Lee's heart jumped for joy when Amanda confirmed what he already suspected. He couldn't stop smiling, He was going to be a dad. He lightly stroked her stomach before leaning in to hiss her softly. He pulled back and gazed into her eyes his own filling with happy tears. "I love you," he said.

"I love you, too," she said smiling slightly at seeing his happiness, but she couldn't help the worry that crossed her face soon afterward.

Lee's face fell at seeing her expression change, "Amanda, please, tell me you're not unhappy about this."

"No, I'm happy. I've thought so many times about how much I would love to give you a child of your own ever since I first saw how you interacted with Phillip and Jamie. I knew from that moment on that you would be an incredible father someday, but I never thought it would actually happen."

"Well, it has."

"I know," she said with a hint of sadness.

"You're not doing a whole lot to convince me that you're happy about this," Lee said filled with trepidation.

"Lee, I'm happy. I really am, but also worried, scared, confused. This complicates things."

"I know it does," Lee said. "Because no one knows we're married, but that's all the more reason we should just come clean about the whole thing."

"We can't, Lee. You know we can't. This doesn't change anything. In fact, it makes our situation even worse now that we'll have an infant to worry about."

"Are you kidding me, Amanda? This changes everything! We can't keep living apart now that we're having a baby."

"How do you think we're going to be able to protect a baby? It's at least a little easier with the boys because they're older, but a baby will be helpless."

"You think I don't know that? That's why we should be together all the time. We can protect our child together." When Amanda didn't say anything, he said, "So, what's your solution? We keep living separate lives and I become some pathetic weekend dad like your ex? I won't do that, Amanda. I won't be kept out of my child's life. It's bad enough right now that I can't be a real husband to you. And what about The Agency? Do you just plan on hiding who your baby's father is like we're hiding our marriage?"

"No, I don't think that's an option after our very public display today. I think everyone will know that you're this baby's father."

"So, what you just want to let then believe that I'm some worthless deadbeat dad who knocked you up but didn't live up to my responsibility to you and our child. That would do wonders for my already tarnished reputation around there."

"You said you don't give a damn what any of them think," she reminded him.

"Well, this is different. I fully intend to be a full-time father to this baby. I don't care if we have to install a dozen alarm systems, motion detectors, infrared, surveillance cameras and post 24/7 armed guards at our front door to protect our family, we are going to live like a normal couple, a normal family."

"You're really serious about this," Amanda said.

"Damn right I am," Lee said unwaveringly. "Amanda, have you even stopped to think about how incredible this is. You and me, we made a baby together. Our love created a new life that's growing inside you right now. That there is a combination of you and me in there is the most amazing thing in the world to me," he said his hand still lightly stroking her abdomen. "But I guess it probably doesn't seem so amazing to you since you already have two kids," he said hanging his head.

"No, Lee, it is amazing. And beautiful," She said as she reached up to stroke his face hoping he would look back up at her. When he finally did, she continued. "This baby was conceived in a lot of love, but I'm so terrified of what could happen," She said as she reached for him for comfort and let the tears she'd been holding back fall.

Lee wrapped his arms around his wife and let her cry on his shoulder. "You don't have to be. We can get through this and make it work, but we have to do it like we do everything else, together."

When her sobbing subsided, she pulled back to look at him. "You seem so sure about this, you almost make me believe it can work."

"Believe it, Amanda. You're supposed to be the optimist and I'm supposed to be the pessimist, remember? If I can have enough faith in us to believe it, you should too."

"I love you so much," Amanda said as she tightened her arms around his neck pulling him to her for a long, slow kiss.

"Ahem," said the ER doctor behind them as he'd just entered the room. When they broke apart, he said to Lee, "So, I take I you've been given the good news."

"Yeah, I'm gonna' be a daddy," He said with jubilation.

"Congratulations," the doctor said. "I hate to do this to you, but I'm gonna' have to kick you out soon."

"How's Jamie?"He asked.

"We've got him moved up to Pediatric Care, room 510. They'll monitor him very closely throughout the night. His temperature's dropped a little, so we're hoping it'll be back to normal by morning and he should be able to go home. As for you, Mrs, King, We need to get you moved up to OB/GYN where they're a little better equipped to look after you and your little one. We're going to keep you on this IV for the rest of the night to get you rehydrated and correct your nutrient deficiency. No more skipping meals and make sure you're getting plenty of sleep. You need to take care of that baby of yours. You got it?" When she nodded, he continued. "They've got room 336 all ready for you. We'll have an orderly come in here soon to transport you up there."

"Hence the need to kick me out," Lee said.

"You got it," the doctor answered.

"Is it ok if I go visit Jamie while you're moving her?"

The doctor glanced at Amanda looking for confirmation who nodded in response. "I don't see a problem with it," he said. "Just keep in mind that he needs his rest. He's been a very sick little boy."

"I understand," Lee said before turning to his wife. "I'll see you soon. I love you," he said lightly kissing her before exiting the room. He walked back through the maze to the ER waiting area wandering until he found a phone. He wanted to call the house to keep Dotty from worrying. The phone was answered on the first ring. "Hi, Dotty, it's me," he said.

"Oh, Lee, I'm so glad you called. It's been over an hour. I was starting to get so worried."

"I know, Dotty, I'm sorry about that. I just found out what was going on myself. There weren't very forthcoming with information since I'm not immediate family," he said hating himself for continuing to lie to his mother-in-law, but until he and Amanda could sit down and device a plan of attack to drop the bomb, he felt it was best to wait even though his heart was crying out to tell the truth.

"Well, that's just ridiculous," Dotty said. "You and Amanda may not have made it official yet, but you are most definitely a member of this family. I mean, it is only a matter of time before you talk my daughter into letting you make an honest woman of her."

"Thanks, Dotty," he said with a smile at her determination that he and Amanda would marry. He wondered how she would react when she found out that he'd already married her four months ago without telling her. He imagined she would not be so tickled.

"So, what's going on?"

"They want to keep both of them overnight. Jamie's been moved to his own room in Pediatric Care and they've got him medicated to the gills. I'm gonna' go up and see him when we're done talking."

"And Amanda?"

"They're getting ready to move her to her own room now where they can keep an eye on her. She's a little dehydrated and malnourished so they've got her on an IV drip to get her rehydrated and give her the nutrients she needs. She let herself get to run down taking care of the kids."

"I'm glad you were there to make her see reason. She never listens to me." Dotty paused for a moment, then asked, "So, where are they moving her to?" Lee hesitated for a moment, not sure if he should be honest with her or not. "Lee?"

He decided that it was best to tell her the truth about this since she'd already suspected what was wrong with Amanda anyway, "OB/GYN." he said an waited for the fallout. He was surprised when it didn't come. "Dotty/"

"So, I was right," she said quietly.

"Yeah, you were. Amanda's pregnant. I'd appreciate it if you could keep this to yourself until we figure out how to tell the kids."

"Of course, Lee. How are you feeling about it?"

"Happy, confused, terrified, anxious, and a whole host of other things that I can't really put into words, but mostly happy."

"Well, that's all normal. I have a feeling though that you are going to be a wonderful father to my newest grandchild."

"I hope so," Lee said nervously.

"I have no doubt," Dotty said. "Thanks for the update. I should let you go so you can go visit Jaime."

"All right, if it's not too late when I get out of here, I'll try to swing back by the house to check on Phillip too."

"You should come by anyway, no matter how late it is."

"Ok," he said. As he hung up the phone and was preparing to go to Jamie's room ha paused at seeing Joe King approaching the ER reception desk.

"I'm Joseph King," Joe was saying to the receptionist. "My son, James King, was brought in tonight."

"Nice of you to finally make an appearance," Lee said from behind him. "Did Dotty call you?"

Joe turned around. "Yeah, she did. What are you doing here?"

"I'm the one that brought Jamie and Amanda here. I'm looking after my family, something you could stand to learn a thing or two about," Lee said seething that it had taken Jamie being hospitalized to get Joe's attention.

"You married Amanda in secret. That hardly makes my son your family," Joe replied. Ever since Amanda had told him her plans with Lee he'd resented the other man. He'd agreed to keep her secret, but didn't like it one bit.

"Wrong. He is my family and so is Phillip, even Dotty. They're all my family, whether you like it or not, I'm going to be a part of their lives. Somebody has to be," he said pointedly.

"Ok, I deserve that," Joe said.

Lee sighed. "Look, I was just going to go upstairs and see Jamie if you want to tag along."

"He's not still in the ER?"

"No, they're keeping him overnight."

"It's that serious?"Joe said worriedly.

Lee smiled a little at the change in Joe's expression. At least that demonstrated that he cared a little about his son. "Yeah, it's that serious." he said as the two of them walked toward the main elevator together.

"Is Amanda already up there?"

"No, she's being admitted too. They kicked me out so they could move her upstairs."

"She's sick too? Did she pick up this bug from Jamie?"

"Nope." Lee said as she jabbed the up button on the elevator with his thumb.

"She hasn't been injured on the job again, has she?" he said with a disdainful look at Lee.

"Nope." Lee said again as he stepped into the open elevator and waited for Joe to step in behind him before pushing the button for the fifth floor.

"Well, then what's wrong with her?"

"Look, Amanda's not your concern anymore. She's mine. You've been divorced for over five years. She's my wife now."

"We may not be married anymore, but that doesn't mean that I don't still care about what happens to her. She's still the mother of my children," He reminded Lee. "Besides, I don't know how you can really call her your wife. You two may have the paperwork, but you don't have a real marriage when you don't even share a home."

"You don't know what Amanda and I have. What right do you have to say my marriage to Amanda is not real? It's not like you and Amanda shared a home, not really. I've spent more time in that house in the last year alone than you ever did the entire ten years you were married to her."

"That's what makes no sense to me in this whole thing. That's the exact reason that Amanda and I got divorced, because she wanted a stable home life, yet she married you in secret and seems to be accept just fine that you're not together all the time."

"Maybe she and I just have a deeper connection that makes her want to work harder at sustaining a long-distance marriage," he said stepped through the now opened elevator doors in the Pediatric Care wing looking for signs indicating what direction to take to get to Jamie's room. "Or maybe she never wanted to marry you in the first place but felt she had to." Lee found the direction he needed and began following the signs to get to his stepson's room.

Joe grabbed Lee's arm to stop him. "Just what the hell is that supposed to mean? What would you know about it?"

"When I was working on your case when you were accused of murdering the Estoccian Prime Minister, I had to research your entire history including your history with Amanda and what I found was pretty interesting."

"Oh? And what's that?"

"I've done the math, Joe. You and Amanda were married in August of '72 and Phillip was born in March of '73. That's only seven months. Makes me wonder if she would have married you if she hadn't been pregnant or if you'd have even asked her. The way you treated her, you sure as hell didn't seem like a guy who wanted to be married." He started walking down the hall again. Joe following behind him.

"I could say the same about you since you don't want to make your marriage public knowledge."

"Actually, that couldn't be further from the truth. Nothing would make me happier than to go public and stop hiding, but that's not really any of your business, just like what's going on with her health is none of your business." When he reached his destination, he stopped. "Here it is, room 510. Before we go in, I suggest we table this discussion. Jamie doesn't need be involved and our difference of opinion."

"I couldn't agree more," Joe said.

"Good," Lee said as he pushed opened the door and walked to Jamie's bedside while Joe hung back at the door for a moment. "Hey, Buddy, how you feeling," Lee said gently sitting on the side of the bed placing a hand to his forehead, happy to find that his skin felt cooler.

"Icky," Jamie said. "But better than I did."

"Your fever's down. That's a good sign."

"How's mom?"

" You mom is tough She's going to be just fine. The doctors are going to fix her up, just like they're fixing you up."

"Has she got the same thing I've got?"

"Nope, she's got something else going on and your mom and I will tell you all about when you get better. I don't want you to worry about your mom anymore. You've got enough to worry about with fighting off this infection, ok? I promise you, I'm going to make sure your mom is well taken care of."

"Good," Jamie said.

"Listen, your dad's here to see you too," Lee said nodding to Joe who was now standing behind him. "And I should go check on your mom to see if they've got her moved to her own room yet. I'll come back by to check on you again another time, ok?" Lee bent to place a kiss on his stepsons forehead before rising to let Joe visit with his son alone..

"OK," Jamie said. "Seeya' Lee." Lee was about out the door when Jamie's voice stopped him. "Lee?"

He turned and said, "yeah?"

"Thanks for taking such good care of me and mom."

"You're welcome." He said with a smile before leaving to go check on his wife and unborn child.

By the time Lee reached the third floor and found Amanda's room, he found that she was already sound asleep. He didn't want to disturb her, but he didn't want to leave her either so he pulled a chair to her bedside and just held her hand while she slept. The longer he sat there just watching her, the more he felt the stress of the day kicking in and before he even realized what was happening, he was dozing off too. He was awakened about an hour later by Joe's voice behind him saying, "So, this is why you didn't want to tell me what was going on with Amanda."

Lee sat up and turned to glare at Joe. "So much for hospital policy of not releasing medical information to anyone but immediate family."

"As far as the hospital staff is concerned, I am immediate family. It wasn't too difficult to convince them of that. She may be married to you, but she still legally has my name."

"You rotten bastard," Lee growled. "Well, It won't happen again. I'll make sure that her name changes very soon," Lee said.

"You know, I find it ironic that you were judging me downstairs, but it took you getting Amanda pregnant to stand up and do the right thing by her."

Lee rose from his chair facing down Amanda's ex. He'd had just about enough of him. "There's a big difference. Amanda and I were already married when our baby was conceived and I didn't marry her because I felt that I had to. I married her because I wanted to because I want spend my life with her."

"Living separate lives is what you call spending your life with her?"

"You have no room to talk. At least I still see her every day, even it's just at the office. I'm not on an entirely different continent."

"Stop it," Amanda said from behind them. Both men turned to look at her. "This macho pissing contest of your is pointless."

"Hey, how you feeling?"Lee said as he sat on the side of her bed, taking her hand in his again.

"I feel a little better," she said as she sat up and planted a light kiss to her husband's lips before turning her attention to her ex saying, "Joe, what are you doing here?"

"Your mom called me and told me Jamie was here."

"hmmm," Amanda said. "Yet you didn't bother to come by the house when she called you earlier in the afternoon to tell you that I needed help with both the boys being sick. It took Jamie having to be taken to the ER for you to take his illness seriously."

"Amanda..." Amanda held up a finger to silence him.

"Don't, Joe. Don't even try to make excuses. I don't care why you weren't there for the boys when they needed you. The reason doesn't matter. It doesn't change the fact that you neglected your responsibility to our children both last night and today and you're partially responsible for me being in here."

"How do you figure? He's the one responsible for getting you pregnant," Joe argued with a spiteful glare at Lee.

"I had some involvement in that myself," she said with a grin at her husband. "That's not what I'm talking about. I'm not in here just because I'm pregnant. They're keeping me up here so they can keep an eye on me and make sure the baby's ok, but my pregnancy isn't what landed me here. Sleep deprivation and malnutrition did because I was so focused on taking care of the boys that I forgot to take care of myself. That's what you're responsible for by not giving me any help when I needed it. If it hadn't been for Lee stepping in, I'd be a whole lot worse off than I am now."

"Amanda,"

"Don't say a word, Joe. It's not just me that feels this way. Phillip does too. He thinks you don't care about him and Jamie and he even told Lee today that he wished he was his dad."

"How did you know about that?"Lee asked. "You were upstairs when he said that."

"Mother told me about your whole conversation with Phillip while you were carrying Jamie out to the car."

"I bet you're just loving this, aren't you," Joe said to Lee. "Now you've got not only my wife, but my kids too."

"Don't blame me because you threw your family away," Lee said hotly.

"I am not your wife! I'm his!"Amanda said just as heatedly. "You lost me a long time ago and you're in serious danger of losing your kids too if you don't straighten up."

"Are you saying that you'd keep the boys from me?"

'No, Joe, I would never do that. You should know that by now. It's not me you have to worry about. It's the boys. Do you think they haven't notice your indifferent attitude toward them?"

"Ok, I screwed up. I get it I panicked last night when Jamie started throwing up. I've never been around them when they've been sick. I didn't know what to do. I knew you would. I thought I was doing what was best for them for them to be cared for properly."

"So, why couldn't you have just called to ask me what to do or my mother or your mother. She'd have known what to do. Or call their doctor? You have his number. Or you could have taken Jamie to the hospital yourself. There are a number of things that you could have done instead of just leaving me to fend for myself and treating the boys like they're not important to you."

"That's not what I intended. They're very important to me."

"You might wanna let them know that."

"How do you suggest I do that?"

"How about taking the rest of the time you were supposed to have with them? That would help them have a little more faith in you and help me out at the same time. Lee and I have an undercover assignment starting Wednesday. It would help me to concentrate on my work better if I didn't have to worry about the boys."

"I can do that." Joe agreed.

"So, why don't you come by the house tomorrow evening and pick them up."

"Ok."

"Now, if you don't mind. I really need to get some sleep."

"I got it," he said. "Take care, Amanda." Joe left husband and wife alone.

"You should get some sleep too," Amanda said to her husband.

"I don't want to leave you."

"Lee, there's nothing you can do for me here. I'm in good hands and I don't want you getting yourself rung down. You need to take care of yourself too."

"You're right. I did promise your mom I'd swing by the house to check on Phillip before I call it a night, but I'll be back first thing in the morning."

"I'm counting on it," she said kissing him again. "Now, go on. Don't make me worry about you."