Jonah fucking Mitchell. Dexter paced around my living room as he told me the whole truth about his little spree after Brother Sam was murdered. He told me how he felt when he realized that it was Jonah that killed his mother and sister and how he had felt somehow responsible for their deaths. He told me how Jonah asked him to just put him out of his own misery but that he didn't go through with it. It had been a while since Jonah found out the truth about my brother but he hadn't said anything. Probably because he knew it would wind up implicating him in his own killings. According to the message he left for Little Miss Hannah McKay, he didn't say much other than he was glad that after months of communicating online that they were able to meet up but that he had given it some thought, he "didn't want to go through with their plan." Whatever the fuck that plan was, I was pretty fuckin' sure it wouldn't involve a happily every after for Dexter. Or by default, me.

After about ten minutes, he came and sat beside me, taking my hands in his. "Deb," he started. "Jonah and I had an understanding. If he were going to say something to anyone – or do something – he would have done it already. I've gotta admit it was pretty bold of Hannah to look him up and track him down. I just wish I knew what they had talked about and what their plan would have been."

"That fucking bitch. Even after she's dead, shes's still fucking up our lives."

"Hannah knew about Jonah because I told her. She obviously couldn't go to the police about who I am since she escaped imprisonment herself. She is – she was – a survivalist Deb. Only…"

"Only she didn't survive." I couldn't help but smirk at the thought of Hannah's corpse lying on the ocean floor in black garbage bags.

"I can only assume she went to Jonah because I told her about how things ended with him. She probably tried to get him to help her get back at me. She didn't have any physical proof of anything so its not like she could blackmail him…" He paused and took a deep breath in. And then he said what I knew he was going to, but dreaded hearing. "I've gotta go Nebraska, Deb. I need to talk to Jonah. If he did talk to Hannah and he doesn't hear back from her, who knows what he may think or do."

I knew he was right. And as much as I didn't want to think this way…if Jonah killed his mother and sister, then he fit Dex's code.

"I'm coming with you."

"Deb, no. You…" I released his hands to raise my own to cup his face and cut him off with a kiss.

"Dex. It wasn't a question." He kissed me back gently and nodded.

"Okay," he said. "Okay."

We spent the rest of the day going over a game plan for Nebraska. Dex found some museum near Carney so that he could take off from work, under the pretense that he was taking Harrison there. I told Elway I needed a few days off, which I knew he would agree to after what happened the other night at the hotel during our sting.

After steaks and many beers for dinner, I asked Dexter if he would walk on the beach with me. "We haven't done that since we were kids," I added.

"Do you remember what happened the summer after Mom died?" he asked.

"Oh fuck." I can't believe he remembers. I can't believe that I forgot. I must have blocked it out.

Dexter smirked. As we walked barefoot along the water's edge, he recalled the afternoon where very literally saved my life.

"Harry took us to the beach that day and you... You insisted on going farther out into the water even though you weren't the best swimmer."

"I guess I always felt like it was okay because you were there."

Dexter stopped and put his hand on my arm to pause me as well. I turned to look at him and his eyes fell from my gaze. "It wasn't an accident that day, was it?"

It wasn't. I guess I had forgotten about it. Or fuckin' repressed it or whatever the fuck that fuckin' shrink said about basically all of the memories from my childhood. That day at the beach, I knew the waves were too rough and I didn't care. I wanted to be pulled under. To be swallowed up by the ocean so that I wouldn't have to feel so damn alone anymore.

I felt my knees buckle and I sank down, falling somewhat gracefully into a seated position, facing the open water. There was hardly anyone around us for miles in either direction. Dexter sat beside me and after a moment, he asked again. "It wasn't, was it?" I shook my head.

"No." I said, softly. I don't remember fighting to stay afloat in the water that day. But I do remember waking up on the sand with Dexter hovering over me. He had swam out to me when he could no longer see me in the water and knew something was wrong. Little did he know, that was my intention. "Even back then, you were my savior."

That night I showed him just how appreciative I was for all the times he has saved me from a fucked up situation. Even if it was his fault I was in that situation in the first place. When we woke the next morning, we agreed that we would leave for Nebraska the next day.

"We'll just have to make one stop along the way, Deb," he said as we lay in bed, his arm protectively lying across my chest.

"Where?"

"Minnesota."