Follow The Yellow Brick Road (7/11)
Previous Parts: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six
Eventually they were let back inside and they reconvened in Jane’s room. It was hardly surprising that Jane was at least partially involved with the alarm going off; the man was a magnet for trouble. Still, her heart broke when she saw Jane in such a state because of the letter he’d received. It was obvious to her that Red John wasn’t responsible for the delivery; the serial killer had been with her when Jane had received the note. She would have said that it was overconfident for someone like John, but then again, he had been in the building at the time, despite knowing full well the hotel was housing several CBI agents. Jane’s reaction was strikingly different to any she had seen from him beforehand. The false bravado and cocky arrogance had disappeared in an instant.
But what really struck her was just how surprisingly similar to John that Jane really was. It was funny how quickly she found these conclusions sprung to her head. Especially so given the fact that she had barely known Jane for any time at all. Both were proud, arrogant, almost painfully so. They both wound her up and didn’t really care about the repercussions of her anger. Neither of them could be told what to do, for it was inevitable that they would never listen. And they were emotionally stunted, one way or another, albeit for very different reasons.
Lisbon watched, as her team listened in horror to Van Pelt reading the contents of the note. She had to give it to the author; it had been very well researched. Although, she was grateful that it wasn’t so well researched that it had dropped another bombshell. One that she feared that somebody would reveal at any given time. The thing that would turn her life upside down. It was selfish, she knew that, but every time Red John was around, her self-preservation instinct kicked in. It was something she couldn’t fight against, something she had needed to get through her hellish childhood. Or at least, that was the excuse she continually repeated to herself. How else would she have managed to get through her life in one piece without fiercely defending herself from outside influence?
When she left, Lisbon told him to get some rest because she genuinely didn’t know what else to say or do.
Sometimes, she almost forgot about the human cost behind her friend’s actions. Or at least, she chose to ignore it because it was easier that way. And this was a more painful reminder than most.
xxx
However much he had pissed her off at the start, she slowly but surely found herself beginning to enjoy Jane’s company at work.
Yes, his techniques were a little odd, but they worked. It had meant her team’s closed case record had shot through the roof. Like so many other things, she pretended the fact that the complaints hadn’t equally skyrocketed, because that just made for depressing reading. And besides, Lisbon was slowly becoming convinced that Jane’s expertise outweighed the problems that he caused. Jane made the CBI look good to the media and therefore, increased their profile considerably. That made Public Relations happy, that made Minelli happy and because it kept them off her back, it made Lisbon happy.
Besides, he made everything a little more fun. It always intrigued Lisbon, watching the way he worked out a case. Jane looked at the world in a different way to other people, much like somebody else she knew, and that was what meant he noticed the small things that she and her team may have overlooked. And not only that, but he made it a little more fun. Sometimes, Lisbon felt like she had the weight of the world pressing down on her shoulders and forgot to make time for herself. Slowly, but surely, Jane was teaching her otherwise.
Or rather, they spent time in each other’s company, instead of wallowing in self-pity, alone, as they may have done so instead.
“I bought you a coffee.”
“Thanks, Jane,” she answered absent-mindedly, her eyes fixated on her computer screen. “Hang on. What have you done?”
“Me? Nothing.”
“Why did you just buy me a coffee then?”
“Can’t a co-worker innocently buy someone a coffee without there being a reason behind it?”
He slouched in the chair opposite her and Lisbon raised a skeptical eyebrow. Eventually she stopped typing in order to observe her consultant properly. She knew that she couldn’t trust him as far as she could throw him and that was the point. If he was trying to buy her off with caffeinated beverages, she knew she wanted to know why so that she could carry out damage limitation while drinking it.
“Ordinarily, yes. But when you’re involved, not so much.”
“I’ve bought you coffee before.”
“Only when we’re out in the field. Or if you‘re buying one for everybody,” she swiftly pointed out.
“I thought it’d make a nice change. I know how much you despise the coffee they supply you with here, even if you can’t stop yourself from drinking it.”
“Oh really?”
“Yes, really. Can’t you accept the gesture without getting suspicious, woman?”
Lisbon immediately felt her cheeks reddening a little and instead, buried her head in the coffee cup to try and disguise the blush. When Jane smirked back at her in response, she knew that she had failed dismally but she didn’t care. Sometimes, despite his claims otherwise, she genuinely believed that he was a psychic. He just had a way of knowing things that others simply did not have and he was relatively unwilling to teach any of the others these supposed skills. It was only natural that she therefore believed that they were partially inherent, something he couldn’t help but too.
She looked up when Cho knocked smartly on her office door. Carefully, she placed the coffee down and observed her second with interest. Jane quickly made his excuses, stating something about them doing boring cop work and disappeared. Automatically, she assumed that he, therefore, had something to do with whatever Cho was interrupting them about. After all, if he didn’t, he would probably have stayed put, if only to listen into their conversation. One thing she knew about Jane was that he had to know everything that everyone was getting up to, otherwise he wasn’t happy. Part of her suspected that he was constantly on the lookout for blackmail material and considering what she knew, it meant she was almost always constantly on edge around him.
“Boss, Minelli wants to see you. Something about Jane telling small children that Santa is dead?”
xxx
“You’re the Good Witch Glinda, obviously,” Jane had said.
Lisbon furrowed her brow slightly as she headed straight to her office. The thought had settled uneasily in her stomach. How was she meant to feel about that? If she was the Good Witch Glinda, what did that make John? The Wicked Witch of the West? But he wasn’t wicked, not really. He was just… human, like everybody was. It just happened that he had made bigger mistakes than most and refused to admit to them. However, she automatically knew that Jane would like that implication. After all, he only knew the one side of Red John. The serial killer, the one who had cruelly snatched his family away. Part of her knew that Jane pretty much saw a demon or devil whenever he thought of Red John, regardless of however much he insisted he was an atheist. That may well have been the case, but there were still some religious images that even atheists cannot resist to cling onto in times of trouble. And that of the devil was just one of those.
It also hurt her more than she cared to admit that he had decided to throw it all in, to desert them. Yes, elements of working with him made her life a little harder, but she had also appreciated everything he’d done for her - and her team - as well. Lisbon hadn’t even realized just how much she had enjoyed his company and learning from him until the chance to carry on had been unwillingly taken away from her. What they needed was a link between Renfrew and Red John.
There was a very obvious way she could have attempted to find one. However, that meant playing one person she cared about against another.
Then again, if she was going to allow herself to get close to Patrick Jane, that was a price she was always going to have to pay. He and John were at polar ends of the spectrum and practically wanted to destroy each other either figuratively or literally. As far as Lisbon was concerned, she was stuck between a rock and a hard place and there was very little she could do about it. Especially so as the further she got with her career, the more reluctant she was to give it all up.
And that was something she could only blame on herself. If she had only called in John’s first murder instead of covered it, then things would have been so much different.
But then, she wouldn’t have had either John or Jane in her life. Probably.
xxx
“I know it was you on the phone. Why did you do that to him?” she snapped, naturally furious at him. “Don’t you think you’ve put him through enough?”
John remained deathly silent. The Tijuana motel had been kind enough to supply the CBI with rooms while they cleared up the bodies of Renfrew and his hooker. Therefore, it was only natural that John had decided to lay in wait for them to arrive. When the cell phone had rang and she’d heard his all too familiar laugh, Lisbon knew that John wouldn’t have been far away. Eventually, when she’d had a moments peace, she had been the one to track him down in the bar, again, sipping at a scotch on the rocks. He’d offered her a warm smile, which dropped the moment she grabbed him by the arm and dragged him to a secluded spot on the balcony.
“Why not?” he eventually retorted. “Why didn’t you stop him from investigating the Renfrew case?”
“Why should I? You killed his family in cold blood! And besides, how the hell should I have known that you had connections with the Renfrew family? I’m not a psychic!”
“No, you’re not. But you once said you’d always be there for me; why not persuade him to drop it once you realized the connection?”
She racked her brains for the memory. Like Jane, John had the eerie capability of being able to remember the smallest of facts and information, ones that escaped the majority of people. Lisbon always hated it whenever either of them used that skill against her. It made her feel small, inferior. Like they could always use that detail against her. In a way, that wasn’t entirely too far from the truth.
“I was a kid; kids say stupid things like that,” she said with a frown.
“You’re not the woman I once knew,” John stated lightly, clearly disappointed by her lack of support.
“Of course I’m not, what did you expect? For me to remain exactly the same as you went on a rampage through California?” she retorted, with a hollow laugh. “Everyone is scared of you. That -- that…. You promised that that was a one-time deal. That you wouldn’t ‘accidentally’ kill anyone and look at you! You’re a serial killer now! And me? I’m still a cop. There’s no way that I can-”
“I just thought that, maybe…” he interrupted before trailing off.
“Well you thought wrong,” she answered back, “leave me alone, John. I mean it. Stop stalking me and my team.”
“Including Patrick Jane?”
“Especially Patrick Jane!”
xxx
“How’s the pony?”
Lisbon dropped a bit of her sandwich on her lap, before looking up at Jane. She thought that this sandwich shop was one of her little secrets and she had used it during her lunch breaks as respite from Jane and the team for a while. Obviously, as he sat opposite her, with a cheese and ham roll in hand, she had been wrong. Silently, she made a mental note to find a new secret hideaway, though she was sad to do so. She had always enjoyed the quaintness of this café and now, she wouldn’t be able to come back nearly as often.
“Fine,” she answered, albeit suspiciously. “Why?”
“Just wondering,” he replied with a typically bright grin, before taking a bite of his sandwich. “This place always does the best sandwiches, don’t you think?”
“Yes.”
“Can you actually form cohesive sentences, or can you only use words with no more than one syllable?”
“I’m trying to eat here!” she snapped, irritably.
“Well done,” he answered, albeit patronizingly, “and you’re not getting very far, eating that.”
“That’s because someone keeps disturbing me.”
“What? Who? I’ll talk to them.”
Instinctively, she rolled her eyes and took a bite. Sarcasm didn’t particularly suit Jane, but that didn’t always stop him from trying. Besides, she was still trying to hide her amusement, because in reality, she had still been hoping for that quiet lunch alone. With a sigh, she pushed half her meal away and stood to leave. Not because she hadn’t been enjoying it, nor because she was angry at Jane disturbing her. She had simply been keeping a very close eye on the clock and knew that she had to get back to the office.
“Where are you going? You haven’t finished your sandwich.”
“Work, of course,” she answered as she pulled on her jacket. “Where else would I be going?”
“I don’t know, somewhere interesting?”
“And here I was, thinking you knew everything.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Lisbon, of course I don’t know everything.”
“You coming?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, Lisbon headed straight for the door and simply expected him to follow. After all, that was what he usually did. Sometimes, she swore he had more in common with a Labrador puppy than the human race. He was annoying, demanding, sometimes seemed to have an obscenely short attention span and loyal to a fault. When he did indeed fall into step with her, but not without shoveling the rest of his food in his mouth, she smirked slightly. And he had the audacity to accuse her of being predictable on occasion.
“Are you really married to the job, or are you just trying to keep up appearances?”
“Now, you’re the one being ridiculous.”
“When was the last time you had a vacation?” he persisted and once again, she wished he hadn’t followed her.
“Last month. You know, when I…”
“Public holidays don’t count, Lisbon.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not healthy.”
She snorted in a very unladylike manner. As if he was one to judge, the hypocrite. Lisbon couldn’t recall the last time he’d had a day off, either willingly or due to illness. In fact, even when suspended, he somehow managed to sneak his way back onto cases, whether she wanted him to or not. Out of everybody she knew, he had the least right to accuse her of being a workaholic, when he was virtually the same.
“I do other stuff. I have a private life,” she eventually said, albeit stiffly.
“Really? Do tell.”
“No! It’s called a private life for a reason.”
“Now I’m just more intrigued,” he said, grinning. “What are you hiding from me, Agent Lisbon?”
“Oh, I could write novels about the things you don’t know about me,” she truthfully replied, hoping that he simply took it as banter.
“Now I find that hard to believe.”
“Of course you would,” she muttered under her breath.
Really, she was wondering just how much he knew about herself and John. Naturally, that was the biggest aspect of her life she was holding from him. Though Lisbon had told John (and herself) time and time again that their affiliation was long since over, there was still something niggling at the back of her brain. It wasn’t over; it never would be. Or at least, it wouldn’t be until one of them was six feet under. And even just because somebody was dead, it didn’t mean the truth wouldn’t necessarily find its own way out. Some stories just begged to be told, especially if somebody was desperate to hide the truth.
This was one that three people already knew about. How many more had to before it reared its ugly head to the masses? And to Patrick Jane, especially?
Soon, they were back in the office and Lisbon took that as a blessed relief. It meant she could stop over thinking every action and every word as she could escape Jane. Instead, she could continue making the mountain of paperwork on her desk considerably smaller. They were having a quiet spell, something which was good for the state of California. It meant that people weren’t killing one another, which was something everyone could be grateful for. Unfortunately, it meant her highly strung team grew bored and irritable, something which was somewhat less pleasant. At least she had the ability to hide away in her office while they annoyed one another.
“Oh I rescued this, by the way,” he said as he handed her the rest of the sandwich. “No point in seeing good food go to waste.”
“Give it to Rigsby, then,” Lisbon answered as she headed straight for her office. “He’s like a human trash can.”
“I’ll tell him you said that!”
“You do that!”
To Part Eight
Eventually they were let back inside and they reconvened in Jane’s room. It was hardly surprising that Jane was at least partially involved with the alarm going off; the man was a magnet for trouble. Still, her heart broke when she saw Jane in such a state because of the letter he’d received. It was obvious to her that Red John wasn’t responsible for the delivery; the serial killer had been with her when Jane had received the note. She would have said that it was overconfident for someone like John, but then again, he had been in the building at the time, despite knowing full well the hotel was housing several CBI agents. Jane’s reaction was strikingly different to any she had seen from him beforehand. The false bravado and cocky arrogance had disappeared in an instant.
But what really struck her was just how surprisingly similar to John that Jane really was. It was funny how quickly she found these conclusions sprung to her head. Especially so given the fact that she had barely known Jane for any time at all. Both were proud, arrogant, almost painfully so. They both wound her up and didn’t really care about the repercussions of her anger. Neither of them could be told what to do, for it was inevitable that they would never listen. And they were emotionally stunted, one way or another, albeit for very different reasons.
Lisbon watched, as her team listened in horror to Van Pelt reading the contents of the note. She had to give it to the author; it had been very well researched. Although, she was grateful that it wasn’t so well researched that it had dropped another bombshell. One that she feared that somebody would reveal at any given time. The thing that would turn her life upside down. It was selfish, she knew that, but every time Red John was around, her self-preservation instinct kicked in. It was something she couldn’t fight against, something she had needed to get through her hellish childhood. Or at least, that was the excuse she continually repeated to herself. How else would she have managed to get through her life in one piece without fiercely defending herself from outside influence?
When she left, Lisbon told him to get some rest because she genuinely didn’t know what else to say or do.
Sometimes, she almost forgot about the human cost behind her friend’s actions. Or at least, she chose to ignore it because it was easier that way. And this was a more painful reminder than most.
xxx
However much he had pissed her off at the start, she slowly but surely found herself beginning to enjoy Jane’s company at work.
Yes, his techniques were a little odd, but they worked. It had meant her team’s closed case record had shot through the roof. Like so many other things, she pretended the fact that the complaints hadn’t equally skyrocketed, because that just made for depressing reading. And besides, Lisbon was slowly becoming convinced that Jane’s expertise outweighed the problems that he caused. Jane made the CBI look good to the media and therefore, increased their profile considerably. That made Public Relations happy, that made Minelli happy and because it kept them off her back, it made Lisbon happy.
Besides, he made everything a little more fun. It always intrigued Lisbon, watching the way he worked out a case. Jane looked at the world in a different way to other people, much like somebody else she knew, and that was what meant he noticed the small things that she and her team may have overlooked. And not only that, but he made it a little more fun. Sometimes, Lisbon felt like she had the weight of the world pressing down on her shoulders and forgot to make time for herself. Slowly, but surely, Jane was teaching her otherwise.
Or rather, they spent time in each other’s company, instead of wallowing in self-pity, alone, as they may have done so instead.
“I bought you a coffee.”
“Thanks, Jane,” she answered absent-mindedly, her eyes fixated on her computer screen. “Hang on. What have you done?”
“Me? Nothing.”
“Why did you just buy me a coffee then?”
“Can’t a co-worker innocently buy someone a coffee without there being a reason behind it?”
He slouched in the chair opposite her and Lisbon raised a skeptical eyebrow. Eventually she stopped typing in order to observe her consultant properly. She knew that she couldn’t trust him as far as she could throw him and that was the point. If he was trying to buy her off with caffeinated beverages, she knew she wanted to know why so that she could carry out damage limitation while drinking it.
“Ordinarily, yes. But when you’re involved, not so much.”
“I’ve bought you coffee before.”
“Only when we’re out in the field. Or if you‘re buying one for everybody,” she swiftly pointed out.
“I thought it’d make a nice change. I know how much you despise the coffee they supply you with here, even if you can’t stop yourself from drinking it.”
“Oh really?”
“Yes, really. Can’t you accept the gesture without getting suspicious, woman?”
Lisbon immediately felt her cheeks reddening a little and instead, buried her head in the coffee cup to try and disguise the blush. When Jane smirked back at her in response, she knew that she had failed dismally but she didn’t care. Sometimes, despite his claims otherwise, she genuinely believed that he was a psychic. He just had a way of knowing things that others simply did not have and he was relatively unwilling to teach any of the others these supposed skills. It was only natural that she therefore believed that they were partially inherent, something he couldn’t help but too.
She looked up when Cho knocked smartly on her office door. Carefully, she placed the coffee down and observed her second with interest. Jane quickly made his excuses, stating something about them doing boring cop work and disappeared. Automatically, she assumed that he, therefore, had something to do with whatever Cho was interrupting them about. After all, if he didn’t, he would probably have stayed put, if only to listen into their conversation. One thing she knew about Jane was that he had to know everything that everyone was getting up to, otherwise he wasn’t happy. Part of her suspected that he was constantly on the lookout for blackmail material and considering what she knew, it meant she was almost always constantly on edge around him.
“Boss, Minelli wants to see you. Something about Jane telling small children that Santa is dead?”
xxx
“You’re the Good Witch Glinda, obviously,” Jane had said.
Lisbon furrowed her brow slightly as she headed straight to her office. The thought had settled uneasily in her stomach. How was she meant to feel about that? If she was the Good Witch Glinda, what did that make John? The Wicked Witch of the West? But he wasn’t wicked, not really. He was just… human, like everybody was. It just happened that he had made bigger mistakes than most and refused to admit to them. However, she automatically knew that Jane would like that implication. After all, he only knew the one side of Red John. The serial killer, the one who had cruelly snatched his family away. Part of her knew that Jane pretty much saw a demon or devil whenever he thought of Red John, regardless of however much he insisted he was an atheist. That may well have been the case, but there were still some religious images that even atheists cannot resist to cling onto in times of trouble. And that of the devil was just one of those.
It also hurt her more than she cared to admit that he had decided to throw it all in, to desert them. Yes, elements of working with him made her life a little harder, but she had also appreciated everything he’d done for her - and her team - as well. Lisbon hadn’t even realized just how much she had enjoyed his company and learning from him until the chance to carry on had been unwillingly taken away from her. What they needed was a link between Renfrew and Red John.
There was a very obvious way she could have attempted to find one. However, that meant playing one person she cared about against another.
Then again, if she was going to allow herself to get close to Patrick Jane, that was a price she was always going to have to pay. He and John were at polar ends of the spectrum and practically wanted to destroy each other either figuratively or literally. As far as Lisbon was concerned, she was stuck between a rock and a hard place and there was very little she could do about it. Especially so as the further she got with her career, the more reluctant she was to give it all up.
And that was something she could only blame on herself. If she had only called in John’s first murder instead of covered it, then things would have been so much different.
But then, she wouldn’t have had either John or Jane in her life. Probably.
xxx
“I know it was you on the phone. Why did you do that to him?” she snapped, naturally furious at him. “Don’t you think you’ve put him through enough?”
John remained deathly silent. The Tijuana motel had been kind enough to supply the CBI with rooms while they cleared up the bodies of Renfrew and his hooker. Therefore, it was only natural that John had decided to lay in wait for them to arrive. When the cell phone had rang and she’d heard his all too familiar laugh, Lisbon knew that John wouldn’t have been far away. Eventually, when she’d had a moments peace, she had been the one to track him down in the bar, again, sipping at a scotch on the rocks. He’d offered her a warm smile, which dropped the moment she grabbed him by the arm and dragged him to a secluded spot on the balcony.
“Why not?” he eventually retorted. “Why didn’t you stop him from investigating the Renfrew case?”
“Why should I? You killed his family in cold blood! And besides, how the hell should I have known that you had connections with the Renfrew family? I’m not a psychic!”
“No, you’re not. But you once said you’d always be there for me; why not persuade him to drop it once you realized the connection?”
She racked her brains for the memory. Like Jane, John had the eerie capability of being able to remember the smallest of facts and information, ones that escaped the majority of people. Lisbon always hated it whenever either of them used that skill against her. It made her feel small, inferior. Like they could always use that detail against her. In a way, that wasn’t entirely too far from the truth.
“I was a kid; kids say stupid things like that,” she said with a frown.
“You’re not the woman I once knew,” John stated lightly, clearly disappointed by her lack of support.
“Of course I’m not, what did you expect? For me to remain exactly the same as you went on a rampage through California?” she retorted, with a hollow laugh. “Everyone is scared of you. That -- that…. You promised that that was a one-time deal. That you wouldn’t ‘accidentally’ kill anyone and look at you! You’re a serial killer now! And me? I’m still a cop. There’s no way that I can-”
“I just thought that, maybe…” he interrupted before trailing off.
“Well you thought wrong,” she answered back, “leave me alone, John. I mean it. Stop stalking me and my team.”
“Including Patrick Jane?”
“Especially Patrick Jane!”
xxx
“How’s the pony?”
Lisbon dropped a bit of her sandwich on her lap, before looking up at Jane. She thought that this sandwich shop was one of her little secrets and she had used it during her lunch breaks as respite from Jane and the team for a while. Obviously, as he sat opposite her, with a cheese and ham roll in hand, she had been wrong. Silently, she made a mental note to find a new secret hideaway, though she was sad to do so. She had always enjoyed the quaintness of this café and now, she wouldn’t be able to come back nearly as often.
“Fine,” she answered, albeit suspiciously. “Why?”
“Just wondering,” he replied with a typically bright grin, before taking a bite of his sandwich. “This place always does the best sandwiches, don’t you think?”
“Yes.”
“Can you actually form cohesive sentences, or can you only use words with no more than one syllable?”
“I’m trying to eat here!” she snapped, irritably.
“Well done,” he answered, albeit patronizingly, “and you’re not getting very far, eating that.”
“That’s because someone keeps disturbing me.”
“What? Who? I’ll talk to them.”
Instinctively, she rolled her eyes and took a bite. Sarcasm didn’t particularly suit Jane, but that didn’t always stop him from trying. Besides, she was still trying to hide her amusement, because in reality, she had still been hoping for that quiet lunch alone. With a sigh, she pushed half her meal away and stood to leave. Not because she hadn’t been enjoying it, nor because she was angry at Jane disturbing her. She had simply been keeping a very close eye on the clock and knew that she had to get back to the office.
“Where are you going? You haven’t finished your sandwich.”
“Work, of course,” she answered as she pulled on her jacket. “Where else would I be going?”
“I don’t know, somewhere interesting?”
“And here I was, thinking you knew everything.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Lisbon, of course I don’t know everything.”
“You coming?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, Lisbon headed straight for the door and simply expected him to follow. After all, that was what he usually did. Sometimes, she swore he had more in common with a Labrador puppy than the human race. He was annoying, demanding, sometimes seemed to have an obscenely short attention span and loyal to a fault. When he did indeed fall into step with her, but not without shoveling the rest of his food in his mouth, she smirked slightly. And he had the audacity to accuse her of being predictable on occasion.
“Are you really married to the job, or are you just trying to keep up appearances?”
“Now, you’re the one being ridiculous.”
“When was the last time you had a vacation?” he persisted and once again, she wished he hadn’t followed her.
“Last month. You know, when I…”
“Public holidays don’t count, Lisbon.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not healthy.”
She snorted in a very unladylike manner. As if he was one to judge, the hypocrite. Lisbon couldn’t recall the last time he’d had a day off, either willingly or due to illness. In fact, even when suspended, he somehow managed to sneak his way back onto cases, whether she wanted him to or not. Out of everybody she knew, he had the least right to accuse her of being a workaholic, when he was virtually the same.
“I do other stuff. I have a private life,” she eventually said, albeit stiffly.
“Really? Do tell.”
“No! It’s called a private life for a reason.”
“Now I’m just more intrigued,” he said, grinning. “What are you hiding from me, Agent Lisbon?”
“Oh, I could write novels about the things you don’t know about me,” she truthfully replied, hoping that he simply took it as banter.
“Now I find that hard to believe.”
“Of course you would,” she muttered under her breath.
Really, she was wondering just how much he knew about herself and John. Naturally, that was the biggest aspect of her life she was holding from him. Though Lisbon had told John (and herself) time and time again that their affiliation was long since over, there was still something niggling at the back of her brain. It wasn’t over; it never would be. Or at least, it wouldn’t be until one of them was six feet under. And even just because somebody was dead, it didn’t mean the truth wouldn’t necessarily find its own way out. Some stories just begged to be told, especially if somebody was desperate to hide the truth.
This was one that three people already knew about. How many more had to before it reared its ugly head to the masses? And to Patrick Jane, especially?
Soon, they were back in the office and Lisbon took that as a blessed relief. It meant she could stop over thinking every action and every word as she could escape Jane. Instead, she could continue making the mountain of paperwork on her desk considerably smaller. They were having a quiet spell, something which was good for the state of California. It meant that people weren’t killing one another, which was something everyone could be grateful for. Unfortunately, it meant her highly strung team grew bored and irritable, something which was somewhat less pleasant. At least she had the ability to hide away in her office while they annoyed one another.
“Oh I rescued this, by the way,” he said as he handed her the rest of the sandwich. “No point in seeing good food go to waste.”
“Give it to Rigsby, then,” Lisbon answered as she headed straight for her office. “He’s like a human trash can.”
“I’ll tell him you said that!”
“You do that!”
To Part Eight