Russian Roulette (13/16)
Previous Parts: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve
Part Thirteen - Entrapment
Lisbon glanced warily over at Jane. The color seemed to have completely drained from his face. This was the soonest after a Red John murder that they had seen the body. It had yet to even enter the state of rigor mortis. As always, the tang of iron hit her the moment she entered the room, quickly followed by the stench of death. These things didn’t bother Lisbon; they hadn’t for years. She had grown accustomed to such things during the course of her career. Instead, she simply felt angry, although she always did whenever Red John killed.
But this time, it was far worse than any previous experience. She knew precisely who was responsible for this death - and all of the others too. She felt betrayed by Jackson, but furious with herself. Lisbon believed that she should have seen the signs and that she should have known who he truly was underneath the pleasant exterior. Instead, she had ignored the hints and chosen to live in blissful denial. For years, this had gone on right underneath her nose. There were so many deaths she could have prevented, including that of Jane’s family.
And it had cost her the relationship she had shared with her brother. In fact, it had cost Tommy his relationship with his other brothers too. After his accident, the Lisbon siblings had rallied around one another, but when she had announced that she was marrying Jackson, that had all changed. While Joseph and James had supported her wholeheartedly, Tommy had refused to speak to her ever again. Or at least, until she saw sense and got the hell away from Jackson Roberts, or so he said. Now, it seemed like he had been right all along.
“It was him,” Lisbon whispered to Jane quietly.
“How do you know?”
If she hadn’t been feeling so mixed up, she would have laughed at Jane being the one who was unsure for a change.
“He left his shoes behind.”
“I did think they looked out of place,” he responded.
They fell into an uneasy silence as the coroner approached to have a conversation about the deceased. Lisbon attempted to listen diligently, but soon found her mind wandering. Now, it seemed like this routine was a waste of precious time. They had identified who Red John was and now, they had to play catch up with him.
Lisbon could practically imagine Jackson laughing at her ineptitude as he drove back home.
“I can’t go home,” she eventually blurted out once she and Jane had managed to excuse themselves from the crime scene. “Red John doesn’t make mistakes. He’ll know I’ve worked it out and I’ll be next.”
“Lisbon…” Jane started slowly and he placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Listen to me, you’ll be fine. Just breathe in and out, in and out.”
With one swift movement, she cut his arm away with a slice of her hand and stared back at him angrily. Deep down, Lisbon knew that he was only trying to help, but instead, it only serve to annoy her further. Jane knew how she felt about his abilities, but that never stopped him from trying to play tricks on her.
“Don’t you dare try any of your mind games on me,” she said frostily.
“I wouldn’t even dream of it, but you do need to calm down.”
“I’m fine.”
“Sure you are,” he answered back skeptically.
Lisbon let out a deep sigh and pinched the bridge of her nose. However much she wanted to deny it, Jane was right. Going into a state of panic wasn’t going to help anybody. Besides, this was what she had been trained to do. This was the case she had always wanted to close, and finally she had the answers she’d craved for. Unfortunately, she also loathed the direction they pointed in. Still, all she had to do was treat this like any other case and react accordingly. This was just like any other case, where they were chasing down the perpetrator. There was one thing she had to clear first.
“You leave him to me.”
“Lisbon…”
“I know you want revenge and I know this is Red John we’re dealing with, but he’s still my husband. If anybody has the right to ask you to leave him alone, it’s me.”
Jane bowed his head slightly in thought. “I won’t touch him.”
“Good.”
“Are you sure you can do this?”
“I know him,” she answered back simply.
However dangerous it was, Lisbon knew there was only one way they were going to ensnare Red John. She had to go home and pretend she was as oblivious as ever. Cho, Rigsby and Van Pelt would be stationed outside, waiting patiently as she made the arrest. She knew they’d need more backup too, just to be safe. Lisbon smiled weakly at Jane in gratitude. Part of her still wondered if the only reason Jane was happy to go along with her plans was because it seemed like the only way. At least it seemed like she was saving him from himself, which was more than could have been said for Jackson. Patrick Jane wouldn’t be able to become a murderer.
But he wouldn’t be able to exact his revenge, either.
She could only hope that he would find peace in some other way. That, and that he wouldn’t leave the CBI. Lisbon was never going to dare to admit it to his face - his ego was already severely over-inflated - but he had become quite indispensable to her. She couldn’t imagine work without his antics anymore. They certainly had made the place more interesting.
It didn’t take long for them to put everything into place. Once they arrived back at the CBI headquarters in the early evening, Lisbon headed straight to her car. They had to get everything moving now, otherwise they were going to miss their opportunity. Jackson had sent her a text message, saying he was due home soon. If he arrived home too early, then he would know that some of his stuff was missing and probably take flight.
Her heart thrummed in trepidation as she opened the car door. Jane caught hold of her wrist and she spun around to look at him. She had believed he’d disappeared off somewhere, probably to update Minelli on the finalizations of their plans.
“Good luck, Teresa,” he muttered and placed a light kiss on her cheek.
Lisbon didn’t even have words to respond. Anything she could have said died on her lips. Instead, she briefly touched her cheek in the place that he had kissed her and wondered what the hell he had meant by it.
Now wasn’t the time to worry. Now, she had to go and arrest her husband.
xxx
“Hello, dear,” Red John spoke as he opened the door widely to allow Lisbon in. “How was your day at work?”
She made a noncommittal shrug and instead, just dumped her purse down and kicked off her shoes. Red John watched carefully as she did so. Technically, there was nothing all too different about her reaction to his question. In fact, this was her routine every day whenever she got home from work at a reasonable time. However, he swore he saw that glint in her eyes, the one that said ‘I know who you are and what you do.’ Her slight frown practically screamed out ‘you betrayed me; how could you?’ Still he didn’t react.
“I got Thai as the meeting ran late,” he continued as she slid out of her jacket. “I hope that’s okay?”
“I ate at work.”
“Liar,” he taunted and wondered if she would catch on the duality of his words.
“We closed a case; we had pizza.”
“Oh,” he answered back, attempting to sound as small and insignificant as possible. Lisbon’s expression softened a little. Either he had made her feel a touch guilty or she was a better actress than he’d ever believed.
“I’m sorry, but I’m really not hungry.”
“Then neither am I.”
“Don’t starve yourself on my account; it’s unhealthy.”
“Pot kettle black,” he muttered back in response.
Lisbon seemed a little distracted and ignored his statement. She glanced out of the window and his eyes followed her path. A red SUV was parked opposite the house; it looked like a fairly new model. Immediately, he gathered that she had brought back up on this little jaunt. Red John would have paid good money on a bet that Agents Wayne Rigsby and Kimball Cho were currently seated in that car, awaiting further instructions.
He also figured that, somewhere in her ensemble, his wife was probably wearing some sort of camera and/or a listening device. The question was where. He needed to get it off of her and to dispose of it before he carried out the next part of his plan. Having cops nearby didn’t faze him; his rage at her discovery had built over the hours. Now, he just wanted her dead. Red John had already accepted that he probably wasn’t going to make it out of the day alive. However, he sure as hell wasn’t going to go alone. He wanted to drag Teresa Lisbon down with him.
That, after all, was why he had a knife stashed in his back pocket. The knife still had the blood from his latest victim staining it, but it was after something infinitely more satisfying. It was waiting patiently for the soft flesh of Lisbon’s throat and for her blood to be spilled over it. He smiled at the very thought.
“You seem tense.”
“I’m fine,” she said, with an air of detachment.
“But you said you closed a case?”
“We got another one.”
“Anything you can tell me about?” he pushed.
Lisbon shook her head. Ever since he had left the CBI, she had promptly stopped discussing work with him. She took confidentiality very seriously and just because he had once been a part of the bureau, it didn’t mean she could continue telling him little facts. Technically, she shouldn’t have in the first place, but his leaving had simply reminded her of the fact. Company secrets were to be kept under lock and key. Sometimes, she apologized for behaving so cagily, but usually she didn’t bother. She was only following the rules, after all.
“Come here,” he said and she shook her head again. “I said, come here.”
Reluctantly she obeyed instructions, and he ran his hands across the length of her back. For a while, she seemed to melt into his touch and he almost felt sad. This was the last time he would feel this kind of closeness to his wife; it was the end of an era. So, when she pushed him away somewhat aggressively, he was rather taken aback. He hadn’t expected her to do that.
In her hands was the very knife that he had just been thinking about.
“Would I be right to assume that the blood of Jessica Aldred is on this knife?”
“Who?” he asked, and he pretended to be oblivious as he did so.
“Jackson, don’t lie.”
“What do you want me to say, Agent?” he hissed.
“The truth, Jackson, or should I say Red John?” she growled back at him.
He bowed his head in response and apologized. Swiftly, Lisbon suddenly had him pinned to the floor and Red John swore loudly at her. While he tried to fight against it, Lisbon had been well-trained in the arts of self-defense and grappling; she knew what she was doing. Eventually, she read him the Miranda rights and had him in cuffs. Then, she called the guys in and they both seemed relieved to see that she had gotten through the experience in one piece.
When he was dragged out to the SUV by Cho and Rigsby, he felt a little vindicated by the fact that he had been right about their presence.
It didn’t change the fact that the serial killer known to all as Red John was now in the custody of the CBI though.
He had lost.
To Part Fourteen