Author's Note: Wow, I did not expect that kind of response to my story. Thank you guys so much for reading and reviewing. You're all awesome.

Twenty-two years later

"The witch at the end of the dock isn't going to be the one with the power to freeze."

Prue tried not to flinch at the despondent tone in Phoebe's voice. She reached out and gave her baby sister's hand a squeeze, trying to be reassuring, but she had the feeling that she was failing. Fear made her heart hammer in her chest, and she couldn't help the dark tone in her own voice as she spoke.

"It's gonna be me."

"I'll be with you the whole time," Sam told her, and Prue nodded, resolutely.

"Let's do this," she said, squaring her shoulders as she marched down to the dock, her sisters trailing behind her.

She stopped as she got to the end of the dock, staring out at the water – and the demon hiding underneath the tranquil blue.

"You ready for this?" Piper asked, as she and Phoebe flanked Prue on either side.

"Yeah," she answered, but she could hear the tremor in her voice that belied her nerves.

"You don't have to do this," Sam said, from behind her, but Prue ignored him.

"Yes, I do," she said, without taking her eyes off the water.

"Just focus on the demon," Phoebe said, trying to sound encouraging. "That's what this is about."

Prue nodded, wordlessly, walking down the dock to the end. Sam joined her a moment later, a determined expression on his face.

"Let's go face our demons," he said, softly.

When they reached the fuse box, she picked up the cables from where they were resting on the dock, turning to look at Sam who was crouched back by the power switch. He gave her a fiercely determined look, and Prue could see his faith for her in his eyes. She turned her attention back to the demon in the water, staring down at the ripples underneath her feet.

"Okay, you in the water," she said, under her breath, "I know that you've been waiting for this. For me. Well, here I am, so come and get me." Tears choked her throat, and her voice rasped as she continued. "You took what matters most to me, and as long as I live, you will never kill again."

The water began to churn underneath the dock in response to her words, and her hands tightened on the cables she was holding. She took an instinctive step back as the water started to boil only inches away from her feet, and from behind her, she heard a scream.

"Prue, behind you!"

The sheer terror in Phoebe's voice had Prue whirling around to see the demon rising up out of the water behind her, towering over her. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Piper freezing Leo to keep him from following her onto the dock, but the majority of her attention was focused on Sam.

At the sight of the demon, the former Whitelighter had bolted forward, placing himself squarely between Prue and the demon. The pair of them were frozen for several long seconds, broken by Sam's hoarse demand.

"No, not her! Take me!" The demon surged forward, engulfing him, and Prue darted forward as Sam swayed, falling heavily to his knees. "No!" he barked, stopping her in her tracks. "Stay back."

Reaching out with an effort, he grabbed the power cables holding them tightly in his hands.

"Now," he gritted out, meeting Prue's gaze, firmly. "Do it."

Prue closed her eyes, briefly. 'God, forgive me,' she prayed. Then, she used her power to flip the switch on.

Electricity surged through the cables and into Sam, making him seize up, his face frozen in a rictus of agony. Distantly, Prue heard a wild scream, but she ignored it. She also ignored the flash of light out of the corner of her eye, figuring that it was just Leo orbing to Sam's side. But, she couldn't ignore the hard hand that shoved her roughly away from Sam, or the young woman who fell to her knees beside Sam, wrapping her arms around him and catching him as he fell.

"No, no, no," the woman moaned, tears streaking down her cheeks as she gently lowered Sam to the dock. "Please, no."

Sam suddenly gasped out a painful-sounding breath, his eyes flying open to lock on the young woman's.

"It's gone," he rasped out. "The demon, it's gone."

The woman nodded, pressing her lips into a tight line. "You're okay," she whispered, with a tremulous smile. "I'm going to fix this; you're gonna be okay."

"No, I'm not," Sam forced out, his eyes falling shut with exhaustion.

"You're gonna be okay," the woman repeated, firmly. She swiped angrily at her eyes with the back of her free hand, sniffling to hold back the tears. "What were you even doing fighting a demon, anyway? Demon hunting is my job."

"And protecting you is mine," Sam whispered. "I don't regret it, Paige. Not if you and Aiden are safe."

Paige shook her head, quickly.

"You're going to be okay," she gritted out, a third time, and then she held her free hand over Sam's body.

Her hand began to glow, just like Leo's did when he was healing someone, but Sam didn't look like he was getting better. Nothing seemed to be happening, and the woman scowled fiercely down at her hand.

"Come on," she muttered, under her breath. "Come on, come on. I can do this. I have to do this."

"Stop," Sam breathed, and the woman froze, looking down at him, a stricken expression on her face.

"No," she whispered, tearfully, shaking her head.

"You have to let me go," Sam went on, his voice barely audible. "It's time, Paige."

"I can't," Paige choked out, but Sam didn't seem to hear her. His eyes were unfocused as he stared at something over her shoulder, but Prue couldn't see anything behind the woman.

"Patty?" Sam whispered, and the woman whipped her head around to stare off into the distance. "Patty?"

Paige swallowed, hard, tears shining in her eyes.

"You take care of him," she hissed, angrily. "Do you hear me? If I can't – you take care of him."

A slight breeze picked up, suddenly, enough to ruffle the young woman's hair around her face, and her eyes closed for the briefest moment. When she opened them, again, Sam was gone.

Choking back a sob, Paige gently closed Sam's unseeing eyes with a shaking hand. She laid him down on the rough dock, her hands supporting his head, and then she reluctantly drew away. Shifting into a kneeling position, she pulled a cell phone out of her pocket, dialing a number.

"Hello?" she said, when whoever she called picked up. "Yes, I – my father is dead. A heart attack."

Prue stared down at the young woman in amazement, exchanging shocked glances with her sisters. Father. This woman was Sam's daughter? How could he have a daughter, if Patty was the only woman he'd loved-

"Camp Skylark," the woman said, suddenly, snapping Prue out of her thoughts. "Down by the lake. Yes, I tried CPR. He's gone. You'll send an ambulance? Thank you."

After a long moment, Paige hung up the phone, slipping it back into the pocket of her jeans. She moved back beside her father's body, staring down at her hands with a helpless look on her face, but before she could do anything, Leo was gently pulling her to her feet.

"You shouldn't be the one to do this," he murmured, quietly, and then he took Paige's position by Sam's body, placing his hands over the man's chest.

He pressed down several times, rapidly, and the sound of a sharp crack had Paige gasping, stumbling back away from the scene with trembling hands held over her mouth.

"I'm sorry," Leo said, hurriedly, but Paige shook her head.

"It – it's okay," she said, her voice shaking. "I should have expected-"

"I can talk to the EMTs when they arrive," Leo offered, and Paige nodded, quickly.

"That's probably best," she said, quietly. "If we tell that that the three of you found him collapsed on the dock-"

"We've got everything under control," Leo reassured her. "Don't worry."

"You sound like my father," Paige told him, with a trembling smile. "He used to always tell me-"

Her voice broke suddenly on a sob, and she pressed her hands to her mouth, tightly, trying to hold back the flood of tears that threatened to emerge. She sank to her knees beside Sam's body, her shoulders shaking as she slumped over, and Prue stepped hesitantly forward. She cautiously put her hand on the younger woman's shoulder, and Paige jerked at her touch.

"I'm sorry," Prue said, as she exchanged awkward glances with her sisters.

Paige didn't look at Prue, she just continued to stare down at her father's body with a despondent look on her face.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered, her voice breaking on the words. "I should have been here – you never should have been facing that demon, alone-"

"He wasn't alone," Prue spoke up, regretting the words the instant they left her mouth as Paige finally glanced up at her.

There was a strange expression in her dark eyes, and for a moment, Prue thought that she was going to accuse them of having caused her father's death. It's what she would have done in the other woman's place, if she'd come upon the same scene. But, Paige surprised her by just nodding, wordlessly.

They stood around in an uncomfortable silence until the wail of distant sirens broke the tension that had fallen over the group. About a minute later, an ambulance was parking at the edge of the shoreline, a pair of uniformed medical techs carrying a stretcher down toward them.

They loaded Sam's body onto the stretcher, asking a few preliminary questions. Leo told them that they'd found Sam collapsed on the dock, and that he'd tried to resuscitate him. He lied that he thought that Sam had suffered a fatal heart attack, and the techs bought it at face value. They told Paige that she needed to stop at the hospital to fill out some paperwork, and then they put Sam in the back of the ambulance and drove off.

Paige stared after the departing vehicle with an absolutely devastated look on her face. For a few seconds, Prue thought that she was going to collapse, and that they were going to have another emergency on their hands. But, then the younger woman took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and marched resolutely up to the boathouse where Sam had been living.

"Should we follow her?" Prue asked, hesitantly, unwilling to intrude on Paige's privacy.

"No," Phoebe snapped, sarcastically, rolling her eyes."We should go home and have tea, and leave a grieving woman who might well be our sister alone with her dead father's memory."

"She might not be our sister," Prue muttered, and Phoebe scoffed out a laugh.

"Right," she replied, disbelief in her voice. "Sam spends twenty-two years mourning our mother, only to fall in love with another woman and have a kid with her, not long after her death, apparently, since that woman isn't much younger than me."

"Both of you, knock it off," Piper interjected, before Prue could say anything in response. "There is a woman up there who just lost her father. Don't you think that might be a little more important than some petty sniping?"

Giving them both an admonishing glare, she abruptly turned and walked away, following Paige up the path to the boathouse, Leo right behind her.

"You think it's a middle sister thing?" Phoebe mused. "That whole cutting us off at the knees thing?"

"She's had a lot of practice, getting in the middle of the two of us over the years," Prue replied, as they followed Piper and Leo up to the boathouse.

"You think I'll ever learn how to do that?" Phoebe asked, wistfully.

They found Paige standing in front of the desk where Sam had kept Patty's love letters, staring down at the empty drawer.

"We've got the letters back at our house," Piper was saying, as they walked in. "We can-"

"Share custody?" Paige asked, quietly, with a weak chuckle. "Dad never knew that I found the letters," she went on, unconsciously wrapping her arms around her torso as she spoke. "I was going to confront him about them, but I just – I don't know if I really wanted to know."

"You mean that you have sisters?" Prue finished for her, and Paige nodded, wearily.

"Wasn't hard to figure out," she told them. "Mom kept talking about 'my girls' in the letters. Pretty obvious she wasn't talking about me."

"Why wouldn't you want to know?" Phoebe asked, curiously. "I mean, if it was me-"

"Dad always told me that Mom died about six months after I was born," Paige replied. "He never mentioned any other family, never even hinted at it, and when I found the letters-" She shook her head, trailing off. "One second, and my whole life changed. I was jealous of you, I guess, getting to have what I never did. Time with Mom."

"I'm sure she had a good reason for not being there," Phoebe protested, weakly, and Paige shrugged.

"At the time," she said, softly. "I didn't really care about reasons. I was just angry. At her, at Dad, at the whole world, it seemed."

"How old were you?" Piper asked, quietly.

"Fifteen," came the equally-quiet reply. "I was young, stupid-"

"If it helps," Prue spoke up, "the teenage years weren't the best years for any of us, either."

Paige smiled, briefly, but it was gone as quickly as it appeared, and the shadows were back in her eyes. She busied herself with tidying the newspaper clippings spread across the surface of the desk, her hands shaking slightly as she handled her father's belongings.

"Do you need any help?" Piper asked, breaking the awkward silence that had fallen over them, but Paige shook her head.

"I think I need to just be alone, right now," Paige said. "If you don't mind."

"If you need us," Piper went on, scribbling quickly on a scrap of paper she dug out of her pocket, "here are our cell phone numbers. And, we're at thirteen-twenty-nine Prescott Street. If you need anything-"

"Thanks," Paige interrupted her, taking the paper and shoving it in the pocket of her jeans. "I – um – I'll be in touch; we should go out to lunch, some time."

Then, she turned back around in a clear dismissal. After a moment, Prue, Piper, Phoebe, and Leo quietly left the boathouse, leaving Paige alone with her grief.