It was sometime after midnight when Alex returned home. He had made a stop at Joe's Bar after a long day at work and now all he wanted to do was to slip into his bed and sleep through the very next day.

"Can I stay here? Please?"

Alex looked at the brunette girl sitting in front of him. He saw the bruise on her cheek, and the swelling of her eye. Clearly someone had done this intentionally to Jo, and Alex could feel the emotions welling up inside of him. The last time he saw her she had been arguing with that asshole, and he knew it must have later escalated, but to this level, he could have never imagined. Seeing the tears in Jo's eyes brought him back to reality. He needed to stay calm, at least for a little while, because he knew that she was feeling terrified. Staying as calm as he could, Alex quickly walked to her.

"Come inside." He reached his hand out for her to take. "I'll help you in."

"I'm okay. It's just my face that's bruised."

"Well I need to get you some ice for that, quick." Alex closed and locked the door behind them and they went into the kitchen for the ice. Jo sat at the table and leaned back in the chair. Alex sat next to her with a frozen bag of peas.

"Sorry, it's all I have. Lean forward a bit."

Jo did as he asked. She leaned closer to Alex and he gently placed the bag on her cheek.

"Now that you've got the ice on there, I need you to tell me what happened. I'm almost 100% positive that I can guess, but I sure as hell hope that I'm wrong. If I'm right, then there is going to be more than one person with a black eye tonight."

"It's not what you think." Jo responded.

"Oh it isn't? Are you going to try to tell me that you fell? Or that you weren't watching where you were going and you ran into something? I've heard it all before Jo, my mother used every excuse in the book to try to keep us from knowing the truth, but the bruises were only ever from one thing."

Jo took her eyes off of him. She felt horrible. She had forgotten about what his mother had gone through, what he had gone through as a child.

"He did this to you, didn't he? He hit you?" Alex stared at Jo, willing her to make eye contact.

"We were just talking at first. We had a fight at work, but said we would talk about it later, at his place. I went over to his apartment after work, and we were just talking. I don't know how it happened."

"What were you fighting about?" Alex asked.

"A lot of things. It's not important." She shifted the bag of peas further up her cheek. "I said some things that I probably shouldn't have said, and he was getting angry, I could tell. I guess I said something that set him off, and the next thing I know my head collided with the wall and I was literally seeing stars. By the time I knew what had happened, he was already trying to apologize. I didn't listen to much of what he had to say before I left."

"How did you get here?"

"I walked. I don't even remember the walk over here, it's all a blur."

"You said your head hit the wall?"

"Yeah he had me backed almost into the corner so when he hit me my head fell back into the wall."

Alex reached his hand up towards her head. Jo quickly pulled away and closed her eyes in fear.

"Jo, it's just me. I'm not going to hurt you."

"I know. I'm sorry, it's just I can't get that image of him coming after me out of my head."

"I just need to reach my hand back to check the back of your head okay. I'm going to feel for anything abnormal."

She nodded so Alex once again reached his hand to the back of her head. With his fingertips he felt along her scalp. He didn't detect any bleeding but she did have quite a large bump from where her head had made contact with the wall.

"I need to take you to the hospital. We should get it checked out, and Avery should take a look at your eye too." He stood up and once again extended his hand towards her.

"Are you crazy? I can't go to the hospital, I know everyone there. I don't want them to find out about this right now."

"I'm more concerned about your well being, than your reputation. Besides, those doctors and nurses are your friends, they aren't going to do anything but care for you."

"People always see me as the weak one."

"That's not true."

"Alex for the longest time even you said stuff like that to me. That I couldn't hack it as a surgeon, that I was too much of a princess to tough it out."

"Well I was wrong okay. You are one of the strongest girls I know."

Jo looked down at her lap. "Yeah. Look how strong I am right now."

Alex reached down to take her chin in his hand, gently because of the bruise, but it was enough pressure to make her look at him. "Hey. You don't ever talk like that about yourself, alright? This is not your fault, and you did nothing to provoke this. This has nothing to do with how weak you are. This has everything to do with how weak HE is. If he was really a man, he wouldn't have to hit you to feel like one."

"I should have seen this coming. He's been getting angry with me a lot these past few weeks, ever since I started to move in with him."

"Well you need to move out. You can stay here for as long as you need to."

"Thanks Alex. I really appreciate it."

"Now come on. Even if you don't want to go to the hospital, I'm taking you to the urgent care across town to at least get you some pain medication and a scan of your head. No one there knows you, and it won't take too long. Then we can come back here and you can get some rest."

"Alright. I'll go. I'm just going to go use the restroom real quick, and try to clean my makeup off before we go. I'll be right back."

Alex watched Jo round the corner of the hallway and waited about 30 seconds before he released all of his pent up anger out on his unsuspecting wall. Punching a hole straight threw it as he tried his best not to yell. He was angrily whispering words of hatred for 'chest peckwell' and contemplated putting his hand through the wall once more since his anger didn't subside. However he stopped when he heard footsteps behind him. Turning around he saw a terrified looking Jo standing in the shadows of the doorway.

"I'm sorry, I'm just…I didn't mean for you to see that." Alex shook his hand in an effort to relieve some pain from it.

"You punched a hole through your wall. You didn't think I would hear it, or see the gigantic hole when I came back downstairs?"

"I wasn't thinking. I shouldn't have done that. I don't want to scare you anymore than you already are."

"It's okay. Let's just get this over with alright? I just want to come back here so that I can go to bed."

"Sure. Here, take my jacket. It's kind of chilly out there."

As Alex handed over his jacket to Jo, she took it willingly. Alex found it unusual that she made no remark about him being too protective of her, nor did she try to tell him that she didn't need it because she wasn't a wuss. Perhaps this incident made Jo realize that sometimes she needed people to take care of her. She couldn't be this tough girl all of the time.

"Will you do me a favor, Alex?"

"Sure, what?"

"When we go to the clinic, will you stay with me the entire time? I really need my best friend right now."

"Sure thing princess."

3 hours later and Alex was back in his bed. Jo was asleep next to him, not wanting to sleep by herself. Alex looked over at her face and could see the stitches and bandages on the right side of her face. Alex would never be able to understand how a man could do this someone they supposedly loved. His dad always said that he loved his mom, and Jason had seemed to care a lot about Jo. But once Alex thought about it, he saw some of the signs. Jason was an Alpha male, he liked to be seen as the leader. He stood up to Alex and flaunted that Jo was his, trying to prove he was the best. He wanted to be in control and that probably translated into his relationship with women. Unfortunately for Jo, she didn't see the signs and get out of the relationship soon enough. But if Alex had any say in it, Jo was never going to be within speaking range of the guy again.

Alex had thought his anger would have subsided the longer the night went on, but it only got worse. The more time he had to sit there and think about it, the more his anger stewed. He wanted nothing more than to beat Jason to a pulp. Alex carefully stood up from the bed and was prepared to leave his apartment when he heard Jo whisper to him.

"Alex, what are you doing?"

"Nothing. I have to go somewhere really quick, but I'll be right back. I won't be long."

"I thought you were going to stay with me tonight. You said you would. I don't want to be alone."

"I know what I said, but I won't be gone long. Just go back to sleep and I'll be home before you know it."

"Where are you even going Alex?"

Alex sighed and looked away from her, trying to think of an excuse as to why he was leaving.

"You're going to go find Jason aren't you?"

"Maybe I am."

"What are you going to do Alex? Beat him up? You think that's going to solve anything? It's not going to take away the bruises on my face, it's not going to make me feel any better."

"It'll make me feel better." Alex raised his voice over her. "Okay, I have so much anger right now, and I can't let it out because you are here. I don't want to scare you, because you've had a terrible night and you've been frightened enough. I need to get out of here for a little while and I need to give that asshole a piece of my mind. Do I want to hit him, yeah I do. Am I going to hit him, I don't know yet. But I at least need to go over there and yell at him. I want to tell him what a spineless, worthless, piece of shit he is. He put his hands on you, and that's not right. He put his hands on my best friend. He put his hands on the girl that I'm falling in love with, and I can't just sit back and let him get away with it."

Jo watched as Alex paced back and forth in front of her. She wasn't sure she had heard him correctly, and she wasn't sure he even knew what he had just proclaimed. How is it that this guy who she cares about so much, has started to fall in love with her. This was Alex Karev, the guy who slept with all of his interns just for the hell of it. This was the guy who didn't want relationships because he was too scared to deal with feelings. This was the guy who tried to make everyone believe that he didn't care about anyone else because he never wanted to get hurt. And this was the guy that she wanted to be with.

She had wanted Alex Karev ever since a few weeks after she had started to date Jason. She never thought about him in any way other than being her best friend, but after she started to date Jason, she could see that it bothered Alex. She would ponder over why it had bothered him so much. All signs pointed to the fact that Alex was jealous. Jealous of no longer having all of her time. He was just upset that his best friend had found someone else to share her time and secrets with. However, Heather put an idea in her head one day that maybe Alex was jealous that he couldn't have her for himself. That he cared about her differently than just as a best friend.

From that point on, her feelings towards Alex had changed. She saw him differently. Yes, Alex was an ass sometimes. Yes, Alex was conceited. Yes, Alex was probably not the person you wanted to put your trust in. However, Jo knew him differently. Alex could be an ass, but then he could be really caring. Alex could come off as full of it, but sometimes he had a right to be, and although he didn't have the track record of being the most trustworthy guy, she have found him trustworthy enough to share her secrets with. Jo wanted to take a chance with Alex, and she never thought that she would get that chance, until right now. Right now Alex was telling Jo that he was falling for her, and she had already been falling for him.

"Alex." Jo was able to get him to stop pacing when she put a hand on his arm. "You mean that? You are falling in love with me?"

"Yeah. I'm not lying. Trust me, it would be a lot easier to not be in love with you. The reason I don't want to be in relationships with people is because it's tough, it's work, and it usually ends badly for me. But with you, I couldn't stop it."

Jo swung her legs over the edge of the bed and stood up next to him. She tentatively placed her hand on his cheek and gently put her lips to his. She could feel him tense up a bit, probably from being shocked, but then she could feel him applying his own pressure. She didn't want to kiss him too hard, in order to not scare him away, and also because she had a bit of a split lip and it was painful. Backing away from him, she left her hand on his cheek.

"I'm falling in love with you too."

"But, Jason."

"Doesn't mean anything to me anymore. Honestly he never really did. Did I like him, sure. Now, not so much. However, I was never really as into him like I am with you. You make me feel cared for, and you make me feel safe, and you make me feel happy. That means so much to me considering how abandoned I've felt my entire life."

"I'm always going to protect you, no matter what happens."

"I know. That being said, can you please reconsider what you were about to do tonight? I know you want to protect me by going and giving Jason a piece of your mind and probably a piece of your fist, but what I really want is for you to protect me by just wrapping your arms around me while we fall asleep."

"Okay. I'll stay here."

They both moved to lay down on Alex's bed. Alex reached around Jo and pulled her close to him.

"Are you sure I can't just go over there for 10 minutes. It will probably only take two hits. Me hitting him and him hitting the floor."

"Okay, that was really stupid. And no you cannot. Not tonight. Tomorrow after you've cooled down a bit, if your still adamant about going over there then you can. But if you mess up your hand and cant operate for a while, don't blame that on me."

Alex smiled down at Jo, happy to see that even though the events of the night hadn't turned out so well for her, she was still smiling. He was even more happy to know that she was smiling because of him.

"I'm glad to see you haven't lost your spunk, princess."