A knock on the manager's door inside Dante's.  Kinzie peaked her in to speak with Will, "Hey - just thought you'd want to know that a car has been parked out front for the past fifteen minutes... Isabella Luciano is sitting in it alone, talking to herself."  Kinzie smiled.

"You want me to keep an eye on her?  Send someone out?  ... wait it out?  I mean, at least that will give you some prep time."  She looked Will up and down.  He was a Don now and probably working more than he ever had before as a Made Man in an operation.  Likely she worried about her boss and the sort of hours he was keeping - both as his subordinate and as his friend.

William had barely even registered the knock. The last few days had been among the busiest in his life and though the bags under his eyes were growing so was the cheer written on his face. His work had invigorated him. All the same, he was prepared for another to do item to come through the door so Kinzie's face was a welcome reprieve. She'd been trying to take care of Will like the old days seeing as he had been sleeping about half as much as he ought to and eating even less. 

Isabella's presence made his heart jump in his chest and his face must have brightened up because Kinzie gave a sly smirk that he usually only saw on her face when he was about to be impulsive. Some things hadn't changed since the old days. But why would she be sitting in the car? What would make her so nervous?

"I'll go talk to her. It gives me an excuse to stretch my legs and get out of the office for a bit. I promise I'll get some food while I'm up too."

Kinzie seemed placated at least, and returned to the bar to serve patrons as William crossed through Dante's, giving nods and small acknowledgments to the fighters and friends that were relaxing at tables about the place. The cool breeze off the Delaware hit him as soon as he opened the door and for a moment the weight lifted off his shoulders. A quick glance found the car in reference and William approached and knocked on the window, a smile on his haggard face.

Isabella had an unopened bottle of wine in her hand, and she was actually talking to herself when Will approached so she jumped nearly out of her skin when he knocked on her window.  Will could see that Joey & Neil were with her in a car across the way - they only gave a polite nod and went back to whatever they were doing ... likely watching for trouble, which they didn't regard Will as.

Isabella opened the door and got out.  "Surprise!"  She said with a chuckle and gave him a hug.  "I thought about calling but Gavin was keen to get back to Philly so... I brought him on my plane to see his boss.  Figured I could get a brief look at the gym and chat with you before I had to be on my way again."

"How's the new operation coming?"  she asked with a bit of pride in her tone.

"It's getting its feet under it quickly. I've got a good bunch to build with and I think we can make something really special."

Will grinned and took in the sight of Isabella. If he hadn't had so many things distracting him he would have been out of his mind worrying about her and Gavin.

"Gavin's home? I knew he was a tough bastard, but most folks take a little longer to go cross country when they take that kind of hit. Why don't we go talk in my office?" Will hesitated for a moment as soon as the words left his mouth. He'd spent long enough in the office. It was time for new scenery. "On second thought, let's just grab a table instead. Maybe we can grab something to pair with that wine you've got while we chat. Unless you have other plans of course." William offered an arm to Isabella to escort her in.

She took his arm, "I have no plans for a few hours.  Gavin is still worse off than he wants to admit... so, he's gone to meet with Jack Mezzo to clear a bit of recovery time in Jamaica.  That way, none of the local mafiosi have to see him laid up.  He's got a reputation to protect as an enforcer after all."  She chuckled and looked up at the Dante's as they approached.

"Will, it's really beautiful!  It's more than I could have imagined, truly!  The contractors did a fantastic job.  I bet you're turning a profit inside of two years."  She looked at the wine in her hand, "My father recommended this vintage. I think this would go nice with red meat. I presume you got a juicy steak on the menu?"

The two of them entered and found a quiet corner away from the majority of the patrons.  "How's your wound?"  She asked quietly.

God, a steak sounded heavenly. Strange how something like a brief visit can bring a feeling of normalcy back so easily.

William escorted her inside and nodded to Kinzie as he brought Isabella to a corner table. He caught a few encouraging smiles on the faces of guards who'd been scattered through the room in plain clothes as an insurance policy as they had passed but he pretended not to notice. He'd made sure each of his men knew Isabella's face and that she was among the elite of the VIP list.

He slid out a chair for Isabella before taking his own seat, bending a little slower than normal as he sat.

"It's still sore, but healing well. I've got some good help with taking care of it though. Also thanks to you." The look of pride and youthful joy that shot across Will's face made him seem just for a moment more like a wayward young man from the Bronx and less like the weathered and scarred Don that he was quickly becoming. "I don't even know how I can begin to thank you for all of this. This business and the gift you gave me."

Will reached out and took Isabella's hand, bringing it to his lips and gently kissing it. "Remind me to thank your father for giving me a good excuse to share a meal with you. As for Gavin, if he's in Philadelphia I'd like to thank him myself for all he did before he goes on that trip. How's your arm by the way?"

Still holding Isabella's hand, William decides he may as well say what's on his mind. He knew if he didn't it would nag him.

"Is everything alright, Angel? I heard you where out front a little while before I came out."

"Gavin's first thoughts were for your safety when he saw that you weren't there."  She said reassuringly.  "I know he wants to see you ... but he definitely doesn't want to be seen in his state - not by anyone but those he trusts.  And you, of course, are among those precious few people he does trust... now."  She smiled.  It was nice that both men had become something of friends... even though they still were rivals for her attention. 

"Perhaps something can be arranged though.  For you, I'm sure he'd do anything."  She squeezed his hand.  "He's so happy for you with this authorization."

Then, William didn't beat around the bush, he wanted to know about her hesitation on the car.  To that, she said, "I'm sorry."  Her smile faded slightly. "I guess I feel like everything has moved forward and I should be closer to a resolution to my own mind and heart.  I was overthinking what I should say or do when I saw you - is that, when we last parted, things were complicated by all our fears and worries for each other and Gavin's health." 

She forced her smile to return.  "But I promised all of you time outside of the chaos to try and sort things out with me, and I mean to.  So, once things calm down here and you have a Right Hand who can handle things ... call me up and I'll return to Philly for a second attempt at that second, or is it officially third, date?  I'm not sure if we should count New York."  She laughed.

William took a moment to register. He could believe that Gavin was concerned about him. They'd been family for longer than the two of them tended to recognize. But first thoughts? Those had almost certainly been for the woman in front of him. Still, the fact that he would consider Will one of his most trusted was a thought that gave pause. What had changed? Why 'now'? And why would he be so eager to do anything he could for Will? No one changes that quickly.

Noting that her smile slipped when asked about the car, and that Jamaica sounded an awful lot like Gavin's time 'outside of the chaos', William decided he wasn't pulling his punches. Not this time. "I'm not sure what changed his mind about trusting me so much, but I'm glad for it. As for everything else, I want the same thing I have since the beginning. I want you to be happy. If that means I get another time with you to myself then I'll move the whole Pier to make that happen. It's what you do for someone you love."

The word was a bomb.  She knew it was coming, maybe in Detroit before he left... most likely today though.  She had hoped perhaps it would be held off - but Will was all the things she knew him to be and his eyes beamed with the same love she saw looking at her from Elias' gaze as well.  She looked down, ashamed.  Elias' words ringing in her ears.

"I can see you really mean that."  She said quietly, she seemed to struggle with what she wanted to say next leaving a pregnant pause in the conversation.  

That...was not the reaction he'd hoped for. She wasn't ready. With everything that had happened how could she be? They'd all nearly died, she'd had to stand vigil at the side of another man she cared about as he struggled to survive, her baby sister had been in danger of dying...

She'd be lucky if she wasn't still fully panicking that another shoe would drop. Now here was big, dumb Will Bowden telling her he loves her. It was said now though and it couldn't be unsaid.

"Yeah, I do mean it. I'm sorry, I know it's fast and I should have known it would be too much right now. I just...I couldn't let it stay unsaid and risk that I might not get a chance. We live a dangerous life. I mean we've nearly died together twice. For a bit I thought your father might kill me too. I couldn't just sit back and hide what I felt. I know it's not fair right now to any of us. You, me, or Gavin. For that I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry for how I feel."

Isabella softened at Will's attempts to comfort her.  Even now, with her not reciprocating his affections, he was more worried about her feelings than his own. 

"Never be sorry for how you feel.  I've spent a fair amount of time feeling like shit for feelings I can't control... I'd never want that for you."   

Even at this moment, he was proving what a good and caring man he was, and that was why she had to tell him.  Even if she regretted it - even if she later realized she'd been wrong.  She couldn't let Will go further with this - not when she felt she knew. 

Looking around the room she knew, she couldn't do this to him where his whole crew and the damn world was watching.  He was a Don.  Don's don't get dumped.  Don's break people who hurt them - that's how men in power stay that way. 

"Maybe we should take dinner somewhere private?" 

"My office is in the back. We can go there."

A hollow feeling was beginning to grow in the pit of William's stomach. No one ever asked to talk more privately after hearing "I love you" for a happy reason and he was beginning to suspect that he'd known what it was before he'd left Detroit. No stopping it now whatever it was.

William nodded and stood, taking his plate and walking Isabella back to the door into his sanctum of work and numbers and cold calculations. The stuffy feel that had built up over the last few days was a familiarity that seemed comforting, which was odd in itself. Once Isabella had entered, he closed the door and sat at his desk. He pushed the steak aside and looked Isabella in the eye, for once not sure what he was seeing in those captivating pools.

"Angel, say what you need to say. I owe you that much after I just did."

Her eyes were instantly drawn to the small brown paper bag with a sketch on it, framed on his desk.  She put her plate down on the desk and sat in the chair opposite him.  It felt - official and less emotional this way.  Maybe that was for the best?  Her eyes looked to the bag again, she smiled.

"You don't owe me anything Will."  She said looking to him, her eyes resting on his cufflinks.  "You love me."  Tears welled in her eyes.  She fought them with everything in her because even as they began to become visible she could see Will's understanding of what was happening to crystalize. 

"Fuck... if I'm being honest with myself, I may be in love with you too."  She said nodding.  "But I can't be with you all forever and every moment I let this go on... we all fall deeper until something forces it all to a head, and I really hurt you.  And I've seen what that looks like - I can barely stand the pain I've already caused Elias.  I don't know if I could handle doing that to anyone ever again.  So I can't ... I can't let this go on..."

"I've thought about it every conceivable way, you know?" She sniffled.  "I've thought about what it looks like to try to win back Elias... and how maybe I could make things work with him, despite how much he hates me now.  Or how I'd fail and then I'd hate myself forever for what I did to us and there never would be an end to what Garrett did."  She violently scrubbed a tear away, pausing before continuing.

A choice had to come eventually. Deep down William knew that. He also knew that there was a possibility it wouldn't be him. He'd hidden that thought deeply, but never quite let it go. Detroit had given it wings again and he'd feared this moment, but he'd feared other words than the ones he was hearing. This wasn't choosing Gavin over him. This was mercy through pain.

He hated himself for realizing that if he just stayed behind his desk he could stay strong. He'd put on the same mask he wore for his work and the solid wooden desk would be a shield, protecting him from all the world might throw at him no matter how much it tore at his heart. He'd smile and reassure Isabella that he understood and try to make her feel like she hadn't torn him open with her words. Words that hurt her as much as him. Hell, he might have even let himself lash out in frustration at what he would lose. He could have done all that and never looked back.

As he stood up and walked around the desk he reflected that it would have been how a Don handled this kind of news. But this wasn't about a Don. This was about William Bowden and Isabella Luciano and he'd be damned if he made it anything else. He knelt down beside Isabella's chair and looked up into her eyes. It was all he could do not to let the cracks in his spirit push through to the surface. That was the last thing she needed right now.

"I owe you honesty. I owe you strength. I owe you a chance at half the happiness I've had since I met you. If that means being somewhere else with someone else, then so be it. It would hurt to see you go, but I'd face that a thousand times if it meant you finding what you need. I can handle pain, Angel. I've had a lifetime of practice." 

In spite of his best efforts Will was starting to crack. He felt the warmth rising up to his eyes, and the rush of the grief for what was happening. But some part of him just refused to stop fighting, even now. It argued that he wasn't done until he was knocked out cold.

"So don't tell me you're giving up to spare me from pain. If I get hurt, I walked into it with my eyes wide open. I'm sorry that things went the way they did with Elias and I mean that. But maybe the problem isn't you winning him back. Maybe the way you didn't think of it was that he should have been working to win you back instead of being stuck in a fairy tale of what might have been. What we get isn't always what we think it should have been, but it's what we've got. The only thing we can do is make the best of it and not throw out the good for something pretend that we think is better."

He was so kind to her, so protective of her heart... it made her question her actions again.  How many times would she deny him before it was done?  Will was doing so as carefully as he could, but he was fighting in the only way that made sense to him.  She was certain of it.

"Thank you for your honesty... advice and help... God knows I've needed it so badly these past weeks."  Had it really been that long?  "And I need to be honest with you too.  Before you can insist on me letting you walk a path of pain, you need to tell you why I sent Gavin up the stairs and not you."  She said squeezing his hands, realizing this might well be the last time he wanted to touch her ever again. 

"Because it might change what you want."  She said with as much courage as she could. 

"I realized that I was likely sending one of you to your death.  I thought about how I would feel losing either of you and it didn't help me decide because... well,"  she whispered, "I don't want to lose either of you in my life."  

"So, how could I decide?  In short, I thought about how us.. me and gavin... me & you... after the death of the other; how I'd feel about what I did.  In that moment I imagined a future where Gavin had died.  I imagined that you and I would marry... and it would be a good life.  Us, our cities, maybe even adopting children one day."  She wet her lips.  "I could find happiness in a future with you, choosing to think of Gavin's sacrifice as a noble - something that had to be done for a greater good, and I think that you would be happy with me too."

She steadied herself.  "Then I thought about how I would feel, if I sent you to die... and I realized I would never be with Gavin afterwards."  She admitted. shaking her head no slightly.  "I had this image in my head of... staring myself in the mirror and hating the selfish woman looking back at me.  I would know that, if I had sent you to die, I had sacrificed you. I could never have forgiven myself let alone allowed myself happiness with Gavin.  In essence, I'd lose you both because it would have felt like ... like I had counted you expendable in an effort to protect the man I wanted to choose at that moment.  And you're anything but expendable to me, Will.  And yet, how could I see myself any other way except wicked, when in that very moment, I had discovered the truth of how strongly I felt for Gavin?"

She shook her head, "And that's when I knew and I sent Gavin, praying that he'd come back to me.  I knew when I looked in his eyes that he understood and I kept hoping he'd say he loved me as easily as you did just now... but he's not ready.  Maybe he never will be, but regardless I have to wait to see if he is.  And that means, could be badly hurt by my inability to walk away from him and this path of his... exploring his capacity to be the sort of man I need... exploring his capacity to love." 

She sighed, the heavy burden of truth unloaded.  Her shoulders sank as she admitted, "I tried to tell myself I'd come here, and do what I said I would.  I wanted to give it a chance to not be about life and death and the madness that has consumed both of your pursuits of my heart; to see how Gavin fared on mundane days and how you stacked up against that - but you already know that you love me Will.  You're wearing the cufflinks, the bag... it's ... I'm all over your life already."

"It doesn't get easier from here forward.  We both grow, together maybe and it just gets harder  And Gavin and I do the same.  Eventually a choice has to be made - maybe it's me or my dad or one of you who forces - but it ends the same.  I could hope that one of you would be the clear victor of my heart, more clearly than in that moment we stood in the stairway, but I'm beginning to think that's not how love really works."

She echo'd the wisdom of LuckyLucy again, "Love is choice.  Making a choice even when it kills you to speak the words and you're sure you'll regret them the minute it's all over."

A tear slid down her milk-white cheek, "But not making a choice when you must, well...that's cruel.  I can see that in Elias' suffering and I won't make you or Gavin go through that.  If I decide now, if this ends here, if I'm wrong at least then the pain is quick and you... you haven't wasted any more of your life wondering about what I'm doing with him, or him wondering about you and I.  You can begin this journey as a Don free of my crazy life ... and you may be better for it."

She'd wanted Gavin. It hurt deep down and it nearly broke his spirit entirely. But she'd tried to avoid the decision with her choice on the stairway, even as she realized what she wanted. He knew he couldn't keep her with him right now, but he couldn't stop loving her. Not now. As he felt a hot tear drop from the corner of his eye and wind its way down his cheek William couldn't help but feel she'd missed one thing in that moment though. 

"I can't ask you to walk away from Gavin. You need to see things through with him. I accepted that before Atlantic City and nothing has changed. I love you Angel, and I always will no matter what. But I think you're right when you said you love me too. When you thought about what the future might look like on that stairwell you realized that you couldn't be happy in a future without me. You said so yourself. That has to mean something."

He raised a hand to her cheek, wiped away the tears that still gathered and leaned in to kiss her for what he knew might be the last time. It wasn't a kiss of passion like so many they'd shared, but tender, gentle, and loving. A small smile raised up through his tears as he pulled back and took a half step back. He held Isabella's hands in between them and though his pain was clearly written on his face a light shone in his eyes that spoke of a hope held deep down. A fire that wouldn't be extinguished. He took a deep breath and spoke softly to the woman he still saw as an Angel.

"Go with Gavin and figure things out with him. Some day I think you'll realize that your happiness is with me, and when you do I'll be here. You're right about love being painful choices, Angel, but I truly believe that this one is worth it."

She didn't know if she wanted to kiss him or run from him.  Both perhaps.  Instead, her hand went to her mouth, the irony being, the bracelet he'd bought her in Atlantic City jangling was the only noise between them.  

He's all over my life too...

There was nothing to say.  Nothing she could say after all he'd imparted.  She held his gaze, in part grateful he was wishing her well... and another part agonized that she was leaving him for good; but it was for the best.  Wasn't it?

She closed her eyes tight, stood up and turned away afraid of what might happen if she dared to look back.  Next to burying her mother and later Elias, then recently watching Gavin die (if only for that brief instant); this was one of the most painful moments of her whole life.  Reaching for the door handle she wiped her tears.  It would be known her visit was short and that she'd left in tears.  That would be good for Will.  Most would assume he ended things... he'd save face.  At least she'd give him that.

She wanted to tell him that some part of her did hope he was right that she was stupid and she'd come running back to him for a happily ever after that they both deserved... but she couldn't.  She knew how she longed for things with Gavin to work out - even in this moment of sadness.  If she said it, she'd encourage him to wait for her and suffer the whole while hoping for something that she wasn't sure could ever be.  William deserved happiness.  He deserved someone who had every ability to love him completely and only him and she knew she couldn't be that person, at least not now - perhaps never.

"I'll call when I get back to Detroit."  She said without looking back, standing at the door.  "We can make plans for our first fight and start getting the word out." 

She opened the door and forced one foot in front of the other to get her out of the building as fast as possible.

A mile away from Purgatory & Race Street Pier she pulled over and cried her eyes out for the better part of an hour.  It would take her that long to be ready to face Gavin, to pretend things didn't affect her as much as they had lest he make her question her choice too.  That was his way - always trying to make sure she knew she had choices in life.  Well, sometimes there were too many hard choices.  She yearned for more simple choices, choices that didn't destroy lives.  And, besides, she wasn't going to let anything (even her own stupid confusion and emotions) ruin this trip. 

Slowly she turned her mind towards Gavin and a future she hoped she'd chosen well.