Disclaimer: I own only the names not recognized, I do not own the song lyrics in the summary.

Authors Note: Well here you are, the sequel, the third in the series and the official end! Ahh I'm getting teary eyed just thinking about writing the end chapter *cries* What will happen? After four stories will Ace finally be able to admit his feelings? Anyway big thank you to those who faved/followed and reviewed the past stories and to anyone who reads them and enjoys them.

:D

Enjoy!

Officially Tied
TheGoofyCat

This chapter was inspired by Bastille's Pompeii (have a listen)

The open air hit her as she stepped out of her car, it had been a long journey and her head was beating an ache she was too familiar with, her heart pounded fast and she felt her knees quiver. Her knee high boots touched the ground, the ground that she had walked on throughout her whole childhood. She took a small breath and looked around taking in the all too familiar surroundings, nothing had changed at all. With fear and a strange excitement she smiled. She was back! Rebecca Chambers was back!

She quickly walked round to the other side of her Ford Mustang and opened the passenger side door. "We're here! Let's go! Don't forget to stretch your legs, it's been a long ride." She sternly told the seven year old child who looked up at her. She had been a mother for seven years now going on eight. It had been a hard time, forced to grow up at an age when she didn't feel like she could, but she managed, she had to she was now a mom whether she had wanted to become one or not.

She gave her son a smile, the kind of smile only a mother could give, a smile that was filled with slight amusement but mainly bossiness, as she watched him jump out of the car and childishly start to mess around with his legs, as if he were doing some kind of dance. "Stop messing around!" She commanded as she placed her hand on his shoulders, he listened and stopped before she changed the subject. "You hungry? You want something to eat?"

"Yeah."

"Yes, please." She gave him yet another stern look and he replied by rolling his eyes. "Now what would you like?"

"Candy!" He grinned from ear to ear.

"Candy? It's breakfast time!" She yawned, reminding herself of the early start they had.

"I can eat candy for breakfast!" He could eat candy all day.

"You're pushing your luck, kid!" She looked down at him before seeing his doe-eyes staring back at her. "Alright! You get one candy bar and you'll eat it after you eat a piece of fruit!" He groaned at the mention of fruit. "That's my final offer. What do you say?"

"Okay!" He agreed.

"C'mon," She grabbed his hand, "There's a convenience store round this corner," It was funny how quickly she remembered it all. They both walked at a slow pace and she watched her son take in his new surroundings. Sure enough after eight years the store was still up and running.

A bell went as the door opened and they both hurried in. She watched with a shake of her head as he shot off to the candy bar selection and she made her way to the fresh fruit, she picked up two apples and an orange, her stomach growling as she couldn't remember the last time she had ate. After picking up a carton of milk and placing it in a basket she then made her way to the newspapers, she watched her son, who still hadn't decided on a candy bar, and rolled her eyes at him yet again. Placing the basket on the floor she picked up a magazine and started to flick through the thin pages.

The bell rang again as the front door opened again. A chill ran through her as she felt a presence next to her, she brought the magazine down from her face and looked though the corner of her right eye, she was met with an all too familiar head of jet black hair.

And before she could stop herself she blurted out, "Billy?" And that's when she was met with Billy Tessio's brown eyes.

His forehead formed a thrown as he tried to figure out who this woman was and why he had recognized her voice? The penny soon dropped and then it dawned on him. "Why if it isn't Rebecca Chambers? Well I'll be dammed!" He swore his eyes widened with shock as he looked her up and down. "You haven't changed one bit! Still got the curls and skinny arms, I see! Nice mini-skirt!" He grinned as he admired her legs.

"Still as annoying as ever, I see!" She grinned back as she placed the magazine back to where it belonged and welcomed him with a hug. "How you doing, Billy-boy?" She asked as she too took in his features, his hair was shorter and he had gained a few pounds, but then again so had she.

"Aww I'm good," He replied with a chuckle as they ended their embrace. "You know Tess and Cassie are going to freak out when they find out you're here, what's it been? Six years?"

"Eight," She replied, "You never were good at math class were you, Tessio." She gave him a wink as she teased him.

"Neither were you." He teased back.

The two old friends stared at each-other in silence for a moment before they were interrupted. "Rebecca, can I have this?" Her son returned to her with a candy bar in his hand, she placed her hand out and he gave it to her she looked down at the Hershey bar and nodded her head.

"Who's this?" Billy asked his eyebrows raised.

"Who are you?" Her son asked back and he looked at Billy disapprovingly. "Rebecca, who is this man?" Billy took a step back from the kid and studied him. The child definitely had Rebecca's furrowed brow, it was uncanny.

"He's an old friend! And what did I tell you about calling me my name in front of people?" She crossed her arms and gave her son yet another stern look.

"Sorry, Mom!" The boy sighed as he looked at the ground.

"Mom?" Billy questioned though he really should have known. The kid was just like her.

"Billy," She laughed. "This is my son." She told him introducing him to the little boy that had changed her whole life and who had been the reason that she had skipped town in the first place. She shook her head at Billy's reaction his mouth to the ground as he stared at the boy and he took one last look at the boy's features then looked up at Rebecca.

"Can't picture me as a mother can you?" She asked, she was slightly amused and yet slightly insulted.

"Well...No." He replied and then turned to the boy and crouched down. "What's your name, little guy?"

"Adam." The boy answered, his arms stayed crossed as he stared up at the stranger in front of him.

"And how old are you, Adam?" Billy asked with a smile but was greeted with a frown. Billy chuckled and looked up at Rebecca, "You know he really is your child! Has the frown and everything." He stated to her and she crossed her arms in response.

"Seven. I'll be eight in July." Adam replied with a shrug. Bored of Billy he then took a toy car from out of his jacket and started to play with it making it fly in the air completely unaware that his mother's heart had skipped a beat.

Rebecca instinctively placed a finger in her mouth and started to bite at a nail, she wondered how long it would take Billy to catch on and find out who was Adam's father.

"Wow! Charlie sure did move fast," Billy commented, completely oblivious to the change in Rebecca's posture, "Where is the old boy now anyway?" He didn't give Rebecca the chance to reply before he spoke again, "I mean, I heard about his Aunt and I figured he would be down for her funeral but he never showed," Rebecca's fingers came out of her mouth as she took in what Billy had told her, Charlie's Aunt had died? She had no idea, but then again why would she?

Snapping out of her daze she spoke up, "I haven't seen Charlie in three years, Billy." She told him with a hint of remorse in her voice, her time away from Castle Rock had been far from easy.

"What?" Billy spat giving her a disapproving glare, "So what? You just took his kid away from him?"

And before she could stop herself in typical Chambers' fashion she spat back, "What makes you think Charlie is the father? It might have started off that way but it was clear from the beginning that it wouldn't work," She placed her hands in her face and breathed. It was true that it had been the plan from the very moment that she had told Charlie she was pregnant that he would bring up the child as his own and they would be a family but it never worked out that way.

Billy stepped back about to say something but that's when it clicked, it was as if a light had turned on in his head and that's when he knew who Adam's father was, it wasn't Charlie, it wasn't a stranger, it was Ace! He looked down at the child, studying him for a moment, and he could have kicked himself for not realizing it sooner he could see the resemblance more so now then the resemblance between the boy and Rebecca, apart from his light brown hair the kid was the spitting image of his father.

Billy looked up at Rebecca his jaw to the floor and Rebecca responded by holding her head up high, she didn't have to explain herself, not to Billy Tessio of all people.

What could she tell him? She couldn't tell him that on the day of the drag-race when she and Tess had driven to the clinic in Fairview, that she had been sat in the waiting room and her mind had wandered to the last time that she had had her period, or the last period she remembered, she had been late for God knows how long, so to be sure she had secretly asked for a blood test. She didn't tell a single soul, not even Tess, who had been with her. The weeks leading up to the letter that had confirmed it she had been in denial and figured it was just her hormones playing up and that she had just been too stressed out, but deep down she knew, she could feel it in her blood and the letter was just the kick she needed and when she had received it in the mail, her whole life was put into focus, she couldn't stay and raise a baby with Ace, what would he have done? It wasn't fair on her unborn child. Hell, it wasn't even fair on Ace, kids were not part of his plan, and she figured he wouldn't have cared or stepped up and taken any sort of responsibility. Her family would have disowned her and she would have had no one and that's why she ran off with Charlie Hogan, he had offered her two things Ace could never have given her - love and stability. She owed it to Adam to give him that, it wasn't his fault he had been brought into this world, it was Rebecca's and Ace's for being so careless.

"Fuck!" Billy whispered his left eye twitching. "Ace Merrill, Jnr."

"Who's Ace?" Adam finally turned his attention away from the car and looked up at Rebecca he then noticed Billy staring and that was when he decided he didn't like this stranger.

"No one!" She told him and grabbed him by the arm. "Let's get going." She walked to the counter and gave the contents of her basket to the young man who started to ring it through the register and bag it. She tucked a loose curl behind her ear and felt Billy's presence behind her feeling her ears burn she gave the young man the correct amount of money and took the bag. "Adam take this to the car," She placed the paper bag in his arms, "Do you remember where the car is?"

"Yeah," He shrugged.

"Alright! Go on and I'll be out in a minute," She told him while staring at Billy and then watched her son walk out of the store, "And stay by the car!" She shouted out to him and then turned her attention back to Billy.

"What are you going to do, Rebecca? What if he finds out? You do know he's still around?" Billy told her. "And he will find out you're back!"

"I'll be gone before he finds me," She assured him, but she wasn't so sure she believed herself let alone assuring him.

"Then what are you doing back here? If you're not back here for Ace then what are you doing here?"

"Trust me, Billy! You don't want to know." She sighed slightly before asking him the question that had been playing on her mind for the last eight years. "What did he do when I left?"

"What do you want me to say, Rebecca? That he mourned you? And that he's been pining for you after all these years? That there hasn't been any girls?" He sighed with a shrug of a shoulder, "Trust me Rebecca there has been many girls."

"Thanks." She replied sarcastically the old jealousy that she used to have boiling inside of her set alight again, though what Billy said was true why would he stick around and wait for her? When she was the one that upped and left.

"Look a lot of things have changed." He grabbed her arm. "Things aren't like they used to be."

"I know," She replied not doubting him for a second. "It's funny though, I keep half expecting to see the old ford drive past." She smirked slightly the memories flooding to her as quick as they were able to be forgotten.

"Now that's impossible," He replied and she gave him a questionable glance, "Someone torched it just after you left." He told her as he paid for the newspaper and started to make his way out of the store.

Her eyes widened in disbelief, "Who?" She asked following him outside, her heart racing as she looked round the town and she thought to herself if he was still here he could walk right round this corner at any moment.

"I dunno," Billy shrugged. "He doesn't have many friends." Thinking of the time him and Fuzzy and Vince had found the car torched and burned to the ground at the creek. "You know me and Fuzzy actually thought it might have been you."

Rebecca laughed at the thought of her doing something that reckless.

"I gotta get to work," Billy told her as he held on to his newspaper. "My boss will cut off my balls if I'm late again, then my wife will cook 'em," Rebecca smiled at him it was hard to picture Billy Tessio with a wife let alone a job, "The joys of working for your father-in-law. See ya!"He waved his newspaper in the air as if to say goodbye.

"I'll see you around, Billy." She smiled as she watched him disappear round the corner.

She took a cigarette from her purse and lit it, inhaling deeply before making her way back to her Mustang and son, who was sitting impatiently on the ground still playing with his toy car., she ushered for him to get up, "Why are we here, Rebecca? And what is this place?" He frowned as he looked around as he opened the car door and hopped back in. "I miss home."

"I know you do, but we can never go back." She told him as she finished her cigarette and flicked it on the floor stubbing it out with her boot and then got into the drivers seat . "This is the place I grew up! It's my hometown." She told him as she put her keys into the ignition and started it up.

Castle Rock hadn't seen the last of Rebecca Chambers, but she just hoped all hell wouldn't break loose any time soon.