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A/N: Hope you all survived the long delay. :) I can't tell you how much I missed writing and posting and reading reviews. It was a good time, but I'm glaaaaad to be home.

Enjoy!

Chapter Seventy Seven:

Everything happened so fast. I don't think I could even tell you the sequence of events precisely. There were suddenly people everywhere, a swat team shouting from all sides and Ayla screaming with all the noise, reaching out for Jace's still form. I didn't have the presence of mind to offer her comfort—I simply shouted for EMTs, insisting that the perp was down. They managed to keep him alive all the way to the hospital, but he never regained consciousness. By the time we arrived, in a separate ambulance, an ER doctor was standing by the open back doors of his ambulance, looking dismayed.

There was a sheet over his face. EMTs were announcing the time—pronouncing him as dead.

Internally I screamed my anguish, ran to him, laid across his chest, attempted CPR myself… but physically, I was frozen. I stared in through the open doors, unmoving, feeling my heart pound in my chest, reminding me that while I was alive… Ayla was alive… Jace was not. I felt like I was swaying on my feet, and I'm not certain what exactly kept me standing.

A doctor finally insisted that she take a look at Ayla—she was dehydrated and in shock, so they kept her for the night. They offered me a bed in the room with her, and I agreed, but didn't sleep. I moved her into my bed, rolling her IV over with some difficulty, and laid in bed just holding her. I didn't know how I would ever feel safe letting her out of my sight ever again. Once she was asleep, I let myself cry silently for the dad she wouldn't remember.

Whatever the man's faults, he had been a good man who loved her—and me—faithfully and unendingly. He would have been an amazing daddy. …He already had been.

I'm not sure where Gil went once we were at the hospital—I had followed the doctors who wanted to look at Ayla and by the time they had her hooked up to an IV to get fluids, he was gone. I wasn't sure when he'd left or when he was coming back, but I couldn't bring myself to actively care. I wanted him there, but if he wasn't… it wasn't a tragedy, like Jace not being here… and Ayla was here. Despite how I loved the man, I could never in my life choose anyone over my baby.

He appeared the next morning, sitting in the seat beside the bed, glancing between Ayla's fluttering eyelashes and my eyes, wide open and blank.

I was vaguely aware that I was happy to see him, on the surface, but the feeling didn't permeate deeper than that. I felt like nothing really seeped in deeper than that. After several minutes of silence, he looked at his knees and cleared his throat softly.

"I'm sorry it took me so long… to figure this out. If I had… sooner… Jace would be alive."

These words did break through and I felt tears welling in my eyes again. I shook my head, mechanically, giving an automated response: "No… you couldn't have known. It isn't your fault." It wasn't that I did blame him—I knew it wasn't his fault. I just didn't have it in me to pour emotion into my disagreement. If I let myself feel fully, I would fall entirely apart.

He nodded, absently too, clasping his hands together. I kissed Ayla's temple, letting my eyes fall closed though I knew I wouldn't sleep, hoping that might end this painful conversation. His phone rang, overloud in the stillness of the room, and once again he pulled it out, looked at it, and chose to silence and ignore. Earlier, I had been curious but preoccupied. Now, I couldn't muster the ability to even feel curious. "…You should silence your phone." I suggested softly, worried it would wake Ayla.

He nodded and complied, and we sat in silence as the faint light slipped into the room through the blinds, changing from washed out gray to a shining golden yellow falling across our faces—Gil's pale, mine ashen, and Ayla's starting to regain some color—pink lips, rosy cheeks, sun-kissed complexion that somehow managed to be peachy as well. I kissed her curls this time, thanking any god out there that she had been spared.

A knock came gently on the door, and I expected the woman in scrubs to be a nurse either bringing Ayla breakfast or coming to yell at me for having moved her to my side for the night. I lifted my head and she gave me a forlorn smile. "…Can I speak with you in private, Mrs. Wendt?"

I felt my eyes close in pain at that—I had wanted for so long to be anything but 'Mrs. Wendt' and now… I was, apparently, a widow. I drew in a shuddering breath and clutched Ayla tighter to me. "I… I don't want to leave her."

Gil stood up. "I can leave…"

And though I had felt like I hardly cared if he were there or not, the idea of him leaving me left me feeling frantic. My heart raced at the thought. "No! …Stay. …Whatever it is," I said, turning to the woman, "he can hear it."

She stepped in, closing the door behind her, and stood at the end of my bed. "…There, ah… was a car accident, last night. Your mother-in-law is fine… she's here, in recovery, but… we were hoping you might have some information about her mental state."

I blinked in confusion. "…Her mental state?"

The woman cleared her throat. "There, uh… are indications that… it was deliberate. The crash was on the Longfellow Bridge… her car only made it halfway through the guard rail… she was unconscious and she survived but… there's no alcohol in her system and there was no crash to propel her into the side. …We're thinking, right now, that it was a suicide attempt."

My head was suddenly spinning. I sat up. "…And you are?"

"Dr. Mead. I'm with the psych department here… she's in my care unless we can determine that the crash was accidental."

I exchanged a glance with Gil, and sighed, reluctantly meeting the woman's eyes. "…You're going to want to sit down for this."

When Jace's dad and sisters landed and couldn't reach Jace or his mother or the home phone, they called my cell. I didn't want to have to face them either, but Gil held the phone out to me from where it had rang on the bedside table, forcing me to meet the confrontation head on. I swallowed, dropping the pancake I'd been tearing into smaller pieces for Ayla who was sitting on my lap, took the phone, and answered it on the last ring.

"…Hello?"

"Sara! Honey, what's going on? We can't reach Jace or Anne and nobody's at home…"

"We're at the hospital, for Ayla." I said, putting off the inevitable. "She's a little dehydrated and they wanted to keep her a while to make sure everything was okay…"

"Oh. …Oh good. …She's safe? Everyone is safe?"

I swallowed. "…No. Ayla is safe, but… Are you driving?"

"We're in a taxi."

"Come to the hospital… there's a lot to tell you."

He hung up without another word and within twenty minutes they were all moving into the room—Jace's father, whom I had always loved, and his three sisters. The two older I had never cared for, the one younger I had liked quite a bit. She offered me a smile, though they were all frowning in confusion at Gil and at Jace's obvious absence. "Gil," I said, my voice cracking. "…Could you take Ayla out of the room?"

He nodded, lifting the small child to rest on his hip and taking the rolling IV tree in hand, wheeling it out into the hallway. I turned my gaze to the people in front of me, noting their panicked gazes. I sniffled, feeling tears well in my eyes again and trying to force them back. "…Jace is… he… he was trying to save Ayla and… he was killed."

Nobody burst into tears or wailed at the sky—they stared at me, numbly. His father trembled and one of the girls slid a chair into place behind him as his knees went out. Silent tears began, everyone shaking their heads in disbelief, insisting that it wasn't possible and that I must be mistaken. …But the sob that broke through my lips, seeing my father-in-law so broken…beyond grief…confirmed their worst fears.

The oldest sister finally met my gaze and wiped her eyes. "…Where's mom?"

I wiped at my own. "…She's, um… she's in the psych ward… right now."

"What?" They shouted as a collective, and I drew in a shaky breath.

"They… She was in a car accident, last night. She's going to be fine, just some minor injuries, but… they believe she was trying to drive herself off the bridge. …They think she was trying to commit suicide."

I watched the effect my words had on Jace's family with a certain amount of detachment—it wasn't that I didn't care, but I had already endured so much grief that I simply felt… drained. Empty. Like I couldn't take on any more pain. I watched their tears, their rationalizations, their denials and hugs and attempts to comfort each other from a grief that could not be soothed, not in a lifetime. And when they hugged me, comforted me, and made their excused to leave and go see Anne—Susan—their wife and mother…I felt nothing but relief. I didn't want to witness any more pain.

They assumed that she had tried to kill herself over grief at her son's death—from the time of the accident, I knew that she had attempted to go over the bridge as Gil and I were running into the warehouse. There was no way she could have known one way or the other. Maybe she believed she had sent him to certain death by letting him go alone, but I was inclined to believe that that was one of the few things she had one right by Jace, even if it had ended so badly… She let go of some control, allowed him to make his own decision and do what he knew to be right. …And while I was devastated that he'd been killed, I couldn't say with certainty that Ayla would have lived if he hadn't gone off alone. …I would have given my life for hers, just as he did, and I knew that if he'd stayed back, he never would have forgiven himself.

He may have been the one attempting to drive off a bridge.

No, I wanted to believe that the woman had seen the error of her ways, not only in how she'd victimized Gil, but in how she'd mothered Jace. I wanted to believe that her apology to Jace outside that had led me to believe he was delayed in talking to her, not because he'd run off after Ayla's kidnapper, was genuine… that she was feeling some level of remorse.

Gil and Ayla returned and a nurse came in, checking over Ayla a final time and handing me a stack of papers to complete to take her home. …I wasn't sure I wanted to go home, to relive the night before and the realities it had brought with it, but I didn't know where else I would go. Ayla hadn't yet asked for Jace… not since we'd left the warehouse. But she had fallen asleep on the ride to the hospital, and hardly woken while they examined her and settled her in a room. She'd only been awake a few hours… it would happen, sooner rather than later, and I was dreading it.

...How do you tell your little girl that she can't see Daddy because Daddy is gone?

I just didn't think about it. It was working for everything else right now—all the things I knew I would eventually have to confront: Paying back the money Jace had borrowed without Jace's income, funeral arrangements, explaining to Jace's family why 'Gramma-Anne' would never be allowed to see Ayla ever again, dealing with the unresolved non-relationship between Gil and I, explaining to Jace's family who Gil was and why he was here and how he knew Suzanna… because I wasn't going to allow her to keep up the innocent façade. I had nieces and nephews, albeit the children of the sisters I didn't like, who would suffer from her influence. I could not remain silent.

But for now… for now it worked to pass the papers back to the nurse, change Ayla into clean pajamas, and tuck her into a borrowed car seat in a hospital shuttle van, because our vehicles were parked outside the warehouse—and one was likely in a junk yard, having been torn apart by guard rails and rescue workers. It was easier to tell my in-laws that I needed to take Ayla home, to avoid the tough problems, and focus on the moment. And even though Gil accompanied us… I didn't know what to say to him.

We walked into the home where everything had built up… where I'd felt like a prisoner… where I had realized that Ayla was missing… and I realized that the only room untainted by these memories was the one I never entered—Jace's. I felt drawn to it and took Ayla, who had fallen asleep on the drive, straight back to it, opening the door and curling both of us up in his bed. It still smelled like him and I breathed in deeply, imagining for a moment that he were still alive.

Gil hovered in the doorway, uncertain, and finally turned to head back down the hallway, away from us… but the idea of him leaving, once again, struck me as unbearable. "Gil…"

He stopped, turning back to me, his weakness clear on his features for the first time in a very long time. I took in the still-black eye and his swollen lips and nose, the bruise on his jaw… It was so hard to reconcile everything that had happened since the morning before when I'd discovered Ayla missing. …It was so hard to reconcile everything that had happened since I'd met the man with the reality we were facing today. I wasn't ready to say that all was forgiven when he'd abandoned me at my lowest moment, how many months previous… but I wasn't ready to send him away.

I drew in a deep breath, scooting Ayla closer to the other side of the bed and scooting with her, leaving room behind me for him to lay with us. He apparently didn't need the words that I couldn't seem to muster—he came in, slipped out of his shoes, and laid in Jace's bed behind us, wrapping a protective arm around me, his palm resting across Ayla's little tummy. We laid in silence for a long moment… I don't know if he thought I was sleeping or simply didn't care, but he lifted his head from the pillow and pressed a gentle kiss to the curve between my neck and shoulder before sighing and letting his head to the pillow.

I didn't know how to respond… so I didn't. I kept my eyes closed and focused on the comfort of my baby in my arms and Gil's arm around me, and let sleep—blissful, unthinking peace—sweep over me.