It had been over a month since she had gotten daughter back and Alexis couldn't have been happier. Yes, she had to give up her position, but now she was able to spend real time with her little girl and the sparkle was back in Kristina's pretty brown eyes. Hide and Seek had become their favorite pastime because it wasn't too strenuous for Alexis and it gave Kristina a chance to really learn her way around their new home. More often than not she would hide in the cabinets or under the table and Alexis would take her time looking for her as if she had no idea. It was far from perfect but it was pretty damn close.

Last night had been a cold reminder of how perfect their life wasn't. Kristina woke up in a cold sweat and started to scream. She hadn't been competent enough to explain the nightmare that had plagued her dream or allowed any of them to help her back to sleep. Her journey to dreamland had been long and she hadn't gone without a fight. She finally dozed about four a.m. Alexis blinked rapidly to ease the sleep away from her eyes and stepped out of her clothes. All she needed was a nice shower to forget about everything that had gone on last night.

She stared at herself in the mirror and noticed that the stress she usually associated with her face was missing. She was feeling more relaxed with each day despite the obvious setbacks such as Kristina's night terrors and her frequent trips to the hospital. She had undergone many treatments and Dr. Bernstein was hopeful while still cautious. Mac had pointed out that they should focus on the positive so that's exactly what she had tried to do. Flipping on the shower, she tested the water and then climbed inside and closed the glass door.

Alexis would never forget Mac's reaction to her suggesting they start going to church because, as he had put it, it had come so unexpectedly and without preamble. She had explained that she had made God a promise and He had come through for her. Spending a few hours a week in worship was a small price to pay for what He had given her and she wasn't going to squander that gift by any means. She had been an avid churchgoer for three weeks now.

She was glad Georgie had returned to Paris because it was obviously doing wonders for her soon-to-be-stepdaughter. Her eyes carried a permanent smile in them and she wasn't nearly as quiet as she had been when she had left them last year. Alexis understood Georgie's obligation to support her family, but it had been time for her to go back and she hadn't fought that hard. Alexis wondered what his name was since there must have been a guy waiting for her. She had only been in love one other time herself but it was easy enough to recognize the signs.

Though he had suggested otherwise, Alexis had gone behind Mac's back and checked the status of the case she had worked on before being hospitalized. As she had expected—despite the evidence she presented—the suspect, Trey Willis, had been found not guilty and released without even a slap on the wrist. She had been outraged to find this out, but there was nothing she could do about it. There was no guarantee that she could have affected the outcome but she would always wonder. Mary Stringle's killer would never be brought to justice; he would never pay for what he had done to her. It was a damn shame.

Alexis lifted the lid to her body wash and lathered some on thinking about how quickly life could change. The clock next to the bed had informed her it was well after eleven a.m. As D.A. she would have been up at five and in the office by six. Sleeping in was not something she would ever be accustomed to, but it sure was nice to not wake up tired. Just the routine of washing was relaxing and the wonderful fragrance of the soap was almost intoxicating. It was too bad Mac was still sleeping. She wouldn't have minded some company. Laughing at herself, she rinsed off and reached for the shampoo/conditioner bottle.

Spring Break was coming up and Mac was already pushing her to plan their destination since—how had he put it?—they were going to go somewhere for a full week and just have fun. She had thought Maxie might have some idea since the girl was all about planning, but she had told Alexis she would probably have to work right through it. Something was going on with her too, something she was no more inclined to express aloud than Georgie had. Maxie was so excited about the opportunity to design Lucy Coe's dress she hadn't stopped talking about it. When they sat down to dinner, she would stress over pages and pages of ideas, none of them seeming quite right to her.

There would always be that fear in the back of her mind that taunted Alexis about exactly how safe Kristina was when they went out in public. If she turned around for a second, would someone snatch her away again? Granted, she had been taken from her own bed—a fact that had kept Alexis sleeping next to her for the first week—but the fear still lingered. She hadn't told Mac about this because she really wanted to be past it and talking about it would solve exactly nothing. Still, when they took a trip to the hospital or even to the grocery store, Alexis never stopped watching the people around them.

She wondered if Robin did it too. The young woman had been a wreck from her own chaotic childhood so it was very likely that Morgan was still under house arrest. Mac had noted his niece's absence but Alexis had assured him it was perfectly natural and she would come around when she felt safe. It was no secret that Logan and Courtney and the secret fourth person were still at large and she bet that kept a pretty large rift between uncle and niece though she had never been so callous to say so aloud.

At least she wasn't confined to a bed anymore, Alexis thought with a smile. She could wash herself, she could play with her daughter, and she could wear regular clothes. She was no longer knocking on Heaven's door. She could live her life and laugh and smile. She could enjoy it for the first time since the doctor had confirmed that after one stupid night with the worst kind of man had sprung a child.

Massaging her scalp carefully, her mouth twitched when she noticed that something was very wrong. Alexis pulled her hands away from her head and noticed that they were filled with hair, her hair. She had heard for years from her stylist that it was normal for people to lose their hair in tiny increments; losing a few strands was normal because it happened to every human being everyday no matter what age. However, this wasn't one of those times. Her hair wasn't falling out in strands but in clumps. Transferring the mess of hair to one hand, she reached up to her scalp and felt how little hair remained. Screaming, she dropped the hair and started to cry.

An effect of her Chemo was hair loss—that much she remembered from her first appointment when she had battled cancer the first time. Of course she was the only one who knew about that because it had happened before she moved here. The first time this had happened she hadn't lost any hair. Weakness was all she had ever experienced. Did this mean her condition was worsening? Was the doctor's hope fake? Was he afraid to tell her that she was indeed dying?

The bathroom door flung open and she spotted Mac in the doorway, a gun in his hands. He made his way quickly to her and pulled the shower door toward him, his eyes widening when he saw the amount of hair clogging the drain. Their eyes met and he was barely able to catch her before she collapsed into a fit of sobs. He helped her out of the tub and wrapped her in a towel hugging her to him.

"Mac." She whimpered.

"It's okay baby. I've got you. It's okay." Mac promised rocking her on the cool tile floor.

"No it's not." She shook her head. "I'm dying."

Mac shoved his thumb under her chin and forced her to look at him. "Don't you ever, ever say anything like that, do you hear me?" His voice broke halfway through the demand. "Not ever Lexie." She sunk deeper into his arms and he gathered her close praying he was right.

"We're going for a week, not two months." Lucas pointed out to Dillon as he watched his husband place yet another set of shorts into his suitcase. Their plane left at what Dillon had affectionately dubbed "O'dark thirty a.m." and they were trying to finish the last of their packing. Dillon seemed to want to take the entire summer contents of their closet on the plane with him.

"Be prepared. That's what the Boy Scouts say." Dillon retorted, throwing yet another t-shirt into the bag.

"Be quiet. You were never a Boy Scout."

"No but the guy I dated before you was. Eagle Scout if I remember right."

Rolling his eyes, Lucas willed himself not to respond to Dillon's obvious attempt to push his jealousy button. They were taking off for the beach, just them and Lance, leaving the stress and worry of the last month behind them for the time being.

His sister was home. His nephew was home. His cousins were home. Kristina was home. Lance was staying out of trouble in school so far. He had felt guilty his family had a stretch of relatively good luck when everyone else they knew seemed to find the worst case scenario every time. Guilt had led him to bury himself in both the bakery and the PI firm, keeping busy and keeping away from anyone who was suffering right now. He had been, to quote Dillon, "one unfathomable sourpuss, rivaling Edward" since Kristina had been grabbed. Now that the danger seemed to be behind them for the time being, he was going to relax and concentrate on nothing but his family.

"A gallon of sunscreen?" he questioned Dillon, raising his eyebrow in confusion. "A gallon?"

"Do you think that's enough?" Dillon wondered.

"For an army."

"You know I burn."

"Love of my life, I say this with all affection, but you are crazier than your grandfather."

Dillon's jaw dropped. "Did you just compare me to Edward?"

"You've packed everything in your closet twice. You're taking more sunscreen than is necessary for those families with 18 children we see on TV. You're taking most of your video equipment because a disposable camera is 'just not good enough.' Face it. You're Edward."

"I don't want to miss a moment of our son's first trip to the beach. Is that a crime?" Dillon asked rather dramatically.

"No." He couldn't blame Dillon for his enthusiasm when he felt the same way. It was way past time for them to go on a family vacation.

"I love you, but we both know if I didn't plan, you wouldn't be able to relax."

"Are you trying to say I'm high strung?"

"I don't have to say it. You just did."

Lucas tossed Dillon's bottle of hair gel at his head, narrowly missing hitting Dillon smack in the eye by a mere inch. "Oops."

"I'm under attack!" Dillon yelped leaping toward his husband and holding him against the bed frame.

"Is it time to go?" Lance asked from the doorway.

"Not yet." Lucas responded shoving Dillon off him. "You all packed?"

"I've got my goggles!" Lance announced happily.

"And your clothes?" Lucas questioned.

"Daddy Dillon packed them."

Lucas shook his head and made his way across the room towards his son. "Then we better make sure you can carry it. Daddy Dillon probably put everything you own in there."

"Only the things he needs!" Dillon shouted after him. He couldn't wait to see Lance's reaction to the Caribbean.

"This means ninety percent of his closet I'm sure."

Steven wasn't sure what he had done wrong, but it must have been something terrible for Georgie to avoid him the way she had been. They hadn't talked in days and, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't come up with any reason for her to be mad at him. Their relationship had gone to the next level and he often wondered how he had survived so long without this woman in his life. She was funny and beautiful and strange. He couldn't figure out what had happened between last week and this week, but it had kept her holed up in her room with only her textbooks for company. What really scared him though was that not even her roommates were talking to him and that meant they knew and had decided that he was at fault.

So here he was, in front of her building with his hands shoved in his pockets to try and conserve some warmth in this dismal climate. He wasn't going to let another moment go by without knowing what was wrong and how he was supposed to fix it. Women created drama out of thin air; it was part of their makeup. If he had done something wrong, she would be the first to tell him. This was just one of those times he had to seek her out and that too made him nervous. An aging bellman let him into the hotel and he asked the man not to announce him. Climbing two flights of stairs, he found himself in front of her door. He lifted his fist to knock, but his hand froze midair. What was he supposed to say?

"Georgie?" He croaked. "Honey, are you here?" Leaning on the door, he was surprised when it yielded beneath his strength. Georgie was sitting on the bed in a pair of pink and brown pajamas. She had her knees to her chest and a pillow under her chin.

"Go away Steven." Georgie scrambled up from the bed and hurried towards the window. "I don't want to see you right now."

Steven put his hands on his hips. "I don't care if you want to see me or not. I'm not leaving until you tell me what's going on."

"Nothing is going on." She hoped. She prayed. Nothing had to be what was going on. It had to be nothing, just like Ronnie and Lindsay told her repeatedly this morning. And the night before. And all week. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

"Liar." Steven pointed at her. "Tell me." He goaded reaching out to touch her left shoulder.

"No." She stuck her chin out stubbornly.

"I know something's wrong. For one thing, you don't act this way." Steven declared calmly.

She moved to get away from his touch. It was too tempting to just fall into his arms and tell him everything right now, right this second, but that sort of thinking was what led her to this very moment Georgie reminded herself. "You don't know that for sure. I might."

"Whatever it is..." Steven began. "You can tell me."

"I can't." She cursed the quiver even she couldn't rationalize away. He had to leave. If he just took the five steps it would take to get outside her door, then she could deal with all of this. But first he had to leave. "Steven, just go."

Steven grabbed her shoulders and turned her to look at him. "No. I'm not going anywhere. Do you understand?"

Georgie looked at the floor. She couldn't look in his blue eyes and do this. "Steven..."

"You're shaking." Steven realized not sounding pleased about his observation. "Are you afraid of me?"

"No." She shook her head furiously. "No I could never be afraid of you."

"Let's sit down and then you can tell me. Would that be alright?" Steven offered cautiously.

Putting her hand up to her face, Georgie closed her eyes and felt herself nod. The fact he had never taken his hands off her shoulders had been her breaking point. She couldn't ignore the warmth that flooded through her from the second he touched her. "I don't know if I can."

"Yes you can." Steven led her toward her bed and pulled her into his lap so that the back of her head rested against his chest. "You can tell me anything." He added stroking her hair gingerly.

"Not this." She shook her head.

"Okay. Maybe I can guess." He tried to joke. "Um, you got less than an A on your last English paper? Our favorite coffee shop ran out of hot chocolate? You didn't find that book you were looking for?"

"I think I'm pregnant."

Steven blinked. "That wasn't on my list."

Georgie laughed sadly. "Join the club on that one."

"Pregnant?" He repeated. "Like with a baby?"

"No with a pause." Georgie swatted at his shoulder. "Yes a baby."

Steven's brain refused to move at more than a snail's pace. He wasn't sure if he was even breathing anymore. His chest tightened. "I'm kind of out of my norm here." He said as way of explanation. "Just give me another minute."

Georgie checked her watch. "I think you have about nine actually."

"Pardon?"

Gesturing nervously towards the small bathroom she had been staring at when he barged in, she offered a nervous smile. "I just took the test. In nine minutes, we'll know for sure."

Steven squinted at the half-open bathroom door as if he had never seen one before. His future was about to be determined by a plastic stick. It was enough to make a guy crazy. "Why do you think...?" He cleared his throat. "Why do you think you're pregnant?"

She rolled her eyes and bit her lip to keep from smiling. His outright cluelessness had a strange effect of calming her racing nerves. "The usual way Steven. I'm late."

"There's a usual way?" He asked with a thready laugh.

"You want me to ask your sister how she knew?"

Steven gulped and shook his head, words failing him. He placed his hands over Georgie's and lightly brushed his thumbs across her knuckles. He didn't want to think about how his sister must have felt or how fast her mind must have run when she realized she was pregnant...or even the eight minutes preceding it because he was doing his best to not fly back across the ocean and strangle her boyfriend. "This is different." He insisted almost desperately.

"Of course it is." Georgie tried not to laugh. "Talk to me. Please."

"Um...well. The weather's...um...it's still...God, I don't know what to do with this." Steven admitted, ashamed. He had never thought this would happen to him. He had never realized what a complete hypocrite he had become. All the times he had come down on Lucky for the way he had handled this very situation and he was acting no better? It wasn't fair!

"You think I do?" Georgie asked incredulously. "God I came here to study. Not meet you and then this...this isn't the plan."

"Okay." Steven forced out. "Okay, we can handle this."

"How? How do we handle this? We haven't told anyone we are dating."

"We don't know if you're pregnant. We still have five more minutes." Steven pointed out feeling about two inches tall.

"What if I am?" Georgie whimpered into his shoulder. "What then?"

Fine, Steven thought to himself. He was scared—terrified—but he couldn't stand watching Georgie fall apart. A baby could mean the end of her dreams and he couldn't stand for that to happen! And his dreams? He was still adjusting to being Uncle Steven. How was he supposed to handle a pint-sized person calling him "Dad"? It simply wasn't rational. The very idea that Georgie could be pregnant...he pushed it out of his mind for the time being. Until that stick read otherwise, he was making the decision that she wasn't. "Then we deal with it then."

She could feel her mind spinning with every passing second. How on Earth was Steven managing to stay so sure they could handle this? Just the other day, she had managed to dye an entire load of laundry pink by forgetting a red sock with her load of whites. And now in five minutes, she would know if she was going to be responsible for a baby? A whole new little person? She still hadn't figured out the subway system in Paris yet! "How do you know?"

"I have to believe." Steven explained. "I have to believe we have some kind of control over the results. We're not going to let ourselves panic."

"I passed panic about four days ago." Georgie admitted.

"How could you keep this from me?" Steven muttered.

"I was scared. I didn't want to keep it from you, but I freaked out." Georgie looked down at the floor. "And then I was scared of what you would think. Or do."

"Locking yourself in your room every time you get scared isn't what a relationship is about." Steven told her. "And you should have trusted me with this a lot sooner."

"I know. I'm sorry."

He heard her voice crack and almost apologized for coming down on her so hard, only his pride stopping him. This wasn't one of her family dramas that only involved her. This was about both of them and the cold hard fact of the matter was that if he hadn't stopped by..."You wouldn't have told me."

"I would have. After the initial freak out, I wanted to be sure. No sense in both of us freaking out if it's nothing."

Steven rubbed his temple and blew out a breath. "Let's just say, hypothetically, that you are pregnant." He paused. "And, hypothetically, that you keep the baby. Would you return to The States and not give a second thought to me?"

"No." Georgie sat straight up and said emphatically, "I would have told you. What about you? Would you send me back and just forget to tell me when the shoot wrapped up?"

Steven looked away. He didn't know what he would do. His life wasn't designed for a child and neither was hers. Throwing a baby into the middle would be the worst thing they could do to each other. "I guess that'd depend on if you still wanted to be with me."

"Who else would put up with me?" Georgie joked. "I won't force you into anything."

"If you are..." His voice drifted away while he tried to work up the courage to finish his thought. "If we are pregnant, do you want to keep the baby?"

"Honestly? I don't know. I haven't adjusted to the whole taking a pregnancy test just yet."

"If you are—"

"Can we please just find out if I am first before we make any decisions?" Georgie asked hopefully.

Her desperation to wait and see mirrored his to get it all out in the open and decide the next course of action. "Yes." He patted her hand. "Two minutes." Turning his head to the side, he kissed her lips softly. It was a comfort kiss and, hell, if they were going to be stuck waiting, it was the best idea he could come up with, especially if she didn't really want to talk about it.

They fell into silence, each staring at their hands as they laced and unlaced their fingers together. Steven pretended to not sneak glances at her stomach, wonder and fear in his eyes, just as Georgie pretended not to catch him doing that just that or sneaking glances at the clock on the wall. Still, the buzz of the egg timer she had hastily set up caused them both to jump.

Steven watched her climb off of the bed, out of his arms, and walk purposefully toward the bathroom. Instead of sneaking a peek for herself, she carried it back to the bed with her and they stared at it together. "I don't understand."

Georgie looked up into his eyes, tears welling in her own. "One line is negative and two is positive." She explained slowly. "Two lines."

"But that second line is blurry. Are we sure it's two lines and not one? Where's the box?" Steven scrambled off the bed in search of the instructions.

"Trash can." Georgie told him hollowly. Her entire attention was riveted to the two lines staring from her hand. Two lines, two lines, two lines, her brain kept repeating. Pregnant, pregnant, pregnant. Baby, baby, baby.

"'The test line is usually slightly weaker in intensity in comparison to the control line.'" Steven read off of the back of the box, his eyes shifting to Georgie's. "'The pattern of increasing intensity of the test line is a much better predictor of pregnancy rather than any individual reading. Positive test results should always be confirmed with your physician." The box slid from his fingertips and bounced off the carpet. "That's under possible pregnancy which means there's still a chance this is just a scare." He spoke to his hands unable to lock eyes with her a second time.

"I can't go through another test Steven. I can't. I'll just not know."

"We have to know." Steven argued.

"Will you go with me?"

Steven dropped down in front of her. "Of course I will. Every step of the way. And after we know."

"Promise?"

Steven didn't give himself a second to consider what he was about to say; he let it fall from his lips without regard. "Marry me."

"What?" Georgie could feel her eyes widen at his words. "You just said what?"

"Marry me." He repeated a little louder.

"Steven...you don't know what you're asking me."

"I do know." Steven countered. "I'm asking you to marry me."

"You don't have to do this. You said it yourself. This could still be a scare." She argued.

"I don't care." Steven informed her. "I don't care if you are or not. I want to marry you."

"Why?" Georgie felt as if she had been plunged right from one surreal situation into another. Ten minutes ago she was wondering if she could possibly be pregnant and now she was receiving a marriage proposal? "Why do you want to marry me?"

"Because I love you and I think it's the right thing to do." Steven winced at his answer. She would either not believe him or not deem it appropriate enough to make her want to accept.

"You...you love me?" Georgie felt her world stop as those three little words penetrated her being. He loved her? She had been with Dillon for almost a year before he had said the same thing and looked what happened there. "You love me?"

"I love you." Steven confirmed his answer for her. "I've loved you since the first time I saw you reading that God-awful book."

"That book is wonderful." She argued.

"Oh honey, you're so deluded. But I love you despite your bad taste."

"I just...I...I..." She felt a million things at once. She felt like flying or jumping on a couch. He loved her? This man loved her? He wanted to marry her? Even when Dillon had proposed, she hadn't felt he really wanted to marry her. That had just been about the baby...Georgie's eyes flew to meet Steven's. "Is this just about the baby? Because if it is..."

"It's not! I swear it's not." Steven insisted with tears in his eyes.

She couldn't breathe. She couldn't think. When she had woken up this morning, Georgie had realized she was going to be faced with the possibility of one life changing decision but two? It was all too much. "I...I need time. To think. It's all too much right now."

"That's fair. I did kind of spring this on you. I'm sorry for that. I've been waiting for a sign...as corny as that sounds. I just needed to know if I was making the right decision. I think we might be meant to be." Steven told her.

"Your terrible taste in movies is showing."

"Whatever. I could have been quoting your books." Steven chuckled.

"That would require you to admit you've read them."

He bit the inside of his jaw. "Alright you got me. Ready to go?"

"We're going to do this now?"

"You'd rather put it off?"

"No. No. You're right. Let's go."