Authoress' Notes: I'm sorry. I know I haven't updated this in while. "Ticket To Berlin" took over my life. I'm dealing with a lot of personal issues, but I wanted to post this. I think I shall call this the Vince chapter. I think I've got one or two more chapters to this piece and then it should be all wrapped up. The end hasn't had the normal editing time, so sorry if errors abound.

I hope you all like this. Thanks for all the support. Please Read and Review.

Crossing Lines: Part Fifteen

The last week had been incredibly tense in the house. Letty and boys had spent the daylight hours they could fixing up the track and Mia was dividing her time between planning her small wedding and looking for a house. Vince and Jenny had three more explosive encounters: two involving his language around Morgan and the last one, he'd unintentionally insulted one of her paintings. Jenny, who seemed to have all the patience in the world, had none for Vince and they had been ignoring each other for over twelve hours.

Jenny came downstairs from taking her shower and kissed the top of Morgan's head. "Morning Hero. Hi Sofia."

"Jen, Jen!" The little squealed between her parents.

"Letty, you didn't forget about today, did you?" Jenny asked her.

Letty yawned, "Naw, I remembered. I'm staying here with Mia to watch Morgan. And I'm signing for your dress when it gets here. Why do I have to sign for a dress?"

"Because it is a very expensive dress and it will be here on loan to me." Jenny answered and asked Mia, "Have you figured out which designer that I'm calling in that favor with?"

"Not yet. I'm thinking Vera Wang, maybe?" Mia was nibbling on her dry toast.

"Okay. She'd be a good one; I've done some work for her before." Jenny looked at the clock on the wall. "It's gonna be a long day."

Letty wiped some of the mess off Sofia's face as she asked Jen, "You gonna be gone all day?"

"Yeah, I won't be back until late tonight." Jenny nodded and walked over to the cabinet. She reached up and pulled down a coffee cup.

"Could you grab me a cup too, Jen?" Brian requested, as he walked up behind her.

Jenny nearly dropped the mug in her hand, before she handed it to him, "I swear, I'm gonna put bells on all the men in this house."

"Sorry." Brian apologized.

"Wait, he," Letty motioned to Dom, "snuck up behind you?"

"I don't wanna hear it." She waved the other girl off and looked outside. "What is Vince doing to my porch?"

"He noticed the top supports were loose. He figured he'd tap some nails into them." Dom informed her.

"I see." Jenny sipped on her own cup of coffee for another moment, than asked. "Does he drink his coffee black?"

"Yeah." Dom answered. He might have asked why, but Jen poured a cup of coffee into a new cup and walked outside with it.

Brian couldn't hide his smirk. "Five bucks says she ends up dumping it on him."

Jenny walked out onto the porch barefoot, which was a stark contrast to the professional looking cream-colored suit she was wearing. She watched Vince for a moment before clearing her throat. "I have people working on the guest house, they could have done that."

Vince looked at the red-head and shrugged his shoulders. "I don't mind. It needed to be done. I'm not so bad with a hammer."

"Mhmm." Jenny walked over to where he'd been working.

"It's just that one right there. I noticed it last night." Vince pointed up to where he'd been working.

She looked up at it, then back at him. "Thank you."

"Mhmm." Vince nodded.

They were quiet for a few moments. The silence was not a comfortable one.

Vince finally cleared his throat and opened his mouth to speak, but Jenny cut him off.

"I'm sorry." She stated simply explained. "I've been overreacting to things. Morgan's heard that language before; I don't know why I yelled. So, I am sorry for how I treated you."

Vince stared at her for a moment, before responded. "It's okay. He's your kid, if you don't want him to hear that sh…stuff than I'll work on it around him. So, I'm sorry. It's your house I need to respect that."

Jenny blinked and took a sip of the coffee in her hands without thinking. "Shit."

His eyebrow arched in disbelief.

She covered her mouth, "Sorry. I just brought this out for you and I just drank out of it."

"You ain't sick are you?" He questioned.

"No." Jenny shook her head.

Vince took the cup from her and took a drink of it. "Thanks. I'm sure you don't have anything in your system that'll kill me."

Jenny chuckled softly, "No, I guess not. Well enjoy the coffee." She went back in the house.

Vince watched her walk back in the house and took another drink from the cup. He decided that he was going to get some answers out of her tonight. He wasn't ever going to let anyone around his family again, without knowing who they were.

.:.

Jenny was exhausted when she got home that night. 2 A.M was simply too late for the single mother. She hung her suit jacket up on the hook and kicked off her high heels. She rubbed the back of her neck and made her way back to the kitchen.

She flipped the light on and jumped back in surprise. "Why are you sitting in the dark?"

Vince looked up at her. "Light from the porch was on. I could see."

Jenny shook her head and poured herself a glass of water. "That's still a little creepy. Why are you awake?" She was staring out of the kitchen window, watching the waves crash on the beach.

He walked up behind and clamped a hand on her shoulder. "I need to talk to you." She jumped violently as he touched her and her free hand clenched into a fist. "This is what we need to talk about. Why are you so scared, when one of us walks up behind you?"

"Jumping is a natural reaction when startled. Now get your hand off me." Jenny ground her teeth together.

"No."

"No?" Her jaw set and she set the glass of water down. "You don't get to say no to that. What makes you think you have any right to touch me?"

"I need to know who the fuck you are." Vince turning her around to face him, keeping his hand clamped on her shoulder. "You're pretty damn close to my family and I don't know shit about you. I've been watching you and there is no fucking way you killed someone. I wanna know what else you lied about."

She dug her nails into his hand and he retracted it cursing angrily. "I don't know a damn thing about you either. I decided that if Letty trusts you than I can trust you. But let me warn you, I did kill my husband and you had better remember that before you put your hands on me again." She growled and pushed him back.

Vince let her push him back, but only a step. He leaned back into her space and glared down her. "You think you scare me? I've been in jail. You're just a scared little bitch, who let an asshole beat on her."

She slapped him so fast that they were both startled by the impact. "You know nothing about me." Her voice was low and she was shacking in fury.

His fists were clenched at his side, "And that's the damn problem."

A heavy footstep drew both of their attentions to the stairs at the side of the kitchen. "Is there a damn problem?" Dom's voice questioned as he looked at both of them.

Jenny shook her head, "No. Everything's fine."

"We were talking." Vince offered.

"Well try and talk without giving her a reason to slap you." Dom grumbled and thumped back up the stairs.

The passive face that Jenny had given to Dom was gone and she looked angry again. "You wanna know who I am so much?" She grabbed a pen and scribbled a name onto a piece of paper. "Here, look up everything you want. It's all on the internet." She turned on her heel and nearly sprinted up the stairs.

Vince walked over to the counter and picked up the note: "Conner Ophelia Morgan."

.:.

"Yes, anytime after four would be fine. I appreciate you being about to stop by and trim my hair." Jenny was talking on the phone as she flipped though a few of the sketches that she'd prepared for the client that she was meeting there tonight. "I'll see you soon then." Jenny snapped the phone closed.

Marisol smiled at her, "Eva, is coming over then?"

"Yes. This is a good assortment. Do you think we should include some of the photos from river bed shoot?"

The Mexican woman bit her lip before answering. "It would showcase your versatility."

"Okay. Get those around and finish prepping my portfolio case, and call the limo service, and. . ."

"Double check with Letty that she'll be home this evening to watch Morgan." Marisol finished. "I already spoke with her this morning, while you were on that call with that woman from Boston. She stayed home today. She said something about having sunstroke yesterday; and she was still dizzy when she woke up today."

"What would I do without you?" Jenny questioned seriously.

"I have no idea, but you better hurry and shower before Eva gets here." Marisol laughed as Jenny hurried upstairs.

After her shower, Jenny slipped on her bathrobe and grabbed her dress from the shipping bag. She unzipped the black bag and. . . "Shit!" Jenny stared in horror at the dress on the hanger and ran her fingers through her wet hair.

Letty leaned in the room and snickered, "We seriously are gonna have to start a swear jar or something. I think we're rubbing off on you." She noticed that Jenny didn't really react and questioned, "What's wrong?"

"It's the wrong size." She motioned towards the dress. "It's a two and on really good day I'm a six. I can't believe I didn't check the size, the gala is tonight and I have no time to get anything around. I'm so screwed, this night is important. . ."

"Whoa, whoa. Calm down, girl."

"You have no idea how important this night is to me. I meet my clientele for the year tonight. I set up the commissions. . .This is my livelihood. Don't tell me to calm down, this is a disaster." Jenny smacked her own forehead and drew in a deep breath.

Letty rolled her eyes. "Don't be such a drama queen. You've got nothing to worry about. You've got Mia Toretto under this roof." She informed the artist matter-of-factly.

"I don't understand what that has to do with anything."

Letty started towards the door, "Mia and I wore the same dress to our quinceaneras and no one knew. 'Cause that girl is that good at turning something old into something brand new. Trust me, we got you." She smiled and called out to her friend. "Mia, we need your help ASAP."

"Give a minute." Mia answered from the other room.

Jenny sat down on the bed and looked up at Letty, "Thank you."

"No big thing. She loves playing dress-up with other people, trust me I know from experience." Letty laughed before asking seriously, "Dom said that you and V got into it again the other night. Is everything okay?"

"It'll be fine. We should probably start looking for a place for you, and your family, though." Jenny suggested.

As Mia flew into action, pulling items out of Jenny's closet to be used for the emergency, Letty was quiet. She didn't know what Vince had done, but she knew it must have been bad, because, never in the entire time they had been there had Jenny ever mentioned them leaving. She was gonna beat the shit out of Vince, for whatever bone-head thing that he did to piss the artist off.

.:.

Vince was sitting in the kitchen again, this time he'd left the main light on; he didn't want a repeat of last time. Letty had yelled at him for a good twenty minutes before he finally came clean about what he'd said to Jen. She threw her hands up in the air and told him to fix it or else. Dom had shrugged and told him that he was on his own with this one.

Yesterday he had typed her name into a search engine, before even thinking about it. The images that flashed up on the screen had been half art and half newspaper headlines. He suddenly realized that this was wrong. She had accepted him into her home, and he had forced her to lay all of her cards on the table.

He went to shut off the site, but one image of her caught his attention. She was smiling brightly, in the photo and he realized she had changed her face. The woman in the photo had a straight nose, Jen's was slightly crooked, like it had been broken towards the top, and her chin was smaller. He had always assumed that Morgan had taken after his old man, but he really looked like Jen. Jen just didn't look like this Conner person anymore. He wondered if Conner was like a stage name or something like that. Was Conner even a girl's name? He was still thinking through all of this when the front door opened.

Jenny's heels clacked against the floor as she entered the room. The black dress she was wearing clung tight to her body, showing off her curves. Mia had found a two pairs of silk pajamas and had sown them into a dress. The top was black, but the under-layer was emerald green. It was short, and it only fell to the middle of her thighs and paired with the four-inch heels, Jen's legs looked very long, despite her being short. Mia hadn't had much material and so the top had ended up in a halter-style with a low back. Her hair was pulled up in a twist and her make-up was darker than normal. Vince knew he shouldn't be staring at her the way he was, but he couldn't help it.

She cleared her throat and got his attention. An angry expression on her face, "If you're done undressing me with your eyes; are we about to have round four or five? Because honestly, I really don't want to fight tonight, I'm very tired."

"I don't want to fight with you." He shook his head, trying to push the sexual image he'd just had race through his head, far away. "Can we talk?" He motioned towards the seat opposite him at the table.

Jenny sat down in the chair closest to him and started to undo the straps of her heels. "Talk." She clipped, not looking at him.

"I looked you up."

She snorted and set her right shoe on the floor.

"And I closed it right after I started, because I realized that it wasn't right. If you wanna tell me about your past, then that's the only way I wanna learn about you." He let the words rush out fast, not sure if he'd sealed his own fate or not. When he heard her heel hit the ground with a definitive clack, he knew he was screwed, he. . .

"Thank you." Her voice was quiet.

"Thank you?" He questioned before cursing and grabbing his right arm.

She leaned forward, instantly concerned, "Are you alright?"

He winced and clamped his eyes closed. "It just does this some. . ." He stopped as she pulled his arm towards her and laid it on her lap. Her fingers instantly ran up and down the length of his forearm, massaging it very purposefully. "What are you doing?" He hissed.

"Helping." She answered simply, and then asked. "Nerve damage?"

"Yeah." He swallowed, very aware of how closer they were to each other.

Her voice was quiet, "Thought so. That's a bitch to deal with. My father worked a factory job, the repetitive motion made his wrist ache before it rained." She continued to move her fingers slowly along his arm and smirked as Vince groaned in quiet appreciation. "So, what do you want to know?"

He was quiet for a spell. He could feel the throbbing start to ebb from his arm; Jen was very good at this. "I just can't image you hurting anyone."

"It isn't a moment of my life that I'm proud of, but I didn't really feel like I had a choice." She let out long sigh. "Even though he beat me, I shouldn't have done what I did. I should have just left."

"Yeah, I'm sure your kid would have been just fine with a guy like that." Vince growled out before he could stop himself.

Her fingers stopped, and she lifted her head to meet his eyes. "I would have never left my son, never. He's my life."

He was staring right into those bright green eyes of hers and knew she was telling the truth. "That's good. So what kind of name is Conner?"

She chuckled and went back to rubbing his arm. "It was my grandfather's. My father had a sense of humor."

"So you changed Morgan's name too?"

"My husband named him after himself. I never liked it and I wanted a way to preserve some of my past." She pulled the clip out of her hair and her curls fell down to the shoulders.

The scent of her hair filled his nostrils and he had to remind himself that he didn't get along with the artist. "So why did you?"

"Kill Erik? I just. . ." She bit her lip. "When I met Erik, I was hosting my first art show and he seemed so sweet. After we got married he would go through these violent mood swings. I could take it, I shouldn't have, but I could. One night shortly after Morgan was born he came up behind me and. . . Well that part doesn't really matter." Jenny shook her head and flipped his arm over to rub the other side. "Anyways, Morgan started crying once and Erik covered his mouth, cutting off his air. I shoved him away and ran out of our apartment with Morgan. When I came back hours later, Erik was passed out on the couch. I was afraid for when he woke up, so I took a knife from our kitchen and I made sure he didn't." Her fingers stopped moving and she rested her hands on her knees. Her breathing was ragged and she was trying not to cry.

Vince lifted his arm away from her lap and grabbed her chin, forcing her to face him. "My Ma, she left. My old man was mean like this Erik ass-hole and he beat me, whenever he felt like it. I lived at the Toretto's when I was kid, only place I ever felt safe. So don't you ever feel bad about protectin' your kid. You're a good person for keepin' him safe." He wiped the tear off her cheek and withdrew his hand.

"Thank you." She stood up on shaky legs and started towards the stairs.

"Are we good?" He asked.

She gave him a soft smile. "Yes. I'll see you in the morning. Good night."