True North
by Jaclyn Parker

Trust your own instinct. Your mistakes might as well be your own, instead of someone else's.
~Billy Wilder
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That Saturday night Jack heard his kids come into the farmhouse before he even saw them, but let Emma fuss over them in the kitchen as she liked to do. He stayed in the living room to help Janet and Liberty put out the last tray of hors d'oevures, managing to steal a mini hotdog before they glared at him.

He held up his hands in an innocent gesture and chewed quickly, finishing just as the kids filed in to see him.

"Hey guys! You look great!" Jack said, taking in his handsome sons in their dress pants, button down shirts, and dress shoes. Sage wore a pale rose colored dress with her hair done in a French braid with a rose colored ribbon interwoven in it.

Jack also noticed that Mattie had arrived with them, her green eyes heightened by the knee length green sweater dress that she wore. He knew he wasn't the only one who noticed her arrival, as he watched Liberty stand up straighter and strategically eye up the other teenage girl.

"Hey, Daddy." Sage said, moving to give him a hug and distracting him.

"Hey, Sweetie! You look beautiful." He said, hugging her back and kissing her head.

"Yeah, you guys look amazing." Janet spoke up.

"Thanks." J.J. said, pulling on his collar. He hated dressing up like this but his mom had asked him nicely and he knew it meant a lot to his dad. But still…

Jack gave him a look as J.J. tugged on his collar again, making the young teen stop instantly and mumble an apology under his breath.

There was silence until Mattie rolled her eyes and nudged Parker in the ribs, her eyes gesturing towards Liberty.

"Hey." He said and Liberty gave him a small smile.

"Hey. You look really nice." She told him and he blushed.

"Yeah, so do you." Parker said, taking in the red V-neck dress that she wore and the silver drop pendant that hung to just below her collarbone. With her hair pulled up in a messy twist with a silver accented pins placed about, Liberty was practically glowing.

Another awkward silence and again Mattie realized that she would have to break it.

"Hi Liberty, it's good to see you again. Thanks so much for inviting me tonight." Mattie said and Liberty gave her a look that was part grimace, part smile.

Liberty wasn't about to share that when Janet had told her that Parker was bringing Mattie, that she had thrown a tantrum that would make a 5 year old proud. When she was done she promptly refused to speak to her mom for 24 hours.

Later on when she was apologizing to Janet, who had taken the tantrum in stride, Liberty realized that if Parker could act maturely about the situation so could she. Never mind if every other moment of the night Liberty was going to be picturing ways to dispose of the Australian girl.

"You're more than welcome, Mattie. In fact, everyone is welcome tonight. Speaking of which, where are Carly and Lee?" Janet asked, frowning. "I could have sworn I heard another accent in the kitchen before."

"Oh, you did. Uncle Lee just got a call about an emergency at the hospital, so he dropped us off and then drove there. He'll be back later." Mattie said, nodding.

"Yeah and Mom actually had a last minute band problem at Metro so she had to stay longer at work than she thought. She's going to be here later too." Parker said, just now remembering what his mom had told him when she called earlier.

Parker hadn't had a chance to ask her much more before he had heard a cymbal crash in the background followed by a string of curses. At that point he had let his mom get off the phone and went to call Lee to drive them to the party like she had asked him to do.

"Oh…well…okay. Good." Jack said, his mind racing with a thousand different thoughts and none of them making him smile. He didn't have much time to reflect about them though, as he heard Holden call out a hello from the kitchen.

"Looks like this party's about to get started." Janet said and sure enough, within forty minutes the house was full of dressed up friends and family, laughing and talking amongst themselves.

There were only two pauses in the flow of the evening, when Paul and Meg showed up, mainly due to the gushing that followed about Meg's pregnancy glow, and when Brad and Katie walked in.

That break in everyone's conversations was minuscule but it was there and Jack noticed as Brad's shoulders slumped slightly. He immediately turned and went back in the kitchen, Katie's eyes imploring Jack to go after him.

"Hey, little brother." Jack said upon entering the kitchen and Brad smirked at him from his spot by the kitchen counter.

"You do know I'm taller than you, right?" Brad asked and Jack rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah. Minor detail." Jack said and after grabbing them both beers from the fridge he also leaned on the kitchen counter. "So, how are you doing? Really?"

"Really?" Brad echoed and took a sip of his beer, before bowing his head. "I'm really losing my mind, Jack. I know that Spencer isn't dead and I just can't prove it."

"Is there any evidence? Any thing at all, no matter how small it seems?" Jack pressed and Brad hesitated. Should he tell Jack about the computer messages and the mysterious texts that Katie had been getting?

"No, nothing." Katie interrupted from the kitchen doorway and Brad turned to look at her. Her eyes conveyed a very simple message and Brad resigned himself to keeping all that had been happening between the two of them.

Jack watched them with interest, his cop instincts alerting him to the fact that there was something else going on. But unless they confided in him, there wasn't anything that he could do.

"Well, you know I'm happy to help in any way I can." Jack said and they both looked at him.

"We know. Thank you, Jack." Katie said and she gave him a soft smile, while leaning into Brad's side.

Despite everything that had gone on between her and the older Snyder brother, she still cared about him. But while she wouldn't begrudge the time she had with Jack for the world, she loved Brad so much that her heart hurt when he wasn't with her. Even if he did drive her crazy half of the time.

"So, I hear Carly's coming to this shindig." Brad said, effectively changing the topic and simultaneously startling his brother and wife.

"Yeah, she is. She got stuck at Metro but she'll be here later." Jack said, taking a swig of beer.

"She bringing that new doctor boyfriend of hers?" Brad continued, not noticing the tick that started in Jack's jaw.

However Katie saw it and knew that Brad had touched a nerve. While she loved her husband deeply, sometimes he wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed. She looked closely at Jack's face and immediately wanted to let out a deep sigh.

Katie wondered if anyone besides her had really ever sat Janet down and explained the history of what happened to the people who came between Jack and Carly, or "relationship fillers" as she tended to refer to them, herself included. No matter what, no matter how long the relationship lasted, it never ended pretty and it was always with the same result.

Jack and Carly ended up together again.

"Um, darling, I'm hungry. Let's go see if any of those mini hotdogs are left." Katie said, knowing that if there was one thing that could change her husband's topic of conversation faster than lighting, it was cocktail weenies.

"Mini hotdogs?" Brad said, his interest peaked and saluting his brother with his beer, he headed towards the living room.

Jack sent Katie a look of gratitude and she sent him back a small wink before following her husband out of the kitchen.

Jack leaned his forearms on the kitchen counter, staring at the dark green glass of his beer bottle, contemplating.

Was Carly really at Metro? Did Lee really have an emergency at the hospital? Or were they really back at Milltown together…doing…having…

Before Jack knew what was happening, his phone was in his hand and the sound of ringing was in his ear.

"Hello Metro. How can I help you?" A young woman's voice came on the line, the sound of music blaring in the background.

"Hi, I was looking for Carly Tenney." Jack said and the young woman said something back. Jack plugged his other ear with his finger to hear her better. "What? I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you."

"I said, Carly left about 10 minutes ago. She had to go home to get ready for some family thing."

The girl asked he wanted to leave her a message but Jack declined and hung up. He stared at his phone suddenly realizing what he had done. Yet, despite that, he still had to fight back a huge urge to call the hospital to also check on Lee's whereabouts.

"Hey, there you are." Janet's voice surprised him and made him jump slightly. He turned to face her and she smiled at him. "Hiding from all the people?"

"Hm? What? No." Jack said and she looked down at the phone in his hand.

"Important call?" She asked, tilting her head to look at him curiously.

"No, uh, just listening to a voicemail." Jack said and shoved his phone back in his pocket.

"Oh, okay. Well, since I have you out here alone I have something I want to give you." Janet said, moving forward to wrap her arms around his waist and placing her chin on his chest to look up at him.

"Really?" Jack said, wrapping his arms around her and trying to bring his focus back to what was at hand.

"Uh-huh. Sort of an early wedding present." Janet said, her eyes dancing and she released him to move to go upstairs.

"I'll be right back."

As Jack watched her go, he mentally kicked himself.

"You idiot. What is wrong with you? You have a great woman who is crazy about you and wants to marry you. Snap out of it!" Jack muttered to himself and yet, even then, his thoughts drifted again towards Milltown.

Why did he care so much about whether or not Lee was with Carly at the house? And why, when he thought about the possibility of them having sex, did he suddenly want to put his fist through a certain Australian doctor's face?

"Jack?" Janet called softly, stepping closer to her fiancée. She had come back downstairs to find him muttering under his breath and looking incredibly intense.

He jumped for the second time in her presence and she just stared at him.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Janet asked and Jack shook himself.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He said and grinned at her, turning to look at gift in her hands. "Is that my present?"

Janet looked at him closely for a moment longer before nodding and handing it to him. It was a plain white gift box with a red ribbon wrapped around it, nothing fancy but something about it seemed familiar.

Jack looked at her and kissed her cheek as he hurriedly opened the box. As he pulled back the thin layer of tissue paper inside and stared at the object nestled within, Jack felt everything inside of him freeze.

"Where…where did you get this? Did the kids…" He managed to whisper out.

"No, the kids don't know anything about it. I saw it in the window of a store in Old Town and something inside me just knew you had to have it." Janet said, not understanding his reaction. In fact, he was starting to frighten her. His face was at least two shades paler than he had been a moment ago and she could see his entire body trembling.

"Jack? What's wrong?"

The roaring of blood from his increased heart rate rushed in his ears as the room started to sway and he gripped the kitchen counter with one hand, the other adamantly refusing to put down the gift box. The music and laughter from the people in the living room swept over him, including the sounds of his kids. Jack closed his eyes, praying for the strength he suddenly needed.

"Janet, sit down. We need to talk."