Sam hugged her son close, the instant, constant comfort and love that always washed her in those moments, calming her troubled spirit.

"I missed you, baby. Did you have a good day?"

Danny pulled back from her to smile widely, "It was awesome!" He turned to look at his father, who was standing behind them on the porch, watching as the pair greeted each other at Alexis'. "Can we do it again, Daddy?"

"You bet we will!" Jason reached a hand out to ruffle his boy's hair. "Thanks for a great day - I'll call you to say goodnight, okay?"

"Okay." Danny ran past Sam into the living room.

Jason was anxious to know how she was. He had the strangest urge to take her into his arms and hold her until the pain went away, and it jolted him to realize how much he wanted to stop her from hurting. He noted the watery smile that followed her next statement.

"Thanks for spending time with him - it makes him so happy when he gets to see you."

"I was the idiot staying away - today was the best day I've had in a long time."

When she shifted from one leg to the other, he remembered that hers hadn't gone so great. As she moved to step back and close the door, he shot a tentative hand out.

"Do you have a minute?"

Sam eyed him warily. She really just wanted to go to bed and stay there for awhile, without company, but she didn't' want to seem rude. "Sure." She grabbed her jacket from the landing, stepped out onto the porch, pulling it on as she walked in front of him to the bench.

Jason couldn't believe how nervous he was. "Are you okay?" He stopped near the bench then sat next to her gingerly, watching her face for an honest reaction. It was schooled to his gaze.

"I'm fine." Sam met his eyes briefly. "What do you want to talk about?"

"I went to the house, Sam. I saw Drake."

Her eyes fell to the hands she rubbed together in her lap. "I'm fine, Jason. Things happen."

"What was the thing that happened today?" His voice was soft as he tried to prod her to share. The eyes that looked up at him said she would do anything but, so he added, "I know it's not my business, but I want to make sure you're okay."

Sam looked down at her hands again. She'd really hoped she'd had the last conversation about this today. Lord knows, he was the very last person she wanted to brooch it with in the first place.

"What happened, happened. I won't be getting married tomorrow, and life goes on."

He found himself wishing he knew her better - he'd be able to tell if this was a total front, or if she'd really be able to handle it. He looked at the stubborn jut of her chin and lift of her shoulders and he instinctively knew…she would handle it…the Sam he'd come to know was tough. But even tough people hurt too.

"I'm sorry, Sam. Is there anything I can do?"

She looked at him again, her brown eyes a pool he wanted to dive into for respite.

"Yes - you can change the subject. Is that all you wanted to talk about?"

"No." Yes, it was, but he didn't want to leave, so he was thinking fast to find something else. "When were we in Italy?"

Sam was thrown off guard - she wasn't expecting anything personal about them. "How did you know that we were?"

"Something Danny said earlier."

The nerves that trembled through her were unwelcome. She didn't want to remember anything about them - it hurt enough that her life had derailed once already today…going down memory lane with the other half of the best memories she had, who couldn't remember a single one, was not something she wanted to do. But she had promised. I'll fill in what I can, was what she'd said.

"Siena was a really long time ago. Michael was taken by AJ, and we were on his trail from the Bahamas. We got there and found he'd sent his pilot alone as a decoy, so we returned to Port Charles. That was Siena."

He was shocked at the rampant disappointment that coursed through him. "That was it? It wasn't a getaway? The Bahamas…it was just work?"

Sam nodded and shoved her hands in her pockets to keep them warm. "Michael was missing and you wouldn't rest until you found him. Turned out AJ had brought him back here…he needed money and was tricking Skye to get it. We caught up to him though, before he could leave again. Found Michael safe - tormented with lies AJ told him, but safe."

A silent moment passed between them as Sam reminisced on that time and Jason pondered on his odd feelings of regret.

"So, I never took you to any of these exotic places on vacation? I just dragged you along to work and that was it?" He knew he'd been brain damaged for years but he couldn't have been that big a fool!

For the first time since he'd arrived, he saw a genuine smile transform her beautiful face. The ping it shot through his heart made him realize how much he loved to see Sam smile.

"Well, we were working those times and you wanted to other times, but work or something always came up…but you did take me to Hawaii, and that was the best trip…" Her voice trailed as her eyes went soft in memory. Then she resurfaced and cleared her throat. "Sonny kept you pretty busy - when it wasn't business, it was usually him and, or, Carly, going off the rails and you trying to keep them from blowing their kids' lives apart."

Jason's eyes dropped to study the floor, her words echoing in his head. "So, I never bothered to do the nice things for you that boyfriends and husbands should? Baby sitting Sonny and Carly came first? Why did you put up with it?"

Sam could hear what he didn't say. Finally, after all this time - he was asking about their lives, their experiences, them - together. She wondered why, but decided to keep from asking, reminding herself that it couldn't be fun living in the dark…especially around people who had answers you didn't.

"You were the best man I've ever known, Jason. You gave me a home, friendship, safety, love and security, when you really didn't have to. You didn't owe me anything, and I didn't have much to give in return, but that never stopped you from being there everytime I fell, everytime I needed you. No, you were never much for romantic getaways and such, yet you still were the most romantic man I ever knew."

She turned her body towards him on the bench. "I never needed fancy trips and expensive gifts to know that you loved me…you showed me everyday, by the way you let me in…you didn't do that with people. I knew by the way you'd hold me, the way you treated me…like I mattered, like I was special. Nobody had ever done that before you."

He had a hard time believing that, even as he marveled at the love she talked about. Since he'd come to know her, he couldn't see how anybody could be unkind to someone so sincere and direct, so vibrant and giving. Then it hit him - he had treated her unkindly in recent months himself, so maybe it wasn't such a stretch afterall. Hadn't he been the one to turn his back on their marriage and their lives like it was unimportant in the now? What a fucking idiot he was turning out to be.

They'd fallen into silence again and Sam worried that she'd inadvertently said too much. Had she just showed her heart still on her sleeve after all this time? Jason wouldn't be interested in her old feelings of adoration and idolization - he wanted useful information that he could connect to. She cleared her throat again, reminding herself to stick to the semantics and keep her information basic. That's what would be better for them both.

"Do you mind if we talked more some other time - it's been a long day." Sam needed to get away from the direction her thoughts were taking, to get away from him for a bit.

"Yes, sure." Disappointment coursed through him, but she needed time to herself - he understood that. Finding out that he wished she needed him instead, was something he'd definitely keep to himself. Standing up, he gave her one last look, then left her to get what she needed. It hurt that it wasn't him.

The pain wasn't over for the day either, picking up almost the minute he stepped through the door at home. It was a little early for candlelight, but that didn't stop it being on a table set for two. The aroma from the kitchen was delicious but didn't make him hungry, just like the sight of his fiancé in a sexy pink number didn't either. She looked beautiful and he felt like he was lucky to have someone like her in his corner, but all he wanted to do was relax in silence. That was not to be.

"There you are - I was hoping you'd make it home before I had to leave for work. I tried to get someone to cover for me but no luck." He watched her approach, standing still when she helped him remove the jacket, watched her hang it on the rack, and went obediently when she took his hand and led him to the table. "I hope you're hungry - I made you a rack of lamb, with those baby potatoes you like."

"Looks great - you didn't have to all this." He took a seat where she put him and returned the kiss she bent and placed on his lips, where she lingered and smiled.

"I wanted to. We haven't had a chance to really connect lately and I don't want us to lose sight of us." She sat across from him and added, "Promise me, Jason…promise me that we won't ever lose sight of who we are to each other." Her voice cracked with the thought of him leaving her, and before she could stop them, the tears welled her eyes and spilled down her cheeks.

He saw the worry in her eyes the streaming tears didn't hide, and the strain in her attempted smile, and the guilt he'd carried from the night before doubled. He was hurting the woman he loved and he really didn't mean to. She hadn't done anything to warrant her fiancé not treating her the way she deserved, and he needed to do better.

"I'm sorry, Elizabeth. It's been a weird few days and I'm a little preoccupied…I didn't mean to pull away." He reached across the table and took her hand, seeing how the small gesture instantly brightened her face. "I'm here now…I promise I'll do better."

She dabbed her eyes with the napkin then grabbed the iPad sitting next to it, handing it to him across the table. "I have the perfect way you can make it up to me."

Dubiously, Jason took it and read the itinerary. "You want to go away? Now?"

"Please, Jason? We really need this, and I finally have some time off from the hospital. Just one week…you and me, in a secluded spot, getting back to each other. Please don't say no." Her lip trembled with the tears that were about start again.

"Okay." He reached across the table for her hand again. "Please don't cry. You're right, we need some time alone together." Desperately. He needed to remind himself that this was the woman he was in love with. This was the woman he would marry and grow old with. She needed him, he'd promised the boys they'd always be family - that he'd adopt Cameron and Aiden as soon as he married their mom. He had promises to keep and a woman who loved him back. He needed to do better.

When her eyes got their sparkle back and her smile spread wide, he roamed her beautiful face. A man could do worse than his sainted, kind hearted, giving Nurse Webber. With that reminder, Jason made himself present to enjoy a meal with his hard working spouse-to-be, sending her off with a wide smile and a kiss that weakened her knees.

"Goodnight, lover. I hate that I have to go, but it's everything to me to have you to come home to. Dream about me tonight, okay?"

He watched her leave before turning in early, shot from a long, full day…but it wasn't his dainty fiancé that filled his hot, torrid dreams that night. No alabaster, soft featured beauty sailing through the realms of dream for him, but rather an exotic, luminous goddess with chestnut eyes of desire and fire, that burned an inferno as she lit his brain, his heart, his loins…igniting an explosive current that ran deep all through him, jarring him awake to sit up in bed panting, sweaty and excited. He looked down to the dampness on his thigh, alarmed at the adolescent reaction his body had to the most erotic, electric dream he could remember.

After he'd shocked his system with an alarmingly cold shower and changed the sheets, he remembered his son's question earlier that day. Guess he does dreams afterall.

Elizabeth arrived at work with an acute anticipation that made her steps lighter and her heart glow. The faster she worked through the motions of her shift, the quicker she could get back to her desire. Feeling how her spirits had been significantly lifted from where they'd fallen earlier that day - her Jason wasn't going anywhere - she breathed again. He might have been temporarily distracted by old, inconsequential feelings that he didn't know where to put at first, but she knew they'd now been laid aside once again. He wanted to marry her…he wanted the family they'd made together…he wanted her!

She looked over the patient list for the night and startled at one name in particular. Hurriedly making her way to the listed cubicle, she caught him just as he was leaving.

"Patrick! What happened to you?" She touched his casted hand gingerly, her face wretched with concern.

The arrogant doctor pulled his injured hand to his chest, his face stony from recalling the incident that sent him there, after trying uselessly to fix it himself at home.

"Your fiancé, that's what!" He stormed around her and stopped at the desk where he hurriedly signed his release. Thank goodness his dominant hand was his left, so he hadn't been rendered completely handicapped…except for surgery - his livelihood. That son-of-a-bitch should've just stayed in the hell he'd disappeared to.

Elizabeth knew she couldn't have heard him right. She moved up to him at the desk, pulling on his arm for attention.

"Jason did this to you? Why? What happened?"

The surgeon laid the pen down and turned to face her. "You should really reconsider opening your life to that violent bastard - he's no good for anybody." He waved the cast at her. "He just blocked me from surgery for who knows how long, because he can't control that blasted temper - he never could." He turned to grab his jacket from where he'd rested it on the station. "I don't know what the hell you all see in him."

Elizabeth stepped in his path to block is exit. "I don't understand - why would Jason attack you? Patrick, what is this about?"

He stopped and looked down on her confusion, feeling sorry for her all at once. He'd known her for years, she was good and kind and the bastard didn't deserve her. The murdering thug had never deserved any of the wonderful women who'd flocked him unabashedly for years, his own wife included.

"Why do you think, Elizabeth? Something I said about his wife didn't sit well with the hoodlum and he let me know. Silly me, thinking I had a right to be upset when she dumped me the day before our wedding…silly me for thinking that she was MY fiancé!"

She took a step back in shock. "Jason doesn't have a wife - not yet. That's about to be me, nobody else!" She saw the pain he was in and felt for him. "I'm sorry, Patrick…I'm so sorry she did that to you." She rested her hand on his arm lightly. "She didn't deserve you in the first place - you're way too good for her. She did you a favor today, you'll soon see it that way, just watch."

He didn't want to hear how losing the woman he'd banked on keeping him and his daughter from a life of loneliness and longing, was a blessing. He certainly didn't want to hear how the man who'd left him physically scarred, was some irreplaceable savior…he'd heard enough of that to serve a lifetime. He'd had just about enough.

"Elizabeth, you're a very good friend - you were there for me and my daughter in a major way when we thought we lost Robin. You have the heart of a saint, and that's probably why you can't see what this man is doing to you, but as your friend, I'm telling you - get out! Get out now - before he takes every bit of good in you when he leaves. I know you don't want to hear it…you believe he's some kind of blessing in your life, but he's the same damn curse he's always been. Those two have some sick, ridiculous connection that keeps them glued to each other…I found out the hard way, but you don't have to. Run, Elizabeth…take your life back and run away from that man. Jason Morgan is only going to break you!"

"Patrick, I know you're hurt, but that's because Sam is the same selfish slut she's always been - you tried to turn her into a housewife - don't fault my Jason for that. He loves me, I know he does…it's not his fault she's throwing herself at him again. I can assure you that he doesn't want her!"

He moved to the elevator and pushed the call button. "For your sake, Elizabeth, I hope you're right."

"I know I am! Jason and I just made plans tonight to go away together - he wouldn't have done that if he was interested in starting up some ridiculous fling with that woman."

That gave him pause. Had he misread the situation and jumped to an erroneous conclusion? Was their situation worth taking another look at? Did he stand a chance of bringing Sammy back home?