Digging up old memories

Chapter 7

Lisbon's POV

Lisbon felt like the sharks were circling with Abbott and Fischer. She knew they were worried about Jane and how to keep him once she left. She'd told both of them on numerous occasions that she didn't have a hold on him. He came and went as he pleased regardless of how she felt about it and pointed to all the examples in her past at the CBI, even the painful ones. But – Fischer had asked her out for coffee to chat and here she was waiting for her at the café's patio.

"Hi, Lisbon. Thank you for meeting with me," Fischer said as she sat down. 'No problem' she'd replied, knowing this was another Jane conversation. Kim put in her order with the waitress and asked her how she was... she went along with the small chitchat, looking for a lull so she could to get to the point.

"So why am I here Kim?" she finally asked. "You want to talk about Jane, right?"

"Well, it's clear that you two had a fight. Abbott is concerned that he's going to bolt once you're in D.C." she said evenly.

"So, Abbott sent you to talk to me? I've already told you – I can't make Jane stay. If he wants to leave he will. He could have left at any time... I'm surprised you even caught him in the first place," she added tiredly.

Teresa saw a look of surprise on Kim's face. "Huh, I told Abbott that this meeting wouldn't achieve anything, but he insisted I try," she said.

Kim was holding something back, she could tell. "What aren't you telling me Kim – I saw that look you just gave. What's going on?" she asked.

"It's just, I assumed that you knew... but you just said that you're surprised that we caught him. I mean – I thought- forget it," she said.

"I forget it! Tell me what you're talking about Kim," Lisbon said sternly.

"Uhm... okay, I guess I can share this info with you now," he said hesitantly.

Teresa felt very uneasy. She knew that she wasn't going like what came next... she felt her adrenaline kick in like it used to when she knew Jane had done something and she would have to clean up his mess.

"I only figured this out about a month ago. I debrief Abbott once I had all the info... that's why he's been concerned lately about Jane. A nagging feeling had started to grow after spending time with Jane these last five months working on cases. It's pretty clear that he's a brilliant strategist and it got me thinking that maybe we hadn't caught him at all," she said.

Lisbon was becoming uncomfortable with the way this conversation was playing out. As Fischer said those words, she felt really stupid... because understanding started to dawn on her and she knew that what she heard next was going to kill the very last of her positive feelings for Jane.

"I went back and looked at the records from his retrieval on the island and the letters he sent you as well. Sorry – I know you're a private person, but they are part of the record and I had to know if we really caught him. Based on what I saw, he had been planning on getting 'caught' for about 18 months. The letters were full of clues about where he was. The stuff he sent you was native to only the island he lived on and... he had set up a network of people to alert him if someone inquired about him. We had been on the island asking questions about him for four days before we knew where he was. He knew we were there the minute we landed, and he didn't run. We found a bank account with lots of funds – more than enough to take off at a moment's notice. We didn't catch him Lisbon – he caught us," she said with amazement.

Teresa took a huge breath to calm the rage she was feeling.

"You really didn't know did you?" she asked, and Lisbon shook her head no, feeling betrayed once again by Jane.