Thanks for the reviews... there's not too many but that's cool. This is a short, wee chapter, but I'm just happy that I'm posting it so soon after the previous one (what can I say? Sometimes I just out due myself... jokes). Promise that there'll be more action soon. Just keep on reading!

Love ya all... enjoy!

Upstairs, Leo paced nervously around the hall, outside of Piper's room. He had already checked for Paige, but she was no where to be found on the second floor of the large manor. Perhaps she had orbed out of the house in order to deal with a charge, or maybe she just needed to be somewhere alone. Privacy was hard to come by at the manor, so the likeliness of him being right was pretty high. Wherever she might be, Leo was left alone and without backup. But Phoebe was right and he realized that this was something that he needed to do - something that only he alone could do. With that tiny surge of confidence, Leo sucked in a deep breath and slowly entered the room, unprepared for the sight that greeted him.

Sitting on the bed, Piper sat motionlessly, staring out of the window from across the room. Not a tear stained her face, and her eyes remained blank - she was a far cry from the emotional wreck that Leo had predicted. An outsider looking in might have mistaken her for a rather content woman, but Leo knew better than to believe the image that she posed. Inside, he knew that she was slowly breaking down, tormenting and beating herself up over the day's events. She was just very skilled, or rather, experienced, at hiding it.

"Piper," Leo started quietly as he joined his wife on the bed and Piper glanced upwards, acknowledging his presence. "Do you... want to talk?"

"No Leo," Piper responded in a monotonous voice. "I don't think that we have anything to talk about."

"Well... I think that we do," he replied as he draped an arm across her shoulders comfortingly and gave her a reassuring squeeze. "Maybe... something about a certain sister?"

Piper backed out of Leo's embrace quickly and stood up to face him before responding, "She's the last person that I want to talk about right now! As far as I'm concerned, she doesn't deserve to be spoken of."

Leo flinched at the hatred that was visibly laced within her voice before he continued calmly, "Piper, I know that you don't mean that. She's your sister and you love her. And she loves you too. I know that you're angry with her, but Phoebe thought that she was doing the best thing that she could by leaving. Not just for her, but for everyone. Did you ever think that these past few years might have been even harder for her? I mean, you had Paige... and me... but she had nobody."

"That's what scares me," Piper cried, tears finally pouring out from her eyes as she collapsed onto the bed and threw her arms around Leo's waist, burying her head deep into his chest. "If she can survive without us once, then who's to say that she won't just take off again? I don't want to get close to her; I don't want to forgive her, because if I do, there's a chance that I'll have to lose her again. And I can't go through that again – I won't be able to handle it. I've already done a shitty job at being her big sister – I mean, Prue would have never let Phoebe become the Queen of all Evil - -"

"Nobody could have stopped that from happening, Piper," Leo started sympathetically as he gently turned her face up to his own and tenderly brushed a strand of hair off of her cheek. "But you brought her back. You helped her become good again."

"But Prue would have never let her become evil in the first place," Piper wailed. "And she would have never, ever, let her leave. She's my baby sister, Leo. God - even to Paige! It's my job, my duty, to protect her... and I didn't. She left for four years! I spent that whole time worrying about her, wondering where she was and wishing that I could talk to her. I feel like I don't even know her any more, and we used to be so close. It's all my fault. She left because of me."

"No she didn't," Leo began sympathetically. "Technically, I guess you could say so, but that's not the point. She was trying to protect you, and believe it or not, sometimes you need protecting, even by your little sister. Phoebe just did it a little differently than you'd expect, but with good intentions, nonetheless. Besides, I don't think that you have to worry about her being any different than she was. She's still the same ol'Phoebe, just a little older and wiser."

"How would you know?" questioned Piper curiously. "You only spoke to her for like two minutes."

Leo couldn't suppress a guilty look from encompassing his face, and while catching it, Piper continued, "Whoa! Wait a minute! You... you've spoken to her before, haven't you? Oh my God! You knew where she was this whole goddamn time! I... I don't believe it! How could you do this to me, I'm your wife for crying out loud!"

"Piper it wasn't like that!" Leo pleaded as she jumped off of the bed, tears of anger and betrayal rushing down her cheeks.

"How could you?" Piper shouted. "I tried every spell in that godforsaken book of ours, and you knew exactly where she was all along! You watched me search and search and search, endlessly for her, year after year! And you couldn't even spare the time to tell me?"

"Piper - -" Leo started, anxious to make her see where he was coming from.

"No!" Piper snapped. "Save it for someone else. I don't want to hear it. Now get the hell out of here."

Leo watched helplessly as Piper collapsed hysterically on the bed, crying uncontrollably into a pillow, while clutching onto another for comfort. As he reached the doorway, he looked back at his wife, wishing that he could do something for her. Knowing that he can't and realizing the huge mistake that he had just made, Leo murmured to himself as he shut the door and walked away, "Damn."

More to come soon, I promise!

Bye for now