Babble: Shadow asked a question that I neglected to answer before I posted last chapter, so I thought I'd do it here, if your still reading it Shadow. A blood clot, can appear just that suddenly and a person who is doing fine, can be at death's door because of it. It wasn't a setback, forever, but Emily could have died if it hadn't been caught as quickly as it was.

Anyway on with the story. I hope you like today's surprise….

Oops almost forgot. One quick question for my readers. I have an 11 part short fic called Quagmire, that is a take on the current stalker storyline, of course, and obviously I made a lot of changes to the current storyline. I was wondering if there would be interest for the story here? Please let me know. It's finished, so I could post several parts at once.

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Betrayal, Loyalty, and Love

Chapter 10

~PCPD~

Lieutenant Marcus Taggert slammed the file on his desk with a disgusted sigh. It had been almost 3 weeks and he was still no closer to finding out who had murdered Sorel, than he had been that rainy night that Nurse Amy Vining had discovered Sorel's body. Bleary eyes focused on the chalkboard of suspects with no alibis. There had been no end of a list of people who had wanted Sorel dead. It had taken weeks alone just to whittle down the list of possible suspects to probable suspects. The resulting names were on the short list because of prime motive and a lack of a credible alibi.

"You keep staring at that board like the secret of life is contained on it." Alex Garcia commented jokingly.

"It does contain a secret. Whoever killed Sorel is on this board," Taggert replied.

"So you think."

"So I know," Taggert maintained. Getting up from his desk he crossed to the chalkboard. "Sonny Corinthos was alone in his penthouse. And the only one who can verify that is his guard, and since Sonny pays the man I'm not putting much stock in that alibi."

"Good point."

"Next," Taggert moved his finger down to the next name on the list and tapped the board thoughtfully. "Jason Morgan. I haven't gotten confirmation that he was in town, yet, but this murder is definitely right up his alley."

"Morgan had to be pissed over what Sorel did to his boss, not to mention his sister," Garcia added.

"Yes Emily Quartermaine which brings us to the next name on the list. Zander Smith. With him being across the hall, from Sorel, he definitely had the best opportunity."

"Was the kid mobile enough?" Garcia wanted to know.

"Hate can make anyone mobile enough," Taggert replied seriously.

"Zander was on monitor's himself. The alarms would've went off if he unhooked them."

"You're forgetting the big helper in this murder, the weather," Taggert reminded him. "The electricity was going off and on all night long, and one of the backup generators that the hospital relied on was blown. All the reserve power was being filtered to those machines that were responsible for actually keeping patients alive. False alarms were going off all night according to Nurse Gabriella. Zander's machine went off three times, all of them false. Since he wasn't relying on the machines to live, the nurses didn't check on him right away when they went off."

"Nurse Gabriella?" Garcia raised a brow in question.

Knowing his partner was the biggest busybody on the force, Taggert ignored the question. "We know Sorel's alarm went off twice and both times he was checked immediately and okay. He was also okay at 10:05 when the duty nurse checked on him. But he was dead when Amy Vining found him at 11:00 p.m. That gives someone a window of only 55 minutes to knock out the guard, get in, move the monitors from Sorel to the guard, kill Sorel, and get out."

Garcia nodded. "I see you still have Carly Corinthos on the list. I thought she had an alibi."

"She does," Taggert admitted grudgingly. "But it's a shaky one and I don't buy it. I was questioning her when the alibi presented himself. She was more surprised than I was. Granted her surprise only lasted a second but it was enough to convince me that the alibi is bogus."

"That's a strong charge, can you prove it? Jasper Jax is an influential member of the community and since he barely knows Carly and hates her husband almost as much as you do, it hardly seems like he would lie," Garcia pointed out.

"My gut tells me that lying is exactly what he is doing. Carly was shaken when Jax interrupted my questioning of her with an alibi. She covered quickly and backed up what Jax said, but I don't buy it." Taggert didn't know why Jax was lying for the blonde, but he knew he was.

"With that short of a timeline you have to figure that the killer had to have pretty good working knowledge of the hospital, not to mention the machines Sorel was hooked up too. The machines that made their way to the guard," Garcia observed.

"I know and that brings me to my next few suspects. Alan Quartermaine as Emily's father had a strong motive in wanting to punish Sorel for his daughter's broken back and subsequent paralysis. Also, I've been doing some checking on the doctor's past, and I'm convinced if he wasn't a Quartermaine he would have been in jail for attempted murder a couple of attempts ago," Taggert couldn't believe what some people got away with.

"The guard on Sorel reported he overheard Alan making comments of malicious intent regarding Sorel just a few hours before Sorel turned up dead. He also has no alibi. Quartermaine claims he was en route to the hospital because someone there paged him, but there is no record of any page. Also the Quartermaine butler confirmed the last time anyone saw Alan Quartermaine was at 9:30. The next time I can find anyone who saw the doctor it is 11:25 at the hospital, when he showed up at the 5th floor nurses station."

"That's far too much time to drive from his house to the hospital," Garcia nodded. "Quartermaine would definitely know how to get in and out of the hospital without anyone seeing him."

"So would Monica Quartermaine," Taggert moved to the next name on the list. "She also has no alibi from 10:20 until 11:15 when she arrived at the hospital. Her window isn't as big as some of the others but she still had the time she would need to kill Sorel, and her motive is as strong as her husbands."

"Yeah but she worked on Sorel when he was originally brought in. She could have just refused to do that if she wanted him dead. From what I heard the only reason Sorel was alive to be killed was because of her impressive work in saving him," Garcia reminded him.

"You're forgetting the fact that she's not only a doctor, she's a surgeon, and also a Quartermaine, that means she's even more arrogant than most doctors. She would have opened herself up to a lawsuit if she refused to work on Sorel and he died because of it. She wouldn't want that on her record, and as a Quartermaine the penalty would be steep," Taggert smiled slightly. "But what if she pulled off the miraculous save of Sorel, one worthy of being written up in medical journals, and the whole time she was intending to kill him, when it couldn't be linked back to her?"

"Christ that's a cold theory."

Taggert shrugged perhaps he was letting his history with Monica Quartermaine color his opinion of her. He could vividly remember the way she'd turned the tables on him, when he'd pressured her to turn on her son. She had called what he was doing blackmail but he knew it was only his willingness to get the job done no matter what.

"What about Skye?" Garcia pointed to the next name on the list.

Garcia's question drew him out of his thoughts and for that he was grateful. He couldn't help but smile when he thought about the fiery redhead. "Skye Chandler-Quartermaine has an interesting story to tell. She was acquainted with Sorel when she was married to Ben Davidson, and living in New Jersey."

"How did you find that out?"

"I have my sources," he answered cryptically, not willing to admit it had been blind luck on his part. "Some people say Skye was involved with Sorel willingly, other's say she hated his guts and tried to kill him on more than one occasion. All I know for certain is that Sorel not only knew her, he kept tabs on her, the latest search of Sorel's home turned up a complete file he had on the latest member of the Quartermaine family."

"Are you thinking it was a love match gone bad?" Garcia expression was one of distaste.

"I don't think so. When I went to the hospital that day she was looking at Sorel with nothing but hate," Taggert sighed wearily and moved back to his desk. "I don't have all the history of what went down in New Jersey but I know whatever it was, it was ugly. And since Skye has no alibi, and she worked in a hospital previously, she stays on the list."

"What about our mystery guest?" Garcia asked about the last name on the list.

"You mean the woman, petite, with dark hair, that a half-drugged patient swears she saw leaving Sorel's room?" Taggert asked sarcastically.

"More than one person reported seeing a brunette woman racing down the stairs and out of the building," Garcia checked his notes. "No one above the 6th floor saw her, so that means her flight originated on the 5th floor where Sorel was."

"I know and I plan on identifying her, that's why she's still on the list."

"You do realize that Corinthos probably wouldn't have gotten his hands dirty, for that matter Morgan may not have either. Either one of them could have ordered the hit on Sorel," Garcia pointed out sagely.

"I know and if Sorel had been executed I know that would be what happened," he was well prepared for this argument. "But given the violence of Sorel's death, the blood, the overkill, he was stabbed twice before the scalpel got stuck in his ribcage. This signals hate to me. Someone wanted Sorel dead in a bad way, the kill was personal and full of hate, that means it was a hands on kill."

"Or the reverse could be," Garcia countered.

"Christ here we go again," Taggert grumbled, sometimes he hated the fact his partner had decided to go back to school. Since he had Garcia had been seeing layers and motives behind parking tickets.

Unperturbed by Taggert's expression, Garcia went on. "Corinthos and Morgan had to know that they would be at the top of the short list if Sorel turned up dead. They also knew that a kill like this, bloody, a little out of control, would more than likely get them off the hook. No one would believe that a mob boss and his chief enforcer would ever be so messy. The focus of the police would shift elsewhere because of this belief."

All right there were times his partner's overcrowded brain actually produced something useful. Taggert conceded his partner's point. "Another reason to keep their names on the board."

"What's the point in leaving Morgan up? We can't find anyone who even says he was in town."

"I think he was in town, not only because of Sorel, but because of what happened the next night."

Garcia paused with his coffee cup halfway to his lips. "You don't mean the theft at the auction house do you?"

Taggert nodded.

"Don't tell me that you're buying what old lady Cassadine is selling," Garcia begged.

"Someone stole that necklace in 25 minutes. They stole it out from under the noses of 4-armed security guards and the latest in high tech security systems. It was there when the auction began but when it came up for bidding 25 minutes later it had vanished. Someone had to be pretty clever to pull that one off."

"I thought you always said Morgan was a brain damaged thug. Now you're saying he has the smarts to pull this job off?" Garcia needled his partner.

Taggert leveled a long glare at his partner. "Morgan has always been a pet monkey for Sonny. He follows orders very well, if Sonny told him to steal the necklace he would get Sonny the necklace."

"But why?"

"Alexis Davis," Taggert theorized. "She tried to steal the necklace earlier in the week. Don't you think Sonny would do anything he had too, to keep his mouthpiece happy and out of jail?"

"I disagree," Garcia shook his head. "I was at the auction house. I saw Alexis' face when the necklace showed up missing. She lost it in a big way, screaming at both Helena and Nikolas that they were trying to keep her mother's legacy from her. It was the first time I'd seen any emotion from a Cassadine. If Nikolas hadn't stepped in between them I swear Alexis would have torn Helena apart, sling or no sling."

"Maybe," Taggert hadn't been there, he hadn't seen her reaction, but he wasn't about to let his pet theory fall apart. "Maybe she's just a real good actress."

"You know I still think it's strange that Nikolas Cassadine is siding with Helena all of a sudden."

Taggert smiled coldly at the mention of his name. Gia being dumped by the Prince was the best thing that ever happened to her. She wasn't aware how lucky she was to escape the Cassadine viper nest.

"Taggert someone is here to see you," Officer Johnson called. "He says he has info on the Sorel murder."

Intrigued Taggert turned and his eyes took on a speculative gleam when he saw who was waiting to talk to him. This could be interesting.

~Penthouse~

"Sonny are they ever going to finish painting this place?" Alexis Davis asked when he opened the door and paint fumes began to overwhelm her, causing her stomach to roll.

"They just put the second coat on last night. It would have been done before now but I decided to have the wiring updated," Sonny explained. "So how are you doing today Katie?"

"I told you not to call me that," she reminded him sharply. Ever since, what he had deemed her Oscar winning performance, on the night of the auction, he'd been calling her Katie as in Katherine Hepburn. The only problem was every time she heard Katie she thought of Luke Spencer saying Katie Belle and the thought of Katherine Belle was enough to kill her sense of joy over out-maneuvering Helena.

"That was the last time I promise," Sonny offered magnanimously.

Alexis knew better than to trust him, with a put upon sigh she moved past him and took a seat on the new couch. She already liked this one better than the last one, it was a lot softer. "So what did you want to talk about? Carly's latest stall tactics or the purchase of those warehouse's on Waters and Front Streets?"

"Neither," Sonny paused at his new desk. "I have something for you."

Immediately uneasy she darted a look towards the door and escape. "I don't want anything. You're my client, as long as you pay my bill each month and the check's don't bounce I don't need anything else from you."

Sonny grinned, moved closer and held out a box, which she studied as though it contained a bomb.

"You can take it, it won't bite," he teased.

But she didn't want to take it. She didn't want to bind herself anymore to Sonny Corinthos than she already had. He was her client and somehow he had become her best friend, but that didn't mean she was comfortable with him. All right so she'd be a lot more comfortable around him if she hadn't slept with him. But she had and as much as she'd like to change that fact she couldn't. She only wished she could banish the memory of that night as easily as he seemed to be able too. For some reason the further removed that night was the more it took on a life of its own in her memory. She hated that, she hated feeling out of control. She refused to feel out of control. So she was going to refuse what was in the box, no matter what it was.

"Maybe I should open it, you don't seem to believe me when I say what's inside won't hurt you." Sonny pulled the ribbon off the box and taking her by surprise he set it on her lap.

Alexis eyed the box warily then looked back at him, but all she saw was amusement in her dark eyes, along with his dimpled grin. She'd never been able to resist that damn dimple. Cursing her weakness she gave in and opened the box. Confusion crossed her features when all she saw was tissue paper, sighing she dug in the box until she came up with an envelope.

"Open it," he urged.

Fighting her growing interest she strove to keep a banal expression on her face. It lasted until the photographs were pulled out of the envelope. "Oh," Alexis gasped, immediately emotional. "Mama's necklace."

"I thought you'd like to see that the necklace is in one piece and that it is secure," Sonny explained as she flipped through the photographs. "It's only temporary. Once I think that the heat has died down, and Helena's interest has moved on I'll smuggle it back in the country and it will be yours, just like it should have been years ago."

Alexis' eyes brimmed with unshed tears. The photo of the necklace inside a glass box in a safe, shouldn't reduce her to tears but it did. "I know you said you got it, but when you wouldn't give me any details," she swallowed a lump of emotion, "a part of me wondered if Helena had tricked me after all."

"I needed to keep you in the dark until Taggert's initial press was over. I told you, Alexis, you operate the best when you're kept in the dark about certain things," he explained seriously.

Not trusting her voice she nodded and thumbed through the photos again.

"I don't have to remind you to keep those someplace safe do I? There's no way anyone can tell the location from looking at them but you should still keep them out of sight of everyone, and that goes for Zander as well. I know he's recuperating at your place now, and you know how nosy he can be."

"I will," Alexis stood and feeling off-balanced she swayed slightly.

"Are you okay?" Sonny was instantly out of his chair trying to steady her.

"Paint fumes, no lunch, and seeing these photos, have wrecked my equilibrium," she explained with a soft smile and stepped back.

"You shouldn't neglect your health. You need to eat regular meals Alexis. Why don't you join me for supper, I'm making Veal Scarpetti."

It was an offer he'd made before, and one she used to have no problem taking him up on. But that was before her big mistake. "No."

Sonny's smile fell from his face and he searched her expression for so long she was afraid she had something on it. She was about to rub her nose when he spoke, his words were soft, his tone, sad.

"It's still between us, isn't it? That night?"

Uncomfortable Alexis took another slight step back. "Of course not. We agreed that what happened was a one-time thing, that only happened at all because we were both hurting. You over Carly and me because of what I had just found out. We're both adults here, we said it wouldn't effect either our working relationship or our friendship and it hasn't," she argued. No one was more desperate to believe her words than she was.

"Then why do you go out of your way to avoid me these days?" Sonny pressed.

"I'm not avoiding you," she lied. Until Sonny was firmly in her brain as best friend, only, she wasn't going to spend anymore time with him then was absolutely necessary.

"Prove it," he dared. "Have dinner with me tonight."

"I can't I have plans," and seeing the disbelief in his eyes her own narrowed in anger. "I do, I'm meeting Ned."

"Ned?" Sonny's expression turned mocking. "Tell me you're not falling for his line all over again."

"What I do with Ned is none of your business," she huffed.

"How many times has he broken your heart? How many times has he told you he loved you only to demand that you change for him in order to keep the love?"

"Sonny you need to stay out of things that don't concern you." She ignored his all too pointed, and accurate questions and stalked for the door. Opening it she turned to look back at him. "And that expressly means staying out of my love life," pivoting she turned and found herself face to face with her ex.

"I couldn't have said that any better," Jax applauded.

Feeling the tension in the room shoot up another ten notches and Alexis tried to ward it off. "We're you looking for me?"

"Yes," Jax nodded, ignoring the man behind her.

"What do you need?"

"Do I need a reason to visit my favorite ex-wife?" He asked with a grin.

Sonny snorted behind her and Alexis knew it was time to leave, before things got ugly. Taking Jax's arm she tried to turn him around. "We can talk at my place."

"Enjoy your date," Sonny called from behind them.

Grumbling under her breath Alexis stalked to her door and inserted the key, but as usual, it refused to move. Fed up she hit the door, hard. "Ow."

"Don't hurt yourself," Jax admonished and brushing her aside he tried to unlock the door himself.

Alexis shook out her throbbing hand and watched him have no success with the lock either. The sight of that vindicated her somewhat. It wasn't just her. That damn lock hated everyone.

"Excuse me," a voice whispered in her ear and she jolted in surprise.

Well the lock hated almost everyone.

"Move," Sonny said arrogantly.

Jax turned to look, then shifted slightly until he was leaning against he locked door. Alexis could read the expression on his face as one of cool derision. She thought about warning him but something made her keep quiet. As she had figured the lock popped under Sonny's hands. The door opened quickly sending an off-balanced Jax staggering side the room.

Alexis quickly covered her mouth to stop the laugh from escaping.

Sonny paused beside her. "Night Alexis," she managed a nod. "Candy boy," he jeered.

By the time Sonny's door had closed she had managed to smother the humor. Bracing herself she moved inside her penthouse to see what was going on in her friend's life.

~Rehab~

"Emily if you don't calm down I think you're going to break the bed," Jason cautioned his sister.

"I can't calm down," Emily bounced on the bed. "I'm just so excited."

"I can tell." He couldn't help but grin when he saw the smile on her face. It was the same one she had been sporting for days now. After seeing her so sad, for so long, he was thrilled to see the return of the sister he was used to seeing.

"Jason I'm going home tomorrow. After all of these months I'm finally going home," Emily pointed out cheerily. "And look," she wiggled her legs slightly. "I can move them so much easier now."

Jason nodded in appreciation she was gaining more strength in her legs every day. After the blood clot he'd been afraid that she would have a setback, both physically and emotionally. But she had surprised him. The day after surgery she'd been eager to start her therapy all over again. She had worked harder than he'd ever seen her work, and the results had come quickly.

The phone chose that moment to ring and Emily pounced on it, nearly falling out of bed when she did so. Jason reached out to pull her back on the bed but she saved herself before he could.

"Zander."

If possible her voice grew even more excited. Jason began moving to the door, he didn't bother to wave, knowing she wouldn't see it if she did. As much as he hated to admit it, Zander's daily phone calls had been what had made the difference in Emily's therapy. The best by product of Sorel finally dying was the fact Emily didn't have to hide anymore. And that was why she was going home tomorrow.

Habit had him taking the stairs until he was on the first floor, then, outside. It may not be a regular hospital but there were enough doctors in the place to qualify. But more than that it was the smell of the place. The mixture of medicine, liniment, along with the overly sweet disinfectant cleaning smells, reeked of hospital to him. He took a deep breath, catching the faint scent of the ocean, some of the tension left him.

Sliding on the shades he headed for his bike, it was time to finalize a few last minute details. He wasn't happy to be going back to Port Charles, he wasn't ready to go back yet. But there was no way he'd let Emily go by herself. The plan of just dropping her back at the hospital and then leaving, had a shelf life of only 5 seconds. That was how long it took for her to look at him and ask him to stay with her even after she got home.

Faced with that there had been no way that he could refuse her, so he had agreed. He was going back to Port Charles and he had no desire to be there. Especially after what happened the last time he was in Port Charles. The memory of that night wasn't a pleasant one.

"What?" Sonny Corinthos demanded when he yanked open the door, then stopped short. "Jason?"

Jason nodded and watched the surprise race over the older man's face. "Can I come in?"

"Of course," Sonny stepped back. "Do you need a towel? I see you got caught in the rain."

"I'm okay." Jason shook his head sending water beads flying. He didn't feel like wasting time. "A bomb?"

Sonny flinched and took a step where the wet bar should have been then stopped.

Jason recognized his actions and looked around the penthouse to see what other changes the bomb had brought. "What were you thinking?"

"Sorel had Carly, he had Alexis, hell he even had Zander. I didn't have a lot of options," Sonny said defensively.

"Don't give me that. I know you. I know what happens to you when you even hear about a bomb. So you want to explain to me why Benny told me that you walked into this place with a bomb strapped to your chest?" Jason kept his eye on his friend, trying to read his actions. "Do you want to tell me what you were thinking?"

"Does it matter?" Sonny asked finally.

Sighing in frustration Jason rubbed wearily at the kink forming in the back of his neck. "I know you kicked Carly out, Michael out, and you disappeared for awhile, does that matter?"

"There were a lot of things going on then, some are still going on," Sonny finally spoke after a few minutes of silence.

"I know how you get Sonny," Jason commented wearily. "I know how you act when you start sliding. You don't care about things, but mostly you don't care about yourself. You walked into this penthouse, prepared to die didn't you?"

Sonny turned his back on Jason and moved to the window to stare out at the stormy night.

The long flight from the West Coast had given him plenty of time to think. And somewhere over Philadelphia he felt he'd figured it out. "I was with you in Puerto Rico after Lily died. And I know you went there to die. You were going to kill Rivera first but you never planned on leaving Puerto Rico. But something happened when you got in that room with Rivera, something changed and you decided to walk out of there."

"I could punish him more by living," Sonny whispered.

Jason could see the point of that and nodded. "Something happened that made you walk into this place with the intention of dying. And whatever it was, it was more than Carly turning you into the feds, and it was more than Sorel sending a bomb here wasn't it?"

"Do the reasons really matter after all this time?" Sonny turned around. "Is there anything I can say that would explain things? Besides, since when do I explain my actions to you?"

"Since always," Jason shot back coldly and saw Sonny flinch. "I've just been letting you slide. I'm not doing that anymore, and if you don't like it tell me now, and I'll go back to what I let myself get turned into."

"What was that?"

"Nothing more than your enforcer, your employee, your expendable employee," bitterness coated his tone and more of it was self-directed than Sonny probably realized. "If that's what you want me to be tell me."

"You were never just an employee," Sonny countered. "From the night you came here for dinner with Robin, and you took my job offer, you've never been just an employee."

"Until the last time I was here," Jason corrected him. "Earlier this year, you stopped talking to me as a friend. I let you do it, I didn't press you when I should have, I just took it."

Sonny nodded slightly.

"I let it go, and look what happened," he gestured around the damaged penthouse. "I'm not going to do it anymore. I will always follow your lead when it comes to business, but I'm not going to do that anymore when it comes to our friendship," sighing he took one of the biggest risks he'd ever taken. "What I want to know is if you still want our friendship, or if I should stay as just an employee?"

Sonny never hesitated. "I want you to be my best friend again. I know I fucked up and I will again, but I still consider you my friend."

Sighing Jason got on his bike and started it up. It wasn't much but it was a start. Now the hard part would be coming, now he was going to be in Port Charles for more than a night. So they'd have to see.

~Penthouse~

"Jax I still don't understand why you're lying for Carly," Alexis rubbed at her temples, in an effort to stem the headache she was rapidly developing.

"Who said I was lying for her?" Jax asked.

"Fine," she knew how the game was played. "In theory, if you were lying to provide an alibi for Carly you should be aware that you could be arrested for providing false information to the police. You could be charged with hindering an investigation, and if it turns out that Carly did in fact kill Sorel, you could be charged as an accessory after the fact."

"Then it's probably a good thing that I'm not lying, isn't it?" Jax asked with a grin.

Jax was spared her retort when Zander made his way slowly down the stairs. Spying him Alexis got to her feet. "Are you doing okay?"

Zander nodded then paused. "If you have a meeting I can go back upstairs."

"Don't be ridiculous," Alexis took his arm gently and led him to the couch. "Move Jax."

Sighing Jax got to his feet. "We can finish our conversation another time," he paused beside her and kissed her cheek. "Take it easy Zander."

"Yeah," Zander grumbled and sank slowly on the couch.

"What's with the frown, I thought you'd be flying," Alexis settled carefully on the couch next to her friend. "Did something happen with Emily?"

"No she's fine, I just talked to her," a small smile drifted over his face then vanished. "She's coming home tomorrow."

"I know, I thought we decided this was a good thing."

"It is, but," he hesitated.

"But?" Alexis prodded.

"She was hurt because of me, and I know she never blamed me, but…"

"But you blame yourself," she realized.

Zander shrugged then flinched.

"Don't do that," she ordered sharply. "Emily never holds grudges, she is one of the few people in the world that never points her finger in blame at people. Especially not when it comes to someone she loves."

"I know she's the best, and she deserves the best. Alexis I'm a runaway, a former drug dealer, I've been arrested several times, charged with murder, I've done things she doesn't even know about, and should never know about. She deserves more than I can give her, in fact the only thing I can give her, is a break. That's why I think I should leave."

"Zander you're forgetting all of those things you've done are in the past. The person you once was doesn't exist anymore," Alexis reasoned. "You've changed for the better."

"I could spend the rest of my life trying to undo the damage that I've done, but it would never be enough, to deserve Emily in my life," he bowed his head in disgust.

"Stop it," she snapped and caused his head to shoot up. "Emily loves you. You love Emily. You have no idea how rare that is. You have no idea how hard it is to find someone who accepts you for whom you are, and doesn't put limits on you. You have no idea how lucky you are, for finding someone like this, when you're still so young. Have you made mistakes? Yes. Does everyone? Yes. But the biggest mistake you will ever make in your life, is if you walk away from Emily using the excuse that you want what is best for her."

"You're really upset."

"Yes I am. You, men, drive me crazy sometimes," Alexis got to her feet and rubbed at her throbbing temples. "You have this vision that women don't deserve or can't handle anything ugly in the world. Well guess what? We're stronger than you think we are, and we can handle any problem that you think we'll overwhelm us. If you decide to walk out on Emily at least be honest with yourself. Admit that you're walking out on her because you're afraid, not because you think she deserves better."

"Alexis…" Zander tried to get to his feet only to be pushed back to the couch.

"I have a headache Zander so please be quiet and think about what I just said. Like it or not, want it or not, she loves you, so what makes you think you leaving her will make her stop loving you? It won't at least not for a long time, and she will always, always, carry that with her. She'll take you leaving her like this, with her, into every relationship she has for the rest of her life," with that final warning Alexis stomped up the stairs.

"Alexis," Zander struggled to go after her but she was gone.

Alexis stormed into her bedroom, then on into her bathroom. "Stupid," she hissed at herself. She shouldn't have said all that to Zander. She wasn't Emily and Zander wasn't… Shaking her head she tried to banish the memory. She'd apologize to Zander later, as soon as she could think again. Opening the cabinet over the sink she reached for the bottle of Advil and found it empty. Tossing it in the garbage, she bent down and opened the cabinet below the sink. The hand that was reaching for the bottle of Advil stopped suddenly when something else caught her eye.

An unopened box of Tampax was what she ended up pulling out of the cabinet. Standing up she looked at the box then at the mirror, and her dark eyes seemed larger than normal with shock. "Oh god," she paled at the implication of what the unopened box could mean.