Chapter 83: Smart Girls Don't Say Yes

Oh man, I've been waiting forever to use my favorite song. I'm not lying, this song is in my top ten favorite songs...I love R. City...

This chapter is dedicated to Darius, who has been mostly in the dark this whole book trying to piece things together. I think he deserves a complete and thorough explanation, don't you? (Also it's a good recap of this complicated mess and how it all has come full circle...)

Marley

Bodie sleeps three hours, and then he bounds down the stairs full of energy and catches me in the kitchen, pulling me into a passionate mouth claiming.

"Sweet Jasmine..." he breathes between kisses. "Need you...now..."

He's drawing me back up the stairs. "Bodie—"

"Jasmine—"

"This is not—"

"A dangerous, drastic situation anymore—" he palms my ass with both hands, pulling me against him, so that I feel his erection hard against my belly. "But a new, urgent matter is on the rise..."

I giggle despite myself, then stop, amazed that I can still make that sound. Dr. Watkins quickly suppresses it.

"Bodie—"

"Marley—" he wheedles and pulls me about halfway up the stairs.

"Dude," a sarcastic voice drawls from the bottom of the stairs.

Bodie's hands are still roving my backside as he looks over his shoulder. "I expect this shit from Darius. But how you gonna do me like this, Adam?"

"You're going to jail!?!?" Adam hisses up the stairwell, aware that Darius is still sleeping.

Bodie looks at me. "You told him?"

"It just...slipped out with amidst all the sobs," I shrug.

He runs a thumb beneath my puffy eyes. "Awww, you were cryin' over me? So you do still love me?"

"Of course. But love is not the point."

"Exactly! Thank you, Marley!" It's amazing how much force Adam can put into a whisper. I guess he and Mac, parents of a toddler, whisper-fight a lot while she is napping.

"Dude, hell yes  I'm going to jail. But listen,did you know that only four states in the whole fucking country still allow conjugal visits? It's highly unlikely I will be assigned to a correctional facility in one of them..."

"For real? Only four?" Adam seems surprised.

Bodie nods solemnly as his remaining hand on my ass disappears. "Hand to god. I looked it up."

Adam sighs all his anger flowing away like a receding tide. "Well I guess love is exactly the point right now..."

Bodie grins. "Thanks, brother."

"Band house. Five o'clock. Moran will be here by then and hopefully the girls will have shit cleaned up by then..."

I turn in Bodie's arms. "What happened at the band house?"

Adam gives me a wan smile, but meets Bodie's eyes for the answer. "When I told Trace what Marley told me, he fucking trashed the place. He's locked himself in the studio right now. Kat says he's playing death metal solos..."

"Fuck," Bodie groans.

"Yeah, better go ahead and do that, while you can," Adam says breezily, grabbing his keys from the bar and striding out the back door.

Bodie's forehead comes down against mine. "It's going to be a shitstorm. Of all the things, that's the one thing I regret. Soundcrush. But it's a necessary sacrifice."

It's my turn for hands to roam. Over Bodie's jaw, his poor cracked skull, down to his shoulders. He feels so beautiful beneath my touch, strange but at the same time, so familiar. He feels like the fifteen year old boy I touched all those years ago in his bedroom. All the tension is gone from him.

"How can  you be so...at peace right now?"

"Because it's all over but the shoutin', baby. I did it. I got you and Darius safe."

"It's not all over. You are going to jail."

He squeezes me tight. "Jasmine, jail is going to feel like a vacation compared to the last two years. It'll give me a chance to catch up on my reading." He kisses beneath my ear, down the side of my neck, sucking lightly as he goes. "The only thing I'm worried about...is the long nights without you..."

His kisses undo me. Dr. Watkins warns me not to give him false hope, but Jasmine shouts her down. He's going to jail. Of course I'm going to give him all the comfort I can. I push him up one step and feel the grin against my neck.

"You'll let me love you right now?"

"Could I stop you if I tried?"

"No, but I'm glad you are going to let me do it up close and personal," he growls.

In seconds we are stripping. It's a frenzy of limbs and tangled sheets. I memorize every touch, every sensation. His skin feels hot on mine, his tongue tender as it traces my collarbone, the callouses on his fingers scratch satisfying down my spine. I watch eagerly as every inch of his cock fills me and yet I can feel the sear of his gaze, watching me, watching him.

And then we move, and my being is like a storm at sea. The exhilarating crashes, the confusion of my soul uprooted, every inner part of me swirling in a jumble of limitless joy and frightening disorientation. I hold onto him tight, never feeling more alive or more unanchored.

All the joy and terror meet in a crash of brilliance, like heaven is a secret pool I swim in. Then Bodie's moment of utter vulnerability as he stills like death.

We are sinking, perfectly, gratefully—all struggle bled from us. We drown in the deep of one another.

I am surprised to find the peace he feels lasts for more than a moment. It lingers as he strokes my arm with careless fingers, and cradles my head to his face, alternately kissing it and breathing in my scent. I have no desire to move, draped across his chest, listening to his heartbeat, as the slow slide of his fingers up and down my arm soothe.

Eventually we hear Darius' door open and close, and the soft pad of him beating down the stairs.

Bodie's fingers never stop as he says, "I want you again already, but I need to be with him, too, right now..."

I crawl on top of him, draping every inch of me on some part of him as I stare down into his face. "Whatever happens when we leave this room, just know, if it were only Jasmine and Bodie, I would ride until the end..."

He frowns slightly. "I don't like the sound of that, baby..."

"I don't either, but I don't know what happens now."

He brushes back my wild hair, and kisses my nose. "Let me tell you what happens. Let me tell you what has happened."

He rolls me to the side, rises, and goes to his closet. I hear his personal safe—the one I never use—beeping, and he returns in jeans, with a robe for me, and a yellow folder. It has a CIA seal embossed on it with the word CLASSIFIED in rusty red, below.

"I can finally tell you everything, because I finally have the means—in my hands—" he shakes the folder, "to keep you safe."

I fold the robe around me and look at the unopened folder. Bodie holds out his hand.

"Come on. Darius needs to hear this, too."

We find Darius in the kitchen, pouring coffee. It still twerks my head that he drinks coffee now. He likes it with a lot of sugar and cream but...still. He's growing up so fast this last year.

He stares at the folder in Bodie's hands.

"I figured out last night you had some kind of deal with the Feds. I have questions," Darius says to his father. So mild, reserving all judgments. My heart aches at his adult reserve, almost wishing he was the overreactive young teen of a couple of years ago.

"I'm sure your mom does to, because I told her as little as possibly could, to keep you safe. I'll answer them all, but let me tell the whole story first, it might clear some up."

Darius takes a seat, looking at us both expectantly.

Bodie looks between us.

"It's a very long story, and I'm going to have to tell it twice today. Here and now, and to Soundcrush later. Some things I might say to you, I might leave out to them. Some things I might say to them, I don't need to say to you because you two are my family and I know that you know how much I love you, and I don't feel the need to justify myself to you two. But everything you will hear me say today is the god's honest truth, okay? That you can absolutely trust."

"Okay," Darius says, and I nod agreement.

Bodie speaks to Darius in the beginning, because the beginning, I know.

"October, three years ago, you were twelve years old. I had just reconnected with your mom at the Call-Out. Remember that time she went to Boston?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I realized who she was. I was angry with her over the way she and I had ended when I fifteen. She—" he pauses, looking over at me, not sure how to explain, or how much Darius knows about our beginnings.

"I told him about your initiation, once," I say to Bodie. I turn my attention to Darius. "I lied to Daemon, I lied to Bodie. In essence I cheated them both, but I loved Bodie, as best as I could love at that time, in those circumstances. Remember when I told you?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah well, I was pissed at your mom over the way things had gone down. " He smiles at me. "Because hate isn't the opposite of love, it's just the angry side of the love coin, sometimes. So we had a hate-flirt and an angry kiss and we might have had one helluva make-up-hook-up but TJ called—"

"Fucking TJ..." Darius hisses.

Bodie holds up a hand for peace— "That'll keep; we'll get to him later..."

"Anyway, TJ called and I learned that Daemon was getting out of prison. And I couldn't get your mom off my mind. I was worried about her, and I was scared what her life was going to be like with him out of jail, and I didn't even know about you then, I was just scared for her.

"And at the same time, I had another problem. I was dating Arabella—for real at that time—and her crazy stepdad was calling her all the time, really upsetting her. I could have handled the step-dad problem about five or six other ways that were better than how I did. But I couldn't get your mom off my mind and it...it took me back to my old life. The truth is...I wanted back in. To Sixmob. I felt like it might be the only way I could watch out for her, and maybe by doing that, I could get her back."

I am blown away. "I never knew that."

"I'm not sure I did either, at the time. But it's exactly why I did what I did. I kissed you on that beach and I remembered you and I wanted you, but then I found out, you weren't free like me. You were still tied to our old life—TJ and Daemon. The only way to get next to you was to rejoin that life and help you cut your ties."

"I'm sorry," I whisper.

He takes my hand and kisses it. "I'm not. I'm sorry for what happened to Cain Priestly, but I'm not sorry it brought me back to you."

"Wait...what?" Darius isn't following, of course.

Bodie holds my hand in his lap.

"Cain Priestly. That was Arabella's step-dad. Ex step-dad, actually. Her mom left him because he was a bigoted meth-head and he only got worse with time. He abused Arabella as a kid. At that time,I thought it was more like...sexual abuse. Later she admitted to me it was more...emotional, but in my mind, the way she explained it, it still skirted the line of causing real trauma with the way she feels about herself. Her sexuality, I mean. Anyway, he had no fucking business doing the things he did and saying the things he said to Arabella when she was just a confused kid."

"That...that's terrible," Darius says.

"Yeah, it is, so cut her a break, okay? You still hate on her constantly..."

"Now I hate on her because she's got the career I want, not because she's messing up stuff for you and mom...if you would sign me, or let me sign with Colossal..."

I groan. "Darius, now is not the time..."

"Okay, okay," he holds up his hands. "Go on."

"So, the two things were constantly on my mind. Your mom and Cain Priestly. I decided the best way to get rid him of him and put myself front and center in your mom's life? I called up TJ and told him I needed a Sixers crew to go threaten Priestly, so that he would finally leave Arabella alone. That act? It sort of...reactivated me as a Sixer. Needless to say...the intimidation visit I planned? It went bad. Cain Priestly said a bunch of hateful shit that only helped me punch a little harder than I had planned. Problem was, after I suckerpunched him, he drew on me. He shot at me and missed. Malik fired back and didn't."

"Fuck."

"Indeed."

"How come I never heard about this?"

"Because...because...I decided to bury him in the woods. It was six months before anyone even reported him missing. And no one in the world but me and Jalen knows where his body is. Until I am taken into custody for interrogation and in due course make my confession about a number of crimes—including my part in Priestly's death—and give the Feds the GPS coordinates where he is buried."

Darius rises from the barstool. "Wh...what? You're going to confess to killing him? But it was self-defense..."

"I know," Bodie reaches out to Darius, like a plea to sit. "Listen to me. This file," he points  opens it. There's a multipage legal document with the US Department of Justice heading at the top. "Has it all worked out. They will act like they are going to charge me with manslaughter and in the end, I will plead out to conspiracy and obstruction of justice charges. I'll get a three year sentence."

"Three years!!!"

"I most likely won't be in jail that long...I'll be up for parole in half that time...the Feds have promised to intervene on my behalf with the Parole board...but the deal can't ensure parole. It doesn't work that way..." Bodie looks at me, making sure I understand. I nod.

Darius doesn't. "I don't get it. Why do you have to go to jail. What does Cain Priestly have anything to do with what happened with the Irish?"

"Those Irish men that hurt us were part of the remnants of IRA. The IRA used to run a political revolution like a guerilla war in Northern Ireland, but they made peace with the UK a long time ago. Now some of the remnants operate under the same name, but they are really a crime syndicate. A gang, but bigger. Like...an Irish mob, okay?"

"Okay," Darius says impatiently. "How did you get involved in their shit and what does it have to do with Cain Priestly?"

"So after I buried Priestly, I was real messed up. Haunted by his death. I went to Thailand to do a lot of drugs and forget about it. I met Connor Ryan. Connor was a real entrepreneur in Thailand. I thought he was just a club promoter at first and a petty dealer, but it turns out he was a poppy farmer, a heroin exporter...brothers with Hugh Ryan, who was basically second in command of Sully Lorcan's IRA cell.

"Connor Ryan was bored with growing poppies in the Thai jungle to send back to Ireland as processed heroin, so he amused himself with his club promoting sideline. He hooked me and Bells on heroin and basically kept us prisoners in a fancy resort so he could make money off our club appearances there. Varrick came and extracted me and Bells from that shit. My mom sent him...with a picture of you and a picture of my grandfather and that's when I realized you were my son. The first thing I did, was come home to meet you."

"And I shot you."

"You did. That wasn't the worst of it. Daemon started extorting money out of me, buying his silence about Cain Priestly. I was cool with that at first, because he really did want to use the money to turn Sixmob into legitimate business."

"Right," Darius snorts.

"He did," Bodie looks between us solemnly. "He tried. We tried...I sank nearly three million dollars into a variety of businesses over a year's time. It is not easy for a bunch of black guys with criminal records, little education, and visible gang tattoos to make low margin businesses work. Not in a place like Atlanta, where there are so many other outfits for hire, and so many subtle prejudices. TJ's success is the exception, not the rule.

"Maybe if I had taken the reigns, pumped more money in, brought in slick marketers, given it more time, maybe I could have helped Sixmob better. But it was Daemon's gang and Daemon's business and it was failing and I was his partner. Not wanting to admit failure to me, he started looking for ways to bring in the money to Sixmob. More drugs. Mostly pills because he had no heroin hook up. The pills he was buying were bad...they were not real, and they were killing even more people than real prescriptions.

"And there I was, knowing I had already supplied him with the money laundering fronts to expand his drug dealing business into an empire. Hell, I was a co-owner in his money laundering businesses. I was already dirty. And I couldn't find a way out for shit.

"So the night your mom got shot at in front of the club—which was a bullshit mistake some of the baby bangers in Sixmob made because Daemon was drunk and mouthing off and they decided to take initiative and get rid of his bitchy Babymama— everything was at a boiling point...and I...I flipped my switch. I decided I would do whatever it took to get you and your mom and me out of this life tied to Sixmob. I did something I'm really not proud of..." Bodie looks thoughtful.

"What did you do that night?" I ask. I've only heard vague references.

"I walked into the trap and put a gun to Daemon's head and I made him a proposition. I told him I would find him a high quality, low cost, heroin supplier and pay cash for the first three shipments, in exchange for specific goods that belonged to him that I wanted."

"What goods?" Darius asks.

Bodie rubs his face. "You. And your mom."

Darius snorts. "No. For real."

"I'm serious. He was more than happy to make the exchange."

"You bought us? You can't buy or sell people. Like that's...well established."

"That's a matter of law, not a matter of Daemon's moral code," Bodie says slowly. "In his mind, you and your mom belonged to him and always would. I had to work within the construct of his fucked up morality. The crazy thing? It actually worked. He mostly left you and your mom alone after that."

"That fucking bastard," Darius says softly. "He really was a monster."

"He was, but not of his own making," I say softly. "He was secretly and...terribly...abused as a child, by one of Pat's boyfriends. I don't think she had any clue. Sixmob saved him from his tormentor. But his initiation was killing the man. At eleven years old."

Both Darius and Bodie stare at me silently. "Jesus," Bodie says softly.

"Pat doesn't know. TJ doesn't know. I don't think we should...add to their grief..."

"No. Mama Pat has enough grief," Darius agrees.

After a long moment I rub Bodie's shoulder. "You should have asked for the gun that shot Cain Priestly as part of that deal."

Bodie gives me a tucked back smile. "There you go again, thinkin' Ol Bodie is dumb..."

I feel my mouth hangin' slack... "You've had the gun since then? This whole time?"

"Well what evidence do you think my 'defense attorney' is going to pretend to use to get my charges reduced? When they get the gun—wiped clean of my prints of course--and Priestly's remains, ballistics are going to show that the injures were not sustained at close range. Based on my statement that Cain bit me just before he fired on me, I couldn't have fired the gun at close range and certainly not with my injured hand. Kade is going give deposition that he treated my bite wound. It's all circumstantial of course, but it's at least some evidence that will corroborate my story. Preston--thank god he's gonna be okay--is going to depose too and state that Malik told him that he was the one that killed Cain Priestly in self-defense. Jalen will make an eye-witness statement too...maybe...if he doesn't bolt first.

"You see, all of the statements will be public record after they are filed with the court and my sentence is delivered. That public record will give some justifications as to why my charges will be plead down. The prosecution's briefs will show that they couldn't gather the evidence for a drug trafficking charge and they couldn't even get me on a gang related murder, they could only make conspiracy and obstruction charges stick. Just in case the IRA takes a special interest in corroborating the way Feds pursue me. The IRA will interpret my conviction as punishment from the Feds for not rolling over on what I knew about Sully Lorcan and his cell."

"Son of a bitch." I can't believe it. It's like a John Grisham novel or something. "How in the hell did you manage to piece all this together?"

"Always underestimating me, Jasmine," Bodie grins. "You think I didn't learn nothing in pre-law, or from all those crime novels we read?"

"I'll never doubt your fine criminal mind again," I murmur.

He chuckles. "Wasn't just me, of course. Varrick and the CIA and the Justice Department have all worked out the details. I just started it all."

"I'll still don't get it," Darius says. "Why you have to go to jail at all. Why does the IRA think you know something about them?"

"Well, that's another long story and the moral of that story is: when you run with thugs of any kind, shit always goes sideways."

"I'll get more coffee," Darius says sarcastically, making his dad laugh, but not me. Laughter is leaving me the more Bodie speaks so resignedly about going to prison.

Bodie senses my steeply declining mood. He's still holding my hand--always touching me now. He rubs it between his, before delivering kisses to each one of my finger pads. He examines my fingernails, gently pushing back the cuticles around my gel nails, squeezing my ring finger at the base, turning my hand over, tracing the lines in my palm.

I fight down tears as I realize what he's doing. He's soaking up the smallest details, the little meaningless touches of lovers. Stocking them up against the separation he knows is coming.

I rise, putting my front to his back as he sits on the barstool, pushing my arms underneath his, holding him close to me. Again, no tenseness in him. He leans back just slightly, as he holds my hands against his chest and I bury my face against his neck.

Darius pours more coffee and glances at us, maybe a half a second longer than strictly necessary. His smile twitches but he can't resist a wise-crack. "You want me to take a picture for your Insta or can we get back to the serious shit?"

Bodie sighs and draws me around in front of him, pulling my stool between his legs, keeping me close, but settling back into his explanations.

"Okay, so I get the Connor Ryan was who you got the drugs from and that he also had family ties to the IRA, but why would they think you are some kind of rat?"

"Because I was. Or rather, I was getting railroaded into being an informant. See at the same time I negotiated with Daemon to make him a heroin drug lord, and I negotiated with Connor Ryan to be his supplier, and I agreed to mule the drugs on private jets under the guise of my Dharma business, I also worked a deal with the DEA to provide testimony about a Thai drug trafficking operation and Daemon's Atlanta drug syndicate. It was pretty straightforward. I would turn state's evidence and get immunity. Connor would be in jail, Daemon would be in jail and I would be in free and clear."

"Varrick was assigned to be my handler and debrief me after every muling trip, helping me document and collect evidence. When the time was right, I would get busted with the goods and the DEA would make the case and two of the people I hated most in the world would go to jail for good. I thought it was a great plan.

"That all changed when Varrick realized that a guy up the chain from Connor, whose approval I had to win before they would sell to me, turned out to be Sully Lorcan, IRA. Bureaucratic bullshit started to whir and all the sudden I wasn't a narc for the DEA in a simple drug trafficking operation, I was a terrorist informant, and asset to be managed by the CIA.

"At first, what the CIA wanted was my eye-witness testimony for a highly classified dossier that would be used to assassinate Sully Lorcan. The dossier would never be public and I would never be revealed as being in part of it. In return, as a favor, they would have the DEA bust Daemon, same as the original plan. Varrick and I thought, it could still work.

"Then, shit changed again. New governmental policies. They wanted to help Interpol bring Lorcan to justice. They wanted court testimony from me, offering to put us all into WitSec. I knew I couldn't do that. They fed me bullshit lines about changing my appearance, ensuring my anonymity but a famous person is very hard to disappear—especially if bad guys are actively looking for you— and I knew they really didn't give a shit about me or what might happen to you and your mom if my anonymity in WitSec was ever compromised. Then shit got real ugly and they threatened to call me as a hostile witness and prosecute me anyway, if I didn't cooperate. There's no jail that could have protected me from IRA vengeance on the inside in that case. Varrick knew it and I knew it. For the longest time, there was no way out for me. Varrick managed to string the case along, drawing it out, withholding key details that might have made the CIA want to move against Lorcan.

"Waiting for the situation to tip, he said. And last night, it did.

"The official reports filed will show that Avery Thompson was executed by Lorcan as the possible informant on Sixmob's and Lorcan's connection. It makes sense, because it was his blunderings into their business that started Lorcan's internal sweep in the first place.

"Varrick believes the IRA had sanctioned Lorcan bringing us all together to determine the true leak. Lorcan executing Thompson will infer that he was the problem—that he just trying to get me killed for double-crossing him in business.

"According to the official report, Lorcan couldn't account for Sixmob's accidental learning of our kidnapping. With Daemon missing from the leadership of his own gang, Sixmob suspected he was also kidnapped along with us. When Sixmob heard shots fired inside the airplane hanger they followed us to, they thought Daemon and TJ and I were being executed and they unleashed on the hangar, taking control and then executing the Irish.

"At some point this report will be leaked so that the IRA sees it. Basically it will infer that Lorcan bungled his own internal investigation and got himself and his cell all killed in the process.

"Of the survivors of the massacre, I am the only known connection between the little known Atlanta street gang and any of the dead Irish. My interactions with Connor Ryan during my time in Thailand is well documented, you see? In the beginning we even had actual contracts for my club promotions.

"So my arrest will look like the Feds are pressuring me to for information about anything I know that caused this shootout...the Thai drug operation, the IRA connection... and when I refuse to give it, they will prosecute me for the only thing they can get me for...Cain Priestly. It will demonstrate that I'm not a rat."

I followed everything Bodie has said closely. It all makes perfect sense. There is only one loophole I can see...

"But Lorcan said that there was some MI-6 mole that said there was informant inside Sixmob. Avery Thompson was not Sixmob."

Bodie sighs. "Yeah, that's the one thing we can't nail down. Whether or not Lorcan told that part to the IRA bosses, or how much detail he supplied them. It's possible that he shared his suspicion about me, and about TJ. Suspicion will be off me when I got to jail...but TJ..."

"TJ's going to jail, too?" Darius says. "He deserves it..."

"No, he doesn't Darius," Bodie says. "Of all of us Sixers, TJ doesn't deserve that. He got out of that life, he went straight, he worked hard, and he only got drug back into this fucking mess because Daemon got out of jail and you and your mom were caught in the middle of my power struggle with him, and that forced TJ to choose sides.

"He is innocent, more than anyone. His only crime is loving you and your mom so much that he couldn't let you go, and I'm sorry, I can't blame him for that, even if you and your mom do. It's true, he robbed me of the first thirteen years of your life, but he loved you and took care of you maybe better than I could have for a long part of that time, and I...I forgive him. And I think you should too. And soon. Very very soon."

My heart sinks and all the anger I feel at TJ rises to the top and evaporates off. "You think the Irish will move on TJ?"

Bodie nods. "I do. The CIA, Varrick, and TJ think that, too. That's why TJ is not at his house. Officially, TJ is in the morgue, killed at the Hangar two nights ago. Even the security footage of him entering the ER has been erased.

"TJ is dead as far as the world is concerned and the Feds are building him a new identity. Shay and the kids and Pat have already been secured too. Pat is going with him to his new life. Shay and the kids have to have a new identity too, but she...she's very upset, understandably. She knew nothing about his involvement with Sixmob. They have a lot to work out. They will be in a safe house for a while, until she and TJ decide if their new life will be together or separate."

Even before Bodie finishes the explanation, all of my attention has shifted to Darius. He's staring at Bodie blankly.

I'm around the bar in a second, but he holds me off with a warning hand.He sits there silently, in all the grief he can't express. He is mute, lost in the wilderness between child and man, not knowing how to process as either. He collects quietly into himself, looking down at his hands.

"Can we see him?" he says quietly.

"While he's in the safehouse, it can maybe be arranged," Bodie says slowly, "Afterward, in his new life, I don't know. It's not impossible, given our resources, I guess...but one photo any of us with TJ that ever goes to the internet, it could bring the whole deception to light for the Irish. I guess it depends on how long of a memory and thirst for vengeance the IRA have. It's more a question for Varrick and the CIA, I think..."

Darius shakes his head. "We shouldn't risk it. Ever. It's not just him we would be risking. It would be...you, too." He looks at his dad.

"Darius—"

Darius turns to me. "No, I think we should...just...say our goodbyes to him. It will be okay. Shay will go with him, I know she will. Even if she's angry, she loves him and a part of him loves her and she won't take his kids away from him. And it will be better for TJ, you see. He can have one family. He can let go of us. He won't feel so...conflicted..."

On the last word, Darius finds his way out of the gulf of unfeeling and he chokes, and his tears come and I know that the conflict is not and will never be, only TJ's.

Daemon is dead, but Daemon is not the father Darius will mourn.

I fucking lose it. Darius and I hug, both crying. Bodie's arms come around us and it only makes us cry more.

After a long time, Darius gently pushes us back, tears still streaming...

"Man, what the fuck. How are you just supposed to go to jail? What the hell are we supposed to do? Just act like it's okay, without you? This is fucking unfair!!!"

Bodie's own composure is thin. He looks to the ceiling to stem tears.

"Listen...I have thought about this a lot. And I need you to understand. This is not unfair. This is justice.

"All this shit started because I did a crime. I conspired with my illegal gang to roll up on a man and beat fear into him. We killed him. It was accidental but he was within his rights to defend himself from trespassers who meant him harm. And then I covered it all up. Not only are all those things crimes, I am responsible for a man's death. I am not the law and I am not god and no matter what that man did, I did not have the right to take his life from him."

"All this crazy shit ensued from trying to hide that series of crimes I committed. I didn't do it because I was afraid of jail—I been to jail, I know I can do jail. I did it so that I didn't have to leave you and your mama and my band. And now at end of it, I'm getting exactly what I deserve. I'm going to jail.

"I'm gonna survive it, because that's what I do, but I know what happens while you are stuck on the inside. Things change on the outside. You will grow and change. Your mom will change. Soundcrush will move on without me.

"I understand, I'm losing my life, and I don't know exactly what life I'm going to get back. But this is not unfair, because Cain Priestly is never getting his back."

Darius growls at Bodie and shoves him, then grabs him right back. "You are not losing me, do you hear me? And you better watch your back in there, because I can not lose you..."

Bodie laughs, breaks free, grabs Darius by the face.

"It's gonna be okay, Darius. Conspiracy and obstruction are white-collar crime. My well paid attorney won't have any work to do for me but work on my sentencing. I'll go to some minimum security Club Fed. I'll be the baddest motherfucker in the joint. It won't be bad at all...except no conjugal visits...they don't do those anymore," he says sadly.

Bodie accomplished his mission of distracting Darius with a joke.

"Gross. Who wants to have sex in a prison?" Darius groans and moves off to the fridge, in that teenage way, inappropriately ravenous.

"Boy, you don't know. I been there. You spend six months in prison with no privacy and dreamin' about your girl with no...relief...because you can't turn your back long enough to take any...believe me, you would have sex in any little broom closet they would give you," Bodie assures him.

I slap him repeatedly on the pec.

"Don't.Fucking.Joke.About.This."

He grabs me, pulling me tight.

"Are you gonna give me at least one certainty? Are you gonna marry me, or what?" he whispers.

"I thought that was a concussion talking," I murmur.

"It was a shitty proposal," he murmurs back, swaying me slightly, "but it was sincere. And actually... not even unplanned." From seemingly nowhere, he puts a small box in my hand.

He goes down on one knee. Shirtless, beautiful, sincerely and uniquely Bodie.

"I promised myself I wouldn't do this until I knew I could guarantee your safety, and our son's. I can do that now. I would live in purgatory a lot longer than eighteen months or even three years, knowing I get to restart my life with you at the end. I want to be your husband. I want to claim my son, and make our family real, in every way. I want to make all your dreams, any of your dreams, come true, in time. Jasmine. Marley. Please say you will marry me. Tomorrow. When they take me away, I want to know for sure what I'm coming home to."

I don't answer. I love him, but I'm frozen, because I'm terrified.

I know the violence and the precariousness of life on the inside. He can joke with Darius about a Club Fed, and I won't dispute the pretty picture he's painting for him. But he and I have both been to jail, and we both know we did not come out the same as we when went in.

How can I marry Bodie tomorrow, not knowing what man will come back to me?

"Mom. Say yes." Darius is gaping at us, the refrigerator door hanging open, snack in hand. I guess the pause has been longer than I thought.

"I...I..." I smile at Bodie. I open the case. I have no idea the ring looks like, because it's just a swimmy sparkle on the other side of my tears. "I love you, Bodie. So much."

Bodie sees it in my face or maybe hears it in my voice—the terror, the trauma. He rises, smoothly, slowly, taking the box from my shaking hands.

"It's okay. That was......a stupid grand gesture...too much right now. Of course we don't have to get married tomorrow." He snaps the box gently closed.

"I'm sorry..." I whisper. "I'm just...I'm so..."

"Mom!!!"

Bodie holds out a hand... "No, Darius. This is my fault...it's really okay...we've been through so much shit, this is just too much...way too much right now..."

"I love you," I whisper helplessly.

Even through my tears I see Bodie's jaw clench and the tenseness tightens in his shoulders again. "I know, baby. I love you, too."

His hand moves to pocket the box, and Darius yells, "God, Mom! At least wear the ring!"

Bodie and I stare at each other. My tears finally spill and I can see him clearly. No rock star visible, just an uncertain, boyish look. His eyebrows are lifted and his mouth is twerked cutely, but painfully, to the side. "You wanna? Wear it while I'm locked up, I mean? You don't have to. Just knowing you and Darius are free and safe is enough..."

"I..."

"Jesus fucking Christ!" Darius yells. He slaps down his string cheese and stalks over, jerking the box from Bodie, grabbing my hand, shoving the ring on.

"Congratulations! You are engaged. You don't gotta get married now, but you better get married after! After all this bullshit you put me through..." he grumbles, stalking away, grabbing his cheese, pulling a burner phone from his pocket, heading toward the stairs.

He disappears, but not before I hear him mumble, "Talk me down, G, because my parents got me on the ledge..."

He leaves us both staring at the ring on my finger. A gorgeous oval diamond lying east to west in a vintage setting.

"You can exchange it," he says softly. "I know we never talked about rings, or what you liked..."

"It's beautiful. It's perfect. It feels right to wear it, and I mean that."

The ring is perfect. The man is perfect. Being his is perfect.

It's just the timing that's fucked.

He pulls my hand to his lips. "Fiancée sounds good. It will good to think of you like that. Better than girlfriend."

My heart is breaking. He's trying to make everything okay when nothing is okay. I start to cry again.

"Shhh, now. I need Doc Gorgeous for this next part. Doc Gorgeous never cries in the face of a Soundcrush disaster..."

"Doc Gorgeous...is not...gonna exist...anymore...you know that..." I say between the sniffles I'm stifling.

"Like hell she isn't," he growls and swats my butt. "Come on, it's time to put our rock stars on."

Wow, that was a lot to happen in what chapter. I'm glad Darius finally got the scoop.

How are we feeling about Bodie and Marley's engagement. It's kind of bittersweet, both funny and sad, but I'm glad she's wearing his ring. I think they will make it, don't you?

But now, Bodie has to face the thing he dreads even more than coming clean to Marley and Darius. He has a lot of faith in Marley and Darius to stand by him, but he's not so sure about Soundcrush...and it doesn't look good, with Trace completely losing it like he has....here we go...final obstacle for Bodie...