Jason Morgan hated Port Charles. Had always hated it growing up, on the wrong side of the tracks, in a broken down trailer, while his mom worked two jobs to try to scrape together enough money to send him to school in decent thrift store clothes. Had especially hated it when he turned 18 and a lawyer showed up at his door informing him that he wasn't Jason Morgan trailer trash poor, he was really Jason Quartermaine, illegitimate son of Dr. Alan Quartermaine, and now that Jason was 18 years old, he inherited a hefty trust fund, which would become fully vested when he turned 25. He told the lawyer to take a message back to the illustrious Quartermaine family who stood by while he was growing up, when his mother died of cancer, and he spent the last two years living by himself - Screw You.

He wasn't going to take a dime of their money, until his best friend convinced him this was his opportunity. He could go to college, something she knew was out of her reach growing up in the same trailer court as Jason and not having a good enough GPA to get a full scholarship to one of the state universities; he could travel the world, instead of just reading about it in second hand travel books he picked up at flea markets and garage sales. Just because he accepted the money, didn't mean he had to accept the nuts over across the lake as his family. But he shouldn't be a fool and turn down the money.

Following her excellent advice, he signed the papers for his inheritance, told the Quartermaines they could still step off and play in traffic, and lit out of town like the hounds of hell were on his heels. If it hadn't been for Lizzie, he never would have come back. But he came back the following summer, and spent the weeks with her, telling her about the places he'd seen and filling up her room with gifts. He came back the following year when she graduated from high school and hoped that he could convince her to come travel with him now that she was no longer in school and her parents couldn't say no. But when she went on and on about the financial aid forms she was filling out and how if she worked her schedule just right she could probably swing going to community college part time, he realized that his hopes of a traveling companion would remain unfulfilled.

Instead he stood there as she laughed and cried, and went on and on about the unbelievable scholarship she got from some foundation she never heard of. She would be able to go to the university, not have to dink away her time at community college, and the scholarship covered not only her cost of tuition and books, but it gave her a generous living allowance so that she wouldn't even have to work. She only had to devote her time to studying. She hugged him and kissed his cheek and he gently wiped away her tears of happiness, all the while remaining silent that he had set up the foundation and she was the only recipient and would remain that way.

Every Christmas and summer he came back and sometimes managed to convince her to join him on a brief vacation. Those were the happiest times of his life. He didn't care about the company he'd formed, or the charities he supported, or the investments he'd made that had him set for life so that he didn't have to touch the principal money anymore that he'd received from the Quartermaines. For four years he'd gone back, reveling in her success with her. When she graduated from college, he offered her a position in his company, but she said she wanted to make her own way.

He'd hoped he could convince her, that she'd come with him so that they never had to come back to this forsaken town. Every time he came for a visit, the Quartermaines circled like vultures, fawning all over him and asking him when he'd take his rightful place in the family and join ELQ. He couldn't understand why they didn't take the hint. They had abandoned him as a child, let him starve and barely scrape by an existence with his mother, he was in no hurry to suddenly form a connection with him. He'd gotten them back though, he raided and dismantled their company last month. The Quartermaine family, while not destitute, was no longer as prominent as they once were. He thought it was fitting.

He hoped that when he came home this time he could persuade Elizabeth to leave. Apparently being her friend wasn't enough, he was going to bite the bullet and tell her he'd been in love with her since they were teenagers. Maybe if he asked her to be his bride, she would be more than just his vacation bud for a couple of weeks at a time. He'd gone to Italy and picked out the perfect ring. Elegant like she was, but not so ostentatious that it would overpower her hand and hide her radiant beauty. It was burning a hole in his pocket and the closer he got to Port Charles, the more his palms began to sweat. It was a huge risk, but he was going for it.

Thirty minutes later, he pulled into the parking lot of Kelly's diner. He'd tried Elizabeth's phone at home and she didn't answer, so he tried her cell phone. He could tell she was at the popular hangout by the noise in the background and the voice of Bobbie Spencer as she passed out orders. He faked cell phone troubles and disconnected so that she wouldn't know he was in the States, let alone pulling into the outskirts of town.

He walked into the courtyard, shaking his head at how little the place had changed in all the time he was gone. The red brick was a little more pitted by the salt water fog that came in off the harbor, but overall it was as if the town had been wrapped in a protective bubble and never aged. He looked in the front windows, over the top of the same red-checked curtains that had been hanging since he and Lizzie used to come for fries occasionally after school, and saw her sitting at a table in the middle of the room.

She was just as beautiful as ever. She must have had time to change after work, because instead of a suit, she was in a topaz colored sweater that clung to all the right places and he knew when he got closer would go perfectly with her eyes. As if the gods had smiled down on him, she got up from the table and went to the counter, bending slightly at the waist as she talked with Bobbie. He loved the jeans she was wearing. They were her favorites, as well as his; the way they looked liked they were painted on, and were as soft as butter. It was like he was being given a sign and he stepped over and opened the door.

The bell above the door caused Bobbie to look up and when she saw him there, she smiled broadly and looked at Elizabeth while tipping her chin towards the diner. Elizabeth slowly pivoted and her eyes all but popped out of her head as she squealed and rushed across the diner, flying into his arms for an all encompassing hug.

"You little sneak!" she said as she smacked him on the arm once he reluctantly released her. "That's why you called. How come you didn't say anything?"

"I wanted to surprise you," he grinned, drinking in every inch of her features after not seeing her for nearly five months. "Hi, Lizzie."

"Jason," she grinned, and pulled him close for another hug. "This is so great. I'm so glad you're here. There are so many things I have to tell you."

"Me too," he said, thinking about the ring in his pocket and not wanting to waste another minute. "Could you take a walk with me?"

She pulled in her bottom lip and hesitated. "Actually..."

She was cut off by the bell jingling once again rang, signaling another customer. Her gaze strayed over his shoulder, and a grin bloomed across her face. "Trevor."

His head snapped over as a tall sandy-haired guy stepped up to her side and bent down to brush a kiss across her lips. Jason felt punched in the gut and struggled to take in air as he watched Elizabeth let go of him and wrap her arms around the stranger. "Hey, babe," he said.

Babe? Elizabeth would hate being called babe, but Jason's world turned further upside down when she giggled and leaned into his side. "This is so great. Trevor, you'll never guess who this is. Jason."

Trevor turned and extended his hand, a genuine smile on his face. "Jason. It's great to finally meet you. Beth's told me so much about you."

Funny, he couldn't say the same thing. He and Elizabeth talked at least once a week, no more than every two weeks and this was the first time he was hearing about Trevor. A guy she felt comfortable enough with to let him practically maul her in a public place and give her annoying nicknames. Elizabeth kept on grinning and looked at Jason. "Jason, this is Trevor Grissom. My fiancé."

Jason's stomach dropped to his feet and he was pretty sure his heart ceased to beat, but he plastered a smile on his face and shook Trevor's hand, then kissed Elizabeth on the cheek. "Congratulations, Elizabeth. I'm very happy for you."

He should have just gotten back into his car and driven away. Left Port Charles, never looked back, even as the Welcome to Port Charles sign faded to a pin point in his rearview mirror. But he didn't, and he knew, even when the thought first flittered through his mind, that he wouldn't. He wouldn't leave Elizabeth, even when she was breaking his heart. Because she looked at him, her eyes wide with excitement and joy and asked him to stay. Of course he said yes, he would always say yes when it came to her. Fools in love did stupid things like that.

She claimed she missed him, and he believed her. He had missed her desperately while he was gone and had been looking forward to this return. Of course, he had also been looking forward to eventually making her his wife, but that wasn't going to be happening in his lifetime. Not with perfect Trevor in her life, his ring on her finger, his hand wrapped her waist.

She had looked up at him with those expressive blue eyes of hers and declared that all she wanted in life was for her two favorite men to get to know each other. Jason would rather eat glass and gargle with bleach, but he swallowed instead and told her that he looked forward to getting to know her fiancé. After all, he teased, he'd never heard about the man before. And because he didn't know anything about the man, he was going to have his right hand man, Stanford Johnson, do an exhaustive and thorough background check on Trevor Grissom. Heaven help the man if Jason found so much as an unpaid parking ticket lurking in his life. He was not going to allow anyone to hurt Elizabeth.

Elizabeth's joy grew when Jason affirmed that he would stay, for as long as she wanted. He had a house in Port Charles, he kept the place because Elizabeth lived here and even though his skin crawled every time he came back to Quartermaine land - invariably Edward would try to corner him and coerce him into joining the family - he wanted to have a place where she lived so that he could visit her and not stay in a hotel. His staff already knew he was planning to come, the house was being cleaned up and readied for him, and it was no trouble at all to simply extend his visit here. He could work from anywhere, and Stan would be able to fly in any documents that Jason needed. It would be perfect.

Except for the man who held onto Elizabeth and acted like she was his possession. He hadn't stopped touching her since his arrival at Kelly's, and if Elizabeth happened to move, he followed right after her, keeping her molded to his side. How did she deal with such smothering behavior? Did she think it was cute? Did she think it was endearing and proved how much the little punk loved her? Jason had never pegged her for someone who would tolerate such blatant territorial marking, and constant public displays of affection. She had always hated such things in the past and mocked others when she saw it happening.

They all sat down to eat dinner together, Jason on one side of the table, Elizabeth and Trevor cuddled together on the other side. Already he was being forced out of her life. He didn't know how he was going to survive this. How he was going to stand by, day by day, and pretend to be happy for her when inside he was slowly bleeding to death. But he would find the strength, because it would make Elizabeth happy. And her happiness was paramount to him. After all, he'd been denying what he wanted in deference to her for years. What was a little bit more? He'd come to her wedding, heck, he'd give her away if that's what she wanted, and he'd stand in the sidelines and watch her build a life with this other man and have his children.

He was going to have to have to get rip-roaring drunk tonight when he got to his place. He made a mental note to stop by a liquor store, who knew what was stocked at the house.

Somehow though, he made it through dinner and even stood by and didn't flinch when Elizabeth had to change her request for them to get together tonight and catch up to having lunch together the next day because Trevor had already made plans for the two of them. After all, Trevor was her fiancé, and if he couldn't sit around and watch the Mets game without Beth at his side - never mind the fact that she didn't like baseball, even Jason knew that - then Jason would wait until the next day for the two of them to talk. He would just have to get used to coming second in her life.

He would stay in town for the lead up to her wedding, support her - especially considering she didn't have much family around these days - and celebrate this momentous event with her. And then, even though it might hurt her, he would drift out of town again, stop in once in a while, maybe share a Christmas with her family, and be an uncle to the children he had hoped to be a father of one day.

For now, he needed to put his feelings aside and be there for his friend, the way she clearly wanted. He would be polite to her fiancé, and he would never show her that he wanted more. It wasn't fair of him to show up and destroy her life. He'd never said anything to her before, how could he blame her for finding something that made her happy.

"I'll call you tomorrow," Elizabeth said, resisting slightly as Trevor was trying to hurry her to the car so they didn't miss the first pitch. "Will you be staying at your house?"

"I will," he told her. "And you have my cell phone. We can go anywhere you want. You still like ribs?"

Something flittered across her face, she quickly glanced towards Trevor and then back to him. "I'll call you," she repeated. "We'll figure it out tomorrow."

And then, she was gone. She followed after the other man, practically jogging to catch with him as he strode briskly towards the parking lot. Jason's eyes narrowed, his fists curling at his side. What kind of man walked two steps in front of his fiancée and didn't even open the car door for her? He called her Beth, made her watch baseball and Jason would bet his bottom dollar that the man didn't eat ribs and had therefore caused Elizabeth to stop eating ribs. Was he deliberately doing these things, or were neither of them even noticing what was happening?

He hoped Elizabeth didn't feel that she had to change who she was in order to keep her fiancé . And if the perfect Trevor was forcing her to change, then there was no way Jason would be able to stand on the sidelines and not say anything. He would support Elizabeth if she was truly happy, if she really felt that marrying this guy was the best thing to ever happen in her life. But there was no way he would stand by and do or say nothing if something else was going on here. He'd rather risk losing his friendship with Elizabeth than mutely watch her become a shell of who she was, or worse, become someone she wasn't, for Trevor Grissom.

He knew, as he headed to his car and prepared to drive home that this whole thing could explode in his face. Elizabeth might not believe him, or, if the truth of his feelings for her came out she might think he was only saying things about Trevor in order to break the couple up. That was why he had to make sure he never told her how he really felt. If he was going to do this, if he was going to look out for Elizabeth, he had to make sure he was right. Which meant that he needed an objective party here, because he knew that he was too emotionally tied to the brunette and he might see what he wanted to see.

Once he was in his car, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed his assistant.

"This is Stan."

"Stan, it's Jason."

"I thought you were on vacation," the other man said. "What, couldn't leave the office behind for a day?"

"I was on vacation," Jason clarified. "But things have changed. I'm going to be staying here longer than previously planned, so that means I'm going to be doing some work up here. I need you to fly up here with the equipment to set up a remote connection for me at my house."

"Sure," his assistant agreed. "But I could just send the IT guys up there to do it."

"What, forgot your skills already?" Jason challenged. "Saying you can no longer perform and you have to wimp out and send IT?"

"Jason, the day one of those IT weenies can outwire me on a computer is the day I quit. Now what's really going on? I thought I was going to get to spend some time with my mom, how am I gonna explain it to her if I have to take off for days at a time after she just showed up?"

He smiled in satisfaction. Stan had just given him the perfect opening. "Bring her along."

"On my job assignment?" His skeptical tone was clear.

"I like your mother," Jason said, and it was mostly the truth. Epiphany Johnson was a no-nonsense woman who cut through to the heart of the matter in mere seconds. She called anybody, including him, on their crap, and he knew if anyone could read the situation with Elizabeth and see it for it really was and not what Jason just thought it might be, it would be Epiphany. "Besides, there's someone I want her to meet."

"Jason, what's going on?"

He didn't answer Stan, not right now. He wanted this to be completely objective. But he did say, "I also need you to do something else for me. I need a background check, everything you can find including if he's a lousy tipper to the paperboy, on a Trevor Grissom."

He heard faint scratching over the phone as Stan wrote down the name. "Trevor Grissom, okay. Who is he?"

"Someone I just need to find out everything there is to know about him, okay?"

It was said in such a manner that he knew Stan would comply, and right now that was what he needed. Maybe when the time was right he would tell Stan his suspicions, but for now, he wanted as broad a sweep as imaginable. His assistant had a good sense about these things, and if there was anything to know, Stan would find it.

When did Elizabeth become Bree from Desperate Housewives? When she walked into the restaurant to meet him for lunch, that was the first thought that popped into Jason's head. She actually had on a sweater set and was wearing pearls in the middle of the day. He automatically stood to greet her, accepting her quick hug, and then pulled out the chair for her.

It was a look he didn't like. It made her look dowdy, like she was a little girl playing dress-up in her mommy's clothes. Or maybe that was because she kept nervously brushing her hand over the strand of pearls, before quickly dropping it back into her lap. He preferred her look from last night; her favorite jeans, butter soft and worn, her sweater that showed off all her feminine curves without being indecent, her hair down and wavy, a riot of chestnut curls dancing around her shoulders. What happened between last night and today to make her wear a gray twill skirt, a lavender twin set, primly buttoned at the top and a strand of cultured pearls around her delicate throat while her hair was demurely back in a clip?

"Hi," he said, forcing himself not to keep staring at her like she just told him she was having Elvis' baby. "You look nice."

Once she would have slugged him for saying she looked nice. She called nice the kiss of death and if he ever said she looked just nice she knew he hated her outfit and ran off to change. But she just looked at him, smiled placidly and said, "Thank you."

"Are...are you going somewhere later today, or meeting with someone?" he couldn't help asking.

When she looked at him curiously, he gestured vaguely to her outfit. She looked down at it, then back up and shook her head. "No, this is what I wore to work today."

He tried to stop his frown, really he did, but he must not have done so quick enough, because Elizabeth blushed, and said, "I go in and help out Trevor a couple of days a week. He likes me to present a certain image when I'm at work."

"Oh." He wasn't entirely surprised to hear that the outfit was for Trevor's benefit. In fact, it wouldn't entirely surprise him to discover that Trevor had picked the outfit out himself and told her to wear it. "How do you find the time with your job?"

She looked away briefly, and then glanced back at him. "I...I've cut back my hours. I'm training my replacement now."

"Your replacement?" he baffled. "You love your job. After you got it when you graduated, all I heard was your enthusiasm about working there, getting the chance to apply the theories you learned in school to a real world application. I remember having to call you to make sure you weren't working sixty or seventy hour weeks and that you were going home to actually sleep in your bed and that you had food in your apartment. You-"

"I'm getting married, Jason," she cut him off, a small - almost sad - smile dancing across her face. "Trevor wants me to come to work for him."

Of course. Trevor wanted Elizabeth to come to work for him, and so Elizabeth was giving up her job to accommodate him. He closed his eyes, counted to ten and told himself not to be so hasty. Maybe Trevor worked in the same field as Elizabeth, maybe that's how they met and so now they were joining forces, becoming true colleagues, partners in and out of marriage. Stan hadn't sent him any information on Trevor yet, so Jason told himself not to rush to conclusions. He would not alienate his friend just because he seemed to automatically distrust the other guy. He would freely admit he was jealous and he didn't want that jealousy clouding his judgment.

So he asked, "What do you do for Trevor? You know, I don't even know what Trevor does; you never mentioned him before."

Elizabeth fiddled with her fork on the table and said, "I help out in the office. Trevor's a lawyer."

Elizabeth didn't have a law degree, guess they weren't going to hang out a shingle together that said Grissom and Grissom. Maybe she was thinking about going back to school, getting a law degree or something. Maybe she was training as a paralegal.

"I help with typing, filing, the phones," she continued. "It'll only be temporary, of course."

Maybe that meant she was only going to be a secretary until she went back to school. Jason couldn't imagine that she was happy just playing receptionist to her fiancé, not after all the hard work she'd done to get her degree.

"Once we have kids, Trevor expects me to stay home with them."

Jason swallowed and forced his fists to relax under the table. The tendons in his hands ached from the length of time they'd been clenched. Did she really just say what he thought she said? "He expects you to stay home? What about what you want?"

"I...I want that, too," she said. "I've always wanted to be a mother, you know that."

She'd talked about having children, some day. That was true. He didn't know if he would mean she'd always wanted to be one. Mostly what she'd talked about was hoping to be able to give her children a better existence than what she'd grown up with. It wasn't just because she, or he, had grown up poor, she wasn't materialistic. She wanted to be a mother who cared about her children. Her mother was a functioning alcoholic who never really cared what Elizabeth did or where she went. And her father had worked two jobs to try to make ends meet, that is when he wasn't down at the tracks losing on the dogs.

Of course, the poverty they both grew up in did affect them. Jason liked having security now, not worrying that he'd lose the roof over his head, and he knew that Elizabeth felt the same in many ways. It was why she had been so excited to be able to afford to go straight to a university, instead of working her way through community college, and why she worked so hard to get good grades and get a good job. But she still lived a relatively simple life. She lived in an apartment, even when she could probably afford a house, she drove a simple, reliable car when many around her were buying status symbols, and she still shopped for bargains. It was the same kind of mentality of those who had lived through the Great Depression and horded everything in fear of one day having nothing again. Elizabeth Webber was the epitome of work hard and save for a rainy day, because she'd had a lot of clouds in her life.

But how that translated to always wanting children and being a stay at home mother, Jason wasn't sure. Maybe it's what she really did want. People could change, their priorities shifted as they got older, met different people, experienced different things. He would not rush to judgment that this wasn't really what Elizabeth wanted and she was only doing these things to please Trevor. He respected his friend too much to believe that she didn't know her own mind and was doing something only to please a man. She had always hated people like that, he didn't easily believe she'd become one of those women.

Yet, it didn't stop the prickling feeling that danced up his spine every time she talked about Trevor and her life to come with the lawyer. He really needed Stan to get back to him with the background check and he really needed Epiphany to get here to tell him if he was just imagining everything, or if there was substance to his fears. But until that happened, Jason told himself to relax and enjoy lunch with his friend and stop looking for things that might not actually be there. He would only make himself miserable, and that would spill over into his interactions with Elizabeth. She didn't deserve that, she deserved the best, and he would do everything to make sure she had it.

They were nearing the dessert course when a small trilling sound floated up from Elizabeth's purse. She looked at him apologetically and then pulled her phone out, quickly flipping it open and bringing it to her ear with a brilliant smile that definitely made him see green.

"Hi, Trevor."

Jason looked away, leaning back in his chair, giving her what privacy the small table could afford, but his gaze was drawn back to Elizabeth as he heard her continue on.

"I told you I was going to lunch with Jason." She frowned into the phone. "We were about to have dessert and then I was going to go to work, I need to show Alex the new procedures."

Now he was unabashedly watching her, but she didn't really notice as she turned in her chair and lowered her voice. "I told you I couldn't come back to the office today; you know this is my half day at my job."

She let out a sigh and brought her hand up to his head. "Yeah, I suppose I can come back this afternoon if I get things finished early with Alex. But Trevor, I told you."

Her mouth firmed into a tense line and then she clipped off a terse good-bye and snapped the phone shut. When she looked back at him, Elizabeth's eyes seemed to be pools of regret. "I'm sorry, Jason, but I better skip dessert. The sooner I get done with Alex, the quicker I can get back to Trevor. His receptionist went home sick and he needs someone to help out."

"Yeah, sure. I understand," he lied, hoping she wouldn't see through it.

More and more, he really hated Trevor Grissom.

"Mr. Morgan?"

Jason looked up at Epiphany Johnson and smiled; no matter how many times he told her to call him Jason, she never did. He was always Mr. Morgan. It unsettled him slightly. Made him feel like he'd done something wrong and was being called in for a scolding. She was a commanding, and a bit intimidating woman, and he had a healthy respect for her, along with a dollop of fear.

He waved her into his office and closed his laptop after quickly saving his work. Then he stood and walked around his desk, "Have a seat, Epiphany. Can I get you something to drink?"

She allowed just a hint of a smile to crack through her stern exterior. "No, thank you, Mr. Morgan. Stanford just took me out to lunch."

"Have a seat," he invited again, after pouring a glass of water for himself. Then he sat down in the chair beside her, instead of going back behind his desk. "What can I do for you? Is everything alright with your hotel?"

"My suite is fine," she assured him. "But still unnecessary."

It wasn't to Jason. He'd disrupted her visit with her son, and he felt she deserved adequate compensation for that. Besides, he'd asked her to meet Elizabeth and give him her opinion on his friend, for that she deserved the best suite the Port Charles Hotel had. And since he owned it, having acquired it from his so-called family, he'd evicted the previous tenant and installed her in it.

He wasn't going to argue about the hotel with her, so instead he asked, "What brings you by, Epiphany?"

With a sigh, she settled back in her chair, clasping her hands across her middle. "I came to talk to you about your friend, Elizabeth Webber. You asked me to meet her, give you my opinion on her, but wouldn't say anymore. Then you introduced us, gave me hints on where I might just happen to find her and have since been suspiciously silent."

When she pierced him with her formidable gaze, he swallowed and nodded. When he said nothing, she continued on. "Now, after meeting your friend, I have an idea why you asked me to join Stanford on his job. And it wasn't just to see the waterfront. You know that I used to be an emergency room nurse and then became a counselor at a domestic crisis shelter."

Again he nodded, this time his throat seizing up and making it impossible for him to swallow, or speak.

"Your friend is being abused, Mr. Morgan," she said, her tone blunt. She didn't believe in sugar coating things. It was one of the things he respected about her.

"Sure, you might have just invited me down here to meet the woman you're in love but happens to be engaged to another man," she continued on oblivious to Jason's sudden wince of discomfort about being read so easily in regards to Elizabeth, "but that isn't why you did, did you?"

"No," he shook his head. "Something..something didn't set well with me, but I didn't know if I was seeing things there-"

"Because you were jealous," she interrupted. "Well, you are jealous, despite doing an admirable job to hide it. But your suspicions weren't off the mark."

He leaned back against his chair, feeling tired and worn after receiving his confirmation. He'd hoped he was wrong. Had prayed for it. Didn't want Elizabeth to be hurt, only wanted her to be happy. Finding out this information, it would end up hurting her. He licked his lips and then asked, "Do you think...do you think she's been...hurt?"

"Physically?" Epiphany clarified. When he nodded, fearing the answer, she paused for a moment and then said, "I don't think so. It's hard to say for sure, it's winter and she's bundled up with long clothes that could just be to guard against the cold and aren't necessarily hiding bruises. Many abusers, the so-called smart ones, they make their marks where they're hard to see. They don't always hit the woman in the eye and leave her to claim that she ran into the door on the way to the bathroom in the middle of the night.

"But no," she shook her head, "I don't think she's being hurt physically. I didn't get that sense from her and I've been in this nasty business long enough that my instincts are usually correct. They're not always," she cautioned him, "but usually."

"I understand," he said, granting her absolution in case she was wrong.

"She doesn't even realize what's going on," Epiphany went on. "From my observations of Elizabeth, the way she talks about her fiancé, and the one time I saw them together, I would guess that it's never even entered her mind. To hear her talk about him, he's a wonderful guy, and she loves him very much. It's all genuine. It's not like the scared women who show up at the ER, split lip and bruises from fingers around their necks and tell everyone that their husbands and boyfriends are wonderful men who never hurt them. All the while their eyes are darting around the room, they're shrinking in on themselves, and you just want to smack some sense into them and tell them to stop protecting the man who's put them in the hospital three times in the past six weeks."

The older woman paused and then leaned forward in her chair, commanding Jason's complete attention. "But make no mistake, Mr. Morgan; she is just as much a victim of domestic abuse as those women are. He is isolating her from her co-workers, from her family, from her friends. He wants her completely dependant upon him, emotionally and eventually it will be financially, so that it will be that much harder for her to leave him. If she doesn't see her friends, then they don't know what's going on in her life and they can't talk to her, they can't say that something doesn't seem right.

"He controls her actions, where she goes, what she wears," Epiphany continued. "He's just very subtle about it. He uses a lot of emotional manipulation. Masks it in his love for her, how much he needs her. But he wants to know where she is at all times, who she's with and if he doesn't like it, then he's making up some reason for her to come back, for her to leave. And she falls for it, even though it annoys her. She probably thinks that because he's her fiancé he should be her first priority, and he should be more important than her other friends."

"Yeah," Jason growled, his hands clenching into fists. "So what can we do?"

She looked at him, one brow quirking up. "Do?"

Now it was his turn to quirk a brow at her. "Surely you don't think that I'm just going to sit back and do nothing while Trevor does this to her."

"What makes you think she'd believe you?"

He swallowed. He'd thought about that, figured that she wouldn't, but was he really supposed to just be silent when he knew this was happening to Elizabeth?

"Trevor Grissom is also very jealous of you, Mr. Morgan. Elizabeth Webber is very careful what she says to me about you, almost as if she's afraid that what she says will somehow get back to her fiancé. We were in a shop and the moment a saleslady walked out of the back room she clammed up, stopped what she was telling me about the two of you growing up together. She went from laughingly telling me about the time the two of you snuck onto the Quartermaine property before you knew they were your family and went swimming in the lake, to silently curling her shoulders in and keeping her head down. Then the saleslady mentioned Mr. Grissom and I understood. When the four of us were having dinner and he called and she mentioned your name he immediately invited himself to join us and then once he got there he was like a bulldog marking his territory, hanging all over her, and shooting you very clear warning signals. I hate men like that," she huffed.

"Alright," he said, "so if she won't believe me, what do you suggest we do? Since you're the experienced person here."

"I can try to talk to her, Mr. Morgan," Epiphany shrugged her shoulders. "But I don't know how effective I'll be. As long as she sees him every day, as long as she's practically living with him, it's going to be hard to get her free from him long enough to even attempt to get through."

She fell silent and Jason's brain was immediately turning. What they needed was for Trevor to leave town for a little while. His mind was going through a mental Rolodex, friends and business contacts that he could call in a favor from, someone who could call up Trevor Grissom, Attorney at Law, and want to hire him, even temporarily and get him out of Port Charles. He had several ideas, two of which were on the West Coast, and all he needed to do now was make a few phone calls.

And if that didn't work, then maybe Jason would have to contact someone he hadn't spoken to since other kid had gotten arrested and sent off to juvie. They hadn't been the closest of friends, but they all lived in the same trailer court and knew each other. Elizabeth always said hello to him, even when everyone else shunned the family because of the dad going to prison for murder. But once Jason explained to Sonny Corinthos that this involved Elizabeth Webber, maybe the local mob boss could lend him a hand.

Life without Trevor Grissom was a relaxing and pleasant affair. At least for Jason. He could spend time with Elizabeth without her looking nervous and possibly flitting off because her keeper called her home. She smiled more, she talked more, and she laughed more than she seemed to when surrounded by Trevor and his constant hovering. It was a glorious sight for Jason to see. And it could go on indefinitely, at least on Jason's part.

Because Mitchell Coleman had no problems helping out an old friend and keeping Trevor busy in Seattle. Mitch had laughed when Jason called him up and asked for a favor, said he would be happy to give the lawyer a call and ask him for his expert services. The tasks were pointless really, certainly nothing that someone else couldn't handle, but Mitch had been born with a golden spoon in his mouth and could sweet talk the most cynical people, charm the panties off a nun and sell a refrigerator to an Eskimo. But he wasn't greasy or oily, he was suave and friendly and people seemed to trip in their haste to do the bidding of a modern day Pied Piper.

So Trevor Grissom didn't even seem to blink or think twice about leaving Elizabeth behind in his haste to rush off to Washington, and that suited Jason just fine. Especially since he knew Mitch would keep Trevor there as long as he asked him to. It would take Trevor himself asking to leave before Jason's good friend ran out of work for him to do. And if by chance Mitch did, Jason was ready to supply him with more. Because he was hoping for out of sight, out of mind regarding good ol' Trevor Grissom. At least as far as Elizabeth was concerned.

Jason's main problem was he wasn't sure how to broach the subject of Trevor's behavior towards Elizabeth. He knew that she probably wouldn't believe him, and was prepared to deal with her anger because she had a temper and would invariably turn it on him. He just didn't know how to find the words, especially in the face of her being so much more relaxed and enjoying herself. Epiphany spent time with her, talking to her, but Jason wouldn't shrug this task onto his employee's mother, even if it would be easier. She would be the professional Elizabeth could turn to; Jason wouldn't use her as the scapegoat.

But since Jason didn't know what to say, he waited. And he continued to gather more information. Stan had compiled what he could find on Trevor Grissom, and it made frustrated. Because it was of absolutely no help. Trevor Grissom was a model citizen. Paid his taxes early, never had a speeding ticket stick on his record, never tried to shirk out of jury duty. He was a straight A student in college and high school; the guy was even a freaking Eagle Scout. He was perfect, and nauseating. And it made Jason suspicious, because nobody could be that perfect all the time. Everyone had flaws, everyone had secrets. Only they couldn't seem to find Trevor's.

So, in a bit of desperation, Jason had Stan track Sonny Corinthos' movements and find out where the man went, and where Jason could approach him. The problem with the mobster was he was smart, and didn't fall into patterns and never went anywhere without at least two bodyguards. Not exactly the most approachable person, especially when Jason was trying to go for discreetness and not advertise to everyone that he wanted to meet with Sonny Corinthos. Jason was hoping to casually bump into an old acquaintance, talk for a few moments and then request a private word, while dropping Elizabeth's name. For a finesse move like that, one didn't call up the local mobster on the phone and announce one's intentions.

Finally, Jason caught a break. Sonny's wife owned a nightclub, and Sonny sometimes went there. So, Jason had taken to frequenting the place himself. Sometimes with Elizabeth, sometimes with business clients, sometimes just by himself. He wanted to appear non-threatening, just another patron at the club. But it was annoying because the whole process was taking time that Jason didn't like wasting, and he was getting anxious to get things in motion. If Sonny didn't come into the club tonight, Jason was going to have to try a more direct approach.

But, luck was on his side and as Jason was sitting at a table off to the side, Sonny Corinthos walked down the stairs into The Cellar and approached the bar where his wife Carly sat with a drink at her elbow. The bodyguards that always accompanied the mobster stopped at the base of the stairs, leaving Sonny open to an approach from an old acquaintance.

Taking a deep breath and wiping his damp palms on his pants, Jason stood with his empty glass and walked over to the bar. He handed over his glass, requested another drink and then sat down in one of the high chairs at the slick oak counter, and glanced a look out of the corner of his eye. Corinthos' wife gave him a kiss on his cheek and then walked across the room to talk to the hostess. Perfect opportunity and Jason didn't see any reason to waste it.

He turned on his seat, looked at Sonny and tipped his head to the side. "Sonny...Sonny Corinthos?"

Immediately the man tensed, shot a look at a bodyguard which had the man starting across the dance floor, heedless of the couples he shouldered past. "Who wants to know?"

Jason schooled his face into one of innocence and held his hands off the bar. "Jason Morgan. Spot Twenty-Five at the Courtland Trailer Courte, you were Spot Eight on Loop B, weren't you?"

Sonny held up his hand, slowing the progress of the guard, and directing him to remove his hand from his jacket. The beefy man complied, but took up a prominent position behind his boss, and fixed a pierced look on Jason. "Morgan," Sonny drawled out. "Right, I remember you. Your old man ended up being Alan Quartermaine."

"Yeah," Jason clipped out. He wasn't interested in talking about the Quartermaines. "Wish he'd kept that information to himself."

"It seemed to help you out," Corinthos said casually. "You moved out after graduation, never looked back. I heard you took over the family holdings, left 'em just enough to keep the house so your grandmother didn't have to lose her rose garden."

Jason nodded.

"I like Mrs. Quartermaine," Sonny continued. "The rest of the family...couldn't care less about. So I'm glad you let her keep her roses."

"Thanks," he said. This whole conversation was going strange. A mobster talking about an old lady and her roses? What next?

"So, you're back in town for...what?" the man asked. "'Cause I was hoping we could talk about the waterfront property you own, maybe come to an arrangement."

Now Jason understood why the man was willing to talk to him. He knew from his people here that Sonny Corinthos was always trying to expand his waterfront holdings, and Jason had never sold simply because he didn't want the property to inadvertently end up back in the Quartermaine's possession. As long as he held the deed, he knew it would never happen. But, this could be used to his advantage, so Jason didn't immediately dismiss the mobster.

"I'm in town to visit an old friend, maybe you remember her. Elizabeth Webber?"

"Webber," Sonny mused. "Spot Twenty-Four?"

"Yes," Jason nodded. "That's her."

"I always liked her," Sonny said with a wisp of a smile.

That boded well for Jason and he pressed it to his advantage. "She's great, isn't she? She's getting married soon."

"Really? Well, tell her congratulations. Maybe I'll give her a set of cookware."

"I'm sure she'd like that," Jason said, not really knowing if Elizabeth would or not. "However..." he hedged, then shook his head. "No, never mind."

Sonny narrowed his eyes. "What?"

"Well," Jason shifted on his chair. "I'm not sure her fiancé would like that. He's...he's a lawyer, and a bit jealous. Hates that I'm in town until the wedding; always trying to keep me away from her."

"You trying to move in on her?" the mobster queried. "'Cause nothing wrong with a guy trying to keep another man from making a move on his girlfriend."

"Isn't like that," Jason shook his head. "Guy doesn't let her make a move without his approval. Picks out her friends, picks out her clothes, tells her where to work."

"Slime," Sonny spit out, and suddenly Jason remembered the rumors regarding Sonny's mother after his father was arrested. She divorced his old man and took up with a guy who put her in the hospital seven times before he met with a mysterious accident on his way home from the docks one night.

The mobster stood and eliminated the few chairs separating them, sitting down next to Jason. "He hit her?"

"I don't think so," Jason shook his head. "But something...something's off about him, you know?"

"Yeah," the other man nodded, "I know what you mean. What's his name?"

"Trevor Grissom," Jason said, swallowing thickly afterwards. Suddenly a pit seemed to open in his stomach. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. Sonny Corinthos wasn't a gummy bear mobster, the man was just too good for the local cops and the Feds to bust. He made the sure the bodies were buried nice and deep. While Jason didn't like Trevor Grissom, was he really comfortable possibly signing the man's death sentence?

"Grissom," the mobster mused. "Can't really say that I know him."

"Me either," he shook his head. "I've looked into him, can't seem to find much about him aside from an abnormally clean record."

"Guys that hurt women aren't perfect; they're just good at hiding it. You think he's hiding things in his background?"

Jason could only shrug, feeling off center by the surreal conversation. Sonny planted an elbow on the bar and rubbed his hand over his cheek. "Tell you what," he said. "Let me do a little digging. Elizabeth Webber was a decent gal, always had a smile for me."

He gave a small chuckle, "Even brought me brownies one time."

"Sounds like Elizabeth," Jason said.

"And if this guy's not on the up and up, and especially if he's hurting her," Sonny said, his eyes narrowing, "I'll find it. And then I'll let you know."

"Thank you," he said softly.

Sonny stood and brought his hand to rest on Jason's shoulder. "I'll get in touch with you, Mr. Morgan. About Elizabeth Webber, and also about the waterfront. Maybe two old neighbors can help each other out."

"Yeah," Jason nodded and watched the mobster walk away. He might now get information on Trevor, but he wondered if he'd just made a deal with the devil to do so.

"You know, Epiphany is an interesting woman. A little strange, actually, and definitely very interesting."

Jason looked up and hastily shuffled the papers in front of him, surprised by Elizabeth's sudden appearance at his office. He was about to stand when she smiled and shook her head, plopping down in one of the chairs across from his desk.

"Hey," he smiled, standing and walking around his desk to join her. "I didn't know you were coming."

"I decided to surprise you," she smiled back at him. "I was out with Epiphany and she was going to come and drag Stanford out to lunch, so I told her to just drop me off. I'd either take a cab home or-"

"I'll take you," he said. "After all, I am the boss and I can leave any time I want."

"I was hoping you'd say that," she smirked, her eyes lighting up. "Any chance you have your bike here?"

"Not here," he shook his head. "But we can stop at my place and get it if you want."

"Perhaps," she grinned. In fact, she hadn't stopped smiling since she'd entered his office. It made his heart lighter to see her so happy, so animated, so free.

"Admit it, Webber," he leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest, "you only like me for my bike."

"That's not the only reason," she waggled her eyebrows at him. The tone of her voice...well, in anybody else he would say they were flirting with him. But this was Elizabeth and she was engaged and he simply told himself he was wrong. "You're also handy with a wrench."

"Sink giving you problems again?" he asked immediately.

"Nope, it's still fixed. Thanks again for coming over to take care of that."

"It was no problem," he told her. "I was happy to help."

"Normally, Trevor would have done that, but with him out of town," she shrugged, and her eyes dimmed slightly. Did that mean she was missing him, or didn't want to talk about her fiancé as much as Jason didn't?

"Have you heard from him?" Jason made himself ask. After all, she was supposed to love the guy, Jason was supposed to be supporting her, and he supposed he should ask about the jerk.

"He calls every night," she answered.

"I bet he does," he mumbled under his breath.

Elizabeth peered at him. "What?"

"Nothing," he shook his head. He did not want to talk about Trevor Grissom right now. Not when he was still mulling over the information Sonny Corinthos had sent over this morning. "Why do you say Epiphany is interesting? She scares me half the time."

She tipped her head to the side, causing her hair to cascade over her shoulder. With a shrug she said, "I don't know. It's hard to explain. She's a straight shooter, tells it like it is, and doesn't take nothing from nobody. She also seems to talk about domestic violence a lot."

"Well, she's a counselor at a shelter," Jason explained slowly.

"Yeah, she mentioned that when we were out today. She drove by a place that she said was a domestic violence shelter." Her eyebrows drew low in concentration. "I looked at the place, and it didn't look like anything except an office building so I asked her how she knew. She said she worked for a shelter and knew how to spot them, plus apparently she'd done some checking into the shelters around here. I guess when you work in that kind of job you don't ever really go on vacation."

"Yeah," he agreed, his eyes firmly fixed on his hands, even though he knew the real reason Epiphany was doing all she was. She wanted Elizabeth to know where the shelter was in case the younger woman ever needed to go there, and because Jason had asked for her opinion on Elizabeth, Epiphany wasn't really having a true vacation out visiting her son. She was keeping an eye on Elizabeth, trying to bring things up in conversation so that Elizabeth might begin to question her relationship with Trevor.

"It's nice that she could come out here to visit her son," Elizabeth smiled. "She told me you put her up in the penthouse suite at the Port Charles Hotel, and she thinks you're wasting your money because it's completely not necessary."

"I interrupted her vacation with Stan," he shrugged. "When I had to call him down here to set up stuff for me to work on, I felt bad that he would have to leave her when she'd just barely gotten there. So-"

"You were a nice guy and put her up in the best room your hotel had to offer," she smiled at him. "That is so typical of you, Jason. You're always doing things for other people."

He shifted uncomfortably in his chair, and then stood and walked back around his desk. "Yeah," he cleared his throat. "So, are you ready to go?"

With a light laugh she stood and followed after him, stopping by the side of the desk. "You really hate taking compliments, don't you? It's not a horrible thing to be thought of a nice guy. And that ridiculous adage of nice guys finish last isn't true. You've done well for yourself, just like Trevor has."

Jason looked down and bit his tongue to keep from speaking. Trevor Grissom wasn't a nice guy. Not for what he was doing to Elizabeth, and not for what Sonny Corinthos had dug up on the guy. His hand tapped nervously on the desk, itching to stray to the folder he'd hastily shoved aside when Elizabeth came in.

"I wish the two of you liked each other better," Elizabeth sighed. "I don't know why Trevor never wants to get together with you."

Jason knew, but he didn't think Elizabeth would believe him. Instead, he shrugged, "I don't know. I guess maybe I haven't been very friendly."

"I think he's jealous of you," she admitted which caused him to look up sharply. But she wasn't looking at him; her gaze was on her fingers slowly dancing over the objects on Jason's desk. "He's jealous that we've been friends forever and you know things about me that he doesn't. Like things from high school and grade school. He wishes he had lived in Port Charles then and had known me."

He made a non-committal sound, not knowing exactly how to respond to that. She gave a shrug and continued on. "Sometimes I don't know what I can say to him to reassure him."

"You shouldn't have to," Jason said. "It's not your job to placate his feelings; he's a big boy."

"But he loves me," she said, looking up at him. "And he just wants to know more about me. I can't blame him for that."

"I can," he said, not bothering to make his voice quiet. "You're allowed to have a life outside of him, Elizabeth. You don't have to make your entire existence about him."

"I'm not," she shook her head.

"Yes, you are," he told her. It looked like the truth was about to come out, and he hoped he could get through it. "You're quitting your job, a job you loved and worked hard at, a job you earned after going to school and being one of the top in your class, a job where you had the praise of your boss and colleagues and room for advancement, to go to work for him. As his secretary. You're overqualified to be making his coffee and answering his phones. But you're doing it because he's fed you some line about loving you so much he wants you to be by his side all the time."

"He does." Her eyes were darkening as her temper began to rise. "There's nothing wrong with that."

"Yes, there is," he retorted. "Because it's not that he wants you with him because he loves you so much, he wants you there so he can keep an eye on you. So he can keep you in line."

"In line?"

"He tells you what to wear, where you can go, who you can go out with. The reason he doesn't want the three of us to get together more is because he doesn't want you having friends outside of him and his friends. You've said yourself that you hang out with his buddies, and you're the little woman in the kitchen bringing all the men their snacks while they watch TV. But you don't hang out with your friends, you don't do things you want to do." Jason took a deep breath. "How is that loving you, Elizabeth, if he doesn't want to get to know your friends, or do things you're interested in?"

"His friends are nice guys," she insisted. "I like them."

"Do you really?" he pressed.

She paused and looked away, her neck tight chords as she swallowed. Finally in a soft voice, almost as if she was afraid to speak it out loud, she admitted, "No, I don't. I think they're disgusting pigs the way they talk about their girlfriends when the women aren't around. Sometimes one of them will say something to me, comment on my butt or something, and Trevor doesn't even say anything to them."

Now it was Jason's turn to swallow thickly as he tried to calm his anger towards Elizabeth's prick of a fiancé. "Why doesn't he?"

"I-I don't know. The one time I mentioned it to him, he just shrugged it off, said that's how guys are."

"No," Jason shook his head. "That's not how guys are, Elizabeth. But that is how abusers are."

She looked at him, her eyes wide first with shock and surprise and then with anger. "Abusers? Abusers? You think Trevor is an abuser?"

"Yes," he stated simply. "I do."

"He doesn't hit me," she protested. "He's always gentle."

"Except that he tells you how to dress, where to go, who you can be friends with, he constantly calls to find out where you are, who you're with and if he doesn't like what he hears, he tells you to come home. He's made you give up your job; he's isolating you from your friends. He doesn't have to hit you to abuse you, Elizabeth."

"You're wrong," she said hotly. "You're wrong. He's not an abuser. Stop saying that."

"Ask Epiphany," he told her. "She'll tell you that he exhibits warning signs of domestic abuse."

Elizabeth took a step back and looked at him like she was seeing something for the first time. "Is that why she's here? Did you ask her to come here and tell you my fiancé is an abuser?"

"I asked her to come," he admitted. "But I never said why. I just told her I wanted her to meet my friend. She came to the conclusion on her own. She is trained, you know."

"You're unbelievable," she shook her head. "You hate Trevor so much that you'll make up these lies about him in an attempt to break us up. Unbelievable. I guess Trevor was right when he said you were jealous of him because you wanted me for yourself."

Jason had no doubt Trevor had spun a story like that, but he wasn't going to get into that right now. Especially since it held kernels of truth. That would only could the issue at hand. The most important thing was telling Elizabeth the truth about her fiancé.

"Are you going to deny it?" she pressed him, stepping forward in a taunting manner.

"I think that you should know the truth," he said. He opened a drawer and pulled out the pamphlets and brochures Epiphany had given him for this moment, and then with a sigh, he pulled out the folder Sonny had delivered this morning. "Epiphany wanted you to have these. Her number is on there in case you want to talk to her. But there's more, Elizabeth."

"Oh, I bet there is," she scoffed at him. "I'm sure you've got this all planned out. All your evidence lined up so that I'll dump Trevor and run off with you, right?"

He sadly shook his head. "No. I just want you safe. And you're not safe with Trevor. He may not have hit you yet, but one day he will, Elizabeth. Because he's done it before. Twice. In other countries, under different names. One ex-fiancée is blind in one eye from the mirror she crashed into when she fell down the stairs and one is dead when her car went over a cliff because her brakes were cut."

Elizabeth paled. "W-what? How..."

"I asked someone to run a check on him," he admitted without guilt. "Turns out Trevor Grissom, your perfect fiancé, doesn't exist. He died as an infant and someone stole his social security number and made up a background for himself. He didn't exist until he moved to town less than a year ago."

"You're lying," she shook her head.

He placed the information in her hand, not letting it go until she reluctantly took hold of it. "I wish I was, Elizabeth. Believe me, I wish I was."

Jason Morgan had never claimed to be a saint. Sure, he wasn't an enforcer for the mob who routinely went out and killed people, but he wasn't a boy scout, either. After all, he had willingly, enthusiastically and almost gleefully went after the Quartermaine holdings, buying them up, dismantling them and reducing his family's bank account and status in town. They no longer owned Port Charles Hotel, they were no longer owned waterfront property and shipping routes, they had a small box factory that provided some income in addition to their stocks and bonds and two doctor's salaries.

As Sonny Corinthos had thanked him for, Lila Quartermaine - the only one of the whacked out nut jobs on Harborview Road that he could tolerate - had kept her roses. He couldn't bear the thought of making an old lady in a wheelchair homeless, so he'd left them one company. He figured if they did a little economizing, like his mother had to do since Alan Quartermaine had never acknowledged him or provided financial support - they'd be just fine. Sure they might have to downgrade from a Bentley to a Mercedes, or even a Lexus, and they might not to be able to drive a brand new car every year, but they'd be able to have electricity, food on their table and clothes. Who cared if they weren't designer labels?

He hadn't been bothered when he'd dismantled their lives. He figured it was a fair exchange for them walking into his and detonating an A-bomb. But tonight, Jason could barely stand to look at himself in a mirror. Because he didn't see his tired, haggard, unshaven face. He saw Elizabeth's wide, hurt and angry eyes. He saw her quivering lower lip as she read through the file Sonny Corinthos' men had put together. He saw her tears she fought to conceal. He saw the denial set into her eyes, in an attempt to protect herself.

And that was why he hadn't been to work in three days, hadn't showered in two and hadn't crawled out of the tequila bottle he'd fallen into the moment he arrived home. He had destroyed his best friend and the woman he loved. And no amount of alcohol was going to be able to numb that pain or erase that fact.

He hadn't wanted to hurt Elizabeth, yet he had done a bang up job of that. Something just hadn't set well with him when he met Trevor Grissom, and he'd tried to ignore it, but hadn't been able to. Because he never would have been able to live with himself if the man had done something that hurt Elizabeth and Jason had stayed silent. Instead, Jason had done the damage. She had been wounded by his unquenchable quest for knowledge, his inability to accept things for face value and his digging had ended up crushing his friend.

She had walked out of his office after tossing the file on the desk. She never said a word to him; her whispered 'I hate you' moments into reading the file had been the last words she said. And he understood her loathing and anger. He had just shattered the façade, crumbled her world. Never mind that he'd done it with the best of intentions and out of his love for her, she hated him for breaking the illusion.

Epiphany told him, the one time she came to his house to try to break him out of his stupor, that Elizabeth had called her. But Jason shook his head and told her he didn't want to know what they'd talked about. He wouldn't be accused of violating Elizabeth's privacy, and in fact, he didn't want to know if the two women had any further contact.

It didn't stop him from wishing to know, however. Elizabeth was all he thought about. From the moment he woke up, from wherever he'd fallen asleep, until the next time he passed out. He wondered how she was. Was she hurt? Was she angry? Was she crying? Was she cursing him? Cursing Trevor? Did she believe what he and Epiphany told her, or was she denying everything? He wanted to go over to her place, and beg her to listen to him. But he knew that he couldn't.

He didn't know if Elizabeth would ever want to see him again. If she stayed with Trevor, then he was pretty sure she never would. Even if she didn't remain with her fiancé, there was no guarantee that she would ever forgive him for what he'd done. And mostly, mostly he was afraid. He was afraid to approach her and see her eyes filled with hate as they had been the last time she looked at him. He couldn't stand to have her cut him with her eyes again. So he stayed away, he hid, and he longed for her with every fiber of his being.

He loved her, had for so long, but she always seemed out of his reach. Now, she was even farther away. He knew that nothing between them would ever be the same again and he wasn't sure how he was supposed to stay in town knowing that. How he was supposed to see her and not be affect by her, or be affected by her deliberately avoiding him. Everything was so screwed up right now that he just didn't know what to do.

Everything inside him told him to run. Self-preservation was demanding him to get away. Sell the waterfront property to Sonny Corinthos and just be done with everything. It would be the easiest way to pay his debt to the other man, and it would sever his ties to Port Charles. He could head back to New York City or maybe even head out to his L.A. office and personally oversee things. Or maybe he'd take a vacation. It would be so easy to just leave. But he didn't want to tuck tail and run, nor did he want to ever make Elizabeth feel like he was abandoning her. What if she believed him and eventually wanted to talk? Or what if she needed his help?

"Mr. Morgan?"

He looked up, blinking through the haze of his tired eyes until they rested on his employee. "What do you want, Stan?" he grunted. "Did your mother send you?"

"No," the man shook his head. "We have a problem, sir."

"Yeah," he snorted. There always seemed to be problems. Just one after another, piling on top of each other. "When don't we?"

"There's a problem in Madrid," the younger man said, sounding hesitant and apologetic. "I...uh, I think you're going to have to handle it personally."

"I pay you to take care of things, Stan," Jason sighed, turning away and heading for the bag on the table that The Beer Barn had delivered earlier.

"I've tried," Stan told him. "I've been working on this for the past two days, but our client in Madrid just keeps calling with more complaints and now states that they won't be satisfied unless you personally handle it."

Jason poured himself a drink and rolled his eyes. "Madrid is a pain. They're never happy."

"No, they're not," his employee agreed. "But they're threatening to pull their contract and if we lose Madrid, we could lose Barcelona and possibly Lisbon. It could snowball even bigger than that. We can't afford to take that big of a hit."

He swore as he placed the bottle down on the table and tossed back the drink in his hand. Stan was right, they couldn't afford to lose these clients.

With a resigned sigh, he turned to face the younger man. "What's been happening?"

"I'll tell you about it on the way to Madrid tomorrow," Stan told him, walking forward and taking the glass out of Jason's hand. "You should get some sleep, the plane leaves in the morning."

Jason shook his head. "No, you can't go with me. I need you to stay here."

"What?" the other man asked in confusion. "Jason, I really don't think that's a good idea."

"I need you to stay here," he said again, more forcefully this time. "You have to stay here. Your mother needs to stay here."

"Ma will be fine while we're gone. It'll only be a couple of days. A week at the most," Stan stated.

"No, I need you to stay here. I mean, here," Jason insisted. "In the house. You have to be here in case Elizabeth comes looking for me. You need to let her know I didn't run, that I had to go."

"Jason," the other man began, his voice cautious.

"Listen to me," he insisted. "I'm trusting you to keep an eye on things and also be here in case Elizabeth needs me. You know what's going on, right?"

Stan nodded slowly.

"Then that's why you're staying. Because I also need you to pass on a message for me."

"To Elizabeth? Or my mother?"

"To Sonny Corinthos."

Stan took a step back and his eyes widened slightly. "Sonny Corinthos? The mobster?"

"No, the pope," he snorted. "You need to arrange a meeting with Sonny tomorrow and give him this message. He can have the waterfront, but I need one more favor from him."

"The waterfront?" Stan blurted out. "You're selling the waterfront properties?"

"Listen to me, Stan," he insisted. "He can have the properties, but he needs to keep an eye out on Elizabeth. Especially if Trevor Grissom comes back while I'm gone. Tell him I gave her the information and so she needs to be protected. Do you understand?"

"Yeah," the other man nodded.

"That's the exact message. It needs to go to him directly. Tell him that you're bringing a message from me."

"Jason, what did you get yourself into?" his employee asked, slightly fearful.

"I made a deal with an old acquaintance to help Elizabeth," he stated. "You don't have to like it, you don't have to understand it, but know that I would do anything to protect her. Including this."

"You've made a deal with the devil. You'll owe him and don't think that Sonny Corinthos won't call that marker in again and again."

Jason knew that, knew that he could be indebted to the mobster forever, but he didn't care. Not when it came to Elizabeth. As long as she was protected, he didn't care. "I know," he breathed out, "but she's worth it."

Why did this have to happen to her? Just when she thought that things in her life were going good, this had to come along and blow everything apart.

She had finally found someone that loved her. Someone that cared about her, but not just as a buddy or good friend, someone who called her beautiful, who made her feel special, who made her feel treasured. It wasn't that she felt she couldn't survive without such a man in her life; it's that he made her life feel so much better. Like watching a beloved old movie, and then one day watching it digitally re-mastered so that all the colors were crisper, brighter, and more vibrant. That was how she felt when Trevor Grissom bumped into her at Kelly's and they struck up a conversation. A few dates later and she looked forward to stopping in at the diner just in case he might be there.

And when he was, her heart would thrill at his presence. So when he asked her to marry him after several months of dating, she accepted. She didn't feel that it was too soon, too rushed, it felt right and natural. But now...now after reading through the pamphlets on domestic abuse and talking with Epiphany she questioned every moment she'd ever spent with Trevor. He had come on strong. He'd made grand, romantic gestures, made sure to have all her favorites covered, and talked about forever very early in their relationship. Long before she really began to think about it. And when she hesitated just a bit, he was quick to reassure her, sweep her cares away or trivialize them until she believed what he was saying. Now she realized that they hadn't really addressed the issues she had, they'd just been ignored and redirected until she no longer remembered them.

When Epiphany Johnson asked her what she really knew about the man she was planning to spend the rest of her life with, she came to the realization that it wasn't actually a whole lot. She really didn't know what his favorites were, he always claimed that her preferences were his as well. She only got a brief history of his life, with things glossed over or hardly addressed. And after reading the file that Jason gave her, she understood why. The man she thought she knew didn't really exist. He was a figment of a twisted man's imagination. Nothing more than smoke and mirrors, an illusion that was carefully crafted, but could fall apart at any moment.

And the illusion had shattered and now she didn't know what to do. The life that she had been living, the life that she had been envisioning, was all suddenly blown away like dust in the wind. And it scared her.

She was frightened because she wondered how she had fallen for the lies. She had always considered herself a smart person. Not just academically, but street smarts as well. She grew up in a trailer park in a bad area of town. Pimps and prostitutes roamed Courtland Street and she passed them every day on her way to and from school. Drug users lived in the trailer court and once the police even raided a trailer in a remote corner that housed a drug stash that not only made the local news, but was known statewide as well. She saw women get beat up by their husbands, boyfriends and pimps, and she knew kids who lived in fear of their fathers. She knew when someone was lying to her, and she knew when someone posed a threat to her. So how had her instincts failed her with Trevor?

The man was capable of violence; the ex-fiancée in Brazil who would never see out of her left eye again was proof of that. And that scared her, too. Because one day that violence could have erupted and been turned on her. She could have ended up in the emergency room like so many other women before her. And what would she have said? Would she have pressed charges, and would anybody have believed her word against a lawyer like Trevor? It truly chilled her to wonder about it.

On some level she resented Jason for telling her about Trevor, but she realized she should be grateful to him. That he had recognized what she hadn't, and that he'd cared enough to tell her. He's spoken up, and he hadn't backed down even when she had fought him on the truth. She had seen how much it had pained him to do so, and she certainly hadn't thanked him for it. She'd yelled at him, she'd cursed him and she'd told him she hated him. All for being honest. Some friend she was.

She had crucified him that night. It had been obvious that it was hard for him to tell her that day. He had said several times he didn't want to hurt her, but he had to tell her the truth. And she had called him a liar, accused him of being jealous of Trevor, of wanting her badly enough to fabricate a story. But it wasn't true. She knew Jason well enough to know that he wouldn't invent such a thing for petty reasons. Trevor would do something like that; Jason was merely honest and loyal. He was her best friend, the person who had always stood by her, and he loved her in his own way. And even though he knew she would be angry, he'd spoken up.

How could she ever face him again? How could she ever go to him and apologize for what she'd said? It wouldn't be easy, but she had to do it. Their years together demanded it. Even though Jason would tell her it was okay, that it didn't matter what she'd said to him, it did. She should have believed him then like she did now. But she had been so stunned, so unable to accept the facts when he'd presented them. And he would probably say he understood, that he wasn't upset, that he was glad that she was alright. Because that's what he always did.

He always seemed to be that quiet, steadfast presence in her life. The person that helped her when things went wrong, who laughed with her, cried with her, celebrated with her. When something happened, he was the first person she thought of calling and telling. Yet, she hadn't done that with Trevor. And she couldn't understand why. Jason was correct when he said she'd never spoken of the man she had intended to marry. One would think that she would have been so anxious to tell him, but she liked their conversations, of having something that didn't revolve around Trevor. It seemed that her subconscious had recognized something even then that the rest of her hadn't.

She would forever be grateful that he had shown up in Port Charles to surprise her, and then agreed to stay. He hadn't let himself be scared off by Trevor. He hadn't given up when Elizabeth had turned down invitations to do things, he kept trying. And because he had she remembered just how much she had enjoyed spending time with her friend. She'd remembered going over to his house after school and eating peanut butter sandwiches while doing their homework and then hanging out until her parents came home. She'd remembered grade school field trips, high school projects and summer vacations, nights going out on Jason's bike to escape the trailer court. She remembered graduation and when he left and how much she'd missed him.

Maybe that's why she'd let Trevor into her life. She'd been lonely for someone who knew all about her and accepted her the way Jason did. She had been looking for what she felt around Jason, but with romance as well. Had she really been that desperate? Well, she could discuss all of that with Epiphany later, what she needed to do right now was talk to Jason. As hard as that was going to be.

She needed to tell him that she didn't hate, as he probably thought. That she was glad he cared enough to risk their friendship and tell her the truth. That he brought someone to town who could give her an honest, professional opinion and also be someone she could talk to. He had done so many things for her, and she owed it to him, and their friendship to talk to him. So, she simply needed to stop hiding like a child in her apartment and go see her friend.

She picked up her phone and turned it over in her hand, thinking over the idea of calling him, but then shook her head. This was something that needed to be done face to face. So she set the phone in its cradle and picked up her car keys.

When she opened up the door, she gasped and stepped back, startled by the solid wall she'd nearly walked into. "T-trevor."

"Hello, Elizabeth," he smiled at her.

"You...you're back," she swallowed.

He nodded. "I told Mr. Coleman I hadn't seen my gal in a while and I wanted to surprise her."

He swept her up in a hug and walked them back into her apartment. "Surprise, baby."

As soon as he put her back down, she planted her feet to keep them from going any further. "Yes, it is. I...I was just on my way out."

"Off to see, Jason?" he asked, his voice dropping a note lower and something flickered in her stomach.

She squared her shoulders. "Yes. I need to talk to him."

"Why?" Trevor demanded.

"He's my friend and I need to talk to him," Elizabeth stated. She nearly apologized to him, nearly came up with some excuse or story to cover why she was going over there, and then she stopped. She didn't need to tell him anything. Jason being her friend should be enough explanation. Trevor certainly didn't tell her everything when he got together with his friends.

She tried to step around the man in her apartment, hoping that he'd leave and she could get out of here. She'd get to Jason's, she'd call Epiphany, and they'd help her know what to say to Trevor to break things off with him. She wasn't going to do it right now, because right now she was honestly afraid of what he'd do when she told him it was over. But Trevor wouldn't move and when she tried to sidestep him, he shifted as well, blocking her. It was the first time she ever realized just how much taller than her he was and what he could do if he had half a mind. And judging by his file, he did have half a mind when he wanted to.

"Where are you going, Elizabeth?" he asked. "I just got back into town and I wanted to spend some time with my girl."

"I know, but I was just leaving. I'm meeting Jason."

"Really?" he arched a brow at her. "How interesting. Especially considering he's not here."

That made her pause and she licked her lips, "Wh-what?"

"He left town," Trevor shrugged. "Probably realized he was never going to steal you away from me."

"That wasn't-" she began, but Trevor cut her off.

"He finally figured out that you're mine, Elizabeth, and nobody is going to take you away from me."

Okay, now she really needed to get out of here. She needed to get past him. Her eyes flicked to the open door behind him and hoped that one of her neighbors walked by so she could call out to them.

"Trevor, you need to leave," she said. "I want you to go."

He looked at her as if he couldn't believe what she'd just said, and then he shook his head. "I don't want to."

A shadow fluttered over her doorway and she looked over at it desperately. And then she blinked. She recognized the face. It had been many years since she'd seen it at the trailer court, but she'd recognize Sonny Corinthos anywhere from the times his picture had been in the paper after an arrest.

"Elizabeth?" he said softly, but his voice commanded the room and caused Trevor to turn. He held out his hand to her, "You wanna come with me?"

Trevor Grissom didn't like interlopers. He hated people who held places for others in line, and believed that if a person went into an express lane with 11 items instead of 10, then the store should send them to the back of the slowest moving line. So, Elizabeth could see the fury passing over his face at the thought of yet another man standing in her house. His jealousy of her wasn't sweet and romantic, it was annoying and infuriating. She had the right to friends outside of his circle and outside of his approval.

While Elizabeth had never approved of the man Sonny Corinthos had become, it was laziness to turn to crime instead of trying to make something better of himself, she had never joined in with the good citizens of Port Charles who called him an evil monster who should be shipped off to Sing Sing. Sure, she couldn't condone his lifestyle of violence and murder, but she remembered the boy he was growing up, and knew that statistically he'd had the deck stacked against him. Jason could have easily ended up in that same lifestyle if it hadn't been for finding out the Quartermaines were his biological family and getting a hefty trust fund, and she herself could have ended up in a minimum wage job with the constant fear of unemployment hanging over her head. Just because she had gotten a scholarship to college she hadn't ended up in a position where she had to contemplate turning to the streets in order to make her living. Sonny just hadn't gotten a chance like she and Jason had; she couldn't hold it against him and she would never consider herself better than him.

Especially since he was standing in her apartment, looking very much like an unlikely, but definitely welcome, savior. The moment Trevor turned and stepped just a fraction of an inch to the side taking his attention off her, she had skirted past him and was by Sonny's side immediately. And when he placed himself slightly in front of her, she breathed a soft sigh of relief. She was safe. She could get out of her apartment, away from Trevor, and get somewhere where she could regroup, figure out what she was going to do, and then find out if it was true Jason was gone and deal with that issue.

"Who are you?" Trevor demanded, acting like the king of her castle.

"You don't read the newspapers?" Sonny asked, a hint of amusement tingeing his voice. Then he shook his head, "I would have figured you'd be smarter than that for a lawyer. I'm rather disappointed."

Then, he cocked his head to the side and sighed dramatically. "But, I suppose considering the fact that you're not really a lawyer, maybe that explains it."

"What do you mean?" Trevor demanded. "What are you talking about?"

"You're not really a lawyer, Mr. Grissom," the mob lord stated. "Or should I call you Mr. Lansing? After all, that was the name you used down in Brazil. But that was just an alias as well, wasn't it? Ric Lansing died as an infant up in Martha's Vineyard. Should I call you Seth Markham as you were known as in Canada? Or how 'bout your real name?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Trevor shook his head, but sweat had started to form on his upper lip. "My name is Trevor Grissom."

"I'll give you points for sticking to your story," Sonny said magnanimously, "but I know the truth. My men are very thorough and they found out who you really are. So, Martin Knight, why don't you just step outside and you can accompany my men while I escort Ms. Webber here to her friends."

Martin Knight. The name seemed so bland, so unoriginal, so non-threatening. Elizabeth looked at him, and wondered what had snapped inside him to make him do what he'd done. To turn him into someone who was suspected of killing the neighborhood animals, and then had graduated onto abusing women.

"I...I'm not going anywhere with your men," Martin stated.

"Oh, relax," the mobster waved his hand casually. Dismissively. "I'm not going to fit you for cement shoes and see if you can grow gills. I'm just going to take you someplace quiet where you and I can have a little chat. See, I don't know if you're aware of the fact but Elizabeth and I grew up in the same trailer court. She was always kind to me, never turned her nose up like the others did when my old man was convicted of murder. Even baked me brownies one time when I was home for two weeks with pneumonia. She's a sweet gal, and I'm rather fond of her. I couldn't bear the thought of anything happening to her."

Sonny flicked his wrist and a tall mountain stepped into the room. "Yes, Mr. Corinthos?"

"Max, take Mr. Knight here out to the house in Parkston, and make sure he's comfortable. The satellite dish was fixed there, wasn't it?"

The mountain nodded the boulder on top of its non-existent neck and Sonny smiled. "Good. We want him to be comfortable. Not sure how long he's going to be there."

Then he turned his attention away from the two men, not seemingly bothered when Max clamped a hand onto Martin's shoulder and escorted him from the room. His attention, and dimples, were firmly on Elizabeth and she shifted slightly under the mafia don's gaze. Equal parts gratitude and apprehension coursed through her.

"Are you alright?" Sonny asked, his voice softening slightly.

When she mutely nodded, his face morphed into a smile of relief. "Good. As soon as I heard he'd gotten back into town I came over here as quickly as I could. I wanted to make sure nothing happened to you. Let's go, okay?"

It was surreal walking out of her apartment building next to the most notorious man in Port Charles. A limo, complete with dark - and she was sure, bullet proof - windows sat waiting on the street. Another man in a suit nowhere near as fine as Sonny's Italian wool, was standing by the back door and opened it immediately at their appearance. Sonny himself, with the greatest courtesy and gentleness, took her hand to help her into the car and then entered after her. A moment later, the engine came to life and the limo pulled away from the curb. She watched her street slide by out the window and felt that at any moment she would wake up from a dream.

"Elizabeth?"

The soft voice drew her gaze back to the man sitting across from her. His dark eyes watched her carefully, and she shifted under his scrutiny. "Are you sure you're alright?" he repeated.

"Yeah," she said, her voice shaking slightly and she cleared it while folding her hands tightly in her lap to keep them from trembling. "Thank you for coming. Trevor...or Martin...I don't know...I'm not sure what I would have done."

"You're welcome," he said simply. "I'm glad I was there. I promised Jason I would keep an eye on you when he had to leave town suddenly, and I would make sure that if Mr. Knight came back into town I wouldn't let him hurt you."

"Jason?" she said, shock evident in her voice. "Jason-"

"He asked me to look out for you. He didn't want to leave," he told her, and her heart sank to her stomach and then ricocheted up to her throat. He'd left like Tr-Martin had said, but according to Sonny Jason hadn't wanted to. "It was one of his terms."

"Terms?" she shook her head. "What?"

"I made an offer to Jason to buy his waterfront property," the man across from her explained, and given the nature of Sonny's business she could imagine why he wanted it. "Jason wasn't too interested in selling at first, but said he'd consider it. Actually, I think he said that just to get me to agree to do research on your fiancé."

"Ex-fiancé," Elizabeth said under her breath. He just didn't know it yet. Then aloud she asked, "Research?"

"He'd had one of his men look into Trevor Grissom's past, and felt it was...amiss," he said with a shrug of his shoulder that was in no way innocent. "It was too clean, too sterile, but he wasn't able to crack it. He figured with my connections I might be able to find something. He dangled the waterfront property in front of me, but truthfully," the man gave her a dimpled smile, "as soon as I heard it was to help you, I would have done it for nothin'."

At her stunned look he continued. "I may have risen above Courtland Trailer Courte, but I remember the people who were there with me, and especially those who were kind to me. To hear that you were being mistreated by a man, well...that was all the incentive I needed."

"I...I don't know what to say," she said honestly. "Thank you?"

He waved a manicured hand through the air, a platinum wristwatch winking at her in the dim interior of the car. "There are no thanks necessary, Elizabeth. Keeping you from going through what my mother went through? That's more than enough for me."

She remembered the whispers about Sonny's mother, the man she'd married after Sonny's father went to prison and the accident the man had one night on icy, slippery streets. It was a tragedy. Apparently, in more ways than one.

She couldn't believe that Jason had gone to the city's crime boss, and on her behalf. What had her friend been thinking? He was making deals with criminals. Because of her? He had put himself into that position, for her? He shouldn't have done that. It was dangerous owing men like Sonny Corinthos. But Jason had done it. They were going to have to talk about that when he returned.

"So, now I'll take you to Jason's," Sonny told her. "Now that you're okay. I can have one of my men pack up some clothes for you-"

"That's okay," she shook her head. "That's not necessary."

"Alright," he shrugged. "Then when you need something, just let the guard know and he'll accompany you back there. Or, if you don't feel like going back home, just have him take you to a store."

He pulled out a money clip from the inside pocket of his suit jacket and pulled off an obscene number of one hundred dollar bills. Holding them out to her he said, "Whatever you need to buy."

She looked at the money, then back up at him, her jaw slack. "That's...thank you, but I have my own money. And if you've got Martin...somewhere, I should be fine. Right?"

"I'd prefer you have a guard with you, for a little while," he said. "You can never be too safe."

She raised her eyebrow. "You think he'll escape from you?"

Sonny laughed and shook his head. "No. But...just do this one thing for me, Elizabeth. Have the guard with you. At least until Jason arrives, or I tell you it's okay. I know it probably makes you uncomfortable, but my men are discrete. They won't cause problems, but they'll look out for you. He'll be outside Jason's house, in case you need him."

"But if Jason's not there," she hedged, "maybe I should go someplace else."

"He wanted you to go to his house," Sonny stated with such certainty she wondered how he knew. "And Mrs. Johnson is there as well, in case you want to talk to her."

The limo slowed and turned into the driveway in front of Jason's house and a moment later it stopped. The back door opened and Sonny stepped out, then reached inside for her. The guard by the door was looking at the two of them and Sonny cleared his throat. "Elizabeth, this is Francis. He'll be the man outside. Francis, this is Ms. Webber. I want you to guard her like she was my sister. Understand?"

"Yes, Mr. Corinthos," the guard nodded immediately.

"Good," the don smiled and then looked at Elizabeth, reaching up slowly to brush a piece of hair out of her face. "If you ever need to get in touch with me, you tell Francis and he'll call me immediately. He also has my numbers on a card, alright?"

She nodded, and then impulsively, she leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Sonny Corinthos' neck. His arms came up around her gently. "Thank you, Sonny."

"Elizabeth?"

She turned when she heard him and her face lit up as she was already moving across the room. Jason dropped his bag and opened his arms, welcoming her into them as she launched herself the last few feet. His arms closed tightly around her, and even though she could hardly breathe, she'd never felt anything so right. It had been a long week without Jason around, even though she had spoken to him over the phone.

"You're back," she smiled into his shoulder.

"Yeah," he agreed, the weight of the world sounding in that one world. "I'm sorry-"

She cut his apology off. "Don't. It's okay. I know you had to take care of business. You called me, and Stan and Epiphany took care of me."

"Nothing should have been more important than you," he shook his head as he set her back on her feet, but didn't step away. His hands were on her shoulders, under her hair; as if he needed to reassure himself she was there, that she wasn't harmed.

Giving a nervous, shaky laugh, she said, "You wouldn't want to lose such important clients because of me."

"Elizabeth," he said, his countenance grave. "Nothing is more important than you."

She felt uncomfortable with such an admission and she sought to change the subject, deflect it away from such serious statements. But his eyes held her and she felt she couldn't escape it. Finally, he released her when he looked down and she felt that she could breathe again.

"You're okay, right?" he asked. The same question he had asked every time he spoke to her. "He didn't hurt you?"

"He scared me," she admitted, the same as she had in all their conversations. She knew there was no point in lying to Jason. He would know; he always seemed to know. But this time, the quaver in her voice was stronger, his presence undoing her more. It was somehow easier to confess these things to him when he was on the other side of an ocean than it was with him right in the room with her. "He...I saw the part of him that could do those things to women. And it frightened me."

He groaned and stepped closer, his arms going around her again and this time she held on. "I never should have left. Stan tried to take care of things, but..."

She nodded, her throat too tight to speak right now. Tears burned her eyes and she really didn't want to cry. She'd cried bucket loads since Sonny Corinthos had delivered her to Jason's house and she was so tired of crying. Epiphany, despite seeming like a tough as nails woman, was surprisingly soft in the face of Elizabeth's tears. She told her that they were natural, a body's response to the stress. And the house seemed to have a Puffs box on every table, every counter, even though nobody said anything about how they suddenly appeared there.

But Elizabeth was tired of crying. Tired of feeling like she was wallowing in self-pity. Her ex-fiancé had done a number on her, but he hadn't hurt her physically, and she had an amazing support system taking care of her. Sometimes she felt it was all unnecessary. But she knew that Jason wouldn't see it that way, and she had a feeling that he was going to be reassuring himself as much as he was reassuring her.

Finally, she was able to swallow and she cleared her throat, but there would be no disguising the thick emotion in it. "Sonny got there in time before things got out of hand and...he got me out of there."

Jason's hand smoothed over her hair and he said, almost as a prayer, "I'm glad. I asked him to look out for you."

There was the opening she needed. The freedom to ask the question that had been filling her with curiosity since she realized the reality of the situation. "Why? Why would you go to Sonny Corinthos, Jason?"

"Because he could help me," he stated and then stood there when she moved away from him.

"There had to be other people who could help you, Jason," she shook her head. "The police."

"You never filed a report," he said softly, tucking his hands in his pockets while rounding his shoulders into himself. "I was afraid they wouldn't take it seriously. Or that because Grissom was a lawyer they might side with him. Even if they did believe me and agree to try to help, they wouldn't be able to devote someone to you twenty-four/seven like Sonny could."

"What about a private security guard?" she pressed. "You have the money to hire someone to be with me all the time if you thought the police wouldn't help."

"They wouldn't have known enough to be discreet," he said. "Also, if you saw them and told them to leave or called the cops to make them leave, they'd have to. They'd also..."

He trailed off and looked away, "They'd also be more worried with laws and morals."

She sighed. He had an answer for each one of her challenges, even if she didn't like them. "You mean you figured that Sonny Corinthos and his men wouldn't bother with niceties because they're mobsters."

He raised his eyes to meet hers and they were unabashedly honest. "Yes. Look, Elizabeth, I'm sorry if it bothers you, but your safety was the most important thing to me. You know the rumors about Sonny's mother and the guy she married. The rumors that Sonny arranged the accident. He doesn't like abusers, and when he heard what Trevor was doing to you, he didn't like it. I knew he would keep an eye on you and do whatever it took to keep you safe."

"That's what Sonny said as well," she admitted softly. "I just...I can't-"

"Don't you dare say you're not worth it," Jason told her.

"A mobster?" she asked. "You made a deal with a mobster?"

"I made a deal with an old acquaintance who happens to run an import/export business and needed waterfront property. He's only an alleged mobster."

She arched a brow at him. "You're really going to argue semantics with me?"

"And you're really going to argue with me when all I was trying to do was keep you safe?"

Well, when he put it that way, it did sound rather petty. She shook her head. "No. I...I'm sorry. I just...I'm worried for you, Jason."

That seemed to give him pause and he puzzled at her as he crossed the room to sit down on the couch. He invited her to join him before asking, "Why are you worried about me? The entire time I was gone I was worried about you."

Elizabeth curled up onto the sofa, trailing a finger over the fabric on the seat beside her. She peeked up at him through her bangs and said, "I worry about you with Sonny Corinthos. You may think that he just was helping out an old friend, or that he'll be happy now that he's got the waterfront, but what if...what if he wants more? What he wants you to help him out? Asks you for the favor this time?"

Jason sighed and ran his hand over his mouth. "He might," he admitted. "I've thought about that. I've thought about that a lot. And if he does..."

He shrugged and turned to face her more fully on the couch. "If he does, then I guess I'll have to cross that bridge when it comes. I don't know what I'll do, because I don't know what, or if, he'll even ask. But like I said, all I wanted to make sure was that you were safe, Elizabeth. That was all I could think about. I didn't know if you believed me, I didn't know if you hated me. But I couldn't leave town and not have someone watching out for you."

She looked down, once again seeking refuge from the intensity of his eyes as she blushed. The softness in his voice, the earnestness of his gaze, it was unnerving to her. It did funny things to her insides that she figured were better not happening. Not now...not ever.

It moved into territory that she wasn't sure she wanted to deal with. Jason was her friend, her best friend, and she loved him. But theirs had always been a platonic relationship and it was comfortable. Even when she'd had a crush on him during high school, it had thankfully occurred when he was getting ready to graduate and leave town so she was able to contain her rampant teenage hormones. Men and women could be friends without it turning into more, and she needed his friendship, especially right now. Anything more would invariably be a mistake and ruin what they had.

So she really needed him to stop looking at her like he was. With his eyes all soft and full of emotion. Friends could share deep emotions without them being laced with sexual tension, that's all this was. That's all it could be.

At least for right now.

No, she gave herself a mental shake. Not just right now. Always.

Right?

Thankfully, Jason spoke and forced her to focus on other things. "So, what do you plan to do?"

She sighed, knowing what he was asking and leaned back on the couch, closing her eyes. "I don't know."

Rubbing her hands over her face, Elizabeth groaned. "I...I don't know what I should do. I've been thinking about it. My job, my apartment...Martin."

"Don't think about Martin," Jason told her. "He's not worth it."

She lifted her head and looked at him. "He's a big part of this. I quit my job. I gave up my lease. I have to be out of there in seven days. Where am I going to go? What am I going to do for a job?"

"Let me help you," he said, moving slightly closer and letting his hand rest on her arm. "Come with me."

"Come with you?" she asked. "Where would we go?"

"Anywhere," he told her. "Anywhere, but here. You don't ever have to come back if you don't want to. You're a smart woman, Elizabeth. With your degree and your experience, you could get a job anywhere. Any company would be lucky to have you. But...take some time. Do some traveling. You've always loved traveling."

She grinned. She had loved traveling. Especially with Jason. She had always kept fond memories of the times they would go somewhere new during the summer. She nodded at him and his eyes brightened just a bit.

"Is that a yes?"

"Yeah," she nodded, warming at the thought of something familiar. Something comfortable.

"Good," he sighed. "I thought I was going to have to work harder to convince you. But you deserve this, and I think you need this time. Some time to relax. To recover. To figure out what you want to do."

Her eyes misted. He was always trying to take care of her, and this time she didn't have the energy to fight him. Because it did sound nice. Get away from Port Charles and all the bad memories of Martin. Decide if she wanted to come back or live somewhere new. And she would have her friend there beside her, like old times, to tell her about Mexico's major exports, or Argentina's climate, or the history of one of Italy's towns. She could really use that right now.

"Thank you, Jason," she sighed softly.

He nodded. "I'll get started on plans, and also get some movers to take care of your stuff. We can put it into storage here until you decide what you want to do. No sense paying for a rental unit when my garage will suffice."

He stood and she knew he was going to start on the phone calls, and he probably needed to catch up with Stan. But there was one more thing she needed to say to him and she caught his hand before he could move past her.

"Jason."

He stopped and sat down on the coffee table, peering at her intently. "Yes?"

"There's just...I wanted to ask you something."

"Anything."

"Don't go after Martin."

They were supposed to be on their way out of town, but instead, they were here. In one of Sonny Corinthos' cars, driving to one of the mobster's safe houses, and not speaking to each other. What a wonderful way to start a trip. Angry, resentful, uncommunicative. Great. Just great.

The man across the car from them seemed to sense the tension between them, and thankfully didn't try to talk to them. He wasn't an entirely stupid man. After all, one didn't head an illegal organization, evade police and feds and stay alive by being dumb. So Sonny Corinthos knew when to keep his mouth shut. Now was one of those times.

When the car stopped, the door didn't open right away, and the three occupants of the back of the limo shifted and waited. Time seemed to stretch. Finally, the mafia don leaned forward, the leather seat creaking underneath him, and braced his elbows on his knees. "We're here."

Elizabeth rolled her eyes and hoped he couldn't see the motion in the reflection of the window she was staring blankly out of. Of course they were here. She didn't say anything; after all, she hadn't initiated this excursion. That had been all Jason. She just insisted she was going to come along. So, if anybody was going to reply to Sonny, it was going to be him. But right now, he was pulling a stone cold silent routine that really raised her hackles. It was the same silence that had descended on them the moment she asked him not to go after Martin Knight.

"Are you ready to go in?" Sonny finally asked when Jason remained mute.

He didn't reply, but Elizabeth heard his clothing shift and figured he'd nodded his head. He seemed to be doing a lot of nonverbal communication around her lately. It was extremely annoying.

"Elizabeth?" the mobster asked, "are you going in?"

"No!"

Jason's angry answer sounded clearly in the car, mixing with her scornful reply. At least they were in complete agreement there.

"Alright," Sonny replied slowly. Then he reached for the door handle. The moment the guard outside sensed the movement of the door he took over the task and opened it. Sonny stepped out, and then Jason followed. Elizabeth stayed inside, not knowing if Sonny was going to go in with Jason, and not wanting to be left alone standing outside the car. Sure, the guard would be there, but she'd learned from her experience with Francis that they didn't say much in the form of direct communication. And if she was going to sulk, she'd rather do so in the confines of the car.

She heard the low murmurs of Sonny and Jason speaking, and then footsteps headed away from the car. She shook her head angrily and crossed her arms even tighter over her chest. Stupid men.

She was startled when the car dipped and Sonny climbed back inside, settling into the seat across from her. The guard closed the door and Sonny reached up and twisted on the dome light so they were a little more illuminated in the smoky interior. She looked at him blankly, and then turned to look back outside.

"I understand why you're angry," Sonny broke the silence.

"Really?" she said on a snort of disbelief.

"I do. But I also think you need to understand why Jason needs to do this."

"Why he needs to do this?" she asked, her eyebrows almost in her hair as she faced him again. "Why he needs to do this? Jason isn't the one Martin messed with, Sonny. That was me. And I never want to see the rat again in my life. So why should Jason need to do this?"

"Because Martin hurt you. And that's all the reason Jason needs."

She didn't bother hiding the roll of her eyes this time. "Oh give me a break. I know that Jason's my friend and he hates what Martin did, but I asked him not to do this. I asked him. Shouldn't that be enough? Shouldn't he respect my wishes enough? But no, he wouldn't listen to me. He insisted on this. He called you, said he was going to do this before we leave and that was that. Rather like Martin used to just decree what was going to happen. So why does he need to do this? To make himself feel all big and macho because he beats Martin up? How does that make Jason any better than Martin?"

"Jason's defending the honor of the woman he loves," Sonny said simply and Elizabeth's eyes widened. "It's not logical, but love never really is. But Martin hurt you, Elizabeth. You can't really just expect Jason to leave without addressing that."

"Whoa, whoa," Elizabeth held up her hand and shook her head. "Back the train up to the station. Jason isn't a man in love and this isn't some romantic claptrap about defense and honor. Jason is just..."

"In love with you," Sonny told her.

"No, he's not," she protested. "Would you stop saying that?"

The older man regarded her with a tilt of his head and asked, "Why?"

"Because it's not true," she insisted. "Jason is my friend. He's my oldest friend, but that doesn't mean he's in love with me. He's not."

"Boy, if you're that blind, it's no wonder Martin was able to snow you," he shook his head.

Elizabeth saw red and it was only through sheer force of will that she didn't reach across the space between them and slap Sonny Corinthos across the face. How dare he! "That was uncalled for," she hissed between clenched teeth.

He dropped his head and nodded, "You're right. I apologize. Martin was a predator and it's not always easy to spot that. Especially when he presses the right buttons. He made you feel special, didn't he? Like you were important; the most important thing in his world. After everything you went through, growing up where you did, all the stuff with your parents, Jason going away...it was probably nice to have someone like that around you."

She sniffed and looked away, blinking rapidly to keep the stinging tears at bay. Sonny was right. Martin had been all of that, and more, and even though Epiphany had told her many times that even the smartest women can be blind to the warning signs, it didn't make it any easier for her to swallow.

"But just because Martin was all of that, it doesn't negate what Jason Morgan feels for you."

"He's my friend."

"He is," Sonny agreed. "But anyone who looks at him, who watches him watching you can see that it's so much more. He looks at you like I look at my wife. You are the most important thing to him, something to be cherished and treasured simply because he considers you a gift in his life."

"I don't need to be wrapped in cotton and put up on a shelf," she shook her head.

"That's not what I mean," he contradicted her. "You are simply the most awe inspiring thing in his life. And someone hurt you. Someone took everything good you were offering and twisted it, used it as a weapon against you, and Jason can't forgive the man for it. And so even though you asked him not to go after Martin, he simply can't give you that one thing. Because everything inside him is demanding that he confront the slime who hurt you.

"It's not a macho thing," Sonny shook his head, as if reading her thoughts. "It's a way to honor you. It's something he has to do because he loves you and respects you."

"If he respected me, he would respect my wishes."

"He's not going to get hurt," the man across from her said softly. "That's why you're really worried, aren't you? You don't want Jason to get hurt. You've read what Martin has done to those women and you're afraid for Jason."

Elizabeth pressed her lips together and looked down. She lowered her arms, twining her hands together in her lap. With just the slightest movement, she nodded her head.

"Then you don't have to worry, Elizabeth," Sonny told her. "He's not going to get hurt. Abusers are bullies. They pick on women because they're smaller, and easier to fight with, but when men confront them, they often sing a different tune. He's not going to hurt Jason."

"How do you know?"

"Because I could tell you things I've observed about Martin in the two weeks I've had him here," he said. "But I won't. Because you don't need to hear what he's said, and what he's done. The easiest way I can assure you that Jason won't get hurt is to tell you one of my men is in there with him. And no matter what Jason says, he's not going to leave the two of them alone. Max is one of my biggest and strongest guards and Martin is terrified of him. He won't dare try anything with Jason with Max in the room."

Elizabeth leaned back against the seat. Max was the name of the mountain who'd accompanied Sonny to her apartment that day; he was the man who'd forced Trevor to leave. If he was in the room, then there was no way that Martin could hurt Jason. It made her breathe just a little easier and loosened the band of fear around her heart.

"What-" she broke off and cleared her throat. Then she peered at Sonny. "What are you going to do with Martin?"

"That depends on you," Sonny stated. "What do you want done with him?"

She looked at the mobster in disbelief. He was leaving this up to her? She didn't want that responsibility or that weight on her conscience. Because she had no doubt that if she asked it, Sonny would make Martin Knight disappear. Maybe they'd see if the man could grow gills after he was weighted down and tossed into the harbor. Alive. She swallowed and looked down at her hands which trembled ever so slightly.

"I...I don't know," she admitted. "I don't ever want to see him again; I don't want to worry about him one day showing up. And I don't want him to hurt anyone else. But I don't know if I can...if I can ask for him..."

She shrugged and looked away. How did one tell a mobster that you weren't going to ask him to kill someone?

Thankfully, Sonny Corinthos was a smart man. "You don't want to ask me to take care of him because you don't want the weight of sentencing another man to his doom."

She nodded as she licked her dry lips.

"Then how about you leave it up to me? I'll find a fitting punishment for the man and you don't have to know anything about it."

Elizabeth thought about it, wondering if complying with Sonny was really any different than actually asking for it directly. But then the door opened and both of them turned and watched as Jason entered the limo. He could have sat beside Sonny, but he looked at Elizabeth and then sat on the seat beside her. When she saw him, she forgot her anger towards him and she forgot the ridiculousness of Sonny's claim, all she saw was that he was alright.

His hair was a little ruffled, and he was breathing a little heavy, but he was there and he wasn't hurt. Martin hadn't hurt him. Before she could process it, she threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly. She was still annoyed with him, but she was glad that he was back. Slowly his arms came up around her, looser than her hold on him, but she didn't care. After going out of their way to avoid each other the past few days, it was nice to feel the strength of his arms again.

She pulled back and Jason immediately dropped his hands, retreating them to his side. She looked down and frowned when she saw his right hand before he could conceal it. Grasping hold of it gently, she stopped him from moving it as she studied it, and then looked up at him. "Jason, your hand."

"It's alright," he said, flexing his fingers slightly and emphasizing the bruises on his knuckles that hadn't been there before.

"You hit him," she stated on a sigh. When he remained silent, she looked up at him, meeting his blue eyes unflinchingly.

"I did," he admitted quietly. "I'm sorry."

"I don't care about him, you idiot," she admonished him with a rough shake of her head. "I never wanted you to get hurt. Don't you know that? That's why I asked you to not go after Martin. I didn't want you to hurt yourself over me."

He brought his hand up hesitantly, and the tips of his fingers grazed her cheek slightly. "I told you before, Elizabeth. You're worth it."

Elizabeth Webber realized that she had to be the stupidest person in the world. As she traveled around the world with Jason for weeks that turned into months, she realized that she'd been stupid, and blind, most of her life. Sonny Corinthos was right. Jason was in love with her. It was obvious in everything he did, all the words he said, even if he never spoke words of love. He made her feel cherished; he made her feel safe, and most of all he made her feel like she was home. It wasn't a physical structure; it was him and his presence in her life.

She realized that the thing she'd been searching for in her relationships in life, a feeling of rightness, was born from her desire to replicate what she'd had in her friendship with Jason. He was someone who knew about her, and didn't judge her. He made her laugh, he made her so angry she could spit sometimes, but he was loyal, he was supportive, and it was a relationship she never wanted to lose. And so she had looked for that kind of feeling, but with the added bonus of love to go with it. Because she had never realized she was in love with Jason Morgan until she was confronted with the thought that he was in love with her.

And then she realized that everything she had ever wanted and looked for in a man was embodied by Jason. Why should she look for someone else to make her feel the way Jason did, when the original was already there? Life could have been a whole lot easier if she'd ever looked at Jason in a light other than her best bud. She could have flirted with him, she could have done a lot of other things, like say no to Martin Knight, and called up Jason and invited him to come visit and try to see how he felt. Instead of going through what she did.

Now, though, she didn't know what to do.

She believed Jason loved her, but as the weeks turned into months and they traveled, there didn't seem to be much change in their relationship. They acted just like all the other times they had traveled together. Friends. And she began to doubt whether Sonny Corinthos' assertion was true. Maybe Jason just loved her as a friend. After all, they'd both grown up without siblings, they'd lived across the street, hung out together, and for the longest time, she'd wished every night that he could have been her brother. Now,however, the thoughts that she had about Jason Morgan were anything but sisterly. But it was hard to know if his thoughts went beyond brotherly.

She sighed and leaned her arms against the cold metal railing, staring sightlessly at the gorge below. It was still dark, though the sky was beginning to lighten. The air around her was moist with fog that had made their trip up here slow, and cold, but when Jason said last night he wanted to take the motorcycle, she went along with it. Because Jason so rarely asked for anything in their travels, seemingly content to let her plan and pick where they went, only offering suggestions on occasion, but leaving it up to her for the most part. So when he made this request, she readily agreed. Who knew they were going to have a foggy morning like they did? Jason had suggested this morning they take a car instead, but she shook her head. It just gave her an excuse to snuggle up closer to him.

She didn't hear Jason's footsteps until he was right beside her. The fog muffled everything, dampening sound as well as themselves. She startled at his sudden presence at her elbow that pulled her back from her thoughts and she turned and smiled up at him.

"How much longer 'til sunrise?" she asked in a low voice.

He peered down at his watch. "About fifteen minutes. With the fog, I don't know if we're going to get the full effect."

"That's alright," she said. "It's been a while since we've gotten up to do something like this. Remember though when we used to stay out all night and then catch a sunrise instead of now getting a few hours sleep? Do you think this means we've gotten old?"

"We're no longer teenagers," he laughed, and then reached out and brushed a piece of hair that was clinging to her cheek back behind her ear.

She shivered at the contact, but didn't look away from him. It was the most intimate gesture he'd made in a long time, even though she'd taken to brushing her hand over his and through the hair on the back of his head more frequently in an attempt to show him of her changing feelings, and her heart took up sudden lodging in her throat. But it retreated when his hand dropped back down to his side and he looked away. With a sigh, she twisted until she was facing the gorge again and leaned more heavily on her elbows. Just when she'd begun to hope...

She was startled when his hand brushed over hers, pulling at her clasped hands until one came free. Then he twined his fingers between hers, his thumb absently brushing over the back of her hand. Elizabeth stared down at their joined hands, almost as if she were mesmerized by the sight. This was no accidental brushing of fingertips when they reached for the ketchup bottle or a friendly taking of her hand to help her up some ruins they were climbing. This was deliberate. This was certainly not just a friendly little gesture. Not with the way his thumb kept sweeping over her skin, sending jolts of pleasure through her arm into her body and turning her knees to jelly.

Slowly, she raised her eyes from their hands, and lifted her gaze to meet Jason's. Her eyes widened when she saw him looking at her. His look was intense, and smoldering. She used to think such a phrase was a hackneyed cliché found only in romance novels covered with pictures where people seemed to have a hard time keeping their two-sizes too small clothes on. But that was the only phrase that fit the particular look in Jason's eyes as he gazed down at her. His eyes were warm, open, and honest.

Nope, there was no mistaking that look for anything familial or brotherly. This was a look Martin had tried for and failed miserably at. Her heart stuttered for a moment and then began to beat so fast she was sure it would burst.

Jason turned slightly towards her and Elizabeth immediately matched the movement. He never let go of her hand, but used it to pull her just a little bit closer, and she went willingly. Then when his free hand reached up to brush over her cheek, she closed her eyes on a sigh and leaned into his palm. He had such warm hands and she was filled with such a heat that even her toes no longer felt cold despite the two hours they'd spent on the bike to arrive here.

"Tell me this is real," she whispered, her eyes still closed.

"I think that's supposed to be my line," he said, once again moving closer.

"Mutual hallucination?" she nervously teased.

But Jason, it seemed, was not in the mood to tease. "It's real, Elizabeth. I...I wasn't sure. I didn't...after Martin, I didn't want to rush anything."

"I know," she said softly. "I wasn't ready."

"And now?" he asked, pulling back slightly to study her.

She followed after him, closing the distance once more. "Now I am. I realized that what I was looking for in life, I already had it. In you. You're my friend, Jason. But you're so much more. And I've finally realized that. The reason none of my other relationships worked was because they weren't you."

"I've waited a long time for you to realize that," he said, his eyes softening.

"You could have said something," she pointed out to him. "Saved us both a lot of trouble."

He licked his lips and rubbed his thumb over her cheek. "I was coming back for you. That night I surprised you in Kelly's...I'd come there to finally tell you."

She closed her eyes and swallowed. "And Martin was there."

"Yeah," he said, his voice hoarse. "I just wanted you to be happy, and if that was with Martin...then that would have been it. But-"

She held up her hand, pressing her fingers lightly over his mouth and stopping his words. "We know what happened there; we don't need to relive it. I'm glad though, that things happened like they did. Because I realized what love really is, and I realized that's what I feel for you. So I'm glad you showed up that night and threw my world upside down, because when everything was said and done, we ended up here."

The sky continued to brighten around them, but the sunrise they'd purposely come out to see went unnoticed. They were on the cusp of something so much more significant than beautiful sunrise over a fog-filled valley. Jason let go of her hand and reached into his pocket, searching for, and then pulling something out. Without even seeing it, she knew. But she didn't look down. She didn't care about cut, clarity, color or how many carets the ring had. That wasn't important.

Instead, she reached out, bringing her hand up to brush Jason's jaw, before sliding around to the back of his neck and tugging him that much closer to what they'd been moving towards. "I love you, Jason," she told him. She felt he deserved to hear the words first, considering he'd waited the longest for them.

Then Elizabeth rose on her toes and met his lips which were moving towards her in reply.

The End