Chapter Ninety:
In Review

Monday

“Baby?” Carly called from the bedroom in a moment of decisiveness. “Fair warning. I am wearing the jeans!”

“Which jeans?” Nikolas’s voice came from the bathroom and caused her some consternation.

“The bad jeans. The jeans I thought I lost.”

“Aren’t those the good jeans?”

“Not if they’re steeped with meaning,” Carly muttered mostly to herself, as she buttoned up the fly. She turned to the side and examined herself in the full length mirror. “Ok, yeah. They’re good jeans.” It was hard to argue with pants that fit.

She pivoted to face the mirror full-on and despaired, once more, at her hair. It would not be tamed. She’d already gone back and forth between letting it do it’s thing and trying to tie it down. She’d waken up that morning feeling safe and satisfied and ridiculously happy. Delighted, even. She’d even thought God, I love my life. And then she’d thought ‘five days’. And now she wasn’t at all certain what her mood was – but she knew she hated her hair, so she gave it all her burgeoning anxiety.

When Nikolas came back into the bathroom, fully dressed and showing none of the previous day’s hesitance – Thank God – she was still trying to decide on a top. “I suddenly hate all of these,” she told him, with an edge creeping into her voice. “You know what would be awesome? If we had, like, an actual home where all my clothes were.”

“We have a home. We have three homes.” He sat down on the chest at the foot of the bed and bent to tie his shoes. “Or two and a half at least.”

Carly paused to consider what the half was and then shook her head. “Or three halves, which ads up to 1.5 places to sleep and no total homes.” She pulled one of her light summer blouses over her head and made a face at her reflection. “Ok. I hate this one. Why do I even own this? Why do I own it and why did I grab it yesterday? What the hell made me think–”

She stopped dead. Nikolas had come up behind her, wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her back against him. She shut her eyes and put both her hands over his. “If you tell me to breathe,” she warned, “I will hurt you.”

He pressed his lips to her neck and said nothing for a long moment. Carly, much to her own irritation, spent the silence breathing. Then she felt tears come to her eyes and she turned around, slipped her arms around his neck and held on with all she had.

“I need to speed up time,” she managed, finally. “I was fine yesterday – Now it’s like… real life. And I can’t do five days of real life.”

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,” Nikolas soothed and Carly squeezed him tighter before stepping back from him. She looked up at him warily, but if he was holding a position, there as no sign of it.

“I can’t just sit around here. Or the Brownstone. Or whatever. I have to do something.”

Nikolas nodded. “Well, you’re seeing Kevin in an hour. That’s something.”

“Yeah, but THEN what?”

“House hunt?”

She hit his chest with the palm of her hand. “No! I don’t want to move, Jesus.”

“We’re going to get good news this week. And then we’re going to have to start planning. We’re going to need more room.”

“This place has more room.”

“This place has… a lot of things.”

She knew that. And he was right, they probably should find a place all their own. But she felt… Proprietary about this place. She wasn’t even sure why. They’d actually lived longer at the Brownstone – but she’d lived there far longer by herself and it still felt like her mother’s home. Or her institution. This place… This place was where Cinnamon was. Where any chance of redeeming herself with Stefan was. More than that, it was where she’d fallen in love with him. Her cheeks flushed hot, and she raised herself up on her toes, slid her arms up his chest and kissed him. Nikolas – who was being far more amenable than he had been the day before – responded in kind, letting things remain soft and gentle and utterly without subtext. When Carly pulled back from him, she picked up the conversation exactly where she’d left it.

“I can't do more upheaval. And you know what Alexis is going to say --"

"Yes," Nikolas admitted. "I know what Alexis is going to say. But she's not unbiased, and it's not going to make an enormous difference this week."

"I like the privacy we have here." She frowned. "With your father here, it might just be the illusion of privacy, but whatever -- I like it." She shot him a look. "I like having you all to myself."

Let it never be said she wasn’t capable of pushing Nikolas’s buttons. She watched his eyes as he took that in and knew the conversation – if not over – was at least going to be put on hold until next week.

Everybody wants to be wanted.

Tuesday

“What happened to you?” Lucky frowned as his cousin strode into Luke’s just after lunch, looking more than a little worse for wear.

“Kevin Collins,” Carly spat as she took the bar stool opposite her cousin. “In light of what he calls ‘my recent progress’. He wants me to make some lifestyle changes.”

“Haven’t you already done that? On an epic level?”

“Yoga.” She shook her head. “I am not even making that up. I just took my first class.”

Lucky grinned. “You’re kidding.”

“Honest to God, and it’s even worse than that. He doesn’t want me to do, like, strip mall yoga. He wants me to do the serious, salute-the-sun, deep breathing, say-namaste-like-you-mean-it yoga.” She stretched out her spine, mostly to make sure it was still working. “Do you know what it’s like to be in a room with that much earnest enlightenment?”

“I … can probably imagine. Have you seen Nikolas do tai-chi?”

“Yes,” She bit her lip, considering Lucky’s point and coming up with at least one major difference between the two pastimes. “But that has a certain aesthetic –“

“Ok, no,” Her cousin, ever vigilant, put up his hands and took a step back from her. “Stop that sentence right there. I never – ever – want to hear the end of that sentence, ok?”

Carly grinned at him. “Lucky. I think your brother is hot.”

Lucky was appalled. “I’m not kidding. Stop that. Now.”

She shrugged, already beginning to feel somewhat normal again. “You’re doing to have to deal with it. I don’t think I’m going to change my mind.”

“You can not talk to me about it,” He pointed out, though – unlike in days past – he leaned back against the back counter rather than absorb himself in shinning up the bar. “Please. Pick any annoying obsession of yours that you’d like. Shelled vs. salted peanuts, William Shatner’s blues career, whatever.”

“You playing guitar in front of actual customers…”

“I do that all the time.”

“Yeah, for the 3:30 suck-with-nothing-to-do crowd.” She drummed her fingers on the bar. “I have an idea.”

“Uh huh.”

“Besides the yoga stuff, the other thing Kevin wants me to do is find a project. Which, interestingly – and possibly creepily – enough… Was something you’d already said to me.”

Lucky eyed her warily. “I do not want to be your project.”

“That’s not what you said last time.”

“You need to invest in a sense of irony,” Lucky frowned. “And a sense of timing.”

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing,” Lucky moved forward and leaned on his own section of the bar, a good foot down from hers. “Are you sure he doesn’t mean he wants you to take up knitting?”

“Yeah, that’s what people generally think when they look at me. ‘I bet she’s a great knitter,’” Carly waited for Lucky to look at her, but he wasn’t having it. “I think we should put on a show."

“Great idea, Andy Hardy.”

“Dated reference, Judy Garland.”

At that, Lucky shot her a small smile.

“Oh, come on, Lucky. You need a project about as much as I do. I mean, there is no way you aren’t terminally bored right now. I’ve been watching you. All signs point to yes.”

“I’d tell you not to psychoanalyze me, but you sound more like you’re just asking questions to a magic 8-ball.”

Carly shook her head, and hopped off her stool. “I need a beer. It’ll help me think.”

“Don’t you have books to do?”

“I have a very high tolerance for alcohol, you should know that,” she sighed, coming around the end of the bar and picking up a glass to pour her own drink – in deference to Lucky, a gingerale. “This is sort of a beginning idea. But here it is… Elizabeth is right, you guys need a big show.”

“We do not need to do anything.”

“You WANT to do a big show. Come on. Wouldn’t it be a hell of a lot more fun to come up with something that’s interesting and yours and … you know, not lame?”

“I’ve thought about it.”

“So what stops you?”

She watched her cousin consider his answer for what seemed a long time. “Family obligations,” was his cryptic answer.

Carly took a long pull from her glass before asking, “Isn’t this whole place a family obligation?”

“It is.”

“So what is it? I mean, God forbid you actually have some fun here.”

Lucky gave her a long, level look, then turned away and pulled the ledger out from under the counter and pushed it into her arms.

“I’ll think about it.”

Wednesday

There were a lot of things Nikolas liked about being married. In addition to the more obvious “being with the woman he loved” side of things, he liked belonging to something, he liked the responsibility, and he liked how it trended things towards, if not the predictable, then at least the somewhat reasonably anticipated.

For instance. He could reasonably anticipate that Carly would be home when he got back from work, and he could reasonably anticipate that she’d be happy to see him. This was an even safer expectation if he called her before leaving to gauge her mood – something he was taking particular care to do this week.

What he had not reasonably anticipated was Carly greeting him as he walked in the front door of the guest cottage by coming at him in a run and essentially tackling him on the landing. But that was one of the things he liked about being married to Carly.

He was flat on his back on the landing just inside the door, just barely managing to keep up with the breathless kiss she was giving him. He was just finding his footing – so to speak – when Carly pulled back.

“Hi,” she flashed him a quick smile, before lowering her head to nuzzle his neck.

“Hi,” he managed, trying to clear his head. “What was that… War cry about?”

“War cry?” She popped up again. “Oh. No. That’s the sound Dino makes when Fred Flintstone comes home.”

Nikolas took advantage of her change of position to sit up and pull her hips closer to his. He laid a few soft kisses against her collarbone before asking, “Who is Dino?”

“Dino… Is a cartoon dinosaur. A pet-sized. . .” She dropped her head back and sighed. “Mmmm. I missed you.”

“Uh huh.” Her top was loose and he let his hands slip underneath it, running them along her waist and up her back.

“I’ve done nothing all day but think about you,” Carly moved her hands into Nikolas’s hair, rolling her hips against him. “Well. And go to see Kevin. And take Cinnamon out. And then wash off the Cinnamon smell. But the rest of the time….” She pulled back from him long enough to grab his mouth in a deep kiss. “I am feeling very keyed up.”

“Is that what the kids are calling it?”

“Shut up.” She was grinning, her eyes already bright, her breathing shallow. “Very, very… keyed up.” She pulled him into another sensuous, mind-obliterating kiss. “You?”

He truly wondered what straight man could possibly be anything else, given this scenario, but instead managed, “That phrase is a little more suggestive when I use it.”

“All the better.” She leaned back from him, slightly, and started to remove his tie. “You know – One nice thing about here instead of, oh, the Brownstone…” She grinned wickedly, and pulled the tie from around his neck with one hand. “We don’t have to go anywhere.”

“If this is about real estate –“

Carly started to laugh, even as she kissed him again, and reassured, “It’s not. I promise.” She cast her eyes upwards a moment. “It might be about things changing if we have a child in the house, though.”

“No child in the house right now.”

“Not yet,” she agreed. “But we’d better get it out of our systems. Because there’s going to be,” a slight note of insecurity crept into her voice. “Right?”

Ah. Alright. Nikolas reached up and pushed her hair back from her face, then slid his hands into her hair and directed her gaze to his.

“Yes,” He told her, without any room for debate. “Soon.”

She nodded and he could nearly see the faith she was putting into his words. “Also,” she admitted, still short of breath, “Kevin would probably say I’m sublimating my anxiety.”

Nikolas shrugged. “Well, what else are you going to do with it?”

“Exactly,” Carly gave him a watery smile and framed his face in her hands. “That’s exactly it,” she murmured, as she bent down to kiss him again.

Thursday

Carly burst through the door of the blessedly-empty office at Luke's and came to a dead stop.

This was not a good idea. She should have gone for the back door.

Pivoting on the spot, she made a change of direction only to run directly into her cousin, now standing directly behind her.

"Move," she hissed, even as he put a hand on her shoulder and she allowed him to push her back into the room as he pulled the door shut behind him.

"Calm down," he instructed her, which only served to further infuriate her.

"Calm DOWN?" her voice raised in pitch but not in volume. "Calm *down*? YOU calm down." She spun away from him, moving to pace the office, though there was precious little of it. “Jesus Christ. WHAT am I doing? What the hell am I even doing here?”

Lucky responded to this tirade by taking his cousin by the shoulders and steering her towards the couch. “Just stay here for TWO MINUTE. Count to 100 – I’ll be right back.”

Carly had allowed him to push her down onto the couch, only to jump up right back up, “Don’t patronize me, Lucky.”

“I’m not –-” He stopped long enough to glance back over his shoulder, as if there was something to be seen beyond the closed door. “Two minutes,” he promised, holding up the appropriate number of fingers. “Stay here.”

And then he was gone. For a lack of anything else to do, Carly sunk back onto the couch. She didn’t count. She breathed. With her head in her hands, bent over at the waist, she took deep measured breaths and tried not to run.

It was probably longer than the promised two minutes when Lucky burst back through the door and skidded to a stop, nearly confused by the lack of chaos. He awkwardly slipped his hands into his back pockets and eyed Carly cautiously.

“Better?”

“No,” she spit, raising her head. “You?”

“No,” Lucky muttered, pointedly. “You WERE early.”

“Good. Blame me.”

“I’m not blaming anyone,” he spun away from her in frustration. “God! It’s not like we never talked about this.”

Carly slumped back against the couch, arms crossed over her chest. “Talking about this is one thing, running smack into Emily Quartermaine the day before I’m supposed to find out whether or not I stand a chance of changing anything about Michael’s…” she stopped and pressed her lips together, firmly. Talking about this wasn’t going to help anybody.

“Emily and I are friends,” Lucky wasn’t long on patience. “We’ve been friends since we were kids. We talk. It’s not exactly high treason.”

“I didn’t say it was,” Carly bit out. She was furious – she knew she had no right to be and very little reason to be – and she hadn’t even known Lucky that long, not really – but honestly, treason didn’t feel far off, and Lucky could see right through her denial.

“Uh huh,” he leaned against the edge of his father’s desk. “Look, I don’t know what she was doing here. I didn’t exactly have time to find out. It was pretty clear from where I was standing that she didn’t expect you to be here.”

“Of course not, not if she was looking for information.”

“She knows damn well where my loyalties lie on this one, Carly. And she is the closest thing to a friend you have in the Quartermaine Mansion, believe it or not. You want it to stay that way.”

Lucky’s voice was soft, but vaguely threatening. She shot him a mutinous look.

“You really don’t know a damn thing about my dealings with the Quartermaines. Or Emily – and don’t think I don’t know about her and Nikolas. I’m not blind. I’ve seen her with him.”

Lucky cringed before dropping his head into his hands and letting out a muffled scream. “This is not about Emily – I mean, yeah, it probably is about Emily – but CHRIST. You’ve been a careening mass of manic energy all week. It’s like working with a human pinaball.”

Carly felt herself go cold at Lucky’s mostly-accurate description of her moods at the bar this week. “This is probably not a great time to use that word as your go-to description of me, Cuz.”

“Which word?” Lucky nearly sneered, and then did the math. “Oh. Ok, good point.”

“Thanks.”

“If anyone asked, manic isn’t the word I’d use.” He looked momentarily thoughtful. “Determined. Maybe intense.”

“Terrified.”

He gazed at her a moment, then gave a slight nod. “Ok, yeah. I guess that’s fair.”

Carly nodded, still feeling that intense chill. “Well, you try this out some time after you have kids. See how balanced you feel.”

She tried to force a laugh – tried to make that a lighthearted statement, but it died on the vine. Suddenly, she felt like she was going to cry. Lucy was watching her appraisingly. After a moment he pushed himself off the desk and threw himself down on the opposite end of the couch.

“I’m on your side.”

“I know.”

“So’s Emily. She’s just… also on AJ’s side.”

Carly managed a breathy laugh. “I have a hard time believing that.”

“Ok, then believe this – She’s on Michael’s side. And she thinks he deserves a mother.” He cleared his throat. “His mother.”

Carly cast her eyes in his direction. “I can’t. Right now? I can’t even… No. Just no.”

“Yeah, I guess not.” Lucky sighed. “You do need a project.”

“I need a time machine. I need to go to Friday night and just know.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t have a time machine.” “So how about a distraction?”

Carly felt pin pricks up her spine. “What’s that?”

“Look – this whole… Luke’s thing. It’s supposed to be about you demonstrating some kind of stability, right?”

“That’s what Alexis says.”

“Like you can keep a job, and the Cassadines and the Spencers can live in perfect harm-on-y,” there was a slight bitter edge to Lucky’s voice that Carly somehow understood had nothing to do with her. She nodded, feeling something close to anticipation.

“So … I promised Nik I’d do what I could do to help you out on this one. So far, that’s been… this.”

Carly willed herself not to make a face, and somehow succeeded. “Right.”

Lucky shook his head, bouncing his knee up and down a few times, before turning his body towards her and leaning across the space between them. “You really want to do this show thing?”

“Uh,” She hadn’t thought about that. She really wanted Lucky to admit she was right about the club and his playing, but … “Yeah,” she decided it was the right answer to his question. “I do.”

“So what if we could make it, like, an event.”

“Yeah?”

“Like, shine things up a bit in the process. Get the club more associated with Blues than mob shootings – and get you associated with … I don’t know, like… Something for the community, you know? Something –“

“Philanthropic.”

“Yeah.”

Carly broke out into a grin. “You found your angle.”

She was sure she saw Lucky redden – just a very little bit. “For a cause… I could be persuaded.” He leaned back. “So what do you think?”

“I don’t know,” she found she couldn’t stop smiling. “What’s our cause?”

Friday

“Carly?”

Nikolas called his wife’s name as he came through the front door, fresh from visiting his nearly-100%-recovered father. There was no answer and he looked around the living room for any sign of her.

He checked his watch before starting up the stairs. She might be out for a run, but she knew he was coming home early. He wasn’t going to be able to think about anything but the review, today, so he might as well keep her company while they waited. He made a cursory check of the other bedrooms as he moved towards their master suite, already pulling off his tie. She could have gone riding – that’s probably what he’d do in her place and it had definitely taken up a pretty substantial part of her week. If she had, he’d go out after her.

He found the door to their bathroom open and heard the sound of bathwater and followed it to find Carly sitting in their expansive tub, the scattered remains of her bubble bath floating on the surface. She was bent forward, her arms around her knees, in the closest thing to a fetal position as a person could manage while sitting down.

“Hi,” she gave him a weak smile. She w

“This is a really good bathtub, have I told you that?”

“You may have mentioned it.”

“If we DO move, we need to make sure it has a tub like this. You could probably actually swim in this.”

He nodded, then started towards her at a cautious pace. “I’m sure we could swing that.”

“And it actually keeps the water warm – which isn’t that spectacular in the summer, but … It means you can stay in here—“ she held up her pruned fingers, “forever.”

He tossed his jacket into a corner and put one hand on the edge of the bathtub as he leaned over to kiss her temple. She gave a smile that seemed almost like a flinch. “What time is it?”

“2:17,” he reported, sitting down on the steps that led up to the tub. “Exactly.”

“So it’s started.”

“Yes.”

Carly nodded, dully, then put her head down on her knees. “I feel like this is honestly killing me.”

“Ok. That’s enough.” Nikolas stood up and kicked off his shoes and removed his socks. Carly raised her head and looked slightly bewildered.

“What…?”

“Here,” He braced his arms on the rim of the tub and climbed in with her, still clothed in half his business suit. Carly started to laugh, sliding forward to make room for him, and was flat out giggling by the time he pulled her warm and naked body back against him. “Nothing’s going to kill you,” he murmured against her ear. “We’re just going to sit here and wait and slowly wrinkle.”

Carly leaned back into Nikolas’s embrace, her hands covering his, and let out a long breath. “I can’t believe I even made it this far,” she said, finally. “I just thinking… Hope is great and it’s good have it back and all, but I feel like this is really just about the most painful thing I’ve ever had to do, to wait…” She shook her head. “I hate this.”

“What was it like last time?” Nikolas spoke softly, not entirely sure she was going to want to talk about that.

“I had Michael last time,” Carly’s voice tightened. “I had to take care of him, so I just… Did it. And when they took him –“ Her voice cracked and she turned her face against his chest. “I think going crazy was the only way to let that happen. Just snapping – and I snapped, I totally did. So I didn’t have to pack up his stuff, or,” a large tear she’d been trying to ignore fell and rolled down her cheek. She brushed it away, impatiently. “I don’t know what to do this time.”

“This time, you’re going to win,” Nikolas said it with certainty, because he had certainty – absolute certainty – that they were going to re-open the case. There was too many powerful reasons not to. “Alexis is positive.”

“So is Kevin,” it came out of Carly in a near gasp. “He said he had no hesitation in recommending the visitation schedule be re-opened, right before he hit me with the yoga whammy.”

“How’d that go today?”

“It took up a full hour and a half, so whatever. That’s all I care about right now.” She moved restlessly against him. “Could you,” deep breath, “could you just hold me tighter?” Her voice squeaked on the last words, and then she turned her entire body towards him, as she started to cry. Nikolas wrapped one arm around her waist and brought the other up to cradle the back of her head as she buried her head against his neck. Nikolas stared straight ahead, feeling like he was made of steel – like his body was turning impenetrable out of sheer desire to protect her, to keep her safe and to give her what she needed.

And she needed this. She needed this more than anything. They hadn’t talked about it, all week, but it had been there in the space between them. This had to work, they had to get this, because without it, the precarious life they were building together would risk toppling. They wouldn’t want it to – but it would. Nikolas knew he couldn’t let it stand – if the Quartermaines somehow prevailed, if they pulled a string he hadn’t found, then he’d have to start playing dirty. He would do that, without hesitation. And he’d have to let Carly see just a little bit more of that dark part of him. He didn't want to do that. He wanted to win – he wanted her to win – because it was the only thing that made sense, it was the “right thing” in the eyes of the law.

That was the best way to do this, they’d all agreed on that. But as he held his wife while she cried, he was more aware than ever – it was only the only way to do this.

They were sitting on the couch downstairs in nearly the exact posture they’d had in the bathtub when the knock on the door came. Carly vaulted off of him before the sound had even faded, then turned to look at him, eyes wide. She was wearing a sweatshirt over jean shorts and her hair was still damp. She grabbed the folds of the sweatshirt in both hands like she was suddenly regretting it, and then hissed “What time is it?”

“4:30,” Nikolas said, grimly, as he got to his feet. “Stay here, it’s ok. It might just be one of the staff.”

Carly nodded, and sunk back onto the couch, running her hands through her hair several times, then wrapping both her arms around herself. Nikolas opened the door to reveal Alexis – and the moment he saw her, relief washed over him, so warm and sweet and complete that it nearly knocked him over. It let him without words, and Alexis raised her brow at him, expectantly.

“May I come in?”

“Absolutely,” Nikolas stepped back to let her in and in that moment Carly leapt back to her feet and nearly hurdled the couch

“Hi,” She managed, barely, before moving into a frantic “What is it? You’re smiling,” She wanted to ask if that was good news, but couldn’t seem to get any other words out.

“I am,” Alexis, confirmed. “And I’m also hoping you’ll both forgive me for coming to talk to you in person, because I wanted to see the look on your faces when I told you – It was a slam dunk. They’re allowing a re-evaluation of the visitation.”

The look on Carly’s face was gorgeous, Nikolas though, through a fog of emotion. She stared at Alexis, mouth slightly open, cheeks flushed, and eyes wide. Then she let out a soft, high-pitched, nearly keening sound, and then turned to Nikolas. She tried to say something – to form actual words – but it just came out as a breathy cry before she flew at him and threw herself into his arms. Nikolas grabbed her and lifted her off the ground, as her cry turned into a scream of triumph. He spun her around. “Congratulations,” He spoke against her ear. “You did it. You did it.”

“I, nothing,” Carly nearly sputtered, as he put her back on the ground. “You… Alexis –“ she turned around to face his aunt and tried to find words. “I… Just… I’d…” she let out a peal of shocked laughter before managing, “I mean, I’d offer you my first born child, but – “ she let out a shriek of joy. “You can’t have him!”

Alexis was beaming, her eyes flicking between her nephew and his wife. “It was always the wrong decision, Carly. Even without all the work you’ve done – It was always an extremely controversial and brutal decision. All I had to do was show up.” She reached out then and did something that startled Carly so much she jumped – she took her hand. “Listen, there’s more, though.”

Carly’s face immediately fell, and Alexis shook her head. “No! No, nothing bad. Not at all – But I told you we were going to ask for expediency and they’ve given it to us. Because of the delay in the review you should have had in February, we’re looking at less than a month before they will want you both to give depositions in preparation for the re-evaluation of the visitation schedule. We should have a new agreement in place by the beginning of September.”

Nikolas stomach flipped. He’d known that Alexis was going to do everything in her power, but that was pushing the boundaries of the possible. “Are you sure? That soon?”

“Something rotten in the state,” Alexis pointed out. “They do not want us to make too much of the delay. In return, they won’t make too much of our not forcing the issues sooner. It’s all to our advantage. And Carly – Most importantly, I moved to have them reevaluate the location of the visitation immediately. They agreed that the current arrangement is probably not appropriate in terms of the location of your visit, and are open to moving your supervised visits, once AJ has been given sufficient notice."

Carly stared at her. “What are you saying?” she barely managed.

“I’m saying,” Alexis shook her head, unable to stop her smile from taking over her face. “Tomorrow is the last time you’ll be visiting Michael at the Quartermaine Mansion.”