Baby Did A Bad, Bad Thing (For A Good Cause)
Carly and AJ from GH
February 2004

Part Three

"I really need to be in a hospital," Carly said, as she tried to get off the couch at the cottage where AJ had taken her.

He couldn't let her leave now though. Not yet. Not when she hadn't promised to allow him visitation of their son. Ever since their divorce she had been hiding behind bodyguards, her mob boss second husband and her best friend (who just happened to be AJ's treacherous brother), the hit man for the mob, Jason.

If Carly left right now she'd end up at the hospital where they would call Sonny or Jason and soon they would close ranks around her, cutting AJ out of Michael's life for who knows how many more years. Maybe for the rest of Michael's childhood.

It had already been four years since Carly walked out on her marriage to AJ to go shack up with Sonny- a gangster who took her in when Jason dumped her on her ass and left town. Now Jason was back but he didn't want Carly in his bed anymore and even the mobster husband had left her recently.

She was finally on a little bit of shaky ground- even more so tonight without her memories- and that gave AJ the opening he had been waiting and longing for since the day Carly had taken Michael from AJ's home. It might be cruel to take advantage of a woman in this state but it was no lower than what Carly would do and what she had done to him and all the other poor sucker's left in her wake over the years.

That woman really could be a bitch. But he could be as much of a bastard as he had to be in order to beat her at her own game.

There was a time when AJ had a high opinion of Carly but she ruined that by deciding he wasn't fit to be a father. After that they never really saw eye to eye again. He kept trying to convince her that together they could be stronger than apart, that together they could rule the Quatermaines and then all of Port Charles and wouldn't she love that? Carly always yearned to be rich and powerful and AJ would have been happy to make her so.

But she hadn't trusted him. She threw her lot in with gangsters instead and was raising his son surrounded by guns, bombs, danger and crime.

AJ had tried to fight her in court but Sonny had threatened to murder him if he didn't sign away his parental rights. From that day on AJ had lost what little meaning he had in his life, growing more and more distraught at the idea of never being able to be a real father to his boy. Some days he thought he would kill anyone who got in between him and Michael again.

Some days he was sure he was more dangerous than Sonny and Jason combined. But so far AJ hadn't put in motion any of his plans to get his son back from those people by any means necessary.

He would rather Carly just agree to a fair visitation schedule so this didn't have to get any uglier. Then they could both have a role in their son's life.

And since she was in the middle of a divorce to Sonny he wouldn't be a factor anymore. Things could end up the way AJ had always prayed they would be- with him and Carly being the only parents Michael knew.

Not if she left this cottage right now though.

He reached out and grabbed her arm. "You're not going anywhere."

She tried to yank her arm away but lost her balance and ended up falling onto him. "Hey! Back off!"

"If I wasn't here you'd be on your ass on the ground, you really want me to back off?" He started to leave go of her but she grabbed onto him tighter. "That is what I thought. Come on, lets get you into the kitchen. I saw some bottles of water. You need to get cleaned up before the pizza gets here."

"Wait, wait, AJ. Why did you bring me here instead of the hospital? It doesn't make sense."

"Haven't you figured it out yet? This is as close to you as you've let me get in years...I had to take the opening when I saw it."

Their eyes met and held again.

He went on "Till morning, Carly, you're staying right here with me. You're gonna give me that much. You owe me."

A shiver raced over her and he felt her quake in his arms. AJ lifted her off her feet and carried her to the kitchen, sat her on the top of a table, grabbed the bottle of water and used the sheet that was covering a chair as a make shift wash cloth to wipe the soot and grime off of Carly's face and hands.

It was the most he had touched her since the last time they made love. During their marriage, when she had been trying to work him, they had sex many times. He let himself believe she felt something just like he had, let himself believe (even knowing she was a schemer who wanted him dead) that they shared something amazing together- at least between the sheets.

And maybe they had. Maybe he just hadn't been with enough women to know that it didn't always feel like that.

He'd had his share but none as fiery and dangerous as Carly. None who set his blood pumping with one hard look from across a crowded room, a look that dared him to try her. AJ never backed down from a dare and he hadn't backed down from the temptation of bedding Carly again after she was his wife.

Maybe he had only been working her the way she had been working him but he had more noble purposes- to give Michael the family he should have always had, with both his biological parents. Biology didn't mean a damn thing to Carly. She always said AJ should just walk away from his son and leave her be happy with Jason...or Sonny...or the milkman, anyone but AJ.

He couldn't do it though. Michael, even if AJ had to catch glimpses of him at the playground, was the center of his world. Michael was his only child- his hope, his dreams, his seed. He wouldn't turn his back on his boy ever.

And Carly wasn't gonna keep them apart anymore.

It was up to AJ to convince her he still had redeemable qualities. If only she didn't still rile him up so much. He had to watch what he said to her. She was getting under his skin already.

It had been way too long since he was with a woman. After Carly he just didn't seem to be able to find someone who got his blood racing like she could. Not that it was a good thing to get to him in the particular way this woman did.

In fact someone could die from the kind of combustion that was ignited when the two of them got near each other.

As he was wiping her face clean, she gripped his wrist, stopping his movements, and whispered "Why are you helping me? I don't get it. You hate me. You said so more than once already tonight."

He let out a sound that was halfway between a strangled sound of lust and frustration. "Yeah but I've come to accept that you hold the key to my happiness. Don't you see? You have all the power over me."

Her head titled to the side. Lifting her other hand, she caressed his face as she whispered "That must suck for you."

"Yeah, it really does," he whispered back, his heart suddenly speeding up.

She leaned forward and brushed her lips against his.

He jerked back. "Don't do that."

"I was just testing a theory. That we were good in bed together."

"That doesn't matter anymore."

"So we were good? Or were we great? Can you still remember what it felt like? Cause I've forgotten everything else but I keep getting these images in my mind of you and me...going at it...hard."

His mouth went dry. "God, you're trouble, Carly. Pure trouble. I need to have my head checked for spending any more time with you tonight or ever than is absolutely necessary."

"You saved my life. You keep saying you hate me but you don't want this night to end...because you don't know when you'll ever see me again and you need to see me...and I get that. I feel it, too, AJ. It doesn't make sense but I feel that there is something between us that has got a hold of both of us and won't let go and I can't ignore it..."

She leaned forward to kiss him again but just then they heard a banging on the door. Before their lips could touch, he moved back from her.

"That's gotta be the pizza. Can you walk?"

She stood up, wrapping the blanket around herself again, and nodded. "I think so."

He groaned. "All right. Lean on me. But don't try any funny stuff. We're divorced for a reason!"

She smirked. "Was it your bad temper?"

"No, yours!"

"I can see I get under your skin."

"You think?"

She leaned against his side and he helped her to the living room, while the pizza guy kept knocking.

AJ sat Carly back down on the couch. "I'm coming! I'm coming!" he yelled out "Hold your dang horses! Geez!"

He crossed the room, yanked open the door, pulled out his wallet and shoved a few twentys at the guy. "Keep the change and if anyone asks, you never saw me or her," and then he closed the door in the teenager's face.

Carly had a full smile on her face by that time. "You must make friends everywhere you go."

"Ha," he grumbled. "Not quite."

"You know it is just as easy to smile as frown, that is something Virginia used to always say to me...whoa, who is Virginia?"

"You're adopted mother."

"I'm remembering!" she cried excitedly "Now if only more would come back. It's really freaky not remembering my own life, my own kid, us."

"There is no us anymore. What you tried to do in the kitchen, don't do that again."

"Kiss you? You can say it, AJ."

He made a frustrated sound as she set down the pizza and opened it. He tossed a can of pop at her. "Don't complain that it's not diet. I'm not in any mood for any more out of you right now. Everything is going wrong, as usual when you're concerned."

Still smirking, she popped open the can and took a sip. "You're just mad because I got to you and you don't like it that your ex-wife can still turn you on."

"I'm glad you find this so funny."

"You should be happy. You brought me here because you miss me...even if you hate missing me...and now we find out that deep down inside I must miss you two...or at least miss kissing you. You should be enjoying that fact because, who knows, by morning I may remember why I don't let you kiss me anymore."

"Yeah. And then the real trouble will start."