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Part Two: Choices

Boston

"Someone should tell Woody," Lily said quietly. She sat in the break room with Garret, Nigel and Bug. The morgue was after-hours quiet.

Nigel didn't look up from his coffee. "Why?"

"Nigel!" Lily admonished. "Because – Because – You know why!"

Now the Brit did look up. He liked Woody, though for a while that feeling had definitely faded. Nonetheless, Nigel loved Jordan as only a friend can and part of him had never forgiven the homicide detective for hurting Jordan the way he had. "Woody pushed Jordan out of his life a long time ago."

"Yes, but-"

Nigel shook his head. "She moved on. If Jordan wants him to know, she'll tell him when she gets back."

"Nigel-!"

"He's right," Garret said calmly. He met Lily's pleading gaze with his own steady, implacable one. "If Jordan wants Woody to know, she'll tell him in her own time and her own way."

"Tell me what?" Woody stood in the doorway, a pathology report in hand.

For a moment silence filled the spaces between them all. With a sigh, it was Garret who spoke. "Danny McCoy was killed. Jordan's coming home to Boston with Catherine and Sarah."

XXXXX

Five years previously…

Jordan reread the letter that had arrived that morning. She'd perused it at least five times, still disbelieving its contents. An offer like this… true, she'd let them know she was interested, but… this? And Danny had promised to stay out of it so… so… she read the letter for the seventh or eighth time.

For nearly a year she and Danny had racked up frequent flier miles – or would have if Ed Deline had offered them almost unlimited use of the Montecito's private plane – to see each other whenever their work schedules permitted. The strings Danny had promised weren't there had caught them both by surprise. What had begun as an impulsive affair borne of fierce attraction had developed into the type of security Jordan had never known.

Danny never lied to her, never asked more of her than she was ready to give and never pushed her to move forward. The changes in their relationship were gradual, almost imperceptible and, for the first time she could recall, Jordan had been the first to say "I love you." True, Danny had been avoiding that utterance for fear of sending her fleeing, but he understood exactly what it meant for her to say it when she did.

He'd been in Boston in late May. She'd had a long day and had gone up to the roof to unwind before meeting him for dinner. He had found her there, staring across the city she loved so much. She'd leaned against him and he'd held her tightly, his chin on her shoulder. He'd said something funny – she couldn't remember what, but she'd laughed. She'd slid a hand up his cheek, resting her palm against his face. Still smiling, she'd murmured, "I love you." So easy, so natural, so… perfect.

He had kissed her neck. "And here I thought it was just the great sex."

"Well, there is that."

He'd tickled her ribs, knowing how to do it just right to make her hot almost instantly. "I love you, too, Jordan."

To her surprise, she'd found she didn't have to adjust to the idea of loving him and having him love her. She didn't have to worry about hurting him or building walls to keep him from hurting her. The strings might have been well in place by then, but it was still as uncomplicated as he'd told her it would be. They were still two people who liked each other. A lot.

Quite a lot.

And now as a dreary October rain sluiced the city, Jordan read a letter offering her a job in Las Vegas. The Clark County Coroner's Office, to be exact, second-in-charge. As much as she ached at the thought of leaving Boston, of leaving Garret and Nigel and Lily and Bug, her heart wasn't here anymore. Her heart was in the middle of an improbable oasis in the Nevada desert.

She gave Garret her two weeks notice, paid off her lease on her apartment and packed up the few things she wanted. Somehow, a lot of her things had already migrated out west, as if waiting for her to get with the program. She cried at the goodbye party they threw her, promising to come back often for visits and insisting everyone come to the desert when they could. She left behind wedding invitations for a ceremony four months away.

Her heart clenched just the slightest bit when Lily offered to pass on Woody's invitation for her. She shook her head. "He wouldn't come."

"Jordan-"

Jordan shook her head again. "Leave it alone, Lily. Okay?" The unshed tears in her eyes were, Jordan told herself, for the friendship that had been lost. She had fought so long to preserve it and, in the end, it hadn't mattered. It hadn't been enough for Woody. She hadn't been enough. She regretted what might have been, but not what was.

It was two months later that Woody finally looked at Bug, who'd caught yet another of Woody's cases, and asked, "Where's Jordan?"

"Las Vegas," came the laconic reply.

"Geez, is she ever in Boston anymore?" Hoyt had asked sarcastically.

Bug gave him a perplexed look. "Woody, she moved out there. She's getting married in two months."

"What? When did she – she moved?" His mouth moved soundlessly for a moment. "What she'd do – pull up stakes and just vanish as usual?"

"No," Bug shook his head. "She got a job out there, a really good job. She gave Dr. Macy her notice. We had goodbye party and everything." He stopped. "She didn't tell you?"

"Never said a word. Of course, she hadn't been the responding M.E. to many of my cases. Maybe it slipped her mind." His voice was bitter.

XXXXX

Nigel found Max in time for the wedding. Max found himself liking Danny McCoy quite a lot and Ed Deline was the sort of man to whom Max could relate pretty well. As he waited with Jordan, dressed in a tuxedo for their walk down the aisle, he smiled at her. "I always knew you'd run off to Vegas to get married, Jordan."

She laughed at him. "I wanted to get married at the Perpetual Chapel of Love, but Danny insisted on something a little more traditional."

Max took her hand. "Are you happy, Jordan?"

She nodded.

"He's not Woody."

"No, he's not," she said simply.

"I always thought you two would…."

"It didn't work, Dad." She smiled. "This works."

Max didn't respond, just studied her face for a few minutes. Somehow she'd taken the train wreck of her life and sculpted a great deal of beauty from it. She'd always been good at her job, but Max was unaccustomed to seeing her be good at her life. She had struggled for so long to get to this place. If the man standing at the other end of the aisle wasn't the one he'd envisioned after meeting Hoyt, well, that was Hoyt's loss.

Jordan stood up when she heard the bridal march. "That's our cue."

XXXXX

They honeymooned in Argentina, ignoring the light hearted jibes about its being a non-extradition country. During the days they took in the sights and at night they made love with as much passion and pleasure as the first time she'd come to Las Vegas – back when there were no strings. Or so they'd thought.

Jordan was pregnant by the time they came home. Catherine Allison screamed her way into the world in the middle of the night after a quick, intense labor that left Jordan exhausted and Danny amazed at her, all over again.

Sarah Anne made her appearance fourteen months later, proof that her parents' attraction and passion for each other was not diminishing.

Danny doted on his daughters, who had his wife's looks and his sly smile. He doted on his wife and never ceased to wonder how he'd gotten so lucky. On Jordan's side of the balance sheet, the wonder was just as deep and strong. Occasionally she would see Sam or, from the corner of her eye, the flash of a dark head of hair and deep blue eyes and time would shift away from her, stranding her in the past. The ache would be fierce and fresh and then the reality of everything she had would banish the past full of what she didn't have.

And then her life, her nearly perfect reality came to a crashing halt. The phone call, as she examined a body – motorcyclist without helmet meets pavement; pavement wins. The kind of call she'd received once before. The kind she'd never wanted to receive again. Ed Deline had already sent a car for her by the time she hung up.

He met her at the hospital. His eyes, hooded and dark, his mouth set and stony made her knees buckle. She swallowed the tears that burned and stung her eyes. "Where is he?" She choked out.

Ed led her to the room where Danny lay, hooked up to tubes and monitors which all said the same thing: the damage was too great. Danny was conscious. He smiled at Jordan as she walked in. It was the same smile he always gave her, the one that welled up unbidden inside him, the one that flew from his heart and soul to rest on his lips at the slightest sight of her. "Hi," he managed weakly.

Her tears spilled over. "Hi." She sat down and took his hand.

"I'm sorry, Jordan."

"For what?"

He lifted his hand to run his finger down her cheek. "I promised I'd never hurt you." Her mouth trembled as the tears coursed down her face. He stroked her cheek a few more times before the effort became too much. "I-"

"Don't talk, Danny. Save your strength," she begged.

He gave her a sad look. "For what? You and I both know what's happening."

"Danny-"

"I love you." He squeezed her hand. "I think I have since I watched you walk out of that jet way and into my life. I never intended to, Jordan. But I can't imagine what my life would have been without you."

"Danny, don't – please…." She brought his hand to her lips and kissed it.

"I'm sorry, Jordan."

She watched the light begin to fade from his eyes. She wanted to scream, to pound on the walls, to throw things, but most of all she wanted to gather him to her and somehow stop this. She leaned into him and kissed him gently.

He managed another smile. "Sleeping Beauty? A kiss changes everything?"

She laughed in spite of herself. "It did once, you know."

"I remember," he told her. He reached out his hand again. "Tell the girls I love them. Let them know I wanted to be there. And – And-" His breath hitched.

"Danny!"

He inhaled. "And make sure this one knows it, too." His hand rested against her belly, swollen slightly in the fourth month of pregnancy.

"I will, Danny. I will." She kept repeating her frantic declaration, a terrible mockery of their wedding vows, until her rational mind could make her realize he had gone. Realize, but not accept.

END Part Two