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 5
Jane entered the house, and pulled the rug on top of which the two bodies had fallen. She used the rug to slide slowly from the main room, maneuvering it through the corridor, and then the kitchen. She rolled the rug to pass through the door.
Maura joined her to help dragging the rug with the bodies to the improvised grave. They opened the rug, and carefully pushed the two bodies inside. Maura gently arranged limbs to fit the tight space. When she stood up, Jane whispered "Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. May your souls rest in peace.", making the sign of the cross. Then, she looked at Maura, who nodded at her, and Jane used the spade to push the dirty back on top of the bodies, covering them and the hole, and pushing even the snow on top of it. After another night of snow, nobody except them would know there was a grave there.
Jane stored the tools on the shed, bolting it again, and then dragged the bloodied rug inside the house again – she didn't want to have any obvious sign that someone had been there visible from the outside.
She kept the door opened for Maura to follow her inside, and brought in their bikes.
"It is almost 6AM, and the first light of the day will be in the sky soon. We should stay here today, and we leave tonight."
Maura just nodded. They did need to rest. Fifty-two miles biking had been a huge effort in itself. Digging a grave another huge effort. Their bodies were screaming for them to lay down and get some recovery time.
Jane asked Maura to wait while Jane swept the other rooms in the floor level. Everything had been sacked, the library had most of the books spread on the floor, but there seemed to be nobody in the house. Just in case, Jane kept the Swiss knife blade open and ready to be used.
She nodded to Maura, and motioned for Maura to wait while Jane went to check upstairs. She checked the right and the left wing, and found the same destruction. Mattresses had been torn apart and everything was spread over. It was the same in every room. But it was all clear.
Jane walked downstairs.
"It is all clear, Mau…" when she was cut short.
Maura was wide-eyed looking urgently at her, a tall German soldier was behind her, holding her against his body, a hand covering her mouth firmly. The man was unkempt and dirty.
Jane had her left hand with the Swiss knife blade behind her body because she was still on the stairs.
"Please… Let her go."
He barked something in German.
Jane looked at Maura, puzzled.
He removed his hand from Maura's mouth, but moved it to her neck.
"He wants food." Maura hoarsed.
"We have food. It is on the backpacks. Take them. It is all yours." Jane urged.
Maura translated to him in German, motioning with her head to where the backpacks were.
He dragged Maura with him, Maura yelping in pain.
Jane used the chance to slowly get down the final stairs, the blade invisible to him.
He sat on the floor, yanking Maura to sit by his side, and opened the provisions Jane and Maura had brought, gorging on them as a famished man would, but with one strong hand keeping a choking grip on Maura, who was looking terrified at Jane.
As he gorged on the food, he kept speaking incoherently, and Jane noticed Maura's face turning red. She wondered if it was because he was choking her inadvertently, but then Maura told Jane very quietly.
"He did it." Fire in her eyes, her jaw set.
That man had been the one who killed Maura's parents. Whatever he had been mumbling, was what had happened in the house.
Jane nodded almost imperceptibly to Maura.
The man went through their provisions, consuming everything at an amazingly fast pace. They had prepared things as rations, knowing they couldn't carry too much, but he went through it as if there was no tomorrow.
When he finished the contents of the two backpacks, he still turned them inside out, as if hoping to find something else.
He threw the empty backpacks aside, and pulled Maura to him, pawing at her, speaking in German, and Maura started to struggle really urgently with all her physical mighty, yelling at him in German.
Jane didn't need translation to know the man had satisfied his stomach and now he wanted to satisfy his flesh. He opened the zipper of Maura's parka, his hand inside fumbling to squeeze her bountiful breasts. But he would only do that to Maura over Jane's dead body.
Jane approached quietly, and only when she was really close to them, she crouched with the knife on his neck. "Don't you dare touch her, you pig…" Jane vociferated.
He pushed Maura from him, and Maura rolled away, scrambling to her feet, panting and hyperventilating, her body shaking in fear and rage. The man bored his cold blue eyes in Jane's, and made a motion to stand up. Jane pushed the knife towards his throat, but her hands were pained with the cold, and both hands and arms were tired after the hours they had spent biking and digging. She managed to make a deep cut on his throat, drawing blood, but he managed to disarm her before the damage was enough to kill him, the blade clinking as it hit the floor.
They moved to hand combat. Jane was tall, but the man was taller and much stronger than her. He pushed Jane against a wall, moving his two hands around her neck, and banging the back of her head against the stone wall repeatedly. Jane yelped, her hands pushing his face and beating him, her knees raised trying to kick him in the groin. When Jane began seeing dark spots on the edge of her vision, she despaired – if he won, he would have Maura. And mad as he was now, he would hurt Maura even more. Jane tried to double her efforts, but air was lacking, and everything went dark.
Maura had watched the exchange as she tried to control her shaking. When she saw the man gaining advantage over Jane, she knew she needed to help. Her eyes immediately found the glint of the discarded blade. She picked it up with her gloved hands, her mind flashing the best way to hold that type of blade and what type of cut to use to inflict the most damage.
Maura flexed her fingers around the blade, her hand and arms tired with the biking and the digging, but she needed to do this. He had confessed to killing her parents. He had just been about to rape her. He was about to kill Jane.
She approached from behind silently, and sank the blade to the hilt, in a swift movement between his shoulders to the left, and then dragged it down all the way to the small of his back. He gasped and sunk to his knees, before falling face down, convulsing lightly in the throes of agony. Maura would not finish the job quickly. He could enjoy the last few moments of his life in as much pain as she could have inflicted.
Her attention immediately switched to Jane, who had slid to the floor like a ragged doll when the man stopped holding her throat with both hands to fight for his life, a trail of dark blood left on the wall where her head had touched it. Jane's unruly curly hair, that had been tied before, was lose and covering her face, her head lolling forward as she sagged against the wall.
Maura kneeled by her side, her hands frantically trying to push Jane's hair back so she could see Jane's face. She muttered when her gloved hand could not detect a pulse, adrenaline pulsing through her veins, and the tears spilling through her eyes. Maura cupped the back of Jane's head and tilted it back, her other hand holding Jane's clefted chin and pulling it down, and then Maura covered Jane's open mouth with hers, trying to provide the precious air the soldier had choked out of Jane.
Maura tried to control her panting to push as much air into Jane's lungs as she could. After she did it twice, she felt Jane's lips move beneath hers, and Jane's tongue found hers. Maura felt relief wash over her. Jane was alive. But it was more than that. She felt warmth and peace and grounding. Maura realized she had involuntarily kissed Jane. And Jane had unconsciously kissed her back. And as good as it felt – and God, it felt good – Maura broke their connection, concerned about what she was doing, how it made her feel, and how Jane would react if she regained consciousness.
Maura should not have feared about this last part, Jane was still mostly out of it, panting and sucking in air and sputtering as she tried to breath.
Air. Warm blessed air. Oh. And soft lips. And salt… Tears? Why tears? Oh, God, this tongue is delicious. Wait… And a tongue? Jane's mind was reeling in confusion as she tried to fight the darkness enveloping her. When the dark spots cleaned from Jane's vision, she saw the man was sprawled at her feet, her pocketknife stuck in the bottom of his back in the end of a long and deep and precise cut. A cut that had opened his back from top to bottom as if he was an animal to be slaughtered.
Jane looked up to find Maura kneeling by her side, her gloved hands bloodied, shaking as if she had a high fever.
"Maura?" Jane's voice was barely a whisper, hoarse, her throat burning after almost being strangled bare handed by the soldier.
Nothing.
Jane tried again.
"Maura?"
Maura raised her haunted eyes to Jane.
"He did it, Jane. He was mumbling about how he came into the house. How they tried to convince him to take whatever he wanted and leave. And how he killed them with the last ammunition he had." Maura spoke, disgusted, tears rolling unchecked through her face.
Jane swallowed hard. She was feeling really sick with the pounding pain in her head. She picked a dusty dish towel from the sink by her right, and cleaned Maura's gloves from the soldier's blood. Then, she pulled the blade of the Swiss pocketknife free from the body, and cleaned it as well, closing the blade and placing it back inside her boot.
"He also spoke how they killed everyone in every house of every village and city across the border, before moving forward. He was a deserter." Maura spoke in a small voice.
"He was a coward, and a war criminal. And you killed him. Thank you for saving my life." Jane panted in barely a whisper.
"Thank you for saving mine."