Chapter 50 – All The Way

Hope is the expectation that something outside of ourselves,

something or someone external, is going to come to our rescue

and we will live happily ever after.

Carlos' POV

The RangeMan garage was dark when I pulled into it. My flight had been delayed and I got home much later than I expected. The day shift had gone home, leaving a skeleton crew to man the monitors. I was tired. I guess what Dr. Chun had warned me about post-surgery exhaustion was true.

I made it up the stairs to the seventh floor and let myself into the apartment. Moving quietly so as not to wake Stephanie, I entered the bedroom. I anticipated her anger at me leaving so abruptly three days ago. If I could put off having to face her hurt looks and scolding until the morning, so much the better.

I stopped suddenly. The bed was empty. The apartment was empty, except for Rex. It was well after midnight – where was Stephanie? I called her cell, but it went straight to voice mail. As I went over the possibilities, I realized her personal car hadn't been in the garage when I arrived. Had she been so mad at me, she went back to her apartment? No, Rex was still here.

I ran down the stairs to the fifth floor and burst into the control room. The new recruit was on duty, Chester… something. He looked up at me and immediately cut his eyes back to the monitors. Tank had obviously warned him about not diverting his attention from the screens.

"Do you know where Stephanie Plum is?" I asked, though it came out more as a demand.

"She's been on stakeout, sir."

"Where?"

"She's been tailing a Ms. Elena Benneau. I have the address to her Newark residence here."

I realized I didn't know whether or not Steph had a tracker in her personal car. A week ago, it wouldn't have crossed my mind to have her tracked, but now… now my memories were returning and…

A flash of fear shot through me as a memory of her being taken by Con Stiva came flooding back to me. Those hours I spent trying to find her were some of the worst of my life. The rocketing emotions I felt when she tumbled out of that cabinet into my arms and I feared she was dead came back full force. I took a deep breath.

"Sir?" Chester was holding out a piece of paper to me, an address written on it.

I grabbed it and barked, "Get me Tank."

"Uh, he's in Boston. They had an emergency earlier today and he flew up there. He's due back by start of first shift."

"Get him online. I'll take it in my office."

I left Chester with his mouth hanging open. The new recruit wouldn't make it much longer at RangeMan.

It took several minutes before my phone rang. "What the fuck, Ranger? It's the middle of the night," Tank's gruff voice came booming out of the speaker.

"I need to know if there's tracker on Stephanie's personal car or if she's carrying a RangeMan phone."

There was a brief silence on the other end as Tank processed the implications of my questions.

"Don't tell me she's in trouble," he said with a sigh. "Her personal car is clean, but she has GPS on her phone. The tracking code is on my computer. Do you need me?"

"No. If I need help, I'll roust out Santos or Brown."

I hung up and strode into Tank's office and found the code for Steph's phone. I went back out to the control room and took the chair next to Chester. When I brought up her signal, it was clear she wasn't at Benneau's house or even in Newark, she was in Trenton. I traced the signal from her phone to an industrial part of town. The signal was unmoving. While copying down the address, I punched up Lester's number on my phone.

A groggy voice answered, "What?"

"Garage. Five minutes," I ordered.

I returned to my office, unlocked the top desk drawer and removed the handgun and several spare magazines. I went back to the control room and informed Chester of the situation and gave him instructions on if and when to call Brown. Then I ran down the stairs to the garage. Lester was thirty seconds behind me still tucking his shirt into his pants.

He jumped in the passenger side of the SUV I'd started and looked over at me, unspoken questions plastered all over his face. I pulled out of the garage, tires squealing.

"Steph was on stakeout tailing Elena Benneau. She's not home, her car's gone and her phone GPS shows she's at the Furnicelli warehouse district," I said, not taking my eyes off the road. I was traveling well above the speed limit.

Lester let his head drop back against the headrest. "Not a good place for anyone to be at 2 in the morning." He looked over at me. "When did you get back?"

"About twenty minutes ago. It may be nothing. She's probably sitting in her car after following Benneau to some hidden rave party, but…"

"Given Steph's history, anything's possible. Do we know anything more about Benneau's involvement with the drug theft case?" Lester asked.

"I… haven't talked to Steph since I left," I admitted. That was another reason I hadn't been looking forward to facing her. Right now though, I would give anything to have her rip me a new one – just so long as she was safe.

We found her car. It was locked and empty, her handbag on the floor tucked up under the passenger seat. After a quick reconnaissance of the area, Lester and I split up.

I was on Garvey Street when I heard a noise come from the next alley. Keeping to the shadows, I moved into the dark alley searching for the source of the noise. There was a car parked at the far end. I was about halfway down the block when I saw a woman rush out the back door of a deserted warehouse. She was carrying something large and she wore a black hoodie that hid her face.

Right on her heels came another woman, but this was one I recognized. When Stephanie reached the woman, a fight ensued. I raced toward them, but before I'd taken five steps, the warehouse exploded. My heart stopped and I watched in horror as the building's walls collapsed on top of the love of my life.

A few hours before…

Stephanie's POV

Numb! My butt was numb from sitting in my car for hours watching Elena's motel room. I'd followed her after she left that lawyer's office. She'd stopped at a Subway and got dinner and then came straight here. That was five hours ago. I was frustrated, hungry and I had to pee.

Zero had been on stakeout last night and said she'd stayed in her room all night. But my spidey sense was telling me tonight would be different. I convinced myself she had to come out soon, but I was tortured with another hour of no movement from Elena.

My thoughts turned to my other main concern – Carlos. He'd been gone for three days now and hadn't called once. I was worried about him. He was supposed to be resting, but knowing him…

I should know better than to worry. Like Tank said, Ranger follows no one's orders, not even mine. Maybe especially not mine. It's not like I didn't know what he was like. He's always been a force unto himself. I guess I was going to need to learn to live with it – for better or for worse. But I was always going to worry.

I sat up suddenly as Elena's door opened. She was wearing a black sweatshirt and black slacks, making her bleached blond hair stand out even more in the dark. She got into her car and drove out onto Hamilton heading south.

I was getting pretty good at tailing cars without being spotted and followed her to the warehouse district. The area wasn't quite as bad as Stark Street, but it was creepy enough with all the abandoned buildings, stray cats screeching and deep dark shadows everywhere.

I parked my car a half a block away from the alley Elena had pulled into. Plastering my body to the side of a building, I peeked around the corner. Elena was nowhere to be seen, but she'd left the hatchback on her car open. I waited and sure enough, she came out of a back door carrying a box.

I'd bet my next month's paycheck the box contained the stolen drugs from the police departments. I had her now, I could feel it.

She loaded the box into her car and disappeared back into the building. It looked like a deserted warehouse. Windows were broken out; some were boarded up. The entire alley and building were pitch black.

I crept forward and crossed over to the other side of the alley, the side where Elena had disappeared into the building. Taking several deep breaths and slipping my gun out from my waistband, I swiftly entered the open back door and flattened myself up against the wall. I couldn't see much in the dark, but I could hear movement in the next room.

As quietly as I could, I moved across the space I was in and slipped into the inner room. I saw a spark, heard a crackle and then everything went blank.

When I woke up, I was tied to a chair and felt like shit. Looking around all I could see were vague shadows. There was a little ambient light coming in from a hole in the roof. My body was still tingling and I knew I'd been zapped by a stun gun. Crap and double crap!

"Ms. Plum, you should have left well enough alone." A black-clad figure moved away from the wall and approached me. I could make out Elena's blonde hair and her annoying voice. I tried to make a snappy comeback, but all I could manage was a croak. I coughed a couple of times trying to clear the fear out of my throat. Struggling against the ropes that were tied around my middle was useless. They were cinched tight. I should have called for backup. I'd been overconfident. A rookie mistake.

"I know you and your sidekick have been following me for days. I'd hoped I was being boring enough to make you give up, but when you showed up again tonight outside my motel room, I knew I needed to do something about your nosy fat ass."

"My ass isn't any fatter than yours and my hair color's not from a bottle." Take that, you bitch. Yeah, I know it was lame, but it was the best I could do after having my brains scrambled by a stun gun.

Elena sneered at me, "How did you ever get a job with the DEA? You must have the dumbest luck in the world. Everything was going perfectly until you stuck your perky little nose in my business."

Perky? She just keeps the insults coming. "Your business seems to be framing innocent police officers," I snapped.

Elena chortled and then her voice turned angry, "Joseph Morelli isn't innocent. He murdered my baby sister."

"Your sister was a drug addict. She died of an overdose. Joe didn't even know your sister had died until I told him."

"Ana died of a broken heart. She loved him and he dumped her."

I tried to shrug but couldn't move my arms. "People break up all the time. They hadn't even been seeing each other very long. There was no reason for her to get that upset."

"Upset! She was desperate. She was pregnant! My sister was carrying that bastard cop's child and he abandoned her. She fell apart; she couldn't handle it."

Pregnant! That put a whole new spin on things.

Once Elena got started there was no stopping her. "Ana was always sensitive and high strung. Being pregnant and alone was too much for her. When I found her, she was already too far gone, but she told me how awful Joe had treated her when he found out about the drug use. He called her terrible names and shoved her away like she was poor white trash. She was trying to get clean, but he wouldn't listen when she tried to explain."

I defended Joe. "Joe didn't know she was pregnant. And there was nothing about it in the death certificate."

"I was able to convince the M.E. to leave that out. It was bad enough that it said she died from a drug overdose. She died because of Mr. High & Mighty Morelli. He needs to pay for that." Her voice was getting shriller the more she ranted.

She mumbled something I couldn't hear and then continued speaking, but she seemed to be talking more to herself than to me. "I've been making people pay for hurting Ana for a long time. Daddy was the first."

The next few sentences were mumbled as she paced and then she turned back toward me. "Mom was always too stoned or too sick, so Daddy made me his little plaything. Or should I say lay-thing?"

She giggled at her own sick joke. I was shocked enough at her ramblings, but what she said next sent my mind reeling.

"He said I had that something 'extra,' that men would buy me my heart's desire if I would just be 'nice' to them. He wanted me to be 'nice' to his gambling buddies. They used to bring me candy and toys if I'd let them 'play nice' with me. But when I got older, they didn't want me anymore. They wanted Ana. Ana was still so little, but Daddy and his friends liked their playthings young. After what he made me do, I'd be damned if I'd let him use Ana that way."

Elena let out a high-pitched giggle. "Daddy disappeared, just like all the others." Between her giggling over possibly 'offing' her father and her sick sad story, I was close to puking.

But she kept talking, "And then it was just Ana and me. Until Christian came along. I played nice with him and he actually bought me my heart's desire. Back then, all I wanted was to get my law degree so I could put bad men, like my Daddy, away. Christian set me up in an apartment and paid my tuition. Everything was fine until he wanted me to quit my job and have babies. Like that was ever going to happen. Of course he had to go. And again, it was just Ana and me, but she wanted a man of her own and Joe…"

She turned and pointed at me. "After tonight, nothing will stand in my way of making sure Joe loses all that's important to him, like he took everything that was important to me. I thought taking his career away and ruining his reputation as a good cop was enough, but now, he's going to lose you, too. What a wonderful bonus. And you walked right into it." More high-pitched giggling.

Shit, she was really nuts! I needed to keep her talking, give me time to think of something… anything. "How did you steal all the drugs? You weren't even there at several of the police departments when they were stolen. I checked. You were at the AG's office in Newark."

Elena laughed. "Yes. I was. I knew somebody would check. I've had this whole thing planned out for months, right down to tonight. Tonight I dump the drugs in the Delaware River and take care of one last detail."

"Me?" I croaked.

"No. You weren't originally part of my plan, but I've taken care of that, too. This building is loaded with explosives, set to go off with the flick of one small switch." She pulled a little black box out of her sweatshirt pocket and showed it to me.

"No, the detail I was talking about is the cop who stole the drugs for me. He's in love with me. Can't get enough of my 'special' talents. After I dispose of these stolen drugs," she indicated a box sitting in the corner of the room, "I'll dispose of him. Mike likes heroin as much as Ana did. It'll be a simple matter to give him a fatal dose. No one knows anything about us, so I won't be linked to him."

Maybe if she knew others were on to her, she'd rethink her 'plan.' "You're wrong. We know about Mike Hanratty and have pictures of you meeting with him. And I know about your special talents. You won't get away with this."

"Did your bigmouth boyfriend tell you about me?" She let out the proverbial evil laugh. "I knew Joe would jump at the chance to sleep with me. All men do. Some of them find my special attributes exciting, but I knew Joe would be horrified. He wants to be the man, he wants things neat and tidy and traditional. He can't handle anything out of the ordinary and I'm extraordinary. I could have got my revenge without sleeping with him, but I couldn't resist getting in my own dig and screwing up his perfect little life. He'll think twice about jumping into bed with another woman."

"As for Hanratty, his bosses know he has a drug problem. When he's found dead of an overdose, they'll think it was an accident. Even if you have pictures of the two of us together, I'll just explain it away as mutual attraction. There's nothing illegal about two consenting adults spending time with each other."

"Now, it's time to finish this. If you've never taken a hit of heroin, you're in for a treat. You won't even care when the building explodes around you."

Elena opened the box and spent some time hunched over it. Then she came toward me holding something in front of her. As she moved across the room, a shaft of light hit the object in her hand. It was a syringe. I struggled as hard as I could, but the ropes didn't give an inch. Talking fast I tried to convince her not to do this, but she just laughed at me. I felt the needle prick my arm and then felt a rush of warmth.

Elena picked up the box and left the room. I was sick to my stomach and started to tremble. When she came back in, she untied my ropes. Removing the last rope, she giggled, "We don't want people thinking there was anyone with you when you shot yourself up with heroin. You'll be just one more dead junkie in a burned out building."

I reached for her, but she struck my jaw and I dizzily collapsed to the floor. My stomach was churning and I felt like I was going to barf. Watching Elena saunter out the door spurred me to action. I jerked to my feet and stumbled across the room. Strangely, I felt better once I started moving. Fearing the whole place was going to explode around me, I raced out the back door.

Elena was nearly at her car and I ran after her. Grabbing the back of her hoodie, I swung her around to face me, but she slammed the box she was carrying into my side. I slugged her in the midsection, knocking the wind out of her. The box fell to the ground, spilling its contents. We continued to grapple with each other moving closer to the building. I tried to steer us away from it, but Elena was strong and she kept hitting any part of me she could. Her fist connected to the side of my head and I saw stars.

And then it happened. I heard it before I felt it. First there was a phooomf, and then the ground dropped out from under us as everything exploded around us.

I woke up to the smell of burning wood and tried to stand up. I could see flames above me and darkness in front of me. And then I was thrown to the ground and Elena was punching me in the face. In spite of being dizzy and in pain, I kicked her off me and scrambled backwards. Even with the warehouse burning down around us, Elena was still trying to kill me. We were both going to be burned alive if I couldn't find a way out of wherever we were.

A portion of the ceiling was lit up in flames, casting eerie shadows in the space we were in. It looked like we were in a dark dusty basement. I could feel chunks of something under me and a fine powdery substance all over the floor. As the ceiling burned brighter, I could see the coal chute Elena and I had slid down. The chute opened into the alley, but the back wall of the warehouse had collapsed on top of it, covering the opening with the debris now burning brightly above me.

Channeling my inner Ranger, I came up with a split second plan of action. I needed to create an opening in the collapsed debris above me, and then I needed to shove enough stuff under the chute so we could climb up and out of this burning hellhole.

I felt around with my hands and found a long wooden plank, but Elena grabbed it the same time I did. Mustering all my strength, I shoved the board into her gut and she fell back on her ass. Maneuvering the long board to a near vertical position, I thrust the board up as hard and as high as I could. It broke through the stuff that was burning, scattering it down on top of me.

As I slapped my hands like mad at the embers clinging to my clothes and hair, I thought I heard a voice coming from up above me. I looked up into the hole I'd made and I heard it again: it was Ranger's voice screaming, "Babe!"

Omigod! I screamed back, "Ranger!" and thrashed my way through the still burning debris toward his voice.

Elena heard him too and ran the other way. I could barely make out a set of stairs across the room and saw Elena race up them. She opened a door and all I could see were flames.

I decided that way lay suicide and turned back toward Ranger's voice. I could hear scraping noises and more light suddenly filled the room. The opening grew substantially larger where there had been only flames before. I heard Ranger again, yelling, "Quick, over here," and saw his hand reach down to me.

Scrambling over debris and burning planks of wood, I climbed as high as I could and then leapt for his hand. He caught me and in one smooth motion lifted me out of hell into heaven and his waiting arms.

You put your arms around me

And I believe that it's easier for you to let me go

You put your arms around me and I'm home.

Ranger quickly moved us away from the burning building, never letting go of me, his arms holding me tightly against him. He was murmuring in my ear a rush of whispered words in Spanish. We stopped when we reached the opposite side of the alley. Did he know what he called me or was it a memory still buried?

I needed to hear it. "Say it… please, say it again," I pleaded.

I pulled my head away from his and stared into his beautiful brown eyes. I didn't know what I expected to see. If his memories were back, would I be able to tell? Would he somehow look different? I just needed to hear him say it, not in the frenzy of the moment, but with conscious awareness of the act.

"Carlos… I need to hear you say it," I whispered, holding his face in my hands and imploring him to answer me.

He pulled me close and his lips descended on mine, but not before he whispered, "Babe."

My heart was pounding and my eyes started to sting. My throat felt like it was closing. That one four-letter word embodied all the love Ranger had for me that he'd never been able to speak of or act upon. For me it personified him accepting me for who I was and for loving me unconditionally. Marc had known he loved me, but he had no reference for it, no shared memories to base his love for me on. I could only hope I had both men in front of me, melded into one man, my Carlos, that I now held tightly in my arms, and forever in my heart.

The kiss was the sweetest touch I'd ever had from him. It was passionate, comforting and hopeful all at the same time. It was a reaffirmation of our love for each other, for finding each other yet again. That's what made what happened next so wrong and yet so right.

As I pulled back, I looked at his face and burst out laughing. After such a touching moment, he probably thought I was hysterical – and maybe I was, a little – but I was staring at his mouth, chin and cheeks that were now covered in a fine black powder.

Ranger never got dirty. We both could be standing side by side and whatever the muck was – mud, paint, garbage – it would only land on me. Until now.

I took that as a sign that while 'superhero' Ranger may be back, 'regular guy' Marc Pardo was still strong within him. I had the best of both possible worlds.

I reached up and swiped my finger across his cheek and looked at it. Coal… well, coal dust. I had it all over me and now so did he. That old coal chute probably saved my and Elena's lives. Wait! Did Elena make it out?

Carlos was still holding me tightly to him. I turned in his arms to look across the alley. A wave of dizziness hit me. The building continued to burn and collapse in on itself as I collapsed in his arms.

. . .

I woke up to bright lights and immediately shut my eyes again. I was lying in a hospital bed and I could hear people moving around me. I tried it again and just barely cracked open my eyes. The first and only thing I saw was Carlos. He was sitting next to my bed with his head on his arms, and his arms on top of the bed.

I moved my hand toward his face and he jerked up.

He immediately placed his cheek next to mine and whispered, "Babe."

I closed my eyes and let the warmth of his cheek melt into me. Then the reality of what he said jolted me fully awake.

Babe! He called me Babe! Just like he had last night. It was real!

"Carlos…" I uttered.

He lifted his head and while I missed the physical connection – the touch of his cheek against mine – I needed to see his eyes.

We gazed at each other and I could see dozens of cuts, scrapes and burns on his head, face and neck. His arms were bandaged. But he was smiling at me and his eyes reflected his love. I touched my fingers to his lips, the only unmarred part of him. He pressed his lips against my fingers and I could feel them move as he uttered "Babe" again.

Hearing that one wonderful word made my chest tighten, my heart feel like it was going to burst and a hard lump form in my throat. Crap, I was going to cry.

I managed to croak out, "You remember? You remember us?"

Carlos smiled, a full 200-watter. "You're my Eliza Doolittle, my Bombshell Bounty Hunter… my Babe. And they all have one thing in common. They're all mine. You're all mine." My vision got all blurry.

He wiped the tears from my cheeks. "I promised you I'd come back, that we'd have our someday. I asked you to be strong and you took me at my word. You're the strongest woman I know. You never gave up on me. You fought for me when everyone else accepted I was dead. Thank you, Babe, thank you for believing in me."

"There was no other option for me. I couldn't live with the alternative," I sniffed.

He pressed his lips lightly to mine and then kissed me more deeply, our tongues touching and our passions flaring. Butterflies were tickling my stomach and a warmth spread through my lower half. My hands started to wander over his body until I remembered we were in a hospital.

He stopped for a minute to grin and tell me, "I still may not be family material, I still carry two guns and a knife, but I also carry you in my heart and in my soul. And nothing's going to change that, memories or no memories. It's you and me, Babe, all the way."

And then the kissing started in earnest.

Epilogue

Both Carlos and I were released from the hospital later that day. I had a mild concussion, some minor burns and lots of bruises, but that was it. Carlos had received some really bad burns on his arms lifting burning planks of wood so he could get to me. He thought I was dead, but when he saw that board come shooting through the flames, he knew I was still alive. He must have gone through hell to get to me.

Before we were discharged, we talked about everything that had happened the last few days.

After surviving Elena, exploding buildings and being trapped in a burning basement, my anger at Carlos for leaving suddenly when he was supposed to be recuperating from brain surgery dissipated quickly.

I was just so glad he was alright and that he was there when I needed him. Ranger had come to my rescue so many times I felt like a cat who'd already gone through her nine lives and was living on borrowed time.

On top of that, he was remembering his past and he remembered us – he remembered that he always called me Babe. In the heat of the moment though, when it first happened, I wasn't even aware of the significance of it. I just knew he was there for me.

I might have been able to get out of the basement on my own, but I would have had to fight Elena before she killed me or the warehouse collapsed on top of us. I'll never know.

As for Elena Benneau, her body wasn't found in the charred ruins of the warehouse. She was still at large, but now she had every law enforcement officer in New Jersey on the lookout for her. All her financial assets had been frozen. It was only a matter of time until she would be apprehended, both the Chief of the Trenton Police Department and the Attorney General assured me. We'll see.

The boxes Elena had been carrying out to her car did indeed hold all the drugs that had been stolen from the PD evidence lockers. One of the packages had been opened. Luckily for me, this was the one Elena had used to inject into me. It contained pure powdered sugar. Drug pushers commonly used this to dilute or 'cut' the heroin to make it go farther. So Elena had injected sugar water into my system. For some reason, I found that amusing.

With all the evidence we had, Joe was eventually cleared of all charges and was reinstated. He'd shown up at the hospital that morning with two dozen donuts from Tasty Pastry – one dozen Boston Creams and one dozen assorted. It was the one thing he got right. Well, that and he shook Carlos' hand and told us he was happy for us. He was taking a lot of heat for the mess with Ana and Elena and needed all the friends he could get. In a round about way, he thanked me for clearing him in the drug thefts. There was one point during Joe's grudging thanks that I thought Carlos was going to deck him, but I watched his blank face slide into place and he was Mr. Cool, Calm and Collected again. Yup, Ranger was back.

Pax also visited me in the hospital. He congratulated me on solving the case, telling me he'd never doubt my spidey sense again. Then he told me he'd accepted a transfer to the DEA office in San Francisco. He grinned like a schoolboy when he confided that he was going to ask Illiana to marry him. Before he left, he said that John would probably be promoted to head up the team in DC and that I had a standing offer of a full-time job if I wanted it.

That's when Carlos interrupted. "Steph has a couple of other job offers to consider, in addition to that one." I shot him a glance, but he had on his blank face. I wasn't aware anyone had offered me a job. What did he have up his sleeve?

When we were alone again, I asked him what job offers he'd been talking about, but he changed the subject and instead asked me when I wanted to meet with our respective families. I knew it wouldn't be long before my family heard about my latest adventure and descend upon the hospital. As for Carlos' family, I hadn't expected him to ever want to visit them again, but he now was looking forward to it. He said he'd had flashes of memories from his early years, but so far couldn't remember anything about his teen years. We both wondered if those memories were lost forever.

The one trip he was very eager to take was another visit to Julie as soon as possible, but I was surprised when he pulled out his cell and called her right then and there.

When she came on the line, he said, "Hey Boo… I thought I'd call and let you know Steph and I will be down to see you next week." I couldn't hear her exact words, but I could hear her excited scream as she recognized her father's name for her when she was a baby.

Listening to father and daughter share memories and seeing Carlos' face light up as he laughed and joked with Julie warmed my heart. I never thought I would see Ranger this way, so at ease and so outwardly happy.

When he'd left a few days ago, he'd been tense and irritable which was very unlike him. Something happened on that trip, something big. I'd been upset when he left, worried he'd overdo things and compromise his surgery, but if this was the result then the trip was a good thing.

I had to ask what happened during his trip to wrap up 'unfinished' business. That was when he told me about the park ranger in Arizona who pulled him from the desert and saved his life. He wanted to payback her kindness. While Ranger has always been a generous man, I thought this gesture was more about putting Marc Pardo to rest.

When he told me he'd also gone to visit Illiana, I had a momentary flash of jealousy, but felt reassured by both Carlos' honesty and Pax's earlier admission of his love for Illiana Parduhn. If Carlos could be generous, so could I.

I could tell there was a lot more that had happened on his trip, but that would come in due time.

And now, we had all the time in the world. We had a lifetime to live our happily ever after.

People always fantasize about true love having a happy ending!

What a pity, they don't know that true love doesn't have an ending.