Well, here it is, folks – the final chapter! Thank you for your interest and encouragement throughout this story. It's been a lot of fun to write, especially for such a gracious audience. I hope you find the resolution satisfying.

The New Beginning

Lisbon's Private Journal: Week 12, Saturday

Oh, I'm so glad I took my video camera with me to the game. Jane was priceless. Since our team was wearing red, Jane got himself a red tuxedo, a red top hat and giant red pom-poms (these last were presumably to show that he was a cheerleader and hadn't just escaped from a circus somewhere). He then took charge of the small crowd of spectators and soon had them doing Mexican waves and following him in chants and songs. Whenever there was a break in the game, he kept everyone entertained with magic tricks, one of which was to make a white rabbit come out of his hat. (We now have a white rabbit as a pet – I'm not so happy about that part. Rabbits smell.) He had a wonderful time. Jane loves to work a crowd. I actually found him rather distracting, but I wasn't the only one. I'm fairly certain that he was sometimes intentionally trying to distract the players on the other team. Not that we needed any help from Jane. We crushed them. It was immensely gratifying.

Jane's Private Journal: Week 12, Saturday

Lisbon kicked some Organised Crime butt today. She and her faithful team annihilated the opposition, and they did it with panache. I would have liked to watch the game with my full attention, but a promise is a promise and I had a job to do. Still, I managed to keep a pretty close eye on my girl, since it would have been a waste not to. Lisbon is poetry in motion when it comes to baseball and I wasn't the only one who thought so. Even without my encouragement, she would have been a huge crowd-pleaser. I was immensely proud of her.

I don't think she's very happy about the rabbit though. Maybe I should trade it in for a puppy.

"Well, you certainly brought your own spin to cheerleading."

"Did I live up to expectations?"

"See for yourself." Lisbon waved the camera in front of him.

"Shouldn't I have been filming you playing in your big game?"

"Oh, I already have far too many videos of me playing baseball..." Lisbon realised too late what she had let slip.

Jane gave her a serene smile.

"It would be easiest if you just tell me where they are, Lisbon. Do you really want me going through your whole house to find them?"

Lisbon gave a defeated sigh.

"They're probably in some of those old boxes over there. With a bit of luck they'll have gone mouldy and we can both save ourselves some pain."

It didn't take Jane long to find the video tapes.

"Nope, not mouldy," he said cheerfully. "It's a good thing you've hung onto your VCR so anachronistically. It would have been annoying having to wait while they were converted to DVD. Though I'll make sure we get that done too."

He pulled Lisbon down onto the couch beside him and started to play one of the tapes. It was of Lisbon, aged about 11, playing Little League baseball. She hit a home-run with the same fluid style that Jane had seen her use that morning. A little later the camera showed Lisbon's mother hugging her. Lisbon, half-lying against Jane's body, was so still he was afraid she'd stopped breathing.

"You okay?"

She jerked her head in response, which Jane knew was meant to be assent, but wasn't terribly convincing.

"Do you want me to put the tapes away?"

"No, it's okay, Jane. It was a long time ago. I just didn't know I had a video of Mom, though. I thought all these videos were from later and I've never actually bothered to watch them."

"You look so much like her."

"I know. Sometimes when my Dad was really drunk he'd talk to me as though I was her. It made me realise how much it bothered him when I grew to look more and more like her. I think he both loved me more and hated me a little for it."

"If we had a child, what do you think she'd look like?" Jane said, casually changing the subject from one mine-field to another. "For some reason I think she'd have dark curls, big green eyes and my ability to make trouble and then charm her way out of it. What do you think?"

Lisbon was looking at him like she'd never seen him before.

"You think about us having kids?" she asked, slightly stunned.

"Well, it would be a shame to waste all these fabulous genes, wouldn't it? Don't you want kids?"

Lisbon looked confused.

"Well, I didn't used to, but I don't know, maybe with you if that's what you wanted. I hadn't really thought about it. I just assumed..." she trailed off, unsure what to say.

"Well, you're right that I'd rather wait until after we catch Red John, but I want to have a family with you and there's only so long we can wait. I think we're getting close to catching him now, though, Lisbon. He's been so active these last couple of years and been so close to us so often that it's just a matter of time before he makes a mistake. I know I'm not psychic, but I have a strong gut feeling about this. And when we've got him, then you and I will be free to do whatever we want."

"We're not free now?"

"You know better than anyone that we're not, Lisbon. But we will be. Soon. And then we can revisit, among other things, our little girl with dark curls. Yes?"

"Okay. And in the meantime we can make the most of the honeymoon period," she said, giving him a look that melted his bones.

He leaned over and began kissing her, the baseball videos mercifully forgotten.

0000000

7 months later

Red John knew he was cornered. He supposed it had to happen eventually, but he was still annoyed. He wasn't sure how Patrick Jane had worked out where he was so quickly, and he disliked the idea of Jane getting the better of him. Even more annoying was the fact that instead of riding in like the Lone Ranger as Red John had expected him to, Jane had arrived with not only Lisbon and her team (all armed to the teeth), but also a swat team, which had surrounded the building and cut off all his exits.

Show time.

Lisbon was approaching with extreme caution. Jane, who didn't have a weapon, was hanging back. Red John raised his gun and pointed it at Lisbon, ignoring her commands to put his weapon down. Red John happened to know that Lisbon was a crack shot. If he was going to die, getting shot in the head and the heart seemed as good a way as any to go. It beat jail-time and it beat whatever it was that Jane had planned to do him. And in a way, he got the last laugh, because Jane's revenge would be incomplete. He'd have to watch his nemesis die a quick, painless death and then live with the knowledge that he'd failed to exact proper revenge. Red John knew exactly how Jane felt on this subject. Which is why he was still puzzled as to why he'd brought the whole gang with him.

The realisation hit him a moment too late. He'd already squeezed the trigger, even though Lisbon was taking cover and there was little chance he'd hit her, and she instantly returned fire. She didn't aim for his head or his heart. She aimed for his stomach – two agonising shots that made him stagger to his knees. He was still holding onto his gun, and Lisbon instructed everyone to hold their positions. The suspect was injured but still armed and dangerous. A stillness fell over the scene. Time seemed to pass agonisingly slowly. Red John didn't look at Jane as the pain started to mist his eyes – he kept his gaze fixed on Lisbon, who watched him steadily, her gun still pointed at him, her expression carefully blank as she waited patiently for him to die.

Still determined that Jane shouldn't win, Red John tried to lift his gun again, wanting to shoot himself in the head and finish things. Lisbon shot him in the arm and he dropped the gun with a clatter. Lisbon instructed him to put both hands where she could see them, but Red John paid her no attention. Given how dangerous he was, Lisbon refused to let anyone approach him until he complied with her command. The man was bound to have at least one knife on his person, and she didn't want any of her people on the wrong end of Red John's knife. They had lost too many people that way already.

In the end they just stood and watched him die slowly and very painfully. Once she was certain he had stopped breathing, Lisbon approached him carefully and checked for a pulse. As soon as she shook her head, everyone burst into a flurry of activity. In the ensuing chaos, Lisbon and Jane didn't have a chance to speak to each other, but he caught her gaze and, with the faintest ghost of a smile on his face, gave her a little nod which she understood.

Some time later, as Lisbon finished up outside the building and was finally ready to leave, Jane appeared at her side. Evidently he'd been waiting for her.

"Hey," he said to her. "You ready to go?"

"I thought you'd gone ages ago," she said, pleased (and a little relieved) to see him. For a man who had just defeated his nemesis he was behaving remarkably normally.

"You've got the car-keys," he joked, his tone light.

Lisbon couldn't quite gauge his mood. They'd been waiting so long for this moment, and she'd imagined him reacting in so many different ways, that she no longer knew what to think. His present behaviour was considerably more anti-climactic than she'd anticipated, but it was the kind of anticlimax she wholeheartedly supported. She smiled at him.

"Let's go then."

They didn't talk in the car. Jane was gazing out of the window, his face expressionless. Lisbon concentrated on the road. She still couldn't quite grasp the fact that everything had happened exactly how Jane had said it would all those months ago when they'd agreed on their compromise. Red John had behaved as though he was following a script Jane had written, and (rather more surprisingly in her opinion) Jane had managed to stay on script too. Her part had been rather easy in the end. Everything she'd done had been perfectly legitimate, necessary even, and the only thing that she would have done differently if she hadn't promised faithfully to stick to Jane's pre-conceived plan would have been to go for a more reliable kill-shot. She glanced across at Jane, but still couldn't read what he was thinking.

Back at the office there was another flurry of activity, none of which involved Jane. He lay on his couch and waited for Lisbon again.

"Are you coming home with me?" she asked him tentatively some time later.

Jane had kept his apartment so that they could maintain, both for themselves and for everyone else, the fiction that he still lived there. It had actually been quite useful – there had been numerous occasions over the past few months when he had known that Lisbon would kill him if he didn't give her some space, and he would then retreat for a few days back at his own place, where he would pass the time wondering how on earth he'd managed to live there on his own for five years. In reality, most of his clothes had long since migrated across to Lisbon's place and he had effectively started living with her the day they first slept together. The first couple of months it had been partly because they couldn't keep their hands off each other, but even when things started to slow down a bit in the bedroom (he wasn't as young as he used to be, after all, and honeymoons can't last forever) he had craved her company. He liked cooking her dinner and he liked watching TV with her and, most importantly, he liked sleeping in the same bed as her and being able to woo her awake in the mornings with a gentleness that even succeeded in circumventing her usual early-morning grumpiness.

Quite simply, he loved her and he found her very easy to be with. She was undemanding, easy-going and uncomplicated to live with. She ate anything he cooked and was always genuinely grateful that he'd gone to the trouble. Mess didn't worry her. Her home life was surprisingly unscheduled and she usually only did chores when they became urgent enough to impress themselves on her consciousness. The only thing she was adamant about was retaining control of the TV remote. This had not come as a surprise to Jane.

"Of course," he said, standing up.

They didn't bother to drive home separately. It was only when they were in the house, however, that Jane finally reached out and pulled Lisbon into his arms.

"Thank you," he said softly into her hair.

"You're really okay?" she asked.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that? You're the one who had to shoot someone today. I know how that always upsets you. Especially the way it went down today."

"I'm not upset. I'm glad he's dead."

Jane leaned back so that he could see her face. She looked like she was telling the truth.

"Are you sure you're okay with me being the one to kill him, though?" she asked, her brow furrowed worriedly. "I know it's what we agreed, but saying and doing are very different things."

"I'm glad it was you," he assured her. "It was even better than me killing him, actually," he added, with a dark pleasure that she understood but still found a little unnerving, "because he wasn't expecting it. Did you see how shocked he was that we'd tricked him? And it was appropriate that it was you, Lisbon. He planned to kill you, I'm sure of it. But you got him first. You represented me and everything he took from me and wanted to take again, and you represented all those women he killed, rising up and getting their revenge."

"And I think Bosco would have been pleased."

"Yes, he would."

"So it's over. We're free. Just like you said."

"Yes. There is something I need to do first, though. I'm going to fly down to LA tomorrow and put my house on the market."

"Do you want me to come with you?"

He smiled sadly at her.

"This is something I need to do on my own. Besides, haven't you got a lot of work to do?"

"It could wait. Let me know if you change your mind."

They didn't make love that night, but Jane held her close to him and stayed awake long after she fell asleep. He didn't know what to feel, and there was an emptiness inside him that frightened him. What if he let Lisbon down after all? What if, after all his promises to the contrary, that partly-suppressed but persistent little fear of hers that he would end up breaking her heart was proven correct? The thought made him feel cold and a little desperate.

The next day he drove from LAX to his house in Malibu, stopping to buy the paint he needed on the way. He knew he'd never be able to sell the house with the smiley still on the wall – that would have been too much of a challenge even for a good real estate market. Still, the house was beautiful and in a prime location, so even in a recession he thought he'd be able to sell it fairly easily.

Standing in the room where his life had changed forever, he tried to talk to the silence, to reach his family and tell them that he'd avenged their deaths at last. But Jane had never believed in life after death and there was little comfort in talking to the empty nothingness that they had left behind. They were gone. Forever. He removed the lid of the paint tin and set about his task, and as the smiley disappeared beneath his brushstrokes, the emptiness inside him finally gave way to grief and he cried in final farewell to his lost loves.

0000000

When Jane returned to Lisbon a couple of days later, she could see the difference in him at once. He looked so happy to see her waiting for him at the airport, and there was a lightness about him that he'd never had before. For the first time she really did believe they were free.

A couple of weeks later he took her on an exact replica of their first date – the roller coaster rides, the picnic at the beach and the walk through Muir Woods. This time, though, after taking her hand, he knelt down, took out a ring and asked her to marry him.

Lisbon's Private Journal: Week 47, Saturday

I didn't think he'd ever ask me to marry him. I'm not sure why. I knew he wanted to live with me and that he even wanted kids with me, but for some reason I just couldn't picture him wanting to get married. Maybe I wanted to pretend it didn't matter to me. I didn't want to hope for it and be disappointed. I guess I wasn't sure how to interpret his desire to be free – whether it simply meant freedom from fear and freedom from the past, or whether it extended beyond that to a desire to be free from obligations and commitments. But the truth is, despite everything, part of me hoped anyway.

I think everyone will be happy for us. My team pretends not to know about us, but in that 'we know and we know you know we know' kind of way which enables them to be supportive without having to say anything embarrassing. And Dr Williams has been a gem – she seems genuinely invested in seeing that our relationship works out. I think she'll be delighted with our news. Hightower has been surprisingly hands-off with us ever since the day Jane told me she wouldn't be a problem. I wonder what went on between them? Anyway, I don't think she's likely to start kicking up a fuss at this point. She has other fish to fry, from what the grapevine has to say.

I wonder what my brothers will say? Only one way to find out, I suppose...

Jane's Private Journal: Week 47, Saturday

She said yes! I have to admit, proposing is a daunting task, particularly when you've never actually discussed marriage before. A small part of me was truly terrified that I might have read her all wrong or at least messed up the timing – especially since she was so clearly not expecting the question. She looked overwhelmed, but, fortunately for me, in a good way. And she said yes without even thinking about it, which made me inexpressibly happy. It's a miracle that she trusts me enough to entrust herself and her future to me, but I honestly have a good feeling about this. I feel like a brand new man. I can't wait to start a new life with her – a new beginning with a clean slate.

I just hope some annoying bureaucrat at the CBI isn't going to start being tiresome. I'm practising my menacing glare, just in case...

THE END

Did I forget to mention that they lived happily ever after? Well, I'm disposed to believe that they did.

Thank you for reading!