FIC: Acrimonious (16-1-2/21)
Title: Acrimonious
Author:
sirenofodysseus
Disclaimer: …it’s probably better that Bruno Heller owns The Mentalist, really.
Rating: NC-17
Summary: After FBI Agent Susan Darcy is overheard telling Special-Agent-in-Charge Luther Wainwright that Patrick Jane may be working with Red John, Red John steals Jane’s body and begins to destroy the team’s lives one-by-one.
Spoilers: Brief spoiler for Crimson Hat (4x24), but the rest of this story is set after Something Rotten in Redmund (4x20).
Warnings: Violence, language, drug use, sex, non-con situations, mentions of child abuse/domestic abuse, negative character portrayals, major and minor character death.
Pairings: Red John/Teresa Lisbon, Patrick Jane/Teresa Lisbon, Wayne Rigsby/Sarah Harrigan, Kimball Cho/Summer Edgecombe.
16 1/2-
“A fugitive, Brenda?” Lisbon seethed toward the woman in charge of Public Relations, as she slammed the first page of the newspaper down on Brenda Shettrick’s cluttered desk. “Jane’s been kidnapped. He’s not a fugitive of the law.” She watched Brenda glance up from whatever held her attention to stare at the newspaper.
“Teresa,” Brenda glanced at her. “Nobody is calling him a fugitive.”
“Bull.” Lisbon interrupted. “What does paragraph three say?” Brenda said nothing and Lisbon picked up the article again. “‘Mr. Jane, the consultant for the Serious Crimes Unit, has been on the run for fourteen weeks,’ said an anonymous source within the California Bureau of Investigation. He is wanted for questioning in connection to the Red John case, where Mr. Jane lost his wife and child back in 2003.'If you should see him,’ continued the anonymous source, ‘proceed with caution; do not try and apprehend him by yourself, as he is extremely dangerous. Instead, call your local law agency.’.” Lisbon slammed the article back down on her desk. “Tell me, Brenda, if that doesn’t spell out fugitive; I don’t know what does.”
“I’m only doing my job.” Brenda replied. “Director Bertram and Special-Agent-in-Charge Wainwright gave me the statement.” Lisbon rolled her eyes and crossed her arms against her chest. “If you have concerns with that statement, you should take it up with them.” Lisbon narrowed her eyes on Brenda, who went back to whatever she had been doing earlier. “People are more inclined to report a criminal than a kidnapped victim. Something you know very well, I’m sure.”
“This is slander.” Lisbon said, while she pointed at the bold headline. “You have no conclusive facts to…”
She watched Brenda glance back up. “I doubt Red John will strike from the information within this article, if that’s what you’re worried about.” Lisbon said nothing. If Brenda thought Red John was merciful, the woman was either naïve, delusional or stupid. Brenda laughed and Lisbon didn’t see how the idea of becoming another one of Red John’s victims was a thing to laugh about. “As for conclusive facts, Teresa, Louisa McKnight did her research in pursuing the material for this article. Calling an award-winning journalist a liar or telling the public all of her information isn't credible will only cause her to dig deeper and for the sake of your unit and the CBI, Director Bertram and myself agreed to give her enough to make her look elsewhere.
“Trust me, Teresa.” Brenda continued. “If you thought that was bad, McKnight’s research could have uncovered so much more than just where everything was recovered and whose DNA, aside from Patrick’s, was found on the bed sheets.”
Lisbon tried to stay calm at Brenda’s words, but the more the woman spoke, the more Lisbon wanted to explode. Just because forensics had found Jane’s blood and semen on the bed sheets and his fingerprints within the gloves didn’t mean a damned thing! Red John could have taken the blood and semen from Jane to frame him for Van Pelt’s rape; but even Van Pelt refused to believe Jane could do something like that. She understood the CBI’s need to minimize the damage as it was probably the number one rule in Public Relations, however, taking an innocent-and maybe even injured-man to place the blame on absolutely disgusted her.
Red John had raped Van Pelt, not Patrick Jane. And anybody who said or thought otherwise could go to hell, in her opinion.
“Personally, Teresa, this article does more for finding Patrick than the missing person’s statement I made nine weeks ago.” Brenda said and she rolled her eyes at Brenda’s ignorance, before she turned on her heels and left Brenda’s office in a huff.
Lisbon didn’t care that had left the newspaper behind or that her exit had been completely unprofessional as she stomped down the hallway and down the flight of steps, which led her back to the Serious Crimes Unit floor. She hadn’t intended to lose her temper with Brenda; the woman meant well and was only trying to do her job, but Brenda had control over what went into the media and that piece of tripe should have never been published in the first place. Logically, if Brenda didn’t agree with what everyone was whispering-Jane was Red John-she shouldn’t have gone to press with any slanderous material, confirmed information or not.
“…don’t need your help, Wayne.” Lisbon overheard Van Pelt’s voice, as she stepped into the kitchenette to find Rigsby pulling out a chair for the pregnant Van Pelt. She shook her head and hid her wistful smile as they both greeted her with the nod of their heads. Even though the pregnancy had come out of horrible circumstances, Rigsby and Van Pelt’s friendship had grown because of it. Rigsby had been there for Van Pelt since she had told him and Lisbon was positive that if Sarah hadn’t been in the picture, Rigsby would have jumped to be the father of Van Pelt’s unborn baby. Van Pelt, on the other hand, kept trying to push him away to focus completely on her work.
Outside of a few minor comments, Van Pelt hadn’t been too forthcoming with how she was doing, which bothered Lisbon. Instead of her trying to comprehend everything, Van Pelt had jumped straight from being a victim to numbing her thoughts under a pile of paperwork.
She tried to ignore the touching scene behind her as she poured herself a hot mug of coffee and drank it black, but she still caught half of their conversation.
“Do you need anything else, Grace? I have some crackers in my desk, in case you’re feeling nauseous.”
“I’m fine, really. Thank you, though.” Van Pelt said quietly. “I have a slight cold, but Dr. Koors said it was normal.”
Dr. Katherine “Kat” Koors was Van Pelt’s OB/GYN; Lisbon had supplied the doctor’s name after Van Pelt had shyly asked for recommendations weeks ago. In all honesty, she hadn’t been too surprised when Van Pelt had informed her of her decision to keep the baby, as Van Pelt probably didn’t believe in the concept of abortion due to her faith.
“And how is the baby doing?” Lisbon couldn’t help the smile at Rigsby’s change of tone. As a father, he had probably talked to Sarah’s stomach many times over the course of nine months and he had probably gotten plenty of smiles and laughs from her too. But the circumstances surrounding Van Pelt’s and Sarah’s pregnancies were completely different;
One welcomed the change with open arms, the other tried to pretend everything was fine.
“Content, right now.” Van Pelt answered. She sounded sad and tired, which didn’t surprise Lisbon either. Last week, they had stayed in a motel for a case and Van Pelt hadn’t slept for more than three hours. The lack of sleep and appetite also worried Lisbon to the point where she had reassigned Van Pelt to all desk duties, as the Junior Agent constantly had dizzy spells and the minor lapses in her attention span were dangerous out on the field.
“How are you doing, Grace?”
Van Pelt said nothing for a few moments, before she quietly responded. “I’m fine.” Without even glancing at her, Lisbon didn’t believe that for a second.
Neither did Rigsby, apparently. “You didn’t eat your lunch today. How do you expect to stay healthy and support your baby at the same time, Grace?” Van Pelt said nothing again. “You need to eat, even if you don’t feel like it.” Lisbon silently agreed with him. At fifteen weeks, she had learned from a quick search online, the expecting mother was supposed to have gained five pounds but Van Pelt kept losing weight.
The young agent had been skinny prior to her pregnancy, due to her height and exercise regimen. However, Lisbon feared that anymore weight loss would require a stint for Van Pelt in the hospital with a feeding tube shoved down her throat just to keep both mother and child alive.
Lisbon shuddered at the mere thought. She had seen the inside of enough hospitals to last for years; between her brothers, her father, Jane, Bosco, various individuals who couldn’t make statements at headquarters, herself and Cho, she didn’t want to imagine anymore of her people almost dying.
She heard a chair scrape across the floor again, when she felt her phone vibrate against her upper thigh. With a roll of her eyes toward the call, Lisbon pulled out her cell phone and held it to her ear.
“Sir, I…” Lisbon started in one breath. Brenda had the number to Bertram’s office and she wouldn’t put it past the woman not to have called the director’s office just to tell him about her behavior earlier.
“Teresa.” Jane’s voice interrupted her in a bare whisper and she about dropped her phone in surprise.
“Jane?” Lisbon asked. Rigsby and Van Pelt silent behind her as she set her coffee mug down on the counter. “Where in the hell are you? Everybody is…”
“Red John has me.” Those four words, a spoken confirmation of what she had already known, made Lisbon’s heart plummet into her stomach. Red John had kidnapped Jane to frame him and once she brought him back from Red John, the CBI would change their stories.
Clearing off a space before her and motioning for a piece of paper with a pen, she cleared her throat and asked. “Where?”
Lisbon had her gun out in front of her as she stepped through the doors to the old Oxley warehouse; the long hallway floor was littered with rat excrements, spider webs, dust, cigarette buds and broken beer bottles from the local teenagers who wanted a place to party.
For this being Red John’s hideout, she thought with the closing of another empty spider web-filled record office, it’s not as secure as I thought it would be.
“Anything?” Lisbon asked Rigsby and Van Pelt, who trailed behind her and searched the rooms on the opposite side of the dreary hallway. She heard one of them shut yet another door.
“Nothing yet.” Rigsby answered, while Van Pelt remained quiet. Lisbon hated the fact that she had to bring Van Pelt along, but she couldn’t trust anyone else within the CBI not to handcuff Jane the moment they stumbled across him.
“He has to be around here somewhere.” Lisbon muttered, while she opened another door to find absolutely nothing inside of the room except a few plastic chairs and a smashed vending machine and she sighed. Aside from the few clues that Jane had been able to give her, he had sounded awfully unsure of where the serial killer had been keeping him for the past fifteen weeks.
Van Pelt though, had been the one to put the clues of leather, some type of black cloth and an assortment of rusted machines together to lead them to Oxley’s Shoe Warehouse, which had been a good two-hour drive from Sacramento.
She heard Rigsby mutter something behind her and she threw him a quick glance over her shoulder. Rigsby gestured toward the door on her left side, which made her turn her body to stare into the rather large doorway.
In the middle of the large warehouse room, surrounded by rusted machines and broken glass on the floor, sat Patrick Jane in a lone chair. Lisbon pushed past Rigsby to get to Jane, who looked no worse for wear with his head bowed and his hands tied behind his back.
Please God, Lisbon hoped silently, don’t let him be dead.
She tucked her gun into her holster, as her hand came into contact with his shoulder. “Jane? Jane? Are you alright?” Lisbon watched his head move until his bluish-green eyes met hers and she sighed in relief at his smile. Jane was fine, everything would be okay. “We need to put a GPS on you.”
Jane chuckled, quietly. “Don’t you keep track of me enough, Lisbon?” He wore a bright smile on his sleep-deprived face and she couldn’t help but smile faintly in return. “Untying me would be helpful though.” Lisbon quickly nodded before she stepped behind his chair and effortlessly freed his hands from the thick rope with a few tugs. “How much do I owe you?” Jane didn’t stand up right away and Lisbon offered him her arm, which he slowly took.
“Come on, Jane.” Lisbon told him, as she helped him up from the chair. He took his time getting up and she feared that Red John had somehow injured him. “We need to leave.” Lisbon couldn’t see any visible injuries, but that didn’t mean anything. Red John could wait until after they had all gotten far away and after Jane had been cleared of all his crimes. She felt one of his arms snake around her waist and she continued to faintly smile; even though she would never admit it to him, she missed him and his touch.
“I’m afraid we can’t do that, Teresa.” Jane replied. Lisbon turned her head slightly to glance at him with her eyebrows raised, before she watched him pull away from her with a frown. If the idiot was trying to save them all by playing the hero, she’d kill him.
“What are you…?” The words died on her throat as her vision was met with her gun in Jane’s hand. “Jane? What in the hell are you doing?” She hadn’t even felt him take her gun. How had she not felt that? Jane’s touch on her thigh had never been exactly light. He said nothing. “Put that down. You might…”
“Kill someone, Teresa?” Jane asked still with a smile. She watched his hand move the gun slightly. “Trust me; I know exactly what I’m doing. I am, after all, a consummate professional with any and all weapons.” Lisbon stared at him in confusion. Jane hated guns; he had only fired one twice. The first time, he had dropped the gun after having saved her life. The second time, he had sat the gun down gingerly on the table. “The gun,” he moved his hand again as if he was testing the weight of the gun, “is a weapon worthy of admiration, don’t you think?” He stared down at the gun; and in the daylight from the broken and dirty windows, the light reflected off the metal. “But you really should see what I can do with a knife; a kitchen knife, to be exact.”
Lisbon stepped backwards in horror.
No, her mind screamed, he can’t be.
“Don’t look so contrite, Teresa. I’m still the same man you fell in love with.” Jane told her as he stepped closer to her. “I’m still the same man you fucked with that filthy little mouth of yours. The same man you begged to fill your insides months ago…” Lisbon’s face burned with embarrassment and shame. Rigsby and Van Pelt were behind her, listening to every single word and she could feel their judging stares on her back.
She had worked with Jane for years and yet she hadn’t been able to figure out he was Red John? Lisbon felt her stomach twist into knots. How had she missed it? She had spent countless days, hours and minutes with him and he was the serial killer that they all had been after for years? She felt disgusted with herself. As the Senior Agent of the Serious Crimes Unit, she had been expected to see the things that no one else could see and she had failed miserably at her job; she was responsible for the lives of three others and she had constantly put them in danger by not seeing the signs.
If there were any, Lisbon thought.
But who was she trying to fool? Of course there had been signs. Jane had spent hours alone in that little attic of his, he had put himself in the middle of the Red John case and he had gotten close enough to destroy them all.
Lisbon frowned. Was she an idiot for having thought the best of him? Jane had always talked about revenge and she had thought she could change him by keeping him close, by listening to him and following his every whim, but he had apparently been playing her the entire time with his golden smiles, the birthday gifts, his kindness and his love for her.
Red John has him hypnotized, Lisbon told herself. Jane had lied to her many times, but his love for her had been written all across his face and she knew the dilation of the pupils couldn’t be manipulated. She wanted so desperately to believe that she hadn’t been wrong though; Jane was a good person, even if he was just a little misguided in his ways and he most certainly didn’t have it in him to be a serial killer.
Or did he?
He had killed Timothy Carter in cold blood, before he had sipped at a cup of tea and had asked the barista for the check in front of five-hundred or more people. Wainwright had apparently told Jane he was a fully-functioning psychopath after he had first taken over the CBI, but Lisbon had never thought much of it. Jane, to her, had always been a mourning husband who had only wanted to get the justice that he thought the law would never provide toward Red John and Wainwright’s analysis had been based off the concept of a five minute surface read.
She continued to step backwards, as he continued to close the space between them.
If Red John hypnotized him, Lisbon connected silently; Jane won’t be able to do anything that goes against his moral character.
Her heart swelled in her chest.
Jane wouldn’t hurt Rigsby or Van Pelt, no matter what Red John had suggested for him to do. Jane didn’t want to hurt his family, who had followed him into every sticky situation out of loyalty and friendship for one another; he only wanted to kill Red John.
He also wouldn’t hurt her.
Lisbon watched him take another step forward; her gun in his hand still pointed straight at her. She continued to step backwards until she bumped into someone and she turned her head slightly to find Van Pelt, who had her arms wrapped around her stomach. Lisbon couldn’t even imagine what was going through Van Pelt’s head, as the woman looked as if she had seen a ghost; an expression of fear was etched across her colorless skin and her brown eyes were opened wide, focused completely on Jane. Lisbon tried to glance for the woman’s gun, but it was nowhere to be seen.
“Hello, my little pet.” Jane greeted Van Pelt, gently. Lisbon brought her focus back to Jane, who stood a few feet away from them both. “Did you enjoy our lovely time together? I know I did.”
She tried to keep the surprise off her face. They had already known what Red John had done, but to hear it coming out of Jane’s mouth-in Jane’s voice-sent her skin crawling. Red John was probably trying to get a rise out of all of them by making Jane admit to all of the serial killer’s crimes and Lisbon wondered how God could have allowed such a monster into the world. It didn’t matter that the world needed a balance of light and dark to function properly, she just wanted one less psychopath in the world.
Lisbon noticed Jane’s eyes dart to the right of them both, which almost made her sigh in relief. Jane’s attention had been distracted from Van Pelt, who she could feel shaking behind her, to Rigsby. Aside from trying to keep Jane from being shot, Lisbon knew her number one goal was to keep both Van Pelt and Rigsby alive.
“And Agent Rigsby.” Jane spoke again. “I can see why you were attracted to her; she had such an excellent body, until the little slut managed to get herself knocked up.” Red John knew Van Pelt was pregnant? She had thought that no one, aside from herself and Rigsby, knew about what had happened. Lisbon glanced back at Van Pelt; the woman had her head bowed and Lisbon knew that if they were going to get out of there alive, Van Pelt’s suddenly found submissive behavior-after all of the independence and the anger that O’Laughlin’s death had brought her-wouldn’t help them at all. Rigsby remained silent and Lisbon focused her attention back on Jane, ready to tackle the gun from his hand. “The taste of her cunt was nothing like Teresa’s though. Teresa’s never tasted of other men, as Teresa has never been a whore.”
She saw something move out of the corner of her eye and she hoped that Rigsby had gone for his gun. Lisbon opened her mouth to say something, when she watched him tilt his head and smirk in Rigsby’s direction.
“Saving the damsels in distress, Agent?” Jane asked. Rigsby said nothing, but Jane’s smirk grew. “Go ahead and pull the trigger, Wayne.” Lisbon saw Jane throw his arms out wide, but she couldn’t grab the gun from his hand without knowing what Jane had planned for them all; and it also wasn’t safe to rush into the situation without knowing if there were more than four people within the room. “But you should keep this in mind. If you pull yours, I will pull mine.” His finger moved to squeeze the trigger and her heart skipped a beat. Jane had pulled many stunts over the years with a gun, but he never tried to pull a stunt with a loaded gun-especially when it was her loaded gun. “And I assure that I do not want to hurt any of you…”
“You son of a bitch!” Jane glanced away from Rigsby and stared at her in surprise, as he brought his arms back to his sides. Lisbon hid her smile of triumph; the more she distracted him, the more chances she had to keep anybody from dying.
“I don’t think I was talking to you, Teresa.” Jane coolly replied. Lisbon met his gaze, deprived from all its usual warmth, and she tried to calm her frantic heart with the reminder that he wasn’t himself.
“Too bad.” She crossed her arms against her chest.
Jane lost his smirk. “I don’t think you’re in any place to speak your mind, my dear.” Keep him calm and do whatever he asks, the two most important rules in hostage situations, were the two rules that she had to break to keep them all safe. She knew Jane, she knew how he worked and she knew nothing better would distract him than a good blow to the ego.
“Or you’re just afraid of what I have to say.” Lisbon responded, before Jane raised his eyebrows.
“I’m not afraid of the words provided by the world’s most oblivious and ignorant Senior Agent the CBI has ever had.” Jane said and Lisbon flinched at his words. Whether or not they held any truth to them, his words still stung. “Tell me, Senior Agent Lisbon, how is it that you could spend hours sucking my cock, licking me clean and have absolutely no knowledge of what happens in hours afterwards?”
“What…?”
“Oh, please.” Jane interrupted her with the wave of his gun less hand. “You saw the boxes of sleeping pills within my apartment, Teresa. How many pills were missing from the boxes, hm?” The forensic report had said ten pills taken from the tiny packages by Jane, months apart. Forensics hadn’t been able to narrow down when they had been taken, but she hadn’t been too worried. Jane was an insomniac, after all. “Ten, right?” Lisbon slowly nodded. The report hadn’t been locked away in some obscure location as the Red John case files had been. Red John, like Brenda Shettrick or any other employee within the CBI, could have gotten their hands on the report without so much as a single word. “Then again, maybe that’s why you never noticed. All of those sleeping pills in your system for weeks; a small amount stirred into coffee doesn’t change the taste. It goes undetected.”
Lisbon furrowed her brows. Sleeping pills? She had stopped taking sleeping pills after she had joined the police academy, as any type of drug-aside from general pain relievers to keep headaches at bay-affected her ability to do her job properly.
“Your headaches, your memory lapses, the constant amount of anxiety that you felt. How did you not correlate your constant exhaustion to the meals I made for you?” Jane continued, before he sighed. “You really are ignorant, aren’t you? I thought there was more to you than just what you could do with your legs, but I guess I was wrong…”
She tried to keep her calm, even though the idea of him drugging her with anything made her want to vomit. After Carmen had drugged her cups of coffee in their weekly sessions, she had confided in Jane that she was weary of anyone buying her drinks. Jane had told her nobody on the unit would drug her; as they all cared about her and none of them had the gall to do it either. Lisbon had taken his word on the basis of trust and in doing so; she had started to allow him to buy her coffee again.
He’s not himself; she continued to remind herself, as Jane would never drug me.
But even she couldn’t be so sure anymore. Jane would have never insulted her or Van Pelt, he would have never stolen her gun without reasonable cause and the Jane she had known would have never betrayed her like this.
Hypnotism could never make someone change their moral character and Jane’s was changing left and right.
“You’re Red John.” Lisbon whispered. She could no longer deny the facts.
Jane said nothing for a moment, until he beamed. “Very good, Teresa. I can see that you’re finally catching up with the class.” Jane had raped Van Pelt. Jane had killed his wife and child. Jane had killed Bosco. “Maybe you’ll learn better judgment of character next time,” he paused, “if there is a next time, of course.” Jane had instructed Hardy to kill her. Red John had been right under her nose, obsessing over himself the entire time, and she hadn’t even seen it. She tried to keep her head held high. She tried to keep herself from falling to the floor. She tried to keep the tears at bay, for the man she had loved had betrayed her and had played them all.
“Why?” Her throat had suddenly become tight with emotion.
“I needed some way to keep you out my way when I had places to be, people to kill,” Jane’s eyes flickered to Van Pelt, “women to rape.” He continued to smile, as he glanced back at her. “The sleeping pills made you compliant, Teresa. You would have thrown out evidence for me if I had asked you too, just because you loved me and you thought I loved you.” Jane snorted and Lisbon bowed her head toward the floor in shame. She had been warned time and time again not to let him cloud her good judgment and she had allowed for him to do just that.
How did I miss so much?
“Love? You?” She heard him scoff. “Why in the world would I want something so…” Lisbon felt his gaze on the top of her head. “…plain? You were a great fuck, Teresa, but women like you are a dime a dozen.”
At his words, she felt something inside of her break.
Jane had been playing her the entire time. His odd behavior months ago should have been more of a red flag, but aside from possible health issues, she hadn’t given much thought into it; instead, she had just given into his explanation that his change of behavior had been because he had reconsidered his actions toward them all. “I’m a changed man, Lisbon.” Jane had said and she been a fool to take him at his word.
“I hold all of the cards here, Teresa. You can’t win, unless I allow for you to do so.” Jane said. Lisbon brought her head back up to stare at him again. “You want to save everyone Senior Agent Lisbon; you’ll do exactly what I say.”
“Go to hell, you sick bastard.”
Jane’s smile became a smirk. “Very well. I gave you the chance to save your people and you refused, so what I do from here on in is all because of you.” She doubted he would kill any of them without cause. Rigsby still had his gun and if Jane tried anything, she knew Rigsby wouldn’t hesitate to blow his head off. Her stomach knotted again. Jane had been her best friend, regardless of who he was, and the idea of a bullet to his brain made her ill. “You already have so much blood on your hands, my love. You have Samuel Bosco’s, Grace’s, and Kimball’s prostitute friend, and Kimball Cho’s blood on your hands so far. Can you really risk having anymore?”
“Lisbon didn’t kill anyone!” Rigsby cut in. “Cho was…”
“I know, Wayne.” Jane replied. “Who do you think set off the bomb though? I can tell you that it most certainly wasn’t me.” He continued to smirk, as she watched him throw his arms up in the air. “Your fearless leader, who just couldn’t let me unstick the space bar, blew Cho and his prostitute friend to kingdom come.”
Lisbon felt her stomach lurch at his words and the back of her throat became overwhelmed with an acidic taste, before the little breakfast she had eaten that morning hit the floor at her feet. She heard Jane laughing over the sounds of her retching; the strong smell of her sickness burned at her nostrils as she glanced away from the colorful mess on the floor to wipe her mouth with the back of her hand.
“You see, Wayne, she isn’t vomiting out of the knowledge that I had the bomb placed under his car.” Jane spoke, before Lisbon had the chance to say anything. “She’s vomiting because she knows she played a part in his injury. He’s crippled for the rest of his life and now unable to pee unless he uses a bag, because of her.” Jane shook his head with a laugh. “And you all say I’m cruel. I had Summer shot and Teresa detonated the device before my accomplice could help Cho out.”
“I didn’t…” Lisbon started. She hadn’t known anything about the bomb. She hadn’t meant to kill anymore. She had just thought she was helping Jane and she had grown annoyed with his constant beating on the keyboard. Her lip trembled as she tried to push back the tears and the guilt that gnawed at her stomach again.
“You didn’t what?” Jane asked, almost mockingly. “Know? Mean to? Save the excuses, Teresa. You had your chances to prevent all of this, yet you and your team followed me into the darkness every time. If anybody deserves to be shot, it’s you.”
He cocked the gun in her direction and she closed her eyes, waiting for the pain.
Truth be told, she thought, I always thought my death would be at the hands of Red John or Jane.
“However,” Jane continued. “If I used this bullet on you, others might think I reward my friends for their stupidities with death. So no, Teresa. I’m not going to kill you, because the worst,” she heard him approach and she felt his hand on her face, which made her shiver, “is yet to come for you. You’ll lose your job because of this. You’ll lose all of your friends, because you could have stopped this. And when you eventually think about killing yourself, as I’m sure you will, you will see all of the faces of the people you’ve killed. You will also see my face; hear my voice, telling you how much you deserve to suffer.” She felt his hot breath against her ear. “And how better to suffer than to continue living with the guilt of your crimes, hanging around your neck, much like your beloved cross?”
Lisbon opened her eyes as she heard him walk away, while her hand brushed idly against her displayed cross.
“If I can’t kill you right now, Teresa. I should kill little Gracie, don’t you think?” Lisbon watched Jane point his gun in the direction of Van Pelt, who remained silent. “Two deaths for the price of one. A mother whore and its demon, cursed with my eyes and her hair.” Jane shook his head slowly. “Do you think I should give her mercy, Teresa? After all, she will think of me every day that she raises her little babe; its little mouth leeching onto her pendant breasts and drinking her milk, much like I drank at her blood.” Lisbon said nothing. “The babe will grow and ask about its father. And what will you tell it, Gracie?” Jane paused, as if he actually expected Van Pelt to answer his question. Van Pelt remained silent. “The truth? That you deserved to be raped with how you spread your legs for Dan, for Wayne, for Craig. Or a lie? Your father died before you were even born…”
“Shut up!” Lisbon interrupted.
Jane ignored her. “Will you resent your child for being the devil’s spawn, Grace? Do you sometimes think of it, draining all of your energy from within the womb, and wish that you believed in the concept of abortion or will you become a killer the moment those precious eyes open to a bluish-green mix? If you do kill the poor child, I am sure that you will use your fists, because my fists were used to bruise your skin.
“You’ll hit and hit and hit, until there’s nothing left to hit. You’ll see the bruises, the blood, you’ll hear the cries and then the silence and all of it will remind you of what I did to you and you will feel relieved, because you will think that you have finally won.” He paused to shake his head again. “But you’ll never win, Grace. I’ll be in your dreams, haunting you no matter where you go. I’ll be the touch you strive to remember and the touch you strive to forget, as you try and wash me away with hours under the scolding hot water. I’ll be the reason why no man will ever want you, because who in their right mind would want the sloppy seconds of a rapist?”
Behind her, she heard Van Pelt start to sob. Lisbon wanted to turn around and wrap her arms around the young woman, who hadn’t needed to hear any of that, but Jane spoke again before she could.
“So, no Teresa.” Jane repeated over Van Pelt’s heart wrenching sobs and Lisbon wanted to kill him. “I’m not going to kill Grace, because she’ll be living with the consequences of her actions for years to come.” She watched him point his gun at the floor. “I’ll be surprised if the cunt makes it past her pregnancy, to be honest. Grace always was the weak link within our little family...”
“You don’t know anything!” Lisbon stated and she watched Jane roll his eyes. Yes, the comeback had been rather weak, but her thoughts were everywhere and she had no clue of what to even say.
--
Part Sixteen 2/2