"Yada, yada, yada……."

Taggert glared at his suspect’s flip response to the Miranda warning. "Do you understand these rights as I’ve explained them to you?"

"Is the Pope Polish?" Jerry Jacks’ mouth twisted in a wry smile and his voice dripped with sarcasm. As Taggert led him down the stairs of the Jacks mansion, the Congressman tugged at his hands, which were cuffed behind him. "Are you sure these are *really* necessary?"

"I always thought you were known for being tough on crime, Congressman," Alexis snapped, following behind them. She stepped onto the marble floor of the entryway, the clicking of her heels echoing in the ominous silence. "Guess you feel differently when the shoe’s on the other foot, hmmmm?"

"Don’t say another WORD, Jerry!" Jax bustled down the staircase to take a place next to his brother. Thunderclouds raced across his face as he gave his former fiancée a look that could cut glass. "These people have NOTHING concrete to justify an indictment." His eyes remained locked with Alexis’s. "They’re just on a fishing expedition……"

"Yeah, and this time I think we came up with the catch of the day!" Taggert chortled. He linked his arm through Jerry’s, pulling him towards the front door. "Come on, Congressman. We’re gonna take a little ride downtown." Just as Taggert put his hand out to open the door, it swung wide in front of him.

"What the………" Completing the morning’s tragedy, Jane Jacks had chosen that exact moment to return from her shopping trip. Her stricken gaze bounced from Jerry’s handcuffs to Jax and back to her eldest son’s abashed face. "Jerry? What’s happening?"

"It’s nothing, mum……" Jerry tried to remain in place to calm his mother but Taggert pulled him through the doorway. "DON’T BELIEVE A WORD THEY SAY!"

As his shout echoed in the foyer, Jane turned back to youngest son, her lower lip quivering. "Jax? What’s……" She placed delicate fingers over her lips as tears began to run down her face. "Is Jerry being arrested?"

"We’re taking him down to the PCPD to book him for Chloe Morgan’s murder, Mrs. Jacks." Alexis spoke softly before Jax could take a breath and compose himself. Genuine warmth momentarily shone in Alexis’s eyes as she took Jane’s hands in hers. "I’m very sorry."

"It’s all just a big misunderstanding, mum……" Jax rushed to his mother’s side and put his arm around her consolingly, pulling her away from his former fiancée. After giving Alexis yet another scathing look, he took his mother by the shoulders to stare into her eyes. "I don’t want you to worry about Jerry, alright? I’m going to take care of everything….."

"Right…….just like you’ve done such a GRAND job of taking care of EVERYTHING so far in this little fiasco!" John Jacks snarled. He descended the staircase, his face red with rage. "If we had done things MY way from the start, things never would have gotten to the point they are this morning!"

"All the money and the calling in of favors in the WORLD wouldn’t have prevented Jerry’s arrest, Mr. Jacks," Alexis retorted in a clipped voice. "Taking another person’s life is a crime, and it deserves to be punished." She returned her frosty gaze to Jax. "No matter WHO did it." Clearing her throat awkwardly when she saw Jane’s tears, she dropped her gaze and moved towards the door. "Now, if you’ll excuse me, I should make sure that everything’s being handled properly outside."

She was no sooner out of the house than John slammed his way across the foyer, heading for the study. "D*MNIT ALL TO H*LL!!" He paused in front of Jax, narrowing one eye at him in an accusing manner. "Now I’LL make sure that everything’s handled PROPERLY!!"

"She was RIGHT, you know, old man!!" Jax’s biting words rang out, stopping his father dead in his tracks. "You can’t buy Jerry’s way out of trouble this time!!"

John turned back slowly to face his youngest son, his eyes narrowed with rage. "I’ve had just about enough of your tone, my boy," he sneered, pointing a finger menacingly at Jax. "You KNOW there could be devastating consequences if you don’t watch your step….."

Jax walked over to his father, meeting his icy glare head-on. "I don’t give a D*MN about your consequences!" he hissed, tapping a finger against his father’s chest to mirror his gesture. "Alexis knows EVERYTHING, dad! We cleared the air last night, and there’s nothing you can do anymore to hurt us!" He dropped his voice to a low, determined whisper. "I’m going to marry Alexis, so you’d better get used to her being part of the family!"

John’s chest puffed out and his eyes turned cold as steel. "Family or not, I’m NOT going to let that woman turn Jerry’s career into a shambles!" He stared at Jax demonically. "Take your pick, my boy – because if YOU can’t stop Miss Davis, I WILL!!"

"Oh, dear………oh, dear………" Everyone turned towards Jane when her strangled cry rose above the din. Her face pale, she clutched her chest as her tears fell unchecked onto the marble floor. "I don’t feel very well……"

"MUM!!" Jax rushed back across the foyer to cradle his mother in his arms. "Do you have any pain in your chest?" he asked, gently pushing her hair back off her forehead.

"Nooo……" She smiled weakly at Jessie as her only daughter came to her side. "I’m just so dizzy….."

Jax looked around and grimaced when he saw Scott obediently following John Jacks into his study. The truth was, he hadn’t even paid much attention to his sister’s fiancé since arriving. "Charles!!" A butler came scurrying over as soon as Jax called his name. "Go call Dr. Monica Quartermaine and see if she can swing by and take a look at my mother." He glanced back down at Jane, whose color was slowly returning even though she still sobbed quietly. "Tell her that mum’s not feeling well and we’d like her to check her out."

"Right away, Mr. Jacks." The butler disappeared with a swoosh as Jessie put an arm around her mother.

"Come on, mum," Jane’s daughter crooned. "Let’s get you a glass of water. You can put your feet up on the couch in the sitting room."

Jax reluctantly let go of his mother and glanced over his shoulder at the front door. "You sure you can handle her?" he asked Jessie quietly.

"Absolutely." Jessie nodded, leading Jane towards one of the side doors. "You go take care of Jerry."

Thankful for once that his sister hadn’t panicked about the implications of Jerry’s arrest for her wedding extravaganza, Jax spun and nearly broke the door in his haste to get outside. He saw Jerry sitting in the back of one squad car and several other squad cars pulling away from the house. Alexis and Taggert were talking quietly but when she saw Jax, she nodded to the lieutenant and started walking briskly back to her silver Audi.

"ALEXIS!!" Jax called her name twice but she seemed to ignore him. Alexis was slipping into the driver’s seat when he jogged up to stop her from slamming the door shut. "ALEXIS! We need to talk!"

"Any *talking* we have to do should probably be done with a court reporter and your client present, Counselor," she replied frostily. Alexis glared down at his hand, holding her car door open. "Now if you’d *kindly* let go of my car, I really need to get back to the PCPD to help in processing your brother’s arraignment."

"My brother didn’t kill Chloe and you KNOW it!" Jax hissed.

When Alexis pulled on the car door another time and he refused to let go, she slapped both hands on the steering wheel angrily. "Are you STILL going to insist on that? Even after the lab tests come back showing Chloe’s blood on Jerry’s shirt and his shoes?"

"I don’t have to worry about it, because you’ll never get that evidence to stand up in a court of law!"

Her breath escaped between clenched teeth. "Your father’s NOT going to get this thrown out, Jax! I was VERY careful to make sure that Taggert’s men followed the exact specifications of the search warrant!"

"But you GOT the warrant based on evidence you collected illegally from my condo this morning!" Jax argued. He propped his hands on his hips after running his fingers through his hair. "Although I have NO bloody idea how they got there, you had NO RIGHT to take those shoes out of the guest closet!"

A brief shadow of guilt flickered in Alexis’s eyes before she collected herself. "Look, Jax, we can hash all this out in motions before Jerry’s trial." When he inadvertently loosened his grip on the car door, she yanked it free and started to turn the key in the ignition. "Now are you coming downtown so that Jerry has legal representa….."

She never even finished the question. In the blink of an eye as Alexis started her car, Jax sprinted around the back, opened the passenger side, and slid into the seat next to her. "Great idea."

"But…….." Alexis turned to look over her shoulder at Jax’s gold Jaguar, which was parked on the side of the house. "Aren’t you going to drive YOUR car?"

He shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly. "Not when you’ve offered so nicely." Alexis’s indignant sputters were cut short when Jax pointed out her windshield at the disappearing squad cars. "You know, the longer you wait while we sit here and argue, the more likely it is that Mac Scorpio will put one of those big feet of his in his mouth….."

"But…."

Jax tipped his head to the side, raising his eyebrows. "And then you’d have to release Jerry, and all this work you went through this morning would be wasted….." He leaned towards her with a smirk. "Not to mention the good taxpayers’ money."

"You…….you……" Alexis’s chin quivered with the force of her ire. But after a few seconds, she started the car and thrust it into gear, rocketing down the driveway so quickly it jolted Jax in his seat.

"You know, you REALLY should put your seat belt on, Lexie," he said cavalierly, pointing towards the dangling restraint. As they neared the main gate to the Jacks estate, he leaned over and grabbed for it with a broad smile. "Unless you’d like me to help you with that….."

"I’d like you to go to ……" The rest of the sentence was drowned out by the engine’s roar as she pulled out of the estate and onto the road. Alexis glanced down once when Jax clicked the seat belt home, then grimaced at him. "You’re a real pain in the @ss, you know that, Counselor?"

Jax buckled his own seat belt and straightened, his eyes softening, his gaze soft as a caress. "I don’t recall you complaining about that last night."

Alexis took a breath to say something, glanced at him in obvious annoyance, and then let it out in quick defeat. "How do you always do that to me?" she asked, staring intently at the road ahead.

One side of his mouth lifted in a crooked, endearing smile. "Do *what* to you?"

"Make me forget every good reason I should be furious with you!" She appeared to be more annoyed with herself than with him. "You drop out of my life for three years, then re-appear without an explanation, and before I know it, you’re back in my life ….. and in my bed!"

"Which I never should have left, by the way," he drawled huskily. "And I thought I explained everything last night."

"And I *still* should be furious with you! Taking control like that, keeping me in the dark about things for "my own good"……." She licked her lips self-consciously, her glance touching on Jax briefly before returning to the road. "But then you look at me with those …..those…….blasted baby blue eyes of yours, and I remember just how much I love you……"

"What can I say?" Jax shrugged his shoulders, tossed his head smugly, and folded his arms across his chest. "I’m just too d*mn charming for my own good!"

Alexis shook her head and smiled. She glanced at her rear view mirror before making the turn onto the road that led to the highway. "Is Lady Jane OK?" she asked in a quiet voice.

"She will be," Jax sighed. "It’s just a shame that she had to walk in on that little scene this morning. Jessie’s wedding has been hard enough on her, and now this….."

Alexis pressed her lips together as she nodded. She took a deep breath. "Jax, you KNOW I didn’t have any other choice this morning…."

"And YOU know that Jerry didn’t kill Chloe."

"But the evidence……"

"Is circumstantial at BEST!" Jax shifted in his seat, turning towards her as much as his seat belt would allow. "YOU saw Jerry in your office that morning, Lexie! YOU saw the look on his face when you told him that Chloe and his baby were dead! Do you REALLY think he could have faked emotion like that?"

She propped one elbow on the driver’s side window, cupping her forehead in her hand. "I don’t know……."

"My brother isn’t stupid, Alexis," Jax argued in an even but earnest voice. "If he really HAD killed Chloe, do you think he would have been foolish enough to put the blood-stained shirt and scarf in his *own* closet? I mean, if you’re really going to persist in this ridiculous notion, why didn’t he hide the shirt and scarf at MY place? With the shoes, where nobody would be as likely to find it?"

Alexis put her knuckle in her mouth, chewing on it thoughtfully. "So you think Jerry is being framed." She said it as a fact, not a question.

"Like a bloody 8 by 14 glossy," Jax quipped sarcastically. "But the question is, by WHOM? And WHY?"

Alexis sighed. "As much as it sounds like something your father would do, I’d have to say I seriously doubt John would send his only hope for political greatness up in smoke by seeing that Jerry goes to prison."

Jax nodded. "Exactly." He settled back in his seat, staring straight ahead and settling his own elbow on the passenger window to rest his head in his hand. "I’d tend to put my money on Bobbie, but then again everything you said last night made sense ….. about her not derailing her own gravy train. So that effectively takes *her* out of the running for framing Jerry." When Alexis glanced up in the rear view mirror and shifted tensely in her seat, he blinked his eyes and straightened up. "What’s the matter?"

She wrapped her fingers around the steering wheel more tightly. "There’s been a black car following me ever since I turned onto Adkins Road."

Jax looked back over his shoulder to see the dark sedan at a moderate distance. "That’s not unusual. Adkins is the only road leading around here that leads to the highway."

"But it’s been pacing me all the way….." Her eyes flickered to the mirror and back to the road again. "And now it’s gaining on me."

Although Jax felt his stomach lurch, he tried to remain nonchalant. "Maybe the guy just wants to pass you before you get to the highway." He chuckled softly, but it sounded hollow. "You know, some macho jerk who doesn’t think women drivers know what they’re doing."

"Jax……" He felt the car’s engine surge as she pressed her foot firmly on the gas pedal. "Can you turn around and see if it’s the same car that tried to run me down at the Cheshire?"

He braced one hand on the seat behind her and one on the dashboard as he turned to see the car, which was rapidly gaining on them. "I’m not sure, Alexis. It all happened so fast that I really didn’t get a good look." He frowned, squinting at the license plate. "Looks like this one is a rental." Finally turning back around, he kept his hands positioned where they were. "I can’t tell too much about the driver, except that he’s wearing a dark hat and sunglasses."

Tense silence reigned for thirty seconds until Alexis gasped aloud. "Jax! The car……it’s right on my tail!" She chanced a look over her shoulder before turning back towards the front, wild-eyed. "I think he’s going to try to ram us from behind!"

Jax reached down to make sure that Alexis’s seat belt was tightly cinched, then braced his hands on the dashboard and driver’s seat again. "Maybe he’s just going to pas……"

An abrupt jolt and the sound of screeching metal cut him off. Alexis’s chest heaved as she dared not take her eyes off the road in front of her. "Are you OK?"

"Fine." Jax swore beneath his breath when he turned to see the car still following them. "D*mnit!!" He looked around at the deserted sideroads. "Where’s a cop when you need one?"

"They’re probably all down at headquarters, booking your brother for Chloe’s murder," Alexis snapped nervously. When she glanced up in the rear view mirror, a frown creased her forehead. "What’s he doing now? It looks like……"

"He’s coming along your side …… maybe to pass you." Jax had turned to keep tabs on the phantom black car, but then peered into the distance through the front windshield. "We’re getting close to the highway entrance. If you can just outrun him a little longer, maybe we can lose him on the interstate….."

"Too late!!" Alexis’s panicked cry echoed above the roar of the car’s engine. "He’s pulling along side, Jax!" As the black car drew even with her Audi, she gripped the steering wheel so tightly that her knuckles turned white. "JAX!!!!"

Jax held on for dear life as the black car slammed against the side of Alexis’s silver one. "He’s trying to force you off the road!" he shouted, wincing again when metal met metal as the two cars caressed each other.

Just as Jax braced for yet another impact, his eyes widened in shock. The black car suddenly put on a burst of speed, pulling slightly ahead of Alexis’s Audi. "Slow down!!" he shouted, pointing at a side road. "Maybe we can pull off and turn around before he realizes what……"

"HE’S BLOCKING ME!!" Alexis screamed in terror as the black car suddenly swerved to pull across the road, perpendicular to her car. She yanked on the steering wheel, pulling to the right with all her might. "I can’t……."

"HANG ON!!" Jax reached over and gripped the steering wheel, adding his strength to Alexis’s. The screeching of brakes and squealing of tires broke the serenity of the early autumn day, but Jax’s effort was for naught. With a loud crash, the Audi’s front left bumper connected with the front passenger side of the black car. The impact sent the black car spinning, generating another impact as its rear smashed against the rear of the Audi. With its engine still revving, the Audi careened off the road, crashing through a grassy patch until it finally came to a stop, just inches from several utility poles.

######

The smell of burning rubber and the sound of chirping birds lured Jax to consciousness. His eyes fluttered, then opened wide as the memory of what had happened just moments before hit him like a ton of bricks. He pulled himself upright in the seat, wincing when a sharp pain ricocheted from just above his right eyebrow to the back of his head. He touched his fingers gingerly to the spot and groaned when they came away bloody. But when he turned to his left, any discomfort from the cut on his forehead quickly dissipated.

"ALEXIS!!" She was slumped down in her seat, her head resting on the driver’s side window next to her. Her lower lip was bleeding profusely, probably the result of being cut by her upper teeth on impact. Jax leaned over to try to rouse her, then moved more carefully when he saw her right hand resting at an awkward angle on the steering wheel, most likely indicating a fractured wrist. He swore beneath his breath, reached down to unfasten his seat belt, and then tried as best he could to pull himself over closer to where she sat.

"Alexis!!" he repeated, caressing the side of her face gently. "You’ve got to wake up, love!" The slow rise and fall of her chest reassured him somewhat, although he was still worried that she was unconscious. After a moment’s thought, he settled back into his seat and managed to pull the cell phone from his rear pocket. Punching the buttons furiously, he placed it to his ear, reaching out with the other hand to rub his knuckles against Alexis’s cheek.

"Hello? Yes, operator……we’ve been in an accident on Adkins Road about three-quarters of a mile from highway 10." His heart leapt in his chest when Alexis moaned softly and her eyelids fluttered. "Yes. We need an ambulance right away……." He struggled to look over his shoulder to see the black sedan, resting at an angle near the side of the road. "And the police, too. Someone forced us off the road and tried to kill us .….."

"Jax?"

"I’m here, love….." He had just pressed the disconnect button when Alexis groaned his name, opening her eyes in obvious pain. "How do you feel?"

"Stupid question, Counselor," she quipped and then caught her breath when she moved her right hand. "D*MN, that hurts!!"

"I think you may have broken your wrist, Lexie," Jax said calmly, catching her upper arm when she tried to move it again. "Just keep it still for now. I’ve called, and the paramedics are on their way."

"What….. what about you?" She tried to reach across her body with her left hand, then let it droop back limply to the seat. "You’re bleeding….."

"Just a cut on my forehead and some bruises." Jax brushed his knuckles against the side of her face tenderly. "Nothing serious."

"Good. That’s good." She nodded weakly and closed her eyes, settling back against the seat with a sigh. "We made it. He didn’t kill us." Suddenly, they popped open again. "Jax!! What about the other car?" She tried to sit up enough to turn around and see behind her. "What if that maniac tries to come and finish the job?"

"Whoever it is, I don’t think he’s got the guts to face us," Jax said grimly, pushing her back in her seat. "Or maybe he’s even hurt too badly to get out of the car." After a few seconds, he reached down and opened the passenger door. "I’m going to go take a look and see."

"Maybe that’s what he wants….." Alexis roused again, grimacing when she moved her hand off the steering wheel. "You shouldn’t go alone. I’ll come with you."

"You STAY HERE!" Jax pushed her back into the seat. "I promise I’ll be safe, and you shouldn’t move until the paramedics check you out."

"But what about yo……"

The sound of Alexis’s words died when Jax slammed the car door shut behind him. He raked his fingers through his hair, wincing again when he passed over the cut above his eye. After one last look inside the Audi to make sure that Alexis was following his orders, he started to jog towards the black car.

The sedan was badly damaged, and steam escaped from beneath the crumpled front hood. Jax approached it cautiously, circling around the back to come up on the driver’s side. Tinted windows prevented him from seeing inside the car at first, but when he got close enough to peer through the darkened glass at the front seat, his shocked exclamation broke the eerie silence.

"BLOODY H*LL!!" He furiously tore at the driver’s side door, finally managing to yank it open. "BOBBIE!!"

The impact of the accident must have knocked the dark glasses right off his flamboyant sister-in-law’s face . Bobbie Jacks rested against the driver’s seat, her head lolling to the side, a dark scarf halfway on and halfway off her crimson curls. When Jax crouched down next to her, trying to see how badly she might have been injured, he was almost overcome by the strong odor from the empty bottle of Jack Daniels bourbon that lay on the seat next to her.

"Bobbie……." He shook her shoulder gently, the only injury visible being some scrapes on her arms. "You have to wake up now….."

"Hmmmmm?" Bobbie groaned lethargically, smacking her lips and turning her head from side to side. When she finally opened her eyes and tried to focus them on Jax’s face, she blinked several times. "Is she dead?"

A sinking feeling gripped Jax’s stomach. "The ambulance is on the way to check you out. Now just sit still and take it easy, Bobbie……"

"No! NO!!" Bobbie flailed in the seat, trying to pull herself upright so she could see out of the front windshield. "I have to know if it worked this time!"

"If WHAT worked this time?"

The sound of the cold disgust in Alexis’s voice at such close range made Jax jump. When he glanced over his shoulder, his blood chilled to see her standing behind him, weaving slightly, weak from shock. "Didn’t I tell you to stay in the car?" he growled. Before she could answer, a loud moan came from the black sedan.

"Awwwwww, H*LL!!! I don’t know what to try next!!" Bobbie lapsed back against the seat, her eyes focusing on no one point in particular. "I tried to run her down, I tried to gas her, I tried to force her off the road……" She belched loudly, moist and deep. "Why can’t the b*tch just die?"

As Alexis’s eyes widened, Jax positioned himself between his sister-in-law and the woman he loved. "Don’t say anything more, Bobbie," he warned in a terse voice. "It’s your legal right……"

Cold venom danced in Alexis’s eyes as the sound of sirens echoed in the distance. "Well, aren’t you the GOOD family lawyer, Jax?" she sneered, cradling her injured wrist to her body. "Always protecting the innocent – or the NOT-SO-INNOCENT, as the case may be!!"

"Yeah, well he did a SH*TTY job of protecting my husband!" Bobbie slurred. "Making secret deals that weren’t worth SQUAT, setting up meetings that only made Jerry look worse…….." She jerked a hand free despite Jax’s attempts to contain it, gesturing wildly in the air. "Somebody HAD to do SOMETHING to stop that b*tch before she sent my husband to jail!!"

Jax’s heart was beating triple time as he saw the flashing lights of the emergency vehicles stopping on the road above them. "Let’s just all stay calm and let the doctors check both of you out, OK?" He rose to his feet and tried to move a suddenly inspired Alexis back away from Bobbie’s car.

"And did you try to stop Chloe the same way, Bobbie?" Alexis called, leaning towards the black sedan and its inebriated driver despite Jax’s protests. "Did you have to stop HER from ruining Jerry, too?"

"DROP it, Alexis!!" Jax kept a firm arm wrapped around Alexis’s waist as he tried to restrain her from launching herself at Bobbie. "NEITHER of you is in any shape to have this discuss….."

"But you were more successful with poor Chloe than you were with me, weren’t you, Bobbie?" Alexis snarled an obscenity at Jax when he waved at the approaching paramedics to signal them. "You killed her on your first try, didn’t you?"

"I didn’t kill your precious Chloe," Bobbie hissed. Only her seat belt kept her from falling out of the car as she leaned towards Alexis. "I guess my husband’s just better at MURDER than I am, isn’t he?" She suddenly relaxed against her seat again, her eyes dazed, hiccuping morosely. "Good old Bobbie screwed up again. Just another failure my husband will be able to remind me of……."

"DOWN HERE!!" Jax felt Alexis’s body stiffen as realization set in. He waved furiously at two paramedics who were approaching along with a police officer. With his brother’s house-of-cards defense crumbling around him, his only hope was to get her as far away from Bobbie as quickly as possible.

"Bobbie……" Since Jax was afraid to exert too much physical pressure, unsure of the extent of her injuries, Alexis remained close enough to question her nemesis. "Are you saying that you BELIEVE Jerry killed Chloe?"

"She saw you march her husband off in handcuffs twenty minutes ago, Alexis," Jax snapped, desperate for any excuse. "What’s she SUPPOSED to think?"

"YOU saw me do that too, Jax," Alexis shot back, cool and collected now. "But I don’t see YOU jumping off the Jerry-is-innocent bandwagon anytime soon!"

The arrival of the paramedics provided a blessed interruption. "We’ll handle things now, sir," one of them said, taking Jax by the arm as another eased Alexis into a sitting position on the grass. "Let me take a look at that cut you’ve got….."

"I’m fine……FINE!!" Jax tried to wave the paramedic off, pointing towards Alexis. "But I think she’s got a broken wrist and maybe a concussion."

"Don’t think you guys have to be in any rush for this one." The policeman’s tone was disdainful as he leaned into Bobbie’s car. "From the looks of things, she was so far gone she probably just bounced around like a newborn baby." He grimaced broadly when he straightened, holding the empty bottle of Jack Daniels. "I’ll need blood alcohol results on this one as soon as they’re available."

Alexis submitted to the paramedic’s poking and prodding, only crying out softly when he examined her wrist. She kept a firm eye on Bobbie as the policeman carefully helped her out of the car and onto a waiting stretcher. When they lifted the gurney to take it back to the ambulance, Alexis suddenly rose to her feet, stopping them in their tracks.

"Tell me the truth, Bobbie," Alexis muttered, leaning over the stretcher. "You OWE me that much after what you’ve done!" She glared at Jax when came up to the two women and opened his mouth to speak. "Were you lying to the police when you said that you were with Jerry the night of Chloe’s murder? Is THAT why you think it’s true that he killed her?"

"I’m…….." Tears sprang to Bobbie’s eyes – the after-effects of the liquor, the impact of the accident, the realization of exactly what she had inadvertently let on to Alexis. "I’m just so confused…….I can’t remember……"

"Mmmm-hmmm…….." Alexis’s icy glance was directed both at her almost-sister-in-law and Jax. "How convenient." But as she looked into Jax’s face and saw his anguish, another idea popped into her head. "Is THAT why you hid Jerry’s shoes at Jax’s condo, Bobbie?"

"What shoes?" Bobbie drawled groggily, tossing her head from side to side.

"Can’t you let it GO now, Lexie?" Jax begged, trying to reach for her arm. "Haven’t you discovered ENOUGH for one afternoon?"

But Alexis wouldn’t be swayed. As the paramedics tried to take Bobbie away, she reached out to stop them one last time. "The shoes with the mud on them – the ones Jerry was wearing the night that Chloe was killed. Did you hide them at Jax’s condo to protect your husband, since you KNEW he didn’t have an alibi?"

"Welllllll ……..I take back what I said before!" The sudden, malevolent gleam in Bobbie’s eyes and wry twist of her lips was eerily reminiscent of her father-in-law. "I guess you FINALLY decided to do something to HELP your brother, didn’t you, Jax?"

His eyes widened with shock and panic as the police motioned for Bobbie to be taken to a waiting ambulance. "ALEXIS!!" Jax frantically lunged for his former fiancée as a paramedic took her by the arm to lead her to another vehicle. "You CAN’T believe that she’s telling the tru….."

"I don’t know WHAT I believe anymore, Jax!" Alexis snarled furiously, pulling away from the paramedic again to face him. "You KNEW that Bobbie was lying about Jerry’s alibi, didn’t you?"

Jax ran his fingers through his hair in frustration. "I only found out day before yesterday, Lexie," he groaned. "And you KNOW as well as I do that I would have violated confidentiality if I had repeated it…."

"And yet you DEFENDED Jerry to me!! KNOWING that he didn’t have an alibi for that night!!"

"Because I KNOW that he’s innocent!!" Jax spat angrily. "Just like I HOPE you believe that I didn’t put those shoes in my bedroom closet!!"

Alexis’s head drooped with sudden weariness. "I don’t know WHAT I believe anymore, Jax," she sighed. She looked up at one of the paramedics. "Can someone give me something for pain?" She lifted her bandaged wrist. "This is really starting to ache…."

"Sure, ma’am…" The paramedic took her by the arm again, supporting her on the uneven terrain. "We’ll just get you to the hospital and then they’ll make you more comfortable."

"I think you should go to the hospital too, sir," the other paramedic told Jax. "You look OK, other than the cut over your eyebrow, but it probably should be stitched and you should have a head CT to make sure there was no concussion."

As the paramedic led Alexis to the ambulance, Jax followed somberly behind them. "I’ll ride with Miss Davis," he told the man attending him. "Since my car is back at my house….."

"You should probably ride with your sister-in-law in the other ambulance, Counselor," Alexis interrupted curtly. "Just in case she decides to blurt out anything ELSE that might be incriminating to any member of your family."

Jax cringed as though she had slapped him. "Alexis, please….."

"Ma’am, is there anyone else I can call to let them know about the accident?" the paramedic asked, helping Alexis into the back of the one ambulance. "Anyone else you’d want to be at the hospital when you get there?"

"No." Alexis’s eyes met Jax’s as she sat down on the gurney inside the ambulance. The coldness and withdrawal he saw there broke his heart. "Nobody else." A single tear ran down her cheek. "I’ve got nobody left in my life at all."

To be continued……