Written in 61 minutes.

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Jason closed the door behind Mac and Scott, but he didn’t turn around right away. He stood there another moment, both hands flat against the door, his head bowed for a long moment, absorbing everything the commissioner and district attorney had thrown at him, trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together.

It was too much, too convoluted, to horrifying to be true, and everything inside of him was rejecting the idea that Luis and Lorenzo Alcazar had switched places a year earlier because a vengeful brother was something Jason could almost understand, but a psychotic obsessed lunatic was harder to grasp—

And the last thing he wanted to do was turn around and listen to Elizabeth ask him to take her back to her grandmother’s, to watch her walk away. Again.

So he stood there, his back to the rest of the room for just another moment, hoping that somehow, with the extra time, he’d find the words that he’d never found before.

How to make her stay.

She hadn’t the day in the park, when he’d all but begged her to see what was in front of them or a year earlier when he’d mishandled everything about Sonny’s fake death—

And it didn’t seem as if he was going to find those words again today. He had nothing left to give. Not after seeing Sonny, the confrontation with Mike, the awful scene with Elizabeth before Scott and Mac had dumped more on his shoulders.

He’d just have to take her to Audrey’s and hope the next time—

Jason jolted when her slim arm curled around his waist and he felt her lean against his back. He reached for her hand, then slowly turned, drawing his brows together. “What?”

“I’m sorry.” She lifted her eyes to his, and he was relieved to see that swirl of anxiety and panic had faded, though the shadows beneath them seemed to have deepened. “You’re so steady, so certain, and I take it for granted. That you’ll always be that way. No matter what gets thrown at you.”

Mystified, he looked down at the hand he held, and then at the one resting at her side, still out of the brace. He lifted it, placing it on top of her other hand, then clasped both his hands around them. “I don’t understand.”

“I think I lost sight of just how awful things were before this happened. You were so unhappy, Jason. So worried about everyone, and then this happens, and it all gets so much worse. I didn’t even think it was possible,” she managed, her throat tight. “But all of those things happened to you, too. And if I’m pushed to the edge of my sanity, it’s not fair to expect you to hold on to my crazy and keep yourself together, too.”

“It’s okay—”

“It’s not. It’s really not.” Tears clung to her lashes, but they didn’t fall. Her lips curved up at the corners, but there was no humor in her features. “Sonny’s like your brother, and I know how much Mike means to you. A-nd Scott and Mac think Luis Alcazar is back? Brenda must be terrified—”

“She doesn’t—” Jason furrowed his brow, considering now if part of Brenda had worried. “She didn’t know that. She thought—thinks—it’s Lorenzo Alcazar. And we still don’t know.”

“No. Just one more awful question. Too many of those and not nearly enough answers.” Elizabeth exhaled in a long, slow, but shaky breath. “I’m okay now. I think maybe I just needed to flip out and let all that awfulness out. I came in here, and God, it looks like the night I left, and I think I broke a little inside. Because what if I hadn’t left? What if I’d stayed?”

Jason looked up, looked around, and really took in the stark surroundings. “I—Mike wanted to get Courtney’s things. I told him there was no hurry. I asked—I asked the guys who’d helped her last spring when she moved in. I don’t know if—maybe they thought I wanted to get rid of everything.”

“It’s fine—”

“It’s—I don’t want to pretend it didn’t happen. We can’t do that.”

“And that wasn’t fair of me to say.” She started to move backwards, and her hands fell from his grasp. She turned in a slow circle, her eyes drinking in the emptiness, the way their voices bounced off the walls. “It’s me, you know. That wishes it hadn’t happened. Listening to Mike—”

“He was wrong—”

“Was he? About Courtney, yeah. I don’t blame him. It’s an awful thing to face, and if it gives him comfort to think it’s a mistake, that I’m a villain, I can live with it. But he wasn’t wrong about the way I took Ric’s side. Over and over again.” Her eyes found his again. “I wish I could say I did it because I truly loved him. Or believed him.  I told myself I did, but I think deep down I didn’t. And because I didn’t, I dug in harder. Just like I did with Lucky. I ignored everything that didn’t fit in my fantasy, and when it all blew up anyway, the fall was so much harder. Because if I hadn’t been so scared, so stupid, none of this would be happening.”

“I know it upsets you to think of that,” Jason said carefully, and she just sighed. “And I was angry with you. For a long time. Especially when you married Ric even after everything you knew. When Sonny told me, I thought—” He grimaced, looked away.

“What?” she asked softly. “What did you think?”

“That I wasn’t going to waste my breath talking you out of it. That I’d done it over and over again, and there was no point. Whatever happened next would be your fault, not mine.”

He didn’t know what reaction he expected, but then she smiled, a full one, with a crinkling of her eyes. “Oh, no. How terrible. What a jerk. How can I even look at you now?”

Jason tipped his head. “That doesn’t make you mad?”

“It’s actually—” She wrinkled her nose. “It’s actually a relief, which sounds insane. I’ve been over here, wracking myself with guilt because of the things I said to you, and you’d never given up on me. But you did. Even if I didn’t know it. I don’t know why that comforts me.” She leaned against the arm of the sofa. “Jason, you had every right to be angry with me. And if you’d held that against me for the rest of our lives, I’d never be able to blame you.”

“What’s the point of doing that?” He came closer, feeling oddly reassured. Maybe they really should have talked about all of this before. And maybe they would have — if there’d been time. If the world hadn’t crashed down around them. “Do you think I felt any pleasure in being right? That he hurt you and that you ended up regretting it? I don’t.”

“I know.” She bit her lip. “When we found out I was pregnant, the original plan was to keep things quiet and let things happen. To let things cool off with you and Courtney. To give you time and space to figure out Sonny and Carly so you’d be able to worry less about Michael. To give us space. Because we can’t just jump into what happens next. I’ve spent too much of this last year lurching wildly from point to point, and just never taking the time to breathe.”

Jason made a face, looked away. “I know. And that was a good plan, but—”

“But it’s not on the table anymore. I don’t know how we fix this. I don’t know what to do except keep moving forward. Doing what feels right in the moment, and just being honest. I’m scared, Jason. Not of Alcazar. Because you’re going to tell me what to do and I’m going to do it. If that means being locked up here in the penthouse until you have answers, then we’ll do that.”

“It—it might,” Jason admitted with a grimace. “If Alcazar doesn’t scare you—”

“That we’re going to mess this up. That I’m going to get too freaked out and run or that you’ll shut down, and I just—don’t know. I lost it today. I mean, I really lost my entire mind, and if Scott and Mac hadn’t shown up—” Elizabeth sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe I would have made you take me home, and that would have been the end of it.”

“I don’t want you to feel obligated to be here because of that. Because all of that will be going on whether you’re here or not,” Jason told her. “If you feel sorry for me—”

“I don’t feel sorry—oh, that came out all wrong, but it’s how I made it sound, didn’t it? No. No.” She straightened, standing up. “No,” she said for a third time. “It’s not that I felt sorry for everything you’ve got on your shoulders. I just got some perspective, that’s all. And a reminder that it’s not fair to look at you for the answers. Too many people do that, Jason, and I refuse to be one more person you have to take care of. I don’t know what tomorrow looks like, what we look like, but I want to be with you. Mac and Scott just dropped this enormous problem on your lap.” She lifted her chin. “What do we next?”

Vannes, France

The brunette had taken the cottage near the harbor some months ago, but mostly kept to herself. There were whispers that she looked familiar, but no one could quite place her. Her accent, the few times she’d ventured out, was obviously American though her French wasn’t too terrible. Boarding school French, to be sure.

If anyone in Vannes suspected that the mysterious woman was the former supermodel Brenda Barrett, whose mysterious return from the death remained cloaked in rumors and scandal, no one breathed a whisper of it. They might gossip around their own, but anyone who had one fake death on their resume had enough trouble without adding to it.

So she lived her life, wondering if this was the day he found her. If this was the last day of her life — or if she’d ever really get her own life back.

The answer came late one night, just after ten. The phone rang in the kitchen and she stared at it for a long time, letting it ring once. Twice. Then a third time. She nearly didn’t pick it up.

But she had her own promises to keep. “Has he found me?”

“No, but it’s time to come home.”

“It’s—” She closed her eyes, tears pricking the corners of her throat. “What do you mean?”

“I mean you’ve run long enough, Brenda. We’re going to deal with this, once and for all. I promised you that I’d keep your safe. But I need your help to do it. Will you come?”

“I—” No. No. The words screamed in her head, but the louder the voices grew, the angrier she became.

How many years was she going to let that man steal? How many more nights would she wake, listening to the dark, waiting for him to emerge from the shadows?

“I’ll come.”

General Hospital: Hallway

Bobbie saw Scott coming down the hallway, narrowed her eyes and turned her back on the irritating man. “I don’t have time for you.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m scum of the Earth, you can get back to hating me when I’m done.” Scott took her elbow, gently pulled her back to face him. “I need to talk to Carly. We need to find out everything she knows about Lorenzo Alcazar. About Venezuela. And the panic room.”

Bobbie scowled. “You think I’m going to let you talk to her after you threw away her case—” Scott handed her a file and she closed her mouth. “What’s this?”

“When we went to Morgan, we told him our theory. Elizabeth was there and told us Alcazar was there at her house the night Ric brought Carly there.”

“What? What does that mean?” Bobbie frowned. “We knew Alcazar knew about the panic room—”

“We thought Alcazar was looking for Elizabeth. Because Jason’s hiding Brenda. I’ll come back to that—but maybe we had it backwards. Maybe there’s something none of us knows. Because I have some questions about Ric Lansing.”

Bobbie opened the file, frowned. “This police report, it’s in Spanish, and—is this his medical file?”

“That police report is for Ricardo Lansing who was thrown in a Caracas jail about a year ago. For stealing from Luis Alcazar.”

Bobbie opened her mouth, then closed it. Looked at the medical report again. “And this?”

“Look at that blood type, Bobbie. Do you happen to know Sonny’s blood type?”

“That’s—that’s not—” Bobbie lifted her stunned eyes to his. “He and Sonny aren’t related. They’re not brothers.”

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