?"

Maura nodded feverishly, rolling both of her lips into her mouth now. "Mhm." Her hips bucked unexpectedly against Jane when a finger alighted upon the sensitive pearl of her clit. Maura raked a sharp breath in through her nose and shivered again; She was working so very hard to maintain her composure. The trouble was that Jane —more specifically her damned and wonderful hands— knew exactly what she was doing. Maura was entirely at her mercy.

Jane leaned down to speak against the shell of Maura's ear then, her voice thick and liquid, "How many times have I made you cum like this since we've been here?"

"So many times—"

"D'you need to do it again?"

"Yes—" Maura gasped; her eyes shut to the world still. "Yes, please." She gulped down another breath and begged further, "Tell me again… Tell me that you love me."

"Mmm…" Jane hummed warmly into her neck as she slid a finger lower, teasing circles at Maura's entrance, "I love you," She whispered with a kiss,

"I love you…"

"I love you…"

"…I love you."

One of Maura's hands left the countertop and grasped behind her blindly, alighting it upon Jane's cheek to pull her into a kiss. The strained angle with which she turned her head to lick at Jane's lips only made her hungrier for them, that and the fact that Jane was making it a point not to push inside of her… it all turned her on more quickly and more intensely than anything she'd ever felt before.

"Can they see us now?" Jane asked, her breath buffeting against Maura's mouth. Maura wanted to swallow each and every syllable.

"Yes."

"Can they hear us?"

"Yes."

"Are you gonna cum for me, baby?"

"Yes…"

Jane's slow and almost cruel teasing with her fingertip nearly took Maura's knees out from underneath her. She cried out, gripping the rock hard forearm that was hugged around her ribcage and keeping her upright.

Just like that, all of Maura's tension left her body.

A rush of wetness filled the space of Jane's palm with the bucking of Maura's hips, some of it running hot and slick down the inside of her thigh. Every inch of her body tingled. Another first; Maura had never done that before. She looked down, the hot breaths of her panting falling just inside the front buttons of her shirt.

"Oh my God…" Maura huffed a laugh as she turned around carefully. The way her legs wobbled and her knees knocked together made her feel so very young again, and so very new at this. The massive rush of oxytocin and dopamine she experienced at the point of orgasm always made her feel a bit giddy in the short and delicate moments that came directly after… A shy smile or quiet giggle was almost a guarantee at this point in their relationship.

"Feel better?" Jane asked.

"Hmm… Much."

Satisfied, Jane balled her left hand into a glistening fist and held it behind her back as if it were precious to her. Her other went to brush some of Maura's hair out of her eyes and politely fixed the collar of her night shirt.

"I'm glad you're here…" Maura said.

Jane leaned down and gave Maura a peck against her cheek then. "I'll do everything I can to make it all go away. I promise."

"I know you will."