Alexis was feeling like crap, she was pretty sure she'd caught the bug Sam had, but she managed to push it aside as she sat at the conference room table putting Tony Jones' lawyer in his place. Tony, on the advice of his former stepmother turned lover, was not only trying to take Bobbie's rights away as a mother but the brownstone as well. His lawyer argued that the brownstone was the children's home and therefore should stay with Tony since he would have sole custody, but Alexis reminded him that they haven't been to family court yet and custody hadn't been decided. Not only that but Bobbie had owned the brownstone before the marriage and continued to pay the mortgage herself. As far at the kids went, Bobbie and Tony where sharing custody, and Bobbie wanted that to stay the same. An hour and half later Tony's lawyer was telling him to give up on the idea of taking the brownstone. Tony didn't like it but he agreed, so they went back to working out the final details of the divorce.

Alexis and Bobbie stayed behind after the meeting broke up. Alexis explained what would happen next and promised Bobbie she would do better then her best. She also reassured her friend that she knew the judge they'd have in family court and that things would work out. The two women stood from their chairs at the same time and Alexis swayed. She put her hand to head as the room spun, a small moan of discomfort on lips as her eyes closed against the sudden feeling.

"Alexis?" Bobbie asked with concern for her friend as her nursing instincts kicked in. She turned Alexis around and gently pushed her back so she was leaning against the table, rather then being solely on her feet.

"I'm alright." Alexis said despite looking anything but alright.

"You nearly fell over, Alexis." Bobbie said as she felt Alexis' forehead and cheeks.

Alexis opened her eyes and smiled sheepishly. "Just a little light headed. I must have stood up to fast."

Bobbie wasn't buying it. Her instincts as a well practiced nurse and a mother were screaming warning bells at her. "Are you feeling alright? You looked kind of tired when we met this morning."

"I think I'm coming down with something." Alexis admitted. She took a deep, slow breath, and then stood up straight again. "I think I caught what Sam had."

"Sam was sick weeks ago." Bobbie pointed out. "When was the last time you saw a doctor?"

"Ten minutes ago." Alexis said with a straight face. "I was looking right at Tony."

That remark caused Bobbie to give the younger woman a motherly glare. "Funny."

Alexis smirked. "I thought so."

"Come on." Bobbie said with a gentle shake of her head. "I'm taking you to the hospital."

"Bobbie." Alexis protested. "Really, I'm fine. I haven't had a fever or anything. I've just felt a little nauseous lately, that's all."

Bobbie's hazel eyes became very inquisitive when she heard that. "Nauseous? What about fatigue? Vomiting?"

Alexis thought about it for a few moments. "Yes, I guess I have felt tired lately. No vomiting, but I can't seem to shake the nausea and a few dizzy spells."

"Have you noticed anything else that seems odd?" Bobbie asked in a knowing tone.

"Odd how?" Alexis asked. Now she was starting to look concerned.

Bobbie was trying hard not to smile. "Odd reactions to food or smells? Odd aches or tenderness?"

Alexis had to think about it again and suddenly her eyes went wide. "Sam was pealing an orange the other day and I thought I was going to vomit." As far as feeling aches or tenderness she didn't say out loud but she did a quick glance down to her breasts.

The smile Bobbie was trying to hide broke out in full force as she asked, "Alexis, honey, is there any possible way you could be pregnant?"

"What?" Alexis asked, her head snapping up, her voice going up in octave, her eyes wide with a slight look of panic. "Pregnant?"

Bobbie nodded. "You're showing all the early signs."

Pregnant? Could she really be pregnant? She thought back over the last few weeks and even though they were normally careful, she and Jax had had a couple of spontaneous nights. Pregnant? They hadn't talked about having a baby, not really, just that brief comment Jax made the day she and the girls moved into the lakehouse. The thought of having another baby, having Jax's baby, both thrilled and terrified her. Things were good between them; her life was good, why did the universe keep trying to rock her peaceful little boat! Pregnant?

"Alexis?" Bobbie said with real concern when Alexis zoned out. "Alexis?"

"Huh?" The suddenly nervous woman replied. "What?" Alexis looked at Bobbie for a moment and then asked yet again, "Pregnant?"

Bobbie smiled brightly at her friend. "Come on hon. Let's go to the hospital. There's an easy way to figure this out."

Alexis shook her head. "No, thank you Bobbie, but no, I can't, I mean, I don't want…"

"It's ok." Bobbie said as she put a hand on Alexis' arm. She understood. Alexis was a little to much of a control freak and needed to get this in hand herself before going to others. "But you need to find out."

Alexis nodded. She still had a deer in the headlights look as she said, "I'll pick up a home test."

On her way home that night Alexis did pick up a home pregnancy test. For several minutes after pulling into the driveway Alexis sat there in her car with the engine off and the white drugstore bag on the passenger seat. A baby; a baby with Jax; a beautiful little baby boy or a baby girl that no one could take from her, a baby she would raise the way she should have raised Sam. A second chance to be the mother she should have been to Sam all along.

After gathering her things Alexis made her way up to her front door. She took a deep breath and then walked in. When she didn't see anyone she got a flicker of hope that she'd have the house to herself.

"Hi Mom!" Sam said as she came bouncing down the steps from the hallway.

"Jesus Sam!" Alexis yelped as she dropped her brief case and the white bag. "Don't do that!"

Sam frowned. "Sorry." She went to help her mom pick her things up but Alexis shooed her away. "Are you ok?"

"I'm fine." Alexis replied. "Aren't you supposed to be somewhere?"

"Mrs. Spencer is running late." Sam replied. "Is that from the drugstore? Are you ok? You haven't looked well lately."

Alexis nodded. "It's something for my upset stomach. I'm fine baby."

Sam studied her mom carefully. Something wasn't right, but she couldn't put her finger on it, and she didn't have time to ask because there was a sudden car horn. "That's Mrs. Spencer. She picked Niky up and we're going to the movies." She kissed her mom's cheek and then ran for the door. "You should take a nap, and have some soup, and some tea, and call Dad so he can come take care of you."

Alexis smiled at her little girl. "I'll be fine baby. Go and have a good time, don't worry."

Once she was alone Alexis took the pregnancy test to her bathroom and locked herself in. She read the instructions five times before she finally peed on the stick. Alexis set the white stick on the counter and then sat on the edge of her bathtub and starred at it. She wasn't sure how much time passed after the egg timer dinged before she finally had the nerve to reach out and pick the test up, though she picked it up with her eyes closed. Her mind was racing, her heart was pounding, and breathing wasn't coming easy to her in that moment.

"If two blue lines appear." She said aloud as she remembered what the instructions said. Alexis took a deep breath, opened her eyes, and looked down at the little window. "You're pregnant."

When Jax got to the lakehouse he was a little surprised to find the living room empty. He knew Alexis was home because her car was in the drive. "Alexis? Sweetheart, are you home?" He called out as he made his way through the house. "Alexis?"

"In here." Alexis called out from her bedroom.

"Hey." Jax said as he walked into her room to find her sitting cross-legged on her bed. She looked a little dazed and he was suddenly really concerned. Walking over he sat beside her and titled her head up. "Hey, are you alright?"

Her bright brown eyes showed fear and wonder, concern and happiness, uncertainty and excitement. She looked both stunned and thrilled as she looked up into Jax's bright blue eyes. For a moment as she stared wordlessly, breathlessly at him she wondered if their child would have his eyes, or hers, light hair or dark. Would he or she look like a Jacks or a Cassadine, or would they be a perfect combination of the two.

She was really starting to freak Jax out. He cupped her face in his hands as he asked, "Alexis, sweetheart, talk to me, are you ok?"

"I'm fine." Alexis said softly. "I'm fine. I'm more then fine. I'm wonderful. I'm pregnant."

Relief washed over him as he let out the breath he'd been holding. She was fine, she was wonderful, and she was… "Pregnant?!"

Alexis nodded as she smiled at him. "You're ok with that aren't you?"

"Ok with that?" Jax asked in disbelief. Jax jumped to his feet and swept her up in his arms. He spun her around as he laughed, causing her to laugh as well. He lowered her to her feet and brought her face close to his and kissed her. When they broke apart he said, "I'm more then ok with that."

"We're having a baby." Alexis said. There was such a look of bliss on her face that it caused Jax to caress her face gently, almost reverently. But behind the sheer joy there was still a shadow of fear.

Jax pulled her into his arms and held her. "It's going to be different this time, Alexis. No one is going to hurt you, or the baby, no one is going to take her or him from you, no one is going to take me from you. There's no one out there who can hurt you like that again. Helena's gone, your father's dead. You're a strong woman, a fierce and wonderful mother, and you have a family now, a real one." He pulled her away a little and cupped her face in his hands. "This time it's going to be the way it should have been last time."

"I know." She said softly. "I know, but there is always going to be a part of me that remembers what it felt like to have Sam ripped out of my arms, a part of me that can still hear the way she cried when they took her from me."

Jax knew that his words of reassurance would fall short in the shadow of those emotions so instead of trying he simply pulled her close again and kissed her. They stood there for several minutes kissing and caressing; showing each other how they felt through their physical connection. Then Jax scooped her up in his arms again and carried her back to the bed. He held her in his arms and played with her hair as she rested against him. "Sam is going to be an amazing big sister."

"She will." Alexis agreed. "But I don't want to tell her just yet, I don't want to tell anyone just yet. I want to wait until I'm a little further along. It's still really early. The only reason I even took a test so soon is because I almost fainted on Bobbie and she figured it out."

"You fainted?" Jax asked with immediate concern. "Should we go to the hospital?"

When she felt him move as if to get up she pressed her weight against him to make him stay put. "I'm going to call and make an appointment with Dr. Meadows first thing in the morning." She shifted in his arms just enough so that she could look at him face to face. "I'm fine, Jax, don't worry. I've actually been sitting here remembering what it was like before, with Sam, and fainting is pretty normal for me. I passed out twice before my dorm-mother sent me to the infirmary. I spent the first few weeks of my pregnancy light headed and nauseous."

"Was it a difficult pregnancy?" Jax asked carefully. Alexis never really talked about that time in her life and he never pushed. He waited for an opening, like now, and asked careful questions.

Alexis shook her head. "No, it was fine. With the exception of being locked away in a clinic for unwed teenage mothers, and the moment they stole her from my arms, it was the most wonderful time in my life. I loved being pregnant with Sam; I adored it. I savored every second of it; every dizzy spell, every bout of heartburn, the never ending hiccups, all the late sleepless nights when she would kick and squirm." Alexis chuckled softly as Jax wiped a tear off her cheek. "I use to call her my little guppy because I could have swore she was in there doing the back stroke or something. Knowing my daughter the way I do now, I was probably right."

Jax chuckled, a bright smile on his face as he listened to her. She was radiating such love for their children that he was soaking it in like man in the desert who'd just found an oasis.

"It was the labor that was difficult." Alexis said softly after taking a moment for herself to look over the memories. "I was alone with a bunch of strangers, doctors, nurses, no one to care about me or my baby. And Sam, Sam just did not want to come out. There was nothing medically wrong, no issues the doctors could fix, she just didn't want to be born. It got so bad that the doctor was thinking of doing a c-section." Alexis paused to let the sadness, hurt; anger and fear wash over her before continuing. "I think she knew. I think she knew that as soon as she was born our time together would be over."

Jax held her a little tighter and kissed the side of her head as his hand covered her hand, which now rested on her stomach.

"Our child won't be born like that, Jax." She told him after several long moments. "He or she won't be born into such a cold world where the only beacon of warmth and love is taken away from them the way it had been taken from Sam. I want you there, I need you to be there, I want our family there."

"I will be, Alexis, I will be right there with you when our child is born." Jax promised. "He or she will be born into a world full of people who are going to love and adore him or her."

Alexis smiled at that and nodded. She knew what he said was true. She knew this time would be different, it would be better, and it would be done right, and at the end if it all she would have Sam and this new baby and no one could ever taken them from her. And if by chance anyone tried? God help them.