"I can't quite believe that this time tomorrow we'll be in our own house. Our very first home together." Kensi's voice is full of pent-up anticipation, and I can't help thinking that we're like two little kids, lying awake on Christmas Eve, too excited to sleep.
"I can."
Mainly because we are lying on the (very hard) floor of my apartment, surrounded by cardboard cartons crammed full of all my worldly belongings, bar the sofa and tv. My old bed went off to Goodwill this morning and we've spent every single evening for the last week either packing things up or throwing things out. Right now just about the only things left out are this double sleeping bag, our toothbrushes and a change of clothes for the morning. And right now, my back is killing me. I'm well aware that a firm mattress is supposed to be good for your back, but sleeping on a hard floor is taking things to a ridiculous extreme.
"You're missing Monty, aren't you?"
"Kind of."
Like I've said before, Monty is a creature of habit and he doesn't exactly react very well to change and yesterday he started running round in circles before coming to a halt beside a cardboard box containing all our bedding and starting to cock his leg. That was when we called Nell and asked she would like to puppy-sit for a couple of days – just long enough for us to get settled into the new house. I don't think Hetty gave her much option, to be truthful.
"He'll be back with us tomorrow night." Kensi moves carefully within the tight confines of the sleeping bag so that her body drapes itself on top of mine. "Once we're all moved in. Just think - this time tomorrow, we'll all be together again. In our new house."
"And in our new bed." I can't wait.
God, Kensi feels so good. I can feel her warm breath brushing across my face in the darkness, feel the long, lean silken length of her and my hands automatically move to caress her. There is the familiar sigh as she hitches in her breath, followed by a lower sound of contentment that comes from somewhere deep inside me in response. I will never get used to this, to exploring her pliant flesh, to the wonder of her body revealing itself to me, and the fact that there are no inhibitions between us anymore. The rough noise of the zip peeling itself undone penetrates the night and we are free of the bonds of the sleeping bag as it peels itself away from our bodies, like a snake shedding its skin. The evening air is cool, but that's like a welcome whisper across the hot, entangled entity of our bodies as we start to move together, slowly at first as we drift seamlessly into a familar rhythm that is as old as time, and yet made new and fresh once again as all the mysteries of the universe dangle themselves enticingly in front of our eyes for just a single second before the world bursts into a rain-shower of colour and light and threatens to disintegrate completely.
"One thousand and one," I say, some little time later.
"Arabian Nights?" Kensi suggests lazily. "Does that make me Scheherazade?"
"Definitely." Well, she's weaved me into her spell, just as the legendary story-teller of the Arabian Nights did so effectively. I probably shouldn't go and spoil it all by telling her I was actually trying to work out how many times we'd made love here, should I? And do not bother telling me I was exaggerating with my estimation – sometimes we all need some scope for artistic license.
"Does it feel strange to you? That we're just about to take this huge step forward?" Kensi raises herself up onto her elbows and stares down at me intently.
I'd noticed how she'd hesitated before signing the legal papers for the house. It was just for a second, but there was definitely a pause, during which time Kensi had taken a deep lungful of air before composing herself and scrawling her signature with rather more force than was strictly necessary. Even so, it was even less legible than normal, if that's possible. Handwriting came a poor second in the Blye household to stripping down a gun blindfolded.
"No," I say firmly, so there is no room for any doubt concerning how I feel about all this. "It doesn't feel strange at all. It feels completely right."
The tension seeps from her body, and she subsides down again, her breasts soft and welcoming against my chest. "Oh good. It's just that… well, you know."
"I know that everything is going to be great, baby girl. This is you and me. Together we can do anything." I know she's not really questioning anything, but that she just needs to be reassured that we are in this together. Which we are, all the way. I stoke her hair and wonder yet again at the miracle that we are together.
The familiar gesture seems to free her thoughts. "It's like the whole world's just waiting for us, isn't it? And that's exciting, but it's kind of frightening too."
Six months ago, Kensi would have pulled her toenails out with her teeth before she'd admit any sort of weakness to me. But that was then and this is now. Back then we were fighting against the inevitable, pushing one another away whenever we got too close. And now – now we are. We are what we are. We just are – and ever more will be, I hope. I might even pray, if I could remember how. Maybe I should start again? After all, if I forget to pray for the angels, then the angels might forget to pray for us.
"There's nothing to be frightened of." I stroke the hair back off her face, and Kensi's mouth nuzzles at the crook of my neck, unerringly finding that exact spot that drives me crazy. She knows me so well. She knows me inside out.
After a while, we get our minds back on track. "It's just that it's been a long time since I did all this couples stuff, you know?"
Oh, I know. "Since Jack, you mean."
Jack. Bloody Jack. The man who walked out on my girl, and broke her heart. Really, I suppose I should thank the man, because if he was still around, then I wouldn't be lying here with Kensi, but in reality I just want to punch his lights out, tear out his liver with my bare hands and feed it to him in little tiny pieces. And then lock him in a very small, airtight room with Monty when he's having one of his especially gassy periods. Nobody hurts Kensi like he did and gets away with it. It doesn't matter that Jack's actions have indirectly led to us getting together, because the point is that he hurt my girl. He broke her heart and made her doubt herself and for that I will hate him until his dying day.
"Since Jack," she confirms. "Only I was so young back then. I think I was almost flattered when he asked me to go out with him. He was a lot older than me, and this big, tough Marine."
Kensi rolls off me, and onto her back. It feels as if she is a million miles away, both literally and figuratively.
And now you're with this idiot cop, who manages to knock himself out all the time, I think, but for once I manage to bite my tongue, so that I don't actually say anything. I'm learning, you see. It's taken a while, but I'm getting there.
"Looking back, I think I was more in love with the idea of being in love," she says slowly. "If that makes sense. I mean, I thought I loved Jack – but now I can see that I didn't even know him."
Do we ever know anybody, I wonder? Really know them, I mean. Know all the secrets of their souls, so that we can see the parts they keep hidden away? Am I brave enough to expose all these parts of myself, or am I still too scared that Kensi would run out of here, screaming at the top of her lungs? Can I ever really, truly believe that she loves me – Marty Deeks, with all my flaws and imperfections? After all, it is just possible that Kensi is more in love with the idea of being in love with me than she's actually in love with me, if that makes sense. Maybe I've rushed her into all this? There's a chance this all happened too fast, even if I have been lusting after her since the day we first met.
Still, like I said, I've learned not to speak before I think. And right now I don't know what to think, so I just lie silently, wondering why everything is slipping away through my fingers, just when it all seemed so perfect.
"Jack was like my Dad," Kensi says, while I just lie there beside her, frozen into immobility, not daring to move or say a single word, unlikely as that might seem. I know how much she loved her father – still does love him. "I've just realised that. How come I never saw that before? Of course, now I know that Jack was nothing like my dad, not really – but back then I thought he was. I thought he was this strong man I could rely on. I thought I could be safe with him. Only I was wrong."
The room is filled with her laughter and my head whirls with confusion. Could somebody give me the Cliff Notes please, because I think something got lost in translation along the way.
"You were wrong?" My voice sounds strange, like it doesn't quite belong to me.
"With bells on. I was such an idiot. Living with Jack wasn't living – it was like having the life sucked out of me, little by little. He was an emotional vampire, you see. But you…" Her voice goes very soft. "With you it's different. Completely different. You make everything seem so simple, and such fun. I've never had so much fun since I met you. You made me love again, Marty."
I've noticed that Kensi only calls me by my first name when she's really emotional.
"I'm not Jack," I say feebly.
"Thank the Lord for that. Even I don't deserve a prick like him twice in one lifetime." She dunts me in the ribs with her elbow.
"What does that say about me?"
"Oh, that's easy – you're the one I love. You're the one I was just waiting for, even if I didn't know it." And her voice is so full of certainty that I believe her. Completely.
"How come I got so lucky?" I move so that we're lying side by side, not quite touching, but just staring into each other's eyes.
"Because you're you? And I just can't help loving you. I tried for so long, you see. I really did. But in the end, I just couldn't help myself."
"You're the one I was waiting for," I assure her. It was like the fates just danced us together. "And this is just the way it was meant to be. You and me. Forever. I'll never stop loving you."
We seem to melt into one another, making love as if time has stopped still. She can dance to me to the end of love and way beyond that, until time stands still.
That makes it one thousand and two times, by my reckoning. Not that it really matters, because tomorrow we're going to have start counting all over again. I want to spent the rest of my life loving her, and being loved in return.
It's a tight squeeze, but we manage to get all my stuff into the U-Haul van, with barely an inch to spare. In a gesture of solidarity, Callen and Sam have already taken Kensi's stuff over to the new house. Either that or Hetty has issued one of her infamous dictats. It's a funny feeling, shutting the doors and knowing that my life is all packed up in boxes inside the van. My old life, that is. Some of it I am taking with me, but there is a whole lot that I've let go off, because it just doesn't matter anymore. The future is what we decide to make of it, and neither of us feels the need to be weighed down by the past any more. Tomorrow has become today, the time is ripe and we're ready to take hold of life with both hands.
"Ready?" I look at Kensi and she returns my gaze steadily.
"Definitely."
"Do you want to drive?" I dangle the keys invitingly. Now, I reckon I'm onto a sure thing here. Kensi loves to drive big vehicles: the bigger the better, as far as she is concerned. I'm considering getting Hetty to have a little word with the Armoured Division HQ to see if we can arrange for Kensi to spend a day driving tanks for her birthday present. She'd be in heaven if we can manage to pull that off.
"No way." She puts her hands behind her back and shakes her head emphatically.
"Really?" Is she being serious? Has someone taken my girlfriend away during the night and replaced her with a doppelganger? With any luck, this one will be equally highly sexed, but rather more domesticated.
"You drive the truck," she says sweetly. "I'll take the Porsche. I want to arrive at my new house in style."
Foiled again. You would think I'd learn by now, wouldn't you? Still, I've got one last card tucked up my sleeve. "Fair enough. I'll see you there then." I climb into the truck and shut the door behind me. "Last one there's a loser, by the way."
"That heap of junk versus the Porsche? See you there, Loser." I love the way she's not afraid to share her feelings with me.
"You're forgetting one thing." I start up the van. "The car keys are still upstairs in the apartment. Be sure and lock up behind you, okay? Oh, and don't forget to drop the keys off at the landlord's on the way, and get my deposit back, will you?"
And with that, I drive off. It pays to think ahead, you see. I kind of had a sneaking suspicion she'd try to pull a fast one on me. It's a good thing I can't lip-read, because I'm pretty sure what I see Kensi mouthing at me in the rear-view mirror is unprintable. As things turn out, Kensi is barely ten minutes behind me in arriving, only of course I make out like it's been a lot longer.
"Did you take the scenic route?" I ask conversationally. Come on, at least I didn't call her a loser, which proves I've acquired some tact and diplomacy, I think.
She ignores that witty sally and peers into the van. "You've not exactly done very much in the way of unloading, have you?"
"I was waiting for you."
"Do I look like a power-lifter?"
"That's not the sort of lifting I had in mind." I pick her up in my arms and stride up path, like I'm some big movie-hero. Come on, give me a break. There are very few times in life when you can make a grand, romantic gesture like this and I'm not about to let this one pass. "Welcome home, Kensi."
Her arms are around my neck and we're kissing as I step across the threshold. Talk about starting off as we mean to continue.
"Do be careful, Mr Deeks," Hetty chides. "If you don't look where you're going, you could trip and have another nasty accident. At least open your eyes."
"Marty never opens his eyes when we kiss," Kensi informs her.
How does she know that? Has she peeked or something?
"Put the woman down, Deeks. You've got the rest of your lives to snuggle."
The world has officially ended. Sam Hanna has used the verb 'to snuggle'. I never thought I would live to see the day, and that's the truth.
"You're just jealous," I say, adjusting Kensi's position slightly. She's heavier that she looks, you know and my left shoulder feels like it's starting to slip out of joint.
"Why would Sam be jealous when he has me?" a voice asks, and a woman emerges from behind him. Given that Sam is very large, there is the distinct possibility that he could have an entire platoon of Marines tucked away in his shadow. Still, they'd make short of unloading the U-Haul.
"You must be Mrs Hanna," Kensi exclaims, and slides down to the ground. Thank God. My arms were going numb and I think I might have herniated a disc in my back.
"Call me Rosie," she says and smiles at us. "And you two must be the infamous Kensi and Deeks. Sam's told me so much about you both."
Much to my surprise, Rosie seems completely normal – in other words, she's nothing like I'd pictured (i.e. deeply scary). I'm just about to tell her that I wished I could say the same, only Kensi stands on my foot, really hard. Excellent. If today goes on like this I'm going to be in pieces by this evening.
"Has he really?" Kensi smiles warmly and Sam starts to look worried. "How about you tell me all about it and we'll let the guys get on with the heavy work?"
Well, we may as well start off as we mean to go, I suppose.
"You heard the lady," Sam says to me, in a manner that suggests he knows better than to even attempt an argument. There's no doubt who rules the roost in the Hanna household. I bet his daughter has Sam wound round her little finger too. No wonder he feels the need to be so aggressively macho at work, because I get the definite impression that Sam is firmly underneath Rosie's thumb. That's just the way it is with us guys: we like to act tough, but when it comes right down to it, we do what our ladies say. It's easier that way. And you can save your energies for the things that really matter. Like flat-screen TVs. Only I lost that battle (sorry – discussion), didn't I?
As we go outside to start unloading the van, Hetty fixes Callen with a beady glare. "What are you waiting for, Mr Callen? Victory?"
Correctly judging that no answer is required, Callen heaves a sigh and joins us. He might not be in a relationship, but Hetty has got him exactly where she wants him.