"Whoa, Mrs. Rollins, you look wiped." Sienna tossed a folded shirt onto a stack on the coffee table and quickly folded the last Billie-sized t-shirt in the laundry basket before standing. "The girls are in their room," she added. "I honestly think they might both be asleep. Today was a day around here."

"I can relate," Amanda said, shucking her shoes by the door. "You didn't have to fold all that," she added, nodding to the pile of laundry.

"I know. But I figured with the crazy hours you and Mr. Carisi have been working, you'd want less time doing chores." Sienna stood up. "How much longer 'til baby gets here, again?"

"Oh, not for a few more months yet," Amanda said, rubbing a hand over her belly.

"I wish it was sooner than that," Sienna grinned.

"So do I. Thank you, Sienna, have a good rest of your night." She had to turn sideways so Sienna could get out the door. Amanda crossed the room and plopped down on the couch, closing her eyes. Carisi's text had popped when she turned her phone back on at Newark, he was with Olivia, Bell, and McGrath, they were waiting for Kyle Wilkie at the 16th so the kid could shut down Shadowerk.

God this case had been a fucking rollercoaster. She was physically exhausted from the flights and the search of the summer camp, and an emotional wreck with the loss of Whelan, having to push so hard to get through to Kyle's mother…

"Mommy?"

Amanda glanced up to see Billie standing in the hall. "Hi, baby," Amanda said softly. "Where's your sister?"

"Sleeping." Billie climbed onto the couch, careful not to jostle Amanda'stomach, and curled up with her. "Jesse and I fighted today."

"Oh you did, huh?" Amanda stroked her hair. "What about?"

"Jesse wouldn't let me play with Bunny."

"Mm, something tells me that's only half the story. What's the rest of it?"

Billie bit her bottom lip. "I mighta hid Bunny."

"And where is Bunny now?"

"Sienna finded her in your room, and then she told me and Jesse to go to our room and sit on our beds."

Amanda looked down at Billie. "Yeah? And then what happened?"

"We were both really mad, so we took a nap."

"I see."

"When will Uncle Sonny be here?"

Amanda glanced at her cell phone. It was pushing eight o'clock. "I don't know for sure, honey. He had a lot of big cases this week at work." Billie was still calling Carisi 'Uncle' Sonny, a habit neither of the two adults minded much. She was young and that was how she'd been introduced to him at a young age, so it was sticking. Jesse, on the other hand, was adamant about correcting Billie that Carisi was 'Daddy' Sonny now, and it was a bone she refused not to pick with her little sister.

"Will he be here before we hafta go to bed for real?"

"I don't know, honey. How about you go brush your teeth, and maybe he'll be home by the time you get finished."

"..kay." Billie crawled off the couch and pressed a kiss to Amanda's belly. "Night, baby," she told it.

Amanda waited until she heard the water running and then closed her eyes.

She was awakened by a gentle shake. "Hey," Sonny said, pressing a kiss to her forehead. "Sorry I'm late. McGrath was on the warpath."

"How's Liv?"

"Sore. Tired, like the rest of us." He eased himself onto the couch on the opposite end from Amanda, a move that set her nerves on edge. "And you?"

"Glad that I wasn't on a plane any later in this pregnancy," Amanda admitted. "Just tired."

"You shoulda never been out there." It slipped out under his breath, but he found he wasn't willing to walk it back.

Amanda shifted. "I'm sorry?"

"Nothin'." Sonny unbuttoned his cuffs and rolled his sleeves up past his elbows. "Never mind."

"That wasn't nothing, Counselor."

Sonny would wonder later if it was the exhaustion of five or six arraignments in a row, the look on Kate's face, the pissed-off look in Kyle Wilkie's eyes that said if he could put a hit on the Manhattan DA he would, or if it was just that he was looking to definitively win a fight. "What the hell were you thinkin', Amanda?" he demanded. "Going on a raid pregnant?"

Amanda glanced over her shoulder at the bedroom door. Sonny must have closed it when he'd gotten home. "Are the girls asleep?"

"Yeah, checked on 'em when I got back. You were dead to the world out here."

"Good." Amanda sat up and adjusted so she was facing him. Baby kicked, and Amanda put a hand over the spot as if to reassure them that things were fine. "I had half the Columbus FBI field office, Fin, and Stabler's team along for the ride."

"Yeah, because Stabler is such a fucking reassuring presence. My office got a call he roughed up Oscar Papa and managed to get Olivia shot."

"Oh he shot Olivia? Tear gassed himself and pulled the trigger?" Amanda retorted. "Let's face it Counselor, you're an unreliable witness. It's not him you're pissed at, is it? Not really."

"I might be, just a little. He should've kept you outta this. You're due in four months with our baby, the last place you shoulda been was in Ohio!"

"Yeah well, the last place I wanted to be was in the classroom!"

Sonny stared. "What?" He frowned. "What are you…" It dawned on him as Amanda matched his gaze. "How come you never-"

"Because I knew this was how you'd react!" Amanda winced at the sound of her voice. Frannie whimpered a little in her kennel. She shushed the dog reassuringly.

Sonny ran a hand over his face and rested his hands on his knees. "Okay, so…Clearly, we need to talk."

Amanda nodded. "Yeah. Yeah we do." She nodded down the hall. "Preferably at a dull roar so we don't wake the girls."

"Right." Sonny took a breath and then sat back against the back of the couch again. "You wanna go first or should I?"

Amanda gestured at him. "I'm sittin' there listening to everybody talk about the after-action report," Sonny said, "and hearing about Whelan, and Liv and Stabler, and all that was goin' through my mind was these flashbacks of you. The thing with Jesse. You gettin' shot on that protection detail. And I kept thinkin'…. 'God I'm so scared to be a father but I can't do it alone. I need her.'"

"You're a great father," Amanda said. "Hey, I couldn't have made it this far raising Jesse and Billie without you."

"Yeah, you could've," Sonny assured her, and the praise made her heart beat a little faster. "I…it's the people that wanna watch the world burn, like, do we really wanna bring a kid into all….all this?" He waved a hand toward the apartment window.

"Yeah, we do," Amanda said. "Because the world out there is a big, scary place, but there's also a ton of good. I know that sounds weird coming from me," she added with a chuckle, "but it's true. Look, every day we deal with the good, the bad, and the ugly. But for every Kyle Wilkie, there's a Monica Russo, an Andy Richards, or a Naomi Hayes." She smiled at him. "There's a Mia Morino."

Sonny couldn't help but smile and shake his head at the mention of his niece. "My point is," Amanda continued, "there's people that are gonna put the good back in the world."

She put a hand on his knee. "You're one of them, Counselor."

He smiled. "You know…for someone who said she doesn't like teaching, you give pretty inspirational pep talks there, Professor."

Amanda shook her head. "Love how everyone keeps calling me that. I don't have the degree to actually be a professor."

"But that's not the reason you don't want to teach."

Amanda shook her head. "That's a leading question, Counselor."

"And you're my witness so you have to answer." He looked at her seriously. "Why didn't you tell me you weren't happy at Fordham?"

"I..it's not that I'm not happy. I am. I like my students, I like the subject matter…"

"But?" Sonny prompted.

"When Stabler showed up…asking about coming up with a profile…" Amanda shrugged. "I don't know. Something about the thrill of the hunt. I missed being on the job. I missed asking the questions, that satisfaction you get when a suspect cracks in the box…"

"Yeah. I get that. That's a good feeling," Sonny agreed.

"That night in the girls' room, the night I pulled my gun on the monster in the closet? I thought, 'that's it. I have to be done. This job is getting too hard to keep away from home.' I had stitches in my stomach and I kept hearing Jesse saying how scared she was-" Her voice cracked, and Sonny covered her hand with his. "When your friend at Fordham, when that job offer came through, I thought it was the perfect excuse to be able to have a job I could leave at the door at night, one that wasn't gonna follow me home...and you got me this job. I didn't want you to...to think you'd gone to the trouble for nothing."

"You were an amazing detective, 'Manda. Still are," Sonny said. "I won't lie that I wish you'd stay at Fordham because then I wouldn't have to worry about you. But I don't want you to stay if you hate it. And, to clarify, I didn't get you the job. If anything, I flaked, you covered my ass, and my roommate threw out the opportunity. But even if I had...If you dread going to work every morning, that's not a job anymore." He shifted so he was facing her. "I just want you to be happy. That's all I've ever wanted for you. I wouldn't want you to stay because you think you owe me something. That's not how marriage works."

Amanda smiled. "Think the 1-6 is looking for a part time profiler?"

"I think half the time we could use one," Sonny replied. "Sometimes it takes a fresher set of eyes than the ones we got to go over the details and get a clear picture. Or come at it from a different angle."

"So what do we do?" Amanda wondered. "I mean, the baby is coming, that we can't do much about."

"But I don't want to leave your thing unresolved, and I don't wanna wait until this one is Jess's age to come up with a solution," Sonny said. "Maybe we give it some time, come up with alternatives, see where we're at in a few months?"

"And actually talk to each other this time instead of Liv?"

"That too."

Amanda winced. "Baby agrees," she said. "He's kicking."

"You keep sayin' 'he' all the time," Sonny said. "Why's this one a he?"

"That would be because when he's driving me crazy, he's your child," Amanda shot back. As if chiming in, or feeling left out, there was a wail from Jesse and Billie's room. "Not to be outdone," Amanda breathed, moving to stand.

Sonny was on his feet in an instant, pulling her up gently. They held each other like that a few moments, until Billie let out a wail again. "We got this," he said.

Amanda nodded. "Yeah, we do."