The elevator to the penthouse opened almost silently and Jason staggered off, his feet slightly unsteady and his arm around a beautiful blonde.

The guard stationed at the front door, relatively new to the position, made a move to stand in front of them.

“Mr. Morgan?” Clearly ill at ease the guard’s voice sounded squeaky to his own ears, “Benny and Johnny have been waiting for you. I’m supposed to let them know as soon as you return.”

Jason took a swig from the bottle of whiskey in his hand and the blonde in his arms moved even closer to him if that was possible. “Let them wait.” Jason said coolly, as he reached over and nibbled on the blonde’s delicate ear. “Can’t you see I have other things on my mind besides business?”

“But Mr. Morgan, no one has heard from Mr. Corinthos in the last day or so and the boys are getting worried and...”

“Shut up.” Jason barked at the guard before turning his attention back to the blonde. “I don’t exactly have boys on my mind at the moment. Sonny is a big boy, let him find his own entertainment for once. I’m tired of his taking my leftovers anyway.”

The guard winced. There were rumors of course about Corinthos and Morgan’s wife, but this was the closest anyone had ever come to having the rumors confirmed.

“Mrs. Morgan?” The hapless guard ventured only to be met by a dark and angry stare from his boss.

“Mrs. Morgan is gone.” Jason offers no further explanation. He takes another swig of whiskey and pulls the tall blonde into a tight embrace. His lips trail kisses down the arch of her neck. “ Meet Barbie. Barbie meet...” Jason snapped his fingers. “What’s your name?”

“Guy.”

“Barbie meet Guy.” Jason pushed open the door to the penthouse. “Now that the formal introductions are over, Barbie and I need a little time to get to know each other better. I don’t want to be disturbed unless its for a real emergency.”

The guard was about to protest, but Jason turned to the blonde and planted a scorching hot kiss on her lips and as the kiss turned even more passionate, if that was possible, the guard gave up and shut the door. Leaning against the closed door, his imagination filling in the details about what might be happening on the other side, the guard shifted uncomfortably and prepared himself for a long and lonely night.

Jason’s lips pulled back slightly as he nibbled on her lower lip, his hand finding the curve of her back and pulling her straight against him.

It’s an act, Sarah reminded herself shakily as she felt the blood rushing in her veins and the heat from his touch burning a path across her. Just an act. An act to fool the guard and give you access to his penthouse so you can complete your mission and.....

Her eyelids shot up when she realized suddenly that they were behind closed doors in the penthouse and there was no longer an audience to “act” for.

Sarah pushed against his chest, causing Jason to stumble backwards, wondering who she was more angry at- him for being able to fake passion so easy or herself for believing for even a second that it was real. And what was worst wanting it to be real.

“What the hell?” Jason muttered, his mind two steps behind the rest of him. He could still remember what it felt like to hold her, taste her, to answer some of the questions that had been burning inside him since he had seen her at the church when Liz got married.

He groaned. This was wrong. So wrong. Carly wasn’t even dead 72 hours. Granted he hadn’t loved Carly but they had been friends. He had been committed to her. Now here he was lusting after the woman who had kidnapped their son and held his sister hostage. The woman who was forcing him to play along with her charade so that she could accomplish her mission.

His mind had just finished processing the idea that that little display of passion out in the hallway was just a charade when he looked up at her, noting the fury that blazed in her eyes.

“What?” He said grumpily as he walked into the kitchen and poured the bottle of whiskey down the sink. “You wanted the world to think you were my mistress and now at least one person is convinced that you and I are in here tearing each other’s clothes off and making mad passionate love on the living room floor.”

“Barbie?” Sarah looked at him incredulously. “Of all the names in the world you had to pick Barbie? God even something insipid like Chloe or brainless like Buffy would have been better than Barbie.”

Jason laughed. “You mean to tell me that the same Sarah Webber who can shoot a man without blinking can’t handle being called Barbie for a few days?”

“Yeah, well you try it if you think its so great.” She removed her long coat and took out the two pistols she carried in the holster around her back and laid them on the coffee table. She moved away from him, making a show of checking out the penthouse, anything to put some distance between the two of them.

A minute later she shrugged. “Everything looks clear.”

“Did you expect anything else?” Jason asked, ignoring the glare that he received as an answer. They were in HIS penthouse, on HIS home ground and for the first time since receiving that damned phone call he felt like he was almost in control of the situation,

“All right. Kosokov arrives in town in two days. That means we have to two days to convince this whole damned town that I’m your mistress. Since I’m sure that I’m only the latest in a long string of...”

“You’re the first.” Jason interrupted.

Sarah stopped and stared at him. “What?”

“Since I married Carly. I mean there’s been a one night stand here and there, but no one that I stayed the night with and no one that I’ve brought home.”

“Oh.” Sarah said nonplussed. And then shaking her head, she went on. “Once I’m established as your mistress, than it gives me an excuse to hang out here while Kosokov and his men are here.”

“And what about your plan for me to give you to him? Or did you come to your senses and change your mind on that one?”

“Actually with me as your mistress, my plan works better. Kosokov will be honored that you are willing to share your personal woman with him. It will make him more trusting of me and less likely to leave the guards out of the room when he entertains me. He will be a lot less of suspicious of your mistress than he would be of a common hooker brought in for his entertainment.”

“Okay. I don’t like it, but let’s say I go along with it.”

“I’m sorry,” Sarah interupted Jason, “did I imply that you have a choice?”

“Let’s say I go along with it,” Jason continued ignoring her. “If you and I paint this town red as a couple, aren’t people going to recognize you? Won’t having people know who you are be a problem Sarah Webber? You exactly kill every person who recognizes you.”

“You’d be surprised what I can do when pushed.” Sarah said softly. “But don’t worry about it. If people recognize me, I’ll come up with some reason for being back in town. Maybe use Emily as a cover and as a way to explain how we met.”

“Keep Emily out of it.” Jason warned softly.

Sarah shook her head. “Emily is in it. You don’t think the people who killed your wife would hesitate to kill your sister or your son? This isn’t a game we are playing Morgan. It’s real. Real people are going to die. And if we don’t do this right the first time, those people are going to be people you care about. The only way to guarantee that anyone is safe when this is over is for Kosokov body to be scattered to the far corners of the earth.”

“What did he do to you?”

The question, simply spoken, caught Sarah off guard.

“This isn’t about what he did to me.”

“Now there you are wrong. This is very much about what he did to you. If my son and my sister are pawns in this vendetta of yours than I damned well will know why.”

“It isn’t a vendetta. I told you, Kosokov is a mad man responsible for the deaths of.....”

“Countless innocent civilians throughout Eastern Europe.” Jason finished. “I heard it the first time. That wasn’t what I asked you. I want to know what he did to you. You know Liz and I became pretty good friends a few years back. She used to talk about you and the work you were doing with your parents in Europe. She hadn’t seen or heard from you in years, but her eyes used to light up when she talked about you and her mother and her father and....”

He stopped when he realized that her shoulders were shaking. Gently he turned her around to face him. “What happened Sarah? What happened to that young girl who set out to save the world?”

Her eyes bright with angry unshed tears, Sarah refused to look at him, looking down instead. “She grew up and she realized that the world isn’t worth saving.” She raised her head defiantly to stare straight at him. “End of story.”

“I don’t believe you. I..” He stopped as his cell phone rang. Pulling away from her, he answered it abruptly. “ Morgan.”

Grateful for the interruption even while she hated her own cowardice, Sarah picked up one of her guns and fled upstairs.

She halted in front of the nursery. She knew that if she opened the door there would be no visible trace of the murder that had taken place in this room just a short while ago. No reminder of that moment when Carly Morgan had died to protect her son.

There would be a new rug to replace the bloodstained one. A new bed to replace the bullet shattered one. Hell the room was probably cleaner than it had ever been.

Still she didn’t open it. She turned instead to the master suite. Telling herself that it made sense to go in there. That there was no way they could make people believe they were lovers if she slept in a separate bedroom. She told herself it was for the mission. All of it was for the mission.

God. When had she started lying to herself so easily? Kosokov dead was more than a mission to her. It was a crusade. It was the reason she had kept herself alive for all this time. She could visualize the moment in her fantasies. Her feet stepping lightly as she stealthily approached the bed, the gun drawn with the silencer on the end. She’d carefully place the gun in the canal of his ear and pull the trigger.

Then it would be over. All of it. The nightmares would stop. She could look down at his dead body and know that she had won. She had been stronger in the end.

It was all that she wanted. It was. And whatever it took to make that moment happen, she would do. Whatever was necessary.

She would do what she had to do. Just like always. No matter what.

And if it wasn’t quite tears that fell down her cheeks, it was still the closest she had come to crying since a long ago spring morning.

Down in the living room of the penthouse, Jason turned on the stereo. The last thing he wanted was for Cates to be listening in on his private conversations from the apartment below. “Yeah Benny.” He listened to his lieutenant for a minute. “No. I’m sure Sonny is fine. Probably taking a few days off. Yeah you know how he gets when he’s in one of these moods. Best to leave him alone and wait for him to return.” Jason’s eyes darted to the stairs. “Listen Benny I need some information and I need it quick. I need to know everything you can get me on a Dr. Jeff Webber and his wife.”

The Quartermaine Gatehouse

“So are you giving to give me the silent treatment all night?” Nikolas Cassadine asked his former girlfriend as she continued to keep her attention on the book in front of her.

“I was kind of hoping you would get the point and leave Nikolas,” Emily said casually turning a page. She hadn’t really read a word, her lingering headache making it hard to focus on the print but she wasn’t about to let him know that.

“Emily. We need to talk.”

“No.”

“No what?”

“No we don’t need to talk. Or in other words I have nothing to say to you Nikolas.”

“No? Aren’t you at least going to explain to me why Sarah Webber pulled a gun on me tonight? Not to mention when did Sarah return to Port Charles?”

“Maybe about the time that it became okay for you to break into my house?” Emily returned.

“I didn’t break in. You gave me a key.”

“Two years ago Nikolas. I gave you a key two years ago. That doesn’t mean that I appreciate coming home and finding you hanging out in my kitchen.”

Nikolas had the grace to look embarrassed. “That doesn’t explain why Sarah pulled a gun on me. What the hell is Sarah doing with a gun anyway?”

Using it to kill people, Emily thought wondering if he would believe the truth even if she felt like telling it to him. “I don’t know. Maybe people in Europe are more paranoid than people from the US. I know that people from Greece are more arrogant and obnoxious.” Emily muttered. She wanted to go to bed. Alone. She wanted to begin to forget the last few days. She wanted to begin to forget HIM. “Leave it alone Nikolas and go home.”

“Emily we need to talk. You are too important for me to leave it alone.”

“Right. I’m important to you.” Emily laughed skeptically. “I stopped believing that the day I walked in on...”

Emily stopped. She wouldn’t go there. Going there was a one way street back to drug rehab. Back to Ferncliff. She looked down at the scars on her wrist. She wasn’t going there.

“Emily we have to talk about that day. It’s the only way we are going to get past it. We belong together you and I. I’m so sorry that I hurt you...” Nikolas bent in front of her on the couch but Emily stood up and put more distance between them walking to stare out the window.

“No you’re not. If you were sorry it would never have happened.” She crossed her arms and stood looking out into the darkness in front of her.

“It was a stupid mistake. It’s not worth throwing away everything we had together.” Nikolas came up from behind her, his hand on her shoulder.

“Everything we had together was a lie. You proved that when I walked in on you and Carly having sex in the cottage. I’d been gone for a week on that shoot. One week. Seven days. All I wanted was to get back to you and when I got the chance to take that earlier flight and surprise you....” She stiffened as the memories of that day came flooding back. “It doesn’t matter. It’s in the past and its over.”

“No. No it’s not.” Nikolas’s voice was low and urgent. “I’m so sorry I hurt you.”

“You didn’t hurt me. I hurt myself by being stupid enough to believe that you could be faithful to anyone woman let alone faithful to me. Hell Nikolas I’ve known you long enough to know how you operate. You want what you can’t have Cassadine. You always have. You wanted Sarah because Lucky wanted her and when you got her, you threw her over for Robin. But Robin was too smart for you so you turned your attention to Katherine. Was there anyone more out of your reach than you father’s ex-fiancée? Maybe your dead brother’s ex-girlfriend? I’ll never know what made you finally turn and look my way, but whatever it is I regret that day when I gave in and let myself believe that you were anything other than who you are. An arrogant bastard.”

“I’m the arrogant bastard who saved your life.” Nikolas reminded her softly. “Everything you said about me is true. I have this stupid habit of destroying my own happiness you know. With you I was finally complete and that scared me. I was sure you were going to leave me. How could you pick me first? Not even my own mother picked me first. It was always Luke and Lucky and Lulu then me. I couldn’t let you hurt me like that so I did something that I knew you would never forgive. I set out to hurt you first. And I succeeded in the worst way possible. “ He breathes deeply of her scent. “If I had known what would happen after...”

His voice trails off and Emily closes her eyes, filling in the blanks for him. She runs the sequence through her mind. Finding Carly and Nik in bed. She’d barely gotten over the shock of that when AJ’s accident had happened. Lost and hurting in ways she had never dreamed possible, Emily had turned to the one thing in her life that had never let her down before.

“When I walked in on you that night,” Nikolas’s voice is low and shaky. “God Em there was so much blood everywhere and you were so pale and I was so scared. All I could think of was the what ifs? What if I hadn’t stopped by to see you? What if I had left when no one answered? What if I had been one minute later? I sat outside that waiting room not knowing if you were going to live or die and I’ve never been so terrified in all my life.”

“I know this story.” Emily said softly. “I heard it the first time you recited it on the witness stand. You remember that hearing don’t you Nik? The one where the judge decided that I was crazy and should be locked up? The one where you testified that you thought I was crazy too?”

“I said you needed help.”

“Yeah well I got it, okay. I’m fine now. Hell I even have a piece of paper upstairs in my dresser that says I’m sane.” She pushed away from him. “Sane enough to know better than to get involved with you again.”

“Emily don’t do this. I was drunk. Carly seduced me...”

“Don’t.” Emily warned him in a shaking voice. “Don’t blame this one on Carly. Carly wasn’t a saint, but she didn’t go around seducing the unwilling either. I made my peace with Carly a long time ago. She wasn’t the one who broke her promise to me, you did.”

“It won’t happen again.”

“No it won’t. It won’t because we won’t happen again.” Emily took a deep breath. “I think you should leave Nik. Now.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“More than I’ve ever meant anything.”

“Emily.”

“I think the lady asked you to leave.” A quiet voice interrupted and Nikolas turned from moving towards Emily to moving towards the stranger who stood in the doorway.

“Whoever you are get the hell out of here.” Nikolas said quietly. “You don’t know what you getting in the middle of.”

“I don’t think so,” The tall broad shouldered man with the dark eyes and the wavy hair grinned casually at Nikolas. “And if that arrogant stance is meant to scare me you’re failing miserably.” Jagger Cates quipped as he walked up to Emily, his eyes darkening as he noticed her pallor. “You okay?” He asked her gently, his eyes searching hers.

She nodded. “What are you doing here?”

“Checking up on you.” He told her softly. he jerked his head towards Nik. “You want me to get rid of him for you?”

Emily suddenly felt every minute of the last 24 hours. “I just want to go to sleep.” she murmured softly, feeling incredibly tired and drained.

“Got ya,” Jagger leaned forward and scooped her up in his arms easily, heading towards the staircase.

“Wait a minute,” Nikolas protested. “Who the hell are you and what do you think you are doing?”

“The lady wants to go to bed, I’m taking her to bed. As for who I am, let’s just say that I’m a friend of her brother’s. We’re in the same work so to speak if you get my meaning. And Cassadine,” Jagger stopped halfway up the stairs and looked down at Nik grimly. “if you’re still here when I come back down I’ll kill you.”

Nikolas Cassadine watched them go in mute frustration. Damn. He had been so close to getting her back. She had been wavering. He knew it.

“This isn’t over yet Emily,” he swore softly even as he exited the gatehouse slamming the door behind him.