Idle Hands
by Lionel

chapter 4

"The baby – Kristina – she – she was having trouble breathing," stammered the bodyguard on duty outside the front door. He wasn't usually the type to stammer, but he wasn't usually on the receiving end of Lorenzo Alcazar's wrath, let alone double-teamed by his even angrier wife. "The nanny took her to General Hospital. Johnny drove them."

"Was she conscious?" Alexis asked, her voice tightly controlled. She was furious and frightened, but instinct kept her calm enough to extract the information she needed.

"Yeah. She seemed sick, you know, and her breathing was really loud, like something was caught there."

"Why the hell didn't someone call us?" Lorenzo demanded angrily.

"The nanny tried to reach Mrs. Alcazar on her cell phone but there was no answer."

"What about me?" Lorenzo asked. "You knew where we were. You could have gotten in touch with Rinaldo."

"You – you said that you and Mrs. Alcazar weren't to be interrupted tonight."

"You imbecile!" Lorenzo spat out harshly. "You should have made an exception. I thought I made it perfectly clear that no one was to interfere between Alexis and her daughter."

"I'm sorry, sir. I thought … "

Lorenzo didn't hear the rest of the apology, because he realized Alexis had slipped by him and was heading toward the limousine that was parked around the side. He caught up with her as she was fumbling with the locked driver's door trying to get in. He put his hand on her arm, and she whirled around furiously.

"Where is my goddamn car?" she shouted. "I want my car back!"

"You're not driving anyway," he told her calmly, pulling her away from the door. He felt a pang of remorse. Her car had been one of the first things he took away from her, and though it had been almost justified for security reasons, he had done it mostly as a symbolic gesture, a brutal reminder of her loss of freedom. But now wasn't the time to feel bad about it. "You're too upset to drive, Alexis. And you've been drinking."

"I'm not drunk," she said, but she stopped fighting to get to the door.

"No, but you're not 100%." He caught her by the elbow and steered her over to his little black sportscar. "I'll drive. We'll get there faster." He held open the passenger door, and she climbed in awkwardly.

"You've been drinking, too."

"No, I haven't. I've been drinking club soda since dinner."

He closed her door and walked around the car. When he got in on the driver's side, she was glaring at him and shaking her head in disbelief. "You bastard. You got me drunk." She considered again the course the evening had taken, the way everything seemed to be just a bit out of her control, the way he always seemed to be a step ahead of her, pulling her faster than she wanted to go. It had all been a game, but it wasn't her game this time. He was manipulating her. And she'd been ready to go to bed with him. "I can't believe you got me drunk to take advantage of me."

Lorenzo laughed almost scornfully as he started the engine. "I thought you weren't drunk."

"Obviously I'm not 100% or I wouldn't have exhibited such colossally poor judgment."

"Clearly we both made colossal misjudgments tonight," he shot back. Looking over his shoulder, he backed the car roughly out of the garage, his jaw clenched tight with restraint. He was furious with her, too, but he didn't want to burden her with his anger right now. He wasn't that much of a bastard.

"I can promise you it won't happen again," she said haughtily.

He threw the car in gear and pulled away hard. He didn't want to lose his temper with her, especially not right now, but the easy accusations she'd thrown at him when she discovered Kristina and her nanny gone, and the harsh words she'd used, still echoed in his ears. He was stunned, hurt even, that she would assume that he'd done something to her daughter, and worse still that he'd somehow used this evening as a cover for his nefarious plotting. How quickly all of her hatred and anger had rushed to the surface, desire drowned out in her rush to judgment. It wasn't hard to imagine that he had caught a glimpse of how his brother died, and the knowledge made his stomach burn. This was the woman he had been so eager to take to bed.

"I didn't get you drunk, Alexis,” he countered sharply. “You drank what you wanted. I didn't give you refills you didn't ask for, I didn't encourage you to have another, and I certainly didn't start you off with a shot of vodka. That was your decision."

"Can you blame me?" she tossed back, annoyed that he knew she'd needed help for her performance tonight. "Faced with the prospect of yet another evening spent with you and your half-cultured friends, I think I would have been justified in downing half a bottle of vodka to dull my senses." She regretted the words even as she said them, but she was too riled up to take them back.

Lorenzo flinched, but resisted the urge to respond to the barb in kind. They were both silent, cooling off in their separate corners, and after a minute he gestured toward the glove box. "There's a cell phone in there if you want to call the hospital."

"Thanks," she said grudgingly. She found the phone and spent several minutes trying to get through to someone at the hospital who could tell her something about Kristina. Finally she gave up and tossed the phone back in the glove box. She closed it roughly and leaned back, her arms crossed and a tight, angry look on her face.

"We'll be there in five minutes," he reassured her. He tried to offer a reassuring smile to go with the words, but he couldn't muster more than a cold, bitter curl.

*****

Lorenzo dropped Alexis off at the emergency room entrance and went to park the car while she rushed inside to track down Kristina.

"I'm looking for my daughter, Kristina Davis," she told the first hospital worker she found. "She's two years old. She – she was having a hard time breathing, and her nanny brought her in."

The nurse smiled and nodded. "Yes, yes, I had the pleasure of meeting Kristina earlier."

"She's okay?"

"She's okay. Just a bad case of croup. I'll page Dr. McKinney and let him know you're here; he can fill you in. In the meantime, she's in the fourth room down on the right. Her father is in with her."

"Her father?" Even as she headed down the hall, Alexis looked back at the nurse with a confused expression on her face. When she reached the fourth door, she peered around the open door cautiously. Kristina was lying in a big hospital bed, the back tipped up, and she appeared to be asleep, but her chest moved heavily with each noisy breath. She looked much too small for the big bed, especially in the hospital-issue pajamas she wore, but she was being watched over by an attentive guardian.

"Ned."

Ned turned around when he heard his name, and greeted Alexis with a tired smile. Wearing jeans and a sweatshirt and a day's growth of stubble, he'd obviously been pulled from bed, though it was barely midnight. He held his finger to his lips instructing her not to make too much noise, and waved her into the room.

"She just fell asleep," he explained softly.

"How is she?"

"She'll be fine. She's sick, but the worst should be over. They gave her a nebulizer treatment to clear her airways and some Motrin to bring down her fever. It seems to have helped."

Alexis nodded, and then looked at him with a perplexed frown. "What are you doing here?"

Ned smiled. "The hospital called me when no one could reach you. I'm on her records. I just got here about half an hour ago. Hope it's okay that I sent Viola home."

Alexis nodded, but didn't comment. She moved further into the room, standing next to Ned at Kristina's bedside, and lightly touched the little girl's cheek. Her curls were matted slightly against her skin, the residue of her earlier fever. Alexis frowned as she stood over her daughter, saying a silent apology for not being there. Ned pulled two chairs up to the side of the bed, inviting Alexis to sit down. She pulled off her cloak without thinking and laid it over the back of her chair, and then she sat down wearily.

Ned looked her up and down, eyebrows raised. "Wow. You look … "

"Like a prostitute. I know."

"No. I was going to say amazing. You look amazing. A little worse for wear, but … damn." He heaved a heavy sigh as he sat down next to her.

Alexis offered a feeble smile. "Thanks."

"I take it you were out on a date?"

"Something like that."

"With Lorenzo?"

"He is my husband."

Ned nodded thoughtfully, and she could see he wasn't going to leave it alone. He never could. "You know, I've seen you out with your … husband … a few times, and I don't recall you ever looking like this. Usually you look like you have a steak knife under the table and you're just barely holding yourself back from using it. Has something changed?"

Alexis frowned at Ned's choice of imagery. "It's complicated, Ned. As I'm sure you've guessed."

"Yeah," Ned acknowledged. "And that's why I've never pressed you to explain what you were thinking by marrying Lorenzo Alcazar. I only know one thing that could have made you walk down that aisle, and she's lying in the bed here." Alexis smiled tightly, but opted not to confirm anything. Ned squinted at her, then nodded in understanding. "Are you okay?" he asked carefully.

"Basically."

"And is Kristina okay? Apart from battles with the usual childhood illnesses?"

"Yes. She's safe. And that's the only thing that matters."

"That's important," Ned conceded. "But it's not the only thing that matters."

"I'm okay, Ned. Really. I'm a big girl."

Ned nodded, but she could see he didn't believe her. "And did you have as nice a time as it appears tonight?"

Alexis smiled bitterly. "Nicer than I should have. It was a mistake." She stood up, putting her back to Ned, and leaned over Kristina's bed. For a long minute she watched the little girl fiercely. "You know…" she began hesitantly.

"What?"

She was silent a beat before she decided to proceed. "You know I don't like making mistakes."

"Yes."

"And I'd like to think I don't make that many. But when I do it seems like they are always so monumental … " She bit her bottom lip for a moment, then released it with a sigh. "There's everything that happened with Luis Alcazar … running from our wedding …. Sleeping with Sonny was a mistake. A big mistake. And the repercussions just keep coming and coming. I have paid a price I never thought I would pay. And so have you. You were right about all of it, Ned." She shrugged wistfully and glanced back at Ned for a moment before returning her gaze to Kristina. "But I can't regret it because it created this amazing little girl. She is a blessing. How do I reconcile that?"

Ned stood up next to her and put his hand over hers on the mattress. "I don't know. Maybe you don't. Maybe you just accept that it isn't something that can be sorted into neat and tidy boxes."

Alexis let out a slow breath. "I have tried to make up for my mistake. From that day all I have tried to do is make the best of a very bad situation, and to keep this little girl safe, and that's all I'm trying to do now. I would do anything to make things right for her so that she doesn't carry the burden of the mistake that made her. I’m just not sure I know how. Sometimes it seems like everything I do only makes things worse. I'm afraid I can't even recognize when I'm making a mistake anymore."

She rested her cheek heavily on her palm, and Ned rubbed her back. He licked his lips, hesitating before speaking. "I know you would do anything for her, Alexis. The thing you're lousy at is doing nothing. But maybe that's what you need to do to stop making things worse. You can't erase Sonny from her. And it seems a shame to give up your own life trying. You deserve more."

Behind them they heard Lorenzo clear his throat, and they both straightened up and turned around. He was leaning against the door, looking casual and comfortable in his slightly rumpled tux with his black tie hanging loosely around his neck. Knowing his habits, Alexis suspected he'd been standing there for quite awhile. She wondered briefly whether she'd said anything that would come back to haunt her, but she didn't really care at the moment.

Lorenzo waited, his husbandly feathers slightly ruffled, but when no apology or explanation for the intimate moment was forthcoming, he spoke first. "How is Kristina?"

Alexis turned back around, not quite ready to offer him any information about her daughter, and returned her focus to Kristina, letting Ned answer the question. She was grateful to him for the effort he made to be civil.

"She'll be okay," Ned said. "She had an attack of croup, but it's subsiding."

"What's that?"

"A viral infection of the larynx. It made her throat swell up. It happens sometimes when kids get colds."

Lorenzo walked to the other side of Kristina's bed and peered down at the sleeping child. For all of his efforts to keep his distance from her, still she had charmed him on occasion, and seeing her like this, sick and small and sleepy, struggling to breathe, tugged at his heart.

"When can we take her home?"

Ned shrugged. "They want to watch her for a few hours to make sure she keeps improving. The pediatrician on duty should be by again soon."

"You don't need to stay, Lorenzo," Alexis offered, eager for some distance.

"I'll make sure that Alexis and Kristina get home," Ned added.

"No, that won't be necessary. Of course I'm staying." He crossed his arms and smirked at them on the other side of the bed. His wife and her former fiancé, standing too close together for his taste, bonding over a sick child they pretended was theirs. He didn't like any of it. In fact, it made him furious. "Perhaps you'd like to be getting home, Mr. Ashton. I appreciate your being here for Alexis's daughter, but I think my wife and I have it from here."

Ned's body language changed in response to Lorenzo's pointed arrows, and he opened his mouth to strike back, but Alexis put her hand on his arm. "You really don’t need to stay, Ned. I'm going to be here anyway -- you know that -- and I'd feel better if I knew at least someone was home getting some sleep. Thank you for everything though."

Ned nodded, letting her push him toward the door. "You're going to be okay?" he asked quietly as they stood in the doorway.

Alexis forced a smile and nodded. "Yes. Thanks very much for coming down."

Ned sighed with some reluctance, then gave her a quick kiss on her cheek and turned to leave. Once he was gone, Alexis sat back down and Lorenzo moved around the table to take the seat next to her. He slung his arm over the back of her chair, and she sat up very straight to avoid contact with him.

"Ashton seems like a prick. Why were you with him?"

A rather unladylike guffaw bubbled up from Alexis's throat. "Pot. Kettle. Black. Trust me, people are much more perplexed by why I'm married to you."

"Were you in love with him?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you marry him?"

"Because he didn't ask me as nicely as you did."

Lorenzo allowed a small smile at her jab. "Do you regret running?"

"There's no simple answer to that. Why are you asking?"

Lorenzo shrugged. "Just curious."

"Go over to the gift shop and get a book. I'm not here to entertain you."

"You're more entertaining than any book. Even when you do things that remind me how much I despise you, you never bore me."

"Should I be flattered?"

Lorenzo considered the question. "No. But you should answer my question. I heard you tell Ashton running was a mistake. Do you regret it?"

She sighed. The man wasn't going to leave her alone. "Yes and no. Running was a mistake, but not marrying Ned was probably a blessing."

"Just like sleeping with Corinthos was a mistake, but Kristina is a blessing."

"Maybe."

"Do you regret killing my brother?"

She hesitated to answer, but there was no anger in his bearing. "Yes and no."

"You're glad he's dead but you wish you hadn't killed him?"

"Something like that. Despite what you believe, I have paid for it and continue to pay for it every day. Much like sleeping with Sonny, killing your brother has had seemingly endless repercussions for me and my daughter."

"Including marrying me."

"Yes."

"Was that a mistake?"

"I had no choice."

"You could have said no."

"And then you would have told Sonny."

"Yes. Do you think it was a mistake to marry me?"

Her eyes flashed to her daughter, then back to him. "I don't know yet. Probably."

"Do you regret it?"

"Not yet. At least she's safe and with me."

"That's why I'm a lesser evil than Corinthos, isn't it? Because he'd take her away."

Alexis licked her lips, debating whether to answer honestly. "Yes," she admitted finally. "Keeping her with me is essential. I'm the one person whose priority is to keep her safe and happy."

"You don't think Sonny would make her a priority?"

"I know he wouldn't. He can't keep her safe."

"And I can?"

"I can. With your help. So far I've been satisfied with your procedures."

"And the rest of it? Your own life?"

She shook her head dismissively. "Doesn't matter."

"Making the best of a bad situation," he said quietly, echoing her earlier words. "Is that what was going on in the car earlier? Making the best of a bad situation?"

Alexis squinted, turning her eyes back to Kristina. She almost wished that had been her motivation, or that she'd been seducing him for her own purposes, but the truth was she had simply lost control. "No, that was just a mistake."

Lorenzo nodded thoughtfully. "Good. And if we hadn't been interrupted, would you have regretted it?"

"Yes."

"Not 'yes and no' this time? Just 'yes'?"

"Yes. Wouldn't you?"

"We're not talking about me."

"And I would prefer it if we weren't talking about me. We're done now." She glared at the arm he had thrown across her chair until he finally removed it, but then she stood up and moved closer to the bed anyway.

Lorenzo leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms, retreating for the time being. He watched her carefully as she stood over her daughter, knowing she was trying to ignore his gaze. "To answer your question, Alexis, I agree it was a mistake." He saw her shoulders stiffen slightly. "But I don't think either of us would have regretted it."

*****

It took awhile for Kristina's breathing to settle to a more normal effort, and it was almost four o'clock by the time they were finally able to leave the hospital. Lorenzo called for his driver and rode back in the limousine with Alexis and Kristina, leaving his car in the hospital lot. He was silent, with nothing acerbic to say, no desire to needle Alexis. He felt beaten down, not just by the late hour but by the dizzying barrage of moods he'd been pelted with tonight.

He felt like he'd been cycling through emotions for hours. It seemed so long ago that the evening had begun with attraction and admiration and an almost playful gamesmanship, and those delicious moments of outright lust and rising need. Those pleasant feelings had been replaced too quickly by hostility and anger, and then jealousy when he saw her with Ashton. He hated feeling jealous. It made him insecure and angry, which was part of the reason why he put up with so much from Carly, supported her ad nauseum through her indecisive flailing about her marriage: he didn't want to be reduced to feeling jealous of her husband. Ashton was irrelevant, of course, not an obstacle to anything, and he'd been easily dismissed, but still the ugly feeling had lingered, and with it its twin of territoriality, and so Lorenzo had insisted on staying at the hospital, not to trouble her but because it was his place. They were both too weary to be openly antagonistic, and as the hours passed and he watched her mother her daughter – adding more layers to his perception of her to further strain his resolve to be cruel – they had fallen into a quiet, barb-less companionship. On the way home, she barely acknowledged him, but she also didn't recoil from the incidental contact that somehow led to him holding her hand.

When they reached the compound and climbed out of the car, he followed closely beside Alexis, mindful of the unstable heels she wore, as she carried Kristina into the house and to her room. He hovered in the doorway watching her settle the girl down to sleep in her crib.

"I'm going to stay here and keep an eye on her for awhile," Alexis told Lorenzo, her air of cool authority almost daring him to object.

He didn't object, and he turned and walked down the hall to their bedroom alone. It was just as well. The mood of earlier was long shattered, and whatever tentative rapprochement had emerged over the last two evenings was a memory. The sight of the red chemise he'd planned to put her in tonight lying where he'd dropped it earlier brought a bitter smile to his face. He picked it up and shoved it in her drawer, then took off his clothes and lay down on the bed.

He was grateful to be alone. His brain was on overload, struggling to process too many bits of data already, and he couldn't handle any more inputs right now. He couldn't handle lying next to her, feeling her so close by, hating her … wanting her. He gripped the bars of the headboard tightly. In spite of everything, he still wanted her, but that was just his body speaking. His body could be tamed if his mind was strong, and all in all the evening had strengthened his resolve. Yes, she'd seduced him briefly, made him forget his anger, dangled her best self in front of him like a sparkling gem, and he'd bitten hard on the lure. But it had turned out to be shards of glass, pretty in the right light, but lacerating. He wasn't likely to forget.

*****

Alexis woke up the next morning in Kristina's room, sitting in the big, soft yellow armchair they always read in together. She had fallen asleep watching Kristina breathe, and she was still wearing the red dress, but someone – presumably Lorenzo – had spread a heavy cotton blanket over her so she was uncomfortable but not cold. It was dark in the room thanks to the blackout shades, but she could see traces of sunlight outside. Slowly she pulled herself out of the soft chair, groaning as she uncurled her back. Kristina was still asleep in her crib, breathing fairly easily and looking almost peaceful.

Alexis stumbled down the hall to the master bedroom. Thankfully, it was empty, and she practically ripped off the inadequate dress and uncomfortable underwear she'd been wearing for much too long. She slipped on her robe and wandered toward the kitchen in search of coffee. She almost ran into Lorenzo as she entered the kitchen, and he put his arm around her waist to steady her.

"Good morning," he said with a polite smile, but his eyes were dark and stormy. He seemed furious about something. He was already dressed in a suit and held a file in his hand, so she hoped it was about business.

"Good morning," she mumbled. He stepped aside, clearing her path to the coffee machine, but then he followed and leaned against the counter watching her as she filled her cup. Her shoulders tensed as she waited for whatever was coming, but when he spoke his words were innocuous.

"How is Kristina?" he asked.

"Still sleeping peacefully. She seems much better. What time is it?"

"A little after nine. You both slept in."

"Nine?" she yelped, spilling hot coffee on her hand. "Dammit. I'm due in court at 9:30."

"No, you're not." Lorenzo moved to the sink and turned on the cold water, gesturing to her to come over.

"I'm not?" She ran her hand briefly under the cold water.

"I took care of it."

She stared at him. "Excuse me? You did what?" She felt her outrage building anew. The jerk had probably closed out her practice entirely while she slept.

"I called your office and spoke to your secretary this morning," he explained patiently. "I told her that you were at the hospital all night with your sick child and that you wouldn’t be in today. I asked her to cancel all your appointments."

She squinted at him. That didn't sound all that bad. Maybe it was even a nice gesture, if not particularly effective. But still there was something off about his manner. "You can't just cancel court, Lorenzo. The judge will be furious if I don’t show." She set down her coffee cup and started to leave to make the necessary phone calls and throw on some clothes.

He caught her by the arm, his grip a little too tight, and pulled her back toward him. He spoke too intensely too close to her ear. "Relax, Alexis. She made arrangements for another lawyer to appear in your place, and I spoke to your opposing counsel and asked him to make allowances. He was very understanding."

"You spoke to Ric?" That worried her.

"Yes, I spoke to Ric. As you can see, I did nothing outrageous. Once again, you've jumped to conclusions." He finally released her arm and shrugged with a non-chalance he obviously didn't feel. "You have the day off to take care of your daughter. Enjoy it."

She nodded cautiously. "Thank you. I … appreciate it."

"You're welcome."

He gestured toward the kitchen table, where breakfast was already set out, but she hesitated to obey his instruction to sit down. There was something he was holding in, something that was burning him up, and it seemed to be directed at her. He looked like he wanted to hit her, or throw her up against the wall and ravage her, and she had no idea what to make of it. Perhaps it was just the residue of the previous evening's catastrophes. They were both trying to behave as if last night didn't happen -- at least none of the kissing. Certainly her accusations were still heavy in the air, but the rest of it, the part where they had been about to have sex, seemed to have vanished into the ether. She was glad. It would have been a terrible mistake. But a certain awkwardness was only natural, wasn't it?

"Where is Viola? She isn't still sleeping, is she?"

"She's out. I gave her the morning off. I wanted to have some time alone with you."

The alarm bells sounded louder in her head, and she moved away from him and sat down at the table. She picked up a section of the newspaper and started to scan the headlines, sipping alternately at her fresh orange juice and coffee and picking at her melon. Eventually he followed and sat down next to her with his own cup of coffee. At first he just watched her, and then he started glancing through the papers in his file.

Just as she started to relax, he tossed the file down on the table. "By the way, when I spoke to Ric he mentioned how much he liked the dress you wore last night."

Her stomach tensed, and she cursed the rubbery fingers that made her knife slip from her grasp as she tried to cut her melon. The knife clattered to the table loudly. "Did he?"

Lorenzo picked up the knife by its blade and offered it to her, but when she tried to take it he didn't let go. The blade pressed into his palm until she stopped pulling. "He did. I thought that was interesting. I couldn't help but wonder why the district attorney had seen my wife dressed for a dinner to which she showed up forty-five minutes late. And then I spoke to the head of your security detail and I learned something else interesting. It appears that you meet with Ric just about every day, sometimes two or three times a day, and you speak to him even more often than that. Now, I'm not a lawyer, and I'm certainly not a defense attorney, but that strikes me as unusual. Obviously I haven't been paying as much attention as I should to what you do when you're at work." He put his other hand around her wrist, squeezing firmly until she dropped her end of the knife, and then he set it down and clasped her hand in both of his. "Tell me, Alexis, are you having an affair with Ric Lansing?"

She felt her heart skip a beat and returned his icy gaze. "No, I'm not," she said calmly.

He seemed to believe her, and she could see relief move over him, easing some of his odd intensity. "Good. I can't really imagine how you would manage it, but if you did the consequences would be severe for both of you." Lorenzo nodded thoughtfully. "But you're friends?"

"I'd prefer to drink my coffee before any further interrogation."

"There's no point in evading my questions, Alexis. By the end of the day I'm going to know everything about you and the D.A." He nodded vaguely toward the file on the table, and she guessed it contained surveillance reports. "You're friends?"

"Yes. We've been friends for some time."

"You were more than friends."

"We dated briefly until you demanded that I marry you. There really wasn't much to it, and there's been nothing inappropriate since we were married."

"Good. You do know that adultery would be an irreparable breach of our agreement?"

"My adultery. Yes."

"I've been perfectly faithful, darling."

"Apart from the fact that the entire premise of our marriage is that you're using me to make Carly jealous."

"Not the entire premise, Alexis, and that really isn't the point."

She eased her hand out of his grasp and stood up. "What is the point, Lorenzo?" She walked back to the coffee machine for an entirely unnecessary refill in her effort to get away from him, but he followed her and was right there when she turned around again, so close she had nowhere to go.

"The point, Alexis, is that I've allowed you to continue working and I've granted you quite a bit of discretion over how and when you do your job. I really think I've been quite generous on this point until now, and I can't tell you how upset I was to learn that you'd taken advantage of my generosity. I trusted you, because I thought I could. You've been admirably upfront about everything else in our arrangement. I respected that about you, that you absorbed the difficulties of your situation without resorting to useless tantrums and undignified subterfuge. But it turns out I was wrong, and I'm very disappointed in you."

He knew he was standing too close to her, that he was making her uncomfortable, and that something dangerous was stirring in his own blood, but he couldn't back off. He liked the way she looked at him, her eyes wide and watchful, forced calm laced with caution. He moved even closer, drawing contact with her hips, and saw the flare of something in her eyes. Fear? Desire?

"I'm so sorry I disappointed you, Lorenzo," she cooed sarcastically.

He raised his hands and curved them around her face gently, willing himself to stay calm. "You're not to see Lansing again," he told her quietly. "At all. And if that means you can' t do your job, so be it. And while we're on the topic, you're not to see Ashton either. I'll make a final decision about whether you can continue working tomorrow, but I'm not feeling very generous at the moment."

She met his gaze steadily, but he could see the worry flickering in her eyes. "That's jealousy speaking, not logic, Lorenzo. Eventually you'll need me as your defense attorney and be glad I have a good working relationship with the D.A."

"It's not a matter of jealousy, Alexis. It's a matter of rules. You're fighting me, and I don't like it." Sure you do, a voice in his head taunted.

She put her hands over his and pulled them down from her face, and then she pushed him firmly away from her. He retreated, giving her back her personal space. He'd made his point, reminded her of his claim, and now he felt calm again. It was simply a matter of re-establishing and enforcing ground rules.

"You can't expect me not to fight, Lorenzo. I need to maintain my practice."

"Why?"

"Because eventually you'll be done torturing me. I'd like to have a life to go back to."

Lorenzo tipped his head and frowned. "I hope you're not counting the days until you're free of me, Alexis, because that day may never come."

"Sure it will," she countered, though she believed it less and less. With a calm she didn't feel, she headed back to the table to resume her breakfast. "Sooner or later you'll get what you want, and you'll need me out of your life."

"You think I'll get what I want?" He followed her to the table and stood with his hands on his chair. "You've told me again and again that Carly would never leave Sonny. Have you changed your mind?"

"Yes," she lied.

"Why?"

She shrugged. "I've seen how persistent you are. You'll eventually get what you want, one way or another. And then Kristina and I will go on our way."

He smiled as he saw her game. "I think you're lying, but thanks anyway for the vote of confidence. But you don't have to worry about the state of your practice. If and when we ever go our separate ways, I'll see to it that you and Kristina are very well supported."

She rolled her eyes in disgust. "I don't want your money, Lorenzo. I can take care of myself and my daughter, as long as you don't destroy my professional standing."

"You don't need to work, Alexis. You won't ever need to work again."

She held up a hand in the air. "I need to work. Trust me."

He shook his head. "Don't you ever take the easy way, Alexis? Can't you just relax?" He wasn't sure why the question provoked a gale of laughter.

"Um, no," she finally managed to answer. She picked up her paper and opened it to its full expanse, effectively cutting him off and dismissing him from her breakfast. He had things to do anyway, so he headed toward the door.

"I'll be home for dinner," he called to her. She didn't look up from her paper, and he watched her for a moment. "Enjoy your day off."

*****

When Kristina went down for her regular nap a little after lunchtime, Alexis succumbed to her own exhaustion and went to the bedroom to rest. Treasuring a rare hour alone in bed, with Lorenzo off doing whatever it was he did all day under the guise of 'work', she took off her clothes and slipped under the covers in just her underwear. The cool sheets against her bare skin soothed her frazzled nerves, and soon she was drifting off.

She awoke some time later to the shifting of the mattress, and when she opened her eyes she saw Lorenzo's back. He was sitting on his side of the bed, leaning over to take off his shoes. She blinked her eyes several times, trying to clear her head of the fog of sleep. As one of his heavy shoes hit the floor with a thud, she woke up enough to remember that she wasn't wearing much, and she pulled the covers up to her neck.

"What are you doing here?" she asked.

He didn’t turn around. "I'm exhausted. I'm going to take a nap."

"No, you're not."

"Yes, I am." He stood up and pulled off his shirt, then began work on his buckle.

"You don't nap."

"How would you know?"

"You're a man. Men don't nap. Maybe you fall asleep on the couch, but you don't take off your clothes and get in bed."

"Well, this man is going to take a nap. Unlike you, I was up at six." His pants fell to the floor, leaving him wearing only his boxer briefs, and he turned around to face her.

She burrowed deeper beneath the covers. "I thought you were at work."

"I came home." He tugged on the covers to pull them down, almost yanking them out of her grip. She felt the rush of cool air over her body where the sheet had billowed up a bit, and then he had climbed in bed next to her and the covers settled down again and everything was warm.

"Can't you go someplace else?"

"This is my bedroom, Alexis. This is my bed. This is where I sleep. If you're not comfortable, you can leave. I assure you your virtue is safe with me, but I'm not going to insist that you stay today. In fact, I'd prefer it if you didn't."

"Why?" she asked doubtfully.

He didn't answer. He closed his eyes and reached his hands above his head, wrapping his fists loosely around the bars of the headboard, his face etched in a grimace. Obviously he did want to be alone, and she would have been happy to leave but for her reluctance to walk across the room in her underwear. Her clothes were draped over a chair fifteen feet away; her robe hung in the bathroom. And he didn't look like he would fall asleep anytime soon.

"Is there something wrong that I should know about?" she asked quietly.

He sighed and shook his head, but he didn't open his eyes. "No. It's personal."

She couldn't help but smile a little. "You might find it a useful reflection on the way you run your life to consider that you've just told your wife, who's lying next to you in bed pretty much naked, that she doesn't need to know about something because it's personal. That should strike you as a bit bizarre."

He opened his eyes and turned his head to look at her as if he hadn't considered what she was wearing before. He scowled slightly at finding her so tightly covered, and he reached his hand beneath the covers to confirm her statement.

"Hey!" she yelped as she felt his hand on her ribs.

"Just checking." He lingered just a few seconds, his thumb brushing over her skin, and then he pulled his hand back to his own side. "So that's why you're still here? Too indecent to get out of bed?"

"I wasn't expecting company."

"I’m not company; I'm your husband."

"You're not that kind of husband."

He rolled onto his side and studied her very seriously. "I'd like to be," he murmured. "But I think you know that."

She shook her head slightly. "No, you wouldn't. Not really. You hate me."

"True," he nodded. "You're right, of course… But still I'd like to. Once. Wouldn't you?"

She fell perfectly still. "I hate you, too."

"That's not an answer," he chastised, but she offered nothing else. "You'd do anything for Kristina. If I insisted, you'd sleep with me, wouldn't you?"

"You won't."

He sighed wearily and rolled onto his back again. "No, I won't… not today at least. You can go ahead and leave. I'll close my eyes. I promise I won't peek."

"I don't trust you."

He smiled slightly. "That's probably wise."

She moved abruptly, dragging the comforter with her as she climbed out of bed. As she stood, she wrapped it around her shoulders.

"Hey!" he objected, trying to grab for it. "I need that."

"So do I. You can have it back later." Safely entombed in down, she picked up her clothes from the floor and swept toward the bathroom. When she came out again a few minutes later, dressed and dragging the comforter behind her, she couldn't tell whether he was asleep. She tried to be quiet anyway as she tossed the comforter across the bed and pulled it flat over him. She was turning to leave when he caught her wrist.

"Wait," he commanded.

"What is it?" she asked, pulling her hand free.

"Sit, please. I was wrong earlier. I realized that this is something you should know about."

He sat up, propping a pillow up behind him and drawing the covers up to his waist, making room for her to sit where his legs had been.

"I had lunch with Carly today," he began, prompting Alexis to wince. "She called me this morning, asked to see me."

"And is she ready to give you your heart's desire, Lorenzo?"

"No. Not completely. And I realize now that she never will be. It seems she'd be happy enough to have an affair with me. In fact she suggested as much. But it was quite clear that her real interest is to hurt Sonny and you. You're right. She's never going to leave Sonny, no matter what he does."

He left out the rest: how Carly had called him claiming she needed to see him immediately, sounding as if she'd come to some sort of realization, sounding as if she couldn't stay away; how he'd taken her to lunch and she'd gone on and on about Sonny's bad behavior, his dark moods, his distraction, laying half the blame on Alexis somehow and regaling Lorenzo with half a dozen impolite references to his wife; and how he'd sat there watching her, wondering when she would ever be done talking about herself, wondering whether she'd always been so selfish and whiny and unpleasant, whether she'd ever given a damn about him, and most of all wondering how it was possible to fall so completely out of love with someone all at once. It was as if some spell had been lifted, and he could see clearly at last, see what everyone else was talking about. She didn't love him, never had, tolerated him with some small fondness at best, gratitude for his utility perhaps, and what is more there was precious little to love about her. He'd been an idiot, a pathetic, delusional, castrated fool.

"I'm sorry," Alexis said, putting her hand gently on his leg.

Surprised by the genuine expression of sympathy, he returned his focus to her sharply. "It's okay. You don't owe me any concern for my feelings. I'm telling you only because this affects you and our marriage. As you pointed out earlier, the primary reason I insisted you marry me was to help me make Carly jealous. Although we've been as successful on that front as I could have hoped, it turns out that it doesn't really matter. And since I've given up my pursuit of Carly, there's no further need to make her jealous."

Alexis nodded carefully, wondering how hard she dared push him in his shell-shocked state. "Then I suppose there's really not much reason for you to want to stay married to me, is there? If you like, I can have annulment papers drawn up tomorrow."

Lorenzo laughed and reached for her hand, giving it a light squeeze. "Oh, no. You misunderstand me, Alexis. I'm certainly not letting you go. I said only that one of the original reasons for our marriage no longer stands as it once did. But my appetite for punishing you has hardly been sated. And more than that, I've found that being married to you has advantages I'd never dreamed of, and I'm not about to give them up."

"What advantages?" she asked cautiously, though she knew the answer. Once again, she'd dug her own grave deeper in her attempt to claw her way out.

"You've spent the last two nights charming some very important people on my behalf, and it's been an enormous benefit to me professionally. How would it look to them if we were to have our marriage annulled? That's damage I really can't afford, and there's no reason why I need to sustain it. Nothing's changed, Alexis. You still need me to keep quiet about Corinthos. And I need you to be my wife."

Alexis sat listening to him, her heart sinking with every word, as his smile grew wider and wider. "I'm sure we could manage a plausible explanation for a split, Lorenzo. One that wouldn't reflect badly on you."

"Oh, but I don't want to split, Alexis," he assured her. "Not only do I need you, I want you. For all of our … differences and difficulties, you're an excellent wife. All in all, it's been a pleasure being married to you, and I look forward to many more years of wedded bliss." He leaned forward to clasp her other wrist, and brought both of her hands together against his chest. His smile faded, and his gaze turned cold. "What god has joined, darling, let no man put asunder."

chapter 05