"You're coming with me." Fury told him through clenched teeth.

"I have no problem with explaining what I've found, Colonel, but I need to explain to Tessa why I did what I did." Brad told the furious spy. "I owe her an explanation."

"Make it snappy." Fury ordered. He signaled the waiting agents who had gathered the unconscious or injured rogues and dragged them off to the waiting helicopters

Brad grabbed Tessa by the arm and pulled her away from the crowd.

"Don't think of tryin' anything." Jubilee warned him. "I was taught to track by the best there is."

"I won't try anything, young lady." he assured her. "I only want to tell her in private."

"Around a telepath?" Emma said archly.

"You'd intrude on our conversation?" he asked.

"To keep Tessa safe, yes." she informed him.

He thought for a moment.

"You may collar me if you wish." he told her.

"I'll keep a nose on him." Wolverine said groggily from his position on the ground beside his partner.

"Wolvie!" Jubilee gasped. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah, darlin'." he said as she helped him to sit up. "I ain't gonna be movin' too quick fer a while but I'll live."

"Don't leave our line of sight." Scott told Brad, his eyes never leaving Fury. "If you do, I will give the order to kill you."

"Stand down, Cyclops." Fury said as Brad took Tessa a few yards from the group. "I ain't here to make trouble. I'm just going to arrest these bozo's and leave."

"You used me!" Tessa hissed at Brad as he pulled her a short distance away.

"I didn't have a choice!" he argued. "I had to hide the information. He tore my offices apart looking the day after I had the implant placed."

"But having me kidnapped?"

"I had to get you away from the assassin he placed with you. I couldn't do it on US soil so I had a friend bring in the slavers. They were paid to hold you but also to protect you."

"And what about Carol's murder?" she demanded.

"Who the hell do you think was the assassin?" he countered.

She was speechless. Carol? An assassin?

"Carol Rousch had been an assassin since she was sixteen." he told her. "Your father hired her to get close to you and keep an eye on you. He's been planning to have you killed so he can run for president on the pity platform. Your murder would have brought him sympathy and votes. It would have made him nearly untouchable. When I got word that he had given the order to have you killed, I ordered her removed and you taken to protect you. I never wanted to get you hurt."

"You're lying!" she screeched.

"No, he ain't, darlin'." Logan said from behind her.

She turned to face him.

"I can smell a lie and he ain't lyin'." he told her. "We always thought there was somethin' squirly about this and what he says makes sense, in a underhanded sorta way."

"But Carol, an assassin?" she asked, incredulously.

"The easiest way ta kill a man is ta get someone close to 'em." he instructed. "That's why the X-Men check out every Secret Service agent on the presidential detail. We mind scan every one on 'em a coupla times a year, just ta make sure."

"But ..." She was having trouble believing that her best friend of four years was hired to kill her.

"She would have done it, Tessa." Brad told her. "She was trained by the Hand. She would have had no problem with killing you."

"Wait a minute." Wolverine drawled. "If she was Hand trained, how did yer people get close enough ta kill her?"

"The bartender drugged her drink with a powerful narcotic that she had never come up against before." Brad explained. "Tessa was given a much smaller dose so she could be taken without anyone noticing."

Wolverine nodded. It was not what he would have done but he was a mutant and could handle whatever the Hand could dish out.

"Why didn't it show up in the autopsy?" Tessa demanded.

"Do you think your father would allow an autopsy on her?" he asked. "She was chemically enhanced in a way that would have pointed directly at the Hand. They would have sold him out for the right amount of money. If the government had gotten involved, they would have found out who hired her fairly quickly."

"Logan?" Tessa turned to him. "Is that true?"

Logan sighed and nodded. "If they were doin' it fer they're own reasons, ya couldn't get 'em ta talk fer nothin'. Since they were paid ta kill ya, whoever came up with the most money would get the goods."

"I'm sorry, Tessa." Brad said. "I didn't want you to get hurt."

A uniformed SHIELD agent approached the group, a Genoshan collar in his hands. "Mr. Bolen." he said.

"I have to go." he said to Tessa. "If you can find it in yourself to talk to me, I'll be in SHIELD custody."

Brad lifted his chin and allowed the agent to lock the collar around his neck. Handcuffs went around his wrists. He looked at her once more before the agent steered him to the waiting hovercraft.

"Can I ever trust a man again?" she asked Logan as she watched Brad being loaded into the vehicle.

"We ain't all bad, Tessa." he told her. "Ya had a bad experience but ya need ta get over it. Some of us actually like and respect women. Jim's like that."

She turned to him and gave him a hug. "Jubilee's so lucky to have you." she said into his shoulder.

"Nah." he said with a smile, giving her a tight squeeze. "I'm lucky ta have her."

He gave her one last embrace and released her, stepping back. "Why don't ya go ta bed. I'll take ya back to San Antonio in the mornin'."

"I'll catch a flight tomorrow." she told him. "You should spend more time with your family."

They walked back to where Jubilee was waiting for them. She had a pleased look on her face. Her new friend was safe now, she was with her Wolvie and all was right with her world.

"If you guys are ever in Texas, look me up." Tessa told them. "I guess I have a ranch in Kerrville now so I have plenty of room."

"What are ya going to do about the ranch?" Jubilee asked as she threw an arm around Logan's waist. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and gave her a quick hug.

Tessa couldn't help smiling. They were so cute together. "I'm going to move out there." she told them. "The ranch has been in my family almost two hundred years. It already has enough hands that I don't need to look for people and the landscape is wonderful. I'll have years to discover the best angles to paint."

"Sounds like ya been thinkin' about it fer awhile." Logan commented.

"I've always wanted to move out to the ranch but Daddy made it clear I wasn't welcome there." she told him. "Now that he's going to spend a great deal of time as a guest of the department of corrections, I can do what I want. It'll bite his butt to know that I live there now."

"Are you okay with all this?" Jubilee asked.

"It hurts." she admitted. "Daddy and I never got along but he's family."

"Well, now yer part of the X family," Logan told her, "and we take care of our own. If ya ever need anythin', let us know."

She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and smiled. "Thanks." she told him. "That means a lot. I'm going to bed. I'm going to catch the first morning flight so I'll be gone when you wake up. Thanks you two, for everything."

They watched as she walked up to the house.

"C'mon, darlin'." Logan said. "Let's get ya ta bed."

"I have to go home, Wolvie." she said as they walked back to the house.

"I know darlin'." he said sadly. "Can ya stay a day or two before ya go? I'd like ta have ya to myself fer a little bit."

"I'd like that." she said shyly. Arm in arm, they walked into the mansion.

Tessa watched them from the window in the den. The one person in her life who was supposed to love her had rejected her for something that had happened when she was a child but now, she had a whole new family. One that would accept her, even if she screwed up. She liked and admired these people. They were real. They were honest. They were all that her real family should have been but weren't. The old saying was right. When God closed a door, somewhere, He opened a window.

Finis