Shifting the car into park a few feet from Eva's driveway, Alyssa leaned back against the headrest and had a good, hard cry. Shedding all her grief and frustration into a torrid flood of tears until her hiccoughing sobs eased into silence. God, that couldn't have hurt anymore had she taken a knife and plunged it straight through her chest.

The look on his face...and because more tears wanted to spill, she pressed her hands to her eyes and willed them to stop. No more. No more crying. What was done was done and eventually he'd thank her for it. Definitely not today or tomorrow, but some day—someday he would see that what she did had been with his best interests at heart.

Because she loved him too much to be selfish.

I'm not your ex-fiancé. I won't bail on you because times get tough. His words rang around her like a ghostly echo of his heartbroken anger. No, he wasn't Sebastian, but even having said that, her ex hadn't been a bad guy. Sure, he'd broken her when he'd called off the wedding and left her the way he did, but when faced with something as profound as one's mortality...could she blame him for wanting to save himself?

To distance himself from that nightmare?

Alyssa remembered in the early days, when Sebastian had come with her to chemo, ashen and severe, he'd held her hand and all the while looked like he was about to be as sick as she was. A couple visits later, she'd forgotten which but she'd only just sat down when something had gone terribly wrong with one of the other patients. She remembered the flurry of doctors and nurses as they flocked in to carry the patient off and behind a curtain where Alyssa caught glimpses and flashes of the woman's convulsing body.

She'd practically turned purple.

After that point Sebastian made excuses why he couldn't come with her to chemo. Work was too busy. There was this errand or that one to run. Only a few weeks after Alyssa got the 'all clear' Sebastian came to her, tears in his eyes and bags packed.

I can't handle this. I'm sorry. Please don't hate me.

For hours Alyssa had sat there, hollow. Numb. Shaken to the root of her very being. She'd faced death and lived, yet he couldn't handle it? But as the weeks bled into months she realized hating him was unfair.

How could she ask someone she loved to watch her go through all of that and more? To carry on with work and life, knowing the pain she'd experience yet be unable to stop it? To sit there while knowing how much she suffered? To smile while cancer ripped their lives apart?

Til Death Do Us Part sounded incredibly romantic until you really took into consideration what those words met when cancer became your reality.

The weight loss, fatigue and mouth and throat sores. The numbness in the hands and feet. The swelling—there was so much more than losing your hair and puking into a toilet. The disease not only ravaged the body, mind and soul, but it broke apart relationships—rotting them straight to the core.

There was always a possibility she would live a full and healthy life—that the cancer would never resurface and Alyssa certainly didn't expect to live the rest of her life alone. But as of right now, only two years into remission, the odds were stacked and she wasn't going to gamble with Ethan's future.

She needed time to heal, time to put back all the broken pieces of her life before she brought someone else into it. The thing that had frustrated her most after finishing chemo was how long her body had taken to recover from the debilitating fog of 'chemo-brain'. The lapses in her memory as well as the inability to focus were arguably two of the most frustrating and troubling side effects for a woman managing a demanding career.

The moment the nurses had slipped that needle out of her arm for the final time, she'd expected all of the horrible pitfalls of cancer to go away as soon as treatment ended. But they didn't. It was almost a year before she felt even a flicker of her old self return, and shortly thereafter is when she committed herself to training in the gym. To pushing her body to grow, to transform and to be stronger then she'd ever imagined.

While the chemo and surgery had saved her life, the gym had saved her soul.

And though her heart felt like it had been cleaved from her body, Alyssa knew she'd get through this. She'd survived worse.

Angling the mirror, Alyssa swiped at her face, ran her fingers along under her eyes now puffy from her crying jag. Reaching into her purse, she fished out some mascara, lipstick and dressed up her face. Masking her pain behind full lashes and colourful lips.

Assessing the end result as she finger combed her hair, Alyssa decided that this was about as good as it was going to get as she slid out of the car and engaged the locks. Rounding the hood, she faltered in her stride as she finally caught sight of a car in Eva's drive way that she didn't recognize.

Clean, the plates almost new...a rental, she mused as she strode past it and up the front steps to ring the door bell. A collection of excited barks rose from inside and only a few seconds later the door swung open. Marshall appeared, face bloodless and eyes bright.

"Hey...come on in." He looked like a man in a daze and seeing him this way made her breath catch.

"Something wrong?" she asked, taking his arm as he nudged the door shut behind her. Around them the dogs bounding and raced, excited by company, but she couldn't take her gaze off his features as he absorbed her words.

"No. You should be a part of this. Come on." As he led her inside she heard the hard rasp of an unfamiliar voice toughened from years of laughter and cigarettes. Seconds later she saw the face to accompany the voice.

It took a second for her to place his face, but only a second as it all came barreling back. This was Jerry Harrows. The man who had been Eva's witness protection liaison. She'd seen him on the stand during the trial, talking about what happened, and his face had been blasted in the media following Marshall's 'Tell All'. The man who's responsibility had been to keep her safe—hidden, and who had acted with the FBI to set her out as bait to lure out a hit man hired by Randy Kincaid.

Now that Alyssa knew the whole truth from Eva, anger surged inside of her.

He was a barrel-chested man, almost as wide as he was tall at a stumpy five-five. Dark hair razed short to his scalp, cheeks reddened from age and fading tattoos visible on his neck, forearms and knuckles. He sat at the far end of Eva's dining room table off the kitchen, his knees spread wide so the girth of his belly had room to breathe, boots hooked around the chair legs.

His gaze—sharp and intense—shot to Alyssa as she entered the space and held there for a long moment before sliding back to Eva who hadn't so much as moved a muscle.

"Shit, Kiddo. Forgot how much ya's looked alike."

Now Eva did glance up at her as if only now realizing that someone else had entered her space. Like Marshall, her face was pale, her eyes glassy. And concern for her sister eclipsed her rage, Alyssa came to her side and took hold of her offered hand.

"What's wrong? What's happened?"

"I..." Eva's voice faded, she shook her head and looked to Jerry.

Nodded, he leaned forward, set beefy arms to the table with a whack, hands linked with thick fingers. "There's been an accident," he said. "'bout three weeks ago, Kincaid requested a transfer from Toronto out to Portland."

"Jesus," Alyssa spat. "Why weren't we notified he was being relocated?"

Jerry jerked a shoulder. "Was no need. The systems a big one and though he's incarcerated, as an American, it was his right to request a transfer to a State facility. Someone in the higher-ups agreed...so, that was that. Anyway, during the final leg of the transfer there was an accident. A big one. FBI has managed to keep it out of the news for now, but I wanted ya's to hear it from me before it hits the six o'clock tonight." Blue-grey eyes flickered to Alyssa. "Kincaid is dead."

Shock blasted over her and as the bones in her legs turned to water, Alyssa slid into the chair next to Eva. "You're sure?"

He nodded, eyes sober with sincerity. "Got these this morning." Jerry reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. Frowning at the screen, he swiped a blunt thumb across—muttering to himself as he swiped a second, third time over before the screen cleared. Pulling up photos, he turned the phone around to show them the clear, alarming images.

"Ordinarily I wouldn't show ya's this kinda thing, but under the circumstances I think ya's deserve to see the truth."

Alyssa took the phone and held it in front of her, dazed.

A twisted face, the jaw broken and hanging askance. The skin was grotesquely charred and the cracked orbs of his eyes made her think of a boiled fish head that had been fired. Next to her, Eva leaned closer, her hands clenched in her lap so tight the white of her knuckles bled across her hand.

Alyssa looked from the photo to Eva and back, holding her breath until the stiffness eased out of her sister's shoulders and a sound tore of her throat. Hands shot to her face and she sobbed into them. Marshall was there in a second, holding her, rocking her as those sounds morphed from sobs into laughter.

"He's dead. Christ, help me, he's dead and I can breathe. I can finally breathe."

Though Eva's sudden lightness made her want to smile, Alyssa turned to face Jerry, returning the phone to him. "Are you sure it's him? Beyond a question of a doubt? When was the wreckage found? What happened?"

"The wreck happened sometime last night just after five. The bodies have been counted and confirmed by the corner as all died in the accident. There are two unaccounted for, and—," he added swiftly as Eva jerked around with a gasp, "we know who the missing are. A duo bound for lethal injection, the Feds believe they're swinging down the coastline to Mexico. It'll be all over the news tonight, which is why I came out this way to make sure ya didn't worry."

"But Randy is dead," Alyssa pressed.

"Yes," Jerry said, tucking away his phone. "The guard ledger records where all the inmates were assigned seating on the bus at each point of transport. Kincaid, being one of the biggest they had and with a lengthy record of violence, Guard Diggs—who recorded the ledger—noted that he'd had Kincaid locked down in restraints while in transport. That means his hands were in rigid cuffs that wouldn't allow for no range of movement," he continued, locking his wrists together in demonstration.

"Those cuffs were then chained to the vehicle with a steal plate that would need a soldering iron and a lot of gear to break through. He was positioned at the back end on the left side of the vehicle. Even in the event of an accident—he'd be unable to free himself without a key from the guard, and another kept in a lock box by the driver."

"I still don't believe it."

"The coroner'll confirm—"

"You, Jerry," Alyssa leaned forward, planting her arms to the table. "I don't believe you. Give me one reason why I should? Why Eva should—when you betrayed her once already? Put her life—her girls' lives in danger? Why should we believe a single word you have to say is sincere and not some script spoon fed to us by the FBI?"

Heat flashed in his eyes, but the temper was fringed with shame. With regret. She stared him down until that regret shimmered and his gaze dropped. Sighing, Jerry pushed from the table, chair legs scrapping loudly as he grunted to his feet.

For a single weary second he held there, hands planted to the table top and his head hung, the ruddy flush in his face and neck deepening. Finally he straightened and slipped a hand into his pocket, pulling out a crushed package of cigarettes.

"I was fifteen when I knew I wanted to serve in the forces. Signed up as soon as I was able and never looked back. In the army, it's all orders and followin' commands. You don't ask questions—you just do. It's what I know. It's what I'm good at. When I got out, law enforcement was an easy mold to fit into. Twenty seven years spent working in various divisions; I've seen and done it all. My entire life has been about followin' orders. Obeyin' superiors. Not askin' questions that went over my pay grade. And I never gave a single damn about any of it, never had reason to regret a single choice until the second I saw ya jump off a cliff. Kiddo..." His eyes softened and his voice, all gravel and smoke held a watery edge of emotion as he twirled the pack between his fingers, the plastic and paper crinkling in the punctuated silence.

And though Alyssa could see he itched to light up, Jerry held off, either out of respect for Eva's home or because it was too damn cold to open a window.

"I can't change what went down. I don't ask ya to forgive what I did. Can't say I ever will, but I'm here to make it right as best I can. Look, I shouldn't even be tellin' ya's this, but Kincaid died bad." Jerry swiped a hand though his hair, the ends rasping against his calloused palm as he slumped back down into his seat.

"The bastard burned alive."