Note- Today I added chapter 13 and 14.

Chapter Fourteen

Jax stood in front of Carly's bed in stunned silence. His mind seemed to have shut off five minutes before.

Carly was rambling on about things he couldn't make sense out of that went all the way back to Tony Jones.

What could that man have to do with now? Jax had thought but let her make her way to what she wanted to say without him interrupting.

Finally she spit out, " I've done nothing but screw up my life. Not just my love life. My life. Every time I fix one part or beat one enemy or pull myself back from the brink of insanity or prison or some crazy situation I have no business being involved in then something else happens or I do something else. Like run off with Jerry. Jason warned me not to. I should have listened but I couldn't.

"I couldn't, Jax. Because that would have meant that Jason would go to prison for life and...be away from me for the rest of his life and I couldn't allow that to happen. No matter what I had to risk. No matter who got hurt. I told myself I would help him first and then find you but...the truth is I made a choice. I chose Jason over you. It didn't feel like a conscious choice. But that's no excuse. Because this time it is...I'm not going home with you...I'm not going back to our marriage..."

"Because of what my brother did? Carly, please, don't make me pay for that."

"Its not because of Jerry. Not at all."

"Jason told you to leave me, didn't he? And you are blindly jumping to do his orders. You will give up all we have, all we want for the future, our life, to soothe Morgan's ego cause he couldn't protect you from Jerry. You really want to go that far for him? Lose yourself in him that bad all over again? Live just for the chance to make him happy?"

She shook her head ,sadly, in a way that said he would never get it. "Yeah, I do. I want to go as far as it takes to get my family back."

"Your family?" he choked the words out, not able to comprehend all she meant and then it hit him. Jason and her boys- her family. He started to feel dizzy at that point.

She didn't answer but then she didn't have to. Carly had already said it all. Too much.

"Jason wants me to move in with him. I'm going to do it. I thought about telling him no. But that would have been out of spite. To make him pay for waiting so long. To make him...hurt. But I hate seeing him hurt. And I hate that I have done this to you."

"But if one of us has to suffer then you are okay with it being me, your husband, instead of Jason?"

Jax was pissed as hell at that moment but it faded away in the next second when Carly quietly whispered, "Don't you get it? I'm in love with him. He's really been the only one...I was ever in love with the way a woman should be before she says I do, the way a person should be when they make a life long promise. I made one. I made vows in my own way...to him eleven years ago and they trump everything else for me."

Now they stared at each other. Her with tears in her eyes. His face slack. Parts of Jax grew cold, died right there on the spot. He wanted to hate her, but he couldn't. Because she hated herself for doing this to him, and that told him that at one time she had loved him, as much as she could, in her own way.

But Carly hadn't loved him the most- not ever. Jason was who she loved best, and Jason was who she had been waiting for all these years. It would be infuriating if it wasn't so damn heartbreaking.

If only his brain would start working again and he could remember how to walk and talk and leave her behind. But all he could picture was their wedding. Alexis asking "Are you sure?" It echoed in his mind now. And for the first time he admitted to himself that he had wanted to tell his best friend "No, I'm not sure."

Because as badly as him and Carly wanted their dream life and dream family and dream future, that's all it should have stayed - a dream. It was the perfect dream. But, in reality, it was ugly, compromised and just painful for both of them. Struggling to get that perfect life that didn't exist- not when you weren't with your soulmate.

Something clicked in Jax then. He knew where he wanted to go. Who he needed to see. He didn't ever think he'd have the urge to run to her and pour out his heart, not this many years later, but suddenly he did. He needed his soulmate, more than he needed this wife who didn't want him anymore.

Carly was openly crying now. Saying things about how she didn't regret their marriage and how he could see the boys anytime he wanted. His stepsons- more children lost to him forever now. He couldn't hear about them so Jax cut her off, "I loved you. Whether I was some stand-in for you or not, I did love you. Know that."

"I wanted our marriage to work. I'm sorry it came down to this. I would have never have married you if I didn't believe we had a real shot."

His last bit of bitterness came out when he threw at her, "You mean if you didn't believe Jason was done with you forever. And would never sleep with you again."

She took that without responding but he knew better than to push much further. Her guilt would only keep her from snapping on him for so long and he didn't want them to end in an ugly scene.

End. Oh my God, we are over, he thought. This is what it felt like when I did this same thing to her. What did I do? What was I thinking?

He had been lost in his own pain and his own mind back then, when he walked away from his soulmate. Only now could he feel the same devastation his true soulmate must have felt. He didn't even know that then, he only knew his own feelings in those days. He had been selfish and foolish and blind, and that is what got him here more than anything else.

Carly crossed her arms over her chest, blocking him out. "You can have the hotel."

"Don't worry about that. We can work something out."

She nodded.

Jax wanted to stumble backwards and out the door but his feet moved him forward instead. He was determined to leave this on a good note. To not let either of them regret their last real moment as a married couple.

(Goodbye,

easier said than done.


Goodbye,

there's no good when you're the one

whose goodbye you swore would never come
and in my goodbye you're finding none.) ( Clint Black)

Jax brought his hand to her cheek. She stiffened. He gave her a small smile. Carly shivered as a wave of sadness washed through her.

He leaned down and let his lips brush over hers.

(How can we be so far between

where we are and one more try?

And any way I look

I've only seen

that I can't leave you
with a bad goodbye.)

The kiss was one of a strained sort of understanding and a hint of forgiveness, a first step toward living in this same town as former spouses and friends, not mortal enemies with lists of who did what to who that they ran down every time they were in the same room together.

"Carly?" Jason's voice asked from the doorway.

Jax couldn't help but feel a bittersweet satisfaction at Jason walking in on them kissing. Served him right.

Carly pulled away from Jax, even though she hadn't kissed him back and only allowed him to kiss her, and looked around Jax. He expected her eyes to be guilty, but they weren't. They held a challenge directed at Jason that even Jax could read clearly : Trust me.

NOTE- The stuff about Jax's soulmate is not a big part of this story. The point was to show he had messed up with his own soulmate years before but only realized how badly right now. This chapter probably marks the end of Jax being in this story.