Disclaimer: If they were mine, there would be a lot more talking. And drinking. And, ahem, other things.

The sun was almost setting when she found him, finally, relaxing on a wooden bench seat tucked away in a corner of the garden. He'd purloined a bottle of wine and a glass from somewhere; as she moved closer, she tried to see how much was left in the bottle. Was he drunk? It could be hard to tell with him.

"Lisbon," he greeted her, seemingly glad to have her company. Though that was sometimes hard to tell, too. "There you are. Have a seat."

"How long have you been out here?" she asked, sitting down beside him.

He made a little production of pulling a second glass from his jacket pocket and pouring her some wine. It was red and smelled like the kind of wine you should drink with a big bowl of stew, not sip by itself in a garden. "I saw our happy couple off, and then retired to think. What a productive trip this turned out to be. Aren't you glad I talked you into it?"

He hadn't talked her into it so much as hustled her out the door before she had a chance to think, she reflected. It bothered her that he obviously knew how susceptible she was to his touch—when he didn't want her to think about something, distracting her with his hands was all too easy. And this time he'd pulled out all the stops with the jacket and the hair. God, the hair. He'd practically fondled it. She hadn't felt so fussed over since she was a child. She wished he'd do it again, but he had no reason to now.

It depressed her a little that she could long to be manipulated, because that was the only time he touched her, wasn't it? Well, maybe stroking her hair in the hospital had just been for comfort. She could let herself believe that.

"Lisbon?" he said gently, and she stared at the glass he was holding out to her for a second before taking it. "Lost in thought? Let me guess. The post-wedding melancholy of the single woman?"

"That's the most sexist thing I've ever heard you say," she remarked, then took a sip of the wine. It was good, though not what she'd prefer to drink. Maybe she could distract him by getting him started on its nose, or bouquet, or whatever. "What kind of wine is this? It's good."

"Nice try, Lisbon, but I'm not going to waste my breath talking about top notes to someone who categorizes all wine as 'good,' 'bad,' or 'what the hell is this'." He chuckled, apparently having amused himself. He was a little tipsy, then, she noted. Or wanted her to think he was. "And I wasn't being sexist. Though perhaps I was generalizing a bit. You've never shown any sign of wanting to be married, after all."

"I spent the first half of my life taking care of men," she replied. "Why on earth would I want more of that?"

"Ah. True. But now who's being sexist? You assume that any man you'd marry would want to be taken care of. Perhaps he'd rather take care of you."

"I don't need to be taken care of." Really, how could he not know that?

"No, you don't. But wouldn't it be nice to try it for once? To have someone put dinner on the table as you walk in the door at night, do those domestic chores you hate, give you little surprises to make you smile, and curl up with you at night on the couch watching old moves and eating your favorite ice cream, which he stashed behind the five-year-old bag of stir fry vegetables in your freezer so he could bring it out at just the right time?"

Okay, maybe he did know her. Or at least her freezer. "Sounds great. If you run into this mythical man, be sure to send him my way."

Jane sipped his wine and grinned at her. "I certainly will. Though not before I warn him that openly displaying his desire to care for you will only get him kicked soundly to the curb. He'll have to be sneaky about it. Leave things in your desk when you're out, slip things into your pockets when you're not looking. That kind of thing."

"Don't I get enough of that already from you?" she replied without thinking. Then she felt herself blush and could only hope the light was bad enough that he wouldn't notice.

He hummed thoughtfully. "Maybe you do."

"Anyway," she said hastily, "it couldn't be someone at CBI. The new rules only apply if there are no rank issues. I'm a senior agent. I think all the guys that leaves me are either married or un-marriable."

"Hm," he said again. "I fall into both those categories, I suppose."

"You? You want to get married again?" She couldn't keep the shock from her voice. Mr. Lone Wolf? Really?

"I liked being married," he replied, shrugging. "But of course I'm not free to really think about it at this point. It's just a pipe dream."

She found it incredibly hopeful that he let himself dream, even a little bit, of his future. "And in this pipe dream, does your gorgeous wife have dinner on the table when you come home?" she teased.

"Only if she gave up on waiting for me and ordered takeout," he chuckled, draining his glass and pouring himself a refill. "Marriage doesn't mean trying to re-enact 'Leave It to Beaver,' you know. The only time I'd expect her to vacuum wearing pearls is if we were doing some kinky roleplaying. And it would have to be her idea, because that particular scenario doesn't do a thing for me."

Maybe he was a little tipsy, she thought. But as much as his mind fascinated her, she knew better than to pry open the lid on that box. A conversation about Jane's sexual fantasies would end with her wanting the Earth to open up and swallow her, she felt sure. He probably had ideas about weird circus sex—

No, she told herself firmly, taking a hasty swallow of wine to hide her blush. Do. Not. Go. There.

Jane chuckled, as if having heard her thought. "So, in your turtleneck fantasies, is there a pipe involved? Or a newspaper and slippers?"

"I don't know where you got that stupid idea, but no," she retorted.

"A snifter of brandy," he continued, ignoring her. "And a smoking jacket, perhaps. You're a traditionalist at heart, aren't you, Lisbon?"

"Right," she snorted. "My idea of a domestic evening is coming home from work and cleaning my gun while waiting for the pizza to arrive. Very traditional."

"You're a traditional bachelor," he said. "You just need someone who's comfortable with reversing the traditional gender roles, that's all. Someone confident enough in his masculinity to wear an apron while baking you a cake because it's your birthday and you forgot all about it until Cho handed you a card."

"That happened once," she grumbled. "And nobody baked me a cake."

"If I had an oven in my attic, I assure you I would have," he said gallantly.

Against her will, the picture formed in her mind: Jane in a pink apron holding out a three-tiered chocolate cake with painstaking flourishes in the frosting, grinning like a madman and not even caring about the flour in his hair. It made her want to laugh and cry simultaneously.

"So," Jane continued cheerfully, "if you're the one in the smoking jacket and slippers reading the paper—we'll omit the pipe since this is the twenty-first century—that means you need a man who will bustle about the kitchen, clean up after the dog—"

"What dog? Who has time for a dog?" she demanded.

"Says the woman with pictures of dogs rather than humans on her desk. Of course you'd have a dog if you had a husband to walk him," he said dismissively. "Where was I? Oh, yes. Clean up after the dog, keep the house from becoming a health hazard, and do the menu planning on Sunday morning so I can buy everything we need for the week that afternoon."

Lisbon froze at the change in pronoun. She hadn't let herself believe he was picturing the two of them, but he was.

She finished the rest of her wine in one gulp to give herself time to think, but it made her start coughing. Jane patted her on the back and took the glass out of her hand, setting it carefully on the ground next to the empty bottle. "Breathe, Lisbon."

Finally, she managed to stop coughing. He patted her back one last time, then rubbed his hand comfortingly between her shoulder blades, his fingers reaching into her hair. Was he—was he petting her hair?

One of them had to be drunk. Or asleep. She was pretty sure it wasn't her, because her dreams were never this nice anymore.

She sprang to her feet, and he got to his more leisurely. "We should be heading back," he said before she had a chance to.

She patted her pocket to make sure he hadn't lifted her keys. He hadn't, which was good because there was no way she was letting him drive after drinking most of a bottle of wine.

"No need to worry, Lisbon. There's no such thing as a sneaky drunk. Even I'm not that talented." His smile looked fake, and he seemed to realize it, because he looked away immediately.

"Good to know. I bet you're a weepy drunk," she said, hoping to tease him out of his sudden funk.

"A melancholy drunk," he sighed, resting his hand on the small of her back as they walked along the garden path. Then he straightened his posture back out and said, "But there's no reason to be melancholy today. Two people who have been ridiculously in love for years but tripped over their own priorities finally made it to the altar. They set a shining example for the rest of us and deserve to live happily ever after."

"Yes, they do," she agreed. But she couldn't blame him for being sad. Weddings must bring back memories of his own, after all.

They were halfway to the parking lot when he said, "Would you wear white, Lisbon?"

"I don't know. I'm not much for dressing up." She would keep this simple, she resolved. She would not follow him into a daydream that would hurt to give up on later.

"But you have to get dressed up in church, right? You'd do it in church." It wasn't a question, so she remained silent. After a moment, he continued, "I'd rather do something simple and private. Like Rigsby and Van Pelt. Is she changing her name? Do we have to call them Rigsby and Rigsby now? It sounds like a jeweller's."

"Patrick Jane, you are so drunk," she couldn't help chuckling.

"If I am, does that mean you'll grant me more leeway than you usually do?"

"Absolutely not," she replied, head filling with possible varieties of inappropriate behavior. "Not in a parking lot, anyway. Not with Sheriff McAllister probably hiding behind a tree making sure we don't cause any more trouble before we leave his jurisdiction."

"Hm. Good point." He frowned. "If he's Red John, he must have really enjoyed saving my life. Making me wonder."

She winced at the thought of how much danger he'd been in, both from the suspect and possibly from the sheriff. "When are you going to stop standing so close to suspects once you're outed them? You scared the crap out of me."

"Me too. For a second there, I thought he'd shot you." She felt him shiver.

"Lucky for me, he was a lousy shot," she said as they reached the car. She got into the driver's seat and waited for Jane to settle into the passenger seat and put his seatbelt on, hoping he'd fall asleep on the drive home.

But once they were on the main road, he asked, "Would you wear your hair up?"

"What's with the twenty wedding questions, Jane?"

"Just trying to picture it, is all." He yawned.

"Fine. Here's what will happen." She decided to end this once and for all. "I'll decide to get married in church back in Chicago, and my sisters-in-law will take over the wedding planning. I won't have time to pick anything out and it will turn into one of those huge circuses they show on that TV channel I never watch. The skirt on the dress will be twice as wide as I am tall, and I won't be able to walk in the stupid shoes, and I'll hate the veil and refuse to wear it at the last minute. The church will be full of people I don't know anymore and I'll be terrified the groom is going to back out any minute because he didn't want any of this. And I'll start wishing we'd just gone to Vegas and thinking maybe this was all a stupid idea and maybe I don't want to be married after all, at least not like this."

He chuckled drowsily. "And then your groom, who knows perfectly well this is all going through your head, will force his way into the room, shooing off your sisters-in-law and trying not to laugh at your miles of skirt. Because really, the idea of you in a crinoline is absurd."

"Damn straight," she muttered.

"And he'll help you change back into your regular clothes, and then he'll take your hand and you'll both sneak out the back door he wisely located earlier. Once you're in the cab he called, he'll pull out the two plane tickets to Vegas he bought yesterday when he realized what was going to happen, and the two of you drink an entire bottle of champagne in first class on the flight and laugh your heads off while being married by an Elvis impersonator. And everyone who sees the wedding pictures says they wish they'd had that much fun at their wedding."

She found herself smiling. There was something attractive about the ridiculous picture he was painting—probably because there was no one she could imagine doing that with besides him.

Oh, shit. He'd lured her into the daydream. She looked over at him to see that he had his eyes closed and was smiling, enjoying himself.

Well, maybe there was no harm in a little daydreaming if it took his mind off his sadness. "And where do we go for our honeymoon?"

"Good question. He let you think it was someplace modestly expensive, like maybe the Del Coronado in San Diego, until he had to give you your boarding pass for Bali and you start complaining that you could have bought a house for what he paid for those first-class lie-flat seats. But he just smiles at you because he has plans for that little hut on a deserted beach he's taking you to, and he knows you'll forgive him once he gets started."

"Oh, so this husband of mine is so good in bed he can get away with anything?" she challenged.

He chuckled. "No. Well, yes, but it's not about the sex. It's about the way he looks at you like he can't believe how lucky he is, the way he touches you reverently like you're a work of art. The way he's obsessed with your hair and constantly wants to run his fingers through it now that he knows what it feels like."

She swallowed, glancing quickly at him. His eyes were still closed, and he'd leaned his head back as if about to fall asleep. "That sounds like it would get annoying."

"Oh, he knows that. He's constantly struggling against temptation where you're concerned, my dear. You're good for his willpower."

You're terrible for mine, she thought. She probably had a better shot at winning the lottery than this coming true, but she would enjoy the idea while it lasted. Until he did something else that made her want to kill him, at least. She sighed. "Jane?"

His sleepy "hm?" was barely audible.

"Do me a favor. Don't let me waste all that money on a wedding that isn't going to happen. Just hand me the plane tickets up front, all right?"

He grinned, eyes still closed. "All right."

A minute later, he was truly asleep, snoring a little from the wine. She glanced at him ruefully and wondered how much of that he'd meant to say. It was impossible to know whether he was drunk or testing the waters, or even just messing with her. But she didn't think he'd have painted those tempting pictures if he didn't want them too. He was devious, and he could be cruel, but he'd never toyed with her heart. Not on purpose.

Well, there was no way she was going to find out until they caught Red John, and she still didn't know if he'd crossed McAllister off the list. She'd ask him later, when she was sure he was sober.

And then maybe she'd tell him she would rather honeymoon in a castle in Ireland.