Epilogue

Lisbon crossed her arms across her chest. The realtor started to get impatient, tapping his foot against the flawless parquet. Not that it bothered her, but Patrick Jane had been wandering the halls for almost three hours now, opening every door, every window, touching, testing, watching…

"Uhm, Mrs. Lisbon…" the realtor started.

"Agent Lisbon." she interrupted with an emphatic smile.

"Well, AGENT Lisbon," the bald, rather nervous man corrected himself, "what if I just leave you the keys and you tell me if you want to buy the house tomorrow, huh? Mr. Jane…doesn't seem to be a man of fast decisions."

She accepted the key and didn't comment. Funnily, Patrick Jane WAS a man of fast decisions. At least normally.

She strode through the rooms, searching for him, finding him in the living-room in front of the fireplace.

„You don't do anything half-heartedly, do you, Patrick Jane?," she chuckled.

She expected him to smile his charming megawatt-smile, but he just looked at her, very serious.

"I absolutely don't want to bungle this, Lisbon," he said softly, "You mean too much to me. If I lose you, I'll definitely stay alone for the rest of my days- there's only so much breaking my heart can take. That means…I'm pretty scared right now. Which is a novelty, so I would enjoy it as long as it lasts if I were you."

Lisbon smiled, and he found himself smiling back. She walked over to him and slipped effortlessly into his embrace.

"We are a sorry pair, aren't we?" she whispered "Two of the most emotionally challenged people in the department- I bet they have quite a laugh about us."

"Oh yes," Jane smiled, kissing her lips softly "I'm sure they have."

For a moment, they just shared emotions through their open mouths, breathing from each other until Jane's worries faded away. They would make this work. She was his. He broke the kiss with a soft smack and smiled at her, putting everything he couldn't possibly say into his eyes.

Lisbon smiled back and changed the topic before she started to cry. Hadn't she told him that she wasn't a cry-baby, dammit?

"I'm surprised Wainwright didn't give us more trouble, though," she mused.

"Are you kidding?" he chuckled, nuzzling her ear "I was talking so much and shared so many utterly intimate details, he was just glad to get me out of his office. And he's a class A bureaucrat…it's his job to find loopholes, so he'd better do what I pay him for."

"What YOU pay him for?" she asked incredulously.

"Well," he shrugged "I pay taxes..."

He chuckled when she slapped his arm and started to wander through the room, looking at everything again.

"You know what?" he said slowly "Let's take this house. I'm sick of the attic big time, and your bath tub is too small."

"It's not!" she cried out "It wasn't supposed to contain a man- you're too big!"

"I'm certainly not, Lisbon," he snorted "I just need some space around me when I'm bathing. And what about you? You want to queue up with your little towel while I take a bath, all alone?" He turned and looked pointedly at her "You know that I hate to be alone these days. No, the huge tub in that bathroom over there is just right…"

"I like my old bath tub…"Lisbon whined.

He walked over to her, bowed down and pressed a slow, lingering kiss on her lips.

"Then let's see if I can make you like this one even more…"

And she had no doubt he could.

The End

Okay, I hope that was okay- I wanted to return them to a little bit more light-hearted level and hope I succeeded. Them moving in together isn't quite as far-fetched for me as it might seem at first: they are not sixteen anymore, and for both, this is pretty much it. So…I found the conclusion fitting in this story. Tell me what you think!