Author's Note: The italicized portion of this chapter is taken straight from the scene as it originally aired on DOOL, which, by the way, still doesn't belong to me. Thanks to my dear friend, LadywriterA, who, when I asked our little group if anyone happened to have the dialogue for this particular scene written out, jumped right on it and sent it to me. Thanks to Scousedancer for the beta.

Chapter 7

Ciara looked out across the open plain, roughly the size of a football field, then cast a skeptical eye at her father. "Are you sure, Dad?"

Bo nodded encouragingly, waiving at his daughter to get her moving. "I promise, now just run to the other end and wait."

Readjusting her sunglasses and shrugging her shoulders, Ciara did as she was bidden. Jogging away from her father, she dodged several groups of other tourists until she took up a spot at the end of the courtyard opposite where she'd left her father standing. He was so far away from her, she doubted that he'd be able to hear her if she shouted.

"Hey, Ciara." Her father's voice sounded in her ear just as clearly as if he'd been standing next to her. It startled her so much that she looked around, wide-eyed, looking for some kind of wire or microphone, amazed that her dad had been telling the truth.

"Oh, my god, Daddy!" she exclaimed. "I really can hear you! Can you hear me okay?"

Grinning broadly, he explained, "It's the acoustics, or so a very smart lady informed me many years ago." Closing his eyes, Bo recalled the memory in perfect detail. Having found Carly missing that morning, he'd set off searching for her, frantic that she'd be spotted by the Mexican police, or worse, one of Victor's goons. His search had led him to the Mayan ball court where, nearly at his wits' end, he'd heard her voice at last.

"You looking for someone?" He spun around in a circle at the sound of Carly's voice, expecting to find the woman he loved.

"Well, are you or aren't you?" Wildly spinning in the opposite direction, he searched for her, growing more and more baffled when he failed to spot her. Frustrated, he called out to her. "Carly?"

"That's the name, don't wear it out," came her taunting reply.

He continued his search, asking where she was.

"Behind you," she answered, and Bo made one last spin to see her afar off, at the opposite end of the ball court. "Way behind you," she added with a jaunty wave.

"I bet you think you're cute, huh?" He grumbled, trying to maintain his anger over the worry she'd put him through. He knew it was a losing battle, but he was going to hold out as long as he could.

"Don't you?" She shrugged.

"Do you know how worried I was about you?" He asked, and it was only when she didn't respond that he noticed something incredibly strange. "Wait a minute…" He trailed off.

"Yes?" She asked, nibbling on her bottom lip while she watched him work out the solution.

"I can hear you!" He exclaimed in wonder.

"Finally, he notices!" She responded, laughter bubbling forth.

"Well, how?" He was still puzzled as to the explanation.

"It's the acoustics," she supplied. "If you were standing in the middle of the court, you wouldn't hear a word I said, but at a higher end, you can hear a pin drop."

"Oh, yeah?" He asked with a grin.

"Yeah," she confirmed with a nod.

"So you can hear me when I talk like this?"

"Yeah, of course."

He laughed then. "That's great 'cause I got something to tell you."

That pretty mouth of hers turned up in a smirk. "You know, I'm not really in the mood for any lectures, especially…"

He interrupted her, shaking a finger at her, but he was unable to keep the smile from his face. "Do you even realize the seriousness of the situation?"

Undaunted, Carly smiled gently. "Bo, I love you."

Exasperated that he couldn't seem to stop her from taking stupid chances, he fussed at her. "Don't try to sidetrack me."

"I love you," she repeated fervently. "Madly, passionately and completely, and I can't wait to make love to you; if you only knew how much I want you right this minute."

Floored at her brazen attitude, Bo scolded her, "Carly!"

"What?" She wondered, as though it were a common occurrence for them to discuss their sex life in public.

"There are tourists around here. How would you like one of them to hear you?" He was slightly scandalized at her behavior.

"Oh, I wouldn't care," she assured him.

"You wouldn't?" He mused at the boldness she exuded.

"No. I don't care who hears what we have to say to each other," she answered with that sexy, little smirk of hers.

Downright flabbergasted at Carly's sauciness, Bo decided that turnabout was fair play. "Oh, okay, well, what if I was to mention, say, what I want to do to you once we come together? Would that bother you?"

She didn't hesitate and that smirk was beginning to do things to his libido. "Not in the least."

"Not in the least," he repeated with surprised laughter. "Well in that case…" He stopped suddenly, lost momentarily in the wonder that was Carly Manning.

Carly snickered at Bo's expression before asking, "What are you waiting for?"

"I'm waiting for you, Princess," Bo smiled at her. "I've been waiting for you."

"It'll be worth it," she vowed.

"Is that a promise?" He asked, hoping and praying it was.

"It's more like a guarantee," she stated with complete certainty.

He stared at her for a beat, then he laughed to disguise his rapidly growing need for her. Just the idea of her spread out beneath him, of getting lost at last in the seductive secrets of her body, was enough to have him ready to take her there, tourists be damned. "Dr. Manning, I never knew you were so..."

"What, sexy?" She offered helpfully.

"No, that I knew." Did he ever; the woman was sexy personified! "I just didn't know you were so, um…" He floundered again, but as usual, she anticipated his need.

"Confident?" She suggested and he readily agreed.

"Confident, that's it."

"Well, I can't help it, I just know how good it's going to be." She was nibbling on her bottom lip again, and he desperately longed to taste her kiss, he ached to cover her mouth with his.

Unable to stand the distance between them any longer, he called out a warning, "Alright, that's it. I'm on my way over there. I'm gonna…"

His train of thought was derailed by his verdant-eyed seductress when she reminded him of their current…limitations. "You know, I thought you wanted me to keep a low profile here in Chichen Itza."

Bo, feeling like someone had just poured a bucket of cold water all over him, responded sullenly, "Yeah, right, you had to remind me?"

"Aw, sorry," she said, though her smile was anything but repentant.

"Okay, now that we're on the subject," Bo began reasonably enough before the wild fear he'd experienced earlier roared suddenly to the surface, casting a serious pall over his next words. "You got to promise me that you're never going to do anything like that ever again." Even as he spoke, he knew there was no way in hell that this would be the last time Carly would go off half-cocked when something or someone she cared about was at stake. Recklessly brave, she'd cast herself into the fire if it meant saving another from the same fate, and Bo loved her for it, but he often thought his sanity would be better preserved if he could just tie her to a chair until his scheming father was brought to justice.

Carly naturally saw things from a different perspective, waiving away his concern and telling him, "Oh, you know what? In a few hours this whole thing is going to be over."

Bo, who knew better than most the damage that madmen could inflict in the space of a few moments, never mind several hours, reminded her, "That doesn't mean we can be careless! We've got to be very careful here."

Carly's brow wrinkled adorably, a sure sign that she was about to get worked up into a tizzy. "Yeah, I know," she responded aloofly. "You don't have to tell me that."

"Well, maybe I don't," Bo conceded, trying to get a handle on his emotions. "But there's something I do have to tell you. That's why I got so upset when you weren't there when I came looking for you."

"I'm sorry," she said again, and this time, Bo could see that she did mean it. "I'm here now. Go ahead and tell me."

"Okay, I'll tell you," he nodded resolutely, then began to smile. "First of all, I love you."

"I love you, too," she replied sweetly.

"And, um, I worry an awful lot about you." An understatement, admittedly, Bo thought as stress over Carly's antics the last couple of days had surely taken years off his life.

"I worry about you, too," Carly said swiftly. "Is that all?" She was looking at him oddly, and Bo suddenly felt like she knew what he'd come to ask her. He'd wanted to surprise her, to sweep her off her feet, and he couldn't do that if his brilliant girlfriend already suspected his intent.

"No," he replied, stalling for time. "There's something else I got to tell you." His eyes raked over her form, then, and he was gone. Oh, god, how he loved her! And now, now, that they were so close to having everything they'd ever wanted, when he could finally hold her in his arms and at last make love with her, when he was poised to ask her the most important question he would ever pose to her, one look at Carly Manning had sent him ass over teakettle, off his game and out of his mind. She wasn't even doing anything other than standing there, hands in the pockets of her shorts, watching him with unguarded affection and looking for all the world like she couldn't wait to devour him.

"Damn!" he exclaimed, and she giggled – she actually giggled! – at him. "I don't remember what it was. I hate when this happens…um…"

"What?" she asked, one eyebrow rising elegantly.

"Oh, I remember what it is." He paused to deeply inhale, filled with equal parts excitement and nervousness. Then he looked straight at her, their eyes locking even across the distance, and asked, "Will you marry me?"

She was speechless, and Bo had to quell the panic that flared in his chest. Now more nervous than excited, he mumbled, "I guess the acoustics aren't as good as they say here."

Carly's face softened as she pondered what Bo had asked. "Did you…just…" She was the one lost for words now, and Bo, realizing that her silence wasn't a sign of rejection after all, beamed broadly at her, wasting no time in repeating himself.

"I want you to marry me!" He shouted, motioning her towards him with an enthusiastic wave of his hand. "I have never, EVER, wanted anything more in my life!" Pure joy radiated forth from his very soul as he saw the answering smile on Carly's face. When she broke into a run, he sped off to meet her, catching her in his arms and spinning her in circles as they laughed together, sharing their happiness with one another in wild kisses and broken declarations of love.

Bo was drawn out of the embrace of his memory when his daughter's silvery laugh floated to him on the breeze. His eyes popped open and instantly narrowed in on the tall, fair haired boy who was standing entirely too close to Ciara for Bo's comfort. Jogging over to the two of them, he stopped in front of the pair, crossed his arms over his chest and waited until Ciara squirmed under the weight of his stare.

"Dad, hi, there you are," she said unnecessarily.

"Yes, Ciara, here I am," he said evenly. "Now, who is this?" His dark eyes swung to the boy, and he was taken aback when the kid thrust out his hand and met Bo's stare directly.

"Ethan Lewis, Sir," he supplied with a hearty handshake. "I'm pleased to make your acquaintance."

"Bo Brady, and this is my daughter, Ciara." If Bo squeezed the boy's hand a little too tightly, well, that was his prerogative. The boy, Ethan, didn't noticeably flinch, but he did step a few inches back from Ciara.

Rolling her eyes behind her sunglasses, Ciara groaned internally. "Dad, Ethan is here for the summer. He's doing an internship through the History Department at UCLA."

"UCLA, huh," Bo eyed Ethan. "So you're, what, a Freshman?"

Smiling broadly, Ethan shook his head. "No, Sir, my Senior year begins this fall."

That surprised Bo, and he wasted no time in pointing out Ciara's age, just in case his daughter had failed to divulge that particular detail. To the young man's credit, Ethan looked confused, but Ciara flung up her hands, completely exasperated with her father. "Oh, my god, Daddy, Ethan is going to be a Senior in high school." She was careful to emphasize the last two words before turning to Ethan. "Please overlook my father, Ethan. He's the police commissioner back home, and years of work in the criminal justice field have left him skeptical of everyone else on the planet. Plus, I'm the youngest of my siblings and therefore get the brunt of all his fatherly concern." Her last words were directed at Bo and even with her glasses covering her eyes, he could tell she was glaring daggers at him.

Ethan shrugged, good natured. "I understand, Ciara, and it's okay," he said before turning to Bo. "My dad is the director of the History Department at UCLA, and I've got two sisters. Whenever one of them brings over a new boyfriend, my dad takes the guy on a tour of his study. He's got all kinds of torture devices dating from the Medieval period of Europe, not to mention the sacrificial daggers he has from the Mayan and Aztec ruins he's investigated. By the time my dad's done with my sisters' dates, the guys are convinced their bodies would never be found." Ethan finished his story with a charming wink to Ciara who laughed prettily.

Bo, still not at all comfortable that his little girl was openly flirting with a boy right in front of him, pulled out his phone and checked the time. Between his earlier daydreaming about Carly and encountering Ethan, they were going to be late for their next appointment. "Ciara, honey, we've got to get a move-on. We're supposed to meet Professor Moore for lunch at his house."

"Professor Hank Moore?" Ethan inquired.

"Yeah, that's him. He's an old friend," Bo explained and the boy grinned again.

"Professor Moore is one of my father's closest friends. In fact, I'm staying with him and his wife while I'm here this summer. He's in charge of the internship."

"My dad and I are staying with them for a few days, too," Ciara said. "Wow, it really is a small world, huh?"

"Isn't it?" Bo responded dryly, not giving Ethan a chance to even comment. He didn't care at all for the way that Ciara and Ethan were looking at one another, and when the boy mentioned that he needed to leave to give a guided tour, Bo was greatly relieved, until his daughter pushed her sunglasses up to rest on top of her head and gave Ethan a million-dollar smile.

"Hey, maybe I could get a tour from you tomorrow, do you think you'd have time?"

Ethan returned the smile in kind, bobbing his head enthusiastically. "Sure! I'm free tomorrow afternoon."

"Great, well, I guess I'll see you later tonight at the Professor's?" Ciara asked hopefully.

"Count on it," Ethan answered, then he looked at his watch. "I'm sorry to just run off, but I really need to go. Bye, Ciara, Mr. Brady." A little dreamy-eyed, Ciara watched Ethan as he bounded off towards a group of tourists clustered at the base of a statue. Then she slowly turned to her father, dropping her glasses back into place.

"Are you ready to go now, Dad?" She asked nonchalantly.

"It'd be nice," Bo said, a bit of sarcasm bleeding through.. "But only if you're done mooning over that boy. I'd hate to deprive you of the opportunity with something as trivial as lunch and meeting some old friends of mine."

"Oh, Daddy, sometimes you just don't think at all, do you? I'm all yours today; tomorrow afternoon, I'll be all Ethan's." She giggled cheekily.

"Ciara Alice Brady, you'd better not be his or anyone else's anything for a very, very long time," he warned her in full-on Papa Bear mode.

"Daddy, please," Ciara said as she slipped her arm around Bo's waist as his settled over her shoulders. "I promise that you have absolutely nothing to worry about."

"Little One," Bo said gently as they walked back to the Jeep he'd rented. "I'm your father, and the only time I won't worry about you is when I'm dead. Hell, I'll probably still worry even then," he added with a chuckle and Ciara laughed, too. "It's just, sometimes, when you come into a room, I expect to see a little girl with pigtails dragging a ratty blanket and a teddy bear. But those days are gone; you're a young woman now, and in just a few years you'll be off to college. So if I'm a little…overbearing when it comes to you and boys, just do me a favor and give your old man a break, huh? I know it's hard to believe, but I was a teenage boy at one time, and teenage boys kinda have a one-track mind when it comes to teenage girls."

"God, Dad, is this your attempt at having the sex talk with me? Because if it is, let me save us both the trouble, not to mention the gag-inducing embarrassment," she said sliding into the passenger seat of the Jeep.

"Honey, no," Bo said as he took the driver's seat, cringing at the thought of his daughter even thinking about sex, never mind discussing it. "I know your mom has already talked to you. This is just me trying to tell you that, as your dad, there isn't a boy alive that I'll ever think is good enough for you, and when I look at you, a part of me is always going to see that little girl in her pigtails," he admitted.

Ciara, deeply affected by her father's words, studied the lush landscape for a few moments before sighing heavily. "Dad, I love you," she said and squeezed his hand where it rested on the stick shift. "But I'm not a little girl, and I haven't been for a really long time. I'm always going to need you, Mom, too, and I hope that we'll always be close, but you have to let me go a little bit." She finished with a bit of an edge to her voice that seemed harsh even to her own ears.

"Ciara, I'm not trying to stop you from living your life," Bo said. He felt like they were headed towards an argument, and that was the last thing he wanted. "I'm not even going to stop you from going with Ethan tomorrow. Just know that I'll be worried while you're gone, and I'll be really glad to see you when you get back." The smile he gave her soothed any feathers that had been ruffled, and she relaxed into the seat.

Silence settled over the pair as they drove, but Ciara stirred at last, wanting to ask her dad for more information on Carly. Slowly but surely, she was developing a sense of the woman who had left such an indelible mark on her father, and thus far, Bo had not refused any of her questions, but she'd only inquired about Carly's personality and the woman's life, so far as her father knew it, before she'd come to Salem the first time. She'd not asked too much about her father's romantic relationship with the woman who, had things worked out differently, might well have been her mother.

But when her dad had left the boat that morning to secure the Jeep for their time spent in Chichen Itza, Ciara had found several more pictures of him and Carly, and one, in particular, had caught her eye. It was a photo of Carly, Bo, and Ciara's oldest brother, Shawn. Shawn looked to be around five or six in the photo, and he was snuggled between Carly and Bo, all three of them smiling happily. They looked like a family, and Ciara had begun to wonder what might have happened if Carly had never left Salem all those years ago. She knew from her brother that their mother had turned up in Salem about three years after Carly had left, confused as to her true identity, but very much alive. Her dad had been in a relationship with Billie Reed by then, but he'd left her quick enough to reunite with his long-lost wife. Glancing at her father from the corner of her eye, she finally asked the question that had been burning in her mind since she'd come across the picture.

"Daddy, I want to ask you something, but, well, before I ask you, I need you to promise that you'll answer me truthfully." Her dad looked strangely at her, and she rushed to clarify her statement. "What I mean is, I don't want you to tell me what you think I want you to say. I want to hear your honest opinion."

Bo stared ahead at the road for a few seconds before succinctly nodding. "All right, Little One, fire away."

"From everything you've told me, you and Carly were really in love. If she hadn't left Salem to be with her son and his father, if she'd stayed with you and Shawn, when Mom came back, would you have left Carly like you did Chelsea's mom?" Ciara waited patiently for her dad to respond, not sure why her father's answer was so important to her, only knowing that it was. She held no illusions that her parents would ever get back together; she'd be the first to testify as to how her life had improved dramatically since they'd officially divorced. But, still, she needed her father to answer her question.

Bo pondered Ciara's query, along with the promise she'd extracted from him. He didn't have to wonder about what he'd have done had he still been with Carly when Hope had come back, and since he'd promised his daughter the truth, he intended to make good on that promise. "It was strange, to say the least, when your mom came back to Salem. At one point in my life, I was deeply in love with your mother, Ciara, and when I thought she'd died, well, if it hadn't been for your brother, I don't know that I could've held myself together. We'd been in a sort of rough patch, your mom and I, and we'd only just begun finding our way back to one another when I thought I'd lost her forever. It was a terrible time, and I spent most of it angry with the entire world. I hated the man who'd taken your mom away, but mostly, I hated myself for not protecting your mother, for not saving her, and I swore that I'd never love again. I couldn't open myself up to that kind of pain and loss ever again." He paused for a moment, allowing himself to recall those early days without Hope, how he'd raged, hot and black, at everyone who'd tried to help him. He'd been grieving, yes, but he'd also been a complete bastard to friends and family alike, determined to keep everyone and everything at arm's length.

Ciara studied her father from her vantage point in the passenger seat, trying to imagine what he'd been like all those years ago, a young man left to raise a child alone, her brother, who'd been barely four years old at the time. Her dad had vowed to never love again, yet he had; she'd seen the evidence herself, and she said as much to Bo.

"That's the thing, Little One," he said chuckling a bit. "I wasn't counting on meeting Carly Manning."

"Was it love at first site?" Ciara asked, surprised when her father burst out laughing.

"Hell, no, we clashed from the second we met," he explained when his laughter had subsided. "But then, before I even knew it had happened, I'd fallen in love with Carly. She healed me, made me whole again, and I knew that I'd never be truly happy unless we were together."

"Is that why you both came here, to finally admit how in love you were?" Ciara asked but Bo shook his head.

"Not quite. See, Little One, I knew I'd fallen in love with Carly, but I was stubborn and I was terrified of opening my heart to her. So I pushed her away, but it did nothing to diminish my feelings for her. In fact, I pushed her right into another man's arms, your grandfather's."

"What?" Ciara exclaimed, sitting up straight in the seat. "Carly and Grandpa Victor?"

"I know, believe me," Bo commiserated with his daughter. "Thinking about it even now makes me sick at my stomach. But your grandfather'd had a mild stroke, and Carly saved his life. When he was released from the hospital, he hired Carly as his personal physician to oversee his recovery. She was spending a lot of time with him, and he lavished her with attention and compliments and gifts and…"

"And all the while, you were still pushing her away," Ciara guessed rightly. When Bo nodded, she snorted. "Jeez, Dad, you really were a dumbass." He narrowed his eyes at her choice of words, but Ciara only scoffed again. "Really, Daddy? You, of all people, are going to lecture me about language? Have you heard yourself and Shawn when you're watching football?"

"Be that as it may," Bo conceded. "Hearing my little girl call me a dumbass is a tad disconcerting."

"Okay, okay, I solemnly swear not to call you a dumbass again," she said, right hand raised to complete her oath, impish grin notwithstanding. "Now can we get on with the story?"

This time, Bo rolled his eyes, but he resumed his story. "It wasn't long before Victor asked Carly to marry him. She said yes because I was still denying my feelings, and the truth was, I couldn't blame her for her decision, not with how I'd been treating her. Just before the wedding, I broke down and poured out my heart to Carly in a letter, begging her to give us a chance and not go through with the wedding. But your grandfather intercepted the letter and forged a replacement, telling Carly the exact opposite of everything I'd written. So they got married, and during the reception, I found her out in the gardens, and I kissed her. I won't lie to you, Ciara, I was drunk, and I was angry, and I said some pretty hurtful things to her, but still, even though she was married and even though I was still being, as you so eloquently put it, a 'dumbass,' we couldn't stay away from each other, and it wasn't long before Carly found out the truth about the letter."

"What happened then? Did you finally admit how you felt about one another?" Ciara asked, eager for more details.

"We did, but…I lied to her," Bo confessed. When his daughter looked at him like he'd just murdered her puppy, he took a deep breath and began to explain. "There was an outbreak of a new virus, Ciara. A lot of other people had already contracted the virus, and Carly, because she's such a wonderful doctor and she's so damn smart, was already working on a cure. She'd finally been successful, but when she went to Washington, DC, to report on her findings, someone sabotaged her lab at the hospital. They destroyed her notes, her formula, everything. The virus worked quickly; most victims were dead within a couple of months, after suffering raging fevers and hallucinations, and Carly had been working around the clock for weeks to find a cure. She was exhausted both from the physical stress of working so hard and emotionally because of what Victor had done to her and what I did when I turned her away. But you see, honey, I'd already gotten sick. I'd known for weeks that I had the virus, but I didn't want Carly to know. I loved her so much, but I couldn't start a relationship with her, not when I knew I was dying. I didn't want Carly to be with me, only to lose me. I thought I was doing what was best for her so I lied to her; I told her that I'd moved on and met someone else, and I made your Aunt Kayla and your Aunt Isabella swear not to tell Carly the truth about my illness," Bo finished.

Ciara sighed heavily, shocked by all the things she'd learned. "For the record, Daddy, I get what you were trying to do," she said at last. "You thought you were going to die, and you didn't want Carly to go through what you had, when you thought Mom was dead."

"That's exactly right, Ciara, but I was wrong to have lied to Carly, even though I was trying to protect her. I was staying at your Aunt Isabella's loft, and she begged me to tell Carly the truth. They were best friends, Carly and your aunt," he told her and she nodded.

"Carly is Brady's godmother," Ciara said, remembering that her cousin was one of the few people in Salem who had stood by Carly.

"She is," he confirmed. "So anyway, I finally broke down and got a message to Carly at the hospital, asking her to meet me at Isabella's loft." Bo paused then, remembering the expression on Carly's face when she'd come running down the stairs of the loft. He'd struggled from the bed, barely able to stand, but determined to hold the woman he loved in his arms. She'd known, then, the truth about his condition, and she'd only held him, cared for him as best she could, loving him and vowing to save him, at any cost. His heart lurched at the memory, and he had to wait a few moments before he could speak again. "Carly, she, she got it in her head that your grandfather had a cure for the virus or that he could at least get his hands on it, and she was right. He agreed to get it for her, but only if she'd come back to him and fulfill her marriage vows. See, they'd never…" He stopped suddenly, afraid he was giving too much detail to his teenaged daughter.

Ciara held up her hand. "I get it, Dad, don't say anything more," she assured him though, truly, she was thankful to know that her grandfather and Carly had never slept together.

"Right, anyway, that's what he wanted in exchange for giving her the cure. I'd been hospitalized by then, and Carly realized that the cure Victor had given her was missing a key element. She tried several different compounds, and they all failed. Finally, she tried one last ingredient and throwing a Hail, Mary, she injected me with it."

"She must've been successful," Ciara observed with a tiny smile.

"That, she was, kid," Bo agreed. "But when your grandfather realized that she was never going to come back to him, he faked his death and framed Carly for the murder." Bo purposely left out the attempt Victor had made on his on life, the rigged elevator that had nearly killed Carly instead. Bo had forgiven Victor for that, and there were some things about her grandfather's dark past that Bo felt Ciara would be better off not knowing.

"Holy…cow," she finished off her father's glare. "I mean, I've always heard rumors about how shady Grandpa's past was, but to frame Carly for murder just because she wanted to leave him? What did he even hope to accomplish? I mean, it's not like they could live happily ever after if Grandpa were 'dead' and Carly was in prison for it," she wondered.

"The details don't really matter, honey," Bo told her. "What matters is that we figured out Victor was hiding in Cancun, and your Aunt Isabella and I came here to investigate. Carly jumped bail and came, too, and once we proved Victor was alive, we were able to clear Carly's name." Bo stopped again, taking a few moments to remember all that had come afterwards – their wedding atop El Castillo, their wedding night and honeymoon in Cancun, their life together back in Salem before things went south, and fate, in the wicked forms of Vivian and Lawrence Alamain, had torn them apart. But those were memories that he would never share with his daughter, at least not all of them. Clearing his throat, he reached over and patted Ciara affectionately on the knee.

"I guess in all my ramblings, I still owe you an answer to your question, don't I?" When Ciara nodded, Bo didn't hesitate to tell his daughter what was truly in his heart. "I loved your mom, Ciara, and a part of me will always love her because of you and your brothers, just like I'll always care about Chelsea's mother, Billie. But I have never loved anyone as much as I love Carly, and if things had gone differently, if I'd been with Carly when your mom came back, I'd never have left Carly. But the fact is, we can't undo the past, and no matter what, I can't regret my life with your mom because after she returned, we had Zach and we had you." He paused, waiting on Ciara's reaction. When none came, he feared the worst, that he'd hurt his daughter with his honesty. Pulling off the road, Bo put the jeep in park and undid his seatbelt so that he could face Ciara.

"Little One, are you all right?" He asked tentatively. When Ciara turned to him, she was smiling softly, and Bo's heartbeat resumed its normal rhythm. Instinctively knowing that her dad needed to look into her eyes, she removed her sunglasses.

"It's okay, Daddy, really," she assured him. "Yeah, sure, if you and Mom had been able to stay together happily, that would've been great. But like you just said, we can't undo the past. You and Mom, both, have been nothing but miserable for a very long time. The only times I even remember seeing you remotely happy over the last year are the few times I saw you with Carly, and now, after learning so much about her and about your relationship with her, I'm only sorry that I was such a brat to her and to you," she said earnestly.

Tugging his little girl to him, Bo pressed a kiss to her dark hair. "Honey, you don't have to apologize to me, not for anything. You were just a kid, and your mom and I did a piss-poor job of shielding you from our problems. You were hurting, and all we did was lob you back and forth between us. For that, I'm sorry, and whether Carly wants to give me another chance or not, I'm so glad to be on this trip with you," he whispered.

Ciara returned her father's embrace. "Me, too, Daddy, and thank you for trusting me enough to tell me the truth. I meant what I said the day we set sail; I want to get to know Carly and I want to help you win her back. I'm a little fuzzy as to how you're going to win her back, but by the time we reach L.A., I'll have a plan put together." She finished with a wink, and Bo marveled once more at the mature, caring, young woman his daughter had grown to be, seemingly in the blink of an eye.

"I bet you will, kid," Bo mused. "All right, I've got a lot more to show you, and we don't have much time. You ready to go?" Ciara nodded enthusiastically, already plotting out the first post she was going to make on Facebook chronicling her trip with her dad, a post that Carly would be certain to see, as long as Melanie kept her promise to help Ciara reunite their parents.