Written in 24  minutes. No time for typing or editing. Alternate Universe

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“Uh, Jason?”

Jason Morgan turned away from his lawyer, Justus Ward, to frown at the guard standing in the doorway of his penthouse.

What had been his penthouse until six months earlier when he’d filed for divorce and left town. He was only here for a funeral and to make sure his nephew was okay. After that, he’d put this place out of his mind again.

“What? What do you want, Max?” Jason demanded.

“Your wife—” Max winced. “I mean, Mrs. Morgan—I mean, uh, anyway. She’s in the lobby. She wanted to come up to see her brother, but—” He gestured at Justus. “No one’s told her.”

Was she still technically his wife? He couldn’t remember now if she’d signed the papers or if either of their lawyers had filed them with the court. He hadn’t wanted to think about it.

That had been the point of the divorce.

“No one’s told her what?” Jason asked slowly when Justus closed his eyes, his expression pained. “What’s going on? What don’t I know?”

“You just got here,” Justus said after a moment. “And we’ve been—” He pressed his lips together , shook his head. “No one’s seen him since we found Carly.”

“Since before we found Carly,” Max pointed out. “He’s gone. His stuff is still there, but—”

“Damn it.” Jason rubbed his hands over his face. “Damn it. That’s—that can’t be about this? Can it?”

“That’s one of the reasons we wanted you to come back,” Justus told him. “It’s—things are a goddamn mess, and Lansing won’t tell us anything. He’s shut us out. And the last thing any of us want—”

“I don’t give a damn about any of this,” Jason growled. “I told you. I just wanted to bury Carly, make sure Michael is okay, and then go—I can’t—”

He couldn’t care about this. Couldn’t care about the chaos left in the wake of Carly Corintho’s death. This life had already stolen everything he loved. There was nothing left to take.

“She looks upset, Jase,” Max said quietly, drawing Jason’s attention again. “She said he’s not returning any of her calls. That’s not like him. You know that.”

“Yeah.” Jason exhaled slowly. “Yeah, I know. She’s his favorite sister.” He met Justus’s eyes. “How bad is it?”

“Since Carly or since you left?” Justus asked, flatly. “My answer is the same. Ric thinks he can slide into power and Sonny is weak enough to let him. Maybe he already has. I don’t know. Like I said, no one can get near him. Lansing’s orders.”

“About Mrs. Morgan?” Max prompted as if Jason had forgotten his wife being left in the lobby of Harborview Towers, hoping to be let up to her brother’s apartment, located three floors below the penthouse levels.

“Ask her to come up here,” Jason finally said. “But ask her, Max. If she doesn’t want to—” He could barely stand to be in these rooms—

Knowing what might still be upstairs—what they’d never taken down—

“Sure thing.”

When Max was gone, Justus folded his arms and arched his brows. “How long has it been since you saw her?”

Jason grimaced, looked at his lawyer—who was also his cousin and had been the best man at his wedding. “The morning I left.”

“Ah. Right. When you left in the middle of the night without a word, leaving her a set of divorce papers that you went to someone else to file.” Justus shook his head. “I thought maybe in the last six months—”

“No.” Jason hesitated. “I don’t know if—if it became final—”

“Not yet,” Justus said after another minute. “Two more weeks. She didn’t—she thought you’d come back. And when she realized you wouldn’t, she signed the papers and went back to Boston.” He tipped his head. “You know, what you two went through—that’d break most people, and I’m sorry for it, Jason. But what you did to her—”

“It was my fault,” Jason said roughly, hating his cousin for bringing any of this back. “All of it was my fault. I couldn’t stand to be here anymore and know it was my fault. That—” He shook his head. “Never mind.”

They heard the ding of the elevator, then the quiet slide of the doors opening. A moment later, Max pushed the door open and his wife—for apparently two more weeks—walked in, stopping just at the threshold.

Elizabeth Morgan, looking tired and pale, folded her arms across a faded Boston University t-shirt and arched a slim brow. “This isn’t Steven’s apartment. Where is my brother?”

Jason just stared at her for a long moment, then swallowed. “I don’t know. I just got back—”

“I didn’t ask you,” Elizabeth said coldly. She looked at Justus. “Where’s Steven? He hasn’t returned my calls in a week. Is it Sonny? Is he taking Carly’s death that badly? What’s going on? He never stays quiet this long—”

“That’s why I asked you to come up,” Justus said smoothly, rounding Jason and walking towards his cousin-in-law. “I don’t know where Steven is. No one has seen him since before we found Carly.”

“Oh.” Elizabeth closed her eyes. “That’s not good.”

“No,” Justus agreed. He looked back at Jason. “Jason, we’ll talk in a bit, okay? I want to take Elizabeth down to the apartment. Maybe she can help us figure out where he went.”

“Yeah.” Jason nodded over the lump in his throat. “That’s—”

But Justus had already closed the door.

Jason went up the stairs and went towards the end of the short hallway on the second floor. He stopped in front of the door across the hall from the master bedroom—

—so we’ll be close to her—

Then he pushed open the door.

He looked around the room, not sure if he was relieved to see that it hadn’t been touched or angry that it was still here as a reminder of why he’d left his wife in the middle of the night, or why she looked right through him.

The white furniture remained unused, the mint green carpet as plush as the day it had been laid—

And the name painted in bouncy peach letters over the crib — Lily Ann Morgan —

The little girl who had never seen this room, who hadn’t lived long to draw her first breath.

Jason quietly closed the door, pressed his fist against it, then took a deep breath. He’d find Elizabeth’s brother for her because that was the least he could do after he’d killed their daughter.

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