Same Time Next Year

Disclaimer: I don't own The New Avengers, nor the characters of Mike Gambit, Purdey, and John Steed. Sadly. They're the property of The Avengers (Film and TV) Enterprises. This story is for entertainment purposes only. No copyright infringement intended

Timeline: Ninth in a series. Takes place in November, 1977, a few months after the conclusion of the series in the Canadian episodes. It is strongly recommended, but not essential, that you go back and read the previous stories in the arc: Lost Boys, Anew, Aftermath, Dance With Me, The Anniversary, Merry Christmas, Mr. Gambit, Brazil, Life on Mars, and 'Til Death.

For more information about the series, please see my profile.

They arrived at Gambit's building, and despite his protestations, Purdey insisted on supporting him by placing his arm over her shoulders as they walked. Though he was loath to admit it, whether due to the fading of the adrenaline that had kicked in in anticipation of viewing Vanessa's body, or the lingering effects of his injuries, Gambit found himself in need of the support.

They stumbled none-too-gracefully into his flat, and Purdey walked them over to the couch, reached down momentarily to touch the button that retracted the bed. "Do you know," she began, as the bed slid out silently, "I used to think this bed was terribly corny, but it does have its advantages."

"Yeah, but I chose it for fun, not recuperation," Gambit grumbled, as Purdey helped him settle down onto the edge of the mattress.

"Yes, I'm well-aware of its storied history, as much as I try to forget about it," Purdey groused, unable to stop a small grunt from escaping her lips as the weight of Gambit's body transferred from her own frame to the mattress.

"I didn't hear you complaining the first time you used it," Gambit reminded, with a bit of his usual playful spark dancing in his eyes. "In fact, I don't remember you complaining about anything at all. You seemed ecstatically happy." His grin broadened. "Although most of your praise was reserved for me, though I'm sure you would have had something nice to say about the bed, too, if you hadn't had other things on your mind."

Purdey could feel her own eyes dancing. "Bigger things?" she chimed in knowingly, but not without humour.

Gambit snickered. "You said it, not me, though I'm having trouble believing it."

"I suppose it was only a matter of time before your corniness rubbed off on me," Purdey sighed with affected weariness. "Sleeping with you must have only accelerated the process."

Gambit was grinning so broadly now that she thought his face might split. "You can rub off on me as much as you like," he said smoothly, one warm hand curling around her hip. "But that offer was on the table the second you met me, not just since we got involved."

"Mike Gambit." Purdey smiled and shook her head at his cheekiness, her usual instinct to knock his ego down a peg or two noticeably absent. It was hard to be annoyed with him, even slightly, when she was looking down at features that were still pale and drawn, in spite of the light in his eyes and the grin on his lips. She stroked his dark curls back from his forehead and tried not to think about how much darker they looked when his complexion was so alarmingly white. Kendrick had assured her more times than she could count that Gambit had had all the transfusions he needed and there wasn't anything else seriously wrong with him, but the physical strain of the injuries he'd sustained in the warehouse, coupled with the mental wounds that had been reopened by having to interact with Vanessa, had left their mark, and she found herself interpreting his appearance in terms of illness, as though he'd been stricken and wounded to his very core. That, coupled with the fears she had been nursing about his safety over the past few weeks, meant that she was reluctant to let him out of her sight, even for a second. Right at that moment, even the kitchen, scant steps from where she was standing and where she had meant to go to get him some water as soon as he was settled, seemed like miles away. What if she turned her back and he slipped away, in body or spirit, never to be seen again? It was an irrational fear, to be certain, but one Purdey's hyperactive imagination and sense of peril could not shake, no matter how much reason she applied to it.

Those imaginings must have been writ large across her own face, because Gambit's grin faded, making him look even more peaked. "You okay, Purdey-girl?" he asked, with obvious concern, thumb rubbing tenderly over her hip.

Purdey laughed in spite of herself—and her anxiety. "Mike Gambit," she marvelled, shaking her head in disbelief. "You're the one who could have bled out after having a warehouse fall on you. And yet you're asking me if I'm all right?"

"Nothing I haven't had to deal with before," Gambit dismissed. Then, at Purdey's sceptical expression, added, "Well, the stabbing, not the building falling on me, but I survived. I know I'll be okay. It's you that I'm worried about, especially when you still haven't answered my question."

Purdey smiled wanly, still stroking his hair back from his forehead. "I'll be all right," she temporised, and knew the assurance hadn't worked the second Gambit pressed his lips into a thin line. "When I've finally convinced myself that you are."

"Purdey…" Gambit looked weary and slightly sad as he released her hip to pat the spot next to him on the mattress. Purdey hesitated for a moment, but the beseeching look on his face coupled with the anxious way his jaw was working made her acquiesce before he wasted any more of his precious strength, though she could anticipate what was coming. She settled down beside him, couldn't resist a wince of sympathy as he readjusted his position on the bed and pain flickered across his face as his stitches cried out in protest, even if the man himself didn't. As per usual, he took his suffering in silence, which was what she was worried he was doing in the first place. "Purdey," he repeated, composing himself and taking her hands in his, regarding her very seriously. "I know you're worried about me, but you have to take my word for it when I say I'm going to be okay. What I'm worried about is you running yourself ragged looking after me."

Purdey tried to smile in a carefree manner to put him off the scent. "So you're saying you're worried about me being worried about you?" she said glibly, but for once, Gambit wasn't smiling.

"Partly, yes. But I'm also worried that you're not worried about yourself. I know that Vanessa was after me, but you went through hell and back helping me fight her." He leaned in, gaze so powerfully intense, so earnest, so deadly serious that she couldn't look away. "A lot of what happened to me happened to you, Purdey, and even when we were on different paths, you went through things that were just as terrible as what happened to me. Hell, Purdey, the damn building fell on you, too!" Purdey bit her lip at that, willing herself not to fall apart right in front of him. "You're one of the toughest, strongest people I know, but after what you've been through, you need time to recover. Let me take care of you, or at least spend less time looking after me and more time looking after you."

Purdey's mouth twitched self-consciously. "I want to keep you safe, that's all," she defended.

"You have saved me," Gambit assured. "In more ways than you know. But I don't feel safe if you're not okay. If you won't relax and take care of yourself for your own sake, then do it to stop me worrying."

Purdey grinned wryly in spite of the anxiety that seemed to have her heart in a death grip. "Now you're saying that if I look after myself it'll stop you worrying, which will stop me from worrying."

"I thought you might be more likely to listen if I used your own logic against you," Gambit quipped, grunting a little as he bent to lift her legs up onto the bed and his stitches screamed in protest. "But it would put my mind at ease if you laid back and rested, maybe had a few winks." He got to his feet and pressed gently on her shoulder to encourage her to recline. "I know you can't have slept very well in the hospital. Those cots aren't very comfortable. And that doesn't count all the sleepless nights I've given you over the past few weeks."

"Someone has a high opinion of himself," Purdey tried, but she couldn't disguise the weariness in her voice or the lack of resistance from her body as she let herself flop back onto the pillows. "All right, I'll rest if it'll put your mind at ease. What are you going to do with yourself while I'm doing my best Sleeping Beauty impersonation?"

"Have a bath and try to wash the hospital smell off of me without getting my stitches wet," Gambit informed wryly as he got to his feet.

Purdey frowned up at him. "And how do you manage that?"

Gambit's grin broadened a little. "Usually it involves sitting in a few inches of water with a bit of cut-out bin bag cellotaped over wherever the wound is, and me doing the best I can with a washcloth on my top half. If I'm feeling particularly ambitious, I might use a bowl and pour water over my head to rinse my hair." Purdey's face was screwed up in a way that suggested that she was less-than-impressed with this arrangement. "Don't worry, Purdey-girl. I've got it in hand. I've had lots of practice over the years. Mind you, reaching parts of my back is still a bit tricky."

"I could help you," Purdey offered, already sitting up despite Gambit's hand on her shoulder.

"Easy, Purdey-girl. You're meant to be looking after yourself, remember?"

"Oh, honestly, it's a bath, not scaling Everest," Purdey chided, shrugging off his hand and sliding off the bed. Gambit couldn't help but be encouraged by seeing some of her usual fire. "Anyway, I quite fancy a relaxing soak in the bath after you've finished, so by letting me help, you'll be ensuring that I'm able to do that sooner rather than later."

Gambit looked at her broad, brilliant, triumphant smile, and shook his head in resigned disbelief. "I should have known that you'd turn my argument back on me, even if I used your logic."

"It's because you used my own logic against me that you failed," Purdey said brightly, standing on tiptoes to give him a quick kiss. "Come along, then. Now that I've thought of it, that bath is sounding lovelier all the time." Her grin turned wicked. "Besides, I've been looking forward to soaking your head for years."

vvv

"When I imagined you giving me a sponge bath," Gambit grumbled irritably, cradling his side as he shifted his 6' frame within the narrow confines of the bathtub, "I pictured it being, well, sexier."

"I'm terribly sorry," Purdey mock-apologised, wringing out the cloth before applying it to Gambit's well-bruised back. The beam may have saved their lives, but it hadn't protected him from every piece of debris that had rained down upon them during their aborted escape attempt from the warehouse. Purdey had more than a few bruises herself, but they weren't as numerous or deep as his. It made it harder to tease him for his comment, but Purdey prided herself on always being up for a challenge. "Should I have dressed more seductively for the occasion?"

"You wouldn't need to be dressed at all," Gambit purred, treating her to a smouldering look, "if you joined me."

"It's a nice thought for another time," Purdey opined, though she couldn't deny the frisson that passed through her as she met his eyes. "But there'll be none of that as long as you have those." She pointed her chin at his side which was, as Gambit had described, covered with a perfect square of bin bag that Purdey had clipped out herself. "If you pop your stitches, it isn't going to be much fun for either of us."

"Definitely not." Gambit shuddered involuntarily, and Purdey could see the muscles ripple all-too-well through his skin. He was still thinner than she would have liked, as though he'd been imprisoned somewhere that hadn't fed him properly. She closed her eyes against the images of him in a cell, both imagined ones from his time in Africa and real memories of when he'd been shut up at the Ministry. She hoped that with a little time to recover, his body would be able to heal and regain its strength, and the ghosts would be banished in the process.

"Anyway," Purdey went on, determined to keep her dark thoughts to herself, "this isn't a sponge bath. This isn't a sponge." She dangled the limp, sodden cloth in front of his nose. "A sponge is what I used to wash you when you were in hospital, so I have given you a sponge bath. You just happened to sleep through it."

"It would've been hard to enjoy it in hospital, anyway," Gambit sighed, eyes fluttering closed, and Purdey could almost feel the weariness exuding from his battered form. "Now you know what you can look forward to when we're old and gray. Years of helping me look after whatever's left of my shattered body."

"Mike Gambit," Purdey whispered, leaning forward to kiss his temple, "if it's your body I'm looking after, I can't think of anything I'd like more."

They both pretended they hadn't heard Gambit's sob for the rest of the bath.

vvv

Gambit reached for the roll of tape in his first aid kit, the contents of which were currently spread out on the smoked glass of his dining room table, and managed, single-handed, to find and lift the end of the roll with his thumbnail, all while holding the lint to his stitches in place with the other. He pressed the end of the roll to the lint and rolled out enough to tape it on one side, tore it—still single-handed—then, with the lint held somewhat in place, finished taping it up with both hands, tearing strips of tape with his teeth with the ease and expertise of someone who had had a lot of experience with this particular ritual. Gambit had lost count of how many injuries he'd cleaned, dressed, set, sterilised, or otherwise treated over the years, both on his own body and on the bodies of others. He'd done everything from stitches to minor surgery in locales that ranged from tropical jungles to his own flat. He'd had training, of course—the navy, the army, and the Ministry all made their recruits take first aid training. The Ministry made its people refresh said training once a year, a class that Gambit diligently completed on-time and with flying colours, a fact that never failed to earn a wry comment from the course's instructor, a certain Dr. James Kendrick, who couldn't resist musing on the correlation between the man with the longest list of injuries also being the one who was first in line and top of the class when it came to refresher time. Kendrick had also mused, on occasion, that he ought to run the mandated regular physicals in tandem with said training, in the hopes that Gambit's outstanding attendance record for the latter would improve his dismal one in regard to the former. Gambit didn't entirely think he was joking, but thus far Kendrick had held off on making the threat a reality. It didn't matter, anyway—Gambit's proficiency for first aid had stemmed from a desire to avoid hospitals as much as possible, and given that he was still alive and relatively intact, his skills appeared to be fit for purpose. As with his karate, his training had been augmented by putting theory into practice, and, by engaging in a great deal of improvisation, he had done some procedures on the fly that never turned up in even the more advanced parts of the course. It was a point of pride on Gambit's part—hard-won, but all the more sweet for it, even if some of the memories of the occasions on which he'd learned his ad hoc medical skills were ones he would have just as soon forgotten.

Stitches cleaned, sterilised, and freshly rebandaged, Gambit cast the roll of tape aside and sat back heavily in his chair, turned to face the window to take advantage of the last bit of natural light filtering into the flat. The stitches, he'd been relieved to discover when he pulled the old dressing away, didn't look too bad. He'd had worse wounds, and definitely uglier ones, in his time. This one wasn't anything to write home about, at least to look at, the actual breaking of the skin belying how much it had bled. It definitely looked better than the body it was on, Gambit mused morosely, as he looked at his reflection in the window. Even with the limited, imperfect image on offer in the glass, he could see how tired and haggard he looked, hollowed-out eyes rimmed with dark circles and lines bracketing his mouth that accompanied the grimace seemingly fixed on his face. He didn't need to see his reflection to know that he'd lost weight, or how pale he was. He'd tried to explain it away to himself as much as anyone else as a side-effect of the blood loss, but here, in the privacy of his own thoughts, with Purdey safely in the bath hopefully soaking her cares away, he could admit to himself that it was the stress and the shock of it all that was responsible for his ghostly pallor. There was only so much a body could take, even a well-trained, physically fit one. Being on the run hadn't done Gambit much harm on the sheer physical fitness front, his usual workouts replaced by activity that had been just as—or more—testing than usual, but it had taken its toll in other ways that left him feeling mentally, emotionally, and physically drained. Despite the, not inconsiderable, musculature visible beneath the skin of his lighter frame, he felt as though he hadn't an ounce of strength left anywhere in his body, as if someone had taken all of the stuffing out of him and left behind nothing but a painfully thin skin.

He did have to be strong, though, if not for himself than for Purdey, to stop her worrying herself into a nervous breakdown on his account more than she already was. This was the one disadvantage of their relationship, as far as Gambit could tell. He'd felt physically shattered after assignments before—maybe not quite like this, but still completely empty—but he'd been able to put on a brave front and smile just for long enough to convince Steed or another agent, and especially Purdey, that he was all right until it was time to go home. Then he could retreat and admit to himself how awful he felt in the privacy of his own bed, with no one to notice that the mask had slipped and the pain was there, for all to see, written across his features in big, loud letters. Gambit could read them now, in every facet, line, and angle of his face, in the slump of his shoulders and the cloudiness of his eyes. There was no one to hide it from now. But soon Purdey would be out, watching him with those big blue eyes and practically vibrating with concern at every expression of discomfort he might make. For her, he would have to muster his strength and try not to worry her as much as possible. He hated it when Purdey was worried, and he hated it even more when he was the one who made her worry. He'd already caused her so much grief that it physically pained him more to cause her another second of it than to hide whatever he was feeling. Still, noble intentions aside, Gambit couldn't deny, as he passed a hand over his eyes, that what he really needed was a holiday. A nice long one, with nothing to trouble him except making sure both he and Purdey were all right. Sadly, he didn't think that, after all the antics they had pulled over the past few weeks, McKay would be too receptive to granting him and Purdey a few weeks of joint leave, except, perhaps, of a more permanent variety…

That line of thought was interrupted before it could go any further by Purdey, who had reappeared from the bathroom swathed in his little-used robe and looking slightly pink. Gambit took a deep breath and pulled himself together, grateful that seeing Purdey alone was enough to coax a smile onto his face without having to work at it. "Feeling better?" he asked, as levelly as he could, hoping his voice wouldn't give out or that the hand he extended to her wouldn't shake.

"A little," Purdey allowed, reaching for his hand automatically, and there was something about the warmth of her skin against his that made him feel a little bit better in spite of his current misery. She pulled out the chair beside his and turned it to face him, settled into it, and wrapped her other hand around the first. "You?"

"The stitches look okay," Gambit told her, careful not to lie because Purdey would spot it in an instant. "And I don't smell like a hospital anymore, so that's a bonus." He passed his thumb, as best he could with it trapped between her hands, over her curled fingers. "And you're here. What more could I ask for?"

It wasn't quite the answer that Purdey had been looking for, and they both knew it, but, much to his relief, she chose to let it go. Maybe he wasn't as good at hiding how felt as he thought. "You must be hungry," she said instead. "I could make us some soup or something else that's easy to digest."

"I don't have much appetite," Gambit demurred, squeezing her hand to take some of the sting away. "Don't trouble yourself on my account."

"My account?" Purdey repeated, incredulous, before treating him to one of her signature toothy grins. "I'm absolutely famished. I was planning on cooking it for myself and offering you my leftovers."

Gambit threw back his head and laughed, and it was worth the ache of his stitches. "Purdey-girl, I'll be happy with your leftovers anytime."

vvv

Purdey startled awake with a jolt, breathing and heartrate elevated. Her eyes snapped open and searched the dark for the cause of her disturbance, finely-honed agent's instincts reaching out into the depths of the flat and searching for anything and everything that might be unusual or a threat. Every sense bent to her will as Purdey engaged in the supreme concentration of a professional, focussed on registering every iota of data that she received, weighing it and sifting it for anything suspicious, and discarding it immediately if it turned up nothing of interest. She followed this process meticulously for several minutes, but, frustratingly, failed to turn up anything notable. No matter how hard she strained her eyes, no unusually-shaped shadows materialised in the dark. There were no ominous sounds, save for the usual white noise courtesy of London's never-sleeping late-night traffic, and no strange smells that suggested drugging, gas, or any other of the tell-tale signs of sabotage or underhanded doings. All in all, the flat was singularly lacking anything unusual. There was quite simply no one there. Not a soul. Not even Gambit.

Not even Gambit.

Purdey turned over and frantically patted the other half of the mattress, found it achingly empty. She bolted upright, heart in her throat. "Mike?!" she called frantically, switching on the bedside lamp and casting around in desperation for her partner in all things. He was nowhere to be seen. "Mike?!" she screamed, not even thinking about how the soundproofing Gambit had installed in his flat to keep the neighbours from complaining about his musical tasted would save her from waking the whole building. Just now, if it meant Gambit appearing, she didn't care if she woke the dead. The dead. Purdey felt her breath catch in her throat and her chest tighten. What if Gambit had never been there? What if she had dreamt the whole thing—Thyme's death, burning the papers, the warehouse, the lot? What if Gambit was still on the run, and she was just here, sleeping in his flat as she sometimes had to reassure herself with the memories of his presence? Or worse, what if he was still dead? What if she really had witnessed his death a few months ago on assignment? What if she hadn't been drugged to hallucinate the fatal shot to his head? What if the shock and strain of it all had simply driven her mad, and she had dreamt up a wild story in her own head to convince herself that he was still alive, sleeping in his flat while he slept in the cold, cold ground…

It was too much. She couldn't bear thinking about it, let alone accept it. She'd scream the whole building down first. Anything to fill the hole in her heart. "Mike!"

"Purdey!" She almost dislocated her neck swivelling her head in the direction of his voice, but it was worth it to see him emerge from the corridor at the back of his flat and pelt flat-out toward her, eyes alive and alert for danger. She could see him scoping out the flat with a professional's brisk efficiency, reassuring himself that there was no external threat. Only once he was satisfied that there was no immediate danger did he tend to her. "Purdey, what happened? What's wrong?"

She didn't answer him right away, too intent on getting her hands on him in any way, shape, or form; on touching him in any way so that she could confirm for herself that he was real, not something she had dreamed up in her head. As he climbed onto the bed, her fingers dug into his shoulders hard enough that she thought she might leave bruises, but she needed to feel the muscles and tendons beneath the skin, the rush of blood in his veins from the fright he'd had hearing her scream and the adrenaline that had shocked him into readiness. He wrapped her in his arms in response, cradling her against his chest with a tenderness that would have made her weep if the tears weren't already flowing freely down her cheeks from sheer relief as the scent of his sweat reached her nose and convinced her, along with all of the other sensations she was drowning in, that he was undeniably real.

"I woke up and you weren't here," she sobbed, so far gone and so relieved that she didn't even care that she was going to pieces right in front of him. Gambit's words about letting him look after her must have sunk in, she realised, because her defences, shored up after her cry in the shower, had well and truly fallen for good now, and the pent-up emotions were gushing forth. She didn't care about being strong; she just wanted to cry and be held by him. "Where were you?" she demanded, angry with him in spite of her relief.

"I was in the loo checking my stitches," Gambit explained, stroking her hair tenderly, and Purdey adjusted her angle ever-so-slightly to look at his side. She found the lint taped over it, just as she remembered, and breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn't imagined it after all, any of it. "I had the water running toward the end and couldn't hear you calling me at first." He looked worriedly down at her. "How long were you up before I got here?"

"Long enough to think that I might have gone mad and imagined that you were here at all," Purdey confessed between gasps for air, struggling to get her crying under control enough to talk properly. "By the time you arrived, I'd convinced myself that you'd actually been killed back in September."

Gambit winced visibly. "Sorry," he apologised, holding her closer. "I should have thought about how it would look if you woke up and I was gone, but you looked so peaceful."

"No, you were right," Purdey sniffled, wiping her eyes with the edge of the sheet. "You should be able to leave for a few minutes without me falling to pieces. I…I don't know what happened to me."

"You had a hell of a fright," Gambit said flatly. "Several frights, really, throughout this whole year. Starting with when you got lost in Brazil." Without looking, his fingers found the scar on her thigh where the tarantula had bitten her, a million years ago. "It's been a hell of a year. Anyone would feel a bit wobbly."

"It hasn't been all bad, though," Purdey qualified, looking up into his eyes, her hand pressed to his cheek. "Has it?"

"No," Gambit agreed, leaning into her touch with a grateful sigh. "It hasn't." They sat there for a moment, silently basking in how lucky they were to have one another.

"Please don't go anywhere, Mike Gambit," Purdey said eventually. "Now or forever."

"Purdey," Gambit murmured, pulling her closer with a contented sigh, "you couldn't keep me away."

vvv

Gambit watched the crack of light between his curtains make its journey across the ceiling and down the wall, at one point neatly cutting his bar—very different from Purdey's barre, in function as well as spelling-in half at one point. He'd been awake nearly an hour, as far as he could discern from the speed of the movement of said light and the calculations he'd done in his head to account for the time of year. He did this often, utilising his excellent recall for written and visual information to pull up the charts in his head that he'd used as a young sailor in the navy to calculate everything from tides to latitude to time until sunrise. Said recall was a skill he'd possessed as long as he could remember, even from early childhood, when books were pictures accompanied by a jumble of mostly-incomprehensible words. He still regularly did calculations about what time it was or what latitude it was, partly to keep his math skills sharp or to pass the time, but also just for the satisfaction of checking to see if he was right, and finding that he usually was, give or take a reasonable margin of error. That ability to recall had served him well in the espionage business, allowing him to call up everything from contents of files to airport arrival times, to whole reams of text from the Ministry's rulebook. That last one proved to be less-than-encouraging on this particular morning—he was vividly aware of just how many rules he and Purdey had broken between them, and the possible repercussions it might have for their careers. Purdey had faith that Steed would sort everything out, but Gambit wasn't so sure. He had every confidence in the agent's abilities, but even the legend that was John Steed couldn't force Thomas McKay and every man above him to let his colleagues off the hook without even the smallest slap on the wrist, solely on his say so. There were going to be consequences for this escapade, Gambit knew, and he was fully prepared to accept them. He only wished that Purdey's career wasn't on the line as well. He knew that she'd done everything that she'd done for him on her own volition—a fact that she'd emphasised to him more times than he could count—but all the same, he couldn't help but feel responsible for any discipline that she might incur. After all, if it hadn't been for him, she wouldn't have been put in such a difficult position, one that required her to actively act against the interests and orders of the department, in the first place.

From the way she was acting, however, any worries that Purdey might have had about what might happen to her professionally were more than overcome by her worries about him. Part of the reason that Gambit had been forced to calculate the time in his head was because he was unable to check his watch. The wrist and the arm it were attached to were currently wrapped around the sleeping Purdey, who was curled up in the fetal position and tucked as close as possible against his chest. Gambit had curled himself around her as best he could, despite the protesting of the stitches in his side, which had faded into a bearable, dull ache after several readjustments to his position. They had tried sleeping with him on his back and her head on his chest, but she had still jerked awake several times in a panic, terrified that he wasn't there. It was only when they had switched to their current position, her surrounded by him, that she had settled down, rousing only once or twice more before lapsing into the deep sleep of the completely exhausted. Gambit couldn't help but wonder how many fitful nights she had had since they were separated by his fleeing arrest, how many times she had woken up looking for him, only to remember that he was gone. It was at times like these that he was vividly reminded that Purdey had already lost one man she loved—her father—to the espionage business, and that her fear of losing another one had kept her from taking the plunge with him. She'd since realised that not loving him and losing him would be no easier—even more difficult—than loving him and losing him, but that didn't mean that the idea of losing him didn't terrify her. And this particular ordeal had been much more harrowing than one of their usual assignments. No wonder Purdey was struggling to regain her equilibrium and desperate to protect him and keep him safe.

"Mike…?" Purdey mumbled drowsily, rousing as if on cue. Despite still being half-asleep and having her eyes closed, she stretched a hand up to cup the back of his head, fingers burying themselves in the dark curls to reassure herself that he was there.

"I'm here," Gambit reassured, rubbing her back with the hand curled around her, hoping that his touch would stave off another panicked awakening with her nightmares taking the place of reality.

Something must have reassured her, whether it was the sound of his voice or his touch, because Purdey didn't thrash awake in a panic. Instead, she snuggled closer, burying her nose in the spot where his neck met his shoulder, and breathed deeply of his scent, sighing contentedly as she exhaled. "What time is it?" she murmured thickly, still somewhat somnolent.

"About eight," Gambit replied, going off his earlier estimation rather than pull his hand away to check the time. Purdey seemed to be all right, but Gambit wasn't going to risk withdrawing his support too soon and frightening her as a result. "Are you going to work?"

Purdey's snort of derision told him that she was more awake than she'd previously let on. "Even if Kendrick hadn't told me to take a day or two off to recover, I'm not entirely certain that they'd want me there."

"Everyone always seems happy to see you as far as I can tell," Gambit pointed out, grinning even though Purdey couldn't see him with her eyes closed. "The male half of the population, at least."

Purdey blew a raspberry. "I suspect that interest will wane now that they know that you're in the picture."

"It's never seemed to make much difference before," Gambit pointed out wryly. "If anything, they'll want to see if they can tempt you away from me. Nothing makes the male ego more determined than a challenge and the opportunity to get one up on the other bloke."

"You're not painting a terribly flattering portrait of your sex," Purdey observed, pulling back slightly from the warmth of Gambit's embrace so she could wrinkle her nose up at him.

"Nothing you haven't already worked out for yourself," Gambit predicted, grinning down at her visage. It did his soul good to see her looking unimpressed—or expressing any other emotion that wasn't panic or terror. "Don't worry, Purdey-girl. I'll be happy to fight for you—or let you fight for yourself."

Purdey's scrunched-up features instantly blossomed into a beaming smile. "And that, Mike Gambit," she said happily, leaning up to give him a quick kiss, "is one of the many reasons that I love you."

"One of many," Gambit mused, as Purdey snuggled back into his arms. "What else is on the list?"

"I'm not about to tell you, especially given what you've just told me about the male ego," Purdey tsked. "But after everything that's happened, I'm not letting you out of my sight. And since Kendrick's left strict instructions that you be allowed to recuperate, why would I want to go to the Ministry without you?"

Gambit smiled sadly. "That'll keep us safe for a few days," he allowed, stroking Purdey's hair. "But even Kendrick can't keep McKay and Larry at bay forever. Eventually, they're going to make us come in for a debriefing, and there are going to be questions that they're not going to like the answers to."

"I know," Purdey sighed, tracing idle patterns on his chest with her index finger. "But we don't have to answer them today, do we?"

Gambit pulled her a little bit closer. "No," he agreed softly. "We don't."

"And that means, for today at least, we can just lie here, together, for as long as we like," Purdey went on, also snuggling closer.

"Definitely," Gambit agreed, letting his eyes slide closed. In spite of everything he knew they'd have to face in the coming days, Purdey's words made sense. Giving themselves permission to rest and recover and not worry about what happened next was just what they needed. The idea was so appealing, so calming, that Gambit thought he might even be able to go back to sleep. They lay in silence for a moment. And then…

"At least, until we get hungry for breakfast," Purdey added coyly. "I mean, if we are going to have to answer for our actions, we'll need to keep our strength up." She untucked her head from beneath his chin and smiled guilelessly up at him. "Won't we?"

Gambit shook his head fondly. "All right, Purdey-girl, what do you want for breakfast?"

"Omelettes," came the response.

"Then we'd better get started," Gambit observed, disentangling himself from Purdey as gingerly as possible to spare his stitches. "Let's hope I have enough eggs."