Chapter Twenty

         Later at the hospital, after the four remaining captives and Jerry had been readmitted for observation and treatment and Jax was treated for smoke inhalation, the entire crew gathered in one of the empty wards used for geriatric patients that were fairly scarce in Angel Fire. Sixteen adults and three children were draped all over the room. Bobbie and Jerry were seated on a couch near the window. Jax, Chloe, John, and Jane were sitting across from them on a low bed. Luke and Lucky were leaning against a wall, positioned in such a similar manner that from the floor Lucas and his nephew Michael commented on it. Candy was with her brother and her nephew as well, while Simon, V, Felicia, Mac, Carly, Jason, Ned and Alexis all sat on chairs framing the rest of the circle.

         Bobbie, Chloe and Lucky related their tales and woven together with what Jerry, John, Jax and Luke had known the police got a complete picture. The army was dealing with William Conroy and the New Mexico State police would deal with Del Mansfield. The remains of Lorenzo Spencer would be buried in a Veterans grave here in New Mexico.

         Tony Jones' body was flown home to Port Charles in order to be placed in the empty grave beside his daughter and his late first wife, Tania. Empty because he'd really been alive all of this time they'd thought otherwise. Sadly, now his grave would be filled. Bobbie knew that Tony had changed once in his life to become something unrecognizable, even to those who had loved him best. He metamorphosed into a kidnapper, a blackmailer, and a mean-spirited man. In the last several hours of his life, Bobbie witnessed the reversal of all of the damage that BJ's death and Carly's appearance had wrought on him. He had once again become the Tony people admired and loved, respected and befriended.

         Bobbie thought that the original changes were partly her fault in the end. It was her daughter that sent him around the bend after all, coupled with her own affair with Damien Smith. But, in reality the Tony she had loved had begun to leave her before he ever physically walked out the door, before Carly, before Damien came between them. If their love had been stronger, or truer, Carly and Damien couldn't have swayed either of them in the first place. That told her that their love wasn't the love she had been trying to make of it. The love she'd been searching for her entire adult life starting with Scotty Baldwin and Roy DiLucca. The kind of love she'd only had once in her life, the kind of uncompromising, give-up-your-life-for-it, no-holds-barred connection she had with Jerry.

         She looked at him now, his wrist in a cast, surgery scheduled for the morning. She was fortunate to be here with him, alive and well. Tony had died trying to save her and the others. So again, his downfall could be traced to her. But guilt wouldn't change the fact that he was dead. All she could do was remember the hero he had tried to be, and the father that he always was to Lucas. The father he'd never stopped being, despite her best efforts to thwart him. All she could do now was honor his memory by telling his son what a great man he had really been.

         After the police left, silence was all that filled the large room as the adults contemplated the deaths of Tony and the Keeper. Alone, Bobbie walked slowly over to her father-in-law, and handed him a flat metal box. The box was new, but the contents were old. "I believe this belongs to you." She smiled the fragile, brittle smile of someone who had recently pulled a trigger in order to save her own life, and he clasped her hands in his.

         "I'm just glad you found it and it was able to help you." John took the box from her and put it in a bag on the floor. He locked the bag carefully. Jerry had not left Bobbie's side since she'd been freed and now he moved to stand beside her again. He couldn't bear to be separated from her for even a moment. They helped each other back to the couch and Jerry had a flash of insight into their future as very old people helping each other along to eternity. "There's only one more question that I have," Jerry said quietly above the heads of the children playing at his feet.

         "Yes. Quite right. One question. Where are the other captives?" Jax asked Chloe.

         "It seems that they are all really dead. The Keeper said he used them as decoys and red herrings." Chloe replied as Bobbie nodded.

         "You mean they were killed for their usefulness in being dead?"

         "Yes." Bobbie said in a low, expressionless way. Her husband involuntarily trembled. The moral compass Jerry used in protecting his family had very nearly failed him. He thought that by shielding them all and protecting them from the truth he was aiding them. In reality he realized it could have cost him everything. This was a hard-learned lesson, one he was unlikely to forget as he looked around the room at the people he loved and trusted, he knew that he had nearly lost everything he held dear and he wouldn't make that mistake again.