It had to be a nightmare. This couldn't be happening. After all that they had gone through to get to this moment, he couldn't accept that she was gone. How could someone so vital and vibrant be gone so quickly. But he could not deny that her ashen skin, waxy and translucent in the candle light was becoming cool to the touch. Others had offered to handle the task of dressing her. Others had tried to take this from his hands, but he would not relinquish this one last moment alone with her. He only had these last moments to spend with her, and he could not willingly lose an instant.

"Oh, my darling. How I loved you, how I loved you even when I was unable to admit it to myself. I wanted to protect you from everything. I wanted to give you the world. But I have failed, failed in more ways than anyone could have ever conceived of..." He whispered in voice thick and heavy with emotion. He brushed an errant strand of hair from her cool brow and then dropped a kiss there.

"I need you my darling, oh how I need you. Our child needs you, your darling baby boy needs you. You can't leave him." His voice was husky as he rasped words uncomprehendingly to her inert form. "Wake up, my darling. Open your eyes, tell me that it has all been a nightmare, tell me that we are all wrong. I would be so happy to be wrong. Please you can tell me many times what a fool I was. Wake up and tell me over and over that you are right." He cried.

But she was silent and still, as unmoving and unyielding as stone. Finally he unbuttoned the white gown that she had been sleeping in and slipped it from her body. There were still the obvious signs of childbearing and the agony of birth marking her. Her abdomen was still softly rounded, still as if life were growing within her.

He stared at her naked body, willing for her to rise, willing for her to turn and pull a blanket over herself to hide her nudity. But she did not move, could not move. Her hands grew cooler and rested limply at her sides even as he stood staring at her. "Scarlett, my love. My love, wake up!" He cried again.

Finally knowing that he would never again hear her voice calling out to him in the night as a scared child, he carefully dressed her in a dress the color of emeralds, the color of eyes that would never stare at him with such an odd combination of naiveté and strength. The material was rough against her smooth skin. He leaned down and brushed his lips once more upon hers, "My darling, my Scarlett, I love you." Tears slipped down his face, "Scarlett. Scarlett" he moaned like a wounded animal cowering under the power of something that he was not able to master or stop.

But there was no reply, only the icy silence of eternity closing in around him. She was gone. "Scarlett" again he cried closing his eyes trying to escape the nightmare of this reality...

"Rhett?" a soft voice called to him, breaking through the agony of his heart. For a moment he was shrouded in confusion, eyes blinking in the heavy darkness. "Rhett?" The voice called again, and then a smooth, cool hand was at his brow. "Rhett?"

And he breathed again, his arms pulling her body closer to his. He buried his nose into the warmth of her neck, her dark hair swirling around him. 'Oh, Scarlett. Oh, Scarlett." He sighed, trying with little effect to control his treacherous emotions.

But she pulled away from him in the darkness, her bright eyes shining like stars in the night. Her hands smoothed a rebellious lock of hair from his face. "Were you dreaming?" She asked.

He shuddered for the nightmare's silvery tentacles had not yet loosened. That nightmare was still as real to him as the warm body of his wife. He squeezed his eyes tightly shut for a moment more to compose himself before finally admitting, "I dreamed that you had died. And somehow, in someways, it was so much darker than even Bonnie's death, no matter how I loved Bonnie." Realizing that he had spoken the words aloud he then clamped his jaw shut, refusing to admit to anything more than he already had. He had showed his cards, slipped and allowed the one person who had the greatest power to destroy him to see him in his weakest moment.

The remote mask slipped over his features as he stiffened in the darkness at the gentle touch of her hand. She flinched at his movement, sensing the distress that was engulfing him. "Rhett, it was only a dream. Only a nightmare like the ones that I have, like the ones Bonnie had." She wiggled closer to him, running her hand slowly down his back in a smooth sweeping gesture.

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Speaking it, doesn't make it happen. Look at me. I am fine. There is nothing wrong."

He relaxed under her careful ministrations, her hands on his body, small and warm, helped to dispel some of the terror the vision that he had seen. Her presence was the balm that he needed to wash away the images of death and loss and grief. Finally her hands stilled as she leaned in and gently kissed his neck; soft breath caressing his tender skin. Her hands moved to the buttons on his shirt.

"Scarlett, darling, I'm not sure that this is advisable, not now." He cautioned gently.

"Please Rhett, please I need you." She responded, her voice soft and yet powerful with yearning.

"As much as I want you, and God, Scarlett, how I want you. I don't want something to happen, I don't want anything to jeopardize this child's health or more than that yours. We can't do this now, darling, no matter how much we want to." He reasoned.

"It's because I've gotten fat. I'm old and you don't want me anymore," she pouted, obviously not pleased with his rebuff or his reasons.

"I swear to you, Scarlett, I want to, I want to very much, but we can't, we can't, not yet. Not until we know that you are stable and able to do this. You nearly miscarried only a day ago. Perhaps you aren't going to be careful with your condition,, but I damn well am not going to place you in any more danger than I already have."

But she continued her assault on him, small hands fumbling with buttons in the darkness, hungry kisses colliding with his lips that could not be reasoned with. She was clinging to him in the darkness like a rose climbing a lattice, and he understood that to pry her away now might kill that bloom.

"I don't understand this Rhett, but I need you. It's been too long, and I need to feel complete. I need to be a part of you. I need that passion." She said between kisses and caresses.

And finally he could no longer control himself, not as she clutched at him and pulled at him, begging him to join her in pleasure and ecstasy, not when her eyes were so flooded with love and desire. He was only man, only a mere mortal. But he also knew that tonight would be different than it had ever been between them. He would not hold back and remain aloof as they came together. And he knew that it would not be a wild celebration of survival as it had been that day on the beach, nor would it contain the frenzied jealousy that had unleashed passion that was equal in his heart with the pain that they were causing each other. Even if it killed him, tonight would be slow and sensual, tonight he would worship her instead of degrade her. Tonight would be different.

The next morning he awoke slowly with the sunshine spilling through the curtains and falling across his face in blinding brightness. But he did not move for Scarlett's small body was twined with his, and he could not move for the chance that it would disrupt her sleep.

He lay there listening to the steady breathing, and watching as her chest rose and fell. And he remembered the nightmare that had attacked him in the night. He wondered if it was not merely a nightmare, but instead a harbinger of what was to come. For all of Scarlett's protestations to the severity of her weakness, Rhett couldn't shake the gloom that had descended upon him with the memory of the nightmare. A child would not be worth her life. He didn't want to lose her, didn't know if his sanity would survive the loss of her.

She stirred in her sleep, hiding her face from the sun within the shelter of his arms. She was so content, so completely at peace that he felt as if the ax was going to fall. This sweetness, this bliss could not remain. Never in his life had something that he loved so much stayed as it was. He had to fight the urge to fling her body away from him and run. It seemed that running was the only thing he had ever done that was able to protect himself from anything.

But her small hands tugged at his shirt, and he could not let go of this happiness. He couldn't sacrifice this moment even if he would have to pay for it later, and he knew that he would. He remembered his father's last words to him as he had walked out the doors of their townhouse in Charleston on the battery, "You'll never be happy. You will ruin everything you love. You will never be anything more than you are now." And then the rest of his bags had been carelessly tossed after him. The door had slammed, and he had refused to look back, refused to give his father any power over him.

But it seemed as if his father had cursed him to be a vagabond, unable to settle down, unable to love anyone fully. With the exception of Bonnie, he had run from everything else that he had loved. And yet Bonnie's love had only cemented that trait further for he could still feel the ache in his heart from her absence. He always ran. Even as a child, he had been prone to running off. And he had never shaken that habit. It had become as much a part of him as the color of his eyes or the stealthy way in which he walked.

"Rhett," she sighed in her sleep.

He tightened his arms around her, inhaling the sweet scent of her skin. She pressed herself against him, and he could feel the nearly invisible swell of her stomach. But he couldn't run anymore. He knew that there would be no more chances. He had run out of chances for he had run too many times. This was the last chance at happiness, and he would cling to it at all costs. He would hold on to her and this new life with all that was within him.

And as he lay there, trying to grapple with his thoughts, she woke and smiled at him, her eyes blazing with happiness. "I love you, Rhett." Her voice was soft and there was a faint blush glowing on her face as if she were remembering her boldness of the previous night..

"Good Morning," he whispered.

"I'm so glad that we are home. And Wade and Ella will be back later. It's going to be perfect, I just know it."

He could not extinguish that warmth and hope in her eyes, and so he smiled vacantly at her, trying to console himself with the hope that she was right. And he held her and allowed the warmth of her skin to thaw the icy shell forming around his heart.

Author's Note: I know I was being terribly horribly mean, but I just couldn't resist.